Brigham Young: Pioneer Prophet - Hardcover

Turner, John G.

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0674049675 ISBN 13: 9780674049673

Publisher: Belknap Press, 2012

Synopsis

Brigham Young was a rough-hewn craftsman from New York whose impoverished and obscure life was electrified by the Mormon faith. He trudged around the United States and England to gain converts for Mormonism, spoke in spiritual tongues, married more than fifty women, and eventually transformed a barren desert into his vision of the Kingdom of God. While previous accounts of his life have been distorted by hagiography or polemical exposé, John Turner provides a fully realized portrait of a colossal figure in American religion, politics, and westward expansion.

After the 1844 murder of Mormon founder Joseph Smith, Young gathered those Latter-day Saints who would follow him and led them over the Rocky Mountains. In Utah, he styled himself after the patriarchs, judges, and prophets of ancient Israel. As charismatic as he was autocratic, he was viewed by his followers as an indispensable protector and by his opponents as a theocratic, treasonous heretic.

Under his fiery tutelage, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints defended plural marriage, restricted the place of African Americans within the church, fought the U.S. Army in 1857, and obstructed federal efforts to prosecute perpetrators of the Mountain Meadows Massacre. At the same time, Young's tenacity and faith brought tens of thousands of Mormons to the American West, imbued their everyday lives with sacred purpose, and sustained his church against adversity. Turner reveals the complexity of this spiritual prophet, whose commitment made a deep imprint on his church and the American Mountain West.

About this title

About the Author:

John G. Turner is Assistant Professor of Religious Studies at George Mason University.

Review:

In this superb new biography, Turner's strong narrative, human insight, knowledge of context, meticulous use of sources, and sophisticated appreciation of Mormon theology combine to create an account of his larger-than-life subject that is at once informative, judicious, and profoundly engaging. (Daniel Walker Howe, author of What Hath God Wrought: The Transformation of America, 1815–1848)

A scholarly yet thoroughly readable historical/biographical study, of considerable interest to students of 19th-century American history and religious revivalism. (Kirkus Reviews 2012-05-01)

Turner provides a searing portrait of a leader at his most determined and—at times—ruthless in defense of his religion. A provocative and compelling view of one of the most elusive, yet influential, figures in our nation's westward expansion. (Ken Verdoia, author of Utah: The Struggle for Statehood)

The story Turner tells in this elegantly written biography will startle and shock many readers. He reveals a Brigham Young more violent and coarse than the man Mormons have known. While lauding his achievements as pioneer, politician, and church leader, the book will require a reassessment of Brigham Young the man. (Richard Bushman, author of Joseph Smith: Rough Stone Rolling)

Inextricably tied together by bonds of fate and faith, Brigham Young and Mormonism rose as one in nineteenth-century America. It is that America, as well as that man and that religion, that Turner explores and explains so well in this wonderful book. (William Deverell, Director, Huntington–USC Institute on California and the West)

Turner's treatment of the complex Brigham Young is unsentimental, cogent, critical, and fair. It takes its place alongside Leonard Arrington's magisterial American Moses as the essential, mutually challenging portraits of one of America's greatest colonizers and religious figures. (Philip L. Barlow, author of Mormons and the Bible: The Place of the Latter-day Saints in American Religion)

Turner's broad historical perspective clarifies why Young's ecclesiastical successors have still felt the man's influence--even after abandoning polygamy. An impressively detailed portrait of a controversial giant. (Bryce Christensen Booklist (starred review) 2012-08-01)

A definitive biography of Mormonism's greatest activist and apostle. (Adam Gopnik New Yorker 2012-08-13)

Previous biographers of Brigham Young have used epithets such as 'American Moses' and 'Lion of the Lord.' However, what Turner demonstrates here is that the three-dimensional Young cannot be reduced to saint or tyrant; he was bold, brave, crude, petty, visionary, manipulative, creative, charismatic, kindly, and much more besides. He presents Young as a family man navigating the complexities of polygamy, as a leader moving large numbers of people across the Great Plains, and as a politician negotiating enough independence for the Mormons from the American government that he could build the kingdom of God as he saw fit. Turner was given unprecedented access to the LDS church archives and he makes full use of them and other sources, as well as providing a cogent interpretive context. It is easy to forget Young's significance in American history, but at a minimum it needs to be remembered that he is responsible for settling a vast swath of the West. Turner gives him his due... There aren't enough superlatives for this book. It will remain the standard biography for a long time. Because of its thorough documentation, academics will take it seriously, while general readers will appreciate its clarity of prose and argument. (D. S. Azzolina Library Journal (starred review) 2012-08-01)

[A] magnificent new biography...[Turner's] book should establish him as one of the best religious historians of his generation. Turner had unfettered access to Young's papers, and his keen eye for social context makes this book an excellent introduction to the story of Mormonism as well as an essential addition to the history of the American West. It should also do for Brigham Young what Richard Lyman Bushman's Joseph Smith: Rough Stone Rolling did for the Mormon prophet: make the case not only that Young was one of the most fascinating people of the 19th century but also that his importance in American history can no longer be overlooked. Indeed, some of that history will have to be revised to fit this "pioneer prophet" into its narrative...Turner's prose is so smooth and his interpretations so balanced that I suspect Mormonism's defenders and detractors alike will flock to this book...Turner is not a member of the Mormon church, which makes his achievement all the more remarkable. (Stephen H. Webb Books & Culture 2012-09-01)

About this edition

• Publisher: Belknap Press
• Publication date: 2012
• ISBN 10: 0674049675
• ISBN 13: 9780674049673
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 512