Question About The Sealing Keys

[Storm Rider]

My understanding is that the Kirtland endowment was essentially what we now consider the initiatory ordinances.

No, I don't think that is accurate. The two endowments are different in process and intent. The Nauvoo endowment is the endowment used today with modifications.

[Cobalt-70]

Which is what?

Because I understand "sealing" pretty broadly.

Today, when we talk about "sealing," we are referring specifically to the temple marriage ceremony, or the temple sealing ceremony. We understand the "sealing power" to be the power to perform temple marriages or temple sealings. This power is only given to temple sealers. But this is a very narrow, specific understanding of "sealing" that sort of existed in the 1840s, but appears to only have been fully developed in the 20th century.

Originally, to be "sealed" was to receive the "power from on high" that was given to all endowed people. This endowment was first given in 1831, when the first High (i.e., Melchizedek) Priests were ordained in Ohio. (see D&C 38:32). D&C 77:7-9 (dated 1832), notes that these high priests were "sealed." It was a metaphor that the name of God was "sealed" on their foreheads.

Circa 1841, there was a different "sealing power," which was given to Hyrum, as Patriarch of the church. This "sealing power" was the power to seal people to their essentially-inevitable salvation--in other words, to make their calling and election sure. (D&C 124:124.) This sealing power was apparently considered to derive from the patriarchal priesthood, which was passed down to Hyrum from his father, who received it in 1833, which was before Joseph Smith's vision of Elijah in 1836.

Yet another understanding of the "sealing power" appears in D&C 132:7, 19 (1843). It includes the power to "seal" marital covenants for eternity. Those who are sealed in this way were also considered to be sealed to their salvation (D&C 132:19), which ties it to Hyrum's sealing power--except that this sealing power is given exclusively to Joseph in the last days (v. 7). This "sealing power" was not yet linked to Elijah, and not linked to the "sealing" of parents to children.

Somebody, either Joseph Smith or Brigham Young, introduced in Nauvoo the idea that not only could you seal marital covenants between men and women, but you could also seal a comparable bond between a man and another man. The idea was that the Celestial kingdom was a big tree-like structure, with men sealed to their wive(s) and men sealed to other men, forming a tree with Adam (Brigham Young's father god) at the base. So women would be sealed to their husband, and the husband would be sealed to one or more other wives, as well as another man (preferably someone high up within the church hierarchy) within the Celestial "tree"

So in a sense, by 1844 there was a concept of "sealing" kind of similar to what we understand it to be today. But it had nothing to do with genealogy, and I don't think that anybody understood that it was a power of the priesthood that Elijah had specifically restored. The thing that was linked to Elijah circa 1844 was the idea that Elijah restored the "keys of this dispensation" which allowed people to be baptized and anointed, and thus sealed to their salvation. I think it is in this sense that Joseph Smith said, in 1844, "I would advise all the Saints to go to with their might and gather together all their living relatives to [the temple], that they may be sealed and saved, that they may be prepared against the day that the destroying angel goes forth; and if the whole Church should go to with all their might to save their dead, seal their posterity, and gather their living friends, and spend none of their time in behalf of the world, they would hardly get through before night would come, when no man can work." (HC 6:183-84). Living people and dead posterity were "sealed" because they were anointed and saved, thus sealed to their salvation, not because they are proxy participants in a sealing ceremony between parent and child.

[Cobalt-70]

In any case, the following link seems to absolutely refute your claim that geneology and sealing to our ancestors is "a 20th century invention."

http://emp.byui.edu/...ah,Messiah.HTML

I disagree. I think this quote supports the view that Smith believed Elijah's "sealing power" was the power to make one's calling and election sure. This is the same understanding found in D&C 124:124. It is the power to seal a person to their salvation. Joseph Smith is not talking about a "sealing ceremony" between a parent and a child.

Nevertheless, this power of Elijah to seal both the living and the dead to their salvation does serve to bind the fathers to the children. But is is in a more metaphorical sense than modern Mormons might understand. The power of Elijah is to "seal up our dead to come forth in the first resurrection" just as the living are sealed to eternal life. Thus, the effect is "to seal those who dwell on earth to those who dwell in heaven" so that both the living and the dead enter the eternal kingdom together. The "sealing" between the living and the dead is a metaphorical and spiritual connection that occurs as the living are baptized and anointed for the dead.

[Cobalt-70]

My understanding is that the Kirtland endowment was essentially what we now consider the initiatory ordinances.

I don't think so. The Kirtland endowment was modeled after the endowment in the book of Acts after the ascension of Jesus, when everybody started speaking in tongues like Pentecostals do today. I believe there was a foot washing ritual performed in the Kirtland temple, but that ritual had been introduced a few years earlier, in the School of the Prophets, and it is not the same as the later initiatory ritual. It was a ritual based on the New Testament foot washing by Jesus of his disciples. You might say, though, that in the 1840s, Joseph Smith adapted the earlier foot-washing ceremony into the whole-body bathing ceremony that constituted the original Initiatory ordinance.

[Alan]

Various statements of several leaders of the Church who were there to witness the ordinances and events. The closest equivalent is what we now call Initiatories, or washings and anointings. The endowment itself in Kirtland was the endowment of the Spirit to most of the participants in the ordinances, preparatory to missionaries going into all the world. Here is what President Brigham Young said about the situation:

Thank you.

That is very helpful.

[volgadon]

This quotation, given in 1844, still does not refer to the genealogical "sealing" of the dead as we know it today. Here, the 1844 understanding of "sealing" is still not the "sealing power" as we know today. It does not even refer to the "sealing" ordinance here. What it means is that when one's progenitors are baptized, confirmed, or anointed, the current generation is "bound" to their progenitors by doing this work, such as baptism, for them. It is a more metaphorical binding than what we think of today when we use the word "sealing power."

Metaphorical? Nonsense. http://books.google.com/books?id=qrlT0KtNUu0C&printsec=frontcover&dq=samuel+brown+in+heaven+as+it+is+on+earth+sealing&hl=en&sa=X&ei=1swsUaylGaGDywGFp4HoDA&ved=0CDUQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=sealing&f=false

Elsewhere in the book Brown remarks that, "In Smith's chain, relationships were the essence of ontological glory."

[CV75]

Today, when we talk about "sealing," we are referring specifically to the temple marriage ceremony, or the temple sealing ceremony.

Only when we are talking about the temple marriage ceremony, or the temple sealing ceremony. We also talk about sealing in terms of other "covenants, contracts, bonds, obligations, oaths, vows, performances, connections, associations, or expectations" that are made and entered into and sealed by the Holy Spirit of promise.

[Cobalt-70]

Metaphorical? Nonsense. http://books.google....sealing&f=false

Elsewhere in the book Brown remarks that, "In Smith's chain, relationships were the essence of ontological glory."

I don't see anything in Brown contradicting my interpretation of Joseph Smith's 1844 statement. Mind you, I'm not saying that this was the only usage of the "sealing" idea that Joseph Smith ever used. But never in Smith's teachings do we have a formulation of Elijah's role in a sealing ceremony between parents and children as elaborated by Joseph F. Smith in D&C 138.

[volgadon]

I don't see anything in Brown contradicting my interpretation of Joseph Smith's 1844 statement. Mind you, I'm not saying that this was the only usage of the "sealing" idea that Joseph Smith ever used. But never in Smith's teachings do we have a formulation of Elijah's role in a sealing ceremony between parents and children as elaborated by Joseph F. Smith in D&C 138.

You claimed it was more metaphorical than anything. If you read pages 165-6, you'll see that it was anything but metaphorical. "This Mormon Elijah provided the cement to unite the society of heaven, an extension of sealing power that secured election for the Saints both individually and corporately."

[pmccombs1]

There is no way to know that they "never spoke of the incident", we simply have no written record following Cowdery's journal entry.

True enough.

This is quite dubious. Do you have other examples?

I understand Denver Snuffer lays out this particular argument in great detail in one of his books, including a couple of other examples. It might be nice to see a detailed rebuttal to his argument sometime.

That is not completely accurate. The editorial comment suggests, given that the vision was experienced by Joseph and Oliver, exclusively, the only way Warren Cowdery could have gotten the information was by copying from a non-extant copy or by dictation from Joseph or Oliver. You left that part out. I suppose it is possible that within the few days Cowdery had the journal, he could have made the whole thing up, but there is precisely zero evidence for this and it seems a bit far fetched to boot.

Some might say the entire genre of written religious experience is a bit far-fetched, and accounts of visitations of this magnitude that only come to light years later give the impression of fanciful collaboration, easily devised and easily forgotten. This event ought to be a big deal, but it seems to have been treated as an afterthought and largely forgotten until 1850.

It doesn't appear to me that he investigated the matter all that thoroughly.

I wouldn't know, but I've thought his claims sounded very plausible. That's likely because I'm a bit of a doubter.

It doesn't appear that you are too familiar with the history of how the various versions of the Doctrine & Covenants came to be or with the development of the History of the Church. It was not left to a chance discovery, the vision was recorded right where it was supposed to be, in Joseph Smith's journal. The next version of the Doctrine and Covenants was published in 1844, but it was, essentially, a reprint of the 1835 edition, with a few changes. The next version to be published was in 1876 which added 26 new revelations (including Section 110), 25 of which, all happened prior to the 1844 edition, but were not included in that version. The date of publication has very little relevance to the reality of an event. Incidentally, Section 109, the dedication of the Kirtland Temple was also absent from the Doctrine & Covenants until 1876

No, I'm not really familiar with the process that went into the publication of the D&C, but I know that what became section 110 was published in the newspaper before it got canonized. You're saying that this sort of dubious treatment is actually common for the D&C. I'm only skeptical of these momentous revelations sitting idle for so long, relatively obscure and unknown (i.e. "taught in secret"), until they are finally canonized many years after they were allegedly experienced by a man who is dead and gone. Visitations, keys, and powers revealed--and apparently not worth shouting from the rooftops at the time. "Here is some Truth from Heaven for the benefit of mankind," saith the angel, "Just keep it on the low-down, OK?" It smacks of made-up stuff.

Well, that's my skeptic's voice speaking. You may have greater reason to believe than I have to doubt.

[Cobalt-70]

You claimed it was more metaphorical than anything. If you read pages 165-6, you'll see that it was anything but metaphorical. "This Mormon Elijah provided the cement to unite the society of heaven, an extension of sealing power that secured election for the Saints both individually and corporately."

I think we're quibbling on the meaning of "metaphorical." I would say that in Joseph Smith's circa 1844 thinking, Elijah's "cement" of corporate salvation between generations is a metaphor, and is much less concrete (sorry) than what we currently imagine the "sealing power" as exercised by temple sealers, to specifically "seal" a father and mother with a son or daughter. It's also less literal and more metaphorical than Smith's somewhat different idea, around 1843, that earthly bonds, contracts, covenants, and oaths could be "sealed in heaven" as per D&C 132.

Edited February 27, 2013 by Cobalt-70