Defending the Faith: 'Mormon Studies Review' is a scholarly feast

My favorite part of their reply, I confess, comes when they conclude "with 99 percent probability," based upon the same sort of statistical reasoning used in the Stanford authors' original article, that Sidney Rigdon, who was born in 1793, wrote 34 of the Federalist Papers that were published in 1788; that Rigdon also wrote roughly 30 percent of the King James Bible; and, most astounding of all, that Oliver Cowdery, who died in 1850, is the real author of the 2008 "Literary and Linguistic Computing" article to which they're responding.

Hilarious stuff. Vintage Review style.

The Mormon Studies Review isn't for every member of the church. But it regularly offers a feast for those who want to read solid, believing, well-written scholarly articles forthrightly engaging serious issues. It has done so for more than two decades now.

To subscribe to the Review, call 1-800-FARMS-15. Single hard copies can be purchased through the BYU Bookstore (1-800-253-2578). All issues of the Mormon Studies Review are accessible online.

Daniel C. Peterson is a professor of Islamic studies and Arabic at BYU, where he also serves as editor in chief of the Middle Eastern Texts Initiative and as director of outreach for the Neal A. Maxwell Institute for Religious Scholarship. He is the editor of the Mormon Studies Review.