What do LDS generally believe about interracial marriage?

[_SatanWasSetUp]

In spite of BCs elementary school repetition about certain things being non doctrinal works (and that is debatable about the JoD) the words of the prophets mean something. Here we have BY, the man claiming to be God's spokesman stating "I shall tell you the law of God..."

Then we have BC nobody saying it is non doctrinal.

Who should we trust?

That's funny, because I agree with BC. I don't think Brigham Young's words were from God either. I assume he takes the same approach when President Monson speaks.

[_Daniel Peterson]

Daniel, you are the king of twisting words around so that you do not have to answer the question.

I've summarized the question, and the two relevant positions on it, clearly, fairly, and accurately.

If there's something inaccurate in my summary above, please identify it. Calling me names adds nothing substantive to the discussion, and is merely an irrelevant distraction.

Does there need to be evidence it was enforced in order for his comment from the pulpit to be bad? Do you think the people listening to his talk took it seriously, or not? If a sheriff from the deep south in the 1950s said, "Any n**ger caught with a white woman will be hung from that tree, on the spot." Would you defend that sheriff, if no evidence could be found that he ever did execute a black person?

That's an entirely separate question.

Let me repeat:

Shades claimed that the penalty for interracial marriage under Brigham Young was death.

I asked for evidence to support this claim.

Shades responded with a familiar quotation demonstrating that, in Brigham Young's view, the penalty for marriage between a white priesthood holder and a black woman should be death.

But this is a distinct proposition.

I replied by pointing out that Shades's response covered only a very specific kind of interracial marriage, and that, even if valid, it didn't support his more sweeping and unqualified claim that interracial marriage, as such, was punishable by death under Brigham Young. (Did Brigham Young believe that marriages between whites and Polynesians should receive capital punishment? How about marriages between whites and Indians? Whites and Japanese? The passage cited by Shades says nothing about such cases at all.)

I also pointed out that, as phrased, Shades's initial claim would most reasonably be interpreted as asserting not only that Brigham Young believed that interracial marriages should be punished by death, but that, in Brigham Young's day, they actually were punished by death. Yet, while the passage cited by Shades supports the first proposition, it has nothing at all to say in support of the second.

And that's where the salient part of the discussion stands.

[_truth dancer]

"Shall I tell you the law of God in regard to the African race? If the white man who belongs to the chosen seed mixes his blood with the seed of Cain, the penalty, under the law of God, is death on the spot. This will always be so." (Young, Brigham. Journal of Discourses, vol. 10, p. 110.)

Who cares if this revelation declared by BY in an official capacity as prophet of God, and published by the LDS church is considered "official doctrine"? (In spite of BC's claim no one seems to know what is or is not LDS doctrine).

And whether or not BY and his buddies actually carried out the killing of white men who hooked up with women who were the "seed of Cain" (I feel nauseous even typing such a disgusting thing ) makes no difference.

The reality is BY in an official capacity as prophet of the LDS church taught this disgusting doctrine/teaching/belief/law as a representative of Jesus Christ.

Is BY's teaching (regarding the above quote), actually the LAW of God as he claims? (And, if so, what sort of sick God is living near Kolob)?

Or was BY lying? Caught up in his own disgusting beliefs? Mistaking Satan for the HG or Jesus Christ?

~td~

[_antishock8]

Was slavery ever used/practiced by Mormons in Utah?

[_Daniel Peterson]

If your response was aimed at me, TD, I can only assume that you're signaling your lack of interest in a focused examination of Shades's very clear and specific (and apparently false) claim.

Is that correct?

[_wondering]

If your response was aimed at me, TD, I can only assume that you're signaling your lack of interest in a focused examination of Shades's very clear and specific (and apparently false) claim.

Is that correct?

Dr. Peterson,

I, for one, would be interested in your response to TDs last post, independent of your back and forth discussion with Shade.

What do you think was was the lesson Pres Young was teaching?

Do you agree with the message he was trying to convey?

[_truth dancer]

Hi Dan,

My post was not directed to anyone in particular, but to anyone who is interested in responding to my comment.

In this discussion, I'm not interested in whether or not BY and his buddies actually carried out the killing of white men who hooked up with women who were "the seed of Cain."

My point was/is, BY, in an official capacity as a prophet of God and representative of Jesus Christ taught this particular doctrine/teaching/belief/"law of God", as truth.


~td~

[_TAK]

Was slavery ever used/practiced by Mormons in Utah?

Yes..
http://www.media.utah.edu/UHE/a/African_Americans.html

[_antishock8]

So. There was:

1) Slavery practiced by Mormons.

2) The Mormon prophet preaching racist doctrines.

Where did all these misguided Mormons and the Mormon prophet get their misguided notions about Blacks?

[_Daniel Peterson]

What do you think was was the lesson Pres Young was teaching?

I think it's pretty clear that he was teaching that the marriage of someone from a priesthood-eligible line with someone from a priesthood-ineligible line was a grievous sin -- presumably because the posterity of the person from the priesthood-eligible line would, because of the nature of the union, become ineligible for the priesthood.

Do you agree with the message he was trying to convey?

Partially. I think, given the premise of a priesthood ban, that it would have been seriously wrong for someone from a priesthood-eligible line to marry someone from a priesthood-ineligible line. I think it wrong to marry out of the Church, too.

That said, though, I think the language about the death penalty for such a sin -- obviously modeled upon Old Testament stories about intermarriage between Israelites and Canaanites, where the death penalty was actually carried out -- is plainly over the top for modern times. Parenthetically, I add that Brigham used strong rhetoric rather frequently to make his points, and that there is no reason to believe that his bite was as bad as his bark. I know of nothing to suggest that the state of Deseret/Utah, let alone the Church, ever actually enforced a death penalty for white/black marriage, let alone (contrary to Shades's casually false assertion) for interracial marriage generally.

Where did nineteenth-century Mormon sentiments on race come from? To a large extent, adjusting for the peculiarities of Mormon doctrine and priesthood structures, from the surrounding culture, both Christian and secular. Abraham Lincoln was an appalling anti-black racist by our standards today. Laws against miscegenation were still on the books in many, if not most, jurisdictions of the United States well into the twentieth century.

Mormon views on race should not be viewed in a vacuum. Would it have been nice if they had been far better than the surrounding culture? Yes. Were they worse? Probably not.