Gilbert W. Scharffs

Gilbert Woodrow Scharffs (June 27, 1930 - February 26, 2015) was a Latter-day Saint religious educator and author.

Biography

Scharffs was born to Fritz and Louise Scharffs and raised in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS Church). He served as a missionary in the German Mission of the LDS Church in the late 1950s, where he served as editor for publications and later second counselor to the Mission President. In 1959 he was married in the Salt Lake Temple to Laura Virginia Smith, a granddaughter of LDS President Joseph F. Smith. They would have four children, one of which, Brett, would become a legal scholar.

Scharffs received a B.A. in marketing from the University of Utah in the class of 1954, a master's degree in business from New York University, and a Ph.D. in religion from Brigham Young University (BYU) in 1969. His doctoral research was on the history of Mormons in Germany, where Scharffs had served as a missionary, and his dissertation was published by Deseret Book in 1970. Historian Donald Q. Cannon considers Scharffs' dissertation as part of the "major scholarly contribution to the study of Mormon history" that occurred during the 1960s.

For many years Scharffs taught with the Church Educational System (CES). He was on the faculty of the Institute of Religion adjacent to the University of Utah for 27 years, having served as director following Reed C. Durham in 1974. Scharffs also taught at BYU.

Among other callings in the church, Scharffs has served multiple times as a stake missionary, a bishop in the early 1990s, and a counselor in a stake presidency.

Writings

Books

• Issued again in 1989, republished by Bookcraft in 1994.

Scharffs response to The God Makers is also available online at the Foundation for Apologetic Information and Research's website.

Other

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References

Sources

• Template:MormonLit author
• Meridian Magazine bio
• FARMS bio listing
• Millennial Press bio
• Robert C. Freeman and Jon R. Felt. German Saints At War. (Springville, UT: Cedar Fort Inc., 2005) p. xiv
• Daily Herald of Provo article that mentions Scharffs work

External links

• Review of Mormonism in Germany by Douglas F. Tobler, published in BYU Studies