Frightening Mormonism

[Philo Sofee]

I've been listening to Lori's trial. I'm about eight days in. More and more, this story reminds me about the uncomfortable question that was at the heart of John Krakauer's book, Under the Banner of Heaven: where is the boundary between religious belief and insanity? Lori Vallow didn't pursue an insanity defense. But anyone who believes that certain people are souless zombies that it is morally right to kill fits pretty well into the typical legal definition of insanity. And if that delusion were not grounded in religion, I don't think we'd have a problem considering a person deluded in that manner to be insane.

I don't disagree with your identification of the zombie doctrine as the worst Mormon terror of the last decade. But I have trouble figuring out which step along the path that got people to that doctrine is the most scary. There's a homeless guy downtown that claims God talks to him. Russell Nelson claims God talks to him. Having seen the harm it has wrought, I'm tempted to find the concept of personal revelation as the scariest step. But maybe it's revelation, period.

That is a great question. Abraham was told to sacrifice Isaac. Another terrifying story. Nephi was told to kill Laban, and no angel intervened to stop the cold blooded murder of a man who was passed out drunk. I used to defend the latter scripture, but I now consider it one of the worst in the LDS canon—Tim Ballard used it to manipulate his victims.

I used to think that religion made people more moral. Now I feel quite differently about that. It would be comforting to think that a divine inspiration could only lead to good, but that is obviously not the case, if horrors such as these are wrought by those believing they were divinely inspired to commit terrible crimes were right. If they could not tell the difference between divine inspiration and madness or evil, that, too, is terrifying.

Or as I have put it in the past, the Holy Ghost is on vacation...

[Shulem]

Nephi was told to kill Laban, and no angel intervened to stop the cold blooded murder of a man who was passed out drunk.

🕸Joseph Smith☠︎︎ experimented with thoughts of murder in trying to understand the implications of what it was like to commit murder without actually having to do it. So he played the character of Nephi and performed the act in secret while mumbling the story with his face in hat. It was not one of his finer moments.

The slaying of Laban or the officer in question is an incident of cold-blooded murder. There is no justification or excuse for Nephi running a drunken man through. It’s a violation of law in the civilized world and is a crime. There is no justification for murdering a man in his sleep or while drunk which is what seems is contained in both accounts. Joseph Smith allowed the darker side of his inner self emerge in expressing how he views God as a Being of retribution and punishment. It frightens me just a little to think what kind of devious acts the prophet Joseph Smith would have committed had he lived to continue his ministry in which he was determined that Jesus was going to return and come to Zion. There was a dark side to Joseph Smith that never played out!

Nephi knowingly murdered a chief clerk who was his father’s boss! The Book of Mormon is all about murder and more murder -- there is lots and lots of murder in the Book of Mormon BECAUSE that is what was on the author’s (Joseph Smith’s) mind! Murder was a fascination to Joseph Smith!

[Shulem]

It's clear to me that the name of the king in Facsimile No. 3 is Mormon. What else could it be?

I've asked professor 🕷Gee and he doesn't know and neither does ⛓Muhlestein, so deductive reasoning concludes that the name must be Mormon.

Don't listen to 🕯Shulem on Shade's board.

[malkie]

There are times when it is fun to be a little scared, and there are other terrors that are no fun and in which no humor exists, no matter how ridiculous they are. I nominate the Daybell-Vallow zombie doctrine for worst Mormon terror of the past decade because it led to the tragic deaths of two innocent children and two adult family members.

I've been listening to Lori's trial. I'm about eight days in. More and more, this story reminds me about the uncomfortable question that was at the heart of John Krakauer's book, Under the Banner of Heaven: where is the boundary between religious belief and insanity? Lori Vallow didn't pursue an insanity defense. But anyone who believes that certain people are souless zombies that it is morally right to kill fits pretty well into the typical legal definition of insanity. And if that delusion were not grounded in religion, I don't think we'd have a problem considering a person deluded in that manner to be insane.

I don't disagree with your identification of the zombie doctrine as the worst Mormon terror of the last decade. But I have trouble figuring out which step along the path that got people to that doctrine is the most scary. There's a homeless guy downtown that claims God talks to him. Russell Nelson claims God talks to him. Having seen the harm it has wrought, I'm tempted to find the concept of personal revelation as the scariest step. But maybe it's revelation, period.

About 50 years ago, during my most intense period as a believer, my then-wife & I were having some problems, and a mutual friend arranged for me to meet a prof of psychology for a day's worth of psychological testing. One of the questions was something like "do you believe that some non-physical being talks to you and tells you what to do?" I checked the "Yes" box. After I finished that test and was returning my answers, I told the prof that I would like to explain why I gave certain answers to some of the questions. I told him that I held the priesthood, and was entitled to revelation about how to conduct my life. His response: "Huh!"

I was a bit miffed at the time - more so a few weeks later after parting with $200 in cash (about $1100 in today's dollars) in exchange for a report that diagnosed me as suffering from a personality disorder.