Restoring the Ancient Church

(from the Scriptural Mormonism blog 10-9-17)

Barry Robert Bickmore (1970-) is the author of Restoring the Ancient Church: Joseph Smith and Early Christianity (2d ed.; Redding, Calif.: Foundation for Apologetic Information and Research, 2013), one of the best books on the patristic evidence in support of Latter-day Saint theology.

The following is the video of his Fair Mormon Conference presentation from 2014 (the audio is a bit out of sync with the video)

Joseph Smith Among the Early Christians - Barry Bickmore 2014 Fair conference (cf. his 1999 paper, Mormonism in the Early Jewish Christian Milieu, a response to Catholic apologist Patrick Madrid)

As an aside, the following is from my review of Barry Bickmore's book, Restoring the Ancient Church: Joseph Smith and Early Christianity (2d ed.). I originally posted this on Amazon in late-2013. Enjoy!

I am glad to see this book both back in print and also updated. This work by Dr. Bickmore is a carefully written text comparing Latter-day Saint theology and that of the patristic literature in the early Church, showing that the "Mormon" understanding of issues such as Christology, baptism, posthumous salvation, and other important, debated topics taught by the Prophet Joseph Smith onwards has support in Patristic literature, albeit in varying degrees (some strong and explicit, such as baptismal regeneration, subordination of the Son to the Father; theosis, and others with some evidence, such as a divine feminine). Alongside providing and exegeting patristic literature, and giving careful references to the pertinent sources, Bickmore does a good job at providing some biblical evidences for LDS belief, most notably in the opening pages showing that the LDS understanding of the nature of the apostasy and predicted restoration of Christ's gospel has meaningful support from the biblical texts, too.

The major update to this work is that it includes a paper Barry presented to the FAIR (now FairMormon) conference in 1999 responding to Catholic apologist, Patrick Madrid's article critiquing the LDS view of the apostasy. In this chapter, as with previous ones, Bickmore provides copious evidence from "Jewish-Christianity" on various doctrinal issues which should be read with care, as it refutes the arguments of critics such as Madrid and others (including many Protestants) on issues that, theologically, separate Latter-day Saints with so-called "Orthodox Christianity."

This book should be read by LDS and non-LDS alike; for the LDS, especially the apologist and scholar, as a good reference work on patristic evidence for Latter-day Saint theology and practices, and for the non-LDS to read a good, carefully researched and written study of the Apostasy and Restoration from an informed Latter-day Saint.

I do have two quibbles with this book--

1. This new edition uses endnotes, not footnotes. In the first edition, it used footnotes, which allow one to read the notes to various points with ease. However, in the revised edition, all the notes are in the back of the book. I hope that in future printings of this book that it will revert back to footnotes.

2. I would have liked if Bickmore dealt with the issue of Mariology (e.g., the origins and development of doctrines such as the perpetual virginity; Immaculate Conception; Bodily Assumption; the early Patristic writers referring to her as the New/Second Eve and how later writers would used such to show her sinlessness, etc). The topic of Mary was an important issue in early Christianity, and especially now in both Eastern Orthodoxy and Roman Catholicism, and, speaking as a former Catholic and a graduate of a Catholic seminary, *the* greatest evidence of the apostasy of both faiths, especially Roman Catholicism. Of course, the "Mormon" view of Mariology is very similar to modern Protestantism (e.g., a Heldivian view of the brothers and sisters of Jesus, etc [see Eric D. Svendsen, *Who is My Mother? The Role and Status of the Mother of Jesus in the New Testament and Roman Catholicism* for the biblical evidence for such a view).

These issues aside, this is a wonderful book, and I mirror the sentiment of Dr. Daniel C. Peterson in that it is a book I wish I had written, which I think if the highest compliment one can pay to an author.
http://scripturalmormonism.blogspot.com/2017/10/barry-bickmore-joseph-smith-among-early.html