Latter-day Satyagraha

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An Islamic scholar observed that, ‘when our whole existence is threatened, as it is today, the eschatological veins in various religions come to the fore’. Millennialism is in relation to eschatology (the doctrine of the latter days) a kind of outrageous hope that it is actually possible for embodied human beings to live in a just society together. For a number of scholars, millennialism is a label that can be applied to just about every truly progressive movement – religious, social, political, and so on – whose vision and work in some way entail the creation of a just society on this earth. But when it comes to millennialism, the essential question is: HOW do we get to the promised kingdom? Good deeds? An apocalypse? A proletariat revolution? A messiah? We could say that there are two types of millennialism: the catastrophic and the progressive.

‘Catastrophic millennialism is the belief that the transition to collective salvation will occur catastrophically. The other type is called progressive millennialism, because of a belief that things are getting better all the time and that human effort, motivated by and working in conjuction with a higher power, can help to create the millennial kingdom’. Carter Phipps in The Hour of My Coming explains that, ‘one way or the other, the message of antiquity is unequivocal: collective salvation is possible through the grace, love, and wisdom of the coming World Teacher who will lead the way to a glorious future. That’s the good news. The bad news is, of course, that accompanying many of the visions of this glorious future is a not-so-glorious apocalypse. All of which begs the obvious question: Are we getting close? Are we approaching midnight? And, how do we know if we are?’

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Progressive millennialism in the midst of catastrophic millennialism

Sidney Rigdon, Joseph Smith’s right hand during the early years of the Church, wrote that ‘the man of God will no sooner cry destruction, desolation and judgement than he will tell them of an ark, a Zoar, a Palla, a Mount Zion, a Jerusalem, or some other place which God has provided for them who will hear His voice’. Underwood explains that, ‘it served little purpose in Rigdon’s mind to proclaim a message of doom and gloom and then offer ‘No way for escape! No hiding place! No city of refuge!’ The progressive type as an integral part of the troubles and tribulations Latter day Saints expect will occur in the latter days before the return of the Messiah is, what was and remains, distinctive about Mormon millennialism. Underwood comments that, ‘the social ramifications of Mormon eschatology are rarely, if ever discussed today’. Mormonism’s future course of development internationally and the potential establishment of Zion, as we have clearly witnessed in the past will be largely conditioned, if not altogether determined, by the particular setting in which the religious movement exists.

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Consequently, since the 9/11 attacks and the 7 long years that followed with Bush jr. at the head of a nation gone erring, LDS blogs, websites, conference addresses, and church magazines, testify of an increased awareness and concern among members of the LDS church with regards to the global debate on religious-motivated terror, international security and under-development. If ye are prepared, ye need not fear - is an often-quoted LDS scripture regarding the ‘perilous times of the latter-days’ and can well inform the emerging debate on Mormon peacebuilding. General authorities’ and members’ practical responses to perceived security threats, financial down-turns, and to their survival needs – and the implications of these responses – will open up for a lot of debate in the nearer future. The long-term structures in which the LDS church will operate – religious, racial, ethnic and national compositions; patterns of social and economic mobility; forms of government; systems of education and media; strength of civil society; and so on – will constitute a web of constraints, opportunities and more than likely, challenges for the preconceptions of many members, American or not.

establishing zion – a viable alternative strategy

Michael Cox in Historical Materialism and Globalization argues that, ‘resistance to globalization is not exactly the same thing as a positive or coherent strategy, and until there is such a strategy’, there will always remain what he calls ‘a vacuum to be filled’. At the heart of this challenge ‘is the question of the motive force for change. Even if the world is in a state of social breakdown – without a united vision of a different society – nothing can fundamentally change. Until the ‘radicals’ can provide a coherent answer to the question of what it is they are for rather than what it is they are against, they will remain what they have been, in effect – well informed rebels without a political cause’.

Leonard Arrington explains in Building the City of God that for nearly a hundred and eighty years now, ‘faithful mormons have confidently expected to see the day when the people of the earth would come to them for instruction and leadership and ‘for the law to go forth from Zion’. A continuing concern of Mormon church leaders since the time of Joseph Smith has been to create a people sufficiently selfless, dedicated, and disciplined to take up the reigns of world government in the wake of an expected collapse of earthly authority. Mormons, living under  a revealed order, would be a perfected and holy people, worthy to build in Missouri the City of Zion. From this people, Christ would choose officials and administrators for the millennial reign’.

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Arrington further believes that as long as millennialism (progressive within the catastrophic that is) ‘remains a part of official doctrine, the potential for a sudden renewal of Mormon communitarianism remains. This seems at first glance unlikely; the church hierarchy is predominantly composed of businessmen and lawyers – men who, for the most part, are firmly devoted to conservative principles. It should be remembered however that in the past, Saints have been quite willing to accept demands made upon them by the church that they would have found intolerable if imposed by the government. Willing obedience to church authority is a cardinal virtue among the faithful and has been a cause of wonder by nonmembers’.