Providence and the Scandal of Missionary Failure

Abstract

This chapter details how the Whitman story evolved out of the history of the establishment and subsequent collapse of Marcus Whitman's mission among the Cayuse people. It situates the Whitman Mission within antebellum Protestant understandings of missionary labor as ordained by God and destined for success. It also illustrates the providential framework, wherein the failure of a mission to win converts or implement any material change in the lives of missionized peoples would be viewed as incompatible with the divine destiny of mission work. The chapter recounts how Whitman came to the conclusion that the Cayuse people were providentially doomed to extinction and that his true purpose was to facilitate the Christianization of Oregon Territory. It discusses Whitman's renarration of his own missionary purpose so that it could be seen as a success.