Eternal polygamy rears its ugly head…again

[VideoGameJunkie]

1 minute ago, JLHPROF said:

Maybe God doesn't want us to know for sure yet.  Kind of takes away faith in his previous revelations and prophets.

But it adds massiv confusion and uncertainty and anxiety to my brain not knowing and not havibg any modern apostles address a concern that so many members have.

[Jeanne]

40 minutes ago, VideoGameJunkie said:

I just finished the 209 page book. It's worth a read but anyone pro Joseph Smith and Brigham Young will be angry at Carol Lynn Pearson.

Did you come away with any new perspective or understanding at all from this book?  I haven't read it yet.

[VideoGameJunkie]

Just now, Jeanne said:

Did you come away with any new perspective or understanding at all from this book?  I haven't read it yet.

Yes the inclusion of many different peoples storied and concerns at the end of chapters was powerful in seeing a woman's perspective.

[Jeanne]

2 minutes ago, VideoGameJunkie said:

Yes the inclusion of many different peoples storied and concerns at the end of chapters was powerful in seeing a woman's perspective.

Thanks for your honest reply! 

[juliann]

10 hours ago, Bobbieaware said:

Here is the problem, and the reason why you and some others on this thread are having a difficult time accepting that the prophet Joseph Smith's practice of polygamy was the will of God: It's because you are observing and analyzing this divine commandment to practice plural marriage with a carnal mind.  

 

You see, because you are looking at polygamy with a carnal mind you're unable to see that the Holy Ghost can refine spiritual sensibilities and motivations to the point that a prophet, like the prophet Joseph Smith, could practice plural marriage in righteousness and holiness. When on the great day of judgement the prophet Joseph Smith is vindicate before all the world by God himself for the practice of plural marriage, the Lord will explain that if some members of the Church had only put aside their cynical carnal minds, and began to see the commandment with purer and holier minds, they would have understood the prophet was not in error and did nothing wrong. As long as the carnal mind is nurtured and doggedly held on to, the deeper things of God will forever remain mysterious and misunderstood.

Oh for heaven's sake. The ramp of Rameumpton comes to mind for some reason...  

Quote

 

1 And I, brethren, could not speak unto you as unto spiritual, but as unto carnal, even as unto babes in Christ.

 2 I have fed you with milk, and not with meat: for hitherto ye were not able to bear it, neither yet now are ye able.

 3 For ye are yet carnal: for whereas there is among you envying, and strife, and divisions, are ye not carnal, and walk as men? (1 Corinthians 3)

 

Wow, I'm convinced I have a carnal mind! Now if only that had anything to do with polygamy.....

Your biggest problem is that you are milking this by demanding either/or responses. It is quite possible to set aside polygamy without it being a judgment against JS (or polygamy) anymore than setting aside the Priesthood ban was a judgement against BY.  If the Church can manage meaty actions like that I'm sure you, since you are favored by God, surely can.

We are a church of revelation and living prophets. 

CFR on future polygamy. Again. 

Edited July 22, 2016 by juliann

[JLHPROF]

40 minutes ago, juliann said:

 

CFR on future polygamy. Again.

President Joseph Fielding Smith - “I get a great deal of comfort out of the thought that if I am faithful and worthy of an exaltation, my father will be my father, and I will be subject to him as his son through all eternity; that I will recognize and know my mother and she will be my mother in all eternity; and my brothers and sisters will be my brothers and sisters for all eternity; and that my children and my wives will be mine in eternity” (Doctrines of Salvation, 2:67 quoted in the Aaronic Priesthood manual)

Or is that too far into the future from a prophet too far into the past even though it's quoted in the official Church published current manual for young men?  See - it's still taught by the Church that polygamy will be a part of our future even if we have to wait a little bit.

SEE ALSO

Bruce R. McConkie -  After Brigham Young led the saints to the Salt Lake Valley, plural marriage was openly taught and practiced until the year 1890. At that time conditions were such that the Lord by revelation withdrew the command to continue the practice, and President Wilford Woodruff issued the Manifesto directing that it cease. (Discourses of Wilford Woodruff, pp. 213-218.) Obviously the holy practice will commence again after the Second Coming of the Son of Man and the ushering in of the millennium. (Isa. 4.)

Brigham Young - Monogamy, or restrictions by law to one wife, is no part of the economy of heaven among men.

Jacob 2:30 For if I will, saith the Lord of Hosts, raise up seed unto me, I will command my people; otherwise they shall hearken unto these things

D&C 132: 28 I am the Lord thy God, and will give unto thee the law of my Holy Priesthood, as was ordained by me and my Father before the world was.
33 But if ye enter not into my law ye cannot receive the promise of my Father, which he made unto Abraham.
34 God commanded Abraham, and Sarah gave Hagar to Abraham to wife. And why did she do it? Because this was the law; and from Hagar sprang many people. This, therefore, was fulfilling, among other things, the promises.

Heber C. Kimball - The principle of plurality of wives never will be done away. Some sisters have had revelations that when this time passes away and they go through the veil every woman will have a husband to herself.

Brigham Young (quoted by Wilford Woodruff) - “[A] man who did not have but one wife in the Resurrection that woman will not be his but [be] taken from him & given to another.”

George Teasdale -  I bear my testimony that it is a necessity, and that the Church of Christ in its fullness never existed without it. Where you have the eternity of marriage you are bound to have plural marriage...”

 

 

Edited July 22, 2016 by JLHPROF

[Tacenda]

1 hour ago, VideoGameJunkie said:

But it adds massiv confusion and uncertainty and anxiety to my brain not knowing and not havibg any modern apostles address a concern that so many members have.

I hear you...

[Tacenda]

2 hours ago, VideoGameJunkie said:

Quick question, is polygamy essential to our exaltation? If not what's the big deal?

It's about time you realized this, you've gone on and on about this for so long. I think the book did you some good, even if subliminally.

[ksfisher]

1 hour ago, VideoGameJunkie said:

I've tried asking God in the Celestial room of the temple and still haven't gotten a clear answer. I asked if I will be living plural marriage in the eternities and haven't gotten an answer. I've asked 3 times in the temple pleading for anow answer.

Perhaps God would like you to focus more on how you're living now than how you will live in the eternities.  

[Glenn101]

1 hour ago, VideoGameJunkie said:

But it adds massiv confusion and uncertainty and anxiety to my brain not knowing and not havibg any modern apostles address a concern that so many members have.

What uncertainty is causing you such anxiety? It would help all those who are worried over this thing, all those who have had this part of church history challenge them and their testimonies, to read as much of the history, to learn as much about it as you can. Find out how many of the wives of Joseph Smith were forced into polygamy. I have read several accounts by the ladies involved themselves, and those who accepted it did so because of personal revelations. Lucy Walker, Vilate Kimball, Zina Huntington, et al had revelations on the matter. Vilate's experience is fairly unique because she received her revelation before having the matter broached to her.

It is pretty certain that plural marriage will be practiced by some in the next life, after reading the quotes from several past prophets.You have the words of different apostles on the subject throughout the ages. It is evident to me that God will force no one into a relationship that they do not wish for. You have the right to your own personal revelation on the subject. I doubt that the Lord will tell you whether plural marriage will be practiced by the person sitting to the left or right of you on the pew.  I do not know if He will give you a specific answer as to whether you personally will need to accept a plural wive or wives. But He will be able to speak peace of mind to you or anyone else who will take the time and effort to take the matter to Him. 

We can thrash this matter over here and elsewhere on the internet, agonize, jump up and down, yell, opine, etc. until the millennium and will get no nearer to finding the answer otherwise.

 

Glenn

[Tacenda]

45 minutes ago, JLHPROF said:

President Joseph Fielding Smith - “I get a great deal of comfort out of the thought that if I am faithful and worthy of an exaltation, my father will be my father, and I will be subject to him as his son through all eternity; that I will recognize and know my mother and she will be my mother in all eternity; and my brothers and sisters will be my brothers and sisters for all eternity; and that my children and my wives will be mine in eternity” (Doctrines of Salvation, 2:67 quoted in the Aaronic Priesthood manual)

Or is that too far into the future from a prophet too far into the past even though it's quoted in the official Church published current manual for young men?  See - it's still taught by the Church that polygamy will be a part of our future even if we have to wait a little bit.

SEE ALSO

Bruce R. McConkie -  After Brigham Young led the saints to the Salt Lake Valley, plural marriage was openly taught and practiced until the year 1890. At that time conditions were such that the Lord by revelation withdrew the command to continue the practice, and President Wilford Woodruff issued the Manifesto directing that it cease. (Discourses of Wilford Woodruff, pp. 213-218.) Obviously the holy practice will commence again after the Second Coming of the Son of Man and the ushering in of the millennium. (Isa. 4.)

Brigham Young - Monogamy, or restrictions by law to one wife, is no part of the economy of heaven among men.

Jacob 2:30 For if I will, saith the Lord of Hosts, raise up seed unto me, I will command my people; otherwise they shall hearken unto these things

D&C 132: 28 I am the Lord thy God, and will give unto thee the law of my Holy Priesthood, as was ordained by me and my Father before the world was.
33 But if ye enter not into my law ye cannot receive the promise of my Father, which he made unto Abraham.
34 God commanded Abraham, and Sarah gave Hagar to Abraham to wife. And why did she do it? Because this was the law; and from Hagar sprang many people. This, therefore, was fulfilling, among other things, the promises.

Heber C. Kimball - The principle of plurality of wives never will be done away. Some sisters have had revelations that when this time passes away and they go through the veil every woman will have a husband to herself.

Brigham Young (quoted by Wilford Woodruff) - “[A] man who did not have but one wife in the Resurrection that woman will not be his but [be] taken from him & given to another.”

George Teasdale -  I bear my testimony that it is a necessity, and that the Church of Christ in its fullness never existed without it. Where you have the eternity of marriage you are bound to have plural marriage...”

 

 

One or two of these are new. Like wow, I didn't know that my eternal marriage made it so I must live polygamy. All these bride and grooms getting sealed together in the temple with no clue. I need to bite my tongue because I have some serious problems with this. 

[rongo]

On 7/21/2016 at 11:54 AM, hope_for_things said:

Bible - no commandment

BoM - denounced as sin, except some strange statement that has more recently been interpreted as an exception clause, but that neither Joseph or Brigham used as justification for polygamy.  There are other ways to read that strange statement.

PoGP - Is it commanded anywhere?  I'm not sure, can't remember, can you help me out on this one.

D&C 132 - Only commanded place in scripture. 

Looks like D&C 132 is the aberration here. 

This is wrong. Brigham Young and contemporaries quoted the passage from Jacob (allowing that sometimes polygamy is a commandment) repeatedly in defense of polygamy in Journal of Discourses.

Joseph Smith didn't talk about polygamy very much at all in mixed company (i.e., when he felt that there might be people of dubious commitment present). 

[juliann]

35 minutes ago, Tacenda said:

One or two of these are new. Like wow, I didn't know that my eternal marriage made it so I must live polygamy. All these bride and grooms getting sealed together in the temple with no clue. I need to bite my tongue because I have some serious problems with this. 

When I want to know about polygamy, I always go to George Teasdale. JLH knows that he needs to produce a modern/living prophet saying these things. Something in the 21st century would be nice. 

[Jeanne]

 t

1 hour ago, Tacenda said:

One or two of these are new. Like wow, I didn't know that my eternal marriage made it so I must live polygamy. All these bride and grooms getting sealed together in the temple with no clue. I need to bite my tongue because I have some serious problems with this. 

Your tongue is going to be so sore Tacenda!   But I, too, see some problems with this though I have never been to the Temple.  Is there a greater need for understanding on all that is meant to be for young brides and grooms that go in with the idea that they are two..who become one?

[JLHPROF]

1 hour ago, Tacenda said:

One or two of these are new. Like wow, I didn't know that my eternal marriage made it so I must live polygamy. All these bride and grooms getting sealed together in the temple with no clue. I need to bite my tongue because I have some serious problems with this. 

Well, in the marriage covenant we promise to observe and keep all laws, rites, and ordinances that pertain to marriage.

Do you know of any rites and ordinances that relate to marriage AFTER you are sealed?  I only know of two possible ordinances relating to marriage that come after being sealed.  One is polygamy and isn't practiced.  The other isn't talked about but is straight out of the NT.

Don't you think God expects us to keep the covenants we make?

Edited July 23, 2016 by JLHPROF

[JLHPROF]

1 hour ago, juliann said:

When I want to know about polygamy, I always go to George Teasdale. JLH knows that he needs to produce a modern/living prophet saying these things. Something in the 21st century would be nice. 

Somehow I knew that 20th Century wouldn't be "modern" enough for you. 
Not even in the current Aaronic Priesthood manual.

Keep moving those doctrinal requirements when they make you uncomfortable.
Personally I'll stick with these prophetic statements until our 21st century prophets care enough to say something or get further light and knowledge by revelation.

Edited July 23, 2016 by JLHPROF

[hope_for_things]

2 hours ago, rongo said:

This is wrong. Brigham Young and contemporaries quoted the passage from Jacob (allowing that sometimes polygamy is a commandment) repeatedly in defense of polygamy in Journal of Discourses.

Joseph Smith didn't talk about polygamy very much at all in mixed company (i.e., when he felt that there might be people of dubious commitment present). 

Please CFR the JoD claim.  I've talked to a couple people researching this very issue, the history of the use of that Jacob passage as a justification for polygamy, and to my memory the late 1800s is the first time it shows up.  I would be very interested in seeing any evidence otherwise.  

[Calm]

1 hour ago, JLHPROF said:

Somehow I knew that 20th Century wouldn't be "modern" enough for you. 
 

Teasdale died in 1907, one year before the Model T appeared.

I can't find one quotation from him on lds.org.  Only references appear to be when he is included in historical lists as well as in the PM essay where he is listed in the footnotes as one of the apostles who were plurally married postManifesto.

 Not exactly seen as a doctrinal source these days.

Edited July 23, 2016 by Calm

[Calm]

What is interesting is the AP manual quote is not stated as a revelation but a "thought".  I have little doubt growing up as he did he had a great deal of confidence that it was truth, but he could have phrased it as "doctrine" or "teaching" or even "belief", but instead it is a comforting thought.

[JLHPROF]

12 minutes ago, Calm said:

Teasdale died in 1907, one year before the Model T appeared.

I can't find one quotation from him on lds.org.  Only references appear to be when he is included in historical lists as well as in the PM essay where he is listed in the footnotes as one of the apostles who were plurally married postManifesto.

 Not exactly seen as a doctrinal source these days.

He was an apostle.  We revere the 12 apostles as prophets, seers, and revelators.
To me any prophet of this dispensation is modern enough to have their teachings considered.  Especially when current prophets are silent on an issue.

1 minute ago, Calm said:

What is interesting is the AP manual quote is not stated as a revelation but a "thought".  I have little doubt growing up as he did he had a great deal of confidence that it was truth, but he could have phrased it as "doctrine" or "teaching" or even "belief", but instead it is a comforting thought.

Agreed.  But Juliann wanted a 21st century Church teaching on future polygamy.
A quote from a prophet as a teaching included in the AP manual stating that a plurally sealed prophet hopes and expects to have all three wives in heaven would qualify as a current teaching on future polygamy.

[Calm]

AaronicPriesthood Manual 3, that is the one that contains the quote that counsels to generally marry people of the same race.

I am beginning to suspect the editors were a bit sloppy or lazy with that one.

[JLHPROF]

6 minutes ago, Calm said:

AaronicPriesthood Manual 3, that is the one that contains the quote that counsels to generally marry people of the same race.

I am beginning to suspect the editors were a bit sloppy or lazy with that one.

I didn't know that so I had to look -

 

Quote

 

Compare the results of the vote with the following statement by President Spencer W. Kimball. Have a young man read it.

“We recommend that people marry those who are of the same racial background generally, and of somewhat the same economic and social and educational background (some of those are not an absolute necessity, but preferred), and above all, the same religious background, without question” (“Marriage and Divorce,” in 1976 Devotional Speeches of the Year [Provo: Brigham Young University Press, 1977], p. 144).

 

How's that for a "modern teaching"?

[rongo]

9 hours ago, Sky said:

Funny you should mention Joseph, Brigham, John, Wilford, Lorenzo, and Joseph F, but ignore Spencer W. and Gordon B.  

It is clear from their words that the law of God is monogamy, and that we are not now expected to live polygamy.  

JLHPROF has never said otherwise. We are all unanimous that "we are not now expected to live polygamy." That is a completely non-controversial statement that no one here disagrees with.

You do know that living prophets always supersede dead ones, right?

As you and others have been quick to point out, there are very few references to polygamy at all by general authorities after the polygamy period. Anti-polygamists among active LDS pounce on this silence as tacit rejection of the past and future (in the hereafter) practice of it. 

But . . .

What do you do with the fact that polygamous sealings continue to be performed in our temples today. Sealings that leader and rank-and-file member alike expect to be efficacious in the next life? Including President Nelson and Elder Oaks?

What was that you said about living prophets superseding dead ones? Isn't the hurt and trauma some people are going on and on about the fact that we doctrinally and practically accept and look towards in-the-hereafter polygamy? I think that the living prophets' actions speak volumes, even if it isn't discussed as much anymore.

[rongo]

1 hour ago, hope_for_things said:

Please CFR the JoD claim.  I've talked to a couple people researching this very issue, the history of the use of that Jacob passage as a justification for polygamy, and to my memory the late 1800s is the first time it shows up.  I would be very interested in seeing any evidence otherwise.  

Polygamy, as you can imagine, is a massive topic in Journal of Discourses. Journal of Discourses contains talks by Church leaders from 1851 to 1886 (with six talks from Joseph Smith) in 26 volumes; nearly 10,000 pages. I have a detailed index in three-ring binders I made while reading it.

The "Jacob 3 clause," as I call it, was part of the defense against objections to polygamy. Here's a typical example of the "Jacob 3 clause:" from George Q. Cannon (Brigham Young's counselor in the 1st Presidency), October 9, 1969. JD 13:197, 201. It's the not first one, but ironically, he refers to U.S. Vice President Skuyler Colfax's reference to the passage in Jacob in claiming that the Book of Mormon itself is against polygamy.

We have heard, during Conference, a great many precious instructions, and in none have I been more interested than in those which have been given to the Saints concerning that much mooted doctrine called Patriarchal or Celestial Marriage. I am interested in this doctrine, because I see salvation, temporal and spiritual, embodied therein . . . I wish, here, to make one remark in connection with this subject—that while there is abundant proof to be found in the Scriptures and elsewhere in support of this doctrine, still it is not because it was practiced four thousand years ago by the servants and people of God, or because it has been practiced by any people or nation in any period of the world's history, that the Latter-day Saints have adopted it and made it part of their practice, but it is because God, our heavenly Father, has revealed it unto us. If there were no record of its practice to be found, and if the Bible, Book of Mormon and Book of Doctrine and Covenants were totally silent in respect to this doctrine, it would nevertheless be binding upon us as a people, God Himself having given a revelation for us to practice it at the present time . . .  The only revelation on record that can be quoted against it, came through the Prophet Joseph Smith, and is contained in the Book of Mormon; and strange to say, here in Salt Lake City, a day or two since, one of the leading men of the nation, in his eager desire and determination to cast discredit on this doctrine, unable to do so by reference to the Bible, which he, no doubt, in common with all Christians, acknowledges as divine, was compelled to have recourse to the Book of Mormon, a work which on any other point he would most unquestionably have scouted and ridiculed as an emanation from the brain of an impostor. What consistency! A strange revolution this, that men should have recourse to our own works, whose authenticity they most emphatically deny, to prove us in the wrong. Yet, this attempt, whenever made, cannot be sustained, for . . . instead of the Book of Mormon being opposed to this principle, it contains an express provision for the revelation of the principle to us as a people at some future time—namely, that when the Lord should desire to raise up unto Himself a righteous seed, He would command His people to that effect, plainly setting forth that a time would come when He would command His people to do so.  

[Calm]

"People who do not accept continuing revelation sometimes get into trouble by doing things too soon or too late or too long. The practice of polygamy is an example."

https://speeches.byu.edu/talks/dallin-h-oaks_timing/

Edited July 23, 2016 by Calm