“And out of Weakness He Joseph Shall Be Made Strong”

Alan C. Miner

In the Book of Mormon, the Lord declared that "out of weakness," Joseph Smith "shall be made strong" (2 Nephi 3:13). Richardson, Richardson and Bentley note that Joseph Quincy, mayor of Boston, said of Joseph: "Born in the lowest ranks of poverty, without book learning and with the homeliest of all human names, he made himself at the age of thirty-nine a power upon earth."

Dr. Harold Bloom, a Jewish religious scholar, and distinguished professor at both New York and Yale Universities, extols Joseph Smith as "an authentic religious genius, unique in our . . . history," and praises "the sureness of his instincts, his uncanny knowing precisely what [was] needful for the inauguration of a new faith." Joseph Smith and Mormonism, he further expounds, have contributed tot he world "a more human God and a more divine man. . . . I also do not . . . doubt that Joseph Smith was an authentic prophet. Where in all of American history can we find his match? . . . Nothing else in all of American history strikes me as . . . . equal to the early Mormons, to Joseph Smith, Brigham Young, Parley and Orson Pratt, and the men and women who were their followers and friends." [Allen H. Richardson, David E. Richardson and Anthony E. Bentley, 1000 Evidences for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints: Part Two-A Voice from the Dust: 500 Evidences in Support of the Book of Mormon, pp. 95-96]

Step by Step Through the Book of Mormon: A Cultural Commentary

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