An Imperfect Book: What the Book of Mormon Tells Us about Itself
A major theme in the Book of Mormon is the depiction of Native Americans as descendants of ancient Hebrews. Other prominent ideas are the restoration of pure Christianity to an apostate world, the visit of Jesus to the western hemisphere, and recurring cycles of ruin and renewal. All of this begs the question: “Is all of this true?” Wunderli has made an avocation of examining this and related questions by digging deeply into the Book of Mormon and surveying the large body of research that has been generated by scholars of various disciplines. He succinctly summarizes his own findings and this mass of often conflicting information, then adds his own trenchant analysis to the mix. Fascinating reading due to how Wunderli has structured the book as his own personal quest for answers, An Imperfect Book is an accessible but thorough overview of major controversies involving authorship, use of idiom, anachronisms, contrived names, borrowed passages, and prophecies made and fulfilled within the book’s own narrative frame. Wunderli includes a discussion of dozens of “curiosities” such as the presence of a solitary polygamist, Amulek, in the book. Wunderli has examined the arguments and reduced the data to a collection of informative observations and reasoned arguments in an altogether readable work.