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No death before the Fall (cf. 11 Nephi No flesh before Adam (cf. Moses 3:7): Flesh in this context probably refers to man and not to animals or premen. Clearly, the animals were created before Adam (cf. Moses 2:24, 25). I have extended the interpretation to include the highest form of animal, premen. Spiritless premen (cf.
Abraham 5:15, D&C 29:31-34, and Genesis 2:5): I see nothing
irreconcilable in having premen "created
spiritually before they were naturally upon the face of the earth" in the
same way all other things were created spiritually. I suggested only that if this means premen had spirits, they were different from those of men
which were in the image of God. Next I would like to comment on the
letters of Speculation. Although speculation is essential for
scientific investigation, it is of more limited value in a religious context
and can be downright dangerous if the speculator comes to believe his
speculations too strongly. My intent in
using it on this occasion was an attempt to calm some troubled waters. Religion does not have anything to fear from
the paleontologists, and scientists do not have to despair that religion needs
to reject evidence and reason; I suggested at least one speculation that
reconciles the differences. If there are superior speculations, so much the better. Limiting God. As far as I'm concerned, God has the
capability to carry out His purposes in whatever way He chooses. My biggest concern is with people who insist
that God must have used a means of which they approve. If God chose to create man through the
process of evolutionary process, why should we insist that He must have done it
some other way? Why is it unreasonable that "preman"
parents, who were mortal, could produce bodies that were not subject to death,
when that same process was later true of Enoch, the Three Nephites,
and John the Revelator? But I don't want to insist either that God did it in a
way I approve. The only thing that I
feel most strongly is that we not reject the evidence obtained from scientific
investigations because it disagrees with our man-made interpretation of how God
must have worked. Adam and Eve story as an
allegory. It is very popular among
liberal thinkers and scientists to consider the story of Adam and Eve as an
allegory, which therefore does not have to be reconciled with scientific
observations. This may be satisfying to
the scientists but has the danger of destroying Divine meaning. We must face up to what is essential in the
story to preserve the main message. For
instance, calling it an allegory cannot duck the issue that there must have
been a creation, for without the concepts of creation by an intelligent
being(s) there can be no purpose to man's life, and thus there is no gospel. Creation implies intervention, which is at
odds with the theory of evolution as being developed by the scientists. Treating the story as an allegory does not
remove the dilemma. The story of Adam and Eve is not
only an affirmation of creation and purpose to man's existence but also an
indication of what that purpose is, particularly as clarified in latter-day
scripture. I am quite content to have
the dilemma unresolved in detail awaiting further clarification through
revelation as long as no church leaders insist that I disregard the basic
scientific evidence, and no scientists insist that I disregard the evidence of
the spirit which convinces me of the truthfulness of the Gospel. Since both of these possibilities are
threatening, I feel it is important to attempt some reconciliation. R.C.
Fletcher Literally
Unbelievable Quite some time ago I received a
little packet of material from you, which, I suppose, was meant to acquaint me
with your organization and to encourage me to consider Mormonism as a
religion. I believe you refer to
yourselves as a "foundation for Mormon studies." Few indeed are those who have
studied Mormonism more, longer, and harder than I have since about 1965 when I
went to Many newspaper job ads even went so
far as to require membership in the church by such statements as: "Need
not apply unless LDS," or "LDS preferred," or "only LDS
will be considered." It was not until 1974, after the federal
non-discrimination laws had been passed, that I was able to get a job and hold
it any longer than until my employer found out I was not a Mormon, and then
only in Federal
service. Quite by accident I got my hands on
a Book of Mormon. It was the first
literature of Mormonism I read. Since
then I have read the History of the Church, some of it several times. I was appalled when I read the Book
of Mormon and even more so when I read the Doctrine and Covenants and Pearl of
Great Price. In fact, I have read some
parts of them over and over again in an effort to convince myself that what I
was reading, and seeing around me, was true.
To me it was literally unbelievable, and appalling, that a church could
be built upon a collection of documents such as those. In order that you may not come to
the conclusion that I have been brainwashed by someone else let it be known
that I read all your doctrinal and most of your historical and other literature
long before I was even aware of the existence of such people as the Tanners,
John L. Smith, Wally Tope and the Concerned Christians of Mesa, Arizona. I came to the conclusion I adhere to through
reading your own literature, and that should tell you
something. It would be very interesting to me
to have all those wise oracles in your "foundation for Mormon
studies" come up with an explanation of B of M Alma 34:36 and D&C
130:1, 2 and 3. How can they reconcile the two? This is just one of hundreds of
such cases in your literature. I have many friends who are
Mormons. Obviously one of them sent my
name as a joke. There is not one of them
who do not know that there is just about as much chance that I will join the
Mormon Church as there is that even so much as one tenth of the prophecy and
revelation of Joseph Smith is true. John F. Durham Look at
the Underlying Assumptions Certain assumptions, though seldom
if ever stated, seem to underlay the viewpoint of several whose statements have
prominently appeared in SUNSTONE. I don't recall you as yet publishing anything
that might counterbalance those assumptions and would therefore like to call
them to your readers' attention. I would say that a number of the
statements I have in mind-often by non-LDS guest speakers at the Sunstone
Theological Symposium-tend to presuppose that any particular doctrinal position
or religious practice is relative to any other and that it is the great need of
Latter-day Saints to acquire the kind of humanitarian sophistication that would
free them from the parochial bias that their own beliefs and practices are
necessarily superior to or exclusive of those in other religious traditions. This assumption clearly underlies
Kenneth Woodward's keynote address at last year's Symposium, entitled "The
Use and Abuse of Religion," as it appeared in the March-April 1982 issue
of SUNSTONE. Little room is left for personal witness to anything traditional
when we are told that we must choose between a pretense at "
certitude" or "humility"-as if the two were in all cases
mutually exclusive. Woodward also
informs his respectful Mormon audience of his distaste for "those who
insist on peddling religion door-to-door as if religion could be sold like Most ironic is that Woodward and his
ilk claim to be objective and implicitly castigate Mormons for being
otherwise-Woodward himself being a nationally recognized journalist. I find a similar critical blind spot and lack
of detachment in the social historian and frequent contributor to SUNSTONE,
Lawrence Foster, who, at the recent meetings of the Mormon History Association,
for instance, urged Mormons to consider the more egalitarian governing style of
the Quakers, which he happens to prefer. (Objectively speaking, so what?) Such
statements also totally ignore the possibility that modes of religious
practice-particularly LDS-might have ever been prescribed by Deity and
expressly revealed through His appointed earthly representatives, or that it is
ever man's obligation to accept God's revelation, however strange, rather than
make it over in terms of the individual's personal likes and dislikes (the old
apostate tendency with which we are well enough acquainted: this is after all
nothing very new). The tone of these
"experts" recommendations is in fact at considerable variance with
even the New Testament Christianity to which they purport a certain allegiance:
The early disciples were clearly sent out two by two and told moreover to shake
the dust from their feet when departing from "that house" which did
not receive them (Matthew 10:14). There was also clearly a powerful hierarchy
among the early apostles and other Church leaders which both interpreted
doctrine and issued unequivocal assignments and norms of behavior to the
members-at-large. Their justification
for doing so was invariably that they had special access to divine revelation
in behalf of the rest of the Church: ". . . no prophecy of the scripture
is of any private interpretation. For
the prophecy came not in old time by the will of man: but holy men of God spoke
as they were moved by the Holy Ghost" (2 Peter I was very pleased with the earlier
observations by one of your columnists and a nominal member, Marvin Rytting, when he pointed out the numerous paradoxes in our
religious life in an earlier Dialogue article (XII:4,
pp. 106-112). I recognize them too and feel we need to be far more aware of
them than we are. It is also refreshing
to see him assert, along with Hans Kung, that we all ultimately "choose to
believe." But the position Rytting takes in his
latest "Paradoxes and Perplexities"-"in Danger of
Spewing"-is pathetic indeed. I
grant that it may be important to hear from and empathize with those who can do
no more than say, "I do not think it is possible to know for a certainty
that the Church is true in a literal sense." But to fancy that such a
position, where faith is concerned, is the optimal way to see things and not to
envy those with more deep-rooted convictions and hope, however long it may take,
to receive some day a more fervent witness oneself is again completely
antithetical to the New Testamnt's frequent
exhortations and compelling examples of self-sacrificing, miracle provoking
faith, and it immediately closes the door on the prospect of further transcendent
contact through the exercise of such faith or even the aspiration for it. (In saying this much, I
readily admit that everyone's faith wavers and that there are 'dry spells' when
we do not receive the same confirmations or intimations of the Spirit we
perhaps once did. But to deny the
possibility of its forcibly, overwhelmingly,
undeniably manifesting itself to us is indeed to reject that mystical,
transcendent power-call it what we will-without which religion is most abstract
and sterile.) For one who has felt these things deeply-as many a Mormon has-or
for anyone who fairly accepts the fundamental terms and conditions of Christian
faith the statement "I am-and shall continue to be Mormon irrespective of
whether the LDS church is the only true church on the face of the earth or
not" is perhaps poignant, even stoically heroic, but otherwise terribly
inane. There may be a clue to Rytting's arms-length detachment in the churlish delight he
expressed in an earlier SUNSTONE column about having been luckily sequestered
in the calling of a stake financial clerk, where he, a professional
psychologist no less, could keep himself safely apart from his flesh-and-blood
fellow members and their repugnant, time-consuming personal quirks and demands
on others. I would urge Brother Rytting to read Dietrich Bonhoffer's
inspired manual on Christian Fellowship, Life Together, and reconsider his
cultivated avoidance of the admittedly arduous and inconvenient task it is to
interact with one's fellow Saints.
Again, religion is utterly lifeless without deep, intimate fellowship,
which is or ought to be one of the special rewards and satisfactions of our
labors in the Kingdom. Indeed, our
interaction with fellow Saints, fraught as it so often is with tears, slights, and
difficult strain, is-blessing in disguise-one of the chief ways we come to know
the truth of that about which wehave been called to
witness. There is surely much which we have
religiously in common with others. The
Lord has, I believe, had more of a hand in the world's great religious
traditions, even the non-Christian, and surely also in the lives of all other
men and women, than we are often inclined to recognize. SUNSTONE and the other publications of our time
which are authored and published by unflinching honest and essentially loyal
and faithful Mormons have done much to broaden our perspectives and diminish
our Pharisaism.
But, much as others may yet have to teach us about basic tolerance,
authentic spirituality, and Christian virtue, it is equally a mistake to
overlook all that, in the restored Church and gospel, is so truly distinctive
and profound and might in turn contribute to the world's enlightenment and
edification. There is still place and
great need for its thoughtful yet forthright and unapologetic exposition in our
Church-related publications. Tom Rogers Feeling
Peculiar--Without and Within Stanley B. Kimball's comments
concerning the Word of Wisdom in the March-April 1982 issue of SUNSTONE
precisely summed up my own feelings on this controversial subject. This is a very important issue, and
I strongly urge that SUNSTONE respond affirmatively to Mr. Kimball's suggestion that
pages be opened to "a thorough and responsible examination of the
matter." Mr. Kimball's compassion and
sensitivity are evident in his letter. I
could truly relate to his tone having been one of those "ostracized
children" he wrote of. Since my return
to the Church, I have often felt "peculiar" outside its walls, even
in front of my own non-member husband and friends. Then again I have felt "peculiar"
within the Church for not being so narrow-minded as most Mormons. I certainly look forward to SUNSTONE
as a place where I can read things and not feel peculiar. Things I can relate to, that stimulate me
towards becoming a better person. I feel
people have a lot to gain by sharing their knowledge concerning the will of God
on this planet earth. Janet Layton-Arribas Apostles or Disciples? Under your recent "Scriptural
Commentary" you blew me out of the water when you said Jesus called twelve
apostles in Hypothetical,
But Not Heretical In a letter on the "premen" Richard C. Russell quotes Galileo's famous
epigram about scripture teaching us how to go to heaven, and not how the
heavens go, and parenthetically wonders if the original author of the
quotation, "an ecclesiastic of most eminent degree," might be
St. Augustine. It is certainly a trivial point, but
Brother Russell might be interested in reading "The Galileo Affair,"
by Owen Gingerich, in the August 1982 issue of
Scientific American. In it the author
quotes the same epigram and says that Galileo borrowed it from Caesar Cardinal Baronius, then the librarian of the This article deserves reading. Galileo's experience and the nature of his
Church's response (it declared the Copernican system hypothetical, but not
heretical) has much to say to us about conflict between religion and science
and the changing nature of accepted truth. Nancy Leek King
Fails to Convince Arthur Henry King's article,
"Are Mormons Joining in World Suicide?" (May-June 1982) fails to
convince me that the world is committing suicide or that Mormons are joining in
that act. In his caustic and disjointed
criticisms, King summarily dismisses the world's cultures, politics, social
sciences, and media. According to King,
modern art is all "self-pity" and "destruction."
Governments-never mind whether democratic or fascist, for "there's no
ultimate difference between them"-are all full of "gangsters".
Can anyone take
seriously King's assertion that Churchill and Hitler are
ultimately of the "same spirit?" Is there no good to be said for
individualism, goals, self-esteem, or capitalism? Obviously, every virtue has
its vice-and the above are no exceptions-but King's desire to attack whatever
is spiritually destroying us obscures his vision of the good aspects of man and
his world. Either King hasn't bothered
to point out what he may find in our world which is "of good report or
praiseworthy" or he sees a very different world than the one we live in. The author's view of man is more
akin to the medieval view of his utter worthlessness without God than the
Mormon affirmation of the eternal, spiritual individual who can become like God
himself by obedience to the laws of morality and through the Atonement of
Christ. King thinks the Church should
abandon its "insistence on individuality," which "is taking us
towards ... isolation. Our emphasis
ought rather to be on the family." (Mormons don't emphasize the
family?) The Mormon belief in individualism is a redeeming one which allows the
individual the right to personal revelation and the ability to merit his or her
salvation through Christ's atonement. To
say that the doctrine of individualism is "profoundly anti-Gospel" is
to misunderstand that doctrine-one that recognizes the worth and ability of the
individual rather than reducing him to "nothing." King is also completely against goal
setting. He says, "If planning with
goals in mind does nothing else, it will tend to occlude the Holy Ghost."
If we believe him, what becomes of the eternal perspective and the long-term
goals which we must make in life in order to realize them? And yet he says,
"If you aim at education, then you'll never become educated." If high
students never aim at education then they'll never apply to college! How one
can only focus on the present and realize the future is a mystery to me. As he does with individualism and goals, King
also finds the essence of capitalism with its "survival of the
fittest" principle "profoundly anti-Christian and anti-Gospel."
His statement is well argued. But later
he says the reason that so many businessmen are called to be General
Authorities is that "they are prepared for the task; the intellectuals are
not." Since these businessmen were trained in a highly capitalistic
society, how does King think they are prepared to guide a Christian religionif he feels the principles of capitalism are " profoundly anti-Christian?" Despite his denouncement
of it, King must admit to certain practical qualities of capitalism. I am also at odds with his all-out
criticism of self-esteem. True, we find
ourselves through others, but self-esteem is an important prerequisite to truly
finding out who we are. As children of
our Heavenly Father we should realize our individual worth. While self-forgetfulness may indeed be
"Prime," we must never forget who we are. Finally, I wonder if King is correct
when he says that "religion is prime and morality is secondary....
religion is deeper and more important than any morality that may emerge from
it." Morality, it seems to me, does not " emerge"
from religion. Religion emerges from
man's imperfections and his need to be saved by obedience to a God who is
always moral. The laws of morality are
eternal and, in a sense, even condition God since he became God by obedience to
those laws. The purpose of religion is
the perfecting of human beings, which is God's work and glory. Thus religion's existence is contingent upon
man's imperfections. While the Church
can not exist, morality is a necessary and eternal fact of existence, for even
if the Church were to become obsolete, i.e. man became perfect, the laws of
morality would still be prime because they are what
define perfection itself. How does King think Mormons can keep
from joining in world suicide? As a church, our duty is to "attack the
world by missioning." Attack?
Rather than attack the world, why not understand it? Then we can more
effectively teach it the Gospel. If the
Church withdraws from the world only to criticize and attack it, we shall then
be joining in world suicide. William R. Handley Shame! Shame on SUNSTONE! A magazine with at least a pretense of intellectual sophistication printing
the right wing blatherings of Jay Bybee. His one-sided "explanation" of the
ERA issues in the Callister case surely made him
official conservative LDS apologist, but with this piece we find he is also
apologist for the racists of the Mr. Bybee
misunderstands or purposely ignores the central issue in the Bob Jones
case. Tax exempt status is not a
right. It is a privilege. By granting tax exempt status to anyone, the
body politic says that it is willing to subsidize it. For as surely as tax exempt status is
granted, other taxpayers must pick up the tab, and pay the bills into the
federal treasury. To suggest that the
public has no rights through the courts, the legislative process, and the much
maligned federal bureaucracy, to demand institutions getting the benefits of
the federal largess not conform to public policy is surely nonsense. Bybee
denies his article is "just conservative hype"-it is not-it is right
wing hype, far to the right of any respectable conservative. It is a great disservice to publish this
piece without some semblance of balance.
Despite Mr.
Bybee's obviously being comatose during the
60s and 70s, the public policy repudiating public support for discrimination
(in schools, stores, voting, jobs, and yes, even education) has been painfully
established over a long period of time. Perhaps Mr. Bybee and Bob Jones are the only persons unaware of
it. The point, for him, must be that
public policy is never to change-despite an overwhelming desire on the part of the
rational public that it must change, a legislative mandate that it must change,
and a mandate from the Supreme Court that it must change. Let us hope that no one reads his
piece with any degree of seriousness, but rather that they take it for the joke
it surely is, and when they have finished it, toss it into the trash can with a
laugh. Kerry William Bate LEARNING TO LIVE WITH THE MORMON
TURF Ray Ownbey The only time I've ever heard the
expression "spiritual turf" was in a talk given by Ken Kesey, author of One Flew Over the
Cuckoo's Nest. It stuck with me,
probably because I found it useful in identifying a concept which is important
to me. The term turf suggests a home
territory, perhaps a gang's territory, an area in which one feels comfortable,
even relaxed. It's an area which must
not be violated by outsiders. And from
the word's association with gangs, we know that turf must sometimes be
defended. Spiritual turf has much the same
aura about it. For most Westerners
spiritual turf is Judeo-Christian, and Western history is replete with examples
of violations of the spiritual turf of others.
The crusades are one such example, as is the continuing violence in One of the great tenets of
Christianity suggests, even commands, the violation of the spiritual turf of
others. The "Great Commission"
to "go ye into all the world and preach the
gospel, baptizing," while not advocating or even condoning violence in the
name of salvation, does provide a precedent for invading the turf of others. Spreading the good news is an
altruistic, maybe even noble, endeavor, at least in principle. However, one person's good news is another
person's righteous crusade, and yet another person's boredom. The line is very fine indeed and is often
crossed by zealous proselytizers who are about as welcome as a reformed smoker
is by a three-pack-a-day person. And
Mormons often cross the line. In fact,
in Mormon Utah, the line often is not visible. I sometimes suspect I'm being
scouted for a potential full-scale assault by people who are annoyingly sure of
their own turf. Such attitudes shouldn't
be surprising. Most of This is a culture, then, where
participants at the local Republican party meeting
occasionally slip into the "brother" or "sister" titles
used for fellow Church members, where the boy scouts are in effect an extension
of the local ward activities, and where the dominant religious institution
teaches everything from how to dry apricots to family financial planning. It is difficult to avoid the influence of the
Mormon church, From a historical perspective, at
least, this influence is understandable.
In an isolated place the religion and the culture were synonymous and
provided for all of the flock's needs: culture, entertainment, practical
skills, as well as spiritual sustenance.
But for the outsider coming in on all this over a hundred years later,
it's overwhelming. I'll never recover
completely from a performance of The Pirates of Penzance
which was preceded by prayer. Such a
practice may be common here, but it certainly didn't add to my enjoyment of
Gilbert and Sullivan. Now, it might be easy to say,
"Don't let it bother you. Take
what's useful and let the rest go." However, I lived for six years in a
community which was overwhelmingly (something over 90 percent) Catholic. I never felt intruded upon there. So my response to the Mormon attitude was
initially pretty baffling for me. A clue
to the difference, I believe, can be found in a footnote I remember from John Ciardi's translation of the Divine Comedy. In discussing some of the vulgarity in the
"Inferno" section, Ciardi observes that to
a thirteenth century Italian Catholic, blasphemy not vulgarity was the primary
offense. In contrast, Protestant culture
finds vulgarity more offensive.
Blasphemy is primarily a spiritual concern, vulgarity a social one. This seems to fit, for a major emphasis,
particularly in nineteenth century
Protestant life, was social and cultural: rewards gained from hard work;
middle-class respectability born of knowing that God is on your side; upward
social and economic mobility; the primacy of the capitalistic market place as
God's arena where his soldiers, armed with the virtue of the free enterprise
system, triumph over their unbelieving economic adversaries; an egalitarian
society where anyone may rise to the top and where those who do are still
brothers and sisters to those who don't. Though Mormonism eventually diverged
quite dramatically from traditional Protestantism theologically, the Mormons
did embrace the Protestant concern with social and cultural standards and have
increasingly promoted such concerns with an aggressive contemporary missionary
system. Because my Catholic neighbors were more interested in the private
sphere, as Ciardi's distinction would suggest, they
were less likely to intrude on others.
But in I'm pretty comfortable with my own
spiritual turf. If I wanted to affiliate
with a religious organization, I'd find it easy to return to the one I grew up
in. I'm always a bit puzzled when
someone wants me to abandon my turf for theirs when mine is as much a part of
me as my fingernails. So when the dark suits want to come to my house and discuss their religion, I am alternately bemused, outraged, delighted by their innocence, affronted by their presumptuousness, and ultimately unwilling to give half an hour of my time to meet their needs. Mine, I happily go on record stating, are being met. BUT IT DOES NOT FEEL LIKE LOVE Marvin Rytting In the summer of 1971 I left the
shadow of the everlasting hills. My wife
Ann and I packed all of our worldly goods into a very small Haut trailer and
with six-month-old Jenny Rebecca set off for some strange place called I was a Danforth
Fellow and needed to attend a conference at They had no car, no telephone, no
friends, no family.
And yet I did not worry about them.
Before I left I went to priesthood meeting, met the bishop, and told him
that we had just moved in, but I was going to be gone for a week and my family
would be alone. True to my expectations,
I returned the following week to find that they had been visited every day, had
been helped with everything they needed, and knew who the best pediatrician in
town was. Ann had already been claimed
by the Primary. I knew that the Church was like a
big family, but in Sociologists point out that families
have both instrumental and expressive functions. The instrumental functions are concerned with
the physical maintenance of the family-providing the financial resources needed
to obtain the shelter, food, and so forth that the family needs, and organizing
the family so that necessary tasks are accomplished. The expressive functions take care of the
psychological and emotional needs of the family members, including the needs to
openly express feelings and ideas and to experience affection and intimacy. The healthiest situation is where
both instrumental and expressive functions are performed and where each member
of the family is involved in both areas.
Traditionally, however, men have been expected to take primary
responsibility for the instrumental side of family life and women have been
assigned to the expressive roles. As
individuals, we do not always fit the stereotypes, so in some families both the
father and the mother are geared towards the instrumental roles and expressive
ones get lost while in other families neither takes on the instrumental roles
and these needs are not met. In instrumental families, everything
is well organized and runs smoothly. The
physical needs are met and things get done, but there is not an open expression
of love and affection and the members do not feel free to show their feelings
or to communicate freely. In expressive
families there is a lot of affection which is freely expressed and the
emotional and psychological needs are met, but there is also a lot of confusion
and things never seem to get done. One
of the classic conflicts for newlyweds occurs when one of the partners comes
from an expressive home and the other from an instrumental family, and their
expectations of what a family is supposed to be like are radically
different. The best situation is a
balance. What kind of a family is the Church?
To some extent, this varies from place to place and from time to time depending
largely on the characteristics of the leaders.
I remember clearly the difference in the tone of our mission between the
tenure of my first mission president, who focused on the instrumental functions
and ran an efficient program, and that of his successor, who was an expressive
leader and presided over a friendlier, if less efficient, mission. Different
wards, stakes, and missions often reflect the styles of their
leaders. The tone of the Church as a
whole can also vary somewhat depending upon the personal style of the current
leaders. In general, however, it is my
experience that the Church tends to focus upon the instrumental functions to a
much greater degree than the expressive ones.
In the Church, we are active and we work. Obedience and conformity are stressed over
expressiveness and creativity. We run
the programs and follow the policies and accomplish the goals. We are friendly, but on a superficial
level. We spend relatively little time
worshiping, introspecting, or really making contact with each other as
individuals. One result of this is that we are
much better at satisfying the physical and instrumental needs of the members
that we are with the emotional and expressive needs. I remember some times when I was alone
because Ann had gone home to visit (and when you travel 2500 miles on a
graduate student budget, you stay more than a few days). I would get offers of
food or help with the household chores, but I almost resented these offers
because of the implication that what I missed when Ann was gone were the
instrumental functions which were assumed to be part of her role. I was perfectly capable of taking care of
myself and the apartment. What I missed
was the expressive part of our marriage.
But did I get offers of companionship and affection? No not a single
hug! Likewise, I am writing this while I am 1800 miles away from home. I am sure that the home teachers, elders'
quorum, and bishopric are all there to help with any instrumental need which
Ann may have (but probably will not), but I am equally sure that not single one will drop by to give her the hugs
that she could really use during this lonely time. Expressiveness is suspect in the
Church. We are afraid of affection
(especially outside of marriage). We are discouraged-sometimes subtly and
sometimes explicitly-from sharing our problems with each other. We maintain the image of the Perfect Mormon
Mother or the Strong and Sure Patriarch and become depressed because we believe
the facades of others and think that we are the only ones who are failing to
live up to the ideal. The one time when it is appropriate
to be expressive in Church is when we bear our testimonies, at which time we
are even allowed to cry although we are expected to be embarrassed about
it. Even here, however, the
expressiveness is not open. We can
express positive feelings, but the only legitimate negative feeling is sorrow
for sins and shortcomings. We are not to
express anger or doubt or dissatisfaction or disagreement with others. If we can express only half of what we feel,
do we really allow the expressive roles to be fulfilled? The welfare system is supposed to
take care of the needs of the members after the individual and family resources
have been exhausted. Again we do much
better at meeting the instrumental needs than the expressive ones. We quickly and efficiently provide food and
help with medical bills. But the
implementation of the social service program which theoretically would provide
for emotional and psychological needs, lags far, far
behind. Not only are the resources not
as accessible, but we are more reluctant to use them. Thus the Church as a family does a
wonderful job of fulfilling the instrumental roles. But I suspect that this model of the
instrumental family encourages us to focus on this aspect of family life in our
individual families as well. I think
that we suffer from our neglect-both in the Church and in our families-of the
expressive side of life. I wish it were
considered appropriate to more freely show affection and express the gamut of
emotions and ideas. Paradoxically many of what appear to
be personal forms of behavior in the Church end up functioning in an impersonal
way because of the instrumental orientation.
The effect of what we do is often the opposite of our intent. Punishment can reinforce rather than
eliminate negative behavior. When we
teach the Ten Commandments, we simultaneously let people know about ten fat
sins waiting to be committed. Likewise,
institutional practices often end up functioning in ways contrary to their
apparent purpose. The most obvious example of this
paradox is our usage of the terms brother and sister. The practice of
calling each other brother and sister should emphasize the familial relationship
we have in the Church and should make us feel friendly and close to each
other. At one time, when the title of
brother was attached to the first name-as in Brother Joseph or Brother
Brigham-it probably had this effect.
Now, however, we append it to the last name and it has become the
equivalent of Mr. and Ms. In this
context, instead of reflecting the intimacy and sense of equality that we
expect between brothers and sisters, it operates to maintain distance and
symbolize status relationships. If we
have an equal status, it keeps our relationship impersonal. If you have a higher status than I, it is
acceptable to call me Marv, but if I have a higher
status, Brother Rytting is deemed appropriate. Because my first name could thus convey
status information, even the use of it-in this system--often seems impersonal. The most important aspect of this
phenomenon is how it feels. It simply
does not feel friendly or intimate-or familial-to be called Brother Rytting. When
someone addresses me in that way, I feel like a role, not like a person. We have taken what ought to be a personal
form of address and made it impersonal. We have done the same thing with the
familiar second person thee, thy, and thou.
Originally, these were the intimate form of address-the most personal
way of talking with someone. In many
languages, such as French and Portuguese, it still is the intimate form of
address. Our language lost something very
beautiful and useful when we stripped it of the familiar form of address. In the Church, we compound this societal crime
by emphasizing the formal nature of the familiar tense as it is used in
prayers. We thus create a distance
between us and God, and personal prayers become less personal. This instrumental orientation seems to
be pervasive and makes our entire form of worship impersonal. Worship should be an intensely personal-even
intimate-activity. But in the Church, we
do not worship. We work and we attend
meetings. In our meetings we ignore the
prelude music, have a formal prayer, sing hymns needlessly led by someone
waving a baton, conduct business, listen to talks or lessons, and ignore the
postlude music. The only time for
individual communion is during the sacrament, and even there we tend to focus
on efficiency rather than worship. The transformation of worship to
work is most serious with the temple ceremony.
What ought to be the hallmark of personal experience with the sacred
realm has become temple work-an assignment to do, a quota to fill. We live more than 700 miles away
from the nearest temple, so we are expected to drive all day and then spend
three to five days doing one session after another-five to seven per day-in an
attempt to rack up the numbers as quickly as possible. It is assembly line temple work and it is not
very personal nor particularly spiritual. We have even been informed that endowments
done in temples other than the The new temples especially reflect
the instrumental orientation. In many
ways, the temple ceremony and the procedures surrounding it have been changed
to make it more efficient, easier, and less time consuming. These changes are nice in some ways and are
definitely more convenient. I feel a
longing, however, for those wonderful days at Manti or I do not want to imply that it is
not possible to have a spiritual experience in the temple or at church meetings
nor that we are completely impersonal in our interaction with each other. It is possible to feel deeply and be close to
each other and to worship meaningfully.
It is simply made more difficult by the institutional church. It erects barriers that get in the way of-but
do not completely impede-a personal, intimate expression of the feeling side of
the gospel. I am also not saying that the
instrumental orientation is totally negative.
There is much to be said for efficiency.
It gets more work done and often with less frustration. Rampant expressiveness can drive us crazy,
and I for one become impatient with it.
I am merely pointing out the dilemma that there are costs involved in
the instrumental focus and we need to be aware that some valuable personal
experiences can be lost in the quest for efficiency. Part of the problem is that we are
too oriented toward techniques, and we therefore miss the feelings that need to
be the basis of any interaction. We
often go through the motions without ever making contact with each other. We are always in danger of falling into this
pattern, but the probability is higher when we are loving people by
assignment. The assigned friendship
inherent in the home teaching system, for example, makes us vulnerable to
superficial interaction. This dilemma is
not unique to the Church, of course.
Many professionals, such as teachers and therapists, need to deal with
the dilemma of being paid to care for people. One paradox which affects both
Church members and helping professionals is the use and abuse of unconditional
love. The principle of unconditional
love is extremely important. It is
crucial for parents to let their children know that they are loved irrespective
of grades in school or how clean the bedroom is or how much they like to go to
church. It is also an important part of
therapy and is nice in any relationship.
Unconditional love has become almost sacrosanct and is indeed worthy of
advocacy. It has its dark side, however, and
therefore we need to be careful about how we use it. I have a friend who is strongly committed to
unconditional love for everybody and never seems [continued on page 57] Van
Hale A LOOK AT NINETEENTH CENTURY BELIEFS
ABOUT THE MOON - ITS FLORA, ITS FAUNA, ITS FOLKS In 1892 the following one-page
article appeared in the Young Women's Journal.
Its author Oliver B. Huntington wrote: Astronomers and philosophers have,
from time almost immemorial until very recently, asserted that the moon was
uninhabited, that it had no atmosphere, etc.
But recent discoveries, through the means of powerful telescopes, have
given scientists a doubt or two upon the old theory. Nearly all the great discoveries of
men in the last half century have, in one way or another, either directly or
indirectly, contributed to prove Joseph Smith to be a Prophet. As far back as 1837, I know that he
said the moon was inhabited by men and women the same as this earth, and that
they lived to a greater age than we do-that they live generally to near the age
of 1000 years. He described the men as averaging
near six feet in height, and dressing quite uniformly in something near the
Quaker style.. In my Patriarchal blessing, given by
the father of Joseph the Prophet, in Kirtland, 1837, I was told that I would
preach the gospel to the inhabitants upon the islands of the sea, and-to the
inhabitants of the moon, even the planet you can now behold with your eyes.1 Opponents of Mormonism have tried to
use Admittedly, in this scientific age
1000-year-old moonmen in Quaker dress
being visited by Mormon missionaries do sound a bit farfetched. It becomes important, therefore, to set The first question, of course, is
what were Most have assumed his source for the
Joseph Smith statement was his own memory and have thus questioned its
credibility because he was only 11 years old in 1837, and 55 years separated
his recollection from the event.
Actually Inhabitants of the Moon The inhabitants of the moon are more
of a uniform size than the inhabitants of the earth, being about 6 feet in
height. They dress very much like the quaker style and are quite general
in style, or the one fashion of dress. They live to be very old; coming
generally, near a thousand years. This is the description of them as
given by Joseph the Seer, and he could "See" whatever he asked the
Father in the name of Jesus to see. I heard him say that "he could
ask what he would ask of the Father in the name of Jesus and it would be
granted" and I have no more doubt of it than I have that the mob killed
him5 The question must now be asked, what
was Dibble's source? He did not indicate whether the story was his personal
recollection or that of another party. I
have found no further information on this except that Dibble was a collector
and had expended considerable effort to collect and produce an exhibit about
the life and death of Joseph Smith, which he presented in several Mormon
communities. It was at one of these
presentations in January of 1881 that Although it has not been established
that Joseph Smith believed in moonmen, several close
to him did. Joseph Smith's own brother
Hyrum stated his belief in an inhabited moon in an 1843 sermon on the
"plurality of gods & worlds" preserved by George Laub: ... every
Star that we see is a world and is inhabited the same as this world is
peopled. The Sun & Moon is inhabited
& the Stars.... The stars are inhabited the same as this Earth.7 President Brigham Young stated a
similar view in a sermon of Who can tell us of the inhabitants
of this little planet that shines of an evening, called the moon? When we view
its face we may see what is termed "the man in the moon," and what
some philosophers declare are the shadows of mountains. But these sayings are very vague, and amount
to nothing; and when you inquire about the inhabitants of that sphere you find
that the most learned are as ignorant in regard to them as the most ignorant of
their fellows. So it is with regard to
the inhabitants of the sun. Do you think
there is any life there? No question of it; it was not made in vain. It was made to give light to those who dwell
upon it, and to other planets.8 The second interesting claim Oliver
Huntington made in the 1892 article was that his patriarchal blessing had
predicted that he might preach the gospel on the moon. He also mentioned this blessing in a second
article for the journal in 1894.9 In the first he
dated the blessing 1837 and in the second 1836. In both he identified Church
Patriarch Joseph Smith, Sr., as the bestower of the
blessing. The following excerpt is
undoubtedly from this blessing. It is
dated I lay my hands on thee & bless
thee with a father's blessing.... thou shalt be
called to preach the gospel to this generation.... before thou art twenty one
thou wilt be called to preach the fullness of the gospel, thou shalt have power with God even to translate thyself to
Heaven, & preach to the inhabitants of the moon or planets, if it shall be
expedient ....10 Although there is a discrepancy as
to who gave Oliver the blessing, this is undoubtedly the same blessing
mentioned in the Young Woman's Journal.
Both content and setting are similar.
In his 1894 article It seems unlikely that Oliver, on
two different occasions in the same year, would have received the same blessing
from two different men. It is more
likely that Oliver, who was 10 years old at the time, was mistaken about who
actually performed the blessing since both men were present. Or perhaps both men anticipated in giving him
the blessing. Or, although I believe
this less likely, an error was made in recording the blessing. The blessing was not copied into the
Patriarchal blessings book for at least nine years, at which time it was
recorded by Albert Carrington along with several other blessings given to other
members of the Ultimately the fact of this
discrepancy is far less interesting than the fact that such a blessing
existed-a blessing which assumed the existence of moonmen
and was given in the presence of the Patriarch, Apostle Orson Pratt, and the
Huntington family and relatives. The
patriarchal blessings books in the LDS archives are not open for research. Therefore, it is not possible at this time to
determine if the idea of preaching to the inhabitants of the moon found in this
blessing to Oliver Huntington was common or unique. To me the surprising fact is that
there have not been found more Mormon declarations of belief in an inhabited
moon. Several of the earliest
revelations, in 1830 (Moses 1) and in 1832 (D&C 76), committed Mormonism to
a belief in many inhabited worlds. But
Mormons, it appears, seldom speculated about which of the heavenly bodies were
so inhabited. Those who believed in moonmen likely did so because of the prevalence of that
view in their day rather than because they believed Joseph Smith had been
inspired to reveal the existence of such beings. From the available sources one could hardly
conclude that belief in an inhabited moon was general among Mormons of the
nineteenth century, and further, to conclude that it was a basic position
either of Joseph Smith or Mormonism is certainly false In the first half of the nineteenth
century scientists may have differed on the question of intelligent life on the moon, but such
a notion was by no means a discredited idea.
In 1822 William Herschel died. He
was the greatest astronomer of his time; he discovered the planet Uranus in
1781 and became official astronomer to King George III. In 1976 Patrick Moore,
Director of the Lunar Section of the British Astronomical Association, wrote of
William Herschel: As an observer it is possible that
he has never been equalled, and between 1781 and his
death, in 1822, every honor that the scientific world could bestow came his
way. His views about life in the Solar System
were, then, rather surprising. He
thought it possible that there was a region below the Sun's fiery surface where
men might live, and he regarded the existence of life on the Moon as "an
absolute certainty." In 1780 Herschel, in a letter to a
disbelieving astronomer, asked: Who can say that it is not extremely
probable, nay beyond doubt, that there must be inhabitants on the Moon of some
kind or another?12 Also in 1822, the German astronomer Gruithuisen announced that he had discovered a lunar city
with a collection of gigantic ramparts extending 23 miles in either
direction.13 It was not until 1838, with the publication of the writings of
Beer and Madler, that the scientific world concluded
that the moon is definitely unable to support higher life forms.14 This,
however, had little immediate effect upon popular belief. The scientific conclusion did not become the
popular conclusion for at least 60 years.15 Throughout the era of belief in moonmen, no year can compare with 1835 for interest and publicity. In that year was perpetrated the Great Lunar
Hoax-perhaps the biggest scientific practical joke of all time. In 1833 the renowned astronomer John
Herschel, son of William Herschel, set sail for the Cape of Good Hope to survey
the skies of the southern hemisphere as his father had so thoroughly done of
the northern. He remained there for five
years until 1838. In 1835 Richard Locke, a reporter for the On Locke first described the
construction and operation of Herschel's new telescope. John Herschel, by perfecting his father's
innovations and with the financial backing of none other than the King of Great
Britain himself, reported Locke, succeeded in constructing a telescope so powerful
that it brought the surface of the moon to an "apparent proximity of about
eighty yards." The lens was 24 feet in diameter, and "its weight was
14,826 lbs after being polished, and its magnifying power estimated at 42,000
times." It was an amalgam of two parts crown to one part flint glass
"cast with perfect success, by Hartley & Grant Dunbarton
Such profound secrecy has been
preserved throughout the whole, that the present publication.
. . is the first that even the scientific world of The telescope was finally ready for
operation made a
solemn pause of several hours, to prepare his mind to tear away the veil that
could make him, for the time, sole depository of the wondrous secrets of that
hitherto unseen world. After these preliminaries, Locke
told it all, with each installment more wondrous than the last. In his first glimpse Sir John saw
various rock formations and then a precipitous shelf covered with a dark red
flower, "the first organic production of a foreign world ever revealed to
the eyes of man." He was then delighted by the sight of a lunar
forest. He succeeded in classifying 38
species of forest trees and nearly twice that number of plants. Next he saw a level green plain and a deep
blue lake breaking in large white billows upon a beach of brilliant white
sand. But, as yet, he observed no animal
life. The excitement mounted as the
telescope was adjusted to the limit of its magnification. Then in the shade of the woods, he
"beheld continuous herds of brown quadrupeds, having all the external
characteristics of the bison" but with a "fleshy appendage over the
eyes which was lifted and lowered by means of the ears. . . . It immediately
occurred to the acute mind of Dr. Herschel that this was a Providential
contrivance to protect the eyes of the animal from the great extremes of light
and darkness." Other animals included a gregarious,
single-horned antelope, engaging in "all the unaccountable antics of a
young lamb or kitten." On one of the lakes he saw a variety of water birds
plunging their long necks into the lake.
He watched for a long time hoping to catch sight of a lunar fish but
never did. However, the most remarkable
animal was the biped
beaver, which exactly resembles the Beaver, only it has no tail, and walks
always on its hind legs, carrying its young in its arms. Its huts are higher and better than those of
many human savages, and from the appearance of smoke in nearly all of them, it is supposed the animal is acquainted with
fire. Man can no longer be distinguished
as the cooking animal! This, of course, was all leading to
Locke's climax-the discovery of moonmen, which he
recounted in his final article. They
were winged men who were first observed flying. "When their attitude was erect and dignified, their stature [was] about four
feet." They were covered with copper-colored hair. "They appeared to
be constantly engaged in conversing, with much impassioned gesticulation; and
hence it was inferred, that they are rational beings. Others, apparently of a higher order, were
discovered afterwards. . . . And finally a magnificent temple for the worship
of God, of polished sapphire, in a triangle shape, with a roof of gold."16 The articles were an immediate
sensation and were reprinted in many of the papers. Reverend Harley gave this assessment: When the first number appeared in
the the
excitement aroused was intense. The
paper sold daily by thousands, and when the articles came out as a pamphlet,
twenty thousand went off at once. Not
only in Young America, but also in Old England, France, and throughout Patrick Moore also detailed the
reception the articles received: The articles met with a mixed
reception, but some eminent critics swallowed the bait hook, line and sinker.
"These new discoveries are both probable and plausible," declared the
New York Times, while the New Yorker thought that the
observations "had created a new era in astronomy and science
generally."18 The New York Evangelist published a
lengthy summary of the articles which was reprinted on In told his
congregation that, on account of the wonderful discoveries of the present age,
he lived in expectation of one day calling upon them for a subscription to buy
Bibles for the benighted inhabitants of the moon.20 On September 16 the Sun confessed
its hoax. Still the articles only
described what many firmly believed existed on the moon, and popular belief was
undaunted by the confession which was, after all, not nearly so widely
publicized as the original articles. The
Painesville Telegraph near Kirtland did not even carry the story of the
confession. The following year
the American theologian Dr.
Timothy Dwight, in his book Theology, declared that "it is most
rationally concluded that intelligent beings in great multitudes inhabit [the
Moon's] lucid regions, being far better and happier than ourselves."21 Belief in intelligent moon life
continued for many years.22 According to Moore, the last great advocate of
intelligent life on the moon was W.H. Pickering, who authored a 1904
photographic atlas and wrote many papers about the moon.23 Perhaps the most valuable point in
all this is that the credibility of figures of one generation cannot be judged
fairly by the standards of a later generation.
It may be that today a person's credibility should be questioned if he
believes in a moon civilization in need of evangelizing. But that would not have been the case for
someone professing such a view in the nineteenth century. The other question still remains:
Did Joseph Smith believe in an inhabited moon? From the historical evidence now
available the answer must be: Not proven.
But, all things considered, the possibility, or probability, that he did
cannot reasonably be denied. For all
others of that era the question seems quite insignificant, especially given
contemporary beliefs. But in the case of
Joseph Smith, he claimed to be a prophet.
Some extremists contend that his claim demands that his knowledge in every
area be superior to that of others in his era.
If he believed any false notion of his day, so these critics say, his
credibility must be doubted. Others, not
so demanding of infallible insight in a prophet, would be more comfortable with
a description of God's revelation which allowed for the human and the
divine. As Rev. J. R. Dumm elow so aptly described the
authors of the Bible in his One Volume Bible Commentary, so might one say of
Joseph Smith: Though purified and ennobled by the
influence of His Holy Spirit, men each with his own peculiarities of manner and
disposition-each with his own education or want of education-each with his own
way of looking at things-each influenced differently from another by the
different experiences and disciplines of his life. Their inspiration did not involve a
suspension of their natural faculties; it did not even make them free from
earthly passion; it did not make them into machines-it left them
men. Therefore we find their knowledge
sometimes no higher than that of their contemporaries ....24 Dummelow's description of the author of Genesis is equally
applicable: His scientific knowledge may be
bounded by the horizon of the age in which he lived, but the religious truths
he teaches are irrefutable and eternal.25 Certainly some critics will persist
in their belief that Oliver B. Huntington's 1892 article has devastated both
Joseph Smith and Mormonism. Some
determined Mormons will dogmatically deny to the end that Joseph Smith ever,
for a moment, believed in moonmen. And I suspect that some ardent
fundamentalists will yet testify fervently that when men really do travel
around the moon they will be greeted by an elderly Quaker-like gentleman,
proving empirically the divine inspiration of the Prophet Joseph Smith. VAN HALE has a radio talk show in Notes 1. Young
Woman's Journal 3:263,264. 2. Jay
Jacobson, "Three Reasons Not to Become a Mormon," p. 7. 3. Utah
State Historical Society, typescript, p. 166. 4. Ibid.
p. 160. 5. Ibid.
p. 166. 6. Ibid.
p. 161, 168. 7. BYU
Studies 18:177. 8. JD
13:271. 9. Young
Woman's Journal 5:346. 10. Patriarchal
Blessings Books, 9:294, 295. 11. Young
Woman's Journal 5:345, 346. 12. Patrick
Moore, New Guide to the Moon (W.W. Norton & Company, New York: 1976), p.
128. 13. Ibid.
p. 129. |