Church Points to Joseph Smith’s Statements on Religious Freedom, Pluralism

[Zakuska]

1 minute ago, Russell C McGregor said:

Thank you. Thus, Prop 8 passes both tests.

On the contrary.  Prop 8 limited the rights of other individuals as citizens.

 

[Avatar4321]

17 minutes ago, Zakuska said:

D&C 134 

 "We believe that religion is instituted of God; and that men are amenable to him, and to him only, for the exercise of it, unless their religious opinions prompt them to infringe upon the rights and liberties of others…. 

We do not believe it just to mingle religious influence with civil government, whereby one religious society is fostered and another proscribed [prohibited] in its spiritual privileges, and the individual rights of its members, as citizens, denied." 

Not seeing how this supports your conclusion.

[Avatar4321]

13 minutes ago, Zakuska said:

On the contrary.  Prop 8 limited the rights of other individuals as citizens.

 

Can't limit rights that never existed prior.

[Zakuska]

2 minutes ago, Avatar4321 said:

Can't limit rights that never existed prior.

Now your playing symantic games.

[Russell C McGregor]

52 minutes ago, Zakuska said:

Now your playing symantic games.

No he isn't. He isn't even playing semantic games.

If the notion that civil governments can pass laws that alter the doctrine of the Church of Jesus Christ is outlandish and absurd, the notion that they can do so retrospectively is utterly hideous.

Utterly. Hideous.

 

[Zakuska]

1 hour ago, Russell C McGregor said:

No he isn't. He isn't even playing semantic games.

If the notion that civil governments can pass laws that alter the doctrine of the Church of Jesus Christ is outlandish and absurd, the notion that they can do so retrospectively is utterly hideous.

Utterly. Hideous.

 

And yet they have done just that (ie passed laws that alter doctrine) twice in its history already.

Priesthood ban 

Polygamy

[Russell C McGregor]

15 minutes ago, Zakuska said:

And yet they have done just that (ie passed laws that alter doctrine) twice in its history already.

Priesthood ban 

Polygamy

The Morrill act, the Edmunds-Tucker act, etc. did not alter an iota of doctrine. They ultimately forced the suspension of a practice. That's it.

CFR that any change to the Priesthood ban was occasioned by any civil law. Once you have provided such a reference, we can examine it to see what impact, if any, it had upon any doctrine.

 

[Maidservant]

5 hours ago, Tacenda said:

 Joseph Smith: 10/14/1838 -- "I will be to this generation a second Mohammed, whose motto in treating for peace was 'the Alcoran [Koran] or the Sword.' So shall it eventually be with us."

 

Did Joseph really say the above?  I saw it quoted in a comment to this article...http://m.deseretnews.com/article/865643394/Herbert-takes-a-courageous-stand-on-Syrian-refugees.html

 

Although al-Quran does not mean the Sword, anyway (I read the sentence that way?).  al-Quran means "recite".  As in speaking.  When Gabriel visited Muhammad the first time, he told Muhammad, "Recite!"  It was the beginning of the giving of the Quran.

[Robert F. Smith]

4 hours ago, Zakuska said:

On the contrary.  Prop 8 limited the rights of other individuals as citizens.

 

In effect, the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Reynolds vs the United States in favor of the 14th amendment -- equal protection of the laws.  To find fault with that is to condemn the Mormons who obeyed God and practiced polygyny back in the day before the Manifesto of 1890.  In order to be consistent with our own history and religion, we have no choice but to support other forms of non-traditional marriage through legal tolerance.  Otherwise, we are hypocrites.

[Robert F. Smith]

1 hour ago, Zakuska said:

And yet they have done just that (ie passed laws that alter doctrine) twice in its history already.

Priesthood ban 

Polygamy

Neither was a matter of doctrine.  Polygyny is still the law, just as Consecration is the law, even though neither is formally practiced.  Try as he might, Pres McKay could never find any revelatory or doctrinal justification for a denial of priesthood to some select group.  Certainly Joseph Smith never believed in or practiced it.

[Zakuska]

1 hour ago, Russell C McGregor said:

The Morrill act, the Edmunds-Tucker act, etc. did not alter an iota of doctrine. They ultimately forced the suspension of a practice. That's it.

CFR that any change to the Priesthood ban was occasioned by any civil law. Once you have provided such a reference, we can examine it to see what impact, if any, it had upon any doctrine.

 

If you think "doctrine" wasn't changed then i suggest that you go back and read OD1 again and study up on it.

https://www.lds.org/scriptures/dc-testament/od/1?lang=eng

 

Quote

 

Historical Background

The first legislation in the United States against the practice of plural marriage came ten years after the doctrine was officially announced on 29 August 1852 by Elder Orson Pratt (see Historical Background for D&C 132). Stephen Harding, the non-Mormon governor of the Territory of Utah, was able to get Justin R. Morrill of Vermont to introduce a bill into Congress. The bill was signed into law 8 July 1862 by President Abraham Lincoln. The Anti-Polygamy Act of 1862 “defined plural marriage as bigamy, and made the contracting of such a marriage punishable by a fine of five hundred dollars and imprisonment for a term of five years” (Smith,Essentials in Church History, p. 432). This bill was the first of a flood of anti-Mormon legislation introduced during the next twenty-five years, most of which never passed (see Roberts, Comprehensive History of the Church, 5:433–41, 610–11).

 

 

https://www.lds.org/manual/doctrine-and-covenants-student-manual/official-declarations/official-declaration-1-manifesto?lang=eng

The entire family structer being taught as "doctrine" by the church had to be gutted. It took over 100 years for that generation to die out. It wasn't a mere "policy" it was a doctrine even the church websites admits it was a "DOCTRINE"

If no "Doctrine" changed then the Proclamation on the family should read a heck of a lot differently than it does today.

 

Edited December 11, 2015 by Zakuska

[Calm]

On December 9, 2015 at 4:49 PM, Zakuska said:

If they do their not following the Doctrines and Covenants we have made as a people.

Do you believe Joseph Smith never talked politics in his sermons?

[Calm]

7 hours ago, Tacenda said:

 Joseph Smith: 10/14/1838 -- "I will be to this generation a second Mohammed, whose motto in treating for peace was 'the Alcoran [Koran] or the Sword.' So shall it eventually be with us."

 

Did Joseph really say the above?  I saw it quoted in a comment to this article...http://m.deseretnews.com/article/865643394/Herbert-takes-a-courageous-stand-on-Syrian-refugees.html

http://en.fairmormon.org/Joseph_Smith/Narcissism/A_%22second_Mohammad%22

Quote

 

Question: Did Joseph Smith say that he would be a "second Muhammad," threatening to spread his beliefs with the sword?

The statement which Joseph is charged with making did not accord at all with how he had his followers behave

Some have argued that Joseph may have said something like this, but was doing so for rhetorical effect to frighten the Missourians into leaving the Saints alone. But, it is by no means certain that he said it at all. Some who made the claims returned to the Church, and other sources were motivated by hostility and a desire to portray the Saints as a military and religious threat.

This claim came from Thomas B. Marsh after he left the Church

The source of this claim is from Thomas B. Marsh, an apostate former president of the Quorum of the Twelve. In 1838, Marsh swore an affidavit in which he claimed to have heard Joseph Smith say:

he would yet tread down his enemies, and walk over their dead bodies; and if he was not let alone, he would be a second Mohammed to this generation, and that it would be one gore of blood from the Rocky Mountains to the Atlantic Ocean; that like Mohammed, whose motto in treating for peace was, 'the Alcoran or the Sword,' so should it be eventually with us, 'Joseph Smith or the Sword.' [3]

Green and Goldrup: "this threat was quite probably a mere fabrication by the disgruntled Marsh"

Arnold Green and Lawrence Goldrup noted in 1971 that "this threat was quite probably a mere fabrication by the disgruntled Marsh," [4] and pointed out Orson Pratt (who was also disaffected at the time) later repented and returned, indicating that parts of the affidavit had been invented by Marsh. Marsh himself was later to repent and return to the Church, which casts further doubt on his story.

The tale was also repeated by George M. Hinkle, John Corrill, George Walter, and partially by Abner Scovil. [5] Joseph Smith's journal for the period notes:

some excitement was raised in the adjoining Counties, that is Ray & Clay, against us, in consequence of the suden departure of these wicked character, of the apostates from this Church, into that vicinity reporting false stories, and statements, but when they [the Missourians] come to hear the other side of the question their feeling were all allayed upon that subject especially. [6]

It is, then, by no means certain that Joseph made this statement—the witnesses are all hostile, and clearly intended to frighten the Missourians

Joseph was under enormous pressure to defend the Saints against the repeated actions of mobbers. As historian Marvin Hill notes,

the actual response to belligerence when it occurred was much more restrained. Although the elders did confiscate property and burn houses, their attacks were generally aimed at specific enemies. Mormons had neither the inclination nor means to wage a general war of extermination against all mobbers, despite menacing talk. The only fatalities occurred in the skirmish with Bogart, where the elders got the worst of the fight. Had the prophet been intent on waging total war, it is unlikely he would have allowed Rigdon to issue his 4th of July warning, which only put the Missourians on guard. [7]

 

 

[Calm]

2 hours ago, Maidservant said:

 

Although al-Quran does not mean the Sword, anyway (I read the sentence that way?).  al-Quran means "recite".  As in speaking.  When Gabriel visited Muhammad the first time, he told Muhammad, "Recite!"  It was the beginning of the giving of the Quran.

I think the quote was meant to mean acceptance of the Quran or they would be given the sword (killed).

It is a claim from a hostile source, with as Russell said no contemporary sources to support it.

[Russell C McGregor]

3 hours ago, Zakuska said:

If you think "doctrine" wasn't changed then i suggest that you go back and read OD1 again and study up on it.

https://www.lds.org/scriptures/dc-testament/od/1?lang=eng

 

 

https://www.lds.org/manual/doctrine-and-covenants-student-manual/official-declarations/official-declaration-1-manifesto?lang=eng

The entire family structer being taught as "doctrine" by the church had to be gutted. It took over 100 years for that generation to die out. It wasn't a mere "policy" it was a doctrine even the church websites admits it was a "DOCTRINE"

If no "Doctrine" changed then the Proclamation on the family should read a heck of a lot differently than it does today.

 

No. It would not.

I didn't say that plural marriage isn't a doctrine. It is.

It was then. It is today.

The President of the Church holds the keys of plural marriage, as he does every other priesthood ordinance. Which is why anyone entering into unauthorised plural marriages does so contrary to doctrine.

That was the doctrine in 1889. That was the doctrine in 1891.

And that is the doctrine today.

But Zak, given that you have this strange idea that the civil authority has power to decree doctrines which the Saints are under obligation to accept, I'm interested in how far you take this weird notion.

Was Daniel in breach of it when he prayed to God instead of Nebuchadnezzar?

Were his three friends in the wrong when they refused to bow before the idol that had been set up in the marketplace?

Was Jesus a sinner when he refused to answer any questions from Herod?

Was Peter in apostasy when he told the Sanhedrin that he would rather obey God than men?

Just how far do you take it?

 

[consiglieri]

On ‎12‎/‎11‎/‎2015 at 6:24 PM, Russell C McGregor said:

The Morrill act, the Edmunds-Tucker act, etc. did not alter an iota of doctrine. They ultimately forced the suspension of a practice. That's it.

I thought it was President Hinckley who denied plural marriage was doctrine.

Are you taking issue with him?

[provoman]

On Thursday, December 10, 2015 at 11:29 PM, Zakuska said:

D&C 134 

 "We believe that religion is instituted of God; and that men are amenable to him, and to him only, for the exercise of it, unless their religious opinions prompt them to infringe upon the rights and liberties of others…. 

We do not believe it just to mingle religious influence with civil government, whereby one religious society is fostered and another proscribed [prohibited] in its spiritual privileges, and the individual rights of its members, as citizens, denied." 

 

On Thursday, December 10, 2015 at 11:32 PM, Russell C McGregor said:

Thank you. Thus, Prop 8 passes both tests.

Russell, what are the "both tests" you are creating? 

Would you consider this one of the tests "Unless their religious opinion prompt them to infringe upon the rights and liberties of others..." ?

[provoman]

On Thursday, December 10, 2015 at 11:49 PM, Avatar4321 said:

Can't limit rights that never existed prior.

 

You might want to look in to the history of Prop 8 before you make such statements. Prop 8 was specifically designed to overturn the legal right to ssm. 

[provoman]

On Friday, December 11, 2015 at 0:46 AM, Russell C McGregor said:

No he isn't. He isn't even playing semantic games.

If the notion that civil governments can pass laws that alter the doctrine of the Church of Jesus Christ is outlandish and absurd, the notion that they can do so retrospectively is utterly hideous.

Utterly. Hideous.

 

He is doing worse than sematic games. Avatar is manifesting his or her lack of knowledge of Prop 8 and why Prop 8 was create and promoted.  Prop 8 was created and promoted specifically to erase the right to ssm.

[Russell C McGregor]

12 hours ago, consiglieri said:

I thought it was President Hinckley who denied plural marriage was doctrine.

Are you taking issue with him?

You thought that, did you?

Because I thought President Hinckley was saying that apostate splinter groups practicing plural marriage was non-doctrinal.

 

[Scott Lloyd]

13 hours ago, consiglieri said:

I thought it was President Hinckley who denied plural marriage was doctrine.

Are you taking issue with him?

You just love slipping in these little bits of toxic sophistry, don't you?

 

[Scott Lloyd]

11 minutes ago, Russell C McGregor said:

You thought that, did you?

Because I thought President Hinckley was saying that apostate splinter groups practicing plural marriage was non-doctrinal.

 

That's precisely what he meant.

consig has parroted the stock anti-Mormon line with precision.