Joseph Smith's most breathtaking lie.

[_deacon blues]

I still can't get over how Joseph Smith could stand in front of an audience of hundreds, maybe thousands, and say with a straight face, "What a thing it is to be accused of having seven wives when I can only find one". He was speaking to people who knew he was lying, to people who suspected, and for those of us who believe in God, the God of Truth himself.
Calling such words "a carefully worded denial" only extends the deception, and is sad indeed.

[_DarkHelmet]

Putting on my apologists hat I would say: Typical anti Mormon lies. Joseph Smith never denied having multiple wives. He said "what a thing it is to be accused of having seven wives". He is simply acknowledging he is being accused of having seven wives. No lie there. He then says "I can only find one". At that moment he only knew where one of his wives was. He didn't know where the others were, thus he could only find one at that moment. Typical stupid anti-mormon liberals to take the quote totally out of context and make up lies about it.

[_fetchface]

Putting on my apologists hat I would say: Typical anti Mormon lies. Joseph Smith never denied having multiple wives. He said "what a thing it is to be accused of having seven wives". He is simply acknowledging he is being accused of having seven wives. No lie there. He then says "I can only find one". At that moment he only knew where one of his wives was. He didn't know where the others were, thus he could only find one at that moment. Typical stupid anti-mormon liberals to take the quote totally out of context and make up lies about it.

But don't forget that in his next sentence, he goes on to say that he will prove his accusers perjurers. Gotta love that Joseph.

[_sock puppet]

I still can't get over how Joseph Smith could stand in front of an audience of hundreds, maybe thousands, and say with a straight face, "What a thing it is to be accused of having seven wives when I can only find one". He was speaking to people who knew he was lying, to people who suspected, and for those of us who believe in God, the God of Truth himself.
Calling such words "a carefully worded denial" only extends the deception, and is sad indeed.

JSJr said that aboard the Maid of Iowa river boat on 5/26/1844. I don't know how many could have been on board a river boat of that era, but it was a Sunday sermon.

[_sock puppet]

Putting on my apologists hat I would say: Typical anti Mormon lies. Joseph Smith never denied having multiple wives. He said "what a thing it is to be accused of having seven wives". He is simply acknowledging he is being accused of having seven wives. No lie there. He then says "I can only find one". At that moment he only knew where one of his wives was. He didn't know where the others were, thus he could only find one at that moment. Typical stupid anti-mormon liberals to take the quote totally out of context and make up lies about it.

But don't forget that in his next sentence, he goes on to say that he will prove his accusers perjurers. Gotta love that Joseph.

In abstentia at least.

[_fetchface]

I've seen someone say somewhere that since this denial isn't dishonest that it would be perfectly honest to tell the bishop in the next recommend interview, "What a thing it is to be accused of drinking coffee when I can't even find a mug. I'm the same man I was two years ago and I can prove them all perjurers" or some nonsense like like that. Since it was okay for Joseph to bend the truth, I don't see why it shouldn't be okay for anyone else to do it too.

[_Polygamy-Porter]

I still can't get over how Joseph Smith could stand in front of an audience of hundreds, maybe thousands, and say with a straight face, "What a thing it is to be accused of having seven wives when I can only find one". He was speaking to people who knew he was lying, to people who suspected, and for those of us who believe in God, the God of Truth himself.
Calling such words "a carefully worded denial" only extends the deception, and is sad indeed.

He was the first mo'pologist.

Emma was, by legal definition, his only "wife". The others, by his definition were "spiritual wives".

To outsiders they were nothing but mistresses, adulteresses, and/or whores.

The question should have been, "Does your wife Emma know that you are having sexual relations with other women.

[_SuperDell]

"What a thing it is to be accused of having seven wives when I can only find one".

Just as today, it depends on what the meaning of is, is.

Joseph could easily have been looking only at one woman, not seeing others with his peripheral vision, so in his mind khe could only find 'one'.

Many ways to lie by telling the truth in a manner convenient at the time. Turns it back to 'you are asking the wrong questions'.

[_sock puppet]

"What a thing it is to be accused of having seven wives when I can only find one".

Just as today, it depends on what the meaning of is, is.

Joseph could easily have been looking only at one woman, not seeing others with his peripheral vision, so in his mind khe could only find 'one'.

Many ways to lie by telling the truth in a manner convenient at the time. Turns it back to 'you are asking the wrong questions'.

That's why we, as jurors evaluating the historical record as we weight the LDS truth claims that began with JSJr, ought to bring common sense to viewing his quotes rather than hypertechnical parsing of quotes. JSJr kept the other 'spiritual wives' a secret, not to be known by the general Nauvoo population. Sometimes hidden from his actual wife. What kind of a 'wife' is that? In that very same speech aboard the Maid of Iowa, JSJr excoriated the Relief Society for having published its position against polygamy. He took steps to quiet those that dared speak of his 'spiritual wives'. He had them interrogated by the Nauvoo police. He had the printing press of six of them destroyed. Yes, in all that context, one would have to be a moron to think JSJr was not, on 5/26/1844, denying he had more than one wife. But parse words is what apologists do to try to crack the door on contrary possibility, even if ever so slightly. As pointed out up thread, the LDS church does not want its members parsing their words in TR interviews or other contexts dealing with their file leaders in the LDS church. All the while, they ask that we "take another" or "take a closer" look at what JSJr's words were, look so closely at this one square inch of bark on this one isolated tree that you lose all perspective of what the grove of trees looks like or its place in big, wide world. JSJr was a scoundrel. There's nothing they can do about that. He's the founder of their organization. They can't change that. The advent of the internet was similar to a poltergeist. The LDS church's foundation is not on sand, much less a rock. It is on what until recently was a covered up and forgotten graveyard. Now with the internet, the spirits of JSJr's skeletons that the LDS church thought it had long ago sufficiently buried are coming to haunt them. And just like in the movie, the spirits are coming through TV/monitor screens. In the LDS and JSJr's case, it is through internet research and message boards such as this, MDB.

[_zeezrom]

I still can't get over how Joseph Smith could stand in front of an audience of hundreds, maybe thousands, and say with a straight face, "What a thing it is to be accused of having seven wives when I can only find one". He was speaking to people who knew he was lying, to people who suspected, and for those of us who believe in God, the God of Truth himself.
Calling such words "a carefully worded denial" only extends the deception, and is sad indeed. :rolleyes:

Here's what my family says to this type of comment. This is fast becoming their canned response to anything critical and it's annoying as hell:

"We can't be sure that this is actually what happened or what was said. This comes through multiple dubious sources like gossip. The fact is, we just don't know what exactly happened."

And you know, I think this answer works pretty well because I never know how to respond to that besides by shaking my head and throwing up my arms.