Introduction

I am troubled by how little people seem to know--or care--about history and context. Our current social climate encourages partakers of online media to develop stories about other people and about the past without questioning those stories or learning more. Checks against the resulting imposed narratives--"Is that really within your purview?" "Do you have enough information?" "Shouldn't you find out more first?"--are  bypassed to deliver (supposedly caring, well-intentioned, emotionally justified and allegedly righteous) verdicts of others. Those verdicts often include labels, which labels appear to align with what I call "first cause," a modern-day version of original sin:   

Everything has gone wrong due to an inherent flaw in a person, plan, or social order. And one of those inherently flawed components is you!

Due to meaning-shorn-of-context, The Book of Mormon steadily seems subjected to a self-help manual approach, which leaves it open to both subjective whimsy and "I'm so appalled" criticism. It is judged, perhaps as useful; perhaps as injurious.

In fairness, for much of history, the "everything is all about us" approach was adopted by believers and doubters as they used the scriptures to talk about other stuff, especially themselves. The approach lends itself to fresh and thought-provoking dialog. It even lends itself to social and religious change!

It also, unfortunately, lends itself to "since everything is relative and nobody can really know anything, you should believe about this passage what the 'expert' or 'proper' leader/authority/scholar/shouting person tells you to believe."

The "believe what you're told" approach doesn't work for me, whatever the identity of the lecturer. I far prefer context because I admire people of the past and believe they deserve to be understood as more than participants in an ideology or springboards to the reader's ego or springboards to the grinding of an axe. 

The context for The Book of Mormon, of course, is difficult and controversial. As stated below, this blog will not address the issue of The Book of Mormon's translation. I have no investment in that argument in any direction. The primary question behind each entry is, rather, What religious climate existed at the publication of The Book of Mormon that made it such a satisfying book to its readers?

REGARDING COMMENTS

I began to post these entries in April 2024 on my Papers blog (see Thesis & Talks). I am reposting them from Nephi to Moroni with edits. After all, the more I learn...

Comments on all my blogs are moderated. On this blog specifically, I will not be allowing through any comment that focuses either on my character (Why did you write that? I know why you wrote that! You skunk!) or on contradiction (see Monty-Python's "Argument Clinic"). I have a very low opinion of most social media commentary, precisely because it fails to back claims, resorts to ad hominem attacks, and conflates stances with substance. 

I have zero interest in defending what I believe. My beliefs are a matter between me and God and come down to theology and integrity. If you would like to express your beliefs, create a blog. 

I have zero interest in arguing over whether one should or should not like/be inspired by Joseph Smith. I like him. I also think he was a flawed individual. In fact, I like him because he was flawed. I will not engage in trying to paint him either as a con-man or a paragon. I find both approaches utterly dreary. I believe in neither of them. 

I have zero interest in arguing over whether one should or should not be a member of a particular church (any church). 

I find conspiracy theories so boring, they make my brain melt. 

In sum, comments that do not address the actual points raised within entries, including stated claims and evidence will not be approved. Spiritual exegesis, anthropological insights, and general ponderings will likely be allowed.  

Entries may change--as I learn more and more about the nineteenth century!

 

1 Nephi and Enos: The Wilderness

The original entries on this topic went in Book/Chapter order, starting, naturally, with 1 Nephi. 

However, as I got further into Alma, I found that approach more and more difficult to sustain. The entries on this blog will group certain ideas while still referencing books and chapters.

1 Nephi 4-6: The Wilderness

Nineteenth-century readers would have reacted positively to the idea of wilderness as freedom. This perspective is often applied only to white settlers in North America--and Manifest Destiny, articulated in 1845, was used to justify the practice of white settlers steadily moving west. However, lots and lots of people—including escaped ex-slaves—also moved west. Irish immigrants, Blacks, and displaced Native Americans occupied the fringes of society as well as a number of religious groups. 

It helps to realize that those “fringes”--what was labeled “the West”--kept moving. At one point in the 1800s, “the West” was western New York and Ohio. It then became the Mississippi River Valley and then what we now refer to as the Mid-West. (California became a self-described utopia and sophisticated “other” coast fairly early on—though it was also perceived as part of “the West.”) 

The Gold Rush, naturally, contributed to the idea that going to the West equaled a new start, but that metaphor impacted North American pioneering as early as the Mayflower (possibly earlier, if one goes back to the Vikings). It links to the Puritan idea of “exodus” from a corrupt society. Methodist preachers, circuit riders, were immensely popular in the nineteenth century while their stable, elite, (well) paid, stationary counterparts on the east coast were perceived as missing the plot. 

Consequently, nineteenth-century readers would have reacted positively to Lehi’s decision to move his family away from perceived urban corruption into a potentially dangerous wilderness. And the thread of violence that inhabits these chapters would have made more sense to nineteenth-century readers than it often does to modern readers. The “Wild” West was truly “Wild” in some cases and the attitude “better left alone to take care of themselves” from state and Federal governments (pre-Civil War) was prevalent. (I will return to this attitude later.) 

Although indigenous people and trackers and traders saw the wilderness as an approachable and useful setting, the mindset for many North American newcomers--when faced with so much risk--was more medieval than Enlightened, namely: 

One goes into the Wilderness and dies heroically (and/or becomes a hermit--see Saint Anthony--and dies sacrificially) or one goes into the Wilderness and fights off all contenders as part of a social order. 

The tensions here between freedom and organized leadership, pacifism and violence continue through The Book of Mormon. Nineteenth-century readers could relate. 

Enos & The Wilderness

Heading into the wilderness to gain insight is not merely a product of modern life and Sondheim’s Into the Woods. The ancient world is full of gurus stepping away from agricultural and urban centers to find themselves and effect contact with deity.

However, one major difference exists between then and now. For much of history, that stepping away was a risk, challenge, and sacrifice. The praying petitioner was stripped of day-to-day concerns and self-protection. It is possible that hunter-gatherers included unorthodox members who traveled alone for the fun of traveling alone. It is also possible that such members were considered practically pathological and usually ended up dead.

When Saint Anthony the Great made his way into the “wilderness”—as numerous gurus had done before him—what mattered was the arduous nature of the experience. Nature was not one’s friend. Nature was, quite literally, the thing that would end your life.

Charles G Finney

In All the Trouble in the World, P.J. O’Rourke writes about Petrarch’s hike up Mount Ventoux, “During his brief sojourn upon the Ventoux peak, the poet stood astride the medieval and modern ages—the first European to climb a mountain for the heck of it, and the last to feel like a jerk for doing so.”

Joseph Smith

Acclaims to nature exist in early Western and Eastern literature. In one of my master’s courses, the professor and some students tried to convince the rest of us that nobody was awestruck by the Grand Canyon until Western civilization told them they should be. So much nonsense! (Academic theories, despite the jargon, are often disturbingly self-centered.) Multiple Native American tribes centered their religious ceremonies in the Grand Canyon. They weren’t exactly doing it in the middle of Kansas.

Okay, maybe they did—but my point stands: a remarkable natural occurrence is a remarkable natural occurrence, from waterfalls to the aurora borealis. Observant humans have always commented on nature’s awe-inspiring products—just look at cave paintings.

What changes are the tropes, the ways in which those wonders are addressed. Human beings are social animals. Once one person goes into the wilderness not to be challenged or to die but to be inspired and comforted, everybody is going to start going for the same reason, and they will use the language (as both writers and translators) that relates to that trope.

Both patterns run through the nineteenth century. Jonathan Edwards—despite terrifying a generation of Congregationalists with “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God”—was a big believer in nature’s spiritual influence. A Puritan’s goal was to undergo a personal conversion and/or reckoning. Nature could help that individual comprehend God’s glory and God’s love.

The connection between contemplation and nature would take off with the Transcendentalists. Though he likely would have disapproved of some of their notions, they are Edwards’ philosophical heirs.

Nineteenth-century readers would have related to both purposes attached to nature: inspiration/comfort—personal challenge/sacrifice. Both run through both Nephi and Enos’s experiences: sunk deep into my heart, wrestle, hungered, guilt swept away, pour out, struggling, unshaken, labored. The Wilderness is an unfriendly place where one struggles. The Wilderness is a place where one retreats and prays and learns.

1 Nephi: Scripture Reading and the Enlightenment

1 Nephi 3: Scripture Reading

The struggle  over the brass plates, wealth versus inspiration, would have struck home with Joseph Smith, who participated in the popular early nineteenth-century search for treasures and understood the survivalist's need for cold, hard cash. The history behind this trend is covered more than adequately elsewhere. 

Of more interest to me is the definition of the brass plates as "spoken by the mouth of all the holy prophets..delivered unto [the prophets] by the Spirit and power of God” rather than "spoken by God...delivered as incontestable words." 

Bible literalism is a relatively late development in the production, collection, and canonization of scriptures. It popped up throughout the Middle Ages (and earlier), of course, but didn't take off until the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. The phrases in 1 Nephi--"spoken by" and "delivered unto them"--places the translator, at least here, on the non-literal side of the argument with the addition of a possible compromise. 

Nineteenth-century readers would have been as invested in this issue as modern readers, in part due to the Reformation; in part due to the Enlightenment. 

Martin Luther, for one, was

extremely argumentative.

The Reformation

Luther et al. challenged Rome's authority based on the belief that the scriptures were the only reliable source of God's truth. The matter was instantly made more complicated by not everyone understanding what the scriptures actually said (translations into everyday language were being made but not all translators had the same background in Greek, Hebrew, and Latin). Like all human beings everywhere, both Catholic and Protestant theologians also had a tendency to "translate" in terms of their own opinions. 

So Luther took transubstantiation literally while other Protestants pointed out that Christ was probably speaking figuratively. Okay. Sounds consistent. Except some of the pro-figurative Protestants insisted on literalism regarding Christ's whereabouts ("right hand of God") while some of the literalists insisted that the reference was only figurative. 

Nevertheless, almost all Protestants--even when they violently disagreed with each other--concurred that the scriptures were the source, not the traditions coming out of Rome (which traditions included the Pope).

The Enlightenment

In recent years, some writers have blamed the Enlightenment--empiricism, searching for proofs, separating faith from science--for ruining religion while Enlightenment believers have blamed religion for keeping everyone thinking medievally. 

I think the argument is as pointless as atheists arguing with fundamentalists. The Enlightenment—a highly varied movement itself—underscored the concept of a rational and reasonable deity. The associated assumptions have impacted everything from church organization to charity work to scripture reading. Many things we take for granted—such as forensics as evidence—are both older than the Enlightenment and were encouraged by the Enlightenment. Theology, likewise, has always focused on producing a coherent explanation of God and God's acts.

One of the Enlightenment's ideas was “evidential” religion, the idea that the natural world and rational argument could prove philosophical and, if necessary, religious truths. The idea influenced generations of believers, from literalists using the natural world and the Bible to prove the equivalent of Creationism to near-atheists using the natural world and Bible studies (coming out of Germany) to prove the non-existence of miracles. 

Not everyone was a fan since there are obviously non-observable aspects of life. But "evidential" religion fit in with the Protestant Reformation's emphasis on going to the scriptures for proof. 

Back to Scripture Reading

Of course, using Bible passages wasn't a perfect solution in the nineteenth century because (a) the Bible’s clarity was being challenged by aforementioned scholars; (b) not every theologian agreed on the Bible’s meaning. An increasing number of Protestants pointed out that Saint Paul was probably speaking hypothetically or metaphorically or specifically or historically when he spoke about “election.”

There were plenty of people in-between. Many in-between religious believers honestly didn’t want to go in either direction. They didn’t want to discard rationality and evidence from the natural world—but why should that mean getting rid of the unseen, unknowable, and unprovable?

Since quantum mechanics hadn’t yet shown up in the sciences, they had a point.

That is, many nineteenth-century religious communities were perfectly capable of rejecting the logical fallacy of either/or (one must either accept that all scriptural events are metaphors or one must accept that they are meant to mean exactly what a current translation argues, in a one word=one definition sense, without any room for debate or context). 

Nineteenth-century readers were also open to a third possibility: more revelations, more visions, more scriptures, and more to come. 

God may not change. But that doesn't mean that humans fully understand the nature of God. 

1 Nephi: Individuality & The Tree of Life

1 Nephi 8-11: The Tree of Life

1 Nephi 8-11 includes Lehi's version of the Tree of Life followed by Nephi’s personal vision of same.

These chapters would have connected to the intense individualism within American thought in the early nineteenth century. (Although the first image depicts the Norse Yggdrasil, it is doubtful that early ninteenth-century Americans were aware of Norse mythology. Greek and Latin--Greek and Roman--mythology still ruled in Western universities. Norse mythology was not made truly accessible until the mid-1800s and truly popular by Tolkien and others in the mid-twentieth century.)

The nineteenth century is the era of de Tocqueville, who arrived in the United States and observed separation of church and state in action. “Good golly,” he exclaimed (I am summarizing), “when religion is not imposed by the state, people are, what do you know, more religious!”

The American Revolutionary also supplied an ongoing narrative of intense individualism—rebellion against (or exodus from) the corruptness of the Old World. Even Puritan thought, which now strikes modern people as rather dictatorial, was about individual salvation, a single person coming to understand God’s grace through lifelong, intense personal analysis.

It is difficult to entirely capture—we are products of the early C.E. era, after all—the break here from communal sin and suffering that encapsulates social orders in antiquity. That urge remains, of course, what with Witch Trials and their modern equivalents: one bad apple rots the entire barrel! Twitter or whatever it is called now appears to be the ultimate expression of badgering everyone everywhere into some kind of compliant order.

But even Twitter is the product of individual offerings.

Individualism existed in antiquity and forms the basis of most narratives, but the social order—and therefore the social role—of populations was entirely presupposed. Kings were not scribes. Scribes were not peasants. Peasants weren’t anybody. If the king is saved, you are all saved. Might as well get on-board.

The Common Era concept of the individual as agent, who works out an individual salvation, is something that nineteenth-century readers would have entirely comprehended and embraced and that modern folks rather take for granted, even when they criticize the ideology.

Lehi’s Tree of Life rests on the premise of the individual agent. Although the “strait and narrow” path connotatively gives rise to images of intolerance and exclusivity, in Lehi’s dream it is a path that each person must walk alone, even if there are others ahead and behind: each of Lehi’s children and even his wife are referenced separately; at one point, he watches them struggle separately. The path is a person’s integrity or personal path in life—choice of profession, artistic endeavor, prophetic calling (see Joseph Smith)—whatever self-definition a person embraces and endures and sacrifices for.

The “great and spacious building”—on the other hand—is the ultimate collective. People get there individually but they stay in the “safe” Borg-like “in-group” that mocks individuals and scorns the difficult pathway that each individual treads.

Consequently, the “great and spacious building” houses detractors, sneerers, people who love labels, mockers, revilers, obnoxious cliques—those who prefer to watch others drown rather than make a life for themselves. (All members of the great and spacious building point in the same direction, as a mob would.)

There are other possible interpretations, of course, including the search for a single path to God’s grace, a search that was dear to the Smith family and many others. Although communal living was all the rage, early nineteenth-century readers still would have perceived such a search in individual terms, one that this group, this community carries out for the sake of each member. (Despite the Donner party haunting American mythology, most successful pioneers moved west within specific groups—religious groups, town groups, family groups.)

And few nineteenth-century readers would have balked at the fruit of the tree being happiness, love, and joy (as opposed to discipline, humiliation, and subjugation). Gotta love those Americans and their life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness mindsets! (Even the Puritans perceived the happiness and beauty of nature as the key to comprehending God’s grace.)

1 Nephi & 2 Nephi & Jacob: Grace & Works, an Ongoing Issue

The meaning of Eden is part of the struggle.

1 Nephi 14-22: Grace & Works

The Book of Nephi begins a struggle over hell and grace and punishment that continues throughout The Book of Mormon. It was an ongoing struggle in the nineteenth century as well as today! That struggle is arguably part of the human condition. 

Nineteenth-century readers would have had personal contact with this struggle, being familiar with Arminianism—God’s grace is universal—and Calvinism—pre-ordination of salvation. In America, the struggle came down to Methodism versus what had become by that time Congregationalism (the latter term now has a broader use).

So hell as punishment is a given. However, in Nephi’s interpretation of Lehi’s dream, the quality or character of hell is defined: “And I said unto them that the water which my father saw was filthiness; and so much was his mind swallowed up in other things that he beheld not the filthiness of the water” (1 Nephi 15:27, my emphasis). 

Although the passage about hell may seem rather harsh—and a bit skimpy on the grace side—nineteenth-century readers would have seen it as bolstering the idea of universal grace: hell is not the place where people who didn’t complete all the correct rituals or joined the right congregation go (it isn’t group-identity hell). It isn’t a place where people go whether or not they worked hard not to go there. It is the place where individual “filthy” people go.

Religious designation is not a qualifier. Neither is race. Neither is birth. This perspective would have been perceived in the nineteenth century as provocative. (Readers are being prepared for a complete rejection of infant baptism.)

2 Nephi and Jacob: Grace & Works Background Up to the Nineteenth Century

Two problems underscore much religious discourse. Those problems have a long history:

1. The problem of grace versus works—that is, the problem of a deity's mercy versus human merit.
2. The problem of the elect or elite, those who are supposedly entitled to God’s mercy and intervention.

At this point, I will turn to etymology—then I will return to the nineteenth century.

In James’s statement, “Faith without works is dead” the word “works” is based on a Greek word, ergon, which refers to “energy.” The word is connected to the business of agriculture and trade—that is, it is connected to multiple roles that people may take in a community. (I did not know this background information for myself: see this site here.)

That is, faith without energy is meaningless because faith without energy means a person is dead.

We wake up in the morning. We get out of bed, feed the cats, carry out tasks, open mail. Everything is something we do as living people. And during all of that, we ponder stuff, which arguably is also an action in which neurons leap the boundaries between synapses. Faith is, in fact, ongoing agency, a position that The Book of Mormo commits to doctrinally (see 2 Nephi 2:26).

However, by the time the Protestant Reformation was in full force, “works” no longer meant “the decisions I make everyday about my life” or, even, “charity” (which is the context for James). It meant what John McWhorter references when he talks about “performances” by so-called protesters. Since they aren’t protesting anybody who dares to disagree with them—and the so-called authorities applaud them (and sometimes feed them)—and their protests rarely, if ever, end with an actual sacrifice of privilege (few higher educators are giving up actual offices or jobs), much less the adoption of a differing lifestyle—they are, in essence, showing off.

That is, “works” as defined by Martin Luther et al. became actions that by themselves don’t appear to have a moral component but have been turned into a moral necessity: good people jump through these hoops; use these phrases; perform these routines; make these mea culpas.

The issue becomes complicated because not all rituals are meant to be works. Sometimes, they are meant to be reminders of faith or inductions into cultural belonging. A signal of commitment. 

And Protestants rapidly split into those who despised all rituals, including any custom that took place in any church or within any religious group, and those who said, “Uh, you folks are kind of throwing out everything at once.” (Forensic anthropologists are not very happy with Protestant zealots in England who threw out Anglo-Saxon saints’ bones that can now not be tested.)

See the posts Why Choosing the Supposedly Correct Side is Difficult.

To nineteenth-century American readers, “works”—on the one hand—smacked of Catholicism, the corrupt Old World, and stuff like worshiping saints. On the other hand, early Protestantism almost immediately created its own sets of “works.” Good religious people embrace the following lifestyle and use the following language and support the following celebrities/political causes…

And the truth is, every culture, by the nature of being composed of non-dead and human people, is going to have “performances,” stuff that people do because that’s part of being a member of a community. (We even create “performances” in our personal lives/routines.) If we decide that only “meaningful” actions should be carried out, we run the risk of ending up as humorless as, well, a bunch of Woke Puritans who burn Maypoles, close down theaters, get offended over single words and phrases, and lecture others on supposedly bad thoughts.

Joseph Smith was not a guy who lacked a sense of humor.

In opposition to “works” is the principle of grace. Saint Paul argues that we are saved by grace. Full stop. Not “after all we can do.” We are saved by grace. Propitiation is off the table. God doesn’t bargain. And humans aren’t meant to be grifters. Give it up.

Yet even Paul struggled with the reality of communal living and the irritation of people doing petty things like, say, suing each other. And he also had a sense of humor.

In sum, if one sets aside the "performance" side of works, the issue of grace v. works/action/energy still remains: Do humans earn God's attention? Or does God offer attention? Does God react based on merit? Or is merit human wishful thinking?

God is bigger than us and can do what He wishes, so we are saved. But sometimes people are jerks. And sometimes they walk away from God. And sometimes they think they have walked away but they haven’t. And sometimes they think they haven’t but they have. And how fair is it really for a jerk to be saved? (According to Jesus Christ and the parable of the workers, Entirely fair and so not your business.) And since we do get up every morning and do stuff, shouldn’t that stuff be moral? And if we claim to love God, shouldn’t there be a connection between that love and the moral stuff we do? 

Do we work our way towards the infinite by a checklist? Or by learning and growing? Or by being loved and accepted?

I consider Christianity one of the most fascinating religions on record simply because it hauls this problem to the surface and doesn’t fully answer it. The Book of Mormon and its translator, for instance, will return to the problem over and over again. Why not? The Book of Mormon’s initial readers were struggling with it as much as Paul’s audience and modern believers. 

Later entries on this blog will return to the issue of grace & works. 

2 Nephi 31, Mosiah 18, & 3rd Nephi: Baptism

Baptism was under debate in the nineteenth century. Was it necessary to salvation (a sacrament or ceremony required for heavenly admittance)? Part of inclusion into a particular order/society (and was that necessary)? Did it regenerate the sinner or simply offer the possibility of regeneration? 

The issue of authority—does a church need educated clergy/bishops to carry out such sacraments or ordinances?—was also under debate.

The issue was of such importance in the nineteenth century that Joseph Smith paused his translation--Oliver Cowdery as scribe--in May 1829 to receive a series of revelations that resulted in baptism by men holding the Aaronic Priesthood. The passage that inspired this act was apparently from 3 Nephi, but the "problem" of baptism shows up in The Book of Mormon earlier. 

2 Nephi presents baptism as following the Son's example--the particular "how" of the act is not addressed, other to separate the remission of sins from the act of baptism. Mosiah 18 follows suit: baptism is presented as admittance into the community. Repentance is more about the individual's relationship with God and is not accomplished instantly or permanently. 

3rd Nephi 11:38 presents baptism (or at least the inner change that accompanies baptism) as a necessary ordinance--"And again I say unto you, ye must repent, and be baptized in my name, and become as a little child, or ye can in nowise inherit the kingdom of God." Chapters 7 and 11 both stress baptism as an act that takes place after repentance: "Verily I say unto you, that whoso repenteth of his sins through your words and desireth to be baptized in my name, on this wise shall ye baptize them" (3 Nephi 7:25). Baptism by "fire and the Holy Ghost" is emphasized in all remaining chapters. That is, baptism by water leads to the second less calculable (and less observable) yet apparently more necessary experience. 

Questions about the actual act of baptism in response to 3rd Nephi are understandable. And if one needs to explain Joseph Smith’s ability to attract members, the events here go a long way towards that explanation. Not only does Joseph Smith use The Book of Mormon to inspire him and Oliver Cowdery to direct action, he resolves several issues at once in the form of a straight-forward ritual carried out by ordinary guys who experience a vision. 

The act and the accompanying ordination back a belief in revelation/divine intervention as well as the position that the gospel is to repentance what baptism is to a remission of sins (baptism remits sins but doesn't accomplish repentance instantly or permanently). The visual, outward ceremony is accompanied by inward grace.

In effect, in response to The Book of Mormon, Joseph Smith pulled together high church and low church approaches—visions, authority, scriptural deference, personal revelation, lay people, rituals, and long-term progress--with one act.

I will post more about Joseph Smith later. Here, I will say that over and over, Joseph Smith's response to religious queries was to go out and make something. If he was a painter, he would have surprised the world with Under the Wave off Kanagawa. If he was a musician, he would have pulled a Beethoven. 

He was an American populist religious leader with a grounding in New England religious thought: therefore, he had wide-reaching revelations that tackled ongoing religious problems in everyday, physical ways.

Mosiah 12 & 13: The Ten Commandments

In Mosiah 12 & 13, Abinadi quotes the Ten Commandments.

In nineteenth-century America, the Decalogue was a link to the Lost Tribes of Israel, a popular topic of the time. Many scholars and religious leaders and archaeologists in the nineteenth century maintained that some or all tribes had made their way to America, bringing with them important wisdom, most specifically the Ten Commandments.

In the aftermath of the Civil War as the United States became home to immigrants from places other than Northern Europe (and Canada), the Ten Commandments were presented as unifying standards, products of "natural law," which presupposes that humans across many cultures will identify similar behaviors as right or wrong. (See section on Natural Law below.) 

The hope was that this natural law--along with archetypes and legends, such as the Founding of Our Country--could bring various religions and sects (and states) together. Hence, the erection of numerous monuments before and after DeMille/Heston's The Ten Commandments. 

Transplanted Israelites alongside their ethical legacy were common currency in the nineteenth century. Despite sharing an interest in those ideas, the first readers of The Book of Mormon were more interested in the associated doctrines. As I will address later, Millenarianism flourished within Mormonism but never went entirely in the same direction as it did in other societies. To borrow from my popular culture background, Joseph Smith had a more Spike attitude towards life and human endeavors than an Angelus attitude, more "let's invest in human activity" than "let's watch the world burn."

Like Joseph Smith, many early Book of Mormon readers were coming out of the Calvinist tradition. An ongoing doctrinal controversy within that tradition was the relationship between grace and works or, rather, the exact nature of grace. Passages within The Book of Mormon return to this issue again and again.

In the Book of Mosiah, Abinadi is brought before the wicked King Noah and King Noah's priests. He uses the opportunity to pull a Martin Luther, to accuse the priests of claiming adherence to a set of behaviors they don’t actually practice: “I perceive that [the Ten Commandments] are not written in your hearts” (Mosiah 13:11). The argument bears resemblance to a current-day interpretation of ancient texts, Jesus’s words, and King Benjamin’s speech, the latter also from The Book of Mormon:

• Michael Coogan argues that the Ten Commandments are likely extremely old. Documentary evidence indicates that they preceded the various versions that appear in the first five Books of Moses. The classically numbered third commandment—commonly presented as “Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord in vain”—is more accurately rendered as “You should not use the name of Yahweh, your god, for nothing.” 

Both books are worth checking out. Joselit

discusses monuments--see above.

Coogan goes on to discuss how ancient religions customarily paired magic with theology. Speaking the name of one’s god was often part of a spell. Coupled with the classically numbered second commandment about idols, the third commandment of the Decalogue tosses out the idea of propitiation through such appeals: “The Israelites’ new god with the mysterious name was not a god who could be controlled by invoking his name in incantations or magic, any more than he could be localized in a statue” (Coogan). Paul, who knew his scriptures, built on this idea.

• Jesus uses the Ten Commandments to make a series of rather sarcastic points. (There is far more sarcasm in the Gospels than may make some religious commentators comfortable—it is a touching indicator that Jesus had a singular personality, though one can’t help but wonder if Heavenly Father turned to Jesus upon the Ascension and said, “You do realize many humans have absolutely no sense of humor. They are going to take a bunch of that stuff you said very, very literally.”)

Don’t commit adultery becomes If your right eye offend thee (with lustful gazes), pluck it out.

Although some scholars perceive Jesus as increasing the rules, I agree with those scholars who argue that Jesus is actually driving home a point that comes up with the Rich Young Man: If you truly think you are already completely righteous for keeping all the commandments, fine—now, try this on. Are you as good as you say? Are you honestly dedicated to what you claim to follow? If you keep pushing the envelope here, you might find that the essence of the law is better than a checklist. Because cutting out your eye is a dumb idea. Instead, try to use thoughtfulness and commonsense to be a decent human being. It’ll be easier.

As David Mitchell states about the eye of the needle directive, “Jesus was being sarky and going, ‘It’s about as easy for a rich man to get into heaven as it is to get a planet into a shoe.’” 

Trying to bargain will get a believer absolutely nowhere.

• King Benjamin’s speech early in Mosiah presents a series of if…then statements. The “then” statements are often treated as commandments by readers. They are not. They are “fruits” of adhering to the first commandment:

Believe in God; believe that he is, and that he created all things, both in heaven and in earth; believe that he has all wisdom, and all power, both in heaven and in earth; believe that man doth not comprehend all the things which the Lord can comprehend.

Believe that ye must repent of your sins and forsake them, and humble yourselves before God…(Mosiah 4:9, 10)

If you believe—

You will not have a mind to injure others.

You will treat your children well.

You will help others and have a magnanimous attitude. (Mosiah 4)

In sum, the Ten Commandments are used in The Book of Mormon as a way to resolve the connection between grace and works. Abinadi chastises the learned because they fail to practice what they claim to know/embrace, which chastisement could be taken as an argument in favor of works. However, as detailed above, the overall argument more resembles the points made by Coogan, Jesus, and King Benjamin: the Commandments only have merit as works if they reflect faith-based beliefs as part of character. 

Abinadi then makes an assertion about knowledge/works that would have signaled a battle-cry to nineteenth-century readers, namely a lack of knowledge does not preclude salvation, when he declares without qualification, “Little children also have eternal life” (Mosiah 15:25).

Such a statement may seem a given to readers now—but a gauntlet is being thrown down.

Natural Law

Coogan argues quite reasonably that the Decalogue specifically references ancient Israelite culture. I think he has a point, but I also think there is something rather impressive here about what C.S. Lewis referred to as the Tao; throughout history, people have considered certain things good and bad despite what society considers acceptable and non-acceptable. Slavery has sometimes been acceptable but nobody has ever advocated it as a lifestyle; violence was often far more acceptable but few cultures have ever supported violence/betrayal against a friend (other than those societies that substitute individual virtues with service to the State)...and so on.

Mosiah 4: The Poor

 

The opening of Mosiah, Chapter 4 extols the principle of grace (a topic I will address in several entries). Yet verse 24—"I would that ye say in your hearts that: I give not because I have not, but if I had I would give”—returns to what people do with their beliefs.

I have been in Sunday School classes where verse 24 was used to discuss whether or not people should give money to panhandlers. People in favor of the loose change theory of charity spoke up and darted judgmental glances at others. They could glare at me all they wanted--I rarely have cash on me--but I happened to know that one of the recipients of those judgmental glances has, over his lifetime, donated considerable amounts of money to charitable programs in America and other countries. At the time, I was considerably irritated.

Such judgmental members clearly missed the point. The verse rests on a state of mind as much as an act. Previous verses address assumptions made about those in need and conclude, "Are we not all beggars?" (Mosiah 4:19). The one-road-to-charity folks are actually guilty of the very thing the speaker, King Benjamin, is preaching against. You can’t judge someone else’s circumstances based on what you see or assume.

In our social media-obsessed world of labels and insta-judgments, I think this lesson often gets lost.

More importantly, for the purpose of these posts, the world has changed. 

Nearly the entire history of the world is the history of people trying not to starve to death. Big Brother’s game-based control over the refrigerator is more accurate to the human condition than perhaps appreciated. Historical exceptions such as Ancient Egypt (trustworthy harvests; major works projects) are the exceptions that prove the rule.  

It is notable and touching that even in poverty-stricken circumstances, human beings are capable of great nobility and compassion. An examination of Anglo-Saxon skeletons indicates that elderly peasants who could no longer work were still cared for by somebody.

A descendant of the original soup kitchens.

That "somebody" would have belonged to the family/community. From the ancient world to the early nineteenth century, the number of aid organizations to which one could contribute was far less than now by a magnitude of a thousand+. 

Regarding the nineteenth century specifically, charity organizations in the urban environment flourished as the urban environment took hold (there's no indication that poor people before urbanization were any better off; they were simply more invisible). The YMCA began in the mid-1800s, the Salvation Army also in the mid-1800s. Soup kitchens came and went but weren’t going strong as regular city institutions until the mid-1800s.

Most charity for most of history was local and church-based. And brought about almost entirely by face-to-face/door-to-door requests. Such efforts did great work! But the fail-safes that modern people take for granted—something as basic as not being sent to jail for debt—didn’t exist. Most people were one harvest away from not being able to feed their families. There is a reason that Pa Ingalls spent a large amount of Laura’s childhood not at home (no, the reality wasn’t like the television show). When a bunch of locusts eat your wheat, you have to go work on the railroad instead. 

And there's a reason that the agricultural poor, despite D.H. Lawrence, went to work in mines and factories when the Industrial Revolution rolled in. Despite the incredible dangers of those places, they were better than working on farms. 

Factory workers at Amoskeag, who were working 12-hour days, still considered that they had gained advantages, such as more free time in the evenings. And they joined social organizations, a pattern of civic engagement that took off in the nineteenth century. 

In the 1830s, however, most people were still laborers or farmers, which means that most people were poor laborers or farmers. Even the “wealthy” people who helped out Joseph Smith were not what we moderns would necessarily deem wealthy (though Martin Harris did pay $3,000 for The Book of Mormon's printing of 5000 volumes, which cost is close to $100,000 today--the calculation is confused by certain things being less expensive and other things being more expensive, and printing was steadily becoming less expensive; it was nevertheless a great deal of money). 

In the 1830s, many aid organizations associated with urban environments were still in their infancy. Consequently, one of the best survival mechanisms at the time was to be a member of a functional social community, such as a religious community. See King Benjamin's citizens, nineteenth-century experimental communities like Oneida, and, eventually, Joseph Smith’s Nauvoo.

Nineteenth-century readers were well-aware of the benefits of such communities. And well-aware of the daily risks they otherwise faced. The reminder to hold one’s fire regarding another person’s circumstances would have hit home.

Mosiah & Alma: Missionary Work

Missionaries have existed in every era. For nineteenth-century readers of The Book of Mormon, missionaries were part of the cultural landscape. 

A Little Background

The earliest missionaries for Christianity were in many ways similar to the early Buddhist missionaries: the idea was to run out and tell people about a new freeing, universal way of being. As Andrew F. Walls points out in The Missionary Movement in Christian History, early Christian missionary efforts avoided later "paternalistic" attitudes (which bother us moderns) because Christians themselves were under the same demands for personal growth. Interestingly enough, in The Book of Mormon, Jacob's "y'all are a bunch of jerks" speech to the Nephites relies on this idea. The comparison of Nephites to Lamanites emphasizes the Nephites' failures.

The Nineteenth Century

The evangelical movement in the late 18th century to early 19th century was somewhat different and fell into two strands.

Marriage Proposal from Hell

The first was the idea of converting non-Christians--the late eighteenth century saw a massive increase of Western missionaries to Africa, the Middle East, Asia and, in the Americas, to the Amerindians. Many of these missionaries were celebrities. There is more than a hint of adventuring in accounts of their deeds.

Consider that in Jane Eyre, when St. John Rivers wants to marry Jane so they can serve in foreign climes together, the heroic, self-sacrificing, and grand gesture attracts Jane. However, she opts instead for a domestic life. Although she praises Rivers at the end of the book, she also uses “Dear John” phrases that were not uncommon at the time, such as we’ll meet again in the hereafter. Jane writes, “[T]he good and faithful servant has been called at length into the joy of his Lord.” And...he’s dead.

Pliny Fisk

The second strand was converting other Christians to another form of Christianity or to sincere practicing Christianity (as opposed to apathy). The Burned Over District in New York was home to this type of missionary work.

The first approach tended to focus on finding points of similarity between Christianity and "pagan" or "animistic" religions, as when Ammon informs the king of the Lamanites that the Great Spirit he prays to is the God that Ammon is introducing to him. And many of these missionaries became unintentional anthropologists, especially if they were sincere in their efforts to understand another culture.

The second approach tended to focus more on doctrine, as when Alma and Amulek get into arguments with various Zoramites. This type of preaching would have resonated with The Book of Mormon's first readers. Standing on a street corner or renting a hall/getting invited to a church and preaching a sermon on a particular doctrinal idea was extremely familiar to just about everybody--religious or not--in the nineteenth century.

All approaches brought with them the expectation of cultural as well as religious change. The king stops killing off his servants. Alma and Amulek undermine an entire social caste system. For that matter, Buddhism challenged caste systems in India. The change not only to belief but to culture bothers moderns. It would have been par for the course in the ancient and early modern world.

King Edwin converted--his

successors then repudiated

his conversion.

And, as Walls again points out, such upheavals to culture are never as conclusive as they sound. Saxons "converted" to Christianity when they were forced to by other Saxon groups. They then dropped Christianity when the first group got conquered by someone else. They converted back when it suited their purpose, no one else's. Likewise, Buddhism in China was perceived as adding to Confucianism, addressing what Confucianism left to other disciplines, rather than replacing it.

For nineteenth-century readers, who were constantly hearing about yet another group of Christians going off to set up a colony of believers somewhere, the connection between belief and lifestyle would have been a norm. And American missionary work was quite successful in part due to America's pluralism (although nineteenth-century America may not appear pluralistic by twenty-first century standards, by nineteenth-century standards--especially in the acceptance of different types of Christianity--it was quite pluralistic). 

That is, Americans were used to setting up volunteer organizations, getting them funded, and then dismantling them when necessary. American Christians were also quite used to sending Christianity into their own frontiers by whatever means were available: circuit riders; revival meetings in tents; magazines, and anything else that came to hand.

Alma: Prayer

Background

Tensions inherent in Christian prayer coalesced with the Protestant Reformation. They linger today:

Tension 1: Set prayers versus personal, individual prayers

 

Set prayers--prayers established by tradition or institutions and often, though not always, associated with ritual--evoke the accusation of being "works," actions performed for the sake of gaining favor (points), not for actual communion with God.

 

Philip and Carol Zaleski in Prayer: A History do a decent job of generously allowing for the beneficial experience of both the set prayer and the individual prayer. That is, a set prayer can evoke nostalgia as well as group solidarity. Moreover, the Zaleskis quite openly address the fact that an element of magic flows through all prayer, especially penitentiary prayers. 

 

Tension 2: Magic & prayer

 

The definitions that follow are my own: Magic is the use of actions and words (a spell) to bring about an event. That is, the actual actions and actual words produce a result whatever the character of the petitioner, the value of the result, and, presumably, the desires and wishes of the listening gods. 

 

Magical thinking, for instance, entails the parent saying to a child, "Have a good day today" with the unstated belief, If I don't say it, the child will not be well. The statement has almost nothing to do with whether the child has been sent away safely in a raincoat with enough money to buy lunch...whether the child is being bullied at school...or any other factor. The statement barely acknowledges deity. It is a "spell" set on the child to keep the child safe.

 

An invocation is about what God or the gods will do rather than what the actual actions/words/spells accomplish.

 

The Zaleskis make the entirely correct point that prayer and magic cannot be un-entwined. An element of magic filters through prayer. And the Zaleskis detail how acts/words themselves can create transcendent moments. That is, communion with God/gods is often set in motion by actions and words that are not inherently religious. (Humans are physical beings after all and react bodily to physical acts, such as meditation.)

The Protestants, specifically the Calvinists, were less than happy with the idea of magic/ritual. Alan Jacobs points out in his tome about the Book of Common Prayer that Cranmer wanted to create a common culture (which the Protestant Reformation both willfully and unintentionally did away with) by instituting the Book of Common Prayer. Moreover, he was (luckily for generations of Anglicans) an artist in his own right, so many of the set prayers are truly beautiful. And he was trying to find middle ground between the "traditionalists" and the Continental Calvinists. Many Anglicans greet the prayers with fondness and nostalgia.

 

The Calvinists were having none of it. Set prayers were popish, anti-Christian, episcopal (reliant on priests/bishops), devilish and part of the lingering rituals that traduced Christianity (it's hard to know at this late date how many Protestants didn't go down the Calvinist route simply because they, like me, rather liked a little bit of ritual in their religion). 

 

Tension 3: Petitionary prayers

 

From a Calvinist point of view, petitionary prayers fell into the "magic" category. They were arrogant, blasphemous and not even religious. First, God is omniscient so He already knows what people want; they don't have to ask, so they shouldn't. Second, asking for things implies that God's mind can be changed. Third, asking for things implies that God's job is to give stuff to humans.

 

In all honesty, the Calvinists kind of had a point when one considers what some people consider to be God's job (as if God were their personal life coach). But the Zaleskis quote C.S. Lewis pointing out that if one starts fussing about whether or not prayer can accomplish anything, one might as well go down the rabbit-hole of fussing whether anything that people do accomplishes anything ("rabbit-hole" is my addition). In other words, asking for stuff is as human as when we "put on boots."

 

My entirely personal view is that God preserves agency to a greater extent than humans can understand or want to understand. Petitionary prayers may be partly for our sakes (to make us aware of our need for God). They could also be for God's sake. In whatever way the relationship between God and agency and human volition operates (and I don't know), prayer could be part of helping God help us.

 

The Calvinists would accuse me of being an Antinomian since after all I am implying a God who either is limited or limits Himself.

 

And, yup, I am implying exactly that!

 

I would answer the Calvinists, "Yeah, well, folks, you're the ones who started this."

 

Tension 4: The intensely private, unquantifiable nature of prayer

 

Catholics in the Middle Ages engaged in private prayers. Augustine's Confessions alone prove that conversion and a relationship with God can be intensely personal. Not-set and unregulated prayers are a human norm.

 

However, the Protestant Reformation made them the only alternative--since set and regulated prayers were not-okay (most of the time). However, the Calvinists then discovered that unregulated prayers were...frightfully unregulated. 

 

As the Zaleskis point out about Pentecostalism: 

 

"[H]ow could one recognize the arrival of this climactic third stage [baptism in the Holy Spirit], of such burning importance to personal salvation?" 

 

The form of "recognition" for the Pentecostals was speaking in tongues. That is, the answer was a group experience that was nonetheless highly individualistic. 

 

Unfortunately, the answer by other religious groups--not just Protestants--has been to become entirely abstract and metaphysical or entirely legalistic (and sometimes, both). That is, many religions/ideologies don't feel comfortable just taking people's word for their communion with God/Truth. 

From an anthropological point of view, the need for some type of yes-we-are-on-the-same-page agreement within the group makes sense. I favor the solution of an individual response to an institutional ritual over the metaphysical-legalistic solution that was unfortunately favored by late Calvinists, as it is by Woke Progressives. That is, the late Calvinists--in an attempt to compete in a changing religious environment--got a little obsessed with how exactly people were confessing their sins...and whether they really meant it...and whether those people had hit all the markers of acceptable confession.

 

And within 70 years, people had deserted Congregationalism for Methodism and other Protestant off-shoots.

 

Prayer in Alma

LDS Church Film

 

In The Book of Mormon, Alma takes a stance against the Zoramites praying in public about how great they are and awful everyone else in (hello, social media). In terms of tensions, the Zoramites uncomfortably mix the doctrine of election with set prayers:  Calvinism gone the (even more) legalistic route. 

 

Alma praises private prayers that occur any time and any place. He is preaching, moreover, to the indigent, who fear for their souls because their (literally) poor credentials keep them from the places where they would deliver set prayers. During his discourse, Alma argues against a tit-for-tat relationship with God and produces a fantastic defense of faith: "If a man knoweth a thing, then he has no cause to believe" (32:18, my emphasis).

 

Alma goes on to connect faith to mercy and humility--"Ye cannot know of [the] surety [of my words] at first"--which leads to one of the most remarkable passages in The Book of Mormon about experimenting upon what one is taught rather than taking it as a given. Agency is paired with personal advancement and faith since the experiment--planting a seed--will produce fruit but the nourishment of the tree that produces that fruit can never end.

 

The link back to prayer occurs in the next chapter. In quite beautiful passages that Alma attributes to Zenos, prayer is presented as communication, a conversation, even experiment, between the praying individual and God: "thou didst hear me." 

 

In many ways, Alma's position here resembles that of Job, who demands a hearing with God. What God delivers is not necessarily what Job expected. Job's reaction is not to pronounce, "Okay, thanks. I've checked off the appropriate boxes on my path to salvation. I now have an exact comprehension of my status." 

 

Rather, he reacts by going, "Uh, wow. Wow. Okay. Wow."

 

In 3rd Nephi, set prayers are definitively rejected by Jesus Christ (see the Sermon on the Mount). The Lord's Prayer--over which theologians have often argued--is presented as containing the necessary elements of prayer rather than being a set prayer. An example rather than a ritual. Using the KJV, 3 Nephi 13 introduces the Lord's Prayer with the phrase "after this manner therefore pray ye." It is a reminder that the KJV, like many English-produced religious documents, has a wonderful tendency to hedge its bets.

 

Prayer, concludes The Book of Mormon, is never going to be what you think it is. Not tit-for-tat. Not automatic/instant regeneration and knowledge. Not salvation according to a list. It's communication, folks. God can take anything you dish out. Be prepared for anything in return.  

 

From Alma 33:

 

5 Yea, O God, and thou wast merciful unto me when I did cry unto thee in my field; when I did cry unto thee in my prayer, and thou didst hear me.

6 And again, O God, when I did turn to my house thou didst hear me in my prayer.

7 And when I did turn unto my closet, O Lord, and prayed unto thee, thou didst hear me.

8 Yea, thou art merciful unto thy children when they cry unto thee, to be heard of thee and not of men, and thou wilt hear them.

9 Yea, O God, thou hast been merciful unto me, and heard my cries in the midst of thy congregations.

10 Yea, and thou hast also heard me when I have been cast out and have been despised by mine enemies; yea, thou didst hear my cries, and wast angry with mine enemies, and thou didst visit them in thine anger with speedy destruction.

11 And thou didst hear me because of mine afflictions and my sincerity; and it is because of thy Son that thou hast been thus merciful unto me, therefore I will cry unto thee in all mine afflictions, for in thee is my joy; for thou hast turned thy judgments away from me, because of thy Son.