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A Joseph Smith quote from our quorum lesson today.


kamenraider

  

24 members have voted

  1. 1. Is the September 27, 1886 revelation to John Taylor merely a "pretended revelation"?

    • Yes.
      5
    • No.
      11
    • I don't know.
      8


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All Saints! profit by this important Keyâ??that in all your trials, troubles, temptations, afflictions, bonds, imprisonments and death, see to it, that you do not betray heaven; that you do not betray Jesus Christ; that you do not betray the brethren; that you do not betray the revelations of God, whether in the Bible, Book of Mormon, or Doctrine and Covenants, or any other that ever was or ever will be given and revealed unto man in this world or that which is to come. Yea, in all your kicking and flounderings, see to it that you do not this thing, lest innocent blood be found upon your skirts, and you go down to hell.

--Joseph Smith, from "Chapter 32: Responding to Persecution with Faith and Courage," of Teachings of Presidents of the Church: Joseph Smith, SLC: LDS Church 2007, pg. 373.

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Hi kamenraider,

I voted No. (You could have guessed.) I noticed that 70% voted no. Hmm.

This wickedpedia article talks about the Sept 27, 1886 John Taylor revelation, and quotes it, if anyone wants to read it.

And it also quotes this:

In an â??Official Statementâ? from the First Presidency of the LDS Church, signed by Heber J. Grant, A.W. Ivins and J. Reuben Clark, Jr., it states: â??It is alleged that on September 26-27, 1886, President John Taylor received a revelation from the Lord, the purported text is given in publications circulated apparently by or at the instance of this organization (Fundamentalists). As to this pretended revelation it should be said that the archives of the Church contain no such a revelation; the archives contain no record of any such a revelation, nor any evidence justifying a belief that any such a revelation was ever given. From the personal knowledge of some of us, from the uniform and common recollection of the presiding quorums of the Church, from the absence in the Church archives of any evidence whatsoever justifying any belief that such a revelation was given, we are justified in affirming that no such a revelation exists.â?

So mine and all the 70% no votes contradict President Heber J Grant. But if you read the above, President Grant may have been deflecting the entire account of what Woolley claimed happened that night and the next day. I do not believe that this or any John Taylor revelation really supports the Woolley story and claims. One should read J Max Anderson's "The Polygamy Story". I could find a link to it online, if anyone is interested.

But I do believe the revelation was from God. Woolley tried to hijack it for his claims, but that does not mean it was not authentic. So I believe one cannot live by the New and Everlasting Covenant of Marriage revealed in D&C 132 and not be ready to live plural marriage when necessary. I am convinced Plural Marriage is necessary when 1. the Lord specifically commands it, 2. when a faithful woman loses her husband to adultery (D&C 132:44), and 3. when a faithful widow in the covenant requires it.

A people who plan to live by D&C 132 and never live any plural marriage are contradicting themselves.

Richard

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Here's a photo of the revelation:

41993796.jpg

Here's what it says:

September 27, 1886

My son John: You have asked me concerning the New and Everlasting Covenant and how far it is binding upon my people. Thus saith the Lord All commandments that I give must be obeyed by those calling themselves by my name unless they are revoked by me or by my authority and how can I revoke an everlasting covenant For I the Lord am everlasting and my covenants cannot be abrogated nor done away with; but they stand forever. Have I not given my word in great plainness on this subject? Yet have not great numbers of my people been negligent in the observance of my law and the keeping of my commandment, and yet have I borne with them these many years and this because of their weakness because of the perilous times. And furthermore it is more pleasing to me that men should use their free agency in regard to these matters. Nevertheless I the Lord do not change and my word and my covenants and my law do not. And as I have heretofore said by my servant Joseph all those who would enter into my glory must and shall obey my law And have I not commanded men that if they were Abraham's seed and would enter into my glory they must do the works of Abraham. I have not revoked this law nor will I for it is everlasting and those who will enter into my glory must obey the conditions thereof, even so Amen.

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...

1) Was it ever approved by the FP and the Qo12? No.

2) Must entering the new and everlasting covenant require plural marriage? No.

Hi BCSpace,

1) In the "all is not well in Zion" school, that does not mean the revelation was not from God.

2) I agree that D&C 132 speaks of the NAECOM in connection with a man and one wife. It verifies that those who enter into this covenant correctly with one wife-- and keep the conditions of this covenant-- will have an eternal marriage.

However, the D&C 132 covenant requires that those who enter into it live by the conditions of that covenant. And part of those conditions is that if the Lord commands plural marriage to raise up seed they will obey. Also, if a woman loses her husband to death or apostacy, the covenant requires that she be offered remarriage by a faithful man in the covenant, even if it means a plural marriage.

Do you agree these conditions are part of the deal?

Richard

(wrong word fixed)

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  • 4 weeks later...
I think I understand what critics and doubters would want to make of it but...

1) Was it ever approved by the FP and the Qo12? No.

Heber J. Grant evidently said it was, though:

Every single one of the men who signed this Official Statement [of the First Presidency, dated June 17, 1933] know that it is false. Besides, this statement denies the revelation given to John Taylor in 1886, together with the important instructions and authority given by the Lord at that time. Heber J. Grant stated only a few years ago that this same revelation was genuine and had been passed upon and accepted by the Quorum of the Twelve; he being one of their number at the time when the revelation was given.

--Charles W. Kingston, et al., letter of July 19, 1933 to the Idaho Falls Stake Presidency and High Council, quoted in Silencing Mormon Polygamy, by Drew Briney, [no city], USA: Hindsight Publications 2008, pg. 154.

2) Must entering the new and everlasting covenant require plural marriage? No.

Wilford Woodruff answered this question differently than you do:

You ask some other questions concerning how many living wives a man must have to fulfil the law.

When a man, according to the revelation, marries a wife under the holy order which God has revealed and then marries another in the same way, he enters into the new and everlasting covenant, and so far as he has gone he has obeyed the law.

--Wilford Woodruff letter to Bishop S. A. Woolley (9th Ward, SLC) May 22, 1888, First Presidency letterpress copybooks, 1877-1949, Vol. 18: 841-843

The new and everlasting Covenant is marriage, plural marriage. Men may say that with their single marriage the same promises and blessings had been granted: 'Why cannot I attain to as much as with three or four?' Many question me in this manner; I suppose they are afraid of [the] Edmunds[-Tucker Act]. What is the covenant? It is the eternity of the marriage covenant, and includes a plurality of wives, and takes both to make the law. The Lord leads the mind step by step to this point. First, that all covenants must be made by his power. Next, the eternity of the covenant reaching into eternity. After this the Lord tells us what the law is and how he justified his servants. God commanded Abraham and Sarah gave Hagar to Abraham because this was the law ordained for the fullness and glory of God before the world was. This was the law and from Hagar sprang many nations. The Lord has said that to whom this revelation is given, that they are eligible to this law, its blessings and its requirements. The men can only be saved by acts of righteousness and the women are under the same law. Joseph Smith declared that all who become heirs of God and joint heirs of Christ must obey his law or they cannot enter into the fullness, and if they do not they may loose the one talent. When men are offered knowledge and they refuse it they will be damned and there is not a man that is sealed by this priesthood but covenants to enter into the fullness of the law, and the same with the woman. She says she will observe all that pertains to the new and everlasting covenant. Both are under the covenant, and must obey if they wish to enter into a continuation of the lives or of the seeds.

--President Wilford Woodruff, Quarterly Conference held March 3rd and 4th, 1883; Sunday, 2 PM, Utah Stake Historical Record #64904/CH0/1877-1888, pg. 271.

Our young people come here to be married to be husband and wife through all eternity taking upon them covenants to observe all the laws, rites and ceremonies pertaining to the Holy order of matrimony, this is the way God has established, and the ceremony that seals one wife to a man seals other wives. And when a man takes a wife they enter this sacred order and covenant to observe all the rites in this. The man covenants to take more wives, the woman covenants to do the part of Sarah and gives her consent for him to take more wives. Hoped the young people would understand these things. A covenant not kept is a covenant broken. When we enter that covenant we must continue in it. Still there is no one here who will say you shall take more wives, that is left entirely with yourselves.

--James G. Bleak, St. George Temple Minute Book, October 4, 1888, pgs. 102-103.

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Heber J. Grant evidently said it was, though:

Wilford Woodruff answered this question differently than you do:

Every single one of the men who signed this Official Statement [of the First Presidency, dated June 17, 1933] know that it is false. Besides, this statement denies the revelation given to John Taylor in 1886, together with the important instructions and authority given by the Lord at that time. Heber J. Grant stated only a few years ago that this same revelation was genuine and had been passed upon and accepted by the Quorum of the Twelve; he being one of their number at the time when the revelation was given.

--Charles W. Kingston, et al., letter of July 19, 1933 to the Idaho Falls Stake Presidency and High Council, quoted in Silencing Mormon Polygamy, by Drew Briney, [no city], USA: Hindsight Publications 2008, pg. 154.

Do you have a primary source for this or only one reported by Charles Kingston?

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I think it's clear, however, that in the minds of many (all?) early leaders in the Church, after the exodus but prior to the 1890 revelation, there was no distinction between the "new and everlasting covenant" of marriage and the "plurality of wives". The two were one and the same.

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  • 3 weeks later...

I thought this was interesting:

The revelation of 1886 was brought up to the attention of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles by John W. Taylor; Francis M. Lyman denied the genuineness of it; Joseph Fielding Smith, Assistant Church Historian at the time, stated that he had personally taken it up with the First Presidency, consisting of Joseph F. Smith, Anthon H. Lund and John Henry Smith and they pronounced it genuine; that if Brother Lyman had not seen or heard of it before, it was his own fault, as it had been in the archives of the Church for several years, and that he, Joseph Fielding, was going to treat it as a genuine revelation from the Lord.

--Items from the Book of Remembrance of Joseph Musser, pg. 8, quoted in The 1886 Visitations of Jesus Christ and Joseph Smith to John Taylor by Lynn L. Bishop, SLC: Latter Day Publications 1998, pg. 63.

Also, regarding this revelation having not been presented at General Conference, I found it interesting that Robert R. Openshaw mentioned in his book The Notes (on pg. 506) that Max Anderson had written in his book The Polygamy Story: Fiction and Fact that the authenticity of the 1886 revelation "has not been established" and then commented in the following manner; "If he means by this, to be presented at conference, indeed it hasn't although it was suggested that President Harold B. Lee desired to do this very thing just prior to his death."

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I think the "revelation" is probably legit. I have no reason to doubt it or accept it. I'm kinda ambivalent about it.

If the 1886 revelation is not genuine, then that means that John W. Taylor would have had to have forged it, because he said that he found it among his father John Taylor's papers after his death. How would any other potential forgers have known that John Taylor was in hiding at the Rouche home and have been able to have access to Pres. Taylor's desk there between the time of his death and John W. Taylor's arrival at the scene? The idea that John W. Taylor, a member of the Quorum of the Twelve, would forge a revelation from the Lord and claim that his father received it though, is of course ridiculous.

I talked to a granddaughter of John Taylor one time and asked her about the 1886 revelation and she said that it was genuine, and that the family knew about it, but that it was not meant to be for the Church.

I think this quote is interesting:

My grandfather, Louis Kelsch, Sr., bore a testimony of being invited by Brother Lorin

Woolley to go to Salt Lake City to the Zions Bank. There, Lorin Woolley opened up

his safety deposit box and took out a handwritten copy of the 1886 Revelation in

President John Taylor's own handwriting which he showed to Louis Kelsch. J. Leslie

Broadbent's wife, Rula, bore testimony of this into her 90th year and was heard by

many witnesses.

--Sallee Kelsch Jessop, Testimony given in Herriman, Utah, 1997. As printed in 1886 Addendum, Deseret

Historical Dept., September 1998, quoted in Silencing Mormon Polygamy, by Drew Briney, [no city], USA: Hindsight Publications 2008, pg. 156.

I think it's interesting because a former mission president and president of a seventies quorum (Louis A. Kelsch Sr.) goes to Lorin Woolley to see a copy of the 1886 revelation. That means that either Lorin Woolley had his own copy in John Taylor's handwriting in his own safe deposit box, or that Rodney Badger or John W. Taylor had given Lorin Woolley a key to their safe deposit box where the original was kept.

Among other things I find that a good many begin to

think that we are very much persecuted and proscribed in our marital

relations, according to the revelations which God has given us, and there

is sometimes a little trembling in the knees. I am pleased there is not

much of it, but there is a little once in a while. Sometimes I get advice

from outsiders, from the newspapers, etc., and sometimes from some of our

brethren, (but from very few of our brethren) in relation to these

matters.

God has given us a revelation in regard to celestial marriage. I did

not make it. He has told us certain things pertaining to this matter, and

they would like us to tone that principle down and change it and make it

applicable to the views of the day. This we cannot do; nor can we

interfere with any of the commands of God to meet the persuasions or

behests of men. I cannot do it, and will not do it.

I find some men try to twist round the principle in any way and every

way they can. They want to sneak out of it in some way. Now God don't

want any kind of sycophancy like that. He expects that we will be true to

Him, and to the principles He has developed, and to feel as Job did

"Though He slay me, yet will I trust in Him." Though other folks would

slay us, yet we will trust in the living God and be true to our covenants

and to our God. These are my feelings in relation to that matter. We

have also been told that "it is not mete that men who will not abide my

law shall preside over my Priesthood," and yet some people would like very

much to do it. Well, they cannot do it; because if we are here, as I said

before, to do the will of our Father who sent us, and He has told us what

to do, we will do it, in the name of Israel's God and all who sanction

it say Amen (the vast congregation responded with a loud "Amen.")

and those that don't may say what they please. (Laughter.)

--John Taylor, JD 25:309-310.

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