Mormon History

Mormonism Unvailed, authored by Eber D. Howe and published in 1834, presents one of the first published critiques and investigations into the origins and credibility of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (LDS Church or Mormon Church) and its founder, Joseph Smith. The book elucidates the skepticism and criticism of early Mormonism, disputing its authenticity and alleging fraudulent and deceptive practices within its early formation.

The Book of Mormon is a religious record of three groups of people who migrated from the Old World to the American continents. These groups were led by prophets who recorded their religious and secular histories on metal plates. The Book of Mormon records the visit of Jesus Christ to people in the Americas following his resurrection. A 200-year era of peace followed that visit of Christ.

In June 1846, General Stephen Watts Kearny rode out of Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, with two thousand soldiers, bound for California. At the time, the nation was hell-bent on expansion: James K. Polk had lately won the presidency by threatening England over the borders in Oregon, while Congress had just voted to annex Texas. After Mexico declared war on the United States, Kearny’s Army of the West was sent out, carrying orders to occupy Mexican territory. Winston Groom recounts the amazing adventure and danger that Kearny and his troops encountered on the trail.

Learn about the scriptures and understand them as never before with beloved scholar David Ridges as he narrates his best-selling audiobook. Make the most of your scripture study and gain insights that will draw you closer to the Lord, improve your teaching skills at home and church, and make you a scripture rock star! Have more "ah-ha" moments than ever before as you truly apply, love, and teach the scriptures.

NATIONAL BESTSELLER From the author of Into the Wild and Into Thin Air, this extraordinary work of investigative journalism takes readers inside America’s isolated Mormon Fundamentalist communities. Now an acclaimed FX limited series streaming on HULU. “Fantastic.... Right up there...

Nephi puts us on notice in his very first sentence that The Book of Mormon was written by temple worshippers and for temple worshippers. He and the other prophets of The Book of Mormon, who called themselves the visionary men and the peaceable followers of Christ, knew and practiced a mystery, an ordinance by which they ascended through the temple and entered into the presence of God. This ordinance was embodied in a dramatic representation of the expulsion of Adam and Eve from Eden and their return to it, in which initiates played the roles of Adam and Eve or their descendants.

Discover the “convincingly researched and thoroughly entertaining” (The Wall Street Journal) history of the world’s oldest and most influential fraternity Founded in London in 1717 as a way of binding men in fellowship, Freemasonry proved so addictive that within two decades it had spread...

Founder of the largest indigenous Christian church in American history, Joseph Smith published the 584-page Book of Mormon when he was 23 and went on to organize a church, found cities, and attract thousands of followers before his violent death at age 38. Richard Bushman, an esteemed cultural historian and a practicing Mormon, moves beyond the popular stereotype of Smith as a colorful fraud to explore his personality, his relationships with others, and how he received revelations.

Brigham Young was a rough-hewn craftsman from New York whose impoverished and obscure life was electrified by the Mormon faith. He trudged around the United States and England to gain converts for Mormonism, spoke in spiritual tongues, married more than 50 women, and eventually transformed a barren desert into his vision of the Kingdom of God. While previous accounts of his life have been distorted by hagiography or polemical exposé, John Turner provides a fully realized portrait of a colossal figure in American religion, politics, and westward expansion.

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER From the acclaimed author of Evil Geniuses comes an electrifying, provocative history of American delusion—“an important book for understanding America in the age of Trump” (Walter Isaacson, author of Elon Musk). “A frighteningly convincing and sometimes...

Insights derived from the author’s knowledge of Isaiah’s prophecies as he applies them to many contexts in the Book of Mormon, transform the experience of reading or listening to the Book of Mormon into a journey of fresh scriptural discoveries. The challenge to dig deeper into hidden meanings behind the words we read on the surface, or how events in Book of Mormon times relate to today, starts with this series of revealing mini-studies.

In our busy world, we sometimes find our scripture study isn't always productive. The solution is here with The Book of Mormon Made Easier! Along with the complete text of the Book of Mormon, this valuable study guide includes additional insights and commentary. A perfect study companion!

In 1851, Olive Oatman was a 13-year-old pioneer traveling west toward Zion, with her Mormon family. Within a decade, she was a white Indian with a chin tattoo, caught between cultures. The Blue Tattoo tells the harrowing story of this forgotten heroine of frontier America. Orphaned when her family was brutally killed by Yavapai Indians, Oatman lived as a slave to her captors for a year before being traded to the Mohave, who tattooed her face and raised her as their own.

Even for the most ardent skeptic, it's hard not to be curious about the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Maybe you've seen the hit musical comedy The Book of Mormon. Maybe you've heard about Holocaust victims and deceased celebrities like Elvis being posthumously baptized in Mormon churches. Or maybe you've come across some other belief or facet of the Mormon faith and can't help but wonder whether the religion is actually as wild as it seems.

With Mormonism on the verge of an unprecedented cultural and political breakthrough, an eminent scholar of American evangelicalism explores the history and reflects on the future of this native-born American faith and its connection to the life of the nation. In 1830, a young seer and...

Nephi's small plates are a time capsule from the sixth century B.C., containing a "loser's eye view" of religion that strongly contrasts with the ideology of the Jerusalem establishment of the time. Lehi's dream and Nephi's interpretive vision are visionary-literary accounts of the two temple ordinances at the heart of the worship of Lehi's "visionary men" -- the Peace Offerings and the Day of Atonement. Learning to understand those visions opens up the rest of the Book of Mormon, and ancient scripture in general.

A sweeping history of Christianity in America, from the arrival of the first Europeans to the political triumphs of evangelicalism, showing the powerful, singular role the faith has always played in American public life. In the United States today, there is no faith more dominant than...

Orrin Porter Rockwell believed in his prophet, Joseph Smith. He spent most of a year chained in an Independence dungeon for his belief, then walked across Missouri to Nauvoo, stumbling into Joseph’s house on Christmas Day. Joseph said to him then, “Cut not thy hair and no bullet or blade can harm thee,” and the legend was born. But although he walked with presidents and generals, scholars and scoundrels, in a life lived at the center of many of the great events of the American frontier, he has remained an enigma, a source of continuing controversy.

Jon Krakauer’s literary reputation rests on insightful chronicles of lives conducted at the outer limits. In UNDER THE BANNER OF HEAVEN, he shifts his focus from extremes of physical adventure to extremes of religious belief within our own borders. At the core of his book is an appalling...

This three-and-a-half-hour audiobook offers a faithful retelling of the Hofmann forgeries, and their impact on the progressive rewriting of Latter-Day Saint history. Why did new Mormon historians insist Hofmann’s forgeries were legitimate, even when investigators provided convincing evidence to them of the hoax? How did Bruce R. McConkie know Hofmann’s Joseph Smith III Blessing was a fake, despite authentication by document experts and pressure by historians calling him “incompetent” for questioning?