It surprises me anyone could doubt the existence of mermaids. It’s a clearly extablished fact that, intermittently and starting from at least the late 19th century onwards, aquairiums and traveling exhibits routinely included still-alive mermaid specimens. And from this evidence it can readily be seen that, certain needs being met, mermaids can accomplish overland travel quite easily (although it might be noted that after much exposure to air, these beautiful creatures’ scaly lower extremities are said to take on a rubbery consistency to touch or feel).

One of my fondest memories from childhood was at just such an exhibit. This one (as I recall, it was located in Anaheim, California) featured mermaids covorting in their native habitat–which, since this is underwater, required the exhibition goers to board these deisel-powered, World War 2 era of submarines.

I can’t recall how old I was then. However, I was apparently old enough to marvel that these mermaids–which we came across soon after the sub departed from its base and which were cavorting underwater some distance from the sub on the port side of the boat–were topless! But, since mermaids are known to be somewhat dangerous when approached while they’re underwater. perhaps this explains why their famed curator (a mister Walter Disney, I believe was his name) did not, at this time at least, insist that they wear tops.

Does anyone know if this policy ever changed anytime before this E-ticket ride was discontinued in 1995?

But–especially since there were no predators in the controlled, exhibition environment of this 4-foot deep lagoon–perhaps, with time, mermaids become accustomed to dealing with humans, even while remaining in their native watery environment. This is supported by the evidence that during the summers of 1965, 1966 and 1967, a small grouping of mermaids, who really looked no older than teenagers, could regularly be seen to sunbathe at this location, on shore and in water only an inch or two deep–albeit with their tops on. The representative sample seen in the photo at
http://www.perry.com/disney/subs/TimesSept398.html
indicates that the hair of approximately 75% of mermaids will lighten to a golden blonde to the sun while 25% will remain a dark brunette.

I think that the search for the noble savage goes back farther than that. Tacitus wrote about the Germans as a foil for what he saw as the decadent culture of Imperial Rome. Ironically, Polybius wrote a couple of centuries earlier about the history of the Romans, who he saw as the noble savages to his own decadent Greek culture.

There are some distinctions which should be made, however, which haven’t been so far in this thread. First there are at least two kinds of “accounting for” beliefs. The most obvious is that you attempt to give some explanation of how the person came to have this belief. This may involve everything from really attempting to claim that angels themselves caused people to believe they saw angels to claiming that people believed in Joseph because he lied cleverly. The second kind of accounting seems to be the attempt to say whether the beliefs are true. Of course the two kinds of accounting are very much related (if there are true beliefs in revelations then of course God causes them in some sense, and if there is a made up story of a charlatan than it’s unlikely to correspond very well to the truth about God). And yet there is still a distinction to be made here, because, among others things it is much easier for the historian to give worldly explanations of why people came to hold the religious beliefs that they do hold than to engage with the question of their ultimate truth (which may ultimately be a religious or theological quesition anyway). It is also possible, indeed, common that people come to true beliefs in ways which are different from the way they think they came to them.

It’s true that Bushman doesn’t engage, by and large, in the second kind of accounting, but historians probably shouldn’t anyway. He doesn’t engage much in the first kind of accounting either. But here again it is questionable what history can do. It really isn’t problematic at all for historians to debunk garden-variety misunderstandings, illusions, misconceptions, etc. E.g. political historians routinely are able to show that political elites at various points in the past operated under false assumptions (the mermaid example also seems to fall into this category). But while it is of course possible in principle for a whole social and cultural world to be illusory, constituted by false consciousness, etc. or on the other hand indeed holy and brought about by God, it is much more difficult to show that it is. It is not enough to show that the founder of it lied about some things, or that Mormon accounts of Mormon history are found to be inaccurate. Complex cultural and moral systems cannot (unlike garden variety deceptions) be attributed solely to the actions of particular people and contingent events (even though these events and people may have supremely important *meanings* for such systems). To give an account (a historical explanation) fo such systems one would first have to figure out what those constitutive meanings and shared practices are. This takes a great deal of skill and careful analysis. This is what Bushman has done–not allow the sources to speak for themselves, but give a historical *interpretation* of the spiritual world of early Mormons. There may indeed be more to be said–from a historical or more generally social-scientific perspective–about early Mormonism (e.g. a sociological explanation of the rise of Mormonism), but I don’t think that this latter project can be done well without the preliminary interpretive history that Bushman does. My beef with Vogel and some others is that they treat Mormonism as a garden-variety deception, not a very complex and rich religious movement that stands in need of extensive “understanding” (in Weber’s sense) prior to historical explanation. Of course this is a value judgment which historians must make, but I think that Bushman has, in his attempt at interpretive understanding, shown quite well such a project is necessary to any account-giving of Mormonism.

So why doesn’t this work for Bushman among his non-LDS scholarly critics? Some possible explanations…

Since the French Enlightenment some intellectuals have loved non-Western tribal people and their religious sensibilities as a foil to Western religious culture which they see as hopelessly flawed. The problem with Mormonism is that it is too close to the Western religious tradition which some have long ago rejected.

Another possible reason… Celebration of religious world views is reserved for dying or dead groups, or at least small cultures that are precieved as rapidly loosing their tribal religious roots and sliding towards Western secularism. Celebration of the tribal religious traditions can be seen as part of protecting a culturally “endangered species.” The problem with Mormonism is that we haven’t had the good grace to fade away like some eastern U.S. urban Native American tribes (always excepting those that run casinos), or perhaps groups like the Shakers. One of our biggest obstacles for intellectual acceptance as a “protected species” of religious history is that our growth and size don’t make us “at risk.”

Assuming that “multi-culturalism” would cover a celebration of Mormon spiritual historys ignors the intellectual world view of those that created “multi-culturalism” (with its attendant celebration of the corresponding religious worlds) in the first place.

Mormons live nearby. A tribe from the Amazon rain forest isn’t geographically threatening. Mormons have chapels and congregations in the neighborhood.

Mormons want others to join them. Small tribes are much more exclusive. They are not seekinng converts. I think it was Woody Allen who said that he wouldn’t want to be part of any group that wanted him to be a member.

Mormon’s see their religion as being universal. The God of Mormonism is not their exclusive god who only works for their particular tribe. Mormonism’s God is the universal god of the entire universe, hence some Mormon spiritual imperatives could be construed as being binding on non-Mormons. Modern scholarly secularists don’t want to have belief and behavioral imperatives put on them to become members of highly structured Christian religious sect.

Just a few thoughts as to why Mormons shouldn’t get their hopes up about a lot of scholarly acceptance for their religious history, especially when it starts dealing with serious faith and mermaids. Still I applaud Bushman for getting the word out and perhaps smoking out the double (or quadruple) standards of what passes for contemporary historical scholarship.

As it is, her claim to have seen all the pretty mermaids is just one more novel episode. This novelty is the only real reason for including all the pretty little mermaids in her story in the first place. It’s not like if you didn’t mention all them, you’d be missing a key piece of Hafen’s life.

Actually, I would have no problem with a history that matter-of-factly recounted the Hafen story or something similar without trying to explain it. The best histories pull you in and pull you in until you are able to percieve how alien the time is, or the people are, or the person is, because you’re looking at it from the inside. The tension you refer to, which will always exist, is the discomfort most people have at being inside the head of a fringe religion.

Only two doors down from Mary Ann Hafen’s house–and one house over from 12-year-old Juanita’s–lives 5-year-old Erma.

Erma is the grandmother of secretary Mike Leavitt (Health and Human Services. Erma’s son Dixie is Michael O. Leavitt’s father.)

And I hope president Romney taps Mike for his cabinet, too. Then Mike can be best situated to work towards the acceptance of mer-people as America’s first state religion.

(See http://ftp.us-census.org/pub/usgenweb/census/nv/clark/1910/ed06-01a.txt/ )

My mother, born in 1915, was a Tobler and hales from 100% Swiss artisan-class stock. She’s extremely bright (some of her nephews are extremely well accomplished , her father represented the area in the Nevada legislature). Her father taught her that the most important thing in the world is someone’s testimony of the Gospel.

When I was a young I remember her mentioning how it’s been found to be scientifically possible the Red Sea to have parted just like it says it does in Genesis. As a boy I’d just taken such accounts of God’s mystical doings so long ago at face value, but I took it in how my mother seemed to delight that there were perhaps natural world justifications for such things.

What makes for the marvelous underpinning of faith for one but seems mere superstition to another.