Come Follow Me (April 1-7) - Talk about chastity, no mention of polygamy

[TheTanakas]

14 minutes ago, CV75 said:

It doesn't say "more seed", either. Just "seed."

If you have 9 wives, you could theoretically have 9 children in the first year, assuming
one child per pregnancy.  One wife, typically one child per pregnancy.  So, more wives
means "more seed". Throw in triplets and quadruplets and then you have "much seed".

Edited April 7, 2024 by TheTanakas

[CV75]

14 minutes ago, TheTanakas said:

If you have 9 wives, you could theoretically have 9 children in the first year, assuming
one child per pregnancy.  One wife, typically one child per pregnancy.  So, more wives
means "more seed". Throw in triplets and quadruplets and then you have "much seed".

If the scripture were written that way, I might take it that way. But it says "seed." Please, no more!

[Calm]

3 hours ago, Teancum said:

Does it matter who wrote the D&C Section that was in the 1835 D&C?  The book was voted on and accepted by the church.  Seems like the marriage section was a valid as the rest of the book.

Surely you know by now details matter to me for their own sake.  Joseph approved it for publishing whether he wrote it or not, so that is not an issue for me.  I am just curious and want to get Portal’s view correct.

Edited April 7, 2024 by Calm

[manol]

On 4/6/2024 at 1:11 AM, PortalToParis said:

I think the LDS church and the now CoC have both diverged from certain original teachings of Joseph Smith's time. Right now we are two splinter groups, but I think we can continue reverting back to all original teachings as they were restored. I think that way, way in the future a convergence can be made, in which our principles and teachings return back to harmony with eachother and we become one in Zion again. If I were the Lord, I imagine my plan for the Millennium would be to settle all inter-church and inter-faith disputes such that we are no more "LDS Mormons" or "FLDS Mormons" or "RLDS Mormons", just like in The Book of Mormon we read that the people became no longer Nephites, Ishmaelites, Lamanites, or any manner of -ites. I don't know if that answer satisfies you or not, it might sound too 'Christian universalism' to you, but that's what I think. Regardless, I still believe the ordination of the priesthood from those who received it from the line of Joseph Smith to be valid, and is in effect for those who use it worthily.

Do you think the LDS Church is currently the only nexus (or the primary nexus, or a primary nexus), through which God "does now reveal many great and important things pertaining to the kingdom of God"? 

Edited April 7, 2024 by manol

[PortalToParis]

21 hours ago, webbles said:

Why would Joseph Fielding adopt the polygamy doctrine so quickly?

Joseph Fielding seems to have perhaps believed in the spiritual wife doctrine before the martyrdom, and seemed to perhaps be trying to convince his wife of it as well. His June 14, 1844 journal entry states the following:

“I often preach to my wife and endeavor to inspire her with faith. Her mind has been troubled at some things in the Church, the subject of spiritual wives so much talked about at this time....But the way in which subjects for the celestial kingdom are selected is not understood, or not considered. I do not boast, but I am thankful for the ideas which God has given me on this subject, and long to teach the same to others, but I have but little chance of doing it but to my wife. I believe that all things shall work together for good to them that love God, and all is well. I tell my wife I mean to hold on to the truth at any cost and the greatest cost would be to lose her, but her unbelief shall not stop us.” http://boap.org/LDS/Early-Saints/JFielding.html

Hyrum Smith said, “One reason I speak to the Elders is, in consequence of the Ten thousand reports which come to me from abroad— almost every foolish man runs to me, to enquire if such and such things are true, and how many spiritual wives a man may have.” I think it to be perfectly possible that Hyrum’s brother-in-law happened to be one of those “foolish men”, despite him being Hyrum’s wife’s brother. It is undoubtable to me, I believe the evidence shows it, that at the same time that Joseph and Hyrum were denouncing polygamy publicly, it was being taught privately. LDS historians have held the opinion that it was Joseph and Hyrum teaching it privately. I don’t think so. Both Hyrum and Joseph publicly stated that polygamy was wrongfully being attributed to themselves.

The traditional LDS narrative states that Hyrum is here in his sermon only condemning “spiritual wifery”, but that he was still practicing polygamy under the term of “celestial marriage”. But take a look back at Joseph Fielding’s entry: he doesn’t write the term “celestial marriage” but very clearly “spiritual wives”. I think this supports the idea that Joseph Fielding was not being taught polygamy from Hyrum, contrary to the traditional LDS narrative.

[PortalToParis]

21 hours ago, webbles said:

Are you saying that Joseph Fielding didn't learn about what ever Joseph Smith was teaching?

The lie that pro-polygamists were giving to people at the time was that Joseph Smith had to publicly denounce polygamy to keep himself safe from the law and from Emma. We know that Chauncey Higbee and John C. Bennet both taught this before the martyrdom (and were both excommunicated), and that after the martyrdom John Taylor taught that this was why Brigham Young had to disband the Relief Society:

“Sister Emma... made use of the position she held to try to pervert the minds of the sisters” and “taught the Sisters that the principle of Celestial [Plural] Marriage as taught and practiced by Joseph Smith the prophet was not of God.” This, he says, was “the reason why the Relief Society did not continue.” “Relief Society Report,” Relief Society Record, July 17, 1880; “R.S. Reports,” 53-54; Harrisville Ward, Farr West Stake, General Minutes, 1850-1977, CHL, vol. 14, June 29, 1881.

[PortalToParis]

22 hours ago, webbles said:

Also Mary adopted [the doctrine of polygamy] pretty quickly as well as she was sealed to Heber C. Kimball in the Nauvoo temple.

While she was sealed to and supported by Heber C. Kimball after the martyrdom, I don’t think she ever adopted the doctrine of polygamy or lived in it with Heber C. Kimball. She was a very independent-minded woman who had turned down more than one offer of marriage, working as a single governess for several years before eventually marrying Hyrum at the age of 36. https://www.ldsliving.com/the-indomitable-faith-of-mary-fielding-smith-how-hyrums-martyrdom-changed-her-forever/s/90736 After the martyrdom she had Hyrum’s six children from his first marriage as well as her own Joseph F. Smith and Martha Ann to take care of. She never lived with Heber and Vilate Kimball until she was dying from illness. I don’t see the arrangement with Heber C. Kimball as anything more than a destitute widow of young children receiving living support. It wasn’t until she was on her deathbed that the big Section 132 reveal happened, which I think gives strong evidence that she was not someone who would have endorsed it.

[Calm]

7 minutes ago, PortalToParis said:

think it to be perfectly possible that Hyrum’s brother-in-law happened to be one of those “foolish men”, despite him being Hyrum’s wife’s brother.

So why didn’t Hyrum correct his false understanding?

[Calm]

2 minutes ago, PortalToParis said:

While she was sealed to and supported by Heber C. Kimball after the martyrdom, I don’t think she ever adopted the doctrine of polygamy or lived in it with Heber C. Kimball. She was a very independent-minded woman who had turned down more than one offer of marriage, working as a single governess for several years before eventually marrying Hyrum at the age of 36. https://www.ldsliving.com/the-indomitable-faith-of-mary-fielding-smith-how-hyrums-martyrdom-changed-her-forever/s/90736 After the martyrdom she had Hyrum’s six children from his first marriage as well as her own Joseph F. Smith and Martha Ann to take care of. She never lived with Heber and Vilate Kimball until she was dying from illness. I don’t see the arrangement with Heber C. Kimball as anything more than a destitute widow of young children receiving living support. It wasn’t until she was on her deathbed that the big Section 132 reveal happened, which I think gives strong evidence that she was not someone who would have endorsed it.

Why did she go west and not denounce it then?

[PortalToParis]

22 hours ago, webbles said:

In the page you like to link to, in section 57, it says that sealings were to create "family bonds".

This website is only a two-hour intro to the topic so it doesn’t properly look at each of the women that were later reported to have been Joseph Smith’s wives. There are many sealings that the LDS church purports to have happened that pro-Joseph-monogamists reject happened due to lack of contemporary record, so that’s one thing that needs to be kept in mind as you’re researching the anti-polygamy narrative. If you want to delve deep (which I recommend if you have time and inclination to) then you’ll be wanting to look at each purported plural wife individually, in terms of what individual reason the LDS church has for listing each woman as a possible or probable plural wife.

Quote

And if Joseph was sealing to create family bonds, why his sister-in-law?

Dr. Bernhisel was also sealed to women in his immediate family, even those he was blood-related to:

Maria Bernhisel, sister; Brother Samuel’s wife, Catherine Kremer; Mary Shatto, (Aunt); Madalena Lupferd, (distant relative); Catherine Bernhisel, Aunt; Hannah Bower, Aunt; Elizabeth Sheively, Aunt; Hannah Bower, cousin; Maria Lawrence, (intimate friend); Sarah Crosby, intimate friend, [deceased] . . . ; Mary Ann Bloom, cousin.” Brown, “Early Mormon Adoption Theology,”

[ZealouslyStriving]

3 minutes ago, Calm said:

Why did she go west and not denounce it then?

And why was her son the one who went around and collected all the affidavits of the women who claimed to be involved in Nauvoo plural marriages?

[PortalToParis]

22 hours ago, webbles said:

So, Hyrum both denounced polygamy and at the same time announced he was sealed to two women.  And it does sound like he sees these sealings as actual marriage covenants.  This sounds very much like what Joseph Fielding wrote about.

Hyrum Smith explained that his two sealings were from being consecutively, legally married to two women. Since it wasn’t under the “adoption” use of sealing, it was the ‘contract be sealed in view of eternity’ use of sealing. It was only because he had separate legal marriage contracts with both of the women without either of those contracts overlapping with eachother in time, that he considered his sealings to both of them as valid.

The topic is certainly a big one, much bigger than the intro website, and even my additional explanations here might not be extensive enough or well-argued enough to be convincing to you, but there’s a lot more on it that you can read from the site’s Further Study page, and even from the Joseph Fought Polygamy site if you want to read hundreds of pages of the RLDS view. The huge amount of conflicting information might end up feeling frustrating or exasperating to you, but I very strongly believe that if the topic is approached with prayer and fasting the Lord makes everything clear to the mind even to the point of receiving strong discernment and faith-based confidence in the truth.

[Calm]

Portal, So it seems like your and others’ only issues with polygyny is because it was against the law at the time?  If Joseph was able to have multiple legal contracts all at once, you would be okay with it?

Edited April 8, 2024 by Calm

[PortalToParis]

7 minutes ago, ZealouslyStriving said:

And why was her son the one who went around and collected all the affidavits of the women who claimed to be involved in Nauvoo plural marriages?

Joseph F. Smith was only 11 years old when Mary died. He was raised throughout adolescence by Heber C. Kimball. 

"Joseph F. Smith wrote to Orson Pratt on July 19, 1875, and stated that, as he began to put together evidence of Joseph's involvement in polygamy and its historical unfolding, he "was astonished at the scarcity of evidence, I might say almost total absence of direct evidence upon the subject."" Brian C. Hales, Joseph Smith's Polygamy 1:9)

[PortalToParis]

1 hour ago, Calm said:

Portal, So it seems like your and others’ only issues with polygyny is because it was against the law at the time?  If Joseph was able to have multiple legal contracts all at once, you would be okay with it?

No, I think that it being against American law was how the Lord wanted it to be. Polygyny was certainly legal during the reign of King David and King Soloman, but the Lord in Jacob chapter 2 said such thing was "abominable" to him anyway. I don't think the Lord wishes it be made legal for excuses of religious freedom, and I think Joseph and Hyrum were of the same opinion. They condemned it as being both against the laws of the land *and* against the laws of God, with the express implied opinion that it should stay that way.

(See Section #32 of the Historical Monogamy Doctrine site)

Edited April 8, 2024 by PortalToParis

[ZealouslyStriving]

7 minutes ago, PortalToParis said:

Joseph F. Smith was only 11 years old when Mary died. He was raised throughout adolescence by Heber C. Kimball. 

"Joseph F. Smith wrote to Orson Pratt on July 19, 1875, and stated that, as he began to put together evidence of Joseph's involvement in polygamy and its historical unfolding, he "was astonished at the scarcity of evidence, I might say almost total absence of direct evidence upon the subject."" Brian C. Hales, Joseph Smith's Polygamy 1:9)

Did Lovina lie?

[PortalToParis]

2 hours ago, Calm said:

Why did she go west and not denounce it then?

She was a widow with eight EDIT: seven kids and was given an offer to have her needs to live be covered if she went. She lived on the outskirts of the town that was being built in Utah, and polygamy was only being privately taught while she was alive. 

Edited April 8, 2024 by PortalToParis

[bluebell]

41 minutes ago, PortalToParis said:

No, I think that it being against American law was how the Lord wanted it to be. Polygyny was certainly legal during the reign of King David and King Soloman, but the Lord in Jacob chapter 2 said such thing was "abominable" to him anyway. I don't think the Lord wishes it be made legal for excuses of religious freedom, and I think Joseph and Hyrum were of the same opinion. They condemned it as being both against the laws of the land *and* against the laws of God, with the express implied opinion that it should stay that way.

According to the bible, some of those plural wives were given by God's prophet, Samuel, right?  (or was it Nathan?).  

[ZealouslyStriving]

11 minutes ago, PortalToParis said:

She was a widow with eight kids and was given an offer to have her needs to live be covered if she went. She lived on the outskirts of the town that was being built in Utah, and polygamy was only being privately taught while she was alive. 

Her MIL and SIL seemed to make a good go of it. She would've had fam to lean on.

[PortalToParis]

1 hour ago, ZealouslyStriving said:

Did Lovina lie?

"Emma had once told her that she [Emma] had consented to and witnessed her husband's [Joseph's] sealings to some of his plural wives."

Something that pro-monogamists consider to have happened a lot during the polygamy years was that non-polygamous sealing stories ended up being falsely equated to plural marriage. So if Emma had once told Lovina, "I was the witness for several of Joseph's sealing ordinances in Nauvoo." and Lovina throughout her next thirty years in Utah was only familiar with man-woman sealings as being polygamous, it stands to reason that she could have simply assumed that those women Emma was talking about must have been plural wives. That's why contemporary records are so much more valuable than later reminiscences. 

(See section #66 of the Historical Monogamy Doctrine site)

Edited April 8, 2024 by PortalToParis

[PortalToParis]

58 minutes ago, bluebell said:

According to the bible, some of those plural wives were given by God's prophet, Samuel, right?  (or was it Nathan?).  

The King James Version of the Bible is the go-to translation for LDS members and leaders, but the New American Standard Bible translation quotes this (the verses you might be referring to) as the following:

5 Then David’s anger burned greatly against the man, and he said to Nathan, “As the Lord lives, the man who has done this certainly deserves to die! 

6 So he must make restitution for the lamb four times over, since he did this thing and had no compassion.”

7 Nathan then said to David, “You yourself are the man! This is what the Lord, the God of Israel says: ‘It is I who anointed you as king over Israel, and it is I who rescued you from the hand of Saul. 

8 I also gave you your master’s house and put your master’s wives into your care, and I gave you the house of Israel and Judah; 2 Samuel 12:5-8 (NASB)

The "master" referred to here is King Saul. David defeated Saul and so Saul's wives became widows. When the Lord (through Nathan) tells David that the wives of Saul were "put into your care", it could simply be referring to David having been commissioned to take care of the widows and their now-fatherless children and in return have them be made part of David's adopted posterity. 

The King James Version translation reads it as 'gave you your master's house and your master's wives into thy bosom', which of course has a much different connotation than the above.

Edited April 8, 2024 by PortalToParis

[Calm]

1 hour ago, ZealouslyStriving said:

Her MIL and SIL seemed to make a good go of it. She would've had fam to lean on.

And it would have been a lot less trouble.  Let’s assume she knows they are lying about polygyny.  Why would she believe any of their promises since they were not honorable men?

Edited April 8, 2024 by Calm

[Calm]

55 minutes ago, PortalToParis said:

Lovina throughout her next thirty years in Utah was only familiar with man-woman sealings as being polygamous, it stands to reason that she could have simply assumed that those women Emma was talking about must have been plural wives.

But Law of adoption sealings were well known.

[ZealouslyStriving]

4 minutes ago, Calm said:

And it would have been a lot less trouble.  Let’s assume she knows they are lying about polygyny.  Why would she believe any of their promises since they were not honorable men?

Exactly... 🥇

[PortalToParis]

9 hours ago, TheTanakas said:

Thank you.  It was a lot of material.  The end stipulates it was written by a faithful 
sister member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. But if she is right,
then many LDS leaders are apostate based on what they have written about the history of
polygamy.  So she could not possibly sustain even the current leaders.

Unlike what Brigham Young taught, sustaining church leaders does not mean thinking them to be infallible or unable to be led astray. It doesn't mean sharing their opinions of doctrine. I'm sure we've all had bishops that we've disagreed with on a certain doctrinal point. Historical polygamy as false doctrine, Joseph Smith's opposition to it, and the lies of it by BY & co is certainly a very, very, big point of disagreement, but Joseph Smith taught that we shouldn't call anyone apostate simply for disagreement of doctrinal belief (and I would certainly include historical belief with that). It's not necessary for us to sustain Brigham Young or any other polygamist in any way.

Also consider The Book of Mormon, where the Lord rebukes the future Gentiles because they have hated and despised the Jews, and "not sought to recover them". I think we ought to also seek to recover our current LDS church leaders from Brigham Young's long-ago lies and false teachings.