Date of Award:
8-2024
Document Type:
Thesis
Degree Name:
Master of Arts (MA)
Department:
History
Committee Chair(s)
Patrick Q. Mason
Committee
Patrick Q. Mason
Committee
Kyle T. Bulthuis
Committee
Kerin Holt
Abstract
From 1836 to the present, the members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints have constructed and undertaken rituals in buildings called temples. In the first temple in Kirtland, Ohio, its 1836 dedication was the scene of visions and speaking in tongues, much like those the apostles had at Pentecost in Acts 2. The second temple in Nauvoo, however, had none of these, and the third set of temples built in Utah, with the first completed in 1877, again saw a number of religious experiences but of a radically different form: mainly the appearance of the spirits of dead ancestors. I argue here that an understanding of what the Saints expected to happen in each of these three phases of the Latter-day Saint temple tradition serves to explain why the experiences varied so greatly.
Checksum
d527ddb79c54903df322e5c14227827f
Recommended Citation
Bennett, Jared Gage, "On the Varieties of Religious Experience in Latter-Day Saint Temples, 1836–1940" (2024). All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Fall 2023 to Present. 264.
https://digitalcommons.usu.edu/etd2023/264
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