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A Mormon friend alerted me today that a review of The Mormon Defenders had appeared in The FARMS Review of Books. For those who haven't tuned in lately, FARMS is the Foundation for Ancient Research and Mormon Studies, the shall we say "professional" branch of Mormon apologetics staffed by true scholars. The Review is a journal set aside for reviewing relevant literature about Mormonism, pro and con. It's an honor to appear in it, but quite honestly, the author, Russell McGregor, may as well have written a song about birthday cakes and rainy days.

Titled, "The Anti-Mormon Attackers" (goodness, since when had that pejorative label been re-applied to me?), the review begins with a cite of Eccl. 1:9, one of my own favorite verses to apply to Skeptics. The theme of course is that "the anti-Mormon enterprise [is like] selling old clothes from a shiny new pushcart." What's that now? TMD by anyone's reckoning -- including that of several Mormons I have shared the material with -- contains almost entirely new arguments; which is to say, the data is not new, but it has never before been applied to a Mormon situation. For example, the idea that "image and likeness" means our "stewardship" representation of God on earth is well known from OT scholarship texts; it just has never found it's way to being used as an argument against the Mormon use of passages like Gen. 1:26. Not that I was otherwise aware of, anyway.

And not that McGregor shows it at first, either. Rather than address the text to begin, McGregor flips himself over to the back cover, where my good friend Kevin Bywater of Summit Ministries had provided a commendation, selected from the Foreword he wrote. McGregor comments that it "seems unusual to me for a book's recommendation to be quoted directly from the book itself." It does? Where has McGregor been living all these years? As a librarian by trade, I have noted that it is a known practice to put blurbs from a Foreword on a book's back cover, or on the flyleaf, or somewhere else where it will be seen; not that it makes a difference, for what on earth does this have to do with the book's contents anyway? I expect this kind of aimless carping from Skeptics, but certainly not from one of the leading professional journals of the top Mormon apologetics organization.

McGregor has more carps on his fishing line yet: My profession in the Introduction to deliver the claims of "top-notch Biblical scholarship" is replied to thusly: "This level of self-certification makes no concessions to false modesty. Whatever the actual quality of the scholarship here, the author certainly thinks it is formidable." Um, yeah....the thing is, McGregor severs my quote somewhat; he puts it as, that "[Holding] promises to deliver the goods in the form of 'top-notch Biblical scholarship'", but wait a second guys, the full quote is, "by bringing top-notch scholarship to bear upon Mormon truth claims." Is this MY scholarship? Uh, no, it's the scholarship of the people I cite -- folks like Ben Witherington III, Larry Hurtado, Simon Kistemaker, etc. who presumably McGregor does not assume are merely sitting around filing their nails. There's a crazed irony here, for yet again I wonder if this review was secretly authored by a Skeptic pretending to be a Mormon. The paranoid parrots in Skepticland have repeatedly used the refrain that in, for example, citing the meanings of Greek or Hebrew words from Strong's, I am professing some sort of "expertise" in those languages. I can't help but hold up McGregor's statement and make an eerie side-by-side comparison.

Are you waiting for McGregor to get to the arguments inside? Don't hold your breath quite yet; he's still offering vague generalities. We are told that TMD is "in part, another response to Blomberg and Robinson's How Wide the Divide? - a book that seemingly continues to disturb those who have trouble accepting the proposition that individuals can believe differently and still be Christians." Aw, gee, THAT canard again? Skeptic tactic imitated #3: I'm psychoanalyzed and found to be disturbed! All the more amusing since I didn't even address the question of whether Mormons can rightly claim the name of "Christian" because frankly, I consider that to be a diversion in context. I am less concerned, by far, with whether Mormons can be called "Christians" than I am with the issue of whether or not what they say is correct. Call yourself a Hare Krishna if you feel like it, but I mainly want to know if what you say is right or wrong. It seems that some LDS apologists (so far a minority I have seen) are too wedded to the standard answers to see what the real question is. As for HTWD, it bugs me not in the least. I think Blomberg gave a licking and kept on ticking.

No, we're still not there. After naming my chapter subjects and commenting on the format in which I use summary notes at the end of each chapter, McGregor returns to the Foreword -- by gosh darn, those arguments in the text are just going to have to wait until McGregor gets done with his hissy fit -- by complaining that when Bywater says that "Mormonism is not biblical", it's worthless, because "neither he nor Holding spells out is what they mean by 'biblical.'" Good grief! Canard #4: Pretend you don't know what the opposition is talking about! How hard is this? "Biblical" = "in agreement with the Bible." Obviously, not 100% (because not even the worst atheist disagrees with the Bible 100%) but at core points that are distinctives. There now, wasn't that easy? But some credit, in this paragraph at last we have some substantive comment:

The hermeneutic approach appears to shift as the author moves from subject to subject; the only overriding principle appears to be a search for whatever readings provide the most useful argument against Latter-day Saint beliefs and truth claims. Thus, in his attempt to support the nonscriptural notion of an ontological trinity, he builds up what he calls an "interpretive template" based on a mixture of canonical, deuterocanonical, and noncanonical Wisdom literature (pp. 36-40), which he then uses to control the biblical passages he chooses to examine. Then, having relied on these sources to teach Latter-day Saints how to read the Bible, he subsequently chides Latter-day Saint apologists for citing the same sources.

Canard #5 from the Skeptic School: Endless vague generalization! The approach shifts, and I'm just looking for anything? How about an answer to one of those "anythings" I propose? No? I'm just "controlling" the Biblical text? Good grief, never mind the precision matches in terminology; I'm just "choosing" texts? What others does McGregor have in refutation? Let me be plain here: What has clearly happened is that McGregor got in way over his head reviewing TMD, and has produced the same sort of frustrated drivel that I regularly get from atheists who are in over their heads when I refer to things like "honor-shame societies" and "collectivist cultures". I may as well be explaining flight aerodynamics to a naked native.

On it goes. My chapter on 1 Cor. 15:29 is dismissed as "appealing to an argument from silence and to pagan customs - in other words, he bases his argument entirely on nonbiblical grounds." Um ho! Well, assuming I have it matched right -- McGregor never says what he refers to here -- sure, uh, DeMaris was just arguing from "silence" and all the data showing special interest in funerary rites and such was quiet as a churchmouse. And all those appealing to, uh, the use of Greco-Roman rhetorical procedures -- or is it DeMaris' funerary rites thing? Who can tell without McGregor engaging those scary specifics? -- clearly used by Paul is "pagan customs" and "nonbiblical"! McGregor gets more like a Skeptic with every sentence. Now we have that Church of Christ "head in the sand" hermeneutic that denies that the Bible was a product of its own culture. Nah, Paul wouldn't dare touch that pagan rhetoric stuff! All the detailed parallels are a coincidence!

And more! Now it's time for Skeptic Imitation Device #6, "Show your need for a reading lesson." I say:

Therefore, we argue that the majority interpretation of 1 Corinthians 15:29 is off the mark. A more reasonable thesis is that the practice was devoid of theological meaning and thus not requiring Paul's explicit condemnation, or else, that we are misunderstanding the passage completely.

McGregor oddly takes this to mean:

Either the passage doesn't mean anything, or we don't understand it - but whatever the case, its meaning must be sacrificed. What isn't biblical?

GOOD GRIEF! No, not "doesn't mean anything," it's "doesn't mean anything theological". See that word "theological" before "meaning"? Ye elohims! And is it like I stopped there and provided nothing to explain how we should be understanding the passage? McGregor's obscuratanism is almost too painful to be borne!

And ugh! Skeptic Tactic #7, already! It's said:

In contrast to this approach, Holding becomes a staunch and loyal enthusiast for majority opinion or scholarship as soon as it suits his purposes.

Um, no, as soon as the data demands it actually, but you won't hear McG stepping into that hornet's nest, now, will you? The subject this time is Mark 16:15-16, and to my note that "the reader may be surprised to see this verse cited by LDS apologists, knowing that it is almost universally declared to be not part of the original Gospel of Mark," McGregor offers the derisive snort, "Just exactly why the fashions of scholarship should determine which passages of scripture form part of the faith of the Latter-day Saints is not clear, but Holding does not even attempt to address the real issue regarding the authenticity and authority of that passage; the actual question has to do not with Mark's authorship but rather with whether Jesus actually made the statement. Matthew 28:19-20 would seem to suggest that he did say it or at least something very much like it." Gack, pfft -- Matt. 28:19-20 is, under the evidence given, a model for Mark 16:15-16, and that "fashion of scholarship" has to do with sound textual-critical principles that I list in full but McGregor doesn't even shake a stick at. I may as well give McG his card for the KJV Onlyist Club. Mark IS the only source for us to decide whether Jesus made that statement as he did, as his text is clearly not original between 16:9-20, and the appeal to Matthew's parallel is a counsel of despair.

McGregor then abandons actual argument again to remark upon my "repeatedly assuming that Mormon and Christian are distinct categories." Not an exact Skeptic canard, to be sure, but a common canard from LDS apologists who know no better. As I have told my Mormon friend Kevin Graham, and which he quite clearly understood, my repeated use of such statements as, "A fundamental point of contention between Mormonism and Christianity . . ." is not meant as any kind of social statement about division. These are terms of convenience for the average reader; if I went about making qualifying statements every line or so I may as well ship each inidividual copy of TMD in a U-Haul. McGregor wastes space on such peripherals, which reminds me yet again of the Skeptic-tactic of engaging peripherals so as to avoid addressing major arguments.

But will there be any such addressing? Heck, still no. McGregor tells us that a "detailed critique...would run to many pages and would be tedious." Heck, yeah, McGregor is too busy counting the number of places I used the words "Mormonism" and "Christianity" in opposition. That's not tedious at all. "What is worthy of note is that the real nuts-and-bolts content of this book is substantially the same as most of the doctrinal anti-Mormon books produced by evangelical Protestants." Oh, like bleck it is. You find me one "anti-Mormon" book that comes at the issue of faith through the Semitic Totality concept, or at 1 Cor. 15:29 via the avenue of Greco-Roman rhetoric, or at the Trinity issue via the Wisdom literature, or to the "image" issue via the testimony of Josephus and Tacitus. You won't find one. You also won't find McGregor daring to address specifics. Calling the work tendentious is not a reply. I realize this was a book review with limited space, but addressing at least ONE argument in detail would have made for some worthwhile effort. Nose-word counts is not an effort.

On the positive end, McGregor allows that TMD "really does improve on some of those of its predecessors in its tone. It neither bristles with hostility, as most earlier productions do, nor drips with insincere, condescending friendliness, as some of the more recent efforts do. Apart from one lapse in Bywater's foreword, I saw none of the usual accusations of 'dishonesty' that conservative Protestant anti-Mormons tend to fling at Latter-day Saints for failing to describe our own faith in terms amenable to the hostile caricatures our opponents have fashioned and prefer. His approach is businesslike and his tone scholarly." Glad to hear it. McG forgot to add that I never use the "c-word" (cult) in my book. The reason for this in part is that -- up until now -- LDS apologists I have dealt with have for the most part earned my respect as being interested in dealing with the issues. There are exceptions (Edward Watson, for example, another man imitating an ostrich) and McGregor just joined that crowd. The rest of LDS apologetics as a whole is still on the good side of the fence with me. But with McGregor making issues of trivia like this, he'll never climb back over where the Petersons and the Grahams are now:

Nonetheless, his agenda is clear from the title he has chosen. For defenders do not contend against other defenders; attackers do. And since Holding's book purports to "contend with The Mormon Defenders" (back cover), its single purpose appears to be to attack.

Oh, bloody heck, yeah, I just agonized over a title that would represent my agenda, didn't I? Skeptic Tactic #8,832: Guess at your opponent's motives and discredit them based on stuff like titles and mission statements! Reality check: I was going to call it The Mormon Challenge until I found out the The New Mormon Challenge was being released at about the same time. Book titles are not easy to come up with. The standard advice in the publishing realm says to make it short and memorable (subtitles may be longer); to put a word at the very beginning that will clearly state your subject and make the book easy to find in searches (thus "Mormon" or "Mormonism" is practically mandatory for a book like this, as the very first word is best) and since my focus was on LDS apologists (as the SUBTITLE clearly indicates), "Defenders" was an appropos word to use and one I regarded as non-confrontational, putting the focus on the efforts of Mormon apologists (not Mormonism as a whole) without making a judgmental statement (as opposed to other books that use words like "illusion" or "counterfeit" or "mask" to suggest deception). But I guess I was wrong. There's no way you can evade everyone's paranoia at once. For what it is worth, again, my friend Kevin Graham knew of the title before it was published, and thought it was just fine. In fact, we discussed it to a fair extent and he didn't get any beads of sweat on his forehead or start hunting around the room for a knife. Maybe my bud is more mature than McGregor is, eh?

McGregor whines some more about definitions, complaining that TMD "fails to define crucial terms, such as biblical, Christian, and Mormon. Perhaps he felt it necessary to avoid such definitions since they might raise questions that would undermine his entire enterprise." Other than what I said about "Biblical" above: perhaps I just thought definitions were irrelevant in the context of my discussion. As noted, I am far, far more concerned with defining "correct" and "incorrect"; from there let the reader decide on their own whether they are in the right place or not. I have no desire to deal with people's paranoias and persecution complexes. TMD was designed to be as "un-anti-Mormon" as possible, but you can't please everyone, it seems, especially McGregor.

McGregor closes with yet another vague accusation of focus-shifting as needed, then offers one specific that TMD "relies heavily on such fallacies as the argument from silence, particularly when he insists that the many biblical accounts of divine appearances in human form do not indicate that God might not take some other form when no one is looking (pp. 15-16) or that Jesus might not simply be dissolving his body when he does not need to put in an earthly appearance (pp. 22-23)." Um, well, that's because the LDS arguments I addressed were themselves arguments from silence; i.e., that God's forms are permanent manifestations (when the texts say nothing of the sort, and where McGregor gets that "no one is looking" description I can only guess, as I say nothing of the sort) and that Jesus' body was likewise a permanent feature. The words "permanent" and "always embodied" appear nowhere. Neither side, then, can use such texts in their favor; as I clearly say, these passages "tell us nothing" -- not "tells us we are right".

So what can I say? Maybe McGregor was p.o.'d because I sent him running to the dictionary too many times, or perhaps he missed his laxatives the day he wrote the review. Either way this review was a far cry from the sort of responsible report I had been expecting from FARMS, and while I must make it clear that this doesn't tarnish the reputation of the whole of LDS apologists in my view, it does make a certain one named McGregor smell a lot like a weasel. And veteran readers know what I mean by that reference.