Life On Gold Plates 2009: Year in Review

It's been a fun, but busy, year between working full time and going to school full time. In case you missed some of my stuff, here's a quick look at the highlights from the past year:

Over the last week LoGP hit the mark of 80,000 visits, which is pretty cool. The peak month was August when I blogged the FAIR conference.

This year I was privileged to rub shoulders with many fine scholars and some of these meetings turned into blog posts. I shared a cab with Jan Shipps, listened to two lectures from Kathleen Flake (one in Boston, the other in Logan), and had a conversational lunch with journalist Krista Tippett. My first guest post ever was provided by Grant Hardy. In collaboration with David Keller and a few other folks I also initiated the Translation Witness Account (TWA) project, which is an effort to gather all of the statements regarding the translation of the Book of Mormon into one location. This is still in process and I have no ETA on the TWA.

I had the opportunity to present a paper for the Society for Mormon Philosophy and Theology on the subject of soteriologial ecumenicism and C.S. Lewis. The paper is currently being peer reviewed by Dialogue, so hopefully it will be published next year. (Dialogue is also publishing a much-improved version of my book review of the Amasa Lyman biography next summer.) I had some left-overs from my C.S. Lewis research to present at the Salt Lake Sunstone symposium on the subject of how Lewis has been employed by Latter-day Saints and what Lewis might have known about the Church.

The antiquarian in me put together a post about the false start of a partial reconstruction of the Nauvoo Temple in the late 60s and the discovery of Hugh Nibley's first known publication (a sketch of a ship, of all things!). After live-blogging my notes of the 2009 FAIR conference I was happy to complete a series on faith and reason with Gregory L. Smith called "Consecrate Your Brain." I also investigated the production or structure of two newer church manuals, the Joseph Smith manual and the new Gospel Principles manual. Above all, it was the year of the book review at Life On Gold Plates. In case you missed one, here they all are:

• Shawn Aaron McCraney, I Was a Born-Again Mormon
• Edward Leo Lyman, Amasa Mason Lyman, Mormon Apostle and Apostate
• Royal Skousen, The Book of Mormon: The Earliest Text
• Michael R. Ash, Of Faith and Reason: 80 Evidences Supporting the Prophet Joseph Smith 
• Abu Hamid al-Ghazali, The Niche of Lights
• Matthew B. Brown, Exploring the Connection Between Mormons and Masons 
• Richard Neitzel Holzapfel, Dana M. Pike, and David Rolph Seely, Jehovah and the World of the Old Testament
• John R. Coats, Original Sinners: A New Interpretation of Genesis 
• Ronald G. Watt, The Mormon Passage of George D. Watt 

Finally, my favorite posts this year. Three particularly stand out as worth reading. Here they are in no particular order:

1. Islam's Hijab [headscarf] and Mormon Garments: On Clothing as Broadcasting.
In this post I talk a little about religious vestments, their visibility, and the religious content clothing can hold. 

2. "In their weakness, after the manner of their language": Joseph Smith's Revelations, Revisions, and Canonization.
Inspired by the Joseph Smith Papers Project, this post talks about the religious authority believers grant to their sacred scriptures. Looking at the recording and adjusting of Joseph Smith's revelations has interesting implications for how Latter-day Saints might understand the "word of God."

3. "The Death of the Old Order": Resurrection, Community, and Identity.
I feel like who I am is largely shaped by my surroundings, the people and places I know. I wonder how we will appear with the backdrop of immortality instead of this lone and dreary world.

Thanks to all the folks who take the time to read this stuff, and especially those who pitch in with advice and comments.

Review: Ronald G. Watt, "The Mormon Passage of George D. Watt"

Title: The Mormon Passage of George D. Watt: First British Convert, Scribe for Zion
Author: Ronald G. Watt
Publisher: Utah State University Press
Genre: Biography
Year: 2009
Pages: 294, index
ISBN13: 9781439102091
Binding: Cloth
Price: 39.95

For over three decades historian Ronald G. Watt has researched and written about the life of his intriguing ancestor, George D. Watt, who is hailed as the first covert to Mormonism in Britain (21). Watt has published a few articles on his ancestor and this new biography extends that work.¹ The book is a simple, chronological overview of George’s life including sketches of his early days in Britain, his conversion to—and missions for—Mormonism, his work in the office of Brigham Young, his plural marriages, and his eventual exclusion to what he called “the category of rejected ones” when he was excommunicated from the Church (247).

George’s childhood in England is sparsely represented in the historical record but Watt traces a reasonable outline by describing the economic and social conditions of England. Upon joining Mormonism George became an ardent advocate of the new religion. During a mission to Edinburgh Watt began to develop the skill of writing in Pitman shorthand. This skill enabled him to take verbatim notes of contemporaneous sermons, meetings, and other events, making him a useful asset to the Church. In Nauvoo he was encouraged by his father-figure Willard Richards to make good use of this shorthand skill. In May 1845, for instance, Watt recorded most of the proceedings at the trial of the accused murderers of Joseph and Hyrum Smith. “Because anti-Mormons feared that the church would use the record for its own purposes,” Watt describes, “they searched those leaving the courthouse daily, including [George]. He thwarted their plan by secretly passing his notes out of a window to friends hourly and thus had no paper on his person when he left the courthouse each day” (51).

The biography contains interesting glimpses of early Church doctrine and practice. For instance, Watt was skeptical of the gifts of tongues and healing amongst elders in Britain. Further, during his mission in England in 1846 Watt advocated the indulgence in a little New Year’s Eve wine at a branch party. William Gibson, president of the branch, objected: “I told them I protested against such a thing & would not sanction it by my presence. Upon that Br Watt said it was a hard thing if men were not to be allowed a little whiskey on New Years day. For his part he could take it or leave it alone” (67). 

In Utah Watt began freelance reporting for the Deseret News, edited by his friend and adopted father Willard Richards. Compensation was not adequately outlined which led to a breach between the men, George feeling underpaid and Richards feeling disrespected as a member of the First Presidency of the Church. Many harsh words were exchanged by letter between the men, but in the end they reconciled. At Richards’s death Watt reported on the funeral, “leaving he remains of one of the best and greatest men that ever trod the earth, to sleep in peace” (135).

Feeling inadequately compensated for his work in the Great Basin recording the sermons of Young and other Church leaders, George had received permission to publish selected sermons in England to sell and make a living. Thus began the Journal of Discourses which remains a critical source on early Mormonism. George also assisted in the development of the Deseret Alphabet, which the leaders of the Church hoped would help Saints of different tongues better communicate and read. Only a few books were published using the new script and it fell completely by the wayside after the death of Brigham Young.

Watt calls George a “man for all seasons,” describing his hobbies in acting, music, writing, and education (188). George participated in many early Utah organizations, often as a clerk. His associations included the Universal Scientific Society, Deseret Theological Institute, Deseret Typographical Association, Musical and Dramatic Company, Deseret Musical Association, and other such groups (188-193). George became an avid reader as well. Pictures of a few of George’s personal sketches round out a discussion of his hobbies and interests. (The book also contains a few useful maps and photographs to facilitate the narrative.)
 
George eventually became employed as one of Brigham Young’s clerks, though the president of the Church often chided him for being absent from the office. Indeed, George was an avid gardener and found himself devoted to the cultivation of fruits, vegetables, and silkworms as often as he was devoted to pencil and paper. Having added several plural wives to his family, who receive much due attention throughout the biography from Watt, George felt he needed better compensation. Young balked at the request leading to a falling out between the men, George storming from the president’s office leaving his papers behind. In the meantime, one of George’s plural wives, a half-sister named Jane who he did not know as a youth, had a falling out and the two divorced (161). George took to business after leaving Young’s employ. After opening a store he opposed the president’s efforts to form Mormon cooperative merchandising outlets to prevent Saints from patronizing gentile establishments. Young had selected George to travel the territory and describe the benefits of home manufacture, especially George’s specialty of silkworm cultivation. Watt describes how George soon “faced several disappointments that drove him away from the course that he had set for himself thirty years earlier. He preached faithfulness to the leaders of the church, but when the final analysis came, he did not always follow his own advice” (224). George began openly opposing Young’s economic policies during the sermons he had been sent to deliver to advocate the policies. When word reached Young he spoke with Watt and cleared up the matter. But soon Watt became attracted to the economic ideas of the Godbeites, a splinter group of former Mormons who advocated laissez-faire economics and spiritualism.

Watt concludes the biography by describing George’s move from Salt Lake City to Kaysville, where he lived in a community that largely viewed him as an apostate and outsider. After the death of Brigham Young, George sought to rejoin the church by writing a long philosophical and theological letter to new church president John Taylor. By then, Watt notes, “his beliefs appear to have rested primarily in Spiritualism and secondarily in Mormonism with science and philosophy interwoven into the fabric of the two” (257). George told Taylor he didn’t understand how a person could be “justly severed from the association of his friends purely on account of a change of conviction and faith if it is his wish still to be associated with them” (259). He wanted to be rebaptized, but wanted Taylor to know the state of his beliefs so he could make the final decision. He hesitated mailing the letter, adding several postscripts, including one which admitted his “mind gradually lost its fixedness” though he still believed there was some truth at the core of Mormonism and wanted to reunite with his former friends of the church. Despite this letter, George would have to wait to be restored to the church by relatives through proxy ordinances after his death (281).

A detailed description of the lives of George’s wives—all of whom remained members of the church following his death and worked together to care for the family—made for a unique conclusion to the biography. “In the final analysis,” Watt writes, “George D. Watt was a unique individual: a product of his time, yet very much his own person” (284). Watt does not spend unnecessary time and space making a history of the Church with interspersed commentary of how George D. Watt fit into the larger picture. Instead, he crafts a narrative that stays focused on George and his family. George, not the church, is the star and focus of the biography, making it a useful contribution to Mormon biography generally.

FOOTNOTES:

[1]
The articles are representative of Watt’s style and approach in the biography. See Ronald G. Watt, "Sailing the Old Ship Zion: The Life of George D. Watt." BYU Studies 18 (Fall 1977): 48-65; "The Beginnings of The Journal of Discourses: A Confrontation Between George D. Watt and Willard Richards," Utah Historical Quarterly 75:2 (Spring 2007): 134-148.

Review: John R. Coats, "Original Sinners: A New Interpretation of Genesis"

Title: Original Sinners: A New Interpretation of Genesis
Author: John R. Coats
Publisher: Free Press
Genre: Religion
Year: 2009
Pages: 237
ISBN13: 9781439102091
Price: 25.00

John R. Coats doesn’t necessarily believe in a historical Garden of Eden but he still believes the Book of Genesis is as relevant today as it ever was. “If you’re alive and breathing and reading this,” he writes, “these stories and their characters have already shaped you, and in greater measure than you might think….Their moral, ethical, and spiritual DNA are embedded in the foundations of our civilization, in our awareness of who we are as a people and as individuals, our best and worst selves” (6). Coats was raised in the Southern Baptist faith, became an Episcopal priest, and left that ministry to become a life-improvement and management adviser. In this book he wishes to bracket the question of scriptural historicity and introduce readers to an alternate way to interpret the text—what he calls “the reflective use of scripture” (5). Whereas some readers regard Genesis as “the history of the world” and others “regard all of it as a silly story with naked people and a talking snake,” Coats takes a “third way…, to read the story as myth and metaphor, a medium for study but also for self-reflection” (23):

I was particularly interested in readers who find themselves in the middle of the modern debate between religious fundamentalists and the new atheists, the marginally religious to the nonreligious who may sense those genetic markers, who are curious about those stories and characters, but want neither to be saved by religion nor saved from it. How does one provide a way into these stories that neither discourages nor requires a religious point of view—that in fact does not require the reader to believe in anything beyond his or her own experience of being human? The answer was to take it entirely as story and metaphor, the characters as the ancient reflections of ourselves, their stories, our stories, mirrors in which to see our best and worst selves (212).

Coats's familiar, conversational writing style weaves personal experiences and historic interpretations into a selective overview of Genesis’s narratives in four sections. He occasionally steps outside of the book of Genesis itself to engage a few other Old Testament narratives, including Jonah, David and Goliath, and Saul and Samuel. Part one, “The Beginning,” features Adam, Eve, Cain, Abel, and Noah. Part two, “The Wanderers,” includes Jonah, Abraham, Sarah, Hagar, Isaac. Part three, “The Blessing Thief,” regards Jacob (Israel ), Esau, Leah, and Rachel. Part four, “The Dream Reader,” concludes the narrative by following the story of Joseph and his brothers. Making liberal use of biblical “Source Theory”¹ he discusses later interpretations of the stories in selections of Jewish midrash, quotes from early Christian Fathers, and the works of contemporary scholars like Karen Armstrong and Harold Bloom.

Depending on the interpreter, different ideas have been extracted from scripture throughout history. Coats seeks to show how the way readers interpret the Fall of Adam and Eve, for example, determines much of how they view themselves. Depending on the source, Eve has been seen as “Inferior-Guilty Eve,” who foolishly caused all of the problems in the world by eating the fruit, making her weak and subordinate to men, or as “Hooker Eve,” the sexual bad girl depiction with the knowing smile and forbidden fruit. Coats finds more meaning in what he calls “Genesis Eve,” the depiction who is “strong, [but] vulnerable, neither apologetic about her womanhood nor tempted to cheapen it. She is carnal, neither afraid of sex nor only about sex. Her partner never says or implies that her sex is inferior to his own, or that she bears more, or less, responsibility for the incident at the tree, or the consequences that enveloped their lives as a result” (22). The Fall is not merely “a onetime occurrence, but an ongoing process” for each of us, when real people confront emotions of “jealousy, greed, stupidity, brilliance, cowardice, bravery, hate, love,” become self-aware, make decisions, and learn to discern right from wrong (2, 16-17).  

Coats says he has been his Abel-like brother and sister’s keeper, but he’s also been their Cain-like killer, figuratively speaking. Thus, Genesis depicts life as a cycle of "falling from grace, regaining it, falling, regaining,” and recognizing this causes the Bible to lose “all purchase as a measure of one’s goodness or badness—loses its tyranny. Instead it shows itself to be a mirror in which to see one’s own humanity, one’s flaws of character, one’s strengths through the lives of the people found in its stories” (2).

Coats recognizes the drawbacks of his interpretive approach. He wonders aloud to the reader whether such a reflective interpretation help readers “to better understand these ancient texts, or am I ascribing meanings that are simply echoes of my own time and life? That is always the risk. Awaiting any attempt at biblical interpretation is the conscious and unconscious imposition of norms prevalent in one’s own time and place, these having become so ordinary, so natural, so obvious, that surely they must have been typical of human culture at all times and in all places” (78). Following Bloom he notes that multiple factors influence our reading, including “family, religion, education, where one was born, and even when one was born” (ibid.). We might entirely miss the point if we allow our preconceived ideas of what the text says dictate our reading. Despite that limitation, Coats embraces a utilitarian view of the scriptures (“I’m all for using what works,” Coats says, “and for me the Bible works well as a resource for mental health—that is, in its role as a repository of human stories that continue to aid my understanding of my own story, the world, and my relationship with others,” p. 60.) After all, “What good are these stories,” he asks, “if we can’t connect with them first at that primal, human level?” (113).

Throughout the book Coats emphasizes that he is not offering the only correct interpretation of a given biblical story, but there are definite moments when he seems to overreach the text. His psychoanalytical speculations about Noah turning into an alcoholic child abuser following the flood seem over the top, for instance (57-66). He admits that after his ordination as a priest he became “something of an iconoclast, with a thirst for shaking things up.” (139). Much of that iconoclasm is carried over into the book. Occasional self-disclosures indicate he is reluctant to proclaim any absolute truth about God, and feels that organized religion generally cannot maintain meaningful inspiration from God (see p. 72, for one example). A few of his self-disclosures may make some readers uncomfortable, including discussion of his acts of adultery during a previous marriage, or his old enraged threats toward a teenage daughter, or his sneaky political maneuverings within church leadership. Moreover, his likening of biblical characters to current situations is mostly projected through a middle-class white American lens. Perhaps readers who cannot relate to those particular experiences might be prompted to seek their own meaning within Genesis, which would make the book worth reading even for those who cannot necessarily relate to a Southern Baptist upbringing or an extra-marital affair. Original Sinners: A New Interpretation of Genesis is worth the read and offers plenty of forbidden fruit for thought. Coats’s easy-flowing dialog makes the often foreign-sounding stories of the book of Genesis seem much more accessible. As Coats notes: “Genesis does not portray every possible human challenge and metamorphosis. But it has more than I, and perhaps you, might have imagined” (213).

FOOTNOTES:

[1]
His brief discussion on source theory, or the Documentary hypothesis, on p. 6. gives a serviceable but simplistic explanation of different contributing authors to the biblical stories. At times he plays a bit fast and loose with the different sources, see p. 28. For an interesting take on the Documentary hypothesis from an LDS perspective, see Kevin L. Barney, “Reflections on the Documentary Hypothesis,” Dialogue: A Journal of Mormon Thought 33, no. 1 (2000): 57-99.

The Logic of Religious Studies and Kathleen Flake

Kathleen Flake’s 2009 Arrington lecture gave a sneak preview of her research for an upcoming book on plural marriage and the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.¹ Flake, associate professor of American religious history at Vanderbilt University, brings a unique list of qualifications to her study by combining elements of law, religious studies, ritual, and the skills of an historian. Using these tools Flake explores what she calls the “priestly logic” of plural marriage, seeking to understand not only how 19th century outsiders viewed the peculiar institution, but how practicing Mormons themselves made sense of it. Flake confines her study to the time period of 1852 (when Orson Pratt first declared the practice publicly) through 1890 when the first "manifesto" was issued by the president of the Church, "officially" ending the practice.² Flake argues that for all the negative reports of plural marriage—both from outside and within the Church—there were also some who flourished under the practice, or at least found a way to make it meaningful for their lives. The institution of marriage itself has not been a static practice and Flake recognizes the shifting opinions regarding the ideal marriage, attempting to contextualize Mormon views within the wider culture. By the 1800s in America marriages were beginning to be entered based on an idea of love rather than being strictly based upon economic or other considerations. Marriage for love became the preference, and then the norm. Flake cites a period poem called "Home" which encapsulates something of the ideal:

  Two birds within one nest;
      Two hearts within one breast;
  Two spirits in one fair
  Firm league of love and prayer,
Together bound for aye, together blest.³

Mormon Polygamy seemed to fly in the face of the Victorian idea of marriage depicted in this poem in practically every respect. Drawing on the accounts of sympathetic non-Mormons, Mormon leaders, and Mormon women who participated in the practice Flake wishes to describe the “priestly logic” of the practice, which involved priesthood, child bearing, family rearing, and kingdom building, all tied together in the ritual act of marriage.

It has been more than a hundred years since the Manifesto officially ended the practice of plural marriage for the LDS Church. Despite this passage of time, plural marriage has remained a large part of the American public’s perception of Mormonism generally. This is in large measure the result of the overwhelming role polygamy played in fictional and polemical literature, as well as political debates in the last half of the 19th century, in addition to Mormon splinter groups who continue living the practice. In what follows I want to briefly discuss a few strengths and weaknesses inherent to Flake’s described approach in order to help evaluate how religious studies can help us understand not only religion of the past, but our “living” religion in the present. This is an effort to turn the hearts of the children to the fathers, and the mothers.

But why talk about it at all? In a recent address to BYU graduates Elder M. Russell Ballard encouraged members not to allow the subject of plural marriage to dominate everyday conversations about the Church. “It’s now 2009,” Ballard stated, “Why are we still talking about it? It was a practice. It ended. We moved on. If people ask you about polygamy, just acknowledge it was once a practice but not now, and that people shouldn’t confuse any polygamists with our Church.” Church members would simply be “reinforcing stereotypes” by wasting their time “trying to justify the practice of polygamy during the Old Testament times or speculating as to why it was practiced for a time in the 19th century.”⁴ Flake described this approach of distancing the Church from current splinter groups in a USA Today article discussing the Church’s handling of plural marriage media coverage in 2008:

The biggest challenge facing the LDS church is not distinguishing their present from the fundamentalist present, but getting people to understand the difference between their past and the current practice of the fundamentalist groups. This initiative, I believe, is their first attempt to do that.⁵

One way to better differentiate past from present is to better illuminate the past. Better historical studies and publications on plural marriage than are currently available would not only alleviate confusion among non-Mormons, but also help Latter-day Saints who are interested in the subject better understand the past practice of plural marriage in their religious heritage.⁶ The subject is mentioned—if only barely—in official Church manuals, never as the focus of an entire lesson.⁷ The publication of an "official view" detailing the history of the plural marriage and the Church is not likely. However, recent academic efforts regarding other aspects of LDS history, including the Mountain Meadows Massacre and the ongoing Joseph Smith Papers Project,are encouraging prospects.⁸ Difficult historical subjects have become the purview of scholars more so than the General Authorities of the Church. Elder Ballard noted the subject of plural marriage—though not the best area for average member speculation—is a legitimate subject "for historians and scholars" to dissect.⁹

To this end, Kathleen Flake’s book The Politics of American Religious Identity: The Seating of Senator Reed Smoot, Mormon Apostle explores the "Mormon compromise" wherein the Church disavowed polygamy in the early 20th century. Elder Dallin H. Oaks lauded the book as the "best thing ever written" on the subject of the transition between the pre- and post-polygamy Church:

I have to say I’ve been a lifetime student and writer of Mormon legal history, at least. I learned many, many things in her book that I didn’t know. She captured it very, very well, and was able to stress also what remained unimpaired by the compromise. Other books have been published, but not in a way that would grab the awareness of the average Mormon.¹⁰

Flake’s general approach has certainly grabbed my awareness. Her background in religious studies makes her especially well-suited to tackle the difficult subject and make some sense of it for contemporary readers. Negative approaches to plural marriage have presented the practice by playing on current sexual mores and emphasizing what is seen to be wrong with the practice. By selecting certain problematic examples and relying on contemporary moral expectations the picture can look quite grim. A wholly positive approach might similarly select material from the historical record that paints the rosiest possible picture to alleviate uncomfortable feelings. Flake seeks a more nuanced and historically rigorous approach. Her current project on plural marriage, as discussed in her Arrington lecture, is an attempt to uncover the “emotional and priestly logic of plural marriage.” Of course, there will be no untainted or “objective” treatment of plural marriage, but Flake explains that her “academic approach tries to understand and explain. It is done out of curiosity and not out of judgment.” Without denying (or directly approaching) the involvement of God, Flake recognizes that religion is not merely something that is believed but is also lived. Religious Studies scholar Robert Orsi has noted that religion “is always religion-in-action, religion-in-relationships between people, between the way the world is and the way people imagine or want it to be.”¹¹ When religion is viewed in this light, different questions must be addressed. Flake’s main concern seems to be to adequately explain what participants in the practice thought they were doing rather than only talking about what we might think of their actions. What did their religion-in-action, or religion-in-relationship mean to them? Orsi says such an approach underscores the “interpretive challenge of the study of lived religion,” that is: “to develop the practice of disciplined attention to people’s signs and practices as they describe, understand, and use them, in the circumstances of their experiences, and to the structures and conditions within which these signs and practices emerge.”¹² Flake’s lecture leaned heavily on the views of women who participated in plural marriage and others who were able to observe polygamous households first-hand. She pays close attention to the prescribed rituals, as well as the perceptions of those who participated in them, to understand the logic of the practice.  

Discovering such logic is much easier said than done, not only because individuals may interpret or experience their religion differently, but because the historical record itself is imperfect and tricky. The researcher must consider and account for potential polemic both praising and demeaning the practice. In many realms of historical studies the available written record has been largely composed by men, skewing the perspective of the researcher by omitting the direct views of women. Fortunately for researchers on Mormon plural marriage, many journals and diaries produced by women have been preserved. It is apparent that even this record is tricky, depending on the perspective of any given writer. According to Flake, works by women like Fanny Stenhouse represent the negative polemic. Still, readers “are rightly sympathetic with the plight of those who struggled in polygamy and many studies focus on these elements.” But Flake wishes to move beyond the perspective of Fanny and those who viewed the practice as she did, asking “what about those who made polygamy seem like a source of human flourishing?” Such examples, she notes, “deserve analysis, too.” In approaching the subject this way she is taking women’s perspectives seriously. Susan Starr Sered has argued that in the past, feminist scholarship has typically offered critiques of patricentric societies by focusing on the oppression of women. “Less is known,” she notes, “about the strategies that women have used to circumvent patriarchal institutions, the techniques women have created for making their own lives meaningful within androcentric culture.”¹³ Such questions transcend a simplistic feminist critique.

In order to recognize such strategies the researcher must pay less attention to contemporary views of the practice and give voice to those who actually participated. Or, as Sered notes:

As scholars learn to shift attention from what men and texts say about women to what women say about themselves, new conceptions of human religious experience begin to emerge.¹⁴

Not only will new understandings of the past come into sharper focus, but religious believers will expand their understanding of their own lived religion. Religion is not an abstract body of specific doctrines, but a fundamental part of how humans view themselves in the world. Such an examination of religion carries the risk of making the sacred profane, like dissecting a dead frog on a school desk. But it also carries the possibility of sacralizing the seemingly profane. “Once we begin looking for religion within the profane world rather than outside of it,” Orsi notes, “we begin to discover realms of religiosity that are not limited to those times, people, places, objects, and events that seem extraordinary; we begin to see religion as potentially interwoven with all other aspects of human existence.”¹⁵

This approach should be particularly appealing to Latter-day Saints, whose religion embodies what Terryl Givens calls the "blending and blurring of sacred and secular categories."¹⁶ This blending was apparently easier and more acceptable for Joseph Smith to execute. Leonard Arrington noted the difficulty of writing religious history for Mormons in words that may resonate with Flake, both of them being committed Mormons:

The professional in us fights against religious naiveté—believing too much. The religionist in us fights against secular naiveté—believing too little. And if this internal warfare weren’t enough, we have a similar two-front war externally—against non-Mormons who think we LDS historians believe too much, and against super-Mormons who think we believe not enough.¹⁷

Much like Arrington, Flake admirably navigates these waters to produce responsible interpretations. Flake’s cautious approach to religious history—her recognition of the “natural” and contextual aspects of religion, her moderate voice, and her attempt to walk the boundary between the purely secular and the purely religious—is a welcome and important addition to Mormon history.¹⁸  

FOOTNOTES:

[1]
See my notes from her address: Kathleen Flake, "The Emotional and Priestly Logic of Plural Marriage," Arrington Mormon History Lecture, Logan, Utah, 1 October 2009. Unless otherwise noted, the quotes from Flake throughout this post are from my personal notes.

[2]
The lot fell to Elder Orson Pratt to deliver the first public announcement of the practice on 29 August 1852. See his discourse, "Celestial Marriage," Journal of Discourses, Liverpool: F. D. and S. W. Richards (1854-1886, 26 vols.), vol. 1, 53-66. It took time for the wheels to stop turning following official announcements to cease the practice. There were a few post-manifesto plural marriages solemnized in the LDS Church until around 1910. See D. Michael Quinn, "LDS Church Authority and New Plural Marriages, 1890-1904," Dialogue: A Journal of Mormon Thought 18 (Spring 1985); Greg L. Smith, “Polygamy/Practiced after the Manifesto,” FAIRwiki.org.

[3]
Dora Greenwell, "Home," Poems, by the author of 'The patience of hope', Alexander Strahan and Co., Edinburgh (1861), 151.

[4]
M. Russell Ballard, "Engaging Without Being Defensive," speech delivered at the Brigham Young University graduation ceremony on 13 August 2009

[5]
Eric Gorski, "Mormons launch campaign to put distance between themselves and polygamists," USA Today, 26 June 2008.

[6]
Even Latter-day Saints who are aware of Joseph Smith’s practice of plural marriage still tend to perpetuate erroneous reasons for the practice, including the implication that there were more women than men in the Church or that Mormon widows simply needed help crossing the plains after being expelled from Illinois.

[7]
For an overview of how each current official teaching manual of the LDS Church treats plural marriage, see Blair Dee Hodges, “Plural Marriage as Discussed in the Church Today,” 20 August 2008, LifeOnGoldPlates.com.

[8]
Ronald W. Walker, Richard E. Turley, Glen M. Leonard, Massacre at Mountain Meadows, Oxford University Press (2008). The subject was also approached in the Church's official magazine. See Richard E. Turley Jr., “The Mountain Meadows Massacre,” Ensign, Sep. 2007, 14–21. On the Joseph Smith Papers project see http://josephsmithpapers.org.

[9]
Ballard, ibid. In the past, Mormon leaders such as Orson and Parley P. Pratt, B.H. Roberts, and Joseph Fielding Smith have spear-headed historical or doctrinal treatments on the Church. This role has decreased over time. Currently, Elder Marlin K. Jensen of the First Quorum of the Seventy serves as Church Historian and Recorder.

[10]
See "Elder Oaks Interview Transcript from PBS Documentary," newsroom.lds.org, 20 July 2007. Other works that might have escaped the attention of the average (American) Mormon include B. Carmon Hardy Solemn Covenant: The Mormon Polygamous Passage, University of Illinois Press (1992); Doing The Works of Abraham: Mormon Polygamy: Its Origin, Practice, and Demise, Arthur H. Clark Company (2007), Richard S. Van Wagoner, Mormon Polygamy: A History, Signature Books (1992), Kathryn Daynes, More Wives Than One: Transformation of the Mormon Marriage System 1840-1910, University of Illinois Press (2008). Martha Sonntag Bradley has written a useful bibliographic essay on LDS plural marriage studies. See "Out of the Closet and Into the Fire: The New Mormon Historians Take on Polygamy," in Excavating Mormon Pasts: The New Historiography of the Last Half Century, Kofford Books (2006), 303-322.

[11]
Robert A. Orsi, “Is the Study of Lived Religion Irrelevant to the World We Live In?” Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion, vol. 42, no. 2 (June 2003), pp. 169-174.

[12]
Orsi, 172.

[13]
Susan Starr Sered, Women As Ritual Experts: The Religious Lives of Elderly Jewish Women in Jerusalem, Oxford University Press (1996), 6.

[14]
Sered, 141.

[15]
Sered, 140.

[16]
Terryl Givens, "The Paradoxes of Mormon Culture," BYU Studies vol. 46, no. 2 (2007): 191-192. Givens explores this theme in-depth in his book People of Paradox: A History of Mormon Culture, Oxford University Press (2007). Brigham Young particularly appreciated this blurring: “When I saw Joseph Smith, he took heaven, figuratively speaking, and brought it down to earth; and he took the earth and brought it up, and opened up, in plainness and simplicity, the things of God; and that is the beauty of his mission,” Journal of Discourses, Liverpool: F. D. and S. W. Richards (1854-1886, 26 vols.), vol. 5, p. 332.

[17]
Leonard J. Arrington, “Reflections on the Founding and Purpose of the Mormon History Association, 1965-1983,” Journal of Mormon History 10 (1983): 101.

[18]
This particular description of Flake’s work parallels the description of Leonard J. Arrington’s in Ronald W. Walker, David J. Whittaker, James B. Allen, Mormon History, University of Illinois Press (2001), p. 64.

The Fall of Relationships, part 2

Part 2 of 2 
(In part 1 we left off with a conversation between Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden from John Milton's Paradise Lost, book IX. Eve was arguing that the two should separate for a short time in order to better dress the garden while Adam is against the idea.)

Eve has just questioned Adam's belief that the two of them need to stay together in order to best overcome temptation. Adam responds to Eve’s questioning the need to be together by invoking a third party in the relationship: what God advises or creates need not be questioned: “best are all things as the will / Of God ordain’d them,” (343-344). In the Genesis account God says “it is not good for man to be alone,”¹²  and one of the reasons seems to be recognized implicitly by Milton—in addition to the need for general companionship they can also keep each other safe from temptation: “Not then mistrust, but tender love enjoins / That I should mind thee oft, and mind thou me” (37-38).¹³ As it turns out, close proximity can also be the very impetus for succumbing to temptation. Adam explains the true danger lies within the individual when one’s reason is tricked and the individual’s will follows the misguided reason, as will occur when the snake convinces Eve that partaking of the fruit is a good thing. Adam urges Eve not to seek temptation because surely it will find them. Ultimately, though, he relents with a poignant line: “Go; for thy stay, not free, absents thee more” (372). The concept of relationship is again invoked implicitly—the virtuous and happy relationship is the one freely chosen by each party in the face of a real alternative, or opposition. After the fall Adam will decry the idea of forcing compliance.¹⁴ That same idea of freely chosen interdependence is shown in his allowing Eve to separate from him. It also seems to reflect the attitude of God in placing them in the Garden with the possibility of a fall, as noted above. If they did not choose to remain in the Garden with Him, their inability to do otherwise would “absent them more.”

Eve reassures Adam by saying that the enemy wouldn’t seek her first anyway because that would be a very weak victory. This excuse hints that Eve is not yet seeing them as a pair—or at least she is no longer seeing them as such at this point. (Or  If the foe’s goal is to get Adam, he could use Eve. It seems she doesn’t realize that her fall will virtually necessitate Adam’s, based on their relationship.¹⁵ “Thus saying,” the moment of fracture is made physical, “from her Husband’s hand her hand / Soft she withdrew” (385-386).¹⁶  There is irony in her having companionship with the serpent, conversing, and even submitting to him: “Lead then,” Eve tells the serpent to show her the tree—a command to be led! (631). Throughout their conversation Adam is not brought up; Eve acts alone and the relationship is further fractured as she decides without Adam and misses her noon lunch date with him (739). She goes as far as bowing at (and to) the tree which she appears to worship (800). Meanwhile, while Eve hasn’t been thinking of Adam he has been thinking much of her while making her a garland of flowers (so much for getting more “work” done, 840). Eve says the fruit is now her “Best guide.” It isn’t until this point that her thoughts recall the relationships between her, God and Adam. Her choice was individual. Perhaps God didn’t notice, she hopes, “But to Adam in what sort shall I appear?” (816-817). She thinks of their relationship, believing perhaps now it will not be more equal, but that she may now be superior. Evidently she misunderstood the power she already held in the relationship—after all, Adam had relented to her request to work alone and clearly possessed much love for her. Her feelings of formerly being subordinate are pronounced as she feels a surge of power and superiority. In reality it seems she has upset the balance between her and Adam under God. The relationship is completely fractured, but oddly she clings to it more now than before, fearing she will be replaced. She resolves that “Adam shall share with me in bliss or woe: / So dear I love him” (831-832). 

Adam seeks her and finds her by the tree where she explains the serpent’s words and admits that she ate. She seeks to repair the relationship by offering him the fruit, “Thou therefore also taste, that equal lot / May join us” (881-882). As Adam noted earlier, problems (or sin) will occur when one’s reason is misled, and this is how Eve fell. Adam, on the other hand, makes the choice with his eyes wide open. Speaking to himself  he says: “How art thou lost, how on a sudden lost,…/ And mee with thee hath ruin’d, for with thee / Certain my resolution is to Die; / How can I live without thee” (900, 906-908). Adam is internally committed to the relationship, but this commitment strains his relationship with God because he places his being together with Eve above God’s strict injunction to refrain from eating the fruit. Adam tries to console or reassure Eve; maybe the serpent ate first and will get all the blame, maybe God will forgo destroying us so the Adversary won’t mock his evident failure. “However I with thee have fixt my Lot…/ Our State cannot be sever’d, we are as one, / One Flesh; to lose thee were to lose myself” (958-959). This can be understood literally, if Adam really views his true self as consisting of a relationship with Eve then he cannot be “himself” without the other part. But this fractures the relationship between him and God—as noted, this is the moment of Adam’s greatest sin and greatest nobility at once.

The severance of Adam from God seals him to Eve spiritually, and now physically as they embrace (990). They also do more than embrace, and when it is over the changes have begun to take a more physically discernible effect. They are naked and ashamed, they cover themselves with fig leaves (as Adam instructs Eve), they realize the relationship between them and God is fractured, and the blaming begins. In fact, Book IX ends with unproductive accusations and bad attitudes manifesting “Anger, Hate, Mistrust, Suspicion, Discord” and other fall-related emotions (1123-1124). The relationship of Adam and Eve is fractured once more. “Thus they in mutual accusation spent / The fruitless  hours, but neither self-condemning, / And of their vain contest appear’d no end” (1186-1189). Vain because it was self-centered as well as useless in terms of affecting resolution. This new conflict sets up the need for the reconciliation that will come through the rest of the epic. When the Son shows up to make them account for their actions, Milton again invokes the relationships: “Love was not in their looks, either to God / Or to each other” (Book X:111-112). The relationships need healing, but in order for that to happen the cycle of blame needs to be broken; someone needs to absorb or assume it in order to make it stop. After the punishments are doled out (Eve to have sorrow and pain in childbirth, Adam to earn bread by the sweat of his brow, the sentence of death upon them and their seed), the couple separates without discussion this time.

Adam’s anger seems fleeting and he is depicted as mentally accepting blame for the situation. The fault is “On mee, mee only” (832). When Eve comes to find him laying in his agony he turns against her in a rage, calling her “thou Serpent” (Book X:867). This is when Eve makes the heroic move, throwing herself at Adam’s feet, breaking the cycle of blame with the same words Adam had heard in his mind: “mee mee only” (936).¹⁷ Only her acceptance of the fault is offered vocally to Adam. She is the heroic martyr who shows tremendous patience by overlooking Adam’s massively misogynistic tirade, and begging him: “Between us two let there be peace” (924). This is a pathetic victory, a humiliating victory at the feet of another person, begging for reconciliation. One of Eve’s most admirable actions follows one of Adam’s worst. He relents and proclaims her “frailty and infirmer sex forgiv’n,” although Eve was the one with the strength and courage to fall at his feet and effect the resolution of the relationship! The relationship is repaired and it isn’t until that time that they are ready to repair the relationship with God again. Falling prostrate on the ground, as Eve had done to Adam earlier, “both confess’d / Humbly their faults, and pardon begg’d, with tears / Watering the ground” (1100-1102). God had likewise already been seeking reconciliation of the relationship, not only by sending the Son, but through “Prevenient grace,” which had descended from God to assist Adam and Eve in their repentance. Milton's depiction of the fall built around and through relationships, with each partner intimately effected by and effecting the others, is a fascinating approach to the paradigmatic Fall of Adam and Eve. ¹⁸

FOOTNOTES:

[1]
Genesis 2:18. The image is Michael Burgesse's engraving for Book 12, "Michael expels Adam & Eve; the Cherubim take their stations to guard Paradise." This engraving is from the 1688 folio edition of Paradise Lost, the first with illustrations. See Milton Texts at Emory University. 

[13]
Multiple senses of “mind” are possible here and the reader is left to take their pick of exactly which sense applies where—“mind” as in obey, or watch over, or be mindful of, etc.

[14]
“…what could I do more? / I warned thee, I admonished thee, foretold / The danger, and the lurking enemy / That lay in wait; beyond this had been force, / And force upon free will hath here no place,” (Book IX:1170-1173).

[15]
One might also ask if Eve was being completely sincere here, believing herself a lesser “prize” to the adversary than Satan. Is she naive? Is she representing what Milton believed true womanhood should represent? Is she flattering Adam?

[16]
This break contrasts with their later embrace in the Garden after they have partaken of the fruit when “There they their fill of love and love’s disport / Took largely,” (Book IX:990, 1042-1043), and their final hand-holding at the conclusion: “The world was all before them, where to choose / Their place of rest, and providence their guide: / They hand in hand with wandering steps and sow, / Through Eden took their solitary way,” (Book XII: 646-649).

[17]
Compare this to her earlier “austere composure” in response to Adam’s apparent insensitivity in Book IX:272.

[18]
“Thus they in lowliest plight repentant stood / Praying, for from the mercy-seat above / Prevenient grace descending had removed / The stony from their hearts…” Book XI:3. Part of this grace could include the sending of messengers to instruct the couple prior to the fall, the initial warnings about the foe.

Milton's Fall of Adam and Eve as the Fall of Relationships

Part 1 of 2
John Milton's Paradise Lost creatively recasts the story of Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden, the War in Heaven, and the promised redemption of humankind. In this paper I explore the conversations and personal speeches between Adam and Eve in books IX and X. These exchanges seem to depict the Fall as being built around relationships. The "relational Fall" of Adam and Eve took place within the context of at least four relationships, each of which alternately fracture and repair (1- Adam and Eve, 2- Adam and God, 3- Eve and God, 4- Eve, Adam, and God). At the outset of book IX when Milton invokes his muse and describes his literary efforts in writing the epic he laments that “the better fortitude of Patience and Heroic martyrdom” are often “unsung” in the great and popular epics. Paradise Lost can be seen as Milton's attempt to depict better examples of an heroic martyrdom—those which serve to repair broken relationships.¹ The heroic moments include the Son’s volunteering to take upon himself the sins of man, and on a lesser scale, Adam’s decision to partake of the fruit to remain with Eve and Eve’s throwing herself at the feet of Adam to ask forgiveness, she being the first to take personal responsibility for the trouble.²

In Book IX Adam and Eve are preparing to begin their daily work in Paradise.³ A conversation takes place in which Eve suggests they separate from each other for a while and Adam argues they ought to stay together. Their exchange reveals important aspects of their relationship which are later related to their respective and collective falls.

Eve feels they have more work than they can handle. By working separately they will accomplish more because they won’t be distracted by each other’s beauty or conversation (220-225).⁴ Adam responds that her idea is good and that it becomes her as a woman—she should be expected to promote good acts in her husband (234).⁵ Nevertheless, Adam says her reasoning for their separation is not sufficient: “Yet not so strictly hath our Lord impos’d / Labour.” God doesn’t mind their getting refreshment, “whether food, or talk between, / Food of the mind, or this sweet intercourse,” (235-238). The couple was created to be together and enjoy life in a relationship. Despite his misgivings, Adam begins to capitulate with an element of foreshadowing: “But if much converse perhaps Thee satiate, to short absence I could yield” (246-247). If she has already had her fill of conversation for the present it might be fine to take a break from each other. Of course, Eve proved more hungry than Adam expected. She later satiated her hunger in a conversation with a serpent and again by partaking of the apple (instances of “food” and “talk between” that Adam had mentioned above). Adam offers another reason they should stay together: according to Milton’s story they had earlier been warned of a certain foe who would try to spoil things for them and suggests that when they are together they are stronger against assault. Any adversary would be “Hopeless to circumvent us joined, where each / To other speedy aid might lend at need” (259-260). Adam seems to imply it is the aspect of relationship that will be the focus of the foe’s attack: “Whether his first design be to withdraw / Our fealty from God, or to disturb / Conjugal love…” (261-263). Ultimately the foe’s design includes each of those relationships.

Although Adam concludes his argument with a hint of chauvinism to discourage the separation,⁶ Eve’s response is restrained because she loves Adam and chooses to overlook his seeming unkindness.⁷ This trait of Eve’s will appear again in a more serious situation after she finds Adam lying on the ground in his misery once they both have partaken of the fruit and he angrily rebuffs her. But in this instance she maintains an “austere composure”(272). She is surprised to hear that Adam doubts her firmness to God and him—again emphasizing relationships. His fear that the foe could mislead her reveals his fear that her faith and love could be shaken or seduced by fraud. How, she asks, could he think that of her? Adam senses her hurt feelings and seeks to repair the breach. Throughout this conversation each person attempts to properly defer to the other. Perhaps this is why it takes several exchanges before the decision to separate temporarily is made, and why the ultimate decision does not seem like the most logical outcome of those exchanges. Adam tells Eve that the actual tempting would be an affront to her and would dishonor her (297). Besides, the foe is more likely to go after him first so he needs Eve nearby to strengthen him. (Is he being condescending?) And as she strengthens him, he notes that he can likewise strengthen her. This seems to be a pretty equal situation where they help each other. His advice, he being the “head” of the relationship, is spoken out of “care and Matrimonial love” (318-319). Their safest resort is in the context of relationship. Soon their relationship will be connected directly with their individual falls as well as their fall as a couple from God and the Garden.

Eve is not persuaded and tells Adam their state is pretty sorry if they have to be connected at the hip all the time (or at the ribs?). Besides, the foe would only dishonor himself, and his failed attempt would only serve to make Adam and Eve look all the better: “By us? who rather double honor gain” (332). If they can’t stand on their own, they have been created too weak by their Maker: “Let us not then suspect our happy State / Left so imperfect by our Maker wise, / As not secure to single or combin’d. / Frail is our happiness if this be so, / And Eden were no Eden” (337-340). Their faith, love and virtue are better if tried and proven true. For Milton, there is no true virtue if it is not truly tried and proved virtuous. In Milton’s Areopagitica he wrote in opposition to the pre-censorship of literature in England.⁸ Such censorship would make virtue meaningless: “If every action which is good or evil in man at ripe years were to be under…compulsion, what were virtue but a name?” Those who complain about God “suffering Adam to transgress” are “Foolish tongues! [W]hen God gave him reason, he gave him freedom to choose.” Otherwise, he would have been “a mere artificial Adam” in a puppet show.⁹ “We ourselves esteem not that of obedience, or love, or gift, which is of force; God therefore left him free."¹⁰ In a way, Eve is right when she says that if they are not as secure separately their happiness is “frail,” but she is incorrect in thinking such a circumstance could not be an Eden. Her attitude of not seeming to care about their current separation stands in stark contrast to her later horror at the thought of separation after she had partaken of the fruit. She realizes she will die: “then I shall be no more, / And Adam wedded to another Eve, / Shall live with her enjoying, I extinct; / A death to think” (827-830). Is it weak for Eve to want so badly to be with Adam? Her statement that “Eden were no Eden” if it is built on such interdependence stands in sharp contrast to the internal Eden, or the Eden of their relationship Eve later prefers, as I will discuss below. As Adam and Eve are being led out of the Garden, Eve tells Adam to “lead on; / In me is no delay; with thee to go, / Is to stay here [in Eden]; without thee here to stay, / Is to go hence unwilling,” (Book XII:614-617).¹¹

But they are not to that point yet. The pre-lapsarian argument about separating continues in the next post.

FOOTNOTES:

[1]
This post is the rough draft of a paper I wrote for English 5721 ("Milton") at the University of Utah. The notion of Eve’s action as representing a sort of “heroic martyrdom” is from Daniel W. Doerksen, "Let There be Peace": Eve as Redemptive Peacemaker in Paradise Lost, Book X," Milton Quarterly 31.4 (1997) 124-130. Professor Barry Weller qualified Doerksen’s claim, stating that Eve’s action was certainly illustrative of self-sacrifice but questions whether it qualifies as “martyrdom.” For him, depicting Eve’s action as an instance of heroic martyrdom seems hyperbolic. Instead, Milton uses the phrase to anticipate the sufferings of Christ more specifically. Nevertheless, Weller noted, “it is at least worth emphasizing that the admirable—even the partially admirable—actions of the poem entail a disregard of one’s own immediate interests,” (personal communication, 2 December 2009). This paper is focused on Paradise Lost. Only peripheral attention is given to some of Milton's other writings and none to that of his contemporaries. The image is Gustave Doré (1832 – 1883), Adam and Eve Driven out of Eden.

[2]
Eve's actions are especially noteworthy considering the circumstances. Milton depicted her decision to partake of the fruit as being the result of true deception by the serpent whereas Adam made a willful and knowing decision. In this sense it can be argued that Eve is actually less "blameworthy" than Adam, but nevertheless is the first to try to repair their broken relationship.

[3]
Depicting Adam and Eve's actions in the Garden as including work is interesting since the Biblical account doesn’t depict much work prior to the Fall, unless one counts Adam’s naming of the animals or God’s creation of Eve.

[4]
Eve tells Adam: “For while so near each other thus all day / Our task we choose, what wonder if so near / Looks intervene and smiles, or object new / Casual discourse draw on, which intermits / Our day’s work brought to little, though begun / Early, and the hour of supper comes unearned” (Book IX:220-225).

[5]
At first blush, Adam’s response to Eve seems a condescending and sexist. The reader may keep in mind Adam is being utterly sincere.

[6]
“…leave not the faithful side / That gave thee being, still shades thee and protects. / The wife, where danger or dishonor lurks, / Safest and seemliest by her husband stays, / Who guards her, or with her the worst endures” (266-269).

[7]
Already before the Fall it seems there are some tempting situations where blissful relationship could be threatened. After Adam concludes, Milton prefaces Eve’s response by describing her mindset: “To whom the virgin majesty of Eve, / As one who loves, and some unkindness meets, / With sweet austere composure thus replied” (270-272).

[8]
England's Licensing Order of 1643 reinstated pre-publication censorship whereby any publication had to be approved and authorized before being published. Milton wrote in opposition to this rule, though he evidently still supported the outright censorship of Catholic literature as well as post-publication censorship. See John Milton, author, Stephen Orgel, Jonathan Goldberg eds., The Major Works (Oxford World's Classics), Oxford University Press (2003), p. 821-822.

[9]
John Milton, “Areopagitica,” ibid., p. 252.

[10]
Milton, ibid., p. 252.

[11]
This re-defining of Eden is also described to Adam by Michael the archangel. While Eve is sleeping, Michael gives Adam an overview of the future of his seed and promises the hope of a Redeemer, saying: “then wilt thou not be loath / To leave this Paradise, but shalt possess / A paradise within thee, happier far,” Book XII:587.

"The Death of the Old Order": Resurrection, Community, and Identity

 Every few months someone stands up in Fast and Testimony meeting to express their gratitude for their spouse who they say has made them who they are today. In the past I have interpreted this by default to mean "I really love my spouse." But lately I've thought about the phrase more literally. I have realized more and more that who I am, my identity itself, is wrapped up tightly with my own spouse, my friends, my work associates, the community and country I live in, and the Church I belong to. I like to feel independent and largely self-determined. I like to act, but I have realized I am also "acted upon," for good and ill (2 Nephi 2: 13-14).

The revelations of Joseph Smith talk about what I've understood as eternal individuality. You and me are one of many eternal "intelligences":

Man was also in the beginning with God. Intelligence, or the light of truth, was not created or made, neither indeed can be (D&C 93:29).

The revelations discuss what seems like eternal community, past and future: 

Now the Lord had shown unto me, Abraham, the intelligences that were organized before the world was; and among all these there were many of the noble and great ones... (Abraham 3:22).

And that same sociality which exists among us here will exist among us there, only it will be coupled with eternal glory, which glory we do not now enjoy" (D&C 130:2).

I'm considering the relationship between individuality and community and how one affects the other. Depending on the approach to the question and the tools used to assess it, we might arrive at different conclusions. An evolutionary biologist may see things differently than a clinical psychologist or a cultural anthropologist or a prophet of God. Right now I want to focus on how environment and community affect individuality, and I am taking it for granted that such is the case. In Fahreed Zakaria's book The Post-American World he talks about the effects of globalization. With better means of transportation and communication the world is shrinking in new ways. Signs of "westernization" are seen in countries all over the world. In Japan we might stop in at McDonald's or Starbucks, we'll hear Michael Jackson songs playing in stores. Some are seeing signs of the "death of the old order" with the rise of what Zakaria calls "mass culture." McDonald's, blue jeans and rock music are crowding out older ways of eating, dressing and singing. Zakaria notes there are still very distinctive differences in culture despite the increasing similarities, though Japan may seem to some like “another prosperous and modern Western country with some interesting quirks”¹. A full fourth of the world can speak and understand English on some level. Zakaria wonders whether a common language makes people think in similar ways.

All this is to say the proximity and accessibility leads to interchange of ideas, products, hairstyles, goals and desires. All of this change worries the status quo: “We have left the past behind and there is an underlying unease that there will be nothing left of us which is part of the old." Zakaria recognizes that many values are slower to change. Nevertheless, "in general, and over time, growing wealth and individual opportunity does produce a social transformation. Modernization brings about some form of women’s liberation. It overturns the hierarchy of age, religion, tradition, and feudal order. And all of this [thus far] makes societies look more and more like those in Europe and North America."²

People throughout the world not only help to shape but are shaped by the individuals around them and the larger communities of which they are a part. How does this idea of change affect the LDS views of individual intelligences and the continuation of sociality in the (anachronistically-called) afterlife? Will the very makeup of "degrees of glory" and those of whom those degrees are comprised provide such a different backdrop so as to change our very identities? The possibility of losing parts of our identity we currently consider important, maybe even fundamental. I've already seen some of this sloughing off occur in myself when I think back to who I was in High School and how the circumstances affected who I was. When I consider how much my surroundings, including those I love, affect who I am I can't help but wonder about who I will be in eternity. In certain ways the very act of resurrection will cause us to lose parts of ourselves, though I'm inclined to think it will be for the better. Suddenly, Eric Clapton's song became much more interesting to me.

Would you know my name
if i saw you in heaven?
Would it be the same
if i saw you in heaven?

FOOTNOTES:

[1]
Fahreed Zakaria, The Post-American World, W.W. Norton & Co. (2008), p. 79. 

[2]
Zakaria, pp. 80-81.

[3]
Image: Sam Brown, "it's much less crowded on the inside" 24 April 2007, Exploding Dog Comics.

Review: "Jehovah and the World of the Old Testament"

Title: Jehovah and the World of the Old Testament
Authors: Richard Neitzel Holzapfel, Dana M. Pike, and David Rolph Seely
Publisher: Deseret Book
Genre: Old Testament/Criticism, Interpretation
Year Published: 2009
Number of Pages: 397
ISBN13: 9781606411360
Price: $45.95

Every fourth year the Sunday School curriculum covers the enigmatic books of the Old Testament. Official Church manuals generally take a homiletic approach, emphasizing lessons from the scriptures for members to apply in their daily lives. This method has the benefit of making the Old Testament more accessible to contemporary Latter-day Saints in terms of practical gospel living, but the drawback of overlooking its complex historical and cultural context. This can be especially problematic when the focus of study includes far-removed stories involving murder, a global flood, parting seas, God-directed plagues and literal fire from heaven. Moreover, official LDS publications generally shy away from the more problematic aspects of the text as described in academic analysis. This is one reason Deseret Book’s new volume Jehovah and the World of the Old Testament is so useful. Church manuals generally do not encourage the use of outside sources during Sunday School lessons. The Old Testament manual encourages teachers to be “judicious” in their use of “commentaries and other nonscriptural sources of information.”¹ This direction carries both positive and negative side-effects, and it does not prevent the Deseret Book catalog from catering to Church curriculum each year. Though it may not be entirely appropriate for an average Sunday School lesson, this book has the potential to richly benefit many LDS students and teachers.

This beautiful volume is a large and graphically-rich introduction to the world of the Old Testament from an accessible academic perspective. Authors Richard Neitzel Holzapfel, Dana M. Pike, and David Rolph Seely did not attempt to write a traditional commentary of Old Testament doctrine or a comprehensive survey of daily life in ancient Israel. Instead, their work "introduces and helps illuminate the Old Testament in its ancient Israelite and broader ancient Near Eastern world" (Jehovah and the World of the Old Testament, p. 2). By making extensive use of the past two centuries of ancient Near East scholarship they examine two different “worlds” of the Old Testament. First: “the world within the Old Testament,” which includes the practices and beliefs outlined by the text itself. Second: the “historical world,” which included the Old Testament within it, “where political, social, and cultural connections and tensions developed among the Israelites and between the Israelites and their neighbors” (ibid.). Rather than shoe-horning the Old Testament into a Latter-day Saint paradigm or using it simply to teach some moral principles, the authors contextualize the narrative in history, drawing upon archeology, anthropology, and source criticism.² 

The format of the book is virtually identical to its predecessor, Jesus Christ and the World of the New Testament.³ The chapters consist of summary narratives of biblical text interwoven with information and explanations of the cultural setting. Nearly every page includes beautiful photographs, original paintings,⁴ or an informative sidebar discussion. Cultural similarities are especially interesting to the authors, who draw comparisons to ancient Near East neighbors of the Israelites. The much-maligned Philistines are brought into sharper focus than the often-polemical Old Testament depiction allows. I was particularly struck by a small Philistine clay figurine of a woman mourning, her hands held together atop her head (244). The picture accompanies a discussion on Ancient Near Eastern signs of mourning and distress, shedding light on the meaning behind unfamiliar things like sackcloth, putting dust or ashes on one’s head, and the rending of clothing. All of this accompanies a thoughtful discussion of the Book of Job and the problem of evil, or why God allows suffering. Other Job-like stories from ancient Babylonian wisdom texts are described in another sidebar, humanizing the Israelite’s neighbors while describing their similarities and differences. Special sections of the book deal with specific topics like the Egyptians, Canaanites, Assyrians, Babylonians, Persians, Abrahamic Covenant, Mosaic Covenant, Temple ritual, animal sacrifice, Solomon’s Temple, the Dead Sea Scrolls, Jewish ritual and holidays, the development of writing and the alphabet, Old Testament archaeology, and the story of how its books became canonized. 

The authors carefully navigate issues that may be sensitive for some Latter-day Saint readers, including theories on the textual development of the Old Testament and the implications the Joseph Smith Translation has on the Bible. They point out that Joseph Smith’s textual interaction was not mainly a restoration of lost Hebrew text, but an inspired commentary from a modern prophet’s perspective to help illuminate otherwise difficult or unclear passages. They also briefly discuss the implications of the Documentary Hypothesis, which holds that later redactors either wrote or heavily edited the five books of Moses, imposing certain views onto earlier Israelite history. Granted, many readers already familiar with these issues will likely find the treatment too brief, but the fact that a discussion is included at all is exciting, especially in a volume published by Deseret Book.⁵ A few instances where the text has implications upon the Book of Mormon are also included, including a profile of Lehi in contrast to his contemporary Jerusalem prophets before Jerusalem’s destruction (327-328). Frequent discussions of historicity and the nature of ancient record keeping will give readers more realistic expectations of the text. The authors explain: “None of these narratives tells the complete story, and there is always more we wish we knew. The authors and redactors consciously selected, emphasized, and arranged their materials in a particular way for a reason, generally theological” (172). This might seem obvious to some readers, but I believe many Latter-day Saints would benefit from a more realistic understanding of the Old Testament as described by these authors. They spend a good deal of time discussing the kind of "history" readers should expect, which obviously differs both from modern academic standards and popular conceptions of what “history” is. The discussion on the various names of God may be surprising to some readers as the authors demonstrate how “Elohim” and “Jehovah” function as titles rather than the precise names for the Father and the Son as has become the general practice of Latter-day Saints (16-19). The authors are careful to point out whenever they are relying on what they call “a Restoration reading,” or an interpretation of a scripture that is uniquely Latter-day Saint (such as the meaning of Ezekiel’s “stick of Ephraim, p. 346) or uniquely Christian (such as Isaiah’s prophecy that “a virgin shall conceive,” referring to a more contemporary circumstance, and foreshadowing the birth of Christ, pp. 296-297).

Frankly, there is too much excellent information in this book to hope to include in a short review (Goliath was likely shorter than what the King James Version claims? See p. 199). The approach of the book is expansive. It treats an astounding amount of information in a remarkably brief number of pages. However, this format also leads to a few drawbacks. For the sake of brevity the authors occasionally move too fast, leaving me hungry for more but without good advice on where to get it. This is understandable, but a few “for further reading” recommendations in the footnotes would have been useful. In fact, there are no footnotes. References are cited in the text. Again, this is understandable since the book is crafted for general readership. At times, the brevity leads the authors to side-step sticky issues without fuller treatment. Horrible death-by-fire as related in the book of Numbers is almost humorously referred to as “a swift object lesson” for Israelites who rejected Moses (130). Noah’s flood is treated in less than a page without mention of different theories of its scope—worldwide or local (28). The authors get bonus points for including information on other flood stories that might have influenced the Noah account, however, including the so-called Gilgamesh Epic (27). Similar discussions introduce readers to the Babylonian creation epic (22), Hammurabi’s code and the Law of Moses (97-98), and the Wisdom literature of Proverbs and Ecclesiastes, which parallels aphorisms of other ancient Near Eastern groups (238). Understanding the culture of the Old Testament will help readers better understand the Old Testament. It is refreshing to see such an academic, attractive, accessible book published by Deseret Book. Understanding the culture of the Old Testament helps readers better understand the Old Testament. It is refreshing to see an academic, attractive, accessible book for average readers published by Deseret Book. 

FOOTNOTES:

[1]
“Helps for the Teacher,” Old Testament Gospel Doctrine Teacher’s Manual, p. v directs teachers as follows: “During class, keep discussions focused on the scriptures. Be judicious in your use of commentaries and other nonscriptural sources of information. Class members should be taught to seek knowledge and inspiration from the scriptures and the words of the latter-day prophets.”

[2]
Strictly speaking, the volume is clearly written through a Christian or Latter-day Saint paradigm, but the authors are conscious of other perspectives on the text generally and give readers a general understanding of several lenses.

[3]
Richard Neitzel Holzapfel, Thomas A. Wayment, Eric D. Huntsman, Jesus Christ and the World of the New Testament (Deseret Book, 2006).

[4]
Many of the paintings were painted by Balage Balogh and were specifically commissioned for this volume. Attention to historical accuracy and detail was important, right down to the dark red blood smeared on temple alters.

[5]
Issues like the Documentary Hypothesis have been discussed in LDS publications elsewhere, including articles in the FARMS Review and Dialogue. One especially useful treatment is Kevin L. Barney, “Reflections on the Documentary Hypothesis,” Dialogue: a Journal of Mormon Thought, Vol. 33 No. 1, Spring 2000: 57-99.

Amasa M. Lyman's Dundee Sermon: "Nature of the Mission of Jesus"

B.H. Roberts believed apostle Amasa M. Lyman was "doubtless the most persuasive and forceful speaker in the church” during his prime.¹ Unfortunately for Lyman, one particular sermon garnered enough attention from his fellow apostles to eventually lead to Lyman's estrangement from that Quorum, and ultimately, to excommunication.

The 1862 sermon on the atonement of Christ was delivered at Dundee, Scotland and was published in the Latter-day Saints' Millennial Star. Perhaps its seemingly innocuous message was overlooked so long because it didn't seem too far away from mainstream LDS thought even then. About five years later the sermon came up again after some of Lyman's more radical sermons came to the attention of church leaders. Lyman was stripped of his apostleship after declining the opportunity to recant and publicly criticizing his fellow apostles. Wilford Woodruff called Lyman's views on the atonement "the worst herricy man can preach." The majority of what Woodruff and others found objectionable is toward the conclusion of the sermon.²

The following is a full transcript of Lyman's Dundee sermon. It was not the only instance where Lyman shared his controversial views but it was cited as a primary reason for Lyman's trouble with the Quorum. I divided the extremely lengthy original paragraphs into thematic segments, marking the original paragraphs with a pilcrow (¶). I also added footnotes and compiled the sermon's scripture references in an ^appendix. A few footnotes mention patterns in the sermon. I haven't fully fleshed out my thoughts, so they are preliminary.

__________________________________________

“‘Nature of the Mission of Jesus.’ A Discourse by President Amasa M. Lyman Delivered in Dundee, Scotland, March 16, 1862,” The Latter-day Saints’ Millennial Star, No. 14, Vol. 24, April 5, 1862, pp. 209-217.

¶ I feel grateful this morning, my friends, that I enjoy another opportunity of meeting with you, and to enjoy with you the comforts of the reflection that, though time has been passing since we last met, we still survive those whom its resistless current has borne away, to meet again, as we continue our labour for the attainment of that happiness, the existence of which renders sure to us the realization of our hopes, if we continue to act and live in harmony with the law and purposes of our being.

We have no matter to interest us but the truth, no labour in which to be engaged but in the acquirement of a knowledge of its principles and their application; and as the fountain of truth, from its boundless extent, is exhaustless, of course we have not acquired a knowledge of it all as yet.  There remains an infinitude of knowledge yet to acquire; and if we could compare the little we know with what remains in the future to be learned, its comparative littleness in point of extent and magnitude, would appear. But small as the amount of knowledge may be that we possess, we know that the knowledge of the truth developed within us constitutes all of ability and capacity that we possess for the acquirement of intellectual or physical happiness.

To continue and extend this good work is the labour that should engage us continually, calling into exercise all of our ever-increasing powers for the development of human happiness. I have no labour in which to engage myself, only to exert what influence I may possess to lead people to an understanding of the truth, that they may be enlightened, consistent worshippers of God, consistently religious, and honestly devoted in their religion to the love of God and the truth, which brings freedom to the soul from the bondage of ignorance, sin, and death. And in order that they may be so, mankind must have knowledge; for how could we act consistently for the accomplishment of any purpose of which we were ignorant? We can only hope to act consistently by having a knowledge of the truth.

There is no great difficulty in understanding that the knowledge of the truth, as unfolding to our open minds to some extent the purposes of God in our being, is the first and most valuable blessing connected with our existence as intellectual human beings here upon the earth; for only by this knowledge so reveled can our actions be correctly [210] and consistently regulated, and all other blessings will follow as a natural consequence of the presence of this knowledge in the soul. We have not come here, then, to worship religion, or bow down to it with the soul’s reverence and adoration, good as it may be, valuable as it may be, and dearly as we may have learned to look upon it. Our worship on the present occasion should be an honest, earnest desire to know the truth of which we are ignorant, with a fixed determination to give that truth an application to ourselves. Then our worship would be acceptable to God, the object of our worship, and our offering would be pleasing in his sight.³ Such a worship would render a people offering it acceptable to God, for it would be honestly, consistently and intelligently offered by beings who understood the nature of their worship.   

We should remember that the blessing that is to result from our worship and devotion to God, from all our services rendered to him, is the good that it will bring to ourselves. We can render to God no happiness, offer unto him no adoration or homage that would compensate him for seeing us degraded and damned, instead of seeing us saved and exalted to everlasting life and infinite happiness. This is the purpose for which we were made and constituted with the germ of every principle of greatness and power implanted within us, that under he enlightening and fructifying influence of the Gospel we might emerge from our condition of ignorance and nakedness to put on the habiliments of light and glory. It is the happiness resulting from a consistency and harmony of developed knowledge that makes heaven a place to be desired—a place where joy is developed without sorrow, where pleasure is unalloyed with anguish or pain, where death finds no habitation, and misery no abode; but where glory and happiness, truth, light, and life that has no sorrowing termination are continually found. 

That this might be our lot, and that we might be raised to enjoy these blessings, was the purpose that induced our Father to give us a being upon the earth. Then no senseless worship, (and by senseless I mean that which is ignorantly offered, unguided by a knowledge of the truth,) no worship that is blindly and ignorantly presented, is acceptable before him; but that which is radiant in the light of truth, and that comes from a soul made free by the knowledge of God, is the only acceptable worship that can be rendered to him. That we may be enabled to become devoted to God, loving the truth because we comprehend its value and feel its emancipating influence upon the mind, awakening within us aspirations for glory and endless life, and feeling the chains that have held us in the bondage of ignorance bursting asunder, and emerging into that world of glowing light and fadeless glory to which our heavenly aspirations direct us,—to establish this upward and glorious tendency in the feelings of the soul, is the object for which religion has been revealed to us, that through the truth we acquire we may be prepared for this glory as children of God.

¶ This view of religion should influence us, because it is right. “Well now,” says one, “if I could only know that it is right! What are the evidences in support of its being so? Do the Scriptures tell us it is right?” Suppose they do not tell us anything about it at all, could we know, comprehend, or understand anything about it? Would we be capable of having developed within us a principle of truth, supposing that the record contained in the Bible had never reached us? I know we would be the same thinking beings we are now. Our minds would not be closed up, and our powers of thought and reflection rendered incapable of action, but we would think of everything we saw, everything that presented itself to our minds furnishing material for thought and reflection. Where would we find the evidences that this view of religion and worship would be acceptable to God as a right one, calculated to elevate his children and exalt them to happiness and glory in his presence? Why, within ourselves, where reflection has its origin. We are capable of knowing that if we pursue the path of truth and travel in the ways of peace, falsehood and contention can never lie at our doors. Could we appreciate the difference between being surrounded with turmoil and strife to being surrounded by scenes of an opposite character—[211] between the blessings of harmony and peace understood and appreciated and contention that was entirely in opposition to our feelings and desires, we would exert all our influence in favour of peace—peace continually rich in the development of happiness and blessing. There is no mind, however darkened by skepticism or unbelief, that could question this. It is a truth, and a plan that commends itself to every mind that is open to conviction. This, then, is my reason, and the reason I assign to you, that the worship I have described is acceptable to God, because it makes you and me feel better, and saves us from the curse of strife and contention. And as it relieves you and me, so it would release from this misery and wretchedness all who would give it an application as we do.

¶ Whether this view of the matter is consistent or not with truth and reason, many would feel a delicacy in coming to a conclusion, unless they could know it was consistent with the Scriptures. But what are the Scriptures? They are simply a record of a small portion of what God is said to have done with and for the inhabitants of the earth during a small portion of the time that the earth has been the home of humanity. The Apostle instructed the ancient Saints to “prove all things and hold fast that which is good;”⁴ and as the Scriptures form a part of all things, they are part of that which is to be proved, and, when found good, to be retained. But we have been taught that they are not only true and in every way sufficient for the salvation of man, but that they have been made, by a marvelous exercise of credulity, to extend over all the broad surface of human existence. There is no point so far remote in that dark and indefinite future that extends away before us, but they are made to extend there, and have their application to human beings with equal force upon all. This involves us in a great amount of difficulties, and a few of those which surround us are something like these:

We are told that the Scriptures contain what is necessary and requisite for the salvation of humanity, and that the fullness of the Gospel contained in them was not revealed till Jesus came preaching the Gospel of the kingdom of God.⁵ Considering it thus, the reflecting mind in a moment is troubled with this question—If it was necessary, when Jesus came into the world, that all the Gospel truth should be made known and sustained by all the power he had, and if it required that power for the proclamation of the Gospel and its ministration, that it should become a perfect to those who should believe it, what has been the condition of the many millions who have never had any understanding of it? What is to become of them? For if it was necessary at any one time to save men and women constituted as we are—if a knowledge of its principles was requisite to secure their salvation, does it not prove to us that it was and is necessary for every other person constituted as we are and sustaining the same relationship to God as we do. Now, from the light of the Gospel as it is revealed in the Scriptures of truth, and at the time when Jesus was its greatest exponent, we arrive at our conclusions that this being necessary at that time, it was always necessary,—that there never was a time when humanity did not need all that Jesus taught for the consummation of their exaltation and glory.

¶ Another of the difficulties which surround us in our efforts to arrive at a comprehension of the truth is that we suppose, under the influence of our education, (and our suppositions are according to our education,) that the Gospel was not revealed in its fullness until the meridian of time, when Jesus came, the great herald of mercy and expositor of the Gospel to man. A little calm reflection will lead us to know that this conception is erroneous and at war with the purposes of God. “Well, if that is so,” you may say, “how are we to become satisfied of it?” By looking at the mission of Jesus and the gospel he came to preach, not from where we are, but, leaving the mists of tradition, (the fogs of error that becloud the minds of men here,) travel backward on the stream of time to the point when the purpose of man’s being as the child of earth was formed by God, and the Gospel had a formation suited to his constitutional wants and requirements. We will find, when it first became a purpose in the mind of our Father that man should live on the earth, the point we seek. If we possess any degree of imaginative power, let us go back to that point, that we may learn, by contemplating man as he appeared there, the nature of his constitution as it was determined by the purpose of God, what he was constituted for, and the nature of that Gospel that was there prepared to be revealed in the future for all humanity. “But were there men there?” Oh, yes. If no others were there, “the man Christ Jesus” was there; and others were with him too, for it is said, “The morning stars sang together, and all the sons of God shouted for joy.”⁶ “Well, if men were there, what kind of men were they? and how were they constituted?” Why, just as we are. I do not say they were weak and sickly as we are, nor corrupt as degenerated man has become. They were not the subjects of disease and pain, as we are; but they possessed the same constitution, with minds having the same properties as ours—possessing the same germs of greatness, influence, and power. Thus constituted, man was there, the subject of his Father’s care and provision—the leading object, the primal object that moved the mind of the Father in the great enterprise of developing intellectual humanity  upon the earth—of sending out His children here upon the earth, that they might return to Him clothed in a fadeless glory and exalted to majesty and power in those abodes of celestial bliss where they might drink of the cup of felicity drawn from an exhaustless fountain.

Man thus constituted was man for whom the Saviour was prepared—man who had never sinned—who had never perpetrated a wrong. For man thus pure and holy, thus unstained by guilt or wrong, pure as the Father who had given him his constitution, the Saviour was prepared and the Gospel was ordained. “But was it decreed, then, that Jesus should die to save men who were thus pure and holy?” No: it did not form any part of the purpose of God that he should die. “What, then, was he ordained to as a Savior?” Why, to be a Prophet, Priest, and King,—a preacher of the Gospel of the kingdom of God. “What! was he ordained there to officiate thus, when in the meridian of time he should travel among his brethren shrouded in mortality?” Why, yes. When he came into the world, he told the people that he came to do the will of his Father, and none other work had he to do than he had seen his Father doing.⁷ What was the work he came doing? Read the history of John the Baptist as he went preaching from place to place, and continue it down until the time when Herod shut him up in prison, so that he could not preach to the people any longer, and there you will find that Jesus followed his forerunner in the great work of human instruction—that he came preaching the Gospel of the kingdom of God.⁸ Was it a part of his preaching to people that he came to pour out his life’s blood—that in its crimson tide the guilt of a sin-stricken world might be washed away? Did he speak of his death as the object to which their thoughts and attention should be turned? Why, he told them to cease from sinning and turn unto righteousness—to put evil and corruption from hem and live in purity and holiness before God. What did he say to the poor unfortunate woman brought before him, when her hypocritical accusers slunk in guilty silence away before the majesty of his rebuke? “He that is without sin, let him cast the first stone!”  Looking up and seeing her standing with downcast eyes, he said, “Go thy way and sin no more.”⁹ That was the lesson he inculcated to all—“Cease to do evil, learn to do well.” I wish you to remember this incident in the history of Jesus—to treasure up this little portion of the Scriptures in your minds. It will not be unwieldy, or troublesome to carry; and when you wish to see the principle upon which God designed to save mankind, you will see there, when you look at it, a truthful reflection of the principles upon which he purposed to exalt poor sinful humanity—of how man, whom you saw so pure and holy before he became a denizen of the earth, was to return to the scenes of hallowed felicity from whence he had come; not on the crimson tide of Emmanuel’s blood poured forth on Calvary’s mount, but by ceasing the perpetration of those wrongs which have brought misery, suffering, and death upon the family of man. This is the Gospel that was de-[213] termined in yonder heavens before the foundations of earth were laid.

“But does not Scripture speak of Jesus as a ‘Lamb slain from the foundation of the world?’”¹⁰ “Why,” says one, “I supposed that it was predetermined before the world was that Jesus must die, and that naught but his blood could bring God’s children back to the home from whence they had simply gone abroad for a time.” Is it said so in the scriptures? No. This is the inference we draw from the fact that we see humanity cursed with sin till we travel back beyond that time when sin brought misery and death upon the race. We contemplate them as having the black stain of wrong fixed upon them; and seeing them thus, we conceive this to be something that had its origin in the purposes of our Father, which caused it to be predetermined that Jesus must die, or man could never return back again to the bosom of his Father. What was necessary, before man transgressed, that he should be saved? Why, simply, that he should be taught. The infant being, inhaling for the first time the free air of heaven with opening mind, simply needed to have principles of truth kept ceaselessly before it to lead from its undeveloped condition onward and upward to God. Instead of man’s becoming the corrupt degraded being we now behold him, he only needed healthy, truthful, and pure elements of knowledge imparted to him continuously, as his enlarging capacity prepared him to receive them, in order to become all that he was constituted to become as the child of God. Without this, he could not reach the high destiny that was made attainable for him. Was a Gospel combining the elements of this instruction prepared that it might bring happiness, blessing, and eternal life to man? Yes. But did not this Gospel have associated with it, as a necessary pre-requisite for man’s salvation, the death of Jesus? No; for if so, he failed to tell the people the true nature of the Gospel he preached and his mission among men, and the means by which eternal life was to be gained. He said it was eternal life to know God. He told this to men who were constituted to learn, who could receive not one lesson, but with minds constituted to receive knowledge eternally. This was the constitution of the human mind; and, for the benefit of men thus constituted, he said, when praying to the Father, “This is life eternal, that they might know thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom thou hast sent.”¹¹ This is what you and I need to know, that our worship may be acceptable to God as being first conducive to our happiness, enlightenment, and emancipation from the bonds of ignorance and death.¹² Shall we, with all these reasons before our minds, arrive at any other conclusion other than that man was constituted to become possessed of knowledge, and the Gospel constituted of what would lead him to the acquirement of that knowledge. The Gospel is nowhere said to be constituted of the death of Jesus. Where shall we find in the record of his teachings anything that would sustain such an idea? Nowhere. We see him as he was revealed among humanity, and read the truths he taught, so far as they have been transmitted to us through an imperfect medium; and we can see that his life was devoted to the truth, if the light of heaven has given to us any degree of understanding.¹³

¶ What, then, was the nature of the mission of Jesus when he came into the world? Some may be startled, doubtless, at the idea that it was not necessary, as having been predetermined and designed by the purposes of the Father, that Jesus should die. Did it ever occur to you how the death of Jesus could effect intellectual humanity? Did you ever think of it? But that we may entertain no wrong reflection on this point, I will call your attention to a parable spoken by Jesus, as recorded in Matthew xxi., 33—39, expressive of the nature of his mission.¹⁴ He speaks of an individual who owned a vineyard, and let it out to certain husbandmen; and when the season came round, he sent his servants to receive the fruits of it, or collect the rent, as would be said now. He had let the vineyard, and he sent his servants down to receive that which was justly his from those in whose care it was. But these men cast the servants out—beat one, killed another, and stoned a third, and would not pay the rent. Other embassies were sent and treated in the same manner as the first. At last the master [214] said, “I will send my son down to them. If they have abused my servants, they will not presume to abuse my son and heir.” What did the master say he was sending the son down for? Simply to collect the rent—to be the same representative of the master’s interests that the servants who preceded him were. How did the husbandmen receive the son? They said, This is the son and heir. If we can kill him and get him out of the way, then the inheritance will be our own, for there will be no heir to it. The result was, the son was killed the same as those who had been sent before him. If Jesus knew it was necessary that they should be killed, as a part of the mission they were sent to perform, he failed to say so. They were killed because of the wickedness and murderous designs of those to whom they were sent, and the purposes of the master in sending them were not then accomplished. If the rent had been faithfully and honestly paid, there would have been no wrong done, no murder committed. Why did they do this evil? —why commit the murders which stained their souls with guilt and crime? Because they followed after an evil thought, and, being seduced by corrupt reasoning, concluded that they would reap some advantage if they could cast out those who were sent to them. These servants and this dear son were alike killed. The same procuring causes led to the same result in the one case as in the other. I wish you to have Jesus’ own interpretation of his mission into the world. Jesus has shown how the servants and the son came, and how they were treated when they did come; but he never said it was necessary that they should die. That they did die is a sad fact. The mission of Jesus to the earth not only cost him poverty and misery, but it cost him his life. Now, when we look at this parable and consider, in connection with it, that eternal life is “to know God and Jesus Christ whom He has sent,” and that this knowledge alone can raise mankind from their misery and degradation to enjoy the blessings of salvation, we see clearly that the Gospel was prepared before the foundation of the world to educate men and lead them from their weakness and ignorance to knowledge, through which and by which alone they could become clothed with the habiliments of might and glory.

Men were all constituted alike to receive, understand, and acquire knowledge; and the great necessity with regard to the coming of Jesus was that man could not be redeemed and exalted without knowledge, which constitutes the Gospel “the power of God unto salvation,” that would enable man thus enlightened to comprehend the purpose of his own existence, and the nature of his relationship to the Father. That human action would become rightly and properly directed under its influence, the Gospel was prepared, because the moment God entertained the design to exalt humanity to glory and immortality within himself, the provision of the means that were required to accomplish his designs became a necessity. If it had not been so, Jesus would never have been put in jeopardy, nor any of the Prophets and Apostles have suffered from cruelty and persecution; but the very salvation of man depending upon his becoming enlightened rendered it imperative that that which would bring the Gospel within his reach should be done. Thus Jesus, at the time of his manifestation on the earth, became the great expositor of the Gospel. If he had declared that it was his blood that would cleanse us from sin, we would not have questioned it. “But does not the scripture say his blood cleanses from sin?” Why, yes. John speaks of “Him that loved the us and washed us from our sins in his own blood;”¹⁵ and if that was all we knew of John, we would be led to form our conclusions from that saying. But there are some other things to be considered concerning him before our thought ripens into conviction. He was one of those to whom Jesus said, hen opening his mission, as they toiled with their nets on the blue waters of Palestine, that if they would come with him, he would make them fishers of men. Did he become obedient to that call? Yes.¹⁶ Then, as through his future life, he rendered a ready response to the voice of him whom he learned to love so dearly. He was one of those who were baptized for the remission of sins; he was taught of Jesus and was ordained by him as his Apostle to represent him when he was gone. [215] Under the sound of the voice of Jesus, he learned those truths which he was to proclaim to the nations as Heaven’s ambassador and representative, and, in learning them, learned their worth—their priceless value, and learned to govern himself and regulate his actions by them. This is the way John became cleansed from sin—by acting consistently with the truth he had learned, and doing no wrong, and not by the blood of Jesus in any other way applied. Do you see any connection between the shedding of the blood of Jesus and the regeneration of the great Apostle John, the friend of Jesus, who shared with him his sorrows and rejoiced under his teachings, the beloved disciple who had leaned in the fondness of his soul upon the breast of that Master he so dearly loved, and who, when he regarded his own salvation, could not take into account all it had cost and leave out the tragedy of Calvary. He had seen him whom he had traveled and lived with—whom he had learned to appreciate and love with the heart’s fondest affections,—he had seen him in his sufferings and misery, and witnessed the excruciating agonies he endured in Gethsemane and on Calvary. Could he forget all this? No; the thoughts moved by the rising sympathy of the soul assumed consistency and form, and said, “Can I forget the cost of the proclamation that brought all that life and light to my soul which I enjoy—that said to the captive soul, ‘Go forth to life and glory and freedom,’ and which cost the lifeblood of my brother and my God?” This was the estimate made in the mind of the Apostle when he calculated the cost of what had brought salvation to him. Yet it was by doing just as Jesus told the poor frail woman to do—“Go thy way and sin no more.” It was thus, when John ceased to do sin, that he was cleansed from sin. I wish you to see and understand this, because I do not wish you in the future to bear record that I ever used an influence to lead humanity to believe that they could derive salvation, or a freedom from the consequences of sin, only by ceasing from sinning. I learn this from what I have learned of the Gospel.

Did Jesus go about seeking to procure his own death, that the world might benefit by it? No. Did he know that such would be his fate? Yes. Where did he learn that it would be so? Why, yonder in the heavens, before the foundation of the earth was laid, when the great scroll on which the records of humanity were written was spread out before him, and in the light of truth the history of humanity was read. It was known then that Jesus would thus die, that the wickedness and evil passions of mankind would cause his death. Then he was known as the “Lamb slain from before the foundation of the world.”  He could not be known in any other character, because his mission was to lead him where men were vile and wicked—men who could believe they could gain some advantage by slaying the Son as they had slain the servants who preceded him. What I find fault with is that when we are told the blood of Jesus will cleanse us from all sin, without any effort on our part to do right, it is virtually a proclamation to us that we can do nothing for ourselves;  and then we will sit down supinely waiting for the blood of Jesus to free us from the consequences of the wrongs we are committing—for the work that God has done or will do to take effect, when we are the authors of the wrongs that exist. It is you and I who do wrong, and from that wrong we want to be saved. How can we be saved from it but by ceasing to do the wrong? Did Jesus say the wicked who continue to do wrong shall be saved? No. With all the power he possessed as the Son of God, and with all the glory he was heir to, he could not save the sinner in his sins. He could only bless those who hearkened to the truth he taught and ceased to do wrong. Listen to his language when he looked upon the city where prophets had raised their warning voice again and again:—“O, Jerusalem! Jerusalem! how often would I have gathered you, as a hen gathereth her chickens under her wings, but ye would not!”¹⁷ If he had power, why did he weep over the city devoted to ruin? Why lament over its approaching desolation? Because its inhabitants would not listen to his offers of mercy. He reviewed how often Prophets had been sent to them and rejected, and how last of all the [216] darling of the Father had been send, whom they treated with contumely and bitter persecution; and yet he could not, with all the God-like charity and ability he possessed, save the unbelievers who still persisted n their iniquities. Who were saved? Why, those and those only who laid off their iniquities. They were the recipients of his mercy, and the only ones who could receive the blessings of the Gospel.

¶ I wish you to look upon this consistently, and reflect upon it. My remarks have not been made to insinuate any criticism upon the opinions of others, but I wish you to look upon them reasonably, because I wish to place before you an incentive to practice  virtue, cultivate charity, and live lives of truthfulness. I would be as glad as any one if I could believe and understand that my salvation was sure simply because Jesus had died. What would there be to hinder me from being happy? But I cannot believe it, and I will show you a reason why. I cannot believe it, because, if I am a liar, there cannot people enough in the world leave off lying to constitute me a truthful man. Suppose I were to profess religion, and day after day continued lying, what would I be? Why, I should be a liar! Although numbered among a congregation of so-called believers, and consequently one of those taught to look forward to salvation as the reward of those who simply believe in Jesus, which they blindly suppose they do by adopting the false opinions of their teachers. If there is any one thing in the wide region of delusion more soul-destroying than another, it is this. What difference does it make to me, though I thus believe? I am a mean man, a false man, because I am a liar; consequently, an impure man. Yet by this false religion I am taught, with all that impunity and falsehood clinging around me, and without one effort to cast it off, to aspire to a seat in the mansions of perfect purity, where God reigns! “But,” says one, “we must forsake our wrongs in order for the blood of Jesus to cleanse us from our sins.” This is all I ask you to do. When you cease from all wrongs, I do not care what you say has cleansed you from sin; but I do not want you to believe that the blood of Jesus has cleansed you from all sin, and yet see you going down to perdition because you have continued to sin. I want you to understand that by practicing purity continually, by being righteous and holy, honest with our God and with one another,—by this means we will avoid doing evil. All is embraced in that creed that calls upon us to love our neighbor [sic] as ourselves and devote our hearts to God:—“Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy might, and with all thy mind, and with all thy strength; and thy neighbor as thyself.”¹⁸ You shall love your neighbor, the man and the woman with whom you associate as you love yourself. But who are your neighbors? All those people around us. Who acted the neighbor’s part to the poor, beaten, wounded, and robbed traveler [sic] who lay by the wayside? The Samaritan who relived his wants, dressed his wounds, and cared for him with a brother’s tenderness, or the Levite and Jew who passed by on the other side and left him to perish? Was not the Samaritan the best man as evinced by the discharge of the neighbor’s duty to the poor sufferer?¹⁹ Who were the Samaritan, the Jew, and the wounded traveler? Why, simply so many of God’s children, sent into the world for the same holy purpose. Why love your neighbor as well as yourself? Because he is just as good as you are, descended from the same high parentage as the Saviour who came into the world that sinners might be saved and exalted. For whom did he die? For you and me, and not for our neighbor? No; but alike for us all. He did not command his Apostles to go and preach to a few for whom he died, but to go and preach to “every creature,” saying, “He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved, but he that believeth not shall be damned.”²⁰ What would have been the utility or wisdom of extending their mission at all, of only a part could have been benefited by it? All were alike the objects of the Father’s parental care, and were alike provided for, if they could only do that which Jesus could not do for them, and which you and I would blush to ask him to do. You could not ask him to cease lying for you, to avoid corruptions for you, to become godly, pure, holy, and righteous [217] for you—a possession of the fulness of the principles which have exalted him to immortality and endless life. No. But if we practice the same principles, they will place us in a similar position of happiness and exaltation. You may ask God to help you and strengthen you; you may invoke his blessings to be ever round about you, and the genial influence of his Spirit is waiting to be with you, to bestow upon you the blessings you lack and desire to obtain. If you do not possess it, it is because you have not prepared a place for it to dwell with you. This is what I want you to see and understand; and that God may bless you and preserve you in your departure from doing wrong, in breaking off your sins by righteousness and your iniquities by turning unto God, is my prayer in the name of Jesus. Amen.

Reported by E.L. Sloan.

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Appendix 1

Scriptures Referenced:

Job 38:7.
Matthew 4:19 (Mark 1:17).
Matthew 14:3-14.
Matthew 21:33-39.
Matthew 22:37-39 (Mark 12:30-31; Luke 10:27).
Matthew 23:37 (Luke 13:34).
Mark 16:15-16.
Luke 10:30-37.
John 5:19.
John 8:2-11.
John 17:3.
1 Thessalonians 5:21.
Revelation 1:5.
Revelation 13:8.

FOOTNOTES:

[1]
B.H. Roberts, A Comprehensive History of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Century 1 (Salt Lake City: Deseret News, 1930), 5:83. The illustration of Amasa Lyman is from Loretta Hefner's article, "From Apostle to Apostate: The Personal Struggle of Amasa Mason Lyman," Dialogue: A Journal of Mormon Thought 16 (Spring 1983), p. 90.

[2]
Wilford Woodruff's Journal, ed. Scott G. Kenney (Signature Books, 1984), 6:321-22. Woodruff's journal entry for 26 December 1866 describes the circumstances: "The subject of A Sermon Preached by A Lyman and published in the Millennium Star April 5, 1862, in vol 24 was brought up & red & it was found to have done away with the Efficasy of the blood of Christ....When you do away with the blood of the Savior you do away with all the Gospel & plan of Salvation. If this doctrin as Preached by A Lyman . . . be preached & Published as the doctrins of the Church & not Contradicted by us it would not be long before there would be syms [schisms] in the Church. This doctrin as Preached in this Sermon is fals doctrin. If we do not believe that it was necessary for Christ to Shed his Blood to save the world, whare is our Church? It is nothing. This does not Set well upon my feelings. It is grievious to me to have the Apostles teach fals doctrins. Now if the Twelve will sit down quietly & not Contradict Such doctrin are they justified? No they are not," (Wilford Woodruff's Journal, 6:308—9). See also Daniel C. Peterson, “Editor's Introduction: ‘The Worst Herricy Man Can Preach,’" FARMS Review 12:1 (2000) and Loretta L. Hefner, "From Apostle to Apostate: The Personal Struggle of Amasa Mason Lyman," Dialogue: A Journal of Mormon Thought 16 (Spring 1983), 90-104. Edward Leo Lyman counters some of Hefner's conclusions in his biography, Amasa Mason Lyman, Mormon Apostle and Apostate: A Study in Dedication, (University of Utah Press, 2009). 

[3]
The pronouns “he”, “his,” and “him,” in reference to God the Father and Jesus Christ were typically not capitalized during this period of Church publications. That usage here should not be seen as reflecting a casual attitude towards the Father or the Son.

[4]
1 Thessalonians 5:21.

[5]
Typical proof-texts on the Bible’s sufficiency include 2 Timothy 3:16-17 and Revelation 22:18.

[6]
Job 38:7. For an interesting approach to this verse see Kevin Barney, “On Preexistence in the Bible,” FAIR (date unknown).

[7]
John 5:19.

[8]
Matthew 14:3-14.

[9]
John 8:2-11.

[10]
Revelation 13:8.

[11]
John 17:3.

[12]
Over the course of the sermon Amasa has replaced the concept of "sin" with "ignorance." Sin, ignorance and death were previously grouped together.

[13]
Amasa appeals to the imperfection of the Bible but apparently also believes it contains a sufficient amount of the sayings of Jesus in terms of Christ's mission and sacrifice. Also he appears to overlook Pauline Christology altogether.

[14]
Matthew 21:33-39.

[15]
Revelation 1:5. 

[16]
Matthew 4:19; Mark 1:17.

[17]
Matthew 23:37; Luke 13:34.

[18]
Matthew 22:37-39; Mark 12:30-31; Luke 10:27.

[19]
Luke 10:30-37.

[20]
Mark 16:15-16.