Criticism of Mormonism/Books/Same-Sex Dynamics Among Nineteenth-Century Americans: A Mormon Example/Index


A work by author: D. Michael Quinn

Index to claims made in Same-Sex Dynamics Among Nineteenth-Century Americans: A Mormon Example

This is an index of claims made in this work with links to corresponding responses within the FAIRwiki.

87

Claim
  • The author extracts the following passage:

"...two who were vary friends indeed should lie down upon the same bed at night locked in each other['s] embrace talking of their love & should awake in the morning together. They could immediately renew their conversation of love even while rising from their bed."


Response

  • Scott G. Kenney, ed., Wilford Woodruff's Journal: 1833-1898 Typescript, 9 vols. and index (Midvale, Utah: Signature Books, 1983-91), 2:227.


87

Claim
  • The book claims that Dan Jones reported that in Carthage Joseph came "and lay himself by my side in close embrace." The author then concludes "the Mormon prophet Joseph Smith enjoyed bedtime snuggling with male friends throughout his life"

Response
  • Dan Jones to Thomas Bullock, 20 January 1855, in Ronald D. Dennis, ed., "The Martyrdom of Joseph and Hyrum Smith," Brigham Young University Studies 24 no. 1 (1984), 101. {Spelling and punctuation as in the original.)off-site

139

Claim
  • The author claims that Joseph "never once mentioned husband-wife relationships . . . remarkable in a sermon on loving relationships in this life and in the resurrection during which the prophet repeatedly spoke of "brothers and friends," fathers and sons, mothers, daughters and sisters. Smith's silence concerning husbands and wives was deafening in this sermon about attachments of love . . . but I do see that as the first Mormon expression of male bonding."

Response
  • Joseph Smith, History of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, 7 volumes, edited by Brigham H. Roberts, (Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 1957), 5:363. Volume 5 link
  • Andrew F. Ehat and Lyndon W. Cook, The Words of Joseph Smith: The Contemporary Accounts of the Nauvoo Discourses of Joseph Smith, 2nd Edition, (Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 1996), 279 n. 11.

??

Claim
  • The author extracts the following Joseph Smith quote:

"...it is pleasing for friends to lie down together, locked in the arms of love, to sleep and wake in each other's embrace and renew their conversation."


Response

  • Joseph Smith, History of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, 7 volumes, edited by Brigham H. Roberts, (Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 1957), 5:360–362. Volume 5 link