Joseph Smith's Polygamy

[JulieM]

TheSkepticChristian,

Here are some stats for the numbers who practiced polygamy:

"At present, perhaps the best estimates of the number of polygamous families among late-nineteenth-century Latter-day Saints range between 20 and 30 percent. Nevertheless, studies of individual communities show a wide variation in the incidence of plurality. Using 1880 census data, geographer Lowell C. “Ben” Bennion found the lowest percentage of polygamous families—5 percent—in Davis County’s south Weber and the highest—67 percent—in Orderville. He found 15 percent in Springville. In a study of St. George, historian Larry Logue found nearly 30 percent of the families polygamous in 1870 and 33 percent in 1880."

http://www.beliefnet.com/columnists/flunkingsainthood/2011/07/polygamy-by-numbers-how-many-mormons-were-really-involved.html

Edited August 14, 2015 by JulieM

[ttribe]

Okay, so your point was? 

 

I'm not going to restate it for you.  If you'll go back and read my post where I stated plainly my observation on what happens when polygamy becomes an institutional practice, and do so without these preconceived notions on what you think I am saying, then you can come back with questions that make sense.

 

In the meantime, if you are unwilling to consider the notion that there are types of abuse that are unique to this practice in an institutional setting, there's not much else I can do for you.  Ignoring the existing documented abuses leaves you willfully ignorant on this issue.

[TheSkepticChristian]

In the meantime, if you are unwilling to consider the notion that there are types of abuse that are unique to this practice in an institutional setting, there's not much else I can do for you.  Ignoring the existing documented abuses leaves you willfully ignorant on this issue.

 

What you are describing is called a cult and abusive religious leaders, of course I am against that. Both polygamous and monogamous cults are bad. Are you sure all polygamists belong to a dangerous cult? 

 

Do they look like a cult?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ci6t5jGR_Zo

 

Do you have any evidence that Joseph Smith was abusive towards his wives? Did he threaten them? 

 

Are you sure all polygamist leaders are abusive? 

Edited August 15, 2015 by TheSkepticChristian

[JLHPROF]

 

Have any of you read any of the following books?

 

• Answer Them Nothing, by Weyermann
• Prophet's Prey, by Brower
• Malignant Pied Pipers of Our Time, by Olsson

 

 

No, I actually know many polygamists, spend time with them socially, have visited their homes.

I think I have a slightly more realistic view than some sensationalized books.

Unless you think books like Under the Banner of Heaven teach real Church history?

[JLHPROF]

Do you have any evidence that Joseph Smith was abusive towards his wives? Did he threaten them? 

Are you sure all polygamist leaders are abusive? 

 

Anyone that believes polygamy is inherently abusive and that all polygamists are abusive is purely prejudiced and completely ignorant.

Does abuse exist among polygamists?  Sure, just as it does among members of the Church, the Catholic Church, the Muslim religion, the conservative Christian sects, and I've even heard of it among the atheists.

 

I'm not suggesting ignoring abuse, but I really wish people would educate themselves about entire groups of people before passing judgement.

[Robert F. Smith]

....................................................................  

Quote

About 70 percent of married men admitted to cheating on their wives

http://magazine.foxn...heat-more-women

Yes, and about 50-60 percent of women cheat.  These stats have been climbing in recent decades.

Edited August 15, 2015 by Robert F. Smith

[Teancum]

Just think back to the way you used to think and believe about the Church and the Prophet Joseph Smith before you arrived at the point where you are today; and then imagine what you would have said in response to the question you asked (above) and you'll have your answer.

No not really. Part of what has caused me to be skeptical of Joseph Smith was asking myself why for so long did I give him a pass for what I viewed as abhorrent behavior as it relates to plural marriage when I would never give anyone else the same tolerance for such behavior. I dedended Joseph and LDS polygamy for years. But I just could not do it anymore. Many other dynamic religious leaders and powerful men throughout history have introduced strange marriage and sexual practices into their sects as well as just simply been sexually promiscuous to a high degree. I just decided at least for me Joseph could simply not be the one special one that had divine sanction from God for something that seems so ungodly.

[Teancum]

You missed the point of my question. I said I wanted you to provide EVIDENCE the God REVEALED a particular doctrine. Saying you agree with a particular doctrine is not the same thing as saying you have provable EVIDENCE that God actually revealed that particular doctrine. Do you now understand the distinction? If so, I'm interested to know if you can provide some provable evidence, beyond a mere positive emotional response, that God revealed the Golden Rule?

Why are you asking and what relevance does it have to this thread?

[Teancum]

Deleted post

Edited August 15, 2015 by Teancum

[Bobbieaware]

Why are you asking and what relevance does it have to this thread?

Because you said you haven't seen any proof that God commanded Joseph Smith to practice plural marriage, as if we are to assume that there exists plenty of proof that God has commanded human beings to do other things. And so I'm asking you, aside from gut feelings and intuition (which aren't forms of proof), what proof do you have that God commanded men to do anything else? You seem to place a high premium on proof, and so I quite naturally assumed you believe there is sound proof that God commanded men to do other things. So if you believe there is such proof, I'd be very interested to see it. But if you don't have such proof, I'm wondering why you won"t believe something unless there is proof?

[Bobbieaware]

No not really. Part of what has caused me to be skeptical of Joseph Smith was asking myself why for so long did I give him a pass for what I viewed as abhorrent behavior as it relates to plural marriage when I would never give anyone else the same tolerance for such behavior. I dedended Joseph and LDS polygamy for years. But I just could not do it anymore. Many other dynamic religious leaders and powerful men throughout history have introduced strange marriage and sexual practices into their sects as well as just simply been sexually promiscuous to a high degree. I just decided at least for me Joseph could simply not be the one special one that had divine sanction from God for something that seems so ungodly.

But the problem is that in the religion of Christ there ARE "one special ones," as you call them, For instance, Mary was the one and only virgin in the history of the world who "knew no man," but would gave birth to the human Son of God. Many Apostolic era Jew's staked their salvation on the confident presumption that Mary had an illicit affair with a Roman soldier because she couldn't possibly have become pregnant without "knowing" an earthly man. They reasoned, "it never happened before, so why should we believe she is the "one special one" who would give birth to God's Son without "knowing a man." If you had lived among those ancients who said Mary couldn't possibly be the one and only exception to a common sense law of nature that had never before been violated, and if you had then the same frame of mind you have now, on which side of the controversy would you have come down?

Edited August 15, 2015 by Bobbieaware

[sunstoned]

And when the Church does teach more accurate information what happens?

 

More Whining and accusations of deceptiveness.

 

eg. the Essays, Church publisihing the Seer Stone Images, etc. etc. etc.

 Many parts of our history are not very uplifting and are in fact downright troubling to many people. For some it is therapeutic and helpful to discuss these matters.  This is not whining.  I know right now the church is taking some shots for the way they have presented its history for some many years.  The old saying goes “While we are free to choose our actions, we are not free to choose the consequences of our actions.”   Right now the church is living with the consequences of its actions.

[sunstoned]

Yep. My mother told me a few years ago that the troubling stuff about polygamy was just a result of a "hatchet job on Joseph Smith by that Brodie woman." Part of me is curious to see what her reaction is to the essays, as they confirm Brodie's "lies," but I really have no interest in arguing religion with anyone in my family, so I leave it alone.

I posted the link to the essays on my family facebook page and was accused of pushing anti mormon propaganda.  When I showed them that the link was to the official LDS.org site, several testimonies were posted and then I got the silent treatment.  

 

I think it will take a while for the full weight of the essays and announcements like the seer stone to sink in and be digested by many of the members.  For many, this big departure from the things that were not taught by their church for many decades.

[Bobbieaware]

No not really. Part of what has caused me to be skeptical of Joseph Smith was asking myself why for so long did I give him a pass for what I viewed as abhorrent behavior as it relates to plural marriage when I would never give anyone else the same tolerance for such behavior. I dedended Joseph and LDS polygamy for years. But I just could not do it anymore. Many other dynamic religious leaders and powerful men throughout history have introduced strange marriage and sexual practices into their sects as well as just simply been sexually promiscuous to a high degree. I just decided at least for me Joseph could simply not be the one special one that had divine sanction from God for something that seems so ungodly.

On another note, you here admit you "defended Joseph Smith and polygamy for years." So this means if you're honest with yourself you can surely think back and remember the defenses you used to make. I'd be interested to hear some of those defenses. I'm wondering if some of those defenses had to do with the fact that you knew in your heart a wicked man could not have brought forth something as holy and true as the Book of Mormon, or bring forth a religion that produces such wonderful, undeniably positive fruit in the lives of its believers.

Edited August 15, 2015 by Bobbieaware

[Teancum]

Because you said you haven't seen any proof that God commanded Joseph Smith to practice plural marriage, as if we are to assume that there exists plenty of proof that God has commanded human beings to do other things. And so I'm asking you, aside from gut feelings and intuition (which aren't forms of proof), what proof do you have that God commanded men to do anything else? You seem to place a high premium on proof, and so I quite naturally assumed you believe there is sound proof that God commanded men to do other things. So if you believe there is such proof, I'd be very interested to see it. But if you don't have such proof, I'm wondering why you won"t believe something unless there is proof?

This is really a topic for another thread. But briefly I am skeptical of all self proclaimed prophets now and in the past. I may even tilt towards being agnostic but I want to believe in God. But my belief in God would be more Deist in nature. Revealed religions all claim special knowledge and truth that conflicts with others. The prophets of all these claim special privilege and knowledge that often leads to abuse and control over their adherents. To me it does not make sense that a all knowing God would be so sloppy about communicating his message.

So I try to judge any instruction from any prophet or revealed religion by the fruits they generate and how it would cause humans to interact with each other. Thus my comments about loving your neighbor and the gold rule.

As for my prior defense of Joseph Smith it was likely generated from my own testimony and need to maintain it. I have wrangled with polygamy and many of the other sticky issues in LDS history and doctrine and I find many of the, problematic not just polygamy but polygamy is near or at the top of the heap. On the other hand I like much of what came from Joseph Smith. I just don't know that it all came from God.

[Teancum]

But the problem is that in the religion of Christ there ARE "one special ones," as you call them, For instance, Mary was the one and only virgin in the history of the world who "knew no man," but would gave birth to the human Son of God. Many Apostolic era Jew's staked their salvation on the confident presumption that Mary had an illicit affair with a Roman soldier because she couldn't possibly have become pregnant without "knowing" an earthly man. They reasoned, "it never happened before, so why should we believe she is the "one special one" who would give birth to God's Son without "knowing a man." If you had lived among those ancients who said Mary couldn't possibly be the one and only exception to a common sense law of nature that had never before been violated, and if you had then the same frame of mind you have now, on which side of the controversy would you have come down?

Well I have no idea how I would have reacted or believed since I did not live then. But I think I view it today it in the same way I explained in my post about proof of anything that is claimed by revealed religion.

[Steve-o]

Anyone that believes polygamy is inherently abusive and that all polygamists are abusive is purely prejudiced and completely ignorant.

Does abuse exist among polygamists?  Sure, just as it does among members of the Church, the Catholic Church, the Muslim religion, the conservative Christian sects, and I've even heard of it among the atheists.

 

I'm not suggesting ignoring abuse, but I really wish people would educate themselves about entire groups of people before passing judgement.

While it may be too broad a brush to paint all polygamy as abusive, surely you would admit that within some fundamentalists sects today there are at least some abusive practices which are often institutionalized. Underage assigned marriages, unequal property rights/inheritance for non-legal wives, removing young men from the community to eliminate competition, to mention just a couple of contemporary issues I see. These things seem to be more the rule than the exception. This doesn't mean there aren't nice polygamists who are good people, but defending the practice where institutionalized abuse has been proven, especially within small communities with strong patriarchal order would be a lost cause for me. Maybe I need to get to know some polygamists so my mind changes.

[JLHPROF]

While it may be too broad a brush to paint all polygamy as abusive, surely you would admit that within some fundamentalists sects today there are at least some abusive practices which are often institutionalized. Underage assigned marriages, unequal property rights/inheritance for non-legal wives, removing young men from the community to eliminate competition, to mention just a couple of contemporary issues I see. These things seem to be more the rule than the exception. This doesn't mean there aren't nice polygamists who are good people, but defending the practice where institutionalized abuse has been proven, especially within small communities with strong patriarchal order would be a lost cause for me. Maybe I need to get to know some polygamists so my mind changes.

 

 

 

Living in the south end of the Salt Lake Valley/north end of the Utah valley I know many members of a couple of fundamentalist groups.  Most of them you wouldn't even recognize on the streets.  People don't realize there are probably 30,000 polygamists in the intermountain west, plus who knows how many more in other states, Mexico, and Canada.

 

The FLDS is just one group of people, making up just a percent of the population.  The institutionalized abuse there is the result of abusive members who manage to gain power (like Warren Jeffs).  If you take something and allow a wicked man to run it then there should be no surprise when it becomes corrupted.  But to say the lifestyle is the source of the corruption is false. 

Almost all the issues you list happen in every community, and only became institutionalized in a group like the FLDS because a wicked man took power.  If a wicked man took power of any Church that Church would become corrupted too (Westboro baptist church for example).

If God ever allowed a wicked man to head the LDS Church (which I doubt he would) corruption would creep in there too.

[carbon dioxide]

No not really. Part of what has caused me to be skeptical of Joseph Smith was asking myself why for so long did I give him a pass for what I viewed as abhorrent behavior as it relates to plural marriage when I would never give anyone else the same tolerance for such behavior. I dedended Joseph and LDS polygamy for years. But I just could not do it anymore. Many other dynamic religious leaders and powerful men throughout history have introduced strange marriage and sexual practices into their sects as well as just simply been sexually promiscuous to a high degree. I just decided at least for me Joseph could simply not be the one special one that had divine sanction from God for something that seems so ungodly.

For me I don't attach anything sinister or ungodly on how Joseph practiced polygamy.  If one chooses to attach strange sexual practices to it that is what they choose to do but I don't think it is required.  When I read about Joseph Smith being sealed to a 14 year old to be his wife, I attach nothing more to that sealing than when my wife and I were sealed to our adopted son when he was around 8 months old.  It is the same sealing ordinance in both situations.  Nothing wrong has occurred between the relationship that we have with our son even though we were sealed to him and him to us.  So to us, what Joseph did is no big deal since he really did nothing different than what we did.  I don't feel the need to attach a sexual relationship between Joseph and Helen Mar Kimball since a sexual relationship is not required for the sealing ordinance and them to be "married" to be valid.  For me sex and marriage are two different things.  One can have sex and not be married and one can be married and not have sex.  Because I separate the two, what Joseph did with is various wives really does not disturb me.  Now if a person requires that one must follow the other, then I can see how they could have a problem with it.

Edited August 16, 2015 by carbon dioxide

[Teancum]

For me I don't attach anything sinister or ungodly on how Joseph practiced polygamy.  If one chooses to attach strange sexual practices to it that is what they choose to do but I don't think it is required.  When I read about Joseph Smith being sealed to a 14 year old to be his wife, I attach nothing more to that sealing than when my wife and I were sealed to our adopted son when he was around 8 months old.  It is the same sealing ordinance in both situations.  Nothing wrong has occurred between the relationship that we have with our son even though we were sealed to him and him to us.  So to us, what Joseph did is no big deal since he really did nothing different than what we did.  I don't feel the need to attach a sexual relationship between Joseph and Helen Mar Kimball since a sexual relationship is not required for the sealing ordinance and them to be "married" to be valid.  For me sex and marriage are two different things.  One can have sex and not be married and one can be married and not have sex.  Because I separate the two, what Joseph did with is various wives really does not disturb me.  Now if a person requires that one must follow the other, then I can see how they could have a problem with it.

D&C 132 seems to require sexual relations as it states that plural marriage is to raise up righteous seed.

[Robert F. Smith]

No not really. Part of what has caused me to be skeptical of Joseph Smith was asking myself why for so long did I give him a pass for what I viewed as abhorrent behavior as it relates to plural marriage when I would never give anyone else the same tolerance for such behavior. I dedended Joseph and LDS polygamy for years. But I just could not do it anymore. Many other dynamic religious leaders and powerful men throughout history have introduced strange marriage and sexual practices into their sects as well as just simply been sexually promiscuous to a high degree. I just decided at least for me Joseph could simply not be the one special one that had divine sanction from God for something that seems so ungodly.

Fawn Brodie had a theory that men in power crave wide sexual opportunity, and she applied that notion in her biographies of Joseph Smith and of Thomas Jefferson.  One professional historian (a non-Mormon) reviewed her book on Jefferson and titled his book review "By Sex Obsessed."  Most of the problems which he had with her book were the same problems pointed out earlier by Hugh Nibley in her Joseph Smith bio.

 

The other problem with the presentist approach which you appear to take is that it defames the memory of Abraham and Jacob and other august biblical figures.

Edited August 17, 2015 by Robert F. Smith

[sunstoned]

D&C 132 seems to require sexual relations as it states that plural marriage is to raise up righteous seed.

Yes,this is a good point.  And Emma's strong reactions seemed to imply that these were not simple dynastic sealings.  Also, if the sealings were suppose to be non-sexual,  then BY didn't get the memo.

Edited August 16, 2015 by sunstoned

[Teancum]

Fawn Brodie had a theory that men in power crave wide sexual opportunity, and she applied that notion in her biographies of Joseph Smith and of Thomas Jefferson.  One professional historian (a non-Mormon) reviewed her book on Jeffereson and titled his book review "By Sex Obsessed."  Most of the problems which he had with her book were the same problems pointed out earlier by Hugh Nibley in her Joseph Smith bio.

 

The other problem with the presentist approach which you appear to take is that it defames the memory of Abraham and Jacob and other august biblical figures.

How does my view defame Abraham and Jacob assuming the Bible is accurate about them? Did God command them to,take many wives and concubines for exaltation or was it the cultural norm of their day. Did they tell women God had reserved them for marriage to them and put a clock on it for a decision? Did they deceive their wife in regards to taking on additional wives? Did they lie about it publicly?

Presentism indeed.....

[Teancum]

Yes,this is a good point.  And Emma's strong reactions seemed to imply that these were not simple dynastic sealings.  Also, if the sealings were suppose to be non-sexual,  then BY didn't get the memo.

Yes defenders of Joseph's purely dynastic roll out of plural marriage forget about Brigham et all.

[why me]

Yes,this is a good point.  And Emma's strong reactions seemed to imply that these were not simple dynastic sealings.  Also, if the sealings were suppose to be non-sexual,  then BY didn't get the memo.

I think that a select group of others were also practicing polygamy at the time of Joseph Smith. I have no idea if they had children by plural wives. Also, how one practices polygamy is left up to them. One doesn't need to consumate such relationships. So, the dynastic element can apply. I do think that the saints began to practice polygamy much more freely when they left nauvoo and separated themselves from prostestant understandings which their neighbors had in other communities. Also, it joseph was all about raising up a righteous seed he did a pretty bad job of doing it. And he was not known to be unfertile. So, what happened?

 

Also, in terms of polygamy as a way to have sex, I can think of easier ways to have sex with women. Just visit a brothel in a different city. He certainly had opportunity to do such things. No need for polygamy to have sex, especially since his wife went up and down about it emotionally. Also, the women he married seemed to respect joseph. I don't think that they ever said an evil word about him. It certainly would have helped the critics if they did. So, I think that it is rather difficult to say just what happened with Joseph's polygamy. But he definitely seemed respectful to the women he married.

Edited August 16, 2015 by why me