an>atter-day Saints adhere to what we would call in religious studies, a “thick” religion: a set of beliefs and practices that have emerged from a deep and sometimes controversial historical context that extends deeply below the tip of the iceberg of our lived experience.  In discussions of our church history, the Biblical narrative of what is referred to in Judaism as the Aqedah, or “binding” of Isaac by his father Abraham on Mount Moriah, is often invoked to serve as a theological point of reference for some of the most challenging aspects our thick religious worldview, from unsettling episodes in church history to difficult callings and other soul-stretching commitments in the present.  Among other contexts, we know the phrase “Abrahamic test” from Truman G. Madsen’s landmark 1971 talk at BYU, and also from Eugene England’s essay on plural marriage, where he offered the explanation that “God apparently uses such a unique and uniquely troubling test because it is the only way to teach us something paradoxical but true and very important about the universe—that trust in our personal experiences with divinity must sometimes outweigh our rational morality.” Read Full Article »