Mormon Enigma Pb [Paperback]

 

 

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If you are interested in LDS history, read this book! I found it shocking and very moving. My respect for Emma Smith has increased 10fold. i have been able to view Joseph in a new light as well.

Written by two members of the Mormon church, this book gives a fascinating insight into early Mormon history and into the life of the first polygamous wife of the prophet Joseph Smith. This book objectively deals with controversial and sensitive issues. It is highly recommended to anyone interested in Mormon history, polygamy, the prophet Joseph Smith or indeed Emma Hale Smith.

Great figures of religious history with musical aspects among their more secondarily known accomplishments are fascinating personages. Martin Luther's importance in music of the Reformation which he launched is at least fairly well documented and widely known. Another is Emma Hale Smith, a seminal figure in the so-called "Restoration" so beloved of Campbellites and of the two major brances of Mormonism, i.e. the polytheistically pagan, Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (L.D.S.) and the Trinitarian Christian, hence monotheistic, Reorganized Church of Latter Day Saints (R.L.D.S., now known as the Community of Christ (as well as various splinter Mormon groups), but Emma Smith's musical contributions seldom have been probed so deeply as they deserve. Right from the outset, Emma Hale Smith set the precedent for Mormonism's uniquely women-dominated ranks of so many of its foremost names in the lore of hymnody. Jack Ergo (of the Community of Christ, one of its most expert and active musical leaders) would be an excellent candidate to write a "musical biography" of this fascinating lady, Emma Hale Smith!

Quite an extraordinary life, indeed, was that of Emma Hale Smith, the first (and only legal) wife of the polygamous Mormon "prophet", Joseph Smith Junior. The best biography of this strong, stalwart, and musical woman (after whom the dear departed mother, née Emma Frances Roach, of the author of this Amazon user's review, was named) is by co-authors Linda King Newall and Valeen Tippetts Avery, "Mormon Enigma: Emma Hale Smith", 2nd (rev.) ed., University of Illinois Press, 1994. Seldom has a biography, after several feebler efforts already had been published by others, opened up so much astonishing new information about a figure. The reader is encouraged, even more than usual in the case of books having undergone revision, to use the 1994 rather than the earlier 1984 edition. The malevolent antics of Mark Hofmann, the infamous L.D.S. Mormon forger, some of whose falsified documents had influenced the writing of the 1984 edition, took a toll on the accuracy of the 1984 edition's accuracy; sorting things out aright after Hofmann's misleading forgeries had been revealed as such, the rewrite of this biography of Emma H. Smith has rectified a number of matters of fact in the 1994 revision; of course, the revision benefits from the more usual advantages of added research during the intervening decade. It is a pity that the opportunity to publish within a book yet more about Emma Smith's musical and hymnological talents and doings, than what finds its way between these paperback covers, went a-begging, the only factor that moves one to rate the book with four stars rather than with five.

For a musician (mostly an hymnist and singer), it simply is amazing how much musical activity Emma H. Smith undertook. One could wish, indeed, that this book would have dealt in further depth on that aspect of Emma Hale Smith's activities and talents. Emma is remembered, aside from putting up with her horny and unprincipled, good-looking, polygamous pseudo-prophet husband's philandering ways (and various other scams), for the very first published Mormon hymnal (words only, intended for use with pre-existant hymn tunes), as its title page acknowledges in the words "A Collection of Sacred Hymns, for the Church of the Latter Day Saints, Selected by Emma Smith" (with aid, unmentioned on that t.p., of William Wines Phelps, another important early figure in Mormon hymnody whose contributions included writing hymns rather than having served mainly as a compiler of hymns, like Emma Smith), but how many know that Emma H. Smith was involved in countless efforts of hymnody, after that first famous Mormon hymnal (dated 1835 on its t.p.) of Emma's, which she produced before the split between the L.D.S. pagan and R.L.D.S. Christian Mormon groups was to occur? She went on to contribute to hymnody in the Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, for years after the exodus to the Gringo West of the "Utah Mormons" under J. Smith Jr.'s polygamous and polytheistic successor, Brigham Young. Emma's life was hard, tumultuous, and faithful to an heroic degree.

Due largely to Emma's influence, there was a monotheistic and Trinitarian variant of Mormonism (the R.L.D.S. Church or Community of Christ, as already mentioned), plus lots of fine hymns in the hymnody of the L.D.S. and R.L.D.S. groups alike that have come down through the years. Both the L.D.S. heathen Mormon cult and the R.L.D.S. Christian Mormon sect owe a much of their musical clout to Emma H. Smith. Hopefully a book-length study of Emma Smith activities in sacred music someday will appear. For now, at least, the life of this sterling figure of hymnody has been set down in greater depth and at greater length than any book prior (or subsequent) to it ever has done. There was quite some stir when this book appeared, since, from having taken Emma Smith's rather than Joseph Smith Junior's perspective, the image of the latter, the putative founding "prophet" of Mormonism, was tarnished (and justly so in the case of that philandering charlatan!). However, there was no overt attempt in either edition of this book to defame Joe Smith, whose hagiographic image in Mormon literature is belied by the truth of things; telling the facts about "The Prophet", Joseph Smith Junior, as well as about his wife, longsuffering Emma Hale Smith, simply laid the facts into public view in a manner that is (to say the least of it!) less than flattering. For all of that, readers whose interests embrace sacred music and hymnody, Mormonism of all stripes, and women's studies, will enjoy this well written biography of "the Elect Lady" of the Mormon "Restoration".

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5.0 out of 5 stars amazon.com has it wrong
This is a truly remarkable book that has won the Evans award in Mormon Biography. Linda King Newell and Valeen Tippets Avery coauthored this book, Avery was more than a... Read more

Published on 7 April 1999

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