Jane Manning James - Sealing questions

[JLHPROF]

My wife saw a Tiktok someone posted about Jane Manning James and her sealing status in the Church today.

I was able to see she had her proxy temple endowment in 1979 but I couldn't find answers to two questions posed:

1. She was married a couple of times - was any proxy marriage sealing performed for her?

2. Given the disavowal of previous racist doctrine or practice is there anything stated about a sealing cancellation of her servant sealing to Joseph?

Anyone have this information?

[rpn]

Sister James was invited to live with Joseph Smith's family in Nauvoo, when she couldn't get work/living quarters in Nauvoo, and she worked for him.   Joseph Smith had asked her if she wanted to be sealed with him and Emma before he died (again no certainty of what relationship he was proposing: it wasn't until Woodruff was prophet that we learned that sealings were only supposed to be families relationships), but she hadn't decided.  She thereafter sought her temple work over the years from all of the prophets, which is a main reason why they at least twice tried to figure out whether the priesthood ban was from God or not.  Joseph F. Smith (if I recall correctly) decided to allow her work to be done for her by proxy, while she was alive.   I'm not sure we know who decided that meant to seal her as JS's servant.  By that time Sister James was married and had children (all of whom she is now sealed to in the normal relationships since 1978): so it might have been because they didn't know what the sealed relationship could be. 

Edited September 5, 2022 by rpn

[JLHPROF]

According to what I read the sealing to Joseph was Jane's idea.

But I'm less interested in what happened back then.  My wife was asking about her proxy work - specifically family sealing.  Her temple work was done.

And if the servant sealing was ever cancelled.  Maybe that's not public information.

Blame the Tiktok guy - https://www.tiktok.com/t/ZTRPsTQmb/

Edited September 5, 2022 by JLHPROF

[webbles]

Per FamilySearch (https://www.familysearch.org/tree/person/details/K2V6-8VS), she was sealed to her first husband in 1979 on the same day she received her proxy endowment.  Her second husband is currently in progress.  Her sealing to her parents were also done in 1979 and then again in 1988.

There's nothing in FamilySearch about the servant sealing, but that's kind of expected since she is the only one that had that sealing done.  I have no idea if it has been canceled or not.

I checked a few of her children and they were all sealed to her on the same day in 1979.  So it looks like all her work and her children's work (and probably more) were done on the same day.

[Benjamin McGuire]

Just some quick thoughts -

Early Mormonism believed that the sealing ordinance formed a series of relationships through which the Celestial Kingdom was organized. The celestial kingdom was a hierarchical kingdom with a potentially infinite set of kingdoms and sub-kingdoms. This was formally taught at least as late as 1847 by Orson Hyde (complete with a picture of this hierarchy). Prior to 1894, most people were not sealed to their parents. In order to be sealed, males were required to have been ordained to the Melchizedek priesthood. So if you father was not ordained to the Melchizedek priesthood, you could not be sealed to them. Proxy ordinations to this priesthood did not begin until 1877, and even then, these did not qualify you to be sealed to your deceased parents (or for them to be sealed together) until 1894. Instead, people were sealed to those they saw as notable figures in the Church (in part because this determined where you were and where your own potential kingdom would fit, within that hierarchy). This practice was eventually discouraged and the Church began moving away from this hierarchical model of celestial organization to the three tiered system we are familiar with today. Perhaps the most interesting figure in this time-frame, and one who was at least partially responsible for the shift in policy in 1894 was James Martineau. He was one of the most prolific temple workers in the last part of the 19th century. Many of the women he did temple work for he simply sealed to himself (this was a common practice at the time). This included notable figures like Joan of Arc. By the time this policy shifted in 1894, the idea of a sealing of adoption had come to be recognized as its own category (although Martineau only had two individuals sealed to himself specifically in this way - an orphan girl and the son of a dead woman he himself had been sealed to). James began pestering the First Presidency over the issue of being sealed to his own parents in 1879, shortly after he did the proxy priesthood ordination for his father. After the policy shift in 1894, he wrote in his journal: "How thankful I am, that I now have a father and a mother. Having been all these years an orphan;and they, now,have their children—before childless and alone....Now I can meet my father and mother without shame and confusion." After the shift in 1894, lots of people were resealed to their parents - really completing the change from the earlier sealing organization of the CK to a family-centric model - and demonstrating the degree to which the earlier model had been abandoned.

With Jane Manning James, I think it's doubtful that the sealing would be cancelled. As our policies and theology have shifted, the general view is that God will sort things out in the Celestial Kingdom. And her case should be understood as coming in the middle of these changes. She began petitioning to have a sealing ordinance (understanding that it was necessary as a part of having a place in the Celestial Kingdom - especially as understood in the earlier model) around 1870 - during the time frame of the theological shift in role of the sealing ordinance in terms of exaltation. The final special sealing occurs in 1894, when that shift had, to a large extent, finally resolved itself. It also occurred during the period of time in which the three degrees of the Celestial Kingdom (an idea that wasn't there in 1840s) was undergoing its own shift from being defined through polygamy to being defined through race and other worthiness metrics. It is an important event, but even within its context it was an anomaly.