Dynasitc Marriages-Doctrinal Question

[_charity]

This dynastic sealing idea seems revisionist. . . .

I think you are not aware of the chaotic nature of the times. There were always persecution from the outside, apostasy from the inside, a new doctrine without precendence in centuries, and an excitement and exhilartion hard to imagine. And there is plenty of evidence for people not understanding the process as we do now. Women were proxies for men, and men proxies for women. Men sealed to men. . . . .

And God does not send lightning bolts when we make little goofs.

[_moksha]

And God does not send lightning bolts when we make little goofs.

I am thankful for that everyday.

What you said sounds true, but I do not understand the proxie part.

[_ludwigm]

I think you are not aware of the chaotic nature of the times.

I think you are not aware of the chaotic nature of Joseph Smith.

There were always persecution from the outside,

There were always persecution complex.

apostasy from the inside

I don't understand this. There was one big apostasy, then everyhing had restored in 1830. Inside of what?

a new doctrine without precendence in centuries,

a new gibberish sermon/writing/talk ciphered for the whole human race (see my signature) but apologists.

And there is plenty of evidence for people not understanding the process as we do now.

Thanks GOd and his only mouthpieces, now we understand everything.

And God does not send lightning bolts when we make little goofs.

And God didn't send lightning bolts when Joseph Smith has made big goofs.

[_Yoda]

I'm waiting for Harmony to back up her claim about Alger; surely she has a basis for her claim.

Before 1894, posthumous sealings were done with little or no basis.

Was it the "main catalyst?" On whose statement?

Bob,

The following is the sequence of events surrounding Oliver Cowdery's excommunication. The affair certainly seems to be one of the main catalysts involved in his leaving the Church:

Excommunication

By early 1838 conflicts had arisen between Smith and Cowdery.

* Leadership. Cowdery competed with Smith for leadership of the new church and "disagreed with the Prophet's economic and political program and sought a personal financial independence [from the] Zion society that Joseph Smith envisioned."[19]
* Church and state. In March 1838, Smith and Rigdon moved to Far West, which had been under the presidency of Cowdery's brothers-in-law, David and John Whitmer. There they took charge of the Missouri church and initiated a number of policies that Cowdery and the Whitmers believed violated separation of church and state.
* Personal Behavior. In January 1838, Cowdery wrote his brother Warren that he and Joseph Smith had "had some conversation in which in every instance I did not fail to affirm that which I had said was strictly true. A dirty, nasty, filthy affair of his and Fanny Alger's was talked over in which I strictly declared that I had never deserted from the truth in the matter, and as I supposed was admitted by himself." Alger, a teenage maid living with the Smiths, may have been Joseph Smith's first plural wife, a practice that Cowdery opposed.[20]

On April 12, 1838, a church court excommunicated Cowdery after he failed to appear at a hearing on his membership and sent a letter resigning from the Church instead.[21] The Whitmers, William Wines Phelps and Book of Mormon witness Hiram Page were also excommunicated from the church at the same time.[22].

Cowdery and the Whitmers became known as "the dissenters," but they continued to live in and around Far West, where they owned a great deal of property. On June 17, 1838, President Sidney Rigdon announced to a large Mormon congregation that the dissenters were "as salt that had lost its savor" and that it was the duty of the faithful to cast the dissenters out "to be trodden beneath the feet of men." Cowdery and the Whitmers took this Salt Sermon as a threat against their lives and as an implicit instruction to the Danites, a secret vigilante group, and fled the county. Stories about their treatment circulated in nearby non-Mormon communities and increased the tension that led to the Mormon War.[23]

This is taken from the following Wikipedia link:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oliver_Cowdery

I know that you don't hold much stock in copy/paste Internet references. Nevertheless, this is the order of events that I have always been taught.

If you know of different circumstances, please add them here if I am mistaken.

[_harmony]

What do you feel would prompt this type of decision from the brethren? Are you saying that it was just some sort of wild notion on their part? That they thought it would be a nice thing to do, and that Joseph had no relationship with Fanny other than the fact that Fanny was a maid/child care provider for Joseph and Emma?

And, wasn't Joseph's relationship with Fanny the main catalyst for the contention between Oliver and Joseph?

I'm waiting for Harmony to back up her claim about Alger; surely she has a basis for her claim.

Before 1894, posthumous sealings were done with little or no basis.

Was it the "main catalyst?" On whose statement?

Oliver was in a position to know, Crock. You aren't.

[_harmony]

TD asked a question that I have also given much pause to. Why would God allow Joseph to get the sealing revelation so completely wrong? Why wasn't there clarification?

Simple explanation: Because the revelation wasn't from God. And Joseph wasn't consistently listening to God any longer. He had the bit between his teeth and he was running out of control. He'd taken off the prophetic mantle by then and was simply going with the flow. God finally took him off the earth in order to salvage some sort of the semblance of order. God's been trying to correct things ever since, but our leaders are so entrenched in tradition and hero worship, they aren't listening any better than Joseph did.

Much has been done that is backwards. Joseph's relationship with Fanny preceded the restoration of the sealing power. The formation of the church itself preceded the restoration of the authority to form the church. The law of tithing only became mandatory when the church was about bankrupt, rather than from the beginning.

Joseph was flying by the seat of his pants most of the time and really didn't have any idea what longterm ramifications his revelations would have. I mean good grief... we have a complete rehash of the restoration of the lesser priesthood, but virtually nothing about the higher one. We have word for word sacrament prayers, but the endowment ceremony isn't even canonized. We have the result of Joseph's gift (the Book of Mormon) and the result of Joseph's ego (the Doctrine and Covenants and the Book of Abraham).

The answer to your question is that Joseph wasn't listening to God, Liz. He was listening to his own ego.

[_Yoda]

God finally took him off the earth in order to salvage some sort of the semblance of order.

It seemed, though, that order did not commence. Things became worse. Under Brigham Young's tyranny, polygamy became an utter mess.

[_charity]

There were always persecution from the outside,

There were always persecution complex.

I find it hard to think that being tarred and feathered, vials of poison forced into his mouth, houses being burned down, women and children forced out of their homes in the dead of winter by armed men, etc. merely a persecution complex. There is plenty of evidence of persecution in the history of the Church in the fulness of times, as there has been in the history of the Church throughout all times.

apostasy from the inside

I don't understand this. There was one big apostasy, then everyhing had restored in 1830. Inside of what?

There is also individual apostasy. As in when Judas betrayed Christ. There were apostates in the times of Restoration, also. Men who fell away from the Church and then became enemies of the Church and its leaders. These men were every bit as traitorous as Judas.

a new doctrine without precendence in centuries,

a new gibberish sermon/writing/talk ciphered for the whole human race (see my signature) but apologists.

The New Testament contains the doctrines of sealing. Of course, I understand that you reject all religion.

And there is plenty of evidence for people not understanding the process as we do now.

Thanks GOd and his only mouthpieces, now we understand everything.

We understand a lot more than we did at first. But we don't know everything. That is why we have continuing revelation.

And God does not send lightning bolts when we make little goofs.

And God didn't send lightning bolts when Joseph Smith has made big goofs.

I suppose it depends on what you call "big." And what you call "goofs." We differ hugely on this topic. Of course.

[_Jason Bourne]

To be clear, I do think at some point Joseph Smith became convinced that he was as special as he told everyone he was, that he was the King of the world, the heavenly judge for this dispensation, and everyone must be sealed to him (or something), but this really has nothing to do with his sexual exploits in my opinion.

Just to clear a couple things up.

Joseph Smith never crowned himself King of the World. It was King of Israel on Earth. I think there is a big difference.


Joseph Smith never claimed that he was judge for this dispensation. Brigham Young claimed that about Joseph Smith after Joseph Smith was dead.

Back to your regularly scheduled program.

[_charity]

God finally took him off the earth in order to salvage some sort of the semblance of order.

It seemed, though, that order did not commence. Things became worse. Under Brigham Young's tyranny, polygamy became an utter mess.

Everything would have been fine in the Kingdom had it not been for the federal government intruding in on matters of religion, which was absolutely forbidden by the Constitution.