"The Angel and the Beehive, The Mormon Stuggle with Assimilation" by Armand Mauss

The epitome of Scholastic
I like it. I like it a lot!

I've recently recommended Armand Mauss' book The Angel and the Beehive, The Mormon Struggle with Assimilation, to several people. So I decided to give it a read again.

The first time through it I thought Mauss was a Godsend to Mormon Scholarship--a man whose ideas were beyond refute. I still think he is a brilliant scholar. But my views on this book changed.

This time through I felt as if the book had been sanitized by extra strength Scholarship at the expense of God. How can one make a sociological study of the Mormonism's place and assimilation into society without taking into account that some of the shifts it is making are a direct result of Gods revelations to his Prophets?

If survival is the first task of the movement [Mormonism], the natural and inevitable response of the host society is either to domesticate the movement or to destroy it. In seeking to domesticate or assimilate it, the society will apply various kinds of social control pressures selectively in an effort to force the movement to abandon at least its most unique and threatening features. pg 4

I agree with this assessment. I think Polygamy would be the most notable example. But then he goes on to say:

...To the extent that the society succeeds in this domestication effort, the result will be the eventual assimilation of the movement. Failing to achieve sufficient domestication, the host society will eventually resort to the only alternative: Persecution and repression" pg. 4

Now we all know that 19th Century Americans did in fact persecute and repress, but to what avail? Each time the refiners fire was lit, the Saints emerged a more determined God fearing people than before. They did now cow tow to every whim of society.

The logical extreme of either of these two societal responses (assimilation or repression) is, of course, oblivion for the movement...the "natural history" of the interaction between radical social movements and their host societies...movements must either submit to assimilation in important respects or be destroyed. pg 5

Nonsense. If God be with us, who can be against us? The abandonment of extreme religious practices were not done as a concession to the United States; rather doctrinal practices abandoned or evolved are merely evidence to me that God leads and guides the Church through his Son Jesus Christ and inspired leaders.

Mauss makes the point that until the 50' and 60' the Church was in the phase of assimilation. But an organization can oscillate between acceptance and rejection as long as the tension is not stretched too far.

Enter stage right: J. Reuben Clark. Mauss states, "Much of the significance of President clarks appointment lies in the fortuitous demise at about the same time of some of the great minds of the church who had been proponents of quite a different leadership orientation from his- e.g. B.H. Roberts, James Talmage, and Anthony Ivins." (ibid pg80)

The esoteric value of this statement is that intellectuals are liberal trouble makers and the conservative and eloquent President Clark was there to steady the ark. Rubbish. Clark was a man of God who was called and prepared to do His will. The idea that he woke up and thought, "Whoa, we've drifted too far into the assimilation continuum, we must begin a plan of retrenchment so as to maintain our unique identity", is laughable, IMO. To be fair, I don't think Mauss directly states this. But using some of my own hyperbole I don't think I'm far off the mark.

The plan for retrenchment had its beginnings while President Grant lay incapacitated, and Clark called Harold B. Lee, Spencer W. Kimball, Ezra Taft Benson, and Mark E. Petersen. He call 3 of the 4 "Clark men" while the other is obviously a "McKay man". lol

Finally he lists the "Five Major Thrusts of Retrenchment"

we can see that the "leadership in more recent years...reassert the distinguishing features of the Mormon heritage, almost as if to declare, "Assimilation has gone far enough. Let's start remembering the things that have made us a peculiar people." Five of these initiatives, in particular, seem especially apparent and worthy of review here:" (pg. 85)

1. Renewed assertion of the claim of continuous revelation through modern prophets
2. Renewed emphasis on temples, temple work, and genealogical research.
3. Expansion and standardization of the missionary enterprise
4. Family renewal and retrenchment
5. Expansion of formal religious education in the service of parochial indoctrination.


Perhaps some of you would like to comment on the alleged "retrenchment" operations of the Church, or Mauss in general.


Mauss has written some amazing things on blacks and the ban on the Priesthood. I really like him. I thought I liked this book. Every time I re-read a book it seems as if a little troll keeps adding and removing things that were or were not there before. Perhaps I'm different and so the book seems different? Nah, I'm sure it's a troll.

Big UP!

Lamanite