1911 Brigham Young University modernism controversy

none thumb|The four professors at the center of the controversy: Joseph and Henry Peterson (top row) and Ralph and W. H. Chamberlin (bottom) The 1911 modernism controversy at Brigham Young University was an episode involving four professors at Brigham Young University (BYU), who between 1908 and 1911 widely taught evolution and higher criticism of the Bible, arguing that modern scientific thought was compatible with Christian and Mormon theology. The professors were popular among students and the community but their teachings concerned administrators, and drew complaints from stake presidents, eventually resulting in the resignation of all four faculty members, an event that "leveled a serious blow to the academic reputation of Brigham Young University—one from which the Mormon school did not fully recover until successive presidential administrations."Bowen, Craig H. (1995). Academic Freedom and the Utah Controversies of 1911 and 1915. Unpublished Master's thesis, J. Willard Marriott Library Special Collections, University of Utah, Salt Lake City. History In 1907, BYU president George H. Brimhall began hiring a new group of faculty to increase the academic reputation of his school. Joseph Peterson was hired to teach psychology, and his brother Henry Peterson hired as the director of the College of Education. Joseph Peterson was the first Ph.D on the faculty of BYU. In 1908 and 1909 Brimhall hired Ralph Vary Chamberlin and his brother William Henry Chamberlin, to teach biology and philosophy, respectively. The Chamberlin and Peterson brothers, while devout Mormons, actively sought to increase the intellectual atmosphere of the university and community, facilitating discussion and debates on evolution and the Bible, and sought to convey that evolutionary ideas and Mormon theology were not mutually exclusive, but rather complementary. Horace H. Cummings, the superintendent of the church schools, felt especially that teaching religion from non-Mormon sources and teaching evolution was contrary to Latter-day Saint teachings. The four instructors' courses were popular among students and other faculty, but university and church officials accused the professors of promoting heretical views, and in 1911 offered the Petersons and Ralph Chamberlin a choice: alter their teachings or lose their jobs.Bowen, Craig H. (1995). cademic Freedom and the Utah Controversies of 1911 and 1915. Unpublished Master's thesis, J. Willard Marriott Library Special Collections, University of Utah, Salt Lake City. Privately, Joseph B. Keeler told Ralph Chamberlin he could stay, but he refused, as the Petersons weren't given the same offer.Ralph Chamberlin Ralph V. Chamberlin oral history interview https://search.lib.byu.edu/byu/record/lee.668334?holding=m0kw9cyyochk4ibi oral history transcript MSS OH 238 1963 L. Tom Perry Special Collections Brigham Young University Provo, Utah This ignited a great deal of controversy in the school and surrounding community. The students of BYU overwhelmingly supported the professors, and a petition of support signed by at least 80% of the student body was submitted to BYU officials and reprinted in the Salt Lake Tribune, Salt Lake City's largest secular newspaper. Unwilling to change their teachings, the Petersons and Ralph Chamberlin left the university in 1911, while William remained for another 5 years, resigning in 1916. Bergera Gary James 1993 The 1911 Evolution Controversy at Brigham Young University http://signaturebookslibrary.org/?p=7065 Sessions Gene A. Oberg Craig J. The Search for Harmony: Essays on Science and Mormonism http://signaturebookslibrary.org/?p=7046 Salt Lake City Signature Books 1-56085-020-5 25873671 23–41 Arrington Leonard J. Bitton Davis The Mormon Experience: A History of the Latter-Day Saints 1992 University of Illinois Press Urbana 9780252062360 258–261 2nd Church and Kingdom: Creative Adjustment and Reinvigoration https://books.google.com/books?id=oMQgrBcI998C&pg=PA258Sherlock Richard Campus in Crisis: BYU's earliest conflict between secular knowledge and religious belief January–February 1979 Sunstone 13 10–16 https://www.sunstonemagazine.com/pdf/013-10-16.pdf 2015-04-26 2018-10-13 https://web.archive.org/web/20181013203310/https://www.sunstonemagazine.com/pdf/013-10-16.pdf dead The loss of the faculty represented an intellectual loss to the university, and a stifling effect on students as well as faculty.Alexander Thomas G. Mormonism in Transition: a History of the Latter Day Saints; 1890-1930 1996 University of Illinois Press Urbana 9780252065781 171–174 https://books.google.com/books?id=nOu7th-Y_DQC&pg=PA171 Definition of a Role for the Church Educational System Milton Bennion, writing in March 1911, called the conflict the most significant event in Utah's recent educational history.Milton Bennion The "evolution" and "higher criticism" controversy at the Brigham Young University The Utah Educational Review March 1911 4 7 9–10 http://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=hvd.32044102881828;view=1up;seq=165 Ann Weaver Hart wrote that the 1911 BYU controversy made Utah comparatively less emotional and reactionary than other parts of the country during the 1925 Scopes Monkey Trial.Ann Weaver Hart Religion and Education: The Scopes Controversy in Utah Utah Historical Quarterly 1983 51 2 183–198 10.2307/45061175 45061175 11633456 32761151 http://digitallibrary.utah.gov/awweb/awarchive?type=file&item=35432#page=81 subscription At the University of Utah in Salt Lake City a similar controversy — what some at the time described as 'a tempest in a teapot' — erupted four years later in February 1915. There, the dismissals of two professors and two instructors by President Joseph T. Kingsbury — and the subsequent resignations of 14 faculty members in protest — launched the American Association of University Professors' first institutional academic freedom inquest, spearheaded by AAUP founders Arthur O. Lovejoy and John Dewey. The 1911 BYU controversy — involving some of the same professors, including the Peterson brothers and the Chamberlins — led in part to the University of Utah debacle. As a result of these intertwined academic storms, the AAUP published the document now known as the 1915 Declaration of Principles on Academic Freedom and Academic Tenure.AAUP's 1915 Declaration of Principles https://www.meforum.org/campus-watch/8306/aaup-1915-declaration-of-principles Campus Watch 31 December 1915 28 March 2019 en Appearing in the inaugural December 1915 volume of the Bulletin of the American Association of University Professors, this became the AAUP's foundational statement on the rights and corresponding obligations of members of the academic profession. See also Utah Education Evolutionary biology LDS Church Mormon views on evolution History of Brigham Young University Creation and evolution in public education in the United States References Further reading Brigham Young University: The First One Hundred Years Twixt Sand and Shoals: 1909-1921 Wilkinson, Ernest L. 1975 Brigham Young University Press Provo, Utah 403–457 978-0-8425-0708-0 https://archive.org/stream/brighamyounguniv01wilk#page/402/mode/2up Joseph F. Smith Theory and Divine Revelation Improvement Era 14 https://books.google.com/books?id=z53tAAAAMAAJ&pg=PA549 1911 General Board, Y.M.M.I.A. 548–551 Brigham Young University: A House of Faith Gary James Bergera Ronald Priddis amp The Organic Evolution Controversy 1985 http://signaturebookslibrary.org/the-organic-evolution-controversy/ Salt Lake City Signature Books 0-941214-34-6 131–171 Metzger Walter P. The First Investigation AAUP Bulletin 1961 47 3 206–210 10.2307/40222666 40222666 Evolution and Theological Belief, R. V. Chamberlin Some Early Hebrew Legends, R. V. Chamberlin The Early Hebrew Conception of the Universe, R. V. Chamberlin The Theory of Evolution as an Aid to Faith in God and Belief in the Resurrection, W. H. Chamberlin "B. Y. U. Students Destroy Reply of the Presidency and Make Public the Protest They Formulated"- Salt Lake Tribune, March 16, 1911 Category:1911 controversies Category:1911 in Christianity Category:1911 in education Category:1911 in Utah Category:20th-century controversies in the United States Category:20th century in Mormonism Category:Academic scandals in the United States Category:Brigham Young University Category:Christianity and science Category:Christianity and evolution Category:Education in Utah Category:Mormonism-related controversies