polygamy?
kcosby
God, and the ones I have personally spoken with, believe that it will once
again be instituted by the church at some later date? From my studies of the
BOM, I find that polygamy is a practice that is condemned. If this is so,
how can it now or have ever been a justifiable practice by the church? The
following excerpts are taken from LDS "scripture". Any explanations for
these would truly be appreciated as I am only able to conclude from this
that polygamy is something that the church leaders instituted for their own
benefit.
Doctrine and Covenants 132:4 states: "For behold, I reveal unto you a new
and everlasting covenant (polygamy); and if ye abide not that covenant then
ye are damned; for no one can reject this covenant and be permitted to enter
into my glory." If polygamy is an "everlasting covenant" as stated in
Doctrines and Covenants 132, why is it not practiced at this time and does
it still mean that Mormons are damned since they are currently rejecting it?
BoM:
Jacob 1:15 (pg 119) "And now it came to pass that the people of Nephi, under
the reign of the second king, began to grow hard in their hearts, and
indulge themselves somewhat in wicked practices, such as like unto David of
old desiring many wives and concubines, and also Solomon, his son."
Jacob 2:23-24 (pg 121) "But the word of God burdens me because of your
grosser crimes. For behold, thus saith the Lord: This people begin to wax in
iniquity; they understand not the scriptures, for they seek to excuse
themselves in committing whoredoms, because of the things which were written
concerning David, and Solomon his son. Behold, David and Solomon truly had
many wives and concubines, which thing was an abomination before me, saith
the Lord."
Jacob 2:26-27 (pg 121) "Wherefore, I the Lord God will not suffer that this
people shall do like unto them of old. Wherefore my brethren, hear me, and
hearken to the word of the Lord: For there shall not any man among you have
save it be one wife, and concubines he shall have none."
Jacob 3:5-6 (pg 122) "Behold, the Lamanites your brethren, whom ye hate
because of their filthiness and the cursing which hath come upon their
skins, are more righteous than you; for they have not forgotten the
commandment of the Lord, which was given unto our father--that they should
have save it were one wife, and concubines they should have none and there
should be no whoredoms committed among them. And now, this commandment they
observe to keep; wherefore, because of this observance, in keeping this
commandment, the Lord God will not destroy them, but will be merciful unto
them; and one day they shall become a blessed people."
Mosiah 11:2 (pg 167) "For behold, he did not keep the commandments of God,
but he did walk after the desires of his own heart. And ha had many wives
and concubines. And he did cause his people to commit sin, and do that which
was abominable in the sight of the Lord. Yea, and they did commit whoredoms
and all manner of wickedness."
Ether 10:5 (pg 505) "And it came to pass that Riplakish did not do that
which was right in the sight of the Lord, for he did have many wives and
concubines, and did lay that upon men's shoulders which was grevious to be
borne....."
Doctrine and Covenants 101:4 (1835 edition) "Inasmuch as this Church of
Christ has been reproached with the crime of fornication and polygamy; we
declare that we believe that one man should have one wife; and one woman but
one husband; except that in the event of death when either is at liberty to
marry again." (Note: this is not found in the current editions of Doctrine
and Covenants. Reasonably ask yourself why.)
D&C 42:22 (Current edition) "Thou shall love thy wife with all thy heart,
and shall cleave unto her, and none else."
Guy R. Briggs
>
> How is it that Mormons once believed polygamy to be something
> instituted by God, and the ones I have personally spoken with,
> believe that it will once again be instituted by the church at
> some later date?
>
>
> From my studies of the BOM, I find that polygamy is a practice
> that is condemned.
>
Go back and try it again. Below you quote Jacob 2, but you snipped
it at verse 27. The answer to your question is in verse 30. It says,
basically, that when the Lord has some special purpose in mind (such as
raising up a righteous generation) he will command polygamy and His
people are expected to obey. At all other times, it's an abomination.
>
> If this is so, how can it now or have ever been a justifiable
> practice by the church?
>
Answer: it is not so. It was justified because the Lord commanded
it. It was also stopped at the Lord's command.
>
> The following excerpts are taken from LDS "scripture". Any
> explanations for these would truly be appreciated as I am only
> able to conclude from this that polygamy is something that the
> church leaders instituted for their own benefit.
<snip quotes, down to>
> Doctrine and Covenants 101:4 (1835 edition) "Inasmuch as this
> Church of Christ has been reproached with the crime of
> fornication and polygamy; we declare that we believe that one
> man should have one wife; and one woman but one husband; except
> that in the event of death when either is at liberty to marry
> again." (Note: this is not found in the current editions of
> Doctrine and Covenants. Reasonably ask yourself why.)
>
The answer is simple. It wasn't a revelation. It was written by
Cowdery, not Smith.
>
> D&C 42:22 (Current edition) "Thou shall love thy wife with all
> thy heart, and shall cleave unto her, and none else."
>
And if you think that 101:4 was removed simply because of polygamy,
you must "reasonably ask yourself why" Sec.42 was left in.
bestRegards,
--------------------------------------------------------------------
Guy R. "BrickWall" Briggs www.geocities.com/Athens/Crete/1818
"Some sing out loud on a telephone wire!"
__,---,
.---. /__|o\ ) .-"-. .----.""".
/ 6_6 `-\ / / / 4 4 \ /____/ (0 )\
\_ (__\ ,) (, \_ v _/ `--\_ /
// \\ // \\ // \\ // \\
(( )) {( )} (( )) {{ }}
=======""===""=========""===""======""===""=========""===""=======
kcosby
be stopped?
kcosby <kco...@worldnet.att.net> wrote in message
news:2I9o4.979$LC4....@bgtnsc04-news.ops.worldnet.att.net...
> How is it that Mormons once believed polygamy to be something instituted
by
> God, and the ones I have personally spoken with, believe that it will once
> again be instituted by the church at some later date? From my studies of
the
> BOM, I find that polygamy is a practice that is condemned. If this is so,
> how can it now or have ever been a justifiable practice by the church? The
> following excerpts are taken from LDS "scripture". Any explanations for
> these would truly be appreciated as I am only able to conclude from this
> that polygamy is something that the church leaders instituted for their
own
> benefit.
>
> Doctrine and Covenants 101:4 (1835 edition) "Inasmuch as this Church of
> Christ has been reproached with the crime of fornication and polygamy; we
> declare that we believe that one man should have one wife; and one woman
but
> one husband; except that in the event of death when either is at liberty
to
> marry again." (Note: this is not found in the current editions of Doctrine
> and Covenants. Reasonably ask yourself why.)
>
Raleigh345
>The
>following excerpts are taken from LDS "scripture".
I see you are Mark HInes' new disciple.
Ever hear of a Jew being rude enough to put the New Testament in quotes as
"scripture"?
Alas, what the ancient pagans said about us Christians is true. We are a rude
bunch of materially and intellecutally rubes.
Regards,
Raleigh
* It is no wonder that those who preach this doctrine declare it a mystery. It
is a greater mystery, that men have been found to believe it.
James J. Strang, on the Trinity
father of peace
>where can it be found in documentation that the Lord commanded that polygamy
>be stopped?
There is no such documentation. The Lord never commanded that
polygamy be stopped. The only writings we have from LDS leaders
that claim to be the word of God on the subject of polygamy
indicate that the practice should never be stopped, in spite of
whatever the government might do.
--
Father of Peace Ministry
http://www.absalom.com
R. L. Measures
"kcosby" <kco...@worldnet.att.net> wrote:
> How is it that Mormons once believed polygamy to be something instituted by
> God,
€ The prophet/seer/revelator/adulterer who founded the church had two
pairs of well-endowed receptive, young sisters living in his home at the
time of the ''take ten virgins revelation''. The power of babealicious
teens is indeed A Marvelous Work and a Wonder. .
cheers
--
- Rich... 805.386.3734.
www.vcnet.com/measures, remove plus from adr.
Guy R. Briggs
>
> where can it be found in documentation that the Lord commanded
> that polygamy be stopped?
>
end of your PofGP. Pres. Woodruff specifically states:
"I have had some revelations of late, very important
ones to me, and I will tell you what the Lord has
said to me. ... But I want to say this: I should have
let all the temples go out of our hands; I should
have gone to prison myself, and let every other man
go there, had not the God of heaven commanded me to
do what I did do; and when the hour came that I was
commanded to do that, it was all clear to me. I went
before the Lord, and I wrote what the Lord told me
to write ..."
bestRegards,
--------------------------------------------------------------------
Guy R. "BrickWall" Briggs www.geocities.com/Athens/Crete/1818
"Some sing out loud on a telephone wire!"
__,---,
.---. /__|o\ ) .-"-. .----.""".
/ 6_6 `-\ / / / 4 4 \ /____/ (0 )\
\_ (__\ ,) (, \_ v _/ `--\_ /
// \\ // \\ // \\ // \\
(( )) {( )} (( )) {{ }}
=======""===""=========""===""======""===""=========""===""=======
jgs ||| ||||| ||| |||
| ||| | '|'
|
Annaknight
marrige, or you are trying to deceive others. I choose to believe that you
have been deceived. In any event, you are trying to stir up people against our
faith which says little for you personally. To quote a recent Arizona Republic
newspaper letter to the editor:
" A group of homophobic religious leaders hung up on thir own limited
interpretation results in the hate found in Northern Ireland, Kosovo, etc, etc.
I propose that these peddlers of religious bitterness are as bad for this
country as the skinheads and the neoNazis we rave about."
Now back to your post:
The answer to your question can be found in Jacob 2:27 - 30. Pay particular
attention to verse 30.
HBlack
> kco...@worldnet.att.net (kcosby) wrote:
> >
> > where can it be found in documentation that the Lord commanded
> > that polygamy be stopped?
> >
> Look at the stuff included with Official Declaration 1 at the very
> end of your PofGP. Pres. Woodruff specifically states:
>
> "I have had some revelations of late, very important
> ones to me, and I will tell you what the Lord has
> said to me. ... But I want to say this: I should have
> let all the temples go out of our hands; I should
> have gone to prison myself, and let every other man
> go there, had not the God of heaven commanded me to
> do what I did do; and when the hour came that I was
> commanded to do that, it was all clear to me. I went
> before the Lord, and I wrote what the Lord told me
> to write ..."
This so-called "revelation" was never offered to the
LDS Church, nor adopted by them. It is not "doctrinally
secure," by Guy's own definition.
Prophet Woodruff also claimed that "cancears are
caused in women by suckling Children to long" (Journal
entry, 7 Jun 1862).
In his Vision of 16 Dec 1877, Woodruff claimed that
he would live to see New York completely desolated
(Journal entry, 15 Jun 1878.)
As I see it, Woodruff's track record in producing
accurate revelations from God, was about as good
as his advice regarding the adverse consequences of
breast feeding in mothers.
Harry Black
Guy R. Briggs
> net...@GeoCities.com (Guy R. Briggs) wrote:
>> kco...@worldnet.att.net (kcosby) wrote:
>>>
>>> where can it be found in documentation that the Lord commanded
>>> that polygamy be stopped?
>>
>> Look at the stuff included with Official Declaration 1 at the
>> very end of your PofGP. Pres. Woodruff specifically states:
<snip PofGP quote>
> This so-called "revelation" was never offered to the
> LDS Church, nor adopted by them. It is not "doctrinally
> secure," by Guy's own definition.
>
The whole PofGP has been accepted by the Church as doctrinally
binding, so it does, in fact, support my own definition. But more to
the point, "wrote what the Lord told me to write" refers specifically
to the so-called Manifesto - which /was/ presented to the Saints in
conference and unanimously adopted as official Mormon doctrine, October
16, 1890.
Obiwan_1138
> LDS Church, nor adopted by them. It is not "doctrinally
> secure," by Guy's own definition.
> caused in women by suckling Children to long" (Journal
> entry, 7 Jun 1862).
> In his Vision of 16 Dec 1877, Woodruff claimed that
> he would live to see New York completely desolated
> (Journal entry, 15 Jun 1878.)
> As I see it, Woodruff's track record in producing
> accurate revelations from God, was about as good
> as his advice regarding the adverse consequences of
> breast feeding in mothers.
>
> Harry Black
>
Whoa, I liked those :) Harry, can you tell me what book those journal
entries appear in, I gotta get a copy.
Obiwan_1138
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Frank Carreiro
Frank Carreiro
--
This is Linux Country. On a quiet night, you can hear Windows NT reboot.
Frank Carreiro
>
> "kcosby" <kco...@worldnet.att.net> wrote:
>
> >where can it be found in documentation that the Lord commanded that polygamy
> >be stopped?
>
> polygamy be stopped. The only writings we have from LDS leaders
> that claim to be the word of God on the subject of polygamy
> indicate that the practice should never be stopped, in spite of
> whatever the government might do.
At times the Lord endorses it's practice and at other's it is condemned.
Depends on what the Lord has in mind I guess.
King David had many wives and concubines but there was a time where he
took a wife that was NOT given him of the Lord. That and killing the
husband were the two reasons he lost favor with the Lord.
Frank
>
> --
> Father of Peace Ministry
> http://www.absalom.com
--
KREB
"father of peace" <abs...@pipeline.com> wrote in message
news:38a1857d...@news.pipeline.com...
> "kcosby" <kco...@worldnet.att.net> wrote:
>
> >where can it be found in documentation that the Lord commanded that
polygamy
> >be stopped?
>
> There is no such documentation. The Lord never commanded that
> polygamy be stopped. The only writings we have from LDS leaders
> that claim to be the word of God on the subject of polygamy
> indicate that the practice should never be stopped, in spite of
> whatever the government might do.
Keith said:
The Church at the time Of Joseph and Brigham was strange to say the least.
The polygamous Mormon community was closed and religiously oriented.
It looks to me like some men went into this aspect of their lives looking
for lust, but the women who were strong in stature and being good at getting
their points across shocked many of these men.
I don't find a lot of cases where there were physical or mental abuses. I
think men resigned themselves to being a husband when they looked over the
dinner table and saw all those mouths he had to feed.
The one point that helped this polygamous type of community, was the closed
group scenerio. It kept many of the outside influences to a minimum.
To-day, no chance.
If so many wish to be polygamous then these are only some of the commands.
a)Baptized
b)High Priest (Patriarchial order)
c)Full tithe payer and offerings
d)Never had sex outside of marriage.
e)Told who to marry.
f)Full Church callings on demand.
g)Serve full time missions
h)Give away all.
i)Ask first wifes permission
j)Approximatey 50 years, minimum, before being eligible.
Don't get your hopes too high. Contrary to popular belief women seemed to
have more to say and do than some would think.
The Old Testament plygamists were rich. Ever hear of a poor Old Testament
polygamous Prophet? In many cases he had armies to back him up.
Male polygamist:
Meals ready and on time. No bawling kids. No sickness. Sex on demand. Oh
my, what a shock...
Keith
Nothing can compensate for failure in the home.
HBlack
> > This so-called "revelation" was never offered to the
> > LDS Church, nor adopted by them. It is not "doctrinally
> > secure," by Guy's own definition.
> > Prophet Woodruff also claimed that "cancears are
> > caused in women by suckling Children to long" (Journal
> > entry, 7 Jun 1862).
> > In his Vision of 16 Dec 1877, Woodruff claimed that
> > he would live to see New York completely desolated
> > (Journal entry, 15 Jun 1878.)
> > As I see it, Woodruff's track record in producing
> > accurate revelations from God, was about as good
> > as his advice regarding the adverse consequences of
> > breast feeding in mothers.
> >
> > Harry Black
> >
>
> Whoa, I liked those :) Harry, can you tell me what book those journal
> entries appear in, I gotta get a copy.
For interesting excerpts, including those I cited:
Waiting for World's End: The Diaries of Wilford
Woodruff, Staker, Susan, editor., (SLC, UT 1993:
Signature Books, Inc.) 424pp.
For the whole thing try:
Wilford Woodruff's Journal: 1833-1898 Typescript,
Kenney, Scott G., editor, 9 vols, (Midvale UT 1983:
Signature Books.)
My citations are found in Kenney, at 6:51 ("cancears"),
and 7:419-22, respectively, and in Staker, on p. 271, and
pp 322-325.
Apostle Woodruff's first hand quotations from
President Brigham Young are especially damning.
Here are a couple of really choice ones:
*** Governor Bigot Young to the Territorial Legislature ***
Let's kill half breed children and their parents:
[Staker 1993, p147 (7 Feb 1852)]
"if any man mingles his seed with the seed of Cane
the ownly way he Could get rid of it or have salvation
would be to Come forward & have his head Cut
off & spill his Blood upon the ground.
It would also take [require] the life of his Children."
= Kenney 1983, 4:97.
*** Top Secret ***
No Temples will be built until after the
central one at Jackson County MO, which
was supposed to be in 1869.
[Staker, 1993, p.274 (23 Aug 1862)]
"I do not want to quite finish this Temple for there
will not be any Temple finished untill the One is
finished in Jackson County Missouri pointed out
by Joseph Smith.
Keep this a secret to yourselves lest some may be discouraged.
Some things we should keep to ourselves ...."
= Kenney 1983, 6:71.
Harry Black
HBlack
> harry...@earthlink.net (HBlack) wrote:
> > net...@GeoCities.com (Guy R. Briggs) wrote:
> >> kco...@worldnet.att.net (kcosby) wrote:
> >>>
> >>> where can it be found in documentation that the Lord commanded
> >>> that polygamy be stopped?
> >>
> >> Look at the stuff included with Official Declaration 1 at the
> >> very end of your PofGP. Pres. Woodruff specifically states:
>
> <snip PofGP quote>
No, the quotes are found in the D&C after Official
Declaration One.
> > This so-called "revelation" was never offered to the
> > LDS Church, nor adopted by them. It is not "doctrinally
> > secure," by Guy's own definition.
> >
> The whole PofGP has been accepted by the Church as doctrinally
> binding,
Which is irrelevant to my accurate observation
about Official Declaration One, in the Doctrine and
Covenants.
> so it does, in fact, support my own definition.
No it doesn't.
First, "Official Declaration One" was placed
into the D&C in 1908, and has never been
included in the LDS "Pearl of Great Price."
> But more to
> the point, "wrote what the Lord told me to write" refers specifically
> to the so-called Manifesto - which /was/ presented to the Saints in
> conference and unanimously adopted as official Mormon doctrine, October
> 16, 1890.
The Official Declaration in fact says NOTHING AT ALL
about 'what the Lord told me to write,' but merely gives
some mundane advice to Mormons about obeying the
law of the land:
"I now publicly declare that my advice to the Latter-day
Saints is to refrain from contracting any marriage
forbidden by the law of the land"
Everything else, by Guys standards, is merely
non validated private opinion and commentary,
since it was merely inserted by editors, without
benefit of any LDS mass vote.
Or do you disagree with your fellow
apologists, Mr P and Russell Mac?
Harry Black
Guy R. Briggs
> netz...@GeoCities.com (Guy R. Briggs) wrote:
>> harry...@earthlink.net wrote:
>>> net...@GeoCities.com wrote:
>>>> kco...@worldnet.att.net (kcosby) wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>> where can it be found in documentation that the Lord commanded
>>>>> that polygamy be stopped?
>>>>
>>>> Look at the stuff included with Official Declaration 1 at the
>>>> very end of your PofGP. Pres. Woodruff specifically states:
>>
>> <snip PofGP quote>
>
> No, the quotes are found in the D&C after Official
> Declaration One.
>
>>>
>>> This so-called "revelation" was never offered to the
>>> LDS Church, nor adopted by them. It is not "doctrinally
>>> secure," by Guy's own definition.
>>
>> The whole PofGP has been accepted by the Church as doctrinally
>> binding,
>
> Which is irrelevant to my accurate observation
> about Official Declaration One, in the Doctrine and Covenants.
>
Which error was repeated. Mr response should have read "The whole
D&C has been accepted by the Church as doctrinally binding, so it does,
in fact, support my own definition." That makes a lot more sense.
<snip>
>>
>> But more to the point, "wrote what the Lord told me to write"
>> refers specifically to the so-called Manifesto - which /was/
>> presented to the Saints in conference and unanimously adopted
>> as official Mormon doctrine, October 16, 1890.
>
> The Official Declaration in fact says NOTHING AT ALL
> about 'what the Lord told me to write,' but merely gives
> some mundane advice to Mormons about obeying the
> law of the land:
<snip OD1>
Which is exactly why the supplemental material was included.
>
> Everything else, by Guys standards, is merely
> non validated private opinion and commentary,
> since it was merely inserted by editors, without
> benefit of any LDS mass vote.
> Or do you disagree with your fellow
> apologists, Mr P and Russell Mac?
>
No, I positively agree with them - we're all saying the same thing.
Had snippets from the various Woodriff discourses been left out of the
D&C then they would have been "non-doctrinally secure". But their
inclusion in the D&C makes them doctrinally secure. The point of
doctrine being that the cessation of plural marriage was, in fact, a
revelation from God.
bestRegards,
--------------------------------------------------------------------
Guy R. "BrickWall" Briggs www.geocities.com/Athens/Crete/1818
"Some sing out loud on a telephone wire!"
Ldzion
>From my studies of the
>BOM, I find that polygamy is a practice that is condemned
The fact that all the book of mormon condemnations of many wives is always
connected to concubines as well indicates that these multiple wives were
nothing about a prophet of God sealing wives to a worthy man in the new and
everlasting covenant of marriage. It was men taking many wives and concubines
of themselves.
So we have God's way which is different than man's way of going about what may
appear to be the same thing but is not.
I think also that the concubine thing is how kings accomodate foreign gifts and
the like.
It was diplomacy. Something kings had to deal with but regular guys had no
reason to get into other than sin.
James
Neos Efialtis
>>Everything else, by Guys standards, is merely non validated private
opinion and commentary, since it was merely inserted by editors, without
benefit of any LDS mass vote.
>>Or do you disagree with your fellow apologists, Mr P and Russell Mac?
What do you do, Harry? Forget conversations and go right on arguing the
false ideas you have?
No vote is necessary to make "Official Mormon Doctrine", and I did supply
about 10 quotes to this effect.
And OTOH, nothing an editor has to say, unless that editor is "under the
influence of the Holy Spirit" can be taken as Doctrine.
And also, any new Doctrine has to come from the Prophet of God.
Nothing anyone has to say about this subject, except the Prophet of the
Church, can change these facts.
Now, kindly stop professing your false assertions, and lets get on witht he
discussion.
--
--Efialtis (Your Friendly Neighborhood, "Loose Cannon")
BoM:
Alma Chapter 5, Verses 59 through 60
Also see:
Alma Chapter 5, Verses 56 through 62
HBlack
<snip>
> No vote is necessary to make "Official Mormon Doctrine", and I did supply
> about 10 quotes to this effect.
And I truly thank you once again, Neos, for
discrediting the previous claims of your fellow
Mormon posters to this ng (Mr. P., Russell Mac,
and Guy Briggs)!
Harry Black
<snip>
HBlack
> harry...@earthlink.net (HBlack) wrote:
> > netz...@GeoCities.com (Guy R. Briggs) wrote:
> >> harry...@earthlink.net wrote:
> >>> net...@GeoCities.com wrote:
> >>>> kco...@worldnet.att.net (kcosby) wrote:
<snip>
> Had snippets from the various Woodriff discourses been left out of the
> D&C then they would have been "non-doctrinally secure"
So you believe that the headings and footnotes in the
D&C are all canonized Official Mormon Doctrine, in spite
of the fact that they were inserted by later editors.
The Lectures on Faith, and Article on Marriage were
all the more Official Mormon Doctrine, Guy.
Thus it can be easily shown that Official Mormon
Doctrine, according to your definition, changes and
contradicts itself over time.
Harry Black
<snip>
Neos Efialtis
Doctrine. We have shown over and over and over and over and over...now see
why I call you "The Harry-Go-Round"?
You just don't seem to get the concept.
All Mormon Scripture != Mormon Doctrine
All Mormon Doctrine = Mormon Scripture
Do we have to go over this again, at length, to show this to you?
Again and again and again and again and again?
--
--Efialtis
Guy R. Briggs
> net...@GeoCities.com (Guy R. Briggs) wrote:
>
> <snip>
>
>> Had snippets from the various Woodriff discourses been left
>> out of the D&C then they would have been "non-doctrinally
>> secure"
>
> So you believe that the headings and footnotes in the
> D&C are all canonized Official Mormon Doctrine, in spite
> of the fact that they were inserted by later editors.
>
completely different matter than headings, footnotes and versification.
>
> The Lectures on Faith, and Article on Marriage were
> all the more Official Mormon Doctrine, Guy.
>
They were and are good Mormon doctrine.
>
> Thus it can be easily shown that Official Mormon
> Doctrine, according to your definition, changes and
> contradicts itself over time.
>
Not when properly interpreted.
Mormon doctrine vis-a-vis marriage has not changed since the Book of
Mormon was published. Jacob 2:30 says, basically, we practice polygamy
when the Lord commands, we stop when the Lord commands. At the time
that the AoM was published until 1852 the corporate Church was under a
law of strict monogamy - even though Smith and several of his inner
circle had been given a higher law. From 1852 until 1890, the Church
openly accepted the practice of plural marriage, although it was
/still/ restricted to an estimated 5% of adult males and slightly more
than 10% of adult females.
Old Sec.CI properly documents the /practice/ of the Church 1835
until 1852 and also 1890 until the present. Sec.132 documents it
better, and covers our belief from 1830 until now.
The Lectures on Faith were never considered revelations but rather
missionary lessons. Properly interpreted, they are still describe
Mormon doctrine today. In fact, McConkie (shortly before his death)
wrote of #5:
"It is without question the most excellent summary of
revealed and eternal truth relative to the Godhead
that is now extant in mortal language. In it is set
forth the mystery of Godliness; that it, it sets forth
the personalities, missions, and ministries of those
holy beings who comprise the supreme presidency of the
universe. To spiritually illiterate persons, it may
seem hard and confusing; to those whose souls are
aflame with heavenly light, it is a perfect summary of
those things which must be believed to gain [exaltation]"
-- A New Witness, p.72
And Bro. Black, please note my "properly interpreted" qualifier
above before you try to cram one of your personal renderings of it down
our throats.
bestRegards,
----------------------------------------------------------
Guy R. "BrickWall" Briggs - net...@GeoCities.com
Used cars - Land - Whiskey - Manure - Nails
Fly Swatters - Racing Forms - Bongos
Wars Fought - Tires Balanced - Assassinations Plotted
Revolutions Started - Governments Run - Uprisings Quelled
Tigers Tamed - Bars Emptied - Orgies Planned
I also program computers
Efialtis
fellows", that I have also contradicted you.
Bye, now!
In article <38A3833C...@earthlink.net>,
--
--
--Efialtis
BoM:
Alma Chapter 5, Verses 59 through 60
Also see:
Alma Chapter 5, Verses 56 through 62
Sent via Deja.com http://www.deja.com/
Before you buy.
TheJordan6
kcosby wrote:
>> Doctrine and Covenants 101:4 (1835 edition) "Inasmuch as this
>> Church of Christ has been reproached with the crime of
>> fornication and polygamy; we declare that we believe that one
>> man should have one wife; and one woman but one husband; except
>> that in the event of death when either is at liberty to marry
>> again." (Note: this is not found in the current editions of
>> Doctrine and Covenants. Reasonably ask yourself why.)
To which Guy Briggs answered:
> The answer is simple. It wasn't a revelation. It was written by
>Cowdery, not Smith.
Simply incredible, Guy. It's been only a couple of weeks since I refuted your
above ridiculous contention. I predicted then that someone would repeat the
same untenable apology in a short time, and you have done so. I'll repeat my
refutation of it:
Part one of three
Guy Briggs wrote:
>We are well aware of Section 100 and what it says. That particular Section was
>written by Oliver Cowdery and approved by the membership of the Church while
>Smith was out of town.
Guy, it's downright painful to read the same misinformation from you guys day
after day. But because I know there are people on ARM who are interested in
the truth, I'm going to attempt to set you straight once again.
To begin with, the AoM was in Section 101 of the 1835 D&C, and RE-PUBLISHED as
Section 109 in the *1854* edition, IN UTAH. For those unfamiliar with it, the
crux of the policy states: "Inasmuch as this church of Christ has been
reproached with the crime of fornication, and polygamy: we declare that we
believe, that one man should have but one wife; and one woman, but one husband,
except in the case of death, when either is at liberty to marry again."
The idea that JS was out of town, and that Cowdery somehow slipped the "Article
on Marriage" into the D&C without his approval, is a prevarication designed
purely as an apology for Joseph's adulterous affair with the teenage Fannie
Alger.
Joseph Fielding Smith perpetuated the misinformation: "This article on
marriage was not a revelation and I want you never to forget it....at this
conference held on August 17, 1835, Joseph Smith and Frederick G.
Williams...were not present; they were in Michigan....this article on
marriage...was written by Oliver Cowdery in the absence of the Prophet Joseph
Smith, and the Prophet knew nothing of the action that was taken ordering them
printed with the revelations. These were not revelations, never were so
considered, were ordered printed in the absence of Joseph Smith, and when
Joseph Smith returned from Michigan and learned what was done---I am informed
by my father, who got this information from Orson Pratt---the Prophet was very
much troubled. Orson Pratt and Joseph F. Smith, my father, were missionary
companions; they traveled together, and my father learned a great many things
from Orson Pratt of these early days. When the Prophet came back from
Michigan, he learned of the order made by the conference of the Church and he
let it go through."
(Doctrines of Salvation, vol. 11, pp. 194-95.)
First off---Joseph Fielding Smith claimed to have gotten his information
third-hand. By the time Pratt allegedly told this to JF Smith, the Mormons
were in Utah, and Pratt himself was a practicer and apologist for polygamy. It
served his agenda to "blame" the AoM on the excommunicated Cowdery, because of
its obvious contradiction to the 1843 "revelation on celestial marriage."
Also, you Mormons constantly repeat that the only official LDS doctrine that is
binding on the members is what is found in the "Standard Works." The Article
on Marriage was voted on by "common consent", approved, and published in the
1835 D&C, whether JS was out of town or not. If, as later Mormons claimed,
that JS had had his first "revelation" on PM as early as 1831, then it is
obvious that upon returning from Michigan, and learning of the AoM, he should
have immmediately called a meeting, corrected the mistake, and ordered the AoM
torn out or stricken through in each copy. JS lived another nine years after
the 1835 D&C was published, and I am not aware of a single statement he made
against the AoM, nor of any action he took to correct it. That being true, it
is obvious that JS was perfectly willing to maintain the AoM as a public
policy, while privately teaching and practicing the exact opposite. And, if
you're going to argue that the AoM was not "official doctrine" IN SPITE of it
being canonized, then you cannot also consistently argue that JS' practice of
polygamy was proper or "doctrinally secure"----because when Smith attempted to
have his "revelation on celestial marriage" approved on August 12, 1843, by his
Nauvoo High Council, the attempt failed to carry, which is necessary according
to LDS rules of "common consent." That means that Smith secretly taught and
practiced polygamy without having proper approval----which was no big deal for
him, however, since he had been a polygamist for at least ten years before he
even presented his "revelation" for a vote. The High Council's refusal to
approve the "revelation" obviously slowed him down, however, because he took no
more plural wives for the last eight months of his life, as opposed to having
taken more than 30 before that time.
On top of all of this, the idea that Smith was in the dark about Cowdery's
inclusion of the AoM is ridiculous on its face. Smith claimed to be in regular
communication with God. If that were truly the case---and God had previously
"revealed" the "ancient order of plural marriage" to Smith---then it should
have been a snatch for God to put a bug in Smith's ear, perhaps telling him
something like, "Joseph, my son, Oliver is trying to mess up your love life.
Go therefore, and tell him to ixnay the Article on arriage-May." For Mormons
to believe that Cowdery could slip an incorrect principle into the "standard
works," they must concede that Smith's pipeline to God was operating at
somewhat less than peak efficiency. Objective thinkers will naturally conclude
that in light of the events, Smith possessed no such pipeline.
As I've documented several times previously, the historical context of the
origin of the AoM was JS' "nasty, filthy affair" with Fannie Alger, which began
as early as 1833, when she was sixteen. According to some accounts, Emma
herself caught them together, and JS expressed remorse over it in a meeting
with Emma and Cowdery.
In none of the accounts is the "prophet" quoted as saying, "I have received a
revelation that allows me to have sex with Fannie." No mention of an angel
with flaming sword threatening to kill him. No hint of asking the "first wife"
for permission to couple with Fannie, as D&C 132:61 requires; Emma was
obviously shocked and saddened at the discovery. All of the accounts paint a
simple picture of a married man having in illicit fling with a teenage girl,
being caught, and apparently being remorseful and repentant of it.
Because news of the incident spread quickly----there are numerous
first-and-secondhand accounts of it----Cowdery, and others, undoubtedly
realized that if it became widespread public knowledge that the "prophet" was
boinking a teenager, it could discredit their church, and destroy their infant
commune. That is undoubtedly why the AoM states that the "church has been
reproached with the crime of fornication and polygamy." It was designed as an
official statement to nip the rumors in the bud. And it worked for
awhile---after being caught with Fannie, there is no evidence of any more
extra-marital activity on Smith's part until his affair with Lucinda Morgan
Harris at Far West in 1838. Fannie and family left Kirtland in 1836, she
married a Solomon Custer, and thereafter refused to discuss her relationship
with JS. In fact, the very REASON JS skipped town to Michigan during the
period may well have been so that he could avoid having to deal with the
fallout over being caught.
But the problem with JS, the AoM, and the truth, goes much deeper than all of
this.
Although you attempt to call the AoM "unauthoritative" and "not official
doctrine"----D&C 42, a "revelation received" on February 9, 1831, ALSO condemns
extra-marital relations: "Thou shalt love thy wife with all thy heart, and
shalt cleave unto her AND NONE ELSE.....Thou shalt not commit adultery; and he
that committeth adultery, and repenteth not, shall be cast out." Obviously,
this "revelation" WAS "official doctrine," and regardless that JS later claimed
to have received his first "inspiration" on PM in 1831 or 1832, monogamy and
fidelity was the canonized standard of behavior even without the AoM. If JS
had been dealt with according to the "canonized" D&C 42:26, he should have been
excommunicated over the Fannie affair; but instead, JS excommunicated Cowdery
in part for "accusing the prophet of adultery." That fact indicates that
contrary to what modern Mormons try to assert, JS held a position of
infallibility, and that he could violate a canonized rule of his church, and
not be punished for it. The incident reveals that JS was totalitarian and held
absolute power, accountable to no one for his behavior. It's also possible
that since Smith arrived at Far West on March 14, 1838---and he began a sexual
relationship with Lucinda Harris almost immediately, while living in her
home---Cowdery may have got wind of that relationship, and it may have been the
adultery that he accused Smith of that got him excommunicated on April 6, just
three weeks later.
As I've documented many times, Smith steadfastly publicly denied PM his entire
life. All public statements from him, and other Mormons, were that PM was not
an LDS practice, and that it was strictly forbidden. Smith and his followers
carried on a lifetime campaign of denial and deception concerning the practice.
Randy J.
TheJordan6
John Whitmer was "called of God" to be church historian in 1831 (D&C 47.) In
1837, he wrote:
"In the fall of 1836, Joseph Smith, Jr., S. Rigdon and others of the leaders of
the Church at Kirtland, Ohio, established a bank for the purpose of
speculation, and the whole partook of the same spirit; they were lifted up in
pride, and lusted after the forbidden things of God, such as covetousness, and
in secret combinations, spiritual-wife doctrine, that is plurality of wives,
and Gadianton bands, in which they
were bound with oaths, etc., that brought division and mistrust among those who
were pure in heart, and desired the upbuilding of the Kingdom of God."
Note that Whitmer speaks negatively of the "spiritual-wife doctrine." He was a
church insider, being a "gold plate witness" and the historian, and he would
have known if there had been any talk of a "revelation on plural marriage." To
the contrary, he points to illicit "plurality of wives" as being a cause of the
Kirtland failure.
On May 8, 1838----exactly one month after Smith had excommunicated Cowdery, in
part for his having accused Smith of adultery----and during the time of his
affair with Lucinda Harris----Smith answered a series of questions that had
been asked of him numerous times. One of the questions was:
"Do the Mormons believe in having more wives than one?" And Smith's answer
was, "No, not at the same time. But they believe that if their companion dies,
they have a right to marry again." ("Teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith",
Deseret Book, p. 119.)
Note the similarity of Smith's 1838 remark to the wording of the 1835 AoM,
which you claim that Smith had nothing to do with:: "We declare that we
believe, that one man should have one wife; and one woman, but one husband,
except in the case of death, when either is at liberty to marry again."
Guy, it's obvious that this one statement of Smith's utterly destroys your
deceitful contention that Smith did not approve of the AoM; in 1838, he quoted
it practically verbatim.
I could stop here, but I will continue, and add some more documentation that
demonstrates the depth and breadth of the deception that Smith and his
followers engaged in on the polygamy issue.
On December 16, 1838----just eight months after he had excommunicated
Cowdery----and while he was in Liberty Jail on charges of treason and
murder----Smith wrote a letter to his followers, in which he declared his
innocence of any wrongdoing, or any involvement in the Danites that looted and
burned out Missouri "Gentiles". In the same letter, he also denied any such
practice as a "community of wives," and he blamed rumors of the practice on
"dissenters" and "Satan":
"Was it for COMMITTING ADULTERY that we were assailed? We are aware that that
FALSE SLANDER has gone abroad, for it has been reiterated in our ears. These
are FALSEHOODS also. Renegade 'Mormon' dissenters are running through the
world and spreading various FOUL AND LIBELOUS REPORTS against us...We have
heard it reported by some, that......we not only dedicated our property, but
our families to the Lord; and SATAN, taking advantage of this, has perverted it
into licentiousness, such as a COMMUNITY OF WIVES, which is an ABOMINATION in
the sight of God.....when a man consecrates or dedicates his wife and children,
he does not give them to his brother, or to his neighbor, FOR THERE IS NO SUCH
LAW; for the law of God is, Thou shalt not commit adultery. Thou shalt not
covet thy neighbor's wife. He that looketh upon a woman to lust after her,
hath committed adultery already in his heart.....Now if any person has
represented ANYTHING OTHERWISE THAN WHAT WE NOW WRITE, HE OR SHE IS A LIAR, and
has represented us falsely." ("Teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith," p. 127.)
I don't think that I need to add any further condemnatory comments to what
Smith said here; he has done an excellent job of exposing his deceit and
convicting himself on his own.
After Smith and friends had escaped from Missouri prison, they joined their
followers at Nauvoo. As his church grew, his power naturally increased, and he
gained confidence enough to again begin taking "spiritual wives." With the
help of his new-found assistant president and 'soul mate' John C. Bennett, he
lobbied the state of Illinois to grant Nauvoo a city charter which made the
Mormon colony a virtual city-state, with the right of habeas corpus---meaning
that no outside jurisdiction could enter Nauvoo and extradite any citizen for
any crime. Smith introduced Bennett and a few other trusted men to his
"spiritual wife system," and Bennett was an eager initiate. However, in the
summer of 1842, their friendship ended, when in their eagerness to add women to
their "kingdoms," they both propositioned Sidney Rigdon's 19-year-old daughter
Nancy. When Nancy told her father that Smith had made an advance on her,
Sidney confronted Smith, and Smith first denied it; but when Rigdon came forth
with a "doctrinal letter" that Smith had written to Nancy, explaining his
"spiritual wife" doctrine and why she should accept him as a "husband," Smith
was forced to admit that he had indeed propositioned Nancy, but his deceitful
excuse for doing so was that he was "testing her virtue." Bennett knew very
well that Smith's intention was far more than a "test," and Smith's
deceitfulness and cowardice over the issue destroyed Bennett's confidence in
him. Smith, knowing that the volatile and big-talking Bennett might spill the
beans on the entire "spiritual wife" doctrine, was forced to disavow Bennett
and blame the entire practice on him:
"Dear Sir:---It becomes my duty to lay before you some facts relative to the
conduct of our major-general, John C. Bennett....It is evident that his
character is that of an adulterer of the worst kind....Some time ago it having
been reported to me that some of the most aggravated cases of adultery had been
committed upon some previously respectable females in our city.....More than
twenty months ago Bennett went to a lady in the city and began to teach her
that promiscuous intercourse between the sexes was lawful and no harm in it,
and requested the privilege of gratifying his passions.....Finding this
argument ineffectual, he told her that men in higher standing in the church
than himself not only sanctioned, but practiced the same deeds; and...said that
I both taught and acted in the same manner, but [that I] publicly proclaimed
against it in consequence of the prejudice of the people, and for fear of
trouble in my own house. By this means he accomplished his designs."
(History of the Church, vol. 5, p. 42.)
Note that what Smith described as being wrong, he was himself secretly engaging
in the exact same activity. Bennett retaliated by writing a series of letters
to the "Sangamo Journal," exposing Smith's "spiritual wifery" practice, which
prompted Smith and his other polygamists to issue a series of deceitful
denials, including a denial of the "doctrinal letter" Smith had written to
persuade Nancy into polygamy:
"BENNETT'S LETTERS.---We have read the fifth and sixth letters of Dr.
Bennett...The sixth letter is what purports to be a copy of a letter from
Joseph Smith to Miss Nancy Rigdon, without date, name, or proof.....we hope the
community are not yet quite so far from a common course of justice and
propriety as to take Bennett's word for the truth.....JOSEPH SMITH IS NOT THE
AUTHOR."
(The "Wasp," August 27, 1842.)
Ironically, the "doctrinal letter" that Smith DENIED authoring was later
published in the "History of the Church," and is now used by the LDS Church as
an example of Smith's "inspiration!" An excerpt from the letter can be read in
"Teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith", pp. 255-7.
Orson Hyde, in an 1845 speech, attempted to destroy Nancy's character by
terming her a "public prostitute." Character assassination was the penalty for
women who refused "the prophet's" offer of illicit multiple marriage.
Smith then had twelve of his followers aid him in his deception and
assassination of Bennett by swearing a false affidavit in his church newspaper,
the "Times and Seasons": "We know of NO OTHER RULE OR SYSTEM OF MARRIAGE
OTHER THAN THE ONE PUBLISHED FROM THE BOOK OF DOCTRINE AND COVENANTS, and we
give this certificate to show that Dr. J. C. Bennett's secret wife system is a
creature of his own make as we know of NO SUCH SOCIETY in this place nor never
did."
(Times and Seasons, vol. 111, October 21, 1842.)
Some brainwashed Mormons assert that Smith's "plural marriage" was a
"revelation from God," and therefore right and holy; and that Bennett had an
aberrant system of "spiritual wifery" that was somehow different and not
proper. However, the above quote from Smith's own newspaper makes it obvious
that Smith tried to blame the ENTIRE practice on Bennett, and that his church's
only authorized system of marriage was that as outlined in the "Article of
Marriage," the same article that you assert that Smith did not approve of. So,
Guy, if you keep repeating your assertion that Smith did not approve of the
AoM, you will only succeed in making yourself as offensive a liar as Joseph
Smith was.
Randy J.
TheJordan6
By the time Smith had dumped Bennett in the summer of 1842, Smith had taken the
following "spiritual wives" for himself in Nauvoo:
Louisa Beaman, Zina Huntington Jacobs (current wife of Henry Jacobs), Presendia
Huntington Buell (current wife of Norman Buell), Agnes Coolbrith, Sylvia
Sessions Lyon (current wife of Windsor Lyon), Mary Rollins Lightner (current
wife of Adam Lightner), Patty Bartlett Sessions (current wife of David
Sessions), Marinda Nancy Johnson Hyde (current wife of Orson Hyde), Elizabeth
Davis Durfee (current wife of Jabez Durfee), Sarah Kingsley Cleveland (current
wife of John Cleveland), Delcena Johnson Sherman, and Eliza R. Snow. ("In
Sacred Loneliness: The Plural Wives of Joseph Smith", Todd Compton, 1997, p.
4.)
That's twelve women who have been amply documented as JS' plural wives, during
the period in which Smith placed responsibility for the entire polygamy
practice on Bennett. In a speech before the Ladies' Relief Society, on
February 21, 1843-----wherein many of his "plural wives" were in
attendance-----Smith had the audacity to state the following:
"There is a great noise in the city...and many are saying there cannot be so
much smoke without some fire. Well, be it so. If the stories about Joe Smith
are true, then the stories of John C. Bennett are true about the ladies of
Nauvoo; and he says that the Ladies' Relief Society are all organized of those
who are to be the wives of Joseph Smith. Ladies, you know whether this is true
or not."
Because his "plural wives" in the audience had been sworn to secrecy, Smith
felt confident enough to stand before them and lie unabashedly.
On February 1, 1844 the following was published in the "Times and Seasons":
NOTICE: As we have lately been credibly informed, that an Elder of the Church
of Jesus Christ, of Latter-day Saints, by the name of Hiram Brown, has been
preaching polygamy, and other FALSE AND CORRUPT DOCTRINES, in the county of
Lapeer, state of Michigan."This is to notify him and the Church in general,
that he has been cut off from the church, for his iniquity; and he is further
notified to appear at the special conference, on the 6th of April next, to
answer to these charges.
JOSEPH SMITH,
HYRUM SMITH,
Presidents of said Church."
(Times and Seasons, vol. 5, page 423)
Note that even though Bennett had been out of the picture for more than a year,
Smith was still publicly calling polygamy a "false and corrupt doctrine." This
further puts the lie to the Mormon apologists' claim that there was an
"approved" polygamy system, as opposed to an "unapproved" one of Bennett's
invention. Smith still denied ALL of it.
The following month Hyrum Smith wrote the following for the Times and
Seasons (15th March 1844, vol. 5, p.474):
"...brother Richard Hewitt... states to me that some of your elders say, that a
man having a certain priesthood, may have as many wives as he pleases, and that
doctrine is taught here: I say unto you that that man teaches FALSE DOCTRINES,
FOR THERE IS NO SUCH DOCTRINE TAUGHT; neither is there ANY SUCH THING practised
here. And any man that is found teaching privately or publicly any such
doctrine, is culpable, and will stand a chance to be brought before the High
Council, and lose his license and membership..."
Note that JS successfully inculcated his brother Hyrum into the litany of lies.
Note also the utter hypocrisy of Hyrum saying that men caught teaching
polygamy were subject to lose their church membership. Obviously, seeing as
how Hyrum and Joseph both were polygamists, his prevarication convicts both of
them. Yet, just two months later, when the 'Expositor' publishers attempted to
remove them from office for their adultery, Joseph and Hyrum responded to them
with violence. With the publication of the 'Expositor' came JS' most notorious
lie about polygamy:
On May 3, 1844 the History of the Church (vol. 6, p. 411) reported that Joseph
Smith responded as follows to the accusation that he "kept six or seven young
females as wives"......."What a thing it is for a man to be accused of
committing adultery, and having seven wives, when I can only find one. I am
the same man, and as innocent as I was fourteen years ago; and I can prove them
all perjurers."
The next month, Joseph and Hyrum were murdered; but their deaths did not stop
the lying about polygamy: "The law of the land and the rules of the church do
not allow one man to have more than one wife alive at once." (Times and
Seasons, vol. 5, p. 715, November 15, 1844.) Note that at the time, several
dozen Mormon men were active polygamists, and the "revelation on celestial
marriage" had still not been voted on, or accepted as official practice----so
Mormon leaders continued their public lies about secret polygamy.
In 1850, Mormon apostle John Taylor published a tract in England:
"We are accused here of polygamy,... and actions the most indelicate, obscene,
and disgusting, such that none but a corrupt and depraved heart could have
contrived. These things are too outrageous to admit of belief;... I shall
content myself by reading our views of chastity and marriage, from a work
published by us containing some of the articles of our Faith. 'Doctrine and
Covenants,' page 330... Inasmuch as this Church of Jesus Christ has been
reproached with the crime of
fornication and polygamy, we declare that we believe that one man should have
one wife, and one woman but one husband, except in the case of death,..."' (A
tract published by John Taylor in 1850, page 8; Orson Pratt's Works, 1851
edition)
So by 1850, Mormon leaders were sharing their lies about polygamy to an
international audience. At the time he published his tract, wherein he quoted
verbatim from the "Article on Marriage," Taylor had seven wives. And, to
repeat---the "Article on Marriage" was REPUBLISHED in the 1854 edition of the
D&C---two years AFTER Brigham Young publicly announced PM in Utah. Talk about
a forked tongue! Mormons preached one policy from their "scriptures," and an
opposite policy from their pulpit!
A few years later, a Mormon publication admitted that JS sinned by taking his
plural wives before his 1843 "revelation": "The Latter-day Saints, from the
rise of the Church in 1830, till the year 1843, had no authority to marry more
than one wife each. To have done otherwise, would have been a great
transgression."
(Millennial Star, vol. 19, p. 475, July 25, 1857.)
Of course, at that time, the documentation of the dates of JS' plural marriages
was only known by a few top Mormons; it was not until LDS historian Andrew
Jenson began delving into Church Archives in the 1880's that the names and
dates began to be established. Few Mormons realized the scope of Smith's
polygamy, or that he took plural wives many years before his alleged
"revelation."
To bring this subject to a close----and back to the "Article on Marriage"----I
quote Lorenzo Snow's testimony in the "Temple Lot Case", pp. 320-322:
"A man that violated this law in the Doctrine and Covenants, 1835 edition,
until the acceptance of that revelation by the church, violated the law of the
church if he practiced plural marriage. Yes sir, he would have been cut off
from the church, I think I should have been if I had. Before the giving of
that revelation in 1843 if a man married more wives than one who were living at
the same time, he would have been cut off from the church. It would have been
adultery under the laws of the church and under the laws of the state, too."
Do you take pride in defending this "true church," Guy? Or are you content to
just keep "lying for the Lord?"
Randy J.
TheJordan6
> "The whole
>D&C has been accepted by the Church as doctrinally binding
Guy, was the "whole D&C", 1835 edition, accepted by the church of that day, and
was therefore "doctrinally binding"? Including the "Article on Marriage,"
which specifically prohibited polygamy?
Randy J.
Neos Efialtis
inclusive.
Randy, has anyone done a language analysis (or whatever you would call it)
to compare a known Cowdery writing with section 101/109, and then did the
same for a known Smith document? If not, your assertion that Cowdery DID
NOT write it is as credible as the assertion that Cowdery DID write it.
Randy:
>First off---Joseph Fielding Smith claimed to have gotten his information
third-hand.
Most of your polygamy source claims are 3rd or worse. So?
And talk about repetition, if you repeat this stuff any more you will burn
it into my monitor...
Smith may or may not have written the AoM, but the AoM was valid for the
Body of the Church. The only exceptions were those under the "private
revelation" given to Joseph circa 1830.
Randy:
>D&C 42, a "revelation received" on February 9, 1831, ALSO condemns
extra-marital relations.
The key here being "extra-marital" of which JS did not. He was "married",
as is stated in most of your sources, including Cowdery.
Randy:
>As I've documented many times, Smith steadfastly publicly denied PM his
entire life.
No, he denied Spiritual Wifery and Community of Wives, and denied that the
Body of the Church believed or taught or practiced Polygamy.
Your deception is all in your words and how you twist the events that
occurred. You draw many conclusions based on your biased views against
polygamy.
Randy:
>Note that Whitmer speaks negatively of the "spiritual-wife doctrine." He
was a church insider, being a "gold plate witness" and the historian, and he
would have known if there had been any talk of a "revelation on plural
marriage." To the contrary, he points to illicit "plurality of wives" as
being a cause of the Kirtland failure.
Randy, this is entirely your speculation. There is no reason to believe
that Whitmer knew anything about a private revelation of Polygamy. He may
or may not have known anything. To assume that he knew because he saw the
plates is just that, an assumption and cannot be accepted as fact.
Randy, again you are making a big jump here. "Do Mormons believe in having
more than one wife?" In 1838 the answer would have been "No." because it
wasn't doctrine for the Mormon Church until 1843. Because some of the faith
were practicing Polygamy does not give credence that they all were taught or
believed such. This is the difference between the "private" revelation and
the "public" one. If the question had been, "Do some Mormons believe in
having more than one wife?" The answer would have to have been "Yes."
Community of Wives != Polygamy
Spiritual Wife Doctrine != Polygamy
Spiritual Wife Doctrine != Community of Wives
The rest of your speculation about Joseph and John Bennett is just that,
speculation. Wasn't it you that drew the outline of Bennett doing something
other than what Smith was doing? There being a difference between Bennett's
"Spiritual Wiferey" and Joseph's "Polygamy"? I read this in one of the many
posts not too long ago, I guess I could go try and find it on DEJA...
In one phrase you say Smith was accusing Bennett of something he was guilty
of, "adulterer...adultery...promiscuous intercourse", then you say it was
actually, "illicit multiple marriage"...why do you work your wording and
evidences this way, it is most deceptive. While it is true that the
practice of Polygamy was illegal in the state of Illinois, making the
marriages, in essence (according to man's laws), as you claim them, "illicit
multiple marriage", but that is a far cry from what you try to tell us is
going on in the previous paragraphs...this is very much the deception I
refer to when I accuse the ANTIs of trying to hide the truth of what
Polygamy was.
And you again try to link the two, Smith and Bennett in their exactly
OPPOSITE practices, Smith's being illegal (according to the laws of man)
marriages, and Bennett's being adultery and promiscuous intercourse, both of
which are against man's laws and the Churches laws. So in the NewsPaper, he
makes it clear that what Bennett was doing was WRONG, not in the light you
try to throw on it. Just more of your deception.
Randy:
>Smith had taken the following "spiritual wives" for himself in Nauvoo
You mix words again. "Smith took the following wives for himself in
Nauvoo", is how you should have put it.
Your deception is shown in this line:
>That's twelve women who have been amply documented as JS' plural wives,
where you admit they were "wives" not "spiritual wives". Bennett was blamed
for "spiritual wifery" not "polygamy" which is what you are trying to mix
here. Yes, JS was practicing Polygamy. No, JS was not practicing
"Spiritual Wifery". Your deception is the only thing I have a problem with.
Most of the information you post seems to be most accurate, but your
conclusions, your bias conclusions, cause you to twist and try to make these
things equal when they were not.
Randy:
>Because his "plural wives" in the audience had been sworn to secrecy, Smith
felt confident enough to stand before them and lie unabashedly.
You keep saying things like this, but all your posts go against this being
the case. "sworn to secrecy", yet so many people knew about it. Hmm.
Something wrong here.
Randy:
>On February 1, 1844 the following was published in the "Times and Seasons":
We need to know what exactly Mr. Brown was teaching or saying about
polygamy. Hiram Brown may have been in the wrong, as there were guidelines
and procedure to follow where polygamy was concerned. For all we know,
Joseph took the right action against Mr. Brown.
Randy:
>Note that even though Bennett had been out of the picture for more than a
year, Smith was still publicly calling polygamy a "false and corrupt
doctrine." This further puts the lie to the Mormon apologists' claim that
there was an "approved" polygamy system, as opposed to an "unapproved" one
of Bennett's invention. Smith still denied ALL of it.
Smith was countering the teachings of Polygamy outside of the guidelines and
procedures regarding polygamy. It was a "false and corrupt doctrine" for
the Body of the Church as a whole, just any old man to go out and take
another wife. You claim smith denied all of it, but you do not clarify what
all smith denied. He denied Spiritual Wifery and Community of Wives, and he
denied the teachings of Polygamy to the Church and the Practice of Polygamy
within the Church, while it was still not a public commandment. Did Smith
EVER deny practicing "Polygamy" on an individual basis? i.e. that he
himself did not practice "Polygamy"? Not "Spiritual Wifery" or "Community
of Wives", but "Polygamy"?
Randy quotes:
>"...brother Richard Hewitt... states to me that some of your elders say,
that a man having a certain priesthood, may have as many wives as he
pleases, and that doctrine is taught here: I say unto you that that man
teaches FALSE DOCTRINES, FOR THERE IS NO SUCH DOCTRINE TAUGHT; neither is
there ANY SUCH THING practised here. And any man that is found teaching
privately or publicly any such doctrine, is culpable, and will stand a
chance to be brought before the High Council, and lose his license and
membership..."
This is speaking of the Church as a whole. The Church had guidelines on the
practice of Polygamy. You had to be "called", you couldn't just pick up a
wife and go for it. These "clarifications" of the doctrines of polygamy are
incomplete as we only have the one side of the problem, similar to the
epistles of Paul. We could understand the epistles if we had had the
reports Paul received about what was going on in the areas that he wrote his
epistles to. Unfortunately, we can only look at what he says and assume
what was happening. The same is true with most of your quotes. We hear the
rebuttal to a problem with the teachings of some people regarding polygamy,
but we do not know what was being taught, we only know what the response is.
Again, we see your deception in this quote:
>Note that JS successfully inculcated his brother Hyrum into the litany of
lies. Note also the utter hypocrisy of Hyrum saying that men caught teaching
polygamy were subject to lose their church membership. Obviously, seeing as
how Hyrum and Joseph both were polygamists, his prevarication convicts both
of them.
If the men caught practicing polygamy were not part of the sanctioned
practice of polygamy, this is a true case, they would loose their church
membership. Why is this? Because those not practicing polygamy according
to the guidelines were not following the revelation, and had no business
practicing polygamy. Instead they were still bound by the AoM.
Randy:
>The next month, Joseph and Hyrum were murdered; but their deaths did not
stop the lying about polygamy: "The law of the land and the rules of the
church do not allow one man to have more than one wife alive at once."
(Times and Seasons, vol. 5, p. 715, November 15, 1844.) Note that at the
time, several dozen Mormon men were active polygamists, and the "revelation
on celestial marriage" had still not been voted on, or accepted as official
practice----so Mormon leaders continued their public lies about secret
polygamy.
Who said this in the Times and Seasons? And as we have proven, THERE IS NO
VOTING ON DOCTRINE. It is doctrine no matter how bad some may not want it
to be. The "voting" is to accept it, promise you will abide by it, and that
you acknowledge it as true (and therefore will be judged by it, etc). It
has nothing to do with it becoming doctrine or not.
So the key here is WHO SAID this in the Times and Seasons? You post so much
complete information, and then this. Something this important, and you only
give the half of it. You attribute it to "Mormon leaders", but WHO? Was
the absence of this info more deception on your part?
Randy Quotes:
""We are accused here of polygamy,... and actions the most indelicate,
obscene, and disgusting, such that none but a corrupt and depraved heart
could have contrived. These things are too outrageous to admit of belief;...
I shall content myself by reading our views of chastity and marriage, from a
work published by us containing some of the articles of our Faith. 'Doctrine
and Covenants,' page 330... Inasmuch as this Church of Jesus Christ has been
reproached with the crime of fornication and polygamy, we declare that we
believe that one man should have one wife, and one woman but one husband,
except in the case of death,..."'
You cut much out (...) at the beginning(and throughout). Does he go from
one thought to another and you are trying to tie the two separate thoughts
together? The only problematic sentence is the last one, "we declare that
we believe that one man should have one wife, and one woman but one husband,
except in the case of death", which might be explained by examining the laws
in England. What were the English laws and penalties for "Polygamy"? Was
there ever a member in England that practiced polygamy, while in England?
This is a problem the Church would face it Polygamy was brought back
today...it could be very troublesome in countries that do not allow
polygamy, and have severe penalties for it...
Randy:
>So by 1850, Mormon leaders were sharing their lies about polygamy to an
international audience. At the time he published his tract, wherein he
quoted verbatim from the "Article on Marriage," Taylor had seven wives.
And, to repeat---the "Article on Marriage" was REPUBLISHED in the 1854
edition of the D&C---two years AFTER Brigham Young publicly announced PM in
Utah. Talk about a forked tongue! Mormons preached one policy from their
"scriptures," and an opposite policy from their pulpit!
You could look at it from the inside, BY and JS both left the AoM in the
Church for 3 reasons:
a) BY and JS knew that Polygamy was "temporary" and that someday polygamy
would have to be stopped, but the AoM was still scripture.
b) The majority of the Church would not be allowed to practice polygamy, it
was, after all, only a small percentage 2-20%(depending on who you believe)
and they had to be "called" to practice polygamy.
c) The fact that we cannot choose what is "scripture" and what is
"doctrine", and since the AoM was such, it had to remain within the Church
and the "standard works".
Who wrote the article in the "Millennial Star, vol. 19, p. 475, July 25,
1857"? Again, as above you leave out some vital information. Also, was the
Millennial Star a Sanctioned Mormon Publication or a Publication by a
Mormon? Big difference. See also the Sunstone. This is not sanctioned by
the Church, but it is written by "Mormons".
Randy:
>Few Mormons realized the scope of Smith's polygamy, or that he took plural
wives many years before his alleged "revelation."
Really? He had wives before 1830? Wow, truly amazing. Why haven't we seen
this information from you earlier?
Randy quotes:
>"A man that violated this law in the Doctrine and Covenants, 1835 edition,
until the acceptance of that revelation by the church, violated the law of
the church if he practiced plural marriage. Yes sir, he would have been cut
off from the church, I think I should have been if I had. Before the giving
of that revelation in 1843 if a man married more wives than one who were
living at the same time, he would have been cut off from the church. It
would have been adultery under the laws of the church and under the laws of
the state, too."
Again, he is talking of the Body of the Church, not those under the
"private" revelation. Your quote is correct in the true light, that only
very few were partial to the 1830 private revelation on polygamy that JS was
given, and the rest of the Church was to go about "business as usual", until
such time that they could overcome the "taboo mentality" about the practice
of polygamy, and be ready for the revelation to be made public.
PS
Guy R. Briggs says:
>> "The whole D&C has been accepted by the Church as doctrinally binding
Randy Replies:
>Guy, was the "whole D&C", 1835 edition, accepted by the church of that day,
and was therefore "doctrinally binding"? Including the "Article on
Marriage," which specifically prohibited polygamy?
The Church as a Whole was bound by the PUBLIC 1835 Article on Marriage.
Joseph and the (very) few practicing Polygamy due to a PRIVATE revelation
were bound by the "higher law" of the direct, private revelation.
This is verified by 2 things:
a) If the Article of Marriage would have said, "all men to have one wife
only, except Joseph Smith and a few others of his choosing by revelation"
there would have been some major problems within the Church, many of which
you point out with your posts were on a small scale, they would have been on
a much larger scale.
b) Not everyone was ready for polygamy, as you demonstrate over and over
with your posts verifying the "taboo mentality" that so many people suffered
from in that day and age. They were given what they could handle, kind of
like the second set of stone tablets Moses was given. It was obvious the
Israelites were not ready for whatever was on the first set.
So, here we are again, a lot more information about polygamy, but a lot of
the same information also, and it all points back to the same thing:
JS had a revelation circa 1830 about polygamy
This revelation was to be kept private, not being given to the Church as a
whole at that time
The taboo mentality and other problems made the practice of polygamy
difficult, and people needed time to adjust
Once the revelation was made public, it still was regulated by guidelines
and procedures
And 99% of Randy's material supports this, if you take his
misinterpretations and bias opinions out of the mix.
Guy R. Briggs
>
>> The answer is simple. It wasn't a revelation. It was written
>> by Cowdery, not Smith.
>
> Simply incredible, Guy. It's been only a couple of weeks since
> I refuted your above ridiculous contention. I predicted then
> that someone would repeat the same untenable apology in a short
> time, and you have done so. I'll repeat my refutation of it:
>
reply. I'll ask the same question again: Are you refuting the fact that
Cowdery wrote Sec.CI? Do you have proof?? If not, then you have to
admit that it wasn't a revelation, wasn't written by Smith (as Smith
was the only one authorized to receive revelation for the Church). Are
you also claiming it wasn't approved when Smith was out of town?
So where am I wrong?
<remainder snipped - asked and answered>
Guy R. Briggs
>> doctrinally binding
>
> of that day, and was therefore "doctrinally binding"? Including
> the "Article on Marriage," which specifically prohibited
> polygamy?
>
could get youself excommunicated for teaching or practicing anything
else.
Unless, of course, you had been /authorized/ to practice a "higher
law".
Make of that what you will. If I didn't have a rock-solid testimony
of the prophetic calling of Smith, I'd probably believe, just as you
do, that Smith invented plural marriage to cover up his own
philanderings.
But to claim that the /whole Church/ believed in plural marriage any
time before 1852 is to misrepresent the facts. As is claiming that it
was official doctrine any time before then.
Guy R. Briggs
<snip sour grapes from John Whitmer>
> On May 8, 1838----exactly one month after Smith had excommun-
> icated Cowdery, in part for his having accused Smith of
> adultery----and during the time of his affair with Lucinda
> Harris----
>
Alleged affair ...
>
> Smith answered a series of questions that had been asked of
> him numerous times. One of the questions was: "Do the
> Mormons believe in having more wives than one?" And Smith's
> answer was, "No, not at the same time. But they believe that
> if their companion dies, they have a right to marry again."
> ("Teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith", Deseret Book, p.
> 119.) Note the similarity of Smith's 1838 remark to the
> wording of the 1835 AoM, which you claim that Smith had
> nothing to do with:: "We declare that we believe, that one
> man should have one wife; and one woman, but one husband,
> except in the case of death, when either is at liberty to
> marry again."
>
And the answer was strictly true. Sec.CI - duly accepted by "common
consent" and canonized - was Mormon doctrine at the time. The question
was, specifically, what the Mormons - i.e. the corporate Church -
believed. At the time they believed in strict monogamy as outlined in
Sec.CI.
A different issue is Smith practicing PM at the same time, and this
is where we're split - we believe he was practicing a higher law, you
guys believe he was getting his rocks off with anything wearing a
skirt. Either way, it doesn't change the author of Sec.CI, doesn't
change whether or not it was a revelation, doesn't change where Smith
was when it was approved by the general membership.
Nor does the fact that Smith found it convenient to quote official
doctrine to cover his actions.
>
> Guy, it's obvious that this one statement of Smith's utterly
> destroys your deceitful contention that Smith did not approve
> of the AoM; in 1838, he quoted it practically verbatim.
>
It would be deceitful only if I believed your contention while
continuing to publicly state mine. But since I believe you are dead
wrong on this issue, it is not deceitful.
Tell me again how Smith's quoting of Sec.CI in 1838 (1) changes it's
authorship, (2) magically turns it into a revelation and (3) puts Smith
in town when it was approved by the general membership.
>
> I could stop here, but I will continue, and add some more
> documentation that demonstrates the depth and breadth of the
> deception that Smith and his followers engaged in on the
> polygamy issue.
>
You should stop here. You can't change historical fact. Cowdery was
the author. It was approved while Smith was out of town. It was taken
out after plural marriage had become official practice in 1852
(although it took 'em a few years).
>
> On December 16, 1838----just eight months after he had
> excommunicated Cowdery----and while he was in Liberty Jail on
> charges of treason and murder----Smith wrote a letter to his
> followers, in which he declared his innocence of any wrongdoing,
> or any involvement in the Danites that looted and burned out
> Missouri "Gentiles". In the same letter, he also denied any
> such practice as a "community of wives," and he blamed rumors of
> the practice on "dissenters" and "Satan":
>
And can you produce any evidence that a "community of wives" - like
a steno pool from which anybody could pick and choose a companion for
the evening - ever existed? No, you cannot. Even Brodie comments that
such a community never existed anywhere outside of Bennett's
imagination.
>
> "Was it for COMMITTING ADULTERY that we were assailed? We are
> aware that that FALSE SLANDER has gone abroad, for it has been
> reiterated in our ears. These are FALSEHOODS also. Renegade
> 'Mormon' dissenters are running through the world and spreading
> various FOUL AND LIBELOUS REPORTS against us...We have heard it
> reported by some, that......we not only dedicated our property,
> but our families to the Lord; and SATAN, taking advantage of
> this, has perverted it into licentiousness, such as a
> COMMUNITY OF WIVES, which is an ABOMINATION in the sight of
> God.....when a man consecrates or dedicates his wife and
> children, he does not give them to his brother, or to his
> neighbor, FOR THERE IS NO SUCH LAW; for the law of God is, Thou
> shalt not commit adultery. Thou shalt not covet thy neighbor's
> wife. He that looketh upon a woman to lust after her, hath
> committed adultery already in his heart.....Now if any person
> has represented ANYTHING OTHERWISE THAN WHAT WE NOW WRITE, HE
> OR SHE IS A LIAR, and has represented us falsely." ("Teachings
> of the Prophet Joseph Smith," p. 127.)
>
Plural marriage was just that - marriage. Smith and those others
permitted to practice "the Principle" (as it later came to be called)
were not committing adultry (at least as they understood it) because
they were doing whatever they were doing with women they had been
married to. Whether the state recognized the marriage or no. There was
no community of wives.
>
> I don't think that I need to add any further condemnatory
> comments to what Smith said here; he has done an excellent job
> of exposing his deceit and convicting himself on his own.
>
Zzzzzzzz.
<snip one-sided description of the Bennett/Rigdon affair>
> "Dear Sir:---It becomes my duty to lay before you some facts
> relative to the conduct of our major-general, John C. Bennett
> ....It is evident that his character is that of an adulterer
> of the worst kind....Some time ago it having been reported to
> me that some of the most aggravated cases of adultery had been
> committed upon some previously respectable females in our
> city.....More than twenty months ago Bennett went to a lady in
> the city and began to teach her that promiscuous intercourse
> between the sexes was lawful and no harm in it, and requested
> the privilege of gratifying his passions.....Finding this
> argument ineffectual, he told her that men in higher standing
> in the church than himself not only sanctioned, but practiced
> the same deeds; and...said that I both taught and acted in the
> same manner, but [that I] publicly proclaimed against it in
> consequence of the prejudice of the people, and for fear of
> trouble in my own house. By this means he accomplished his
> designs." (History of the Church, vol. 5, p. 42.)
>
> Note that what Smith described as being wrong, he was himself
> secretly engaging in the exact same activity.
>
No. Smith was marrying women and then, perhaps, sleeping with them.
Bennett was sleeping with them without the benefit of marriage. There's
a difference.
>
> Bennett retaliated by writing a series of letters to the
> "Sangamo Journal," exposing Smith's "spiritual wifery"
> practice, which prompted Smith and his other polygamists to
> issue a series of deceitful denials, including a denial of
> the "doctrinal letter" Smith had written to persuade Nancy
> into polygamy:
>
<snip reply Bennett's letters>
> Smith then had twelve of his followers aid him in his deception
> and assassination of Bennett by swearing a false affidavit in
> his church newspaper, the "Times and Seasons": "We know of NO
> OTHER RULE OR SYSTEM OF MARRIAGE OTHER THAN THE ONE PUBLISHED
> FROM THE BOOK OF DOCTRINE AND COVENANTS, and we give this
> certificate to show that Dr. J. C. Bennett's secret wife system
> is a creature of his own make as we know of NO SUCH SOCIETY in
> this place nor never did." (Times and Seasons, vol. 111, October
> 21, 1842.)
>
That's becauase the "spiritual wifery" system described ny Bennett
was a complete and total fabrication, a gross misrepresentation of the
plural marriage system.
And it still wasn't Mormon doctrine. And it still doesn't change the
authorship of Sec.CI or the whereabouts of Smith when it was accepted
by the membership.
>
> Some brainwashed Mormons assert that Smith's "plural marriage"
> was a "revelation from God," and therefore right and holy; and
> that Bennett had an aberrant system of "spiritual wifery" that
> was somehow different and not proper.
>
Bingo. Except for the brainwashed part, of course.
>
> However, the above quote from Smith's own newspaper makes it
> obvious that Smith tried to blame the ENTIRE practice on
> Bennett, and that his church's only authorized system of
> marriage was that as outlined in the "Article of Marriage," the
> same article that you assert that Smith did not approve of.
> So, Guy, if you keep repeating your assertion that Smith did
> not approve of the AoM, you will only succeed in making
> yourself as offensive a liar as Joseph Smith was.
>
Bzzzzt. Wrong. But thanks for playing anyway. The only authorized
system of marriage accepted by the Church by common consent and
properly canonized was monogamy. Plain and simple.
Guy R. Briggs
>
> By the time Smith had dumped Bennett in the summer of 1842,
> Smith had taken the following "spiritual wives" for himself
> in Nauvoo:
<snip list>
Correct. I think this was Smith's way of trying to dodge full
compliance with the concept of plural marriage. He "married" wives for
the /next/ life only and left the marriages for /this/ life intact.
>
> That's twelve women who have been amply documented as JS'
> plural wives, during the period in which Smith placed
> responsibility for the entire polygamy practice on Bennett.
> In a speech before the Ladies' Relief Society, on February 21,
> 1843-----wherein many of his "plural wives" were in
> attendance-----Smith had the audacity to state the following:
> "There is a great noise in the city...and many are saying
> there cannot be so much smoke without some fire. Well, be it
> so. If the stories about Joe Smith are true, then the stories
> of John C. Bennett are true about the ladies of Nauvoo; and he
> says that the Ladies' Relief Society are all organized of those
> who are to be the wives of Joseph Smith. Ladies, you know
> whether this is true or not."
>
Misleading, but strictly true. They /did/ know who they were. But
Bennett had accused them of being in a "steno pool" so to speak, of
willing companions for the evening - essentially calling them a bunch
of whores. His "Saints of the Black Veil" and "Saints of the Green
Veil" were probably "cut from the cloth of Bennett's imagination" - to
quote Brodie.
>
> Because his "plural wives" in the audience had been sworn to
> secrecy, Smith felt confident enough to stand before them and
> lie unabashedly.
>
Or else the "plural wives" in the audience knew that there was no
such thing as a "community of wives".
>
> On February 1, 1844 the following was published in the "Times
> and Seasons":
>
> NOTICE: As we have lately been credibly informed, that an Elder
> of the Church of Jesus Christ, of Latter-day Saints, by the name
> of Hiram Brown, has been preaching polygamy, and other FALSE AND
> CORRUPT DOCTRINES, in the county of Lapeer, state of Michigan.
> "This is to notify him and the Church in general, that he has
> been cut off from the church, for his iniquity; and he is further
> notified to appear at the special conference, on the 6th of April
> next, to answer to these charges.
>
Teaching contrary to official, approved and canonized doctrines.
That can even get your membership lifted in /this/ century.
>
> Note that even though Bennett had been out of the picture for
> more than a year, Smith was still publicly calling polygamy a
> "false and corrupt doctrine."
>
Depends on how Brown was teaching it. I doubt he was quoting Jacob
2:30 and telling the people to wait for the Lord to "command [His]
people". The Lord's people had not yet been so commanded.
>
> This further puts the lie to the Mormon apologists' claim that
> there was an "approved" polygamy system, as opposed to an
> "unapproved" one of Bennett's invention. Smith still denied
> ALL of it.
>
> The following month Hyrum Smith wrote the following for the
> Times and Seasons (15th March 1844, vol. 5, p.474):
>
> "...brother Richard Hewitt... states to me that some of your
> elders say, that a man having a certain priesthood, may have as
> many wives as he pleases, and that doctrine is taught here: I
> say unto you that that man teaches FALSE DOCTRINES, FOR THERE
> IS NO SUCH DOCTRINE TAUGHT; neither is there ANY SUCH THING
> practised here. And any man that is found teaching privately
> or publicly any such doctrine, is culpable, and will stand a
> chance to be brought before the High Council, and lose his
> license and membership..."
>
Strictly false, for we all hold the same priesthood. That in and of
itself does not qualify us to take as many wives as we want. Only by
revelation to the Lord's authorized representative can it be allowed.
That was even true even between 1852 ans 1890 - you had to be approved
by your Bishop and your Stake President before it was allowed.
>
> Note that JS successfully inculcated his brother Hyrum into
> the litany of lies.
>
Randy, the best you can make of this is that Joseph was using
shadings of meaning to cover his activities. I'll freely admit that and
even go so far as to say I think he was wrong in doing so.
>
> Note also the utter hypocrisy of Hyrum saying that men caught
> teaching polygamy were subject to lose their church membership.
> Obviously, seeing as how Hyrum and Joseph both were polygamists,
> his prevarication convicts both of them.
>
You can prove, then, that either of them were teaching it openly to
the corporate Church?
>
> Yet, just two months later, when the 'Expositor' publishers
> attempted to remove them from office for their adultery, Joseph
> and Hyrum responded to them with violence. With the publication
> of the 'Expositor' came JS' most notorious lie about polygamy:
>
Still waiting for proof about that chicks from the "furthest regions
of the eastern hemisphere" were being transported to Nauvoo for sex,
then being abandoned, then dying. The lies that the _expositor_ printed
were like throwing gasoline on a fire. They were intended to destroy -
not to reveal truth.
>
> On May 3, 1844 the History of the Church (vol. 6, p. 411)
> reported that Joseph Smith responded as follows to the
> accusation that he "kept six or seven young females as
> wives"......."What a thing it is for a man to be accused of
> committing adultery, and having seven wives, when I can only
> find one. I am the same man, and as innocent as I was
> fourteen years ago; and I can prove them all perjurers."
>
Technically, they were all misrepresenting the facts. Joseph AND his
accusers.
>
> The next month, Joseph and Hyrum were murdered; but their
> deaths did not stop the lying about polygamy: "The law of the
> land and the rules of the church do not allow one man to have
> more than one wife alive at once." (Times and Seasons, vol.
> 5, p. 715, November 15, 1844.)
>
Still strictly true. The law of the land /did/ prohibit polygamy.
The law of the Church /did/ prohibit polygamy. Where is the lie?
>
> Note that at the time, several dozen Mormon men were active
> polygamists, and the "revelation on celestial marriage" had
> still not been voted on, or accepted as official practice----
> so Mormon leaders continued their public lies about secret
> polygamy.
>
They continued to live the higher law. But as you point out - the
RoCM still had NOT been voted on, and PM was not yet Mormon doctrine.
>
> In 1850, Mormon apostle John Taylor published a tract in England:
>
> "We are accused here of polygamy,... and actions the most
> indelicate, obscene, and disgusting, such that none but a
> corrupt and depraved heart could have contrived. These things
> are too outrageous to admit of belief;... I shall content
> myself by reading our views of chastity and marriage, from a
> work published by us containing some of the articles of our
> Faith. 'Doctrine and Covenants,' page 330... Inasmuch as this
> Church of Jesus Christ has been reproached with the crime of
> fornication and polygamy, we declare that we believe that one
> man should have one wife, and one woman but one husband, except
> in the case of death,..."' (A tract published by John Taylor in
> 1850, page 8; Orson Pratt's Works, 1851 edition)
>
Bennett's accusations - and probably a thousand others like them -
/were/ obscene and disgusting. The corporate Church /did/ believe in
1850 in strict monogamy. For another two years, in fact.
>
> So by 1850, Mormon leaders were sharing their lies about
> polygamy to an international audience. At the time he
> published his tract, wherein he quoted verbatim from the
> "Article on Marriage," Taylor had seven wives. And, to
> repeat---the "Article on Marriage" was REPUBLISHED in the
> 1854 edition of the D&C---two years AFTER Brigham Young
> publicly announced PM in Utah. Talk about a forked tongue!
> Mormons preached one policy from their "scriptures," and
> an opposite policy from their pulpit!
>
We don't practice the Law of Moses any longer, either. Are you
suggesting that we speak with a "forked tongue" when we quote the Old
Testament and continue to publish it?
>
> A few years later, a Mormon publication admitted that JS
> sinned by taking his plural wives before his 1843 "revelation":
> "The Latter-day Saints, from the rise of the Church in 1830,
> till the year 1843, had no authority to marry more than one wife
> each. To have done otherwise, would have been a great
> transgression." (Millennial Star, vol. 19, p. 475, July 25,
> 1857.)
>
The corporate Church did not have the authority. Smith, however,
did. As I said above, make of that what you will, but don't try to
assert that the Church had any other doctrine besides strict monogamy
until 1852.
>
> Of course, at that time, the documentation of the dates of JS'
> plural marriages was only known by a few top Mormons; it was
> not until LDS historian Andrew Jenson began delving into Church
> Archives in the 1880's that the names and dates began to be
> established. Few Mormons realized the scope of Smith's
> polygamy, or that he took plural wives many years before his
> alleged "revelation."
>
There is a difference between when a revelation is received and when
it is recorded. In some cases it can be many years. For example, the
life of Christ took place more or less between 1 and 33 AD. The gospels
- Matthew, Mark, Luke and John, were not written until decades later.
>
> To bring this subject to a close----and back to the "Article on
> Marriage"----I quote Lorenzo Snow's testimony in the "Temple Lot
> Case", pp. 320-322:
>
> "A man that violated this law in the Doctrine and Covenants,
> 1835 edition, until the acceptance of that revelation by the
> church, violated the law of the church if he practiced plural
> marriage. Yes sir, he would have been cut off from the church,
> I think I should have been if I had.
>
Exactly what Hiram Brown found out - the hard way.
>
> Before the giving of that revelation in 1843 if a man married
> more wives than one who were living at the same time, he would
> have been cut off from the church. It would have been adultery
> under the laws of the church and under the laws of the state,
> too."
>
True, except that the revelation was given much earlier, so the date
has to be adjusted.
>
> Do you take pride in defending this "true church," Guy?
>
Yes I do. Especially from people who would try to twist the facts.
>
> Or are you content to just keep "lying for the Lord?"
>
Do not knowingly lie - for the Lord or anybody else. I present the
facts as I understand them. I freely admit that I may be mistaken. When
I am, I admit it.
I rail against people who misrepresent the facts. Those who would
claim that "14 years old" and "in my 15th year" are two different ages,
just to prove a point. Those who would limit "that region of country"
to shouting distance of the Smith homestead.
The facts, as I see them remain unchanged. Cowdery wrote the AofM.
Nothing you said in parts 1, 2 or 3 changes that. Smith was out of town
when they were read and approved. Nothing you said in parts 1, 2 or 3
changes that. Church doctrine from 1830 until 1852 was strict monogamy.
Nothing you said in parts 1, 2 or 3 changes that.
That Smith and some of his inner circle practiced plural marriage
during that time is irrefutable. I believe he was obeying a higher law,
you believe he was gratifying his own lusts. We can agree to disagree
on that.
That Smith was less than forthright about the practice is also a
given. You call it a "litany of lies", I call it shading the truth a
bit. Either way, I think Smith was wrong - but I didn't live in those
times, I can only imagine how badly the violence would have escalated
and how many lives would have been lost had the truth, the whole truth
and nothing but the truth been told. Did not Abraham /also/ lie about
his marital status?
I don't expect my Prophets to be infallible and I believe that
they'll answer for whatever sins they may have committed before the
Lord some day. That is not my concern. Not my place to judge.
My concern is what the Lord expects of me. Guy Briggs. in the year
2000. I believe that my feet are on the path God wants 'em on. To that
end, I express the truth as I see it, and rail against those who would
distort it.
HBlack
> harry...@earthlink.net (HBlack) wrote:
> > net...@GeoCities.com (Guy R. Briggs) wrote:
> >
> > <snip>
> >
> >> Had snippets from the various Woodriff discourses been left
> >> out of the D&C then they would have been "non-doctrinally
> >> secure"
> >
> > So you believe that the headings and footnotes in the
> > D&C are all canonized Official Mormon Doctrine, in spite
> > of the fact that they were inserted by later editors.
> >
> Don't be ridiculous. The excerpts included with the OD-1 are a
> completely different matter than headings, footnotes and versification.
Oh?
These excerpts from Woodruff's speeches,
which appear in small print and are set off separately
from OD-1, did not appear in the D&C until the
1981 edition -- some 73 years AFTER the
Official Declaration was first added to
the D&C.
They are obviously not canonized text.
Harry Black
R. L. Measures
<Efia...@WinISP.net> wrote:
> See, Harry, you assumption that all Mormon scripture or writings are
> Doctrine.
€ Say what?
>........
--
- Rich... 805.386.3734.
www.vcnet.com/measures, remove plus from adr.
R. L. Measures
thejo...@aol.com (TheJordan6) wrote:
€ Amen, Randy. It's almost as if the thinking has been done elsewhere.
> Joseph Fielding Smith perpetuated the misinformation: "This article on
> marriage was not a revelation and I want you never to forget it....at this
> conference held on August 17, 1835, Joseph Smith and Frederick G.
> Williams...were not present; they were in Michigan....this article on
> marriage...was written by Oliver Cowdery in the absence of the Prophet Joseph
> Smith, and the Prophet knew nothing of the action that was taken ordering them
> printed with the revelations. These were not revelations, never were so
> considered, were ordered printed in the absence of Joseph Smith, and when
> Joseph Smith returned from Michigan and learned what was done---I am informed
> by my father, who got this information from Orson Pratt---the Prophet was very
> much troubled.
€ Who would not be very much troubled if his wife observed him doin'
her maid?
€ hear, hear.
> Objective thinkers will naturally conclude
> that in light of the events, Smith possessed no such pipeline.
>
> As I've documented several times previously, the historical context of the
> origin of the AoM was JS' "nasty, filthy affair"
€ I think you left off a "dirty", Randy.
well put, Randy
€ What next? ... an apologist explanation that Fannie Alger was really
and truly an agent of the Devil sent forth to bedevil prophet Smith. .
R. L. Measures
net...@GeoCities.com (Guy R. Briggs) wrote:
> thejo...@aol.com (TheJordan6) wrote:
>
> <snip sour grapes from John Whitmer>
>
> > On May 8, 1838----exactly one month after Smith had excommun-
> > icated Cowdery, in part for his having accused Smith of
> > adultery----and during the time of his affair with Lucinda
> > Harris----
> >
> Alleged affair ...
>
€ by the alleged "prophet".
> .............
R. L. Measures
<Efia...@WinISP.net> wrote:
> For Randy in answer to his "explanation" to Guy R. Briggs, parts 1, 2 and 3
> inclusive.
>
> Randy, has anyone done a language analysis (or whatever you would call it)
> to compare a known Cowdery writing with section 101/109, and then did the
> same for a known Smith document? ..
€ [guffaw]
R. L. Measures
> Just as long as you realize that by saying I have contradicted "my
> fellows", that I have also contradicted you.
>
> Bye, now!
>
>....
€ a too-hot kitchen?.
TheJordan6
>> The Lectures on Faith, and Article on Marriage were
>> all the more Official Mormon Doctrine, Guy.
And Guy replied:
> They were and are good Mormon doctrine.
Guy, you've claimed several times that the "Article on Marriage" was written by
Cowdery, and not approved by Smith. Your purpose in writing that is obviously
to discredit the "Article on Marriage" as official policy, so that you can
apologize for Smith's adultery.
But above, you call the "Article on Marriage" "good Mormon Doctrine."
Which is your actual position, Guy? Was the "Article on Marriage" unapproved,
and not binding on Joseph Smith? Or was it "good Mormon Doctrine?"
> At the time
>that the AoM was published until 1852 the corporate Church was under a
>law of strict monogamy - even though Smith and several of his inner
>circle had been given a higher law.
Guy, you and other Mobots have repeatedly stated that the only "official,
doctrinally secure" sources of Mormon doctrine are those which have been
received by "revelation," approved by the church's governing bodies, and
accepted by the church. But above, you contradict yourself by stating that
Smith had received a "higher law" to practice polygamy in secret, contrary to
the church's sustained, canonized standard of monogamy.
You claim that "Smith and his circle had been given a higher law." Please
provide me with a reference where I can document the reception of this "higher
law" for myself.
Please inform us as to the date of the inception of the "law," the conference
wherein it was discussed and approved, the people who voted on it, and the
contemporary documentation of it. And be sure to document your information
from your own standard of "doctrinally secure sources."
>From 1852 until 1890, the Church
>openly accepted the practice of plural marriage, although it was
>/still/ restricted to an estimated 5% of adult males and slightly more
>than 10% of adult females.
Various historians have estimated higher percentages than those, but regardless
of that, plural marriage was not "restricted" to any such low percentage, but
was to the contrary, taught as a requirement to reach the "highest level of the
celestial kingdom."
You are spreading more misinformation, which is SOP for you.
"A man that violated this law in the Doctrine and Covenants, 1835 edition,
until the acceptance of that revelation by the church, violated the law of the
church if he practiced plural marriage. Yes sir, he would have been cut off
from the church, I think I should have been if I had. Before the giving of
that revelation in 1843 if a man married more wives than one who were living at
the same time, he would have been cut off from the church. It would have been
adultery under the laws of the church and under the laws of the state, too."
----Lorenzo Snow's testimony, "Temple Lot Case", pp. 320-322.
Randy J.
TheJordan6
>Date: Fri, Feb 11, 2000 20:55 EST
>Message-id: <8ED7BC462netza...@209.84.17.10>
John Whitmer was "called of God by revelation" to be the official LDS church
historian according to D&C 47. But because his perfectly accurate history
provides contemporary documentation that Joseph Smith's secret wife practice
was illicit and unapproved, Guy Briggs calls the history "sour grapes."
I guess you don't have any comment on the fact that Smith tried to get Whitmer
to turn over his writings so that he could suppress the information about
polygamy and the Danites, huh Guy?
>> On May 8, 1838----exactly one month after Smith had excommun-
>> icated Cowdery, in part for his having accused Smith of
>> adultery----and during the time of his affair with Lucinda
>> Harris----
> Alleged affair ...
"Lucinda Harris is the third woman on Andrew Jenson's list of Joseph Smith's
plural wives, though Jenson gives no date for the marriage and his source is
not specified. In addition to this sympathetic attestation, the antagonostic
Sarah Pratt reported that while in Nauvoo Lucinda had admitted a long-standing
relationship with Smith. It is well-documented that he stayed with the
Harrises in 1838, and the Pratt reference concurs with this date. These data,
along with an early Nauvoo temple proxy sealing to Smith and other
corroborating details lead to the conclusion that Lucinda in fact married
Smith, possibly in 1838."
(In Sacred Loneliness: The Plural Wives of Joseph Smith," Todd Compton, pp.
43-44.)
In 1842, Lucinda characterized herself as Smith's "mistress since four years,"
Guy. That obviously means that she knew that her sexual relationship with
Smith was no "revelation."
>> Smith answered a series of questions that had been asked of
>> him numerous times. One of the questions was: "Do the
>> Mormons believe in having more wives than one?" And Smith's
>> answer was, "No, not at the same time. But they believe that
>> if their companion dies, they have a right to marry again."
>> ("Teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith", Deseret Book, p.
>> 119.) Note the similarity of Smith's 1838 remark to the
>> wording of the 1835 AoM, which you claim that Smith had
>> nothing to do with:: "We declare that we believe, that one
>> man should have one wife; and one woman, but one husband,
>> except in the case of death, when either is at liberty to
>> marry again."
>>
> And the answer was strictly true.
Was it, Guy? The question was asked of "the Mormons." Was Joseph Smith a
Mormon, Guy? Or was he of some different sect? Are you saying that the LDS
church had one public standard of behavior (monogamy) for its rank-and-file,
and an opposite, secret standard for its elite leaders, which allowed them to
have extra-marital sex?
Sec.CI - duly accepted by "common
>consent" and canonized - was Mormon doctrine at the time. The question
>was, specifically, what the Mormons - i.e. the corporate Church -
>believed. At the time they believed in strict monogamy as outlined in
>Sec.CI.
So, you're admitting that Joseph Smith's secret wife practice was contrary to
his own church's canonized rules of conduct.
Your saying that Joseph Smith practiced a double standard of behavior---one
standard for his followers, and a different one for himself. D&C 82:5, Guy.
It's also incredible that in earlier posts, you tried to assert that the
"Article on Marriage" was written by Cowdery, and not approved by Smith, and
therefore, not "official LDS doctrine"---but above, you assert the
OPPOSITE---that it WAS doctrine for the "corporate church." You have no
credibility, Guy.
> A different issue is Smith practicing PM at the same time, and this
>is where we're split - we believe he was practicing a higher law,
According to what official source? When, where, and by whom was this "higher
law" approved? What happened on August 12, 1843, Guy?
you
>guys believe he was getting his rocks off with anything wearing a
>skirt.
Smith's extra-marital sexual exploits are well-documented. As I have quoted
Compton's doucumentation several times, nearly all of Smith's "plural wives"
were of child-bearing age, and all of the theological justifications for PM
were based on sex and procreation.
Either way, it doesn't change the author of Sec.CI, doesn't
>change whether or not it was a revelation, doesn't change where Smith
>was when it was approved by the general membership.
Now you revert back to your earlier claim.
Will you please settle on one position or the other?
> Nor does the fact that Smith found it convenient to quote official
>doctrine to cover his actions.
<chuckle> ***DDDUUUHHH***!!!!!!
Your admission that Smith secretly practiced his secret wife doctrine, while
publicly preaching the opposite, means that you admit that he was a liar and a
hypocrite. Your admission means that he has no credibility. We don't know
when Smith was telling the truth, and when he was lying---and you admit it!
What does 2 Nephi 9:34-36 say, Guy?
>> Guy, it's obvious that this one statement of Smith's utterly
>> destroys your deceitful contention that Smith did not approve
>> of the AoM; in 1838, he quoted it practically verbatim.
> It would be deceitful only if I believed your contention while
>continuing to publicly state mine. But since I believe you are dead
>wrong on this issue, it is not deceitful.
It's not a matter of whether you believe that *I* am wrong or right; it's a
matter of what Joseph Smith HIMSELF stated. You have repeatedly contended that
Cowdery wrote the AoM while Smith was out of town, and that Smith did not
approve of it. I have provided Smith's exact words, from the LDS-published
"Teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith," wherein Smith quoted the AoM
practically verbatim, only three years after it was published in the D&C.
Now, if you still think that your contention isn't "deceitful", Guy, then I
would submit that you do not know truth from lie.
> Tell me again how Smith's quoting of Sec.CI in 1838 (1) changes its
>authorship, (2) magically turns it into a revelation and (3) puts Smith
>in town when it was approved by the general membership.
Smith's quoting of it indicates that your contention that he did not approve of
it is untenable and deceitful. Regardless of Smith's being out of town, as
Dale has documented, Smith was on the committee that approved the 1835 D&C. I
shouldn't even need to comment on the stupidity of your contention that an
entire section of the D&C could make it into the "approved, sustained canon"
without the knowledge and approval of the "prophet of God."
Please provide us with some references from Joseph Smith that indicate his
disapproval, or displeasure with, the 1835 "Article on Marriage", Guy. Smith
lived nine years after it was published; if he didn't agree with it, surely you
can show us something in writing that supports your contention.
>> I could stop here, but I will continue, and add some more
>> documentation that demonstrates the depth and breadth of the
>> deception that Smith and his followers engaged in on the
>> polygamy issue.
> You should stop here. You can't change historical fact. Cowdery was
>the author. It was approved while Smith was out of town. It was taken
>out after plural marriage had become official practice in 1852
>(although it took 'em a few years).
So what you're saying is, that the approved, canonized, published D&C is not a
credible source of official LDS doctrine or policy---right, Guy? Mormonism
preaches one policy, but practices the opposite---right?
>> On December 16, 1838----just eight months after he had
>> excommunicated Cowdery----and while he was in Liberty Jail on
>> charges of treason and murder----Smith wrote a letter to his
>> followers, in which he declared his innocence of any wrongdoing,
>> or any involvement in the Danites that looted and burned out
>> Missouri "Gentiles". In the same letter, he also denied any
>> such practice as a "community of wives," and he blamed rumors of
>> the practice on "dissenters" and "Satan":
> And can you produce any evidence that a "community of wives" - like
>a steno pool from which anybody could pick and choose a companion for
>the evening - ever existed? No, you cannot. Even Brodie comments that
>such a community never existed anywhere outside of Bennett's
>imagination.
"Community of wives" is exactly what Smith's secret polygamy practice was. At
least eleven of his plural wives were currently married to other men, making
them "communal wives," IOW, a "free love commune."
>> "Was it for COMMITTING ADULTERY that we were assailed? We are
>> aware that that FALSE SLANDER has gone abroad, for it has been
>> reiterated in our ears. These are FALSEHOODS also. Renegade
>> 'Mormon' dissenters are running through the world and spreading
>> various FOUL AND LIBELOUS REPORTS against us...We have heard it
>> reported by some, that......we not only dedicated our property,
>> but our families to the Lord; and SATAN, taking advantage of
>> this, has perverted it into licentiousness, such as a
>> COMMUNITY OF WIVES, which is an ABOMINATION in the sight of
>> God.....when a man consecrates or dedicates his wife and
>> children, he does not give them to his brother, or to his
>> neighbor, FOR THERE IS NO SUCH LAW; for the law of God is, Thou
>> shalt not commit adultery. Thou shalt not covet thy neighbor's
>> wife. He that looketh upon a woman to lust after her, hath
>> committed adultery already in his heart.....Now if any person
>> has represented ANYTHING OTHERWISE THAN WHAT WE NOW WRITE, HE
>> OR SHE IS A LIAR, and has represented us falsely." ("Teachings
>> of the Prophet Joseph Smith," p. 127.)
> Plural marriage was just that - marriage. Smith and those others
>permitted to practice "the Principle" (as it later came to be called)
>were not committing adultery (at least as they understood it) because
>they were doing whatever they were doing with women they had been
>married to. Whether the state recognized the marriage or no. There was
>no community of wives.
Here, you admit that the state did not recognize Smith's illicit plural
marriages, which is of course true. The LDS church's "Articles of Faith" vowed
to be "subject to...magistrates, in obeying, honoring, and sustaining the law."
The "sustained, canonized" D&C 58:21 states "Let no man break the laws of the
land, for he that keepeth the laws of God hath no need to break the laws of the
land."
Since you admit that Smith's plural marriages were against the law, you by
default admit that Smith violated the "voice of God" which I have quoted above.
If the official, canonized policy of the LDS church is to obey the laws of the
land, it obviously follows that Smith's bigamous marriages were not of "God."
Unless you wish to claim that Cowdery authored D&C 58:21 while Smith was out of
town.
>> I don't think that I need to add any further condemnatory
>> comments to what Smith said here; he has done an excellent job
>> of exposing his deceit and convicting himself on his own.
>>
> Zzzzzzzz.
>
><snip one-sided description of the Bennett/Rigdon affair>
You're welcome to provide a responsible opposing version, if you can find one
that makes Smith look any less of a liar and hypocrite.
>> "Dear Sir:---It becomes my duty to lay before you some facts
>> relative to the conduct of our major-general, John C. Bennett
>> ....It is evident that his character is that of an adulterer
>> of the worst kind....Some time ago it having been reported to
>> me that some of the most aggravated cases of adultery had been
>> committed upon some previously respectable females in our
>> city.....More than twenty months ago Bennett went to a lady in
>> the city and began to teach her that promiscuous intercourse
>> between the sexes was lawful and no harm in it, and requested
>> the privilege of gratifying his passions.....Finding this
>> argument ineffectual, he told her that men in higher standing
>> in the church than himself not only sanctioned, but practiced
>> the same deeds; and...said that I both taught and acted in the
>> same manner, but [that I] publicly proclaimed against it in
>> consequence of the prejudice of the people, and for fear of
>> trouble in my own house. By this means he accomplished his
>> designs." (History of the Church, vol. 5, p. 42.)
>>
>> Note that what Smith described as being wrong, he was himself
>> secretly engaging in the exact same activity.
> No. Smith was marrying women and then, perhaps, sleeping with them.
He was definitely sleeping with them, but he was only married to one
woman---Emma Hale. If you can provide us with documentation of Smith's divorce
from Emma Hale, and marriage licenses to the other women he had sex with, then
you can contend that he was married to them.
Bit since you've already admitted that Smith's extra-marital relations were
against the law, you're by default admitting that they weren't marriages, so
the point is moot, and you are on the losing side of it.
>Bennett was sleeping with them without the benefit of marriage. There's
>a difference.
Since Smith wasn't married to any of them either, Bennett was doing the same
thing Smith was. Guy, please, for once in your life, think for two
seconds-----Smith had not one single negative word to say about John C.
Bennett's sexual activity until both Smith and Bennett wanted Nancy Rigdon. If
Bennett had been engaging in some "renegade" extra-marital relations, Smith
didn't say a word about it UNTIL the split over Nancy. And to repeat---as
though it would actually sink into your brain-----
SMITH BLAMED THE *ENTIRE* POLYGAMY PRACTICE ON BENNETT, STATING THAT HE (SMITH)
KNEW OF ***NO OTHER MARRIAGE RULE OR SYSTEM THAT WHAT IS PUBLISHED IN THE
DOCTRINE AND COVENANTS.***
So will you PLEASE STOP LYING ABOUT IT?
>> Bennett retaliated by writing a series of letters to the
>> "Sangamo Journal," exposing Smith's "spiritual wifery"
>> practice, which prompted Smith and his other polygamists to
>> issue a series of deceitful denials, including a denial of
>> the "doctrinal letter" Smith had written to persuade Nancy
>> into polygamy:
><snip reply to Bennett's letters>
How convenient to just snip without comment, documentation that destroys your
contentions, Guy. I guess I'll just have to restore it:
"BENNETT'S LETTERS.---We have read the fifth and sixth letters of Dr.
Bennett...The sixth letter is what purports to be a copy of a letter from
Joseph Smith to Miss Nancy Rigdon, without date, name, or proof.....we hope the
community are not yet quite so far from a common course of justice and
propriety as to take Bennett's word for the truth.....JOSEPH SMITH IS NOT THE
AUTHOR."
(The "Wasp," August 27, 1842.
Was Joseph Smith lying when he denied writing that letter, Guy? What does 2
Nephi 9:34 say?
>> Smith then had twelve of his followers aid him in his deception
>> and assassination of Bennett by swearing a false affidavit in
>> his church newspaper, the "Times and Seasons": "We know of NO
>> OTHER RULE OR SYSTEM OF MARRIAGE OTHER THAN THE ONE PUBLISHED
>> FROM THE BOOK OF DOCTRINE AND COVENANTS, and we give this
>> certificate to show that Dr. J. C. Bennett's secret wife system
>> is a creature of his own make as we know of NO SUCH SOCIETY in
>> this place nor never did." (Times and Seasons, vol. 111, October
>> 21, 1842.)
> That's becauase the "spiritual wifery" system described by Bennett
>was a complete and total fabrication, a gross misrepresentation of the
>plural marriage system.
Your level of cognitive dissonance is incredible, Guy. I guess I'll just have
to repeat it again. For a "brickwall" like yourself, that's about all I can
do:
"We know of NO OTHER RULE OR SYSTEM OF MARRIAGE OTHER THAN THE ONE PUBLISHED
FROM THE BOOK OF DOCTRINE AND COVENANTS."
Perhaps Cowdery wrote this when Smith was out of town, Guy? Oh, I forgot!
Cowdery wasn't a Mormon in 1842. I guess some other renegade must have written
this lie to make Smith look bad.
> And it still wasn't Mormon doctrine.
If what is published in the D&C, and is preached and expounded on by the
"prophet", is not "Mormon doctrine," then you are conceding that officially
approved, canonized LDS "scriptures" are worthless as reliable sources for
truth or policy. You are admitting the Mormon leaders can teach one policy
publicly, and an opposite policy secretly. Hmmmmm...Maybe that's the origin of
that "lying for the Lord" culture in Mormonism.
And I shouldn't even have to repeat that you are once again contradicting
yourself by stating that the AoM wasn't "Mormon doctrine", when in previous
posts you claim that it was "good Mormon doctrine."
And it still doesn't change the
>authorship of Sec.CI or the whereabouts of Smith when it was accepted
>by the membership.
Since Smith himself quoted the AoM practically verbatim, that indicates his
public approval of it. For you to continue to contend that his absence negates
the AoM as normative public policy is an indication that you are utterly
insane.
That doesn't even begin to address the real issue---that of whether or not
Joseph Smith was a "prophet of God." If Smith had received a "secret"
revelation to practice polygamy---and Smith was in constant communion with
"God"---then "God" should have informed his "prophet" that Cowdery was
inserting a policy into the "canon" that would contradict the "polygamy
revelation," and that would make a liar and hypocrite of Smith, and destroy his
credibility unto this day. The fact that the AoM made it into the "sustained,
approved" canon reveals that Smith had no communion with Deity as he claimed
to. And that's the real issue.
>> Some brainwashed Mormons assert that Smith's "plural marriage"
>> was a "revelation from God," and therefore right and holy; and
>> that Bennett had an aberrant system of "spiritual wifery" that
>> was somehow different and not proper.
> Bingo. Except for the brainwashed part, of course.
That is for each reader of this thread to decide for themselves. Please inform
us as to the difference between Smith's adultery and Bennett's adultery.
>> However, the above quote from Smith's own newspaper makes it
>> obvious that Smith tried to blame the ENTIRE practice on
>> Bennett, and that his church's only authorized system of
>> marriage was that as outlined in the "Article of Marriage," the
>> same article that you assert that Smith did not approve of.
>> So, Guy, if you keep repeating your assertion that Smith did
>> not approve of the AoM, you will only succeed in making
>> yourself as offensive a liar as Joseph Smith was.
> Bzzzzt. Wrong. But thanks for playing anyway. The only authorized
>system of marriage accepted by the Church by common consent and
>properly canonized was monogamy. Plain and simple.
>
>bestRegards,
>----------------------------------------------------------
> Guy R. "BrickWall" Briggs
Very good, Guy! Your above admission does two things: It
A) Again destroys your ridiculous assertion that
Cowdery inserted the AoM without Smith's approval and
B) It forces you to concede that Smith's secret plural marriages were against
his own church's sustained, canonized rules of conduct.
Now, if you can provide us with the documentation of a "secret polygamy
revelation", prior to the 1843 "revelation on celestial marriage," and show
that it was discussed, voted on, and approved by the First Presidency and the
High Council (which was the governing body at the time), you can go a step
towards showing us that Smith's practice of polygamy from the early 1830's
onwards was something other than just adultery.
Randy J.
TheJordan6
>Date: Fri, Feb 11, 2000 20:09 EST
>Message-id: <8ED7AE7E5netza...@209.84.17.10>
>
>thejo...@aol.com (TheJordan6) wrote:
>>
>>> The answer is simple. It wasn't a revelation. It was written
>>> by Cowdery, not Smith.
>>
>> Simply incredible, Guy. It's been only a couple of weeks since
>> I refuted your above ridiculous contention. I predicted then
>> that someone would repeat the same untenable apology in a short
>> time, and you have done so. I'll repeat my refutation of it:
> First, I answered your so-called refutation.
I haven't seen one, until Friday 2/11.
Still waiting for your
>reply.
My reply was in my original post. You provided no credible refutation to it.
> I'll ask the same question again: Are you refuting the fact that
>Cowdery wrote Sec.CI?
No. I have never asserted that Cowdery didn't write it. The issue is not who
wrote it, but whether JS knew of it, approved it, and quoted from it.
>Do you have proof?? If not, then you have to
>admit that it wasn't a revelation, wasn't written by Smith (as Smith
>was the only one authorized to receive revelation for the Church).
The "revelation on celestial marriage" wasn't an "authorized" document either,
until 1876---four decades after JS began secretly practicing polygamy.
When did D&C sections 137 and 138 become "approved, official LDS doctrine, Guy?
>Are
>you also claiming it wasn't approved when Smith was out of town?
No. I never have, and if you read my posts, you'd know that. The possibility
that Smith was out of town when the vote occurred is not the issue.
>So where am I wrong?
You're wrong in that you jump to the confusion that since Cowdery wrote it
instead of Smith, that that means that Smith didn't approve of it. If Smith
didn't approve of it, then show us some statement from Smith indicating that.
I have provided many quotes from Smith and other Mormons that indicate that
Smith did approve of the AoM, and you have already conceded so in other posts,
so I don't know why you still keep up your stupid argument.
><remainder snipped - asked and answered>
>
>bestRegards,
>----------------------------------------------------------
> Guy R. "BrickWall" Briggs
You haven't answered squat.
Speaking of the AoM and official denials of polygamy, Todd Compton wrote:
"This statement was approved at a general assembly and was included in every
edition of the Doctrine and Covenants until 1876, when it was replaced by the
present section 132 on polygamy and exaltation, an interesting case of
decanonizing a portion of a standard work. Joseph Smith in Nauvoo also denied
practicing polygamy (HC 6:411, 5:72), and post-manifesto polygamy was denied by
church leaders...Faced with the necessity of keeping polygamy secret, the
Mormon authorities generally chose to disavow the practice, cometimes using
language with coded double meanings. But such denials, sending contradictory
signals to church followers and non-Mormons, always were made with a
significant price.....Joseph F. Smith.....stated that this 'Article on
Marriage' was indisputable evidence of the early existence of the principle of
patriarchal marriage by the Prophet Joseph, and also by Oliver Cowdery.'
Brigham Young stated that Oliver Cowdery wrote the Article on Marriage and
insisted that it be included in the Doctrine and Covenants, 'contrary to the
thrice expressed wish and refusal of the Prophet Jos. Smith.'....This reference
indicates that Young clearly saw the article as deceptive, and tried to place
the blame for it entirely on Oliver Cowdery. But Smith could have easily
overruled Cowdery, and Young himself could have removed the Article before
1876."
("In Sacred Loneliness: The Plural Wives of Joseph Smith", p. 643.)
Bottom line---If Smith had disapproved of the AoM, he had nine years after its
publication to state so. The fact that he quoted from the AoM in his denials
of polygamy indicate his knowledge and approval of its inclusion, as well as
his willingness to deceive.
It was BY who claimed that Smith had disapproved of the AoM, not Smith himself.
Therefore, BY's statement is hearsay, and was obviously made to "proof-text"
the polygamy practice in Utah, to allay RLDS objections that polygamy was
contrary to church doctrine. The D&C was *REPUBLISHED* in Utah in 1854, two
years AFTER BY first publicly admitted the polygamy practice. That would have
been an ideal opportunity for BY to remove the AoM, but he did not do so. That
obviously means that BY's attempt to "blame" the AoM on Cowdery was a lie to
make JS' polygamy practice look better, and it also means that BY considered
the AoM to be "official" enough to leave it in the 1854 republication of the
D&C.
So any way you cut it, BY's statements and actions were deceptive and
contradictory. As yours are.
Randy J.
TheJordan6
>Date: Fri, Feb 11, 2000 21:02 EST
>Message-id: <8ED7B452Bnetza...@209.84.17.10>
>>> doctrinally binding
>>
>> Guy, was the "whole D&C", 1835 edition, accepted by the church
>> of that day, and was therefore "doctrinally binding"? Including
>> the "Article on Marriage," which specifically prohibited
>> polygamy?
> That is correct. The corporate Church was practicing monogamy. You
>could get youself excommunicated for teaching or practicing anything
>else.
Very good, Guy! So please tell us why Joseph Smith did not get excommunicated
for teaching and practicing the opposite of monogamy.
> Unless, of course, you had been /authorized/ to practice a "higher
>law".
Please provide us with the documentation that Joseph Smith had been "authorized
to practice a higher law." And please use your own standard of providing such
documentation from "approved, doctrinally secure sources."
> Make of that what you will. If I didn't have a rock-solid testimony
>of the prophetic calling of Smith,
But you'd never consider the possibility that your "rock-solid testimony" is
cult brainwashing. Considering the contradictory, illogical, incredible nature
of your responses, you might want to think about it for a second or two.
I'd probably believe, just as you
>do, that Smith invented plural marriage to cover up his own
>philanderings.
That is exactly what the evidence clearly shows. From his attempted advance on
Nancy Johnson, to the Fannie affair, to the inclusion of the AoM, to Cowdery's
excomunication, to Lucinda Harris calling herself JS' "mistress", to Emma's
reaction to Hyrum presenting her with the "revelation," to William Marks'
testimony that Smith attempted to disavow and stop the practice, and many other
incidents, they all combine to reveal that Smith wanted to have sex with other
women, and he invented a "revelation from God" to facilitate his desires.
> But to claim that the /whole Church/ believed in plural marriage any
>time before 1852 is to misrepresent the facts.
When have I ever written that? My entire contention is that PM WAS NOT an
officially-approved LDS doctrine during the time that JS practiced it, nor
until 1852.
>As is claiming that it
>was official doctrine any time before then.
<guffaw> If PM wasn't "official doctrine" when JS practiced it---which you
obviously concede----then that means that JS could secretly teach and practice
a doctrine that was in direct contradiction to his own church's canonized rules
of conduct. That means that your standard contention that "official LDS
doctrine" is only that which has been proposed, sustained, and canonized, is
worthless.
What happened on August 12, 1843, Guy?
>bestRegards,
>----------------------------------------------------------
> Guy R. "BrickWall" Briggs
Randy J.
Kilgore Trout
>€ What next? ... an apologist explanation that Fannie Alger was
really and truly an agent of the Devil sent forth to bedevil
prophet Smith.
More likely an apologist explanation that sometimes god appoints
sexual predators to rule over his church just to test our
faithfulness. That god is one fun guy!
Kilgore
* Sent from RemarQ http://www.remarq.com The Internet's Discussion Network *
The fastest and easiest way to search and participate in Usenet - Free!
Kilgore Trout
thejo...@aol.com (TheJordan6) wrote:
>Very good, Guy! So please tell us why Joseph Smith did not get
excommunicated
>for teaching and practicing the opposite of monogamy.
>
To the LDS, excommunicating Joseph Smith would have been like
excommunicating God.
Raleigh345
snip a lot of the general argument
>
>Was it, Guy? The question was asked of "the Mormons." Was Joseph Smith a
>Mormon, Guy? Or was he of some different sect? Are you saying that the LDS
>church had one public standard of behavior (monogamy) for its rank-and-file,
>and an opposite, secret standard for its elite leaders, which allowed them to
>have extra-marital sex?
This is probably the thing that gave me such an aversion to the LDS Church
that I joined the RLDS instead.
If it is possible to teach tens of thousands of people a sacred and
God-approved moral code and then do just the opposite oneself merely because
one is the "leader", then the leadership could never be trusted.
I could be depriving my family by paying in 10% of my gross income while my
leaders have a secret and unwritten revelation that they are allowed to take
*out* of church funds an amount equal to 10% of their own gross income. This
wouldn't be any different in principle than the way Brother Joseph and his
associates in the leadership quorums handled the official 1835 doctrine of
marriage. Since all these higher laws are kept secret to keep the lower ranking
members from finding out and wanting some, too, who would know? In fact, how do
we know that such a "higher law" of tithing doesn't exist right now?
The truth is, we can't, if we justify Smith's self-aggrandizement on the
basis of his being a prophet like unto Moses. Why? Because the doctrine of the
Church says that all his successors are prophets of the same calibre, and can
do anything and everything he did when God says so; and they are not required
to tell us everything that God says, either.
Regards,
Raleigh
*Nor is the effect of Christ's ordinance taken away..., nor the grace of God's
gifts diminished from such as by faith, ..., do receive the Sacraments
ministered unto them;... although they be ministered by evil men.
Episcopal Art. of Faith 1801
Guy R. Briggs
>
>>> The Lectures on Faith, and Article on Marriage were
>>> all the more Official Mormon Doctrine, Guy.
>>
>
> Marriage" was written by Cowdery, and not approved by Smith.
>
Everything I've read on the subject seems to indicate that it was
written by Cowdery, but I'd certainly be willing to look at evidence
that states otherwise. You got any?
>
> Your purpose in writing that is obviously to discredit the
> "Article on Marriage" as official policy, so that you can
> apologize for Smith's adultery.
>
I'm not discrediting it at all. I'm explaining why it isn't in the
current D&C. Let me summarize:
1) Was never a revelation. Written by Cowdery.
2) Was confusing after the adoption of "the Principle" in 1852.
3) The doctrine is more clear in our current Sec.132 - which
WAS a revelation.
The basic doctrine is spelled out in Jacob 2:30. It states,
basically, when God commands PM we practice it, when God does not
command it, we don't. That doctrine hasn't changed in 170 years. The
/practice/ however, has. So it doesn't matter if Smith had a different
revelation in his back pocket or no, the AoM became official Mormon
practice as soon as it was accepted be common consent (although it was
the unofficial practice from the time the Church was organized!)
I'm not apologizing for "Smith's adultery," either. If Smith was
acting under the aegis of the Lord, then it wasn't adultery. If there
was no aegis, then it was adultery. I believe the former, you believe
the latter.
>
> But above, you call the "Article on Marriage" "good Mormon Doctrine."
>
> Which is your actual position, Guy? Was the "Article on Marriage"
> unapproved, and not binding on Joseph Smith? Or was it "good Mormon
> Doctrine?"
>
The AoM was accepted by common consent. If that's what you mean by
"approved" then yes, it was approved. As I've stated several times, I
think Smith was obeying the will of the Lord - a higher law - and not
committing adultery any more than Abraham was committing adultery, or
Jacob or many of his 12 sons were.
Monogamy is the standard unless and until the Lord says otherwise.
In that sense it IS good Mormon doctrine and is also current policy.
>>
>> At the time that the AoM was published until 1852 the corporate
>> Church was under a law of strict monogamy - even though Smith
>> and several of his inner circle had been given a higher law.
>
> Guy, you and other Mobots have repeatedly stated that the only
> "official, doctrinally secure" sources of Mormon doctrine are
> those which have been received by "revelation," approved by the
> church's governing bodies, and accepted by the church. But
> above, you contradict yourself by stating that Smith had
> received a "higher law" to practice polygamy in secret, contrary
> to the church's sustained, canonized standard of monogamy.
>
Correct, but it's not a contradiction. The "higher law" of plural
marriage meets all of the criteria I have put forward. It was received
by revelation (as early as 1831 or 1832), was recorded in 1843, and was
accepted and approved in 1852. It's an expansion of the idea expressed
in Jacob 2:30 - which was also received by revelation and accepted as
doctrine by the Saints.
But before 1852 and after 1890 the Church officially practiced
monogamy.
>
> You claim that "Smith and his circle had been given a higher
> law." Please provide me with a reference where I can document
> the reception of this "higher law" for myself.
>
That would be what later became Sec.132.
>
> Please inform us as to the date of the inception of the "law,"
> the conference wherein it was discussed and approved, the people
> who voted on it, and the contemporary documentation of it. And
> be sure to document your information from your own standard of
> "doctrinally secure sources."
>
Section 132 is a doctrinally secure source.
"Section 132 contains the doctrinal basis of plural
marriage. Although some were distressed by it,
others found plural marriage 'the most holy and
important doctrine ever revealed' (W. Clayton, in
A. Jensen, _Historical Record_ 6:266). This
revelation was recorded on July 12, 1843, in the
brick store in Nauvoo. At the urging of Hyrum Smith
so that Emma might be convinced of its truth, the
Prophet Joseph Smith dictated it sentence by
sentence. Clayton reported that 'after the whole
was written Joseph asked me to read it through,
slowly and carefully, which I did, and he
pronounced it correct. (CHC 2:106-7). That eveining,
Bishop Newel K. Whitney received permission to copy
the revelation. The next day, his clerk, Joseph C.
Kingsbury, copied the document, which Whitney and
Kingsbury proofread against the original. This copy
was given to Brigham Young in 1847; it was
officially adopted as revelation at a general
conference in Salt Lake City in August 1852, and was
first published for public review in the _Deseret
News) in September 1852.
"The doctrines in this revelation were probably
received sometime in 1831 while the Prophet was
translating the Bible. In response to questions
about the legitimacy of the ancient prophets'
plural marriages, the Lord revealed to Joseph Smith
the conditions and requirements under which plural
marriage was to be observed. Lyman Johnson told
Orson Pratt that 'Joseph had made known to him
[Johnson] as early as 1831, that plural marriage
was a correct principle," but had said it was not
yet time to teach and practice it (MS 40 [1878]:788).
That date was later confirmed in various statements
and affidavits collected by Joseph F. Smith and
others from those who had been close to Joseph
Smith in Nauvoo."
-- _Encyclopedia of Mormonism_
So it meets all my criteria. It was received as revelation (1831),
recorded as such (1843) eventually approved by the Bretheren, presented
to the Church and accepted by common consent (1852) - and even became
part and parcel of the printed canon in 1876 (if memory serves).
>>
>> From 1852 until 1890, the Church openly accepted the practice
>> of plural marriage, although it was /still/ restricted to an
>> estimated 5% of adult males and slightly more than 10% of adult
>> females.
>
> Various historians have estimated higher percentages than those,
> but regardless of that, plural marriage was not "restricted" to
> any such low percentage, but was to the contrary, taught as a
> requirement to reach the "highest level of the celestial kingdom."
>
"The statement about every Mormon having from two to
twenty wives, which has been uttered many, many
times is an absolute falsehood. I presided
ecclesiastically for two years [1880-1882] over one
of the counties during the time we were preaching
and practicing plural marriage, and no individual
was permitted to take a plural wife without the
written recommendation of the Bishop in the ward in
which he resided vouching for his character. Not
only that, the president of the stake had to vouch
for his character as well. And before he could go
to the temple to marry a plpural wife the president
of the Church had to give him a recommend. I had
only two applications for permission to marry plural
wives during the entire time I presided over the
Toole Stake of Zion, covering the entire county of
Toole, and I refused them both."
-- Grant, Heber J., _Gospel Standards_, p.158
>
> You are spreading more misinformation, which is SOP for you.
>
Not knowingly, I don't. And I usually document my sources.
<snip Snow testimony>
bestRegards,
----------------------------------------------------------
Guy R. Briggs
>
>>
>> <snip sour grapes from John Whitmer>
>
> John Whitmer was "called of God by revelation" to be the official
> LDS church historian according to D&C 47. But because his
> perfectly accurate history provides contemporary documentation
> that Joseph Smith's secret wife practice was illicit and unapproved,
> Guy Briggs calls the history "sour grapes." I guess you don't have
> any comment on the fact that Smith tried to get Whitmer to turn over
> his writings so that he could suppress the information about
> polygamy and the Danites, huh Guy?
>
1838) are sometimes a bit biased. It's a little like talking to a
person about his/her ex-spouse after a bitter divorce. The ex might be
a fine individual but to the person you're talking to he/she is evil
incarnate.
I see that a little bit in you, Bro. Jordan.
>>>
>>> On May 8, 1838----exactly one month after Smith had excommun-
>>> icated Cowdery, in part for his having accused Smith of
>>> adultery----and during the time of his affair with Lucinda
>>> Harris----
>
>> Alleged affair ...
>
> "Lucinda Harris is the third woman on Andrew Jenson's list of
> Joseph Smith's plural wives, though Jenson gives no date for
> the marriage and his source is not specified. In addition to
> this sympathetic attestation, the antagonostic Sarah Pratt
> reported that while in Nauvoo Lucinda had admitted a long-
> standing relationship with Smith. It is well-documented that
> he stayed with the Harrises in 1838, and the Pratt reference
> concurs with this date. These data,along with an early Nauvoo
> temple proxy sealing to Smith and other corroborating details
> lead to the conclusion that Lucinda in fact married Smith,
> possibly in 1838." (In Sacred Loneliness: The Plural Wives of
> Joseph Smith," Todd Compton, pp.43-44.)
>
If they were married, then it wasn't an affair, now was it? We get
back to my earlier statement that if it was done under the aegis of the
Lord then it's not adultery.
>
> In 1842, Lucinda characterized herself as Smith's "mistress since
> four years," Guy. That obviously means that she knew that her
> sexual relationship with Smith was no "revelation."
>
Not necessarily - depends on what she meant by "mistress". I think
the most you can read into it was that she realized it was a non-
standard relationship (by Western standards). The 1806 _Webster's_
includes "concubin" as one of the possible definitions, and that seems
to support your assertion, but you still run headlong into the problem
of the Biblical precedent: Many of Biblical Prophets had wives /and/
concubines and that seems OK with God.
>>>
>>> Smith answered a series of questions that had been asked of
>>> him numerous times. One of the questions was: "Do the
>>> Mormons believe in having more wives than one?" And Smith's
>>> answer was, "No, not at the same time. But they believe that
>>> if their companion dies, they have a right to marry again."
>>> ("Teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith", Deseret Book, p.
>>> 119.) Note the similarity of Smith's 1838 remark to the
>>> wording of the 1835 AoM, which you claim that Smith had
>>> nothing to do with:: "We declare that we believe, that one
>>> man should have one wife; and one woman, but one husband,
>>> except in the case of death, when either is at liberty to
>>> marry again."
>>
>> And the answer was strictly true.
>
> Was it, Guy? The question was asked of "the Mormons." Was
> Joseph Smith a Mormon, Guy? Or was he of some different sect?
> Are you saying that the LDS church had one public standard of
> behavior (monogamy) for its rank-and-file, and an opposite,
> secret standard for its elite leaders, which allowed them to
> have extra-marital sex?
>
No, I'm saying that God sometimes asks extraordinary things of
leaders that He does not ask of the rank-and-file. Nephi killing Laban,
as an example. Moses bringing plagues upon Egypt. Abraham sacrificing
his son.
If the point was simnply extra-marital sex then why didn't Smith
just have extra-marital sex? Why go to the time and trouble of
accepting the responsibility of more than one wife - not just for time
but for all eternity - if the goal is getting some "strange"?
>
> Sec.CI - duly accepted by "common consent" and canonized - was
> Mormon doctrine at the time. The question was, specifically, what
> the Mormons - i.e. the corporate Church - believed. At the time
> they believed in strict monogamy as outlined in Sec.CI.
>
> So, you're admitting that Joseph Smith's secret wife practice
> was contrary to his own church's canonized rules of conduct.
> Your saying that Joseph Smith practiced a double standard of
> behavior---one standard for his followers, and a different one
> for himself. D&C 82:5, Guy.
>
Abraham, Moses and Nephi. The standard is not sacrificing our
children, bringing plagues upon our enemies or killing our politicians.
But higher laws are sometimes given to men of God. Not a double
standard, but a higher law.
>
> It's also incredible that in earlier posts, you tried to assert
> that the "Article on Marriage" was written by Cowdery, and not
> approved by Smith, and therefore, not "official LDS doctrine"
> ---but above, you assert the OPPOSITE---that it WAS doctrine for
> the "corporate church." You have no credibility, Guy.
>
You're playing word games. I did assert that the AoM was written by
Cowdery. I never asserted it wasn't official LDS doctrine. quite the
opposite, in fact. I even admitted that Smith hid behind it.
>>
>> A different issue is Smith practicing PM at the same time, and
>> this is where we're split - we believe he was practicing a
>> higher law,
>
> According to what official source? When, where, and by whom was
> this "higher law" approved? What happened on August 12, 1843,
> Guy?
>
Robert D. Foster was sworn as school commissioner at Carthage.
>>
>> you guys believe he was getting his rocks off with anything
>> wearing a skirt.
>
> Smith's extra-marital sexual exploits are well-documented.
>
If he was married to these women, it cannot, by definition, be
extra-marital. It may have been adulterous, depending on if he was
obeying the Lord or marching to the beat of a different drummer.
>
> As I have quoted Compton's doucumentation several times, nearly
> all of Smith's "plural wives" were of child-bearing age, and all
> of the theological justifications for PM were based on sex and
> procreation.
>
You mean "child-bearing" as in Sessions (47), Woodman (48-49), Davis
(52-53), Cleveland (54), Jaques (55-56), Young (56), and Richards (59)?
>>
>> Either way, it doesn't change the author of Sec.CI, doesn't
>> change whether or not it was a revelation, doesn't change
>> where Smith was when it was approved by the general membership.
>
> Now you revert back to your earlier claim.
> Will you please settle on one position or the other?
>
I've never changed my position. CI was written by Cowdery, presented
to the Church and accepted by common consent. It was the official
practice of the Church from then until 1852.
>>
>> Nor does the fact that Smith found it convenient to quote official
>> doctrine to cover his actions.
>
> <chuckle> ***DDDUUUHHH***!!!!!!
>
> Your admission that Smith secretly practiced his secret wife
> doctrine, while publicly preaching the opposite, means that you
> admit that he was a liar and a hypocrite. Your admission means
> that he has no credibility. We don't know when Smith was telling
> the truth, and when he was lying---and you admit it!
>
I admit no such thing. I DO admit that Smith was hiding behind the
official practice of the Church at the time - quoting it, in fact. I
don't condone his equivocations - but I wasn't in his shoes, either.
>
> What does 2 Nephi 9:34-36 say, Guy?
>
If taken literally, it means that Abraham (lied to Pharoah about his
marital status), Jeremiah (lied about what Zedekiah had told him, in
order to save his own skin), David (lied to Shimei about sparing his
life), Elisha (lied about whether Benhadad would recover - for a large
fee, I might add!) and Peter (lied about whether or not he knew Christ)
are all roasting in hell. It means we don't know when they were lying
or telling the truth, and I guess it means we should remove Genesis,
Jeremiah, 1 Kings, 2 Kings Matthew and Peter from the Bible.
Oh, and Joseph Smith, too.
>>>
>>> Guy, it's obvious that this one statement of Smith's utterly
>>> destroys your deceitful contention that Smith did not approve
>>> of the AoM; in 1838, he quoted it practically verbatim.
>>
>> It would be deceitful only if I believed your contention while
>> continuing to publicly state mine. But since I believe you are
>> dead wrong on this issue, it is not deceitful.
>
> It's not a matter of whether you believe that *I* am wrong or
> right; it's a matter of what Joseph Smith HIMSELF stated. You
> have repeatedly contended that Cowdery wrote the AoM while
> Smith was out of town, and that Smith did not approve of it.
> I have provided Smith's exact words, from the LDS-published
> "Teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith," wherein Smith quoted
> the AoM practically verbatim, only three years after it was
> published in the D&C.
>
He said that Mormons practiced monogamy, which was strictly true.
>
> Now, if you still think that your contention isn't "deceitful",
> Guy, then I would submit that you do not know truth from lie.
>
I know very well which is which.
>>
>> Tell me again how Smith's quoting of Sec.CI in 1838 (1) changes
>> its authorship, (2) magically turns it into a revelation and (3)
>> puts Smith in town when it was approved by the general membership.
>
> Smith's quoting of it indicates that your contention that he did
> not approve of it is untenable and deceitful.
>
Nonsense.
>
> Regardless of Smith's being out of town, as Dale has documented,
> Smith was on the committee that approved the 1835 D&C. I shouldn't
> even need to comment on the stupidity of your contention that an
> entire section of the D&C could make it into the "approved,
> sustained canon" without the knowledge and approval of the
> "prophet of God."
>
I don't deny Smith left it in there. That's not the point.
>
> Please provide us with some references from Joseph Smith that
> indicate his disapproval, or displeasure with, the 1835 "Article
> on Marriage", Guy.
>
Already did. That's what started this thread.
>
> Smith lived nine years after it was published; if he didn't
> agree with it, surely you can show us something in writing
> that supports your contention.
>
I don't expect that Smith believed that Mormons should be
circumcised, either. Yet he didn't say a thing about it being included
in the Old Testament. What does that prove?
>>>
>>> I could stop here, but I will continue, and add some more
>>> documentation that demonstrates the depth and breadth of the
>>> deception that Smith and his followers engaged in on the
>>> polygamy issue.
>>
>> You should stop here. You can't change historical fact. Cowdery
>> was the author. It was approved while Smith was out of town. It
>> was taken out after plural marriage had become official practice
>> in 1852 (although it took 'em a few years).
>
> So what you're saying is, that the approved, canonized, published
> D&C is not a credible source of official LDS doctrine or policy---
> right, Guy?
>
Not right. The approved, canonized and published D&C IS a credible
source of LDS doctrine and policy. Monogamy was official Church policy
until 1852. Took a few years before it made it into the new printing.
A similar situation is the recent declaration on family and
marriage. It WAS received by revelation, WAS jointly issued by the FP
and Qot12, WAS accepted in conference by common consent. It's doctrine.
And will, before too many years, be included in printings of the
D&C. The fact that it's not there yet does not mean it's not doctrine.
>
> Mormonism preaches one policy, but practices the opposite---right?
>
No, not right.
>>>
>>> On December 16, 1838----just eight months after he had
>>> excommunicated Cowdery----and while he was in Liberty Jail on
>>> charges of treason and murder----Smith wrote a letter to his
>>> followers, in which he declared his innocence of any wrongdoing,
>>> or any involvement in the Danites that looted and burned out
>>> Missouri "Gentiles". In the same letter, he also denied any
>>> such practice as a "community of wives," and he blamed rumors of
>>> the practice on "dissenters" and "Satan":
>>
>> And can you produce any evidence that a "community of wives" -
>> like a steno pool from which anybody could pick and choose a
>> companion for the evening - ever existed? No, you cannot.
>> Even Brodie comments that such a community never existed
>> anywhere outside of Bennett's imagination.
>
> "Community of wives" is exactly what Smith's secret polygamy
> practice was.
>
No, it was not.
>
> At least eleven of his plural wives were currently married to
> other men, making them "communal wives," IOW, a "free love
> commune."
>
Sorry, no. IMHO, those situations had nothing to do with sex and had
everything to do with Smith's feeble attempt to comply with the higher
law he had been given and yet not really comply. Those women were
married to their earthly husbands for time, to Smith for eternity (but
NOT for time).
And in expansions of the principle further indicates that
governments exist to "secure to each individual the free exercise of
conscience, the right and control of property, and the protection of
life." The US government was doing none of the above at the time, at
least in Nauvoo. When you have to choose between God's law and the law
of the land, which do you choose? Smith chose God's law.
<snip>
>>> Note that what Smith described as being wrong, he was himself
>>> secretly engaging in the exact same activity.
>>
>> No. Smith was marrying women and then, perhaps, sleeping with
>> them.
>
> He was definitely sleeping with them,
>
And you proof of this is ... sperm samples? DNA testing? Children?
None of the above???
>
> but he was only married to one woman---Emma Hale.
>
In the eyes of the state. Our concern is his marital status in
the eyes of God - unless, of course, you believe that God is limited by
secular law.
>
> If you can provide us with documentation of Smith's divorce
> from Emma Hale, and marriage licenses to the other women he
> had sex with, then you can contend that he was married to them.
>
> But since you've already admitted that Smith's extra-marital
> relations were against the law, you're by default admitting that
> they weren't marriages, so the point is moot, and you are on the
> losing side of it.
>
You're arguing secular law, I'm arguing God's law.
>>
>> Bennett was sleeping with them without the benefit of marriage.
>> There's a difference.
>
> Since Smith wasn't married to any of them either, Bennett was
> doing the same thing Smith was. Guy, please, for once in your
> life, think for two seconds-----
>
You implication that I've never given this any thought is both
arrogant and insulting. This is the standard antiMormon ploy: Mormons
don't really know their own doctrine. Mormons are stupid. Mormons are
ignorant.
Or, in your case, any Mormon who doesn't reach the same conclusion I
reached hasn't thought about it.
What a pompous ass!
>
> Smith had not one single negative word to say about John C.
> Bennett's sexual activity until both Smith and Bennett wanted
> Nancy Rigdon. If Bennett had been engaging in some "renegade"
> extra-marital relations, Smith didn't say a word about it UNTIL
> the split over Nancy.
>
You assumption is that Smith was aware of Bennett's activities
before Nancy. You proof of this would be ...?
>
> And to repeat---as though it would actually sink into your brain-----
>
> SMITH BLAMED THE *ENTIRE* POLYGAMY PRACTICE ON BENNETT, STATING
> THAT HE (SMITH) KNEW OF ***NO OTHER MARRIAGE RULE OR SYSTEM THAT
> WHAT IS PUBLISHED IN THE DOCTRINE AND COVENANTS.***
>
> So will you PLEASE STOP LYING ABOUT IT?
>
I have never lied about it. Lying is when you knowing make a
statement that isn't true.
Smith painted himself into a corner. He had not been completely
truthful about the practice of PM - and while we could debate at length
whether or not he was justified in doing so, the bottom line is that
after Bennett's accusations, Smith could not admit to any part of PM
without it appearing that Bennett was right.
>>>
>>> Bennett retaliated by writing a series of letters to the
>>> "Sangamo Journal," exposing Smith's "spiritual wifery"
>>> practice, which prompted Smith and his other polygamists to
>>> issue a series of deceitful denials, including a denial of
>>> the "doctrinal letter" Smith had written to persuade Nancy
>>> into polygamy:
>>
>> <snip reply to Bennett's letters>
>
> How convenient to just snip without comment, documentation
> that destroys your contentions, Guy. I guess I'll just have
> to restore it:
>
They do not destroy my contentions. Let me remind you what they are:
1) Smith didn't write Sec.CI, Cowdery did.
2) Sec.CI was approved while Smith was out of town. Be that as
it may, it was official Mormon practice until 1852.
3) According to Pratt, Smith was "troubled" when he found out.
Nevertheless, he let it remain in the D&C.
4) Smith later found that it was a good thing it was there
because he could plausibly deny the practice of PM. I do
condone Smith's actions on this point - I think it would
have been better if PM had been brought into the open,
but I wasn't there, do not know how many lives would have
been lost had the whole truth been known. I am certainly not
claiming that Smith was being absolutely forthright. Some
of his statements were technically true, but misleading
just the same. Smith was hiding behind the AoM.
5) Smith was practicing a higher law than rank-and-file
Mormons at the time were required to practice. If Smith
was a prophet, he was no more under divine condemnation
than Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Moses or any other Biblical
man of God who had multiple wives.
Which of my contentions do Bennett's letters destroy?
<snip Bennett again>
>>> Smith then had twelve of his followers aid him in his deception
>>> and assassination of Bennett by swearing a false affidavit in
>>> his church newspaper, the "Times and Seasons": "We know of NO
>>> OTHER RULE OR SYSTEM OF MARRIAGE OTHER THAN THE ONE PUBLISHED
>>> FROM THE BOOK OF DOCTRINE AND COVENANTS, and we give this
>>> certificate to show that Dr. J. C. Bennett's secret wife system
>>> is a creature of his own make as we know of NO SUCH SOCIETY in
>>> this place nor never did." (Times and Seasons, vol. 111, October
>>> 21, 1842.)
>>
>> That's becauase the "spiritual wifery" system described by
>> Bennett was a complete and total fabrication, a gross
>> misrepresentation of the plural marriage system.
>
> Your level of cognitive dissonance is incredible, Guy. I guess
> I'll just have to repeat it again. For a "brickwall" like
> yourself, that's about all I can do:
>
Again with the insults, eh?
>
>"We know of NO OTHER RULE OR SYSTEM OF MARRIAGE OTHER THAN THE
> ONE PUBLISHED FROM THE BOOK OF DOCTRINE AND COVENANTS."
>
> Perhaps Cowdery wrote this when Smith was out of town, Guy?
> Oh, I forgot! Cowdery wasn't a Mormon in 1842. I guess some
> other renegade must have written this lie to make Smith look bad.
>
Don't be ridiculous.
>>
>> And it still wasn't Mormon doctrine.
>
> If what is published in the D&C, and is preached and expounded
> on by the "prophet", is not "Mormon doctrine," then you are
> conceding that officially approved, canonized LDS "scriptures"
> are worthless as reliable sources for truth or policy.
>
The "it" in my reply was PM, not monogamy. Monogamy was published in
the D&C, preached and expounded by the Prophet and was Mormon doctrine
and practice at the time, so the above statement is nonsensical.
>
> You are admitting the Mormon leaders can teach one policy
> publicly, and an opposite policy secretly. Hmmmmm...Maybe
> that's the origin of that "lying for the Lord" culture in
> Mormonism.
>
There is no "lying for the Lord" culture in Mormonism. In fact, we
believe that would be the culture of antiMormons because we see so much
misinformation coming from your side of the aisle. IMHO, the truth is
that we've simply drawn different conclusions from the data available
and we're both passionate in presenting it.
>
> And I shouldn't even have to repeat that you are once again
> contradicting yourself by stating that the AoM wasn't "Mormon
> doctrine"... <snip>
>
Since I'm not making that claim I sincerely wish you'd QUIT
repeating yourself.
>
> ... when in revious posts you claim that it was "good Mormon
> doctrine."
>
>> And it still doesn't change the authorship of Sec.CI or the
>> whereabouts of Smith when it was accepted by the membership.
>
> Since Smith himself quoted the AoM practically verbatim, that
> indicates his public approval of it. For you to continue to
> contend that his absence negates the AoM as normative public
> policy is an indication that you are utterly insane.
>
More insults.
>
> That doesn't even begin to address the real issue---that of
> whether or not Joseph Smith was a "prophet of God."
>
Ah, grasshoppah - that is the REAL issue. Was Smith a bona fide
prophet of God? If he was, then he had the Biblical precedent to
practice PM. OTOH, if Smith was NOT a prophet of God, then he was, in
fact, breaking both legal and moral laws.
But to claim Smith wasn't really a Prophet because he practiced PM
is putting cart before horse. Try that argument with Abraham. Can we
say that Abraham wasn't really a "prophet of God" because he had
children with both Hagar and Sarah?
>
> If Smith had received a "secret" revelation to practice
> polygamy---and Smith was in constant communion with "God"---
> then "God" should have informed his "prophet" that Cowdery was
> inserting a policy into the "canon" that would contradict the
> "polygamy revelation," and that would make a liar and hypocrite
> of Smith, and destroy his credibility unto this day. The fact
> that the AoM made it into the "sustained, approved" canon reveals
> that Smith had no communion with Deity as he claimed to. And
> that's the real issue.
>
You have a strange idea of how revelation is supposed to work for
somebody who claims to have once been a TBM. As I have stated before,
revelation seems to be more of a "pull" technology than a "push"
technology. It comes when you ask for it, it doesn't come and beat you
over the head.
So if Smith had asked God, "Is Oliver up to mischief behind my
back?" then he might have gotten an answer. I don't expect it occurred
to Smith to ask that question.
>>>
>>> Some brainwashed Mormons assert that Smith's "plural marriage"
>>> was a "revelation from God," and therefore right and holy; and
>>> that Bennett had an aberrant system of "spiritual wifery" that
>>> was somehow different and not proper.
>>
>> Bingo. Except for the brainwashed part, of course.
>
> That is for each reader of this thread to decide for themselves.
> Please inform us as to the difference between Smith's adultery
> and Bennett's adultery.
>
I'll answer a question with a question. What was the difference
between all of David's other wives and Bathsheeba? The answer is that
all of the other wives had been given to David by the Lord through a
Prophet. But David took Bathsheeba on his own, without authority. That
made it morally wrong. Plus there was that "making sure Uriah was out
of the picture permanently" thing.
Smith was authorized, Bennett was not. Smith was marrying women (in
the eyes of the Church, if not in the eyes of the state), Bennett was
not. That's the difference.
>>>
>>> However, the above quote from Smith's own newspaper makes it
>>> obvious that Smith tried to blame the ENTIRE practice on
>>> Bennett, and that his church's only authorized system of
>>> marriage was that as outlined in the "Article of Marriage," the
>>> same article that you assert that Smith did not approve of.
>>> So, Guy, if you keep repeating your assertion that Smith did
>>> not approve of the AoM, you will only succeed in making
>>> yourself as offensive a liar as Joseph Smith was.
>>
>> Bzzzzt. Wrong. But thanks for playing anyway. The only
>> authorized system of marriage accepted by the Church by common
>> consent and properly canonized was monogamy. Plain and simple.
>
> Very good, Guy! Your above admission does two things: It
>
> A) Again destroys your ridiculous assertion that
> Cowdery inserted the AoM without Smith's approval and
>
How so? My assertion all along was that it was official
doctrine/practice REGARDLESS of whether Smith approved it or not.
>
> B) It forces you to concede that Smith's secret plural marriages
> were against his own church's sustained, canonized rules of conduct.
>
Quite true. So the question is, "Was Smith operating under the same
aegis as Prophets of old?"
>
> Now, if you can provide us with the documentation of a "secret
> polygamy revelation", prior to the 1843 "revelation on celestial
> marriage," and show that it was discussed, voted on, and approved
> by the First Presidency and the High Council (which was the
> governing body at the time), you can go a step towards showing us
> that Smith's practice of polygamy from the early 1830's onwards
> was something other than just adultery.
>
All the above would do is prove that it was Mormon doctrine. Since
I've never claimed that it was - quite the opposite, in fact - the
above is irrelevant.
bestRegards,
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