Misrepresenting History

The church has been intentionally misrepresenting history since the tenure of Brigham Young. One historian has written:

The official “History of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints” was published in book form under the direction of the First Presidency in 1902. The introductory assurance that “no historical or doctrinal statement has been changed” is demonstrably wrong. Overshadowed by editorial censorship, hundreds of deletions, additions, and alterations, these seven volumes are not always reliable....Charles Wesley Wandell, an assistant church historian, was aghast at these emandations....Wandell noted in his diary: “I notice the interpolations because having been employed in the Historian’s office at Nauvoo by Doctor Richards, and employed, too, in 1845, in compiling this very autobiography, I know that after Joseph’s death his memoir was ‘doctored’ to suit the new order of things, and this, too, by the direct order of Brigham Young to Doctor Richards and systematically by Richards.” The Quorum of the Twelve, under Brigham Young’s leadership, began altering the historical record shortly after Smith’s death. (Richard S. Van Wagoner, “Sidney Rigdon: A Portrait of Religious Excess,” Signature Books (Salt Lake City, 1994), p. 322.)

One example of changes made to “suit the new order of things” was the revision of the excommunication of Thomas Marsh. Thomas Marsh was excommunicated for providing an affidavit that stated: A company of about eighty of the Mormons, commanded by a man fictitiously named Captain Fearnot [David W. Patten], marched to Gallatin. They returned and said they had run off from Gallatin twenty or thirty men and had taken Gallatin, had taken one prisoner and another had joined the company. I afterwards learned from the Mormons that they had burned Gallatin, and that it was done by the aforesaid company that marched there. The Mormons informed me that they had hauled away all the goods from the store in Gallatin, and deposited them at the Bishop’s storehouses at Adam-on-diahmon.

History supports the factual accuracy of this statement. As such, it is unclear why he was excommunicated. From other documents, it seems that Joseph Smith may not have been aware of the actions of or existence of Patten’s group (called Danites) at this time.

Most members will not recognize that Thomas B. Marsh was excommunicated for swearing out an affidavit correctly describing the pillaging conducted by the Missouri Mormons. Instead, they have been told that he was excommunicated over a dispute between his wife and another sister regarding milk strippings.

The first telling of the milk stripping story was in 1864 when George A. Smith. There is no contemporary evidence supporting this story. Furthermore, there is no mention of the issue in the Far West High Council minutes, despite Smith having said that Thomas Marsh “immediately took an appeal to the High Council, who investigated the question with much patience.”

Marsh requested rebaptism on September 6, 1857, addressing a large gathering in the Salt Lake City Bowery. The event was a critical one in the history of the succession of leaders in the LDS church. Prior to this time, in each case where an apostle had been excommunicated, they resumed their ranking at the time of reinstatement. At the time of his excommunication, Marsh was the president of the quorum. Following precedent, his reinstatement would make him the president of the church.¹ In a public reply to Marsh’s request to be rebaptized, Brigham Young gave him a severe dressing down. Though rebaptized, he was not reinstated to the Quorum of the Twelve.² The misrepresentation of Marsh’s excommunication has been perpetuated ever since, including by President Monson,³ and is even contained in the church’s history article on him.⁴

Another perpetuated myth is that of Brigham Young appearing or sounding like Joseph Smith during his campaigning in the succession crisis.⁵ Like the milk strippings, there is no contemporary evidence that this event actually occurred. The first accounts occurred much after the fact in a time when there were significant reasons to justify Brigham’s succession claims. In both cases, the perpetuated accounts distract from a factual discussion of whether Brigham Young’s succession claims were justified.⁶

Some quotes from Joseph Smith are published and republished despite the lack of any firsthand contemporary accounts. For example, the History of the Church states that Joseph said,

I will give you one of the Keys of the mysteries of the Kingdom. It is an eternal principle, that has existed with God from all eternity: That man who rises up to condemn others, finding fault with the Church, saying that they are out of the way, while he himself is righteous, then know assuredly, that that man is in the high road to apostasy; and if he does not repent, will apostatize, as God lives. (History of the Church 3:385.)

The doctrinal importance of this quote is significant, as it is the only source in Joseph’s words or in scripture of which I am aware that states that one who truthfully criticizes the church is committing or will soon commit apostasy. The History of the Church takes the quote from a discourse given by Joseph Smith on July 2, 1839, in Montrose, Iowa; reported by Wilford Woodruff and Willard Richards. The problem is that, although Wilford Woodruff was present at and recorded this sermon, his account does not contain this quote. Willard Richard’s Pocket Companion is the only source for this quote. Importantly, Richards was in England at the time, and therefore copied his account from somewhere else. There are many other examples of quotes attributed to Joseph Smith that have no contemporary support. For example, the church recently reprinted the following in a Priesthood/Relief Society manual:

Joseph the Prophet... said, 'Brethren, remember that the majority of this people will never go astray; and as long as you keep with the majority you are sure to enter the celestial kingdom.' (Orson Hyde, Deseret News: Semi-Weekly, June 21, 1870, p. 3.)

The problem is that there is no contemporary source for this quote. Orson Hyde’s was an extemporaneous recollection⁷ at least 27 years after the fact. Various versions of this quote exist, all given decades after the fact, with no contemporary recording of the quote despite all or nearly all of Joseph’s Nauvoo sermons having been recorded.⁸ Because the church has repeatedly engaged in citation obfuscation,⁹ it is not easy to tell what quotes ascribed to Joseph were witnessed firsthand and recorded contemporarily, no quote from Joseph ought to be trusted unless it can be traced to the original source. The Joseph Smith papers, which has a free online portal, is the best resource at this point. Anything less than a firsthand contemporary account is not historical record, but uncorroborated hearsay from leaders proven to have engaged in intentional historical fabrication for church-promoting purposes.

In the case of another misrepresented historical topic—plural marriage—the driving factor seems to be a desire to avoid negative public opinion rather than strengthen otherwise weak authority claims.

From the first public teaching of plural marriage on August 29, 1852, until the so-called “Second Manifesto” in 1904 that marked the end of church-sanctioned polygamy, the doctrine occupied preeminence among the LDS faith.¹⁰ It is important to understand that to Latter-day Saints between 1852 and 1904, plural marriage was just as central a tenant of the gospel as baptism.¹¹ The church's treatment of plural marriage is an example of how any central tenant could be handled in the future.

The official position has been and continues to be that the church did not sanction plural marriages after 1890 or that the only sanctioned ones took place in Mexico where it was legal. Both statements are untrue. Hundreds of plural marriages occurred with the sanction of the First Presidency in the United States and Mexico after 1890, with some even occurring after 1904.¹²

Leaders from 1890-1904 and beyond had personal knowledge of hundreds of post-manifesto plural marriages, having been personally involved in many. Faced with significant public opinion ramifications,¹³ the church misrepresented plural marriage for generations after the 1890 manifesto, at first continuing plural marriages in secret despite public denials, then (after 1904) misrepresenting plural marriage as having ended in 1890 so as to vindicate leaders who said one thing and practiced another. For example, President Joseph F. Smith—a strong proponent of post-manifesto plural marriages—stated under oath in the Reed Smoot hearings, “There never has been a plural marriage by the consent or sanction or knowledge or approval of the church since the manifesto.” Apostle John Widstoe wrote in 1936: “Since that day [6 October 1890] no plural marriage has been performed with the sanction or authority of the Church.”¹⁴ After these first-hand witnesses of post-manifesto plural marriage had been replaced by the next generation, it is unclear to what degree leaders were aware that their statements were incorrect. BYU Historian Gustive O. Larson taught in 1958: “While Presidents Woodruff, Snow, and Smith maintained monogamous integrity of the Church, plural marriages were being performed secretly by two members of the Apostles' Quorum.”¹⁴ Stephen L Richards (First Presidency counselor) stated in 1961: “Since that time ¹⁸⁹⁰, entering into plural marriage has been construed to be an offense against the laws of the Church.”¹⁴ Apostle Gordon B. Hinckley stated in 1969: “Since that time [September 1890] the Church has neither practiced nor sanctioned such marriage.”¹⁴ Apostle Mark E. Petersen wrote in 1974 that “the Manifesto put an end to all legal plural marriages.”¹⁴ Whether leaders after 1905 were aware of the falsehood of their statements or not, whatever ignorance church leaders had should have ended with the publication of Quinn’s 1985 report on the topic. This report was hand delivered to President Gordon B. Hinckley, who gave the author his permission to publish the document.¹⁵ Yet, years later, Hinckley made the following statement:

I condemn it [polygamy], yes, as a practice, because I think it is not doctrinal. It is not legal. And this church takes the position that we will abide by the law. We believe in being subject to kings, presidents, rulers, magistrates in honoring, obeying and sustaining the law. (Gordon B. Hinckley, Interview with Larry King, September 1998.)

This statement is misleading at best, given the evidence that church leaders have not only openly broken the law with regards to plural marriage, but also committed perjury in denying having done so while under oath.¹⁶

Church leaders have not corrected the facts regarding plural marriage in statements since then. The recent essay “The Manifesto and the end of Plural Marriage”¹⁷ continues many of the falsehoods, among them that the manifesto ended plural marriage, that the manifesto was a revelation,¹⁸ that only a “smaller number of new plural marriages” were performed between 1890 and 1904, and that these did not have church sanction. The church has published many articles stating that the 1890 manifesto ended plural marriage.¹⁹ The statement is made in at least four current church manuals.²⁰

President Gordon B. Hinckley, on national television, stated “In 1890, that practice was discontinued.”²¹ He made a similar statement in conference that same year.²² Even the timeline in the Presidents of the Church: Joseph F. Smith manual, which includes an entry stating Smith issued a “second manifesto on plural marriage (without describing what it was) states that Woodruff’s manifesto ended plural marriage.²³

What does it mean that church leaders were willing to abandon what they believed was a commandment from God essential for salvation in order to gain worldly power? If modern Mormons can call a commandment of God considered essential to salvation²⁴ in 1890 “not doctrinal” 100 years later, are there any doctrines that are protected from modern sensibilities? Furthermore, none of the information in the essay is new. Why did it take over 100 years for the church to change its position on polygamy? Even without any effort on the part of the church, Quinn published his searching report of post-manifesto sanctioned polygamy in 1985. Why did it take 30 years for the church to make a statement on the topic, and then only making some half-truth concessions towards the truth?²⁵

Another example of historical misrepresentation is found in the publicly expressed reasons for substituting water for wine in the sacrament. In modern Mormonism, water is used exclusively for the sacrament instead of wine. D&C 27 is usually cited for this change. The heading for D&C 27 says:

In preparation for a religious service at which the sacrament of bread and wine was to be administered, Joseph set out to procure wine. He was met by a heavenly messenger and received this revelation, a portion of which was written at the time and the remainder in the September following. Water is now used instead of wine in the sacramental services of the Church.

Although the last line in the heading gives the impression that this section is the reason water is used instead of wine in the sacrament, this is simply not true. The church continued to exclusively use wine for the sacrament for over fifty years after this section was received. Sometimes the Word of Wisdom is cited as the reason for the change from wine to water. Yet, the change was not made until long after the Word of Wisdom revelation was received. The Word of Wisdom actually explicitly states that wine is acceptable to drink for the sacrament.²⁶ The change came not because of D&C 27, or because of the Word of Wisdom, but in deference to the personal opinions of certain leading brethren, fans of the increasingly popular prohibition movement.²⁷

In this case, the misappropriation of the change to revelation shields church leaders from the charge that they changed a revealed ordinance to accord with social pressure.

Joseph’s use of a seer stone to translate the Book of Mormon has long been an accusation against the official story. Images in church materials show Joseph reading directly from the uncovered plates. In response to the allegations, Joseph Fielding Smith wrote:

...there is no authentic statement in the History of the Church which states that the use of such a stone was made in that translation. The information is all hearsay, and personally, I do not believe that this stone was used for this purpose. (Joseph Fielding Smith, Doctrines of Salvation 3:225-226.)

Joseph Fielding Smith dismissed this as anti-Mormon propaganda. Yet, the modern church has changed the narrative, admitting that the “anti” materials were actually correct:

In fact, historical evidence shows that in addition to the two seer stones known as ‘interpreters,’ Joseph Smith used at least one other seer stone in translating the Book of Mormon, often placing it into a hat in order to block out light. (Ensign, Oct 2015.)

Joseph Fielding Smith, as the church historian for decades, had full access to church archives. There is nothing that modern church historians have access to that Joseph Fielding Smith didn’t have access to, if he was willing to look. How is it that this information was only admitted recently?

The telling of the history of the Nauvoo temple is another example of how history in modern Mormonism is warped to avoid negative implications. The original Nauvoo temple has a rich history.²⁸ At the time of the martyrdom, the temple was far from complete, with walls only about halfway to their final height and most interior construction not yet started. It took almost another year to finish the walls, with the attic still not framed and the roof not yet shingled. The Saints used the incomplete temple for Oct. 1845 general conference, despite the need for temporary floors to be installed in order to do so. At this time, the first dedication of the incomplete temple took place. In Nov. 1845, the unfurnished attic level was dedicated and repurposed for endowments until February 1846, when no more ordinances were performed in the temple. At this time, the Saints began moving west, with members of the 12 praying in the temple that the Lord would “bless their move to the west and asked Him to enable them to complete the temple and have it formally dedicated” as it was not yet “formally dedicated.” The day after this, the roof caught fire. Later, the floor suddenly cracked so dramatically that some smashed windows to make it out of the building. In April 1846, a general conference was held in the basement of the temple, as the other floors were still under construction. Mob persecution was so great that a secret dedication was held. After holding a public dedication (with $1 cover charge), Orson Hyde and Wilford Woodruff, the last apostles in Nauvoo, headed west. Unable to sell the temple as intended, they abandon it to the mob, who destroyed the interior the following month (June 1846). In Sept. 1846, the steeple was struck by lightning. In Oct. of 1848, much of the temple was destroyed by fire. Finally, the church was able to sell the temple in March 1849. Ten years later it was knocked to the ground by a cyclone. The stones of the building were used to build other buildings, resulting in not one stone being left upon another.

While the temple was dedicated many times, it is a stretch to say that it was ever completed. The temple was indeed used for ordinances long before the building was completed, but even these required the rigging of canvas to repurpose the attic, which had not been designed for endowments. Lack of sufficient donations for construction, settling floors, fires, and general lags in construction created a constant block to completion of the temple until it was finally “formally dedicated” long after the Saints had left Nauvoo. Still, the impression given in modern mentions is quite different from reality. Elder Cook’s recent account is typical, giving no mention of the delays or complications of building the temple, and featuring an ordering that gives the false impression that the temple was completed prior to the endowments being given:

After the Prophet’s martyrdom, the Saints completed the Nauvoo Temple, and the sealing power was used to bless thousands of faithful members before the exodus to the Mountain West. (Elder Quentin Cook, “Roots and Branches,” April 2014 General Conference.)

President Monson glosses over the delays and gives the impression that the temple was in fact finished before they left. In reality, they were driven from their homes before the temple was anything close to completed.

Persecutions raged, however, and with the Nauvoo Temple barely completed, they were driven from their homes once again, seeking refuge in a desert. (President Thomas Monson, “The Holy Temple—a Beacon to the World,” April 2011 General Conference.)

Why aren’t leaders more straightforward in their accounts of the Nauvoo temple? As with many other examples of misrepresented church history, plain recitation of the facts raises undesired negative implications. The Lord gave specific promises to accompany the completion of the Nauvoo temple, and curses to accompany the lack of completing it by the appointed time.²⁹ The leaders of the time knew this well. Orson Hyde stated:

If we moved forward and finished this house we should be received and accepted as a church with our dead, but if not we should be rejected with our dead. These things have inspired and stimulated us to action in the finishing of it which through the blessing of God we have been enabled to accomplish and prepared it for dedication. In doing this we have only been saved as it were by the skin of our teeth. (Wilford Woodruff’s Journal, 3:46-47; May 8, 1846.)

Leaders today know that an admission that the Saints fled Nauvoo prior to the completion of the temple would draw attention to the possibility that the martyrdom marked something other than a routine succession of church leadership. The fulfillment of the curses promised in D&C 124³⁰ for failure to heed God’s commandments regarding the Nauvoo temple are not simply a historical chastisement—there are contemporary implications, and they are significant.³¹

A modest number of honest mistakes are reasonable in a church composed of lay local membership. However, when General Authorities have stated that their duty is to purposefully manipulate history³² to preserve the reputation of leaders³³ and make the story of the restoration more palatable to the public, all while maintaining the accuracy³⁴ and transparency³⁵ of church-produced history, the fine line between presentation and dishonesty is crossed.