One doesn't need to cohabit in order to have sex or impregnate, so cohabitation in and of itself is outside the point.
Bob is pretending that all Josephine meant was that since her mother was sealed to Joseph Smith, she was - in terms of Mormon theology for the afterlife - his "daughter", as in spiritually adopted.
It is so laughable and strained it took me a few minutes to realize that's what he was actually arguing.
It does help to remember that this is a man who still denies that the Maya had a written language, despite all the evidence offered to him that demonstrates otherwise. He simply cannot admit he's wrong.
We hate to seem like we don’t trust every nut with a story, but there’s evidence we can point to, and dance while shouting taunting phrases.
I have given you a famous example of where a child's testimony has not resolved disputed paternity -- the Hemmings' family. Perhaps you can give me an example where a child's testimony alone has resolved disputed paternity. Maybe one?
How many people have tried to explain to you that paternity is not the issue? The issue is that Sylvia believed that Joseph Smith was Josephine's father. Hence, she had had sex with Joseph Smith.
All this babbling of yours about paternity is smoke and mirrors.
No, the fact continues to remain that the evidence is coming from a child, which is totally untrustworthy evidence when a mother tells a child the mother's claim to paternity.
I assume you mean to say "offspring," since "child" implies someone far younger than her 38 years.
Here, Sylvia does not claim sexual relations; she claims paternity.
One is generally and logically implied from the other.
What do we know of all the other children who died? Is it not curious that she lost so many children? The mortality rate among her offspring seems unusually high, even for the times.
The road is beautiful, treacherous, and full of twists and turns.
rcrocket wrote:No, the fact continues to remain that the evidence is coming from a child
Does this put the word of a 14-year-old boy also in question with respect to matters of evidence?
And you would have understood the distinction in the context of Mormon sealing theology had you correctly quoted from Josephine. I won't trust you again with any quote.
If your argument is that there are different aspects of fatherhood, what implications does that have for LDS belief in the literal (read: biological) fatherhood of God?
The road is beautiful, treacherous, and full of twists and turns.
rcrocket wrote:Even more troubling is Beastie's almost total misquote and mispunctuation of the last sentence of the Josephine quote . . . I won't trust you again with any quote. . . Don't garble your sources in such a way as to turn the meaning around 180%. . . you intentionally garbled your quote but putting a period in where a comment existed, and by leaving out the final phrase. . . Plus, the Josephine quote got the chronology completely wrong in terms of the Lyon's fellowship in the Church, but I'll leave that you to garble and misconstruct. . . Shame, shame, shame on your complete torture of the text by changing the punctuation and leaving a phrase out. For shame. . . Shame on you for your terrible misquote. It does not impress me that you had access to the correct quote; even more shameful.
Rcrocket is 100% correct on this one. I can't believe such a lapse of ethics from you, beastie. This was nothing less than a blatant attempt to manipulate your audience. You know what? You're almost as bad as the author of that one article on the Mountain Meadows Massacre who shamelessly left out a key phrase from Lee's defense attorney, thereby changing the meaning 180°, although I can't recall offhand who it was who wrote that article.
Right, Mister Scratch?
"Finally, for your rather strange idea that miracles are somehow linked to the amount of gay sexual gratification that is taking place would require that primitive Christianity was launched by gay sex, would it not?"
rcrocket wrote:Even more troubling is Beastie's almost total misquote and mispunctuation of the last sentence of the Josephine quote . . . I won't trust you again with any quote. . . Don't garble your sources in such a way as to turn the meaning around 180%. . . you intentionally garbled your quote but putting a period in where a comment existed, and by leaving out the final phrase. . . Plus, the Josephine quote got the chronology completely wrong in terms of the Lyon's fellowship in the Church, but I'll leave that you to garble and misconstruct. . . Shame, shame, shame on your complete torture of the text by changing the punctuation and leaving a phrase out. For shame. . . Shame on you for your terrible misquote. It does not impress me that you had access to the correct quote; even more shameful.
Rcrocket is 100% correct on this one. I can't believe such a lapse of ethics from you, beastie. This was nothing less than a blatant attempt to manipulate your audience. You know what? You're almost as bad as the author of that one article on the Mountain Meadows Massacre who shamelessly left out a key phrase from Lee's defense attorney, thereby changing the meaning 180°, although I can't recall offhand who it was who wrote that article.
Right, Mister Scratch?
LOL!!!
Actually, I think that we probably ought to cut poor Bob some slack. His "let's have a debate!" gambit completely blew up in his face. Now he seems to have blown a gasket, and he's flailing about angrily, slinging personal attacks left and right. I vote that he take a small breather in order to try and regain his composure.
I've just read the additions to this thread since I last posted. Lawyer Crockett continues to do his gallant best for his client, as is his duty, but hasn't he noticed that the jury are having difficulty stopping themselves from snickering as his rhetoric gets more and more far-fetched?
rcrocket:
No, the fact continues to remain that the evidence is coming from a child, which is totally untrustworthy evidence when a mother tells a child the mother's claim to paternity.
The 'child' is a 38 year old woman, who makes an affidavit saying what her mother told her solemnly in a dying declaration. And as he knows the argument here is not that Josephine's evidence proves that Joseph Smith was her father; it is that her mother made a statement whose truth entails that she had sexual relations with Joseph Smith.
Here, Sylvia does not claim sexual relations; she claims paternity.
I am sorry to have to tell lawyer Crockett that in the real world in which the jury live, and on the basis of which his arguments are being judged, the claim to the latter rather strongly implies the claim to the former.
One of the bizarre elements of this particular marriage has not yet been mentioned. Sylvia's mother, Patty Sessions, was also a polyandrous wife of Joseph Smith.
The Sessions spent a year in Missouri and then settled in Nauvoo. There, Patty wrote in her journal: “I was sealed to Joseph Smith by Willard Richards March 9 1842 in Newel K Whitneys chamber Nauvoo, for time and all eternity...Sylvia my daughter was presant when I was sealed”. Patty was 47. Her daughter Sylvia had married Joseph a month earlier on February 8. It is unclear if Patty’s first husband, David, was aware of the marriage.
After her marriage to Joseph, Patty continued to live with David. Three months later, he left on a mission to his former home state of Maine. Of the occasion, Patty wrote in her journal, “He left me alone, and I am very lonesome.” Two months later she wrote that she was “making shirts for Joseph.”
Patty’s duties as Joseph’s plural wife included approaching and educating prospective wives, serving as a messenger and go between, and acting as a witness at the wedding ceremonies of Joseph and the other plural wives he took. Patty continued in this role until Joseph’s death in 1844. Patty and David later left Nauvoo for Utah with the other migrating Saints.
We hate to seem like we don’t trust every nut with a story, but there’s evidence we can point to, and dance while shouting taunting phrases.
beastie wrote:One of the bizarre elements of this particular marriage has not yet been mentioned. Sylvia's mother, Patty Sessions, was also a polyandrous wife of Joseph Smith.
The Sessions spent a year in Missouri and then settled in Nauvoo. There, Patty wrote in her journal: “I was sealed to Joseph Smith by Willard Richards March 9 1842 in Newel K Whitneys chamber Nauvoo, for time and all eternity...Sylvia my daughter was presant when I was sealed”. Patty was 47. Her daughter Sylvia had married Joseph a month earlier on February 8. It is unclear if Patty’s first husband, David, was aware of the marriage.
After her marriage to Joseph, Patty continued to live with David. Three months later, he left on a mission to his former home state of Maine. Of the occasion, Patty wrote in her journal, “He left me alone, and I am very lonesome.” Two months later she wrote that she was “making shirts for Joseph.”
Patty’s duties as Joseph’s plural wife included approaching and educating prospective wives, serving as a messenger and go between, and acting as a witness at the wedding ceremonies of Joseph and the other plural wives he took. Patty continued in this role until Joseph’s death in 1844. Patty and David later left Nauvoo for Utah with the other migrating Saints.
So how do you suppose they dealt with this:
(Leviticus 18:17 NIV) "'Do not have sexual relations with both a woman and her daughter. Do not have sexual relations with either her son's daughter or her daughter's daughter; they are her close relatives. That is wickedness.
Oh, I get it - this PROVES that Joseph Smith's sealings never involved sexual relations. The prophet would never have gone against the direct teachings of the Bible, would he?
I wonder why lawyer Crocket has not come up with this one yet? Be my guest.
beastie wrote:One of the bizarre elements of this particular marriage has not yet been mentioned. Sylvia's mother, Patty Sessions, was also a polyandrous wife of Joseph Smith.
The Sessions spent a year in Missouri and then settled in Nauvoo. There, Patty wrote in her journal: “I was sealed to Joseph Smith by Willard Richards March 9 1842 in Newel K Whitneys chamber Nauvoo, for time and all eternity...Sylvia my daughter was presant when I was sealed”. Patty was 47. Her daughter Sylvia had married Joseph a month earlier on February 8. It is unclear if Patty’s first husband, David, was aware of the marriage.
After her marriage to Joseph, Patty continued to live with David. Three months later, he left on a mission to his former home state of Maine. Of the occasion, Patty wrote in her journal, “He left me alone, and I am very lonesome.” Two months later she wrote that she was “making shirts for Joseph.”
Patty’s duties as Joseph’s plural wife included approaching and educating prospective wives, serving as a messenger and go between, and acting as a witness at the wedding ceremonies of Joseph and the other plural wives he took. Patty continued in this role until Joseph’s death in 1844. Patty and David later left Nauvoo for Utah with the other migrating Saints.
And thus the missionary program was born.
The road is beautiful, treacherous, and full of twists and turns.
Chap wrote:So how do you suppose they dealt with this:
(Leviticus 18:17 NIV) "'Do not have sexual relations with both a woman and her daughter. Do not have sexual relations with either her son's daughter or her daughter's daughter; they are her close relatives. That is wickedness.
Oh, I get it - this PROVES that Joseph Smith's sealings never involved sexual relations. The prophet would never have gone against the direct teachings of the Bible, would he?
I wonder why lawyer Crocket has not come up with this one yet? Be my guest.
That's easy. A modern prophet of the restoration can contradict anything in the Bible. Anything.
The road is beautiful, treacherous, and full of twists and turns.