We're Being Haunted by the Ghost of Bruce R. McConkie

An incredibly important skill set to develop as a Latter-day Saint is constantly asking "How did we get here?"

When you do that, the answers will find you.

And it's in that spirit that I want to talk about how the books of scripture you grew up reading have come to be in their present form.

That Promised Day: The Coming Forth of the LDS Scriptures is a documentary on the 1981 edition of the standard works. It's when the standardized version of the Bible, all the references, the current formatting, and the footnotes and headings were written. It talks about who participated in the project, how different parts were developed, and the timing of when all of this took place.

This is important to know because no one person has had a greater impact on your experience with Scripture than Bruce R. McConkie. And he was sexist and racist. You need to understand that when you view the parts of your scripture references that still haven't been revised since then.

Like these entries on Interracial Marriage, which are still present in the current edition of the Topical Guide.

 

A Screenshot of the current entry from Interracial Marriage in the Topical Guide. It redirects to two separate entries for Interfaith Marriage and Separation

The entry in the Topical Guide for Separation, in which Old Testament laws regarding marriage and covenant separation of Jews and Gentiles are laid out.

Who put this falsehood in our scriptures?

Bruce R. McConkie and his team of white male RMs in the 1970s.

A great deal of inspiration went into choosing the format of the LDS edition of the scriptures in 1981. They were attempting to do many things that had never been done before in publishing any edition of the Bible. It was a sacred process that is fascinating to learn about.

They also codified in writing some of the worst failures of conservative Republican thinking to enter into LDS thought, which still lingers and festers today.

Both of those things can be true at the same time.

This documentary is worth your time so you can begin to understand that about the scriptures you read. There are dead Church leaders whose ghosts still haunt you, whether you can see them or not. And this documentary was how I began to see how true that is for Bruce R. McConkie.