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===Joseph the "money digger"=== | ===Joseph the "money digger"=== | ||
{{HiddenFact|fact=Joseph was involved with "money digging"|location=''History of the Church'', the ''Ensign''}} | {{HiddenFact|fact=Joseph was involved with "money digging"|location=''History of the Church'', the ''Ensign''}} | ||
− | ===='' | + | See if you can determine exactly which point in history this fact became "hidden" by the Church. |
− | * | + | ====2001==== |
+ | =====''Ensign''===== | ||
+ | * An enterprising farmer by the name of Josiah Stowell came 30 miles from his farm in Bainbridge Township, Chenango County, New York, carrying a purported treasure map and accompanied by a digging crew. The company took their room and board with the Hale family. On the crew were Joseph Smith Jr. and his father. Lucy Mack Smith records that Josiah “came for Joseph on account of having heard that he possessed certain keys, by which he could discern things invisible to the natural eye.” The Smiths had initially refused Josiah’s invitation in October 1825. However, the reality of the family’s difficulty in meeting the $100 annual mortgage payment on their farm and Stowell’s promise of “high wages to those who would dig for him” finally persuaded them both to join in the venture. | ||
+ | : — {{Ensign1|author=Larry C. Porter|article=Joseph Smith’s Susquehanna Years|date=Feb 2001|start=42}} {{link|url=http://www.lds.org/ldsorg/v/index.jsp?hideNav=1&locale=0&sourceId=a2f6a1615ac0c010VgnVCM1000004d82620a____&vgnextoid=2354fccf2b7db010VgnVCM1000004d82620aRCRD}} | ||
− | = | + | ::[Note that this article cites such anti-Mormon or hostile sources as |
− | + | ::*{{CriticalWork:Tucker:Origin Rise and Progress|pages=41-42}} (describes Martin Harris' trip to Charles Anthon) | |
+ | ::* ''Baptist Register'', Utica, New York, 13 June 1834, 68. (reprint of ''Susquehanna Register'' material, below) | ||
+ | ::* ''Susquehanna Register'', Montrose, Pennsylvania, 1 May 1834. (the [[The_Hurlbut_affidavits|Hurlbut-Howe]] affidavits, with focus on money-digging)] | ||
− | ====''Ensign''==== | + | ====1987==== |
+ | =====''Ensign''===== | ||
* Treasure-seeking was a cultural phenomenon of that day. It was indulged in by upright and religious men such as Josiah Stowel. Young Joseph Smith accepted employment with Stowel at fourteen dollars a month, in part because of the crushing poverty of the Smith family. Joseph and his older brothers had to scour the countryside for work in order to construct their home and make the annual payment on the farm, which they were in imminent danger of losing and finally lost for nonpayment shortly after this period. | * Treasure-seeking was a cultural phenomenon of that day. It was indulged in by upright and religious men such as Josiah Stowel. Young Joseph Smith accepted employment with Stowel at fourteen dollars a month, in part because of the crushing poverty of the Smith family. Joseph and his older brothers had to scour the countryside for work in order to construct their home and make the annual payment on the farm, which they were in imminent danger of losing and finally lost for nonpayment shortly after this period. | ||
: —{{Ensign1|author=Dallin H. Oaks|article=Recent Events Involving Church History and Forged Documents|date=October 1987|start=63}} {{link|url=http://www.lds.org/ldsorg/v/index.jsp?hideNav=1&locale=0&sourceId=309b71ec9b17b010VgnVCM1000004d82620a____&vgnextoid=2354fccf2b7db010VgnVCM1000004d82620aRCRD}} | : —{{Ensign1|author=Dallin H. Oaks|article=Recent Events Involving Church History and Forged Documents|date=October 1987|start=63}} {{link|url=http://www.lds.org/ldsorg/v/index.jsp?hideNav=1&locale=0&sourceId=309b71ec9b17b010VgnVCM1000004d82620a____&vgnextoid=2354fccf2b7db010VgnVCM1000004d82620aRCRD}} | ||
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: —{{Ensign1|author=Richard Lloyd Anderson|article=The Alvin Smith Story: Fact and Fiction|date=Aug 1987|start=58}} {{link|url=http://www.lds.org/ldsorg/v/index.jsp?hideNav=1&locale=0&sourceId=1e9971ec9b17b010VgnVCM1000004d82620a____&vgnextoid=2354fccf2b7db010VgnVCM1000004d82620aRCRD#footnote5}} | : —{{Ensign1|author=Richard Lloyd Anderson|article=The Alvin Smith Story: Fact and Fiction|date=Aug 1987|start=58}} {{link|url=http://www.lds.org/ldsorg/v/index.jsp?hideNav=1&locale=0&sourceId=1e9971ec9b17b010VgnVCM1000004d82620a____&vgnextoid=2354fccf2b7db010VgnVCM1000004d82620aRCRD#footnote5}} | ||
− | * | + | ====1902==== |
− | + | =====''History of the Church''==== | |
+ | *"Was not Joseph Smith a money digger?" Yes, but it was never a very profitable job for him, as he only got fourteen dollars a month for it.<br>—Joseph Smith's own answer to the question, ''History of the Church'' Volume 3, p. 29 | ||
+ | |||
+ | ====1864==== | ||
+ | =====''Millennial Star''===== | ||
+ | <blockquote> | ||
+ | Editorial [editor was George Q. Cannon], “The Truth Vindicated by the Conduct of its Enemies” | ||
+ | “The most serious charge that was brought against the Prophet Joseph, by the enemies of the Church in its early days, was that he had been a ‘money digger’—had been engaged with some person or persons in searching in the earth for the precious metals. This was considered by them so disreputable an avocation, that the mere report that he had been engaged in it was deemed sufficient to forever debar him from the society of those who prided themselves upon their respectability and social standing. The idea that the Lord would communicate his will to, or in any way have anything to do with, a ‘money digger,’ was deemed preposterous and blasphemous” (264)<br>— ''Millennial Star'' 26 (1864): 264-6. | ||
+ | </blockquote> | ||
+ | |||
+ | ====1853==== | ||
+ | =====''Journal of Discourses''===== | ||
+ | *I can sum up all the arguments used against Joseph Smith and "Mormonism” in a very few words, the merits of which will be found in OLD JOE SMITH. IMPOSTOR, MONEY DIGGER. OLD JOE SMITH. SPIRITUAL WIFE DOCTRINE. IMPOSTURE. THE DOCTRINE IS FALSE. MONEY DIGGER. FALSE PROPHET. DELUSION. SPIRITUAL WIFE DOCTRINE. Oh, my dear brethren and sisters, keep away from them, for the sake of your never dying souls. FALSE PROPHETS THAT SHOULD COME IN THE LAST DAYS. OLD JOE SMITH. ANTI-CHRIST. MONEY DIGGER, MONEY DIGGER, MONEY DIGGER. And the whole is wound up with an appeal, not to the good sense of the people, but to their unnatural feelings, in a canting, hypocritical tone, and there it ends.<br>—{{JDwiki|author=Brigham Young|url=http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Journal_of_Discourses/Volume_1/President_B._Young%E2%80%99s_Journey_South,_etc.|vol=1|pages=109-110}} | ||
+ | |||
+ | ====1847==== | ||
+ | =====''Millennial Star''===== | ||
+ | <blockquote> | ||
+ | Religious Impostors. | ||
+ | <br><br> | ||
+ | In the second volume of a neat, cheap but, flimsy and ephemeral compilation or periodical, published among the hundreds of similar and better works by W. and R. Chambers of Edinburgh,…. this "Miscellany" of the Messrs. Chambers, Edinburgh…. in this they quote only from the "Rise, Progress and Causes of Mormonism, by Professor J. B. Turner, New York, 1844," and “little work” by a Rev. Mr. Caswall, A.M., Professor of Divinity, Kemper College, Missouri, &c., &c., who visited the city of the Mormons -- Nauvoo -- in the year 1842. …. Again, the article before us reads -- "Joseph Smith, the youthful imposter! followed the profession of a money digger," which being corrected should be read as follows: -- "He was for a time a farmer's assistant; his employer requested him on some occasions to dig in certain portions of his estate where money was supposed to have been concealed" -- and while he thus did what his master required, he followed the profession of a money digger! | ||
+ | That money has been concealed in this continent, before and during the times of the late wars in America, as well as aforetime by the ancient inhabitants, is generally believed, and I doubt not this is the fact; and were I an owner of the soil, to get good crops and perhaps money, I might probably induce my posterity to believe I had hid some in my fields; thus would I secure for them, ample irrigation and an abundant reward to satisfy their money digging propensities. Oh! covetous generation, how will ye escape if you dig for silver ore, iron, lead, or copper; or cull and dig for such miserable scraps of falsehood which ye publish for money. Know ye not that thus ye are sealing you own condemnation?<br>—''Millennial Star'' 9.6 (March 15, 1847): 85-89 | ||
+ | </blockquote> | ||
+ | |||
+ | ====1842==== | ||
+ | =====''Millennial Star''===== | ||
+ | GREAT DISCUSSION ON "MORMONISM," BETWEEN DR. WEST AND ELDER ADAMS, AT THE MARLBORO CHAPEL, BOSTON.===== | ||
− | + | <blockquote> | |
− | + | From the Weekly Bostonian, July 2. | |
− | + | <br> | |
− | + | Mr. Editor,—In the haste of my remarks last week. I briefly referred to the proceedings of the first three evenings of the discussion, but necessarily omitted several interesting features which I wish now to notice. The last paragraph of my communication which was inserted as the paper was going to press, stated, that the discussion closed on Friday night; but for want of time and room in your columns, my sketches of the last two evenings were reserved till this week. Dr. West spent much of the second and third evenings in reading from a Mormon pamphlet, containing a history of the rise of their church....Dr. West's chief effort the first part of the evening, was to impeach the character of Smith and the Mormon witnesses; for this purpose, he read from an old pamphlet what appeared to be a certificate from some twenty or thirty citizens of the state of New York, representing Harris and Smith's family as being money diggers, superstitious and visionary, and that they had no confidence in their pretended discoveries. ....In the reply, Mr. Adams said, the certificate from the citizens of New York ..... If Mr. Smith dug for money, he considered it was a more honourable way of getting it than taking it from the widow and the orphan; but a few lazy hireling priests of this age, would dig either for money or potatoes.<br>—''Latter-day Saints' Millennial Star'', 3.5 (September, 1842): 87-92 | |
+ | </blockquote> | ||
===Joseph, seer stone, and treasure=== | ===Joseph, seer stone, and treasure=== |
See if you can determine exactly which point in history this fact became "hidden" by the Church.
Editorial [editor was George Q. Cannon], “The Truth Vindicated by the Conduct of its Enemies” “The most serious charge that was brought against the Prophet Joseph, by the enemies of the Church in its early days, was that he had been a ‘money digger’—had been engaged with some person or persons in searching in the earth for the precious metals. This was considered by them so disreputable an avocation, that the mere report that he had been engaged in it was deemed sufficient to forever debar him from the society of those who prided themselves upon their respectability and social standing. The idea that the Lord would communicate his will to, or in any way have anything to do with, a ‘money digger,’ was deemed preposterous and blasphemous” (264)
— Millennial Star 26 (1864): 264-6.
Religious Impostors.
In the second volume of a neat, cheap but, flimsy and ephemeral compilation or periodical, published among the hundreds of similar and better works by W. and R. Chambers of Edinburgh,…. this "Miscellany" of the Messrs. Chambers, Edinburgh…. in this they quote only from the "Rise, Progress and Causes of Mormonism, by Professor J. B. Turner, New York, 1844," and “little work” by a Rev. Mr. Caswall, A.M., Professor of Divinity, Kemper College, Missouri, &c., &c., who visited the city of the Mormons -- Nauvoo -- in the year 1842. …. Again, the article before us reads -- "Joseph Smith, the youthful imposter! followed the profession of a money digger," which being corrected should be read as follows: -- "He was for a time a farmer's assistant; his employer requested him on some occasions to dig in certain portions of his estate where money was supposed to have been concealed" -- and while he thus did what his master required, he followed the profession of a money digger! That money has been concealed in this continent, before and during the times of the late wars in America, as well as aforetime by the ancient inhabitants, is generally believed, and I doubt not this is the fact; and were I an owner of the soil, to get good crops and perhaps money, I might probably induce my posterity to believe I had hid some in my fields; thus would I secure for them, ample irrigation and an abundant reward to satisfy their money digging propensities. Oh! covetous generation, how will ye escape if you dig for silver ore, iron, lead, or copper; or cull and dig for such miserable scraps of falsehood which ye publish for money. Know ye not that thus ye are sealing you own condemnation?
—Millennial Star 9.6 (March 15, 1847): 85-89
GREAT DISCUSSION ON "MORMONISM," BETWEEN DR. WEST AND ELDER ADAMS, AT THE MARLBORO CHAPEL, BOSTON.=====
From the Weekly Bostonian, July 2.
Mr. Editor,—In the haste of my remarks last week. I briefly referred to the proceedings of the first three evenings of the discussion, but necessarily omitted several interesting features which I wish now to notice. The last paragraph of my communication which was inserted as the paper was going to press, stated, that the discussion closed on Friday night; but for want of time and room in your columns, my sketches of the last two evenings were reserved till this week. Dr. West spent much of the second and third evenings in reading from a Mormon pamphlet, containing a history of the rise of their church....Dr. West's chief effort the first part of the evening, was to impeach the character of Smith and the Mormon witnesses; for this purpose, he read from an old pamphlet what appeared to be a certificate from some twenty or thirty citizens of the state of New York, representing Harris and Smith's family as being money diggers, superstitious and visionary, and that they had no confidence in their pretended discoveries. ....In the reply, Mr. Adams said, the certificate from the citizens of New York ..... If Mr. Smith dug for money, he considered it was a more honourable way of getting it than taking it from the widow and the orphan; but a few lazy hireling priests of this age, would dig either for money or potatoes.
—Latter-day Saints' Millennial Star, 3.5 (September, 1842): 87-92
Joseph actually used a stone which he placed in a hat to translate a portion of the Book of Mormon in addition to or instead of the "Urim and Thummim." This fact was found hidden in the official Church magazines the Ensign and the Friend on the official Church website lds.org:
Critics charge that the existence of multiple accounts of the First Vision has been hidden. A review of just some of the sources demonstrates that this is simply false:
There are many more references to the pistol in Church publications.
Joseph and others drank wine at Carthage. This fact is presented without apology in Joseph Smith, History of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, 7 volumes, edited by Brigham H. Roberts, (Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 1957), 6:616. Volume 6 link:
Before the jailor came in, his boy brought in some water, and said the guard wanted some wine. Joseph gave Dr. Richards two dollars to give the guard; but the guard said one was enough, and would take no more.
The guard immediately sent for a bottle of wine, pipes, and two small papers of tobacco; and one of the guards brought them into the jail soon after the jailor went out. Dr. Richards uncorked the bottle, and presented a glass to Joseph, who tasted, as also Brother Taylor and the doctor, and the bottle was then given to the guard, who turned to go out. When at the top of the stairs some one below called him two or three times, and he went down. (emphasis added)
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