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Joseph Smith: Rough Stone Rolling, A Cultural Biography of Mormonism’s Founder by Richard Lyman Bushman http://www.amazon.com/Joseph-Smith-Rough-Stone-Rolling/dp/1400042704 The famous “warts and all” history of Joseph Smith written by an active, believing LDS Member and scholar. Richard Bushman has a PhD in American History from Harvard, and is considered one of the world’s experts on the founding prophet of the Church. I really enjoyed reading this book. It is THICK and not a light read, but I enjoyed it. I think it is well written.
I really don’t believe in un-biased history. It simply doesn’t exist. The best option IMO is to read a wide selection so that I am exposed to different points of view. I plan on getting “Now Man Knows My History” by Fawn Brodie next. RSR (Rough Stone Rolling) doesn’t whitewash our history. Bushman goes into all the big issues of that day. The author is clearly favorable to Joseph though. That is fine. I think everyone struggling with mormon faith, specifically JS, owes it to themselves to take a look at this perspective on our history.
For me personally, it was a faith developing read. I appreciate our history so much more. I feel empowered to know the details, and to be able to come to my own conclusions. I really came away from the book with a much more intimate and real picture of Joseph Smith. I like it that way.
I highly recommend listening to the interviews John Dehlin recorded with Richard Bushman. We host the interviews here on this site in the LIBRARY section. I had a much different (wrong) perspective about the book before I listened to the interviews. It was good to hear so much from the author before diving into the book.
Just want to second the recommendation of the book and the interviews. It’s important to realize that very intelligent people can be exposed to everything and still be “believers” – not just participators. I also really appreciated how the interviews fleshed out the book experience. Yes, this book was terrific! I think the only LDS-history-type book I enjoyed more than this one was
David O. McKay and the Rise of Modern Mormonism. That was the best I’ve read, ever. Of course, that covered my adolescence and young adulthood, very ‘fond’ periods of my life. HiJolly
For me, Rough Stone Rolling was heartbreaking. I thought it told the story of a beautiful promise corrupted and unfulfilled. My prevalent ongoing exclamation as I read it was, “For what?” I read it after my second conversion (my mystic initiation), when the Sermon on the Mount had come to embody the highest religion, and bricks and mortar and earthly dominions meant little to me. At around the same time I was reading Lucy Mack Smith’s history, and I had been compelled sometimes as I read Lucy to exclaim about Joseph Smith, “This boy is the real deal! He knows what I know and has seen what I have seen.” But in contrast, I experience in “Rough Stone Rolling” very much what I experienced in “The Autobiography of Parley P. Pratt”. I saw an idealistic vision turn in the course of a lifetime through a series of worldly and fleshy compromises into another disappointing mess.
I admit it would be hard for any human to live up to the promises and ideals of the Plain and Precious truths taught by Jesus. I don’t even hold that Jesus himself exemplified them in every moment. I think what made “Rough Stone Rolling” difficult for me was Bushman’s portrayal (rightly) of the whole process as grand religion-creating. When Bushman pressed that theme, I had to respond, “For what?”
I could see in the infant beginnings of the movement the faint spark of non-violence and non-resistance that eventually only barely survived (D&C 98) buried beneath the emergence of self-defense. I could see the clear ideal of ungrasping that was somehow enshrined in the scripture even as it was buried beneath the expediencies of an earthly kingdom. When I read Joseph demanding in 1830 of Oliver Cowdery, “By what authority he took upon him to command me to alter or erase, to add to or diminish from, a revelation or commandment from Almighty God,” I saw the evaporation of meaningful corporate spiritual gifts leaving a twistedly hierarchal idea of revelation in their place.
In the end, the book was too dismal for me to finish. And as I write this review I remind myself of its lesson that Staying LDS must never mean giving up the faith. Did Parley and Joseph stay LDS, only to lose their simple faith in the process? Perhaps I can return to the book again someday as a check of whether for me, too, Priesthoods and Kingdoms, Generals and Covenants have overcome Love and Mercy, Simplicity and Peace, which I hope to seek as long as I walk on earth.
Tom
It talks about all the “sticky” issues in church history, from a former Stake President, Harvard grad, Columbia University professor, internationally recognized historian, and current Director of Mormon Studies at Claremont University in California. He hits almost all the rough topics, and is probably as close to neutral as anyone can be, while still being considered faithful. I must say his treatment of polygamy left me feeling it is not an inspired practice, but I though he explained things wonderfully. Really loved this book. Definitely gave me a much broader view and put all the foundational LDS beliefs in context with the time. I was really shocked at how massive a role polygamy played in the last years of Joesph’s life; it looked to be behind the excommunications and apostasies and even his arrest and murder. Also, the theology of becoming a god was really a keystone to so many of the church ordinances. My only criticism is that Bushman tends to be reticent about tackling certain tough subjects. In regards to the multiple versions of the first vision, he says Joseph merely left out certain parts in his initial account because he was afraid of what people would think of him. He doesn’t acknowledge that Smith’s official version could very easily have been a reaction to the apostasies of his witnesses and close brethren. And the official account of the first vision was told to solidify his stake as the divinely-elected leader of the church. But I suppose one can draw their own conclusions from the info alone. I certainly did, and learned quite a bit. Quote:He doesn’t acknowledge that Smith’s official version could very easily have been a reaction to the apostasies of his witnesses and close brethren. And the official account of the first vision was told to solidify his stake as the divinely-elected leader of the church. But I suppose one can draw their own conclusions from the info alone. I certainly did, and learned quite a bit.
Bushman alludes to the idea that the MP (rather than the FV) was possibly done in reaction to the apostasies and to bolster authority of the leadership. But these are all just theories about what the history means, not actual historical facts.
My own opinion about the FV was that JS didn’t originally view it as having broad application to the world (as a missionary message) or the church outside of himself (e.g. to bolster his authority as prophet) and only later did he see its potential in that light. That doesn’t mean it didn’t happen (in some form). In assigning it an audience we see its meaning shift dramatically. Today, IMO, we’ve stretched it into a meaning that JS didn’t necessarily believe it had from the first. The other thing I often wonder about the FV was whether it was a vision, like a dream, or a visit, as most TBMs portray it today. If it was a visit, that really spins it differently. It was referred to as a vision by contemporaries and not used as a missionary tool until much later.
Your right, I think I must have gotten the FV theory from Palmer, though I also saw a trend in Bushman’s chronology. Smith certainly struggled with his position in the church. But towards the end, he was self-appointed as mayor(after excommunicating Bennett), general, presidential nominee, king (from the second anointment), and leader of the council of the fifty, which looked to be the government that would hold divine-authority over every nation. I don’t think he had trouble allowing his status to grow. Bushman also shows how ferocious Smith could be when criticized. He constantly spoke of the sins of his critics in public meetings, he made Cowdrey, Bennett and a militia leader publicly recant their criticisms of him and were then punished…..
With this in mind, as well as the strain he must have had with the plural marriage commandment going disastrously, I can see how a man struggling to keep a hold on a faltering organization would amend his account of a personal religious experience to that of an all-out calling as the restorer of the gospel to secure himself as their leader. Doesn’t mean this is what happened, but I can’t help but think of how the church would be today if our only knowledge of the FV was Smith’s hand-written 1832 version.
I just finished RSR today. I started reading it after my wife told me of her disaffection a month ago. I decided that I needed a lighter and “faithful” introduction to the messiness of Church History that my wife warned me about. I found that Bushman seemed to give light treatment to many disturbing subjects, but would maintain his academic integrity by giving disclaimers such as “while complicated . . .” or “some outside the church have disagreed” before giving the apologetic/faith-building response. Overall a good read. I am going to have to listen to the podcasts and see how they expand my understanding of the book. I was a bit disappointed with the podcast interview with Bushman. Not that John didn’t ask the right questions, but Bushman never really countered the accusations and problems with the church from the last 50 years. Instead, he just jumped in with the “ya, that may be true but i’m o.k with it” bandwagon. I gotta say; that stance is very frustrating to me. Other than that stance in his interview, and his very light touch on the major issues of modern historicity, I felt his book was rather extraordinary. Fwiw, on the issue of interviews, I kind of look at them like the movie versions of books – abbreviated and somewhat shallow due to time constraints. I agree it would have been nice to have fuller answers in the podcast, but he probably was thinking, “The longer, more complete answers are in the book – and everybody who hears this knows about the book. I don’t have time here for much more than a statement of belief.” I didn’t mention this earlier, but one of the reasons I like the book so much is that I love Joseph’s description of himself as a rough stone rolling, being beaten into shape constantly by the Lord. I just like that imagery, and it helps redefine “prophet” in a way that makes many of the issues surrounding him and others much more manageable.
This doesn’t add any great insight, but I really loved this book. I really like the way the book portrayed the context of so many things. I didn’t realize how much religious activity was during that time, and how so many others not only had visions and spiritual experiences (speaking in tongues) but that so many congregations were specifically looking for these kinds of “gifts” and it was commonplace, although more commonly accepted through certain crowds than others. It just placed a much greater “human” and “real-life” factor to the history…and less stories of legends and heroes.
I got the feeling in the interviews Bushman was hesitant to share his specific ideas on how he reconciles some things because he really tried to set out to be a historian…not to prove something or advocate one way or the other…but as a Harvard guy, do what he thinks historians should try to do…tell the story and let others draw their own conclusions from the history. Even with that, however, he is open and honest about admitting bias seems inevitable because you have to draw some conclusions and make some judgments in order to tell the story.
I really like it. At the top of my list of books, and really helped me strengthen my testimony in the prophet Joseph Smith at a time I was ready to denounce it.
Heber13 wrote:I really like it. At the top of my list of books, and really helped me strengthen my testimony in the prophet Joseph Smith at a time I was ready to denounce it.
Yes! Totally. This book helps prove what Alexander Pope wrote:
“A little learning is a dang’rous thing;
Drink deep, or taste not the Pierian spring:
There shallow draughts intoxicate the brain,
And drinking largely sobers us again. “
We get a little bit of knowledge that shakes our world, but geting a better and more complete picture can sooth us again. Was my experience, too.
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