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1838 to 1839 | A FairMormon Analysis of Wikipedia: "Joseph Smith" A work by a collaboration of authors (Link to Wikipedia article here)
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Newspapers throughout the country criticized Missouri for expelling the Mormons,Author's sources:
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and Illinois accepted the refugeesAuthor's sources:
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who gathered along the banks of the Mississippi.Author's sources:
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Smith purchased high-priced swampy woodland in the hamlet of CommerceAuthor's sources:
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and urged his followers to move there.Author's sources:
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Promoting the image of the Saints as an oppressed minority,Author's sources:
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he unsuccessfully petitioned the federal government for help in obtaining reparations.Author's sources:
- Smith traveled to Washington, D.C. to meet with President Martin Van Buren and Congress (Bushman (2005) , pp. 392–94; Brodie (1971) , p. 260).
During a malaria epidemic, Smith anointed the suffering with oil and blessed them;Author's sources:
- 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.
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:
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These missionaries found many willing converts in Great Britain, often factory workers, poor even by the standards of American Saints.Author's sources:
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The religion also attracted a few wealthy and influential converts, including John C. Bennett, M.D., the Illinois quartermaster general.Author's sources:
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Bennett used his connections in the Illinois legislature to obtain an unusually liberal charter for the new city,Author's sources:
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which Smith named "Nauvoo" (Hebrew נָאווּ, meaning "to be beautiful").Author's sources:
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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:
- Quinn (1994) , p. 110.
from which he was still a fugitive.Author's sources:
- 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).
The charter also authorized the Nauvoo Legion an autonomous militiaAuthor's sources:
- Brodie (1971) , p. 267; Bushman (2005) , p. 412.
with actions limited only by state and federal constitutions.Author's sources:
- Quinn (1995) , p. 106.
"Lieutenant General" Smith and "Major General" Bennett became its commanders,Author's sources:
- 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).
thereby controlling by far the largest body of armed men in Illinois.Author's sources:
- 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.)
Smith, who was often a poor judge of character,Author's sources:
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made Bennett Assistant President of the church,Author's sources:
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and Bennett was elected Nauvoo's first mayor.Author's sources:
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Though Mormon general authorities controlled Nauvoo's civil government, the city promised an unusually liberal guarantee of religious freedom.Author's sources:
- Quinn (1995) , pp. 106–08.
The early Nauvoo years were a period of doctrinal innovation. Smith introduced baptism for the dead in 1840,Author's sources:
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and in 1841, construction began on the Nauvoo Temple as a place for recovering lost ancient knowledge.Author's sources:
- Bushman (2005) , pp. 448–49.
An 1841 revelation promised the restoration of the "fulness of the priesthood,"Author's sources:
- D&C 124:28.
and in May 1842, Smith inaugurated a revised endowment or "first anointing."Author's sources:
- Quinn (1994) , p. 113.
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:
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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:
- Quinn (1994) , p. 634.
Smith also elaborated on his plan for a millennial kingdom, no longer envisioning the building of Zion in Nauvoo.Author's sources:
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He now viewed Zion as encompassing all of North and South America,Author's sources:
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all Mormon settlements being "stakes"Author's sources:
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of Zion's metaphorical tent.Author's sources:
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Zion also became less a refuge from an impending Tribulation than a great building project.Author's sources:
- Bushman (2005) , p. 415 (noting that the time when the Millennium was to occur lengthened to "more than 40 years".)
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:
- Quinn (1994) , pp. 111–12.
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:
- 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).
ten of whom were already married to other men,Author's sources:
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and about a third of them teenagers, including two fourteen-year-old girls.Author's sources:
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Meanwhile he publicly and repeatedly denied that he advocated polygamy.Author's sources:
- Bushman (2005) , p. 491.
Smith told at least some of his potential wives that marriage to him would ensure their spiritual exaltation.Author's sources:
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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:
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Smith kept the doctrine of plural marriage secret except for potential wives and a few of his closest male associates,Author's sources:
- 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.")
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:
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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:
- Ostling (Ostling) , p. 12; Bushman (2005) , pp. 461–62; Brodie (1971) , p. 314.
By mid-1842, popular opinion had turned against the Saints.Author's sources:
- Bushman (2005) , p. 436.
Thomas C. Sharp, editor of the Warsaw Signal became a sharp critic after Smith attacked the paper.Author's sources:
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When Lilburn Boggs, the Governor of Missouri, was shot by an unknown assailant on May 6, 1842, many suspected Smith's involvementAuthor's sources:
- Bushman (2005) , p. 468. Boggs survived the attack.
because of rumors that Smith had predicted his assassination.Author's sources:
- 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).
Evidence suggests that the shooter was Porter Rockwell, a former Danite and one of Smith's bodyguards.Author's sources:
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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:
- Bushman (2005) , pp. 468–75.
Rockwell was tried and acquitted.Author's sources:
- Bushman (2005) , p. 468. Rockwell later acquired "a reputation as a gunslinging lawman in Utah."
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:
- Bushman (2005) , pp. 504–08.
Ford later wrote that this incident caused a majority of Illinois residents to favor expelling Mormons from Illinois.Author's sources:
- Bushman (2005) , p. 508.
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:
- Brodie (1971) , p. 339; Bushman (2005) , p. 494; Remini (2002) , pp. 152–53.
Emma also participated with Smith in the first "sealing" ceremony, intended to bind their marriage for eternity.Author's sources:
- Quinn (1994) , p. 638 (first Mormon sealing); Bushman (2005) , p. 494.
However, Emma soon regretted her decision to accept plural marriage and forced the other wives from the household,Author's sources:
- Brodie (1971) , p. 339.
nagging Smith to abandon the practice.Author's sources:
- Brodie (1971) , p. 340.
Smith dictated a revelation pressuring Emma to accept,Author's sources:
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but the revelation only made her furious.Author's sources:
- 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.").
Nevertheless, in the fall of 1843, after Smith allowed women to be initiated into the Anointed Quorum,Author's sources:
- Quinn (1994) , p. 36 (arguing that Smith extended the priesthood to women through the Endowment, rather than through ordination).
Emma participated with Smith in the first second anointing.Author's sources:
- Quinn (1994) , p. 640.
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:
- Quinn (1994) , p. 115.
The Anointed Quorum became Smith's advisory body for political matters.Author's sources:
- Quinn (1994) , pp. 115–18.
In December 1843, under the authority of the Anointed Quorum,Author's sources:
- 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.").
Smith petitioned Congress to make Nauvoo an independent territory with the right to call out federal troops in its defense.Author's sources:
- 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.
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 proselytizingAuthor's sources:
- Quinn (1994) , p. 119
and sending out the Quorum of the Twelve and hundreds of other political missionaries.Author's sources:
- 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.
In March 1844, following a dispute with a federal bureaucrat,Author's sources:
- 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).
Smith organized the secret Council of FiftyAuthor's sources:
- 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.
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.
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.
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.
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).
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.
with authority to decide which national or state laws Mormons should obey.Author's sources:
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The Council was also to select a site for a large Mormon settlement in Texas, California, or Oregon,Author's sources:
- Bushman (2005) , p. 517.
where Mormons could live under theocratic law beyond other governmental control.Author's sources:
- Bushman (2005) , p. 517.
In effect, the Council was a shadow world government,Author's sources:
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a first step toward creating a global "theodemocracy".Author's sources:
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One of the Council's first acts was to elect Smith as "prophet, priest and king" of the millennial monarchy.Author's sources:
- "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
Wikipedia references for "Joseph Smith, Jr." |
FairMormon regularly receives queries about specific LDS-themed Wikipedia articles with requests that we somehow "fix" them. Although some individual members of FAIR may choose to edit Wikipedia articles, FairMormon as an organization does not. Controversial Wikipedia articles require constant maintenance and a significant amount of time. We prefer instead to respond to claims in the FAIR Wiki rather than fight the ongoing battle that LDS Wikipedia articles sometimes invite. From FAIR’s perspective, assertions made in LDS-themed Wikipedia articles are therefore treated just like any other critical (or, if one prefers, "anti-Mormon") work. As those articles are revised and updated, we will periodically update our reviews to match.
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Although there exist editors on Wikipedia who openly declare their affiliation with the Church, they do not control Wikipedia. Ironically, some critics of the Church periodically falsely accuse Wikipedia editors of being LDS simply because they do not accept the critics' desired spin on a particular article.
Again, the answer is no. The truth is that Wikipedia is generally self-policing. Highly contentious articles do tend to draw the most passionate supporters and critics.
Although some LDS-related Wikipedia articles may appear to have a negative tone, they are in reality quite a bit more balanced than certain critical works such as One Nation Under Gods. Although many critical editors often accuse LDS-related Wikipedia articles of being "faith promoting" or claim that they are just an extension of the Sunday School manual, this is rarely the case. Few, if any, Latter-day Saints would find Wikipedia articles to be "faith promoting." Generally, the believers think that the articles are too negative and the critics believe that the articles are too positive. LDS Wikipedia articles should be informative without being overtly faith promoting. However, most of the primary sources, including the words of Joseph Smith himself, are "faith promoting." This presents a dilemma for Wikipedia editors who want to remain neutral. The unfortunate consequence is that Joseph's words are rewritten and intermixed with contradictory sources, resulting in boring and confusing prose.
We examine selected Wikipedia articles and examine them on a "claim-by-claim" basis, with links to responses in the FairMormon Answers Wiki. Wikipedia articles are constantly evolving. As a result, the analysis of each article will be updated periodically in order to bring it more into line with the current version of the article. The latest revision date may be viewed at the top of each individual section. The process by which Wikipedia articles are reviewed is the following:
The ability to quickly and easily access literature critical of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints has been made significantly easier through the advent of the Internet. One of the primary sites that dominates search engine results is Wikipedia, an online encyclopedia that “anyone can edit.” Wikipedia contains a large number of articles related to Mormonism that are edited by believers, critics, and neutral parties. The reliability of information regarding the Church and its history is subject to the biases of the editors who choose to modify those articles. Even if a wiki article is thoroughly sourced, editors sometimes employ source material in a manner that supports their bias. This essay explores the dynamics behind the creation of Wikipedia articles about the Church, the role that believers and critics play in that process, and the reliability of the information produced in the resulting wiki articles.
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