Mormon polygamy and spiritual manifestations

[majick275]

I have never seen anything linking Emma smith to Strang. most of the available writings on Emma pretty much show the RLDS party line. (before they became teh very universalist looking CoC)

wasn’t a bishop just a counselor. I WAS an EQP earlier on though so I guess that makes me President?
of course pride is a sin so just a penitent catholic now.

 

[RebeccaJ]

I have never seen anything linking Emma smith to Strang. most of the available writings on Emma pretty much show the RLDS party line. (before they became teh very universalist looking CoC)

wasn’t a bishop just a counselor. I WAS an EQP earlier on though so I guess that makes me President?
of course pride is a sin so just a penitent catholic now.

The LDS Strangites claim that Emma Smith and Joseph’s brother William joined the group that followed James Strang immediately following Joseph’s murder. The LDS (Brigham version) claim that Emma remained unaffiliated with any religious organization after Joseph’s death.

Strang was killed 12 years after the “succession crisis”, following Joseph’s death. The majority of those who followed Strang joined up with the RLDS which was formed 4 years after Strang’s death.

 

[why_me]

D&C 132 amongst others. she was certainly a professed believer in the RLDS church which denied all of the Temple ordinances as well as polygamy. she refused to join the brighamite church because she disagreed with their doctrine and their leadership. she also wanted to keep the disputed property.

Emma felt alienated from the main body of the church soon after her husband was murdered. When JS was murdered he and emma had five children still living. Because of this, she wanted to secure her family against financial ruin.

Her life was in danger if she stayed in Nauvoo and she moved away to a neighboring state, only to return to Nauvoo when the dust settled. She ended up with quite a bit of property in Nauvoo and she later married Major Bidemon who raised JS’s children as his own.

Emma had a torn life with JS during the last couple of years or so of his life. She loved her husband but could not get her head around polygamy. She struggled. However, she wore a locket with a piece of hair of JS around her neck for the rest of her life after JS was killed.

The reformed church asked Emma to join and she did. But she never took a formal role in the organization. She suffered much because of what happened to her husband and the mobs. She lost two children to mob violence when they were young.

She retired from religious life because of the hardship.

The information can be found in Bushman RSR page 554-555

 

[why_me]

Strang was killed 12 years after the “succession crisis”, following Joseph’s death. The majority of those who followed Strang joined up with the RLDS which was formed 4 years after Strang’s death.

And I believe this is when they asked her to join with JS III as head of the church.

 

[why_me]

“A dirty, nasty, filthy affair of his [Joseph Smith’s] and Fanny Alger’s was talked over in which I strictly declared that I had never deserted from the truth in the matter, and as I supposed was admitted by himself.”
-Oliver Cowdery, in a letter to his brother Warren

Do you like polygamy? Is it something that you feel is consistent with Mormonism? Not trying to be argumentative here, and it’s fine if you do (different strokes and all that). Just curious.

Oliver’s first reaction may have been in those lines. Many people disliked polygamy and many left the fold. And it continued right on up to William Law and the Nauvoo Expositer.

However, Oliver did return to the fold and gave a beautiful testimony of the book of mormon.

www.fairlds.org/FAIR_Brochures/Book_of_Mormon_Witnesses_2.pdf This is an interesting piece of reading.

lightplanet.com/mormons/people/oliver_cowdery.html

 

[majick275]

oliver was a sleazy fraudulent con man himself. the polygamy was too much for him though. even he couldn’t handle that big a crime. Joseph used his other crimes against him to discredit him when he left. Oliver kept his mouth shut to avoid incriminating himself. destitute and desperate he came crawling back to the LDS so that they wold care for him in his old age. whatever he had to say to make that happen he did.

Emma’s son and Joseph’s brother both consistently denied that any of the temple endowment or celestial marriage doctrines were true. they claimed (and Emma along with them) that Brigham (and his cronies) made it all up and falsely accused joseph.

 

[why_me]

oliver was a sleazy fraudulent con man himself. the polygamy was too much for him though. even he couldn’t handle that big a crime. Joseph used his other crimes against him to discredit him when he left. Oliver kept his mouth shut to avoid incriminating himself. destitute and desperate he came crawling back to the LDS so that they wold care for him in his old age. whatever he had to say to make that happen he did.

Thank you for your take on the matter. Of course it is just a tad bit slanted. I provided oliver’s testimony and other information. I must have missed your interpretation.

From the mormonwiki:

After he his excommunication, Oliver moved back to Ohio and practiced law. He became a prominent leader in the area and was known as an able lawyer, brilliant, yet modest and reserved. In 1847, he moved to Wisconsin and continued practicing law. Letters to his family show that he remained a believer in the Church and was hurt by being rejected as he saw it. In 1848, Oliver returned to the Church and joined the Saints in Council Bluffs, Iowa with his wife and young daughter. During the ten years he had been out of the Church he did not once deny the Book of Mormon or the visions he saw.

mormonwiki.com/Oliver_Cowdery

 

[lukewarm]

en.fairmormon.org/Plural_marriage_spiritual_manifestations

The interesting thing about the information from the above link is the spiritual manifestations experienced by many polygamous women who were sealed to Joseph Smith. It seems that god certainly works in mysterious ways. **Can we deny what these women felt or saw? **

Of course we can, Charlie Manson had a haram of women too who would’ve died for him and swore on their lives he was some sort of demi god or second coming of Jesus. Some even to this day have undying loyalty to the guy and a swatiska carved in their forehead…

They all also talked about deep spiritual experiences with Manson. David Koresh same thing, all these cult leaders end up sleeping with members wives and children oddly enough…

 

[why_me]

Of course we can, Charlie Manson had a haram of women too who would’ve died for him and swore on their lives he was some sort of demi god or second coming of Jesus. Some even to this day have undying loyalty to the guy and a swatiska carved in their forehead…

They all also talked about deep spiritual experiences with Manson. David Koresh same thing, all these cult leaders end up sleeping with members wives and children oddly enough…

Nice try. When in doubt bring up comparisons that are illogical. But hey, it is the implication that counts, right?

 

[why_me]

More on Oliver:

maxwellinstitute.byu.edu/display.php?table=transcripts&id=50

 

[RebeccaJ]

Emma felt alienated from the main body of the church soon after her husband was murdered. When JS was murdered he and emma had five children still living. Because of this, she wanted to secure her family against financial ruin.

She had an argument with Brigham Young who claimed the church owned everything of Joseph’s, Emma of course disputed this.

Her life was in danger if she stayed in Nauvoo and she moved away to a neighboring state, only to return to Nauvoo when the dust settled. She ended up with quite a bit of property in Nauvoo and she later married Major Bidemon who raised JS’s children as his own.

She never left Nauvoo.

Emma had a torn life with JS during the last couple of years or so of his life. She loved her husband but could not get her head around polygamy. She struggled. However, she wore a locket with a piece of hair of JS around her neck for the rest of her life after JS was killed.

Yes, it is a familiar story. A woman who loves a philandering husband, in spite of all the abuses of infidelity he puts her through.

The reformed church asked Emma to join and she did. But she never took a formal role in the organization. She suffered much because of what happened to her husband and the mobs. She lost two children to mob violence when they were young.

Where is this documented, outside of Bushman, re:losing children to mob violence?

 

[RebeccaJ]

whyme, have you ever read how the Strangite branch of mormonism came to be? Or, of the spiritual manifestations that Strang claimed to have?

 

[majick275]

Thank you for your take on the matter. Of course it is just a tad bit slanted. I provided oliver’s testimony and other information. I must have missed your interpretation.

From the mormonwiki:

After he his excommunication, Oliver moved back to Ohio and practiced law. He became a prominent leader in the area and was known as an able lawyer, brilliant, yet modest and reserved. In 1847, he moved to Wisconsin and continued practicing law. Letters to his family show that he remained a believer in the Church and was hurt by being rejected as he saw it. In 1848, Oliver returned to the Church and joined the Saints in Council Bluffs, Iowa with his wife and young daughter. During the ten years he had been out of the Church he did not once deny the Book of Mormon or the visions he saw.

mormonwiki.com/Oliver_Cowdery

yes mormonwiki and maxwell institute aren’t biased at all.

actually Oliver LEFT the LDS church. he sent a letter of resignation. here is an excerpt showing part of his reason why:

*“but the bare notice of these charges, over which you assume the right to decide, is, in my opinion, a direct attempt to make the secular power subservient to Church direction–to the correctness of which I cannot in conscience subscribe–I believe that principle never did fail to produce anarchy and confusion. This attempt to control me in my temporal interests, I conceive to be a disposition to take from me a portion of my Constitutional privileges and inherent right–I only, respectfully, ask leave, therefore, to withdraw from a society assuming they have such right.” * of course they exed him anyway.

there is also some evidence that he may have denied the BoM. see the 1841 LDS publication times and seasons. but don’t forget he was related to the whitmers and had to keep up appearances with them.

Oliver went and joined the strangites in Voree. and when they fell apart he pretty much had nowhere else to go. his temporary successes outside of “mormon” communities seemed to fall apart once his past became known. people didn’t like his dishonest financial dealings. (i think his actions make his credibility suspect thus negating any “testimonies” of his) he not only was printing money for the Kirtland “anti-bank” but also was runing the michigan based bank of monroe that the DLS church owned. both failed leaving a trail of defrauded victims. Joseph Smith himself gives the most damaging testimony against oliver:

{joseph smith accused Oliver of} "stealing, lying, perjury, counterfeiting, adultery, and being the leader of a gang of “scoundrels of the deepest degree!”(Comprehensive History of the Church, B. H. Roberts, vol. 1, pp. 438-439)
Joseph Smith also listed Oliver Cowdery as among those, “too mean to mention; and we had liked to have forgotten them.” (History of the Church, vol. 3:232)
and let’s not forget that Oliver Cowdery died claiming that the book of Doctrines & Covenants must be discarded.

 

[majick275]

oliver cowdery even joined the methodist church after he left teh jospehites. when that failed he went to the strangites and even when he returned to the brighamites he was accused of trying to raise up the whitmers and other cronies who the brighamites didn’t like.

 

[why_me]

She never left Nauvoo.

She left Nauvoo for six months moving to Fulton, ILLinios when she feared for her life after JS was murdered. It was a tempory move on her part since all her property was in Nauvoo.

 

[why_me]

Yes, it is a familiar story. A woman who loves a philandering husband, in spite of all the abuses of infidelity he puts her through.

It is obvious that you didn’t know Emma. This was hardly the case. She believed her husband to be a prophet and she believed the book of mormon to be the word of god. Hence, her dual life: believing in her husband but against his revelation on polygamy.

 

[why_me]

Where is this documented, outside of Bushman, re:losing children to mob violence?

Emma faced continued difficulties during her eight-year residence in Kirtland. To the alarm of original settlers, Latter-day Saint converts swelled the community, inflating land values and creating hardship and dissension both within and outside the Church (see Kirtland Economy). Scarcity of goods plagued the new residents. Emma witnessed again both the abuse and the fierce loyalty her husband and his work engendered. On March 24, 1832, she saw him dragged from the John Johnson house in the night and tarred and feathered by an angry mob. Five days later, she mourned the death of her adopted son, Joseph, from exposure to the cold as a result of mob action. Enduring her husband’s frequent absences on Church business, Emma was obliged to support herself and her children by taking boarders into her already crowded quarters, an expedient that she would frequently employ throughout her life.

She and Joseph lost one child not two.

lightplanet.com/mormons/people/emma_smith.html

 

[why_me]

yes mormonwiki and maxwell institute aren’t biased at all.

actually Oliver LEFT the LDS church. he sent a letter of resignation. here is an excerpt showing part of his reason why:

I know. But he was rebaptized into full fellowship. He was also planning to travel with the mormons to Utah but died before the departure. He was a good man. No need to blacken his name. All humans get into tiffs during their lives and Oliver and Joseph were no different. You forget that the Whitmers also left the lds church. No need to keep up appearances, if they lied about seeing the plates. And lest we forget, David Whitmer also never denied the book of mormon.

 

[why_me]

Polygamy and spiritual manifestations were an important part of the mormon tradition. Without them there would be no mormon church. Even during the early years when the priesthood was restored through heavenly visitations the impact was enormous on the early saints.

What makes the early history interesting is that no one who was involved in such visitations ever claimed that they lied. No matter if they left the church or remained they never denied what they expienced. And this is what makes mormonism so interesting as a faith and why critics seem to do cartwheels around mormonism.

 

[RebeccaJ]

Emma faced continued difficulties during her eight-year residence in Kirtland. To the alarm of original settlers, Latter-day Saint converts swelled the community, inflating land values and creating hardship and dissension both within and outside the Church (see Kirtland Economy). Scarcity of goods plagued the new residents. Emma witnessed again both the abuse and the fierce loyalty her husband and his work engendered. On March 24, 1832, she saw him dragged from the John Johnson house in the night and tarred and feathered by an angry mob. Five days later, she mourned the death of her adopted son, Joseph, from exposure to the cold as a result of mob action. Enduring her husband’s frequent absences on Church business, Emma was obliged to support herself and her children by taking boarders into her already crowded quarters, an expedient that she would frequently employ throughout her life.

She and Joseph lost one child not two.

lightplanet.com/mormons/people/emma_smith.html

Is this the same Johnson’s that were the older brothers of a young girl that Joseph was chasing after? If so, they were chasing him away. Granted, tar and feather was overboard, but it wasn’t out of persecution over religion. It was keeping an older, married man, who was a known con man and adulterer away from their sister.