Contributed by Greer Bates Cordner
Greer Bates Cordner is a Ph.D. candidate at Boston University. Her primary area of research is American Religious History, with Global Christianity and Mission as a secondary area. Greer also holds a Master of Theological Studies degree (Boston University) and a B.A. in History (Brigham Young University). She is a mom to three young kids, all of whom were born during her doctoral program, and who put her academic and gospel studies into perspective with their questions, hugs, and prayers.
At the 2024 meeting of the Mormon History Association in Cleveland, Ohio, Dr. Janiece Johnson delivered a plenary address in which she outlined some of the ways that Latter-day Saints became a “people of the book.” Johnson reminded her listeners that, unlike its most recent iterations, the first editions of the Book of Mormon did not divide the text into verses. Instead, when readers opened the tan leather volume, they met large paragraphs of narrative that more closely resembled the pages of a novel than the leaves of the Bible. Johnson also pointed out that early Latter-day Saints sometimes reenacted pieces of the narrative—especially the more “charismatic” scenes—as they wove the stories into their own religious practices. For its first readers, the Book of Mormon was at least as much (maybe more) about story as it was about doctrine.
Johnson’s address touched on reception history, which one scholar summarized as: “[the] history of the effects of writings rather than [their] origins.” Biblical scholar Brennan Breed has pointed out that for sacred texts, reception history must retain a “constitutive boundary” from textual criticism. As Breed notes, biblical studies frequently focus on questions about the composition of the Bible, the original meaning of its passages, etc. Reception histories of the Bible, on the other hand, “[are] based on the premise that how people have interpreted, and been influenced by, a sacred text . . . is often as interesting and historically important as what it originally meant.”[1]
One of the common ways early readers of the Book of Mormon were “influenced by” it was through conversion. Parley P. Pratt famously tore through the text, losing his appetite for food and saying that he “preferred reading to sleep,” finally concluding that “the book was true.”[2] Pratt read the Book of Mormon and was baptized in 1830, just after the book’s first printing. His eyes met paragraphs, not verses, on the pages; he read a book, rather than studying scripture. But the effect was still conversion.
Over time, though, the format of the Book of Mormon changed to reflect Latter-day Saints’ views of the book’s status as scripture. And these format changes no doubt affected its reception; after all, drawing comparisons between the Book of Mormon and the Bible likely grew easier once the texts looked more alike.[3] Although there had been some earlier, unofficial attempts to divvy the Book of Mormon into verses, the Church released the first official versified edition in 1879.
This edition also included footnotes and cross-references that could aid in a deep study of the book, taking readers well beyond its narrative.[4]
The fact that official verse structures did not appear in the Book of Mormon until 1879 means that the first two Church Presidents died without knowing what “1 Nephi 3:7” or “Moroni 10:4-5” would mean to generations of seminary students and Sunday School teachers. It also means that well over 120,000 Church members (on the record for 1879) also developed relationships with the Book of Mormon when it looked nothing like it does today.[5]
All books, including scripture, bear the fingerprints of editors, publishers, and printers; the Book of Mormon is unique because those editors, publishers, and printers have typically held Church authority, or worked closely with Church officers. In his sweeping overview of the purposes and roles of the priesthood, John Widtsoe specified that “[t]he bearers of the Priesthood are under the obligation to deliver the message of the Everlasting Gospel to the world,” and that they must oversee the instruction of subjects “as may be prepared for class study by the General Authorities of the Church.”[6] Widtsoe specifically referred to the “courses of study” that outlined instruction for Sunday Schools and other classes in Church education. Efforts to unify, organize, and regulate Church instruction began in the late nineteenth century with the formation of the Sunday School Union (1872) and the Board of Education (1888), and continued in the early twentieth century with the creation of the Church Education System (1906).[7] Each of these bodies operated under the leadership of priesthood officers, and worked to reinforce institutional regulation of gospel study among Church members. Versifying the Book of Mormon (which occurred around the same time as the formation of these education bodies) undoubtedly contributed to the regulatory efforts, making it easier for teachers and classes to identify particular passages to discuss together.
But a tension exists between the individual and the institutional when it comes to gospel study. To what extent does experience of the Book of Mormon benefit from formal structure? And to what extent have readers’ perspectives of the book been shaped by the decisions of Church officers?
Every person who comes across the Book of Mormon brings individual perspectives, interpretations, assumptions, and questions to the text, and that process of reception matters. However, the presentation of the book can affect its reception—and that matters too. It is not uncommon for Latter-day Saints to learn the story of the discovery of the gold plates, the translation, and the first printing of the Book of Mormon. These stories are important. But the “coming forth of the Book of Mormon” also includes the countless reception histories that reflect individual engagement with the text, as well as the publication histories that reflect institutional decisions about how to present the text.
Since 1830, Latter-day Saints have approached the Book of Mormon as narrative, as history, as scripture, as poetry, as challenge, and as promise. Embracing status as a “people of the book” may include a stronger commitment to “the premise that how people have interpreted, and been influenced by, [the Book of Mormon] . . . is often as interesting and historically important” as how it emerged in the first place.[8]
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