Criticism of Mormonism/Books/Nauvoo Polygamy/Chapter 3

1. REDIRECTTemplate:Test3

Response to claims made in "Chapter 3" (pp. 159-240)

Chapter 2 (pp. 108-158)

A FAIR Analysis of: Nauvoo Polygamy: "... but we called it celestial marriage" A work by author: George D. Smith

Chapter 4 (pp. 241-309)

Claim

•  Author's quote: "several days after Orson Pratt, Sidney Rigdon, and Ebenezer Robinson declined to affirm Smith's good character…."

Author's source(s)

• History of the Church 5:125, 139.

Response

•  Citation error
• The three were Pratt, Rigdon, and George W. Robinson, not Ebenezer. (See Manuscript History, 29 August 1842; History of the Church 5:139; Faulring, American Prophet's Record, 254).

Claim

• Governor Carlin described the Nauvoo statute on writs as an "extraordinary assumption of power….most absurd and ridiculous…[a] gross usurpation of power that cannot be tolerated."

Author's source(s)

• History of the Church 5:153-55.

Nauvoo city charter (edit)

Response

• Carlin may not have agreed, but this does not mean that the law was reckless or irresponsible.
• City of Nauvoo/City charter
• City of Nauvoo/City charter/Usurpation of power

Claim

• The Nauvoo charter is claimed to be "the basis for this presumption of independence from state jurisdiction…."

Author's source(s)

• The author cites chapter 2 of the present work. However, no argument or justification for this claim is provided in the previous chapter either.

Nauvoo city charter (edit)

Response

• The author again gives no hint that the Mormons were being anything but "presumptuous," when in fact the legal arguments of the day were likely in their favor.
• City of Nauvoo/City charter
• City of Nauvoo/City charter/Usurpation of power

Claim

• The author claims that it is "interesting" that The Peace Maker, a non-member's defence of polygamy, "appeared during the hiatus in the erstwhile marriage frenzy of 1842 and while Smith's apostles were traveling the countryside to counter Bennett's words and deny polygamy."

Author's source(s)

• Lawrence Foster, "A Little-Known Defense of Polygamy from the Mormon Press in 1842," Dialogue 9 (Winter 1974): 21–34.

Response

• The author does not discuss the many differences between The Peace Maker and LDS doctrine.
• The author and his source also ignore the arguments which had been raised against Joseph's participation or approval. See:
  • Eli B. Kelsey, "A Base Calumny Refuted," Millennial Star 12 no. 6 (15 March 1850), 92–93.
  • Kenneth W. Godfrey, “Causes of Mormon Non-Mormon Conflict in Hancock County, Illinois, 1839–1846” (PhD diss., Brigham Young University, 1967), 96-97.
  • Richard L. Bushman, Joseph Smith: Rough Stone Rolling (New York: Knopf, 2005), 445–446.

Claim

• The book claims that Latter-day Saints were expelled from Illinois "primarily because of the dominant sense they betrayed public trust."

Author's source(s)

• No source provided. He merely asserts and moves on.

Response

• The author here over-simplifies an extremely complex issue, with no references or argument. See:
  • Kenneth W. Godfrey, "Causes of Mormon Non-Mormon Conflict in Hancock County, Illinois, 1839-1846," Ph.D. thesis (1967), Brigham Young University.

Claim

• Joseph's "summer 1842 call for an intimate visit from Sarah Ann Whitney…substantiate[s] the intimate relationships he was involved in during those two years."

Author's source(s)

• No source provided.

Whitney "love letter" (edit)

Response

• Again, an inaccurate representation of the purpose of the letter.
• Joseph Smith/Polygamy/Whitney letter
• Use of sources—Letter to Whitneys
• Criticism of Mormonism/Books/Loaded and prejudicial language
• Criticism of Mormonism/Books/Mind reading
• Criticism of Mormonism/Books/Romance
• Gregory L. Smith, A review of Nauvoo Polygamy:...but we called it celestial marriage by George D. Smith. FARMS Review, Vol. 20, Issue 2. (Detailed book review)

Claim

• The author claims that the History of the Church "predictably gives no notice of these weddings."

Author's source(s)

• No source provided.

Censorship of Church History (edit)

Response

• Church history/Censorship and revision
• Criticism of Mormonism/Books/Censorship

Claim

• The "pretended marriage" of Joseph Kingsbury to the polygamously-married Sarah Ann Whitney is postulated by the author to "have been a precaution against possible pregnancy."

Author's source(s)

• No source provided.

Whitney "love letter" (edit)

Response

• Speculation.
• Despite the author's wearisome repetition of his "tryst" fable, there is no evidence of a sexual relationship with Sarah Ann.
• Joseph Smith/Polygamy/Whitney letter
• Use of sources—Letter to Whitneys
• Criticism of Mormonism/Books/Loaded and prejudicial language
• Criticism of Mormonism/Books/Mind reading
• Criticism of Mormonism/Books/Romance
• Gregory L. Smith, A review of Nauvoo Polygamy:...but we called it celestial marriage by George D. Smith. FARMS Review, Vol. 20, Issue 2. (Detailed book review)

Claim

• Lucy Walker "told Joseph she required a revelation before she would submit [to plural marriage]. He promised that if she prayed, she would receive her own personal manifestation from God, which she reported she received 'near dawn after—a sleepless night"—when a "heavenly influence" and feeling of "supreme happiness…took possession" of her."

Author's source(s)

• Littlefield, Reminiscences, 48; Smith, Intimate Chronicle, 100, 557.

Response

• Smith provides the bare minimum of the story; Lucy's account is more impressive and powerful than these few fragments suggest.
• Plural marriage spiritual manifestations—Lucy Walker

Claim

• The author presumes that financial and marital issues, "especially concerning the Lawrence sisters" would eventually "inflame public opinion" and result in Joseph's arrest.

Author's source(s)

• Gordon Madsen, ‘The Lawrence Estate Revisited: Joseph Smith and Illinois Law regarding Guardianships,’ Nauvoo Symposium, Sept. 21, 1989, Brigham Young University.

Response
The author does not tell us that Madsen's work (which he cites for his claim) demonstrates that Joseph properly discharged all his financial duties as guardians of the Lawrence estate. The author completely ignores the primary documents on this issue, and relies only on Law's hostile, and demonstrably false, account.

• Mismanagement of the Lawrence estate?
• Gregory L. Smith, A review of Nauvoo Polygamy:...but we called it celestial marriage by George D. Smith. FARMS Review, Vol. 20, Issue 2. (Detailed book review)

Claim

• The author speculates that there existed a "conflict of interests between building a church community and [Joseph's] continuing affection for young women."

Author's source(s)

• No source provided.

Ages of wives (edit)

Response

• Smith commonly exploits the presentist fallacy in the matter of Joseph's wives' ages.
• Age of wives
• Criticism of Mormonism/Books/Presentism

Claim

• The author claims that Joseph was "pursuing" Helen Mar Kimball.

Author's source(s)

• No source provided.

Womanizing & romance (edit)

Response

• Criticism of Mormonism/Books/Loaded and prejudicial language
• Joseph Smith/Polygamy/Helen Mar Kimball

Claim

• Helen's biographer concludes that she 'expected her marriage to Joseph Smith' to be a ceremony 'for eternity only,' not an actual marriage involving physical relations.

Author's source(s)

• Todd Compton, In Sacred Loneliness: The Plural Wives of Joseph Smith (Salt Lake City: Signature Books, 1997), 500. ( Index of claims )

Response

• There is no evidence for physical relations in Helen's marriage to Joseph. The source cited, Compton, does not agree with the author's reading: “there is absolutely no evidence that there was any sexuality in the marriage, and I suggest that, following later practice in Utah, there may have been no sexuality. All the evidence points to this marriage as a primarily dynastic marriage.”
• Gregory L. Smith, A review of Nauvoo Polygamy:...but we called it celestial marriage by George D. Smith. FARMS Review, Vol. 20, Issue 2. (Detailed book review)
• Joseph Smith and polygamy/Helen Mar Kimball

Claim

• The author claims that Helen Mar Kimball was surprised to discover "that it included [marriage for] time also: a physical union at age fourteen with a thirty-seven year-old man."

Author's source(s)

• Todd Compton, In Sacred Loneliness: The Plural Wives of Joseph Smith (Salt Lake City: Signature Books, 1997), 500. ( Index of claims )

Response

• The author again distorts the source. The surprise was not in finding that she needed to have "a physical union," but that she was regarded as married, and so could not date others her age while Joseph was alive.
• Joseph Smith/Polygamy/Helen Mar Kimball
• Gregory L. Smith, A review of Nauvoo Polygamy:...but we called it celestial marriage by George D. Smith. FARMS Review, Vol. 20, Issue 2. (Detailed book review)

Claim

•  Author's quote: "As she put her ambivalent feelings into verse in her "Reminiscences," Helen had "thought through this life my time will be my own," but "the step I am now taking's for eternity alone." She saw her "youthful friends grow shy and cold" as "poisonous darts from sland'rous tongues were hurled." She was "bar'd out from social scenes by this destiny," and faced "sad'nd mem'ries of sweet departed joys"

Author's source(s)

• Stanley B. Kimball, Heber C. Kimball: Mormon Patriarch and Pioneer (Ubana: University of Illinois Press, 1981): 109-110.

Response

• This poem in fact demonstrates the author's misrepresentation of the facts. Helen's concern was indeed that she was "bar'd out from social scenes"—she could not date while married. This does not mean, however, that there were sexual relations, and the author's source agrees.
• In addition to hiding Compton's conclusion, the author does not tell us that his Kimball source likewise concluded that the marriage with Helen was “unconsummated.”
• Joseph Smith/Polygamy/Helen Mar Kimball
• Gregory L. Smith, A review of Nauvoo Polygamy:...but we called it celestial marriage by George D. Smith. FARMS Review, Vol. 20, Issue 2. (Detailed book review)

Claim

•  Author's quote: "That [Rhoda Richards] was her husband Brigham's cousin was apparently secondary to the grander scheme of interlocking the hierarchy in marriage."

Author's source(s)

• No source provided.

Response

• Here the author again relies on presentism to provide a hostile interpretive lens. It was not unusual for first cousins to marry. Nineteen of the present-day states permit unrestricted marriage between first cousins, and most countries have no restrictions at all on marriage between cousins. In its exploitation of the presentist fallacy, the author’s remark is utterly irrelevant in its historical context.
• Criticism of Mormonism/Books/Presentism

Claim

• The author states that "Smith and Clayton spent three hours preparing the eloquent language" of D&C 132….

Author's source(s)

• No source provided.

Response

• Presumes or implies that Joseph Smith and William Clayton were the author(s).
• Clayton would testify: "Joseph commenced to dictate the revelation on celestial marriage, and I wrote it, sentence by sentence, as he dictated. After the whole was written, Joseph asked me to read it through, slowly and carefully, which I did, and he pronounced it correct."
• Criticism of Mormonism/Books/Loaded and prejudicial language

Claim

• The author speculates that Joseph "found it useful to reference the conditional restriction on marriage found in the Book of Mormon."

Author's source(s)

• No source provided.

Joseph Smith: cynical motivations (edit)

Response

• Implies that Joseph was acting out of pragmatism or opportunity, rather than out of sincere conviction.
• Criticism of Mormonism/Books/Loaded and prejudicial language

Claim

• The author intends Joseph to be seen as arrogant. He quotes a letter from Joseph to James Arlington Bennet:

“I combat the errors of ages; I meet the violence of mobs; I cope with illegal proceedings from executive authority; I cut the Gordian knot of powers, and I solve mathematical problems of universities, with truth . . . diamond truth; and God is my ‘right hand man.’”

• The author then editorializes:

“With such a self-image, it is not surprising that he also aspired to the highest office in the land: the presidency of the United States.”

Author's source(s)

• No source provided.

Response

• The author fails to tell us that Joseph's remarks are a tongue-in-cheek reply to Bennet's previous letter.
• Joseph Smith/Narcissism

Claim

• The author again quotes Joseph: "‘I am learned, and know more than all the world put together."

Author's source(s)

• History of the Church 6:222–223.

Response

• The author does not quote enough of Joseph's remarks to complete his thought.
• The author also avoids quoting the better versions of this talk, from the Times and Seasons, BYU Studies, or even Signature Books.
• Joseph Smith/Narcissism
• Gregory L. Smith, A review of Nauvoo Polygamy:...but we called it celestial marriage by George D. Smith. FARMS Review, Vol. 20, Issue 2. (Detailed book review)

Claim

• The author claims that there is "no reason to doubt that Smith's marriages involved sexual relations in most instances."

Author's source(s)

• No source provided.

Response

• We have evidence of sexual relations for only nine wives.
• Gregory L. Smith, A review of Nauvoo Polygamy:...but we called it celestial marriage by George D. Smith. FARMS Review, Vol. 20, Issue 2. (Detailed book review)

Claim

• Mary Elizabeth Lightner is claimed to have spoken of "'three children' whom she said she 'knew he had.'"

Author's source(s)

• The Life & Testimony of Mary Lightner (Salt Lake City: Kraut's Pioneer Press, n.d.); "Mary E. Lightner's Testimony, As Delivered at Brigham Young University)," [punctuation sic] Apr. 14, 1905, 41-42, complied by N.B. Lundwall, LDS Archives, at Bancroft Library, University of California, Berkeley.

Response

• Joseph Smith/Polygamy/Children of polygamous marriages

Claim

•  Author's quote: "Until decisive DNA testing of possible Smith descendants—daughters as well as sons—from plural wives can be accomplished, ascertaining whether Smith fathered children with any of his plural wives remains hypothetical."

Author's source(s)

• No source provided.

Response

• This is true, but the author fails to tell us that all those who have been definitively tested so far—Oliver Buell, Mosiah Hancock, Zebulon Jacobs, Moroni Pratt, and Orrison Smith—have been excluded. Would he have neglected, one wonders, to mention a positive DNA test?
• Joseph Smith/Polygamy/Children of polygamous marriages
• Gregory L. Smith, A review of Nauvoo Polygamy:...but we called it celestial marriage by George D. Smith. FARMS Review, Vol. 20, Issue 2. (Detailed book review)

Claim

• The author claims that in 1841 "Sarah Pratt firmly rebuffed Smith and remained monogamously committed to her missionary husband."

Author's source(s)

• Bennett, History of the Saints, 228-31; "Workings of Mormonism Related by Mrs. Orson Pratt," 1884, LDS Archives.

Response

• The author here again follows Bennett completely uncritically. He tells us nothing about the multiple witnesses who testified to Sarah's adultery with Bennett.
• John C. Bennett

Claim

• The author speculates that "Cordelia C. Morley Cox...had rejected [Joseph's] amorous proposal."

Author's source(s)

• Cordelia Morley Cox, Autobiographical statement, Mar. 17, 1909, Perry Special Collections.

Response

• The author again uses loaded language. There is little evidence that Joseph's proposals were romantic or amorous.
• Women who rejected plural marriage
• Criticism of Mormonism/Books/Mind reading

Claim

• It is speculated that Eliza Winters “perhaps did not” resist Joseph’s advances “but apparently talked about it all the same.”

Author's source(s)

• No source provided.

Eliza Winters (edit)

Response

• There is no evidence that Eliza ever said anything about this.
• Eliza Winters
• Gregory L. Smith, A review of Nauvoo Polygamy:...but we called it celestial marriage by George D. Smith. FARMS Review, Vol. 20, Issue 2. (Detailed book review)

Claim

•  Author's quote: "According to LDS theology, the posthumous sealing meant that Heber would be Smith's son in the eternities, not the son of his biological father."

Author's source(s)

• No source provided.

Sealing takes away families? (edit)

Response

• Heber was connected to Joseph because all believers had to be sealed into one large family. This was no attempt to displace Heber's biological father, but grew out of the recognition that his father had not been a believer, and so had not accepted essential ordinances. Later clarification under Wilford Woodruff encouraged believers to be sealed to their biological family, with the understanding that such matters would be sorted out through God's mercy and justice via proxy ordinances for the deceased.
• Vicarious ordinances

Claim

• It is claimes that in 1831 Joseph "directed missionaries to marry native American women."

Author's source(s)

• No source provided.
• Early preoccupation with polygamy (edit)

Response

• Polygamy/Lamanites to become "white and delightsome" through polygamous marriage
• Initiation of the practice
• Joseph did not direct them to marry the women. None did so. Joseph reported that God said that "It is my will, that in time, ye should take unto you wives of the Lamanites and Nephites…." (italics added).
• That this might entail plural marriage was only realized three years later when Joseph was asked about it. None of the missionaries in 1831 understood the plural marriage implication.
• Beginnings of plural marriage

Claim

• The author hints that Emma would have to sneak up on Joseph to check up on him, as evidenced by “his warning to Sarah Ann to proceed carefully in order to make sure Emma would not find them in their hiding place.”

Author's source(s)

• No source provided.

Whitney "love letter" (edit)

Response

• Joseph’s hiding place from the mob and instructions to the Whitneys have been transmogrified into a hiding place for Joseph and Sarah Ann.
• Joseph Smith/Polygamy/Whitney letter
• Use of sources—Letter to Whitneys
• Criticism of Mormonism/Books/Loaded and prejudicial language
• Criticism of Mormonism/Books/Mind reading
• Criticism of Mormonism/Books/Romance
• Gregory L. Smith, A review of Nauvoo Polygamy:...but we called it celestial marriage by George D. Smith. FARMS Review, Vol. 20, Issue 2. (Detailed book review)

Claim

• The author asks us to “assume . . . that LeRoi Snow’s account [about Emma and Eliza and the stairs] was accurate.”

Author's source(s)

• No source provided.

Emma, Eliza & stairs (edit)

Response

• Yet again, the author provides no hint that most researchers doubt this event. He does nothing to deal with his sources' objections here or elsewhere.
• Emma, Eliza, and the stairs

Claim

•  Author's quote: "Just as Joseph sought comfort from Sarah Ann the day Emma departed from his hideout…."

Author's source(s)

• No source provided.

Whitney "love letter" (edit)

Response

• The author's version of Sarah Ann is again trotted out.
• Joseph Smith/Polygamy/Whitney letter
• Use of sources—Letter to Whitneys
• Criticism of Mormonism/Books/Loaded and prejudicial language
• Criticism of Mormonism/Books/Mind reading
• Criticism of Mormonism/Books/Romance
• Gregory L. Smith, A review of Nauvoo Polygamy:...but we called it celestial marriage by George D. Smith. FARMS Review, Vol. 20, Issue 2. (Detailed book review)

Claim

• The author refers to what he calls Joseph's "insatiable addition of one woman after another to an invisible family…."

Author's source(s)

• No source provided.

Womanizing & romance (edit)

Response

• If Joseph was "insatiable," ("unable to be satisfied") how could he avoid entering into marriages for the last nine months of his life?
• Criticism of Mormonism/Books/Mind reading
• Criticism of Mormonism/Books/Loaded and prejudicial language

Claim

• The author claims that Joseph had a "prolonged dalliance with Fanny Alger."

Author's source(s)

• No source provided.

Ignoring Hancock autobiography (edit)

Fanny Alger (edit)

Womanizing & romance (edit)

Response

• Fanny Alger—affair or marriage?
• Criticism of Mormonism/Books/Loaded and prejudicial language
• Polygamy book/Initiation of the practice

Notes