What an odd continent it is, America. A promised land in the eyes of one nation, it is Egypt in the eyes of another, while it seems like everyone there views themselves as Israelites. Just as the Jews accepted the burden of reciting the Passover Haggadah once a year every year, the history of the United States accepted the burden of reenacting the story of the Exodus from Egypt.
The 17th-century Christian Puritans viewed the eastern coast of the New World as a promised land, one that they reached by crossing the desert, namely the ocean, while escaping persecution in Europe. Over 200 years later, in the 1830s, a new group emerged whose members believed that their calling in life was to re-establish Zion. These were the Mormons, whose full, formal name is the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. They too needed to endure their own exodus from Egypt.
The founder of the Mormon religion, Joseph Smith, Jr., believed that he bore the word of God, in contradiction to the accepted doctrine of most streams of Christianity. Smith (1805-1844) claimed that he was personally chosen by God to serve as his prophet to humanity. He experienced his first epiphany as a 14-year-old. Several years later, in 1823, he was visited one night, he claimed, by an angel named Moroni, who revealed to him a book that contained a set of golden plates. Inscribed on the plates were the new scriptures of the Mormon religion, addenda to the Hebrew Bible and the New Testament that told the story of a group of Hebrews who left Jerusalem for the American mainland in 600 B.C.E. In other words, ascending to a promised land is a principal component of Smith's basic myth.
The book was published in 1830, the year the Mormon church was founded. Smith oversaw the affairs of the church in keeping with messages he received from supreme powers. One of the most important of these instructed him to temporarily relocate the church to Ohio until the New Jerusalem could be built in Missouri. The Mormon religion continued to evolve at a pace proportional to its ever-increasing number of followers. Yet the drive for power and new converts aroused significant antagonism toward members of the church in general and Smith in particular.
Persecuted minority
Given their standing today as a key component of the conservative movement in the United States, it may be difficult to conceive of the Mormons as a persecuted minority. Yet, even after most followers settled in Utah, in the second half of the 19th century, Mormons were still thought of as an eccentric, dangerous group. This attitude is reflected in texts written during that period.
In his book recounting his experiences traveling along the Oregon Trail in 1846, historian Francis Parkman wrote of the terror that gripped a group of settlers upon hearing that Mormons were nearby. Even contemporary American popular culture occasionally reveals a hostile attitude toward Mormons. The satirical animated TV show "South Park" featured an episode devoted to Smith's life. It included a short song with a chorus of "dumb, dumb, dumb" to describe Smith. There is also no shortage of lurid Web sites with names like "The Truth About Mormons."
However, it was not Joseph Smith who led his disciples in building a new temple . Rather, it was Brigham Young. In 1844, Smith and his brother were murdered by an angry mob in Nauvoo, Illinois, leaving members of the church without a leader and prophet. Young had been an ordained member of the church's Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, and after Smith's death, he became its second president. One of several splits in the church took place in 1860, when Smith's son Joseph Smith, III, leading a group of those opposed to Brigham Young, defected from the movement.
Most Mormon followers, however, opted to remain in the church under Young's tutelage. The new leader abandoned Smith's prophecy of a new Zion in Missouri and instead chose to search for an alternate location that would later become the nerve center of the church. The few photographs that exist of Brigham Young depict a square-jawed man, somewhat vivacious looking, with long hair that nearly reaches his shoulders. Like many other politicians, the smile Young flashes for the camera might be construed as an arrogant one, but it is clear that his supporters were attuned to his sense of self-confidence and strong conviction.
A carpenter and builder by trade, Young emerged as a supremely talented leader and skilled people person. Before he assumed the mantle of leadership, he persuaded the more affluent members of the movement to sign a document obligating them to extend aid to the neediest Mormons. Under his leadership, many Mormons volunteered to serve in the U.S.-Mexico war. This enabled the church to increase its revenues and allowed members to gain the military experience that would be necessary for settling parts of the western United States.
The Mormon exodus did not take place in a single movement. Rather, it consisted of wave after wave of migrants who moved westward. Brigham Young stood at the head of a group of 2,000 pioneers, most of them men, which made its way beyond the then-borders of the United States, west of Utah. The path they followed was later known as the Mormon Trail. The assumption at the time was that Native Americans in the vicinity would set their sights on the goods carried by the convoys, which thus necessitated a high level of military preparedness to the expedition. Discipline on the trail was strictly enforced. The men were ordered to always remain beside their wagons unless otherwise instructed. The convoy set out every morning at 5 A.M. In the evenings, the wagons were lined up in circular formation so that they would be easier to protect. A challenge that proved more difficult than the natives was the rough terrain, particularly the daunting task of crossing rivers. On numerous occasions the convoy was held up for days until it managed to reach the opposite bank.
'This is the place'
When the Mormons reached Salt Lake Valley, on July 24, 1847, Young declared: "This is the place." One pioneer described his first impressions of the valley in which the new Jerusalem was destined to be built: "We emerged from the mountains in which we were ensconced for many days, and suddenly we saw a view spread out before us. We couldn't refrain from howls of joy that burst from our mouths the minute our eyes met this beautiful, exalted landscape."
Within four days, Young had already determined the location of a temple, as well as other vital matters involved in planning the colony, which would later be named Salt Lake City. The construction of the new community, which seemed more like a fortress than a city, commenced immediately. One month later, Young returned east to lead another group.
Every summer until 1852, another flock of Mormons experienced their own exodus from Missouri. The first convoys that embarked on the journey in the spring of 1848 numbered 623 wagons; 1,891 men, women, and children; 2,012 oxen; 983 cows; 904 chickens; 237 pigs; 134 dogs; 54 cats; 11 doves; three goats; and one squirrel. The colonists also brought with them much in the way of material items, including books and school equipment, a library, and artifacts for a museum to be built in the promised land.
Unlike previous instances, this journey encompassed all members of the Mormon population. This stage of the migration dovetails with the stereotypical image of pioneers trekking West: a family in its wagon being led by a muscular ox, the husband gripping the reins while his wife sits beside him, both of them peering ahead at the future with confidence, or perhaps concern. Inside the cloth-covered cart sit children, with various house items strewn across the floor, a surrealistic site when placed against the backdrop of the great outdoors. Scores, if not hundreds of wagons roll ahead in unison.
The Mormons' wanderings in the desert did not end with their arrival in Utah. Members of church embarked on missionary expeditions throughout the United States and Europe. Not only did the missionaries succeed in winning over new converts to Mormonism, but they also managed to persuade many of them to relocate to Utah. Prior to the advent of the steam engine, every fresh convert who chose to migrate to the new seat of the Mormon religion, and thus enjoy freedom from religious persecution while taking his or her place as members of a pious community, needed to brave the journey through the plains and the Rocky Mountains.
Young, who was dubbed the "American Moses" by one of his biographers, was also the Mormons' Joshua. Even while many followers still lived in the Midwest, he devoted most of his efforts to solidifying the church's presence in Utah and organizing Mormon communal life there. Young even became the governor of the territory of Utah, until the federal government squashed nascent plans for Mormon self-rule through measures that included military action.
Less endearing sides
There is much to admire among the Mormons and their leaders, imbued as they have always been with determination, courage and concern for the welfare of others. But one should not forget the less endearing sides to the Mormon lifestyle, like a patriarchal attitude toward women. It is most prominently expressed in the widespread practice of polygamy . It is also worth remembering that Mormon colonies were built on lands that just prior to their arrival were inhabited by Native Americans.
It seems that the most fascinating aspect of Mormon history is the combination of a mythological element, as exemplified by tales of revelations by angels, and torturous travails that strike a familiar historical note. Mormon migration was motivated by the belief in a direct link between church leaders and a supreme power. Yet, in addition, it also fit nicely into the ongoing narrative of an expanding United States. Even if religious fervor later compelled many church members to pull up stakes and move away from most of the followers, they still faced the same direction - westward. Rather than being removed from the American ethos - one that portrayed a nation as being subject to divine guidance while carrying out God's will - the Mormons were the radical embodiment of that ethos.
Perhaps this was the reason why American-Jewish playwright Tony Kushner drew inspiration from the story of the Mormons, which served him in writing his magnum opus, "Angels in America: A Gay Fantasia on National Themes." One character who evokes particular sympathy in the story is Harper Pitt, a Mormon woman whose husband leaves her for a man. Pitt eventually takes refuge in the Mormon visitors center in New York. In one of her hallucinations, a doll belonging to a Mormon pioneer springs to life and converses with her about the nature of man and God. Kushner saw in the history and religious figures of the Latter-day Saints objects for ridicule, yet he also utilized them as potent symbols to help express his views on the experiences of the gay community during the tumultuous period of the AIDS epidemic. He did so within a very American context.
Mormon history encompasses themes that include religion, economics, geopolitics and prophecy. In this sense, Mormon settlement in the western United States is no different than Jewish-Zionist settlement in the Middle East. Alongside the historical reasons that underpin its establishment, the Zionist movement, too, relied on holy, prophetic scripture to motivate human beings to embark on a journey to an unknown land and to build the new Zion.
Various elements within the Jewish community in Israel maintain differing attitudes regarding the myths that drive our behavior. They also maintain varying degrees of belief in the actualization of prophecies that first appeared in biblical texts. Perhaps this explains Mormon support for the settlement enterprise in the West Bank. Among the settlers, the Mormons discern a faith that is very similar in nature to theirs, one that fuses Messianic vision with nationalist expansion.
Yet if one is to examine Israeli society within the context of the Mormon exodus, thus staking out a more objective position than is customary, it is important to remember that it is not just the religious right that affixes itself to the combination of myth and politics. All branches of Zionism - a movement that has adopted symbols such as wandering in the desert, Moses and Joshua as some of its most important concepts - embrace such a link.
