Joseph Smith’s First Vision: New Methods for the Analysis of Experience-Related Texts

Abstract

and the Materialization of the Golden Plates. " That fascinating panel interaction spurred a productive subsequent personal correspondence related to their shared interest in religious experience and Joseph Smith's first vision. They eventually opted for a formal dialogue script to recount what they had learned in their scholarly exchange. We reproduce the complete dialogue here, with minor editing to suit a print format and accompanying appendixes related to primary source material, both as a case of best practices in lively, respectful, and muscular scholarly engagement and also as an example of the fruitful tension produced by marked differences in methodological approaches and assumptions in the academic study of Mormonism.

Mysticism and esotericism as contested taxonomical categories

“…There are several partly conflicting versions of, in particular, the first of the two visions (see Taves and Harper 2016). For the present purposes, the details of these versions or their veracity is of no consequence.…”