Arm the Children: Faith's Response to a Violent World (Byu Studies Monographs)

Review by Terry C. Warner: The first precept I heard from the lips of Arthur Henry King was that an author is revealed by his work. Attitudes, prejudices, morality, commitments-all are unfolded in the works of any given author. At the very least, this expanded and edited volume, which draws upon Arthur Henry King's earlier work, The Abundance of the Heart, reveals the man without being overtly autobiographical. If this work reveals the man, he was a man of firm convictions, of great humility, and of guilelessness. He made the historical, the cultural, the philosophical accessible. In this book, this convert to the LDS faith affirms the life-changing experience of finding the Restoration of the gospel and then draws upon the understanding brought by it to recast the meaning of academic inquiry, tradition, judgment, language, education, effective writing, and wholeness. The depth and breadth of this book is that it is an expression of a man whose way of being in the world unfolds by his reflections on how the restored gospel transforms the meaning of everyday life and of our grand purposes here. Our salvation and our happiness hinge on being persons of commitment to light and truth. The world seems constantly to offer counterfeits to that light. The pure hearted can tell the difference. When those seeking to be pure in heart raise children, teach in homes and schools, are administrators in organizations, or seek to understand art, literature, or language, they see possibilities and understandings to which the worldly are blind. Arthur Henry King offers a light which helps illuminate. One measure of his success is that by the end of the book the reader discovers he or she has been turned not to the author, but to Christ; not to procedures, policies, or rules, but to the grand invitation to see earthly experience by being in the Restoration.