Apocalypse Here: Reading the Natural World in Native American Mormon Visions

In the November and December 1874 issues of the Juvenile Instructor, a publication for the youth of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (the LDS, or Mormon, Church), readers found a four-part article interpreting the conversion of the Deep Creek band of Goshute Indians as the fulfillment of prophecy.¹ John Nicholson, the author of the series, wrote that the events he narrated “should be interesting to every Latter-day Saint, as showing plainly that the Lord is working visibly among the remnant of His people, in fulfillment of the predictions concerning them, and in confirmation of His promises to their fathers.”² Nicholson’s article, which recounted a report from Mormon farmer and missionary William Lee, began with a dream and vision experienced by a Goshute man named Torbuka, whom Nicholson characterized as “a leading chief.”³ Torbuka’s experience—as he told it to Lee, Lee reported it to Nicholson, and Nicholson related it to Juvenile Instructor readers—included a strong affirmation of the truth of Mormonism, instructions about how Torbuka and his people should live, and an apocalyptic scene of punishment for the enemies of the Indians and triumph for the Indians themselves.

Six years later in 1881, LDS missionary Christian “Lingo” Christensen used his journal to record the vision of another Native American man. Christensen later transcribed the narrative, titling it “An Indian vision by a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of L.D.S. of the Moenkopi Little Colorado Stake of Zion,” adding at the end that the narrative had been translated “through the Navajo.” Moenkopi is a Hopi town in a region that was occupied by both Hopi and Navajo people. Thus, it is likely that the visionary here was a Hopi man, but Christensen never recorded his name.⁴ The fact that Christensen transcribed this passage of his journal suggests that he shared it with church members and may have sought to publish it formally. Like Torbuka’s vision, the vision that Christensen recorded asserted the truth of Mormonism, instructed the visionary about how to live well, and described in detail an apocalyptic scene of punishment for evildoers and reward for the good. It is likely that Christensen and those with whom he shared this narrative, like William Lee, John Nicholson, and the Juvenile Instructor’s readers, found in these Native American visions a kind of independent confirmation of their faith.

Spiritual visions and dreams like the ones that Christensen and Nicholson reported were foundational to the LDS Church. Indeed, the founding narrative of Mormonism turned on the visions of Joseph Smith, Jr., who reported encounters with God the father, Jesus Christ, an angel named Moroni, and other biblical figures. Smith was not the only one to experience such manifestations. In 1893, well after Smith’s death, historian Truman G. Madsen reports that “[a] pproximately 63,000 participated in the dedicatory sessions of the Salt Lake Temple, and many reported seeing visions and hearing heavenly music.”⁵ Visions and dreams (terms that Latter-day Saints often used interchangeably) were experiences that undergirded and augmented individuals’ faith, but they were also understood as experiences that should be shared with the community. Madsen writes that “the most crucial” supernatural experiences in the early LDS Church, many of which included visionary elements, “were shared, witnessed, and recorded.”⁶ These experiences, told and retold, shaped the beliefs and practices of the LDS Church.

As the official name of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints suggests, Mormons in the nineteenth century incorporated a significant dose of millennialism into their faith. The expectation that Jesus would return soon led many Mormons to be on the lookout for signs of the savior’s coming, and at least some Mormons appear to have interpreted the Ghost Dance movement of the 1870s as just such a sign. James Mooney reported that “Mormon priests accepted” the Ghost Dance “as a prophecy of speedy fulfillment of their own traditions, and Orson Pratt, one of the most prominent leaders, preached a sermon . . . urging the faithful to arrange their...