This week, Elizabeth Smart, who in 2002 was kidnapped from her family home at the age of fourteen and held captive as a “plural wife” for nine months by self-styled Mormon prophet Brian David Mitchell and his wife Wanda Barzee, returned from serving a voluntary Mormon proselytizing mission in Paris, France, to testify against her captors in federal court.
Smart’s testimony reads like the transcript of a journey into the underworld: make that a Mormon-style underworld, saturated by a mind-bending mash-up of scripture, obscure prophecies, profaned temple ceremonies, and abusive plural marriage, as well as forays into the strange urban subculture where Salt Lake City’s ravers, absinthe-drinkers, street people, and mental illness sufferers mix.
What’s so important about her testimony is this: until the 1970s or 1980s, it was not uncommon to hear LDS leaders advise women that their “virtue” or virginity was more important than their life. Our culture is slow to change, and it’s possible to encounter the remnants of that attitude still. But Smart’s unflinching forward march to well-being, including her mission in Paris—where I wish her many, many delicious pastries and very little door-to-door tracting—sets a powerful example that LDS women who survive sexual violence have no reason to be ashamed of themselves.
At one point in the trial, Smart testified that Mitchell had forced her to relinquish her name and instead named her Shear-Jashub, from the book of Isaiah. She was able, for a time, to choose her own middle name, provided it was Biblical.
“I chose Esther,” Smart said.
The Book of Mormon provides LDS women very few examples of heroic women. But in the Old Testament, we find Esther, who stood unashamed and undeterred by penalty of death to reveal her Judaism to the Persian court.
Elizabeth Smart didn’t choose the circumstances under which she is revealing such painful, horrific experiences to the world, but she’s doing it, and setting a brave example. The story of Esther sure fits Elizabeth Smart. And so does the story of Persephone.
