the road to hana wrote:beastie wrote:http://www.wivesofjosephsmith.org/08-SylviaSessionsLyon.htmOn January 27, 1844 her only surviving child, Philofreen, also died. At this time, Sylvia was eight months pregnant with her fourth child, Josephine Rosetta Lyon. Josephine later wrote, “Just prior to my mothers death in 1882 she called me to her bedside and told me that her days were numbered and before she passed away from mortality she desired to tell me something which she had kept as an entire secret from me and from all others but which she now desired to communicate to me. She then told me that I was the daughter of the Prophet Joseph Smith”.
Josephine was 38 years old at the time of her mother's death. Deathbed confessions are normally regarded as quite reliable.
It is extremely doubtful that Sylvia would lie about this to her daughter on her deathbed. So if someone was lying, it was Josephine. Why would she lie about such a thing?
Even more troubling, the elephant in the corner is the implication that these women could have been having sex with more than one man, when paternity is in question.
Even more troubling is Beastie's almost total misquote and mispunctuation of the last sentence of the Josephine quote; had she set it forth accurately the explanation would have been clearly against an implication of cohabitation. I can' t believe it.