Image and Word in Mormonism's Foundational Media Events

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<h1 style="color:white; text-align:center">Image and Word in Mormonism's Foundational Media Events</h1>
<h3 style="color:white">Spencer P. Greenhalgh, PhD<br>     School of Information Science, University of Kentucky
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<p style="color:white"> slides: <a href='https://spencergreenhalgh.com/_ijes_2026' style='color: rgb(249, 38, 114)'>https://spencergreenhalgh.com/_IJES_2026.html</a></p>

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# Introduction

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# "Mormonism is a media religion: every contribution to this forum makes this point in some way. Of course, the same could be said of most religions, and yet **the Mormon tradition in particular incorporates media**. How so?"

Peters, B., & Peters, J. D. (2018). Introduction: Small means, great things. *Mormon Studies Review*, *5*, 17-25. (p. 17)

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Peters and Peters (2018) concede that most (or all) religions are dependent on media but affirm that "the Mormon tradition in particular incorporates media" (p. 17). The mediated nature of Mormonism invites conversation with Jacques Ellul in two ways. First, to the extent that Mormonism is unusually mediated, Ellul may prove useful for organizing thinking about Mormonism and media.

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# "When I started this project several years ago, I began with the question, **what can Mormonism teach us about the evolving relationship between technology and religion**? It was, and remains, a theoretical question about the cultural history of technology in America using a religious institution as a case study."

Feller, G. (2023). *Eternity in the ether: A Mormon media history*. University of Illinois Press. (p. vii)

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Second, Feller (2023) suggests that Mormonism is a helpful example for exploring "the evolving relationship between technology and religion" (p. vii)—and, thus, offering new readings of Ellul.
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<a title="Diliff, CC BY-SA 3.0 <http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/>, via Wikimedia Commons" href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Salt_Lake_Temple,_Utah_-_Sept_2004.jpg"><img height = 550, alt="Salt Lake Temple" src="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/97/Salt_Lake_Temple%2C_Utah_-_Sept_2004.jpg"></a>

<p style = "font-size:smaller"><a href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Salt_Lake_Temple,_Utah_-_Sept_2004.jpg">The Salt Lake Temple of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in Salt Lake City, Utah</a> by <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Diliff">Diliff</a> is licensed under <a href="https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/deed.en">CC BY-SA 3.0</a></p>

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Before exploring these ideas, I wish to clarify two points. First, Mormonism is a diverse collection of religious traditions, most of which prefer not to be described as "Mormon" (see Shields, 2019), but I use this term today to refer to the best-known of these traditions, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, headquartered in Utah, USA.

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# "In this book I regularly use the terms 'Mormon' and “Mormonism,” which the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints has sought to retire since 2019. The term is more accurate for this project not only because the period covered here is before 2019 but also **because I am not seeking to represent the church but rather a more capacious theological tradition**."

Petrey, T. G. (2024). *Queering kinship in the Mormon cosmos*. The University of North Carolina Press.  (p. xi)

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I follow Petrey (2024) in using the term "Mormon" when referring to "a more capacious... tradition" (p. xi) than the Latter-day Saint institution that rejects the term.

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<p style = "font-size:smaller"><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:IndependenceTemple.jpg">The Community of Christ Indpendence Temple in Independence, Missouri</a> by <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Jonathunder">Jonathunder</a> is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License</p>
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Second, while Ellul considered the theological and sociological aspects of his work to be inseparable (see Rognon, 2024), this paper is focused on sociological observation. I do have personal connections to two different Mormon traditions and confess a personal interest in Ellul and Mormon theology. However, I am here as a technology researcher employed by a public US university and will limit my comments to that capacity.
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# Mormonism's Foundational Media

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The many Mormon traditions all share a common origin: Joseph Smith Jr.'s 1830 organization of a church in New York, USA.

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Yet, Latter-day Saint authorities and missionaries typically trace their tradition's beginnings to "The First Vision," a theophany that Smith reported experiencing as a teenager during the 1820s.

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However, this experience was not frequently discussed in the early years of Mormonism (e.g., Allen, 1966; Harper, 2020), and early members of Smith's church were more attracted by the Book of Mormon, a new volume of scripture that he claimed to have translated from records kept by ancient proto-Christians living on the American continent.

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???

Both events invite Ellulian analysis. In particular, Ellul's Humiliation of the Word provides a useful framework for explaining how these events are understood in Mormonism and how Mormonism engages with media more broadly. Both the First Vision and the translation of the Book of Mormon can be (and have been) understood as either word or image as Ellul describes them. Of course, these various understandings sometimes blur the distinction that Ellul himself acknowledges is an oversimplification and perhaps more of an imprecise spectrum.

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Importantly, Ellul does not merely distinguish word from image; this comparison is an extension of a deeper distinction between truth and fact (or truth and reality) that serves as a recurring theme in his writing. As I will show, this second distinction is especially useful when studying Mormonism.

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<h2 style="color:white; text-align:center">The First Vision</h2>

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In the past decade, no fewer than four scholars (two writing as co-authors) have argued that despite the name "First Vision," this founding Mormon theophany can also be understood in terms of orality.

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# "What is most striking, then, is not simply that the first vision is as much audition as vision—that is, that revelation entails sound as well as image—but rather that **from the very first moment, Mormonism has been produced *through* sound** while simultaneously theorizing *about* its relationship to sound."

Harris, S. J., & McMurray, P. (2018). Sounding Mormonism. *Mormon Studies Review*, *5*, 33-45. (p. 34)

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In 2018, Harris and McMurray argued that "from the very first moment, Mormonism has been produced through sound" (p. 34).

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# "Ironically, the storied First Vision depends less on *seeing* than on the practice of *speaking and hearing*."

Johnson, J. (2019). *Mormons, musical theater, and belonging in America*. University of Illinois Press.

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Similarly, Johnson's 2019 book uses the event to develop a theory of the important role voice plays in Mormonism.

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# "Following the Prophet’s martyrdom in 1844, his followers began to call this world- historical moment in a woodlot—the origin, as it were, of modernity—the First Vision.

# "In media terms, a more appropriate descriptor would be the First Audition."

Farmer, J. (2025). *The sound of Mormonism: A media history of Latter-day Saints* (Leonard J. Arrington Mormon History Lecture Series, no. 28). Merill-Cazier Library, Utah State University. (p. 3)

???

Finally, Farmer's 2025 "Media History of Latter-day Saints" begins with a chapter entitled "The First Audition" (p. 3).

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# "Precisely because this God continues to direct and command through his Word alone... **He never does anything but speak**."

Ellul, J. (1985). *The humiliation of the word*. Wipf & Stock. (p. 68)

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None of these conceptions perfectly matches Ellul, but together, they suggest the possibility of understanding this event through the lens of the word. While these arguments are scholarly rather than theological, they do create room for Ellul's (1985) insistence that God "never does anything but speak," (p. 68) and makes few concessions to sight.

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# "The 1838 account tha circulated most widely in print **stressed the urgency that Smith's eyes had not deceived him, almost to the point of obsession**s."

Allred, M. K. (2023). *Seeing things: Technologies of vision and the making of Mormonism*. University of North Carolina Press. (p. 23)

???

In contrast, the official Latter-day Saint account of the First Vision captures Smith's insistence that it was, indeed, a vision. Allred (2023) describes this account as "stress[ing] the urgency that Smith's eyes had not deceived him, almost to the point of obsession" (p. 23).

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# "I had actualy [sic] seen a light... I have actually seen a vision... why does the world think to make me deny what I have actually seen, for I had seen a vision, I knew it, and I knew that God knew it, and I could not deny it...."

[Joseph Smith History, circa June 1839-circa 1841 [Draft 2]](https://www.josephsmithpapers.org/paper-summary/history-circa-june-1839-circa-1841-draft-2/4)

???

Indeed, Smith writes: "I had actualy [sic] seen a light... I have actually seen a vision... why does the world think to make me deny what I have actually seen, for I had seen a vision, I knew it, and I knew that God knew it, and I could not deny it...."

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# "My general thesis is that nowhere do we have **true theophany**, genuinely comparable to the theophanies found in all religions...."

Ellul, J. (1985). *The humiliation of the word*. Wipf & Stock. (p. 72)

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While Ellul (1985) is seemingly skeptical of "true theophany" (p. 72), Smith insisted that he had experienced such a phenomenon.

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However, even Smith's supporters have not always insisted on literal vision. Orson Pratt, a contemporary of Smith elevated by him to a high church position, played a crucial role in making the First Vision central to Mormon thinking (Harper, 2020). Indeed, Pratt appears to be one of the first to use an account of the vision for evangelism purposes.

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# "When it first came upon him, it produced a peculiar sensation throughout his whole system; and, immediately his mind was **caught away, from the natural objects with which he was surrounded; and he was enwrapped in a heavenly vision**, and saw two glorious personages, who exactly resembled each other in their features or likeness."

In Morris, L. E. (2019). *A documentary history of the Book of Mormon*. Oxford University Press. (p. 98)

???

In an 1840 pamphlet published in Great Britain, he described Smith's mind as "caught away, from the natural objects with which he was surrounded; and he was enwrapped in a heavenly vision" (see Morris, 2019 p. 98). This account more closely resembles Ellul's (1985) conception of visions as "deal[ing] with realities utterly different from the ones which make up the world perceived by our senses" (p. 75).

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# "[Visions] refer to images and are *seen*, but they **deal with realities utterly different from the ones which make up the world perceived by our senses**."

Ellul, J. (1985). *The humiliation of the word*. Wipf & Stock. (p. 75)

???

This account more closely resembles Ellul's (1985) conception of visions as "deal[ing] with realities utterly different from the ones which make up the world perceived by our senses" (p. 77).

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???

There is another aspect of the First Vision that further associates it with the word. The official account described by Allred as almost obsessed with the visual is not Smith's only account of his theophany. It was written in 1838, over a decade after the experience reportedly took place. However, between 1832 and 1842, Smith wrote at least four accounts of this experience, and there are differences between these accounts, including whether God alone appeared to Smith or God and Jesus appeared as two separate persons.

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# "The written word is continually repeated and always identical; this is not possible for the true word. **Ask the person speaking with you to repeat the explanation he has just given, and it will be different**."

Ellul, J. (1985). *The humiliation of the word*. Wipf & Stock. (p. 44)

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These differences, while potentially awkward for orthodox Latter-day Saints, are consistent with Ellul's (1985) observations about the word: He argues that if you ask "the person speaking with you to repeat the explanation he has just given... it will be different" (p. 44).

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# "The written word is **continually repeated and always identical**; this is not possible for the true word. Ask the person speaking with you to repeat the explanation he has just given, and it will be different."

Ellul, J. (1985). *The humiliation of the word*. Wipf & Stock. (p. 44)

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And yet, the existence of an official account demonstrates Latter-day Saint authorities' interest in fixing this word in writing so that it takes on aspects of the image, becoming "continually repeated and always identical" (p. 44). Indeed, for about three decades, the early 1832 account of this event was excised from the letterbook it was recorded in (see Larson, 2014), presumably to downplay the existence of a conflicting version.

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<h2 style="color:white; text-align:center">The Translation of the Book of Mormon</h2>

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Joseph Smith claimed to have translated the Book of Mormon from records engraved on metal plates by religious and political figures living in the Americas centuries before.

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Because Smith himself offered little insight (see, e.g., Hardy, 2021; Morris, 2019), the mechanics of this translation have been a subject of considerable conjecture. A 2003 episode of the American animated television show South Park caused controversy in Mormon circles by depicting Smith as looking into "seer stones" in a hat to translate.

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<p style = "font-size:smaller">still from 2005 official Latter-day Saint film <em>Joseph Smith: Prophet of the Restoration</em></p>

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This contrasted with contemporary Latter-day Saint depictions, which showed Smith reading from the plates. Although both depictions emphasize the visual, the South Park depiction was uncomfortable for the way it depicted American 19th century folk magic practices. It was therefore surprising when, in 2013, an official Latter-day Saint essay implicitly accepted the South Park portrayal—or, more accurately, accepted the historical accounts that portrayal had been based on.

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# "In a larger picture, however, **the essay is** significant not because it is progressive but because it is **markedly conservative even by LDS standards**."

Duffy, J.-C. (2020). The "Book of Mormon Translation" essay in historical context. In M. L. Harris & N. G. Bringhurst (Eds.), *The LDS Gospel Topics Series: A Scholarly Engagement* (pp. 97-130). Signature Books. (p. 99)

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However, Duffy (2020) has argued that the promotion of inconvenient historical accounts should not be seen as progressive; rather, "the essay is... markedly conservative even by LDS standards" (p. 99).

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# "it was not inevitable that the Gospel Topics essay would assert the particular scenario it did for *how* the Book of Mormon was translated—namely, that **Smith *read* the English translation from the interpretive instruments**."

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This is where Ellul's framework enters. As Duffy goes on to explain, the essay didn't just accept the seer stone scenario but also argued that "Smith read the English translation from the interpretive instruments." (p. 99, emphasis in original; see also Hardy, 2021). This understanding affirms that Smith saw written words visually appear. If the folk magic connotations of this understanding remain awkward, it remains desirable for the way it appeals to the image as Ellul understands it. How can one contest the text of the Book of Mormon if it was read word-by-word from a divinely prepared seer stone?

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# "Eyewitnesses to the translation described two different stone instruments that Joseph used to translate the Book of Mormon. They testified that as Joseph looked into these objects, the text of the Book of Mormon was revealed to him."

"[Book of Mormon Translation](https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/manual/gospel-topics/book-of-mormon-translation?lang=eng)," The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints

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However, this is not the only way of understanding the Book of Mormon translation. Even a 2025 Latter-day Saint essay appears to back off from strong claims; while it also emphasizes the visual, it does not claim that the text appeared in the seer stone (Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, n.d.). This is more of a backing away from the image than a full embrace of the word, but Duffy (2008, 2020) has described how even some Mormon apologists have conceded that Smith must have played a *word*-like role in developing the text, subjectively interpreting spiritual impressions.

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# "In 1829 Joseph Smith Jr., the future prophet and founder of the Latter Day Saint movement, produced the Book of Mormon in **an extended oral performance**."

Davis, W. L. (2020). *Visions in a seer stone: Joseph Smith and the making of the Book of Mormon*. University of North Carolina Press. (p. 7)

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Scholars not bound by apologetic commitments have gone even further. Davis (2020) draws on 19th century U.S. cultures of orality to argue that Smith's translation was "an extended oral performance" (p. 7),

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# "By the time he actually started dictating the text, Smith would have required only a **small handful of notes** containing brief outlines and narrative cues, which he could keep private among his personal papers."

Davis, W. L. (2020). *Visions in a seer stone: Joseph Smith and the making of the Book of Mormon*. University of North Carolina Press. (p. 190)

???

the foundations of which were prepared over four years and perhaps committed to "a small handful of notes" (p. 190) consulted in between dictations but extemporaneously expanded in the moment.

Davis's invocation of secret notes is necessarily speculation but opens the door to considering how Smith engaged with written texts during the translation process.

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# "The same process applies to **religious writing**. It **is filled with life only when it serves as a support and starting point for a word that is spoken, announced, or proclaimed**."

Ellul, J. (1985). *The humiliation of the word*. Wipf & Stock. (p. 46)

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Ellul sees the written word as somewhere between the true word and the image. In the context of "religious writing," he specifically argues that it "is filled with life only when it serves as a support and starting point for a word that is spoken, announced, or proclaimed." (Ellul, 1985, p. 46). While Smith's goal was to produce written word, Davis's understanding of the translation process as oral performance lets us understand Smith's oral reproduction of written texts in these Ellulian terms.

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cover of Skousen, R. (2019). *The history of the text of the Book of Mormon, part five: The King James quotations in the Book of Mormon*. The Foundation for Ancient Research and Mormon Studies.

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Somewhat infamously, the Book of Mormon quotes the King James Version of the Bible at considerable length (Skousen, 2019). While some apologists have insisted that these near-verbatim quotations were displayed in the seer stone—or otherwise revealed—others have conceded that Smith likely dictated from (and made occasional verbal edits to) text he was reading from an open Bible (Duffy, 2020; see also Skousen's 2019 discussion of evidence for dictation). Townsend (2025) goes even further, arguing that Smith used a Bible commentary as a source for edits.

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<h2 style="color:white; text-align:center">Image, Reality, and Technique in Mormon Thought</h2>

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Thus far, I have demonstrated that the two foundational media events of Mormonism can be understood as closer to either the *word* or the *image*. You may have noticed that it is most often scholars who privilege *word*-based explanations while church authorities and conservative apologists tend to insist on *image*-oriented accounts. Like the underlying *image*/*word* framework, this is a bit of an oversimplification, but the pattern is consistent enough to be useful. What I would like to do next is to tie this conservative preference for the *image* to a preference for *reality* over *truth*, following Ellul's distinction of the two.

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<a title="Jan van Boeckel, ReRun Productions, CC BY-SA 4.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0>, via Wikimedia Commons" href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Jacques_Ellul_(cropped).jpg"><img height="450" alt="Jacques Ellul" src="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/7/79/Jacques_Ellul_%28cropped%29.jpg/960px-Jacques_Ellul_%28cropped%29.jpg"></a>

<p style="font:smaller"><a href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Jacques_Ellul_(cropped).jpg">French sociologist and technology critique Jacques Ellul in his house in Pessac, France</a> by <a href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Janboek">Jan van Boeckel</a> is licensed under <a href="https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/deed.en">CC BY-SA 4.0 International</a></p>

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It is also helpful to consider how Ellulian technique may be relevant when exploring these connections between image and reality. Ellul (1985) explicitly links both concepts to technique and also insists that technique must be evaluated as a whole—that it is less desirable to consider examples individually. While I have discussed Smith's First Vision and his translation of the Book of Mormon as distinct events, it is also useful to consider how the two are intertwined.

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# "**Latter-day Saints used print to store and reproduce the powerful shock of Smith's visions** to help readers experience their own."

Allred, M. K. (2023). *Seeing things: Technologies of vision and the making of Mormonism*. University of North Carolina Press. (p. 25)

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In fact, Allred (2023) has already done so, arguing that "Latter-day Saints used print to store and reproduce the powerful electric shock of Smith's visions" (p. 25). While Allred does not use Ellulian terms, his observation helps us consider how early Mormon media events served as a technicized whole.

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# "Having generated excitement among some of Smith’s most important converts, Page’s revelations **threatened Smith’s self-proclaimed prophetic authority** as head of the newly organized Church of Christ."

Feller, G. (2023). *Eternity in the ether: A Mormon media history*. University of Illinois Press. (p. 18)

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Furthermore, there is a third media event of early Mormonism that explains the appeal of that technicized whole for Smith and his successors. Very early Mormonism encouraged all to seek their own visions. However, Feller (2023) notes that one early follower's use of another seer stone ultimately "threatened Smith’s self-proclaimed prophetic authority " (p. 18).

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# "Education, even in France, is becoming oriented toward the specialized end of producing technicians; and, as a consequence, toward the creation of individuals useful only as members of a technical group, on the basis of the current criteria of utilitary—**individuals who conform to the structure and the needs of the technical group**"

Ellul, J. (1964). *The technological society*. Alfred A. Knopf, Inc. (p. 349)

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It is in response to events like this that Allred (2023) describes Mormons' use of the written word to not only record Smith's visions but also systematize the visionary experience, concentrating visionary authority in the church's leader. In short, Mormons were quickly encouraged to become what Ellul (1964) described in a different context as "individuals who conform to the structure and the needs of the technical group" (p. 349).

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# "The atomic bomb provides quite a striking example of this religious authority that the fact carries. In the face of this discovery, this instrument of death, humankind retained the possibility of not using it, of not accepting this fact. But this question was not even posed. **We found ourselves before a fact; thus we had to accept it**."

Ellul, J. (2016). *Presence in the modern world*. Wipf and Stock Publishers. (p. 23)

???

This emphasis on conformity to the reality of technique is a frequent complaint in Ellul's writing, though outside of Humiliation of the Word, he often describes this reality in terms of facts. In some of his earliest writing, he ironically explains the use of the atomic bomb as finding "ourselves before a fact; thus we had to accept it" (Ellul, 2016, p. 23).

---

# "ceci revient tout le temps ; **l'intervention génétique est un fait — donc...**"

# [this comes up all the time; **genetic engineering is a fact — therefore...**]

Ellul, J. (2014). *Théologie et technique: Pour une éthique de la non-puissance*. Labor et fides.

???

In his notes posthumously published as Théologie et technique, he similarly bemoans an attitude of "l'intervention génétique est un fait — donc... [genetic engineering is a fact — therefore...]" (p. 81).

---

# "Reality deals with **fixed things not open to discussion, things which one can only observe. It forces us to conform**."

In Ellul, J. (1985). *The humiliation of the word*. Wipf & Stock. (p. xvi)

???

While Humiliation of the Word clearly does not avoid the subject of technique, it addresses self-evidence in broader terms with its treatment of truth and reality. Thus, Joyce Main Hanks, who translated the book into English, describes Ellulian reality as dealing "with fixed things not open to discussion, things which one can only observe. It forces us to conform" (Ellul, 1985, p. xvi).

---

Image retrieved from [churchofjesuschrist.org](https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/bc/content/ldsorg/church/news/05/01/580-young-woman-bearing-testimony.jpg?lang=eng).

???

With this foundation in place, I would like to suggest that the typical Mormon deference to *image*-based understanding of the tradition's media events is because despite the Mormon cliché of believers using the stock phrase "I know [our] church is true" during monthly testimony meetings, these believers are actually more invested in *reality*.

---

# "In other words, the canonized First Vision had become, among other things, **a series of foundational LDS scriptural 'prooftexts' to support various formal and informal church doctrines**."

Howlett, D. J. (2020). The cultural work of the "First Vision Accounts" essay. In M. L. Harris & N. G. Bringhurst (Eds.), *The LDS Gospel Topics series: A scholarly engagement* (pp. 131-161). Signature Books.

???

Indeed, the First Vision and the Book of Mormon are often invoked to invite conformity with specific beliefs. The First Vision has become "a series of foundational LDS scriptural 'prooftexts' to support various formal and informal church doctrines," including distinct Latter-day Saint beliefs about an embodied, non-Trinitarian God (Howlett, 2020, p. 139).

---

# "Reading the Book of Mormon with the guidance of the Spirit can help **people find answers or insights to their personal questions—or questions of the soul**. Help people see how the teachings in the Book of Mormon address life’s questions."

Intellectual Reserve, Inc. (2023). *Preach my gospel: A guide to sharing the gospel of Jesus Christ*.

???

Similarly, Latter-day Saint missionaries are encouraged to prioritize the Book of Mormon when: 1) teaching general Christian beliefs, 2) affirming more specific Latter-day Saint teachings, and 3) when helping "people find answers or insights to their personal questions—or questions of the soul" (Intellectual Reserve, 2023, p. 117).

---

# "By gaining a testimony that the Book of Mormon is the word of God, we can know that Joseph Smith was a prophet. Through him, God’s priesthood authority was restored by heavenly messengers. God also authorized Joseph to organize the Church of Jesus Christ. Revelation continues today through living prophets."

Intellectual Reserve, Inc. (2023). *Preach my gospel: A guide to sharing the gospel of Jesus Christ*. (p. 114)

???

Missionaries are also taught to develop a rhetorical chain by which the reality of the volume of scripture becomes a need to accept Joseph Smith as a prophet of God, which becomes an obligation to accept the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints as God's only authorized church on earth.

---

# "Again and again, Hinckley **referred to the First Vision as a foundational part of the LDS mythos that had to have happened as a historical event or else, he suggested, the LDS Church itself was a sham**."

???

It is remarkable the extent to which the Latter-day Saint institution is willing to associate its fate with the reality of its these events. Howlett (2020) notes that Gordon Hinckley, president of that church from 1995 to 2008, repeatedly "referred to the First Vision as a foundational part of the LDS mythos that had to have happened as a historical event or else, he suggested, the LDS Church itself was a sham" (p. 131; see also Harper, 2020).

---

## "Just as the arch crumbles if the keystone is removed, so does all the Church stand or fall with the truthfulness of the Book of Mormon. The enemies of the Church understand this clearly. This is why they go to such great lengths to try to disprove the Book of Mormon, for if it can be discredited, the Prophet Joseph Smith goes with it. So does our claim to priesthood keys, and revelation, and the restored Church."

Intellectual Reserve, Inc. (2014). *Teachings of the Presidents of the Church: Ezra Taft Benson*. (p. 128)

???

One of Hinckley's predecessors, Ezra Taft Benson, similarly tied the validity of the church he led to the reality of its claims about the Book of Mormon (Intellectual Reserve, 2023). Understanding Latter-day Saint believers and leaders as being invested in not only a church but in a technical system to which others must conform helps explain why leaders are willing to marry the reputation of the church to the reality of some of its boldest claims: An Ellulian technical system privileges reality, and if it is to privilege reality, it must be based in the image.

---

background-color: gray

# Ellul and Mormonism

???

In introducing this paper, I suggested that to the extent that Mormonism is indeed uniquely mediated among religions, it invites two connections with Ellul's work, which I will now address.

---

background-color: #272822

<h2 style="color:white; text-align:center">Ellul's Relevance for Mormonism</h2>

???

My analysis suggests the relevance of Ellul's writing for the study of Mormonism, even beyond these two cases.

---

# "**Mormonism is interesting for scholars of media and communication** for several reasons. First, **the timeline of Mormonism’s organizational development parallels, somewhat uncannily, the timeline of electronic media innovation**."

Feller, G. (2023). *Eternity in the ether: A Mormon media history*. University of Illinois Press. (p. 6)

???

Feller (2023) has argued that one of the reasons that "Mormonism is interesting for scholars of media and communication" is that "the timeline of Mormonism's organizational development parallels, somewhat uncannily, the timeline of electronic media innovation" (p. 6). This broader coincidence is paralleled more narrowly in the context of Ellulian technique.

---

# "How, then, are we to explain the sudden blossoming of technique in the nineteenth century?"

Ellul, J. (1964). *The technological society*. Alfred A. Knopf, Inc. (p. 47)

???

In The Technological Society, Ellul (1964) repeatedly emphasizes the nineteenth century as a turning point in the history and significance of technique. If a purported theophany and the dictation of a new volume of scripture are not the most intuitive examples of technique, their origins in the 1820s and the ease with which they can be understood as word or image suggests that Mormonism was born in an Ellulian context and may be productively understood through his ideas.

---

# "It is less about the impact of a certain technology on a religious group, or about how religion influences the development of this or that medium, and more about an exploration of the **coevolution of technology and institutional religion over time**."

Feller, G. (2023). *Eternity in the ether: A Mormon media history*. University of Illinois Press. (p. 3)

???

For one, while many scholars have asked questions about "Mormonism and technology," Ellul's conception of technique invites an alternate understanding of "Mormonism as a technical system." For example, instead of Feller's (2023) exploration of "coevolution of technology and institutional religion over time" (p. 3), an Ellulian lens would question whether those are two separate phenomena that can co-evolve—or whether media techniques and organizational techniques are part of a single Mormon apparatus.

Going even further, Ellul's association of image, reality, and technique suggests that we can also consider the epistemological foundations undergirding Mormon theology—and affirming Latter-day Saint authority—to also be part of this technicized whole.

---

# "Magic developed along with other techniques as an expression of man's will **to obtain certain results of a spiritual order**."

Ellul, J. (1964). *The technological society*. Alfred A. Knopf, Inc. (p. 24)

???

Scholars may also profitably consider how other aspects of the Latter-day Saint institution also fit into a technical apparatus. While Ellul (1964) seems keen to distance religion from technique, he does acknowledge the existence of techniques intended "to obtain certain results of a spiritual order" (p. 24). Latter-day Saint sacraments and rites—held to be necessary to salvation—might profitably be considered through this lens.

---

# "Any open-endedness in religion, no matter what it is, is so dangerous that we feel a need to ritualize. But the **ritualization of discourse** amounts to the closing of any possibilty for the word."

Ellul, J. (1985). *The humiliation of the word*. Wipf & Stock. (p. 265)

???

Indeed, an Ellulian perspective could be helpful for understanding the "ritualization of discourse" (Ellul, 1985, p. 265) whereby Latter-day Saint temple rites once preserved only through the word were systematized into an authoritative image (not to mention the gradual mediation of these rites for the purposes of efficiency; on both, see Buerger, 1987).

---

# "It was formerly believed that **technique and religion were in opposition** and represented two totally different dispensations."

Ellul, J. (1964). *The technological society*. Alfred A. Knopf, Inc. (p. 423)

???

Yet, a holistic view of technique within the Latter-day Saint context is still narrower than what Ellul (1964) argues for. To the extent that Latter-day Saint authorities work the First Vision, the Book of Mormon, sacraments, and ecclesiastical organization into a technical whole, they are also attentive to the traditional belief that "technique and religion [are] in opposition" (p. 423).

Indeed, contemporary church leaders praise modern technologies such as the internet and artificial intelligence while also warning against them.

---

## "New religions that have survived beyond a generation or two have thus typically lost much of their distinctiveness in the process of assimilation. The Mormon religion presents an anomaly to this pattern. Since about midcentury, a partial reversal of the assimilation process can be seen in a deliberate church policy of retrenchment."

Mauss, A. L. (1994). *The angel and the beehive: The Mormon struggle with assimilation*. University of Illinois Press. (p. 16)

???

In a classic sociological study of Mormonism, Armand Mauss (1994) described Mormonism's wavering between assimilation into and retrenchment from broader American culture. Ellul's insistence on the totality of technique allows for a variation on this observation. Latter-day Saint leaders embrace modern technique to the extent that it is seen as supporting an internal totality. However, they also resist it to the extent that Mormonism is threatened by a broader technical totality.

---

background-color: #272822

<h2 style="color:white; text-align:center">Mormonism's Expansion of Ellul</h2>

???

Studying Mormonism may also challenge Ellulian ideas in productive ways. For example, Ellul associates the image with reality and the word with truth, establishing a strong association between medium and epistemology. While I do not mean to overstate this association, my present analysis suggests that image and word may be thought of as malleable perspectives of individuals rather than fixed attributes of media. Both events that I have considered incorporate both visual and oral elements, challenging the simplification that Ellul admits to.

---

# "In this sense, the image is **deceptive**: **it passes itself off as reality when it is artifice**; it pretends to be unilateral truth when it is a reflection of something that cannot be truth."

Ellul, J. (1985). *The humiliation of the word*. Wipf & Stock. (p. 265)

???

More importantly, I have explored the possibility that individual Mormons' perception of these events is driven by underlying commitments to reality or truth than by any media feature. Ellul (1985) describes the image as "deceptive" because "it passes itself off as reality when it is artifice" (p. 32);

---

# "The Word contains **fuzziness**, a halo that is richer and less precise than information."

Ellul, J. (1985). *The humiliation of the word*. Wipf & Stock. (p. 17)

???

can the problematic features of a technical medium be minimized if it is acknowledged to have the "fuzziness" (p. 17) of the word?

Indeed, understanding image and word as different epistemological approaches may be helpful for understanding the current landscape of online Mormonism

---

# "Like early radio, the medium of film was viewed as a tool to **extend and amplify existing texts** rather than a means of creative production"

Feller, G. (2023). *Eternity in the ether: A Mormon media history*. University of Illinois Press. (p. 49)

???

Feller (2023) describes how Latter-day Saint authorities used earlier media such as radio and film to "extend and amplify existing texts" (p. 49), reappropriating image-like qualities to bolster (rather than cede) their authority. 
---

# "Similarly, the semblance of privacy and anonymity online **frees members to express unconventional and even heretical ideas** about Mormonism and its proper expression."

Avance, R. (2025). *Mediated Mormons: Shifting religious identities in the digital age*. The University of Utah Press

???

In contrast, Avance (2025) describes how internet technology "frees members to express unconventional and even heretical ideas" (p. 10).

---

# "When it uses a loudspeaker and crusehes others with its powerful equipment, when the television set speaks, **the word is no longer involved, since no dialogue is possible**."

Ellul, J. (1985). *The humiliation of the word*. Wipf & Stock. (p. 23)

???

Ellul would surely not accept social media platforms as embodying the true word. Yet, if "the word is no longer involved" in the realm of television "since no dialogue is possible" (Ellul, 1985, p. 23), the dialogue afforded by social media platforms to individual Mormons suggests some kind of resurgence of the word that challenges the Latter-day Saint institutional image.

---

## "Therefore it is important to realize that stark reality is never conveyed to us in this universe of images. Instead we find a more or less arbitrary construction or reconstruction, with the result that **we must constantly remind ourselves of the ambiutiy behind the apparent objectivity of the image**: it expresses a reality, but of necessity it presents us with an artifice."

Ellul, J. (1985). *The humiliation of the word*. Wipf & Stock. (pp. 31-32)

???

Of course, this is not to naïvely embrace modern technique when it seems to embody the word. Indeed, online Mormonism provides another opportunity to extend Ellul's thinking by offering a variation of his warning about the image. Ellul (1985) insists that "we must constantly remind ourselves of the ambiguity behind the apparent objectivity of the image" (p. 32).

---

# "Borrowing terminology from actor-network theory, a platform is a *mediator* rather than an intermediary: it **shapes the performance of social acts instead of merely facilitating them**."

van Dijck, J. (2013). *The culture of connectivity: A critical history of social media*. Oxford University Press.

???

Conversely, while it is incontestable that modern social media platforms allow for the kind of dialogue that Ellul valorizes—but that the Latter-day Saint technical apparatus has historically limited—van Dijck (2019) argues a platform "shapes the performance of social acts instead of merely facilitating them" (p. 29). If the technical foundations of the image betray its promise of objectivity, the technical foundations of social media likewise betray its promise to capture the true word. Just as Latter-day Saint authorities resist assimilation into a larger technical apparatus, those trying to create space for the word within Mormonism must also beware of the influence of that same apparatus.

---

background-color: gray

# Conclusion

???

If all religions are necessarily mediated in some way, Mormonism has often been described as uniquely so. Indeed, its birth and foundational development in the 19th century corresponds with the era that Ellul associates with the emergence of technique. In this context, it is unsurprising that Ellul's image and word are both salient in the context of Mormonism's foundational media events. Both Joseph Smith's First Vision and his production of the Book of Mormon can be—and have been—understood through both visual and oral lenses; furthermore, observers are divided by this Ellulian ambiguity, with more conservative voices eager to emphasize reality and more liberal voices open to the possibility of truth. This salience highlights the potential of Ellulian thought to describe Mormonism as a technical system while also suggesting new, Mormonism-informed ways of reading Ellul.

---

background-color: #272822

<h1 style="color:white; text-align:center">Thank you! Looking forward to questions.</h1>

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???

Thank you!