About that other Parley P. Pratt biography

Note: I found this review of Reva Stanley's long-ago published biography of the Apostle Parley Pratt in Wayback, dated May 29, 2009. I had been looking for it. I examined its value compared with other sources of Pratt's life, mostly the still well-read "The Autobiography of Parley P. Pratt." Of course, several years later, the world was blessed with a better-researched biography, "Parley P. Pratt: The Apostle Paul of Mormonism," by Terryl L. Givens and Matthew J. Grow. (review here)

Few people, even Latter-day Saints today, understand how very popular the early Mormon apostle Parley Parker Pratt was in the first several decades of the LDS Church. His books, such as “Key to the Science of Theology,” were as common in Mormon households as “Jesus the Christ” or “The Articles of Faith” are today.

Pratt, who was murdered in 1857 in Arkansas by a man whose wife he had married and ran away with, still maintains high popularity among Latter-day Saints. That is due largely to his autobiography, which is still published and available from multiple sources, including free on the Internet.

Also, Pratt was a fascinating, charismatic man, and the “Autobiography of Parley P. Pratt” is an important read. However, sections have been edited, particularly his murder and the events leading up to his death, a result of Pratt marrying a woman under her husband’s nose.

Pratt should be a biographer’s dream. His life cries out for in-depth treatment. Although few know this, there is a biography of Parley P. Pratt out there. It’s the obscure 1937 out-of-print “The Archer of Paradise,” written by Pratt’s great-granddaughter, Reva Stanley.

It was published by The Caxton Printers in Caldwell, Idaho. I found a copy several years ago for $100-plus and have read it many times. It’s a mediocre biography, but complements Pratt’s autobiography very well.

“The Archer of Paradise” relies way too much on the autobiography. Large sections of the book, while properly sourced, are rehashes of the autobiography. However, there is historical value in Stanley’s recount of Pratt’s marriage to Elenore McClean and the subsequent murder of Pratt by her estranged husband, Hector McLean.

Stanley’s account supports the belief that McClean was a violent man, who abused Elenore. It was doubtless imprudent, though, of Pratt to marry her without legal sanction. There is an extensive afterward that includes recounts of the events by Ms. McClean.

Author Stanley is quite critical of early Mormon President Brigham Young. She feels Pratt was mistreated by Young and that Young was a lustful, hypoctitical man with a grandiose complex. Here is how Stanley describes Young in “Archer.”. “It was Brigham’s wont to travel with a huge calvacade. He loved pomp and display and the feeling that he was some sort of king.”

Opinions are mixed freely in “Archer.” Example: Stanley says that the early Mormon church was exciting and progressive. She then laments that the church in the 1930s is run by scared old men living in the past.

One must assume author Stanley was estranged from the LDS Church when she wrote “The Archer of Paradise.” The critical comments, especially those about Young, are probably why this historically important biography has not been re-published by the LDS Church.

That’s a pity. One doesn’t have to agree with Stanley’s grudges to find historical value in “The Archer of Paradise.”  We can hope that there is a well-researched biography of Pratt in the future. (Note: And of course there was one published; the aforementioned, Parley P. Pratt: The Apostle Paul of Mormonism.)

-- Doug Gibson

Interview with authors of Parley P. Pratt: The Apostle Paul of Mormonism

This interview was conducted in August of 2011, soon after the publication of the biography, Parley P. Pratt: The Apostle Paul of Mormonism, (reviewed by me here.) For various factors, it ended up in Wayback purgatory. It is now available at the Culture of Mormonism blog. I appreciate the input from authors Terryl Givens and Matthew J. Grow. Below is the 2011 post:

As Political Surf readers know, I mentioned the new biography of early Mormon leader Parley P. Pratt, “Parley P. Pratt: The Apostle Paul of Mormonism,” Oxford University Press, 2011, by Terryl L. Givens and Matthew J. Grow, in a previous blog that dealt with Pratt’s death (read). I will be reviewing the biography soon in the print edition of The Standard-Examiner. However, I had the opportunity to ask the authors, Givens and Grow, some questions about Pratt, his contemporaries, and the biography. The results are below:

Q: Did Pratt view his calling in life as an apostle to be as the apostles in the Book of Acts, such as as receiving visions, being persecuted or martyred, as Stephen, performing miracles, debating disbelievers, gathering and counseling members, and preaching without recompense and living in poverty?

A:  There is no doubt that Pratt saw his calling as an apostle as consistent with the New Testament pattern of apostleship. He was a fervent restorationist, was convinced that Joseph Smith had received the authority and keys necessary to restore the kingdom of God, and personally experienced those spiritual gifts such as healing that he believed were sure evidence of an authentic restoration. His willingness to leave his family behind time and again to preach the gospel at  home and in foreign lands, and suffer persecution and imprisonment for the gospel’s sake, was in part a consequence of the office he held and the biblical precedent of apostolic sacrifice and martyrdom.

Q: As a premillennialist, did Pratt have any theories as to a particular time Christ was going to return. Would he have been amazed that Christ had not returned by 2011?

A: Pratt’s millennial expectations preceded his conversion to Mormonism, but found particular focus and support from two events. First was his exposure to the Book of Mormon itself-Isaiah’s “ensign to the nations.”  Second was its reinforcement of his personal interest in the spiritual destiny of the American Indians. In light of Book of Mormon prophecies, he read the Indian Removal Act of 1830 as a providential episode that heralded the gathering of that segment of Israel, and was convinced the Second Coming was accordingly imminent. Smith’s announcement of the city of Zion to be built further confirmed him in his sense that he was living on the cusp of millennial events. The failure to realize the promise of Zion in Missouri was devastating to Pratt, as it was to thousands of his co-religionists.

Q: Pratt’s books and pamphlets, although rarely discussed today, are so much a part of Mormonism’s deepest beliefs. Did these emulate mostly from his private talks with Joseph Smith or from his personal study? And did he ever run into conflict on his published doctrine with Brigham Young, as his brother Orson often did?

A: Because so little is recorded of Smith’s Kirtland teachings and personal interactions with other leaders, it is impossible to know how much of Pratt’s writing was directly derivative of Smith’s ideas, and how much was Pratt’s own extrapolation and elaboration of seeds he garnered from Smith and his revelations. Most likely, it was both. Smith did on one occasion complain that Pratt and other “great big elders” were passing off his ideas as their own. Some later editions of Pratt’s writings had portions edited out, but we found no evidence of Young criticizing any particular ideas of his.  Rather, Young recommended Pratt’s writings to others.

Q: Did Brigham Young like Parley P. Pratt? An earlier biography of Pratt (Stanley) claimed the prophet disliked him and kept him away via constant missions?

A: In general, Young and Pratt seem to have had a good relationship, though there were moments of tension and conflict.  For instance, during the trek west, Young rebuked Pratt over several issues related to authority and organization of the trek west.  In general, though, Young respected Pratt for his preaching and literary talents, as well as his willingness and ability to take on difficult tasks like the Southern Utah Expedition, and Pratt accepted Young as his quorum president (and later Church president) and looked to him for guidance and advice.

Q: Regarding Pratt’s murder, do you think he wished to be a martyr or had resigned himself to dying when he left the Van Buren jail?

A: The last years of Pratt’s life were marked by disappointment in the millennium deferred, and in the failure of the Saints to attain the high standards expected of them. (Their unwillingness to generously support his missionary endeavors was one factor in that perception). He missed his family terribly during his missions, and was worn out emotionally and physically. In his final days, he refused to take precautions to defend himself against the man thirsting for his blood, and certainly met his death with uncommon equanimity.

Q: What are some unanswered questions about Parley P. Pratt that are still left to be discovered by historians?

A: One important question relates to your question 3. How much of a role did Pratt have as a catalyst to Joseph Smith’s own expansion of his ideas, especially in regard to human theosis, which Pratt discussed in print long before the King Follett discourse? Another question might be the enduring theological legacy of Pratt’s works. How did Pratt’s books, especially Voice of Warning and Key to the Science of Theology, shape Mormon thought throughout the nineteenth century and the twentieth (and indeed to the present)?

-- Interview by Doug Gibson

The last year of Parley P. Pratt's life included a media-covered deadly hunt

On May 13, 1857, LDS Apostle Parley P. Pratt was murdered near Van Buren, Ark., released early in the day by a judge who feared Pratt would be lynched. About 12 miles from the jail, Pratt was caught by a small posse led by Hector Hugle McLean, the still legally-married husband of Pratt’s polygamous wife, Eleanor McComb McLean Pratt. McLean stabbed Pratt three times in the chest, then returned and shot him in the neck. Mortally wounded, Pratt was lucid for more than an hour. According to Zealey Winn, a blacksmith whose home was near where Pratt was slain, said the 50-year-old apostle bore his testimony of his faith in the LDS Church and Joseph Smith and proclaimed himself a “martyr to the faith."

To me, Parley P. Pratt is easily the most fascinating early LDS church leader. I’ve read the first scholarly biography of Pratt, “Parley P. Pratt: The Apostle Paul of Mormonism,” Oxford University Press, 2011, by Terryl L. Givens and Matthew J. Grow, and reviewed it.

In this article, I want to focus on Pratt’s death. Not only was it a martyrdom (Pratt died for what he believed in) it was also largely a justifiable homicide in the mores of that time period. There was barely an effort to try McLean, and he was quickly exonerated. More so, many U.S. newspapers that covered Pratt’s murder lauded McLean for killing Pratt and one even suggested that President James Buchanan appoint McLean as territorial governor of Utah.

There’s no doubt that McLean was a brutal man. He was an alcoholic, a wife beater and falsely tried to have Eleanor committed to an insane asylum. But he was also a cuckold. Pratt had married his wife, Eleanor, after McLean — angry that his wife had been baptized LDS while Pratt was supervising the San Francisco missionary efforts — had taken the couple’s children and returned to New Orleans to his in-laws’ home. They were as angry at Eleanor’s conversion as her husband was.

Eleanor wasn’t the first plural wife Parley had married who wasn’t divorced from her husband, but she was the first whose husband — an immigrant from Scotland — was a believer in the extralegal tradition of a husband being allowed to kill his wife’s seducer. As the authors write, this “right” received sympathy all over the nation (even Utah had codified it as “mountain common law”) but it was especially strong in the southern United States. Passion, spur-of-the-moment murders by cuckolds were generally legal. Planned murders were considered crimes, but as Givens and Grow write, “...juries generally acquitted a husband even if he had obviously planned the killing.” And, “as a southerner, McLean was deeply influenced by notions of honor and manhood.”

Whether one agrees that Pratt had a right to marry Eleanor McLean, it’s clear that he made a serious error in judgment in taking on this wife. He had made an enemy who would take any opportunity to kill him. Had Pratt stayed in Utah, he likely would have been safe. But that was not Pratt’s style. He was a missionary, and in late 1856 he began a trek east on another LDS mission. Eleanor traveled part way with him, then detoured to New Orleans to her parents’ home. By design, she deceived them, claiming she was now a disbeliever in Mormonism. However, as soon as she was alone with the children, she took off for Utah without telling her family.

But more on that later: In December 1856, as Pratt was on his mission, the New Orleans Bulletin published a widely distributed feature article on the Pratt/McLean love triangle. Not surprisingly, Pratt was the villain. As Givens and Grow relate, the Bulletin wrote that “Eleanor intended to take her children to Utah, ‘to be thrust into the opening throat of the grim visaged and horrible monster, who sits midway upon the Rocky Mountains, lapping his repulsive jaws, and eager to devour new victims as they become entangled in his foul, his leprous coils.’” 

Whew! As the authors relate, there’s little doubt that such rhetoric encouraged McLean to begin a cross country manhunt of Pratt, ostensibly to take him back to Missouri, where he was still officially a fugitive from justice. 

By March 1857, Pratt was on the run, just avoiding being caught by McLean in St. Louis. However, by mid March, LDS leaders thought Pratt had escaped detection and assumed he would return to Utah. That was not Parley’s intention, though. Reckless, he decided to go south and try to help Eleanor — who was on the lam with her children — get to Utah with him. It was a fatal mistake. There was realistically little chance Eleanor could make it to Utah with her three children and Pratt, who was being hunted by McLean with the help of the feds and major newspapers, was a walking target the closer he got to McLean and the south. On May 6, McLean caught Eleanor, the children, and later Pratt, in Creek territory, west of Arkansas.

Eventually they were taken to Van Buren for trial. The cases against both Pratt and Eleanor were weak. They were charged with stealing Eleanor’s children’s clothes. In fact, although the crowds outside the courthouse at times advocated lynching Pratt and Eleanor, Judge John B. Ogden, after interviewing Eleanor, found himself more disgusted with McLean than the two defendants. Ogden believed Eleanor’s account that McLean’s drinking and wife-beating — not Mormonism — were responsible for his marital woes.

Later, in court, McLean drew his pistol and pointed it at Pratt. Bailiffs prevented him from shooting the LDS apostle. At this point, Ogden postponed court proceedings. Aware that Pratt could very well be lynched, Ogden dismissed charges and released Pratt in the pre-dawn hours, hoping he could escape. Pratt was offered a pistol and knife from Ogden but refused, saying, “Gentleman, I do not rely upon weapons of that kind. My trust is in my God.” A few hours later Parley P. Pratt was dead at the age of 50.

Givens and Grow write that Pratt had a foreboding he would never return alive from his last mission. He told his plural wife, Ann Agatha in August 1856, exactly that. Pratt and Eleanor, who traveled part way with him, certainly planned her attempt to get her children from Hector. Perhaps Pratt was thinking of how dangerous that attempt would be when he spoke with his wife. Pratt’s refusal to arm himself as he was released from Van Buren may indicate that he had already accepted his pending martyrdom. 

The LDS apostle was a man from Acts, ready to preach the Gospel to the most hostile crowds and be stoned as Stephen if the Lord saw fit to have it happen. It is ironic, though, that prior to his last mission, LDS Prophet Brigham Young promised Pratt “he would return to the Saints.” He never did. A monument marks the area where Pratt was murdered although his remains have not been recovered.

Notes: Eleanor McComb McLean Pratt returned to Utah and taught school until her death on Oct. 24, 1874. She remained a Latter-day Saint. In 1870, her youngest son joined her in Utah and taught at her school. I often wondered what happened to Hector McLean, who for a while boasted of his deeds in the press. I did a Google search of “Hector Hugle McLean” and within a few minutes I believe I tracked him down. By following a link — discovered at an anti-Mormon website — to the 1867 New Orleans parish death archives (http://files.usgwarchives.org/la/orleans/vitals/deaths/index/1867dimo.txt) it reveals that a Hector Hugle McLean died on (ironically) Oct. 24, 1867 in New Orleans. The archive lists McLean as being only 30 when he died, but that is certainly an archival error. It’s possible that the death notice mistook McLean’s entrance into the United States as his birth date. McLean was born in 1816. The fact that one McLean son decided to visit his mother a couple of years after his dad’s death also seems reasonable. I’m convinced this is McLean, whose death remains unreported by virtually all accounts of Pratt’s life and murder. Despite the notoriety and even adulation that Hector McLean received for killing Pratt, today he maintains small part in a much bigger figure’s life story. Pratt’s great-great grandson, by the way, is Republican presidential candidate and current Utah U.S. senator, Mitt Romney.

--- Doug Gibson

--- Originally published at StandardNET.

LDS Church has a test to discern good, and bad spirits

Mormonism, even in its more modern version today, does firmly believe in the visitations of spirits, good and bad, as well as resurrected beings. After all, the church’s genesis involved the presence of an evil spirit, followed by the appearance of two resurrected divine beings, to its founder, Joseph Smith. In fact, in Mormon scripture, there are specific instructions on how to discern good spirits from bad. It’s found in Doctrine & Covenants, Section 129:

1 There are two kinds of beings in heaven, namely: Angels, who are resurrected personages, having bodies of flesh and bones—

2 For instance, Jesus said: Handle me and see, for a spirit hath not flesh and bones, as ye see me have.

3 Secondly: the spirits of just men made perfect, they who are not resurrected, but inherit the same glory.

4 When a messenger comes saying he has a message from God, offer him your hand and request him to shake hands with you.

5 If he be an angel he will do so, and you will feel his hand.

6 If he be the spirit of a just man made perfect he will come in his glory; for that is the only way he can appear—

7 Ask him to shake hands with you, but he will not move, because it is contrary to the order of heaven for a just man to deceive; but he will still deliver his message.

8 If it be the devil as an angel of light, when you ask him to shake hands he will offer you his hand, and you will not feel anything; you may therefore detect him.

9 These are three grand keys whereby you may know whether any administration is from God.

I’m sure there are other churches that have specific instructions on how to discern a supernatural visitor. It’d be interesting to compare notes. (It’s a Mormon thing to be sure but there are likely tens of thousands of Latter-day Saints, the majority probably missionaries, who are confident enough in their faith to want to put the “handshake” test on a spirit.) In one of my favorite Mormon-themed novels, “Brother Brigham,” by D. Michael Martindale,” the protagonist, C.H., visited by a spirit claiming to be Brigham Young, applies the handshake test. The spirit rather coyly avoids the test, by both asking C.H. if he wants to shake hands and saying he’d rather refuse. The “ruse” works on the human.

Spiritual manifestations were ubiquitous in the LDS Church in the 19th century. I’m reading Todd Compton’s new biography of Jacob Hamlin and his visits with spirits included his late father. The early Parley P. Pratt (seen above and read his autobiography) had so many communications with spirits, good and bad, that the young prophet, Joseph Smith assigned Pratt and others to go through the branches of the Mormons in May 1831, specifically to discern which spiritual manifestations were legitimate, or of the devil. You can read Smith’s charge to Pratt and others in Doctrine and Covenants, Section 50.

Members of the church are encouraged when they relate tales of being privileged to have a connection to positive vibes from the spirit world, or if they overcome the presence of an evil spirit, trying to add to their stress, depression, or tempt them to do wrong. However, it’s considered more appropriate to share such experience with intimates, such as family or close friends, or in a setting such as the LDS Fast and Testimony meeting. Occasionally, I hear a spirit anecdote in a class such as Sunday School, but not as often as I imagine such were related 150 years ago in Mormon wards and branches.

There is a strict rule, though, to the Mormon encouragement of communication with spirits. It must be a spiritual manifestation that reinforces the faith. In my job as a journalist, I have infrequent communications with persons who — as Mormons — claim heavenly visitations that told them that the church was not being directed as God wanted. These persons have either left the church or been excommunicated. One of the more poignant, and sad cases of this was my short correspondence with a woman, soft-spoken who sincerely told me that she had received revelation from spiritual sources that told her to tell the faithful to stop using sanitized versions of cuss words, such as “heck,” “darn,” “shoot,” and so on. She took this message from ward to ward, refusing entreaties to stop, until she was excommunicated.

For those who want to learn more about how angels and spirits fit into Mormon culture, there’s a fascinating article in a 2010 issue of the “Intermountain West Journal of Religious Studies.” (here).  In the piece, Benjamin E. Park, University of Edinburgh, School of Divinity, provides an overview of the early Mormon embrace of communications with spirits, which included a belief in guardian angels. Park notes that the LDS belief in communion with the other world was often a point of contention with other ministers. In debates, primarily with Parley P. Pratt, ministers would argue that while divine communication is possible, it’s not probable given Christ’s message and the Bible, and certainly would never be wasted on Joseph Smith’s Mormons! Park’s article also provides more early Mormon viewpoints on what angels are, even classifying them by degrees! It reads:

Apostle Orson Pratt argued that there were “four grand divisions,” including spirits or angels not yet embodied, spirits or angels currently embodied, spirits or angels disembodied yet waiting to be resurrected, and spirits or angels embodied in an immortal tabernacle.

An editorial in the Mormon newspaper, likely penned by William Phelps, divided angels into three categories: archangels, resurrected personages and the angels which are ministering spirits. 

This latter editorial goes into the most detail as to the nature and function of angels, making the revealing statement that “it is evident that the angels who minister to men in the flesh, are resurrected beings, so that flesh administers to flesh; and spirits to spirits…”

What’s fascinating about these old, arcane references from the 19th century is that they are doctrine very similar to what I was told, usually in conversation, sometimes in church classes, as a youngster growing up in the faith. Despite there being less emphasis on visits from spirits in the temple or elsewhere, it remains a strong tenant of Mormonism and one component that builds a testimony among many members.

--- Doug Gibson

--- Originally published at StandardNET

Review: Parley P. Pratt: The Apostle Paul of Mormonism

Review by Doug Gibson

It’s been a long wait for the biography of Parley P. Pratt, the irascible, in-your-face 19^th century Mormon apostle who, like the man he idolized, LDS founder Joseph Smith, met his end via assassination.  Not even a Deseret Books hagiography has been published.  Mass market accounts of Pratt’s complex life have been relegated to his autobiography, an exciting first person account that is selectively edited, mostly omitting his marriage and family life and providing virtually no details of his death at the hands of a cuckold whose wife Pratt had added to his polygamous family.  A mediocre biography, published 75 years ago, is forgotten.

Hopefully, “Parley P. Pratt: The Apostle Paul of Mormonism” (Oxford University Press, 2011) will restore Pratt to the prominence he enjoyed during Mormonism’s first 100 years.  Scholars Terryl L. Givens and Matthew J. Grow have provided a well-researched, unbiased account of his life that includes a detailed look into his personal life, including his 12 marriages, his near apostasy in 1837 after a church bank failure and his estrangement and reunion with his equally gifted brother and fellow apostle, Orson.

The biography reads well enough to be enjoyed by the casual consumer.  However, perhaps the most valuable contribution the biography offers is that Givens and Grow have had translated –from 19 century shorthand – a collection of previously unavailable discourses that Pratt delivered in the last decade of his life.  It is not an exaggeration to say that very few Latter-day Saints comprehend how much of their church’s complex doctrine regarding eternal life, pre-existence, and the existence of matter and spirit, derives from Pratt’s teachings, pamphlets, and two books, “Voice of Warning” and “Key to the Science of Theology.”  Now largely forgotten, those books were once ubiquitous in LDS homes.  As Givens and Grow relate, Pratt wrote, “The individual thinking being never ceases to live and think and act.  (It) never ceases those sympathies and affections which are … the inherent principles of their eternal existence.”

Pratt reveled in and adored the doctrines that today’s LDS Church – while not repudiating – is shy to discuss.  Pratt spoke often of the eternal existence of matter, the existence of countless gods furiously working on as many planets, and, of course, Pratt was a staunch defender of polygamy.  The authors theorize that as much of Pratt’s inspiration for these complex doctrines likely derived from private, unrecorded, conversations he had with Joseph Smith over 14 years.

Pratt was a product of his times, born poor in the midst of a religious awakening in the early 19^th century.  Long before he was a Mormon, he sought New Testament-type active religion, with revelations, spiritual gifts and proper authority of God.  Pratt was part of a growing faction of pre-millennialism believers who believed that Christ’s coming would occur to overcome evil, rather than as a complement to a world that had achieved righteousness, which was the more popular post-millennialism belief of that era.

The authors concede that Pratt was an extremely valuable convert.  He was also likely the first Mormon convert swayed by the Book of Mormon, rather than the charismatic Smith.  The Book of Mormon, Pratt believed, confirmed his belief in latter-day revelation.  Pratt’s baptism paved the way for tens of thousands of converts, including brother Orson, renowned preacher Sidney Rigdon and future LDS Prophet John Taylor.

The subtitle “The Apostle Paul of Mormonism” fits Pratt, as he clearly identified himself and his calling with those of the apostles in The Book of Acts.  Like Paul, Pratt was willing to confront poverty, persecution, disgust, disbelief, and sacrifice to preach what he believed.  He relished debate, and despite his lack of schooling, was rarely defeated by opponents.  He also was not afraid of death.

Although his recurring poverty frustrated him at times, he would end all profitable business on a moment’s notice when called to a new mission by Smith or Brigham Young.  Indeed, it is hard to imagine Pratt fitting in with today’s staid, public relations-conscious LDS Church, with its compensated, elderly, well-attired apostles.

Pratt’s value to the young church’s survival was critical in the couple of years after Smith was martyred.  Through visits to the East Coast, Britain, and preaching in the Church’s center of Nauvoo Ill, Pratt solidified Young’s claims to lead the LDS Church, eliminating such rivals as William Law, James L. Strange, Rigdon, David Whitmer, Samuel Smith, and Samuel Brannan.  Pratt also played a key role in the migration of LDS members to the Salt Lake valley and later led an exploratory mission to Southern Utah and headed missions to San Francisco and even South America.

Pratt’s single-mindedness sometimes caused clashes with Young, who reproved the apostle for rash behavior that included rushed marriages.  Pratt was at time intemperate, fleeing debts, ignoring Young’s directions, taking wives in secret and not bothering with securing divorces for two.

The practice of polygamy led to a divorce from his second wife, and another abandoned him shortly after arriving in the Salt Lake Valley.  By all accounts though, the authors write that Pratt’s relations with his children and remaining spouses were loving and cordial.

Givens and Grow have produced a triumphant biography that gets as close to knowing the enigmatic Pratt as any biographer has.  There will always be gaps in Pratt’s life that invite speculation: his private conversations with Smith; his relationship with his much older first wife, Thankful, who died after childbirth; and what motivated him to recklessly help his last wife, Eleanor, try to escape to Utah with her children.  That failed attempt guaranteed Pratt’s death at the hands of her first husband and an enabling extralegal culture that condoned murder as a penalty for adultery.

Pratt’s legacy extends far beyond his 50 years.  Love him or hate him, Givens and Grow have provided readers with a biography worthy of their subject’s talents.

Originally published in 2011 at StandardNet

Early Mormon leader Pratt talked of spirit world, disdained ghost hunting

Originally published at StandardNET in 2010.

Today, as an LDS leader, Parley P. Pratt is mostly mentioned and taught as a subject of history, but not theology. We see his much-read, edited autobiography, as well as a little-read scholarly biography, on book shelves, and his name is listed as the author of several songs in the LDS hymn book.

Pratt was more than that, of course. In the 19th century his books on theology, available free on the web today, were required reading for serious church members. ( A book on his early writings, The Essential Parley P. Pratt, can be read here.)

There’s a convenient website to learn about Pratt. It’s at http://jared.pratt-family.org/ I peruse it often, eager to learn more about this amazing man, who lived a half a century and died a violent death, pursued by a cuckold whose wife he had married. (Brigham Young referred to Pratt’s activities as “whoring,” but there was no prurience in Pratt’s actions. His theology on earth saw no conflict in taking the unhappy wife, and Mormon convert, of a drunken spousal abuser as his own plural wife. His placid acceptance of his own violent death adds support to this assessment.)

Pratt’s writings on the post-life spirit world, while not often cited today, clearly laid a framework for how the spirit world is taught today in the LDS Church. It’s key to understand that to be “active” in the Mormon church requires service. And there’s no defined approved amount of service. Example: at our ward conference on Sunday, our stake president definitively told the congregation that more service is needed. Further explanation: as Pratt taught years ago, Mormonism believes that every person on earth needs to be taught the Gospel of Jesus Christ. As with many other Christian religions, Mormons are taught that every person who has lived on earth will accept Christ as his or her savior.

Almost 161 years ago, Pratt laid out the spirit world in a General Conference address on April 7, 1853, in Salt Lake City. Pratt described the spirits that left life as “organized intelligences,” created long before they entered and departed earth, a second estate to Mormons.

Pratt taught that the spirit, being material, contained the shape and characteristics of a mortal body. The spirit also retained what we had learned in the first estate (pre-existence) and the second estate (earth). These characteristics included knowledge, emotions, passions, beliefs, and vices.

In the discourse, he says: “Let a given quantity of this element, thus endowed, or capacitated, be organized in the size and form of man, let every organ be developed, formed, and endowed, precisely after the pattern or model of man’s outward or fleshly tabernacle, what would we call this individual organized portion of the spiritual element?

“We would call it a spiritual body; an individual intelligence; an agent endowed with life, with a degree of independence, or inherent will; with the powers of motion, of thought, and with the attributes of moral, intellectual, and sympathetic affections and emotions.

“We would conceive of it as possessing eyes to see, ears to hear, hands to handle, as in possession of the organ of taste, of smelling and of speech.

“Such beings are we, when we have laid off this outward tabernacle of flesh. We are in every way interested, in our relationships, kindred ties, sympathies, affections, and hopes as if we had continued to live, but had stepped aside, and were experiencing the loneliness of absence for a season. ....”

(Pratt also taught what Mormons are taught today, that after we die, the “veil,” which prevented a knowledge of our first estate — thereby allowing free agency — is lifted, and we recall our entire existence.)

But, getting back to the spirit world, Pratt describes it as having “many places” and “degrees.” Mormons like to use the terms “Paradise,” where more-righteous exist, and “spirit prison,’ where unrighteous spirits reside. Pratt describes it in deeper terms.

The more unrighteous a person is in the spirit world, the longer the sinner’s wait — in darkness and misery — before he or she receive education, and ultimately accepts the Gospel.

Here is how Pratt describes the lowest degrees of the spirit world: “I will suppose, in the spirit world, a grade of spirits of the lowest order, composed of murderers, robbers, thieves, adulterers, drunkards, and persons ignorant, uncultivated, etc., who are in prison, or in hell, without hope, without God, and unworthy as yet of gospel instruction. Such spirits, if they could communicate, would not tell you of the resurrection, or of any of the gospel truths; for they know nothing about them. They would not tell you about heaven, or priesthood, for in all their meanderings in the world of spirits, they have never been privileged with the ministry of a holy priest. If they should tell all the truth they possess, they could not tell much.”

Ultimately, as Pratt and current LDS doctrine define, the responsibilities of righteous spirits mandate more service. The second estate is not a period of blissful rest, but more missionary work.

In fact, Pratt is a bit prescient in his disdain of today’s pop-fascination with “ghost-hunting,” as well as the fad of spiritualism, which was beginning its long popularity in the mid-19th century. As Pratt explains in his discourse, the righteous spirits have little interest in what occurs on earth; they are far too preoccupied with serving the countless spirits who need assistance.

He even describes what the spirit world must be like for the slain Mormon Prophet Joseph Smith, saying: “… if I were to judge from the acquaintance I had with him in this life, and from my knowledge of the spirit of priesthood I would suppose him to be so hurried as to have little or no time to cast an eye or a thought after his friends on the earth. He was always busy while here, and so are we. The spirit of our holy ordination and anointing will not let us rest. The spirit of his calling will never suffer him to rest, while Satan, sin, death or darkness possess a foot of ground on this earth. While the spirit world contains the spirit of one of his friends, or the grave holds captive one of their bodies he will never rest, or slacken his labors.”

Parley P. Pratt envisioned a world of spirits with missionaries, and their superiors, on the run, constantly busy, trying to fulfill what is the mantra of Mormonism’s Heavenly Father, who is quoted in LDS scripture as such, “… this is my work and my glory — to bring to pass the immortality and eternal life of man.” (Moses 1:39, The Pearl of Great Price)

Today’s LDS General Conference sessions often feature shorter, earnest “peanut butter & jelly” speeches that reflect a safer, more cautious era.

Pratt’s discourses and writings provide a rougher, but healthier meal.

-- Doug Gibson

Pratt's book was must-Mormon reading long ago

I have always wanted to read early Mormon apostle Parley P. Pratt’s “Key to the Science of Theology,” a book that was heavily read by church members in the 19th century, yet probably would not be placed by most members today. But the book was a must-read 150 years ago.

The book is free electronically, online or Kindle, but it never seemed appropriate to read this tome via technology, and the dead-tree editions were a tad pricey until I found — surprisingly — a 1973 Deseret Book edition in an Ogden thrift store. For $1, I snapped it up and read it one long weekend.

With the exception of Joseph Smith, I find Pratt the most interesting of the early Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints leaders. I can support that claim by merely having skeptics read his autobiography or the recent biography by Terryl L. Givens and Matthew J. Grow.

He was a force of theological energy, a mixture of piety and randiness. He was that curious blend of frontier independence, New Testament fundamentalist and progressive theologian that Mormonism attracted.

He weathered a major dispute with Joseph Smith and frequently angered Brigham Young, but he stayed a stalwart in Mormonism, eventually being murdered in 1857 by the husband of a convert he had taken as a plural wife. Perhaps more than any other early leader, Pratt understood the power of the printed word and his writings likely brought scores of thousands into the young church.

Pratt’s theme in his book is that every theological occurrence is based on a scientific law that we may not understand but is the norm in a higher, celestial sphere occupied by deity.

To be honest, the book is a tough read. Pratt writes in a ponderous, flowery manner in which a lot is used to say a little. On the plus side, the book’s explanation of Mormonism’s Plan of Salvation, with its pre-existence, distinct godly trinity, the earth being renewed to heavenly glory, and degrees of post-mortal salvation and exaltation, is similar to what is taught weekly in LDS chapels. These were extremely provocative concepts even within Mormonism 150-plus years ago, and Pratt’s mastery of the concepts lend credence to accounts that he and Joseph Smith engaged in long, productive conversations on theology during the last several years of Smith’s life.

There are nuggets of unconventional information that get through, such as his belief that the Book of Mormon prophets Lehi and Nephi landed in what is today Chile in South America. Also, in the book, Pratt opines in detail about life in the spirit world. One can imagine that this passage may have been inspired as a rebuttal to the then new fad of spiritualism and summoning the dead.

Pratt writes: “Many spirits of the departed, who are unhappy, linger in lonely wretchedness about the earth, and in the air, and especially about their ancient homesteads, and the places rendered dear to them by the memory of former scenes. The more wicked of these are the kind spoken of in Scripture, as ‘foul spirits,’ ‘unclean spirits,’ spirits who afflict persons in the flesh, and engender various diseases in the human system. They will sometimes enter human bodies, and will distract them, throw them into fits, cast them into the water, into the fire, etc. They will trouble them with dreams, nightmare, hysterics, fever, etc. They will also deform them in body and in features, by convulsions, cramps, contortions, etc., and will sometimes compel them to utter blasphemies, horrible curses, and even words of other languages. If permitted, they will often cause death. Some of these spirits are adulterous, and suggest to the mind all manner of lasciviousness, all kinds of evil thoughts and temptations.”

Although there’s a lot of theological fun within the heavy prose (imagine a high priest group lesson extending beyond the lesson’s boundaries), it’s a good idea that this book stays an historical curio to be pored over by church historical buffs. It contains bits and pieces of the biases of earlier church history, some of which extended well into the second half of the 20th century. In this unfortunate passage. Pratt “describes” post-resurrection exaltation, writing:

“The heathen nations, also, will then be redeemed, and will be exalted to the privilege of serving the Saints of the Most High. They will be the ploughmen, the vine-dressers, the gardeners, builders, etc. But the Saints will be the owners of the soil, the proprietors of all real estate, and other precious things; and the kings, governors, and judges of the earth.”

For those with an interest in Mormon history, by all means give Pratt’s “Key to the Science of Theology” a read. As mentioned, its main point of interest is as an early primer on the LDS Plan of Salvation.

-- Doug Gibson

Originally published at StandardNET

Pratt an early contributor to Mormon media efforts

The rise of Mormonism in its first decades was largely due to the eagerness that early Mormon leaders embraced innovations within media, with press advances that allowed pamphlets, books and newspapers to be published much cheaper than previously, and thereby affordable to the poor.

While missionary work was always a priority, the Book of Mormon, pamphlets, and other works were read by thousands, and shared with others. Perhaps the most prolific user of the printed-press media was Parley P. Pratt, one of Mormonism’s first apostles. An impetuous, emotional, argumentative church leader, he wrote several books, including “Voice of Warning,” the second-most influential Mormon book for almost a century, as well as other books and hymns. A talented propagandist, Pratt is best known for a widely circulated pamphlet that detailed persecutions on Mormons in Missouri. He was also editor of the church newspaper in London.

Authors Terryl L. Givens and Matthew J. Grow add that Pratt’s media acumen and enthusiasm still impacts the Mormon faith. “As an essayist and theologian, Pratt shaped the content and language of early Mormon self-understanding. Few Latter-day Saints today read Pratt’s treatises, though his imprint pervades the theological spectrum they have inherited,” the pair note in their biography, “Parley P. Pratt: The Apostle Paul of Mormonism” ($31.46, Oxford University Press).

That is an accurate reflection of Pratt’s legacy. During the 1830s and into the early 1840s, Pratt had many opportunities for personal discussions with the Mormon founder and prophet, Joseph Smith. He undoubtedly had opportunity to be at the genesis of some of Smith’s unorthodox teachings regarding the pre-existence, the divinity and eternal state of matter, the similarities between man and God, and the relationship between exaltation and marriage and families. As a result, much of Pratt’s early writings take these concepts -- at least to the reading public -- further than they had been publicized previously. He both defined and refined these doctrines.

These include the concepts of matter being eternal, marriage being a contract that lasted for eternity, the multiplicity of worlds, the concept of heavenly parents and spirit children, and a repudiation of the doctrine of original sin, the idea that man entered the world impure. Mormonism, as Pratt maintained, teaches that man is responsible for his own sins, but Christ’s atonement covers Adam’s transgression. Also, Pratt was an early advocate of the idea of an eternal unchanging celestial law that enhances righteous individuals after earthly life and leads them on a path to be heirs of what God possesses. Pratt also wrote that the relationship of a husband and wife would become even more perfect through eternity.

These beliefs are matter of fact to active Mormons today, and some are still fiercely disputed by persons of other faiths, but they were far more radical long ago when Pratt unleashed them into the public debate via the press.

One of the advantages of the Internet is that virtually everything Pratt published is available online. As mentioned, he was an effective propagandist. At OliverCowdery.com, there is Pratt’s first major literary effort as a Mormon leader. It’s titled “A Short Account of a Shameful Outrage Committed by a Part of the Inhabitants of the Town of Mentor, Upon the Person of Elder Parley P. Pratt, While Delivering a Public Discourse Upon the Subject of the Gospel.”

The flowery but combative essay is an account of Pratt’s efforts in 1835 to preach on the steps of a church in Mentor, Ohio, a neighboring town of the early Mormon settlement of Kirtland, Ohio. Mentor was dominated by the Campbellites, a progressive anti-sectarian movement Mormon leader Sidney Rigdon had once ministered to. Campbellites rejected modern-day authority, a dispute that put them often in conflict with the new Mormon religion. The bombastic Pratt no doubt enjoyed preaching repentance to the Campbellites.

As Pratt relates, while he preached on the steps: “I saw a band of men collected about 20 rods from me. Two Bugles, a Base Drum, and several smaller ones, with their Fife, were put in lively motion, and the men in regular file came marching towards that place where I stood speaking. ... The music or noise for a moment drowned my voice.”

The band continued through Pratt’s discourse, making it impossible for him to be heard. He soldiered on, but as he closed the band, he added, “discharged a full volley of eggs at me, some of which struck me in the face and others besmirching me from head to foot.” After Pratt left, he claims in the essay he was followed by the band and threatened. (Pratt’s account, which includes an “eyewitness’ account,” (probably Pratt himself using literary license) is fun reading. It’s here. 

Besides the public relations points the pamphlet earned, Pratt also scored in a court of law. He filed a complaint against Grandison Newell, a prominent anti-Mormon, in Kirtland before a justice of the peace. According to OliveryCowdery.com, Pratt was awarded $47 in damages that Newell was ordered to pay. The jury came to the conclusion that the band that harassed Pratt was a militia, and that Newell, as a commandeer, was responsible for their actions.

-- Doug Gibson

Originally published at StandardNet.

Apostle Parley P. Pratt suffered a violent death at the hands of a cuckold

The murder of Mormon apostle Parley P. Pratt, slain by the husband of a woman Pratt had taken as a plural wife, was national news in 1857.

Hector McLean chased Pratt across much of the country before catching him and killing the LDS leader in Arkansas. The small Mormon media defended Pratt, pointing out that McLean was a drunk and wife-beater long estranged from his wife. However, defenders of Pratt also, not surprisingly, criticized the motives of murderer Hector McLean, who was never legally punished. The strongest published condemnation of McLean came from the wife who abandoned him for Pratt, Eleanor McComb Pratt. Her argument, shared by others, was that to kill Pratt, or to spend a long time seeking Pratt and finally murdering him, was the work of a brutal, godless man consumed by thoughts of revenge, hate and killing.

There is a certain irony to the Utah Mormons’ outrage over Pratt’s murder by the cuckold McLean, though. Through the latter half of the 19^th century in Utah, cuckolds who murdered seducers of wives were routinely found not guilty of murder, and in fact applauded by the Utah media. Historian Kenneth L. Cannon II has written an interesting history “Mountain Common Law: The Extralegal Punishment of Seducers in early Utah,” published in the fall 1983 issue of Utah Historical Quarterly. Two early cases researched by Cannon are noteworthy. In 1851, Manti resident Madison Hambleton discovered his wife was having an affair with Dr. John Vaughan. After learning of the affair, one Sunday Hambleton spent hours at his Mormon church meetings, then sought out Dr. Vaughan, and then shot and killed him. He immediately surrendered and was taken to Great Salt Lake City. At the court of inquiry, Hambleton was represented by Mormon prophet Brigham Young! Writes Cannon, “The supreme court of the territory heard the case and acquitted Hambleton. Those in attendance enthusiastically voiced their approval of the court decision.”

Defenders of Hambleton may have argued that he killed Vaughan in a fit of passion upon learning of the adultery. I have no idea if that is true but it was an argument for adultery-related murders of that era. However, a more publicized case of a cuckold murdering a seducer could not claim “heat of passion” as a defense. Also in 1851, Mormon leader Howard Egan, returning to the Salt Lake Valley after guiding gold miners to California, discovered his first of three wives, Tamson, had been unfaithful with a man named James Monroe. Indeed, Tamson had given birth to a child by Monroe. Monroe, aware that Egan would want to kill him, fled the area. Egan pursued Monroe, and around the territorial border, found him with a wagon train and killed him. As Cannon recounts, a church investigation cleared Egan. At his civil trial, “Egan’s defense was handled by W.W. Phelps, a prominent Mormon, and George A. Smith, a Mormon apostle.”

During final arguments, Smith’s words are important, as Cannon writes, “they display the sentiments of Mormon Utah society at the time.” Smith was blunt and to the point. Criticizing English law, that applied only civil damages to adultery, Smith said, “The principle, the only one, that beats and throbs through the hearts of the entire inhabitants of this territory, is simply this: The man who seduces his neighbor’s wife must die, and her nearest relative must kill him!” It took the jury only 15 minutes to acquit Egan of a murder, that not unlike McLean’s of Pratt, was clearly premeditated.

Later in his article, Cannon posits that acquittals of cases where men killed seducers of their wives and daughters may have been grounded in efforts to protect wives, mothers and daughters from seducers in rural areas. Also, it’s likely many Utah territory residents were dissatisfied with penalties for seductions, which ranged from one to 20 years, plus fines, for a crime that was difficult to prove. Cannon notes that there was no evidence that Egan’s wife, Tamson, resisted Monroe’s sexual advances. Utah Mormons, Cannon adds, heavily publicized the Egan murder case, perhaps as a warning for outsiders to stay away from Mormon women?

Back to the Pratt murder by McLean. Patrick Q. Mason, writing in the excellent book of essays, “Parley P. Pratt and the Making of Mormonism,” 2011, The Arthur H. Clark Company, notes the power of cultural context of “honor.” Honor “is a communally constructed characteristic, as opposed to virtue or integrity.” As a result, a father or husband lost his “honor” among the community if a wife or daughter was seduced. Legal remedies might imprison or fine the seducer, but they did nothing to restore honor to the father of cuckold.

To regain honor, the offended man had to murder the seducer. That law doomed Pratt, no matter his religious motivations or the evidence that McLean was a brutal, drunken wife-beater. As the Hambleton and Egan cases show, Utah shared traits of the honor’s cultural context.

Utah’s commitment to “mountain common law” would last for decades, long after Pratt’s similar murder in 1857. As mentioned, the media usually agreed with the harsh punishment. After the seducer of a restaurant owner’s daughter was shot by father William Hughes, the Deseret Evening News published this approbation, writes Cannon: “… Public opinion in these mountains declares that a man who seduces a woman ought to pay the penalty with his life; and her nearest kindred should bring him to account.”

“Mountain common law” as a legal remedy was first challenged by the anti-Mormon Salt Lake Tribune, probably due more to antipathy to the church than a real commitment to legal reform. However, as Utah, and the LDS Church leadership, sought better relations with the “gentile” world, mountain common law, as in other parts of the nation, started a slow, consistent fade legally.

By 1888, the Utah Supreme Court reject the arguments of a cuckold convicted of killing his wife’s seducer because the killer, Wilford H. Halliday, had waited 24 hours before murdering the seducer. The “Egan rule” no longer applied.

          doug1963@gmail.com

          Posts are authored by Doug Gibson. Cartoon is by Cal Grondahl. This post and cartoon was originally published on the now-defunct StandardBlogs website from The Standard-Examiner website, which this post is credited to.