Originally the essay making up McMurrin's book was a series of lectures at the University of Utah. Occasionally this comes through when he does a summary of what came before. This is the case, for instance, on 83, where McMurrin does an excellent paragraph summary of Mormon views on grace, sin and the fall. Indeed the summary is amazingly better than the sections it is summarizing. Those earlier sections, as I mentioned were muddled and frequently incorrect. This section starts out well and McMurrin uses his strength of summarizing traditional Christian positions. Unfortunately his discussion of Mormon views of atonement only takes a page and discusses only Talmage. McMurrin's entire view of the Mormon theological position on the atonement?
Here in the work of one man is a confused combination of the entire gamut of atonement theories - Christ's blood spilled because God wants sacrifice for sin, to purchase souls from the devil, and to free mercy from the demands of justice. (90, emphasis mine)
He then quotes Alma 42, saying that was the "finest passage" on the atonement because there is "no element of sacrificial rite, no ransom paid to the devil, no effort to assemble in one formula ideas that, however much they may enjoy the support of scripture and tradition, do not belong together." (ibid)
Once again I'm at a bit of a loss of how to deal with McMurrin. While Mormon theology isn't systematic the way I suspect McMurrin's positivism might wish, this is simply a horrible analysis. Indeed, I'd go so far as to say it is amazingly irresponsible. The atonement is the key doctrine of Mormon theology and we have his analysis consisting only of a page asserting it is muddled and basically worthless. The only praise he ever gives is the assertion, undefended and difficult to accept, that we hold to a "moralistic interpretation of the atonement" which was typical of liberalism and the Abelard heresy. Basically McMurrin likes the view of the atonement wherein it only has a psychological impact on people, so as to bring us to a recognition of guilt and thereby change. This gets back to his oft repeated view that Mormonism is basically pelegianism. Yet he keeps coming up with all these inconvenient facts wherein most Mormon theologians don't speak like Pelagius and keep ascribing important roles to the atonement which he'd like to overlook as "confused."
I wouldn't mind McMurrin doing this were he critiquing Mormonism. But he keeps coming up with this weird dual tendency to overlook or reinterpret basic Mormon doctrines for the Mormonism he wishes were present. (Basically, as I can see, a kind of pragmatic liberal protestantism with an emphasis on works and a theology primarily viewed as a psychological tool) Then occasionally he'll simply critique those aspects of Mormonism which he can't do this to as confused, muddled or worse, without trying to understand them on their own terms. It really does get frustrating at times - especially when he often does a much fairer job summarizing basic Christian and Hellenistic history and philosophy.
I probably should also note the section on free will. He does see this as the lynchpin of Mormon theology. Probably because it emphasizes classic liberal views of humanity. Yet he seems to get wrong the whole compatibilism debate, or at least misses the point. While the Book of Mormon does frequently speak of freedom, its conception is the freedom to act and not be acted upon. Yes freedom is a kind of origination, but it never is expressed in terms of "genuine open alternatives." That must be read in via intuitions or the appeal from responsibility and justice. Mormonism with its rejection of predestination, creation ex nihilo, and ontological assertion of a kind of origination, does vary significantly from most Christian views of compatibilism. Most specifically, the whole issue of causal determinism is made much more difficult. However it also asserts fairly strongly foreknowledge. So if free will is merely origination and lack of external imposition, then Mormonism is inherently based upon a particular view of free will. If we bring in the question of the fixity of the future, which McMurrin doesn't, then things are a little more sticky.
To be fair, when McMurrin wrote at the beginnings of the 1960's, perhaps those forms of the argument of free will weren't discussed much. Yet this does seem to be a fairly significant way that Mormon forms of compatibilism would differ from other Christian forms of compatibilism.
Of course one can assert the more thorough-going view of free will as essential to Mormonism. (Blake Ostler and others do this) My point isn't to criticize here those views, merely to point out that this entire discussion is neglected by McMurrin. Once again to be fair, McMurrin does point out on page 82 that Mormon theology hasn't grappled with the issues in the debate nor attempted to refine its theology. So perhaps this is less a problem with McMurrin than the fact that Mormon views of free will are vague and ambiguous. I agree completely with him that Mormon views of freedom are typically conflated with political or social freedom. Indeed I'd argue that it is this sense that Mormonism discusses freedom, although once again I'll not make that discussion here.
Responses to other chapters in McMurrin's The Theological Foundations of the Mormon Religion can be found on our Reading Club page.
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