Brother Crockett vs...?

[_rcrocket]

beastie's purported hijinks notwithstanding, how do you address the issue of a woman giving a deathbed confession to her daughter who is either sleeping with more than one man or lying?

Beastie intentionally corrupted the quote to remove the possibility that the explanation was the Joseph was only sealed to Sylvia, and not in a connubial sense. [I really wonder why she felt it necessary to do so; either it was simply sloppy internet scholarship or it was malicious We cannot tell.] Without that omitted phrase, one would have to assume that Joseph was Josephine's actual father. With the omitted phrase, anybody familiar with LDS theology at the time could not rule out the distinct possibility that Joseph was Josephine's father only because Sylvia was sealed to Joseph.

After all, Sylvia and Lyon were living together as man and wife, and under the law he is presumed conclusively to be the biological father.

The "deathbed confession" does nothing more than what it does.

The best argument against my position is that Josephine's statement was offered to show in the Missouri court proceedings that Joseph Smith practiced plural marriage. Why offer this particular evidence if there was no connubial relationship? But, when the statements were collected I think the Church wanted as many as possible of whatever quality.

[_the road to hana]

beastie's purported hijinks notwithstanding, how do you address the issue of a woman giving a deathbed confession to her daughter who is either sleeping with more than one man or lying?

There's nothing purported about them. Again, as rc pointed out throughout this thread, with the comma replaced and the final sentence of her deathbed "confession" reattached, the claimed logical dilemma capsizes and sinks.

Take the "purported" out and answer my question.

[_the road to hana]

beastie's purported hijinks notwithstanding, how do you address the issue of a woman giving a deathbed confession to her daughter who is either sleeping with more than one man or lying?

Beastie intentionally corrupted the quote to remove the possibility that the explanation was the Joseph was only sealed to Sylvia, and not in a connubial sense. [I really wonder why she felt it necessary to do so; either it was simply sloppy internet scholarship or it was malicious We cannot tell.] Without that omitted phrase, one would have to assume that Joseph was Josephine's actual father. With the omitted phrase, anybody familiar with LDS theology at the time could not rule out the distinct possibility that Joseph was Josephine's father only because Sylvia was sealed to Joseph.

After all, Sylvia and Lyon were living together as man and wife, and under the law he is presumed conclusively to be the biological father.

The "deathbed confession" does nothing more than what it does.

The best argument against my position is that Josephine's statement was offered to show in the Missouri court proceedings that Joseph Smith practiced plural marriage. Why offer this particular evidence if there was no connubial relationship? But, when the statements were collected I think the Church wanted as many as possible of whatever quality.

The difficulty with your logic is that a deathbed confession wouldn't have been necessary to indicate a sealing relationship.

I still find that neither you nor "Droopy" are addressing the conundrum of "plural marriage" absent consummation. It's an interesting dance you're doing, but I think you're closest to the truth when you realize that this business of taking the sex out of the plural marriages and making them platonic is a recent invention and does not necessarily reflect reality.

[Guest]

There's nothing purported about them. Again, as rc pointed out throughout this thread, with the comma replaced and the final sentence of her deathbed "confession" reattached, the claimed logical dilemma capsizes and sinks.

Take the "purported" out and answer my question.

The question has been answered. The argument is now over. It has been plausibly established that Joseph's spiritual sealing to Sylvia, as understood in LDS doctrine, was very likely the meaning intended, given the text and grammatical structure of the passage in question, and not marriage in the normative sense of the term. Therefore, Sylvia need logically be neither lying or sleeping with anyone other than the husband to whom she was legally wed.

If this has not been proved (and, from a historical perspective, it can't) to your satisfaction, that's fine, but let's stop playing let's pretend with the evidence as it stands. Beastie tortured the evidence and it confessed for her.

Move on, nothing more to see here.

[_rcrocket]

I still find that neither you nor "Droopy" are addressing the conundrum of "plural marriage" absent consummation. It's an interesting dance you're doing, but I think you're closest to the truth when you realize that this business of taking the sex out of the plural marriages and making them platonic is a recent invention and does not necessarily reflect reality.

You are overstating what I am saying. I comment only upon Josephine's statement.

[_the road to hana]

I still find that neither you nor "Droopy" are addressing the conundrum of "plural marriage" absent consummation. It's an interesting dance you're doing, but I think you're closest to the truth when you realize that this business of taking the sex out of the plural marriages and making them platonic is a recent invention and does not necessarily reflect reality.

You are overstating what I am saying. I comment only upon Josephine's statement.

It just doesn't make sense that a woman would make a deathbed confession about a sealing to a daughter who logically would already know about it.

[_Droopy]

It just doesn't make sense that a woman would make a deathbed confession about a sealing to a daughter who logically would already know about it.

She would know about it "logically"? But, the text made clear that she had hitherto kept it a complete secret. Why would she call her daughter to her deathbed to tell her something she already knew?

How long are you going to keep this text on the Rack, hana? Its already confessed once to Beastie, but the Witchfinder Generals of anti-Mormonism know no mercy.

[_the road to hana]

There's nothing purported about them. Again, as rc pointed out throughout this thread, with the comma replaced and the final sentence of her deathbed "confession" reattached, the claimed logical dilemma capsizes and sinks.

Take the "purported" out and answer my question.

It has been plausibly established that Joseph's spiritual sealing to Sylvia, as understood in LDS doctrine, was very likely the meaning intended, given the text and grammatical structure of the passage in question, and not marriage in the normative sense of the term. Therefore, Sylvia need logically be neither lying or sleeping with anyone other than the husband to whom she was legally wed.

It defies almost two millenia of Christian tradition to have "marriages" suddenly be unconsummated, and "not normative," but what the hey. Why call it marriage at all? There's no evidence whatever of Biblical polygamy being sexless, absolutely no precedent for it whatever. They'd simply have been called sealings or adoptions if that's all they were. It's stuff and nonsense you're dealing in here. Why should it bother you that someone restoring a principal that you believe to be correct actually practiced it?

Not marriage in the normative sense? No sh*t, Sherlock. Not marriage at all.

[_Droopy]

The difficulty with your logic is that a deathbed confession wouldn't have been necessary to indicate a sealing relationship.

And why might this be, pray tell?

I still find that neither you nor "Droopy" are addressing the conundrum of "plural marriage" absent consummation.

I think you understand it perfectly well hana, but you're like a Pit bull swinging from a tree limb with its jaws locked around a side of beef. You just won't let go

What necessary reason, in LDS theology, is there for the consummation of an eternal sealing in mortality? Not the consummation of an earthly marriage, but of a sealing?

[_the road to hana]

It just doesn't make sense that a woman would make a deathbed confession about a sealing to a daughter who logically would already know about it.

She would know about it "logically"? But, the text made clear that she had hitherto kept it a complete secret. Why would she call her daughter to her deathbed to tell her something she already knew?

My point exactly. Thanks for making it for me.

Josephine would have known already that she was sealed to Joseph. That wouldn't have been necessary in a deathbed confession.

How long are you going to keep this text on the Rack, hana?

Until you squeal.

You apparently have no idea how ridiculous your argument really is, trying to make plural marriage suddenly sexless, and deathbed confessions about housekeeping matters, parsing a woman's words to fit your own neat and tidy view of what Joseph Smith really did or did not believe the afterlife entailed.

My guess is that underneath all of this is a fear by some in the Mopologetic community that Joseph Smith actually had no personal assurance of the afterlife, or marriage, monogamous or plural, including physical intimacy, surviving past it, and took what he could get in this life. If he held out, and didn't have sex with the women other than Emma, then that somehow proves to them that he nobly knew without question that he could get his eternal reward complete with the multiplicity of women sealed to him.

Somehow, to many of you, if he had sex with those women it compromises the sealings, and Joseph's determination.

It's sort of the flipside of the clerical celibacy argument. Latter-day Saints believe all should marry, and celibacy is wrong, and criticize it in other faiths where it's practiced as a principle, and then turn this plural marriage conundrum suddenly into a platonic wonderland.

It seems apparent that the great fear is that Joseph had sex with multiple women. But isn't that what you'd want him to do, if he restored a principle you believe to be correct and eternal, even if some of those women were already married to other men? Wouldn't that be his right, and prerogative? Why would you care if a woman confessed to her daughter on her deathbed that she had sex with her husband?