B.H. Roberts: Studies of the Book of Mormon, University of llinois Press, 1985, $21.95.

REVIEW BY JOHN W. WELCH

This book prints, for the first time, three papers written by B.H. Roberts, who served valiantly from 1888 to 1933 in the First Council of Seventy. In these particular papers, Roberts lists all the arguments he can muster against the Book of Mormon. Here he makes no real effort to articulate answers, only to ask questions.

The papers have been edited by three professors at the University of Utah, Brigham D. Madsen, Sterling McMurrin and Everett Cooley. Historians will find it useful to have a bound version of these Roberts papers, which were donated to the University of Utah in 1979 by Roberts family members.

The Roberts papers themselves are unusual. He did not prepare or intend them for publication. They are not self-explanatory. Such papers always call for a careful, complete and accurate presentation. Unfortunately, the introductory essays in this book do not do this.

As a result, one editor concludes that the record is mixed on whether Roberts believed in the Book of Mormon as an authentic ancient text. That conclusion was drawn, however, without the benefit of a complete record. It also confuses an important distinction: It is one thing to doubt (as Roberts properly did) one's ability to prove scientifically that the Book of Mormon is the translation of an ancient text; it is quite another thing to doubt the book itself.

The editors also offer little analysis of the Book of Mormon questions themselves and make no effort to bring the reader up-to-date. They considered those tasks beyond the scope of their volume, although a fair description of the sources available to Roberts in 1922 is given.

The Roberts materials in this book are divided into four sections, "Correspondence," "Book of Mormon Difficulties," "A Book of Mormon Study," and "A Parallel."

In the correspondence section are several letters relating to B.H. Roberts' 1921 and 1922 Book of Mormon projects. If the editors intended, in printing these letters, to put the Roberts Book of Mormon studies into context, they fail on many counts, especially because the collection is incomplete. The editors also disregard Roberts' own words when they draw their conclusions.

An example of disregarding Roberts' words is Sterling McMurrin, who writes repeatedly of Roberts' "conclusions" in these Book of Mormon studies. Roberts, however, wrote, "I do not say my conclusions, for they are undrawn .... Let me say once and for all, so as to avoid what might otherwise call for repeated explanation, that what is herein set forth does not represent any conclusion of mine."

The volume contains several interesting letters that show that Roberts found "the difficulties" in providing archaeological answers "to be more serious" than he had expected. Knowing of his struggle with these academic disappointments helps us to appreciate even more the faith of this great man.

The volume would have presented a more complete picture of Roberts' faith, however, if it had quoted the more than 50 other positive, faithful, unambiguous, published statements made by Roberts in support of the antiquity and veracity of the Book of Mormon after he wrote the study. For example, "Surer recognition of Jesus being God may not be found in sacred writ," he wrote of the Book of Mormon in 1930. It is "one of the most valuable books that has ever been preserved," he spoke in 1933.

The "Book of Mormon Difficulties" section is comprised of a 145-page paper written by Roberts in December 1921. This paper was the product of a Church committee assignment. It was submitted to the First Presidency and the Quorum of the Twelve, who discussed it in January 1922. It reports the problems Roberts encountered as he tried to answer some archaeological questions about the Book of Mormon. Roberts correctly learned that it is impossible to "prove" the Book of Mormon by archaeology.

The editors correctly characterize Roberts as the "lightning rod" for the Church, who was often asked to respond to questions about the pre-Columbian archaeology. He did not always have answers at his disposal. Today, while we still cannot answer all questions, there is evidence bearing on most of the questions Roberts faced.

For example, Roberts found no evidence of barley (mentioned in Mosiah 9:9) in America before Columbus; such samples have since been found. See "Finding Answers to B.H. Roberts' Questions and An Unparallel," and "Did B.H. Roberts Lose Faith in the Book of Mormon?" available from F.A.R.M.S. (P.O. Box 7113, University Station, Provo, UT 84602). The most significant thing to say about these 1922 Roberts papers is the way they can be used to show how far some Book of Mormon studies have come since his day.

The main body of the book is the "Book of Mormon Study." The editors make a clear mistake about the time when this study was written. This mistake puts the writing out of context. The editors also do not put the study very well into its stylistic context. They underestimate Roberts' personal love of debate and his deep belief that knowledge was improved by vigorous debate.

Brigham Madsen claims the study was written by Roberts in his spare time while serving as president of the Eastern States Mission, and that it was completed "by the time he left New York" in 1927. This idea, however, has no historical support. In fact, the first line of the first page of Roberts' original typescript dates the writing of the study to 1922, as the editors now acknowledge.

Knowing that Roberts wrote the study in 1922 changes one's assessment of it. Roberts' further research and many faithful statements about the Book of Mormon from 1922 to his death in 1933 affirm his faith in the Book of Mormon.

In the study, Roberts bluntly states two main problems. First, he questions passages in the Book of Mormon that are arguably absurd or erroneous. On closer examination, however, we can see today that few of these oddities are problematic. In fact, many end up strengthening the credibility of the Book of Mormon. For example, Roberts thought someone might argue that it was impossible for Captain Moroni to have waved a "rent" (Alma 46:19, 1st ed.) in the air. In Hebrew, however, that expression is perfectly acceptable.

Second, Roberts displays at great length many purported similarities between the Book of Mormon and several early 19th century materials, especially the second edition (1825) of a book published in Vermont, Ethan Smith's View of the Hebrews (VH). That book argues that the American Indians were descendants of the Lost Ten Tribes, a common theory widely believed for centuries, a theory which Roberts in 1932 affirmed "is not the Book of Mormon attitude."

Most of the suggested similarities between VH and the Book of Mormon, however, are not so precise or significant as they appear at first glance. In fact, recent studies show that the Book of Mormon differs from and contradicts VH far more often than it resembles it. This makes it hard to believe that Joseph Smith specifically relied on VH to any significant extent. In the face of these differences, the similarities pale.

Perhaps most importantly, the editors fail to point out that the Book of Mormon study was Roberts' collection of "cons"; He thought defenders of the faith should know the arguments against the Book of Mormon so they could work on reasonable answers. He said that he "most humbly prayed" and "most anxiously awaited" those answers." He ends most sections in the study with questions, often challenging questions. Rarely, however, does he state a specific conclusion. Never does he draw a general conclusion.

Most readers of the book will not know that Roberts raises many arguments in the study that he had answered before. He has not rejected his earlier arguments. For example, he had already in 1909 adequately answered the question about how a small group of Nephites could build a temple "like" Solomon's.

Nor will readers know from this book that Roberts raises questions he continues to answer later. The study of the Book of Mormon was an ongoing inquiry for Roberts, not a settled issue. For example, regarding the question of whether Joseph Smith's powers of imagination and creativity were sufficient to have written the Book of Mormon, Roberts regularly preached in the 1930s that the inspired and perfect sacramental prayers are evidence that the book was not written by Joseph Smith.

On the suggestion that the doctrine of "opposition in all things" came from View of the Hebrews, he said "emphatically no" in 1928. The failure to include information like this is another dimension many readers will find lacking in this book.

One should remember that the Book of Mormon will probably never be an open and shut case intellectually. Few people have ever sensed this fact more keenly than B.H. Roberts. His faith was "not only unshaken but unshakable in the Book of Mormon," as he said.

Roberts knew that some of his words or actions might cause some people to wonder about his beliefs. Perhaps this is why he said in October conference of 1929: "I hope that if anywhere along the line I have caused any of you to doubt my faith in this work, then let this testimony and my indicated life's work be a correction of it."

Roberts, a man of great faith and testimony, was a believer iq the Book of Mormon in the face of all that he or anyone else could say against it. But to realize this fact, readers will have to look largely outside the covers of this book.

Welch is a professor of law at BYU's J. Reuben Clark Law School. He has a B.A. degree in history, M.A. in Greek, J.D. in law, and studied Greek philosophy for two years at Oxford University as a Woodrow Wilson Fellow.