Buddhist Catholic Contemplative Evangelical General Christian Hindu Jewish Latter-day Saint Muslim New Visions Progressive Christian

Beliefs

Topics

Columnists

Resource Library

Research Tools

Video

Podcasts

Thought Readers

Faith In Media Tracker

Newsletters

Ad-Free & Subscriber Log-In Subscription Support

Follow Patheos

Home
Latter-day Saint
“Is Eyewitness Testimony Reliable?”

“Is Eyewitness Testimony Reliable?”

Last updated on: August 23, 2022 at 3:50 pm by Dan Peterson

“Is Eyewitness Testimony Reliable?” 2022-08-23T15:50:14-06:00 Dan Peterson

LOGO Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

Edinburgh Castle, Scotland (Wikimedia Commons public domain image)

A new short-video feature has gone up on the website of the Interpreter Foundation. Please watch it. And, if you like it, please share it with others:

“Witnesses of the Book of Mormon — Insights Episode 18: Is Eyewitness Testimony Reliable?”

Eyewitness testimony is used around the world in courts of law. But there’s a movement today that calls into question the reliability of eyewitness testimony. Is it true that eyewitness testimony is unreliable—and thus invalid?

This is the eighteenth in a series compiled from from the many interviews conducted during the course of the Witnesses film project. This series of mini-films is being released each Saturday at 7pm MDT. These additional resources are hosted by Camrey Bagley Fox, who played Emma Smith in Witnesses, as she introduces and visits with a variety of experts. These individuals answer questions or address accusations against the witnesses, also helping viewers understand the context of the times in which the witnesses lived. This week we feature Jeff Bradshaw, Senior Research Scientist, Florida Institute for Human and Machine Cognition. For more information, go to https://witnessesofthebookofmormon.org/ or watch the documentary movie Undaunted.

Short clips from this episode are also available on TikTok and Instagram.

Be sure to subscribe to our YouTube channel at https://www.youtube.com/c/theinterpreterfoundation and our other social media channels on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and TikTok.

In case you want to pursue this subject a little bit further, the role and importance of eyewitness testimony are also addressed — this time, by a retired federal judge and a retired federal prosecutor — in the Interpreter Foundation’s two-part docudrama, Undaunted: Witnesses of the Book of Mormon.

The monument to Sir Walter Scott — said to be the largest monument dedicated to an author in the entire world — on Princes Street, in Edinburgh. Call me a romantic: I love both Sir Walter’s 1819 novel “Ivanhoe” and the 1982 Anthony Andrewes television movie that was based on it.
(Wikimedia Commons public domain image)

I wrote this column for the Deseret News back in 2016, in the wake of a previous visit to Edinburgh:

“John Knox and the Scottish Reformation”

And this somewhat later Deseret News column also mentions John Knox, albeit only in passing:

“Christmas after the Protestant Reformation”

St. Giles Cathedral, Edinburgh (Wikimedia Commons public domain photograph)

Some time ago, I read a book by Fiona Givens and Terryl Givens that is entitled The Christ Who Heals: How God Restored the Truth that Saves Us. I sometimes encounter derisive comments from certain critics about how shallow Mormonism supposedly is. Such complaints astonish me. I find the implications, entailments, and disclosures of the Restoration both radical — which, here, means reaching right down to the root (radix) — and utterly profound. And so, it seems, do Fiona and Terryl:

Mormonism [sic] is so rich in doctrine, so expansive in its teachings, that we may be too easily distracted from this one cardinal proposition: The Restoration recovered that Christ who is the most remarkable being in the history of religious thought. (1)

They endeavor to show, in fact, that the figure of Christ “comes into his full splendor and beauty through the lens of the Restoration” (1).

Mormonism [sic] has immense theological profundity. It repudiates notions of inherited guilt and depravity, restores vulnerable compassion and empathy to a Heavenly Father, recaptures the saga of human preexistence and our literal co-heirship with Christ, and provides a coherent scheme of salvational plenitude for the dead as well as the living. Its doctrines are alternately exhilarating and consoling, controversial and common-sensical. (2)

I strongly suspect that one of the factors in recently declining conversion rates and in some retention problems among young Latter-day Saints is our failure to adequately exhibit the exciting and radical depth of the teachings of the Restoration. The book by Terryl and Fiona Givens is a helpful instrument for reminding ourselves and others of what we’ve sometimes allowed to be obscured.

Especially in this context, I like their comments on what Latter-day Saints often call the “Great Apostasy”:

This “falling away” does not represent some minor corruptions of sacramental liturgy or ritual forms. It is not about wicked priests whom God punished by removing their priesthood. It is about a fundamental misapprehension of the background and purpose and extent of the covenant (premortal origins, mortal incarnation, and eventual theosis and sealing into the eternal family). It is the loss of the mode by which that covenant is executed (through temple covenants that create those chains of infinite belonging, completing our journey from intelligence to joint heirship with Christ).

The loss of the larger cosmic context was compounded by failing to see the Fall as a necessary and premeditated immersion of humankind into the crucible of experience, suffering, and schooling in the practice of love. The loss was not about baptizing at the wrong age or in the wrong medium. It was about not knowing that baptism makes us — all of us eventually — literally members of Christ’s family and co-heirs with him as planned in premortal councils. What is at stake is not simple difference in standards of sexual practice or marriage’s purpose per se. It is about failing to see the family structure as a divine mode of eternal association that is at the very heart of heaven itself. In sum, the “Restoration” is not about correcting particular doctrines or practices as much as it is about restoring their cosmic context. (14-15)

Shown here in an 1822 portrait by Sir Henry Raeburn, Sir Walter Scott (1771-1832), a native of Edinburgh, wrote such works as “Ivanhoe,” “Rob Roy,” “The Lady of the Lake,” “Waverley,” and “The Bride of Lammermoor.”
(Wikimedia Commons public domain image)

And here’s a remarkable bit of astronomical or astrophysical news that has caught my attention:

“Supergiant Betelgeuse had a never-before-seen massive eruption”

Elder Orson Pratt, of the Quorum of the Twelve, climbed atop Arthur’s Seat, overlooking Edinburgh, in order to dedicate Scotland for the preaching of the Restored Gospel.
(Wikimedia Commons public domain image)

Finally, I close with a pair of items that I’ve managed to recover from the Christopher Hitchens Memorial “How Religion Poisons Everything” File©. Read ’em and weep:

“Latter-day Saints Volunteer, Donate Supplies for The World Games: International multi-sport event was held in Birmingham, Alabama, July 7-17, 2022”

“The Church and UNICEF Help Refugee Children from South Sudan: Since Learning for Life began in 2018, more than 115,000 children have gained access to education”

Posted from the Firth of Forth

Uncategorized

Arthur's Seat

Book of Mormon Witnesses

Undaunted: Witnesses of the Book of Mormon

Witnesses of the Book of Mormon

Previous Post

August 20, 2022

"Should a member of the clergy report sex abuse of the penitent? A look inside the priest-penitent privilege"

Next Post

August 23, 2022 Lost causes, lost worlds, and lost monsters

Browse Our Archives

Select a Category Uncategorized

Select a Month October 2026 September 2026 August 2026 July 2026 June 2026 May 2026 April 2026 March 2026 February 2026 January 2026 December 2025 November 2025 October 2025 September 2025 August 2025 July 2025 June 2025 May 2025 April 2025 March 2025 February 2025 January 2025 December 2024 November 2024 October 2024 September 2024 August 2024 July 2024 June 2024 May 2024 April 2024 March 2024 February 2024 January 2024 December 2023 November 2023 October 2023 September 2023 August 2023 July 2023 June 2023 May 2023 April 2023 March 2023 February 2023 January 2023 December 2022 November 2022 October 2022 September 2022 August 2022 July 2022 June 2022 May 2022 April 2022 March 2022 February 2022 January 2022 December 2021 November 2021 October 2021 September 2021 August 2021 July 2021 June 2021 May 2021 April 2021 March 2021 February 2021 January 2021 December 2020 November 2020 October 2020 September 2020 August 2020 July 2020 June 2020 May 2020 April 2020 March 2020 February 2020 January 2020 December 2019 November 2019 October 2019 September 2019 August 2019 July 2019 June 2019 May 2019 April 2019 March 2019 February 2019 January 2019 December 2018 November 2018 October 2018 September 2018 August 2018 July 2018 June 2018 May 2018 April 2018 March 2018 February 2018 January 2018 December 2017 November 2017 October 2017 September 2017 August 2017 July 2017 June 2017 May 2017 April 2017 March 2017 February 2017 January 2017 December 2016 November 2016 October 2016 September 2016 August 2016 July 2016 June 2016 May 2016 April 2016 March 2016 February 2016 January 2016 December 2015 November 2015 October 2015 September 2015 August 2015 July 2015 June 2015 May 2015 April 2015 March 2015 February 2015 January 2015 December 2014 November 2014 March 2014 August 2013 February 2012

TAKE THE

Religious Wisdom Quiz

What is the Christian teaching about humility?

Select your answer to see how you score.

Value others above yourself Be proud always Demand honor Boast often