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highly recommended |
Religion Gone Awry 
John Krakauer gives a well researched study of faith and religion gone awry in this intriguing saga of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints and it's various splinter groups: fundamental, extreme and mainstream. Krakauer seduces, then hypnotizes the reader with a tale of two brothers and "saints" who descend the deepest valley of evil, condoned and guided from the tallest summit of morality and virtue.
Proclaimed America's "only and true" religion, the Mormon faith is deeply rooted in the fertile soil of the imagination of the third son of an immigrant farmer, Joseph Smith. Smith was born in 1805, the Mormon faith in 1825. Smith was 20 and had been labeled an imposter by New York state when his "seer stone" would not, as he claimed, allow him to see things others could not. The angel "Moroni" visited this purveyor of black magic one night in a dream to tell him where to find the golden pages of the Book of Mormon. While some labeled him an imposter, others called him a religious genius. Fueled by mysticism and spiritualism, while flouting a litany of laws, Smith propels a catapult of charisma; inspiring followers to obedience to church, faith and fanatical extremes of the highest order. Every whim and order devine, as uttered by this "prophet", would be followed to the letter as he and he alone spoke to God.
The culmination of this saga, as invested throughout, is the story of Dan and Ron Lafferty, "saints", who commit the most abhorent of sins under orders from God.
While an author might easily be given to stagger from the centerline of fair play; Krakauer, an agnostic, remains on a true course of equity in this stunning report.
Thought provoking study
If you have any interest in learning about Mormon history, beliefs and the ongoing struggle between the mainline LDS establishment and the fundamentalists who see no religious reason to accept the post Joseph Smith revelations rejecting polygamy and certain racial "attitudes", this book is well worth reading. And, if Mitt Romney continues to be a prominent national political figure, this book will likely get a lot more attention.
While most voters would probably answer a survey question with a "no" regarding whether or not there should be a religious litmus test for presidential candidates, I expect that there's still a large majority who are at least curious about candidates' beliefs and would hesitate to vote for a candidate who holds beliefs they'd consider strange or cultlike. And, I imagine that the vast majority of the so called "social conservatives" (who comes up with these labels? these people are far from being real small government, big liberty philosophical conservatives) have to come up with an answer to the question: are Mormons a cult? So, we can all read this book and have more of a basis for evaluating questions of that type and also study some very interesting history about the settlement of the U.S. west.
But, I suppose that the nominal main theme of the book has to do with a brutal family murder which, according to the killers, was ordered by God in a revelation to them. Conveniently for the killers, they said they believed God wanted them to kill some people who were thorns in the sides of the killers (and God, according to the killers). So, issues about religious extremism are examined by considering the thought processes of these fanatics.
I think the book succeeds on all fronts - laying the historical predicates and weaving them through the fundamentalist Mormon groups straight into the murder. It's well written, easy to read and worth considering. It's not my first Krakauer book and probably won't be my last.
Perfect Storytelling
In my opinion, this is Mr. Krakauer's most important work to date. The research alone deserves five stars. He departs from books about, "beautiful or profound adventure," and dives head-long into the difficult subject of Mormon fundamentalism. In the spaces between historical reporting and the chronicling of a gruesome tragedy, Jon unwittingly becomes an advocate against child abuse and domestic violence. He provides the reader with a bird's eye view of this particular murder case and the machinations/abuses within Mormon fundamentalism. He is careful to make distinctions between the Mormon Faithful and it's fundamentalist sub-culture. This book is riveting; it leaves the reader hungry for a greater understanding of human behavior. Religious fundamentalism is dangerous in all cultures, on every continent, "even here, in our own backyard." This book seeks to shed light on this difficult subject and hits the mark. Perfectly. He intended to write a book about, "spiritual seekers," such as the extraordinary mystic, Pierre Teilhard. My hope is that one day this book will come to fruition.
The Deadly Doctrines of Mormonism - Chilling!
From seeing all the reviews on this book, and reading both extremes of reviews, I suspected that this book was going to be good. A book that has this many 5 stars reviews - and they were well written, tells me a lot. People enjoyed this book. Also, a book that also has this many 1 star reviews by people who hated it also tells me a lot. They don't want you to read it. This book really hit a sore spot with Mormons.
So I bought it and read it in 3 days. It was quite fascinating. It was very well written. As I read this book I thought maybe the title could have been "The Deadly Doctrines of Mormonism". The reason I say this is because it shows very clearly what the end product of Mormon Doctrines can be. Even though the 2 brothers Dan and Ron are an extreme, they only show the tip of the effects of Joseph Smith and his wicked, self-serving life. All you have to do is read this book and you will see the full scope of the damage these doctrines continue to have even today in the lives of his followers. The legacy that Joseph Smith left his church has been one of damage to millions of people's lives for over 100 years now.
The history of Mormonism reminds me of a game we played as children - "King on the Mountain". See who could knock the other person off.
I already knew much about Joseph Smith and his trickery, but this book gave a fresh view of the effects of Mormon Doctrine. Jon Krakauer purposely does not go into great detail about the many doctrines of Mormonism. You can easily find books that cover the errors of Mormon Doctrines. Instead, he focuses on 3 of the most harmful doctrines introduced by Joseph Smith -
1) Special Revelations from God to Men
With this doctrine, everything becomes rather unclear. My revelation can trump your revelation. And there is no requirement that my revelation must be Biblical. It can be pure evil.
2) Plural Marriages
With this doctrine you can rape and harm whatever little girl you can get away with. Then take her home and make her work for you, cleaning, taking care of your other babies, etc. Don't bother to marry her, just have her go on welfare and food stamps. Let the government pay for your little slave. They call it "bleeding the beast". This is a pedophile's dream.
3) The Blood Covenant
With this doctrine you are allowed to shed the blood of sinful people. Mormonism teaches that there were some sins so heinous that the blood of Jesus cannot cover them. For those sins, the person must shed their own blood to atone for their own sins. So for you to slit their throat, you are actually doing them a big favor.
These 3 doctrines alone can account for much of the misery that has been caused by Joseph Smith.
I had to laugh at one point when the author says "and thus you have Fundamental Mormonism".
One thing that was new to me was the internal struggle within the Mormon Church concerning Plural Marriages. I thought that the LDS Church readily accepted it. Not so, the Doctrine of Plural Marriages was always a battle within the LDS Church. At first it was a well-guarded secret because it was not well received. Only at the right time was this doctrine revealed to the church as a whole. It was revealed several years after the death of Joseph Smith. Even at that time, it did not go over very well. It was not clear if this would split the LDS church.
One thing I disagree about with the author is his definition of "Fundamentalism". He seems to equate Fundamentalism with Fanaticism. In my opinion, we should all be Fundamentalists in our faith. If you are a Muslim, you should be a Fundamentalist in your doctrine. If you are a Buddhist, you should be a Fundamentalist in your doctrine. If you are a Christian, you should be a Fundamentalist in your doctrine. Why would you be anything else? Then you are not true to your religion. Just because someone is a Fanatic and harms other people does not make that person a Fundamentalist. I know Christians can be "Funnymentalists", but I do not equate that with Fundamentalism. And a person that kills abortionist doctors, is not a Fundamentalist, he is a Fanatic. He is using the Bible to justify his evil. That is not Fundamentalism.
However, I do see the Fundamental Doctrines of Mormonism as very dangerous and having great potential for harm. I believe that is what this book has clearly revealed.
A tutorial on the stupidity of our fellow man
This book follows two tracks ... a chilling modern day account of the evil deranged men can do under the "banner of heaven," and an historical account of the origin and evolution of the Mormon "religion."
The idea that some lunatics would commit murder while under the sway of their extreme religious beliefs is nothing new and I read those portions of the book quickly. Every religion has its share of sickos.
However, I found the historical account of Mormonism absolutely fascinating. This is a "religion" (read the book, you'll understand why quotations are a must) invented out of thin air by a very horny, egomaniacal nut job, a snake oil salesman of his day with extraordinary charisma. Somehow he convinced a load of simpletons that God communicated directly with him and gave him specific instuctions to, among other things, get it on with all the little girls he could find, as long as they were pretty of course. It would be comical if not so tragic. An entire culture has grown around this man and his follower of the 1800s. Very scary.
reviews: 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, page 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20
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under the banner, banner, faith, heaven, story, under, violent
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based on 729 reviews
