Review
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Title: The Testimony of Two Nations: How the Book of Mormon Reads, and Rereads, the Bible
Author: Michael Austin
Publisher: University of Illinois Press
Year Published: 2023
Pages: 242
Format: Trade Paperback
Genre: Scriptural Hermeneutics
ISBN: 9780252087479
Price: $25.00
Reviewed by Kevin Folkman for the Association for Mormon Letters
The Bible and the Book of Mormon, Michael Austin writes in The Testimony of Two Nations, are unique among sacred texts because they are primarily narrative stories with limited direct instruction. Both texts invite us to read the stories of prophets and heroes as types that urge us to apply their lessons to our own lives. When we read the Old Testament through the lens of the New Testament, we see how the Old prefigures the stories of the New. In the same way, the New Testament hearkens back to the Old. Each text, standing on its own, offers an incomplete narrative about the relationship between God and humankind. Taken together, the two create a more detailed and complete story that informs our faith. The sum of the two texts is greater than either the Hebrew Bible or the New Testament standing alone. Big stories are built from smaller stories, and the big stories of the Bible, Austin is proposing, create an even bigger story when taken together.
It should not be surprising, Austin argues, that the Book of Mormon, with its claims of being an additional testament of Christ, should also hearken back to the Old and New Testaments. The Book of Mormon draws heavily from them to create an even greater scriptural record when, as is claimed in the text from Ezekiel, the two sticks “shall become one in thine hand.” (Ezekiel 37:16-19) Building on this idea, Austin develops a critical reading of how the three texts share similar types, repeat similar stories with different characters, and then expand on each other in similar ways.
While many critics of the Book of Mormon point to what appears to be strong 19th-century influences in the text, Austin uses the tools of literary criticism to delve deeply into what the texts of both sets of scripture have in common, as well as how they differ. As he puts it, such elements ought not to be surprising, pointing out how Shakespeare’s Hamlet says more “about Elizabethan England than it does about medieval Denmark” [p59]. The King James Version of the Bible uses the language, idioms, and framework of the early 17th century in its text. No surprise, then, that 19th-century influences have found their way into the Book of Mormon through the translation and printing process. More importantly, Austin describes significant types and parallels between the texts to create a canon that is more complete than either the Bible or the Book of Mormon by themselves.
There are obvious parallels with Old Testament and Book of Mormon characters as familiar types beyond the persons-as-types motif, Austin argues for what he calls type-scenes, similar narratives in both works that parallel each other. Moses leads the Children of Israel out of a corrupt and wicked Egypt and puts them through trials in the wilderness, before finally leading them to the promised land of Canaan. Not only does the Book of Mormon create a similar narrative with the family of Lehi fleeing Jerusalem for a new world, but the migration story is retold several other times in the Book of Mormon. Mosiah leads his people away from the Lamanites to the land of Zarahemla, Zeniff and his followers leave Zarahemla to reclaim the lands of their first inheritance, Alma leads his Christian followers back to Zarahemla, and Limhi makes a parallel trek a few years later. These are just a few of the many type-scenes Austin found.
Austin writes about the concept of curses, comparing the Biblical roots of the people of Canaan being cursed through the lineage of Ham with the Book of Mormon curse on the Lamanites. In both cases, Austin says, we are reading history through the eyes of victors (although not permanently, in the case of the Nephites). He correctly points out that as time goes on in the Book of Mormon accounts, the labels of Nephites and Lamanites become more of a self-identification rather than an actual racial or tribal delineation. We should learn from the Book of Mormon, Austin argues, to read the text more carefully and see how both the Biblical and Book of Mormon stories argue for looking beyond prejudicial types to a more inclusive view of others around us.
As an example of how these types are expanded in the Book of Mormon; Austin points to the role of prophets. Prophets in the Old Testament are almost exclusively presented as outsiders who challenge the status quo of a corrupt Israel. Of the major Book of Mormon prophets, only two seem to fit in the same Old World prophet type: Abinadi and Samuel the Lamanite. The two Mosiahs, Benjamin, Alma, Alma the Younger, Helaman, and various other Book of Mormon prophets expand their roles beyond the outsider status of what we think of as Old Testament prophets and are both civic and ecclesiastical leaders. This expansion, Austin argues, is why we sustain Presidents of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints as prophets and not just as the presiding official leaders of the LDS church.
Despite his announced primary audience of scholarly readers, Austin’s text is highly readable and accessible to most readers looking to supplement their study of the Book of Mormon and the Bible. Throughout The Testimony of Two Nations, Austin points out many other examples of how these sacred texts both reinforce and challenge some of our long-standing ideas about these scriptures and their interrelationships with each other. In the end, Michael Austin also steps very lightly into some speculative theology, much like Eugene England before him, drawing on the same ideas that he has presented in this book. Austin uses The Testimony of Two Nations as a timely reframing of how to view the primary text of Christianity with the primary text of the Restoration movement and expand our understanding of both in creating a better path of discipleship.