Religion and American Society

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Religion and American Society

• A Product of Antebellum America The Mormons
• Week 5 Lecture 3

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A Product of Antebellum America The Mormons

• Centripetal and Centrifugal Forces of Antebellum
  Life
• Joseph Smith
• The Founding of Mormonism
• Headed West
• Preliminary Conclusions

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Centripetal and Centrifugal Forces of Antebellum
Life

• Evangelicalism made each individual person
  responsible for his/her theology and salvation
• Respect for clerics within the context of
  disestablishment
• Focus on the immediate conversion of ones soul
• Innovation

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Centripetal and Centrifugal Forces of Antebellum
Life

• Societal developments shaping evangelical
  perspective
• Like many other evangelicals, Lyman Beecher comes
  to the conclusion that nothing could temper or
  restraint society and its depravity except the
  force of Gods law written upon the heart of
  each individual

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Centripetal and Centrifugal Forces of Antebellum
Life

• Disruptions and bewilderments in the lives of
  many people in America led them to readily
  conclude the world was on the verge of a great
  transformation
• Pre- and post-millennialism
• New millennialism of antebellum represents a
  rationalizing of revelation and a Christianizing
  of Enlightenment belief

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Centripetal and Centrifugal Forces of Antebellum
Life

• Optimistic and worldly
• Promise of divine destruction of powers of evil
  and oppressive social structures
• Step-by-step progress to usher in the millennium
• Focus on converting individuals to bring about
  social reforms

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Joseph Smith

• Joseph Smith (1805-1844)
• Like many of his earliest followers, Smith grew
  up in an area of western New York called the
  "Burned Over District
• Area of western New York "scorched" by so many
  revivals
• Smith claimed to have been "seared but not
  consumed" by the exuberant evangelicalism of the
  era

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Joseph Smith

• Claims to have had a direct revelation with God
  (experiential) in which Gods laws/word was
  passed on to him in a series of golden tablets
• Translates works into fundamental testament of
  the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day

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Joseph Smith

• According to Smith he translated the book from
  golden plates engraved in a language referred to
  as reformed Egyptian.
• The plates, which were seen and handled by 11
  witnesses, deal chiefly with the inhabitants of
  the American continents spanning the period 600
  BCE to 421CE.
• The plates relate the sacred history of
  Israelites who, led by a divinely directed
  righteous man named Lehi, emigrated from
  Jerusalem to the New World.

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Joseph Smith

• In the New World, Jesus appeared and gave them
  his teachings.
• The record of their experiences, kept by various
  prophets, was compiled and abridged by the 5th
  century prophet Mormon

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Joseph Smith

• Mormon Church cannot be considered as the direct
  product of revivalism or as a splintering off
  from an existing Protestant denomination
• Mormonism was inspired by Smith and created its
  own sacred text entitled the Book of Mormon in
  1830

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Headed West

• Mormonism Adherents persecuted from the
  inception of the movement
• Move from upstate New York to Ohio and then on to
  Missouri and Illinois where they settle.
• 1844, Joseph Smith and his brother Hiram were
  attacked by a mob in Carthage, Illinois and
  murdered

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Headed West

• Following the murder of Smith, the Mormons under
  the leadership of Brigham Young migrate in
  1846-1847 to Utah where they found a permanent
  home
• Exilic motif of ancient Israelites

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Preliminary Conclusions Mormonism

• Mormons reflect both the centripetal and
  centrifugal forces of American religious society
  at the time
• The Mormons subscribed to many orthodox Christian
  beliefs but professed a distinctive doctrine of
  post-canonical biblical revelation
• Mormons saw themselves as a restorative effort
  within Christianity to get back to the primitive
  church