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Claim
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Sources used
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FAIR Commentary
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- The web site notes that Sylvia married Joseph Smith on February 8, 1842, and states: "It is uncertain if her husband, Windsor, was aware of the marriage, but she did continue to live with him." The site then states that Brigham Young taught
“if the woman preferred a man higher in authority, and he is willing to take her and her husband gives her up-there is no Bill of divorce required...it is right in the sight of God”.
- Brigham is also claimed to have said that the woman:
“...would be in a higher glory”.
- The web site speculates that "[t]his may help shed light on Sylvia’s complex marriage arrangement."
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- The actual source is a journal entry by J.A. Beck on Brigham Young's discourse on plural marriage given on 8 October 1861. Extractions are highlighted (note that the extracted text has been altered):
But there was a way in which a woman could leave a man lawfully. When a woman becomes alienated in her feelings & affections from her husband it is then his duty to give her a Bill & set her free which would be fornication for the man to cohabit with his wife after she had thus become alienated from him. The children begotten of such a woman would be bastards in the true scriptural term of the word fornication for the crime of adultery a woman (& also men) would be stoned to death & then come up in the morning of the resurrection & claim all of her rights & priviledges in the marriage covenant. Also there was another way in which a woman could leave a man if the woman preferred another man higher in authority & he is willing to take her & her husband gives her up there is no Bill of divorce required in the case it is right in the sight of God. But if he ever after has any connexion with her, he is then guilty of committing a very great sin & will be punished accordingly. If a man is faithfull & should his wife leave him & be married to another without his consent there is no power in heaven or on earth that can prevent him from claiming her in the resurrection.
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- Note that the site uses a discourse given by Brigham in 1861 to "help shed light" on a "complex marriage arrangement" in 1842. The site makes no effort to note that Brigham's sermon occurred 19 years later.
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- The site notes that "10 months later" (24 Dec. 1942) that "Joseph’s journal mentions a visit to his wife, Sylvia, who was giving birth to her third child":
“Walked with Sec[retary Willard Richards] to see Sister Lyons who was sick. Her baby died 30 minutes before [we] arrived”.
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- The implication of "10 months later," of course, is that the baby was Joseph's child, and that this is why the visit occurred.
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- The site notes another visit by Joseph to Sylvia:
“Joseph and I rode out to borrow money, drank wine at Sister Lyons P.M. I got $50 of Sister Lyons and paid it to D.D. Yearsly.”
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“Just prior to my mothers death in 1882 she called me to her bedside and told me that her days were numbered and before she passed away from mortality she desired to tell me something which she had kept as an entire secret from me and from all others but which she now desired to communicate to me. She then told me that I was the daughter of the Prophet Joseph Smith”.
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