Orson Pratt was Mormonism’s first intellectual

Originally published at StandardNET in 2011.

In the 19th century, for many in the East Coast of the United States, Brigham Young may have been the image they saw when they thought of Mormonism, but the ideas they heard coming from the new religion came mostly from the Apostle Orson Pratt.

That’s a conclusion reached by Top of Utah author Breck England, in his still-important biography of Pratt, “The Life and Thought of Orson Pratt.” The book was published in 1985 by University of Utah Press. I picked up a copy at a local library and was fascinated by Pratt, who was considered a rationalist thinker who often clashed with President Brigham Young, who preferred a more “meat and potatoes” interpretation of the Gospel.

Pratt, the brother of the more flamboyant Parley, lifted himself out of poverty to become Mormonism’s top intellectual. He was blessed with an amazing brain. He authored an unpublished textbook on calculus and penned a text on algebra that was cited by academics of the era. He was responsible for creating an odometer that could accurately log miles accumulated by wagon trains. He was instrumental in mapping the Salt Lake valley after the pioneers arrived. In fact, England notes that the parcel allotted to Pratt is today prime commercial real estate just south of Temple Square.

One can speculate that Pratt’s natural interest in science attracted him to follow Joseph Smith. Later in his ministry he developed the intelligence-matter theory, inspired by Joseph Smith’s teachings. The theology of endless worlds and gods progressing in eternity was manna to Pratt’s mind, and he was a fervent advocate of it his whole life.

Early in the his church membership, Pratt almost left Mormonism. The first was over a bank failure. The second was more serious and led to a short excommunication of Pratt and his wife. While he was away preaching, allegations were made in Nauvoo of impropriety between Smith, his associate John C. Bennett, and Pratt’s wife Sarah. Sarah Pratt claimed that Smith had asked her to be a plural wife. Smith claimed Sarah had had an affair with Bennett. 

Pratt initially sided with his wife. Eventually, Pratt and Sarah returned to fellowship in the young church and Bennett was excommunicated. He later became a prominent enemy of the church.

It is impossible to know what really happened, but apparently the bad feelings and scars never subsided. Years later, the Pratts separated and Sarah became an enthusiastic enemy of the LDS church, teaching her children to hate it.

Pratt’s excommunication reversed his placement in the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles and likely prevented him from becoming church president. For the rest of his life, he was a vigorous defender of Mormonism, the Book of Mormon and Joseph Smith. He was often called to Europe to lead missions and church publications. While in Germany he denounced that nation’s refusal to allow any religions besides Catholicism a chance. Pratt also translated the Book of Mormon into the church-created phonetic language Deseret.

Late in his life, Pratt was more mellow and less eager to explore unique looks into Mormonism or Christian theology. This was probably in large part due to Young and other apostles publicly denouncing some of Pratt’s ideas. In fact, some of his books were hunted down and destroyed by church leaders. 

Pratt accepted these rebukes humbly and urged church members to ignore his writings that were condemned by Young. Perhaps the Nauvoo battle, with his near expulsion from the church and failed marriage had worn him down and he wanted peace. Or, perhaps he truly believed his painstaking research was now a detriment to the church.

According to Breck, Pratt left a legacy of philosophy to Mormonism. His belief in an energy of one and many attempts to rationalize science and theology have been explored countless times since his death.

-- Doug Gibson

Orson Pratt Jr., Erastus Snow, apostasy and excommunication

(Above, Orson Pratt Jr., from Pratt Family Photo Project)

I’ve been reading a lot about Orson Pratt, the early Mormon apostle and leader who almost left the young church over allegations of seduction and adultery involving his wife, Sarah M. Pratt, the prophet Joseph Smith and Smith’s assistant, John C. Bennett. Later, after reconciling his wife’s accusations against Smith and Bennett with his belief in Mormonism, the apostle Pratt often clashed with Smith’s successor, Brigham Young, over doctrines, including who God was and His attributes.

His disputes with Young cost Pratt a chance to be president of the church. His dispute with Smith, and the way he resolved it, ultimately cost him his relationship with his first wife, her belief in the church he sacrificed so much for, and the belief of the children he bore with Sarah, save one. That brings us to Orson Pratt, Jr., the eldest son of Orson and Sarah.

Orson Jr. was a lot like his father. Like his dad, he was an intellectual man who applied reason and evidence with faith. He was also an accomplished musician, talented enough to teach at the university level. Unlike his father, though, Orson Jr. was not able to reconcile his theological doubts with his respect for reason. He became a disbeliever of Mormonism, and in a very public forum in southern Utah, where he had been a member of that area’s theological hierarchy, Orson Jr. told a large crowd that he no longer believed Joseph Smith was a prophet or that Mormonism was the true church. His discourse took place in September 1864, the same month he was excommunicated at the urging of LDS Church Apostle Erastus Snow, who had supplanted Orson Sr., on a mission to England, as sole leader of the southern Utah LDS cotton mission.

In Orson Pratt Jr.: Gifted Son of an Apostle and an Apostate,” published in the journal Dialogue, Richard S. and Mary C. Van Wagoner provide more insight into Orson Jr.’s decision to leave Mormonism. Orson Jr. claims to have disbelieved Mormonism at an early age. This is supported by his brother Arthur telling a reporter that his mother, Sarah Pratt, would secretly teach the children — while Orson Sr. was away on his many missions — to disbelieve in Joseph Smith, polygamy and Mormonism.

Nevertheless, Orson Jr. lived the life of a favored young Mormon son. He married Susan Snow, the daughter LDS leader Zerubabel Snow, was appointed to a Salt Lake City alderman and LDS high council member in his early 20s, played organ concerts privately for Brigham Young and other Mormon leaders and became a prominent music teacher. In the early 1860s he followed his father to the southern Utah mission and was quickly elected St. George city alderman and LDS high councilman.

However, in 1864 Orson Jr. refused a mission call from President Brigham Young, and action that in those days, explain the Van Wagoners, “was tantamount to an announcement of personal apostasy.” Later that year, Orson Jr., writing in the literary journal, “Veprecula,” under the pen name, “Veritas,” argued that faith could not derive from the supernatural, but “must be a careful and patient exercise of reason.” Young Pratt’s reasoning was similar to his father’s earlier declarations that evidence must support faith, but Orson Jr. took a step his father never did — he applied that reasoning to reject his father’s teachings.

There is a certain irony to Erastus Snow — Orson Jr.’s uncle — leading the excommunication of Orson Jr., given that Orson Sr. had helped convert Snow to Mormonism 30 years earlier in Vermont. In his discourse, Orson Jr. denounced Snow as a man who had actively, but secretly, tried to convince his wife, Susan, to reject him. As Gary Bergera explains in his book, “Conflict in the Quorum: Orson Pratt, Brigham Young, Joseph Smith,” Snow’s beliefs on how to treat unbelieving family members may have played a large role in his desire to punish Orson Jr. with excommunication. In an 1857 LDS general conference address, Snow’s harsh beliefs on how to handle in-family apostasy were recorded: “…Sometimes we may err by being remiss in duty — too lenient in our families, and some of us may be under condemnation by being too careless about transgressors in our families; for if we hold fellowship with transgressors and spirits that are in rebellion against God and that will not repent and humble themselves — if we close our ears to it and go to sleep while wickedness is stalking unrebuked through our habitations, we become partakers in that transgression, and the consequences thereof will stick to us. …”

Snow went on to urge LDS families to send siblings and spouses who rejected the LDS Church teachings away from their families and out into the world, “better this than to harbour them where they were like a viper … corrupting and corroding in the midst of … family.”

The idea that members should cast out every young adult who rejects the Gospel of their parents fit the times of 1857, a time when the LDS church was at its most orthodox, and apostles such as George Albert Smith were sent to all corners of Utah to preach “us against them” fire-and-brimstone speeches; of such rhetoric was the Mountain Meadows Massacre wrought. But it hardly applied to the mild, academically talented, gifted musician, Orson Pratt Jr., who in more civil times would have been quietly released from his callings and left to live his existence outside the LDS Church without the theological stain of excommunication. Orson Pratt, Jr., by the way, lived a quiet, distinguished life in Ogden and Salt Lake City before dying in late 1903. He is buried in Salt Lake City and received a respectful obituary in the church-owned Deseret News. As late as September 1903, the ailing Pratt, who had moved to Ogden for his health, advertised in the Standard-Examiner for music students.

Mentioned in Bergera’s book is the suggestion that Orson Jr.’s excommunication was an attempt to embarrass his father and weaken his influence in the Quorum of the Twelve. According to Bergera, Orson Jr. initially refused to resign from his church position because he feared a “possible backlash for his father.” Also, Brigham Young blamed Orson Sr. for his son’s apostasy, calling his then-senior apostle “at heart an infidel.”

-- Doug Gibson

-- This post was originally published at StandardBlogs

The Adam-God debate, or how an apostle bested a prophet

(Can't find the Cal Grondahl cartoon that went with this post, so until I do, enjoy this Cal "Culture of Mormonism" classic.

We Mormons shy away from the old relic called the Adam-God doctrine. In recent years, the late prophet Spencer W. Kimball denounced it from the pulpit, as did the late apostle Bruce R. McConkie in “Mormon Doctrine.” McConkie added that those who said that Brigham Young pushed it had taken Mormonism’s greatest leader out of context.

But the later denials are, to be frank, historical revisionism. Brigham Young did believe Adam was the god of our earth, and that doctrine was pushed with fervor by Young and many church leaders for decades. It was debated by LDS apostles as late as the 1890s. Apostles Heber C. Kimball and George Q. Cannon believed Adam was our God.

Why the Adam-God doctrine never gained enough traction in the LDS Church and was eventually ruefully de-emphasized by Young is mostly due to one man, the LDS apostle, Orson Pratt, who just as fiercely opposed the Adam-God doctrine and backed up his opposition with LDS scriptures. Supporters of the Adam-God doctrine were finally forced into vague defenses along the lines of “God has not revealed the details of this wondrous doctrine.”

The Adam-God debate that flourished for so long among the LDS faithful and hierarchy is detailed in the spring 1982 issue of Dialogue: A Journal of Mormon Thought. The article, by BYU graduate David John Buerger, is fascinating reading, and makes me wish the LDS Church would offer more information about this historically interesting period of its development. On April 9, 1852, Young said this during a general conference speech: “Now, hear it, O inhabitants of the earth, Jew and Gentile, Saint and Sinner! When our Father Adam came into the garden of Eden, he came into it with a celestial body, and brought Eve, one of his wives, with him. … He is our Father and our God, and the only God with whom we have to do.”

Young added that Jesus Christ was a spiritual son of Adam: “Jesus, our Elder Brother, was begotten in the flesh by the same character that was in the Garden of Eden, and who is our Father in Heaven. …” Young added that this doctrine would matter in the salvation or damnation of listeners.
As Buerger recounts, leading Mormons, including future prophet Wilford Woodruff, clearly understood that Young had decreed Adam as our God.

In later dispatches, published in The Millennial Star, the church strengthened its Adam-God doctrine by listing a geneology for the creators. In a school of the prophets class, Buerger writes that it was taught that Elohim was Adam’s grandfather, followed by Jehova, Adam’s father, and our God, Adam. Christ, as mentioned, was classified a spirit son of God Adam.

Of course, LDS doctrine today teaches that Jesus Christ is Jehova and that Adam was created out of the dust, as was Eve. Adam-God ran into trouble immediately; members could not find it in the scriptures. Nevertheless, Apostle Willard Richards had a succinct reply to doubters. He wrote, “If, as Elder Caffall remarked, there are those who are waiting at the door of the church for this objection to be removed, tell such, the prophet and Apostle Brigham has declared it, and that is the world of the Lord.”

In an 1854 general conference speech, Young went further: “I tell you more, Adam is the father of our spirits. He live upon the earth; he did abide his creation and did honor to his calling and preisthood (sic) and obeyed his master or Lord, and probably many of his wives did (the same) and they lived, and died upon an earth, and (then) were resurrected again to immortality and eternal life …”

However, one apostle, Orson Pratt, did not buy this new doctrine. He pointed to scriptures, including to what is Section 29, verse 42 in the Doctrine and Covenants and also Moses 4:28 and Moses 5:4-9. In defense, Young claimed that Joseph Smith had taught the Adam-God doctrine. Buerger’s research points to anecdotal evidence from third parties that Smith believed Adam was far more than his peers on Earth (a belief shared today by the current LDS Church) but past sermons of Smith’s also clearly show the first LDS prophet regarded Adam as an inferior to Jesus Christ, which puts him at odds with Young’s beliefs.

Other scriptural problems with the Adam-God doctrine include references to Adam’s death (Moses: 6:12 and Doctrine and Covenants 107:53) Also, Buerger cites Alma 11:45 in the Book of Mormon, where Amulek teaches that a resurrected body can die no more. How, Pratt reasonably wondered, can Adam have a resurrected celestial body and later die?

There were other contradictions to the Adam-God doctrine in theological books penned by apostles Parley P. Pratt and future prophet, John Taylor. Eventually, Young began to slowly abandon efforts to push the controversial doctrine, although he defended it often, sometimes with caustic remarks that skeptics were “yet to grovel in darkness.”

There is one recorded deviation by Young from Adam-God; as Buerger recounts, in an 1861 address to a non-Mormon audience, Young refers to Adam and Christ being created by a Supreme Being. However, this may be an example of the prophet speaking more simply to people — gentiles — he felt too naive to understand the doctrine. According to Brueger’s research, Young continued to teach the Adam-God doctrine, but mainly in more exclusive settings, such as teachings to general authorities.

In 1870, Young, quoted in the Deseret News, again said that God had revealed Adam’s celestial status to him. However, the doctrine’s steam slowly ebbed away. Eventually, Charles W. Penrose, editor of The Deseret News, signaled the church’s rejection of claims that Adam is our God. At first, Penrose said that Young’s personal views were not church doctrine; however, within a few years a church article stated that the debate over Young’s views were of no real value. Eventually, that changed to a view — held today — that Young had been misinterpreted.

The misinterpretation claim, as evidenced, does not survive historical scrutiny. It’s a shame that more information is unavailable on the fierce debate between Young, Pratt and others over the Adam-God doctrine, which comprised one of the most interesting eras in LDS Church history. The decades long controversy is an example of the progressive, brainstorming, exciting nature of the 19th century LDS church, where ideas — polygamy, new scriptures, Christ visiting America, celestial godhood, temples, priesthood revival, prophets, etc. roiled the theological world. It’s evidence of a uniquely American religion that still appeals to inquisitive minds.

-- Doug Gibson

Originally published at StandardBlogs.