Книга Мормона

This year, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints used the Book of Mormon as the text, in conjunction with the relatively new Come, Follow Me manual, for Sunday school lessons.  The Book of Mormon has always been a part of my life since I’m a life-long member of the Church, and I have come to know that it never hurts to re-read this book, which is aptly described by its subtitle, “Another Testament of Jesus Christ.”  Since it’s been almost twenty years since I finished by mission, which I served in St. Petersburg, Russia, I thought it would be fitting to read the Russian translation of the book.  It’s gone through a few updates since I read it as a missionary, so there would be a little bit of a new feel to it for me (my version was dated March 24th, 2015).

 
While I normally try to summarize the book or provide highlights and some of the author’s main points, that seemed a little less useful for a book of scripture, but since part of the impetus behind reading it in Russian was to help maintain (re-gain?) at least a semblance of Russian-language skills, I thought I would hearken back to my mission days and try to give the same type of overview of the Книга Мормона that we gave as missionaries when doing what we called street contacting, simply walking up to people, asking if they’d give us a few minutes of their time, and then explaining who we were and what, in generic terms, our message was.  If people were willing to listen for a few minutes, we usually had a chance to talk about the Book of Mormon, which was new and unique for upwards of 90% of the people with whom we spoke.  Most missionaries, myself included, liked to use the illustrations included at the front of the book.  We typically told people we met that the Book of Mormon was a book of scripture, the same as the Bible is a book of scripture, that testified of Jesus Christ.  It was written by ancient prophets, starting with a man named Lehi, who left Jerusalem and moved to the American continent.  The book recorded the history and prophecies of Lehi’s descendants, culminating in a visit to these people by the resurrected Savior, where He taught His gospel and performed miracles just as He had done in Jerusalem.  This record was compiled by another ancient prophet, named Mormon, and buried, later to come forth, with God’s help, through a modern-day prophet named Joseph Smith.  The book ends with a promise that if we ask God about its truthfulness, He will answer us.

I will first note that I am a huge fan of how this edition of the Book of Mormon in Russian uses the Russian letter Ё (yo).  While most literate Russians don’t need it printed, and there’s some debate among linguists about its status, learners of Russian are helped immensely by the letter.  I would’ve loved having it in the Book of Mormon as a missionary (as it was, I always added the two dots over the E when it was required by hand in my copy as a missionary).  The new translation, though, didn’t always leave me as satisfied.  I found that they strayed from some Biblical phrasings or other more staid expressions in favor of more literal translations (which has been done with other languages, too), likely in an attempt to make the scriptures more accessible to the modern, younger reader.  Finally, there were a few translations, as usual, where having a native English speaker who knows Russian well as a proofreader would’ve helped.  None of those imperfections reduce the truth of the book, of course.  As stated above, it’s never bad to re-read the Book of Mormon.  Even though I know very well how the stories go and what the main lessons are, the book is inspiring almost every time I pick it up.  Like the Bible, the Book of Mormon is full of eternal truths and principles that apply to our lives even though the situations we encounter are continually changing and the world around us is always fluid.  At the end of the book, Moroni’s promise continues to deliver.  Moroni notes that we can know the truth of all things through the Holy Ghost, and I have put that to the test repeatedly, both about the Book of Mormon and about other Church- and doctrine-related questions.  My belief in God, in the scriptures, and in the Church have repeatedly been strengthened, often as a result of my questions, and I can state, just as I did twenty years ago at the end of the quick overview given to so many people on the streets of St. Petersburg, I know the Book of Mormon is the word of God!

   

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Democracy in America

I have always appreciated what America’s Founders did.  George Washington, Samuel Adams, Thomas Jefferson, Thomas Paine, Benjamin Franklin, John Adams, Patrick Henry, Nathan Hale, and others were childhood heroes of mine (and remain so today).  They were people that sacrificed much, in some cases their lives, for liberty.  They did so with a lot of uncertainty swirling around them.  They knew they were fighting for the right thing, freedom, but there were so many questions about whether or not the revolution would be won, then whether or not their new country would survive, and whether or not the untried system of government they set up in the U.S. Constitution would work or not.  Would such a government be able to protect the rights of its citizenry?  In other countries, many were anxiously watching to see how the American experiment would turn out.  Many in Great Britain hoped it would fail.  Others watched with hope or out of curiosity.

Democracy in America by Alexis de Tocqueville (ISBN: 978-0-553-21464-2) are the results of the aristocrat’s observations of the fledgling United States.  He and a companion were assigned by the French government to learn about the prison system in the U.S., which they did, but de Tocqueville came home with extensive notes on all aspects of life in America and wrote about the unique American take on democracy, a subject that was always of interest to de Tocqueville.  The book consists of two volumes and does, in fact, cover just about every aspect of American life.  The author’s discussion includes the following non-exhaustive list of topics: socio-economic upward mobility, sense of community, belief in God, history of the American Indians (especially interesting to members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints since de Tocqueville’s sources point to all the Indian languages coming from one source), the arm of Providence in the American founding, religion as the foundation of morality, the importance of a judiciary that can be recalled (impeached), the inability of a central power (government) to control every aspect of its citizenry’s lives, centralization’s tendency to promote stagnation, government’s purpose being to secure the welfare of the people and not to establish order and regularity, executive authority’s tendency to abuse power, the negatives of re-elecction being a possibility for politicians, the importance of sound men being appointed to the Supreme Court because of the court’s inherent power, the dangers of political parties (de Tocqueville shared this observation with many of America’s Founders), freedom of the press working best when the media is characterized by a wide variety in sources, the role of individualism and how politics work best when one does not look to the government for solutions of one’s problems, government is a necessary evil, laws’ tendency to prevent wealth, the importance of a strong middle class, lawyers’ negative impact on society, how when one loses one’s religion, one tends to try to take it from others, the pursuit of happiness, the importance of common foundations for society and community to exist, and the relative importance of freedom relative to the opinion of others. 

This book is often touted as being must-read stuff for political scientists, historians, and those interested in early American politics or history.  It lived up to its billing and, in my view, more.  This edition that I read is a mass-market paperback, so tiny print and over 1,000 pages.  It never felt like slogging through even with the old-fashioned language and heavy subject matter.  The book was fascinating.  I made a dozen pages of notes with quotations from the book.  As mentioned above, it touched on just about every aspect of American political life and made a few trips off to the side to talk about some of the social aspects of America, too.  What was particularly interesting was the book’s relevance to today.  The Founders live large in American life not only because they founded a country, but because that country remains today, having withstood almost 250 years, which isn’t too bad for an experiment.  It helps that the experiment was divinely inspired, but it’s not too shabby, nonetheless.  The book’s relevance is heightened because of the adroit commentary provided by de Tocqueville.  It’s not just observations, but also analysis.  I noticed that I didn’t always agree with the analysis provided, but I usually did.  De Tocqueville’s analysis more often than not seemed to agree with a more traditional American approach to government: small, local, by and for the people, and based on a belief in God.  Maybe it was easier for him to see since he wasn’t an American and had less of a stake in it, but de Tocqueville noted on a few occasions in the book that he thought much of the American governmental experiment would be wise to apply elsewhere, even in spite of his self-described Leftist beliefs.  We today would be wise to heed such advice.

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Just Mercy

I don’t remember when I first heard about modern executions, but at some point as a kid, probably around ten years old, I remember a prisoner on death row in Utah being executed.  It was all over the news because, as I recall, there were protests against the death penalty.  I remember seeing crowds lined up around the fence of the prison with signs and everything.  The death penalty has been around since the beginning of time, so I have always been interested in the arguments some people make against it.  Easily the most compelling is that of wrongful conviction.  Widely accepted studies claim that between 1 and 5% of all trials result in wrongful conviction, which seems unfair, especially if one of those wrongful convictions leads to the death penalty.

Just Mercy: A Story of Justice and Redemption by Bryan Stevenson (ISBN: 978-0-8129-8496-5) tells the story of the author’s lifelong crusade to provide justice for people whom he believes were treated unfairly by the courts in America.  The reader gets a brief history of Stevenson’s life before founding his non-profit law project, the Equal Justice Initiative (EJI), and then a detailed look at the case of Walter McMillian, a man who was wrongfully accused (let along wrongfully convicted).  Along the way, Stevenson provides a few details of other cases he and his project was working on.  Like the McMillian case, most of the cases involve people who were possibly wrongfully accused or convicted, those who were mentally disabled, and those whose defense had been ineffective (for various reasons, but usually, per Stevenson, because the defendant did not have enough money to pay for effective counsel).  He also spends a solid chapter discussing his efforts to prevent juveniles from being sentenced to life in prison (“death in prison” as he calls it) and from being dealt with by the adult criminal justice system.  The McMillian case also had a racial element to it, which is likely unsurprising since it happened in Alabama in the early 1980s.  After a girl was murdered and the local police couldn’t identify a culprit, they found a convenient suspect in McMillian, a black man who was known in some circles to have had an affair with a white woman.  For most whites in the South in the early 1980s, that was still culturally unacceptable.  Eventually, McMillian was convicted on very shaky testimony and put on death row.  When Stevenson got around to working his case (“got around” since Stevenson took it upon himself to look into just about every death row case), he found many legal holes and worked tirelessly to overturn the conviction.  It took years, but he eventually succeeded, overcoming general police incompetence, racist feelings, and legal precedent, something that is always hard to deal with in the American justice system.  Stevenson notes, in his conclusion to the book, that as he’s worked these cases, he’s learned about justice and mercy.  It’s not just the people in prisons (there rightfully or wrongfully) that are, in some way, “broken,” but that we all are, and that when we recognize that, we are more prepared to show mercy to the broken around us.

The book is informative and really makes the reader think (two important qualities in books).  Crime and the criminal justice system are an interesting topic to learn about, even if one has never really been involved (the closest I’ve ever been is explaining to a judge that the 90 m.p.h. I was accused of driving was patently false, although I would freely admit to driving 75 m.p.h. in a 65-m.p.h. zone; he believed me, thankfully, and the fine I had to pay was quartered).  McMillian’s story is quite gripping, and the book is well worth a read.  Some of the other stories Stevenson brings up are also interesting, but given the lack of detail and attention paid to them, they waver between being a decent supporting cast and being a distraction.  The points made in the supporting stories about the struggles those with mental incapacities have in getting a fair trial are well worth exploring, but need a more extensive treatment.  Arguably the largest point made by the book is that poor people are often hung out to dry when it comes to adequate representation in court.  Stevenson’s book does not make public defenders look good at all.  They are repeatedly shown to be petty and lazy.  My guess is that is an unfair characterization of all of them, although there is no reason to doubt his description in the specific cases he mentions.  Another subject brought up is rehabilitation for those who get out of prison, which seems like a pretty universal thing people should be able to rally around.  In discussing legal questions, it’s always worth hearing the other side, and this book doesn’t do that.  There is no discussion of how, in cases with mentally competent adults, by simply not committing crimes (or, in cases where things aren’t legal crimes, but are against God’s commandments), the majority of these situations could be avoided.  I also found it somewhat disingenuous to have a lawyer talking about applying the law fairly since it is unscrupulous lawyers (Stevenson seems to be an honest one) who use legal tricks and loopholes to keep those who are actually guilty out of prison or free from other consequences.  The justice system, like anything done by the government, is a one-size-fits-all thing, so when too many people are seen getting off the hook, the pendulum swings the other way with minimal sentencing requirements and other harsh penalties.  Finally, racism is also brought up a couple times in the book, and in a few cases mentioned, it seems to have played a negative role, and there is no reason to not believe Stevenson’s account.  I am old enough to remember some people saying interracial relationships were to be avoided (by the time I was a teenager, this sentiment had either died out or was not something people chose to talk about, but in circles I ran in, I believe it to be the former and, certainly, those of my generation did not hold those views), so the McMillian story has a very real air about it.  At the very end of the book, Stevenson strayed into the world of social justice, but it seemed to be a small part of the message, and one I hope stays in the background because it pales in comparison to the message Stevenson, maybe unwittingly, presents, which is that individuals who are free to make their own decisions and who are willing to love their neighbor and sacrifice their time and efforts provide the greatest good.  There was a powerful story in the book where Stevenson helped a black guy who had a troubled childhood and then committed a violent crime.  During prison visits, Stevenson met a prison officer who was quite antagonistic toward Stevenson and, based on some of his tattoos and bumper stickers, harbored at least some racist beliefs.  Stevenson didn’t openly confront this man, and once the warden had to escort the prisoner to trial and heard about his troubled childhood in the foster care system, mellowed greatly, even getting the prisoner a favorite treat, likely against prison rules because the guard found something in common with the prisoner: a troubled childhood in dysfunctional foster homes (dysfunctional homes are a constant in the book, but not an issue that gets discussed).  I thought the story fit Stevenson’s message about all of us being broken in one way or another and our cognizance of that opening us to being more merciful toward others as powerful as anything in the book.  

   

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Next Stop Execution

If one spends very much time doing anything connected to Russia, the topic of spies will undoubtedly come up.  As one who was born before the Cold War had ended and as one who served a church mission in Russia, Russian spies are something I’ve often heard about.  On my mission, I served in the mission office for a while.  Missionaries who were serving in the city of Kaliningrad (I, sadly, have never been able to visit that intriguing place) once sent the office a copy of an editorial cartoon published in a local newspaper that depicted missionaries for our church asking local Russians about missiles.  Thanks to the Cold War, all Americans knew there was a vast intelligence complex in Russia, bent on suppressing dissent in Russia and recruiting spies abroad.  It seems that the American news has often dealt with the topic, too, thanks to traitors like Robert Hannsen and Edward Snowden or people that catch the media’s attention like Anna Chapman.  There have been a few Russians willing to help the West, though, even if we seem to not hear as much about them.

Next Stop Execution by Oleg Gordievsky is the account of one of those Russians.  The book is an autobiography or memoir, and takes the reader through Gordievsky’s life from his early childhood to his post-defection life in England.  He seemed to have a fairly normal childhood, although his father was somewhat enigmatic since his father worked for Stalin’s intelligence organ, the NKVD.  Gordievsky did well in school and happily joined up when the intelligence services came calling.  He enjoyed being pushed by his training and quickly assimilated to the system, including bureaucratic idiosyncrasies.  He had a talent for languages, and ended up being posted abroad, where he enjoyed life and started to get a taste for Western democracy.  Gordievsky chronicles his home life, including an unsatisfying first marriage and then a second marriage.  He explains how he had suspicions about inefficiencies in the Soviet system and outright lies about Communist doctrine early in his training since he had access to Western publications.  Those doubts didn’t lead to much until he saw the Berlin Wall go up and Czechoslovakia invaded.  After that, he decided to take action and responded positively to overtures from the British and Danish intelligence services.  Eventually, he would go on to spy for quite a while for the UK, before being outed.  He says he figured out on his own that something was about to go down since he was unexpectedly called back to Moscow from London, where he had been posted.  Gordievsky made the decision to get out of Russia then and there.  He left his wife and kids, surviving extended family, and homeland with the help of the UK via a harrowing ride to Finland.  That story includes all the stuff of movies, including being smuggled across borders in the trunk of a car.  Gordievsky’s life in the UK, he says, has been interesting, presenting information to many Western governments, but not without some sadness since his longtime separation from his second wife resulted in them splitting up.

The book was interesting and a good read.  I enjoyed reading about his childhood and schooling and probably could’ve handled more information about everyday life in the post-WWII Soviet Union.  Having lived in Russia as a missionary and having experienced everyday Russia, information expanding my views on that is always nice to have.  I enjoyed reading about some of his disdain for the processes his agencies made their employees go through.  As an American, I often participate in the time-honored tradition of complaining about bureaucracy, and it was good to see that Russians do the same.  The middle part of the book, about his work and home life, was maybe a little less interesting, and I thought a little on the egotistical side.  His philosophical evolution was interesting to read about, especially from the standpoint of current international relations.  He was intrigued by the West because of democracy and economic opportunity.  It is worth asking is we are doing all we can today to preserve those two ideals.  The final section of Gordievsky’s book, about being hunted by his own employer and his escape to freedom, was riveting, although, as mentioned above, a bit sad because of the need to leave his family behind.  That, too, though, is a lesson, not unique to this book, about the value of liberty and the need to sacrifice in order to have liberty.

This work, including all text, photographs, and other original work, is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial No Derivatives 3.0 License and is copyrighted © MMXIV John Pruess.