Whether your family tree is partially filled out, mostly complete, or full with many LDS relatives, this step-by-step method will help you discover new relatives and reserve their temple ordinances. You will review the accuracy of your tree, analyze your pedigree, and make a list of ancestors to research. Those with many LDS relatives will locate research opportunities by diving deeper into tree analysis and listing ancestors who were not members of the LDS Church. Using descendancy research to find cousins will open doors for those will full family trees. Instead of selecting random ancestors, you will systematically view descendancy trees for each of the ancestors in your list. By evaluating each descendancy tree, you can determine which branches are most likely to contain candidates for further research likely to be found in available records. Once you have chosen a relative to focus on, you'll begin a research project. Research begins by choosing a research question. Next you will create a simple research plan and research log. When you have completed your searches, you will then record what you found in FamilySearch, including adding sources and new relatives to the tree, and then write a summary of your research. After merging duplicates you will be ready to reserve temple ordinances. After you've successfully found names for the temple, you can repeat the process by going back to your list of candidates for further research and begin again with a new research question. Now you won't run out of research opportunities! As you research each relative one by one, you will grow to love them and think of them as friends. As President Eyring said, "your heart will be bound to theirs forever."

In this book, Patton E. Burchett offers a path-breaking genealogical study of devotional (bhakti) Hinduism that traces its understudied historical relationships with tantra, yoga, and Sufism. Beginning in India’s early medieval “Tantric Age” and reaching to the present day, Burchett focuses his analysis on the crucial shifts of the early modern period, when the rise of bhakti communities in North India transformed the religious landscape in ways that would profoundly affect the shape of modern-day Hinduism. A Genealogy of Devotion illuminates the complex historical factors at play in the growth of bhakti in Sultanate and Mughal India through its pivotal interactions with Indic and Persianate traditions of asceticism, monasticism, politics, and literature. Shedding new light on the importance of Persian culture and popular Sufism in the history of devotional Hinduism, Burchett’s work explores the cultural encounters that reshaped early modern North Indian communities. Focusing on the Rāmānandī bhakti community and the tantric Nāth yogīs, Burchett describes the emergence of a new and Sufi-inflected devotional sensibility—an ethical, emotional, and aesthetic disposition—that was often critical of tantric and yogic religiosity. Early modern North Indian devotional critiques of tantric religiosity, he shows, prefigured colonial-era Orientalist depictions of bhakti as “religion” and tantra as “magic.” Providing a broad historical view of bhakti, tantra, and yoga while simultaneously challenging dominant scholarly conceptions of them, A Genealogy of Devotion offers a bold new narrative of the history of religion in India.

What if the biblical creation account is true, with the origins of Adam and Eve taking place alongside evolution? Building on well-established but overlooked science, S. Joshua Swamidass explains how it's possible for Adam and Eve to be rightly identified as the ancestors of everyone, opening up new possibilities for understanding Adam and Eve consistent both with current scientific consensus and with traditional readings of Scripture.

Finally back in print, this special 40th anniversary edition of Dr. Schonfield’s international multimillion-copy bestseller is set to rock the establishment view of the life of Jesus all over again. There is probably no other figure in modern Jewish historical research who is more controversial or famous than Hugh J. Schonfield, who once said: “The scholars deplore that I have spilled the beans to the public. Several of them have said to me, ‘You ought to have kept this just among ourselves, you know.’” What he did to “spill the beans” was present historical evidence suggesting that Jesus was a mortal man, a young genius who believed himself to be the Messiah and deliberately and brilliantly planned his entire ministry according to the Old Testament prophecies—even to the extent of plotting his own arrest, crucifixion and resurrection. Since Schonfield’s death in 1988, his popularity and the interest in his prodigious work, which included over 40 books, has drawn increasing attention, particularly outside Judaism. In fact, it is probably fair to say that his contribution to the Gentile understanding of Jewish aspirations among those within the Christian cultural framework has been without parallel. In true Christian tradition, he has also been the cause of much contention. In the wake of resurgent interest in religious history spurred by Mel Gibson’s The Passion of the Christ and Dan Brown’s The Da Vinci Code, this 40th anniversary edition of The Passover Plot is set to engage a completely new generation of readers searching for truth.

Jefferson regarded Jesus as a moral guide rather than a divinity. In his unique interpretation of the Bible, he highlights Christ's ethical teachings, discarding the scriptures' supernatural elements, to reflect the deist view of religion.

"Readers may find themselves ordering their own DNA testing kit upon finishing this." —Publishers Weekly "The Soul of the Family Tree posits that a spiritual grounding in one's family history can combat 'historical amnesia' and nurture a sense of belonging." —Foreword Reviews Growing up in a passionately Norwegian-American Iowa town, Lori Erickson rolled her eyes at traditions like Nordic Fest and steaming pots of rømmegrøt. But like many Americans, she eventually felt drawn to genealogy, the "quintessential hobby of middle age." Her quest to know more about the Vikings and immigrants who perch in her family tree led her to visit Norse settlements and reenactments, medieval villages and modern museums, her picturesque hometown and her ancestor's farm on the fjords. Along the way, Erickson discovers how her soul has been shaped by her ancestors and finds unexpected spiritual guides among the seafaring Vikings and her hardscrabble immigrant forebears. Erickson’s far-ranging journeys and spiritual musings show us how researching family history can be a powerful tool for inner growth. Travel with Erickson in The Soul of the Family Tree to learn how the spirits of your ancestral past can guide you today.