Review
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Title: Bruce R McConkie Apostle and Polemicist, 1915-1985
Author: Devery S. Anderson
Publisher: Signature Books
Genre: Biography
Year Published: 2024
Number of Pages: 201
Binding: Paper, eBook
ISBN: 978-1560854760
Price: Paper, 17.95; eBook, 9.95
Reviewed by Andrew Hamilton for the Association of Mormon Letters
I turned twelve in January of 1985. That April, as a newly minted deacon, my parents expected me to pay attention to general conference. I survived Gordon B. Hinckley opening the meeting and performing the sustainings and releases. I then did my best to pay attention as Ezra Taft Benson spoke about missionary work. Following a hymn by the Mormon Tabernacle Choir, Elder Bruce R McConkie got up to speak and started with these words:
I feel, and the Spirit seems to accord, that the most important doctrine I can declare, and the most powerful testimony I can bear, is of the atoning sacrifice of the Lord Jesus Christ.
Even as a twelve-year-old, I could sense that something unusual was going on. I noticed a shift in the mood in the room. Everyone I was with began paying rapt attention. Elder McConkie’s sermon soon became the talk of the town, even more so when he died a little under two weeks later. Elder McConkie and his final talk in general conference still held legendary status when I went on my mission seven years later. Most of the missionaries in my mission could quote Elder McConkie at length. Nearly all of us carried well-read copies of Mormon Doctrine even though it was officially banned according to the mission rules. When I got home, I began collecting McConkie’s books and copies of any of his talks that I could get my hands on, a much more difficult task in the pre-internet days.
While my feelings about Bruce McConkie have changed a lot over the last three decades, I still enjoy the chance to learn more about him. Devery Anderson’s Bruce R McConkie Apostle and Polemicist, 1915-1985, proved to be absolutely enthralling for me to read. It taught me a lot about the man who was once the object of my hero worship and helped me to understand and come to terms with the much more complicated feelings I came to have for Elder McConkie as I learned more about him and his various interactions.
Apostle and Polemicist is a part of Signature Books “Brief Mormon Lives” series, so it is on the shorter side as biographies go. The books in this series are meant to be succinct, they are not intended to have the depth of a standard biography. As short as it is, Anderson includes enough details about McConkie’s life from his meticulous research that the book never feels fleeting or hasty.
There are ten chapters and an epilogue in the book. The first three cover McConkie’s early life and career. Chapter Four discusses his call to be a seventy. Chapter Five focuses on the controversy around writing Mormon Doctrine. Chapter Six is about his time as a mission president in Australia and chapter Seven details his remaining time in the seventy. The final three chapters are about his time as an apostle. A brief epilogue discusses the events immediately following McConkie’s death, shares a few details about a couple of McConkie’s experiences that shed some light on his personality and concludes with Anderson sharing some final summaries and thoughts on what he learned about Bruce R McConkie.
Chapter Nine, which is titled “Heresies and Reprimands, 1978-1982,” was my favorite, I found it to be quite engrossing. The title of the chapter is obviously meant to catch your attention, but while there is a certain “naughtiness” implied in the chapter name, it is not the least bit salacious. I found it to be quite engrossing and I believe that it very fairly and indepthly covers an important chapter in LDS history. Included are discussions on Elder McConkie’s involvement in the revelation giving Blacks the LDS priesthood and some of the controversy over the statements that he later made about the event. Anderson also gives great coverage of McConkie’s polarizing “Seven Deadly Heresies” talk as well as his personal attacks on Gene England and George Pace. This chapter alone is worth the price of the book. While these events may be familiar to many readers (as they were to me), Anderson writes of them in a way that makes them engaging and provides new insights to the stories behind these events and what happened after they occurred.
I have read all of Devery Anderson’s previous books, so I expected Apostle and Polemicist to be good. Still, I was surprised at how interesting it was and how much I learned. This little book contains a lot of details in its 200 pages to captivate and educate its readers. Along with learning all about Elder McConkie’s faith and beliefs and the experiences that shaped them, those who read this book will also find fun stories about McConkie’s sense of humor, details about his political thoughts, and amusing and even charming particulars of his personal quirks and behaviors, including his penchant for pulling jokes on friends and family
Bruce R McConkie Apostle and Polemicist is the first scholarly biography to be published about one of the LDS Church’s most influential twentieth-century apostles. Writing any book and making it good is difficult. Writing a book about a man like Bruce R McConkie that is scholarly and engaging is extra tricky given the strong opinions that exist about him by both those who loved and hated him. Before it was released, I saw some chatter online from people who were convinced that Anderson was obviously writing an “attack book.” Others were hoping that was exactly what it would be. Both of those groups are going to be sorely disappointed. Devery Anderson has written a book about McConkie that is fair, detailed, and very interesting. It is a masterfully written book that I believe will appeal to all who read it. If you looking to have your testimony strengthened about your favorite apostle or to get dirt on a man who could be somewhat infamous for his strong opinions, this is not the book for you. But if you want to read an engaging and fascinating book about a man who is far more complex than you probably realized, then pick up Bruce R McConkie Apostle and Polemicist.
In the final paragraphs of his book, Anderson includes these statements, “however people choose to remember McConkie, it would be unfair to judge him strictly by the controversies surrounding him…there is sufficient reason to hold a charitable view toward a man who devoted the entirety of his life to a cause he loved so deeply” (pp. 196-197). In my young days following Elder McConkie’s last talk and my time on my mission, I was a huge fan of Elder McConkie, almost to the point of being a “groupie”, I practically hung on his every word. Like many in my generation, he was my “go to” guy when I wanted to say something in church and have it sound authoritative. Later, as I learned of things such as his treatment of George Pace and Gene England, the story behind Mormon Doctrine, and as I began to view McConkie’s dogma much differently, I became rather disillusioned. Bruce R McConkie Apostle and Polemicist gave me new and needed insights and did for me exactly what Anderson said in those two sentences, reading it allowed me to judge McConkie more fairly and see how I could hold a much more charitable view toward him. This is a very important book and will be a valued part of any library.