Under the Banner of Heaven: A Story of Violent Faith by Jon Krakauer

Genre: Non-Fiction: Theological

Book Summary: Strung throughout the account of a senseless 1984 murder of a young woman and her baby girl by her brothers-in-law is the story of the radical Mormon faith that lead the two men to commit their crimes. The author heavily researched this book which details not only the murders, but also the history of Mormonism from its birth during Great Awakening America to the church as it is today, with a focus on the belief systems and practices (including polygamy) of Fundamentalist Latter Day Saints.

Indulgent Book Talk: Krakauer, better known as the author of Into Thin Air and Into the Wild (both of which have been made into movies) is an engaging author who definitely knows how to write what could be dry history in a way that entertains his readers. There’s also a “true crime” element to this book which is both at times disturbing and fascinating. The narrative was structured a bit like a road trip where one has a final destination in mind (namely, what drove the Lafferty brothers to commit such a heinous crime), but is content take a lot of side trips along the way. That’s really what this book felt like. Sometimes it felt a little too long, dragging on with details that for me strayed a little too far from what I saw as the original purpose, but it was still quite informative.

Glorifying Elements: I should state right from the beginning that Krakauer is a professing agnostic (he didn’t use that word, but the description of his religious beliefs was basically that), so don’t read this thinking you are going to get a deep, Biblical analysis of the Mormon religion. However, for the Christian, this is still a very thorough, fairly unsympathetic history of the Mormon religion and how it began and what its followers did. It actually doesn’t go much into the theology of Mormonism except in its discussion of polygamy, but even then there is no contrasting of what Mormons believe and the what the Bible says, no discussion of the different levels of Mormon heaven, and only brief mention of the belief that Mormons will be gods of their own planets one day populated with physical children. There are definitely better discussions for Christians about Mormon theology than this. That being said, this is still a pretty complete, well-researched history that gave me a better understanding of how the Mormon religion came to be and what it is today.

Worldly Elements: My least favorite part of this book, which made me lose respect for Krakauer to some degree, was the way that he kind of panned to this intellectual elitism that likes to look down on religious people as kooky, brainless hillbillies who are a prayer away from going on murderous killing sprees in the name of God. I might be exaggerating a little, but only a little. He focuses on Mormonism of course (and believe me, I’m not in the least bit of agreement with the Mormon belief system), but his thesis is an exploration of religion in general and the kind of actions it can lead to. Forgive me, but I’m just jaded by this sentiment that seems to be an excuse to not look into what religions believe, and taking the rare, if evil actions of a couple people who have used God as an excuse to commit great wrong and generalizing that as a product of religious belief in general is just lazy thinking. I consider myself a fundamentalist Christian. And for that reason, I’m not going to go around killing people. God said not to. I’d rather love people radically. And that’s Biblical Christianity. Please, Mr. Krakauer, do not lump all of us fundamentalists together. We are not all crashing airplanes into buildings or killing people in their homes in the name of God. Some of us get speared in the jungle or hung by the neck for simply loving people and sharing Jesus with them.

This book is not censored at all, and is filled with detailed descriptions, if only courtroom ones, of murders, rapes, polygamous sex, and the swear words quoted by the people he has interviewed are not cut out and are fairly frequent. It’s not gratuitous, it is real to life, but this is an adult-only book.

Also, throughout the reading of this book, I felt spiritually attacked. I had to make an effort to remember that what the Bible says is true, Mormonism is not true, and to be assured that the Living God is awesome and loving and powerful  He and will have the final say in history. It was a relief to finish the book because I often just felt contaminated reading it.

General Recommendation: After finishing this book, it went immediately into my Bookman’s bag. Make of that what you will. For the Christian, I’m pretty sure there are better, more helpful books out there for witnessing to Mormons and understanding the faults of their religion from a Biblical perspective, rather than a cynical agnostic one. This booked lacked the hope of Christ. As does the author. Pray for him, and all of those caught up in the false LDS faith.