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| − | {{question}}<br>{{draft}}
| + | #REDIRECT [[Question: Did Joseph Smith believe that the lost Ten Tribes were living under the polar ice cap?]] |
| − | ==Question==
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| − | Can you tell me something about the location of the lost ten tribes of Israel? I heard they might be under the polar ice cap.
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| − | {{CriticalSources}}
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| − | ==Response==
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| − | Those who ask this question have often encountered a remark attributed to Joseph Smith. The original source for the claim seems to be in the autobiography of Benjamin F. Johnson, an early Church member who knew Joseph Smith:
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| − | :I can now see, as President George A. Smith afterwards said, that I was then really "the bosom friend and companion of the Prophet Joseph." I was as welcome at the Mansion as at my own house, and on one occasion when at a full table of his family and chosen friends, he placed me at his right hand and introduced me as his "friend, Brother B. F. Johnson, at whose house he sat at a better table than his own." Sometimes when at my house I asked him questions relating to past, present and future; some of his answers were taken by Brother William Clayton, who was then present with him, and are now recorded in the Doctrine and Covenants; the one as to what the Lord told him in relation to seeing his face at 85 years of age; also the one as to the earth becoming as a sea of glass, molten with fire. [D&C 130: 9, 14-17] Other questions were asked when Brother Clayton was not present, one of which I will relate: I asked where the nine and a half tribes of Israel were. "Well," said he, "you remember the old caldron or potash kettle you used to boil maple sap in for sugar, don't you?" I said yes. "Well," said he, "they are in the north pole in a concave just the shape of that kettle. And John the Revelator is with them, preparing them for their return." Many other things of a public or private nature I might here record, but will only note one or two, those pertaining to our own family.{{ref|johnson.1}}
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| − | The problem with this source is that it is late and second hand; that is, it was not written by Joseph himself, but by someone who heard him say it, and it was written long after the conversation supposedly took place. Sources like these tend to be less than reliable because they are obscured by time and the writer's own personal bias.
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| − | We also note that the comment was made as part of a conversation with others, and not as part of a revelation. If Johnson's memory was accurate, there's nothing to distinguish Joseph's comment from idle speculation.
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| − | ===Other Church leaders===
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| − | Other Church leaders have not seen this second-hand remark as revelatory. Mark E. Peterson wrote:
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| − | :...the Ten Tribes are lost. We do not have any indication in the revelations as to their whereabouts.{{ref|peterson.1}}
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| − | Joseph Fielding Smith wrote:
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| − | :The promise is made that they shall return, but to this day they are lost to the world. As they journeyed to the north many of their number straggled and fell behind and mingled with the peoples in the lands through which they passed, but the main body continued on their journey and were hidden by the hand of the Lord.{{ref|jfs.1}}
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| − | Bruce R. McConkie wrote:
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| − | :The Lost Tribes are not lost unto the Lord. In their northward journeyings they were led by prophets and inspired leaders. They had their Moses and their Lehi, were guided by the spirit of revelation, kept the law of Moses, and carried with them the statutes and judgments which the Lord had given them in age past. They were still a distinct people many hundreds of years later, for the resurrected Lord visited and ministered among them following his ministry on this continent among the Nephites. ({{s|3|Nephi|16|1-4}}; {{s|3|Nephi|17|4}}.) Obviously he taught them in the same way and gave them the same truths which he gave his followers in Jerusalem and on the American continent; and obviously they recorded his teachings, thus creating volumes of scripture comparable to the Bible and Book of Mormon. ({{s|2|Nephi|29|12-14}}.){{ref|md.1}}
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| − | While some have seen the ten tribes together in a discrete location, Elder McConkie wrote later in life:
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| − | {{NoOfficial}}
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| − | ==Conclusion==
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| − | {{nw}}
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| − | ==Endnotes==
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| − | #{{note|johnson.1}} {{Book:Johnson:My_Life's_Review|pages=109}}
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| − | #{{note|peterson.1}} Mark E. Peterson, ''Joseph of Egypt'' (Salt Lake City, Utah: Deseret Book Co., 1981), 84.
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| − | #{{note|jfs.1}} Joseph Fielding Smith, ''Restoration of All Things'' (Salt Lake City, Utah: Deseret Book Co., 1945), 131–132.
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| − | ==Further reading==
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| − | {{nw}}
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| − | ===FAIR wiki articles===
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| − | ===FAIR web site===
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| − | ===External links===
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| − | ===Printed material===
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