Review
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Title: As Iron Sharpens Iron: Listening the Various Voices of Scripture
Author: Julie M. Smith, editor
Publisher: Greg Kofford Books
Genre: Scripture Study
Year Published: 2016
Number of Pages: 182
Binding: Softcover
ISBN13: 978-1-58958-501-0
Price: $20.95
Reviewed by Jenny Webb for the Association for Mormon Letters
I was intrigued by Julie M. Smith’s recent project—an edited collection of fictional dialogues on scripture—from the moment I heard about it, but I was also unsure what to expect. With so many options available for study, could fictionalized conversations really contribute something useful to the ongoing discussions on Mormon scripture, doctrine, and theology? Fiction, however faithful to an original text, seems at first glance like a less effective method when it comes to thinking scripture. Curious but cautious, I opened the attractive volume and was subsequently fascinated, surprised, and even delighted by what I found. In *As Iron Sharpens Iron: Listening to the Various Voices of Scripture*, Smith and her authors provide a unique and absorbing engagement with the Mormon scriptural canon that is well worth reading.
The concept behind the project is relatively straightforward: Smith invited authors to select two people from any book of scripture, and then place them in dialogue on a specific topic. She found this approach while reading Matthew Richard Schlimm’s *This Strange and Sacred Scripture: Wrestling with the Old Testament and Its Oddities*, in which Schlimm presents a brief, fictionalized dialogue between Ezra (who held that all Israelite men should divorce foreign wives) and Ruth (a foreign wife who then becomes a model of fidelity). Smith recounts:
“I think the main reason why I was so taken by Ruth and Ezra’s dialogue is that it modeled some important principles in the interpretation of scripture—principles which often get lost in the rush to find a personal application for the text. One of these principles, perhaps the most significant, is that not all scripture texts agree with each other. This is to be expected, since no writer of scripture … [has] written perfectly.” (1)
In other words, Smith seeks to find a way to highlight the ways various linguistic, cultural, and historical factors affect and play into the words recorded as scripture. This approach is explicitly *not* meant to undermine the truthfulness or validity of the Mormon canon, but rather to emphasize the ways civil discourse and respectful debate can, in the end, enrich and enhance our understanding of scripture. As Smith explains:
“The dialogues in this book are somewhat reminiscent of midrash (the Jewish tradition of creative writings which extend scripture texts). But there is one very significant difference: we tried not to invent anything which would ‘solve’ the differences between the texts. Our goal was to explore those differences, not explain them away. While the dialogues are obviously fictional, we attempted to base them as closely as possible on what the scriptural records suggest that the people involved would have actually believed. … The goal was to relish the apparent divergences in the canon—to highlight what is there without substantially changing it or adding to it.” (5)
Smith’s invitation results in sixteen unique, creative dialogues. The disadvantage of this approach, of course, is that there is some unevenness throughout the collection: the dialogues vary widely in form (some have brief introductions, others just dive right in to the conversation) and the topics taken up lack anything beyond the broadest organizational principle as “gospel topics,” but these are minor issues compared to the energetic creativity and careful, thoughtful approaches to tough doctrinal and theological issues that run throughout the volume.
In order to provide a sense of the breadth and scope of this project, let me give just a brief description of the various chapters. Michael Austin begins the collection with “Abraham and Job: Suffering,” in which the value of both strict obedience to and a questioning of God are examined. Mark T. Decker wonders what would happen if the Book of Mormon prophet Jacob were to sit down with a modern Joseph Smith to discuss polygamy. Nicholas J. Frederick takes up an author many on first read might consider to be the same person, but whose identities in biblical scholarship are distinct in the nuanced “John the Evangelist and John the Revelator: The Divinity of Jesus.” Heather Hardy then considers the ways Joseph of Egypt and Nephi handled intense sibling rivalry and even hatred, and through their conversation presents a shift towards brotherly love that points toward an expanded universal love.
Ronan James Head examines the various ways the term “satan” is utilized and understood through a conversation between Job and John the Revelator, who find a type of necessary entropy at the heart of the satan figure. James D. Holt’s dialogue between Alma and Abinadi contains a rewarding reimagining of what it might have meant to Abinadi to know that his message was received not only by one person, but ultimately by thousands of converts. Jason A. Kerr contrasts the personal morality of Tamar and David in a discussion that highlights Tamar’s potential grandmotherly frustration and even anger with her descendant. In “Moses and Paul: The Law,” Jared Ludlow presents a debate surrounding the question of the law’s efficacy and its potential non-essentialness. And Steven L. Peck takes up the question of doubt—how we doubt, why we do so, and what role doubt can play as we work out our salvation—through the figures of Abraham and Thomas. (And, I can’t refrain from noting, Peck’s retelling of the events on Moriah was likely my favorite piece from the volume as a whole. I won’t give it away here, but it’s an intelligent demonstration of how and why the creative hermeneutics of this project as a whole can provide real theological weight and revitalizing freshness.)
Julie M. Smith then imagines a conversation between Mark and Luke regarding women’s roles in scripture, and her subtle critique and nuanced dialogue regarding the choices authors make regarding not just including women, but *how* those women are depicted provides much food for thought. As does Joseph M. Spencer’s “Amulek and Alma: Atonement,” which contains a detailed theological discussion that demonstrates the importance of thinking carefully through all the implications when we talk about doctrine. Walter E. A. van Beek provides a series of thoughtful dialogues between less common Old Testament figures in a series of three dialogues: “Balaam and Daniel: Prophecy” (which reclaims Balaam’s identity), “Solomon and Josiah: Writing History” (which does a marvelous job emphasizing the family relationships behind historical projects), and “Jeremiah and Jonah: Doom and Deliverance” (in which I was saddened but not necessarily surprised to see Jonah reimagined as celebrating Nineveh’s eventual destruction).
The final three dialogues examine the topics of complaint, wealth, and communication respectively. Miranda Wilcox writes a sharp and insightful dialogue between Hannah and Sariah in which the practice of praise is bound up with complaint via grief and loss. Walker Wright’s conversation between Mormon (who eschews personal wealth having seen the destruction it has brought upon the Nephites) and Israel (Jacob, who argues that God wants us to prosper and then use good stewardship to bless others) raises issues regarding wealth that anyone with an interest in a truly global church ought to take time to reflect upon. And finally, Benjamin Peters and John Durham Peters produce an enigmatic, even haunting, dialogue between the Master and the Disciple on the central question of how we communicate with deity and how deity communicates with us.
As seen from this brief summary, there is significant variety in the topics, identities, and scriptural sources undertaken by these authors. What emerges from all these myriad experiences, discussions, and even arguments is an interesting agreement that *disagreement* is not necessarily inimical to discipleship, but rather can be reframed as an opportunity to give one another the benefit of the doubt. Time and again characters find peace in Christ throughout these dialogues, and it is a peace that ultimately helps them to let go of their need to be right (and more specifically, to be the *only* one who is right). The portrait of the God behind the texts that thus emerges through these discussions is one where God’s greatness is manifest in and through an expansive, welcoming, and variety hermeneutic terrain.
The approach worked through by Smith and her colleagues also weighs the historical forces that bind and blind the protagonists in our scriptural narratives in a way that foregrounds our own significant privilege as contemporary readers of scripture. We have it all laid out before us, right in front. We know where the stories are going; often in these dialogues, the participants do not, and the various geographic, linguistic, and cultural limitations experienced by these scriptural characters are brought out in a way that I can only describe as poignant. Reading these dialogues emphasizes a very real humanity in these characters and their stories that is not always easy to locate when reading a scriptural text. We have all their voices available to us—we know things unavailable to our predecessors for a host of reasons, but do we really appreciate the value of these texts, and even more, of these past lives?
*As Iron Sharpens Iron* provides important insights while helping us to conceptualize scripture as a set of relational texts in an ongoing conversation. This book is well worth reading, and one that I will be recommending to many in the coming months.