This paper, paired with a paper by Jonathan Stapley on Mormon adoption theology after 1844, provides the contexts and meanings for the distinctive early Mormon rituals of spiritual adoption. In abbreviated form it is included in chapter 8 of In Heaven As It Is on Earth. The two papers, with a co-written introduction, are slated for publication in the Journal of Mormon History in 2011.
    
Samuel Brown—physician leader, medical researcher, and cultural historian—is Professor of Medicine at Intermountain Medical Center/University of Utah Trained at Harvard College and Harvard Medical School, Dr. Brown researches and writes at the interfaces among medicine, religion, culture, and history. 
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