Array

Mormonism and Wikipedia/Joseph Smith, Jr./1839 - 1844: Difference between revisions

(: fix link)
m (bot use legacy Detail template)
 
(49 intermediate revisions by 5 users not shown)
Line 1: Line 1:
__NOTOC__
{{Main Page}}
{{H2
|L=Mormonism and Wikipedia/Joseph Smith, Jr./1839 - 1844
|H=An analysis of Wikipedia article "Joseph Smith"
|S=
|L1=
}}
{{FAIRAnalysisWikipedia
{{FAIRAnalysisWikipedia
|title=[[../]]
|title=[[../|"Joseph Smith"]]
|wikipedialink=http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_Smith,_Jr.
|wikipedialink=http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_Smith
|uplink=[[../|Joseph Smith, Jr.]]
|uplink=[[../|Joseph Smith]]
|section=1838 - 1844: Nauvoo, Illinois
|section=Life in Nauvoo, Illinois (1839–44)
|previous=[[../1838 to 1839|1838 to 1839]]
|previous=[[../1838 to 1839|1838 to 1839]]
|next=[[../Death|Death]]
|next=[[../Death|Death]]
|notes={{WikipediaDisclaimer}}
|notes={{WikipediaDisclaimer}}
}}
}}
=An analysis of Wikipedia article "Joseph Smith, Jr." (Version 19 May 2009)=


===Reviews of previous revisions of this section===
==Reviews of previous revisions of this section==
[[/051909|19 May 2009]]
{{SummaryItem
|link=/051909
|subject=19 May 2009
|summary=A review of this section as it appeared in Wikipedia on 19 May 2009.
}}


==Section review==
===Life in Nauvoo, Illinois (1839–44) {{WikipediaUpdate|9/3/2011}}===


===Life in Nauvoo, Illinois (1839–44) (Section Version 1/8/2010)===
{{BeginWikipediaTable|link=http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_Smith,_Jr.|section=1838_-_1844:_Nauvoo,_Illinois|article=Joseph Smith, Jr.}}
===== =====
===== =====
||
{{IndexClaimItemShort
In April 1839, Smith rejoined his followers who, having fled east from Missouri, had spread out along the banks of the [[Mississippi River|Mississippi]], near [[Quincy, Illinois]]. There, for both humanitarian and political reasons, the refugees had been welcomed.
|title=the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith<ref name="at_the_time">Due to the nature of wikipedia, articles can change. This analysis applies to the article as it stood circa September 2011.</ref>
||
|claim=
"There was chronic border friction between Missouri and Illinois, and the 'Suckers' welcomed the chance to demonstrate a nobility of character foreign to the despised 'Pukes.'  More important, a presidential election was in the offing, and the Democratic Association, which controlled the votes in the quincy area, was eager to make friends with this huge new voting bloc. Fearful lest the Mormons turn Whig in bitterness against the Democratic government in Missouri they solicited funds for relieving the Mormons' distress and did their best to provide housing." Fawn Brodie, 248-49.
Newspapers throughout the country criticized Missouri for expelling the Mormons,
||
|authorsources=<br>
#{{Harvtxt|Brodie|1971|pp=246–47, 259}} (noting rebukes by Missouri and Illinois newspapers, and "press all over the country"); {{Harvtxt|Bushman|2005|p=398}} (Mormons were depicted as a persecuted minority).
|authorsources=<br>
#
}}
*{{WikipediaCorrect}}
*{{WikipediaCorrect}}
|-
|


===== =====
===== =====
||
{{IndexClaimItemShort
Purchasing waterlogged wilderness land on credit from two [[Connecticut]] speculators (who drove a hard bargain during this period of economic recession), Smith established a new gathering place for the Saints along the Mississippi in [[Hancock County, Illinois|Hancock County]].
|title=the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith<ref name="at_the_time">Due to the nature of wikipedia, articles can change. This analysis applies to the article as it stood circa September 2011.</ref>
||
|claim=
*Bushman, 383-84. Smith also purchased land across the river in Iowa from a dishonest  recent convert, Isaac Galland.  Galland sold his land cheaply enough, but when courts finally straightened out the titles, Gallands' proved worthless.  The 250 Mormon families who had settled had to return "penniless to Nauvoo." Brodie, 262.
and Illinois accepted the refugees
||
|authorsources=<br>
#{{Harvtxt|Brodie|1971|p=248}} ("There was chronic border friction between Missouri and Illinois, and the 'Suckers' welcomed the chance to demonstrate a nobility of character foreign to the despised 'Pukes'".).
|authorsources=<br>
#
}}
*{{WikipediaCorrect}}
*{{WikipediaCorrect}}
|-
|


===== =====
===== =====
||
{{IndexClaimItemShort
He renamed the area [[Nauvoo, Illinois|"Nauvoo"]], which he said meant "beautiful" in Hebrew.
|title=the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith<ref name="at_the_time">Due to the nature of wikipedia, articles can change. This analysis applies to the article as it stood circa September 2011.</ref>
||
|claim=
*A similar Hebrew word appears in Isaiah 52: 7
who gathered along the banks of the [[Mississippi River|Mississippi]].
||
|authorsources=<br>
*The word "Nauvoo" is a Hebrew word. It means "to be comely." Joseph gave the word in the Sephardic transliteration system he learned from Joshua Seixas; in fact, the word Nauvoo is given in the Seixas grammar. See [http://www.fairlds.org/Misc/Is_Nauvoo_a_Hebrew_Word.html Is Nauvoo a Hebrew word?].
#{{Harvtxt|Bushman|2005|p=381}} (Saints gathered near [[Quincy, Illinois]].
|-
|authorsources=<br>
|
#
}}
*{{WikipediaCorrect}}


===== =====
===== =====
||
{{IndexClaimItemShort
The soggy low land and river eddies were exceptional breeding grounds for mosquitoes, and the Saints suffered plagues of [[malaria]] in the summers of 1839, 1840, and 1841. (In 1841 malaria killed Joseph's brother [[Don Carlos Smith|Don Carlos]] and his namesake, Joseph's son Don Carlos, within a few days of one another.)
|title=the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith<ref name="at_the_time">Due to the nature of wikipedia, articles can change. This analysis applies to the article as it stood circa September 2011.</ref>
||
|claim=
*Bushman, 384, 425.
Smith purchased high-priced swampy woodland in the hamlet of Commerce
||
|authorsources=<br>
#{{Harvtxt|Bushman|2005|pp=383–84}} (noting that the land had strategic importance as a possible major port).
|authorsources=<br>
#
}}
*{{WikipediaCorrect}}
*{{WikipediaCorrect}}
|-
}}
|


===== =====
===== =====
||
{{IndexClaimItemShort
Late in 1839, Smith went to Washington to seek redress from the federal government for the Saints' losses in Missouri. He met briefly with President [[Martin Van Buren]], but neither man seems to have thought much of the other, and the trip produced no [[reparations]]. Whatever sympathy Van Buren or Congress might have had for Mormon victims was canceled out by the importance of Missouri in the upcoming presidential election.
|title=the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith<ref name="at_the_time">Due to the nature of wikipedia, articles can change. This analysis applies to the article as it stood circa September 2011.</ref>
||
|claim=
*Bushman, 392-93.
and urged his followers to move there.
||
|authorsources=<br>
#{{Harvtxt|Bushman|2005|pp=384}}.
|authorsources=<br>
#
}}
*{{WikipediaCorrect}}
*{{WikipediaCorrect}}
|-
|


===== =====
===== =====
||
{{IndexClaimItemShort
Nevertheless, Smith shrewdly made Missouri a "byword for oppression" and "saw to it that the sufferings of his people received national publicity."
|title=the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith<ref name="at_the_time">Due to the nature of wikipedia, articles can change. This analysis applies to the article as it stood circa September 2011.</ref>
||
|claim=
*rodie, 259. The editor of the ''Chicago Democrat'' wrote, "We will not go so far as to call the Mormons martyr-mongers, but we believe they are men of sufficient sagacity to profit by anything in the shape of persecution....The Mormons have greatly profited by their persecution in Missouri...let Illinois repeat that bloody tragedies of Missouri and one or two other states follow, and the Mormon religion will not only be known throughout our land, but will be very extensively embraced. March 25, 1840 in Brodie, 259.
Promoting the image of the Saints as an oppressed minority,
||
|authorsources=<br>
#{{Harvtxt|Bushman|2005|pp=398–99}}; {{Harvtxt|Brodie|1971|p=259}} (Smith "saw to it that the sufferings of his people received national publicity.").
|authorsources=<br>
#
}}
*From the cited source: "The press all over the country was sympathizing with the Saints, for Joseph, resolving to make Missouri a byword for oppression and Boggs a synonym for tyranny, saw to it that the sufferings of his people received national publicity." (Brodie 259)
*From the cited source: "The press all over the country was sympathizing with the Saints, for Joseph, resolving to make Missouri a byword for oppression and Boggs a synonym for tyranny, saw to it that the sufferings of his people received national publicity." (Brodie 259)
|-
*{{SeeCriticalWork|author=Fawn Brodie|work=No Man Knows My History: The Life of Joseph Smith}}
|


===== =====
===== =====
||
{{IndexClaimItemShort
In a bold stroke, Smith sent off the Twelve Apostles to Great Britain to serve as missionaries for the new faith. All left families in desperate circumstances struggling to establish themselves in Iowa or Illinois. While Smith had been imprisoned, [[Brigham Young]], the senior member of the [[Quorum of the Twelve Apostles]], had with indefatigable skill, brought the believers out of Missouri, and the Saints "had obeyed him implicitly."
|title=the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith<ref name="at_the_time">Due to the nature of wikipedia, articles can change. This analysis applies to the article as it stood circa September 2011.</ref>
||
|claim=
*Brodie, 258.
he unsuccessfully petitioned the [[Federal Government of the United States|federal government]] for help in obtaining reparations.
||
|authorsources=<br>
#Smith traveled to [[Washington, D.C.]] to meet with President [[Martin Van Buren]] and [[United States Congress|Congress]] ({{Harvtxt|Bushman|2005|pp=392–94}}; {{Harvtxt|Brodie|1971|p=260}}).
}}
 
===== =====
{{IndexClaimItemShort
|title=the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith<ref name="at_the_time">Due to the nature of wikipedia, articles can change. This analysis applies to the article as it stood circa September 2011.</ref>
|claim=
During a [[malaria]] epidemic, Smith [[Anointing of the Sick|anointed the suffering with oil]] and blessed them;
|authorsources=<br>
#{{Harvtxt|Bushman|2005|p=385}}; {{Harvtxt|Brodie|1971|p=257}}. In 1841, malaria claimed the lives of one of [[Don Carlos Smith|Smith's brothers]] and his son, who died within eight days of each other {{Harv|Bushman|2005|p=425}}.
}}
 
===== =====
{{IndexClaimItemShort
|title=the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith<ref name="at_the_time">Due to the nature of wikipedia, articles can change. This analysis applies to the article as it stood circa September 2011.</ref>
|claim=
but he also sent off the ailing [[Brigham Young]] and other members of the [[Quorum of the Twelve]] to missions in Europe.
|authorsources=<br>
#{{Harvtxt|Brodie|1971|p=258}} (arguing that Smith was eager to reclaim some of the prestige that had been ceded to [[Brigham Young]] while Smith was imprisoned); {{Harv|Bushman|2005|p=386}} (Though many of the apostles had malaria, Smith required them to covertly slip into hostile [[Missouri]] so that [[Far West, Missouri|Far West]], now deserted, would be their point of departure on exactly 26 April 1838.); {{Harvtxt|Roberts|1905|pp=46–47}} (Revelation given in [[Far West, Missouri|Far West]] in 1838: "Let them take leave of my saints in the city of Far West, on the twenty-sixth day of April next, on the building-spot of my house, saith the Lord.").
|authorsources=<br>
#
}}
*{{WikipediaCorrect}}
*It should be noted that the idea that Joseph was "eager to recover the prestige and authority that was his in Far West's palm days" is Brodie's opinion. (Brodie, p.. 258).
*{{SeeCriticalWork|author=Fawn Brodie|work=No Man Knows My History: The Life of Joseph Smith}}
 
===== =====
{{IndexClaimItemShort
|title=the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith<ref name="at_the_time">Due to the nature of wikipedia, articles can change. This analysis applies to the article as it stood circa September 2011.</ref>
|claim=
These missionaries found many willing converts in [[Great Britain]], often factory workers, poor even by the standards of American Saints.
|authorsources=<br>
#{{Harvtxt|Bushman|2005|p=409}}; {{Harvtxt|Brodie|1971|pp=258, 264–65}}.
|authorsources=<br>
#
}}
*{{WikipediaCorrect}}
*{{WikipediaCorrect}}
|-
*Bushman notes that the missionaries  were "appalled by the miserable living conditions they encountered."
|


===== =====
===== =====
||
{{IndexClaimItemShort
But with Young and the others in Europe, Smith recovered his earlier prestige and authority. Meanwhile, the missionaries found many willing converts in Great Britain, often factory workers, poor even by the standards of American saints.
|title=the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith<ref name="at_the_time">Due to the nature of wikipedia, articles can change. This analysis applies to the article as it stood circa September 2011.</ref>
||
|claim=
*Bushman (2005), 409; Brodie, 258, 264-65. Many converts came from dissatisfied members of English sects "along the margins of conventional church life." On the previous religious beliefs of these Mormon converts, see [[Grant Underwood]], ''The Millenarian World of Early Mormonism'' (Urbana: [[University of Illinois]], 1993). The Mormon missionaries were shocked by the poverty they witnessed, and as Fawn Brodie has written, they "began to preach the glory of America along with the glory of the gospel." The Mormon ''[[Millennial Star]]'' published in [[Liverpool, England|Liverpool]] "frequently had the ring of a real estate pamphlet." Brodie, 264.
The religion also attracted a few wealthy and influential converts, including [[John C. Bennett]], M.D., the [[Illinois]] [[quartermaster general]].
||
|authorsources=<br>
*{{WikipediaSecondaryFact}} The idea that Joseph was "eager to recover the prestige and authority that was his in Far West's palm days" is Brodie's opinion. (Brodie, p.. 258). The editor has converted Brodie's opinion to fact in the wiki article.
#{{Harvtxt|Bushman|2005|pp=410–11}}.
*{{WikipediaCorrect}}, although most of this comes from Brodie. Bushman notes that the missionaries  were "appalled by the miserable living conditions they encountered," but he says nothing about preaching "the glory of America"&mdash;this is from Brodie.
|authorsources=<br>
|-
#
|
}}
*{{WikipediaCorrect}}


===== =====
===== =====
||
{{IndexClaimItemShort
These first trickled, then flooded, into Nauvoo, raising Smith's spirits.
|title=the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith<ref name="at_the_time">Due to the nature of wikipedia, articles can change. This analysis applies to the article as it stood circa September 2011.</ref>
||
|claim=
*Bushman (2005), 410.
Bennett used his connections in the Illinois legislature to obtain an unusually liberal charter for the new city,
||
|authorsources=<br>
#{{Harvtxt|Bushman|2005|p=412}}; {{Harvtxt|Brodie|1971|pp=267–68}}.
|authorsources=<br>
#
}}
*{{WikipediaCorrect}}
*{{WikipediaCorrect}}
|-
|


===== =====
===== =====
||
{{IndexClaimItemShort
In February 1841, Nauvoo received a charter from the state of Illinois, which granted the Latter Day Saints a considerable degree of autonomy. Smith threw himself enthusiastically into the work of building a new city.  The charter authorized independent municipal courts, the establishment of a university, and the creation of a militia unit known as the "[[Nauvoo Legion]]." Smith dreamed of industrial projects, and even received a revelation commanding the building of a hotel, "that strangers may come from afar to lodge therein."
|title=the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith<ref name="at_the_time">Due to the nature of wikipedia, articles can change. This analysis applies to the article as it stood circa September 2011.</ref>
||
|claim=
*Bushman (2005), 410-13; ''D&C'', 124: 23. The revelation (still included in the Mormon canon) specifically provided the amount of stock to be owned by any individual and granted a suite of rooms to Joseph Smith and his posterity "from generation to generation, for ever and ever." ''D&C'', 124: 59.
which Smith named [[Nauvoo, Illinois|"Nauvoo"]] ([[Hebrew language|Hebrew]] נָאווּ, meaning "to be beautiful").
||
|authorsources=<br>
*The revelation doesn't specifically mention a "suite of rooms." It says "Therefore, let my servant Joseph and his seed after him have place in that house, from generation to generation, forever and ever, saith the Lord." ({{s||DC||124|59}})
#{{Harvtxt|Bushman|2005|p=415}}. A similar Hebrew word appears in Isaiah 52: 7.
{{EndTable}}
|authorsources=<br>
#
}}
*{{WikipediaCorrect}}
*The word "Nauvoo" is a Hebrew word. It means "to be comely." Joseph gave the word in the Sephardic transliteration system he learned from Joshua Seixas; in fact, the word Nauvoo is given in the Seixas grammar. See [http://www.fairlds.org/Misc/Is_Nauvoo_a_Hebrew_Word.html Is Nauvoo a Hebrew word?].


====Doctrine (Section Versio n1/8/2010)====
===== =====
{{Main|Teachings of Joseph Smith, Jr.|Freemasonry and the Latter Day Saint movement}}
{{IndexClaimItemShort
|title=the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith<ref name="at_the_time">Due to the nature of wikipedia, articles can change. This analysis applies to the article as it stood circa September 2011.</ref>
|claim=
The charter granted the city virtual autonomy, authorized a university, and granted Nauvoo ''[https://newsroom.churchofjesuschrist.org/article/-elder-oaks-joseph-smith-law-address habeas corpus]'' power—which saved Smith's life by allowing him to fend off extradition to Missouri.
|authorsources=<br>
#{{Harvtxt|Quinn|1994|p=110}}.
}}


{{BeginWikipediaTable|link=http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_Smith,_Jr.|section=1838_-_1844:_Nauvoo,_Illinois|article=Joseph Smith, Jr.}}
===== =====
===== =====
||
{{IndexClaimItemShort
While burdened with the temporal business of creating a city, Smith also elaborated on the [[cosmology]] of the new religion. According to Richard Bushman, Smith moved from "a traditional Christian belief in God as pure spirit to a belief in His corporeality."
|title=the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith<ref name="at_the_time">Due to the nature of wikipedia, articles can change. This analysis applies to the article as it stood circa September 2011.</ref>
||
|claim=
*''D&C'', 130: 22; Bushman (2005), 420. According to LDS theologian David Paulsen, this teaching was foreshadowed in the Book of Mormon by the story of the brother of Jared, although even Richard Bushman admits that the "doctrine of a corporeal God was not fully articulated until later." David L. Paulsen, "The Doctrine of Divine Embodiment: Restoration, Judeo-Christian, and Philosophical Perspectives, ''BYU Studies'' 34, no. 4 (1995-96), 19-21.  The earliest unequivocal statement of Joseph Smith was made at the opening of the Nauvoo Lyceum, January 5, 1841: "There is no other God in heaven but that God who has flesh and bone." Kurt Widmer, ''Mormonism and the Nature of God: A Theological Evolution, 1830-1915'' (Jefferson, North Carolina: McFarland, 2000), 122. See also Douglas J. Davies, ''An Introduction to Mormonism'' (Cambridge University Press, 2003), 75-76.
from which he was still a fugitive.
||
|authorsources=<br>
*{{WikipediaCITE}} It is ''Bushman'', not Paulsen, who says that "[t]he concept was foreshadowed in the ''Book of Mormon,'' where the brother of Jared saw first the Lord's finger." (Bushman, p. 420) Bushman then cites Paulsen in an endnote on page 642, noting that "David Paulsen argues that Joseph Smith understood the embodiment of God and Christ by 1830. (Paulsen, "Divine Embodiment," 19-21). Somehow the wiki editor has turned this into having Bushman "admit" that the doctrine of a corporeal God was articulated later. Bushman is not "admitting" this&mdash;he is simply stating it as his view and is noting Paulsen's opposing view in the endnote. This is entirely lost in the wiki article.
#{{Harvtxt|Brodie|1971|p=273}}; {{Harvtxt|Bushman|2005|p=426}}. Prior to the charter, Smith had narrowly avoided two extradition attempts ({{Harvtxt|Brodie|1971|pp=272–73}}; {{Harvtxt|Bushman|2005|pp=425–26}}).
|-
}}
|


===== =====
===== =====
||
{{IndexClaimItemShort
In other words, Smith declared that God had a body of flesh and bone and taught that "the great principle of happiness consists in having a body."
|title=the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith<ref name="at_the_time">Due to the nature of wikipedia, articles can change. This analysis applies to the article as it stood circa September 2011.</ref>
||
|claim=
*Bushman (2005), 421.
The charter also authorized the [[Nauvoo Legion]] an autonomous [[militia]]
||
|authorsources=<br>
*{{WikipediaCorrect}}
#{{Harvtxt|Brodie|1971|p=267}}; {{Harvtxt|Bushman|2005|p=412}}.
|-
}}
|


=====3B=====
===== =====
||
{{IndexClaimItemShort
Instead of affirming that there was an eternal God who had created matter, Smith taught that matter was eternal and that it was God who had developed through time and space. God only assembled the earth from preexisting materials and then had drawn on "a cohort of spirits from the pool of eternal intelligences to place upon it."
|title=the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith<ref name="at_the_time">Due to the nature of wikipedia, articles can change. This analysis applies to the article as it stood circa September 2011.</ref>
||
|claim=
*Bushman (2005), 421. In general see, Kurt Widmer, ''Mormonism and the Nature of God: A Theological Evolution, 1830-1915'' (Jefferson, North Carolina: McFarland, 2000). Widmer notes that Smith's "Doctrine of Eternal Progression" includes four components: that God is an exalted man; that man's spirit is co-equal with God and he can become a god; that there are innumerable gods who are progressing in knowledge; and that there is a "council or plurality" of gods." (119)
with actions limited only by state and federal constitutions.
||
|authorsources=<br>
*The cited source states, "Joseph modified the Creation story until it appeared that God had not created anything ex nihilo. He did not make the earth 'out of Nothing...'" The wiki editor's interpretation that "God only assembled" appears to be an emphasis on the idea that he wishes to promote that Latter-day Saints believe that God is somehow limited..
#{{Harvtxt|Quinn|1995|p=106}}.
*{{Detail|Nature of God/Corporality|Creation/Creatio ex nihilo}}
}}
|-
|


===== =====
===== =====
||
{{IndexClaimItemShort
Another striking doctrine revealed to Smith after 1840 was [[baptism for the dead]], an attempt to join "the generation of humanity from start to finish" by bringing "saving ordinances to the millions who had died without their benefits."
|title=the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith<ref name="at_the_time">Due to the nature of wikipedia, articles can change. This analysis applies to the article as it stood circa September 2011.</ref>
||
|claim=
*Bushman (2005), 422.
"[[Lieutenant General]]" Smith and "[[Major General]]" Bennett became its commanders,
||
|authorsources=<br>
*{{WikipediaCorrect}} The cite should be to page 421 rather than 422. The word "striking" to describe the doctrine was taken from Bushman's prose.
#{{Harvtxt|Brodie|1971|p=271}} (Smith "frequently jested about his outranking every military officer in the United States".); {{Harvtxt|Bushman|2005|p=259}} (noting that Bennett had effective command of the Legion).
*{{Detail|Temples/Baptism for the dead}}
}}
|-
|


===== =====
===== =====
||
{{IndexClaimItemShort
During the same period, Smith published the [[Book of Abraham]], his translation of what later turned out to be an ancient Egyptian [[Book of the Dead]] that he had purchased from a traveling exhibitor in 1835. The Book of Abraham, canonized by the LDS Church after Smith's death, also emphasized the plurality of gods, [[preexistence|pre-mortal existence]], and the concept that the earth had been organized out of preexisting matter.
|title=the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith<ref name="at_the_time">Due to the nature of wikipedia, articles can change. This analysis applies to the article as it stood circa September 2011.</ref>
||
|claim=
*Bushman (2005), 452-58; Brodie, 170-75; Widmer, 90. The Book of Abraham was also used by later Mormons to justify discrimination against those with black skin because they were, like Pharaoh, descendants of Ham.
thereby controlling by far the largest body of armed men in Illinois.
||
|authorsources=<br>
*Bushman notes: "Nothing is said about the process of translation, who did it, or by what means." (Bushman, p. 453)
#{{Harvtxt|Quinn|1995|p=106}} (The Legion had 2,000 troops in 1842, 3,000 by 1844, compared to less than 8,500 soldiers in the entire [[United States Army]].)
*{{Detail|Book of Abraham/Joseph Smith Papyri|Blacks and the priesthood/The "curse of Cain" and "curse of Ham"|l2=The "curse of Cain" and "curse of Ham"}}
}}
|-
|


===== =====
===== =====
||
{{IndexClaimItemShort
These doctrinal expansions culminated in a renewed effort to build another temple. Smith chose a site on a bluff in Nauvoo where he blessed the cornerstones in a public ceremony on April 6, 1841. In Kirtland, Smith had instituted rituals of washing and anointing, but in Nauvoo "the ceremonies were further elaborated to include baptism for the dead, [[endowment (Latter Day Saints)|endowments]], and priesthood marriages."
|title=the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith<ref name="at_the_time">Due to the nature of wikipedia, articles can change. This analysis applies to the article as it stood circa September 2011.</ref>
||
|claim=
*Bushman (2005), 448; Ostlings, 9; Davies, 205. Davies notes that "Baptism for the dead and covenant-endowments for the conquest of death both found their ultimate validation in the power of the priesthood yet these three elements are absent from the Book of Mormon, whose emphasis upon baptism is always a baptism of repentance of the living for themselves." Smith did not live to see the completion or dedication of the temple. The Saints began to receive endowments on December 10, 1845, and the temple dedication was held on April 30, 1845, just before Nauvoo was abandoned.
Smith, who was often a poor judge of character,
||
|authorsources=<br>
*{{WikipediaCorrect}}
#{{Harvtxt|Ostling|Ostling|1999|pp=11–12}}; {{Harvtxt|Bushman|2005|p=410}} (Smith "had trouble distinguishing true friends from self-serving schemers," and incorrectly stated that Bennett was "calculated to be a great blessing to our community.").
*{{Detail|Book of Mormon/Why is baptism for the dead not taught}}
|authorsources=<br>
|-
#
|
}}
*{{Detail_old|Polygamy book/John C. Bennett|l1=John C. Bennett}}
*{{SeeCriticalWork|author=Richard N. Ostling and Joan K. Ostling|work=Mormon America: The Power and the Promise}}


===== =====
===== =====
||
{{IndexClaimItemShort
Smith had "a green thumb for growing ideas from tiny seeds," and "portions of the temple ritual resembled [[Freemasonry|Masonic]] rites that Joseph had observed when a Nauvoo lodge was organized in March 1842 and that he may have heard about from [[Hyrum Smith|Hyrum]], a Mason from New York days."
|title=the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith<ref name="at_the_time">Due to the nature of wikipedia, articles can change. This analysis applies to the article as it stood circa September 2011.</ref>
||
|claim=
*Bushman (2005), 449. Smith was initiated as an [[Freemason#Degrees|Entered Apprentice Mason]] at the Nauvoo lodge on March 15, 1842. The next day, he was raised to the degree of [[Master Mason]]; the usual month-long wait between degrees was waived by the Grand Master of Illinois, [[Abraham Jonas (politician)|Abraham Jonas]].[http://www.masonicinfo.com/mormons.htm Mormons];[http://www.signaturebooks.com/excerpts/anointed2.htm Excerpts - Joseph Smith's Quorum of the Anointed<!-- Bot generated title -->];[http://www.fairlds.org/FAIR_Conferences/2005_Latter-day_Saints_and_Freemasonry.html The Message and the Messenger: Latter-day Saints and Freemasonry<!-- Bot generated title -->];[http://www.ftfacts.com/morm.htm Facing the facts about Mormonism<!-- Bot generated title -->];[http://www.mastermason.com/masonicmoroni/Images1.htm The Masonic Moroni- Images- Page One<!-- Bot generated title -->];[http://www.experiencefestival.com/a/Joseph_Smith_Jr_-_Biography/id/1539122 Joseph Smith Jr.: Encyclopedia II - Joseph Smith Jr. - Biography<!-- Bot generated title -->]. Some commentators have noted similarities between portions of [[Joseph Smith, Jr.#Temples|temple ordinance of the endowment]] and the Royal Arch Degree of [[Freemasonry]]. [[Richard Ostling]] and [[Joan K. Ostling]], ''Mormon America: The Power and the Promise'' (Harper Collins, 1999), 188. "Smith was an active Mason when he introduced the endowment ordinance two years before his death, and many scholars have noted the strong resemblance between the Mormon ordinance and Masonic ritual." [[Richard Ostling]] and [[Joan K. Ostling]], ''Mormon America: The Power and the Promise'' (Harper Collins, 1999), 194-95. "Early Mormons were fairly open in recognizing the connection between the endowment ritual and Masonry. Apostle and First Counselor Heber C. Kimball wrote that Smith believed in the 'similarity of preast Hood in Masonary.'<!--spelling here is in the original. Do not correct the spelling of quotations--> Other early church leaders taught that the Masonic ceremony was a corrupted form of temple rituals that had descended directly from the biblical [[Solomon]] and were restored to their true, pristine form by the inspired Joseph Smith. ... Joseph Smith became a Mason in March 1842, advancing all the way to Master Mason the next day. This was highly unusual since the normal minimum wait between each of the three degrees is thirty days. In the weeks that followed he observed Masonic ritual degree advancements thirteen times before introducing the endowment ceremony on May 4 and 5, 1842. The essentially British version of Masonry as probably practiced in Nauvoo included such elements as ritual anointing of body parts; a ... drama as a metaphor for a spiritual journey; bestowal of a secret name (as a password into eternity); special garments (in Mormonism, sacred undergarments) when stepping through a veil in glorified ascent to a Celestial Lodge; secret handshakes and tokens; promises to fulfill moral obligations; penalty oaths to protect secrecy; progression through three degrees toward perfection; the use of special temple robes and aprons; and the word ''exalted'' to signify becoming kings in connection with the Royal Arch degree. Masons regard the lodge as a temple. All these elements have strong parallels in Smith's endowment ceremony. In addition, Masonic symbols that have been adapted by Mormons on everything from temples to gravestones to logos include: the beehive, the square and compass, two triangles forming a six-pointed star, the all-seeing eye, sun, moon, and stars, and ritualistic hand grips." Steven Naifeh and Gregory White Smith,''The Mormon Murders'', (St Martin's Press, 1988), 78. "But like many Mormon boys with doubts, Mark was already caught up in the intriguing, Masonic-like initiation rites of the Mormon priesthood, the secret passwords, the secret handshakes, the special garments." [[Stanley B. Kimball]],''Heber C. Kimball: Mormon Patriarch and Pioneer'', 85: "Heber thought he saw similarities between Masonic and Mormon ritual." "Heber seems to have felt that both Mormonism and Masonry derived separately from ancient ceremonies connected with Solomon's temple." (See [[Freemasonry and the Latter Day Saint movement]].)
made Bennett [[Assistant President of the Church|Assistant President]] of the church,
||
|authorsources=<br>
*The footnotes in this section suffer from an excessive amount of "bloat." It seems that the wiki editors want to include much of the "Freemasonry and the Latter Day Saint movement" wiki article here as well, just to make sure that you read it. Most of this should simply have been left in the other article.
#{{Harvtxt|Brodie|1971|p=268}}; {{Harvtxt|Quinn|1995|p=1067}}.
*Bushman states, "Joseph often requested revelation about things that caught his attention....He had a green thumb for growing ideas from tiny seeds. Masonic rites seem to have been one more provocation."
|authorsources=<br>
*{{Detail|Temples/Endowment/Freemasonry}}
#
{{EndTable}}
}}
*{{Detail_old|Polygamy book/John C. Bennett|l1=John C. Bennett}}


{{WikipediaUnderRevision}}
===== =====
{{IndexClaimItemShort
|title=the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith<ref name="at_the_time">Due to the nature of wikipedia, articles can change. This analysis applies to the article as it stood circa September 2011.</ref>
|claim=
and Bennett was elected Nauvoo's first mayor.
|authorsources=<br>
#{{Harvtxt|Bushman|2005|p=411}}
|authorsources=<br>
#
}}
*{{Detail_old|Polygamy book/John C. Bennett|l1=John C. Bennett}}


====Plural marriage====
===== =====
=====Revealed to Smith=====
{{IndexClaimItemShort
{{BeginWikipediaTable|link=http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_Smith,_Jr.|section=Revealed_to_Smith|article=Joseph Smith, Jr.}}
|title=the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith<ref name="at_the_time">Due to the nature of wikipedia, articles can change. This analysis applies to the article as it stood circa September 2011.</ref>
=====1C=====
|claim=
||
Though Mormon [[general authority|general authorities]] controlled Nauvoo's civil government, the city promised an unusually liberal guarantee of [[freedom of religion|religious freedom]].
The early years in Nauvoo had been a time of comparative peace and economic prosperity, but by mid-1842, Smith was entangled in the conflicts that ended with his death two years later.
|authorsources=<br>
||
#{{Harvtxt|Quinn|1995|pp=106–08}}.
*Bushman (2005), 436.
}}
||
*{{WikipediaCorrect}} The prose is certainly familiar: "Joseph was entangled in the conflicts that would end in his death two years later." (Bushman, p. 436)
|-
|


=====2C=====
===== =====
||
{{IndexClaimItemShort
A year previous, Missouri courts had once again tried to extradite him on old charges that stemmed from the Mormon War. Although Stephen Douglas, then a member of the Illinois State Supreme Court, declared the writ of extradition void on a technicality, Smith "realized that popular opinion was turning against the Saints after two years of sympathy." Not surprisingly, Smith's praise for the Democrat Douglas first provoked opposition to the Mormons in a Whig newspaper, the ''Warsaw Signal'', whose young editor, Thomas C. Sharp, Joseph then arrogantly and unwisely offended.
|title=the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith<ref name="at_the_time">Due to the nature of wikipedia, articles can change. This analysis applies to the article as it stood circa September 2011.</ref>
||
|claim=
*Bushman (2005), 425-28. Prior to Smith's praise for Douglas, Sharp had been a "neutral observer" of the Nauvoo settlement. Smith had given him a place of honor at the dedication of the temple cornerstone and had invited him to his house for turkey dinner. After Sharp announced that his newspaper would "oppose the concentration of political power in a religious body, or in the hands of a few individuals," Smith canceled his subscription and called the paper "a filthy sheet, that tissue of lies, that sink of iniquity," and signed the letter "Yours, with utter contempt."
The early Nauvoo years were a period of doctrinal innovation. Smith introduced [[baptism for the dead]] in 1840,
||
|authorsources=<br>
#{{Harvtxt|Bushman|2005|p=421}}; {{Harvtxt|Brodie|1971|p=282}}.
|authorsources=<br>
#
}}
*{{WikipediaCorrect}}
*{{WikipediaCorrect}}
|-
|


=====3C=====
||
Although Joseph Smith probably married at least twenty-seven other women,
||
*Bushman, 493;
*Compton, 4-7;
*Remini, 153-54;
*Brodie, "The Plural Wives of Joseph Smith," Appendix C in ''No Man Knows My History'', 2nd ed. (New York: Knopf, 1971), 457-88. *Remini, 153.
*Brodie guessed that there might have been as many as 48 plural wives, but succeeding scholars have considered her numbers exaggerated.
*Remini said that the true number might have been as high as eighty-four, although many of these might have been "simply sacred sealings for eternity." Remini, 153.
*Smith's biography in the ''Encyclopedia of Mormonism'', 3: 1337, says that Smith took at least twenty-eight plural wives.
||
*{{WikipediaCorrect}}
*See: [[Joseph Smith and polygamy]]
|-
|


=====4C=====
===== =====
||
{{IndexClaimItemShort
throughout her life, and even on her deathbed, Emma Smith denied that her husband had ever practiced polygamy.
|title=the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith<ref name="at_the_time">Due to the nature of wikipedia, articles can change. This analysis applies to the article as it stood circa September 2011.</ref>
||
|claim=
*''Church History'', 3: 355-356.
and in 1841, construction began on the [[Nauvoo Temple]] as a place for recovering lost ancient knowledge.
||
|authorsources=<br>
*See: [[Joseph Smith and polygamy/Emma Smith]]
#{{Harvtxt|Bushman|2005|pp=448–49}}.
|-
}}
|
 
 
===== =====
{{IndexClaimItemShort
|title=the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith<ref name="at_the_time">Due to the nature of wikipedia, articles can change. This analysis applies to the article as it stood circa September 2011.</ref>
|claim=
An 1841 revelation promised the restoration of the "[[second anointing|fulness of the priesthood]],"
|authorsources=<br>
#D&C 124:28.
}}


=====5C=====
||
Of all Smith's innovations during the years immediately preceding his death, the one that received the most hostile reception was his institution of plural marriage. In April 1841, Smith secretly wed Louisa Beaman as a plural wife, and during the next two and a half years, he may have married about thirty additional women, ten of them already married to other men.
||
*Bushman (2005), 437;
*Remini, 151;
*Brodie, 335.
*Bushman follows the conservative reckoning of Todd Compton, ''In Sacred Loneliness: The Plural Wives of Joseph Smith'' (Salt Lake City: Signature Books, 1997), excluding one.
||
*See: [[Joseph Smith and polygamy/Polyandry]]
|-
|


=====6C=====
===== =====
||
{{IndexClaimItemShort
About a third of Smith's plural wives were teenagers, including two fourteen-year-old girls.
|title=the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith<ref name="at_the_time">Due to the nature of wikipedia, articles can change. This analysis applies to the article as it stood circa September 2011.</ref>
||
|claim=
*Compton, 11;
and in May 1842, Smith inaugurated a revised [[Endowment (Mormonism)|endowment]] or "first anointing."
*Remini,154;
|authorsources=<br>
*Brodie, 334-43.
#{{Harvtxt|Quinn|1994|p=113}}.
||
}}
*See: [[Joseph Smith and polygamy/Marriages to young women]]
|-
|


=====7C=====
||
Smith was "a charismatic, handsome man," and in Remini's words, he "seemed cheerful and gracious" to all.
||
*Bushman (2005), 439;
*Remini, 144.
|-
|
=====8C=====
||
Because many husbands and fathers knew about these plural marriages, Smith must have convinced them that "they and their families would benefit spiritually from a close tie to the Prophet."
||
*Bushman (2005), 439.
*Smith also told some women that an angel had commanded him to marry them, sometimes coming with "a drawn sword and threatened his life." Brodie, 303.
||
*Bushman states: "In most cases, the husband knew of the plural marriage and approved....The only answer seems to be the explanation Joseph gave when he asked a woman for her consent: they and their families would benefit spiritually from a close tie to the Prophet." (Bushman, p 439)
|-
|


=====9C=====
===== =====
||
{{IndexClaimItemShort
Smith told one prospective wife that submitting to plural marriage would "ensure your eternal salvation & exaltation and that of your father's household"; a father who gave his daughter in plural marriage was assured that the marriage would ensure "honor and immortality and eternal life to all your house both old and young."
|title=the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith<ref name="at_the_time">Due to the nature of wikipedia, articles can change. This analysis applies to the article as it stood circa September 2011.</ref>
||
|claim=
*Whitney, "Autobiography" [2];
The endowment resembled rites of [[freemasonry]] that Smith had observed two months earlier when he had been initiated into the Nauvoo Masonic lodge.
*Revelation, July 27, 1842, Revelations Collections; quoted in Bushman, 439;  
|authorsources=<br>
*Martha Sonntag Bradley and Mary Brown Firmage Woodward, Plurality, Patriarchy, and Priestess: Zina D. H. Young's Nauvoo Marriages," ''Journal of Mormon History'' 20 (1994): 84-118.
#{{Harvtxt|Bushman|2005|pp=449}}; {{Harvtxt|Quinn|1994|pp=114–15}}.
||
|authorsources=<br>
*The wiki article fails to mention that Bushman goes on the say that there is "no certain evidence that Joseph had sexual relations with any of the wives who were married to other men. They married because Joseph's kingdom grew with the size of him family, and those bonded to that family would be exalted with him." The Whitney autobiography is one of Bushman's cited sources.
#
*See: [[Joseph Smith and polygamy/Helen Mar Kimball]]
}}
*See: [[Joseph Smith and polygamy/Zina and Henry Jacobs]]
*{{Detail_old|Temples/Endowment/Freemasonry}}
|-
|


=====10C=====
||
Furthermore, once sealed for eternity by priesthood authority, Smith revealed that such couples would continue to procreate in the next life, becoming, in effect, gods.
||
*Bushman (2005), 439, 444;
*''D&C'' 132: 20: "Then shall they be gods, because they have no end; therefore shall they be from everlasting to everlasting, because they continue; then shall they be above all, because all things are subject unto them. Then shall they be gods, because they have all power, and the angels are subject unto them."
||
*{{WikipediaCorrect}}
|-
|


=====11C=====
===== =====
||
{{IndexClaimItemShort
As Bushman has written, Smith surely "must have realized that plural marriage would inflict terrible damage, that he ran the risk of wrecking his marriage and alienating his followers." And for those in the larger world, plural marriage "would confirm all their worst fears" about Mormonism. "Sexual excess was considered that all too common fruit of pretended revelation."
|title=the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith<ref name="at_the_time">Due to the nature of wikipedia, articles can change. This analysis applies to the article as it stood circa September 2011.</ref>
||
|claim=
*Bushman (2005), 438: "Joseph's enemies would delight in one more evidence of a revelator's antinomian transgressions. He also risked prosecution under Illinois's antibigamy law."
At first the endowment was open only to men, who once initiated became part of the [[Anointed Quorum]]. For women, Smith introduced the [[Relief Society]], a [[service club]] and [[fraternity|sorority]] within which Smith predicted women would receive "the [[keys of the kingdom]]."
||
|authorsources=<br>
*Bushman wrote, "His followers would see the revelation as an unforgivable breach of the moral law and reject it altogether, or, even worse, use it as a license for free love....Sexual excess was considered the all too common fruit of pretended revelation. Joseph's enemies would delight in one more evidence of a revelator's antinomian transgressions." (Bushman, p. 438)
#{{Harvtxt|Quinn|1994|p=634}}.
|-
}}
|
 


=====12C=====
===== =====
||
{{IndexClaimItemShort
Although Emma believed in Joseph's prophetic calling, she was displeased with his multiple marriages, especially since five of the women lived in the Smith household when he married them.
|title=the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith<ref name="at_the_time">Due to the nature of wikipedia, articles can change. This analysis applies to the article as it stood circa September 2011.</ref>
||
|claim=
*Leonard Arrington & Davis Bitton, ''The Mormon Experience'' (University of Illinois, 1979), 223;
Smith also elaborated on his plan for a millennial kingdom, no longer envisioning the building of [[Zion (Latter Day Saints)|Zion]] in Nauvoo.
*Bushman (2005), 491;
|authorsources=<br>
*Remini, 152-53;
#{{Harvtxt|Bushman|2005|p=384}} (Smith viewed Nauvoo as a compromise to his plan to build Zion).
*Brodie, 340-42: "Only Joseph's intimates knew that Emma nagged at him incessantly to be done with plural marriage....There was a hard core of resistance in Emma that Joseph simply could not wear down."
|authorsources=<br>
||
#
}}
*{{WikipediaCorrect}}
*{{WikipediaCorrect}}
|-
|


=====13C=====
||
Emma may have temporarily approved of Joseph's marriage to two sisters, Eliza and Emily Partridge, but even they were an "awkward selection" because Joseph had already married the sisters two months previous, and he had to go through another ceremony for Emma's benefit.
||
*Bushman (2005), 494;
*Brodie, 339;
*Remini, 152-53. The day Joseph married the Partridge sisters, he bought Emma a new carriage.
||
*Actually, the cited source (Bushman) states that Emma ''did'' approve of the marriage, not that she ''may'' have approved. (Bushman, p. 494) Bushman cites Lucy Walker Kimball, Affidavit, Dec. 17, 1902, Affidavits; ''Woman's Exponent'', Jan. 1911, 43; Lucy Walker Kimball, Testimony, 2:461, in U.S. Court of Appeals. (Bushman, p. 654, note 38).
|-
|


=====14C=====
===== =====
||Nevertheless, "from that hour," Emily later wrote, "Emma was our bitter enemy," and they had to leave the household.
{{IndexClaimItemShort
||
|title=the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith<ref name="at_the_time">Due to the nature of wikipedia, articles can change. This analysis applies to the article as it stood circa September 2011.</ref>
*Quoted in Brodie, 339.
|claim=
||
He now viewed Zion as encompassing all of [[North America|North]] and [[South America]],
|authorsources=<br>
#{{Harvtxt|Bushman|2005|p=404}}.
|authorsources=<br>
#
}}
*{{WikipediaCorrect}}
*{{WikipediaCorrect}}
|-
*{{Detail_old|Book of Mormon/Geography/New World/Great Lakes geography/Location of Zion|l1=Location of Zion}}
|


=====15C=====
||
According to Smith's scribe, William Clayton, Joseph's brother Hyrum encouraged him to write down his revelation on plural marriage to present to Emma, and Joseph did so.
||
*Bushman (2005), 495-96.
|-
|


=====16C=====
===== =====
||
{{IndexClaimItemShort
When Hyrum presented Emma with the revelation, she abused him.
|title=the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith<ref name="at_the_time">Due to the nature of wikipedia, articles can change. This analysis applies to the article as it stood circa September 2011.</ref>
||
|claim=
*Bushman (2005), 496;
all Mormon settlements being "[[stake (Latter Day Saints)|stakes]]"
*Newell and Avery, 161. Hyrum said that he came away from Emma having "never received a more severe talking to in his life." Later Joseph supposedly told his brother, "I told you you didn't know Emma as well as I did. ''Historical Record'', 6: 224-26 (1887), quoted in Brodie, 341.
|authorsources=<br>
||
#{{Harvtxt|Bushman|2005|p=384}}.
|authorsources=<br>
#
}}
*{{WikipediaCorrect}}
*{{WikipediaCorrect}}
|-
|


=====17C=====
||
Clayton reported that when Joseph reproved Emma for demanding from one plural wife a watch Joseph had given her, Joseph "had to use harsh measures to put a stop to [Emma's] abuse."
||
*Bushman (2005), 496 quoting Clayton, Journal, August 16, 21, 23, 1843,
||
*{{WikipediaCorrect}}
|-
|


=====18C=====
===== =====
||
{{IndexClaimItemShort
Throughout her life and on her deathbed, Emma Smith frequently denied that her husband had ever taken additional wives.
|title=the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith<ref name="at_the_time">Due to the nature of wikipedia, articles can change. This analysis applies to the article as it stood circa September 2011.</ref>
||
|claim=
*Emma claimed that the very first time she ever became aware of a polygamy revelation being attributed to Joseph by Mormons was when she read about it in Orson Pratt's booklet ''The Seer'' in 1853 (''Saints' Herald'' 65:1044–1045).
of Zion's metaphorical tent.
*Emma campaigned publicly against polygamy and also authorized and was the main signatory of a petition in Summer 1842, with a thousand female signatures, denying that Joseph was connected with polygamy (''Times and Seasons'' 3 [August 1, 1842]: 869).  
|authorsources=<br>
*As president of the Ladies' Relief Society, Emma authorized publishing a certificate in October 1842 denouncing polygamy and denying her husband as its creator or participant (''Times and Seasons'' 3 [October 1, 1842]: 940).  
#The tent–stake metaphor was derived from [[Book of Isaiah|Isaiah]] 54:2.
*In March 1844, Emma said, "we raise our voices and hands against John C. Bennett's 'spiritual wife system', as a scheme of profligates to seduce women; and they that harp upon it, wish to make it popular for the convenience of their own cupidity; wherefore, while the marriage bed, undefiled is honorable, let polygamy, bigamy, fornication, adultery, and prostitution, be frowned out of the hearts of honest men to drop in the gulf of fallen nature". The document ''The Voice of Innocence from Nauvoo''. signed by Emma Smith as President of the Ladies' Relief Society, was published within the article ''Virtue Will Triumph'', Nauvoo Neighbor, March 20, 1844 (''LDS History of the Church'' 6:236, 241) including on her deathbed where she stated "No such thing as polygamy, or spiritual wifery, was taught, publicly or privately, before my husband's death, that I have now, or ever had any knowledge of...He had no other wife but me; nor did he to my knowledge ever have". ''Church History''3: 355-356
|authorsources=<br>
||
#
}}
*{{WikipediaCorrect}}
*{{WikipediaCorrect}}
|-
|


=====19C=====
||
Even when her sons Joseph III and Alexander presented her with specific written questions about polygamy, she continued to deny that their father had been a polygamist.
||
*{{Harv|Van Wagoner|1992|pp=113-115}}
*As Fawn Brodie has written, this denial was "her revenge and solace for all her heartache and humiliation." (Brodie, 399) "This was her slap at all the sly young girls in the Mansion House who had looked first so worshipfully and then so knowingly at Joseph. She had given them the lie. Whatever formal ceremony he might have gone through, Joseph had never acknowledged one of them before the world."
*Newell and Avery wrote of "the paradox of Emma's position", quoting her friend and lawyer Judge George Edmunds who stated "that's just the hell of it! I can't account for it or reconcile her statements." {{Harv|Newell|Avery|1994|p=308}}
||
*{{WikipediaCorrect}}
{{EndTable}}


====Revealed to others====
===== =====
{{BeginWikipediaTable|link=http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_Smith,_Jr.|section=Revealed_to_other|article=Joseph Smith, Jr.}}
{{IndexClaimItemShort
|title=the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith<ref name="at_the_time">Due to the nature of wikipedia, articles can change. This analysis applies to the article as it stood circa September 2011.</ref>
|claim=
Zion also became less a refuge from an impending [[Tribulation]] than a great building project.
|authorsources=<br>
#{{Harvtxt|Bushman|2005|p=415}} (noting that the time when the [[Millennium]] was to occur lengthened to "more than 40 years".)
}}


=====1D=====
||
Although Smith's teachings about plural marriage were expressed in strict confidentiality and only to his leadership, the more men and women who participated, the more likely it became that these secret marriages would be revealed to the Nauvoo community and, of course, to the larger world.
||
*"Rumors of polygamy among the Mormons were not loud, but they were persistent....there was talk of it, talk that increased with the passing years." Brodie, 186. 
*When in 1841, Smith approached Joseph Bates Noble about marrying his wife's sister, Smith asked Bates to "keep quiet": "In revealing this to you I have placed my life in your hands, therefore do not in an evil hour betray me to my enemies." Noble performed the ceremony "in a grove near Main Street with Louisa in man's clothing." Bushman, 438.
||
*{{WikipediaCorrect}}
|-
|


=====2D=====
===== =====
||
{{IndexClaimItemShort
By May 16, 1842, the ''New York Herald'' reported the rumor that "promiscuous intercourse" was being practiced in Nauvoo.
|title=the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith<ref name="at_the_time">Due to the nature of wikipedia, articles can change. This analysis applies to the article as it stood circa September 2011.</ref>
||
|claim=
*Quoted in Brodie, 269.
In the summer of 1842, Smith revealed a plan to establish the [[Millennialism|millennial]] Kingdom of God, which would eventually establish [[theocracy|theocratic]] rule over the whole earth.
||
|authorsources=<br>
*Brodie notes that the ''Herald'' reported the rumor that men and women were "connected in promiscuous intercourse without regard to the holy bonds of matrimony." In other words, the ''Herald'' was speculating that some sort of "free love" was being practiced.
#{{Harvtxt|Quinn|1994|pp=111–12}}.
|-
}}
|


=====3D=====
===== =====
||
{{IndexClaimItemShort
Yet Smith might have been able to talk down these reports along with other salacious gossip had it not been for his erstwhile second-in-command, John Cook Bennett.
|title=the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith<ref name="at_the_time">Due to the nature of wikipedia, articles can change. This analysis applies to the article as it stood circa September 2011.</ref>
||'
|claim=
*Ostlings, 32.
In April 1841, Smith secretly wed [[Louisa Beaman]] as a [[plural marriage|plural wife]], and during the next two and a half years he may have married thirty additional women,
||
|authorsources=<br>
*NOTE: The page number for this citation is incorrect&mdash;it should be page 12.
#{{Harvtxt|Compton|1997|p=11}} (counting at least 33 total wives); {{Harvtxt|Smith|1994|p=14}} (counting 42 wives); {{Harvtxt|Brodie|1971|pp=334–36}} (counting 49 wives); {{Harvtxt|Bushman|2005|pp=437, 644}} (accepting Compton's count, excepting one wife); {{Harvtxt|Quinn|1994|pp=587–88}} (counting 46 wives); {{Harvtxt|Remini|2002|p=153}} (noting that the exact figure is still debated).
|-
}}
|


=====4D=====
===== =====
||
{{IndexClaimItemShort
Smith was not always a good judge of men,
|title=the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith<ref name="at_the_time">Due to the nature of wikipedia, articles can change. This analysis applies to the article as it stood circa September 2011.</ref>
||
|claim=
*Ostlings, 32.
ten of whom were already married to other men,
*Bushman says more discreetly that Smith "had trouble distinguishing true friends from self-serving schemers." Bushman (2005), 410.
|authorsources=<br>
||
#{{Harvtxt|Foster|1981}}; {{Harvtxt|Quinn|1994}}; {{Harvtxt|Compton|1997}}; {{Harvtxt|Bushman|2005|p=437}}; {{Harvtxt|Launius|1988}}; {{Harvtxt|Van Wagoner|1992}}; {{Harvtxt|Newell|Avery|1994}}.
*NOTE: The page number for the Ostling citation is incorrect&mdash;it should be page 12.
|authorsources=<br>
|-
#
|
}}
*{{Detail_old|Joseph Smith/Polygamy|Joseph Smith/Polygamy/Polyandry}}


=====5D=====
===== =====
||
{{IndexClaimItemShort
and Bennett shortly became Smith's nemesis, although Smith had first predicted that Bennett was "calculated to be a great blessing to our community."
|title=the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith<ref name="at_the_time">Due to the nature of wikipedia, articles can change. This analysis applies to the article as it stood circa September 2011.</ref>
||
|claim=
*Bushman, 410.
and about a third of them teenagers, including two fourteen-year-old girls.
||
|authorsources=<br>
*Stating that "Smith had first predicted" that Bennett would be a benefit to the community makes it sound like some sort of prophecy. It wasn't. According to Bushman, Joseph was commenting on Bennett's qualifications, and saw Bennett as "'a man of enterprize, extensive acquirements, and of independent mind,' who was 'calculated to be a great blessing to our community." (Bushman, p. 410; 640 note 30, citing ''Weekly North American'', Mar. 21, 1840; First Presidency to the Saints Scattered Abroad, Jan. 15, 1841, in ''Times and Seasons'', Jan. 15, 1841, 275.)
#{{Harvtxt|Compton|1997|p=11}}; {{Harvtxt|Remini|2002|p=154}}; {{Harvtxt|Brodie|1971|pp=334–43}}.
|-
|authorsources=<br>
|
#
}}
*{{Detail_old|Polygamy book/Age of wives|Joseph Smith/Polygamy/Marriages to young women|l1=Age of Wives}}


=====6D=====
===== =====
||
{{IndexClaimItemShort
After deserting a wife and three children and arriving in Nauvoo in 1841, Bennett had been baptized into the new religion.
|title=the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith<ref name="at_the_time">Due to the nature of wikipedia, articles can change. This analysis applies to the article as it stood circa September 2011.</ref>
||
|claim=
*Ostlings, 12.
Meanwhile he publicly and repeatedly denied that he advocated polygamy.
||
|authorsources=<br>
*See: [[Polygamy book/John C. Bennett|John C. Bennett]]
#{{Harvtxt|Bushman|2005|p=491}}.
|-
}}
|


=====7D=====
===== =====
||
{{IndexClaimItemShort
Emma never trusted him, but Joseph welcomed his assistance in acquiring the Nauvoo city charter. Soon Bennett became the first mayor of Nauvoo, “assistant president,” and Major General of the Nauvoo Legion.
|title=the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith<ref name="at_the_time">Due to the nature of wikipedia, articles can change. This analysis applies to the article as it stood circa September 2011.</ref>
||
|claim=
*Ostlings, 12;
Smith told at least some of his potential wives that marriage to him would ensure their spiritual [[exaltation (Mormonism)|exaltation]].
*Bushman, 459.
|authorsources=<br>
||
#{{Harvtxt|Bushman|2005|p=439}}; {{Harvtxt|Hill|1977|p=355}}.
*See: [[Polygamy book/John C. Bennett|John C. Bennett]]
|authorsources=<br>
|-
#
|
}}
*It should be noted that Bushman goes on the say that there is "no certain evidence that Joseph had sexual relations with any of the wives who were married to other men. They married because Joseph's kingdom grew with the size of him family, and those bonded to that family would be exalted with him." The Whitney autobiography is one of Bushman's cited sources.
*{{Detail_old|Joseph Smith/Polygamy/Helen Mar Kimball|Joseph Smith/Polygamy/Zina and Henry Jacobs}}


=====8D=====
===== =====
||
{{IndexClaimItemShort
The latter Bennett threatened to use in challenging Missouri for restitution of the Saints’ lost property, suggesting to skittish gentiles that Mormons intended to use force of arms to accomplish their objectives.
|title=the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith<ref name="at_the_time">Due to the nature of wikipedia, articles can change. This analysis applies to the article as it stood circa September 2011.</ref>
||
|claim=
*Brodie, 273.
Although Smith's first wife Emma knew of some of these marriages, she almost certainly did not know the extent of her husband's polygamous activities.
*Bennett wrote that the “blood of murdered Mormons cries aloud for help…and I swear by the Lord God of Israel, that the sword shall not depart from my thigh, nor the buckler from my arm, until the trust is consummated, and the hydra-headed fiery dragon slain.” Times and Seasons, 3 (March 15, 1842), 724.
|authorsources=<br>
||
#{{Harvtxt|Bushman|2005|p=439}}.
|authorsources=<br>
#
}}
*{{WikipediaCorrect}}
*{{WikipediaCorrect}}
|-
*Bushman cites Lucy Walker Kimball, Affidavit, Dec. 17, 1902, Affidavits; ''Woman's Exponent'', Jan. 1911, 43; Lucy Walker Kimball, Testimony, 2:461, in U.S. Court of Appeals. (Bushman, p. 654, note 38).
|


=====9D=====
===== =====
||
{{IndexClaimItemShort
Unfortunately for Smith, Bennett also had an eye for women and made use of Smith’s new revelation to seduce the unwary, telling them that illicit sex was acceptable among the Saints so long as it was kept secret.
|title=the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith<ref name="at_the_time">Due to the nature of wikipedia, articles can change. This analysis applies to the article as it stood circa September 2011.</ref>
||
|claim=
*Bushman, 460.
Smith kept the doctrine of plural marriage secret except for potential wives and a few of his closest male associates,
||
|authorsources=<br>
*Bushman says nothing about Joseph's "new revelation." Otherwise, the citation is correct.
#{{Harvtxt|Bushman|2005|p=438}} (Smith approached Joseph Bates Noble about marrying his wife's sister, Smith asked Bates to "keep quiet": "In revealing this to you I have placed my life in your hands, therefore do not in an evil hour betray me to my enemies." Noble performed the ceremony "in a grove near Main Street with Louisa in man's clothing.")
|-
}}
|


=====10D=====
===== =====
||
{{IndexClaimItemShort
And Bennett ignored even perfunctory wedding ceremonies.
|title=the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith<ref name="at_the_time">Due to the nature of wikipedia, articles can change. This analysis applies to the article as it stood circa September 2011.</ref>
||
|claim=
*Brodie, 310;  
including Bennett. Smith's plural relationships were preceded by a "priesthood marriage," which Smith believed legitimized the relationships and made them non-adulterous. Bennett, on the other hand, ignored even perfunctory ceremonies.
*Bushman, 460. Bennett, a minimally trained doctor, also promised abortions to those who became pregnant.
|authorsources=<br>
||
#{{Harvtxt|Brodie|1971|pp=311–12}}; {{Harvtxt|Bushman|2005|p=460}} (Bennett told women he was seducing that illicit sex was acceptable among the Saints so long as it was kept secret). Bennett, a minimally trained doctor, also promised abortions to any who might became pregnant.
*{{WikipediaCITE}}The statement about Bennett promising abortions comes from Brodie rather than Bushman, and the page number for the Brodie citation is incorrect.
|authorsources=<br>
#
}}
*The statement about Bennett promising abortions comes from Brodie rather than Bushman.
*Brodie, 311-312: "Bennett had seduced innumerable women in Joseph's name quite without benefit of ceremony. Even worse, he had promised abortion to those who became pregnant. Zeruiah N. Goddard, repeating the gossip of Sarah Pratt, reported that 'Dr. Bennett told her he could cause abortion with perfect safety to the mother at any stage of preganancy, and that he had frequently destroyed and removed infants before their time to prevent exposure of the parties and that he had instruments for that purpose.'" Brodie cites the testimony of Hyrum Smith, ''Wasp'' extra, July 27, 1842, republished in ''History of the Church'', Vol. V, pp. 71-2; and the statement of Zeruiah N. Goddard, ''Affidavits and Certificates Disproving the Statements and Affidavits Contained in John C. Bennett's Letters (Nauvoo, August 31, 1842); Wyl, ''Mormon Portraits'', p. 61.
*Brodie, 311-312: "Bennett had seduced innumerable women in Joseph's name quite without benefit of ceremony. Even worse, he had promised abortion to those who became pregnant. Zeruiah N. Goddard, repeating the gossip of Sarah Pratt, reported that 'Dr. Bennett told her he could cause abortion with perfect safety to the mother at any stage of preganancy, and that he had frequently destroyed and removed infants before their time to prevent exposure of the parties and that he had instruments for that purpose.'" Brodie cites the testimony of Hyrum Smith, ''Wasp'' extra, July 27, 1842, republished in ''History of the Church'', Vol. V, pp. 71-2; and the statement of Zeruiah N. Goddard, ''Affidavits and Certificates Disproving the Statements and Affidavits Contained in John C. Bennett's Letters (Nauvoo, August 31, 1842); Wyl, ''Mormon Portraits'', p. 61.
|-
*{{SeeCriticalWork|author=Fawn Brodie|work=No Man Knows My History: The Life of Joseph Smith}}
|
}}
 
===== =====
{{IndexClaimItemShort
|title=the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith<ref name="at_the_time">Due to the nature of wikipedia, articles can change. This analysis applies to the article as it stood circa September 2011.</ref>
|claim=
When embarrassing rumors of "spiritual wifery" got abroad, Smith forced Bennett's resignation as Nauvoo mayor. In retaliation, Bennett wrote "lurid exposés of life in Nauvoo."
|authorsources=<br>
#{{Harvtxt|Ostling|Ostling|1999|p=12}}; {{Harvtxt|Bushman|2005|pp=461–62}}; {{Harvtxt|Brodie|1971|p=314}}.
}}
 
===== =====
{{IndexClaimItemShort
|title=the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith<ref name="at_the_time">Due to the nature of wikipedia, articles can change. This analysis applies to the article as it stood circa September 2011.</ref>
|claim=
By mid-1842, popular opinion had turned against the Saints.
|authorsources=<br>
#{{Harvtxt|Bushman|2005|p=436}}.
}}
 
===== =====
{{IndexClaimItemShort
|title=the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith<ref name="at_the_time">Due to the nature of wikipedia, articles can change. This analysis applies to the article as it stood circa September 2011.</ref>
|claim=
[[Thomas C. Sharp]], editor of the ''[[Warsaw Signal]]'' became a sharp critic after Smith attacked the paper.
|authorsources=<br>
#{{Harvtxt|Bushman|2005|pp=427–28}}.
|authorsources=<br>
#
}}
*Indeed, Sharp became a "sharp" critic after Joseph sent a hotly worded letter terminating his subscription to the paper.
 
===== =====
{{IndexClaimItemShort
|title=the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith<ref name="at_the_time">Due to the nature of wikipedia, articles can change. This analysis applies to the article as it stood circa September 2011.</ref>
|claim=
When [[Lilburn Boggs]], the [[Governor of Missouri]], was shot by an unknown assailant on May 6, 1842, many suspected Smith's involvement
|authorsources=<br>
#{{Harvtxt|Bushman|2005|p=468}}. Boggs survived the attack.
}}
 
===== =====
{{IndexClaimItemShort
|title=the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith<ref name="at_the_time">Due to the nature of wikipedia, articles can change. This analysis applies to the article as it stood circa September 2011.</ref>
|claim=
because of rumors that Smith had predicted his assassination.
|authorsources=<br>
#{{Harvtxt|Brodie|1971|p=323}} (noting rumors that Smith had predicted in 1840 that Boggs would meet a violent death within a year, and that Smith offered a $500 reward for his death); {{Harvtxt|Quinn|1994|p=113}} (noting that Smith held Boggs responsible for the [[Haun's Mill massacre]]).
}}
 
===== =====
{{IndexClaimItemShort
|title=the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith<ref name="at_the_time">Due to the nature of wikipedia, articles can change. This analysis applies to the article as it stood circa September 2011.</ref>
|claim=
Evidence suggests that the shooter was [[Porter Rockwell]], a former [[Danites|Danite]] and one of Smith's bodyguards.
|authorsources=<br>
#{{Harvtxt|Quinn|1994|p=113}}; {{Harvtxt|Bushman|2005|p=468}} (stating the evidence was circumstantial).
|authorsources=<br>
#
}}
*{{WikipediaNPOV}}A subsequent sentence notes that "Rockwell was tried and acquitted," yet the Wikipedia article states that "[e]vidence suggests that the shooter was Porter Rockwell." Therefore, although Rockwell was acquitted at the time, the Wikipedia article condemns him for the crime.
 
===== =====
{{IndexClaimItemShort
|title=the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith<ref name="at_the_time">Due to the nature of wikipedia, articles can change. This analysis applies to the article as it stood circa September 2011.</ref>
|claim=
Smith went into hiding, but he ultimately avoided extradition to Missouri because any involvement in the crime would have occurred in Illinois.
|authorsources=<br>
#{{Harvtxt|Bushman|2005|pp=468–75}}.
}}
 
===== =====
{{IndexClaimItemShort
|title=the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith<ref name="at_the_time">Due to the nature of wikipedia, articles can change. This analysis applies to the article as it stood circa September 2011.</ref>
|claim=
Rockwell was tried and acquitted.
|authorsources=<br>
#{{Harvtxt|Bushman|2005|p=468}}. Rockwell later acquired "a reputation as a gunslinging lawman in Utah."
}}
 
===== =====
{{IndexClaimItemShort
|title=the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith<ref name="at_the_time">Due to the nature of wikipedia, articles can change. This analysis applies to the article as it stood circa September 2011.</ref>
|claim=
In June 1843, [[Governor of Illinois|Illinois Governor]] [[Thomas Ford (politician)|Thomas Ford]] issued an extradition writ against Smith, but Smith countered with a Nauvoo writ of [[habeas corpus]].
|authorsources=<br>
#{{Harvtxt|Bushman|2005|pp=504–08}}.
}}
 
===== =====
{{IndexClaimItemShort
|title=the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith<ref name="at_the_time">Due to the nature of wikipedia, articles can change. This analysis applies to the article as it stood circa September 2011.</ref>
|claim=
Ford later wrote that this incident caused a majority of Illinois residents to favor expelling Mormons from Illinois.
|authorsources=<br>
#{{Harvtxt|Bushman|2005|p=508}}.
}}
 
===== =====
{{IndexClaimItemShort
|title=the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith<ref name="at_the_time">Due to the nature of wikipedia, articles can change. This analysis applies to the article as it stood circa September 2011.</ref>
|claim=
In 1843, Emma reluctantly allowed Smith to marry four women who had been living in the Smith household—two of whom Smith had already married without her knowledge.
|authorsources=<br>
#{{Harvtxt|Brodie|1971|p=339}}; {{Harvtxt|Bushman|2005|p=494}}; {{Harvtxt|Remini|2002|pp=152–53}}.
}}
 
===== =====
{{IndexClaimItemShort
|title=the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith<ref name="at_the_time">Due to the nature of wikipedia, articles can change. This analysis applies to the article as it stood circa September 2011.</ref>
|claim=
Emma also participated with Smith in the first "[[sealing (Latter Day Saints)|sealing]]" ceremony, intended to bind their marriage for eternity.
|authorsources=<br>
#{{Harvtxt|Quinn|1994|p=638}} (first Mormon sealing); {{Harvtxt|Bushman|2005|p=494}}.
}}
 
===== =====
{{IndexClaimItemShort
|title=the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith<ref name="at_the_time">Due to the nature of wikipedia, articles can change. This analysis applies to the article as it stood circa September 2011.</ref>
|claim=
However, Emma soon regretted her decision to accept plural marriage and forced the other wives from the household,
|authorsources=<br>
#{{Harvtxt|Brodie|1971|p=339}}.
}}
 
===== =====
{{IndexClaimItemShort
|title=the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith<ref name="at_the_time">Due to the nature of wikipedia, articles can change. This analysis applies to the article as it stood circa September 2011.</ref>
|claim=
nagging Smith to abandon the practice.
|authorsources=<br>
#{{Harvtxt|Brodie|1971|p=340}}.
}}
 
===== =====
{{IndexClaimItemShort
|title=the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith<ref name="at_the_time">Due to the nature of wikipedia, articles can change. This analysis applies to the article as it stood circa September 2011.</ref>
|claim=
Smith dictated a revelation pressuring Emma to accept,
|authorsources=<br>
#{{Harvtxt|Hill|1989|p=119}} ("By assuring Emma that her salvation would be virtually certain and all but the unpardonable sin would be merely visited 'with judgment in the flesh,' Smith placed enormous pressure on his reluctant wife to accept plural marriage."; {{Harvtxt|Bushman|2005|pp=495–96}}; {{Harvtxt|Brodie|1971|pp=340–341}} (revelation indicated Emma would be "destroyed" if she refused polygamy); {{Harvtxt|Roberts|1909|pp=505–06}} ("A commandment I give unto mine handmaid, Emma Smith,...[that she] receive all those [wives] that have been given unto my servant Joseph.... But if [Emma] will not abide this commandment she shall be destroyed, saith the Lord; for I am the Lord thy God, and will destroy her if she abide not in my law.")
|authorsources=<br>
#
}}
*Bushman wrote, "His followers would see the revelation as an unforgivable breach of the moral law and reject it altogether, or, even worse, use it as a license for free love....Sexual excess was considered the all too common fruit of pretended revelation. Joseph's enemies would delight in one more evidence of a revelator's antinomian transgressions." (Bushman, p. 438)
 
===== =====
{{IndexClaimItemShort
|title=the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith<ref name="at_the_time">Due to the nature of wikipedia, articles can change. This analysis applies to the article as it stood circa September 2011.</ref>
|claim=
but the revelation only made her furious.
|authorsources=<br>
#{{Harvtxt|Bushman|2005|p=496}} (Emma abused [[Hyrum Smith]] when Joseph sent him to Emma with the revelation); {{Harvtxt|Hill|1989|p=119}} (noting that according to William Clayton, Emma "did not believe a word of [the revelation] and appeared very rebellious.").
}}
 
===== =====
{{IndexClaimItemShort
|title=the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith<ref name="at_the_time">Due to the nature of wikipedia, articles can change. This analysis applies to the article as it stood circa September 2011.</ref>
|claim=
Nevertheless, in the fall of 1843, after Smith allowed women to be initiated into the [[Anointed Quorum]],
|authorsources=<br>
#{{Harvtxt|Quinn|1994|p=36}} (arguing that Smith extended the [[Priesthood (Latter Day Saints)|priesthood]] to women through the [[Endowment (Mormonism)|Endowment]], rather than through ordination).
}}
 
===== =====
{{IndexClaimItemShort
|title=the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith<ref name="at_the_time">Due to the nature of wikipedia, articles can change. This analysis applies to the article as it stood circa September 2011.</ref>
|claim=
Emma participated with Smith in the first [[second anointing]].
|authorsources=<br>
#{{Harvtxt|Quinn|1994|p=640}}.
}}
 
===== =====
{{IndexClaimItemShort
|title=the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith<ref name="at_the_time">Due to the nature of wikipedia, articles can change. This analysis applies to the article as it stood circa September 2011.</ref>
|claim=
According to Smith, this ritual was the prophesied "fulness of the priesthood"{{sic}} in which participants were ordained "kings and priests of the Most High God" and thus fulfilled what Smith called "[a] perfect law of Theocracy."
|authorsources=<br>
#{{Harvtxt|Quinn|1994|p=115}}.
}}
 
 
===== =====
{{IndexClaimItemShort
|title=the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith<ref name="at_the_time">Due to the nature of wikipedia, articles can change. This analysis applies to the article as it stood circa September 2011.</ref>
|claim=
The [[Anointed Quorum]] became Smith's advisory body for political matters.
|authorsources=<br>
#{{Harvtxt|Quinn|1994|pp=115–18}}.
}}
 
 
===== =====
{{IndexClaimItemShort
|title=the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith<ref name="at_the_time">Due to the nature of wikipedia, articles can change. This analysis applies to the article as it stood circa September 2011.</ref>
|claim=
In December 1843, under the authority of the Anointed Quorum,
|authorsources=<br>
#{{Harvtxt|Quinn|1994|pp=115–16}} ("Such decisions were made by the formality of 'a vote' after the '[[Prayer circle|true order of prayer]]' and the announcement of God's revelation on the subject.").
}}
 
 
===== =====
{{IndexClaimItemShort
|title=the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith<ref name="at_the_time">Due to the nature of wikipedia, articles can change. This analysis applies to the article as it stood circa September 2011.</ref>
|claim=
Smith petitioned Congress to make Nauvoo an independent territory with the right to call out federal troops in its defense.
|authorsources=<br>
#{{Harvtxt|Bushman|2005|p=511}}; {{Harvtxt|Brodie|1971|p=356}}; {{Harvtxt|Quinn|1994|pp=115–116}} (noting that the Anointed Quorum also authorized "a proclamation to the kings of the earth," but Smith never sent it). Smith also threatened Congress.  The ''[[Millennial Star]]'' later quoted Smith as having said that "if Congress will not hear our petition and grant us protection, they shall be broken up as a government and God shall damn them, and there shall be nothing left of them—not even a grease spot." Quoted in Brodie, 356.
}}
 
 
===== =====
{{IndexClaimItemShort
|title=the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith<ref name="at_the_time">Due to the nature of wikipedia, articles can change. This analysis applies to the article as it stood circa September 2011.</ref>
|claim=
Smith then wrote the leading presidential candidates and asked them what they would do to protect the Mormons. After receiving noncommittal or negative responses, Smith announced his own [[Third party (United States)|third-party]] candidacy for [[President of the United States]], suspending regular [[proselytizing]]
|authorsources=<br>
#{{Harvtxt|Quinn|1994|p=119}}
}}
 
 
===== =====
{{IndexClaimItemShort
|title=the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith<ref name="at_the_time">Due to the nature of wikipedia, articles can change. This analysis applies to the article as it stood circa September 2011.</ref>
|claim=
and sending out the [[Quorum of the Twelve]] and hundreds of other political missionaries.
|authorsources=<br>
#{{Harvtxt|Quinn|1994|pp=118–19}} (the [[Anointed Quorum]] chose [[Sidney Rigdon]] as Smith's [[Vice President of the United States|running mate]]);{{Harvtxt|Bushman|2005|pp=514–15}}; {{Harvtxt|Brodie|1971|pp=362–64}}.
}}


=====11D=====
||
Smith was incensed at Bennett’s activities and forced Bennett’s resignation as Nauvoo mayor.  In retaliation, Bennett remained in the area and wrote “lurid exposés of life in Nauvoo” that were first published in various newspapers and, later that year, compiled into a book.
||
*Ostlings, 12;
*Bushman, 461-62;
*Brodie, 314.
||
*{{WikipediaCorrect}}
|-
|


=====12D=====
===== =====
||
{{IndexClaimItemShort
Even contemporaries could hardly escape the conclusion that Bennett was, as Fawn Brodie has called him, “a base and ignoble opportunist.” But the Ostlings note that “there was just enough of a kernel of truth to arouse internal suspicion and whip up anti-Mormon sentiment elsewhere.”
|title=the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith<ref name="at_the_time">Due to the nature of wikipedia, articles can change. This analysis applies to the article as it stood circa September 2011.</ref>
||
|claim=
*Ostlings, 13.
In March 1844, following a dispute with a federal [[bureaucracy|bureaucrat]],
||
|authorsources=<br>
*{{WikipediaCorrect}}
#{{Harvtxt|Quinn|1994|p=121}} (The day before the Council was organized, word reached Smith that a U.S. Indian agent was interfering with acquisition of lumber needed for the [[Nauvoo Temple]]).
|-
}}
|


=====13D=====
||
Non-Mormons looked with increasing uneasiness not only at reports of Mormon “free wifery” but at the comparative success of Nauvoo, the competent drilling of the Nauvoo Legion, and the growing political clout of the Saints.
||
*Ostlings, p. 13
||
*{{WikipediaCorrect}}
|-
|


=====14D=====
===== =====
||
{{IndexClaimItemShort
Furthermore, on May 6, 1842, an unknown assailant shot former governor of Missouri Lilburn Boggs three times in the head.
|title=the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith<ref name="at_the_time">Due to the nature of wikipedia, articles can change. This analysis applies to the article as it stood circa September 2011.</ref>
||
|claim=
*Bushman, 468.
Smith organized the secret [[Council of Fifty]]
||
|authorsources=<br>
*{{WikipediaCITE}} The cited source states that Boggs "received a damaging but not fatal blast of buckshot to his head from a shot through the window." It does not say that he was shot "three times in the head."
#{{Harvtxt|Quinn|1994|pp=120–22}} (noting that the Council was authorized by a revelation, and members committed to keep what Smith said during the organizational meeting secret); {{Harvtxt|Bushman|2005|p=519}}.
*Sally Dention in her book [[American Massacre|''American Massacre'']] ''does'' claim that "[i]n early May, while reading by candlelight in his Missouri home, Boggs was shot three times in the head by an unknown sniper." (Denton, p. 24) Denton may be citing William Wise, ''Massacre at Mountain Meadows'' p. 57-58. Brodie makes no mention of how many times Boggs was shot. 
}}
|-
*{{SeeCriticalWork|author=D. Michael Quinn|work=The Mormon Hierarchy: Origins of Power}}
|
{{:Question: What was the Council of Fifty?}}
{{:Question: Was Joseph Smith anointed to be "King over the earth" by the Council of Fifty?}}


=====15D=====
===== =====
||
{{IndexClaimItemShort
Bennett named a rough Mormon loyalist, Porter Rockwell, as the gunman.  Mormons assumed Boggs would die and considered his assassination a fulfillment of prophecy. The ''Nauvoo Wasp'' indiscreetly gloated that the person who “did the noble deed remains to be found out."
|title=the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith<ref name="at_the_time">Due to the nature of wikipedia, articles can change. This analysis applies to the article as it stood circa September 2011.</ref>
||
|claim=
*Bushman, 468;
with authority to decide which national or state laws Mormons should obey.
*Brodie, 323;
|authorsources=<br>
*Nauvoo Wasp, May 28, 1842.
#{{Harvtxt|Quinn|1994|p=121}}.
||
|authorsources=<br>
*Brodie, 323: "When...word came to Nauvoo that Boggs had been shot by an unknown assailant, 'it went through the city as if a great prophecy had been fulfilled,'" citing a letter from Governor Carlin to Joseph Smith, June 30, 1842, ''History of the Church'', vol. V, p. 50.
#
|-
}}
|
*{{SeeCriticalWork|author=D. Michael Quinn|work=The Mormon Hierarchy: Origins of Power}}


=====16D=====
||
Boggs refused to die, however, and when he recovered, he pressed Illinois governor Thomas Carlin to extradite Smith to Missouri.  Smith once again went into hiding for some months until the U. S. Circuit Court in Springfield finally ruled that the extradition order was unconstitutional.
||
*Bushman, 468-75.  The court’s reasoning was that if Smith had committed a crime, it had been committed in Illinois not Missouri.
||
*{{WikipediaCITE}} There is no indication in the cited source (Bushman) that Boggs' life was seriously threatened. Bushman did not say that Boggs "refused to die"&mdash;this is creative license taken by the wiki editor.
{{EndTable}}


====Political commitments====
===== =====
{{BeginWikipediaTable|link=http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_Smith,_Jr.|section=Political_commitments|article=Joseph Smith, Jr.}}
{{IndexClaimItemShort
=====1E=====
|title=the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith<ref name="at_the_time">Due to the nature of wikipedia, articles can change. This analysis applies to the article as it stood circa September 2011.</ref>
||
|claim=
Nevertheless, Smith realized his current position was tenuous. Many citizens of Illinois were now determined to drive the Mormons out of the state.
The Council was also to select a site for a large Mormon settlement in [[Texas]], [[California]], or [[Oregon]],
||
|authorsources=<br>
*Bushman, 508.
#{{Harvtxt|Bushman|2005|p=517}}.
||
}}
*{{WikipediaCorrect}}
|-
|


=====2E=====
===== =====
||
{{IndexClaimItemShort
In December 1843, Smith petitioned Congress for the right to make Nauvoo an independent federal territory with the right to call out federal troops in its defense.
|title=the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith<ref name="at_the_time">Due to the nature of wikipedia, articles can change. This analysis applies to the article as it stood circa September 2011.</ref>
||
|claim=
*Bushman, 511;
where Mormons could live under theocratic law beyond other governmental control.
*Brodie, 356.
|authorsources=<br>
*Smith also threatened Congress.  The ''Millennial Star'' later quoted Smith as having said, "if Congress will not hear our petition and grant us protection, they shall be broken up as a government and God shall damn them, and there shall be nothing left of them—not even a grease spot." Quoted in Brodie, 356.
#{{Harvtxt|Bushman|2005|p=517}}.
||
}}
*{{WikipediaCorrect}}
|-
|
=====3E=====
||
Then, probably unwisely, Smith also decided to desert both Whigs and Democrats, and announce his own candidacy for President of the United States, sending out the apostles to advertise his campaign.
||
*Bushman, 514-15;
*Brodie, 362-64.
*Smith chose Sidney Rigdon as his running mate.
||
*{{WikipediaCorrect}}
|-
|
=====4E=====
||
Meanwhile, he made plans to scout possible sites for a large Mormon settlement in Oregon or California.
||
*Bushman, 519.
||
*{{WikipediaCorrect}}
|-
|
=====5E=====
||
In March 1844, Smith organized a secret Council of Fifty, a policy-making body based on what Smith called "Theodemocracy"
||
*Smith told a St. Louis reporter, "I go emphatically, virtuously, and humanely for a Theodemocracy, where God and the people hold the power to conduct the affairs of men in righteousness. And where liberty, free trade, and sailor's right [sic], and the protection of life and property shall be maintained inviolate, for the benefit of ALL." (Quoted in Bushman, 522.)
*Nevertheless, as Bushman admits, to critics, "Joseph's plan for the Kingdom of God looked like a program for Mormon dominance."
*The Council of Fifty (which originally had fifty-three members) included only three non-Mormons, two of whom were known counterfeiters. (Ostlings, 13).
||
*{{WikipediaSecondaryFact}} The wiki author has altered the meaning of a cited tertiary source (Ostlings, 13). The Ostlings state: "The Council originally had fifty-three members, including three non-Mormons, two of who ''apparently'' were known counterfeiters." {{ea}} The wiki editor has removed "apparently" in order to state as fact "two of whom were known counterfeiters."
*The Ostlings cite the following sources for their information:
**Robert Bruce Flanders, ''Nauvoo: Kingdom on the Mississippi'', pp. 292-294.
**{{CriticalWork:Quinn:Mormon Hierarchy|pages=127-128, 643}}
|-
|


=====6E=====
===== =====
||
{{IndexClaimItemShort
and which was in effect a shadow government.
|title=the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith<ref name="at_the_time">Due to the nature of wikipedia, articles can change. This analysis applies to the article as it stood circa September 2011.</ref>
||
|claim=
*Bushman, 511;  
In effect, the Council was a shadow world government,
*Ostlings, 13;  
|authorsources=<br>
*Remini, 166;
#{{Harvtxt|Bushman|2005|p=521}} (noting that in April, Smith prophesied "the entire overthrow of this nation in a few years," at which time his Kingdom of God would be prepared to take power); {{Harvtxt|Ostling|Ostling|1999|p=13}} (As if they had just organized an independent state, Smith and the Council sent ambassadors to England, France, Russia, and the [[Republic of Texas]]); {{Harvtxt|Remini|2002|p=166}}.
*Robert Bruce Flanders, ''Nauvoo: Kingdom on the Mississippi'' (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1965), 292-94.
|authorsources=<br>
||
#
*The Ostlings cite Flanders. Flanders is the author that calls the Council a "shadow government."
}}
|-
*The Ostlings cite Robert Bruce Flanders, ''Nauvoo: Kingdom on the Mississippi'' (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1965), 292-94). Flanders is the author that calls the Council a "shadow government."
|
*{{SeeCriticalWork|author=Richard N. Ostling and Joan K. Ostling|work=Mormon America: The Power and the Promise}}


=====7E=====
===== =====
||
{{IndexClaimItemShort
One of the Council's first acts was to ordain Smith as King of the Kingdom of God. And, as if they had just organized an independent state, Smith and the Council sent ambassadors to England, France, Russia, and the Republic of Texas.
|title=the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith<ref name="at_the_time">Due to the nature of wikipedia, articles can change. This analysis applies to the article as it stood circa September 2011.</ref>
||
|claim=
*Ostlings, 13.
a first step toward creating a global "[[theodemocracy]]".
||
|authorsources=<br>
#{{Harvtxt|Bushman|2005|pp=521–22}} (noting use of the term ''theodemocracy''); {{Harvtxt|Ostling|Ostling|1999|pp=13, 15}} The council included only three non-Mormons, two of whom were apparently counterfeiters.
|authorsources=<br>
#
}}
*The Ostlings cite the following sources for their information:
*The Ostlings cite the following sources for their information:
**Robert Bruce Flanders, ''Nauvoo: Kingdom on the Mississippi'', pp. 292-294.
**Robert Bruce Flanders, ''Nauvoo: Kingdom on the Mississippi'', pp. 292-294.
**{{CriticalWork:Quinn:Mormon Hierarchy|pages=127-128, 643}}
**{{CriticalWork:Quinn:Mormon Hierarchy|pages=127-128, 643}}
|-
*{{SeeCriticalWork|author=Richard N. Ostling and Joan K. Ostling|work=Mormon America: The Power and the Promise}}
|
*{{SeeCriticalWork|author=D. Michael Quinn|work=The Mormon Hierarchy: Origins of Power}}


=====8E=====
===== =====
||
{{IndexClaimItemShort
In April, Smith predicted "the entire overthrow of this nation in a few years."
|title=the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith<ref name="at_the_time">Due to the nature of wikipedia, articles can change. This analysis applies to the article as it stood circa September 2011.</ref>
||
|claim=
*Quoted in Bushman, 521.
One of the Council's first acts was to elect Smith as "prophet, priest and king" of the millennial monarchy.
||
|authorsources=<br>
*According to the cited source, Joseph "prophecied the entire overthrow of this nation in a few years." Bushman is citing D. Michael Quinn, "Council of Fifty," 163; Ehat, "Kingdom of God," 257, 265-66; George Miller to Dear Brother, June 27, 1855, in Miller, "De Tal Palo Tal Astilla," 131.
#"In an act shocking to democratic sensibilities, at the Council of Fifty meeting of April 11, 1844, 'Prest J[oseph] was voted our P[rophet] p[riest] and K[ing]...Monarchy did not repel Joseph as it did other Americans. A righteous king was the best kind of ruler, the ''Book of Mormon'' had taught. The office of king came out of temple rituals where other Saints were anointed 'kings and priests,' according to prescriptions in the Revelation of St. John, but here the title had overt political implications. Joseph was to be king in the Kingdom of God, or 'King and Ruler over Israel.' His election as king did not alter his behavior or give him additional power. . . but it did indicate Joseph’s frame of mind." {{Harvtxt|Bushman|2005|p=523}}|{{Harvtxt|Quinn|1994|p=124}}. For a few months, the Council took over from the [[Anointed Quorum]] as the leading council of church government.{{Harvtxt|Bushman|2005|p=525}}.
{{EndTable}}
}}
 
==References==
{{WikipediaRefList:Joseph Smith, Jr.}}


==Further reading==
{{To_learn_more_box:anti-Mormon_literature_and_Wikipedia}}
{{MormonismAndWikipedia}}


{{suggestions}}
{{Endnotes sources}}

Latest revision as of 07:05, 31 May 2024

An analysis of Wikipedia article "Joseph Smith"



1838 to 1839
A FairMormon Analysis of Wikipedia: "Joseph Smith"
 A work by a collaboration of authors (Link to Wikipedia article here) 		Death
The name Wikipedia® is a registered trademark of the Wikimedia Foundation, Inc.. Wikipedia content is copied and made available under the GNU Free Documentation License.

Reviews of previous revisions of this section

19 May 2009

Summary: A review of this section as it appeared in Wikipedia on 19 May 2009.

Section review

Life in Nauvoo, Illinois (1839–44)  Updated 9/3/2011

The author(s) of the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith[1] make(s) the following claim:

Newspapers throughout the country criticized Missouri for expelling the Mormons,

Author's sources:

FAIR's Response

  •  Correct, per cited sources

The author(s) of the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith[1] make(s) the following claim:

and Illinois accepted the refugees

Author's sources:

FAIR's Response

  •  Correct, per cited sources

The author(s) of the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith[1] make(s) the following claim:

who gathered along the banks of the Mississippi.

Author's sources:

FAIR's Response

  •  Correct, per cited sources

The author(s) of the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith[1] make(s) the following claim:

Smith purchased high-priced swampy woodland in the hamlet of Commerce

Author's sources:

FAIR's Response

  •  Correct, per cited sources

}}

The author(s) of the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith[1] make(s) the following claim:

and urged his followers to move there.

Author's sources:

FAIR's Response

  •  Correct, per cited sources

The author(s) of the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith[1] make(s) the following claim:

Promoting the image of the Saints as an oppressed minority,

Author's sources:

FAIR's Response

  • From the cited source: "The press all over the country was sympathizing with the Saints, for Joseph, resolving to make Missouri a byword for oppression and Boggs a synonym for tyranny, saw to it that the sufferings of his people received national publicity." (Brodie 259)
  • For an analysis of Fawn Brodie's critical work, see A FAIR Analysis of No Man Knows My History: The Life of Joseph Smith.

The author(s) of the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith[1] make(s) the following claim:

he unsuccessfully petitioned the federal government for help in obtaining reparations.

Author's sources:
  1. Smith traveled to Washington, D.C. to meet with President Martin Van Buren and Congress (Bushman (2005) , pp. 392–94; Brodie (1971) , p. 260).

FAIR's Response

The author(s) of the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith[1] make(s) the following claim:

During a malaria epidemic, Smith anointed the suffering with oil and blessed them;

Author's sources:
  1. Bushman (2005) , p. 385; Brodie (1971) , p. 257. In 1841, malaria claimed the lives of one of Smith's brothers and his son, who died within eight days of each other Bushman (2005) , p. 425.

FAIR's Response

The author(s) of the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith[1] make(s) the following claim:

but he also sent off the ailing Brigham Young and other members of the Quorum of the Twelve to missions in Europe.

Author's sources:

FAIR's Response

  •  Correct, per cited sources
  • It should be noted that the idea that Joseph was "eager to recover the prestige and authority that was his in Far West's palm days" is Brodie's opinion. (Brodie, p.. 258).
  • For an analysis of Fawn Brodie's critical work, see A FAIR Analysis of No Man Knows My History: The Life of Joseph Smith.

The author(s) of the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith[1] make(s) the following claim:

These missionaries found many willing converts in Great Britain, often factory workers, poor even by the standards of American Saints.

Author's sources:

FAIR's Response

  •  Correct, per cited sources
  • Bushman notes that the missionaries were "appalled by the miserable living conditions they encountered."

The author(s) of the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith[1] make(s) the following claim:

The religion also attracted a few wealthy and influential converts, including John C. Bennett, M.D., the Illinois quartermaster general.

Author's sources:

FAIR's Response

  •  Correct, per cited sources

The author(s) of the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith[1] make(s) the following claim:

Bennett used his connections in the Illinois legislature to obtain an unusually liberal charter for the new city,

Author's sources:

FAIR's Response

  •  Correct, per cited sources

The author(s) of the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith[1] make(s) the following claim:

which Smith named "Nauvoo" (Hebrew נָאווּ, meaning "to be beautiful").

Author's sources:

FAIR's Response

  •  Correct, per cited sources
  • The word "Nauvoo" is a Hebrew word. It means "to be comely." Joseph gave the word in the Sephardic transliteration system he learned from Joshua Seixas; in fact, the word Nauvoo is given in the Seixas grammar. See Is Nauvoo a Hebrew word?.

The author(s) of the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith[1] make(s) the following claim:

The charter granted the city virtual autonomy, authorized a university, and granted Nauvoo habeas corpus power—which saved Smith's life by allowing him to fend off extradition to Missouri.

Author's sources:
  1. Quinn (1994) , p. 110.

FAIR's Response

The author(s) of the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith[1] make(s) the following claim:

from which he was still a fugitive.

Author's sources:
  1. Brodie (1971) , p. 273; Bushman (2005) , p. 426. Prior to the charter, Smith had narrowly avoided two extradition attempts (Brodie (1971) , pp. 272–73; Bushman (2005) , pp. 425–26).

FAIR's Response

The author(s) of the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith[1] make(s) the following claim:

The charter also authorized the Nauvoo Legion an autonomous militia

Author's sources:
  1. Brodie (1971) , p. 267; Bushman (2005) , p. 412.

FAIR's Response

The author(s) of the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith[1] make(s) the following claim:

with actions limited only by state and federal constitutions.

Author's sources:
  1. Quinn (1995) , p. 106.

FAIR's Response

The author(s) of the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith[1] make(s) the following claim:

"Lieutenant General" Smith and "Major General" Bennett became its commanders,

Author's sources:
  1. Brodie (1971) , p. 271 (Smith "frequently jested about his outranking every military officer in the United States".); Bushman (2005) , p. 259 (noting that Bennett had effective command of the Legion).

FAIR's Response

The author(s) of the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith[1] make(s) the following claim:

thereby controlling by far the largest body of armed men in Illinois.

Author's sources:
  1. Quinn (1995) , p. 106 (The Legion had 2,000 troops in 1842, 3,000 by 1844, compared to less than 8,500 soldiers in the entire United States Army.)

FAIR's Response

The author(s) of the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith[1] make(s) the following claim:

Smith, who was often a poor judge of character,

Author's sources:

FAIR's Response

The author(s) of the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith[1] make(s) the following claim:

made Bennett Assistant President of the church,

Author's sources:

FAIR's Response

The author(s) of the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith[1] make(s) the following claim:

and Bennett was elected Nauvoo's first mayor.

Author's sources:

FAIR's Response

The author(s) of the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith[1] make(s) the following claim:

Though Mormon general authorities controlled Nauvoo's civil government, the city promised an unusually liberal guarantee of religious freedom.

Author's sources:
  1. Quinn (1995) , pp. 106–08.

FAIR's Response

The author(s) of the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith[1] make(s) the following claim:

The early Nauvoo years were a period of doctrinal innovation. Smith introduced baptism for the dead in 1840,

Author's sources:

FAIR's Response

  •  Correct, per cited sources


The author(s) of the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith[1] make(s) the following claim:

and in 1841, construction began on the Nauvoo Temple as a place for recovering lost ancient knowledge.

Author's sources:
  1. Bushman (2005) , pp. 448–49.

FAIR's Response


The author(s) of the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith[1] make(s) the following claim:

An 1841 revelation promised the restoration of the "fulness of the priesthood,"

Author's sources:
  1. D&C 124:28.

FAIR's Response


The author(s) of the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith[1] make(s) the following claim:

and in May 1842, Smith inaugurated a revised endowment or "first anointing."

Author's sources:
  1. Quinn (1994) , p. 113.

FAIR's Response


The author(s) of the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith[1] make(s) the following claim:

The endowment resembled rites of freemasonry that Smith had observed two months earlier when he had been initiated into the Nauvoo Masonic lodge.

Author's sources:

FAIR's Response


The author(s) of the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith[1] make(s) the following claim:

At first the endowment was open only to men, who once initiated became part of the Anointed Quorum. For women, Smith introduced the Relief Society, a service club and sorority within which Smith predicted women would receive "the keys of the kingdom."

Author's sources:
  1. Quinn (1994) , p. 634.

FAIR's Response


The author(s) of the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith[1] make(s) the following claim:

Smith also elaborated on his plan for a millennial kingdom, no longer envisioning the building of Zion in Nauvoo.

Author's sources:

FAIR's Response

  •  Correct, per cited sources


The author(s) of the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith[1] make(s) the following claim:

He now viewed Zion as encompassing all of North and South America,

Author's sources:

FAIR's Response


The author(s) of the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith[1] make(s) the following claim:

all Mormon settlements being "stakes"

Author's sources:

FAIR's Response

  •  Correct, per cited sources


The author(s) of the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith[1] make(s) the following claim:

of Zion's metaphorical tent.

Author's sources:

FAIR's Response

  •  Correct, per cited sources


The author(s) of the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith[1] make(s) the following claim:

Zion also became less a refuge from an impending Tribulation than a great building project.

Author's sources:
  1. Bushman (2005) , p. 415 (noting that the time when the Millennium was to occur lengthened to "more than 40 years".)

FAIR's Response


The author(s) of the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith[1] make(s) the following claim:

In the summer of 1842, Smith revealed a plan to establish the millennial Kingdom of God, which would eventually establish theocratic rule over the whole earth.

Author's sources:
  1. Quinn (1994) , pp. 111–12.

FAIR's Response

The author(s) of the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith[1] make(s) the following claim:

In April 1841, Smith secretly wed Louisa Beaman as a plural wife, and during the next two and a half years he may have married thirty additional women,

Author's sources:
  1. Compton (1997) , p. 11 (counting at least 33 total wives); Smith (1994) , p. 14 (counting 42 wives); Brodie (1971) , pp. 334–36 (counting 49 wives); Bushman (2005) , pp. 437, 644 (accepting Compton's count, excepting one wife); Quinn (1994) , pp. 587–88 (counting 46 wives); Remini (2002) , p. 153 (noting that the exact figure is still debated).

FAIR's Response

The author(s) of the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith[1] make(s) the following claim:

ten of whom were already married to other men,

Author's sources:

FAIR's Response

The author(s) of the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith[1] make(s) the following claim:

and about a third of them teenagers, including two fourteen-year-old girls.

Author's sources:

FAIR's Response

The author(s) of the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith[1] make(s) the following claim:

Meanwhile he publicly and repeatedly denied that he advocated polygamy.

Author's sources:
  1. Bushman (2005) , p. 491.

FAIR's Response

The author(s) of the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith[1] make(s) the following claim:

Smith told at least some of his potential wives that marriage to him would ensure their spiritual exaltation.

Author's sources:

FAIR's Response

  • It should be noted that Bushman goes on the say that there is "no certain evidence that Joseph had sexual relations with any of the wives who were married to other men. They married because Joseph's kingdom grew with the size of him family, and those bonded to that family would be exalted with him." The Whitney autobiography is one of Bushman's cited sources.
  • For a detailed response, see: Joseph Smith/Polygamy/Helen Mar Kimball and Joseph Smith/Polygamy/Zina and Henry Jacobs

The author(s) of the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith[1] make(s) the following claim:

Although Smith's first wife Emma knew of some of these marriages, she almost certainly did not know the extent of her husband's polygamous activities.

Author's sources:

FAIR's Response

  •  Correct, per cited sources
  • Bushman cites Lucy Walker Kimball, Affidavit, Dec. 17, 1902, Affidavits; Woman's Exponent, Jan. 1911, 43; Lucy Walker Kimball, Testimony, 2:461, in U.S. Court of Appeals. (Bushman, p. 654, note 38).

The author(s) of the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith[1] make(s) the following claim:

Smith kept the doctrine of plural marriage secret except for potential wives and a few of his closest male associates,

Author's sources:
  1. Bushman (2005) , p. 438 (Smith approached Joseph Bates Noble about marrying his wife's sister, Smith asked Bates to "keep quiet": "In revealing this to you I have placed my life in your hands, therefore do not in an evil hour betray me to my enemies." Noble performed the ceremony "in a grove near Main Street with Louisa in man's clothing.")

FAIR's Response

The author(s) of the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith[1] make(s) the following claim:

including Bennett. Smith's plural relationships were preceded by a "priesthood marriage," which Smith believed legitimized the relationships and made them non-adulterous. Bennett, on the other hand, ignored even perfunctory ceremonies.

Author's sources:

FAIR's Response

  • The statement about Bennett promising abortions comes from Brodie rather than Bushman.
  • Brodie, 311-312: "Bennett had seduced innumerable women in Joseph's name quite without benefit of ceremony. Even worse, he had promised abortion to those who became pregnant. Zeruiah N. Goddard, repeating the gossip of Sarah Pratt, reported that 'Dr. Bennett told her he could cause abortion with perfect safety to the mother at any stage of preganancy, and that he had frequently destroyed and removed infants before their time to prevent exposure of the parties and that he had instruments for that purpose.'" Brodie cites the testimony of Hyrum Smith, Wasp extra, July 27, 1842, republished in History of the Church, Vol. V, pp. 71-2; and the statement of Zeruiah N. Goddard, Affidavits and Certificates Disproving the Statements and Affidavits Contained in John C. Bennett's Letters (Nauvoo, August 31, 1842); Wyl, Mormon Portraits, p. 61.
  • For an analysis of Fawn Brodie's critical work, see A FAIR Analysis of No Man Knows My History: The Life of Joseph Smith.

}}

The author(s) of the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith[1] make(s) the following claim:

When embarrassing rumors of "spiritual wifery" got abroad, Smith forced Bennett's resignation as Nauvoo mayor. In retaliation, Bennett wrote "lurid exposés of life in Nauvoo."

Author's sources:
  1. Ostling (Ostling) , p. 12; Bushman (2005) , pp. 461–62; Brodie (1971) , p. 314.

FAIR's Response

The author(s) of the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith[1] make(s) the following claim:

By mid-1842, popular opinion had turned against the Saints.

Author's sources:
  1. Bushman (2005) , p. 436.

FAIR's Response

The author(s) of the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith[1] make(s) the following claim:

Thomas C. Sharp, editor of the Warsaw Signal became a sharp critic after Smith attacked the paper.

Author's sources:

FAIR's Response

  • Indeed, Sharp became a "sharp" critic after Joseph sent a hotly worded letter terminating his subscription to the paper.

The author(s) of the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith[1] make(s) the following claim:

When Lilburn Boggs, the Governor of Missouri, was shot by an unknown assailant on May 6, 1842, many suspected Smith's involvement

Author's sources:
  1. Bushman (2005) , p. 468. Boggs survived the attack.

FAIR's Response

The author(s) of the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith[1] make(s) the following claim:

because of rumors that Smith had predicted his assassination.

Author's sources:
  1. Brodie (1971) , p. 323 (noting rumors that Smith had predicted in 1840 that Boggs would meet a violent death within a year, and that Smith offered a $500 reward for his death); Quinn (1994) , p. 113 (noting that Smith held Boggs responsible for the Haun's Mill massacre).

FAIR's Response

The author(s) of the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith[1] make(s) the following claim:

Evidence suggests that the shooter was Porter Rockwell, a former Danite and one of Smith's bodyguards.

Author's sources:

FAIR's Response

  •  Violates Wikipedia: Neutral Point-of-View off-site— All Wikipedia articles and other encyclopedic content must be written from a neutral point of view, representing fairly, and as far as possible without bias, all significant views that have been published by reliable sources.

    A subsequent sentence notes that "Rockwell was tried and acquitted," yet the Wikipedia article states that "[e]vidence suggests that the shooter was Porter Rockwell." Therefore, although Rockwell was acquitted at the time, the Wikipedia article condemns him for the crime.

The author(s) of the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith[1] make(s) the following claim:

Smith went into hiding, but he ultimately avoided extradition to Missouri because any involvement in the crime would have occurred in Illinois.

Author's sources:
  1. Bushman (2005) , pp. 468–75.

FAIR's Response

The author(s) of the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith[1] make(s) the following claim:

Rockwell was tried and acquitted.

Author's sources:
  1. Bushman (2005) , p. 468. Rockwell later acquired "a reputation as a gunslinging lawman in Utah."

FAIR's Response

The author(s) of the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith[1] make(s) the following claim:

In June 1843, Illinois Governor Thomas Ford issued an extradition writ against Smith, but Smith countered with a Nauvoo writ of habeas corpus.

Author's sources:
  1. Bushman (2005) , pp. 504–08.

FAIR's Response

The author(s) of the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith[1] make(s) the following claim:

Ford later wrote that this incident caused a majority of Illinois residents to favor expelling Mormons from Illinois.

Author's sources:
  1. Bushman (2005) , p. 508.

FAIR's Response

The author(s) of the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith[1] make(s) the following claim:

In 1843, Emma reluctantly allowed Smith to marry four women who had been living in the Smith household—two of whom Smith had already married without her knowledge.

Author's sources:
  1. Brodie (1971) , p. 339; Bushman (2005) , p. 494; Remini (2002) , pp. 152–53.

FAIR's Response

The author(s) of the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith[1] make(s) the following claim:

Emma also participated with Smith in the first "sealing" ceremony, intended to bind their marriage for eternity.

Author's sources:
  1. Quinn (1994) , p. 638 (first Mormon sealing); Bushman (2005) , p. 494.

FAIR's Response

The author(s) of the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith[1] make(s) the following claim:

However, Emma soon regretted her decision to accept plural marriage and forced the other wives from the household,

Author's sources:
  1. Brodie (1971) , p. 339.

FAIR's Response

The author(s) of the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith[1] make(s) the following claim:

nagging Smith to abandon the practice.

Author's sources:
  1. Brodie (1971) , p. 340.

FAIR's Response

The author(s) of the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith[1] make(s) the following claim:

Smith dictated a revelation pressuring Emma to accept,

Author's sources:

FAIR's Response

  • Bushman wrote, "His followers would see the revelation as an unforgivable breach of the moral law and reject it altogether, or, even worse, use it as a license for free love....Sexual excess was considered the all too common fruit of pretended revelation. Joseph's enemies would delight in one more evidence of a revelator's antinomian transgressions." (Bushman, p. 438)

The author(s) of the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith[1] make(s) the following claim:

but the revelation only made her furious.

Author's sources:
  1. Bushman (2005) , p. 496 (Emma abused Hyrum Smith when Joseph sent him to Emma with the revelation); Hill (1989) , p. 119 (noting that according to William Clayton, Emma "did not believe a word of [the revelation] and appeared very rebellious.").

FAIR's Response

The author(s) of the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith[1] make(s) the following claim:

Nevertheless, in the fall of 1843, after Smith allowed women to be initiated into the Anointed Quorum,

Author's sources:
  1. Quinn (1994) , p. 36 (arguing that Smith extended the priesthood to women through the Endowment, rather than through ordination).

FAIR's Response

The author(s) of the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith[1] make(s) the following claim:

Emma participated with Smith in the first second anointing.

Author's sources:
  1. Quinn (1994) , p. 640.

FAIR's Response

The author(s) of the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith[1] make(s) the following claim:

According to Smith, this ritual was the prophesied "fulness of the priesthood"(sic) in which participants were ordained "kings and priests of the Most High God" and thus fulfilled what Smith called "[a] perfect law of Theocracy."

Author's sources:
  1. Quinn (1994) , p. 115.

FAIR's Response


The author(s) of the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith[1] make(s) the following claim:

The Anointed Quorum became Smith's advisory body for political matters.

Author's sources:
  1. Quinn (1994) , pp. 115–18.

FAIR's Response


The author(s) of the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith[1] make(s) the following claim:

In December 1843, under the authority of the Anointed Quorum,

Author's sources:
  1. Quinn (1994) , pp. 115–16 ("Such decisions were made by the formality of 'a vote' after the 'true order of prayer' and the announcement of God's revelation on the subject.").

FAIR's Response


The author(s) of the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith[1] make(s) the following claim:

Smith petitioned Congress to make Nauvoo an independent territory with the right to call out federal troops in its defense.

Author's sources:
  1. Bushman (2005) , p. 511; Brodie (1971) , p. 356; Quinn (1994) , pp. 115–116 (noting that the Anointed Quorum also authorized "a proclamation to the kings of the earth," but Smith never sent it). Smith also threatened Congress. The Millennial Star later quoted Smith as having said that "if Congress will not hear our petition and grant us protection, they shall be broken up as a government and God shall damn them, and there shall be nothing left of them—not even a grease spot." Quoted in Brodie, 356.

FAIR's Response


The author(s) of the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith[1] make(s) the following claim:

Smith then wrote the leading presidential candidates and asked them what they would do to protect the Mormons. After receiving noncommittal or negative responses, Smith announced his own third-party candidacy for President of the United States, suspending regular proselytizing

Author's sources:
  1. Quinn (1994) , p. 119

FAIR's Response


The author(s) of the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith[1] make(s) the following claim:

and sending out the Quorum of the Twelve and hundreds of other political missionaries.

Author's sources:
  1. Quinn (1994) , pp. 118–19 (the Anointed Quorum chose Sidney Rigdon as Smith's running mate);Bushman (2005) , pp. 514–15; Brodie (1971) , pp. 362–64.

FAIR's Response


The author(s) of the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith[1] make(s) the following claim:

In March 1844, following a dispute with a federal bureaucrat,

Author's sources:
  1. Quinn (1994) , p. 121 (The day before the Council was organized, word reached Smith that a U.S. Indian agent was interfering with acquisition of lumber needed for the Nauvoo Temple).

FAIR's Response


The author(s) of the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith[1] make(s) the following claim:

Smith organized the secret Council of Fifty

Author's sources:
  1. Quinn (1994) , pp. 120–22 (noting that the Council was authorized by a revelation, and members committed to keep what Smith said during the organizational meeting secret); Bushman (2005) , p. 519.

FAIR's Response

Question: What was the Council of Fifty?

Joseph Smith received a revelation which called for the organization of a special council

On 7 April 1842, Joseph Smith received a revelation titled "The Kingdom of God and His Laws, With the Keys and Power Thereof, and Judgment in the Hands of His Servants, Ahman Christ," which called the for the organization of a special council separate from, but parallel to, the Church. Since its inception, this organization has been generally been referred to as "the Council of Fifty" because of its approximate number of members.

The Council of Fifty was designed to serve as something of a preparatory legislature in the Kingdom of God

Latter-day Saints believe that one reason the gospel was restored was to prepare the earth for the second coming of the Lord Jesus Christ. Just as the Church was to bring about religious changes in the world, the Council of Fifty was intended to bring a political transformation. It was therefore designed to serve as something of a preparatory legislature in the Kingdom of God. Joseph Smith ordained the council to be the governing body of the world, with himself as chairman, Prophet, Priest, and King over the Council and the world (subject to Jesus Christ, who is "King of kings"[2]).

The Council was organized on 11 March 1844, at which time it adopted rules of procedure, including those governing legislation. One rule included instructions for passing motions:

To pass, a motion must be unanimous in the affirmative. Voting is done after the ancient order: each person voting in turn from the oldest to the youngest member of the Council, commencing with the standing chairman. If any member has any objections he is under covenant to fully and freely make them known to the Council. But if he cannot be convinced of the rightness of the course pursued by the Council he must either yield or withdraw membership in the Council. Thus a man will lose his place in the Council if he refuses to act in accordance with righteous principles in the deliberations of the Council. After action is taken and a motion accepted, no fault will be found or change sought for in regard to the motion.[3]

What is interesting about this rule is that it required each council member, by covenant, to voice his objections to proposed legislation. Those council members who dissented and could not be convinced to change their minds were to withdraw from the council, however, they would suffer no repercussions by doing so. Thus, full freedom of conscience was maintained by the council — not exactly the sort of actions a despot or tyrant would allow.

The Council never rose to the stature Joseph intended

Members (which included individuals that were not members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints) were sent on expeditions west to explore emigration routes for the Saints, lobbied the American government, and were involved in Joseph Smith's presidential campaign. But only three months after it was established, Joseph was killed, and his death was the beginning of the Council's end. Brigham Young used it as the Saints moved west and settled in the Great Basin, and it met annually during John Taylor's administration, but since that time the Council has not played an active role among the Latter-day Saints.

Load video
YouTube
Load video
YouTube


Question: Was Joseph Smith anointed to be "King over the earth" by the Council of Fifty?

Joseph was never anointed King over the earth in any political sense

Some people claim that Joseph Smith had himself anointed king over the whole world, and that this shows he was some sort of megalomaniac.

The Council of Fifty, while established in preparation for a future Millennial government under Jesus Christ (who is the King of Kings) was to be governed on earth during this preparatory period by the highest presiding ecclesiastical authority, which at the time was the Prophet Joseph Smith. Joseph had previously been anointed a King and Priest in the Kingdom of God by religious rites associated with the fullness of the temple endowment, and was placed as a presiding authority over this body in his most exalted position within the kingdom of God (as a King and a Priest).

Joseph was anointed as the presiding authority over an organization that was to prepare for the future reign of Jesus Christ during the Millennium

The fact that Joseph's prior anointing was referenced in his position as presiding authority over this body creates the confusion that he had been anointed King of the Earth. He was in fact only anointed as the presiding authority over an organization that was to prepare for the future reign of Jesus Christ during the Millennium. The fact that Joseph had submitted his name for consideration as President of the United States during this same period adds fodder for critics seeking to malign the character of the Prophet.


The author(s) of the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith[1] make(s) the following claim:

with authority to decide which national or state laws Mormons should obey.

Author's sources:

FAIR's Response


The author(s) of the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith[1] make(s) the following claim:

The Council was also to select a site for a large Mormon settlement in Texas, California, or Oregon,

Author's sources:
  1. Bushman (2005) , p. 517.

FAIR's Response

The author(s) of the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith[1] make(s) the following claim:

where Mormons could live under theocratic law beyond other governmental control.

Author's sources:
  1. Bushman (2005) , p. 517.

FAIR's Response

The author(s) of the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith[1] make(s) the following claim:

In effect, the Council was a shadow world government,

Author's sources:

FAIR's Response

  • The Ostlings cite Robert Bruce Flanders, Nauvoo: Kingdom on the Mississippi (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1965), 292-94). Flanders is the author that calls the Council a "shadow government."
  • For an analysis of Richard N. Ostling and Joan K. Ostling's critical work, see A FAIR Analysis of Mormon America: The Power and the Promise.

The author(s) of the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith[1] make(s) the following claim:

a first step toward creating a global "theodemocracy".

Author's sources:

FAIR's Response

The author(s) of the Wikipedia article on Joseph Smith[1] make(s) the following claim:

One of the Council's first acts was to elect Smith as "prophet, priest and king" of the millennial monarchy.

Author's sources:
  1. "In an act shocking to democratic sensibilities, at the Council of Fifty meeting of April 11, 1844, 'Prest J[oseph] was voted our P[rophet] p[riest] and K[ing]...Monarchy did not repel Joseph as it did other Americans. A righteous king was the best kind of ruler, the Book of Mormon had taught. The office of king came out of temple rituals where other Saints were anointed 'kings and priests,' according to prescriptions in the Revelation of St. John, but here the title had overt political implications. Joseph was to be king in the Kingdom of God, or 'King and Ruler over Israel.' His election as king did not alter his behavior or give him additional power. . . but it did indicate Joseph’s frame of mind." Bushman (2005) , p. 523

FAIR's Response

Wikipedia and anti-Mormon literature
Key sources
  • Roger Nicholson, "Mormonism and Wikipedia: The Church History That 'Anyone Can Edit'," Interpreter: A Journal of Mormon Scripture 1/8 (14 September 2012). [151–190] link
Wiki links
Online
Navigators
Notes (click to expand)
Back to Top
  1. ↑ 1.00 1.01 1.02 1.03 1.04 1.05 1.06 1.07 1.08 1.09 1.10 1.11 1.12 1.13 1.14 1.15 1.16 1.17 1.18 1.19 1.20 1.21 1.22 1.23 1.24 1.25 1.26 1.27 1.28 1.29 1.30 1.31 1.32 1.33 1.34 1.35 1.36 1.37 1.38 1.39 1.40 1.41 1.42 1.43 1.44 1.45 1.46 1.47 1.48 1.49 1.50 1.51 1.52 1.53 1.54 1.55 1.56 1.57 1.58 1.59 1.60 1.61 1.62 1.63 1.64 1.65 1.66 1.67 1.68 1.69 1.70 1.71 1.72 1.73 1.74 Due to the nature of wikipedia, articles can change. This analysis applies to the article as it stood circa September 2011.
  2. ↑ See 1 Timothy 6:15; Revelation 17:14; 19:16
  3. ↑ Andrew F. Ehat, "'It Seems Like Heaven Began on Earth': Joseph Smith and the Constitution of the Kingdom of God," Brigham Young University Studies 20 no. 3 (1980), 260-61.
Retrieved from "https://www.fairlatterdaysaints.org/answers/index.php?title=Mormonism_and_Wikipedia/Joseph_Smith%2C_Jr./1839_-_1844&oldid=262659"