{"id":40980,"date":"2020-10-16T06:57:46","date_gmt":"2020-10-16T11:57:46","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.timesandseasons.org\/?p=40980"},"modified":"2020-10-16T09:27:07","modified_gmt":"2020-10-16T14:27:07","slug":"john-turner-on-brigham-young","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/2020\/10\/john-turner-on-brigham-young\/","title":{"rendered":"John Turner on Brigham Young"},"content":{"rendered":"

John Turner\u2019s well-known biography Brigham Young: Pioneer Prophet <\/em>(Harvard University Press, 2012)<\/a> provides one of the most well-rounded and in-depth look at the second president of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.\u00a0 It remains today one of the definitive biographies of an incredibly complicated man and leader.\u00a0 Recently, Kurt Manwaring sat down with the author to discuss the book after eight years of time to reflect on the volume and on the prophet it discusses.\u00a0 What follows here is a co-post, with excerpts and commentary on the interview.\u00a0 For the full effect, however, I recommend going over and reading the interview here<\/a>.<\/p>\n

In the interview, Turner discussed some of his thoughts about his biography on Brigham Young.\u00a0 He noted that he was \u201cincredibly gratified by the book\u2019s reception,\u201d including many complimentary reviews across the board.\u00a0 He noted that there were \u201ca few dissenting views, but I regard those in much the same way that Brigham regarded dissenters.\u201d When asked if he would write the book differently today, Turner stated simply that \u201cI wouldn\u2019t change anything of significance,\u201d just \u201ca few very minor errors that careful readers brought to my attention.\u201d\u00a0 He also stated that Brigham Young probably wouldn\u2019t \u201clike it very much,\u201d but noted that he (Turner) \u201cwouldn\u2019t want someone to write a warts-and-all biography about me either.\u201d\u00a0 Overall, John Turner still seems happy with how the biography turned out.<\/p>\n

One aspect of his biography that I appreciated was that I felt like I got a better glimpse into the character of Brigham Young. \u00a0Kurt Manwaring asked John Turner \u201chow well do you feel you got to know Brigham Young?\u201d\u00a0 I felt like this question got at the process by which Turner was able to deliver a deeper look into the personality of Brigham Young and the challenges historians face in this regard when dealing with an individual who has a lot of documents available to draw upon:<\/p>\n

That\u2019s the tricky thing about history, even when one writes about a figure so incredibly well documented as Brigham. So many of those sources do not provide an intimate encounter with the man.<\/p>\n

Take, for instance, his hundreds of sermons. Do those published records reflect every word that he spoke? Of course not. \u2026 Or take his letters. In most instances, clerks drafted letters, which he signed and sometimes revised. That being said, there are some very intimate sources, such as his early, handwritten journals, and, on occasion, some handwritten letters, such as some to his sons.<\/p>\n

But as a historian who primarily works with written texts, I always remind myself that we do not have direct access to the experiences of others. We only have narratives.<\/p>\n

With all of those qualifications, I felt that I got to know Brigham well enough to have a clear sense of his personality: his sharp wit and sense of humor, his perseverance, his creative mind, his adaptability, his faith, and his combativeness.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

It\u2019s difficult to capture a person in writing, especially someone from the past that you\u2019re accessing through documents.<\/p>\n

Now, not all of Young\u2019s personality as portrayed in Brigham Young: Pioneer Prophet<\/em> was positive.\u00a0 With it being a wart-and-all biography, we get to see the darker side of President Young.\u00a0 As Julie M. Smith noted in her review on Times and Seasons<\/em> back when the book first came out: \u201cThis book is a real treat, but it might completely destroy your testimony if you can\u2019t handle a fallible, bawdy, often mistaken, sometimes mean, and generally weird prophet.\u201d[1]<\/a>\u00a0 In the recent interview, John Turner shared some of his thoughts about this side of Brigham Young:<\/p>\n

Sure, Brigham Young had character flaws. Or, to put it another way, he engaged in some behavior and rhetoric that cannot be squared easily with the gospel of Jesus Christ.<\/p>\n

It makes me reflect on what it means for someone to be a prophet in different traditions. Muslims generally regard prophets as free from at least major sins and free from failure and ignominy.<\/p>\n

But that\u2019s not the biblical understanding of prophets or anointed leaders, and David isn\u2019t the only example. Look at Noah\u2019s drunkenness, Abraham\u2019s blundering lies about Sarah, or even Joseph, who reduces people to a state of slavery. And those are the heroes!<\/p>\n

Latter-day Saints, likewise, maintain that their leaders are fallible and also that they will not lead the church astray. The question is simply the extent of their fallibility.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Even though Turner is not a Latter-day Saint, his reflection on what it means to be a prophet or anointed leader gave me some thoughts to chew on when considering our leaders (past and present).<\/p>\n

Along those lines, one of the issues reviewers brought up about Brigham Young: Pioneer Prophet<\/em> was that they felt like didn\u2019t always give a good explanation for why people liked Young or chose to follow him.\u00a0 Kurt Manwaring gave Turner a chance to explain his feelings on why so many Latter-day Saints loved and followed President Young, to which Turner replied:<\/p>\n

For thousands of Latter-day Saints, Brigham Young was the missionary who brought them into the church. This was true of some individuals in the northeastern United States, but even more true in England. Then, for those Saints who followed him to what became Utah, Brigham was the individual who had saved the church in its darkest hour.<\/p>\n

Many other things endeared him to church members.<\/p>\n

At times, he displayed an intense spiritual fire, whether that manifested itself in speaking in tongues or through his discourses. He could be also incredibly down to earth. He danced with the Saints in the Nauvoo Temple and at Winter Quarters.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Turner went on to express frustration that reviewers felt this his book lacked in this regard, stating that: \u201cWhile I did not reiterate the above on every single page of the book, I spent a fair amount of time providing precisely these sorts of explanations.\u201d<\/p>\n

I can see where Turner is coming from, and I personally walked away from the book feeling like he balanced showing how deeply religious Young was and why he was respected and loved, while also showing that he was flawed and probably someone I wouldn\u2019t like to be around.\u00a0 One of my favorite assessments of Young in the biography was Turner\u2019s statement (drawing on the words of Richard Burton that \u201chis followers deem him an angel of light,\u201d and \u201chis foes a goblin damned\u201d): \u201cMany of Young\u2019s close associates experienced both the angel and the goblin.\u00a0 Young excoriated fellow church leaders in public, then salved their wounds with private tenderness.\u00a0 Living with those contradictions, many of his followers craved his approval even as they feared his fury.\u201d[2]<\/a>\u00a0 Brigham Young was both an angel and a goblin at times, and Turner tried to show that balance.<\/p>\n

Now, there\u2019s more in the full interview.\u00a0 For further thoughts on what Turner is still most curious about with Brigham Young, changes in Young\u2019s rhetoric over time, and how his approach to research for a forthcoming biography on Joseph Smith will be similar, head on over to Kurt Manwaring\u2019s site here<\/a>.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Footnotes:<\/strong><\/p>\n

[1]<\/a> Julie M. Smith, \u201cBook Review: Brigham Young: Pioneer Prophet<\/em> by John Turner,\u201d 10 September 2012, Times and Seasons<\/em>, https:\/\/www.timesandseasons.org\/harchive\/2012\/09\/book-review-brigham-young-pioneer-prophet-by-john-g-turner\/<\/a>.<\/p>\n

[2]<\/a> John G. Turner, Brigham Young: Pioneer Prophet <\/em>(Cambridge, Massachusetts and London, England: The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 2012), 303.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

John Turner\u2019s well-known biography Brigham Young: Pioneer Prophet (Harvard University Press, 2012) provides one of the most well-rounded and in-depth look at the second president of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.\u00a0 It remains today one of the definitive biographies of an incredibly complicated man and leader.\u00a0 Recently, Kurt Manwaring sat down with the author to discuss the book after eight years of time to reflect on the volume and on the prophet it discusses.\u00a0 What follows here is a co-post, with excerpts and commentary on the interview.\u00a0 For the full effect, however, I recommend going over and reading the interview here. In the interview, Turner discussed some of his thoughts about his biography on Brigham Young.\u00a0 He noted that he was \u201cincredibly gratified by the book\u2019s reception,\u201d including many complimentary reviews across the board.\u00a0 He noted that there were \u201ca few dissenting views, but I regard those in much the same way that Brigham regarded dissenters.\u201d When asked if he would write the book differently today, Turner stated simply that \u201cI wouldn\u2019t change anything of significance,\u201d just \u201ca few very minor errors that careful readers brought to my attention.\u201d\u00a0 He also stated that Brigham Young probably wouldn\u2019t […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10397,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[17,2890,35],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-40980","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-church-history","category-from-the-desk","category-mormon-studies"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40980","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/10397"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=40980"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40980\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":40981,"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40980\/revisions\/40981"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=40980"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=40980"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=40980"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}