Mormons & Polygamy

Jane_Doe · Oct 30, 2015

Jutta2 said:
For heaven's sake. That what you're doing, is Mormon obfuscation. What is the official church sites on the Internet, is often not that how it is handled. I live, as you know, in Germany, formerly fascist country. The church here has a wide tradition (since 1860 approximately). Members of my family were in the church since the First World War. So, I have many of my Mormon ancestors diaries. And in all the following statement could be found: what the prophet, the apostle, a Seventy, stake president, bishop, or some other church leaders say, or arranging, is the Word of God and must be obeyed ".
Serve with the following statements:

You see, how they think, how Mormons act? Don't cheat on me!

I cannot speak to your personal experience, so I'm not going to.

But the way Mormons are SUPPOSED to follow the Gospel is not through blind faith in God, and certainly not blind following of fallible human leaders. We do not believe that prophets (let alone stake presidents) are infallible. Rather, their fallibility has been proclaimed from the General Conference pulpit. A prophet is a MAN of God, complete with the wrinkles.

Are there Mormons whom just follow blindly? Yes, along with blind members of every other faith. That is not how it is supposed to be and such faith is prone to fracture. This is why Mormons so stress individual prayer/confirmation/guidance with God, daily scripture study, and applying faith to your life.

I hav

Jutta2 · Nov 1, 2015

If a church lies, or members of a church lies, I call them liars, because they ARE liars. I didn't mean with it mistakes, because we all are humans, and make mistakes. I mean with it such persons, who know the truth, and lie. For example: Joseph smith lies several times about his polygamous relationships, even to his first wife Emma. If he says, that in the LDS church is no polygamy, and he knows it better, he is a liar.

smaneck · Nov 1, 2015

Jutta2 said:
For example: Joseph smith lies several times about his polygamous relationships, even to his first wife Emma. If he says, that in the LDS church is no polygamy, and he knows it better, he is a liar.

Whether Joseph Smith lied about his supposed polygamy would depend on what he was saying about them. As has been pointed out, there is no evidence that any of those 'celestial marriages' produced offspring. That may well indicate they were never physically consummated. That being the case, would it necessarily be a lie if he said he had only one wife? Because in the flesh, that might well have been true.

drstevej · Nov 1, 2015

smaneck said:
Whether Joseph Smith lied about his supposed polygamy would depend on what he was saying about them. As has been pointed out, there is no evidence that any of those 'celestial marriages' produced offspring. That may well indicate they were never physically consummated. That being the case, would it necessarily be a lie if he said he had only one wife? Because in the flesh, that might well have been true.

If you were Emma would you buy this rationalization?

smaneck · Nov 1, 2015

drstevej said:
If you were Emma would you buy this rationalization?

I would not assume my husband was being unfaithful unless he was having sexual relations with another woman.

fatboys · Nov 1, 2015

drstevej said:
If you were Emma would you buy this rationalization?

You believe that God has witnessed to you do his work. Now I can't judge you and say this calling had nothing to do with God but your own desires. I can make a guess as to why you HATE Mormonism and from your actions here it has nothing to do with your love for us. You may say it is but I personally do not feel any love. Only hate.

Jane_the_Bane · Nov 1, 2015

drstevej said:
If you were Emma would you buy this rationalization?

As long as I was not kept in the dark, no breach of trust has taken place. As far as I am concerned, infidelity requires some kind of betrayal, i.e. the lack of consent or trust with at least one of the involved parties.

Ran77 · Nov 1, 2015

fatboys said:
You believe that God has witnessed to you do his work. Now I can't judge you and say this calling had nothing to do with God but your own desires. I can make a guess as to why you HATE Mormonism and from your actions here it has nothing to do with your love for us. You may say it is but I personally do not feel any love. Only hate.

Ditto.

Ran77 · Nov 1, 2015

Jutta2 said:
Everything a prophet, or apostle, or other Church leaders, is considered by Mormons as the Word of God, as modern Holy Scripture.

That is false. And plenty of the LDS apostles have clearly stated the opposite of what you have presented here.

:o

Jutta2 · Nov 2, 2015

smaneck said:
Whether Joseph Smith lied about his supposed polygamy would depend on what he was saying about them. As has been pointed out, there is no evidence that any of those 'celestial marriages' produced offspring. That may well indicate they were never physically consummated. That being the case, would it necessarily be a lie if he said he had only one wife? Because in the flesh, that might well have been true.

He never lied?

For example:

Joseph Smith emphatically denied accusations linking him to polygamy. In 1838 he answered some questions for the Elder's Journal. Question number seven was: "Do the Mormons believe in having more wives than one?" The answer was: "No, not at the same time" (Elder's Journal, as cited in History of the Church, vol. 3, p.28).
According to the History of the Church, on May 26, 1844, Joseph Smith absolutely denied the accusation that he was living in polygamy: "What a thing it is for a man to be accused of committing adultery, and having seven wives, when I can only find one. I am the same man, and as innocent as I was fourteen years ago; and I can prove them all perjurers" (vol. 6, p.411).

Source: The Changing world of Mormonism, p. 259

At this time, Smith got more than 20 women,women of under age, older than 18, single and married women (married with other men)

And he must have had sex with them. Or why he would do this to a married Mormon woman (Zina Huntington Jacobs) according to her diary:

“[Joseph] sent word to me by my brother, saying, ‘Tell Zina, I put it off and put it off till an angel with a drawn
sword stood by me and told me if I did not establish that principle upon the earth I would lose my position and my life’”. Joseph further explained that, “the Lord had made it known to him she was to be his celestial wife.”

Source: The wives of Joseph Smith, Zina Huntington Jacobs

Did Smith have had sexual relationships with his polygamous women? Let's have a closer look:

Joseph Smith's personal secretary records that on May 22nd, 1843, Smith's first wife Emma found Joseph and Eliza Partridge secluded in an upstairs bedroom at the Smith home. Emma was devastated. William Clayton's journal entry for 23 May (see Smith, 105-106)

Smith's secretary William Clayton also recorded a visit to young Almera Johnson on May 16, 1843: "Prest. Joseph and I went to B[enjamin] F. Johnsons to sleep." Johnson himself later noted that on this visit Smith stayed with Almera "as man and wife" and "occupied the same room and bed with my sister, that the previous month he had occupied with the daughter of the late Bishop Partridge as his wife." Almera Johnson also confirmed her secret marriage to Joseph Smith: "I lived with the prophet Joseph as his wife and he visited me at the home of my brother Benjamin F." (Zimmerman, I Knew the Prophets, 44. See also "The Origin of Plural Marriage, Joseph F. Smith, Jr., Deseret News Press, page 70-71.)

Emily D. Partridge (Smith Young) said she "roomed" with Joseph the night following her marriage to him and said that she had "carnal intercourse" with him. (Temple Lot case (complete transcript), 364, 367, 384; see Foster, Religion and Sexuality, 15.)

So, he have had SEX with his polygamous women. That's a fact! But, was he also fathered them?

Stake President Angus Cannon also testified: "I will now refer you to one case where it was said by the girl's grandmother that your father [Joseph Smith] has a daughter born of a plural wife. The girl's grandmother was Mother Sessions . . . She was the grand-daughter of Mother Sessions. That girl, I believe, is living today, in Bountiful, north of this city. I heard prest. Young, a short time before his death, refer to the report . . . The woman is now said to have a family of children, and I think she is still living." (Stake President Angus M. Cannon, statement of interview with Joseph III, 25-26, LDS archives.)

Faithful Mormon and wife of Joseph Smith, Sylvia Sessions (Lyon), on her deathbed told her daughter, Josephine, that she (Josephine) was the daughter of Joseph Smith. Josephine testified: "She (Sylvia) then told me that I was the daughter of the Prophet Joseph Smith, she having been sealed to the Prophet at the time that her husband Mr. Lyon was out of fellowship with the Church." (Affidavit to Church Historian Andrew Jenson, 24 Feb. 1915)

In her testimony given at a Brigham Young University devotional, Faithful Mormon Mary Elizabeth Rollins Lightner stated that she knew of children born to Smith's plural wives: "I know he [Joseph Smith] had six wives and I have known some of them from childhood up. I know he had three children. They told me. I think two are living today but they are not known as his children as they go by other names." (Read her full BYU testimony here: http://www.ldshistory.net/pc/merlbyu.htm)

Source: http://www.i4m.com/think/history/joseph_smith_sex.htm

So, you didn't tell the truth about Joseph "always randy" Smith.

Jutta2 · Nov 2, 2015

drstevej said:
If you were Emma would you buy this rationalization?

When Emma Smith learned of the law of polygamy, was beside her husband Joseph; also her brother Hyrum, and the writer of Smith, William Clayton in attendance. And Clayton wrote in his diary that Emma Smith did not believe that polygamy comes from God. Smith had his wife as "God (section 132 in the Doctrine and Covenants), said that she would be destroyed if she would not accept the law of plural marriage. Yes, Smith was a manipulator. In Secret Service he had made a career.

Jutta2 · Nov 2, 2015

smaneck said:
I would not assume my husband was being unfaithful unless he was having sexual relations with another woman.

Smith was caught by others in bed with another woman. He told others that he spent the nights with other women. So, if that were my husband, I would get a divorce immediately from him, and relieve him of his shirt (they say it Germany for a messy divorce)

Jutta2 · Nov 2, 2015

fatboys said:
You believe that God has witnessed to you do his work. Now I can't judge you and say this calling had nothing to do with God but your own desires. I can make a guess as to why you HATE Mormonism and from your actions here it has nothing to do with your love for us. You may say it is but I personally do not feel any love. Only hate.

Do you feel as a victim? Do you think someone would hate the Mormons here? It goes about facts here. Naked, verifiable facts. Facts that prove that Joseph Smith lied about polygamy, that he lied of his polygamous relationship with Fanny Alger was already known since 1831 (his maid) that he had more than thirty women, and have had sexual intercourse with some of them.
That's a fact, and you can't deny it.

smaneck · Nov 2, 2015

Jutta2 said:
He never lied?

Apparently you are not reading what I wrote very carefully. I didn't say he never lied. I said *if* he never consummated those marriages was what he said necessarily a lie?

And he must have had sex with them. Or why he would do this to a married Mormon woman (Zina Huntington Jacobs) according to her diary:

If the marriage was consummated how is it that she had two children through Jacobs during this time and none by Smith?

So, he have had SEX with his polygamous women. That's a fact! But, was he also fathered them?

Source: http://www.i4m.com/think/history/joseph_smith_sex.htm

Here is the thing. The DNA evidence doesn't substantiate it.

So, you didn't tell the truth about Joseph "always randy" Smith.

Given the fact that I didn't make any assertions but only 'if' statements I don't know how you could say I wasn't telling the truth. I don't know the truth about this and I'm guessing you don't either.

Ironhold · Nov 2, 2015

Jutta2 said:
So, he have had SEX with his polygamous women. That's a fact! But, was he also fathered them?

Nope.

To quote Wikipedia on the matter:

Though there were allegations of paternity in some of these polygamous marriages, no children have ever been proven to be Smith's. There is ongoing genetic research to determine if any descendants of alleged children have Smith's genetic markers, and so far all tests have been negative.

So as of the time the article was written, there was no evidence to believe that Joseph fathered any children beyond those borne by Emma.

If anything, there's now a hypothesis which holds that Fanny Alger was already pregnant by a former lover when the Smith family brought her in.

Ironhold · Nov 2, 2015

Jutta2 said:
Do you feel as a victim? Do you think someone would hate the Mormons here?

If you'd check the other threads, you'd see just how much "Christian love" we get shown on a regular basis.

Ironhold · Nov 2, 2015

Jutta2 said:
You really have no idea about your own church history, and the doctrines that were then distributed. At that time believed Mormons even that which is inhabited ond. From people who look like Quakers. Or those strange things that God has been proclaimed in their time of church leaders as a word, and when it turned out to be wrong, they were either not be printed again or glammheimlich removed from the records. So here are some information about the "moon prophecy:

On July 24, 1870, Brigham Young, the second president of the Mormon church, stated:

Trying to find my sources now, but here goes -

In the early to mid 1800s, newspapers across America fell for a hoax. According to the hoax, a top astronomer of the day (who had no idea his name was being used for such) allegedly discovered life on the moon. The inhabitants were supposedly dressed up as Quakers. It was some time before the hoax was discovered, and by that time the damage was widespread.

Given this, it would be fair to question whether or not Young (et al) were among the many, many Americans who took the hoax at face value. If so, then it simply means that they didn't say anything that other sources elsewhere hadn't been saying at one point.

fatboys · Nov 2, 2015

Ironhold said:
Trying to find my sources now, but here goes -

In the early to mid 1800s, newspapers across America fell for a hoax. According to the hoax, a top astronomer of the day (who had no idea his name was being used for such) allegedly discovered life on the moon. The inhabitants were supposedly dressed up as Quakers. It was some time before the hoax was discovered, and by that time the damage was widespread.

Given this, it would be fair to question whether or not Young (et al) were among the many, many Americans who took the hoax at face value. If so, then it simply means that they didn't say anything that other sources elsewhere hadn't been saying at one point.

I can also see Brigham Young saying this tongue in cheek. But these things get recorded and if not corrected can go on to be what they believe. It's like me trying to be funny here. Unless you know my personality you would think that sometimes I am serious when I am joking around. By the way I am really funny. If you don't believe me ask me.

drstevej · Nov 2, 2015

fatboys said:
I can also see Brigham Young saying this tongue in cheek. But these things get recorded and if not corrected can go on to be what they believe. It's like me trying to be funny here. Unless you know my personality you would think that sometimes I am serious when I am joking around. By the way I am really funny. If you don't believe me ask me.

This too?

“Who can tell us of the inhabitants of this little planet that shines of an evening, called the moon?... When you inquire about the inhabitants of that sphere you find that the most learned are as ignorant in regard to them as the ignorant of their fellows. So it is in regard to the inhabitants of the sun. Do you think it is inhabited? I rather think it is. Do you think there is any life there? No question of it; it was not made in vain.”

- Prophet Brigham Young, Journal of Discourses, v. 13, p. 271

Ironhold · Nov 2, 2015

drstevej said:
This too?

“Who can tell us of the inhabitants of this little planet that shines of an evening, called the moon?... When you inquire about the inhabitants of that sphere you find that the most learned are as ignorant in regard to them as the ignorant of their fellows. So it is in regard to the inhabitants of the sun. Do you think it is inhabited? I rather think it is. Do you think there is any life there? No question of it; it was not made in vain.”

- Prophet Brigham Young, Journal of Discourses, v. 13, p. 271

If Young was still under the impression that the media hoax was real, it wouldn't be too much of a stretch for him to think this as well.

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