Doctrine and Covenants Study Resources

As we enter 2025, church members’ course of study for Come, Follow Me will move through the Doctrine and Covenants and related episodes in church history. Readers, students, teachers, families, and lesson planners will have a trove of resources at their fingertips. Whether searching for lesser-known anecdotes, current scholarship, or sharpened narratives, readers will find a wealth of information from the Church Historian’s Press and Church History Department that is growing all the time. Here’s a sampling geared especially for studying the Doctrine and Covenants and the founding era of church history.

Doctrine and Covenants Historical Resources

This tool is a good springboard between lessons in Come, Follow Me and related content published by the Church Historian’s Press.

Each lesson is listed with links to chapters in Revelations in Context and Saints, personal biographies, maps and geographic information, chronologies and events, topic articles, and primary sources.

Joseph Smith Papers Reference

The deepest scholarly resource for the Doctrine and Covenants and its development remains the Joseph Smith Papers series. The “Reference” menu item on the website points to biographies on every person mentioned in the revelations, a calendar of documents giving a complete record of original sources for the Doctrine and Covenants, and several featured topics with detailed introductions and explanations. The articles “Sources behind the Doctrine and Covenants,” “Corresponding Section Numbers in Editions of the Doctrine and Covenants,” and “Publishing Joseph Smith’s Revelations” provide a careful look into how Joseph Smith and others produced and developed content for the Doctrine and Covenants, as well as into the publication process for the book and its subsequent editions. Two longer-form articles offer detailed historical introductions to the revelations and Joseph Smith’s role in producing them: “Joseph Smith as Revelator and Translator” and “Joseph Smith–Era Publications of Revelations.”

A quick way to navigate to a section of the Doctrine and Covenants in the Joseph Smith Papers website is to find the section in the “Sources behind the Doctrine and Covenants” list and click on its corresponding document. From there, users can toggle between other versions of the text by using the “Additional Versions” feature. The related “Historical Introduction” section of each of these documents affords some of the most thorough contextual descriptions for the texts of the Doctrine and Covenants found anywhere.

Joseph Smith’s Revelations: A Doctrine and Covenants Study Companion from the Joseph Smith Papers

First published as an ebook in 2016 and updated in 2024, this volume compiles the earliest extant versions of Joseph Smith’s revelations found in the Doctrine and Covenants, along with historical information on each revelation from the Joseph Smith Papers. Readers can download a free version in EPUB format or view the full book online.

Revelations in Context: The Stories behind the Sections of the Doctrine and Covenants

Unlike the Book of Mormon and many parts of the Bible, the Doctrine and Covenants presents no connecting narrative between sections. Readers looking for the scenery and settings for the various sections will find engaging chapters in Revelations in Context that link together the events surrounding the development of the Doctrine and Covenants.

Saints: The Story of the Church of Jesus Christ in the Latter Days

The four Saints volumes offer a broad Latter-day Saint history in a colorful and detailed narrative. Together with Revelations in Context and the Church History Topics series, Saints fleshes out the Doctrine and Covenants for general audiences and advanced readers alike.

Church History Topics

Specific episodes and topics related to the Doctrine and Covenants and early church history receive short encyclopedic treatment in the Church History Topics series. Articles generally draw from current scholarship to present digestible and informational explanations for common questions and subjects.