Doctrine and Covenants 132

“Revelation given through Joseph Smith the Prophet, at Nauvoo, Illinois, recorded July 12, 1843, relating to the new and everlasting covenant, including the eternity of the marriage covenant and the principle of plural marriage.”

Doctrine and Covenants, Official Declaration 1

“Following a revelation to Joseph Smith, the practice of plural marriage was instituted among Church members in the early 1840s.”

Gospel Topics Essays, “Plural Marriage in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints,” Church History, Gospel Library, Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints

“The revelation on plural marriage, recorded in Doctrine and Covenants 132, emerged partly from Joseph Smith’s study of the Old Testament in 1831.”

Saints: The Story of the Church of Jesus Christ in the Latter Days, Volume 1, The Standard of Truth, 1815–1846, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Salt Lake City, Utah 

“On the morning of July 12, William Clayton was in Joseph’s office when the prophet and Hyrum entered. “If you will write the revelation,” Hyrum told Joseph, “I will take and read it to Emma, and I believe I can convince her of its truth, and you will hereafter have peace.” 

“You do not know Emma as well as I do,” Joseph said. That spring and summer, he had been sealed to additional women, including a few whom Emma had personally selected. Yet helping Joseph choose wives had not made obeying the principle easy for Emma. 

“The doctrine is so plain,” Hyrum said. “I can convince any reasonable man or woman of its truth, purity, and heavenly origin.”

“We will see,” Joseph said. He asked William to take out paper and write as he spoke the word of the Lord.” Ch. 41

“When Joseph finished dictating the revelation, William had filled ten pages. He put down the pen and read the revelation back to Joseph. The prophet said it was correct, and Hyrum took it to Emma.” Ch. 41”

Doctrine and Covenants 42:22-24

“Thou shalt love thy wife with all thy heart, and shalt cleave unto her and none else. 

And he that looketh upon a woman to lust after her shall deny the faith, and shall not have the Spirit; and if he repents not he shall be cast out. 

Thou shalt not commit adultery; and he that committeth adultery, and repenteth not, shall be cast out.”

Doctrine and Covenants 49:15-16

“And again, verily I say unto you, that whoso forbiddeth to marry is not ordained of God, for marriage is ordained of God unto man.

Wherefore, it is lawful that he should have one wife, and they twain shall be one flesh, and all this that the earth might answer the end of its creation.”

Book of Mormon, Jacob 1:15

“And now it came to pass that the people of Nephi, under the reign of the second king, began to grow hard in their hearts, and indulge themselves somewhat in wicked practices, such as like unto David of old desiring many wives and concubines, and also Solomon, his son.”

Book of Mormon, Jacob 2:23-35

“But the word of God burdens me because of your grosser crimes. For behold, thus saith the Lord: This people begin to wax in iniquity; they understand not the scriptures, for they seek to excuse themselves in committing whoredoms, because of the things which were written concerning David, and Solomon his son.

Behold, David and Solomon truly had many wives and concubines, which thing was abominable before me, saith the Lord.

Wherefore, thus saith the Lord, I have led this people forth out of the land of Jerusalem, by the power of mine arm, that I might raise up unto me a righteous branch from the fruit of the loins of Joseph.

Wherefore, I the Lord God will not suffer that this people shall do like unto them of old.

Wherefore, my brethren, hear me, and hearken to the word of the Lord: For there shall not any man among you have save it be one wife; and concubines he shall have none;

For I, the Lord God, delight in the chastity of women. And whoredoms are an abomination before me; thus saith the Lord of Hosts.

Wherefore, this people shall keep my commandments, saith the Lord of Hosts, or cursed be the land for their sakes.

For if I will, saith the Lord of Hosts, raise up seed unto me, I will command my people; otherwise they shall hearken unto these things.

For behold, I, the Lord, have seen the sorrow, and heard the mourning of the daughters of my people in the land of Jerusalem, yea, and in all the lands of my people, because of the wickedness and abominations of their husbands.

And I will not suffer, saith the Lord of Hosts, that the cries of the fair daughters of this people, which I have led out of the land of Jerusalem, shall come up unto me against the men of my people, saith the Lord of Hosts.

For they shall not lead away captive the daughters of my people because of their tenderness, save I shall visit them with a sore curse, even unto destruction; for they shall not commit whoredoms, like unto them of old, saith the Lord of Hosts.

And now behold, my brethren, ye know that these commandments were given to our father, Lehi; wherefore, ye have known them before; and ye have come unto great condemnation; for ye have done these things which ye ought not to have done.

Behold, ye have done greater iniquities than the Lamanites, our brethren. Ye have broken the hearts of your tender wives, and lost the confidence of your children, because of your bad examples before them; and the sobbings of their hearts ascend up to God against you. And because of the strictness of the word of God, which cometh down against you, many hearts died, pierced with deep wounds.”

Book of Mormon, Jacob 2:23-24

“But the word of God burdens me because of your grosser crimes. For behold, thus saith the Lord: This people begin to wax in iniquity; they understand not the scriptures, for they seek to excuse themselves in committing whoredoms, because of the things which were written concerning David, and Solomon his son.

Behold, David and Solomon truly had many wives and concubines, which thing was abominable before me, saith the Lord.”

Doctrine and Covenants 132:38-39

“David also received many wives and concubines, and also Solomon and Moses my servants, as also many others of my servants, from the beginning of creation until this time; and in nothing did they sin save in those things which they received not of me.

David’s wives and concubines were given unto him of me, by the hand of Nathan, my servant, and others of the prophets who had the keys of this power; and in none of these things did he sin against me save in the case of Uriah and his wife; and, therefore he hath fallen from his exaltation, and received his portion; and he shall not inherit them out of the world, for I gave them unto another, saith the Lord.”

Old Testament, Genesis 2:24

“Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife: and they shall be one flesh.”

Old Testament, Genesis 4:19

“And Lamech took unto him two wives: the name of the one was Adah, and the name of the other Zillah.”

Old Testament, Genesis 16:1-3

“Now Sarai Abram’s wife bare him no children: and she had an handmaid, an Egyptian, whose name was Hagar.

And Sarai said unto Abram, Behold now, the Lord hath restrained me from bearing: I pray thee, go in unto my maid; it may be that I may obtain children by her. And Abram hearkened to the voice of Sarai.

And Sarai Abram’s wife took Hagar her maid the Egyptian, after Abram had dwelt ten years in the land of Canaan, and gave her to her husband Abram to be his wife.”

Old Testament, Genesis 25:1

“Then again Abraham took a wife, and her name was Keturah.”

Old Testament, Genesis 26:34-35

“And Esau was forty years old when he took to wife Judith the daughter of Beeri the Hittite, and Bashemath the daughter of Elon the Hittite:

Which were a grief of mind unto Isaac and to Rebekah.”

Old Testament, Genesis 28:8-9

“And Esau seeing that the daughters of Canaan pleased not Isaac his father;

Then went Esau unto Ishmael, and took unto the wives which he had Mahalath the daughter of Ishmael Abraham’s son, the sister of Nebajoth, to be his wife.”

Old Testament, Genesis 29:21-28

“And Jacob said unto Laban, Give me my wife, for my days are fulfilled, that I may go in unto her.

And Laban gathered together all the men of the place, and made a feast.

And it came to pass in the evening, that he took Leah his daughter, and brought her to him; and he went in unto her.

And Laban gave unto his daughter Leah Zilpah his maid for an handmaid.

And it came to pass, that in the morning, behold, it was Leah: and he said to Laban, What is this thou hast done unto me? did not I serve with thee for Rachel? wherefore then hast thou beguiled me?

And Laban said, It must not be so done in our country, to give the younger before the firstborn.

Fulfil her week, and we will give thee this also for the service which thou shalt serve with me yet seven other years.

And Jacob did so, and fulfilled her week: and he gave him Rachel his daughter to wife also.”

Old Testament, Genesis 30:1-4

“And when Rachel saw that she bare Jacob no children, Rachel envied her sister; and said unto Jacob, Give me children, or else I die.

And Jacob’s anger was kindled against Rachel: and he said, Am I in God’s stead, who hath withheld from thee the fruit of the womb?

And she said, Behold my maid Bilhah, go in unto her; and she shall bear upon my knees, that I may also have children by her.

And she gave him Bilhah her handmaid to wife: and Jacob went in unto her.”

Old Testament, Genesis 36:2-3

“Esau took his wives of the daughters of Canaan; Adah the daughter of Elon the Hittite, and Aholibamah the daughter of Anah the daughter of Zibeon the Hivite;

And Bashemath Ishmael’s daughter, sister of Nebajoth.”

Old Testament, Deuteronomy 17:17

“Neither shall he multiply wives to himself, that his heart turn not away: neither shall he greatly multiply to himself silver and gold.”

Old Testament, Judges 8:30

“And Gideon had threescore and ten sons of his body begotten: for he had many wives.”

Old Testament, 1 Samuel 1:1-2

“Now there was a certain man of Ramathaim-zophim, of mount Ephraim, and his name was Elkanah, the son of Jeroham, the son of Elihu, the son of Tohu, the son of Zuph, an Ephrathite:

And he had two wives; the name of the one was Hannah, and the name of the other Peninnah: and Peninnah had children, but Hannah had no children.”

Old Testament, 2 Samuel 5:12-13

“And David perceived that the Lord had established him king over Israel, and that he had exalted his kingdom for his people Israel’s sake.

And David took him more concubines and wives out of Jerusalem, after he was come from Hebron: and there were yet sons and daughters born to David.”

Old Testament, 1 Kings 11:1-4

“But king Solomon loved many strange women, together with the daughter of Pharaoh, women of the Moabites, Ammonites, Edomites, Zidonians, and Hittites;

Of the nations concerning which the Lord said unto the children of Israel, Ye shall not go in to them, neither shall they come in unto you: for surely they will turn away your heart after their gods: Solomon clave unto these in love.

And he had seven hundred wives, princesses, and three hundred concubines: and his wives turned away his heart.

For it came to pass, when Solomon was old, that his wives turned away his heart after other gods: and his heart was not perfect with the Lord his God.”

Old Testament, 1 Chronicles 4:5

“And Ashur the father of Tekoa had two wives, Helah and Naarah.”

Old Testament, 2 Chronicles 11:18-21

“And Rehoboam took him Mahalath the daughter of Jerimoth the son of David to wife, and Abihail the daughter of Eliab the son of Jesse;

Which bare him children; Jeush, and Shamariah, and Zaham.

And after her he took Maachah the daughter of Absalom; which bare him Abijah, and Attai, and Ziza, and Shelomith.

And Rehoboam loved Maachah the daughter of Absalom above all his wives and his concubines: (for he took eighteen wives, and threescore concubines; and begat twenty and eight sons, and threescore daughters.)”

Old Testament, 2 Chronicles 13:21

“But Abijah waxed mighty, and married fourteen wives, and begat twenty and two sons, and sixteen daughters.”

New Testament, Matthew 19:4-6, 9

“And he answered and said unto them, Have ye not read, that he which made them at the beginning made them male and female,

And said, For this cause shall a man leave father and mother, and shall cleave to his wife: and they twain shall be one flesh?

Wherefore they are no more twain, but one flesh. What therefore God hath joined together, let not man put asunder.”

“And I say unto you, Whosoever shall put away his wife, except it be for fornication, and shall marry another, committeth adultery: and whoso marrieth her which is put away doth commit adultery.”

New Testament, 1 Timothy 3:2, 12

“A bishop then must be blameless, the husband of one wife, vigilant, sober, of good behaviour, given to hospitality, apt to teach.”

“Let the deacons be the husbands of one wife, ruling their children and their own houses well.”

New Testament, Titus 1:5-6

“For this cause left I thee in Crete, that thou shouldest set in order the things that are wanting, and ordain elders in every city, as I had appointed thee:

If any be blameless, the husband of one wife, having faithful children not accused of riot or unruly.”

Requirement of Priesthood Keys

Doctrine and Covenants 132:7, 58-59

“And verily I say unto you, that the conditions of this law are these: All covenants, contracts, bonds, obligations, oaths, vows, performances, connections, associations, or expectations, that are not made and entered into and sealed by the Holy Spirit of promise, of him who is anointed, both as well for time and for all eternity, and that too most holy, by revelation and commandment through the medium of mine anointed, whom I have appointed on the earth to hold this power (and I have appointed unto my servant Joseph to hold this power in the last days, and there is never but one on the earth at a time on whom this power and the keys of this priesthood are conferred), are of no efficacy, virtue, or force in and after the resurrection from the dead; for all contracts that are not made unto this end have an end when men are dead.”

“Now, as touching the law of the priesthood, there are many things pertaining thereunto.

Verily, if a man be called of my Father, as was Aaron, by mine own voice, and by the voice of him that sent me, and I have endowed him with the keys of the power of this priesthood, if he do anything in my name, and according to my law and by my word, he will not commit sin, and I will justify him.”

Emma’s Requirement to Consent

Doctrine and Covenants 132:52, 54-56, 64-65

“And let mine handmaid, Emma Smith, receive all those that have been given unto my servant Joseph, and who are virtuous and pure before me.”

“And I command mine handmaid, Emma Smith, to abide and cleave unto my servant Joseph, and to none else. But if she 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.

But if she will not abide this commandment, then shall my servant Joseph do all things for her, even as he hath said; and I will bless him and multiply him and give unto him an hundred-fold in this world, of fathers and mothers, brothers and sisters, houses and lands, wives and children, and crowns of eternal lives in the eternal worlds.

And again, verily I say, let mine handmaid forgive my servant Joseph his trespasses; and then shall she be forgiven her trespasses, wherein she has trespassed against me; and I, the Lord thy God, will bless her, and multiply her, and make her heart to rejoice.”

“And again, verily, verily, I say unto you, if any man have a wife, who holds the keys of this power, and he teaches unto her the law of my priesthood, as pertaining to these things, then shall she believe and administer unto him, or she shall be destroyed, saith the Lord your God; for I will destroy her; for I will magnify my name upon all those who receive and abide in my law.

Therefore, it shall be lawful in me, if she receive not this law, for him to receive all things whatsoever I, the Lord his God, will give unto him, because she did not believe and administer unto him according to my word; and she then becomes the transgressor; and he is exempt from the law of Sarah, who administered unto Abraham according to the law when I commanded Abraham to take Hagar to wife.”

Requirement for Plural Wives to be Unmarried Virgins, and for Consent of the First Wife

Doctrine and Covenants 132:61

“And again, as pertaining to the law of the priesthood—if any man espouse a virgin, and desire to espouse another, and the first give her consent, and if he espouse the second, and they are virgins, and have vowed to no other man, then is he justified; he cannot commit adultery for they are given unto him; for he cannot commit adultery with that that belongeth unto him and to no one else.”

Requirement to Produce Children

Doctrine and Covenants 132:63

“For they are given unto him to multiply and replenish the earth, according to my commandment, and to fulfil the promise which was given by my Father before the foundation of the world, and for their exaltation in the eternal worlds, that they may bear the souls of men; for herein is the work of my Father continued, that he may be glorified.”

Joseph Prohibited from Relinquishing Property

Doctrine and Covenants 132:57

“And again, I say, let not my servant Joseph put his property out of his hands, lest an enemy come and destroy him; for Satan seeketh to destroy; for I am the Lord thy God, and he is my servant; and behold, and lo, I am with him, as I was with Abraham, thy father, even unto his exaltation and glory.”

Gospel Topics Essays, “Plural Marriage in Kirtland and Nauvoo,” Church History, Gospel Library, Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints

“The sealing of husband and wife for eternity was made possible by the restoration of priesthood keys and ordinances. On April 3, 1836, the Old Testament prophet Elijah appeared to Joseph Smith and Oliver Cowdery in the Kirtland Temple and restored the priesthood keys necessary to perform ordinances for the living and the dead, including sealing families together. Marriages performed by priesthood authority could link loved ones to each other for eternity, on condition of righteousness; marriages performed without this authority would end at death.”

Church History Topics, “Sealing,” Church History, Gospel Library, Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints 

“Latter-day Saints believe that God has restored to the earth the power given to the ancient Apostle Peter to bind, or seal, on earth and in heaven. This sealing power is exercised in temples to solemnize marriages and to seal together families across generations.”

“Many Bible readers interpreted passages mentioning the term seal as meaning something was rendered official in the eyes of God. Early Latter-day Saints often spoke of sealing in this way, referring to prayers, testimonies, blessings, anointings, ordinances, and marriages solemnized by the priesthood as being sealed, or marked by divine authority, and thereby efficacious in heaven. Several early revelations given to Joseph Smith further taught that restored authority, ordinances, and covenants could seal individuals up unto eternal life.”

“Acting on further revelation he received, Joseph Smith introduced new teachings and ordinances in Nauvoo, Illinois, that expanded upon and gave more precision to the Saints’ understanding of sealing. He taught that ‘the spirit and power of Elijah’ consists of the power to place ‘the seals of the Melchizedek priesthood upon the house of Israel.’ He also taught that he had been authorized to invoke this sealing power on behalf of his loved ones and all Latter-day Saints through the ordinances of the temple. These references to Elijah’s power to seal evidently stemmed from Joseph Smith and Oliver Cowdery’s 1836 vision of Elijah in the Kirtland Temple.”

“The Sealing Keys Restored,” Friend, February 2002

“We know from modern-day revelation that Elijah was the last prophet to hold the sealing keys on earth before the Savior lived on the earth. Keys are rights of the holy priesthood to administer certain spiritual blessings or ordinances. The First Presidency and the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles hold all of the priesthood keys on earth, and those keys can be transferred only by the proper authority. Since Elijah was the last prophet to hold the sealing keys, he had the authority to restore them.”

“Malachi’s prophecy came true when Elijah appeared in the Kirtland Temple. He restored the sealing keys to Joseph Smith and Oliver Cowdery on April 3, 1836—the second day of the Passover Feast, when many Jews throughout the world symbolically opened their doors to invite Elijah in. Because Elijah restored the sealing keys, we can be sealed together as families throughout eternity. We show our gratitude for this sealing power by living worthy to enter the temple and by submitting our ancestors’ names to have temple ordinances done for them.”

“Elijah and the Restoration of Sealing Keys,” Teachings of Presidents of the Church: Joseph Smith, Chapter 26

“In the spring of 1836, after three years of work and sacrifice, the Kirtland Saints finally saw their beautiful temple complete, the first temple in this dispensation. On Sunday, March 27, more than 900 people gathered in the temple chapel and vestibule for the dedicatory service.”

“In a meeting held in the temple a week later, on Sunday, April 3, manifestations of extraordinary significance occurred.”

“Joseph and Oliver saw the prophet Elijah. The coming of Elijah was so important that the ancient prophet Malachi had prophesied of it centuries earlier, and the Savior had repeated the prophecy to the Nephites. Elijah came to commit to Joseph and Oliver the keys of sealing—the power to bind and validate in the heavens all ordinances performed on the earth.”

Saints: The Story of the Church of Jesus Christ in the Latter Days, Volume 1, The Standard of Truth, 1815–1846, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Salt Lake City, Utah 

“After Elias departed, Joseph and Oliver had another glorious vision. They saw Elijah, the Old Testament prophet who ascended to heaven in a chariot of fire.” Ch. 21

“The time has fully come, which was spoken of by the mouth of Malachi,” Elijah declared, referring to the Old Testament prophecy that he would turn the hearts of the fathers to the children and the children to the fathers.” Ch. 21

“The keys of this dispensation are committed into your hands,” Elijah continued, “and by this ye may know that the great and dreadful day of the Lord is near, even at the doors.

The vision closed, leaving Joseph and Oliver to themselves. Sunlight filtered through the arched window behind the pulpit, but the breastwork in front of them no longer shone like gold. The heavenly voices that had shaken them like thunder gave way to the muted stirrings of the Saints on the other side of the curtain.

 Joseph knew the messengers had conveyed important priesthood keys on him. Later, he taught the Saints that the priesthood keys restored by Elijah would seal families together eternally, binding in heaven what was bound on earth, linking parents to their children and children to their parents.” Ch. 21

“Joseph understood through revelation that marriage and family were central to God’s plan. The Lord had sent Elijah the prophet to the Kirtland temple to restore priesthood keys that sealed generations together like links in a chain. Under the Lord’s direction, Joseph had begun to teach more Saints that husbands and wives could be sealed together for time and eternity, becoming heirs to the blessings of Abraham and fulfilling God’s eternal plan for His children.” Ch. 36

Richard Lyman Bushman, Joseph Smith: Rough Stone Rolling, Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group

“At the base was priesthood sealing, the practice of binding people together by priesthood authority. The revelation informed the Saints that no marriages, monogamous or plural, would last after death unless sealed by priesthood authority.” Ch. 25

Gospel Topics Essays, “Plural Marriage in Kirtland and Nauvoo,” Church History, Gospel Library, Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints

“Fragmentary evidence suggests that Joseph Smith acted on the angel’s first command by marrying a plural wife, Fanny Alger, in Kirtland, Ohio, in the mid-1830s.”

“Little is known about this marriage, and nothing is known about the conversations between Joseph and Emma regarding Alger.”

Richard Lyman Bushman, Joseph Smith: Rough Stone Rolling, Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group

“There is evidence that Joseph was a polygamist by 1835.” Ch. 18  

“In an angry letter written in 1838, Oliver Cowdery referred to the “dirty, nasty, filthy affair” of Joseph Smith and Fanny Alger.” Ch. 18

“Alger was fourteen when her family joined the Church in Mayfield, near Kirtland, in 1830. In 1836, after a time as a serving girl in the Smith household, she left Kirtland and soon married. Between those two dates, perhaps as early as 1831, she and Joseph were reportedly involved, but conflicting accounts make it difficult to establish the facts.” Ch. 18

“Rumors of Mormon sexual license were circulating by 1835, when an “Article on Marriage” published in the Doctrine and Covenants said that Church members had been “reproached with the crime of fornication and polygamy.” Ch. 18

“The sources written before 1839 indicate that most Church leaders knew nothing of a possible marriage. What they did know is suggested by the minutes of Oliver Cowdery’s excommunication trial before the Far West High Council in April 1838, one of the few contemporaneous sources. Cowdery, long Joseph’s friend and associate in visions, was a casualty of the bad times. In 1838, he was charged with “seeking to destroy the character of President Joseph Smith jr by falsly insinuating that he was guilty of adultry &c.” Fanny Alger’s name was never mentioned, but doubtless she was the woman in question.” Ch. 18

“On his part, Joseph never denied a relationship with Alger, but insisted it was not adulterous. He wanted it on record that he had never confessed to such a sin. Presumably, he felt innocent because he had married Alger.” Ch. 18

“Surprisingly, they all agree that Joseph married Fanny Alger as a plural wife. Ann Eliza Webb Young, the notorious divorced wife of Brigham Young who toured the country lecturing against the Mormons, thought the relationship was scandalous but reported that Fanny’s parents “considered it the highest honor to have their daughter adopted into the Prophet’s family, and her mother has always claimed that [Fanny] was sealed to Joseph at that time.” Ann Eliza’s father, Chauncey Webb, who reportedly took Alger in when Emma learned of the marriage, said Joseph “was sealed there secretly to Fanny Alger,” Mormon language for marriage.” Ch. 18

“The date when plural marriage was begun will remain uncertain.” Ch. 18

“After Joseph’s death, Alger’s brother asked her about her relationship with the Prophet. She replied: “That is all a matter of my—own. And I have nothing to Communicate.” Ch. 18

Saints: The Story of the Church of Jesus Christ in the Latter Days, Volume 1, The Standard of Truth, 1815–1846, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Salt Lake City, Utah 

“Since the time had not come to teach plural marriage in the church, Joseph and Fanny kept their marriage private, as the angel had instructed. But rumors spread among some people in Kirtland. By the fall of 1836, Fanny had moved away.

Oliver was deeply critical of Joseph’s relationship with Fanny, although how much he knew about it is unclear. What Emma knew about the marriage is also uncertain. In time, Fanny married another man and lived apart from the main body of the Saints. Later in life, she received a letter from her brother asking about her plural marriage to Joseph.

“That is all a matter of our own,” Fanny wrote back, “and I have nothing to communicate.” Ch. 25

Oliver Cowdery, “Letter to Warren A. Cowdery,” 21 January 1838

“I did not fail to affirm that what I had said was strictly true. A dirty, nasty, filthy affair of his and Fanny Alger’s was talked over in which I strictly declared that I had never deviated from the truth on the matter.”

Oliver Cowdery to Joseph Smith, “Letter from Oliver Cowdery,” 21 January 1838, p. 80, The Joseph Smith Papers

“I learn from Kirtland, by the last letters, that you have publickly said, that when you were here I confessed to you that I had willfully lied about you— this compels me to ask you to correct that statement, and give me an explanation—until which you and myself are two.

Oliver Cowdery”

Zion High Council and Bishopric, “Minutes,” 12 April 1838, Far West, Caldwell Co., MO, p. 123-124, handwriting of Hosea Stout, The Joseph Smith Papers

“David W. Patten testifies, that he went to Oliver Cowdery to enquire of him if a certain story was true respecting J. Smith’s committing adultery with a certain girl, when he turned on his heel and insinuated as though he was guilty; he then went on and gave a history of some circumstances respecting the adultery scrape stating that no doubt it was true. Also said that Joseph told him, he had confessed to Emma, Also that he has used his influence to urge on lawsuits.

Thomas B. Marsh testifies that while in Kirtland last summer, David W. Patten asked Oliver Cowdery if he Joseph Smith jr had confessed to his wife that he was guilty of adultery with a certain girl, when Oliver Cowdery cocked up his eye very knowingly and hesitated to answer the question, saying he did not know as he was bound to answer the question yet conveyed the idea that it was true. Last fall after Oliver came to this place he heard a conversation take place between Joseph Smith and Oliver Cowdery when J. Smith asked him if he had ever confessed to him that he was guilty of adultery, when after a considerable winking &c. he said no.”

“Joseph Smith jr testifies that Oliver Cowdery had been his bosom friend, therefore he intrusted him with many things. He then gave a history respecting the girl buisness.”

William McLellin, “Letter to Joseph Smith III,” July 1872, Community of Christ Archives

“Emma saw him, and spoke to him. He desisted, but Mrs. Smith refused to be satisfied. He called in Dr. Williams, O. Cowdery, and S. Rigdon to reconcile Emma. But she told them just as the circumstances took place. He found he was caught. He confessed humbly, and begged forgiveness. Emma and all forgave him. She told me this story was true!! Again I told her I heard that one night she missed Joseph and Fanny Alger. She went to the barn and saw him and Fanny in the barn together alone. She looked through a crack and saw the transaction!!! She told me this story too was verily true.”

Chauncy Webb, in Wilhelm Wyl, “Mormon Portraits: Joseph Smith the Prophet, His Family and His Friends: A Study Based on Facts and Documents,” Salt Lake City: Tribune Printing and Publishing Company, 1886, p. 57

“Emma was furious, and drove the girl, who was unable to conceal the consequences of her celestial relation with the prophet, out of her house”

Ann Eliza Webb, “Wife No. 19, or the Story of a Life in Bondage, being a Complete Exposé of Mormonism, and Revealing the Sorrows, Sacrifices, and Sufferings of Women in Polygamy,” Hartford, Conn: Dustin, Gilman & Co., 1875, p. 66–67

“Consequently it was with a shocked surprise that the people heard that sister Emma had turned Fanny out of the house in the night.”

“It was felt that she [Emma] certainly must have had some very good reason for her action. By degrees it became whispered about that Joseph’s love for his adopted daughter was by no means a paternal affection, and his wife, discovering the fact, at once took measures to place the girl beyond his reach.”

Benjamin F. Johnson, in Dean R. Zimmerman, “I Knew the Prophets: An Analysis of the Letter of Benjamin F. Johnson to George F. Gibbs, Reporting Doctrinal Views of Joseph Smith and Brigham Young,” Bountiful, Utah: Horizon, 1976, p. 37–39:

“Altho there then lived with his Family a Neighbors daughter Fanny Alger. A vary nice & Comly young woman about my own age. towards whoom/ not only mySelf but every one Seemed partial for the/ ameability of her character and it/ was whispered eaven then/ that Joseph Loved her.“

There was Some trouble with Oliver Cowdery. and whisper Said it was Relating to a girl then living in his Family And I was afterwords told by Warren Parish that he himself & Oliver Cowdery did know that Joseph had Fanny Alger as a wife for They ware Spied upon & found togather.”

Gospel Topics Essays, “Plural Marriage in Kirtland and Nauvoo,” Church History, Gospel Library, Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints

“The exact number of women to whom he was sealed in his lifetime is unknown because the evidence is fragmentary.”

“Careful estimates put the number between 30 and 40.” Footnote 24.

Richard Lyman Bushman, Joseph Smith: Rough Stone Rolling, Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group

“By the middle of 1842, the time of peace in Nauvoo was drawing to a close. By summer, Joseph was entangled in the conflicts that would end in his death two years later… Perhaps most fateful, the number of Joseph’s wives increased dramatically.” Ch. 25

“Of all the events, the resumption of plural marriage was the most disturbing. After marrying Fanny Alger sometime before 1836, Joseph, it appears, married no one else until he wed Louisa Beaman on April 5, 1841, in Nauvoo. (Historians debate the possibility of one other wife in the interim.)” Ch. 25

“In the next two and a half years, Joseph married about thirty additional women.” Ch. 25

“The personal anguish caused by plural marriage did not stop Joseph Smith from marrying more women. He married three in 1841, eleven in 1842, and seventeen in 1843. Historians debate these numbers, but the total figure is most likely between twenty-eight and thirty-three. Larger numbers have been proposed based on the sealing records in the Nauvoo temple. Eight additional women were sealed to Joseph in the temple after his death, possibly implying a marriage while he was still alive.” Ch. 25

Perego, Ugo A., et. al., “Reconstructing the Y-Chromosome of Joseph Smith, Jr: Genealogical Applications,” 2005, Journal of Mormon History, 32: 70-88, see also Martha Sonntag Bradley and Mary Brown Firmage Woodward, “Four Zinas: A Story of Mothers and Daughters on the Mormon Frontier,” 2000, Signature Books, Salt Lake City, p. 112, 114

“On March 7, 1841, Zina was civilly married to Henry Bailey Jacobs. Nine months later, on October 27, 1841, when she was already pregnant with Zebulon, she was sealed to Joseph Smith.”

Gospel Topics Essays, “Plural Marriage in Kirtland and Nauvoo,” Church History, Gospel Library, Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints

“Following his marriage to Louisa Beaman and before he married other single women, Joseph Smith was sealed to a number of women who were already married.”

“Estimates of the number of these sealings range from 12 to 14.” Footnote 29

Saints: The Story of the Church of Jesus Christ in the Latter Days, Volume 1, The Standard of Truth, 1815–1846, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Salt Lake City, Utah 

“In some cases, a woman who was married for time to a disaffected Saint, or to a man who was not a member of the church, or even to a church member in good standing, could be sealed for eternity to another man.” Ch. 37

Richard Lyman Bushman, Joseph Smith: Rough Stone Rolling, Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group

“In the next two and a half years, Joseph married about thirty additional women, ten of them already married to other men.” Ch. 25

“The marital status of the plural wives further complicated the issue. Within fifteen months of marrying Louisa Beaman, Joseph had married eleven other women. Eight of the eleven were married to other men. All told, ten of Joseph’s plural wives were married to other men. All of them went on living with their first husbands after marrying the Prophet.” Ch. 25

“Not all were married to non-Mormon men: six of the ten husbands were active Latter-day Saints.” Ch. 25

“The records don’t reveal how much Henry knew about the marriage at first, but in 1846 he stood by in the temple when Zina was sealed posthumously to Joseph Smith for eternity.” Ch. 25

“Besides poisoning the public mind, Bennett’s attack sowed dissension among the Mormons themselves. His letter in the July 15 issue of the Sangamo Journal accused Joseph of making advances to Sarah Pratt, wife of one of Joseph’s longtime loyal associates, Orson Pratt. Bennett claimed that while Pratt was in England with the other apostles in 1841, Joseph had proposed marriage. In History of the Saints, Bennett claimed that Sarah replied, “I believe in no such revelations,” and sent the Prophet away.” Ch. 26

“Orson Pratt faced two equally repulsive stories. Either his wife had received a proposal of marriage from the man Pratt thought was the Lord’s anointed (Bennett’s story), or she had compromised her virtue with John C. Bennett ( Joseph’s story). No contemporary report of Sarah’s own version remains (save Bennett’s account), but forty years later, after Orson’s death, and after she had left the Church, she told a story that substantially supported Bennett against Joseph. If that was the story she gave at the time, Orson was forced to choose between his wife and the Prophet, dreadful alternatives.” Ch. 26

Gospel Topics Essays, “Plural Marriage in Kirtland and Nauvoo,” Church History, Gospel Library, Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints

“The youngest was Helen Mar Kimball, daughter of Joseph’s close friends Heber C. and Vilate Murray Kimball, who was sealed to Joseph several months before her 15th birthday.”

Richard Lyman Bushman, Joseph Smith: Rough Stone Rolling, Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group

“In 1842, when Lucy was fifteen or sixteen, Joseph told her, “I have a message for you. I have been commanded of God to take another wife, and you are the woman.” Ch. 27

“Ten of Joseph’s wives were under twenty.” Ch. 27

Elizabeth Ann Whitney, “A Leaf from an Autobiography,” 15 December 1878, Woman’s Exponent, Volume 7, No. 14, p. 105

“Our hearts were comforted and our faith made so perfect that we were willing to give our eldest daughter, then only seventeen years of age, to Joseph, in the holy order of plural marriage.”

“Laying aside all our traditions and former notions in regard to marriage, we gave her with our mutual consent.”

Gospel Topics Essays, “Plural Marriage in Kirtland and Nauvoo,” Church History, Gospel Library, Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints

“Sealings for time and eternity included commitments and relationships during this life, generally including the possibility of sexual relations. Eternity-only sealings indicated relationships in the next life alone.

Evidence indicates that Joseph Smith participated in both types of sealings.”

Saints: The Story of the Church of Jesus Christ in the Latter Days, Volume 1, The Standard of Truth, 1815–1846, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Salt Lake City, Utah 

“As the story of Abraham and Sarah showed, God sometimes commanded faithful followers to participate in plural marriage as a way to extend these blessings to more individuals and raise a covenant people to the Lord. Despite the trials it brought, Abraham’s marriage to his plural wife Hagar had brought forth a great nation.” Ch. 36

“Like monogamous marriages, these marriages could involve sexual relations and having children.” Ch. 37

Richard Lyman Bushman, Joseph Smith: Rough Stone Rolling, Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group

“Even so, nothing indicates that sexual relations were left out of plural marriages; Noble testified many years later that Joseph spent the night with Louisa after the wedding.” Ch. 25

“Besides proving the existence of plural marriage, the affidavits attempted to refute the hypothesis that Joseph’s relations with his plural wives were purely spiritual. Some members of the Reorganized Church accepted ceremonial marriages but thought Joseph never slept with his wives. To rebut that view, the affidavits noted the occasions when Joseph occupied the same room with a wife, facts that might have been omitted had not the Utah Mormons been determined to prove that Joseph and his plural wives were married as completely as the later polygamists under Brigham Young.” Ch. 27

Emily Dow Partridge Young, Deposition, Temple Lot Transcript, Part 3, pp. 371, 384, questions 480–84, 747, 751-762)

“Q. Did you ever have carnal intercourse with Joseph Smith?

A. Yes sir.

Q. How many nights?

A. I could not tell you.

Q. Do you make the declaration that you ever slept with him but one night?

A. Yes sir.

Q. And that was the only time and place that you ever were in bed with him?

A. No sir.

Q. Were you in bed with him at any time before . . . you were married?

A. No sir, not before I was married to him. I never was.”

Angus Cannon, “Angus M. Cannon statement of an interview with Joseph Smith, III,” 1905, Call Number MS 3166, Church History Catalog, Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints

He said, “I am informed that Eliza Snow was a virgin at the time of her death.” I in turn said, “Brother Heber C. Kimball, I am informed, asked her the question if she was not a virgin although married to Joseph Smith and afterwards to Brigham Young, when she replied in a private gathering, ‘I thought you knew Joseph Smith better than that.’”

Saints: The Story of the Church of Jesus Christ in the Latter Days, Volume 1, The Standard of Truth, 1815–1846, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Salt Lake City, Utah 

“As much as Joseph welcomed a time of goodwill and peace in Nauvoo, however, he knew the Lord expected him to obey all His commandments, even if doing so tried the faith of the Saints. And no commandment would be a greater trial than plural marriage.” Ch. 36

“Because neither Joseph nor Emma wrote down how they felt about plural marriage, many questions are left unanswered.” Ch. 40

Richard Lyman Bushman, Joseph Smith: Rough Stone Rolling, Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group

“The possibility of deception did occur to him. Satanic counterfeits concerned Joseph; he talked to the Saints about the detection of fraudulent angels. But when Lightner asked if perhaps plural marriage was of the devil, Joseph said no. In his mind, the revelation came from God, and he had to obey or suffer. The written form of the revelation, recorded in 1843 (later canonized as Doctrine and Covenants 132) said bluntly, “I reveal unto you a New and an Everlasting Covenant and if ye abide not that Covenant, then are ye damned.” Ch. 25

“Years later, William Law, Joseph’s counselor in the First Presidency, said he was shocked once to hear Joseph say one of his wives “afforded him great pleasure.” Ch. 25

“Like Abraham of old, Joseph yearned for familial plentitude.” Ch. 25

“Joseph was torn by the command to take plural wives.” Ch. 25

Doctrine and Covenants 132:1

“Verily, thus saith the Lord unto you my servant Joseph, that inasmuch as you have inquired of my hand to know and understand wherein I, the Lord, justified my servants Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, as also Moses, David and Solomon, my servants, as touching the principle and doctrine of their having many wives and concubines.”

Doctrine and Covenants 132:61

“And again, as pertaining to the law of the priesthood—if any man espouse a virgin, and desire to espouse another, and the first give her consent, and if he espouse the second, and they are virgins, and have vowed to no other man, then is he justified; he cannot commit adultery for they are given unto him; for he cannot commit adultery with that that belongeth unto him and to no one else.”

William Law, Affidavit, July 17, 1885, in Charles A. Shook, The True Origin of Mormon Polygamy, 126

“[Joseph Smith] said it was a great privilege granted to the High Priesthood. He spoke strongly in its favor… He was very anxious that I would accept the doctrine and sustain him in it. He used many arguments at various times afterwards in its favor… Joseph told me that he had several wives sealed to him, and that they afforded him a great deal of pleasure. He kept some of them in his own house.”

Levi Ward Hancock, “Autobiography of Levi Ward Hancock, circa 1896,” Part Three, 6 June 1896, Call Number MS 570, Church History Catalog, Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints

“At that time Clarissa Reed was working at the Prophet’s She told the Prophet She loved brother Levi Hancock The Prophet had the highest respect for her feelings She had thought that perhaps she might be one of the Prophet’s wives as herself and Sister Emma were on the best of terms My Father and Mother understanding each other were inspired by the spirit of the Lord to respect His word through the Prophet—Therefore Brother Joseph said “Brother Levi I want to make a bargain with you—If you will get Fanny Alger for me for a wife you may have Clarissa Reed. I love Fanny.” 

“Prophet Joseph loves your Daughter Fanny and wishes her for a wife what say you.”

“Clarissy, Brother Joseph the Prophet of the most high God loves Fanny and wishes her for a wife what say you.” 

“Fanny Brother Joseph the Prophet loves you and wishes you for a wife will you be his wife”? 

Joseph Smith to Sarah Ann Whitney, Letter to Newel K., Elizabeth Ann Smith, and Sarah Ann Whitney, 18 August 1842, Joseph Smith Papers, JSP, D10:436–440

“For my feelings are so strong for you since what has passed lately between us, that the time of my absence from you seems so long, and dreary.”

“It would afford me great relief, of mind, if those with whom I am allied, do love me, now is the time to afford me succor, in the days of exile, for you know I foretold you of these things.”

“I have a room entirely by myself, the whole matter can be attended to with most perfect safety, I know it is the will of God that you should comfort me now in this time of affliction.”

“So much the greater friendship, and the more Joy, when I see you, I will tell you all my plans.”

“You will pardon me for my earnestness on this subject when you consider how lonesome I must be, your good feelings know how to make every allowance for me, I close my letter.”

Joseph Smith to Sarah Pratt, Article: Sarah M. Pratt, Richard A. Van Wagoner, Dialogue, Vol. 19, No. 2, p.72

"Sister Pratt, the Lord has given you to me as one of my spiritual wives. I have the blessings of Jacob granted me, as God granted holy men of old, and as I have long looked upon you with favor, and an earnest desire of connubial bliss, I hope you will not repulse or deny me."

Joseph Smith, Letter to Nancy Rigdon, circa Mid-April 1842, Joseph Smith Papers, JSP, D9:413–418

“Happiness is the object and design of our existence, and will be the end thereof if we pursue the path that leads to it; and this path is virtue, uprightness, faithfulness, holiness, and keeping ALL the commandments of God.”

“If we seek first the kingdom of God, all good things will be added. So with Solomon—first he asked wisdom, and God gave it him, and with it every desire of his heart, even things which might be considered abominable to all who do not understand the order of heaven only in part, but which, in reality, were right, because God gave and sanctioned by special revelation.”

“Every thing that God gives us is lawful and right, and ’tis proper that we should enjoy his gifts and blessings whenever and wherever he is disposed to bestow.”

“But in obedience there is joy and peace unspotted, unalloyed, and as God has designed our happiness, the happiness of all his creatures, he never has, he never will, institute an ordinance, or give a commandment to his people that is not calculated in its nature to promote that happiness which he has designed, and which will not end in the greatest amount of good and glory to those who become the recipients of his laws and ordinances.”

“Our heavenly father is more liberal in his views, and boundless in his mercies and blessings, than we are ready to believe or receive.”

Gospel Topics Essays, “Plural Marriage in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints,” Church History, Gospel Library, Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints

“For Joseph Smith’s wife Emma, it was an excruciating ordeal.”

“Emma likely did not know about all of Joseph’s sealings.”

“She vacillated in her view of plural marriage, at some points supporting it and at other times denouncing it.”

Saints: The Story of the Church of Jesus Christ in the Latter Days, Volume 1, The Standard of Truth, 1815–1846, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Salt Lake City, Utah 

“Joseph himself left no record of his own views on plural marriage or his struggle to obey the commandment. Emma too disclosed nothing about how early she learned of the practice or what impact it had on her marriage. The writings of others close to them, however, make clear that it was a source of anguish for both of them.” Ch. 36

“All idle rumor and idle talk must be laid aside,” Emma agreed. Yet she mistrusted quiet discipline. “Sin must not be covered,” she told the women, “especially those sins which are against the law of God and the laws of the country.” She believed in bringing sinners to light to prevent others from making the same errors.” Ch. 38

“In her writings, Emily recorded some of their struggles with the practice. At times Emma rejected it completely while at other times reluctantly accepting it as a commandment. Torn between the Lord’s mandate to practice plural marriage and Emma’s opposition, Joseph sometimes chose to marry women without Emma’s knowledge, creating distressing situations for everyone involved.

In early May, Emma took Emily and Eliza aside and explained the principle of plural marriage to them. She had told Joseph that she would consent to him being sealed to two additional wives as long as she could choose them, and she had chosen Emily and Eliza, apparently unaware that Joseph had already been sealed to them.

Rather than mention her former sealing, Emily believed that keeping silent on the matter was the best thing for her to do. A few days later, she and Eliza were again sealed to Joseph, this time with Emma as a witness.” Ch. 40

“Hyrum returned to Joseph’s office later that day and told his brother that he had never been talked to more severely in his life. When he read the revelation to Emma, she had become angry and rejected it.

“I told you you did not know Emma as well as I did,” Joseph said quietly. He folded the revelation and put it in his pocket. 

The next day, Joseph and Emma spent hours in heart-wrenching discussion. Sometime before noon, Joseph called William Clayton into the room to help mediate between them. Both Joseph and Emma seemed caught in an impossible dilemma. Each loved and cared deeply for the other and wanted to honor the eternal covenant they had made. But their struggle to keep the Lord’s commandment was splitting them apart.” Ch. 41

“That fall, as her family settled into their new house, Emma became increasingly troubled over plural marriage. In His revelation to her thirteen years earlier, the Lord had promised to crown her with righteousness if she honored her covenants and kept the commandments continually. “Except thou do this,” He had said, “where I am you cannot come.” 

Emma wanted to keep the covenants she had made with Joseph and the Lord. But plural marriage often seemed too much to bear. Although she had allowed some of Joseph’s plural wives into her household, she resented their presence and sometimes made life unpleasant for them. 

Eventually, Emma demanded that Emily and Eliza Partridge leave the house for good. With Joseph at her side, Emma called the sisters into her room and told them that they had to end their relationships with him at once.” Ch. 41

“Decades later, when Emily was an old woman, she reflected on these painful days. By then, she better understood Emma’s complicated feelings about plural marriage and the pain it caused her. 

“I know it was hard for Emma, and any woman, to enter plural marriage in those days,” she wrote, “and I do not know as anybody would have done any better than Emma did under the circumstances.” Ch. 41

“Emma and the children were not going west. Her struggle to accept plural marriage, as well as ongoing disputes over property, continued to complicate her relationship with the church and the Twelve.” Ch. 46

Richard Lyman Bushman, Joseph Smith: Rough Stone Rolling, Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group

“The Whitneys stole away from Nauvoo without Emma knowing. She was unaware of this marriage, and perhaps most of the others.” Ch. 26

“In 1843 Joseph would approach Emma for consent, but her earlier opposition meant the 1842 marriages entangled Joseph in subterfuge and deception.” Ch. 26

“Newel was to come ahead of the women and knock at Joseph’s window, taking care to arrive when Emma was not there. The letter was to be burned upon receipt—though it survived to tell its tale. “Keep all locked up in your breasts, my life depends upon it,” he warned them.” Ch. 26

“Despite the concealment that lay between him and Emma, Joseph relied on her judgment and ability. Though he knew she would disapprove of his other wives, she was his chief contact with the city while he remained in hiding.” Ch. 26

“In the first six months of 1843, Joseph married twelve women, two of them already married to other men, one single and fifty-eight years old. Five of the women boarded in Joseph’s household when he married them. Emma probably knew nothing of these marriages.” Ch. 27

“Emma was more resistant. She probably knew of plural marriage but had no idea of the extent of her husband’s practice. Aware of her opposition, Joseph could not bring himself to explain what he was doing. Caught between the plural marriage revelation and Emma’s opposition, he moved ahead surreptitiously, making the recovery of his domestic life almost impossible.” Ch. 27

“In May 1843 she approved two wives, Eliza and Emily Partridge, daughters of Edward Partridge and helpers in the Smith household. The sisters were an awkward selection because Joseph had already married them two months earlier in March without Emma’s knowledge.” Ch. 27

“In May, they both went through the ceremony again with Emma present.” Ch. 27

“Emma had agreed to the plural marriages, but she immediately regretted it. “Before the day was over she turned around or repented of what she had done and kept Joseph up till very late in the night talking to him,” Emily Partridge wrote in the 1880s.” Ch. 27

“One day Emma heard Joseph talking to Eliza Partridge in an upstairs room. Joseph closed the door and held it shut, while Emma called Eliza’s name and tried to open the door. “She seemed much irritated,” he reported to William Clayton.” Ch. 27

“The situation deteriorated. In her 1884 reminiscence, Emily wrote of Emma: “She sent for us one day to come to her room. Joseph was present, looking like a martyr. Emma said some very hard things—Joseph should give us up or blood should flow. She would rather her blood would run pure than be poluted in this manner. Such interviews were quite common, but the last time she called us to her room, I felt quite indignant, and was determined it should be the last, for it was becoming monotonous, and I am ashamed to say, I felt indignant towards Joseph for submitting to Emma.” Emma wanted the marriages to the Partridge girls ended.” Ch. 27

“Joseph was unsure how far the usually composed Emma would go in her anger. Near the end of June, he warned William Clayton that Emma “wanted to lay a snare for me.” Ch. 27

“The staid and upright Emma, determined to regain her dignity, was looking for a way to punish her husband. Joseph was anxious and under pressure.” Ch. 27

“Hyrum thought Joseph should show Emma a written revelation on plural marriage.” Ch. 27

“In July, Hyrum argued that writing the revelation would win over Emma. To be sure of its accuracy, he asked Joseph to use the Urim and Thummim, but the Prophet said he knew it perfectly. On July 12, 1843, Joseph dictated to William Clayton for three hours in the upper office of his store. Emma once said Hyrum’s words were irresistible to her, but when he presented the revelation, she was adamant. He came away from Emma saying that he “had never received a more severe talking to in his life.” Ch. 27

“A month later, Joseph said that Emma had completely rejected plural marriage. She had given him the Partridge sisters but “he knew if he took them she would pitch on him & obtain a divorce & leave him.” But Joseph told Clayton that he “should not relinquish any thing.” He was unwilling to put away the women he had married. Even with his marriage at stake, he could not back down. Meanwhile, Emma kept watch for suspicious signs. She was “vexed & angry” when she found two letters from Eliza Snow in Joseph’s pocket, and demanded to know if Clayton had delivered them. The next day, Emma learned from Flora Woodworth, another plural wife, that Joseph had given her a gold watch. Emma demanded its return. When Joseph learned of the incident, he reproved her, and on the return trip from the Woodworths, Emma “abused him much & also when he got home,” Clayton reported. “He had to use harsh measures to put a stop to her abuse but finally succeeded.” Ch. 27

During Sunday dinner on November 5, Joseph became ill, rushed to the door, and vomited so violently that he dislocated his jaw. “Every symptom of poison,” Richards noted in Joseph’s diary. That night at the prayer meeting, Richards wrote in code that Joseph and Emma did not dress in the usual special clothing, a sign they were too much at odds to participate. The next day, Richards wrote that Joseph was “busy with domestic concerns.” Years later, in the anti-Emma atmosphere of Utah, Brigham Young spoke of a meeting where Joseph accused his wife of slipping poison into his coffee. Brigham interpreted Emma’s refusal to answer as an admission of guilt.” Ch. 27

“His marriages had dropped off sharply after July 1843. During his confrontation with Emma between July 12 and 16, Joseph may have agreed to add no more. He told Clayton she would divorce him if he did.” Ch. 27

“Three weeks later, William Law charged Joseph with living in adultery with a plural wife, Maria Lawrence. A Carthage grand jury issued indictments for perjury and polygamy on the witness of Joseph Jackson, Robert Foster, and William Law. Joseph could elude these court actions by the familiar device of taking them before the Nauvoo municipal court, but that could not stop the county sheriff. Twice during the month Joseph had to hide while officers waited around his house. These awkward disappearances displeased Emma, who was still suspicious of his whereabouts when out of sight. Joseph sent William Clayton to “find Emma’s mind about him going home,” and Clayton found her “crying with rage and fury because he had gone away.” She was not well, and Joseph promptly hurried home.” Ch. 29

“Eventually the reform Mormons who founded the Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, made up of Saints who had not gone west, persuaded Joseph III to take the leadership. Emma joined but never took a leading role. She fended off Joseph III’s increasingly urgent questions about plural marriage, leaving the impression that her husband had never supported the principle.” Epilogue

William Law, Affidavit, July 17, 1885, in Charles A. Shook, The True Origin of Mormon Polygamy, 126

“He said his wife Emma had annoyed him very much about it, but he thought the revelation would cause her to submit peaceably, as it threatened her removal if she did not. Mrs. Smith complained to me about Joseph keeping his young wives in her house and elsewhere and his neglect of her. She spoke freely about the revelation and its threat against her life, etc. She seemed to have no faith in it whatever.”

Joseph Smith to Sarah Ann Whitney, Letter to Newel K., Elizabeth Ann Smith, and Sarah Ann Whitney, 18 August 1842, Joseph Smith Papers, JSP, D10:436–440

“So much the greater friendship, and the more Joy, when I see you, I will tell you all my plans, I cannot write them on paper, burn this letter as soon as you read it.”

“You will pardon me for my earnestness on this subject when you consider how lonesome I must be, your good feelings know how to make every allowance for me, I close my letter, I think Emma won’t come to night if she don’t, don’t fail to come to night, I subscribe myself your most obedient, and affectionate, companion, and friend.”

Footnote: “JS may have asked that the letter be destroyed because it could indicate his sealing to Sarah Ann Whitney.”

Richard Lyman Bushman, Joseph Smith: Rough Stone Rolling, Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group

“There is evidence that Joseph was a polygamist by 1835.” Ch. 18  

“Of all the events, the resumption of plural marriage was the most disturbing. After marrying Fanny Alger sometime before 1836, Joseph, it appears, married no one else until he wed Louisa Beaman on April 5, 1841, in Nauvoo. (Historians debate the possibility of one other wife in the interim.)” Ch. 25

“In the next two and a half years, Joseph married about thirty additional women.” Ch. 25

“The personal anguish caused by plural marriage did not stop Joseph Smith from marrying more women. He married three in 1841, eleven in 1842, and seventeen in 1843. Historians debate these numbers, but the total figure is most likely between twenty-eight and thirty-three.” Ch. 25

“But on a cold Sunday evening, May 28, 1843, in the upper room of Joseph’s redbrick store, Joseph and Emma were “sealed” for eternity by the power of the priesthood.” Ch. 27

Saints: The Story of the Church of Jesus Christ in the Latter Days, Volume 1, The Standard of Truth, 1815–1846, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Salt Lake City, Utah 

“In late May 1843, Emma and Joseph were sealed together for eternity in a room above Joseph’s store, solemnizing at last what they had long desired.” Ch. 40

Gospel Topics Essays, “Plural Marriage in Kirtland and Nauvoo,” Church History, Gospel Library, Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints

“Despite claims that Joseph Smith fathered children within plural marriage, genetic testing has so far been negative.” Footnote 25

Perego, Ugo A., et. al., “Reconstructing the Y-Chromosome of Joseph Smith, Jr: Genealogical Applications,” 2005, Journal of Mormon History, 32: 70-88

“During the last half of the nineteenth century, when the contest of authority between the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and the Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints (now Community of Christ) was most intense, a key point in the RLDS attack on the LDS insistence that Joseph Smith Jr. originated polygamy was the absence of fully documented children produced by his unions with about thirty plural wives.”

“Yet even though this historical question has lost its controversial content, it has remained unanswered: Where are the children, if any, of Joseph Smith by his plural wives?”

“A Y-chromosome profile was also generated for a Smith lineage suspected to originate from Joseph Smith because of his association with Fanny Alger. Even though Compton reports that Fanny was probably pregnant when she left Kirtland in 1836, there is insufficient historical evidence to show that she had a child by Joseph Smith.”

“While some sources report Joseph Smith as the biological father of Moroni Pratt and Zebulon Jacobs through polygamous relationships, genetic testing on the Y-chromosome showed that it is unlikely that Joseph Smith fathered either of them. In addition, the Y-chromosome haplotype for the descendant of Orrison Smith, regarded by some as a possible child of Joseph Smith and Fanny Alger, was significantly different from Joseph Smith’s Y-chromosome haplotype and could be confidently excluded as being part of the same lineage.“

“In this study, we can definitely state that Moroni Pratt’s father was Parley P. Pratt because the genealogical information harmonized with the genetic results. Similarly, we can confidently exclude Joseph Smith as Zebulon Jacobs’s father and identify Henry Bailey Jacobs as his and his brother’s likely father on the basis of combined genetic and genealogical evidence. We could not identify Orrison Smith’s exact paternity, even though the Y-chromosome haplotype of the descendant tested was clearly not from Joseph Smith’s paternal line.”

Melissa Lot Willes, “Malissa Willes Affidavit,” 4 August 1893, Call Number MS 29468, Church History Catalog, Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints

“I was married to his father the Prophet, on September 20th, 1843, by Hyrum Smith, at Nauvoo, in the presence of my parents and Joseph and Hyrum Smith. My age at that time was 19 years and nine months, and I lived with him as his wife until his death. Mr. Joseph Smith Jr. asked if I would answer him a few very plain questions for his own special benefit. I told him I would do so with pleasure.

Question 1. Were you married to my father?

Answer. Yes.

Question. When?

Ans. I handed him the Family Bible, in which was recorded by my father, at the time, the record of my said marriage, and told him he would find it there.

Ques. Was you a wife in very deed?

Ans. Yes.

Ques. Why was there no increase, say in your case?

Ans. Through no fault of either of us, lack of proper conditions on my part probably, or it might be in the wisdom of the Almighty that we should have none. The Prophet was martyred nine months after our marriage.

Ques. Did you know of any Brother or Sister of mine by my father’s plural wives?

And. I did not know of any.” 

Angus Cannon, “Angus M. Cannon statement of an interview with Joseph Smith, III,” 1905, Call Number MS 3166, Church History Catalog, Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints

“How was it that there was no issue from them[?]”

“All I knew was that which Lucy Walker herself contends. They were so nervous and lived in such constant fear that they could not conceive.” 

Gospel Topics Essays, “Plural Marriage and Families in Early Utah,” Church History, Gospel Library, Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saint

“Plural marriage did result in the birth of large numbers of children within faithful Latter-day Saint homes.”

“Studies have shown that monogamous women bore more children per wife than did polygamous wives except the first.” Footnote 6

Saints: The Story of the Church of Jesus Christ in the Latter Days, Volume 1, The Standard of Truth, 1815–1846, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Salt Lake City, Utah 

“Emma seemed especially worried about the future. What if Joseph’s enemies found out about plural marriage? Would he go to prison again? Would he be killed? She and the children depended on Joseph for support, but the family’s finances were entwined with the church’s. How would they get by if something happened to him?

Joseph and Emma wept as they spoke, but by the end of the day they had worked through their problems. To provide Emma additional financial security, Joseph deeded some property to her and their children.” Ch. 41

Richard Lyman Bushman, Joseph Smith: Rough Stone Rolling, Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group

“The next day, Joseph and Emma talked for hours. Clayton was called into the room near the end to hear “an agreement they had mutually entered into. They both stated their feelings on many subjects & wept considerable.” They were in impossible positions: Joseph caught between his revelation and his wife, Emma between a practice she detested and belief in her husband. The agreement represented some kind of compromise. Emma was beginning to think practically of the consequences of sharing her husband with other women. Two days later, Clayton made a deed to her for half of the steamboat Maid of Iowa, and sixty city lots. The assurance of financial security did not heal the breach.” Ch. 27

Gospel Topics Essays, “Plural Marriage in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints,” Church History, Gospel Library, Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints

“Polygamy had been permitted for millennia in many cultures and religions, but, with few exceptions, it was rejected in Western cultures. In Joseph Smith’s time, monogamy was the only legal form of marriage in the United States.”

“The women who united with Joseph Smith in plural marriage risked reputation and self-respect in being associated with a principle so foreign to their culture and so easily misunderstood by others.”

Gospel Topics Essays, “Plural Marriage in Kirtland and Nauvoo,” Church History, Gospel Library, Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints

“Plural marriage tested faith and provoked controversy and opposition. Few Latter-day Saints initially welcomed the restoration of a biblical practice entirely foreign to their sensibilities.”

Gospel Topics Essays, “Plural Marriage and Families in Early Utah,” Church History, Gospel Library, Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints

“For these early Latter-day Saints, plural marriage was a religious principle that required personal sacrifice. Accounts left by men and women who practiced plural marriage attest to the challenges and difficulties they experienced, such as financial difficulty, interpersonal strife, and some wives’ longing for the sustained companionship of their husbands.”

“Virtually all of those practicing it in the earliest years had to overcome their own prejudice against plural marriage and adjust to life in polygamous families.”

Saints: The Story of the Church of Jesus Christ in the Latter Days, Volume 1, The Standard of Truth, 1815–1846, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Salt Lake City, Utah 

“Still, he knew the practice of plural marriage would shock people, and he remained reluctant to teach it openly. While other religious and utopian communities often embraced different forms of marriage, the Saints had always preached monogamy. Most Saints—like most Americans—associated polygamy with societies they considered less civilized than their own.” Ch. 36

“Yet Joseph felt an urgency to teach it to the Saints, despite the risks and his own reservations. If he introduced the principle privately to faithful men and women, he could build strong support for it, preparing for the time when it could be taught openly. To accept plural marriage, people would have to overcome their prejudices, reconsider social customs, and exercise great faith to obey God when He commanded something so foreign to their traditions.” Ch. 36

“Like Joseph, the apostles at first resisted the new principle. Brigham felt such agony over the decision to marry another wife that he longed for an early grave. Heber Kimball, John Taylor, and Wilford Woodruff wanted to delay obedience as long as possible.” Ch. 37

“Joseph had already tried without success to teach his brother and William about plural marriage. Once, during a council meeting, he had barely broached the issue when William interrupted. “If an angel from heaven was to reveal to me that a man should have more than one wife,” he said, “I would kill him!” Ch. 40

“Discussions about plural marriage swirled around Nauvoo, and rumors that Joseph had several wives were also common. Hyrum wanted to believe this was not the case, but he wondered if Joseph was not telling him something.” Ch. 40

“William took the revelation to Joseph, who confirmed that it was genuine. William begged him to renounce its teachings, but Joseph testified that the Lord had commanded him to teach plural marriage to the Saints and that he would stand condemned if he disobeyed.” Ch. 42

“I have tried for a number of years to get the minds of the Saints prepared to receive the things of God,” Joseph told a congregation on a chilly Sunday early in 1844, “but we frequently see some of them, after suffering all they have for the work of God, will fly to pieces like glass as soon as anything comes that is contrary to their traditions.” Ch. 42

“After his dismissal from the First Presidency, William Law avoided Joseph. In late March 1844, Hyrum tried to reconcile the two men, but William refused to make amends as long as the prophet upheld plural marriage.” Ch. 43

“William saw himself as a church reformer. He still professed to believe in the Book of Mormon and Doctrine and Covenants, but he was furious about plural marriage.” Ch. 43

Richard Lyman Bushman, Joseph Smith: Rough Stone Rolling, Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group

“But surely he realized that plural marriage would inflict terrible damage, that he ran the risk of wrecking his marriage and alienating his followers.” Ch. 25

“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. He also risked prosecution under Illinois’s antibigamy law.” Ch. 25

“Joseph thought he might reduce animosity if he could “correct the public mind.” A common accusation in Missouri was that Joseph put his revelations above the law. To answer the charge, a meeting of Nauvoo citizens resolved that so far as they knew Joseph was “a good, moral, virtuous, peaceable and patriotic man, and a firm supporter of law, justice and equal rights; that he at all times upholds and keeps inviolate the constitution of this State and of the United States.” The Female Relief Society drew up a petition, signed by nearly a thousand women, speaking of Joseph’s “virtue integrity honesty.” A newspaper, the Nauvoo Wasp, was founded to counter “the shafts of slander.” The Nauvoo City Council assured Governor Carlin that to their knowledge Joseph Smith had “violated no Law, nor has he in any wise promoted sedition, or Rebellion.” The council did not know that Joseph was then breaking the state’s antibigamy law, putting the law of God above the law of man. Though he was law-abiding in most respects, plural marriage put Joseph at odds with moral and legal conventions of all kinds.” Ch. 26

“On August 18, Joseph wrote to Newel and Elizabeth Whitney asking them to come with their seventeen-year-old daughter Sarah Ann. Three weeks before, on July 27, Joseph had married Sarah Ann. The Whitneys had reacted to the marriage request with the usual horror.” Ch. 26

“Nothing Joseph had done put the Church and his own reputation in greater jeopardy. The doctrine shocked his faithful followers.” Ch. 27

Heber C. Kimball, Discourse, Sept. 2, 1866, George D. Watt Papers, Church History Library, Salt Lake City

“I never felt more sorrowful. I wept days… I had a good wife. I was satisfied.”

Brigham Young, in Journal of Discourses, Volume 3, p. 266.

“It was the first time in my life that I had desired the grave.”

John Taylor, Address, Jan 4, 1880, Salt Lake City

“God is greater than the United States, and when the Government conflicts with heaven, we will be ranged under the banner of heaven against the Government. The United States says we cannot marry more than one wife. God says different.”

U.S. Census Bureau, “Decennial Censuses, 1890 to 1940, and Current Population Survey, March and Annual Social and Economic Supplements, 1947 to 2024.”

“Table MS-2. Estimated Median Age at First Marriage, by Sex: 1890 to Present”

“Year: 1890, Men's median age at first marriage: 26.1, Women's median age at first marriage: 22.0”

Karen Rolf, Joseph P. Ferrie, "The May-December Relationship since 1850: Age Homogamy in the U.S.," Working paper, March 7, 2008, 2-4, 12

“The discrepancy between the ages of husbands and wives in the U.S. has fallen continuously throughout the twentieth century: husbands were on average nearly five years older than their wives in 1900, but were just over two years older in 2000.”

“The gap between the ages of husbands and wives in the U.S. fell in each decade from 1900 to 2000. We explore whether this trend was present as well in the second half of the nineteenth century. We find that age homogeny (similarity in the ages of spouses) actually decreased after 1850 before beginning its twentieth century decline.”

“Figure 1. Average Difference Between Husbands’ and Wives’ Ages By Census Year, All Races and Origins. 

Census Year: 1850, Age Difference (Husband - Wife): < 4.5”

“Figure 1. Average Difference Between Husbands’ and Wives’ Ages By Census Year, White Native-Born Only. 

Census Year: 1850, Age Difference (Husband - Wife): ≅ 4.5”

Saints: The Story of the Church of Jesus Christ in the Latter Days, Volume 1, The Standard of Truth, 1815–1846, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Salt Lake City, Utah 

“Joseph’s invitation unsettled Mary.” Ch. 37

“A year earlier, however, Joseph had mentioned that he had something to tell her. He had offered to write it in a letter, but she asked him not to do so, worried that it might say something about plural marriage.” Ch. 40

Richard Lyman Bushman, Joseph Smith: Rough Stone Rolling, Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group

“Zina was a pious young woman of twenty who had spoken in tongues and heard angels singing… When Joseph explained plural marriage to her the following year, her first response was to resist.” Ch. 25

“She despaired of the consequences. “I mad[e] a greater sacrifise than to give my life for I never anticipated a gain to be looked uppon as an honerable woman by those I dearly loved.” Ch. 25

“The reaction was almost invariably negative.” Ch. 27

“Lucy felt “tempted and tortured beyond endureance untill life was not desireable.” “Oh let this bitter cup pass,” she moaned.” Ch. 27

“This arroused every drop of scotch in my veins. . . . I felt at this moment that I was called to place myself upon the altar a liveing Sacrafice, perhaps to brook the world in disgrace and incur the displeasure and contempt of my youthful companions; all my dreams of happiness blown to the four winds, this was too much, the thought was unbearable.” Facing an ultimatum, Lucy bluntly refused, unless God Himself told her otherwise, and “emphatically forbid him speaking again to me on this Subject.” Ch. 27

“On May 1, 1843, William Clayton married Joseph to Lucy. “It was not a love matter,” she wrote later, “but simply the giving up of myself as a sacrifice.” Ch. 27

“Lucy’s autobiography fits the standard pattern for the celestial marriage narratives written in Utah a quarter of a century or more after Nauvoo. The circumstances encouraged the plural wives of Joseph (now married to other men) to be candid about their torment when the Prophet made his proposal.” Ch. 27

“Women were free to enlarge upon their initial anguish, which must have been real, especially for the younger women. (Ten of Joseph’s wives were under twenty.) They had to give up romance, cut themselves off from friends, perhaps suffer disgrace if they became pregnant. Their dreams of happiness, as Lucy said, were “blown to the four winds.” Ch. 27

“When Joseph proposed, Emily and Eliza, nineteen and twenty-three, went through the usual turmoil. At first they turned Joseph down.” Ch. 27

Lucy Walker Kimball, “Brief Biographical Sketch,” 10–11, Church History Library, Salt Lake City.

“Every feeling of my soul revolted against it.”

Lucy Walker Kimball, “Lucy W. Kimball’s Testimony” in Andrew Jenson, Historical Record, Volume 6, p. 229-230

“In the year 1842 President Joseph Smith sought an interview with me, and said, ‘I have a message for you, I have been commanded of God to take another wife, and you are the woman.’ My astonishment knew no bounds. This announcement was indeed a thunderbolt to me.”

“Tempted and tortured beyond endureance until life was not desirable. Oh that the grave would kindly receive me that I might find rest on the bosom of my dear mother.”

“When the Prophet Joseph Smith first mentioned the principle of plural marriage to me I became very indignant, and told him emphatically that I did not wish him ever to mention it to me again, as my feelings and education revolted against any thing of such a nature.”

“I felt gloomy and downcast; in fact, I was so intirely given up to dispair that I felt tired of life.”

Mary Elizabeth Rollins Lightner, “Mary Elizabeth Rollins,” copy of holograph in Susa Young Gates Papers, USHS box 14, in The Life and Testimony of Mary Lightner, p. 24

“No human being can tell my feeling on this occasion. My faith in him, as a Prophet about failed me. I could not sleep, and scarcely eat.”

Helen Mar Kimball, “Scenes in Nauvoo,” 1 August 1882, Woman’s Exponent, Volume 11, No. 5, p. 39

“Suffice it to say the first impulse was anger.”

“My sensibilities were painfully touched. I felt such a sense of personal injury and displeasure; for to mention such a thing to me I thought altogether unworthy of my father, and as quick as he spoke, I replied to him, short and emphatically, No I wouldn’t!”

“No one else could have influenced me at that time or brought me to accept of a doctrine so utterly repugnant and so contrary to all of our former ideas and traditions.”

Helen Mar Kimball, “A Woman’s View: Helen Mar Whitney’s Reminiscences of Early Church History,” Religious Studies Center, Brigham Young University, 1997, p. 482–87

“Having a great desire to be connected with the Prophet, Joseph, he offered me to him; this I afterwards learned from the Prophet’s own mouth. My father had but one Ewe Lamb, but willingly laid her upon the alter: how cruel this seamed to the mother whose heartstrings were already stretched untill they were ready to snap asunder, for he had taken Sarah Noon to wife & she thought she had made sufficient sacrifise but the Lord required more.”

Helen Mar Kimball, “Autobiography, 30 March, 1881,” Call Number MS 744, Church History Library, also in “A Woman’s View: Helen Mar Whitney’s Reminiscences of Early Church History,” Religious Studies Center, Brigham Young University, 1997

“None but God & his angels could see my mother’s bleeding heart–when Joseph asked her if she was willing, she replied ‘If Helen is willing I have nothing more to say.’”

“She had witnessed the sufferings of others, who were older & who better understood the step they were taking, & to see her child, who had scarcely seen her fifteenth [sic] summer, following in the same thorny path, in her mind she saw the misery which was as sure to come as the sun was to rise and set; but it was all hidden from me.”

“The world seamed bright the thret’ning clouds were kept From sight and all looked fair but pitying angels wept. They saw my youthful friends grow shy and cold. And poisonous darts from sland’rous tongues were hurled, Untutor’d heart in thy gen’rous sacrafise, Thou dids’t not weigh the cost nor know the bitter price; Thy happy dreams all o’er thou’st doom’d alas to be Bar’d out from social scenes by this thy destiny, And o’er thy sad’nd mem’ries of sweet departed joys Thy sicken’d heart will brood and imagine future woes, And like a fetter’d bird with wild and longing heart, Thou’lt dayly pine for freedom and murmor at thy lot;”

“I felt quite sore over it, and thought it a very unkind act in father to allow him [William] to go and enjoy the dance unrestrained with others of my companions, and fetter me down, for no girl loved dancing better than I did, and I really felt that it was too much to bear. It made the dull school more dull, and like a wild bird I longed for the freedom that was denied me; and thought myself an abused child, and that it was pardonable if I did murmur.”

“I hated polygamy in my heart.”

Gospel Topics Essays, “Plural Marriage in Kirtland and Nauvoo,” Church History, Gospel Library, Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints

“Joseph told associates that an angel appeared to him three times between 1834 and 1842 and commanded him to proceed with plural marriage when he hesitated to move forward. During the third and final appearance, the angel came with a drawn sword, threatening Joseph with destruction unless he went forward and obeyed the commandment fully.”

Saints: The Story of the Church of Jesus Christ in the Latter Days, Volume 1, The Standard of Truth, 1815–1846, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Salt Lake City, Utah 

“When teaching a woman about plural marriage, he would instruct her to seek her own spiritual confirmation that being sealed to him was right.” Ch. 37

“During their discussion, Joseph told Mary that the Lord had commanded them to be sealed together for the next life.

“If God told you that,” Mary asked, “why does He not tell me?”

“Pray earnestly,” Joseph replied, “for the angel said to me you should have a witness.” Ch. 37

“In teaching her about plural marriage, Joseph had described the everlasting blessings of the eternal marriage covenant. When Mary had married Adam, they had made promises to each other for this life only.” Ch. 37

Richard Lyman Bushman, Joseph Smith: Rough Stone Rolling, Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group

“By delaying plural marriage, Joseph risked provoking God’s wrath. Mary Rollins Lightner, one of his plural wives, later said Joseph told her about the pressure he was under. “The angel came to me three times between the year of ’34 and ’42 and said I was to obey that principle or he would [s]lay me.” Others told the story with an additional detail: the angel held a drawn sword.” Ch. 25

“Joseph told a prospective wife that submitting to plural marriage would “ensure your eternal salvation & exaltation and that of your father’s household. & all your kindred.” Ch. 25

“Zina changed her mind after her brother told her about the angel threatening Joseph’s “position and his life.” Ch. 25

“In making proposals, Joseph would sometimes say God had given a woman to him.” Ch. 25

“Often he asked a relative—a father or an uncle—to propose the marriage. Sometimes one of his current wives proposed for him. When he made the proposal himself, a friend like Brigham Young was often present. The language was religious and doctrinal, stressing that a new law has been revealed.” Ch. 25

“In 1842, when Lucy was fifteen or sixteen, Joseph told her, “I have a message for you. I have been commanded of God to take another wife, and you are the woman.” Lucy was astounded. “This announcement was indeed a thunderbolt to me.” Do you believe me to be a Prophet of God? Joseph asked.” Ch. 27

“In April 1843, Joseph spoke again and this time he exerted pressure: “I will give you untill to-morrow to decide this matter. If you reject this message the gate will be closed forever against you.” Lucy hated that.” Ch. 27

Mary Elizabeth Rollins Lightner, “Statement” signed Feb. 8, 1902, Vesta Crawford Papers, MS 125, Special Collections, MS 1132, Brigham Young University

“Joseph said I was his before I came here and he said all the Devils in Hell should never get me from him.”

Mary Elizabeth Rollins Lightner, “Mary Elizabeth Rollins,” copy of holograph in Susa Young Gates Papers, USHS box 14, in The Life and Testimony of Mary Lightner, p. 24

“Joseph made known to me that God had commanded him in July, 1834, to take me for a wife. But he had not dared to make it known to me, for when he received the revelation, I was in Missouri and when he did see me, I was married. But he was again commanded to fulfill the first revelation or suffer condemnation, for I was created for him before the foundation of the earth was laid.”

Orson F. Whitney, “Life of Heber C. Kimball: An Apostle, the Father and Founder of the British Mission,” Salt Lake City, UT, Juvenile Instructor Office, 1888, p. 331–339

“It was no less than a requirement for him to surrender his wife, his beloved Vilate, and give her to Joseph in marriage!”

“Then, with a broken and bleeding heart, but with soul self-mastered for the sacrifice, he led his darling wife to the Prophet’s house and presented her to Joseph.” 

“Joseph wept at this proof of devotion, and embracing Heber, told him that was all that the Lord required.”

Helen Mar Kimball, “Autobiography, 30 March 1881,” Call Number MS 744, Church History Library

“After which he said to me, ‘If you will take this step, it will ensure your eternal salvation & exaltation and that of your father’s household & all of your kindred.[’] This promise was so great that I willingly gave myself to purchase so glorious a reward.”

Helen Mar Kimball, quoted by Catherine Lewis in “Narrative of Some of the Proceedings of the Mormons; Giving an Account of their Iniquities,” 1848, p. 19

“I would never have been sealed (married) to Joseph had I known it was anything more than ceremony. I was young, and they deceived me, by saying the salvation of our whole family depended on it.”

Joseph Smith, “Blessing to Sarah Ann Whitney,” 23 March 1843, p. 1, The Joseph Smith Papers

“Nauvoo City March 23d 1843

Oh Lord my God thou that dwellest on high bless I beseach of thee the one into whose hands this may fall and crown her with a diadem of glory in the Eternal worlds Oh let <​it​> be Sealed this day on high that She Shall come forth in the first reserrection to recieve the Same and verily it Shall be so Saith the Lord if She remain in the Everlasting covenant to the end as also all her Fathers house Shall be Saved in the Same Eternal glory and if any of them Shall wander from the foald of the Lord they Shall not perish but Shall return Saith the Lord and be Saived in and by repentance be crowned with all the fullness of the glory of the Everlasting gospelel these promises I Seal upon all of their heads in the name of Jesus Christ by the Law of the holy preisthood Even so Amen

Joseph Smith”

Joseph Smith, “Revelation, 27 July 1842,” p. 1, The Joseph Smith Papers

“Verily, thus saith the Lord unto my servant N.K. Whitney, the thing that my servant Joseph Smith has made known unto you and your family and which you have agreed upon is right in mine eyes and shall be rewarded upon your heads with honor and immortality and eternal life to all your house, both old and young because of the lineage of my Priesthood, saith the Lord, it shall be upon you and upon your children after you from generation to generation, by virtue of the holy promise which I now make unto you, saith the Lord.”

“These are the words which you shall pronounce upon my servant Joseph and your daughter S.A. Whitney. They shall take each other by the hand and you shall say, “You both mutually agree,” calling them by name, “to be each other’s companion so long as you both shall live, preserving yourselves for each other and from all others and also throughout eternity, reserving only those rights which have been given to my servant Joseph by revelation and commandment and by legal authority in times passed. If you both agree to covenant and do this, I then give you, S.A. Whitney, my daughter, to Joseph Smith, to be his wife, to observe all the rights between you both that belong to that condition.”

Joseph Smith, Letter to Nancy Rigdon, circa Mid-April 1842, Joseph Smith Papers, JSP, D9:413–418

“That which is wrong under one circumstance, may be, and often is, right under another.”

“Whatever God requires is right, no matter what it is, although we may not see the reason thereof till long after the events transpire. If we seek first the kingdom of God, all good things will be added. So with Solomon—first he asked wisdom, and God gave it him, and with it every desire of his heart, even things which might be considered abominable to all who do not understand the order of heaven only in part, but which, in reality, were right, because God gave and sanctioned by special revelation.”

“Every thing that God gives us is lawful and right, and ’tis proper that we should enjoy his gifts and blessings whenever and wherever he is disposed to bestow.”

“But in obedience there is joy and peace unspotted, unalloyed, and as God has designed our happiness, the happiness of all his creatures, he never has, he never will, institute an ordinance, or give a commandment to his people that is not calculated in its nature to promote that happiness which he has designed, and which will not end in the greatest amount of good and glory to those who become the recipients of his laws and ordinances.”

Elizabeth Ann Whitney, “A Leaf from an Autobiography,” 15 December 1878, Woman’s Exponent, Volume 7, No. 14, p. 105

“Our hearts were comforted and our faith made so perfect that we were willing to give our eldest daughter, then only seventeen years of age, to Joseph, in the holy order of plural marriage.”

“Laying aside all our traditions and former notions in regard to marriage, we gave her with our mutual consent.”

Lucy Walker Kimball, “Lucy W. Kimball’s Testimony” in Andrew Jenson, Historical Record, Volume 6, p. 229-230

“He asked me if I beleived him to be a Prophet of God. ‘Most assuredly I do,’ I replied. He fully Explained to me the principle of plural or celestial marriage. Said this principle was again to be restored for the benefit of the human family. That it would prove an everlasting blessing to my father’s house. And form a chain that could never be broken, worlds without End.”

“How could I speak, or what could I say?”

Saints: The Story of the Church of Jesus Christ in the Latter Days, Volume 1, The Standard of Truth, 1815–1846, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Salt Lake City, Utah 

“Since removing William Phelps and John Whitmer from office, the high council had excommunicated both men, and Joseph approved their decision. Now he believed it was time to address Oliver’s apostasy.” Ch. 26

“On April 12, Edward Partridge convened a bishop’s council to review Oliver’s standing in the church.” Ch. 26

“For the rest of the day, the council reviewed evidence and heard several Saints testify of Oliver’s actions. Joseph stood, spoke of his former trust in Oliver, and explained his relationship with Fanny Alger in response to Oliver’s accusations.

After hearing more testimonies, the council discussed Oliver’s case. Like him, they cherished the principles of individual agency and liberty. Yet for nearly a decade, the Lord had also urged the Saints to be united, setting aside individual desires to consecrate what they had to building the kingdom of God.

Oliver had turned away from these principles and relied instead on his own judgment, treating the church, its leaders, and the commandments of the Lord with contempt. After reviewing the charges one more time, Bishop Partridge and his council made the painful decision to remove Oliver from the church.” Ch. 26

Richard Lyman Bushman, Joseph Smith: Rough Stone Rolling, Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group

“The Far West court did not accuse Joseph of being involved with Alger. Some councilors had heard the rumors, but concluded they were untrue. They were concerned only with Cowdery’s insinuations. He was on trial for false accusations, not Joseph for adultery.” Ch. 18

“George Harris testified that in conversation between Cowdery and Joseph the previous November, Cowdery “seemed to insinuate that Joseph Smith jr was guilty of adultery.” Eventually the court concluded that Cowdery had made false accusations, and cut him off from the Church.” Ch. 18

“Cowdery denied that he had lied about Joseph and Alger. Cowdery had heard the accusations against him when he wrote to Joseph in January 1838. “I learn from Kirtland, by the last letters, that you have publickly said, that when you were here I confessed to you that I had willfully lied about you.” He demanded that Joseph retract the statement. In a letter to his brother Warren, Cowdery insisted he would never dishonor the family name by lying about anything, much less about the Smiths, whom he had always defended. In his conversations with Joseph, Cowdery asserted, “in every instance, I did not fail to affirm that what I had said was strictly true,” meaning he believed Joseph did have an affair. His insinuations were not lies but the truth as he understood it.” Ch. 18

“Cowdery and Joseph aired their differences at a meeting in November 1837 where Joseph did not deny his relationship with Alger, but contended that he had never confessed to adultery.” Ch. 18

“No one proposed to put Joseph on trial for adultery.” Ch. 18

“Joseph exercised such untrammeled authority in Nauvoo that it is possible to imagine him thinking no conquest beyond his reach. In theory, he could take what he wanted and browbeat his followers with threats of divine punishment.” Ch. 25

“Young said Pratt’s “mind became so darkened by the influence and statements of his wife, that he came out in rebellion against Joseph, refusing to believe his testimony or obey his counsel. He said he would believe his wife in preference to the Prophet.” Joseph told Pratt that “if he did believe his wife and follow her suggestions, he would go to hell.” Ch. 26

“After laboring with Pratt for days, the apostles decided he would not yield. On August 20, 1842, he was excommunicated.” Ch. 26

“The message was always the same: This is a revelation from God to your prophet. Seek your own inspiration, and you will know for yourself. If you deny it, you will lose your blessings.” Ch. 27

“Law’s disaffection began when Hyrum showed him the plural marriage revelation. Law had disputed John Bennett’s charges of Nauvoo polygamy and temporarily allied with Hyrum and William Marks to deny the existence of the practice. After Hyrum accepted the revelation, he tried to persuade Law. Although they considered plural marriage, William and Jane eventually decided Joseph had gone too far. On January 1, 1844, Law wrote in his diary that what he had learned “paralizes the nerves, chills the currents of the heart, and drives the brain almost to madness.” Ch. 29

“William and Jane were torn, but by the end of 1843, they had made their decision against plural marriage. On January 8, 1844, Law learned he had been dropped from the First Presidency. Attempts at reconciliation failed, and he was excommunicated in April.” Ch. 29

The Joseph Smith Papers, “Historical Introduction,” to Zion High Council and Bishopric Minutes, 12 April 1838, Far West, Caldwell Co., MO, The Joseph Smith Papers

“In addition, as noted in his trial, Cowdery had insinuated since 1837 that JS was guilty of adultery. Nevertheless, in a 3 September 1837 conference of the church in Kirtland, Cowdery was accepted as one of the “assistant Councilors” in the First Presidency. The next day, JS wrote to church leaders in Missouri, warning them that although Cowdery had been “chosen as one of the Presidents or councilors” in the First Presidency, he had “been in transgression” and that if he did not “humble himself & magnify his calling . . . the church will soon be under the necessaty of raising their hands against him.”

“As a result of the testimony JS and others offered, Partridge and his counselors decided to excommunicate Cowdery; the high council concurred.”

Doctrine and Covenants (1835), Section 101, Statement on Marriage, circa August 1835

“Marriage should be celebrated with prayer and thanksgiving; and at the solemnization, the persons to be married, standing together, the man on the right, and the woman on the left, shall be addressed, by the person officiating, as he shall be directed by the holy Spirit; and if there be no legal objections, he shall say, calling each by their names: ‘You both mutually agree to be each other’s companion, husband and wife, observing the legal rights belonging to this condition; that is, keeping yourselves wholly for each other, and from all others, during your lives.’ And when they have answered ‘Yes,’ he shall pronounce them ‘husband and wife’ in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, and by virtue of the laws of the country and authority vested in him: ‘may God add his blessings and keep you to fulfill your covenants from henceforth and forever. Amen.’”

“Inasmuch as this church of Christ has been reproached with the crime of fornication, and polygamy: we declare that we believe, that one man should have one wife; and one woman, but one husband, except in case of death, when either is at liberty to marry again.”

Gospel Topics Essays, “Plural Marriage in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints,” Church History, Gospel Library, Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints

“In Nauvoo, Joseph Smith married additional wives and authorized other Latter-day Saints to practice plural marriage. The practice was introduced carefully and incrementally, and participants vowed to keep their participation confidential, anticipating a time when husbands and wives could acknowledge one another publicly.”

Gospel Topics Essays, “Plural Marriage in Kirtland and Nauvoo,” Church History, Gospel Library, Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints

“Many details about the early practice of plural marriage are unknown. Plural marriage was introduced among the early Saints incrementally, and participants were asked to keep their actions confidential. They did not discuss their experiences publicly or in writing until after the Latter-day Saints had moved to Utah and Church leaders had publicly acknowledged the practice.”

“Joseph knew the practice of plural marriage would stir up public ire. After receiving the commandment, he taught a few associates about it, but he did not spread this teaching widely in the 1830s.”

“Participants in these early plural marriages pledged to keep their involvement confidential.”

“The rumors prompted members and leaders to issue carefully worded denials that denounced spiritual wifery and polygamy but were silent about what Joseph Smith and others saw as divinely mandated “celestial” plural marriage. The statements emphasized that the Church practiced no marital law other than monogamy while implicitly leaving open the possibility that individuals, under direction of God’s living prophet, might do so.”

“In the denials, “polygamy” was understood to mean the marriage of one man to more than one woman but without Church sanction.” Footnote 22

Gospel Topics Essays, “The Manifesto and the End of Plural Marriage,” Church History, Gospel Library, Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints

“Church leaders advised plural husbands to live openly with only one of their wives, and advocated that plural marriage not be taught publicly.”

Gospel Topics Essays, “The Manifesto and the End of Plural Marriage,” Church History, Gospel Library, Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints

“At first, the performance of new plural marriages after the Manifesto was largely unknown to people outside the Church. When discovered, these marriages troubled many Americans, especially after President George Q. Cannon stated in an 1899 interview with the New York Herald that new plural marriages might be performed in Canada and Mexico. After the election of B. H. Roberts, a member of the First Council of the Seventy, to the U.S. Congress, it became known that Roberts had three wives, one of whom he married after the Manifesto. A petition of 7 million signatures demanded that Roberts not be seated. Congress complied, and Roberts was barred from his office.”

“Church President Lorenzo Snow issued a statement clarifying that new plural marriages had ceased in the Church and that the Manifesto extended to all parts of the world, counsel he repeated in private. Even so, a small number of new plural marriages continued to be performed.”

“President Smith carefully distinguished between actions sanctioned by the Church and ratified in Church councils and conferences, and the actions undertaken by individual members of the Church. “There never has been a plural marriage by the consent or sanction or knowledge or approval of the church since the manifesto,” he testified.”

Saints: The Story of the Church of Jesus Christ in the Latter Days, Volume 1, The Standard of Truth, 1815–1846, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Salt Lake City, Utah 

“He could foresee trials coming from plural marriage, and he wanted to turn from it. But the angel urged him to proceed, instructing him to share the revelation only with people whose integrity was unwavering. The angel also charged Joseph to keep it private until the Lord saw fit to make the practice public through His chosen servants.” Ch. 25

“The years following Joseph’s departure from Kirtland had been turbulent, and he had not introduced the Saints to plural marriage then. But the situation was different in Nauvoo, where the Saints had finally found a measure of safety and stability.” Ch. 36

“Bates was present during Joseph’s discussions with Louisa about plural marriage. “In revealing this to you, I have placed my life in your hands,” Joseph told him. “Do not in an evil hour betray me to my enemies.” Ch. 36

“Yet up to now no women and only a handful of men had received the endowment, and many Saints were still unaware of the eternal marriage covenant. Joseph, however, continued to handle the matter privately.” Ch. 40

“His claim that Joseph had married multiple women was correct. Unaware of this fact, Hyrum Smith and William Law fiercely denied all of John’s statements and unwittingly condemned the actions of Saints who obediently practiced plural marriage. This made Brigham Young uneasy. As long as members of the First Presidency remained unaware of the practice, he believed, their condemnation of polygamy could prevent Joseph and others from fulfilling the commandment of the Lord.” Ch. 40

“In choosing to be sealed to Joseph, Emily trusted in her witness that she was acting in obedience to the Lord’s commandment. She and her sister Eliza continued to keep their marriages private.” Ch. 40

“I have mistrusted for a long time that Joseph had received a revelation that a man should have more than one wife,” Hyrum said.

“I will tell you about this,” Brigham said, “if you will swear with an uplifted hand before God that you will never say another word against Joseph and his doings and the doctrines he is preaching.” 

Hyrum stood up. “I will do it with all my heart,” he said. “I want to know the truth.” Ch. 40

“They and the others who practiced plural marriage never referred to it as polygamy, which they considered a worldly term, not a priesthood ordinance. When Joseph or someone else condemned “polygamy” or “spiritual wifery” in public, those who practiced plural marriage understood that they were not referring to their covenant relationships.” Ch. 40

Richard Lyman Bushman, Joseph Smith: Rough Stone Rolling, Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group

“In approaching Joseph Bates Noble in the spring of 1841 about marrying his wife’s sister, Louisa Beaman, Joseph asked Bates, a man he had known since Kirtland, 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.” Ch. 25

“To disguise the wedding, Joseph asked Noble to perform the ceremony in a grove near Main Street with Louisa in man’s clothing.” Ch. 25

“Plural marriage was practiced secretly in 1843 and would be until well after Joseph’s death. The doctrine was not publicly announced until 1852.” Ch. 27

“To safeguard his burdensome secret, Joseph publicly and repeatedly denied he was advocating polygamy.” Ch. 27

“To admit he was practicing polygamy would have authorized behavior he condemned. He taught his complicated religious version privately to trusted individuals and small groups, telling the Twelve Apostles about the doctrine in the summer of 1841 after their return from Great Britain, and others one by one.” Ch. 27

“A notice in the February 1, 1844, issue of the Times and Seasons announced: As we have lately been credibly informed, that an Elder of the Church of Jesus Christ, of Latter-day Saints, by the name of Hiram Brown, has been preaching Polygamy, and other false and corrupt doctrines, in the county of Lapeer, state of Michigan. This is to notify him and the Church in general, that he has been cut off from the church, for his iniquity. Joseph and Hyrum taught against the doctrine from the pulpit. Joseph insisted “the Church had not received any license from him to commit adultery fornication or any such thing but to the contrary if any man Commit adultery He Could not receive the Ce[le]stial kingdom of God.” Ch. 29

“At the Sunday meeting on May 26, before the entire congregation, he answered the specific charges about spiritual wives and malfeasance levied against him in the Nauvoo municipal court. His main point as always was that he was not committing adultery, nor was he practicing “spiritual wifeism,” another name for polygamy.” Ch. 29

Joseph Smith, History of the Church, 26 May 26 1844, p. 441

“What a thing it is for a man to be accused of committing adultery, and having seven wives, when I can only find one.”

Joseph Smith to Sarah Pratt, Article: Sarah M. Pratt, Richard A. Van Wagoner, Dialogue, Vol. 19, No. 2, p. 72

"I hope you will not expose me, for if I suffer, all must suffer; so do not expose me. Will you promise me that you will not do it?"

"If you should tell, I will ruin your reputation, remember that."

Joseph Smith, “History, 1838–1856, volume C-1 Addenda,” p. 20, The Joseph Smith Papers

“I charged the Saints not to follow the example of the adversary in accusing the brethren, and said “if you do not accuse each other God will not accuse you. If you have no accuser you will enter heaven; and if you will follow the Revelations and instructions which God gives you through me, I will take you into heaven as my back load. If you will not accuse me, I will not accuse you. If you will throw a cloak of charity over my sins, I will over yours— for charity covereth a multitude of sins. What many people call sin is not sin; I do many things to break down superstition, and I will break it down.”

George W. Robinson, Nauvoo, IL, to James Arlington Bennet, 27 July 1842, in Bennett, History of the Saints, 246

“She left him with disgust, and came home and told her father of the transaction; upon which Smith was sent for. He came. She told the tale in the presence of all the family, and to Smith's face. I was present. Smith attempted to deny it at first, and face her down with the lie; but she told the facts with so much earnestness, and the fact of a letter being present, which he had caused to be written to her, on the same subject, the day after the attempt made on her virtue, breathing the same spirit, and which he had fondly hoped was destroyed, --all came with such force that he could not withstand the testimony; and he then and there acknowledged that every word of Miss Higdon's testimony was true.”

Emily Dow Partridge, “Incidents in the Life of a Mormon Girl,” undated manuscript, p. 186, Call Number MS 5220, Church History Library

“He came into the room where I was one day, when I was in the room alone, and asked me if I could keep a secret. I was about eighteen years of age then I think, — at any rate, I was quite young. He asked me if I could keep a secret, and I told him I thought I could, and then he told me that he would sometime, if he had an opportunity, — he would tell me something that would be for my benefit, if I would not betray him, and I told him I wouldn’t.”

“Then he said that he had intended to tell me something, but he had no opportunity to do so, and so he would write me a letter, if I would agree to burn it as soon as I read it, and with that I looked frightened, for I thought there was something about it that was not just right.”

Saints: The Story of the Church of Jesus Christ in the Latter Days, Volume 1, The Standard of Truth, 1815–1846, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Salt Lake City, Utah 

“The previous summer, less than a week after the apostles returning from England arrived in Nauvoo, he had taught the principle to a few of them and instructed them to obey it as a commandment of the Lord.” Ch. 37

“Joseph taught the Johnsons that a woman and man could be sealed together for eternity in the new and everlasting covenant of marriage. Only by entering into this covenant, which was an order of the priesthood, he taught, could they obtain exaltation.” Ch. 40

Richard Lyman Bushman, Joseph Smith: Rough Stone Rolling, Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group

“Joseph had made the acceptance of plural marriage in principle a prerequisite to couples being sealed for eternity.” Ch. 29

Doctrine and Covenants 132:3-6, 27, 32-33

“Therefore, prepare thy heart to receive and obey the instructions which I am about to give unto you; for all those who have this law revealed unto them must obey the same.

For behold, I reveal unto you a new and an everlasting covenant; and if ye abide not that covenant, then are ye damned; for no one can reject this covenant and be permitted to enter into my glory.

For all who will have a blessing at my hands shall abide the law which was appointed for that blessing, and the conditions thereof, as were instituted from before the foundation of the world.

And as pertaining to the new and everlasting covenant, it was instituted for the fulness of my glory; and he that receiveth a fulness thereof must and shall abide the law, or he shall be damned, saith the Lord God.”

“After ye have received my new and everlasting covenant, saith the Lord God; and he that abideth not this law can in nowise enter into my glory, but shall be damned, saith the Lord.”

“Go ye, therefore, and do the works of Abraham; enter ye into my law and ye shall be saved.

But if ye enter not into my law ye cannot receive the promise of my Father, which he made unto Abraham.”

First Presidency, “Reed Smoot Case,” 1891, Volume 1, p. 18

“We formerly taught to our people that polygamy or celestial marriage as commanded by God through Joseph Smith was right; that it was a necessity to man's highest exaltation in the life to come. That doctrine was publicly promulgated by our President, the late Brigham Young, forty years ago, and was steadily taught and impressed upon the Latter-day Saints.”

William Clayton, “William Clayton’s Testimony,” 16 February 1874, in Andrew Jenson, Historical Record, Volume 6, p. 226

“From him [Joseph Smith] I learned that the doctrine of plural and celestial marriage is the most holy and important doctrine ever revealed to man on the earth, and that without obedience to that principle no man can ever attain to the fulness of exaltation in celestial glory.”

Thomas Grover, “Thomas Grover’s Testimony,” 10 January 1885, in Andrew Jenson, Historical Record, Volume 6, p. 227

“Brother Hyrum was called upon to read the revelation. He did so, and after the reading said, ‘Now, you that believe this revelation and go forth and obey the same shall be saved, and you that reject it shall be damned.’”

Orson Pratt, “Discourse by Elder Orson Pratt, Delivered at the Semi-Annual Conference of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, in the new Tabernacle, Salt Lake City,” 7 October 1874, Journal of Discourses, Volume 17, p. 215-29

“I want to say a few words in regards to the revelation on polygamy. God has told us Latter-day Saints that we shall be condemned if we do not enter into that principle; and yet I have heard now and then (I am very glad to say that only a few of such instances have come under my notice,) a brother or a sister say, “I am a Latter-day Saint, but I do not believe in polygamy,” Oh, what an absurd expression! What an absurd idea! A person might as well say, “I am a follower of the Lord Jesus Christ, but I do not believe in him.” One is just as consistent as the other. Or a person might as well say, “I believe in Mormonism, and in the revelations given through Joseph Smith, but I am not a  polygamist, and do not believe in polygamy.” What an absurdity! If one portion of the doctrines of the Church is true, the whole of them are true. If the doctrine of polygamy, as revealed to the Latter-day Saints, is not true, I would not give a fig for all your other revelations that came through Joseph Smith the Prophet.”

“The Lord has said, that those who reject this principle reject their salvation, they shall be damned, saith the Lord; those to whom I reveal this law and they do not receive it, shall be damned. Now here comes our consciences. We have either to renounce Mormonism, Joseph Smith, Book of Mormon, Book of Covenants, and the whole system of things as taught by the Latter-day Saints, and say that God has not raised up a Church, has not raised up a prophet, has not begun to restore all things as he promised, we are obliged to do this, or else to say, with all our hearts, “Yes, we are polygamists, we believe in the principle, and we are willing to practice it, because God has spoken from the heavens.”

“Now I want to prophecy a little. It is not very often that I prophecy, though I was commanded to do som when I was a boy. I want to prophecy that all men and women who oppose the revelation which God has given in relation to polygamy will find themselves in darkness; the Spirit of God will withdraw from them from the very moment of their opposition to that principle, until they will finally go down to hell and be damned, if they do not repent.”

“By and by some Christian will come along, and he will look at these gates and admire their beauty, for each gate is to be constructed of one immense splendid pearl. The gates are closed fast and very high, and while admiring their beauty he observes the inscriptions upon them. Being a Christian he of course expects to enter, but looking at the gates, he finds the name of Reuben inscribed on one of them. Says he - “Reuben was a polygamous child; I will go on to the next, and see if there is the name of a monogamous child anywhere.” He accordingly visits all the twelve gates, three on each side of the city, and finds inscribed on each gate the name of a polygamous child, and this because it is the greatest honor that could be conferred on their father Jacob, who is in their midst, for he is to sit down with all the honest and upright in heart who come from all nations to partake of the blessings of that kingdom.

“But,” says this Christian, “I really do not like this; I see this is a polygamous city. I wonder if there is not some other place for me! I do not like the company of polygamists. They were hated very badly back yonder. Congress hated them, the President hated them, the cabinet hated them, the Priests hated them, and everybody hated them, and I engendered the same hatred, and I have not got rid of it yet. I wonder if there is not some other place for me?” Oh yes, there is another place for you. Without the gates of the city there are dogs, sorcerers, whoremongers, adulterers and whosoever loveth and maketh a lie. Now take your choice, Amen.”

Brigham Young, Journal of Discourses, Volume 11, p. 269

“The only men who become Gods, even the Sons of God, are those who enter into polygamy. Others attain unto a glory and may even be permitted to come into the presence of the Father and the Son; but they cannot reign as kings in glory.”

Brigham Young, Journal of Discourses, Volume 16, p. 166-167

“Now, when a man in this Church says, `I don't want but one wife; I will live my religion with one,' he will perhaps be saved in the celestial kingdom, but when he gets there, he will not find himself in possession of any wife at all! He has had a talent that he has hid up. He will come forth and say, `Here is that which thou gavest me; I have not wasted it and here is the one talent,' and he will not enjoy it, but it will be taken from him and given to those who have improved the talent they received, and he will find himself without ANY wife, and he will remain single forever and ever.

But if the woman is determined not to enter into a plural marriage, that woman when she comes forth will have the privilege of living in single blessedness through all eternity. Well, that is very good, a very nice place to be a minister to the wants of others.

I recollect a sister conversing with Joseph Smith on this subject. She told him:  “Now, don’t talk to me; when I get into the celestial kingdom, if I ever do get there, I shall request the privilege of being a ministering angel; that is the labor that I wish to perform. I don’t want any companion in that world; and if the Lord will make me a ministering angel, it is all I want.” Joseph said, “Sister, you talk very foolishly, you do not know what you will want.” He then said to me: “Here, brother Brigham, you seal this lady to me.” I sealed her to him. This was my own sister according to the flesh. Now, sisters, do not say, “I do not want a husband when I get up in the resurrection.” You do not know what you will want. I tell this so that you can get the idea. If in the resurrection you really want to be single and alone, and live so forever and ever, and be made servants, while others receive the highest order of intelligence and are bringing worlds into existence, you can have the privilege.”

“This means obeying the law of Abraham and Sarah as set forth in the Holy Scriptures (D&C Sections 131 and 132, especially verse 34). Without compliance to this law upon which eternal marriage is predicated, you will get about as far as anyone married outside the temple.”

John Taylor, “John Taylor revelation,” 1886 September 27, Call Number MS 34928, Church History Catalog

“As I have heretofore said by my servant Joseph, all those who would enter into my glory must and shall obey my law, and have I not commanded men that if they were Abraham’s seed and would enter into my glory they must do the works of Abraham? I have not revoked this law, nor will I, for it is everlasting and those who will enter into my glory must obey the conditions thereof, even so. Amen.”

John Taylor, in B.H. Roberts, “The Life of John Taylor,” p. 100

“Joseph Smith told the Twelve that if this law was not practiced, if they would not enter into this covenant, then the Kingdom of God could not go one step further. Now, we did not feel like preventing the Kingdom of God from going forward. We professed to be the Apostles of the Lord, and did not feel like putting ourselves in a position to retard the progress of the Kingdom of God. The revelation says that ‘All those who have this law revealed unto them must obey the same.’ Now, that is not my word. I did not make it. It was the Prophet of God who revealed that to us in Nauvoo, and I bear witness of this solemn fact before God, that He did reveal this sacred principle to me and others of the Twelve, and in this revelation it is stated that it is the will and law of God that ‘all those who have this law revealed unto them must obey the same.”

John Taylor, Journal of Discourses, Volume 11, p. 221-222

“When this commandment was given, it was so far religious, and so far binding upon the Elders of this Church, that it was told them if they were not prepared to enter into it, and to stem the torrent of opposition that would come in consequence of it, the keys of the kingdom would be taken from them and given to others.”

Lorenzo Snow, Journal of Discourses, Volume 18, p. 376

“The principles of Plural Marriage were revealed for the benefit and exaltation of the children of men, but how much unhappiness has arisen through failure, on the part of some who have contracted this order of marriage, to conform to the laws that govern it! But does it arise through any defect in the order of the marriage system? O no; but from ignorance and the folly and wickedness of those individuals who enter into it, who abuse, rather than righteously obey, it.”

Joseph F. Smith, Journal of Discourses, Volume 20, pp. 26-31

“Some people have supposed that the doctrine of plural marriage was a sort of superfluity, or non-essential, to the salvation or exaltation of mankind. In other words, some of the Saints have said, and believe, that a man with one wife, sealed to him by the authority of the Priesthood for time and eternity, will receive an exaltation as great and glorious, if he is faithful, as he possibly could with more than one. I want here to enter my solemn protest against this idea, for I know it is false.”

“Therefore, whoever has imagined that he could obtain the fullness of the blessings pertaining to this celestial law, by complying with only a portion of its conditions, has deceived himself. He cannot do it.”

“Man may receive great reward, exaltation and glory by entering into the bond of the new and everlasting covenant, if he continue faithful according to his knowledge, but he cannot receive the fullness of the blessings unless he fulfills the law, any more than he can claim the gift of the Holy Ghost after he is baptized without the laying on of hands by the proper authority, or the remission of sins without baptism, though he may repent in sack-cloth and ashes.”

“But if he remain faithful with only the one wife, observing the conditions of so much of the law as pertains to the eternity of the marriage covenant, he will receive his reward, but the benefits, blessings and power appertaining to the second or more faithful and fuller observance of the law, he never will receive, for he cannot. As before stated no man can obtain the benefits of one law by the observance of another, however faithful he may be in that which he does, nor can he secure to himself the fullness of any blessing without he fulfills the law upon which it is predicated, but he will receive the benefit of the law he obeys. This is just and righteous.”

"I understand the law of celestial marriage to mean that every man in this church, who has the ability to obey and practice it in righteousness and will not, shall be damned, I say I understand it to mean this and nothing less, and I testify in the name of Jesus that it does mean that.”

Saints: The Story of the Church of Jesus Christ in the Latter Days, Volume 1, The Standard of Truth, 1815–1846, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Salt Lake City, Utah 

“Around the fall of 1840, Joseph had begun speaking with twenty-five-year-old Louisa Beaman about the practice. Louisa’s family had been among the first to believe in the Book of Mormon and embrace the restored gospel. After her parents died, she had moved in with her older sister Mary and her sister’s husband, Bates Noble, a veteran of the Camp of Israel.” Ch. 36

Richard Lyman Bushman, Joseph Smith: Rough Stone Rolling, Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group

“In an 1842 affidavit, Fanny Brewer, who left the Church during the troubles of 1837 and 1838, referred to “much excitement against the Prophet” in those years. There were rumors of “an unlawful intercourse between himself and a young orphan girl residing in his family and under his protection.” Ch. 18, footnote 11

“In October 1841, Joseph married Zina Huntington.” Ch. 25

“Joseph and Emma had cared for Zina and her siblings for three months in 1839–40 after their mother died.” Ch. 25

“One young woman, Lucy Walker, was struck with horror on hearing the doctrine. She was fifteen when the Prophet invited her to live in his house. Her parents had joined the Mormons in 1832 in Vermont and later migrated to New York, to Missouri, and then on to Illinois, where Lucy’s mother died of malarial fevers. Joseph told Lucy’s father he would look after the children while John Walker went on a mission.” Ch. 27

Lucy Walker, “Autobiography,” in Lyman Omer Littlefield, Reminiscences of Latter-day Saints, Logan, Utah, The Utah Journal Co., 1888

“Calling her children arround her bed She bore a faithful testimony as to her convictions that Joseph Smith was a prophet of God; and that through him the Gospel of the Son of God had been restored in its fullness … She ernestly exorted her children to never depart from the truth, but live so that she might meet them in that world where there will be no more Suffering no more tears of anguish at pronouncing the Sad word good-bye. She then closed her eyes and her sweet spirit passed away, leaveing a heavenly smile on her dear face. It did not Seem to us possible that She was dead, but only in a sweet Sleep. When at length we were forced to beleive she would not speak to us again we were in the depths of despair. Ten motherless children!–And such a mother! The youngest not yet two years old.”

“The Prophet came to the rescue. He Said, if you remain here Bro. Walker, you will soon follow your wife. You must have a change of scene, a change of climate. You have Just such a family as I could love. My house shall be their home. For the present, I would advise you to sell your Effects, place the little ones with kind friends, and the four Eldest shall come to my house and [be] received and treated as my own children, and if I find the little ones are not content, or not treated right, I will bring them home and keep them untill you return.”

“I rung my hands in the agony of dispair at the thought of being broken up as a family, and being sepparated from the little ones … However my father sought to comfort us by saying two years would soon pass by when with renewed health he hoped to return and make us a home where we might be together again.”

“The Prophet and his wife introduced us as their Sons and daughters.”

“In the year 1842 President Joseph Smith sought an interview with me, and said, ‘I have a message for you, I have been commanded of God to take another wife, and you are the woman.’ My astonishment knew no bounds. This announcement was indeed a thunderbolt to me.”

“Why–Why Should I be chosen from among thy daughters, Father, I am only a child in years and experience. No mother to council; no father near to tell me what to do, in this trying hour. Oh let this bitter cup pass. And thus I prayed in the agony of my soul.”

The Joseph Smith Papers, “Custer, Fanny Alger,” Interim Content, People, The Joseph Smith Papers

“Lived with JS’s family, ca. 1833. Identified in some sources as a plural wife of JS.”

The Joseph Smith Papers, “Babbit, Maria Lawrence,” Interim Content, People, The Joseph Smith Papers

“Biography

18 Dec. 1823–1847. Born in Pickering, York Co. (later in Ontario), Upper Canada. Daughter of Edward Lawrence and Margaret. Moved with family to Lima, Adams Co., Illinois, 1838. Father died, between 5 Nov. and 23 Dec. 1839. Resided in Quincy, Adams Co., 1840. JS became legal guardian, 4 Jan. 1841. Resided with mother and stepfather in Nauvoo, Hancock Co., Illinois, Third Ward, ca. spring 1842. Began living with JS’s family, ca. 1843. Identified in some sources as a plural wife of JS, sealed ca. May 1843.”

The Joseph Smith Papers, “Mount, Sarah Lawrence,” Interim Content, People, The Joseph Smith Papers

“13 May 1826–28 Nov. 1872. Seamstress. Born in Pickering, York Co. (later in Ontario), Upper Canada. Daughter of Edward Lawrence and Margaret. Moved with family to Lima, Adams Co., Illinois, 1838. Father died, between 5 Nov. and 23 Dec. 1839. Resided in Quincy, Adams Co., 1840. JS became legal guardian, 4 Jan. 1841. Began living with JS’s family, ca. 1843. Identified in some sources as a plural wife of JS, sealed ca. May 1843.”

The Joseph Smith Papers, “Willis, Malissa (Melissa) Lott,” Interim Content, People, The Joseph Smith Papers

“Moved in with JS’s family in Nauvoo, Hancock Co., Illinois, and helped Emma Smith with housework, 1842. Plural wife of JS, sealed on 20 Sept. 1843.”

Heber C. Kimball, Journal of Discourses, Volume 6, p. 256

“Build up the kingdom of God, and gather the sheep into the fold. You are sent out as shepherds to gather the sheep together; and remember that they are not your sheep: they belong to Him that sends you. Then do not make a choice of any of those sheep; do not make selections before they are brought home and put into the fold. You understand that. Amen.”

Heber C. Kimball, “From Utah,; Polygamy and its Fruits,” The New York Times, 17 April 1860, also in Stanley P. Hirshon, “The Lion of the Lord: A Biography of Brigham Young” 

“Brethren, I want you to understand that it is not to be as it has been heretofore. The brother Missionaries have been in the habit of picking out the prettiest women for themselves before they get here, and bringing on the ugly ones for us; hereafter you have to bring them all here before taking any of them, and let us all have a fair shake.”

Heber C. Kimball, Journal of Discourses, Volume 4, p. 209

“He will say to us, “Come along, my boys, we will give you a good suit of clothes. Where are your wives?” “They are back yonder; they would not follow us.” “Never mind,” says Joseph, “here are thousands, have all you want.”

Gospel Topics Essays, “The Manifesto and the End of Plural Marriage,” Church History, Gospel Library, Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints

“Church leaders prayerfully sought guidance from the Lord and struggled to understand what they should do. Both President John Taylor and President Wilford Woodruff felt the Lord directing them to stay the course and not renounce plural marriage.”

Brigham Young, “Mosiah Hancock Journal,” Spring 1863

“The powers of hell will do their utmost to get this people to give up that holy law which God designs to maintain.” 

Joseph Smith, “Contributor,” Volume 5, p. 259

“The same God that has thus far dictated me and directed me and strengthened me in this work, gave me this revelation and commandment on celestial and plural marriage, and the same God commanded me to obey it. He said to me that unless I accepted it, and introduced it, and practiced it, I, together with my people would be damned and cut off from this time henceforth. We have got to observe it. It is an eternal principle and was given by way of commandment and not by way of instruction.”

Joseph Smith, “History, 1838–1856, volume C-1,” 2 November 1838 – 31 July 1842, addenda, p. 17, The Joseph Smith Papers

“The ordinances must be kept in the very way God has appointed, otherwise their Priesthood will prove a cursing instead of a blessing.”

John Taylor, “Millennial Star,” 9 November 1855, Volume 47, p. 708, also in Journal of Discourses, Volume 23, p. 240-41 and Volume 26, p. 151-53

“It is an eternal part of our religion, and we will never relinquish it – We cannot withdraw or renounce it – He has promised to maintain it.”

John Taylor, 7 June 1874, Journal of Discourses Volume 25, p. 310

“If God has introduced something for our glory and exaltation, we are not going to have that kicked over by an improper influence, either inside or outside of the Church of the living God.”

John Taylor, “John Taylor revelation,” 1886 September 27, Call Number MS 34928, Church History Catalog

“My son John, You have asked me concerning the New and Everlasting Covenant and how far it is binding upon my people.

Thus saith the Lord, All commandments that I give must be obeyed by those calling themselves by my name, unless they are revoked by me or by my authority. And how can I revoke an everlasting covenant? For I, the Lord, am everlasting and my everlasting covenants cannot be abrogated nor done away with; but they stand for ever. Have I not given my word in great plainness on this subject? Yet have not great numbers of my people been negligent in the observance of my law and the keeping of my commandments, and yet have I borne with them these many years? And this because of their weakness, because of the perilous times. And furthermore it is now pleasing to me that men should use their free agency in regard to these matters; Nevertheless, I, the Lord, do not change and my word and my covenants and my law do not, and as I have heretofore said by my servant Joseph, all those who would enter into my glory must and shall obey my law, and have I not commanded men that if they were Abraham’s seed and would enter into my glory they must do the works of Abraham? I have not revoked this law, nor will I, for it is everlasting and those who will enter into my glory must obey the conditions thereof, even so. Amen.”

“[Revelation about the new and everlasting covenant as written by John Taylor. File includes John Taylor's 1886 handwritten copy and a handwritten copy by a Taylor family member. Also includes an 18 July 1933 memorandum from J. Reuben Clark Jr. about the provenance of the copy in John Taylor's handwriting, a 1909 typescript copy of the revelation by Joseph Fielding Smith, and additional typescript copies.]”

Lorin C. Woolley, “Affidavit,” 1929

“When President Taylor came out of his room about eight o'clock of the morning of September 27, 1886, we could scarcely look at him on account of the brightness of his personage.” He stated, “Brethren, I have had a very pleasant conversation all night with Brother Joseph.” (Joseph Smith) I said, “Boss, who is the man that was there until midnight?” He asked, “What do you know about it, Lorin?” I told him all about my experience. He said, “Brother Lorin, that was your Lord.”

“I was called to offer the benediction. I think my father, John W. Woolley, offered the opening prayer. There were present, at this meeting, in addition to President Taylor, George Q. Cannon, L. John Nuttall, John W. Woolley, Samuel Bateman, Charles H. Wilkins, Charles Birrell, Daniel R. Bateman, Bishop Samuel Sedden, George Earl, my mother, Julia E. Woolley, my sister, Amy Woolley, and myself. The meeting was held from about nine o'clock in the morning until five in the afternoon without intermission, being about eight hours in all.”

“He then put each person under covenant that he or she would defend the principle of Celestial or Plural Marriage, and that they would consecrate their lives, liberty and property to this end, and that they personally would sustain and uphold that principle.”

“After that he talked for about an hour and then sat down and wrote the revelation which was given him by the Lord upon the question of Plural Marriage.”

“Then he talked to us for some time, and said, “Some of you will be handled and ostracized and cast out from the Church by your brethren because of your faithfulness and integrity to this principle, and some of you may have to surrender your lives because of the same, but woe, woe, unto those who shall bring these troubles upon you.”

“He then set us apart and placed us under covenant that while we lived we would see to it that no year passed by without children being born in the principle of plural marriage. We were given authority to ordain others if necessary to carry this work on; and they in turn to be given authority to ordain others when necessary, under the direction of the worthy senior (by ordination), so that there should be no cessation in the work.”

“President Taylor said that the time would come when many of the Saints would apostatize because of this principle.“

“He also said the day will come when a document similar to that (Manifesto) then under consideration would be adopted by the Church, following which, “apostasy and whoredom would be rampant in the Church.”

Daniel R. Bateman, “Sworn Statement,” 4 May 1934

“I was privileged to be at the meeting of September 27, 1886, spoken of by Brother Woolley, I myself acting as one of the guards for the brethren during those exciting times. The proceedings of the meeting as related by Brother Woolley are correct in every detail.”

 Wilford Woodruff, “Journal,” 26 January 1880

“And I say again, wo unto that Nation or house or people who seek to hinder my People from obeying the Patriarchal Law of Abraham.”

Wilford Woodruff, “Minutes of the Quorum of Twelve Apostles,” 12 December 1888

“The Lord will never give a revelation to abandon Plural Marriage.”

Wilford Woodruff, in “Heber J. Grant Journal,” 17 May 1888

“We won't quit practicing plural marriage until Christ shall come.”

Wilford Woodruff, “Manti Temple Dedication,” 17 May, 1888

“We are not going to stop the practice of plural marriage until the coming of the Son of Man.”

Heber C. Kimball, Journal of Discourses, Volume 3, Discourse 17

“The principle of plurality of wives never will be done away.”

Heber C. Kimball, Journal of Discourses, Volume 4, p. 108

“Many of this people have broken their covenants by finding fault with the Plurality of Wives and trying to sink it out of existence.”

Heber C. Kimball, “Correspondence,” Millennial Star, Saturday, 24 March 1866

“The Government of the United States are designing to do away with polygamy, or, to disqualify us, or make us a nonentity or a nuisance, and then send an army here to remove it. Is is polygamy which they call the “twin relic of barbarism,” This is the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, and the kingdom of God that is set up, that Daniel saw in a vision, which was to be established in the latter days, and that never should be thrown down, but was to be diverse from all other kingdoms, and should stand forever, and it will throw down and destroy every thing that comes in contact with it. Plurality is a law which God established for his elect before the world was formed, for a continuation of seeds forever. It would be as easy for the United States to build a tower to remove the sun, as to remove polygamy, or the Church and Kingdom of God.”

Marriner W. Merrill, “Rudger Clawson Diary,” 11 July 1899

“The time would never come when children of Polygamous parents would cease to be born in the Church.” 

Abraham O. Woodruff, “Quarterly Conference in Colonia Juarez,” 18-19 November 1900

“No year will ever pass, ... from now until the coming of the Savior, when children will not be born in Plural Marriage. And I make this prophecy in the name of Jesus Christ.” 

Lorenzo Snow, “History of Utah,” Orson F. Whitney, 1879

“Though I go to prison, God will not change His law of Celestial Marriage.”

Gospel Topics Essays, “The Manifesto and the End of Plural Marriage,” Church History, Gospel Library, Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints

“In the United States, most people thought that the practice was morally wrong. These objections led to legislative efforts to end polygamy. Beginning in 1862, the U.S. government passed a series of laws designed to force Latter-day Saints to relinquish plural marriage.”

“In Reynolds v. United States (1879), the Supreme Court ruled against the Latter-day Saints: religious belief was protected by law, religious practice was not. According to the court’s opinion, marriage was a civil contract regulated by the state. Monogamy was the only form of marriage sanctioned by the state. “Polygamy,” the court explained, “has always been odious among the northern and western nations of Europe.”

“Confronted with these contradictory allegiances, Church leaders encouraged members to obey God rather than man. Many Latter-day Saints embarked on a course of civil disobedience during the 1880s by continuing to live in plural marriage and to enter into new plural marriages. The federal government responded by enacting ever more punishing legislation.”

“In 1882, the U.S. Congress passed the Edmunds Act, which made unlawful cohabitation (interpreted as a man living with more than one wife) punishable by six months of imprisonment and a $300 fine. In 1887 Congress passed the Edmunds-Tucker Act to punish the Church itself, not just its members. The act dissolved the corporation of the Church and directed that all Church property over $50,000 be forfeited to the government.”

“Polygamous men went into hiding, sometimes for years at a time, moving from house to house and staying with friends and relatives. Others assumed aliases and moved to out-of-the-way places in southern Utah, Arizona, Canada, and Mexico. Many escaped prosecution; many others, when arrested, pled guilty and submitted to fines and imprisonment.”

“The departure of husbands left wives and children to tend farms and businesses, causing incomes to drop and economic recession to set in. The campaign also strained families.”

“As federal pressure intensified, many essential aspects of Church government were severely curtailed, and civil disobedience looked increasingly untenable as a long-term solution. Between 1885 and 1889, most Apostles and stake presidents were in hiding or in prison. After federal agents began seizing Church property in accordance with the Edmunds-Tucker legislation, management of the Church became more difficult.”

“Church leaders began to investigate alternative responses. In 1885 and 1886 they established settlements in Mexico and Canada, outside the jurisdiction of U.S. law, where polygamous families could live peaceably.”

“President Woodruff saw that the Church’s temples and its ordinances were now at risk. Burdened by this threat, he prayed intensely over the matter. “The Lord showed me by vision and revelation,” he later said, “exactly what would take place if we did not stop this practice,” referring to plural marriage. “All the temples [would] go out of our hands.” God “has told me exactly what to do, and what the result would be if we did not do it.”

“On September 25, 1890, President Woodruff wrote in his journal that he was “under the necessity of acting for the Temporal Salvation of the Church.” He stated, “After Praying to the Lord & feeling inspired by his spirit I have issued … [a] Proclamation.” This proclamation, now published in the Doctrine and Covenants as Official Declaration 1, was released to the public on September 25 and became known as the Manifesto.”

Doctrine and Covenants, Official Declaration 1

“We are not teaching polygamy or plural marriage, nor permitting any person to enter into its practice, and I deny that either forty or any other number of plural marriages have during that period been solemnized in our Temples or in any other place in the Territory.”

“Inasmuch as laws have been enacted by Congress forbidding plural marriages, which laws have been pronounced constitutional by the court of last resort, I hereby declare my intention to submit to those laws, and to use my influence with the members of the Church over which I preside to have them do likewise.

There is nothing in my teachings to the Church or in those of my associates, during the time specified, which can be reasonably construed to inculcate or encourage polygamy; and when any Elder of the Church has used language which appeared to convey any such teaching, he has been promptly reproved. And I now publicly declare that my advice to the Latter-day Saints is to refrain from contracting any marriage forbidden by the law of the land.

Wilford Woodruff

President of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.”

“The question is this: Which is the wisest course for the Latter-day Saints to pursue—to continue to attempt to practice plural marriage, with the laws of the nation against it and the opposition of sixty millions of people, and at the cost of the confiscation and loss of all the Temples, and the stopping of all the ordinances therein, both for the living and the dead, and the imprisonment of the First Presidency and Twelve and the heads of families in the Church, and the confiscation of personal property of the people (all of which of themselves would stop the practice); or, after doing and suffering what we have through our adherence to this principle to cease the practice and submit to the law, and through doing so leave the Prophets, Apostles and fathers at home, so that they can instruct the people and attend to the duties of the Church, and also leave the Temples in the hands of the Saints, so that they can attend to the ordinances of the Gospel, both for the living and the dead?

The Lord showed me by vision and revelation exactly what would take place if we did not stop this practice. If we had not stopped it, you would have had no use for … any of the men in this temple at Logan; for all ordinances would be stopped throughout the land of Zion. Confusion would reign throughout Israel, and many men would be made prisoners. This trouble would have come upon the whole Church, and we should have been compelled to stop the practice.”

“I leave this with you, for you to contemplate and consider. The Lord is at work with us. (Cache Stake Conference, Logan, Utah, Sunday, November 1, 1891. Reported in Deseret Weekly, November 14, 1891.)”

“All these things would have come to pass, as God Almighty lives, had not that Manifesto been given. Therefore, the Son of God felt disposed to have that thing presented to the Church and to the world for purposes in his own mind. The Lord had decreed the establishment of Zion. He had decreed the finishing of this temple. He had decreed that the salvation of the living and the dead should be given in these valleys of the mountains. And Almighty God decreed that the Devil should not thwart it. If you can understand that, that is a key to it. (From a discourse at the sixth session of the dedication of the Salt Lake Temple, April 1893. Typescript of Dedicatory Services, Archives, Church Historical Department, Salt Lake City, Utah.)”

Gospel Topics Essays, “The Manifesto and the End of Plural Marriage,” Church History, Gospel Library, Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints

“The Manifesto was carefully worded to address the immediate conflict with the U.S. government.”

“Not all the Twelve accepted the document immediately. John W. Taylor said he did “not yet feel quite right about it” at first. John Henry Smith candidly admitted that “the Manifesto had disturbed his feelings very much” and that he was still “somewhat at sea” regarding it.”

“The Manifesto was formally presented to the Church at the semiannual general conference held in the Salt Lake Tabernacle in October 1890. On Monday, October 6, Orson F. Whitney, a Salt Lake City bishop, stood at the pulpit and read the Articles of Faith, which included the line that Latter-day Saints believe in “obeying, honoring, and sustaining the law.” These articles were sustained by uplifted hand. Whitney then read the Manifesto, and Lorenzo Snow, President of the Quorum of the Twelve, moved that the document be accepted as “authoritative and binding.” The assembly was then asked to vote on this motion. The Deseret News reported that the vote was “unanimous”; most voted in favor, though some abstained from voting.”

“Rank-and-file Latter-day Saints accepted the Manifesto with various degrees of reservation. Many were not ready for plural marriage to come to an end. General Relief Society president Zina D. H. Young, writing in her journal on the day the Manifesto was presented to the Church, captured the anguish of the moment: “Today the hearts of all were tried but looked to God and submitted.” The Manifesto prompted uncertainty about the future of some relationships. Eugenia Washburn Larsen, fearing the worst, reported feeling “dense darkness” when she imagined herself and other wives and children being “turned adrift” by husbands. Other plural wives, however, reacted to the Manifesto with “great relief.”

“Believing that the covenants they made with God and their spouses had to be honored above all else, many husbands, including Church leaders, continued to cohabit with their plural wives and fathered children with them well into the 20th century.”

“The Manifesto declared President Woodruff’s intention to submit to the laws of the United States. It said nothing about the laws of other nations. Ever since the opening of colonies in Mexico and Canada, Church leaders had performed plural marriages in those countries, and after October 1890, plural marriages continued to be quietly performed there.”

“Polygamy was illegal in Mexico and, after 1890, in Canada as well.” Footnote 34

“Under exceptional circumstances, a smaller number of new plural marriages were performed in the United States between 1890 and 1904.”

“The precise number of new plural marriages performed during these years, inside and outside the United States, is unknown.”

“In all, 8 of 19 members of the Quorum of the Twelve who served between 1890 and 1904 married new plural wives during those years, and these marriages are not represented on the ledger. These members include Brigham Young Jr., George Teasdale, John W. Taylor, Abraham H. Cannon, Marriner W. Merrill, Matthias F. Cowley, Abraham Owen Woodruff, and Rudger Clawson. It is alleged that President Wilford Woodruff married an additional plural wife in 1897, but the historical record makes this unclear.” Footnote 36

“The exact process by which these marriages were approved remains unclear. For a time, post-Manifesto plural marriages required the approval of a member of the First Presidency. There is no definitive evidence, however, that the decisions were made by the First Presidency as a whole; President Woodruff, for example, typically referred requests to allow new plural marriages to President Cannon for his personal consideration.”

“President Joseph F. Smith later affirmed that he, President Woodruff, and President Snow, as Presidents of the Church, “have not given authority to any one to perform or enter into plural marriages since the Manifesto” (Francis M. Lyman journal, Dec. 14, 1905).” Footnote 38

“By the late 1890s, at least some of the men who had authority to perform sealings apparently considered themselves free to either accept or reject requests at their own discretion, independent of the First Presidency.”

“Church President Lorenzo Snow issued a statement clarifying that new plural marriages had ceased in the Church and that the Manifesto extended to all parts of the world, counsel he repeated in private. Even so, a small number of new plural marriages continued to be performed.”

“After Joseph F. Smith became Church President in 1901, a small number of new plural marriages were also performed during the early years of his administration.”

“One of the most aggressive proponents of new plural marriages, Apostle Matthias F. Cowley, listed the plural marriages he performed in a small notebook. The book contains 3 marriages for 1898, 4 for 1899, 9 for 1900, 20 for 1901, 18 for 1902, and 3 for 1903. (Cowley, Marriages Solemnized, 1898–1903.)” Footnote 42

“The Church’s role in these marriages became a subject of intense debate after Reed Smoot, an Apostle, was elected to the U.S. Senate in 1903. Although Smoot was a monogamist, his apostleship put his loyalty to the country under scrutiny. How could Smoot both uphold the laws of the Church, some of whose officers had performed, consented to, or participated in new plural marriages, and uphold the laws of the land, which made plural marriage illegal? For four years legislators debated this question in lengthy public hearings.”

“President Smith carefully distinguished between actions sanctioned by the Church and ratified in Church councils and conferences, and the actions undertaken by individual members of the Church. “There never has been a plural marriage by the consent or sanction or knowledge or approval of the church since the manifesto,” he testified.”

“In this legal setting, President Smith sought to protect the Church while stating the truth. His testimony conveyed a distinction Church leaders had long understood: the Manifesto removed the divine command for the Church collectively to sustain and defend plural marriage; it had not, up to this time, prohibited individuals from continuing to practice or perform plural marriage as a matter of religious conscience.

The time was right for a change in this understanding.”

“During his Senate testimony, President Smith promised publicly to clarify the Church’s position about plural marriage. At the April 1904 general conference, President Smith issued a forceful statement, known as the Second Manifesto, attaching penalties to entering into plural marriage: “If any officer or member of the Church shall assume to solemnize or enter into any such marriage he will be deemed in transgression against the Church and will be liable to be dealt with according to the rules and regulations thereof and excommunicated therefrom.”45 This statement had been approved by the leading councils of the Church and was unanimously sustained at the conference as authoritative and binding on the Church.”

“The Second Manifesto was a watershed event. For the first time, Church members were put on notice that new plural marriages stood unapproved by God and the Church.”

“Contrary to direction, two Apostles, John W. Taylor and Matthias F. Cowley, continued to perform and encourage new plural marriages after the Second Manifesto.”

“Rudger Clawson, a member of the Twelve who married a plural wife in 1904, was not disciplined by Church authorities.” Footnote 50

“Many others quietly cohabited into the 1930s and beyond.”

“Church members who rejected the Second Manifesto and continued to publicly advocate plural marriage or undertake new plural marriages were summoned to Church disciplinary councils. Some who were excommunicated coalesced into independent movements and are sometimes called fundamentalists. These groups are not affiliated with or supported by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Since the administration of Joseph F. Smith, Church Presidents have repeatedly emphasized that the Church and its members are no longer authorized to enter into plural marriage and have underscored the sincerity of their words by urging local leaders to bring noncompliant members before Church disciplinary councils.”

Wilford Woodruff, “Wilford Woodruff Journal,” 31 December 1886

“The year of 1886 is past and gone. It has been an important year in the history of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. It has sent to prison hundreds of the leading men of the Church and driven into exile the Presidency of the Church and Twelve Apostles and many other leading men all for obeying the celestial law of God and the patriarchal order of marriage and our nation are uniting in passing unconstitutional Laws for the purpose of destroying the Latter-day Saints from off the Earth.”

Pres. Charles W. Penrose, Deseret News, 23 April 1885

“What would be necessary to bring about the result nearest the hearts of the opponents of 'Mormonism'? Simply to renounce, abrogate or apostatize from the new and everlasting covenant of marriage in its fullness.” 

First Presidency, “Petition of Amnesty,” 19 Dec 1891

“To be at peace with the government and in harmony with their fellow citizens who are not of their faith, and to share in the confidence of the Government and the people, our people have voluntarily put aside something which all their lives they have believed to be a sacred principle.” 

Wilford Woodruff, in Abraham H. Cannon, Diary, 5 April 1894. Also Hebe r J. Grant, Journal, 5 April 1894, and Francis M. Lyman, Diary, 5 April 1894.

“The day is near when there will be no difficulty in the way of good men securing noble wives.”

Wilford Woodruff, in Salt Lake Tribune, 9 May 1895, p. 8.

“I hurl defiance at the world to prove that the manifesto forbidding plural marriages has not been observed.”

Carl Ashby Badger, Apostle Reed Smoot’s secretary, “Journal,” 8 October 1904

“A.B. Irvine told me that Apostle Woodruff told him that a certain number of worthy people had been commissioned to keep alive the principle of plural marriage.”

John W. Taylor, “The Trial of Apostle John W. Taylor,” Minutes of a meeting of the Twelve Apostles held in the Salt Lake Temple, 22 February 1911, at 10 A.M

“I remember consulting with Brother Ivins about Robinson's case, he having been promised long before President Smith's declaration that he should have another wife and I referred him to President Smith and he came to Salt Lake and saw the President and I returned to my home in Provo, where he called upon me one day in my field.”

“He was crying for joy. He said that President Smith told him to hunt out the way, and if he could find the way the President said "God bless you." He said he had found the way.”

B.H. Roberts, “A Comprehensive History of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints,” Century I, Salt Lake City, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter day Saints, 1930, 6:399-400

“The injunction of said Manifesto had not been strictly adhered to even by some high officials of the Church of Latter-day Saints and people misled by them.”

D. Michael Quinn, “LDS Church Authority and New Plural Marriages, 1890-1904,” 1985, Dialogue, Volume 18, No. 1

“Ninety percent of new polygamous marriages contracted from September 1890 through December 1904 directly involved Church authority. Because this subject is so complex, we will begin with a chronological overview of the involvement of Church authority in new plural marriages after the Manifesto.

From the publication of the Manifesto until November 1890, the First Presidency authorized seven residents of the United States to go to Mexico to be married there.”

“In July 1892, the First Presidency authorized a couple of marriages to be performed in Mexico and Canada.”

“In 1893, the Presidency authorized only one U.S. resident to visit Mexico for a plural marriage ceremony, and only one was performed there for a local resident. In 1894, the First Presidency committed themselves to the position that there were circumstances under which plural marriages would not only be permitted but also encouraged, and by the authority of the Presidency, one plural marriage occurred in Canada, six in Mexico, and two in Utah temples. That pattern continued about the same in 1895 and 1896. Plural marriages had ceased for six months in Mexico even for residents of the newly created Juarez Stake until two apostles visited the colonies early in 1897 and performed plural marriages for two residents. During the last six months of 1897 the First Presidency authorized seven U.S. residents to visit Mexico for plural marriage ceremonies and also authorized two ceremonies to occur aboard ship.”

“Toward the end of the year, the First Presidency instructed the Juarez Stake president to perform plural marriages for worthy residents of the stake without obtaining specific authorization from the First Presidency for individual cases. Although lower-ranking Church members continued to travel from Utah with letters from the Presidency for their plural marriages to be performed in Mexico, during 1898 the First Presidency established still another avenue for plural marriages to be performed by an apostle in the United States for higher-ranking Mormons. 

During 1899 a confused state of affairs emerged concerning Church authorities and new plural marriages, a confusion which continued for the next five years. Plural marriages were being performed in Mexico and in various places in the United States, but because anti-Mormons began publishing accusations of these violations of the Manifesto, Church authorities began excommunicating a few new polygamists. The Church president stopped plural marriages in Mexico in 1899 but turned a blind eye to those still occurring in Utah and Idaho.

As an extension of the confusion of the previous year, in January 1900 the Church president made a public denial that either new polygamous marriages or polygamous cohabitation had his or the Church’s sanction. In the quarterly meeting of the Quorum of the Twelve that began the day after this announcement, nearly all the apostles expressed opposition to the publicly announced position of the Church president.”

“Nevertheless, in July 1892 President Woodruff consented to renewing the performance of plural marriages in Mexico for a few men who continued to pester him for that privilege. Although he personally signed the recommends for the polygamous marriages performed between October and Decembr 1890, President Woodruff thereafter tried to distance himself as President of the Church from future authorizations.”

“No specific evidence of Wilford Woodruff’s direct involvement in new polygamous marriages emerges again until 1897. In June 1897, the First Presidency authorized Juarez Stake President Anthony W. Ivins to perform polygamous ceremonies in Mexico, and in the fall President Woodruff authorized Anthon H. Lund to perform two plural marriages aboard ship, one on the Pacific Ocean and one on the Great Lakes.”

“Circumstantial evidence indicates that Wilford Woodruff married Madame Mountford as a plural wife in 1897. President Woodruff recorded attending her lecture on 7 February 1897, the first of ninety references to her in his diary during the next eighteen months. By April, he was recording frequent “private” or “personal” talks with her in the First Presidency’s office, and she was a dinner guest at the Woodruff home. She left Salt Lake City on 28 April to stay in San Francisco. By 8 May 1897, President Woodruff indicated his increasing interest in the charismatic forty-nine-year-old woman.”

“Nine days later, he recorded a further conversation with his trusted secretary about “Madam Mountford who is now in California.” President Woodruff’s letters to and from her were the only references to correspondence in his diary for 1897-98. She returned to Salt Lake City from July to August, when she was a frequent guest at the Woodruff home. After her return to California, Wilford Woodruff began referring to her as “M,” and asked his secretary to go with him “on the quiet” to the Pacific coast, waited until the day before his departure to inform his wife Emma of the trip, and irritated her by declining her request to accompany him because it was to be “a very quiet trip.” On the train from Utah to Portland, President Woodruff “talked with Bro Nuttall confidentially in regard to some of my personal affairs,” and once the two were on the coast they not only avoided the usual visits with Mormon officials and non-Mormon friends, but President Woodruff also noted that they made all their hotel and travel arrangements under “assumed names.”

“Although there is no presently available document that records the sealing ceremony specifically, the evidence seems compelling that L. John Nuttall performed a polygamous marriage for Wilford Woodruff and Madame Lydia Mary Mountford aboard ship on the Pacific Ocean on 20 September 1897. That such a marriage has never been acknowledged in the Woodruff family’s published genealogies is no argument against its existence: those genealogies also fail to mention that he married Eudora Young Dunford as a plural wife in 1877, even though she bore him a child that died the day of its birth. Their divorce less than two years after this pre-Manifesto plural marriage was apparently the reason neither the Woodruff nor Young family histories acknowledges the marriage, and President Woodruff’s manifesto was greater cause to ignore the polygamous wife the ninety-year-old Church president married a year before his death. At any rate, there is documentary evidence of the polygamous ceremony President Woodruff authorized Apostle Anthon H. Lund to perform “on the Pacific Ocean” a month later; and at the meeting in December 1897 where President Woodruff apparently gave final authorization to Lund for the second aboard-ship ceremony Lund would perform, President Woodruff confided the “astonishing” news about Madame Mountford. President Woodruff’s nephew, Apostle Matthias F. Cowley, later told the Quorum of Twelve, “I believed President Woodruff married a wife the year before he died, of course, I don’t know, I can’t prove it,” and still later, Mormon Fundamentalists (who had no access to the Lund diary) stated that Madame Mountford was the plural wife Wilford Woodruff married after 1890.”

Gospel Topics Essays, “Plural Marriage in Kirtland and Nauvoo,” Church History, Gospel Library, Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints

“Consistent with Joseph Smith’s teachings, the Church permits a man whose wife has died to be sealed to another woman when he remarries. Moreover, members are permitted to perform ordinances on behalf of deceased men and women who married more than once on earth, sealing them to all of the spouses to whom they were legally married.”

General Handbook: Serving in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Gospel Library, Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints

“38.4.1.2 Sealing of Living Members after Divorce

Women. A living woman may be sealed to only one husband at a time. If she and a husband were sealed and later divorced, she must receive a cancellation of that sealing before being sealed to another man during her lifetime (see 38.4.1.5).”

“38.4.1.3 Sealing of Living Members after a Spouse’s Death

Women. If a husband and wife have been sealed and the husband dies, the woman may not be sealed to another man unless she receives a cancellation of the first sealing (see 38.4.1.5).”

“Men. If a husband and wife have been sealed and the wife dies, the man may be sealed to another woman if she is not already sealed to another man. In this circumstance, the man does not need a sealing clearance from the First Presidency unless he was divorced from his previous wife before she died (see 38.4.1.2).

A living man may be sealed to a deceased wife if she was not sealed to another husband in life. If she was sealed to another husband while living, all men to whom she was married must be deceased before any other man may be sealed to her (see 38.4.1.8).”

“38.4.1.8 Sealing of Deceased Persons

Deceased Men. A deceased man may be sealed to all women to whom he was legally married during his life if (1) they are deceased or (2) they are living, are not currently married, and are not sealed to another man (see 38.4.1.3).”

Joseph Fielding Smith, “Answers to Gospel Questions,” Volume 3, 1957

“When the wife is faithful and desires to obey the divine law and the husband is rebellious, or unwilling to obey the will of the Lord, if she maintains her integrity to the best of her ability, she will be given to another husband in eternity and will receive all the blessings of the celestial kingdom.”

Dallin H. Oaks, “Timing,” 29 January 2002, Speeches, Brigham Young University

“A marriage that is timely in our view may be our blessing or it may not. My wife Kristen is an example. She did not marry until many years after her mission and her graduation. Older singles have some interesting experiences. While she was at her sister’s place to celebrate her fiftieth birthday, her sister’s husband shared something he had just read in a newspaper. “Kristen,” he said, “now that you are a single woman over 50, your chances of marrying are not as good as your chances of being killed by a terrorist.”

“I was then 48 years old. My wife June and I tried to plan the rest of our lives. We wanted to serve the full-time mission neither of us had been privileged to serve. We planned that I would serve 20 years on the state supreme court. Then, at the end of two 10-year terms, when I would be nearly 69 years old, I would retire from the supreme court and we would submit our missionary papers and serve a mission as a couple.

I had my 69th birthday last summer and was vividly reminded of that important plan. If things had gone as we planned, I would now be submitting papers to serve a mission with my wife June.”

“When I was 66, my wife June died of cancer. Two years later—a year and a half ago—I married Kristen McMain, the eternal companion who now stands at my side.”

Dallin H. Oaks, “Life’s Lessons Learned,” 27 September 2011, Deseret Book

“Whether a person who has lost a spouse enters into a second marriage is a very personal decision. It depends on many individual circumstances, including the ages of the prospective marriage partners and children, financial implications, and even what is known about the feelings of the deceased spouse. In the hope of benefiting others who decide (as I did) to remarry, I share here some of what I learned as I experienced some of the issues involved in a second marriage.”

“First, June approved of my remarrying. As I mentioned earlier, during her year-long battle with cancer she came to realize that she would die before me. I was never willing to discuss my remarrying, but she frequently told our four daughters that she knew I would need to remarry and that when that time came they should help me find a companion who would fit well into our family, and welcome her. That was her wise preparation, and it proved very important to all of us.”

“It was also important to both of us that Kristen felt comfortable about becoming a “second wife.” She understood the eternal doctrine of relationships. She was becoming part of an existing eternal family unit, and she has always been eager to honor and include June. In tribute to June she often says, “I am so thankful for the influence of a righteous woman who refined Dallin and the children into the husband and family I love today.”

I have learned from many letters received since my remarriage that many who have lost a spouse have questions about the effects of remarriage on family relationships in the eternities to come. There are so many different circumstances involving parents and children, and so little is known about the circumstances of the next life, that it is not possible to give answers to most questions. Some gospel doctrines are revealed only in part. Often, because we do not have these doctrines in their entirety, we cannot tell how they will apply to our individual circumstances.”

“We trust in the efficacy of temple covenants that have been honored by those who entered them.”

“A second marriage in His temple, will, when covenants are honored, result in the greatest possible happiness for all concerned.”

Dallin H. Oaks, “Trust in the Lord,” General Conference, October 2019

“My dear brothers and sisters, a letter I received some time ago introduces the subject of my talk. The writer was contemplating a temple marriage to a man whose eternal companion had died. She would be a second wife. She asked this question: would she be able to have her own house in the next life, or would she have to live with her husband and his first wife? I just told her to trust the Lord.

I continue with an experience I heard from a valued associate, which I share with his permission. After the death of his beloved wife and the mother of his children, a father remarried. Some grown children strongly objected to the remarriage and sought the counsel of a close relative who was a respected Church leader. After hearing the reasons for their objections, which focused on conditions and relationships in the spirit world or in the kingdoms of glory that follow the Final Judgment, this leader said: “You are worried about the wrong things. You should be worried about whether you will get to those places. Concentrate on that. If you get there, all of it will be more wonderful than you can imagine.”

What a comforting teaching! Trust in the Lord!”

“That same principle applies to unanswered questions about sealings in the next life or desired readjustments because of events or transgressions in mortality. There is so much we do not know that our only sure reliance is to trust in the Lord and His love for His children.”

Russell M. Nelson, “Doors of Death,” General Conference, April 1992

“I remember my deep sense of gratitude that my sweetheart and I had been sealed eternally to each other and to our children, born and reared in the covenant. I realized that our marriage in the temple was my most important accomplishment. Honors bestowed upon me by men could not approach the inner peace provided by sealings performed in the house of the Lord.”

Russell M. Nelson, “Faith and Families,” Church Educational System fireside address, 6 February 2005, in Ensign, March 2007

“If Sister Nelson were here, I would invite her to stand beside me. As you know, man is not without the woman in the Lord.”

“What is most important to Sister Nelson and me now? That we are husband and wife, wedded for time and all eternity. Our children are born in the covenant and are sealed to us forever. What joy that knowledge brings!”

Russell M. Nelson, “Revelation for the Church, Revelation for Our Lives,” General Conference, April 2018

“In 2005, after nearly 60 years of marriage, my dear Dantzel was unexpectedly called home. For a season, my grief was almost immobilizing. But the message of Easter and the promise of resurrection sustained me.

Then the Lord brought Wendy Watson to my side. We were sealed in the Salt Lake Temple on April 6, 2006. How I love her! She is an extraordinary woman—a great blessing to me, to our family, and to the entire Church.”

Russell M. Nelson, Address at his 100th Birthday Commemoration, Monday, 9 September 2024

“I am grateful for my precious family. I am grateful to be sealed in the house of the Lord to them. I marvel that the Lord led me as a young man to marry Dantzel White and build an eternal family. After Dantzel suddenly passed away, the Lord blessed me again. Later, He led me to Wendy Watson to be my eternal companion. Wendy has been a strength and a beacon for me for more than 18 years. How grateful I am for each of these remarkable women.”

Dallin H. Oaks, Sacrament Meeting in Belgium, July 2025

“For reasons the Lord has not revealed, we do not know much about a Heavenly Mother. But we have been told that the purpose of life on earth is to give us the opportunity to grow toward being like our Heavenly Father. And we know that we are children of heavenly parents. So we know that we have a Heavenly Mother or Mothers.”

Note: This is the only mention found. 

Preach My Gospel: A Guide to Sharing the Gospel of Jesus Christ, Chapter 5: “What is the Role of the Book of Mormon?” Handbooks and Callings, Mission Callings, Gospel Library, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints 

“All objections, whether they be on abortion, plural marriage, seventh-day worship, etc., basically hinge on whether Joseph Smith and his successors were and are prophets of God receiving divine revelation.”

None found.

None found.

None found.

None found.

(As of 2025)

M. Russell Ballard, “Faith, Family, Facts, and Fruits,” General Conference, November 2007

2007: “We have a deep commitment to marriage (defined as a union between one man and one woman). Polygamy, a limited practice in the early pioneer days of the Church, was discontinued in 1890, some 117 years ago.”

Old Testament, Jeremiah 23:9-11

“Mine heart within me is broken because of the prophets; all my bones shake; I am like a drunken man, and like a man whom wine hath overcome, because of the Lord, and because of the words of his holiness.

For the land is full of adulterers; for because of swearing the land mourneth; the pleasant places of the wilderness are dried up, and their course is evil, and their force is not right.

For both prophet and priest are profane; yea, in my house have I found their wickedness, saith the Lord.”

Old Testament, Jeremiah 23:14

“I have seen also in the prophets of Jerusalem an horrible thing: they commit adultery, and walk in lies:”

Book of Mormon, 2 Nephi 28:14-15

“They wear stiff necks and high heads; yea, and because of pride, and wickedness, and abominations, and whoredoms, they have all gone astray save it be a few, who are the humble followers of Christ; nevertheless, they are led, that in many instances they do err because they are taught by the precepts of men. 

And all those who preach false doctrines, and all those who commit whoredoms, and pervert the right way of the Lord, wo, wo, wo be unto them, saith the Lord God Almighty, for they shall be thrust down to hell!”

Book of Mormon, Mosiah 11:2, 4-6

“For behold, he did not keep the commandments of God, but he did walk after the desires of his own heart. And he had many wives and concubines. And he did cause his people to commit sin, and do that which was abominable in the sight of the Lord. Yea, and they did commit whoredoms and all manner of wickedness.”

“And all this did he take to support himself, and his wives and his concubines; and also his priests, and their wives and their concubines; thus he had changed the affairs of the kingdom. 

For he put down all the priests that had been consecrated by his father, and consecrated new ones in their stead, such as were lifted up in the pride of their hearts. 

Yea, and thus they were supported in their laziness, and in their idolatry, and in their whoredoms.”

Book of Mormon, Alma 30:18

“And thus he did preach unto them, leading away the hearts of many, causing them to lift up their heads in their wickedness, yea, leading away many women, and also men, to commit whoredoms.”

New Testament, 2 Timothy 4:3

“For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but after their own lusts shall they heap to themselves teachers.”

New Testament, Titus 1:16

“They profess that they know God; but in works they deny him, being abominable, and disobedient.”

New Testament, 2 Peter 2:1-2

“But there were false prophets also among the people, even as there shall be false teachers among you, who privily shall bring in damnable heresies, even denying the Lord that bought them, and bring upon themselves swift destruction. 

And many shall follow their pernicious ways; by reason of whom the way of truth shall be evil spoken of.”

Book of Mormon, 4 Nephi 1:34

“They were led by many priests and false prophets to build up many churches, and to do all manner of iniquity.”

Doctrine and Covenants 3:4

“For although a man may have many revelations, and have power to do many mighty works, yet if he boasts in his own strength, and sets at naught the counsels of God, and follows after the dictates of his own will and carnal desires, he must fall and incur the vengeance of a just God upon him.”

Old Testament, Exodus 7:20, see also Mosiah 13:15

“Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain; for the Lord will not hold him guiltless that taketh his name in vain.”