From the Salt Lake Tribune today:
The LDS Church has made subtle—but significant—changes to chapter headings in its online version of the faith’s signature scripture, The Book of Mormon, toning down some earlier racial allusions.
The words “skin of blackness” were removed from the introductory italicized summary in 2 Nephi, Chapter 5, in describing the “curse” God put on disbelieving Lamanites.
Deeper into the volume, in Mormon, Chapter 5, the heading changes from calling Lamanites “a dark, filthy, and loathsome people” to “because of their unbelief, the Lamanites will be scattered, and the Spirit will cease to strive with them.”
This isn’t the first change to the Book of Mormon. There have been thousands of changes, most of them minor, since its first publication in 1830. In 1981, a verse claiming that repentant Lamanites will become “white and delightsome” was changed to “pure and delightsome” (which is actually what the phrase was in the 1840 edition). And more recently, the church edited the introduction to the Book of Mormon to read that Native Americans are “among the principal ancestors” of the Lamanites instead of being “the principal ancestors.”
I applaud the LDS Church for making the chapter headings, which were written by the conservative Mormon apostle Bruce R. McConkie, more racially-sensitive. But the church cannot escape its history of racism so long as the text of the Book of Mormon itself remains unchanged.
Racial language is replete throughout the Book of Mormon. Consider the following verses:
And [the Lord] had caused the cursing to come upon them, yea, even a sore cursing, because of their iniquity. For behold, they had hardened their hearts against him, that they had become like unto a flint; wherefore, as they were white, and exceedingly fair and delightsome, that they might not be enticing unto my people the Lord God did cause a skin of blackness to come upon them. — 2 Nephi 5:21
And it came to pass that those Lamanites who had united with the Nephites were numbered among the Nephites; And their curse was taken from them, and their skin became white like unto the Nephites… — 3 Nephi 2:14-15
O my brethren, I fear that unless ye shall repent of your sins that their skins will be whiter than yours, when ye shall be brought with them before the throne of God. — Jacob 3:8
My undergraduate sociology thesis was on the racial implications of Book of Mormon teachings. And the verses I included above have influenced LDS beliefs about race. Brigham Young, for example, taught that apostates would “become gray-haired, wrinkled, and black, just like the Devil” (Journal of Discourse, vol. 5, p. 332). Until only a few decades ago, the devil was even referred to as black in the LDS temple endowment ceremony (“A Kinder, Gentler Mormonism: Moving Beyond The Violence Of Our Past,” by Keith E. Norman, Sunstone, August 1990, page 10).
Also, in the October 1960 General Conference, then apostle Spencer W. Kimball said this concerning the Lamanite adoption program, whereby LDS families would adopt Native American children:
The day of the Lamanites is nigh. For years they have been growing delightsome … The children in the home placement program in Utah are often lighter than their brothers and sisters in the hogans on the reservation … There was the doctor in a Utah city who for two years had had an Indian boy in his home who stated that he was some shades lighter than the younger brother just coming into the program from the reservation. These young members of the Church are changing to whiteness and to delightsomeness.
Again, I am genuinely glad that the LDS Church and its members have moved away from these ignorant teachings. I just don’t want Mormons to forget them. You can change chapter headings, but you cannot change history.
Jon,
Have you read Bushman on this?
Pehaps. He didn’t mention it in Rough Stone Rolling though, did he? You may have to forward me the piece where he addresses the verses I included.
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One of the central themes of the Book of Mormon is that God punishes the wicked by changing the color of their skin. If you tried to remove this teaching, you would not have much left.
I suppose there is more than one way to burn a book or kill a prophet.
I always have a hard time with it when I see the church make little changes like this. Yes, I think the teaching of blacks being “like unto the devil” is both disgusting and pre-historic, as well as fundamentally against the nature of a loving and compassionate creator. However, whenever the church does this, it feels to me very much like the church is saying “look over there!” while shoving dirt under the rug and skeletons further into the closet. I’d say the majority of their active and faithful members are genuinely good people, who deserve far better than the doctored and severely abridged history they get from the church. I feel like the church has gotten addicted to telling half-truths to its members.
But then, I’m one who believes the church’s spotty history is evidence against its validity, a cynicism that is further supplemented by the church’s own efforts to cover or sugar-coat said spotty history. Rather than elmer’s-gluing the proverbial vase back together before mom gets home, perhaps they should put a tad more emphasis on the idea that the leaders are men, prone to weakness, personal bias and mistakes. That’d sit better with me than round-about (and sometimes blatant) lying, I think.
As a caveat, I understand why they don’t do so. To admit leaders’ imperfections in this case would undermine McConkie, and quite likely Joseph Smith. To throw the latter into question would not only be downright heresy, but throw the validity of the entire church into question because it would mean the BoM is no longer perfect and correct scripture. It would basically be theological suicide.
I guess I would just be able to respect the church a little bit if it actually stood up and said “we’re sorry” occasionally. Maybe issue a little apology every time Packer speaks in conference and work their way up from there.
I personally don’t think that the actual changing of skin color is the curse here. Perhaps it could be explained using simple economics. Many people argue that skin pigment is a result of environment. Well suppose Cain loses his birthright and is cast out to be a vagabond. His descendants live in Africa, an entire continent of very poor agriculture. Over time their skin changes and adapts to the harsh environment. Esau who is always labeled as having red skin loses his birthright to Jacob and his descendants are suggested to live in Arabia. Perhaps this is skin adaptation is a mark of Esau’s descendants losing their birthright and living in much harsher conditions. It is not actually the curse itself, but if you’re an affluent and influential guy that’s writing down the history of the world, you sure are gonna see it as a curse, or at least a symbol that people could understand.
One also needs to recognize that in Mormonism, “skin” is almost synonymous with garments. White garments are to signify a covenant with God. If God says that somebody’s skin is darker, this could perhaps suggest that a covenant with God was broken and that the garment has been disrespected. Mormons are taught to not even let their garments touch the ground because of the sacredness of the covenant (they would also get dirty). Is a dark skin suggestive of a dirty garment both figuratively but also as a sign that the wearer of the garment shows a lack of respect towards the sacredness and the covenant?
When covenants are re-established with God in the Book of Mormon, their skins become white again. Couldn’t this be that their garments are spotless (wording used in all canonical Christian texts?) One thing is for sure, skin color only changes when covenants are broken or made, whether in the Book of Mormon, D&C or the Bible. Even in the Book of Mormon when the Nephites join the Lamanites, they paint their skin (maybe this is a tattoo, maybe war paint like unto the Amerindians, or maybe they change their garments), it is a sign as to where their allegiances lie, and suggests that they broke their covenants with God. To say that their skin actually changed may be far fetched. The Anti-Nephi-Lehis changed and became white and delightsome but they were still a distinctive ethnic group within the larger group of the white and delightsome. How was it that this group although they have white and delightsome skins do NOT assimilate? Perhaps they had spotless/white/pure garments or skins but the actual pigment of their skin remained the same.
Religion comes from the latin word “religare” which means to bind or link together. We as humans have always created in-groups; we link ourselves together and we feel better about ourselves when we make the group exclusive. Any religious text can be used to welcome people or to push people out, to exert power over people, or to set them free. When I read the Book of Mormon, I don’t read racism. It seems to me that racism is a personal problem of the unbeliever, and those “believers” that would try to exert some superiority/power over another group of people (which has been done in the LDS church).
I’ve heard the explanation that the BoM is only referring to gradual skin color changes due to environment, but it doesn’t comport with a straightforward reading of the text. Same with your conflation of ‘skin’ with ‘garment.’ Sure, these explanations allow you to circumvent the uneasy racial implications of these verses, but I see no textual justification for them. They appear to just be conjecture.
I think BYU professor Rodney Turner had it right when he said at a BoM symposium, “There can be no question but that their altered skin color was a miraculous act of God; it cannot be understood in purely metaphoric terms, nor as being nothing more than the natural consequence of prolonged exposure to the sun.”
First, I would say that any text in regards to the temple is going to be first, vague and second symbolic. Both in the BOM and NT it refers to Jesus teaching specific groups of people and it says thing to the effect of “Many things did Jesus do and say which cannot be written here”. So if it is in regards to covenants, not necessarily temples, I think I could create a good case.
Second, I don’t think I said anything about the sun. I said environment and economic factors. If we are looking at the racial insensitivities of Joseph Smith’s time, then it is important to note that when the Irish came to this country they were called black as well. This could be the result of poor health, bad working conditions or blatant racism, but it is obvious to us that the Irish most definitely are not black. Shoot, Africans aren’t even “black”. So what causes somebody to refer to another person as dark or even black? (as a side note, skin pigmentation of Africans cannot be explained with just adaptations to the sun. Sure, they have more melanin which is a protection, but ask any black person and they will tell you that they sunburn worse than white people. Darker colors tend to absorb heat while lighter colors reflect. Overtime wouldn’t you expect skin to adapt to burn less easily? You know like in Twilight when vampires are exposed to sun they sparkle?
Jon, be fair here. You omit in your commentary that the wording “white and delightsome” despite the change to “pure and delightsome” which you point out, is still in a handful of places in the Book of Mormon. Both were mentioned in the Tribune article. You slanted that pretty good. It also needs to be made clear that if the leaders of the church were overtly racist, they’d probably have the white people win not only in the prophecies, but also in the Book of Mormon. Both show the downfall of the “white” people. I’d like to know your thoughts on that as well.
I don’t see how that omission is all that glaring, Landon. It obviously wasn’t my argument to suggest, as many critics do, that the church changed that verse in response to racial sensitivities. Had that been my argument, why would I have mentioned that the 1840 version of the BoM said ‘pure’, not ‘white’? If my intent was to be unfair to the church, I would have omitted that fact. That ‘white and delightsome’ is mentioned elsewhere in the BoM is an observation that, first, I didn’t think was relevant to this article, and, second, doesn’t do the LDS position any favors.
I also did not argue that the Book of Mormon is a wholly racist book. There are several verses which condemn racism, of course. My point, rather, was just that the book is a product of it’s racially insensitive environment, and that the racial implications of some BoM verses (like the ones I’ve included) have influenced LDS views on race for many decades.