Brother Crockett vs...?

[_Scottie]

Bob, you keep beating this drum that a child has no say in who the father is.

What is the definition of "a child"?

[_Jason Bourne]

This has been a very interesting thread.

I think it boils down to the three things Beastie listed:

1:Sylvia lied to Josephine,

2: Josephine lied about her mother claiming Joseph Smith was her father

3: Joseph Smith and Sylvia were physically intimate.



I must say I disagree with Bob's conclusion that Sylvia meant Jospehine was JSs child in the eternal sense through the adoption from a sealing. I do not see how one arrives at that at all.

[_guy sajer]

Read Mormon Enigma and/or Mormon Polygamy. The sad tale of Zina Daintha Hunington Jacob Smith Young can be found in both of those books.

According to Zina's own documentary writings, she didn't seem to perceive it as the sad tale you would like to make it. See my post above.

Yes I know she did not. But later letters from Henry seem to indicate he was fairly heart broken over it all. Thus I refer to it as sad tale. I also find it sad that Zina seemed A OK with it.

Maybe I am just weak kneed but Prophet or not, if they made the move on my bride I would have beat the snot out of them. Well Joseph Smith probably would have been able to whoop me but I still would have tried. Guess I would have failed this awful "test."

Yes, Jason, but you've passed the second test. You have been able and willing to turn off your sense of moral outrage to know this but yet still conclude that Joseph Smith and BY were prophets of God. In other words, your test is NOT to surrender you wife to God (and his servants) but to surrender your sense of moral reason.

Amazing how much easier it is to hear all this and still believe when it happens to someone else, but if it happens to you . . . ?

[_rcrocket]

This has been a very interesting thread.

I think it boils down to the three things Beastie listed:

1:Sylvia lied to Josephine,

2: Josephine lied about her mother claiming Joseph Smith was her father

3: Joseph Smith and Sylvia were physically intimate.



I must say I disagree with Bob's conclusion that Sylvia meant Jospehine was JSs child in the eternal sense through the adoption from a sealing. I do not see how one arrives at that at all.

John D. Lee went around his whole life claiming to be Brigham Young's son.

There is a bishop in my stake with the last name of a prominent 19th Century apostle whose only connection with that apostle was a sealing, not a physical descendancy. Because his great great grandmother was sealed to the apostle, rather than to the father of her children, she took the apostle's name when her husband left the church. But she never had any children by the apostle.

I think you overlook the most obvious explanation. These dynastic sealings had real meaning; they were suspended by Pres. Woodruff in 1894. To us today they seem odd, but they were done frequently by Joseph Smith and Brigham Young, and less so by their successors.

To claim that one's father was Brigham Young (as did John D. Lee and many others who were merely sealed) or to claim that one's father was Joseph Smith (as did Josephine) was a very big deal to those folks. Josephine's statement about the "sealing" would have no other meaning. Josephine's mother was living with Lyon.

[_beastie]

John D. Lee went around his whole life claiming to be Brigham Young's son.

There is a bishop in my stake with the last name of a prominent 19th Century apostle whose only connection with that apostle was a sealing, not a physical descendancy. Because his great great grandmother was sealed to the apostle, rather than to the father of her children, she took the apostle's name when her husband left the church. But she never had any children by the apostle.

I think you overlook the most obvious explanation. These dynastic sealings had real meaning; they were suspended by Pres. Woodruff in 1894. To us today they seem odd, but they were done frequently by Joseph Smith and Brigham Young, and less so by their successors.

To claim that one's father was Brigham Young (as did John D. Lee and many others who were merely sealed) or to claim that one's father was Joseph Smith (as did Josephine) was a very big deal to those folks. Josephine's statement about the "sealing" would have no other meaning. Josephine's mother was living with Lyon.

You are completely ignoring the context of the affidavit. Andrew Jenson was collecting affidavits in order to prove to the RLDS that Joseph Smith not only instituted polygamy, but actively practiced it. That is why the church went to the extent it did in questioning these women and getting personal details that almost directly state sexual relations occurred. Victorian sensibilities may have prevented them from using those explicit words, but certainly the meaning is obvious to anyone but the most willfully blind.

It would not have helped the church's case to the RLDS to simply demonstrate that sealings took place in some context outside the actual practice of plural marriage.

For heaven's sake, crocket, even the FARMs article I cited recognizes this. You are in deep denial. Or you just can't admit you're wrong. Probably both.

And in the early days, as today, 'sealed' can also mean being married. The distinction some apologists attempt to make is obfuscation.

[_rcrocket]

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?

It doesn't matter whether the child is a boy or girl, 14 or 94. As I have repeatedly stated, until DNA evidence vindicated the children of Sally Hemmings, and I have read a few biographies of Thomas Jefferson, I just can't recall any of his biographers accepting without substantial doubt their statements, and the statements of their descendants, that Thomas Jefferson fathered Sally's eight (or seven) children. Now, their evidence was even stronger than Josephine Lyons'.

They saw the fruits of seven or eight children. They saw the Great Man come and go in their household. They lived in slave quarters on the Great Man's plantation. It seems historians seemed to accept the explanations of Jefferson's daughter Martha, and her children Ellen and Thomas (who were not the children of Sally) over the statements of Sally's children Madison and Eston, who insisted that the Great Man was their father.

Here, Josephine never saw or spoke with Joseph Smith, and based her statement on one single statement made by her mother. So, unlike the rest of you, I just don't accept what I read in Church history at face value -- whether it favors the Church or not. Having been a published author on issues of history, I wonder - just how strong is this evidence? Is it direct? Is it hearsay? How long was it after the event? Is it against somebody's interest (which makes it valuable) or self-justification? I mean, these are the historian's tools.

But, because you hate and despise the faith of your fathers, you are willing (as was van Wagoner in many respects, I might add, and as was Quinn, in some respects) just to accept at face value unprovenanced evidence.

[_Scottie]

This has been a very interesting thread.

I think it boils down to the three things Beastie listed:

1:Sylvia lied to Josephine,

2: Josephine lied about her mother claiming Joseph Smith was her father

3: Joseph Smith and Sylvia were physically intimate.



I must say I disagree with Bob's conclusion that Sylvia meant Jospehine was JSs child in the eternal sense through the adoption from a sealing. I do not see how one arrives at that at all.

John D. Lee went around his whole life claiming to be Brigham Young's son.

There is a bishop in my stake with the last name of a prominent 19th Century apostle whose only connection with that apostle was a sealing, not a physical descendancy. Because his great great grandmother was sealed to the apostle, rather than to the father of her children, she took the apostle's name when her husband left the church. But she never had any children by the apostle.

I think you overlook the most obvious explanation. These dynastic sealings had real meaning; they were suspended by Pres. Woodruff in 1894. To us today they seem odd, but they were done frequently by Joseph Smith and Brigham Young, and less so by their successors.

To claim that one's father was Brigham Young (as did John D. Lee and many others who were merely sealed) or to claim that one's father was Joseph Smith (as did Josephine) was a very big deal to those folks. Josephine's statement about the "sealing" would have no other meaning. Josephine's mother was living with Lyon.

So why weren't any other of Sylvia's children considered children of Joseph Smith? Why only Josephina?

[_beastie]

So why weren't any other of Sylvia's children considered children of Joseph Smith? Why only Josephina?

Good catch.

[_rcrocket]

So why weren't any other of Sylvia's children considered children of Joseph Smith? Why only Josephina?

Good catch.

I am going on only one quote at a time. I don't know what Sylvia told her other children or when she had her children. And, it depends upon the date of the sealing.

But, the language omitted from your quote just jumped out at me, as having studied the life of John D. Lee in some detail.

[_rcrocket]

John D. Lee went around his whole life claiming to be Brigham Young's son.

There is a bishop in my stake with the last name of a prominent 19th Century apostle whose only connection with that apostle was a sealing, not a physical descendancy. Because his great great grandmother was sealed to the apostle, rather than to the father of her children, she took the apostle's name when her husband left the church. But she never had any children by the apostle.

I think you overlook the most obvious explanation. These dynastic sealings had real meaning; they were suspended by Pres. Woodruff in 1894. To us today they seem odd, but they were done frequently by Joseph Smith and Brigham Young, and less so by their successors.

To claim that one's father was Brigham Young (as did John D. Lee and many others who were merely sealed) or to claim that one's father was Joseph Smith (as did Josephine) was a very big deal to those folks. Josephine's statement about the "sealing" would have no other meaning. Josephine's mother was living with Lyon.

You are completely ignoring the context of the affidavit. Andrew Jenson was collecting affidavits in order to prove to the RLDS that Joseph Smith not only instituted polygamy, but actively practiced it. That is why the church went to the extent it did in questioning these women and getting personal details that almost directly state sexual relations occurred. Victorian sensibilities may have prevented them from using those explicit words, but certainly the meaning is obvious to anyone but the most willfully blind.

It would not have helped the church's case to the RLDS to simply demonstrate that sealings took place in some context outside the actual practice of plural marriage.

For heaven's sake, crocket, even the FARMs article I cited recognizes this. You are in deep denial. Or you just can't admit you're wrong. Probably both.

And in the early days, as today, 'sealed' can also mean being married. The distinction some apologists attempt to make is obfuscation.

I don't accept FARMS material cited to me. Sorry. Good or bad. I don't cite them to you. I use them for reference material, but I can reach my own conclusions about original material. I find their articles of spotty quality although some articles are really very good.

And, it is very true that the Church was in a battle royale over Missouri property and needed affidavits to buttress the claim that Joseph Smith practiced polygamy. But, I disagree with Jensen's conclusions about Fanny Alger, for instance. As to Sylvia Lyon, the statement of her daughter is certainly couched in a most unique way that rings with folks familiar with the issue.

And, the Maya did not have a written language. Let's see you lose your temper once again.