Under the Banner of Heaven: A story of a Violent Faith by Jon Krakauer (Anchor, 2004. ISBN 978-1-4000-3280-8)
OK, I’ll admit to my prejudice. As an historian, I have a hard time buying Joseph Smith’s story regarding the discovery of the golden plates near the Hill Cumorah in the early 19th century. There are many arguments that I could advance here to illustrate why I am a skeptic when it comes to Smith’s claim that divinity led him to the Mormon faith and to the founding of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS) a few years later. This review isn’t the place for such a debate. And even in my fightingest mood as an Episcopalian, I must admit: the Mormons, as the fastest growing faith in the world, are on to something.
Jon Krakauer explores what that something is not by examining the brutal murder of a woman and her infant daughter at the hands of the woman’s brothers-in-law (the child’s paternal uncles). Krakauer’s work unravels the dedication and call to duty that permeates the LDS faith, and in the case of LDS Fundamentalism, rises to the level of murder.
There is no question that the issue of polygamy remains the central principle of the tens of thousands of Fundamentalist Mormons who cannot reconcile the teachings of Joseph Smith (and the leadership of Brigham Young) with the modern LDS stand against plural marriage. Krakauer explores these fissures in the only American-born religion in great detail, and paints a picture that the LDS hierarchy would rather went unnoticed.
Krakauer interviews one of the brothers involved in the murders which form the centerpiece of the book. And as Krakauer questions the faith, the motives, and the ideas contained in the seemingly innocent and benevolent mind of Dan Lafferty (the brother who wielded the knife that slashed the throats of his sister-in-law and niece) one gets the sense that religious zealotry is not only found in third-world countries. Just like Timothy McVie, who evinced no remorse for killing dozens of children as part of his attack on the federal building in Oklahoma City, Dan Lafferty seems content with what he has done. After all, God spoke to his brother Allen and Allen relayed the plan to Dan. Isn’t that how it was done in the Old Testament?
Krakauer never loses sight of the fact that, as cynical as outsiders might be regarding the historic accuracy of Joseph Smith’s discovery, no one within the mainstream LDS church, the church that raised the Laffery brothers, supports their theology or their crimes. But, even though the modern church has distanced itself from the fringes, the Laffertys’ brand of Mormonism shares a common history with the mainstream church.
The Lafferts’ brutality isn’t far removed from the legendary Mormon trek west; a journey which reached the height of paranoid depravity with the massacre of over one hundred men, women and children. Surrounded by Mormon militia and their Native American allies at a place called Mountain Meadows in August of 1857, members of an Arkansan wagon train were assured safe passage through Utah by the Mormon commander if they surrendered their weapons. The travelers did so, with nary a hint of fear, only to be slaughtered.
According to the author, the religious fervor that caused sane men to commit such an atrocity still lurks in the dark fringes of Mormonism. There has been no recognition by the LDS church of the church’s involvement in the massacre. Even today, the official line remains: “It was the Indians.” And this failure, Krakauer convincingly asserts, is why folks like Allen and Dan Lafferty persist at the far edges of Joseph Smith’s religion nearly 200 years later.
A great non-fiction book on a misunderstood and under appreciated religion, Under the Banner of Heaven is also a solid “true crime” story. 4 stars out of 5.
