The Learning of the Jews and the Language of the Germans: Edward Isaacson in Utah and the Hebrew Book of Mormon

Abstract

The Learning of the Jews and the Language of the Germans:Edward Isaacson in Utah and the Hebrew Book of Mormon1 Michael Casper (bio) In March 1888, a German-speaking man purporting to be a doctor and a rabbi arrived by train in Salt Lake City, which was then still a settlement in Utah Territory. He sent his card to Angus M. Cannon, president of the Salt Lake City Stake—an organization akin to a diocese within the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS)—who "was delighted to join in prayer through Jesus."2 After an overnight, the visitor caught the next train to Provo, where he was met at the station by Joseph Marion Tanner, the principal and German professor of Brigham Young Academy (later University), who had recently returned from a mission to Jerusalem. "A Jewish Ex-Rabbi in Town," announced a notice in Provo's Utah Enquirer. "Yesterday Prof. J.M. Tanner received a telephone message to meet Dr. Isaacson, lately from Germany, at the depot … Elder Tanner had been requested by President Angus M. Cannon to labor with the 'Rabbi' in the principles of the gospel, as he has accepted Jesus of Nazareth, being expelled from the Jewish Synagogue for that reason, and is investigating the 'Mormon' religion."3 Isaacson promptly began a highly public and widely celebrated conversion to Mormonism that would lead to his attainment of a unique position in the LDS Church and to the temporary revision of the Church's missionary policy. He enjoyed the company and endorsement of the highest Church authorities and was honored with speaking engagements at Salt Lake's City Hall, the Brigham Young Academy commencement, and, among past and future Church presidents, at the dedication of the Manti Temple, completed in the town of Manti before the main temple [End Page 1] in Salt Lake City.4 After settling in the mining town of American Fork, he edited the American Fork Independent while authoring a regular column for the Deseret News, the region's main LDS newspaper, on topics as various as "Babylonian Literature" and "The Definition of Science."5 But what was perhaps most remarkable about Isaacson was that he persuaded Church leaders that he would convert the Jews. On the Sunday after his arrival, he told a meeting of German-speaking Mormons, "I am glad to have the opportunity of addressing the brethren and sisters in my native tongue … I am now convinced that the Church of the Latter-day Saints is the true one and teaches the doctrine of salvation. The principal labor resting upon the Latter-day Saints is to prepare for the second coming of Jesus, who will provide for the fulfillment of all predictions concerning every branch of the house of Israel. Joseph Smith commenced this great preparatory work and it is for us to continue it to its final consummation."6 Remembering Isaacson's April baptism by Cannon, during which a choir sang "I Know He May Redeem Him," and the mother of Elder Milando Pratt fell into the baptismal font, Church leader Orson Whitney wrote, "He is to be sent on a mission soon, I understand, and may prove an important step towards the turning of the House of Judah to the Lord Jesus Christ. God knoweth."7 By May, Albert Ricks Smith, a respected missionary, would note in his diary, "We learn that Dr. Isaacson is translating the Book of Mormon [into the] Jewish Hebrew language."8 This article examines the unusual case of Edward Isaacson, whose tenure in Utah has been called "the only event during the first century of Mormonism which can possibly be construed as an indication that [End Page 2] the saints might have been preparing to proselytize Jews."9 Indeed, for Isaacson, the Church appeared to lift the ban on missionizing Jews that had been levied by Church-founder Joseph Smith himself.10 And yet, the significance of Isaacson's role in the late-nineteenth-century LDS Church in Utah has been unexplored.11 Based on a close reading of writings by and about Isaacson, including some previously closed to researchers, and an analysis of his activities in Utah...