Maybe rabbis should knock on doors
Mormon Media Observer Joel Campbell's title is ambiguous. I could mean he's a Mormon who examines media reports on the LDS religion. Or it could mean he critiques Mormon-generated news.
Take into account that Campbell is a BYU journalism professor and collects a paycheck from the church-owned Deseret News and you can guess which meaning is correct.
He then rips into news reports from around the world that contain errors or negative attitudes about the LDS church or just plain lazy reporting.
Apparently, Campbell doesn't read his own paper. He could have deconstructed a DNews Mormon Times piece headlined:
Take into account that Campbell is a BYU journalism professor and collects a paycheck from the church-owned Deseret News and you can guess which meaning is correct.
He then rips into news reports from around the world that contain errors or negative attitudes about the LDS church or just plain lazy reporting.
Apparently, Campbell doesn't read his own paper. He could have deconstructed a DNews Mormon Times piece headlined:
"LDS more like Jews than any other world religion"In the one-source story, journalist Roger Hardy reports that BYU professor of ancient scriptures Victor Ludlow explains:
Members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints are more like the Jews than they are like members of any of the other world religions, he said. In the United States neither group fits in the fabric of society. . . .It might have been illuminating for readers if an unlazy reporter had asked a rabbi or, better yet, a Jewish stand-up comedian what he or she thought of Ludlow's concept.
The Book of Mormon prophesies of the conversion of the Jews to Christ, and when that happens the Lord will gather them.
12 Comments:
It is an insult to Jews for mormons to say that they are more like Jews than any other religion. Besides, Jews are more accepted in the real world than mormons.
I don't see Ahmadinejad seeking the destruction of Utah County...
As far as comparing persecution/general acceptance, we've both got our problems.
And techinically, I think the Real World has had more Mormons on it...Oh, you didn't mean MTV?
I think the comparisson he is making is in regards to societies persecution of the two faiths has been similar.
Both faiths have been driven out of areas and then found new homes.
It's a similarity, not necessarily meaning their the same.
I think there are people also who have the same level of animosity towards Jews as some have towards Mormons. There are documented cases of anti-Semitism in communties, as well as documented cases of anti-Mormon activity.
The BOM predicts . . .
Gee, and I thought it was Isaiah, who predates Joe by, what, 4,000 years, who is interpreted as saying that.
Or, at least, St. Paul, more specifically, about 2,000 years ago.
But then, about a quarter of the BOM is a ripoff of the King James Bible -- including the inserted, italicized words of Hebrew/Greek to English translators.
Guess they traveled back in time and did the same work in "Reformed Egyptian?"
I remember this one time in my Mormon Sunday school class, my teacher was a recently returned missionary, and he was teaching about missionary work and the spread of the gospel, new countries being opened to missionary work, etc.
Anyhoo, the glaring omission of course, is that there are no plans for missionary work in Israel. So we asked him, "what about the Jews?" His response was simply, "we'll get the Jews." Well we almost fell of our folding chairs laughing. After that day, anytime a subject remotely related to Judaism came up, someone could be relied upon to threateningly mutter that, "we'll get the Jews."
Despite their claims to the contrary, Mormons are meshugga goyim and not like us Jews. We don't pester people at their doors and try to convert them. We tend to be liberal and support human rights for everyone, including fagilahs, while Mormons tend to be screaming right wing and deny human rights to gays. Mormons outdo Jews only when it comes to their whining persecution complex. And I'll take lox, bagels and cream cheese anyday over green gelatinized pigs hooves!! Oy vey.
Barmitzvah - nice try at the jewish attempt. unfortunately you sound more like an uneducated clown.
Mormons deny human rights? Pull your head out of your rectum - it's not very kosher to stick it there in the first place.
You can hardly compare the extermination of 6 million jews during the holocaust with the handful of mormons driven west to Utah. Give me a break. Dream on, you wish. Mormons love to stew in their exagerated persecution complex.
Dear Friends,
I have heard more than one Jew make claims similar to that of Victor Ludlow, just as I have heard more than one Jew dismissively mock any such notion. Jews, apparently, are like Mormons and snowflakes in that no two are exactly alike.
In fact, there is an old joke told among certain Jews that states: "Wherever you have two Jews, you have three opinions." If that's true, then the task of obtaining the Jewish perspective to Dr. Ludlow's assertion may be rather challenging, indeed.
As for me, one evening after giving a Jewish friend of mine a ride home from an activity we had been attending, we stayed in the car and had a long talk. As the conversation was winding down, my friend did something that caught me by surprise. He declared his authority in Judaism and the Torah, quickly placed his hand upon my head, and declared me to be a Jew! (In his own eccentric way, he was quite serious.)
So, as a Jew (who also happens to be a Mormon) please allow me to unequivocally declare that Dr. Ludlow is correct!
Like Judaism, Mormonism is unique in that it is a faith, a culture, and an ethnicity. Like Judaism, it has been irrationally persecuted by outsiders for as long as anyone can remember. Like the Jews, the Mormons have more than once felt compelled to flee their homes in order to save themselves, to wander as strangers in a strange land until eventually gathering to establish an independent homeland.
Like Jews, Mormons claim to be heirs of an Israelite heritage. But, unlike mainstream Christian sects, Mormons have never claimed to be the "new Israel" that usurps the Jewish inheritance. Rather, Mormons have always maintained that the Jews retain their place as a chosen and covenant people. Mormons have simply viewed themselves as being cousins of the Jews, not replacements.
Like Jews, Mormons have an historical connection to temple worship. And, like Jews, Mormons have always held to an ORTHOPRAX theology, and not one that was merely ORTHODOX. In other words, like Judaism, Mormonism has consistently stressed that to be righteous one must actually DO and not merely BELIEVE correctly. (That is why many of our Evangelical brethren mistakenly suppose that we do not believe in grace. We do, but we have a different way of explaining its essential role.)
I could go on, but you get the idea.
Love,
A.W.
P.S. I also have a Muslim friend who complimented my faith by saying that "Mormonism is the Islam of the West." So, maybe, if we asked Daniel Peterson (a Mormon Islamic scholar) instead of Victor Ludlow, we might get an entirely different point of view on this subject -- evidence of that whole Maslow's Hammer thing, I guess, and snowflakes too.
snowflakes are neat.
really neat.
They ARE neat. I love it when they stick on my tongue.
Yup . . . neat.
I kinda like how they melt too . . . and become water . . . that I can drink.
I like that . . . a lot.
Except when they flood my basement . . . that's less neat.
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