Alma 30–63: A Brief Theological Introduction

The Book of Mormon: brief theological introductions #7

by Mark A. Wrathall

"Now is the time and the day of your salvation . . ."

Alma the Younger is forever changed by an overwhelming personal experience with God’s mercy—a mercy capable of overpowering justice and giving Alma the means to exercise faith unto repentance. Driven by his new desire to share the joy that God’s mercy brings, Alma confronts the apostate Korihor, preaches a sermon on faith to the Zoramite outcasts, and encourages and consoles his sons. His ministry cannot be understood apart from the miraculous transformation initiated and powered by God’s mercy.

In this brief introduction to the second half of the book of Alma, philosopher Mark Wrathall painstakingly works out the logic of Alma’s understanding of faith, justice, mercy, and the final judgment and restoration of all things, encouraging readers to receive salvation today.

Genres: Religion, Nonfiction, Lds, Theology, Church, Philosophy, Spirituality

164 pages, Paperback

Published November 17, 2020

Reviews

[Aaron · Rating 5 out of 5]

This volume is the most thoroughly "theological" of the series so far, analyzing closely what Alma actually meant in his sermon on the seed, how Alma truly resolves the tension between justice and mercy, and how, for Alma and Amulek, the resurrection and judgment are inextricably linked. Wrathall systematically deconstructs arguments and speeches found in the last half of the Book of Alma, numbering the sequential arguments to show how they prove (or fail to prove) the speaker's intended point. His analysis of the exchange between Korihor and Alma is masterful.

Although the volume is truly philosophical, Wrathall's writing style is clear and engaging, so I rarely had to reread a passage to make sure I understood it. Most surprising of all, I found it easy to apply the book's messages to my own efforts to become a disciple of Christ. For example, viewing faith as a "practical stance," and not a superior form of belief or an inferior form of knowledge, is immensely helpful. If I have faith that Christ suffered and died for my sins and was resurrected, how should I live my life? How should I interact with others? If I view the purpose of justice and repentance as the way to become more merciful, how will I treat those who wrong me or my loved ones? If the final judgment is the means by which the earthly pleasures of wickedness are stripped away, leaving only a desire to continue to engage in wicked behavior without the pleasurable reward, how do I view the temptation to sin? Wrathall's work caused me to ask these questions and many others, changing the way that I view faith and repentance.

[Courtney Hatch · Rating 5 out of 5]

A beautiful theological overview. Some of the books in this series have gone straight for my heart, piercing it in a new place I’d been neglecting. This one, though, went straight for my eyes. I am grateful it has both expanded and colored my vision. I love the idea of faith as a practical stance.

“If we are raised to assume that faith is a kind of belief, we may think that we’re supposed to discover a secure rational foundation for our faith. But if faith is a practical stance rather than a cognitive attitude, it’s not the kind of thing that needs rational foundations. A practical stance has its own type of surety—not the surety of intellectual justification but the conviction that comes from successfully achieving one’s aims and coping with challenges.

The practical stance of a bike rider, for instance, is not secured by a cognitive understanding of the physics involved in staying upright on a moving bicycle. . . .Her practical stance is ‘confirmed’ when the rider reliably propels her bicycle over a variety of roads and fluidly negotiates a variety of obstacles to successfully reach her destination.”

[George · Rating 5 out of 5]

Truly outstanding. Maybe my favorite in the series so far. Wrathall is exceptional observant and insightful and makes his nuanced understanding readily accessible to his readers. His discussion of Alma 32 is remarkable, as is his discussion of justice and mercy.

[Janae · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is one of my favorite brief theological introductions of the 7 that I've read. The car driving, bicycle, and gardening metaphors are spot on and illustrate the ideas presented. Faith as a practical stance vs a belief - absolutely. Reading this entire series thus far has changed how I read the Book of Mormon and how I practice my religion.

[William Bennett · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is excellent but doesn’t quite rise to the heights of some of the other volumes in the series in terms of emotional impact and personally transformative quality of the ideas presented. I think Wrathall’s strength is in his painstaking re-definition of many words and concepts that Latter-day Saints and other Christians believe they understand, but about which we harbor various misapprehensions or have limited understanding. I was particularly drawn to his characterization of the Atonement as a process by which we become more merciful towards others as the fullest expression of our becoming like Christ.

I think where Wrathall doesn’t quite connect with me is his tone and the overall feel of the writing. It felt a little bloodless to me in comparison to the warm, personal feeling of some of the other authors’ prose that just connected with me right away. This read more like a scholarly resource that I will return to in order to annotate my scriptures (and would have been phenomenally useful for writing religion class papers back in my BYU days).

Still, highly recommended on its own merits and as a part of the series overall.

[RK Bitton · Rating 4 out of 5]

Took me much longer than normal.
This was a tough one and then I got to Part II and was touched at the beautiful concepts of and the interplay between justice and mercy. Just a mind-broadening discussion and on a night I really needed to hear it and share it. Not my favorite in the series but I will return to Part II whenever I want to engage with what I formerly thought of as a type of “tug of war” between justice and mercy.

[Ryan · Rating 5 out of 5]

For me, this was the best one yet. The book brought together so many threads I'd been pondering over the years and buttressed my leanings and feelings on those threads. A beautiful review of faith (as a principle of action), the "balance" of justice and mercy, and another refreshing revisiting of the words of Alma. I'd love for everyone to read this.

[Brad Rees · Rating 3 out of 5]

2023- Jan

[Jessica · Rating 4 out of 5]

After reading the author's bio and getting into the first bit I was worried this one would be too theoretical and hard to follow but I ended up loving it. Really beautiful insights

[John · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book was really hard for me to get through. I restarted multiple times and let it sit unread for long periods before finally finishing it this week. It is written by a philosopher and my brain just doesn't work that way. I often had to read things multiple times to grasp the message, which is challenging when a lot of my reading time is in the evening when I am tired from work and life.

But the book also has some concepts and discussion in it that when put in practice have helped me change in meaningful ways. There's a lot here, especially in regards to the nature of faith and the relationship between justice and mercy. This book is well worth the effort it took me to get through it.

I took some notes:

The book of Alma is a demanding book. If you don't feel challenged by it—challenged to change your priorities, your everyday practices, and your worldly preoccupations—you probably have not understood it. (Pg 2)

Faith is not about thinking the right things. It is not concerned with straightening out our beliefs about the world. For Alma, faith is a practical stance—a way of being poised and ready to actively respond to the world. (12-13)

The Book of Mormon never uses the "faith that p" locution, although it uses "A believes that p" frequently. This suggests that the authors of the Book of Mormon didn't think of faith as a cognitive attitude. ... In the Book of Mormon faith is an attitude that always and exclusively takes as its object God and Christ. (18)

Faith evaluates not by thinking about things or forming judgements about things but by actively responding to them. ... Faith is concerned with our willing or resolving to act in a particular way. (19)

Faith in the book of Alma = a practical stance. A practical stance evaluates person's or things or deeds or the world itself, and it evaluates them in the terms of the appropriate way of actively responding to them. (21)

Faith is instinctive, not something we should need to think about. ... The stronger my faith, the less I need to think about how I ought to feel and what I ought to do, and the more I will just see, feel, and act as Christ would. ... Faith changes the way we perceive and feel about the world. (22)

Alma experienced a change in his practical stance; Korihor only experienced changes that were cognitive. (27)

Alma does not respond directly to Zoramite beliefs. He doesn't try to convince them cognitively. His target is their hearts and their practical stance of faith. (46)

Alma's sermon on the seed shows us how to shift our background assumptions about faith. (48)

Acceptance of the doctrine of the coming of Christ is foremost a matter of the heart... Faith in Christ is not a cognitive evaluation of the doctrines or teaching about Christ; it is a practical evaluation of the world in the light of Christ.

The seed is not faith, but the word (God). As the seed swells and grows, our faith increases—that is, we become better at actively serving God. (52) Exercise or action is the soil that nourishes the word (61).

As the seed grows, we'll understand God better because we will be more like Him. And as we develop our faith, we will be disposed to act in the way that Christ would act. We resemble the Son of God insofar as we are able to pursue the aims and ends that Christ himself has pursued. (60)

Joy is the experience of a practical stance that is successfully oriented to the world through Christ. So the confirmation of faith is found in joy. (68)

Every part and aspect of the law...exists to point us toward the sacrifice of the Son of God. ....understanding the meaning of the law amounts to learning to be merciful. (72) The intent of God's sacrifice is to produce in us a powerful yearning to show mercy and receive mercy. ...obedience to the law is a means, and mercy is the end. (83)

The defining event in the life of Alma the Younger ... was an event of unexpected, overwhelming mercy. (88)

The purpose of justice is to bring us to a state of repentance. (103) The ultimate purpose of justice, the work that justice aims to produce, is to help us find mercy---not just to receive acts of kindness or pity but to be transformed so that we are merciful. (105)

The limited time frame of mortal existence ... makes what we do in this life matter. [imagine an eternal basketball game...players would have no motivation to play well] (118)

[Joey · Rating 5 out of 5]

Each different author of each volume in this excellent series views his or her material with through very different and distinct intellectual and spiritual lenses. Wrathall is a formal philospher, so he approaches the second half of the Book of Alma with careful and thorough logic that establishes foundations from which he addresses seminal Book of Mormon themes like faith, mercy, and justice. Much of this volume is devoted, in fact, to these three ideas. Except, refreshingly, Wrathall does not consider them ideas. He views them as activities that matter much, much less to the disciple's mind than they do to the disciple's practice.

While this posture towards faith -- to take just the one example -- is not original, Wrathall's treatment feels full, systematic, and airtight. I'm sure he would agree that his work here is far from airtight and complete, but his formal philospher's touch lends the reader this impression.

In short, Wrathall argues that faith is not cognitive at all, but rather, properly deployed, constitutes a posture toward life and one's fellow humans that activates and projects the teachings and example of Christ. Wrathall's exploration of the relationship between mercy and justice is fascinating, fresh, and moving. In sum, mercy and justice exist in purposeful tension; it is this tension that engenders humility and gratitude within the recipient of mercy, which then motivates the recipient to emulate God and in turn show mercy to others. This chain reaction accomplishes the underlying purpose of justice, which is to create a good and benevolent people. This is -- inartfully expressed -- how God can extend mercy without undercutting justice.

Wrathall hews closely to the words of Alma and Amulek as his source material, and indeed readers will not have the sense that he is freelancing or intellectualizing the material. He leverages his academic training to shed a new shade of light on passages we already know, probably too well. As Wrathall insightfully suggests, "Familiarity breeds neglect." Sometimes we have read Alma so many times, rehashed the same lessons over and over, to the point that we struggle to engage it in new ways that might inspire us anew. This book is a great tool to help rediscover some of the most basic themes of the Book of Mormon.

[Carl · Rating 4 out of 5]

I feel that this has been the most theological of the Brief Theological Introductions just in a pure sense. Which is ironic, since Dr. Wrathall starts off kind of disparaging theology and theologians. I think he and I differ on what our definitions are of these terms, because he's pretty clearly doing theology.

Where I wish he had done a better job was contextualizing his incredibly in-depth analysis of Alma's theology around grace, time, the nature of human freedom, redemption, repentance, and all of the other topics he weaves together with the skill one might expect from someone who teaches at Oxford. While there are a few nods to various inflection points in Alma's life, Wrathall doesn't really tie Alma's theology to a lot of his own experiences as much as he might like. One of my general rules of scripture study is to take each individual contribution on its own terms. Paul was not writing in a way that can secretly only be decoded by reading him alongside Moroni. They were two prophets in different parts of the world with different historical situations. Can they be read together? Yes. Do they explain each other? No. I felt that Wrathall did this with the various sermons and letters and writings of Alma—mashing them together to create a whole with little regard (or at least less than I wanted) to historical context. So while this might be the most pure theological of the Brief Theological Introductions, I feel the strength of this series is in deep dives into the text, and this was a very deep dive into theology. Those are not the same things, and that's a weakness here.

Which is not to say I didn't enjoy it. In particular, some of his conversation around the proper boundaries to human freedom will help me if I ever get around to revising my dissertation! So he has a lot of good things to say, I just wish they were more tied to the historical person of Alma than the discussion was.

[Larry · Rating 5 out of 5]

Thought and Faith-filled Religion

How might I reconcile the seeming contradiction manifest scripturally of a perfectly loving God and a God for Whom, “vengeance is mine. Or as has been elsewhere observed how might I reconcile the God of the Old with the God of the New Testament?

I had concluded that humankind’s notion of justice must be different than God’s and in some manner errant, insufficient, and / or wrong. Words to describe God’s justice I’ve lacked. Recently the notion of “need” as compared to “deserve” was presented to my mind. Asking what is needed for a person’s development is more consistent with God’s character than asking what is deserved.

The author’s analysis of Alma’s written words has invited and continues to invite the Holy Ghost to reveal increased understanding to me of God, His character, perfections, and attributes.

I love a religion that prizes faith and thought-filled discipleship.

[Tim Larsen · Rating 5 out of 5]

Alma teaches contrary to popular opinion that faith is not a belief set or to have a perfect knowledge but to be in a practical stance that determines our relationship to the world and others around us and the actions we take in life. Alma pulls down the materialism of the Zoramites and the ultra-empiricism of Korihor by making the point that empiricism cannot disprove God, and proposes an empiricism of the soul in which joy offers its own proof of the goodness of the seed, which is not faith, but Christ himself. Christ is of course what allows mercy to overpower justice, not because of what we do but because of what Christ did and does for us. Sin, on the other hand, is its own punishment, and Gods mercy is in the delay of its full realization to allow a period of probation and repentance.

[Milkybarkid · Rating 5 out of 5]

Some books are merely entertaining, while you can feel others expanding your horizons as you read (and re-read) them. This series is full of such 'expansion points', but I particularly enjoyed Professor Wrathall's contribution in guiding the reader through some of the most 'theologically dense' parts of the Book of Mormon. Creating a clearer boundary between belief and faith, differentiating between the function and purpose of justice are just two amongst many valuable insights gained. Most of all, I enjoyed being taught that, taken as a whole, the Book of Mormon is far more nuanced and profound as a religious text than I would likely have ever learned through personal study or group discussion. These books are not a 'brief' read, but they are tremendously rewarding.

[Jackson Switzer · Rating 5 out of 5]

Probably the best installment of the series so far. The discussion of justice and mercy is nothing short of brilliant. Parts II and III were downright gripping and had me on the edge of my seat--extremely impressive for a book written by a philosopher. Any of the other Brief Theological Introductions might have a greater impact on an individual depending on his or her circumstances or questions, but if I were to recommend any one of them to a generic member of the Church of Jesus Christ, it would be this one. (And I haven't even mentioned Part I, about Alma's insistence on the priority of faith over intellectual belief and knowledge, which is incredibly, practically valuable to understand.)

[conor · Rating 4 out of 5]

Lots of fascinating and insightful thoughts in this volume, which interestingly embodies some tension between a more philosophical and intellectual engagement with the latter half of Alma and and Wrathall's argument that for Alma faith is a practice, not a position of belief. Throughout the volume, Wrathall returns to this idea, repeatedly seeking to ground his observations and ideas in something practical, something that can be felt and touched.

Does some interesting work in concert with some of the ideas explored in Kylie Turley's volume in the earlier half of Alma.

[Brad Cramer · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of the best scriptural companion books I have ever read. Wrathall puts Alma and Amulek’s teachings in such a different, hopeful, understandable light. His thoughts on faith, justice and mercy are well taught and explained. He explains that to really understand Alma and Amulek, the reader has to go back and also understand the real arguments of Korihor and the Zoramites. He does a wonderful job of tying each of these to our own day as well. With these insights, we see that Alma and Amulek’s message is fully focused on turning people to Jesus Christ.

[Chad · Rating 5 out of 5]

I bought this book a few years ago to complete my collection-- I got a few sent to me for free from the Maxwell Institute back when I was more on top of writing reviews. And I pulled this one off the shelf to accompany my Come Follow Me reading for the week. I needed to prep a lesson on Alma 39-42, and this was the volume that overlapped with it. There are some really great gems in here. Some of the material here is hard to enjoy because it's theological not practical e.g. explaining what happens to the soul after death. But Wrathall shows how to Alma, this is all practical. The fact that mortality is limited in time directly impacts how we position ourselves to God. Highly recommend the read.

[Michael · Rating 4 out of 5]

Another concise and thought-provoking entry in this 12 volume series of theological explorations in the Book of Mormon by the Neal A. Maxwell Institute for Religious Scholarship. Like the previous six author’s, Mark Wrathall’s contribution is worthy of “re-reading” and reference. So grateful for the production of this praiseworthy work!

[Chanel Earl]

This book led to some wonderful insights. I don't think I totally followed all of the discussions of logic, but I enjoyed them, and I really enjoyed thinking about how the beliefs and premises of Alma influenced his teaching.

[Paul Manuele · Rating 5 out of 5]

I’m incredibly impressed with this book. I’ve considered new meanings to faith, justice, and mercy that I never would have considered on my own. Alma’s teachings have taken on new and significant meaning for me.

[Ryan Patrick · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is one of the better books in this series, in my view. The author is a philosopher and he lays out his views very logically. They not only made sense, but deepened my understanding of some of Alma's teachings.

[Jon · Rating 5 out of 5]

great help in better understanding the doctrine Alma and his companions teach

Some of our assumptions get in the way of understanding what Alma taught on faith, the restoration and resurrection, as well as happiness and misery. There is a lot to think about in this book.

[Abby · Rating 5 out of 5]

These are all fantastic in different ways. This one felt particularly scholarly at first but don’t give up. He has some great insights. I love what he teaches about “eternal” being a qualitative description.

[David Barney · Rating 3 out of 5]

At this point of reading this series of books for me, this was a task for me to work through. The author has some interesting, yet thought provoking insights. I need to read this book again.

[Ryan Haueter · Rating 4 out of 5]

Continues to be a great series put out by the Maxwell Institute.

[Erika · Rating 5 out of 5]

These theological introductions are so important

[Nic · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was one of the best books in this series. Excellent discussion on justice and mercy.

[Josh · Rating 5 out of 5]

Outstanding!