No Man Knows My History

1945 book by Fawn M. Brodie

No Man Knows My History: The Life of Joseph Smith is a 1945 book by Fawn M. Brodie that was one of the first significant non hagiographic biographies of Joseph Smith, the progenitor of the Latter Day Saint movement. No Man Knows My History was influential in the development of Mormon history as a scholarly field. However, scholars have since criticized the book for its methodological deficiencies, factual errors, and overt hostility to Smith. No Man Knows My History has never been out of print, and 60 years after its first publication, its publisher, Alfred A. Knopf, continues to sell about a thousand copies annually. For a revised edition released in 1971, Brodie added a supplement incorporating psychohistorical commentary. In 1995, Utah State University (USU) marked the 50th anniversary of the book's first publication by hosting a symposium to re examine the book, its author, and her methods, and in 1996 USU published the symposium papers as a book of essays.

Reared in Utah in a respected, if impoverished, family of Latter day Saints, Brodie drifted away from religion during her graduate studies in literature at the University of Chicago. Having found temporary employment at the Harper Library, Brodie began researching the origins of Mormonism as a biographical study of Joseph Smith. The writing of the biography was slowed by the birth of her first child and by three rapid moves to follow her husband's career, but in 1943, Brodie entered a 300 page draft of her book in a contest for the Alfred A. Knopf literary fellowship; and in May, the publisher judged her application to be the best of the 44 entries. Other scholars of Mormonism enlarged and critiqued Brodie's research, most notably Dale Morgan, who became a lifelong friend, mentor, and sounding board. Brodie finally completed her biography of Smith in 1944, and Knopf published it in 1945, when Brodie was 30 years old.

In No Man Knows My History, Brodie presented the young Smith as a good natured, lazy, extroverted, and unsuccessful treasure seeker, who, in an attempt to improve his family's fortunes, first developed the notion of golden plates and then the concept of a religious novel, the Book of Mormon. This book, she asserts, was based in part on an earlier work, View of the Hebrews, by a contemporary clergyman, Ethan Smith (no relation). While previous "naturalistic approaches to Joseph's visions had explained them through psychological analysis", regarding Smith as honest but deluded, Brodie instead interpreted him as having been deliberately deceptive. In No Man Knows My History, Brodie depicts Smith as having been a deliberate impostor, who at some point, in nearly untraceable steps, became convinced that he was indeed a prophet—though without ever escaping "the memory of the conscious artifice" that created the Book of Mormon. Jan Shipps, a preeminent non LDS scholar of Mormonism who rejects this theory, nevertheless called No Man Knows My History a "beautifully written biography the work of a mature scholar [that] represented the first genuine effort to come to grips with the contradictory evidence about Smith's early life." Although Brodie's analysis of Smith has sometimes been termed psychobiography or psychohistory, she did not gain a reputation as a psychohistorian until later in life, and she denied the presence of psychohistory in No Man Knows My History "except by inadvertence." In 1971, Brodie added a supplement to the book that engaged more directly—though still somewhat sparingly—in psychoanalysis, revising her earlier portrayal of Smith from a deliberate charlatan to a conflicted person torn by unconscious internal dissonance in a "personality disorder" that nevertheless defied clinical models. For decades afterward, No Man Knows My History enjoyed broad acceptance. In 1971, Latter day Saint historian Marvin S. Hill observed that at the time, "most professional American historians" regarded the book "as the standard work on the life of Joseph Smith." By 1995, although four other book length studies of Joseph Smith had been produced, none achieved as much prominence as No Man Knows My History. In 1995, Utah State University sponsored a symposium to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the publication of No Man Knows My History during which scholars reflected on the book's contributions to Mormon studies. In his 2005 biography of Smith titled Joseph Smith: Rough Stone Rolling, Richard Bushman noted that at that time Brodie's "biography was acknowledged by non Mormon scholars as the premier study of Joseph Smith," and he called Brodie "the most eminent of Joseph Smith's unbelieving biographers." In 2007, Bushman observed Knopf still sold about a thousand copies of No Man Knows My History annually and noted Brodie had "shaped the view of the Prophet for half a century. Nothing we have written has challenged her domination. I had hoped my book would displace hers, but at best it will only be a contender in the ring, whereas before she reigned unchallenged." However, historian Laurie Maffly Kipp, who is not Mormon, believed the influence of No Man Knows My History was waning, as while it had been "the 'go to' book on Smith's life" for "most historians", Rough Stone Rolling displaced it as a "definitive account" of Smith.

Upon its 1945 release, one of the book's earliest critics was Vardis Fisher, a prolific novelist and former Latter day Saint. Fisher also criticized Brodie's willingness to "give the content of a mind or to explain motives which at best can only be surmised," making No Man Knows My History "almost more a novel than a biography." However, attributing conversions to hypnosis and charisma neglects the broader religious context of nineteenth century America and fails to account for Mormons who converted or stayed committed in Smith's absence. Although Brodie's literary style invited readers to identify with people portrayed in the book, critics said it relied on guesswork and sometimes outright invention of what someone may have been thinking or feeling. In No Man Knows My History, Brodie hypothesized that Smith had fathered five children through polygamous relationships: Oliver Buell, Orson Washington Hyde, Frank Henry Hyde, John Reed Hancock, and Moroni Pratt. In the 2000s, the Sorenson Molecular Genealogy Foundation, using Y DNA testing, excluded Smith as the father of Buell, Hancock, and Pratt. Frank Henry Hyde's recorded date of birth precludes Smith's paternity, and whether or not Smith fathered Orson Washington Hyde has neither been proved nor disproved. At a 1995 USU symposium, scholars praised Brodie's accomplishments but generally agreed that No Man Knows My History made questionable interpretations, misused evidence, and had factual errors.

The significance and ground breaking nature of Brodie's work is generally acknowledged within Mormon studies, and No Man Knows My History influenced the field in several lasting ways. Brodie also rejected earlier academic hypotheses that Smith was epileptic or paranoid and instead depicted Smith as rational and thoughtful. The interpretation of Smith as possessing all his faculties spread and persisted in scholarly studies of Mormonism. In 1998, non Mormon Dan Vogel agreed with Brodie that Smith deceived others but posited him as a "pious deceiver" who lied in order to impel people toward repentance and faith in God. In his 2005 book Rough Stone Rolling, historian Richard Bushman, a Mormon, sought to challenge the popularity of No Man Knows My History by studying Smith's cultural context and sympathetically understanding him as an accomplished but contradictory person. In 2014, religious studies scholar Ann Taves, who is not Mormon, proposed a naturalistic model of Smith that nevertheless rejected the idea of fraudulence, instead interpreting Smith as a "skilled perceiver" who, with the assistance of other believers, manifested a new religious reality they mutually and sincerely believed in. In 2020, William L. Davis similarly posed a naturalistic model while still interpreting Smith as sincerely religious without deception. asserting that Brodie had cited sources supportive only of her conclusions while conveniently ignoring others. Brodie considered Nibley's pamphlet to be "a well written, clever piece of Mormon propaganda" but dismissed it as "a flippant and shallow piece." The church formally excommunicated Brodie in June 1946 for apostasy, citing her publication of views "contrary to the beliefs, doctrines, and teachings of the Church."

Shortly after the release of No Man Knows My History, leaders of the Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints (RLDS; now called Community of Christ) warned Brodie they would sue her, though the Standard Examiner describes these as having been "empty threats." Israel A. Smith, president of the RLDS Church at the time, claimed that Brodie's authorship of No Man Knows as a "renegade Mormon, born into a Mormon family" was evidence the LDS Church was "an evil bird that fouls its own nest." In 1966, RLDS scholar and member Robert B. Flanders disapproved of the book's uncritical use of 19th century anti Mormon literature and criticized Brodie's "zeal to create the grand and ultimate expose of Mormonism." Nevertheless, Flanders also recognized Brodie's "painstaking" research and considered the book "transitional" in the field shift from "old" to "new" Mormon history because it possessed elements of both.