My Interview with Brian Hauglid is Up!

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jfro18
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Re: My Interview with Brian Hauglid is Up!

Post by jfro18 » Thu Jul 09, 2020 5:51 pm

I was able to listen while working today - this one is extremely important to understanding the inner workings of church apologetics.

I don't think this podcast is "important" to the normal member because a lot of it just goes into how the church whitewashes and 'subterfuges' evidence, but I do think this is a very important one for critics of the church who have long maintained that this is how they operate.

The last 12 minutes were crazy to hear, even knowing what Hauglid said in 2018 on Dan Vogel's Facebook post.

Well done, Consig... very well done.

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Hagoth
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Re: My Interview with Brian Hauglid is Up!

Post by Hagoth » Thu Jul 09, 2020 6:25 pm

jfro18 wrote:
Thu Jul 09, 2020 5:51 pm
I don't think this podcast is "important" to the normal members...
I insisted that a post-mo friend listen to it. He was way into Nibley and the BoA in his believing days but he's been out of the church for a long time. He tried to show interest after listening but I could tell he didn't really understand why I thought this interview was so significant. Blissfully unplugged. So, I guess it's a big deal to a very small slice of the Mormon universe. You would think it should shake some earth but most people won't even feel the jello jiggle.
“The easy confidence with which I know another man's religion is folly teaches me to suspect that my own is also.” -Mark Twain

Jesus: "The Kingdom of God is within you." The Buddha: "Be your own light."

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moksha
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Re: My Interview with Brian Hauglid is Up!

Post by moksha » Thu Jul 09, 2020 11:40 pm

Hagoth wrote:
Thu Jul 09, 2020 10:29 am
Image
Perhaps you might start a thread to cover all that interesting stuff you and Shulem got into on this subject? I bet everyone would find it fascinating and informative.
Good faith does not require evidence, but it also does not turn a blind eye to that evidence. Otherwise, it becomes misplaced faith.
-- Moksha

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Mormorrisey
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Re: My Interview with Brian Hauglid is Up!

Post by Mormorrisey » Fri Jul 10, 2020 6:31 am

I have a block of time to re-listen tonight, when I'm doing nothing else so I'll have more thoughts to give later.

But a slight rant, if I may.

I've read a lot of comments on the RFM page and the Peterson/Midgely "board that will not be named," and I'm a little annoyed at the people ripping Brian Hauglid for not coming forward a couple of years ago and revealing his "faith crisis." These people (on both sides of the divide, the TBM and the exmo crowd) complain that he still collected a paycheck, only came forward when he retired, and that somehow cheapens what he is saying, and by inference hint at a lack of integrity on behalf of Dr. Hauglid.

Bugger off to all of that, I say.

What was the guy to do for a job if he burned all his bridges? How much weight does any other university in the GD world place on FARMS publications? Or teaching religion classes at BYU? What other employment would he be able to do other than work at a CES school? If anything, Brian was rather strategic in coming forward now, being retired. I get it, as a former academic, that his options were limited. He should not be castigated at all for his timing, or for keeping (somewhat) silent for the last couple of years before he retired. I'm simply glad at the glimpse behind the curtain, glad he's being authentic, and fully understanding and empathetic on his timing. Screw all the people who think otherwise. You go, Brian!!
"And I don't need you...or, your homespun philosophies."
"And when you try to break my spirit, it won't work, because there's nothing left to break."

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jfro18
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Re: My Interview with Brian Hauglid is Up!

Post by jfro18 » Fri Jul 10, 2020 7:20 am

This is my favorite illustration to show that the church knows Joseph Smith's translations are absolute garbage but just don't have any way out without being caught.

They knew that "God sitting upon his throne" is an Egpytian god with an erect penis, but they couldn't leave it out because people noticed.

Just like they're now noticing that Joseph had the snout of Anubis chiseled off the woodplate to cover up the fact that he wanted it to look like a black person to claim he was a slave.

It's so absurd... and I'm on Facebook with Michael Ash telling me this evidence isn't "proof" of anything because spiritual witnesses have confirmed to him otherwise. It's so ridiculous.

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consiglieri
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Re: My Interview with Brian Hauglid is Up!

Post by consiglieri » Fri Jul 10, 2020 10:49 am

Mormorrisey wrote:
Fri Jul 10, 2020 6:31 am
I have a block of time to re-listen tonight, when I'm doing nothing else so I'll have more thoughts to give later.

But a slight rant, if I may.

Thanks everybody for your great comments!

I just wanted you to know, Mormorrisey, that I took a photo of your post and texted it to Brian Hauglid this morning.

He was very heartened by your words of support.

All the Best!

RFM

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deacon blues
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Re: My Interview with Brian Hauglid is Up!

Post by deacon blues » Fri Jul 10, 2020 11:18 am

The house divided against itself metaphor is very appropriate for a church that declared “some truths are not useful.” Until the church can embrace a God of Truth instead of a god of corporate expediency it will remain divided.
God is Love. God is Truth. The greatest problem with organized religion is that the organization becomes god, rather than a means of serving God.

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2bizE
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Re: My Interview with Brian Hauglid is Up!

Post by 2bizE » Fri Jul 10, 2020 12:02 pm

jfro18 wrote:
Fri Jul 10, 2020 7:20 am
This is my favorite illustration to show that the church knows Joseph Smith's translations are absolute garbage but just don't have any way out without being caught.

They knew that "God sitting upon his throne" is an Egpytian god with an erect penis, but they couldn't leave it out because people noticed.

Just like they're now noticing that Joseph had the snout of Anubis chiseled off the woodplate to cover up the fact that he wanted it to look like a black person to claim he was a slave.

It's so absurd... and I'm on Facebook with Michael Ash telling me this evidence isn't "proof" of anything because spiritual witnesses have confirmed to him otherwise. It's so ridiculous.

Image
It appears that between 1902 and 1981, Min started looking at Pornography.
~2bizE

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Not Buying It
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Re: My Interview with Brian Hauglid is Up!

Post by Not Buying It » Fri Jul 10, 2020 12:06 pm

Brian Hauglid is brave coming forward no matter when he did it. There will be social repercussions, they just can’t fire him now. He’s still going to pay a price, and we should all respect that. He would have been a complete idiot to do it any sooner than he did, you gotta keep food on the table. But even if he is spared being fired, he is still subject to all of the social punishments the Church loves to pull out when they think they need to.

I say Thank You Dr. Hauglid!
"The truth is elegantly simple. The lie needs complex apologia. 4 simple words: Joe made it up. It answers everything with the perfect simplicity of Occam's Razor. Every convoluted excuse withers." - Some guy on Reddit called disposazelph

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Hagoth
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Re: My Interview with Brian Hauglid is Up!

Post by Hagoth » Fri Jul 10, 2020 1:24 pm

Mormorrisey wrote:
Fri Jul 10, 2020 6:31 am
What was the guy to do for a job if he burned all his bridges? ... You go, Brian!!
I agree. We have seen how nasty those good church men can be to people who don't play the game properly. I think Hauglid did exactly the right thing. He was working his way through this stuff the whole time. Unlike Muhlstein he didn't just start with a conclusion and nail himself to it; he did the hard work and he arrived at a conclusion later in is career.

He should expect an onslaught of character assassination now, but at least they can't take the bread from his table.
“The easy confidence with which I know another man's religion is folly teaches me to suspect that my own is also.” -Mark Twain

Jesus: "The Kingdom of God is within you." The Buddha: "Be your own light."

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jfro18
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Re: My Interview with Brian Hauglid is Up!

Post by jfro18 » Fri Jul 10, 2020 1:47 pm

Hagoth wrote:
Fri Jul 10, 2020 1:24 pm
Mormorrisey wrote:
Fri Jul 10, 2020 6:31 am
What was the guy to do for a job if he burned all his bridges? ... You go, Brian!!
I agree. We have seen how nasty those good church men can be to people who don't play the game properly. I think Hauglid did exactly the right thing. He was working his way through this stuff the whole time. Unlike Muhlstein he didn't just start with a conclusion and nail himself to it; he did the hard work and he arrived at a conclusion later in is career.

He should expect an onslaught of character assassination now, but at least they can't take the bread from his table.
100%

Were the people upset that he didn't come out publicly sooner going to pay his salary after he got fired from the church and destroyed as a scholar? I like Simon's work and I don't think he was as mad as some are making him out to be from his post, but I just don't think it was realistic to expect him to put his career and family's financial well being at stake to address it a few years earlier.

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Mormorrisey
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Re: My Interview with Brian Hauglid is Up!

Post by Mormorrisey » Fri Jul 10, 2020 3:21 pm

consiglieri wrote:
Fri Jul 10, 2020 10:49 am
Mormorrisey wrote:
Fri Jul 10, 2020 6:31 am
I have a block of time to re-listen tonight, when I'm doing nothing else so I'll have more thoughts to give later.

But a slight rant, if I may.

Thanks everybody for your great comments!

I just wanted you to know, Mormorrisey, that I took a photo of your post and texted it to Brian Hauglid this morning.

He was very heartened by your words of support.

All the Best!

RFM
I really appreciate you doing that, consiglieri. I'm glad Brian got to read that.

And do extend an invitation for Brian to join us anytime on our little corner of the internet. I think his views, personality and all around good-guy-ness would be most welcome here.

On to my second round of closer listening in my bunker!
"And I don't need you...or, your homespun philosophies."
"And when you try to break my spirit, it won't work, because there's nothing left to break."

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2bizE
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Re: My Interview with Brian Hauglid is Up!

Post by 2bizE » Fri Jul 10, 2020 3:54 pm

I really liked the interview. Thanks RFM for arranging and conducting. This feels like a turning point in church history. It also feels similar to Arrington where he spent his entire life looking for truth, couldn’t find it, became honest with himself and accepted the real truth.

Take always:
1) You can only trick yourself for so long and then you must face the truth.
2) A learned man came to the same conclusions as I did.
3) I loved hearing the stories of the development of the BoA Essays.
4) He was smart enough to keep his mouth shut long enough to retire. I suspect this type of scenario will happen more in the future.
5) John Gee uses subterfuge and wordsmithing to trick himself and others. Also, he is a douchecanoe.
6) He believes the BoM and BoA are 19th century works.
7) He is in a faith crisis and trying somewhat to live the middle way...sounds like he is at peace with this.
~2bizE

Apologeticsislying
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Re: My Interview with Brian Hauglid is Up!

Post by Apologeticsislying » Sat Jul 11, 2020 12:08 pm

RFM YOU ***ROCK***!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

That was the BEST interview you have ever done! Brian Hauglid is a hero for his honesty. And you had better allow my comment I made, it says it is in moderation, so please accept it.
I listened to it all in one setting. SENSATIONAL!
Give me an honest scholar ANY day to a John Gee or Daniel C. Peterson. I will take Hauglid! That interview was EPIC......***EPIC***
Hauglid being called into the bishop's office because he's being honest with the evidence........may the vile shame of it reflect on any MORON involved including the church for having its policy. So immature, childish and admission that they WILL NOT tell THE truth, but will coerce people to live their own lying views which now makes John Gee's stupid apologetic make much more sense. He lies in order to cover the truth because the truth WILL lead you out of belief in what Mormonism said. And Gee hypocritically makes his scholarship into a lie. HOWLING LAUGHTER! Is it any wonder we slam Sic et Non and the idiots who defend the Book of Abraham using Gee's ridiculous "scholarship"?
The same energy that emerges from the fountain of eternity into time, is the Holy Grail at the center of the universe of the inexhaustible vitality in each of our hearts. The Holy Grail, like the Kingdom of God, is within. -Joseph Campbell-

Thoughtful
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Re: My Interview with Brian Hauglid is Up!

Post by Thoughtful » Sat Jul 11, 2020 5:31 pm

Great Interview RFM!

I just listened with Spouseman. Shared on my Facebook as well.

Then we listened to your podcast on Agency vs Covenant path and Elder and sis Gay. Also excellent.

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Mormorrisey
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Re: My Interview with Brian Hauglid is Up!

Post by Mormorrisey » Sat Jul 11, 2020 7:14 pm

I'm in a write-y mood tonight, so a few thoughts on the Hauglid interview, and I apologize for the length of this. None of my thoughts are about the Book of Abraham stuff, I think as a forum we've beaten that to death a this point, and I suspect most of us are in agreement that it's a 19th century production, as is the BOM. Most of what I want to talk about addresses Brian's experience as both an apologist and an academic, and the struggles he had reconciling the two. It mirrored a lot of my experiences as an academic, so I'll tell a few stories. Most of them happened 20 years ago, so I hope I won't dox myself. Two points, if I may.

1) Brian is absolutely correct, that the challenge of apologetics is that they come to the table with their conclusions first, and not only do they refuse to follow the evidence, they manipulate the data to support that conclusion. Those are two HUGE problems with the Gee/Peterson school of apologetics. That irritates me to no end, and like Brian, I have no patience for poor scholarship and a refusal to incorporate problematic evidence just because it doesn't follow the theory. And then, they lash out at those who point out the poor scholarship. It's such a problem.

I've had two experiences with this in my own academic career. My thesis supervisor was an exemplary scholar, with enormous output in his field (I'll just say it was largely Canadian history!) And he instilled that in me, that I needed to support all my arguments with evidence, and I needed to follow where the evidence took me - and this spilled over into my PhD thesis defense. One of my chapters was about an organization that practiced "selective racism" - they restricted membership to some races when it was convenient, and they were inclusive when they needed to be. So that's what I said, and some committee members were appalled at the word "selective." But it was the truth. Of course this organization was racist, but they also tried to be inclusive to drum up membership. So, I argued, the word selective absolutely applied to this case. Everything else was just political window dressing. I argued my point well, I thought, and they ended up dropping their objections. And luckily my external examiner was impressed with my willingness to incorporate evidence that didn't really fit my argument, it was just the truth. But to have to fight for good scholarship is so problematic, especially when those around you have a clear agenda. And this is why, Brian is so right, that much of BYU's religion department "scholarship" is peer-reviewed by each other or not at all, because it doesn't follow the rigour of regular scholarship.

The other story is much worse, and this follows Brian's story about Gee's slippery use of footnotes and evidence, and his manipulation of the sources simply to prove a point. Early in my career as I was establishing myself with publications and teaching, I had the opportunity to review a book by a very well regarded Canadian historian. It was my field of study, so I knew what he was talking about. One of his central arguments I disagreed with, and I wondered where he got his conclusions from - and it was from a minute book of a particular organization. A minute book that I had read for my thesis. The trouble is, his footnote just said "___ Minute book, National Archives of Canada." No page number, no date, nothing to show where he got this information. (For context, it's like saying the concept of God's conditional love is found in the BOM, but not providing a book, chapter or verse. Not good practice.) So I approached my supervisor with this, and said, what do I do? Not only is this guy wrong, I stormed, he probably never even looked at this minute book, because it says the opposite of what he's saying here! My supervisor kind of smirked at me, and told me that this was common with older scholars who had tenure, that they forgot how to be actual historians. He told me to do what I wanted, and he would support me, but this historian had a lot of clout, and if wanted to work as a historian, I should probably let it go. And that's the problem with the apologetic system, that Gee/Peterson et al have the power, and they do not look kindly at those who don't follow their agenda. Which is, everything to make the church look good is fair game, and they should be allowed to do that unencumbered by silly things such as facts. And God help the person who points this out. This part of the interview was absolutely fascinating to me.

2) I love Brian's categorization of himself as a heretic, rather than as an apostate. I think that's brilliant. While in the TBM mind there is no clear difference between the two, the handbook itself is very clear, that the one can be punished and the other not. While leadership roulette is a real thing and I'm glad his bishop was kind to him, it's a very important distinction to me. As much as leaders think that they can control your thoughts, they really can't. There was absolutely nothing in Brian's interview that was apostasy - clear, public, and open opposition to the church or its leaders. He merely stated facts as he saw them, and that was that. There was nothing there that would disqualify Brian from a temple recommend, as I saw it, should he desire to have one. Man, I really appreciated that insight.

All in all, a great interview, worth listening to twice!
"And I don't need you...or, your homespun philosophies."
"And when you try to break my spirit, it won't work, because there's nothing left to break."

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Hagoth
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Re: My Interview with Brian Hauglid is Up!

Post by Hagoth » Sun Jul 12, 2020 4:40 pm

Mormorrisey wrote:
Sat Jul 11, 2020 7:14 pm
1) Brian is absolutely correct, that the challenge of apologetics is that they come to the table with their conclusions first, and not only do they refuse to follow the evidence, they manipulate the data to support that conclusion.
And they are doing exactly what the church wants. Truth is the first head on the chopping block to get the desired result, which is that any response at all, if it is packaged as scholarship will suffice for most members. A lack of response will raise red flags. I think that's why Muhlstein is so open about his process of starting with the conclusion and bending the evidence to fit it; in his mind that is commendable because it is what he is told to do to be in good favor with the High Sheriffs.

On the latest MS podcast about B H Roberts there was a quote by Dallin Oaks where he said basically that the substance of the apologetic answer doesn't really matter much, what is important is that they respond to a criticism because silence would alert the membership to the fact that there isn't a good answer.
“The easy confidence with which I know another man's religion is folly teaches me to suspect that my own is also.” -Mark Twain

Jesus: "The Kingdom of God is within you." The Buddha: "Be your own light."

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2bizE
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Re: My Interview with Brian Hauglid is Up!

Post by 2bizE » Tue Jul 14, 2020 7:11 am

I can’t stop thinking about this. I’m trying to understand apologists and how and why they think like they do.
Suppose you go to college, continue and earn a Masters Degree and persevere to obtain a doctorate...you work in your chosen field for 29, 30, or 40 years... then imaging at some point you realize that your entire career, the career you have spent a lifetime leaning and cultivating turns about to be the study of the tooth fairy. You have spent your life going around trying to convince the world that the tooth fairy is real...in the end, only those few 5-10 year olds believe you. You realize the entire adult world cares nothing of your efforts...some decide to cut their losses and walk away (Brian Hauglid) and some keep running around trying to keep the 5-10 year olds from finding out (John Gee).
~2bizE

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