Victorian Women and the Mormons

[_CaliforniaKid]

I was reading today in the book In Her Own Words: Nineteenth-Century Women Writing on Women in Genesis. The author makes some interesting comments in the introduction about Victorian women. The ones that particularly sttod out to me were on the subject of women's role as the spiritual center of the household. Piety was widely seen as a primarily feminine virtue, and women in the nineteenth century served as the spiritual leaders and educators of the family. Taylor and Weir (the authors of this book) describe this as the "cult of domesticity" and call women the "priests of the home". It occurred to me when I read this that Mormonism, in making male heads of household literally priest and prophet to their own families, usurps the only domain in which 19th-century women were able to take any real leadership and puts it safely back into the hands of men.

I also recently read Discerning Spirits: Divine and Demonic Poseesion in the Middle Ages by Nancy Cacciola. That book describes an interesting dynami in which women, who felt utterly powerless and alienated in a world dominated by male authority structures, sought to gain a voice and some power over their lives and social setting by taking on the role of ecstatic prophetess. This frequently involved ecstatic trance-dancing and prophesying. Perhaps as a sign of how powerless some women felt among the Mormons, a young prophetess in Kirtland took on a very similar role for herself. Cacciola describes how male figures, feeling threatened by female usurpation of male leadership prerogatives, accused women of dishonesty or demonic possession and tried them as heretics. Joseph Smith, too, wasted little time in denouncing this upstart prophetess, especially when it seemed that she was gaining influence among his closest followers (the witnesses).

Another recent reading was an essay by Susan Staker, wherein she commented on the extension of the endowment and some priesthood prerogatives to Relief Society women in 1842, sometimes cited as Joseph Smith's empowerment of women. Staker argues, rather, that Joseph Smith wanted them to be exposed to the oaths and penalties in the endowment, so as to secure their silence on the subject of polygamy. It was therefore a fundamentally oppressive and stifling act premised on the assumption that these gossipy women might otherwise go run their mouths.

[_truth dancer]

Hi CK... Nice post.

Patriarchy originated as dominant warring tribal nomadic men destroyed those whose beliefs centered on the Goddess.

Even Genesis removes the birthing "power" of women ... Eve comes from Adam's rib, ultimately giving to Adam the ability to "birth" women. (Symbolically or metaphorically, the message is still there... women created for the pleasure of men).

Patriarchy just doesn't allow for women to be powerful, share their unique gifts, or contribute in ways equal to men.

How to keep women from usurping the spiritual power of men? Do not let them participate in spiritual matters, take away any form of the divine feminine, do not give them the "power and authority" to bless their children or heal the sick. Keep them under the authority and power of men.

(sigh)

~dancer~

[_CaliforniaKid]

If only Adam and Eve had had a praying mother to bring them up right, we might not be having this discussion today.

[_Blixa]

Your first paragraph was very interesting to me. The cult of the "Angel of the Hearth" cannont be emphasized enough in respect to Victorian gender. It becomes a legitimating relgious gloss on the hardening of public/private boundaries in 19th C bourgeois family politics. Another aspect of the Victorian cult of domesticity for women is class: the domestic hearth was a middle-class domain and giving it the imprimator of divine blessing was a way to further separate the emerging bourgeoise from the supposed corruption of the "higher" class they were replacing and the supposed criminality of the classes beneath them (who they would in turn rule). Within this model, then, some women ("ladies:" i.e. middle class, married women) were given a smidgen of authority: they were to "naturally" preside over the management of the household (be the boss of the servants) and be the center of its piety. This latter was dependent on her strictly "private" role: her saintliness was in direct proportion to how little she traveled in, or even knew of, the "public" world. So while she might teach her children and generally project a saintly goodness, these were all seen as natural aspects of her gender (which, of course didn't extend to those of her gender in other classes) which was firmly in the secondary position of the gender divide. Men, fathers, oft as not, led the family prayers, which would also include the household servants in the family group. In other words, men were the paternal authority even over those not part of the biological family: they had the "duty" to oversee the morality of thier employees. Women as domestic household "priests" were also subordinate to their local ecclesiastical superiors (it goes without saying). The vast amount of literature and legistation that went into producing the Victorian "angel of the hearth" ideology was in service more to a politcal symbol than to much actual material practice women were involved, even on a highly limited scale. Therefore, it is highly interesting to see as you pointed out, the way Mormon notions of priesthood authority both intervene in this discourse and maybe even carry it out to its "logical" conclusion...