With polygamy being in the news so much lately, I have been reading and watching a lot about it. Until recently, polygamy was something that I put “on the shelf,” way in the back where I wouldn’t have to look at it. I grew up believing that is was a dormant doctrine, something that I might very well have to accept someday. I now lean toward believing that it was not inspired the way that Joseph Smith lived and presented it, and that even if it is sanctioned by God in some instances (I don’t claim to know that one way or the other), it is totally optional. I believe that people who choose to live it should be consenting adults, and should never be coerced. I think it is generally an unhealthy lifestyle for most people, although there may be exceptions.
That being said, lately I am fascinated with accounts of people who have lived polygamy. Reading some of the stories is a little like watching an accident scene–you know it’s going to be bad, but you just can’t turn away. After putting polygamy on the shelf so long, I’m taking it out to look, smell, and examine. But never to actually try (is that taking the metaphor too far??) I just finished this book, His Favorite Wife by Susan Ray Schmidt, a few days ago:
She was a member of an LDS fundamentalist group called the Church of the Firstborn of the Fullness of Times, located in Mexico and led by members of the LeBaron family, one of whom she married when she was 15, becoming his seventh wife. The church itself has quite a sad story, with one of the LeBaron brothers breaking away from the main body and ordering his followers to kill (“blood atone”) his brother, the church’s prophet, along with several other leaders who disagreed with his doctrine. Fanaticism at its worst.
The main focus of the book, however, is on Susan’s life as a polygamist wife. Luckily she was not married to the violent LeBaron brother, or the prophet who was killed. She narrowly escaped marrying the renegade brother, but married another LeBaron brother instead. She did love her husband, who was 30 years her senior, and at the time wanted to marry him. But as the years went on, she became progressively more disillusioned with polygamy. Her husband was so driven in his dedication to the church, and in his pursual of more and more wives, that he simply could not give his families the attention or financial support that they needed. They lived in total squalor at times, and always in poverty.
The book examines the emotional ups and downs (more downs than ups) of Susan’s relationships with her husband and her sister-wives, including the jealousies that inevitably occurred. She eventually escaped her polygamous life, bringing her children to the states with her when she was in her early to mid-twenties.
Reading this book helped me understand how different some of the fundamentalist sects are. In this sect, women were entitled to have revelation and choose their own husband, with arranged marriages being more the exception than the rule. They wore modern clothes and makeup, not the pioneer dress typical of FLDS. Most members didn’t wear garments, although Susan’s husband did. The group is extant still today, although many members left in the years following the murder of their prophet, Joel. The doctrine taught that Joel was supposed to live to see them through to the second coming, and when it didn’t happen many people became disillusioned.
A very interesting read. I’m now waiting for Carolyn Jessup’s Escape to come available at my local library–there are a lot of people on the hold list before me, so I guess I’m not the only one with fixated on polygamy accounts right now!
