Nevo wrote:I don't dispute the fact that Joseph Smith concealed from Emma the full extent of his practice of polygamy. But I question whether this necessarily speaks poorly of his character.
I believe that Joseph believed that he was divinely commanded to practice polygamy. But I think he also saw clearly that following this divine imperative would create enormous hurt and resentment on the part of Emma. Joseph--hoping against hope, no doubt--sought Emma's blessing at one point, but it was short-lived. Emma had shared her husband with others, indeed the whole church, for almost their entire marriage. It was too much for her to share him with other wives too--including trusted friends. Surely Joseph wished to avoid domestic strife (he abhorred contention), but I think he also wished to spare Emma's feelings (as much as possible). After all, he loved her.
So he left her out of it. To my way of thinking, to do otherwise, to have involved Emma in every detail of his polygamous relations--or worse, to have taken wives openly and exposed Emma to public shame--would have been heartless and cruel. As it was, their marriage was severely strained by the ordeal.
So, although regrettable, I don't know that Joseph's actions here were necessarily wrong. They may have been (D&C 132:56 refers to unspecified "trespasses" against Emma), but I can't say with certainty that they were.
Nevo, I'm genuinely glad that you've decided to drop by and weigh in. You've laid out a very charitable interpretation of the events under discussion without denying the evidence for them or calling into question the motives and character of those who are troubled by them, and for that I'm grateful.
It's certainly possible that Joseph's primary motivation in concealing his marriages from Emma was to spare her feelings, and it's possible that he really believed polygamy was commanded by God. I don't claim to know the mind of Joseph Smith (and don't believe anyone really can, for that matter) and I've known my share of good men who concealed troubling information from their wives out of a sincere desire to not distress them, so I'm sympathetic to the possibility.
However, I have to disagree with you that involving Emma would have been crueler than not involving her. In all of the cases I've known where a husband concealed something from his wife, if his wife found out in spite of his efforts, the situation became far, far worse than it would have been had he simply been honest with the difficult news from the beginning. Sure, the wife had some peace for however long he kept the truth from her, but when she finally found out, she had to deal with the horrible news on top of the lack of trust in her husband. Some hear the truth from other sources instead of hearing it from their husbands directly, which is usually even worse.
You say that he probably wanted to spare her feelings, and he may have achieved that to some extent in the short run. But how spared do you think her feelings were when, years later, women began coming out of the woodwork and claiming marriages to her fallen husband that she had known nothing about?
In any case, my only position on this is that it was wrong for Joseph to conceal marriages from Emma and then lie to her about them. I don't think a sincere belief in polygamy as a divine commandment or a well-meaning desire to preserve Emma's feelings would have made any of it right. It was still wrong.