Part I
By Richard Bushman
Editors' Note: BYU Studies is
the university’s journal of LDS thought and scholarship.
BYU Studies is dedicated to the premise that faith
is strengthened through the intellectual pursuit of light
and truth.
Richard Bushman is perhaps the most respected scholar on Joseph
Smith within as well as outside of the Church and has published
extensively with BYU Studies. To learn more or to subscribe
to the journal, to go byustudies.byu.edu
Since Henry Caswall published The
Prophet of the Nineteenth Century in 1843, a year before
Joseph Smith’s death, nineteen book-length biographies of
the Prophet have appeared in print, more than half of them
since 1940.1 They differ wildly in tone and perspective,
as might be imagined…
We have no reason to think that the writing of biographies
about the Prophet will cease as we enter the twenty-first
century. Major historical figures always invite reassessment,
and interest in Joseph Smith shows no signs of flagging. The
relentless growth of the Church makes him more important now
than ever. To account for Mormonism’s modern success, the
mysteries of Joseph Smith have to be plumbed. How are we to
understand this extravagant and bold figure whose work has
now attracted millions of followers all over the world? How
can Joseph be situated in American culture and now in global
culture? Why was he so successful? Puzzles such as these are
sure to attract biographers in the coming century.
Over the past hundred years, two issues have shaped writing
on Joseph Smith, and as we move into the twenty-first century,
it may be worth speculating on how these questions will be
addressed in the future. May we expect sharp departures, or
will the classic questions be answered in the classic ways?
The first of these is the question of belief. Until now, the
tone and import of a Joseph Smith biography has depended heavily
on whether or not the author believed in Joseph’s revelations.
Will the author’s attitude toward the authenticity of the
revelations continue to govern the organization of biographies
in the future as they have in the past?
The second issue is the question of significance. What is
the place of Mormonism in American history? Where did Mormonism
come from? What is its impact? What does Mormonism tell us
about America? These questions bear directly on Joseph Smith’s
life, and the answers are sure to change as our understanding
of American culture evolves. The discussion will become even
more complicated as Mormonism spreads around the globe. Mormon
historians rarely deal with the question of significance,
but non-Mormon readers want an answer. Mormon authors should
contribute to this speculation as it goes forward rather than
leaving the question of significance to outsiders and critics.
Belief and Joseph Smith’s Life
The issue of belief was recently posed to me by Alfred Bush,
curator of Western Americana at the Firestone Library at Princeton
University. Because of his Mormon background, Bush is one
of the most attentive observers of the Mormon scene and is
responsible for a superb collection of Mormon Americana at
the Firestone. When he learned I was writing a biography of
Joseph Smith, he told me that I must address the question
of the historicity of the Book of Mormon. The historian is
responsible, Bush insisted, for determining whether or not
the book is true history.
I see this as a version of a question that has dominated writing
on Joseph Smith from the beginning: Was Joseph Smith a prophet
to whom God actually spoke? Were the Book of Mormon and the
other revelations—amounting to over 800 pages of writing—from
God or were they the fabrications of a human mind? Although
Mormons and their critics answer differently, they all deal
with this question of authenticity, and the author’s answer
determines a great deal about how a biography is put together.
The issue of authenticity can be thought of as a governing
question. The writer’s position on the revelations has consequences
far beyond the passages where the revelations themselves are
discussed.
If the author believes in the revelations, the story is likely
to take the following shape:
1. Joseph’s character and personality will be conceived positively.
A believing author will tend to see Joseph as possessing a
character worthy of a prophet. George Q. Cannon said of the
Prophet, “His magnetism was masterful, and his heroic qualities
won universal admiration.”2
For these biographers, faults get overlooked and virtues magnified.
Critical historians always suspect believing historians of
whitewashing Joseph and his family. After my book Joseph
Smith and the Beginnings of Mormonism appeared, I was
asked by one colleague why I had not mentioned Joseph Smith
Sr.’s bouts of intoxication. Actually it was a slip in my
scholarship, but the critics thought I was covering up. Unbelievers
would never make such a mistake. They would be sure to notice
Father Smith’s somewhat demeaning weakness.
2. Believers will see Joseph’s doctrines as unique or at
least inspiring. His revelations look like new truth bursting
on the earth. John Henry Evans inspired Leonard Arrington
because Evans was so upbeat about Joseph’s teachings. “Joseph
Smith’s attraction,” Evans wrote, “lay partly in his personality,
but mainly in the dynamic power of his religious philosophy.”3 Non-Mormons tend to think that the Book
of Mormon is simplistic and easily dismissed.4
Believers see its profundities and complexities.
3. Among believers there is an inclination toward providential
history, that is, to see the hand of the Lord working on the
Saints’ behalf. They are likely to play up small miracles
in everyday life. The Mormon world is filled with God’s presence.
Consequently, the biography’s overall plot line is inclined
to be triumphalist. Struggle is
a form of testing that brings success in the end. This is
God’s cause, and it will eventually overcome all opposition.5
Skeptics, on the other hand, give the narrative another form:
1. Joseph has to become in some sense a scoundrel. The reason
for this is that he pretended to have revelations that the
author believes were fabricated. It follows that Joseph deceived
his followers by claiming revelation he was not really receiving.
He almost inevitably therefore becomes a showman or a con
man. This is the way Brodie puts
it:
“For Joseph what was a dream one day could become a vision
the next, and a reality the day after that. It is doubtful
if he ever escaped the memory of the conscious artifice that
went into the Book of Mormon, but its phenomenal success must
have stifled any troublesome qualms. And at an early period
he seems to have reached an inner equilibrium that permitted
him to pursue his career with a highly compensated but nevertheless
very real sincerity. Certainly a persisting consciousness
of guilt over the cunning and deception with which his prophetic
career was launched would eventually have destroyed him.”6
Starting with such assumptions about Joseph Smith’s character,
one can expect all sorts of relapses into deceptive behavior
because a lie lay at the bottom of his life. Joseph becomes
morally ambiguous, doing many noble and heroic things but
also capable of base behavior—a divided man at his core.7
2. Because Joseph’s revelations are thought to be a concoction,
the skeptical biographer has to locate the sources of the
revelations. Where did all the components of the Book of Mormon
and the Book of Moses come from? As Brodie puts it, Joseph Smith’s theology was “a patchwork of
ideas and rituals drawn from every quarter.”8
This assertion leads to a survey of all kinds of source materials,
sometimes ranging far into the past in search of precedents
for his ideas.9 Since Joseph
wrote so much, it is difficult to locate a source for everything,
so these biographers content themselves with a few examples
and presume the rest could be accounted for by further searching.
Strangely, not much credit is given to Joseph’s own imagination
and certainly none to God. The skeptics show a peculiar reluctance
to suggest Joseph might have had independent genius, even
though writing the Book of Mormon in three months is surely
one of the greatest writing feats of all time.
3. Along the same line, the skeptic may have to work out
the devious means by which Joseph carried off his deceptions.
Having to account for the testimonies of the Three and Eight
Witnesses, skeptics speculate about making supposed gold plates
out of tin or filling a box with sand to make it heavy enough
to feel like gold. The requirement of discovering
the magician performing his tricks results in the fabrication
of events, comparable to the attenuated explanations of the
Spaulding theory in the previous century where Sidney Rigdon
had to be shown smuggling the manuscript of the Book of Mormon
to Joseph.10
These contrasting qualities could be elaborated, but they
suggest, I hope, how the question of authenticity has shaped
the organization and tone of writings about Joseph Smith in
the twentieth century. Doubtless the question of authenticity
will not die in the twenty-first century, but I believe that
this issue has steadily been losing its edge and that a
growing body of readers are ready for another depiction
of the Prophet. These readers do not want to be caught up
in the battles of believers and disbelievers; they are more
interested in knowing about an extraordinarily intriguing
person…
Questions that are addressed in Part II
of A Joseph Smith for the Twenty-First Century:
·
Does a growing tolerance help or hurt
the cause of Mormonism?
·
Can rationalists believe in the Joseph
Smith story?
·
How did the Enlightenment view those who
believed in modern revelation?
·
How did the golden plates and other concrete
religious artifacts set Joseph apart from all others claiming
visionary experience?
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Studies, go to byustudies.byu.edu
