Brother Crockett vs...?

[Guest]

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.

As the Restored Gospel of Jesus Christ has never, to my knowledge, been understood to be a continuation of two millenia of Christian tradition, this argument has no logical relevance to what Joseph was doing antecedent to those two millenia. Joseph did not claim to be practicing polygamy in the precise manner in which it had been practiced in the Old Testament. Nor is the Old Testament as we have it anything but a fragment of the total corpus of ancient texts that once existed and were considered authentic within the ancient Israelite religious milieu. It is precisely the claim of the restored Gospel that we do not have but a fragmentary record of the Lord's dealings with his people in other times and ages.

In this case, the absence of evidence is evidence of absence argument takes center stage again as the only alternative to simply not knowing what the ancient Israelites were doing at various points in their history. Otherwise, the Old Testament would have to be considered a thoroughly compete and comprehensive record of ancient Israel's religious beliefs and practices.

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?

See above.

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

Are you debating LDS doctrine here or semantics?

[_the road to hana]

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?

Biblical mandate coupled with specific pronouncement by Jesus Christ.

If it were just a "sealing," why call it a "marriage" at all? Why not call it an adoption? (Yes, I've asked this before, but it seems to stay unanswered.)

If it were just a "sealing," why would it require sneaking around, or having difficulty dealing with Emma?

Is it, or is it not, your understanding that these "sealings" implied that Joseph would be having full marital physical relations with this women in the next life, if not in this, and that that was completely within the expected bounds of the sealing relationship between husband and wife? Do you have any reason to believe any of these women are "sealed" to him as parent-child rather than spouse-spouse, or that any of them are intended to be a "guardian/ward" relationship as opposed to potential God/Goddess partner relationship?

[_Droopy]

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

But uhhh...Sylvia quite clearly indicates that Josephine did not have such knowledge, otherwise, no deathbed confession would have occurred.


Your preserverance in going around the sugar bowl with this is becoming nothing short of surreal.

[_the road to hana]

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.

As the Restored Gospel of Jesus Christ has never, to my knowledge, been understood to be a continuation of two millenia of Christian tradition, this argument has no logical relevance to what Joseph was doing antecedent to those two millenia. Joseph did not claim to be practicing polygamy in the precise manner in which it had been practiced in the Old Testament. Nor is the Old Testament as we have it anything but a fragment of the total corpus of ancient texts that once existed and were considered authentic within the ancient Israelite religious milieu. It is precisely the claim of the restored Gospel that we do not have but a fragmentary recored of the Lord's dealings with his people in other times and ages.

So it's your belief that Joseph was intended to restore sexless marriage, Christ's mandate notwithstanding?

In this case, the absence of evidence is evidence of absence argument takes center stage again as the only alternative to simply not knowing what the ancient Israelites were doing at various points in their history. Otherwise, the Old Testament would have to be considered a thoroughly compete and comprehensive record of ancient Israel's religious beliefs and practices.

So what's the point of using them as an example of pre-Joseph Smith polygamy at all, when justifying it as a "restoration?" Are you planning to throw out the entire Old Testament baby with that particular bathwater?

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?

See above.

There is no "above." It was marriage, or it wasn't. Why call it marriage? Why "restore" a principle of Celestial Marriage? Is the LDS Church now going to completely disavow that it ever practiced it? Is an entire section suddenly going to disappear from the D&C?

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

Are you debating LDS doctrine here or semantics?

[/quote]

Both. It doesn't fit in with LDS doctrine, either. Fortunately, you have D&C Sec. 132 to clarify all that for you, including the Old Testament practice and whether or not Joseph was given a plurality of wives in this life as a blessing or simply promised them in the next.

[_Droopy]

Biblical mandate coupled with specific pronouncement by Jesus Christ.

Show me how sexual relations are a necessary condition of being sealed for time and all eternity within LDS theology.

If it were just a "sealing," why would it require sneaking around, or having difficulty dealing with Emma?

Because Emma most likey did not like the idea of her husband being sealed to another woman in eternity. I've encountered the same attitude from my own wife and my own feelings could be considered similar in nature.

Is it, or is it not, your understanding that these "sealings" implied that Joseph would be having full marital physical relations with this women in the next life, if not in this, and that that was completely within the expected bounds of the sealing relationship between husband and wife?

You assume that there could be only one kind of sealing, and only one kind of sealing relationship. But assumptions don't get us very far without substance. Whatever relations there will be in the next life, we know that any number of things we are sealed to, or promised in this life, may be delayed until or not fulfilled until the next life. Nothing we live in the Church or Gospel in this life is in its 'fullness", and is not expected to be. The idea of a sealing, to be consummated in eternity, with limitations obtaining in this life is perfectly consistent with the Gospel as a whole.

You've already made up your mind what the actual nature of this sealing was, and no amount of evidence, even Beastie being exposed as essentially a practitioner of yellow journalism, is going to dissuade you. Your argument here is fundamentally weak because you've been cornered into grounding it on assertions of logical necessity which are, in point of fact, neither necessary or contemplated by the text of the confession itself, and by recourse to ideas or historical assumptions culled from two thousand years of post apostolic Christian traditions, traditions with which, in many cases, Joseph claimed to have made a decisive break and for which we have only very fragmentary record.

[Guest]

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

But uhhh...Sylvia quite clearly indicates that Josephine did not have such knowledge, otherwise, no deathbed confession would have occurred.


Your preserverance in going around the sugar bowl with this is becoming nothing short of surreal.

I don't personally care whether Joseph Smith had sex with one woman or a hundred, as it doesn't affect me at all personally. But if I believed in the principal of plural marriage as Celestial Marriage, I'd have no difficulty accepting his having sex with any woman sealed to him as his wife, regardless of who she was. So I find it curious that people professing to be faithful Latter-day Saints do.

I've yet to find a faithful Latter-day Saint who has any objection to the possibility of Jesus Christ having at least one wife, and possibly more, and engaging in physical intimacy with them.

It makes no sense to me that faithful Latter-day Saints would be looking for evidence that Joseph Smith was celibate.

[_harmony]

There is no "above." It was marriage, or it wasn't. Why call it marriage? Why "restore" a principle of Celestial Marriage? Is the LDS Church now going to completely disavow that it ever practiced it? Is an entire section suddenly going to disappear from the D&C?

We can only hope, but I'm not holding my breath. I've seen so little inspiration in our leaders in the last 37 years, it's pitiful.

[_Chap]

Coggins7 has evidently been pupating; he now emerges as Droopy. The point of this tactic eludes me, though I suppose I should be grateful for the disappearance of the blankly staring avatar associated with his larval stage.

Goodness knows who this post is addressed to. It simply repeats points already made by rcrocket, which have already (in the opinion of all other posts apart from rcrocket, so far as I can see) been shown to be just a little silly.

I think this man is talking to himself.

What rc showed was that Beastie, with a slight change of punctuation, and the convenient editing of the statement in question, substantially altered the potential meaning of that statement. As rc pointed out, to an unbiased mind conversant with the LDS theology involved, the potential meaning of that statement would not be at all difficult to tease out. To biased demagogues seeking the conclusions at which they have already arrived, the situation is different.

Beastie engages in literary high jinks reminiscent of the worst of the populist EV polemical literature of the past several decades.

Nope. Beastie didn't edit anything.

She reproduced exactly what was in her source, and referenced the source she used.

Either you haven't read the thread, or ...

[_Droopy]

We can only hope, but I'm not holding my breath. I've seen so little inspiration in our leaders in the last 37 years, it's pitiful.

Yes, and you're the expert on "inspiration" we should turn to for advice on how to discern when its present and when it isn't, is that right?

[_the road to hana]

Biblical mandate coupled with specific pronouncement by Jesus Christ.

Show me how sexual relations are a necessary condition of being sealed for time and all eternity within LDS theology.

Are you suggesting that no sex is involved in this life or the next, and that "eternal increase" is just an expression without foundation?

If it were just a "sealing," why would it require sneaking around, or having difficulty dealing with Emma?

Because Emma most likey did not like the idea of her husband being sealed to another woman in eternity. I've encountered the same attitude from my own wife and my own feelings could be considered similar in nature.

Why would she care if the marriage/sealing were platonic? It's only because sex is involved that there's any issue whatever.

Is it, or is it not, your understanding that these "sealings" implied that Joseph would be having full marital physical relations with this women in the next life, if not in this, and that that was completely within the expected bounds of the sealing relationship between husband and wife?

You assume that there could be only one kind of sealing, and only one kind of sealing relationship. But assumptions don't get us very far without substance. Whatever relations there will be in the next life, we know that any number of things we are sealed to, or promised in this life, may be delayed until or not fulfilled until the next life. Nothing we live in the Church or Gospel in this life is in its 'fullness", and is not expected to be. The idea of a sealing, to be consummated in eternity, with limitations obtaining in this life is perfectly consistent with the Gospel as a whole.

I think your grasp of Mormon theology is fascinating, and your apparent read of D&C 132 amazing.

Would you suggest that daughters sealed to their fathers but no husband in this life will be having sex with their fathers in the next?

You've already made up your mind what the actual nature of this sealing was, and no amount of evidence, even Beastie being exposed as essentially a practitioner of yellow journalism, is going to dissuade you. Your argument here is fundamentally weak because you've been cornered into grounding it on assertions of logical necessity which are, in point of fact, neither necessary or contemplated by the text of the confession itself, and by recourse to ideas or historical assumptions culled from two thousand years of post apostolic Christian traditions, traditions with which, in many cases, Joseph claimed to have made a decisive break and for which we have only very fragmentary record.

Yet Joseph Smith himself, and D&C 132, and over a hundred years of LDS General Authorities, have cited the same in discussing marriage and teaching about it.

Who instituted marriage, according to LDS theology, and when, and under what circumstances? If it is the "gospel of Jesus Christ" that is being preached, and his words are regularly cited in support of that, why would LDS theology suddenly discard them (hint: it hasn't--check your Conference Talks).

You know, you're exemplifying something in Mormonism that was a pet peeve when I was a member, and that is someone who wants to cherry pick doctrine and practice and make his or her own view of how Mormonism ought to be into some grand notion of how it really is perceived by the leadership.

Either believe in plural marriage or don't. Your choice. Sealings are relatively meaningless without the intent of the family, and family relationships, continuing, and "eternal increase" is a hollow promise.