Editorial Reviews:

From The Back Cover
Current facts about Mormonism
Over 11 million members. Most notable being Presidential Candidate Mitt Romney.
Over 60,000 full-time missionaries more than any other single missionary-sending organization in the world. More than 310,000 converts annually. As many as eighty percent of converts come from Protestant backgrounds. (In Mormon circles, the saying is, We baptize a Baptist church every week.)
Within fifteen years, the numbers of missionaries and converts will roughly double. Within eighty years, with adherents exceeding 267 million, Mormonism could become the first world-religion to arise since Islam.

You may know the statistics. What you probably dont know are the advances the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS) is making in apologetics and academic respectability.

With superb training, Mormon scholars outclass many of their opponents. Arguments against Mormon claims are increasingly refuted as outdated, misinformed, or poorly argued.

The New Mormon Challenge is a response to the burgeoning challenge of scholarly Mormon apologetics. Written by a team of respected Christian scholars, it is free of caricature, sensationalism, and diatribe. The respectful tone and responsible, rigorous, yet readable scholarship set this book in a class of its own.

The New Mormon Challenge recycles no previous material and duplicates no ones efforts. Instead, responding to the best LDS scholarship, it offers freshly researched and well-documented rebuttals of Mormon truth claims. Most of the chapter topics have never been addressed, and the criticisms and arguments are almost entirely new. But The New Mormon Challenge does not merely challenge Mormon beliefs; it offers the LDS Church and her members ways to move forward.

The New Mormon Challenge will help you understand the intellectual appeal of Mormonism, and it will reveal many of the fundamental weaknesses of the Mormon worldview. Whether you are sharing the gospel with Mormons or are investigating Mormonism for yourself, this book will help you accurately understand Mormonism and see the superiority of the historic Christian faith. Outstanding scholarship and sound methodology make this an ideal textbook. The biblical, historical, scientific, philosophical, and theological discussions are fascinating and will appeal to Christians and Mormons alike. Exemplifying Christian scholarship at its best, The New Mormon Challenge pioneers a new genre of literature on Mormonism.

The Editors
Francis J. Beckwith (Ph.D., Fordham University), Carl Mosser (Ph.D. candidate, University of St. Andrews), and Paul Owen (Ph.D., University of Edinburgh) are respected authorities on the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter day Saints and the authors of various books and significant articles on Mormonism. Their individual biographies as well as information on the books contributors appear inside.

With contributors including such respected scholars as Craig L. Blomberg, William Lane Craig, J. P. Moreland, and others, The New Mormon Challenge is, as Richard Mouw states in his foreword, an important event for both Protestant evangelicals and Mormons that models to the evangelical community what it is like to engage in respectful and meaningful exploration of a viewpoint with which we disagree on key points.

In recent years, Mormon scholars have produced a body of literature that has been largely ignored by evangelicals. This current volume takes a giant step forward in correcting this oversight in a way that is both intellectually vigorous, yet respectful. Ken Mulholland, President, Salt Lake Theological Seminary

Intellectually serious evangelical responses to the faith of the Latter day Saints have been depressingly rare. This book represents a significant contribution to a conversation that, really, has just begun. Daniel Peterson, Brigham Young University; Foundation for Ancient Research and Mormon Studies (FARMS)

Finally we have a book from evangelicals in which the authors have made a good faith effort to accurately represent the range of Mormon beliefs. I believe this book is the best effort to date by evangelicals to assess and critique Mormon worldviews. Blake Ostler, LDS philosopher, author of Exploring Mormon Thought: The Attributes of God

I applaud the sensitivity and understanding invested in this enormous work. Ravi Zacharias

This impressive new book makes every earlier evaluation of Mormonism outdated. The book sets a new standard in evangelical discussions of Mormon beliefs. Dr. Ronald Nash, Reformed Theological Seminary (Orlando) and Southern Baptist Theological Seminary (Louisville)

. . . displays an admirable grasp of primary sources and a commitment to genuine courtesy, combined with an unflinching desire to remain faithful to Scripture. D. A. Carson, Research Professor of New Testament, Trinity Evangelical Divinity School

What an important book! Evangelical scholars have joined together to pay Mormonism the high compliment of a serious, contemporary evaluation. This is not a volume of Anti-Mormon rhetoric, but rather a thoughtful, scholarly interaction in the tradition of How Wide the Divide? While theologically sophisticated, this is nonetheless an accessible book that will assist readers of all kinds to respond effectively to the new Mormon challenge. It is a book that demands a response. Rev. Gregory Johnson, President, Standing Together Ministries, Orem, Utah

See additional endorsements inside.

About the Author:

Francis J. Beckwith is Associate Professor of Church-State Studies, and Associate Director of the J. M. Dawson Institute of Church-State Studies, Baylor University. A graduate of Fordham University (Ph.D., philosophy) and the Washington University School of Law, St. Louis (M.J.S.), his books include Law, Darwinism, and Public Education: The Establishment Clause ad the Challenge of Intelligent Design (Rowman & Littlefield), To Everyone An Answer: A Case for the Christian Worldview (InterVarsity Press), and Do the Right Thing: Readings in Applied Ethics & Social Philosophy (Wadsworth) Carl Mosser (PhD candidate, University of St. Andrews) has published significant articles on Mormonism in both evangelical and Mormon journals. Paul Owen (PhD, University of Edinburgh) is assistant professor of Bible and religion at Montreat College. He has published significant articles on Mormonism in both evangelical and Mormon journals. He lives in Asheville, North Carolina.

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.:

THE APOLOGETIC IMPULSE IN EARLY MORMONISM
The Historical Roots of the New Mormon Challenge
CRAIG J. HAZEN
Craig J. Hazen is Associate Professor of Comparative Religion and Christian Apologetics at Biola University and Director of the Graduate Program in Christian Apologetics. He earned a B.A. from California State University, Fullerton; studied law and theology at the International Institute for Law and Theology in Strasbourg, France; and earned an M.A. and Ph.D. in religious studies from the University of California at Santa Barbara. Dr. Hazen is the author of The Village Enlightenment in America: Popular Religion and Science in the Nineteenth Century (University of Illinois Press) and editor of the philosophy journal Philosophia Christi. His academic work has received multiple awards for excellence from the American Association for the Advancement of Science and the American Academy of Religion. His articles have appeared in Journal of the American Scientific Affiliation, Journal of Christian Apologetics, and the Proceedings of the International Congress of the History of Science, among others.

The flamboyant governor of Minnesota, former theatrical wrestler and Navy SEAL Jesse the body Ventura said in a highly publicized and provocative interview that he considered religious people to be inherently weak-minded folk. By doing so he was parroting a popular notion of arm-chair agnostics that people who embrace religion are gullible and needy; they are people willing to give up all or a certain amount of rationality in order to have their emotional needs met by some type of spirituality or superstition.

A furor ensued in his state, and his popularity rating plunged, but to some extent the governors remark had some basis in reality. Many get the same impression very quickly by talking to the rank-and-file devotees in most religious movements. The average believer generally does not have the training or the interest in articulating or defending a coherent, systematic worldview that captures and makes sense of his or her faith. This is certainly true with regard to the movements that are addressed in this essay, evangelical Christianity and Mormonism. Both movements have been characterized as anti-intellectual, and detractors have not been slow with insults to both groups along those lines. What both Christians and Mormons in North America know, though, is that those who characterize and insult the groups in this way are themselves not particularly well informed. In both modern American evangelicalism and Mormonism there are significant pockets of believers who are scholars and thinkers, people who are committed to making a vigorous defense of their respective faiths based on reason and on the very best evidence. Whether the case these thinking believers make is sound and persuasive is another question, but the fact that there are LDS and evangelical Christian scholars who would very much like to show that their belief systems are eminently reasonable is not up for dispute.

The accusation of anti-intellectualism and gullibility on the part of believers was especially rife in the early years of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. As religious historian Jan Shipps put it, outsiders saw Mormonism pandering to the superstitious, the gullible, and the fearful. They would accuse Mormonism of blinding its adherents so effectively that when they heard Smiths report of his visions and his explanation of the origins of the Book of Mormon, they could not distinguish truth from falsehood. Just a month after the publication of the Book of Mormon, newspaper editors like Abner Cole of the Palmyra, New York, Reflector began the lampooning and discrediting of the new Gold Bible, Joseph Smith (1805 44), and his followers. Mormon historian Richard L. Bushman correctly noted that early on there was simply an assumption that they had to be dull because it was axiomatic that superstition flourished in ignorance. That there were undiscerning converts to Joseph Smiths new religion in the nineteenth century is a given. That they were all, or even mostly such, is a myth. Clearly, there was an advantage to early opponents of the Mormon movements slapping a pejorative label on those who chose to join. It made the overall task of response and refutation much easier and perhaps more effective. Some adversaries at the time went so far as to claim that Joseph Smith was adept at the power of animal magnetism or fascination and hence could wield undue influence over the minds of potential converts. These kinds of characterizations held on for years. Esteemed Mormon historian Leonard J. Arrington tried to gauge popular views of the movement in the nineteenth century by examining fiction that involved the Latter-day Saints in the plot line. He discovered that almost every one of the fifty novels that described Mormon life saw the people as incurably ignorant if not also lecherous and depraved.

One can not make full sense of the initial rise of Mormonism without recognizing that there were strong elements in it that resonated with thoughtful people on the frontier. I do not mean by this that the rational element was the only factor, perhaps it was not even the primary or secondary factor to which one can attribute the success of the early LDS movement. But for many at the time there was undoubtedly a logic to it and certainly enough cultural resonance of a rational sort in the message of the Mormon restoration of Christianity to attract intelligent, reflective people. Of course, I am not talking here about professors, academics, or trained scholarsthere were none in the early LDS Church. But here I would make the same point that social anthropologist Stanley Jeyaraja Tambiah and historian of Mormonism D. Michael Quinn both make: that we should be sure to carve out a distinction between the academic and the folk, not between intelligent and unintelligent. We are discussing here very bright but not highly educated people on the frontier who were unwilling to join a religious movement without what they thought were good reasons.

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New Mormon Challenge, The Facts about Mormonism

Customer Reviews:

The Christian response to new Mormon scholarship
I was very impressed by this book. It contains chapters by many major Christian scholars in areas of their specialization, providing excellent insights into and arguments against LDS beliefs.

The authors of this book do not argue against traditional Mormon sources of authority, as they have been largely abandoned by contemporary Mormons. The authors assume that the only accepted sources of God's revelation accepted by modern Mormons are the Bible, Book of Mormon, Doctrine and Covenants, The Pearl of Great Price, and the current president of the organization. Traditionally (and I believe, officially) all of the past presidents have been included as accepted sources of God's revealed word, but many of today's Mormons are shying away from accepting that, as it leads to innumerable problems, as their previous leaders have said many rather unfortunate things which have long been used to refute Mormonism.

However, I think that the authors should have raised an objection to the new Mormon acceptance of only the current president's words as inspired. If only the current president's words are inspired, then when there is a new president, are the past president's words no longer considered inspired? If so, then God's truth is changing and Mormonism has collapsed into relativism. If not, then the same should apply to all of the past presidents, thus putting them right back where they started with all the problems that position brings with it. In either case, it should have been pointed out that this is a rediculous position to be taken.

I personally enjoyed William Lane Craig's chapter on creation ex nihilo the most. Craig presents a rather strong case that the Mormon's doctrine of the pre-existing matter fails to line up with the Bible, philosophical reasoning, and scientific evidence. I look forward to reading any responses that Mormon scholars make to the arguments presented against them in this book.

This is definitely a unique book. While other Christian books written about Mormonism tend to simply point out that Mormonism is in conflict with the Bible, or they focus on errors in the Book of Mormon, etc, this book takes a rather different approach and looks mainly at the philosophical and historical implications and claims of Mormonism, and why these positions are not viable. I imagine it will be an elightening book whether you agree with their conclusions or not.

Overall grade: A+


An improvment in con-Mormon pro-Evangelical books
This is an improvement in the "con-Mormon, pro-Evangelical" series of books, and a vast improvement by Zondervan's last anti-Mormon screed, "Mormonism" by Kurt Van Gorden. The authors avoid the typical inane "arguments" forwarded by other Evangelicals such as Ankerberg and Rhodes, which is commendable, and I look forward to future works along this line. I would really be hard pished to describe this book as an "anti-Mormon" book.

That said, the text does have a number of failures. Brief examples include the following -

Finley would have Lehi et al. travel in a 360 degree circle in the Sinai Peninsula, in order to explain away the overwhelming evidence supporting the authenticity of First Nephi (i.e. the discoveries of Nahom, Bountiful and the River Laman and Valley of Lemuel) all because there is an Exodus motif in First Nephi, notwithstanding Jeruslame cerca 597 BCE was the Lehites "Egypt." There is no logic behind this argument, and flies in the face of the work of able LDS scholars and rssearchers that have shown that the Book of Mormon sites Nahom, Bountiful and the Valley of Lemuel with its River of Laman have all been discovered, proving that Joseph Smith was not the author of the First Book of Nephi and, contra Finley, the Book of Mormon does have its origins in the ancient Near East.

Also, Shepard, in what was my favourite of the eleven essays, claims that metallurgy in the Book of Mormon represents an anachronism. However, only 1% of pre-classical (i.e. Book of Mormon era) sites have been excavated in any manner. To claim that metallurgy is an error is way off, as we know little to nothing about Mesoamerica in the pre-classical era. Moreover, there is some evidence of metallurgy in Book of Mormon times (see any of the works on this topic by John Sorneson).

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New Mormon Challenge, The Facts about Mormonism