Rise And Reckoning: New Biography Confronts The Myths And Realities Of Joseph Smith

[Michie]

Considering the chaotic first 14 years before founding Prophet Joseph Smith, Jr., was assassinated, it is incredible that today his Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (nicknamed “Mormon” until 2018) is America’s fourth largest religious body.

The growing U.S. membership has reached 6.9 million, exceeding a United Methodist Church lately reduced by schism and ranking below only the Catholic Church, independent evangelical congregations (that collectively have 21 million followers) and the Southern Baptist Convention.

In a classic American saga, Smith, though a thinly-educated child of hardscrabble farmers, developed compelling dynamism and charm to establish the only major success among countless new religious faiths born in the U.S. Smith’s church has expanded to 17.5 million members worldwide, and the Book of Mormon, the first of the scriptures Smith added to the Bible, is said to be the most widely distributed writing originated in America.

All that and more underscores the significance of a long-awaited and definitive new biography, out now: “Joseph Smith: The Rise and Fall of an American Prophet” (Yale University Press) by historian John G. Turner of George Mason University. It is the first biography to benefit from official publication of the 27-volume Joseph Smith Papers.

Until now, the two most influential biographies have reflected contrasting viewpoints. “No Man Knows My History” (1945) was a pioneering and sour psycho-history by Fawn Brodie, a skeptical LDS dropout. “Joseph Smith: Rough Stone Rolling” (2005) was the work of eminent Columbia University historian Richard Bushman, a devout LDS believer. Presbyterian Turner, by contrast, is an outsider who strives for fairness while stating that he does not accept Smith’s revelations (nor in candor does this writer).

Continued below.

Rise And Reckoning: New Biography Confronts The Myths And Realities Of Joseph Smith

(ANALYSIS) All that and more underscores the significance of a long-awaited and definitive new biography, out now: “Joseph Smith: The Rise and Fall of an American Prophet” (Yale University Press) by historian John G. Turner of George Mason University. It is the first biography to benefit fr

religionunplugged.com

 

[A New Dawn]

The author introduces a fairly unknown secret organization (the Council of Fifty) within the later early church (the Nauvoo era) where all the secret practices were practiced prior to Brigham Young taking the majority of the group to Utah. The only thing they practiced openly was Baptism for the Dead. The rest of the secret practices they tried to introduce to the church body in the last year or two before his death, but the church body rejected it. That included polygamy, which was one that they practiced in secret (though some knew, like Emma Smith.) Once Brigham young took his group out of the US, they started teaching and practicing most of those secret rituals publicly, which did cause some to return to Nauvoo and join back with the ones who split and became the RLDS church.

The LDS church, in today’s world had long taught Joseph Smith practiced polygamy and the RLDS long taught that he didn’t, but that changed over the last 30-40 years to the point that the RLDS accepted it, and the LDS started denying it.

I haven’t read the book. I, as a previous member of the RLDS church, have studied church history in detail, so I’m not sure what else there is to learn. LOL. And to be honest, since leaving the church, I don’t really care.

 

[RileyG]

I thought the LDS Church was declining? Hmmm…,

 

[A New Dawn]

I thought the LDS Church was declining? Hmmm…,

No. Unfortunately it has all the stuff that draws people with egos. Becoming a god of your own world. Polygamy. Who wouldn’t like all that?

 

[RileyG]

No. Unfortunately it has all the stuff that draws people with egos. Becoming a god of your own world. Polygamy. Who wouldn’t like all that?

Such bizarre doctrine for sure!