Introduction and Episode Overview

John Dehlin [00:00:00] Hello, everyone, and welcome to another edition of Mormon Stories podcast. I am one of your hosts today. I am John Dehlin. We are super happy to have you all joining us on the live stream. And we are here gratefully to have back in our studio with us the one, the only, the myth, the legend, Sandra Tanner. Welcome back to Mormon Story, Sandra.

Sandra Tanner [00:00:25] Yes. Good to be here.

John Dehlin [00:00:26] Thank you. Thanks for joining us.

Sandra Tanner [00:00:28] Yes. Hope I can just remember some of what I've read through the years.

John Dehlin [00:00:32] Well, we're here to talk about early Mormons and Joseph Smith's polygamy. This is kind of part two of our series and we're trying to cover Doctrine of Covenants Section 132. And I don't think we're going to make it through it all, but we're going to at least cover part two. And I think there's going to be part three. We are joined, of course, by our dear beloved friend and co host, Gerardo Sumano. Hey, Gerardo.

Gerardo Sumano [00:00:56] Hi, John.

John Dehlin [00:00:56] Thank you. Thanks for joining us.

Gerardo Sumano [00:00:58] Yeah, I'm excited as always.

John Dehlin [00:01:00] Thanks for preparing this and making it happen.

Gerardo Sumano [00:01:02] Yeah, yeah, no problem.

John Dehlin [00:01:05] And we are wishing Kara Burrell our best as she engages in a much needed vacation. So Cara's out this week, and in Kara's place, we have the newest member of the Open Stories foundation family, Jen Camp. Hey, Jen.

Jenn Kamp [00:01:20] Hi, everyone.

John Dehlin [00:01:22] Thanks for joining us.

Jenn Kamp [00:01:23] You're so welcome. It's fun to be here.

John Dehlin [00:01:25] It's good to have you back.

Jenn Kamp [00:01:26] Thanks.

John Dehlin [00:01:26] Yeah. Okay, so we covered in part one, the first half of a podcast with Hank Smith, John, by the way, and who. Gerardo, do you want to give us the background of the podcast that we're kind of. That we're going to be reviewing today?

Reviewing a Faith-Promoting Polygamy Lesson

Gerardo Sumano [00:01:44] Yeah, so. So the podcast is called Follow Him. And what they, what they're doing is basically every week or at least couple times a month, they released an episode just covering the materials on the Come Follow Me program. And this is from last year because last year the church was studying Doctrine and Covenants on Sunday School. And it just happened that someone sent me this, the link to the podcast of Hank Smith and John, by the way, for doctrine incumbents 132. And I was kind of interested in it because Kate Holbrook, who is a church historian, she works for the church.

Sandra Tanner [00:02:21] She.

Gerardo Sumano [00:02:22] So she was in it. And they just discussed polygamy. They discussed how Joseph Smith practiced it and, and a lot of the context around it, but they also left a lot of the context out, which is why we're doing basically playing some of the stuff they were saying and then responding to it and making our own comments.

John Dehlin [00:02:43] Yeah. Yeah. So we. We responded to part one of their two parter on DNC 132, and today we're going to cover part two that we thought would cover the rest of the Doctrine and Covenants. It turns out that's not true. Right, Sandra?

Sandra Tanner [00:02:57] No, they stopped short of some of the most intriguing part.

John Dehlin [00:03:01] Yeah. So that's why we're gonna have to have a part three. All right, so I guess we'll. We'll dig in. So where we left off, what we're going to do is we're just going to be playing clips. Gerardo.

Gerardo Sumano [00:03:10] Sorry, is that just a comment from Dan Hardy, who is. He listens frequently. He said those guys are pretty amazing. Talking about Hank Smith and John, by the way, such strength for the youth. Love that My daughter is taking Hank's class at BYU this semester. Actually, I have a friend who's also taking a class by Hank Smith, and she's not very happy about it, But

John Dehlin [00:03:37] Dan's basically saying Dan's a faithful member. And we're really glad that Dan is joining us in the comments.

Gerardo Sumano [00:03:42] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:03:43] Because we don't want to be an echo chamber and we actually want, like, Sandra, you even were kind of setting the tone. We want to be respectful and not be angry, not be sarcastic, not be cynical. It's kind of hard. But I just want to say, Dan Hardy, we're glad you're here. Any of you who are believers or orthodox Mormons, we're glad you're here. We want your comments. We don't want you to feel unwelcome or disrespected. So thanks, Dan. Glad to know that your daughter is enjoying Hank Smith's class at byu. And what. What we'll appreciate, Dan, is your comments and others from what's said by Dan and John, by the way, definitely today.

Gerardo Sumano [00:04:22] And our responses. What does he think about it?

John Dehlin [00:04:24] Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. Okay, so I think we should probably jump in. Should we jump in?

Sandra Tanner [00:04:30] Yep.

John Dehlin [00:04:31] Okay. So let's begin with part two. I'll switch over to the video and we'll hear the first clip. And this is Kate Holbrook on the

Kate Holbrook [00:04:42] Follow him podcast and read them. And that information about to raise up a righteous seed. We have allowed that in our imaginations to give us inaccurate understandings. I don't know about you. When you were on your missions. When I was on my mission, I taught what my trainer had taught me, and it's incorrect. And it was to say that the reason we had plural marriage in Utah is because there were more women than men. And so in order for all of those women to be able to be married, you know, there had to be plural marriage. And that's not true. That's incorrect. There were more men than there were women. But the thing that is correct is there were more righteous women than there were men. There were more women who took the restored gospel very seriously and church participation and obedience and all that very seriously. So for a woman who wanted that kind of a relationship, her choices were more narrow. I'm not saying that that explains plural marriage, but we also see that the descendants of those plural marriages, hardly any, if any, I'm trying to remember descendants of plural marriages that took place in Nauvoo, but there are definitely a lot of descendants that resulted from plural marriages in Utah. I'm one of them. And among them have been church leaders for decades, for gener. For generations. So it. It did. It did produce a righteous seed.

John Dehlin [00:06:21] Okay, so I apologize. I should have probably acknowledged that they were starting DNC 132, verse 30. And we're going to go along with the few verses that they do cover, because they do cover about six or seven verses in this part two. And what they were referring to was doctrine covenants. So pull out your scriptures, Mormon Stories listeners. Pull out your quads, turn to D and Doctrine and covenants, section 132, verse 30, because that's what they were talking about. I'm going to go ahead and read it. It says, quote, abraham received promises concerning his seed. And Sandra, what do you think she. What do you think Joseph Smith means when he says seed?

Sandra Tanner [00:07:03] Well, I believe he is meaning posterity. But Abraham's promise was that he would be, through his seed, he'd be a blessing to all nations. And so I see that as a foreshadowing of blessing the world through his descendant Christ, whereas Joseph sees it as this eternal procreation of millions of children for all eternity.

John Dehlin [00:07:32] Right, Right. And when I think of the word seed, I, not to be crude, it's an anatomical body part. I think of sperm when. When I read the word seed. So again, Joseph writes, abraham received promises concerning his seed or sperm, and of the fruit of his loins, which I think you're right, Sandra, that's posterity. Right. According to Joseph Smith, from whose loins ye are, namely my servant Joseph. So he's basically saying Joseph is. Is a descendant of Abraham.

Sandra Tanner [00:08:03] Right?

John Dehlin [00:08:03] Like a literal blood descendant of Abraham.

Sandra Tanner [00:08:06] Literally, literally through Abraham, down through Christ.

John Dehlin [00:08:10] So somehow Joseph is Jewish and. And Anglo, Saxon or Caucasian at the same time. I don't know how that works. Anyway, verse 30 goes on. Which were to continue so long as they were in the world, and as touching Abraham and his seed, the out of the world, they should continue both in the world and out of the world. Should they continue as innumerable as the stars, or if you were to count the sand upon the seashores, you could not number them. So, Sandra, you're basically saying Joseph Smith is talking about eternal increase in gazillions of spirit children as Joseph Smith becomes a God, like our current heavenly father, that sort of thing.

Sandra Tanner [00:08:53] Right. And this would also seem to be an endorsement of continuing polygamy in heaven, because if all of Abraham's plural wives and everyone past him that had plural wives are having all these. This seed, then it seems to be putting that as the norm rather than just one man, one woman. It seems to be putting the stamp on large posterity that would be accomplished through more than one wife.

John Dehlin [00:09:24] Right. What do you guys make. And Gerardo and Jen want to bring you in, if you want to, is they basically are making this point that. That all of us were taught at some point that there were more.

Gerardo Sumano [00:09:37] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:09:38] There were more righteous women. There were more women than men. Yeah.

Gerardo Sumano [00:09:42] And that's incorrect.

John Dehlin [00:09:43] Utah. And that that's why we had to do polygamy and. Right. More women than men.

Speaker F [00:09:50] Men.

Gerardo Sumano [00:09:50] Yeah. Well, she's off to a good start because she starts by saying this idea that she taught on her mission. Right. That there was more women than men in Utah, and that's why polygamy had to be lived. So. And she acknowledges that that's actually wrong and that she, now that she's a historian, realizes that that's wrong.

John Dehlin [00:10:12] That's good. She's being honest.

Gerardo Sumano [00:10:13] Right, Right. So we're off to a really good start. And then she brings up the fact that. Well, but actually, what it's actually true, she says, is that there was more righteous women than righteous men. So the righteous women needed righteous husbands, but there were not enough righteous husbands. But she does say that that's in and of itself. It's not a reason. It's not the reason or a reason for why polygamy was instituted.

Sandra Tanner [00:10:43] And I don't know why she brought it up.

Gerardo Sumano [00:10:45] Right, exactly.

Sandra Tanner [00:10:47] But in actual fact, it's the same condition today. They have more righteous women in their churches than righteous men. So why wouldn't God have them do the same program now?

Gerardo Sumano [00:10:58] Right.

John Dehlin [00:10:58] So what's wrong with that, Sandra? I mean, God wants, God wants everyone to be in the celestial kingdom with him and everybody's got to have the celestial marriage. And so it's just, it's just a matter of math, Sandra, that there's got to be polygamy so that, so that women will have men to be sealed to.

Sandra Tanner [00:11:17] Well, if that were truly what God said, yes. I don't believe that God instituted polygamy or that it ever was. God ordained. It was just a cultural system of Abraham's day. It wasn't something God instituted.

John Dehlin [00:11:37] Does the Bible say that God commanded Abraham, Isaac and Jacob to practice polygamy?

Sandra Tanner [00:11:42] No, there's nothing to indicate that. And they always want to talk about Sarah and her obeying and giving Abraham her concubine, but they make it out as though God commanded this in the book of Abraham. But the Bible says that it was all Sarah's idea. She made this big mess by her jumping ahead of God's promise. Instead of waiting for God to do a miracle for her to conceive,

Speaker F [00:12:17] she

Sandra Tanner [00:12:18] was the one that takes charge and says, oh well, you could take Hagar and get a child that way. And in that day that would have been an acceptable custom. But they want to make it out that God commanded that as part of a doctrine and the scriptures just won't back that up.

John Dehlin [00:12:35] Right. What about the argument they're making that lots of Mormon leaders came from polygamy? So it must be a good thing because a lot of the past Mormon leaders came from polygamous families. And by the way, isn't Jacob say in the, in the Book of Mormon, Jacob one, Whatever Jacob says, no polygamy except I need to raise up a righteous seed.

Gerardo Sumano [00:12:57] Right, Right.

John Dehlin [00:12:58] So what's wrong with that argument?

Sandra Tanner [00:13:00] Well, I came from that righteous seed and maybe there's truth in that.

John Dehlin [00:13:08] Anyone else, anyone else want to comment on that?

Gerardo Sumano [00:13:11] I mean that's their belief. But if you want to do a counter argument, also a lot of non righteous seed has come out from it. So.

John Dehlin [00:13:24] Yes, like, like Sandra and me. By the way, I'm. I'm a descendant of polygamy.

Gerardo Sumano [00:13:31] Right.

John Dehlin [00:13:32] So I don't know. I think I'm righteous. Do you think I'm righteous right now? And then he didn't answer.

Gerardo Sumano [00:13:39] It's hard to answer, John. By whose standards?

John Dehlin [00:13:44] By yours.

Gerardo Sumano [00:13:45] By my standards you are.

John Dehlin [00:13:46] Thanks. Thanks, buddy.

Jenn Kamp [00:13:49] But.

Gerardo Sumano [00:13:50] And that. So then, so then there's that. And then there's also the fact that you're in Utah, everyone's Mormon people are practicing polygamy. Like you're already programmed since you're born that this is the religion you need to follow. Even, you know, we know about the women who were recruited in England to come to join the church. Come. And then, oh, guess what, there's polygamy here. And. But then they wouldn't have the money to leave. So kind of saying, you know, like, oh, it's such a miracle that righteous seed was produced out of this practice in Utah. It's kind of like, I mean, it's obvious that that was going to happen. Right. That there was going to be leaders coming out of that. Of the state.

Sandra Tanner [00:14:39] Well, that's the same today. We have. Still have leaders coming out of that same pool.

Gerardo Sumano [00:14:44] Right?

John Dehlin [00:14:46] Yeah. I mean, it could. It could be a testimony of the truthfulness of polygamy or it could be a testimony that Mormon leaders call other leaders who are in their families.

Gerardo Sumano [00:14:55] Oh, yeah, that's true.

John Dehlin [00:14:56] Or who are their buddies or their cronies. And if they're giving multiple wives to their buddies, then they're going to maybe give leadership positions to the children of their buddies. And so it's more of a testament to cronyism, to favoritism, to. What's it called when, like, you're. When you make your son a prophet, you know, you're a prophet, you make your son a prophet. Nemo. Nemo talks about this in a recent episode.

Gerardo Sumano [00:15:21] I can't remember the word.

John Dehlin [00:15:23] Anyway, kind of favoritism or patronage, that sort of thing.

Sandra Tanner [00:15:28] But see, the same thing would. Could be pointed out in all the states back east where no one practiced polygamy, and you could find all sorts of righteous descendants of people in those states. So it's an argument that.

John Dehlin [00:15:42] Oh, yeah, go ahead, keep going.

Sandra Tanner [00:15:44] Nepotism. Yeah, it only works out in. In that kind of setting. But I mean, it means nothing for the polygamous Mormons to have wonderful leaders coming out of that stream of families, because any state has their great leaders of that state who probably have a whole bunch of kids descending down from them, and that also went on to serve their city, state, country, whatever.

John Dehlin [00:16:10] Yeah. And we've had about 50 of our viewers write nepotism down in the comments.

Sandra Tanner [00:16:16] Thank you.

John Dehlin [00:16:18] Thank you, viewers. We have the best commenters in Live Livestream, the world of Live Stream. Yeah, nepotism. So maybe polygamy is a testimony of God's truth and. And ability to prophesy, or maybe it's a testimony of nepotism. Okay, all right, so the next verses that they're going to be covering are. Are verses 34 and 35 of DNC 132. I'm going to go ahead and read them. Is that all right? And then we'll play the clip. So 34 says God commanded Abraham and Sarah gave Hagar to Abraham to wife. So that's going to be important. Sarah gave Hagar to Abraham to wife. And why did she do it? Because this was the law. And from Hagar sprang many people. This, therefore, was fulfilling, among other things, the promises. Then 35 was Abraham therefore under condemnation? Verily, I say unto you, nay, for I, the Lord commanded it. So Those are verses 34 and 35. Now we hear them discussing verses 34 and 35.

Doctrine and Covenants 132 and Abraham's Example

Speaker G [00:17:24] He starts out by coming back to Abraham.

Kate Holbrook [00:17:27] Yes, right. I'm glad you noticed. Yes. And these verses, I think, teach us important things about the practice of plural marriage, which God wanted at this particular time. And one is Sarah gave Hagar to Abraham to wife.

Speaker F [00:17:46] Yeah.

Kate Holbrook [00:17:47] God commanded Abraham, and Sarah gave Hagar to Abraham to wife. I wish I could ask our listeners what they. What they make of that. Yeah, what I think is Sarah had agency here, Right.

Speaker F [00:18:04] There was consent from.

Kate Holbrook [00:18:05] She might not have a ton of agency, but she. But she gave her consent. And I think Jesus is setting this up as a model here, that a first wife gives consent to other marriages. And the way this played out. The way this played out with in Nauvoo was more complicated. This didn't always happen. Nauvoo plural marriage is very different than Utah marriage. Plural marriage in Nauvoo, they were trying to figure it out. They knew there would be a lot of social opposition. They knew it could wound a lot of their loved ones, and they were keeping it secret as they tried to figure it out. But the secrecy was really wounding, too. So this. This part of it was not always. Was sometimes, but not always fulfilled in Nauvoo or. And including in Joseph and Amazon marriage.

Speaker F [00:18:57] Really good point.

Kate Holbrook [00:18:59] In Utah, it was more often. There's still, you know, fallen people. There were still people who didn't obtain the consent of their first wives to take on more wives. But the rule they were supposed to.

Speaker G [00:19:12] Well, it's important here that God was involved. Sarah was involved.

Kate Holbrook [00:19:17] Yes.

Speaker G [00:19:18] And that's why he says they were not under condemnation. For I, the Lord, commanded it.

Kate Holbrook [00:19:24] Yeah, great. Great point. That's essential. That's essential for this to be. To be.

Consent and Coercion in Early Mormon Polygamy

John Dehlin [00:19:30] Okay, so I have to note. Is this the first time in the history of Mormon curriculum that the word consent has been used and is being discussed? Hey, did. So, Jen, in all your Days as a Mormon, did you ever hear a discussion about consent in Sunday school or Relief Society?

Jenn Kamp [00:19:50] No, I did not. I did not hear. There's a lot of things that have already been said that I have never heard. So.

John Dehlin [00:20:00] But, I mean, I guess we could say it's good that they're talking about consent.

Speaker F [00:20:03] Right?

Jenn Kamp [00:20:04] Yeah, I. I hope that they will use that more.

John Dehlin [00:20:08] They do. They actually do. But what do you guys think about the idea that. That Sarah gave her consent? Yeah, like, they think that's really important, that Sarah.

Gerardo Sumano [00:20:19] God commanded. Right. Well, that's. They keep bringing that up, and I think it's very explicit on the scripture. But Sandra already told us that God didn't have anything to do with that.

Sandra Tanner [00:20:30] But when we hear all this talk of consent, I didn't hear, hey, Hagar's name mentioned anywhere in that. I mean, she's just a. Like a servant, like your dog in the front room on the rug or something, you know. Oh, yeah, let me give you my dog. You know, I mean, sure. So here's Sarah. She's the great one obeying God. She's going to give a human being to her husband to raise up seed. And nowhere does anyone say anything about Hagar. What did she want? I mean, the lady on the video says, oh, I'd like to ask the people listening to this just what they think of this. And I. You probably wouldn't want to know what we're all thinking because it's so insulting to this woman.

John Dehlin [00:21:20] Yeah, yeah.

Jenn Kamp [00:21:23] And it's insulting when they're. They keep commenting. Yeah. Sarah. Sarah, you know, had to give her to her husband. And, you know, this is. This is the rule. This is what they're supposed to follow. And, and then you read the stories of polygamy, and that rule was not followed like there was no rule. It was if. If there was a rule, it was broken again and again and again again.

Sandra Tanner [00:21:54] Well, you know, I think that's. This comes up. I believe it's in the Reid Smoot hearings that they talked to different women about polygamy. And this one lady was questioned and she said, well, polygamy worked best if you didn't love your husband very much because then you had a more amicable relationship. But if too much love came into. Just caused jealousies and contentions. And you take Brigham Young and different ones, they don't list all their wives. I don't think that he's asking all his wives for consent. Do you only have to ask the first? I mean, the rest don't matter what they think about it. I mean, I'm not sure just how all that works.

John Dehlin [00:22:43] That's a great point. Do the second and third wives get to consult and the fourth wife are just the first?

Gerardo Sumano [00:22:50] Well, and it's. Sorry.

Jenn Kamp [00:22:51] Yeah, go ahead.

Gerardo Sumano [00:22:54] It's. It's really bothering me that she's bringing this point about consent over and over again because she knows the history and she knows how it really played out, and she knows that it was, in most cases, it was not followed. I mean, Emma didn't give consent of the first 20 wives, most likely, and then even how he played out with other women that were asked to live polygamy that were close to Joseph. Like, we're going to be talking about Helen Mark Kimball in a bit, but when Helen Mark Kimball's father, Heber C. Kimball, he was asked by Joseph to practice polygamy. And so Heber goes to his wife and tells her about it. And I mean, her wife took it pretty badly, but she finally. They said the story goes like they. They went and prayed and fasted for like three days. And then finally Heber goes to Joseph and says, okay, yeah, my. My wife said, yeah, we can go ahead and do it. And I want. And. And my wife wants me to marry this older ladies, these two older ladies. And then Joseph goes and says, oh, no, actually I want you to marry this younger woman over here who has a kid and who just came from Europe. So it's like she knows all these stories, but she keeps bringing up the consent part. And she knows. I mean, she acknowledges that it didn't play play, like, but I don't know, it just seems really kind of like double speak. To me. It would be more honest to say, yeah, this is talking about consent, but it actually most, most of the time never played out that way.

John Dehlin [00:24:48] Yeah. She kind of gives this vague reference that it was more complicated in Nauvoo.

Gerardo Sumano [00:24:52] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:24:52] What she doesn't say explicitly is that Joseph, the receiver of this revelation, he himself violated it 20 plus times, but before he ever actually bothered to check in with Emma if she'd be okay with him marrying extra wives. But she doesn't call Joseph out by name. She just kind of keeps it vague that, oh, in Nauvoo, it was a little bit. A little bit more complicated.

Gerardo Sumano [00:25:16] Yeah.

Jenn Kamp [00:25:16] And with Helen Kimball, that there's so many layers to that story that I hope we can get in maybe a little bit later when they start talking about her again, because I've pulled up many quotes from her journal that are from her hand. And I Don't believe there was any consent there.

Sandra Tanner [00:25:34] Now, the Partridge sisters, aren't they the ones that he married twice? Okay, so you have these two teenage young girls staying in the home, and Joseph's been going to them secretly behind Emma's back and behind each of the sisters backs, trying to convert them into polygamy. They each marry Joseph secretly. They don't even know at the time that the other one has married Joseph. And then in the meantime, Joseph's trying to get Emma to buy onto polygamy. When she finally consents, it's that she gets to pick the girls. And he says, okay, who do you pick? And she says, well, the Partridge girls staying here, they're so sweet. That'd be good. So you can marry them. Well, then Joseph got this problem of he's already married them. So he decides, well, we'll just have a second wedding and not tell her, and we'll seal you guys all over again. And then it says that from that moment on, Emma became hostile to these girls to the point, finally, she gets Joseph to tell them they have to move out. But that certainly was not a case of asking her consent. He didn't even ask the girls their consent for each other. It was all done behind the scenes.

Gerardo Sumano [00:26:58] Yeah. Finally. I just want to drive home the point that Sandra mentioned that, because while I was growing up in the church, and I think every one of us, like, we are really so meshed into the idea that God commanded the prophets in the Bible to practice polygamy. And when we even think about the story of David and how he later sinned and took someone that was not given by God and all that, if you actually go and read the Bible, there's nothing that says that God commanded them to take multiple wives. And so when you take that point out of the Mormon rhetoric, all you're left out is with Joseph is the one. Like, he's the one inventing all this or coming up with all this stuff. And I don't know to me, that that's really important. It was really important for me when I. When I first learned that there was nothing on the Bible that says that God was involved in any way with polygamy.

Sandra Tanner [00:28:05] Right.

John Dehlin [00:28:06] And that's kind of what Joseph Smith is doing here in, you know, in this verse, he's basically saying, you know, was Abraham under condemnation? No, because God commanded it. So that's. That leads, you know, so many people ask, why do Mormons stop believing in God and Jesus? Because the Mormon God can really be a jerk. And basically the Mormon God gets blamed for what likely was Joseph Smith's sexual predation. And if it's God sending an angel with a flaming sword, which we'll talk about later, to force Joseph Smith to practice polygamy with a teenage girl or whatever. What kind of God is that?

Gerardo Sumano [00:28:43] Yeah.

Sandra Tanner [00:28:44] Doesn't sound like consent.

John Dehlin [00:28:46] Whatever it is, it's not consent. And I, again, I really. I really want to like Kate Holbrook. And she's so. She's a lovely, sincere woman, but when she just describes the Nauvoo period as more complicated, you know, that they were just trying to figure it out.

Gerardo Sumano [00:29:01] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:29:01] What's there to figure out?

Gerardo Sumano [00:29:03] Right.

John Dehlin [00:29:03] Like, it's here in the revelation. Follow the revelation. But the problem is Joseph had already married 22 women before the revelation came or whatever. And so it's not that they were trying to figure it out, it's that Joseph. I mean, maybe a more plausible explanation is Joseph came up with the revelation afterwards to justify the behavior that he was doing before.

Gerardo Sumano [00:29:25] Yeah. Which actually, Hallberg kind of says that later.

John Dehlin [00:29:29] Yeah. But, yeah. Okay. All right, so, um, let's continue. And I'm going to go ahead and read verse 36, because I think they're about to talk about the Abrahamic test next. So. DNC 132, verse 6. Abraham was commanded to offer his son Isaac. Nevertheless, it was written, thou shalt not kill. Abraham, however, did not refuse, and it was accounted unto him for righteousness. All right, let's hear what they have to say as they discuss. As they discussed this,

The Abrahamic Test Argument Examined

Kate Holbrook [00:30:04] Abraham was commanded to offer his son Isaac. Nevertheless, it was written, thou shalt not kill. Abraham, however, did not refuse, and it was accounted unto him for righteousness.

Speaker F [00:30:15] I like that the Lord is bringing up this Abrahamic test, as we've come to call it, because I feel like plural marriage is kind of an Abrahamic test for the whole church. And even for us today. Even for us today, trying to make sense of this is kind of an Abrahamic test for some of us.

Kate Holbrook [00:30:35] Yes, absolutely. And a lot of the people who were alive during the time when this practice was part of the church, they referred to it this way as an Abrahamic test. And why an Abrahamic test? Because it was as painful as having to offer up your son as a sacrifice. It was. I mean, this was. This was painful. All of the ideals that they had of romantic marriage, of the intimacy of marriage between two people, instead of marriage among five people or more, they had to give up all of those ideals which were really, really valued and prevalent in society at that time, you know, we. Even more so than now. Now we have a lot of other visions of marriage than they did back then. So this. This was tough. This was a big ask.

Speaker G [00:31:28] Kate, I don't know if you're going to bring this up later. I don't want to steal it from you, but if I remember right, when Joseph introduces this principle to Brigham, Brigham says, it's the first time I desired the grave.

Speaker F [00:31:38] I. Yeah, he saw a funeral, and he envied the corpse that he saw in the funeral.

Speaker G [00:31:44] He said, I'd rather die then. Then. Then live this.

Kate Holbrook [00:31:48] Yes.

Speaker F [00:31:49] Right.

Speaker G [00:31:49] I hope I didn't steal that from you. But no, no, everybody felt that way.

Kate Holbrook [00:31:53] I. I think that the. What I read is nobody liked it. They. I mean, Hyrum, Joseph's own brother, just resisted and resisted for. For years.

Speaker F [00:32:03] And, you know, Oliver Cowdery, pretty upset with Joseph and.

Kate Holbrook [00:32:08] And then imagine, you know, the. The women who heard about this because Mo. Usually because they were invited to be sealed to Joseph Smith, they hated it, too. But that we're on the foundation of God's love and grace here in this section. And God did. He answered prayers and not. Not every woman said yes. And those women who said yes, they had spiritual experiences.

Sandra Tanner [00:32:32] They.

Kate Holbrook [00:32:32] Deep ones, profound ones, letting them know that this was God's will so they didn't have to go into this blind.

Speaker F [00:32:41] Most women would have to have something pretty powerful, you know, and so agency, consent. Still operative here, is what you're saying?

Kate Holbrook [00:32:51] Yes. Yes, Absolutely.

John Dehlin [00:32:53] Oh, man. There's so much there.

Gerardo Sumano [00:32:55] So much.

John Dehlin [00:32:55] You guys were laughing. I want to cover it all. First of all. I just want to. I want to do a poll. By the way, did. Did Isaac consent to being sacrificed by his dad or. Anyway, okay, Sandra, which would be harder for you to take on an extra spouse or to kill your own child? Sandra, you go first. Kill your own child, take on an extra spouse.

Sandra Tanner [00:33:19] Well, I'd probably take the spouse over killing my child.

John Dehlin [00:33:22] Right, Gerardo? Taking an extra spouse or killing your child, which is taking another spouse? Jen. Killing a child or taking on an extra spouse.

Jenn Kamp [00:33:31] I would take on an extra spouse.

John Dehlin [00:33:32] So Kate wanted. Kate Holbrook wanted to say that it's equal. It's like, yeah, kill your child, take on an extra. And then they just go on. And you guys were totally laughing that, like, Brigham was Hiram and Brigham. Jen, why were you laughing about the. Brigham was just tortured to take on 50 wives. Why?

Jenn Kamp [00:33:52] That's just ridiculous. Like, okay, I can maybe give him. I could maybe think that when he initially first heard it, that that could be possibly a reaction. But I think he got over it pretty fast is all I'm saying.

John Dehlin [00:34:09] Why is it? Why?

Jenn Kamp [00:34:11] Because he had like 50 plus wives.

Gerardo Sumano [00:34:14] And like, well, even during this time, he's pulling women, you know, like when the. Around the rebel, when the revelation was written, like Brigham is cornering women in rooms and locking the door and proposing them to be married to him. And.

John Dehlin [00:34:31] And we're actually. We're actually telling you, Sandra, an actual descendant of Brigham Young, what Brigham Young was like, do you want to get in here?

Sandra Tanner [00:34:41] Yes. Well, you're bringing up the Martha Brotherton case, where you have this single woman who's invited up to the office room upstairs in the red brick store, which it's reported had a sign above it, positively no admittance, and you would be invited into this room. And Martha's locked in. And Brigham talks to her about polygamy, and she still can't believe this is true. So he brings in Joseph to convince her it's really true. And she is quite startled by this whole thing and doesn't know what to do. And she's very quick thinking because then she says, well, I'll have to go home and pray about this. And so she's able to get them to unlock the door and let her go home. And as I recall, she flees the city rather than face all this. And then the Mormons demonize her as this liar and horrible person that she would spread these terrible rumors. So in the video, they talk about.

Gerardo Sumano [00:35:48] And what's funny is that Brigham later seals to her when once she dies. Right?

Sandra Tanner [00:35:53] Yeah.

Gerardo Sumano [00:35:54] She later seals himself to her. No consent there.

Sandra Tanner [00:35:58] No. So the whole thing becomes so muddled in what it means to give consent. How is it working when half the time Brigham and Joseph aren't asking someone's their real wives consent, they're just doing this behind their back. We have no knowledge that Brigham's wife, Marianne angel, was asked about any of this, but he keeps racking up the numbers.

Jenn Kamp [00:36:29] Yeah.

Gerardo Sumano [00:36:30] And I think something that probably I was just thinking about right now, like, the reason why Brigham and Joseph and William and all this, Heber and all of them were really trying to get the consent or convince the women that polygamy was something from God, was so the women wouldn't talk about it and keep it secret, not because they were really like, if they had a choice, I bet. Well, probably they wouldn't be getting their consent. They would just be doing it.

Sandra Tanner [00:37:00] Right. And you have to define consent of which Woman.

Gerardo Sumano [00:37:03] Right.

Sandra Tanner [00:37:04] That woman's consent or the wife's consent.

Gerardo Sumano [00:37:07] Right, Yep. Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:37:10] Yeah. Going back to Hagar, by the way. Hagar. It turns out Hagar was a slave. So you. You mentioned that they're treating her like a dog. Yeah, she was a literal slave. And somehow God. God didn't stop in. In the Old Testament to go, hey, stop having slaves. It's just like.

Sandra Tanner [00:37:28] Yeah, well, it's, again, a part of their culture.

John Dehlin [00:37:31] Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay, so. And then they wanted to talk about romantic values and how tough it was.

Gerardo Sumano [00:37:39] They mentioned Oliver Cowdery and how mad he was when he found out. Well, in reality, when Oliver Cowdery finds out, there's no polygamy doctrine around, like, at all. Like, it's not being. It's not being developed. And everyone. Every contemporary source that talks about Fanny Augur talks about it as an affair.

Sandra Tanner [00:38:00] Yes. It's 1834. 35. This is.

Jenn Kamp [00:38:03] Yeah.

Gerardo Sumano [00:38:03] She will say anything. Yeah, she'll say. Actually, Kate halberg will say 1833, which is way early. Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:38:10] Yeah.

Sandra Tanner [00:38:11] Right. Yeah. Oliver thought of it as a dirty, nasty, filthy affair, which would have been. Correct. Correct. According to the Mormon doctrine of the day, he would have been in line with what the Mormons considered scripture. Joseph would have been the one out of line.

Gerardo Sumano [00:38:32] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:38:33] Yeah. And I just have to say, I. I'm. I. I would never bring up. I would never compare something to an Abrahamic test as a good thing. To me, I'm not a fan of the story. I think it's. It. It. I want to think it was just, like, maybe some cultural thing, but, like, can you imagine hauling your child up to a rock, putting him on a rock, and lifting a knife as you're about to stab your child? What that would literally do. It's okay if it's a myth, if it's a story, but. But I would never favorably compare something to that. That story of Abraham. You're. You're nodding your head, Jen.

Jenn Kamp [00:39:14] Yeah. I don't even think it's a good story.

John Dehlin [00:39:17] Yeah.

Jenn Kamp [00:39:17] If it was just a, like, common day story. Yeah. It's just. I, like, as a parent, that's unthinkable. Like, it is. It's unthinkable that the God or Heavenly Father, even when I was Mormon and believed, I still. That story never felt good in my heart. Like, I could not imagine Heavenly Father, the God that I loved and felt love from, would ever ask that of his child.

Sandra Tanner [00:39:56] I think that some of how. Some of the ways Christians would deal with that would be in thinking that, but he went up knowing God would supply and that he wouldn't have to. Somehow he knew he wouldn't have to kill the Son. And whether the story is true or whether you agree with that kind of a take, the Christians generally do not look at it as though that they, that it was a test and that God was not going to let him go through with that. I'm not saying that's a good answer or it solves anything, but that's the way a Christian would be more likely to think of it. In that sense. It wouldn't be equal to the way the Mormons are using the Abraham test because God doesn't have him go through with it. He provides a lamb. Whereas the way the Mormons are using it, you go through with it. The Abrahamic test is to take this woman as a plural wife and then you go ahead and do it. Whereas the Abrahamic test would be. Oh, God would say, oh no, it'll be fulfilled already. Just the fact that you're faithful to your one wife, to God. That's enough.

John Dehlin [00:41:12] Yeah. And if anyone knows the history of like Jim Jones and the People's Temple in Guyana.

Gerardo Sumano [00:41:17] Yeah, I was going to say.

John Dehlin [00:41:17] You want to go ahead.

Gerardo Sumano [00:41:19] Well, I was just going to say that this story is usually used whenever this story is used as an Abrahamic test and as an example of how God will test people. It turns out that the people most likely will be like a religious leader from a high demand group who is trying to make you do something that you're not comfortable with. And this story is used even outside of religious circles just to promote this idea of. It's important to test people.

Sandra Tanner [00:41:54] Yes. For total obedience.

Gerardo Sumano [00:41:56] Right, Exactly.

John Dehlin [00:41:57] Yeah. Because Jim, because Jim Jones would have his followers drink Kool Aid, tell them it was poison.

Gerardo Sumano [00:42:03] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:42:03] They would drink it and then he'd say, oh, it was just a test. It was just an Abrahamic test. There's no poison in it, except eventually there was poison in it and then 100 or a couple hundred died or however many died. So.

Sandra Tanner [00:42:16] Right.

Jenn Kamp [00:42:16] I, I just don't see God also if this is a story that he's putting into his Bible that from almost from that point on, whenever I hear this story from a high demand religion, it's used in such a wrong way, like such a, a way to take control over another human being. And maybe that's why it just doesn't, it just doesn't feel like it would come from, from God to me.

John Dehlin [00:42:52] And you make a great point, Sandra. It's, it's a bad comparison purely because Abraham didn't have to go through with it.

Jenn Kamp [00:42:58] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:42:59] And generations of women and men in Mormonism did.

Sandra Tanner [00:43:02] Yes.

John Dehlin [00:43:02] Yeah, that's a great point. Okay, so this is fun. We're only in slide three. All right, so we're now on to slide four. So let's go ahead and play the next slide that is quoting from the happiness letter. Now, Sandra or Gerardo, do either of you want to kind of give a little context or should we play the slide first?

Joseph Smith's Happiness Letter and Grooming Concerns

Gerardo Sumano [00:43:31] I think we can give you context.

Sandra Tanner [00:43:33] Okay, go for it.

Gerardo Sumano [00:43:34] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:43:35] So, I mean, we should have the show notes.

Gerardo Sumano [00:43:38] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:43:39] Jonathan Streeter's treatment of the happiness letter and Bill Real and. And RFM on Mormonism Live or on Radio Free Mormon. One of the two. Or on Bill's podcast, they talk about it, but go ahead. Yeah, yeah.

Gerardo Sumano [00:43:53] So there's. There's so much context around the happiness letter. And if you really want to understand what went on and what was happening, you need to watch the two and a half hour episode by Jonathan Streeter on and be real. And then they have another person called Chris Smith on it.

John Dehlin [00:44:12] Christopher Smith.

Gerardo Sumano [00:44:13] Yeah. And it's just kind of. It's kind of like you'll understand so much of the context of polygamy and how Joseph was handling all of it and the sources and stuff. But basically the happiness letter is a letter that is attributed to Joseph Smith. And basically he wrote.

Speaker F [00:44:36] He.

Gerardo Sumano [00:44:36] He dictated the letter to. To convince Nancy Rigdon, Sidney Rigdon's daughter. Yes.

John Dehlin [00:44:43] Yeah.

Gerardo Sumano [00:44:44] To go ahead and. And enter into polygamy and Mary Joseph. It's kind of in. It's kind of like an. It's very interesting that the church has used that letter because the actual source that we have for that letter is John C. Bennett. And it's on his expose where he has the transcript of the letter. And that's the earliest source that we have. But the church has used it from very, very early, has used the letter and has accepted as coming from Joseph Smith. Something that Jonathan Streeter says is like, if you accept the letter, you have to accept the context that John C. Bennett is giving, because John C. Bennett is the one that's providing the letter. And anyway, so they go on the pod on their podcast episode and they go through, like, what was going on, how Joseph was trying to approach Nancy, and eventually Nancy said no, rejected him. He became into this whole big mess because Sidney Rigdon found out and was not very happy about it. Joseph tried to deny that he ever proposed marriage to Nancy. And because then later the letter was leaked, or John C. Bennett gets a hold of it and publishes it. Then Joseph and his. His associates just start dragging Nancy through the mud and saying that he was a. She was a whore and, you know, like all sorts of horrible stuff. And then eventually Sidney has to go and plead with Joseph to stop that. And Sidney has to ride something in newspaper saying. Or I'm not remember, but Cindy has to publish something saying that he. That he acknowledges that Joseph didn't propose marriage to Nancy or something like that. He does a very careful word of denial on Joseph's stuff. But anyway, so it's just the whole context is really interesting and the fact that the church uses it and Hank Smith will quote from it. He won't say where it's coming from, but he just says, oh, Joseph said this, the letter. Jonathan Streeter goes through, like about an hour just dissecting the letter and how coercive language it has and how the whole letter, it's about, you know, convincing Nancy that, well, things that you might think they're bad are sometimes actually not bad.

John Dehlin [00:47:17] Things that are wrong in one context are right in another.

Gerardo Sumano [00:47:19] Right, exactly.

John Dehlin [00:47:21] It's kind of grooming. It's kind of grooming.

Sandra Tanner [00:47:22] But you have to remember it doesn't mention polygamy. That's why the church ends up using parts of the letter as faith promoting comments to give the youth about things that Joseph Smith said. But it's innuendo. It does not directly try to convince her of polygamy. It tries to convince her that God doesn't always say the same things, that God can say one thing one day and another thing another day. And that you shouldn't be too picky on if God contradicts something he said the day before.

Gerardo Sumano [00:47:57] Yeah. Something also that's really interesting about the letter is that it says, basically, it says that once you're in the church, you receive blessings because of living the commandments. But then if you're giving another commandment and you don't accept or live that commandment, then you will lose not just the blessings that will come from that new commandment, but that you will lose the blessings that you received for all the other stuff. So you will lose all your blessings. So it's pretty coercive language where, like, Nancy is being told, like, if you don't accept what it's coming, what will come next? Or what would what it's coming, then you might lose, you know, every blessing you have.

Speaker G [00:48:36] Yeah, right.

John Dehlin [00:48:38] All right, well, let's play the clip, and then we'll talk a little bit about more. All right, here we go. They're going to bring up the happiness letter

▶ Video Clip 1

Video Clip 1 [00:48:45] where Joseph Smith says this. He says that which is wrong under one circumstance maybe and often is right under another. God said, thou shalt not kill. At another time, he has said, thou shalt utterly destroy. This is the principle on which the government of heaven is conducted. Revelation adapted to circumstance. Revelation adapted to circumstance. Whatever God requires is right, no matter what it is. Although we may not see the reason till long after the events transpire. I bring this up with Nephi killing Laban in the Book of Mormon, that we've grown up with it and so we're pretty used to it. But someone who is a first time reader of the Book of Mormon might be horrified by the idea of Nephi killing Laban.

Video Clip 1 [00:49:29] Right.

Video Clip 1 [00:49:30] And so I don't think anyone needs to come into plural marriage feeling good about it. Like, oh, this is, this is a good, good thing. This is. I feel so warm and fuzzy inside. Right. I don't think that's the Lord's expectation. He's just saying this is revelation adapted to circumstance. This is my law. This is how we're going to do this. So I don't know, I like the comparison with Nephi killing Laban, that it's an exception, not the rule. But you have to trust Nephi and trust the Lord that this is really from him.

Kate Holbrook [00:50:05] I think that's another really powerful explanation for why we have this verse 36 that otherwise doesn't seem to fit. And it's because that is the rule is do not sleep with anyone other than your wife, the person you're married to. But then here's the situation, just like Abraham's situation, just like Nephi's situation, where you do something different.

Speaker F [00:50:30] I think that's exactly why it's, I

John Dehlin [00:50:32] am just blown away that they're, they're, they're, they're basically saying, hey, it's not so bad. It's kind of like this murder that, that we read about. Like polygamy is not so bad. It's, it's kind of like murder. Right?

Sandra Tanner [00:50:49] Why does this bother you?

John Dehlin [00:50:54] Why? I mean, it's just ridiculous. I mean that again, that story of Nephi and Laban is heinous. It's, it's what the Lafferty brothers used to kill the pregnant woman. That's covered in under the Banner of Heaven. Why would you want to use murder as an example of why polygamy is not so bad? Yeah, because it's kind of like murder. Do you have a thought on that?

Sandra Tanner [00:51:15] No, my mind's blown.

Gerardo Sumano [00:51:17] Laurie Daybell also uses. Used that story to justify a lot of the things she was doing. You know, that we know that her kids ended up dead and, and several of her husbands. And she would constantly refer to that Laban and Nephi story. We. We have recordings of her referring to that story.

John Dehlin [00:51:37] And then, Jen, I'm just going to ask you because you have four daughters, right?

Jenn Kamp [00:51:40] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:51:41] Yeah. So you're a mother of four daughters. Let's say they join a church. And in the church, the general rule is married men shouldn't have sex with teenage girls who are unmarried. Let's just say that's the rule. And then the preacher of that church isolates one of your daughters, hands her a letter, and the letter says, hey, daughter of Jen Camp, what's wrong in one circumstance can be right in another. When what he's actually saying is, hey, sometimes you make it. God makes an exception. In this case, he's making an exception for me to have you as a wife. Like what, what would you think?

Jenn Kamp [00:52:21] He would be arrested promptly. Yeah, yeah, yeah. No, that wouldn't fly. I don't. That's. No, no.

Sandra Tanner [00:52:33] Let me read again how this starts. Happiness is a subject and design of our existence. He turns it to happiness. Well, I don't think that's going to make us mothers very happy, but happy or the daughters. Happiness is the object and design of our existence.

Gerardo Sumano [00:52:51] And actually, something that was really interesting that Jonathan Streeter mentions. Is that Nancy. Nancy's dad, Rigden. Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:53:04] Sydney.

Gerardo Sumano [00:53:06] Yeah. Sydney had done a funeral. And on the funeral, like, he. He gave. He gave, like, kind of like this speech. And the speech, he. He included, like, a lot of the ideas on happiness, a lot of the language he was using. So it was kind of like Joseph using his dad's language, her dad's language, to include it into the happiness letter.

Sandra Tanner [00:53:27] Yeah. He goes on to say, happiness is the object and design of our existence and will be the end thereof if we pursue the path that leads to it. So he's grooming her right there. I've tried to talk to you about polygamy. This is. Polygamy is the object that we're designed for in our existence and polygamy, if we follow it to the end. So he goes on, actually says, if we pursue the path that leads to it. And this path. Now here's a real mind bender. He's trying to get her to go into polygamy, which is illegal. And behind Emma's Back. So this path is virtue, uprightness, faithfulness, holiness, and keeping all the commandments of God. So the first few things. Oh yeah, that sounds really good. That sounds godly. And then you throw in, ah, the important part is you're going to keep all the commands of God. And by the way, God just commanded me to ask you to be my plural wife. And so it's putting her on the horns of a dilemma of how do you be virtuous and keep all the commandments of God? Because now all the commandments include God's prophet can ask you to marry him secretly and not tell his wife about it.

Gerardo Sumano [00:54:54] Right.

Jenn Kamp [00:54:55] And the rule. And he's breaking the rule. The one rule.

Gerardo Sumano [00:54:59] Yeah, several. We'll see later. Most of them.

John Dehlin [00:55:05] Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay, well that's, that's Slide 5. That's Slide 4. Slide 5. All right, so we're going on now to Slide 6. And, and now we're going to bring in David and we're going to talk about the restoration of all things. So I'll just go ahead and start reading. They're going to be covering verses DNC132, verses 37 through 39, and it says Abraham received concubines. Now I'm just going to stop there. He's about, they're about to start talking about the main. Tell me if I'm wrong, Sandra. The main justification is tell me this is right in Joseph's mind that God's saying to Joseph, Joseph, we need a restoration of all things, Right?

Sandra Tanner [00:56:01] Yep.

John Dehlin [00:56:01] And if we need a restoration of all things, and if Abraham, Isaac and Jacob and David and Solomon all practice polygamy, then, then of course, Joseph, it's just, it's just really important that you practice polygamy too. Is that, am I following the right logic so far?

Sandra Tanner [00:56:18] Right. But it would, that would make you restore all sorts of things in the Old Testament that we wouldn't want coming back.

John Dehlin [00:56:26] Right. Like eating pork and stoning adulteresses and all sorts of things. But I just want to also make the point that if we're going to rely on this logic train that there needs to be a restoration of all things. And here we have mentioning in verse 37, the third word is concubines.

Sandra Tanner [00:56:44] Yes.

John Dehlin [00:56:45] What does that, what does that mean?

Sandra Tanner [00:56:47] It means your second hand inferior, lower level marriage partner, but you have no rights of inheritance or honor or position in the community as a wife does. So I mean, why is God throwing in concubines? Why isn't it just wives? And I find this Very strange that they would want to throw that in with their eternal marriage. So do we have concubines in Joseph Smith's group? Were some of those wives not to be recognized as legitimate plural wives? They were just servants of the wives. It's a funny add in.

John Dehlin [00:57:33] I mean, I mean, I. I want to sort of define the word concubine as kind of like a sex slave. Right. I don't know how else to think about it. But it says here in verse 37, Abraham received concubines and they bore him children.

Speaker G [00:57:47] And.

John Dehlin [00:57:47] And it was accounted unto him for righteousness.

Sandra Tanner [00:57:50] Yes.

John Dehlin [00:57:50] So if concubines are righteousness and there needs to be a restoration of all things. Jen, am I. Am I stretching things here? Why didn't God then command Joseph to have concubines?

Jenn Kamp [00:58:07] Because I don't believe God commanded him to do any of this.

John Dehlin [00:58:12] But the logic, it.

Jenn Kamp [00:58:13] Yeah. If he's supposed to restore all things, then in, you know, this dnc, then he should have restored all things.

John Dehlin [00:58:22] Yeah.

Jenn Kamp [00:58:23] If that's what he said he was doing, then that's the way it should be.

John Dehlin [00:58:27] And he's saying that they were. That his concubines bore him children that were accounted unto him in righteousness. So clearly God was okay with these sex slaves back then, and then why isn't he okay with them now? I wonder if that's part of ongoing revelation. I wonder if Russell M. Nelson is going to come up with the new revelation announcing concubines as a new. As a new restoration. Restoration of all things.

Sandra Tanner [00:58:53] I think he's just sticking with more wives.

John Dehlin [00:58:56] Okay, all right.

Sandra Tanner [00:58:57] Well, it's easier to get your wife's consent for more wives than concubines, especially

John Dehlin [00:59:03] if your wife's dead, which his wife. First wife was.

Kate Holbrook [00:59:05] Right.

Sandra Tanner [00:59:05] Yeah, that's. That's the other thing that worries so many Mormon women is if I die first, my husband can marry again and he'll come out in the resurrection with more wives that I never approved of.

John Dehlin [00:59:18] Yeah, well, we're beating a dead horse. But I continue. So verse 37.

Nancy Rigdon and Joseph Smith's Proposals

Gerardo Sumano [00:59:23] I just wanted to say that actually the story goes that when she proposes to Nancy Rigdon, when Joseph does, Joseph tells her, oh, I. I'll take you as a concubine, but if you don't really like that idea, I'll take you as a wife. That's what the story.

John Dehlin [00:59:40] Oh, my goodness.

Gerardo Sumano [00:59:41] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:59:43] So Joseph was trying to restore the concubine.

Gerardo Sumano [00:59:46] Yeah. John C. Bennett says that. Yes, he was.

John Dehlin [00:59:49] Oh, but John, John, John C. Bennett. And Joseph had A falling out. So we. So we can't trust.

Gerardo Sumano [00:59:53] Well, we have. We. We trust. The happiness letter that came from John

John Dehlin [00:59:57] C. I know, it's so crazy. Okay. Verse 37 continues. And it was accounted. Okay. No, because they were given unto him and he abode in my law. Again, that's just. It's like. It's like women are handed around as cattle.

Sandra Tanner [01:00:12] Yes.

John Dehlin [01:00:12] In. They were in. It's like God's like, okay, I'll give you these wives and these concubines and yeah, okay, let's see. Um. And he abide. He aboded my law. And Isaac also, and Jacob did none other things than that which they were commanded. Cuz God does that. And because they did none other things than that which they were commanded, they have entered into their exaltation according to the promises and sit up on the thrones and are not angels, but are what?

Sandra Tanner [01:00:46] Gods?

John Dehlin [01:00:47] Gods. I thought we didn't know. I don't know if we emphasized or, you know, really focused on that.

Sandra Tanner [01:00:53] You have to pay attention to whether gods is capitalized or not capitalized.

John Dehlin [01:00:58] Okay.

Sandra Tanner [01:00:58] Because there's evidently different levels of gods.

John Dehlin [01:01:01] Okay.

Sandra Tanner [01:01:01] You get. Whether you get a capital or not. But in the original, I believe it's capitalized.

John Dehlin [01:01:06] Oh, wow. And.

Gerardo Sumano [01:01:08] And I didn't know that.

John Dehlin [01:01:09] Yeah. And we read when we mentioned last time that Gordon McHinkley, when he was asked about this doctrine, you know, can men become gods? He said, I don't know that we teach it. I don't know that we emphasize it. And he must have not remembered DNC 132, verse 37 because we don't emphasize it.

Gerardo Sumano [01:01:26] We have to have a separate podcast where Kate Holbrook is talking about it. It's not, it's not on the Come follow me manual.

John Dehlin [01:01:34] Yeah.

Sandra Tanner [01:01:35] Also the capital G thing is an interesting side, like study, because like in the King Follette sermon, one of Joseph last sermons, he talks about becoming gods and things in there. And as I recall, the originals use capital G. So early Mormons had. Did not shy away from a concept of becoming big G gods.

Gerardo Sumano [01:02:03] Yeah.

Sandra Tanner [01:02:03] Nowadays they have taken the capitalizations out of many of the documents when they publish them so that you don't, you don't understand and grasp that they really mean full godhood to these people.

John Dehlin [01:02:18] Yeah, for sure.

Gerardo Sumano [01:02:20] Yeah. I didn't know that. I think that's a big deal because. Because, yeah, I think a big apologetic argument is like that I've heard. I think it was fair. Mormon is like, oh, it's God's and it's not capitalized, so it might not mean actual, like, heavenly father, God.

Sandra Tanner [01:02:38] Yeah.

Gerardo Sumano [01:02:38] Kind of thing.

John Dehlin [01:02:39] Yeah. Okay. Verse 38. 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. So God's okay with all that Polygamy and concubinary goes on to verse 39. 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. And I gave them unto another, sayeth the Lord. Really quickly, when he says, I gave them unto another, sayeth the Lord. What does he mean by them?

Sandra Tanner [01:03:40] Wives.

John Dehlin [01:03:42] Right. Did you catch that? Anyone, anyone, anyone catch why that's problematic?

Jenn Kamp [01:03:49] That's what they did when Joseph passed away, right? They gave his wives to Brigham and other men.

Sandra Tanner [01:03:57] Yeah. The main group of Joseph's wives, widows, were split between Brigham Young, Heber C. Kimball, and. Who was the third main one?

John Dehlin [01:04:11] Wilver Woodruff.

Gerardo Sumano [01:04:12] Heber C. Kimball got to have like 40. 40 plus wives before Joseph died. So he got more.

Sandra Tanner [01:04:20] Yeah, well, I can't remember the count, but. Yeah, but there was a whole bunch of Joseph's. Of Brigham and Hebrews and others that took Joseph Smith's plural wives. Not all of Joseph's plural wives got passed on to somebody else. I think some of them were older and probably didn't care about going on to some other guy. And maybe some weren't able to have children. So if you're looking for seed, if you have a woman past childbearing, she may not want to even go marry it. But we see a great pattern of Brigham's taking of Joseph's wives as though they are swapping. Yeah. Objects, you know, like, I got three Mercedes. Do you want three of them? Or, you know, I don't know. It just seemed like treating them as property.

Gerardo Sumano [01:05:14] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:05:14] Yeah. And it's kind of disingenuous for Kate Holbrook to be even using the word consent for any of them to use the word consent. We're all repulsed by Joseph Smith handing out women to men for favors. We're all repulsed by Brigham Young handing out wives as favors to his friends and buddies. We're all repulsed by Warren Jeffs deciding whose daughters get to marry his buddies. But what's powerful, and I never realized this, is in verse 39, it's God who's modeling this behavior because it says here, for I gave them unto another, saith the Lord. So Jesus basically reassigned David's unapproved wives and concubines to other men. So God is the author of treating women like cattle, according to this verse.

Jenn Kamp [01:06:09] And, like, even. I don't even want to say even harsher, but, like, pointing out what Sandra said that, you know, after Joseph, you know, passed away, the. The men all, you know, get together or whatever they did and decide, oh, yeah, that one's too old. We don't need to marry her to someone else. Oh, that one hasn't had any kids yet. So we're just gonna not marry her to anyone else. You know, they'll just be, you know, helpers or, you know, we'll just leave them here in Nauvoo. And to, like, that just, you know, is so infuriating as a woman to be like, oh, yeah, you know, you're not. You're no good. Oh, that part, you know, you can't do that. You're no. You're no good. And they're just going through like they're not even human. And that is not okay. That's not okay in any way. Yeah, so.

John Dehlin [01:07:09] And we haven't even played the clip yet.

Jenn Kamp [01:07:10] Sorry.

John Dehlin [01:07:12] No, it's good. Yeah, let's play. Should we play the clip? All right, so here's the clip.

▶ Video Clip 2

Video Clip 2 [01:07:19] It's in there.

Video Clip 2 [01:07:20] Wow, this is. This is a intense scripture. Let's keep going. Keep walking us through this.

Video Clip 2 [01:07:28] So then we get several scriptures again, looking to. To ancient prophets who had more than one wife. And it explains that most of them, it was accounted unto them for righteousness. They were not sinning when they did this because they were. They were doing it according to God's will. But then one of them did not do it according to God's will. This is verse 39 with. With David. So at first it was okay. It says, in none of these things did he sin against me, save. Except in the case of Uriah and his wife. We know that's Bathsheba. David sees her bathing, desires her, sleeps with her, and then does. Doesn't want to get caught, so sends him to the front lines where in

Video Clip 2 [01:08:16] battle, he's sure to be killed.

Video Clip 2 [01:08:17] He's sure to be killed.

Video Clip 2 [01:08:19] I remember the jaw drop that I had in seminary when I learned that the same David, hero David who slew Goliath was this same David, I thought, wait, but, but, but, but no, but he slew Goliath.

Video Clip 2 [01:08:34] Such a disappointment.

Video Clip 2 [01:08:35] So eight foot, eight foot giants are no problem but your own lust. Oh man, I just. That was a, that was a sad day.

Video Clip 2 [01:08:45] Yeah, yeah. And so, and so we see what happens to him. David hath fallen from his exaltation. He received his portion already. He shall not inherit more out of the world. God gave that portion that heavenly, you know, those thrones and principalities and powers, those are given to unto another person.

John Dehlin [01:09:09] Oh, so it wasn't wives given to another person, it was thrones and principalities. So God had a certain number of thrones and principalities reserved for David and then David blew it so he could gave those thrones and principalities, not wives to others.

Sandra Tanner [01:09:25] Well, he had to have wives to for all those kingdoms though.

Gerardo Sumano [01:09:30] Isn't it interesting that in the LDS church we, we, we are, we are, we feel really okay about throwing David in under the bus and saying how horrible it was, how he disobeyed God and putting him up as an example of like what not to do and how he lost, you know, his exaltation and how terrible it was what he did. But then they want to offer Joseph Smith all the grace in the world when and how he lived polygamy, even when he went against the way God was commanding it to be lived. Like, why is there a double standard between David of the Bible and Joseph Smith?

John Dehlin [01:10:13] That's a great question.

Sandra Tanner [01:10:15] Right. Because further on in the revelation it says a man, if a man have 10 virgins, he hasn't sinned.

Gerardo Sumano [01:10:22] Right.

Sandra Tanner [01:10:22] And yet he marries about 12 women with living husbands.

Gerardo Sumano [01:10:26] Right.

Sandra Tanner [01:10:26] So why isn't that counted as sin? Like with Bathsheba.

Gerardo Sumano [01:10:32] Exactly. Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:10:33] Oh, by the way, Bathsheba never gets named. So isn't that just fitting that it doesn't say. It doesn't even have the grace to name her. It says in the case of Uriah and his wife.

Sandra Tanner [01:10:45] Yes. So property.

John Dehlin [01:10:49] Yeah, it's not, it's not Bathsheba. It's. It's Uriah's wife. Yeah, kind of this cattle. Kind of, kind of this cattle situation again. All right. I mean, we're kind of being hard. We're all a little bit upset. I'm just going to check in. We're all kind of really critical and negative. Why? Why is that?

Joseph Smith's Public Denials of Polygamy

Sandra Tanner [01:11:08] Because it was against the law and because he lied to everyone. He wasn't just lying a Little bit. He publicly, time after time, said in the pulpit what a thing it is that I'm accused of having seven wives when I can only find one. I'm the same innocent guy I was when I got married. And he gives these denunciations of people that practice polygamy. Of course they'll say, well, they did it without authority. But he never says he did it with authority in public. Every statement of Joseph in public was to deny polygamy. And yet this man is held up to us as God's example of true prophet of God called to restore the church that has been in disarray for almost 2,000 years. And then the guy we're supposed to follow is lying to his wife, lying to his church, lying to his community, lying to everyone in the nation. I don't see this as setting an example of how a man of God should live.

John Dehlin [01:12:18] Yeah. Yeah. And then. And then, Jen, I'll just ask you, what is it? How does it make you feel to hear that Jesus, which is Mormon, Lord, is Jesus. Jesus is giving these revelations in the Doctrine and Covenants. Right, Sanders? Yeah. How does it make you feel, Jen, to know that Jesus is the one handing out all these women to other men and is approving all of this stuff?

Jenn Kamp [01:12:42] Yeah. The Jesus that I know does not. So I. Yeah, I don't. It. It's been. This was my shelf breaker. I just want to let everyone know that. And so this. All of this is really hard for me, like this subject, because I don't. I don't. I don't believe it came from God. I don't believe Christ or Jesus would approve of any of this. And I. Yeah, so it's just hard when it's hard for me because even in trying to restructure my spirituality and what I believe and what feels true within myself, I. I, no matter what way, you know, Jesus, I don't believe he would ever approve of this. And so having that be said in the Doctrine and Covenants, that this comes from him just does not feel right in any part of me.

John Dehlin [01:13:50] Yeah. Thank you, Jen. That's heartfelt. And. And, and yet in verse 40, it goes on to say, I am the Lord thy God, and I gave unto thee my servant Joseph, an appointment and restore all things. Ask what you will, and it shall be given unto you according to my word. So it's. Yeah. Gerardo, were you going to say something? No.

Gerardo Sumano [01:14:14] Think it's okay. We can keep going.

John Dehlin [01:14:17] Okay. All right. Okay. So we are on to the next slide. And, you know, I. I Think we. I think it's a discussion about boundaries and God's house being a house of order. So let's. Let's hear that.

Speaker G [01:14:39] Now, Kate, correct me if I'm wrong here, but I see in verse 39, the Lord saying this principle I'm going to give you. Plural marriage has very strict boundaries, and you cannot cross those boundaries. This isn't a okay, do whatever you want type thing. If you want this. This is a strict law that we're going to carefully hold in line. Would I be correct in saying that in verse 39, this is very serious?

Kate Holbrook [01:15:05] I think that's absolutely true. So I think we've learned two things so far. And the first is that the first wife should consent. And the second is this, that this is not a free for all. And the way this played out, the way my house is, the house of order comes out in. What we're talking about now is you had to ask the prophet, you couldn't practice plural marriage with authority unless you had Joseph Smith's permission. And then in Utah, Brigham Young's sandra,

John Dehlin [01:15:38] I saw you smile.

Sandra Tanner [01:15:40] Well, we've gone from needing to ask the wife's permission that gets passed over as not important. And now we got to have the prophet's permission, which evidently was one of the problems with Bennett was the accusation that Bennett went out without asking Joseph and was doing it all on his own. But that's going to be a natural outcome of anyone that sets up this kind of a sexual program. When one guy gets to pass out favors and say, yeah, you can have plural wives. No, you can't. You're not worthy enough. Somebody's going to break out and say, well, why do I need your permission? If it's of God, I'll just go do it myself. It. It ended up creating just a horrible environment in Nauvoo where who knew when. When it would be from Joseph or not. I mean, if people are going around claiming his authority, and we know that Joseph had the. Some going around claiming his authority that were publicly telling people that, that it's not true. So how would you ever know who to believe?

John Dehlin [01:16:48] Yeah, I'm just befuddled, and you guys helped me out with this, that they're like rejoicing that the scripture states that God's house is a house of order, and they're just so relieved that then polygamy had all these rules and structures. And I'm just thinking, how could they be saying that with a straight face that somehow anything about this was ordered and structured?

Gerardo Sumano [01:17:14] I just don't think they know the history or don't remember. Honestly, a lot of this I studied three years ago and I had forgotten. And it was preparing for this episode that I was just studying all this stuff again. And I was like, oh, my goodness, this was crazy. It's just hard to look at the evidence and not see it as a sexual cult. Like, seriously, Because. Yeah, sex cult. Because it was just horrible. Like you. We have William Smith at some point, like Joseph's brother, who was an apostle, telling women like, oh, it's okay if single women are having sex with married men. As soon as the women are not married to other men, then it's fine. And she, at one point, William Smith. And this is. This was testified by. By the woman, Catherine Fuller, where she says that William Smith, when she was about to get married, William Smith went to her and said, oh, don't get married, because then I won't be able to have sex with you. And this is Joseph, Joseph's brother, an apostle. Like, it's like elder oaks going out and telling this to a woman. So this was far from. From anything ordered and structured and.

John Dehlin [01:18:33] Yeah, yeah, yeah. Valerie writes, nothing about this can be considered a house of order. We already covered in last episode that the missionaries are doing this in 1831 to. Only to the Native American women. And then Joseph's doing it in 1833. But Oliver Cowdery thinks it's. It's a dirty, nasty, filthy affair. And all of that's happening before the ceiling power was even given and. And before the revelations even given. And then even after that, Joseph Smith marries 22 women, violates his own law of Sarah, doesn't give, get consent with Emma, marries these twin sisters twice because Emma's pissed off and he wants to fool her.

Gerardo Sumano [01:19:14] Oh, Zina. To Zina's story. That's an awful story where Joseph proposes to her before she's married. She says no, and then. But Joseph still wanted her. And after Zina finds the love of her life, marries him, Joseph comes back and says, oh, God, it's threatened me with a flaming, like, with a drawn sword. If I don't marry you, then I'm gonna be killed. And Zina finally gives in and says, okay, then I guess I'll marry you. It's just awful, awful stuff.

Jenn Kamp [01:19:50] Yes.

Sandra Tanner [01:19:50] If you took the names out of this story and gave it to the average person to read the average Mormon, they would think it was one of these splinter polygamous groups like Warren Jeffs, and I'm sure would condemn the whole thing as false doctrine. But it's when you put the Mormon approved names in, it changes your whole perspective on it. And everything can be allowed. If it was the prophet or at the prophet's direction, when under any other circumstance they would have condemned the whole practice.

John Dehlin [01:20:29] Yeah.

Sandra Tanner [01:20:31] It shows you the mind control there is in high control religions. And Mormonism is the pattern for that. You see it all through the consecration of property, being in Joseph's army, marrying women, he gets to have control of the church finances. It's all just set up as one man has the right to tell you anything is from God that he feels led to say, and you have no recourse. There's no scripture you can use as a corrective to a leader that has gone off the rails.

Gerardo Sumano [01:21:18] There's no checks and balances. Like, how do you tell if the prophet, what if he turns out like David? You know, how do we know if he was another David from the Bible? There's no way to know.

Sandra Tanner [01:21:31] No, because it all goes by testimony. And we're taught that as children, everything is through emotion, through feeling, through praying about something. Just as you obey your parents, you obey your prophet, and whatever the prophet says is from God. So we grow up submitting to all these things. And like you're saying at byu, you grow up with rose colored glasses on, on a lot of this stuff that keeps you from doing an evaluation of the situation that in any other circumstance you would have seen couldn't have been from God.

John Dehlin [01:22:09] Yeah.

Jenn Kamp [01:22:10] Yeah. And growing up in the church, the reason why all of this, mainly some points of it were my shelf breaker, was because for 43 years, I did not ever learn this. I, I was never taught this. It was never shown to me, never taught in curriculum. And it was shocking and it broke my heart. And it's not taught in the normal classrooms or primary young women's release society. I learned about this in trying to find an answer for someone that I love. And then I found and came upon all of this and it shattered, Shattered me. So it's not okay. It's, it's not okay to hide it from women in the church. And it's not okay the way that it's been structured and hidden. It's just not okay. So.

Gerardo Sumano [01:23:25] Yeah. And now that you're saying this, Jenna, it just makes me think of all these people that I've met who say, oh, I knew about Joseph Smith's polygamy since I was young. I'm not troubled about this stuff. But then really, do you know about Joseph Smith's polygamy or do you just know he practiced it? Do you know the stories of the women, what happened with them? I think it would be really hard to find someone that. I mean, we have Kate Holbrook here, which is like ignoring a bunch of this important context and stories of these women and painting.

Kate Holbrook [01:24:00] She.

Gerardo Sumano [01:24:00] She's the one that's supposed to know all these stories.

Jenn Kamp [01:24:03] Yeah.

Sandra Tanner [01:24:04] And.

Gerardo Sumano [01:24:04] And she's completely dismissing all the trouble. Information and troubling information and painting like a, A, A nicer picture.

Jenn Kamp [01:24:13] Yeah. And she's stating things like all the, all the women she used. All, all the women had sex. Spiritual, grand. Spiritual experiences. That. That's untrue. And she knows it.

Gerardo Sumano [01:24:26] Yeah.

Jenn Kamp [01:24:27] Like, she knows, like, firsthand journal writings from women that are total opposite of that. And she, She's a historian. Like, she knows better and she's painting a picture that all women just were so excited about this and they had these big spiritual experiences that they. That said, you know, that they should do this. That's not the case. Yeah, it's not.

Gerardo Sumano [01:24:52] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:24:53] Yeah. Okay. Well. Yeah. What do you do when the guy in charge, you know, you can't put the fox in charge of the hen house. What do you do when the guy who's prophet, who's in charge of the. The polygamy is potentially a, A predator?

Sandra Tanner [01:25:14] You do like William Law and set up an opposition newspaper exposing his secret teachings and try to get the public aware of what's going on. And then Mormons go and burn out his press and essentially run him out of town. And so it's been a problem all through Mormon history of those that are doing whistleblowing or try to bring awareness to people. There's a big backlash against them.

Gerardo Sumano [01:25:48] Yeah. Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:25:52] All right. Well, yeah. So much for their house of order. It's just weird that they were all so excited.

Gerardo Sumano [01:26:00] I think there's another clip where they even. They talk about it even more.

Speaker F [01:26:04] Yeah.

Gerardo Sumano [01:26:04] In depth.

John Dehlin [01:26:04] But. Okay. All right, well, let's go to the next. Go ahead and go to the next clip. We're going to talk about John C. Bennett. Here we go.

Kate Holbrook [01:26:16] Permission.

Speaker G [01:26:17] Isn't that Joseph's conflict with John C. Bennett is. John C. Bennett is seeing his. Hey, I can do whatever I want here. And Joseph is. No, this is strict.

Kate Holbrook [01:26:31] Yes. And John C. Bennett had not been brought into. Into this story of Joseph. Like, he just heard rumors, but he hadn't been invited. He hadn't invited. Joseph Smith had not invited him to practice plural marriage. But he took those rumors and used them and and so did a few other of, of his friends use them to seduce women, saying, I have. And because they were friends with Joseph Smith, women believed them. You know, I have authority. Joseph Smith has told me that I have authority to sleep with, with people, women that I'm not married to and did. And then those women had to come up on public trial. And we, we have, we don't know a lot of detail about plural marriage in Nauvoo because it was secret and people didn't even write. Most people, there are a couple of exceptions, didn't even write about it in their journals. But we do have these court cases of people who were seduced and deceit, seduced and deceived.

Speaker G [01:27:32] And so because this is, this could be so abused, the Lord is putting very strict rules on it. And he uses David as an example.

Kate Holbrook [01:27:41] And another evidence of why we learned early in this section, my house is a house of order. You can see how high the stakes are with that by the time you get here.

Speaker G [01:27:51] And I'm glad about that. I don't know, there's something about that that says, yes, I'm going to command this, but I, this is a very strict command, careful principle that we're going to live. I, I that gives me confidence moving forward with this.

Speaker F [01:28:04] I, I'd like to make sure, and I want to.

John C. Bennett and His Role in Nauvoo

John Dehlin [01:28:08] So, Sandra, would you mind telling us about John C. Bennett? Because I, I this, he's one of the most important characters in the history of Mormonism that Mormons have never heard of.

Sandra Tanner [01:28:19] Well, he, Joseph was, seems to be enamored of strong personalities. And so Bennett was immediately accepted into the group. And Joseph puts him up to be mayor of Nauvoo. And he's put up with some very important positions. One of the things she mentioned that I was surprised about is how she knows. How would she know that Joseph didn't teach Bennett polygamy?

Gerardo Sumano [01:28:52] Right.

Sandra Tanner [01:28:53] I mean, he could have done that and still gone rogue. Whatever you want to say about that.

Gerardo Sumano [01:28:57] Exactly.

Sandra Tanner [01:28:57] But how does she know Joseph didn't teach it? Yeah, we know in his book, his expose, he writes on this whole thing. He knows some of the women that are plural wives because he uses their names only, only with the asterisks of the first letter of their first and last name. And so now historians can go back and look at who he mentions and we can plug in the actual name of the women. It shows he did have inside knowledge. I mean, you have to be an insider to know who these women were. It wasn't listed in the Newspaper. So I think there's always an attempt to tear Bennett down to the lowest mean person when we don't know what really was going on behind the scenes with him and Joseph. He could have had a lot of teaching by Joseph on polygamy for all we know.

Gerardo Sumano [01:29:52] Yeah. And Jonathan Streeter mentions a lot on their podcast that a lot of John C. Bennett's testimonies or exposes are corroborated by other sources as well. So it's not just. And that's how we know that John C. Bennett was in the inn. I mean, he was at some point, like, even, like, second church command and stuff, so.

Sandra Tanner [01:30:18] Right.

John Dehlin [01:30:19] Wasn't he co president? Yeah, at some point.

Gerardo Sumano [01:30:22] Yes.

Sandra Tanner [01:30:23] Remember?

Gerardo Sumano [01:30:24] Something like that. Yeah.

Sandra Tanner [01:30:25] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:30:25] And like, William Law was later, like Oliver Cowdery was before. Why is it that the assistants to Joseph Smith always end up claiming that he was an adulterer?

Sandra Tanner [01:30:38] Bad guys.

John Dehlin [01:30:39] No. Oliver. Yeah, right. All. So we have at least four. Oliver Cowdery, John C. Bennett, William Law,

Sandra Tanner [01:30:49] and Sydney Rigden for a time.

John Dehlin [01:30:53] Sidney Rigdon, like, all of them basically said, Joseph Smith was an adulterer. Why? And getting kicked out. Why?

Sandra Tanner [01:31:02] Because there can only be one king in the country, and if you started looking like a threat to the other guy leading the place, then the top guy's gonna push him out.

Gerardo Sumano [01:31:16] Yeah. I was gonna mention this. LDS discussions just. Just brought it up.

Speaker F [01:31:22] She.

Gerardo Sumano [01:31:23] Kate Holbrook, tries to make it sound like John C. Bennett was tried, he. She says, with his friends. By going rogue on polygamy. It was not just his friends. He was tried with Joseph's brother, William Smith. And then at some point during the trial, Joseph. Right. When they're gonna get his testimony, Joseph stands up and says, I'm not gonna hear this anymore. Yeah, I'm not gonna hear this anymore. And then Brigham Young just ends the trial. And they don't really say much about try him, but that's kind of disingenuous because William Smith was an apostle. He was not just one of John C. Bennett's little friends.

Sandra Tanner [01:32:11] Yeah. Crony or something.

Gerardo Sumano [01:32:12] Right. Exactly.

Sandra Tanner [01:32:13] Well, one of the other things I thought was curious about what she was saying. I thought she was implying that several of the women went on trial.

Gerardo Sumano [01:32:22] Yeah, they were. They. They did.

Sandra Tanner [01:32:23] They did.

Gerardo Sumano [01:32:24] I. I think so. And that's where we get the stories of, you know, some of the stories of William Smith and how he. He was involved. Like, I think in some. At some point, women were asked, like, why is Joseph. Why. Why is Joseph denying, you know, all this stuff outside but then, but then, you know, how did you rationalize that with. Why would he, why would they, why would you accept that the Joseph was in on this if he is denying it outside and stuff like that?

Sandra Tanner [01:32:59] But what must be a black hole in my memory.

Gerardo Sumano [01:33:02] Okay, maybe, I don't know, I could be wrong.

Sandra Tanner [01:33:04] No, I have to go back and do a little refreshing.

John Dehlin [01:33:07] Senator, what's. So what's your take on what happened? So clearly John C. Bennett, he was the one who took the Nauvoo charter to the Illinois legislature to approve Nauvoo. He was clearly Joseph's co president or right hand man. He was able to list Joseph's plural wives. So. But then Joseph says, well he, he was off doing an illegitimate form of spiritual wifery. I was doing legitimate plural marriage even though I was denying it and lying to Emma about it. But somehow William Bennett was doing illegitimate spiritual wifery and it wasn't approved of. What do you think really happened as you read the history?

Sandra Tanner [01:33:46] Well, that could have really been the issue that if you have two corrupt men and one starts to look like he's after your job, you'd start pushing him out. So they obviously had some kind of leadership challenge falling out. Yeah, falling out of some sort.

Gerardo Sumano [01:34:07] Chris Smith's argument actually and Jonathan Streeter, sue, is that John C. Bennett got caught and that was the problem. Like John C. Bennett was not being careful and not being too secretively and because it was because of John C. Bennett's not, not being really careful about. He was approaching these women and more rumors spreading. They had to kind of be. He had to be the sacrificial lamb kind of thing because most of the rumors that had gone out were around his, the way he was approaching it.

Sandra Tanner [01:34:41] Yeah, sounds good. Sounds right.

John Dehlin [01:34:42] Yeah. Mormons really need to, to think about that. That he's Joseph's right hand man. He's doing the same things Joseph's doing. But somehow.

Gerardo Sumano [01:34:53] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:34:54] Joseph condemns it after they have a falling out. Joseph condemns it as illegitimate when it was the same stuff Joseph was doing. Isn't that a little fishy?

Sandra Tanner [01:35:03] Yes.

Gerardo Sumano [01:35:05] Yeah. If you really want to understand it, like a lot of I, I, I, you, you should go listen Chris Smith and Jonathan street to talk about this.

John Dehlin [01:35:13] We'll include that in the show notes.

Gerardo Sumano [01:35:14] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:35:15] As well. Okay. Yeah. And again, Hank Smith just feels more confidence in the restoration because William Bennett's. John C. Bennett's behaviors was condemned. Why doesn't that make you feel better about Joseph Smith? Because he condemned John C. Bennett. Sandra.

Sandra Tanner [01:35:33] Hank feels Good about it because we're only looking at a small part of the story. All of Nauvoo Mormonism is full of problem areas. And if you can weave in and out of the problem areas, you can make it look like a nice development in Nauvoo. But there's another side to the story. So it's the editing they're able to do around the public knowledge of Nauvoo that when you hear it and not aren't prepared for it, it's very shocking and troubling for you because you start realizing you were spoon fed half a story. I grew up knowing that Joseph Smith gave the revelation on polygamy. I don't know why. It never occurred to me that he must have lived it. I just never really thought about it. I grew up knowing my great grandma, who was the last polygamous wife of Brigham Young Jr. And it never really occurred to me to even ask how many wives there were or how she was able to deal with polygamy because everyone else was dead and she could just tell the story the way she wanted. All I heard was great stories of how God protects polygamists from being arrested. But I didn't get any of the surrounding story. So there's so much of polygamy that is so shocking when you hear the whole story. And yet people will say to me, oh, it doesn't bother me. And I think, well, then I don't think you've read enough because it should bother you.

Gospel Topics Essays and Modern Apologetics

John Dehlin [01:37:15] Yeah, yeah. For me, this is why the Gospel topics essays and modern Mormon neo apologetics are, are dishonest and kind of gaslighting. Because there's no reading of this history that doesn't conclude that it's super chaotic and confusing. And yet here, Hank Smith and Kate Holbrook and John, by the way, are going, isn't God a God of order? Isn't it amazing that God had rules and structure for the polygamy and the plural marriage with Joseph and Nauvoo? And it's, it's basically. I don't know that they're doing it on purpose, but it, but it has the effect of just. These are not the droids you're looking for. There is no confusion here. God is a God of order. Joseph Smith did polygamy under God's law with order, even though it's completely chaotic. Jen, you had some other reactions as well.

Jenn Kamp [01:38:11] Yeah, that was the reaction I was having when I was watching that video because they. There, they repeat it. They say he, you know, God had Very strict rules. Very strict rules that he gave to Joseph. This was all given with very strict rules. And then you. You look at it, you look at the stories, and you look at how the timeline. And he didn't follow those very strict rules. And so I don't understand, like, why they're presenting it that way when they all know that the rules weren't followed, even if it was, you know, the way it was presented in the Indian C. It. He didn't follow them. So I don't understand their. Their. Why they're emphasizing that.

John Dehlin [01:39:02] Yeah. Yeah. It doesn't make sense. Thanks, Jen. All right, well, so we're just a few verses in, and we. We're not going to make much more, actually. We're. We're. We're coming up to all the verses that they actually address in the entire episode. Let's go ahead and go to the next clip.

Speaker F [01:39:26] I want to restate something Kate said. So you had to be invited by the president of the church, by the prophet, to participate. To participate in this, whether that was Joseph or in Salt Lake, Brigham, and those who. But there were some who. Who lied and said that they had been. Yeah. And so we. I have heard percentages thrown around. I don't know, maybe this isn't the time to talk about it, but about how many were actually practicing this in. In Salt Lake era, For example, how many of the men of the church, or we're practicing this in Salt Lake or Nauvoo do we know? Do we have good numbers?

Kate Holbrook [01:40:08] We don't have good numbers. Not for lack of trying, but the people who have looked very closely at this still feel that there are too many questions and not enough data to really come out with a secure number. We know it was not a majority of people. It was a minority of people, of people, especially a minority of men.

Speaker G [01:40:37] That's what I think Elizabeth Keene called historical silence.

Kate Holbrook [01:40:41] Right.

Speaker G [01:40:42] She said, you gotta get used to historical silence.

Kate Holbrook [01:40:46] She has a lot of good phrases, good smart phrases. So.

John Dehlin [01:40:51] So, Gerardo, you didn't originally include that clip, but I wanted to include it because they're kind of laughing over this idea that just like, oops, sometimes we don't have the historical documents, and so we have what's called historical silence.

Gerardo Sumano [01:41:08] We don't have good numbers. It was super structured. God loved ordered and super strict laws and. But we. We don't have good numbers.

John Dehlin [01:41:22] We have no idea who is marrying who.

Sandra Tanner [01:41:25] Well, and one of the things they throw out that confuses people is sometimes they will only try to give A percentage of the men that practice polygamy, which does not give you a picture of life in Utah because you have all these women and children that are also involved in this polygamy lifestyle. So I've heard at different times when they said, oh, only 2% of the church live polygamy. Well, that's 2% of the men. And then it's also 2% of the men in the intermountain area. They aren't counting outside of our immediate environs here. So. Well, like they say, they probably do have some sort of lack of data to figure it all out, because I'm sure a lot of people didn't have records kept of all of the marriages that took place. But how come we all end up being descendant from polygamous out here? I mean, there got to be an awful lot of them. And when you have men taking 50 women, how many leaders can take those enormous amounts of women without leaving a bunch of men with no one to choose from? They're taking an awful lot of women off of the marriage market when they do that.

John Dehlin [01:42:50] But then they literally went to the United Kingdom and recruited young teenage girls and shipped them back to Nauvoo to replenish the anti Utah.

Sandra Tanner [01:43:00] Not just a Nauvoo. Right. And that's why I forget who it was. One of the leaders said, told the missionaries, we don't want you picking over the women before they get on the boat. You wait till they get. We need to all get a fair shot at this. You know, they got to get out here single.

Gerardo Sumano [01:43:16] I think it was he Kimball, actually.

John Dehlin [01:43:19] Yeah. Yeah.

Gerardo Sumano [01:43:20] Who said that.

John Dehlin [01:43:21] Yeah. Okay. And I just. I took umbrage at them, kind of like marveling at this mystery of historical silence when we all know Joseph was hiding and lying.

Gerardo Sumano [01:43:33] Exactly.

John Dehlin [01:43:34] And. And they were literally not keeping records because they wanted to keep it secret. So they're acting like sometimes in history there's just this magical historical silence.

Sandra Tanner [01:43:45] Well, and they have the same problem here in Utah because the. The government was after them for years about polygamy. It didn't all just wait until suddenly 1890. The government started complaining about this. They had been searching to arrest different ones living polygamy for years before the manifesto. So again, they had no incentive to list out how many were involved in polygamy.

John Dehlin [01:44:10] Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Well, this is basically the point where they stop actually talking about the verses. And they're just now going to hit all the major issues that I think they are trying to respond to. So we'll go to the first one where they're talking about agency being essential and how Joseph Smith is a great example of everyone having agency. You guys ready for this one?

Sandra Tanner [01:44:36] Yep.

John Dehlin [01:44:37] Okay,

Kate Holbrook [01:44:39] so we know there are clearly very specific ways to go, go about doing this. And then finally we know that agency is essential. And, and we see this in the way that Joseph Smith went about this. He didn't tell women they were going to be sealed to him or to someone else. He, he asked them and he invited them to go on their own and think about it and pray about it. That was a very important part of this process.

John Dehlin [01:45:15] So what's the problem with the idea that because Joseph asked the women and they could say yes or no, that Joseph was all about consent and agency? What's wrong with that? Sandra, you go first.

Sandra Tanner [01:45:29] I didn't hear Emma get mentioned just the girls consent, but even there you have the stories of different girls saying that essentially they were coerced into polygamy and under spiritual pressure by the man they've been trained all their life to see as God's prophet. I mean that's not informed consent. We see a pattern with Joseph Smith of grooming, where he's been in all, most of these girls lived in a Mormon home. And at times Joseph would have stayed in many of these girls homes where the parents would have accepted him as God's prophet, where the parents would have been supporting him and taking his word as the word of God. And so when Joseph meets them when they're say nine and they're given this hero worship of Joseph, he can later tap back into that to persuade them that, well, you know, I'm a prophet of God, you know, your parents approved of me, you saw my actions in your home. And so when I tell you this is from God, you have to know it's really from God. So I think the religious pressure that would have been applied doesn't make it conform to real consent.

John Dehlin [01:47:00] And Jen, I want to ask you too, what, what's wrong with using Joseph as a shining pillar of consent? He's a prophet viewed as a man who's next to Jesus in terms of God's, you know, approval and he's approaching teenage girls and 20 year old girls and, and giving them the option. What's wrong with framing that as, as agency and consent?

Jenn Kamp [01:47:25] Yeah, it's not agency at all because Joseph is in a position of power over not only the women, but their families. And it's not consent because he, he threatens or makes promises of salvation. But if you don't accept, then it means damnation to their families. So it's your families can be saved if you do this. He, Emma, didn't know Joseph was their prophet is another reason he would say that God came down and you know, with a flaming sword or you know, said that he would, he would kill him if he, if he didn't ask, ask this person to marry them. Or he would go to the young girl's parents and say, you know, if you give me your daughter in marriage, then your whole family is saved just by this one, one gift to me. And that's not consent. None of that is consent. So.

John Dehlin [01:48:37] And by the way, can a 14, 15, 16 or 17 year old girl give consent to a 38 year old man? Is that even possible, Jen?

Jenn Kamp [01:48:47] No.

John Dehlin [01:48:47] Why not?

Jenn Kamp [01:48:48] It's because their brain is not even developed. They're not like reading the journals of the young girls like Helen Kimball, like reading her words and her heart being torn out because all she wanted to do was go to the dance and dance with the boys that were her age and you know, have this fairy tale that every woman usually has when they're young, you know, of finding someone that they connect with and fall in love with. And she's crying and she is devastated and she's writing in her journal, she doesn't want this. She doesn't want it. And the only reason she's doing it and the only reason her mom, who's also devastated, approves of it is because it, Joseph, promises to save their whole family. And that is not consent in any way. That is wrong and that is a male predator. And that is not okay. And that was never, ever taught to me.

Sandra Tanner [01:50:00] Yeah, well, I think it also brings in the problem of bringing your young children into the realm of justifying lying and that you can keep secrets and things that you would be embarrassed about or ashamed of you. You are being taught now that that's the way it's okay to live. Which would confuse a child on when's a lie a lie and what do I say publicly these girls had their lives suddenly changed where they had no normal social life as teens. So when people talk about, oh well, you can get married at 14 in some states or 16 or whatever, trying to normalize the age on that it wasn't legal and the girls couldn't tell anyone about it. They couldn't say, oh yes, I got married last Friday. The other girls that were getting engaged or got married, they could talk to people.

Gerardo Sumano [01:51:01] Yeah, well, and then the story about Zina, right, And the, and the drawn sword. So it Says, like, I'll pull it up. It just says, Sina later wrote that within months of her marriage to Henry, she wrote, joseph sent word to me by my brother saying, tell Zina I put it off and put it off till an angel with a drawn sword stooped by me and told me if I did not establish that principle upon the earth, I would lose my position and my life. The Lord had made it known to him she was to be his celestial wife. So if there's an angel coming and threatening people with a drawn sword, like, is that agency?

John Dehlin [01:51:48] Yeah, and you don't even need an angel in a flaming sword, like this. Revelation DNC132 is all about how polygamy is important. Polygamy is of God. Polygamy is essential. Polygamy is God's way. God gave all these different wives and concubines to all these prophets. It's the restoration of all things. It's got to be what goes on. It's the only way to have salvation. Well, is that giving a teenage girl like, huh, well, maybe I can do it or maybe I won't. Like, even that isn't really offering much of an option if you. If you believe in God's scriptures and in the revelation. Jen, were you going to say something too?

Helen Mar Kimball's Journal and Her Marriage

Jenn Kamp [01:52:28] I was just going to read from Helen's journal.

John Dehlin [01:52:30] Oh, yeah.

Jenn Kamp [01:52:31] So everyone can hear her words. So the lds.org and places like to say she was a couple months shy of being 15. So let me just correct that. She was 14. She was 14 years old. So her father comes to her after Joseph has. Has come to her father. And her father says, hey, your whole family will be saved if you give me Helen as a wife and an internal companion. So both. And so he goes to. He talks to his wife, and then his wife is. Does not like the idea, but she says to talk to Helen. So he goes to Helen, and this is what she writes in her journal. And this is a quote from her journal now. But suffice it to say the first impulse was anger, for I thought he had only said it to test my virtue. 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. I had always been taught to believe in it as a heinous crime, improper, unnatural, and I indignantly resented it. And then she goes on to say later, my father had but one ewe lamb but willingly laid her upon the altar. How cruel this seemed to my mother, whose heartstrings were already stretched until they were ready to snap asunder. None but God and 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. That breaks my heart. That breaks my heart. I was not taught this and that. That is not okay. Helen didn't need to be saved. There were other boys at the dance she wanted to dance with. She didn't need to be married off to go across the plains. All these excuses that I was given and fed when I was in church, none of those implied to this little small 14 year old girl or her parents or her mother that was devastated. I don't believe it. I don't believe.

John Dehlin [01:55:30] Yeah. And then the way Joseph justifies it is to say, well, what's wrong in one circumstance can be right in another. And that was beautiful, Jen. Thank you. That was very powerful and beautiful.

Gerardo Sumano [01:55:41] Yeah. I think we're going to talk about Helen.

John Dehlin [01:55:44] Yeah.

Gerardo Sumano [01:55:44] A little bit more. But yeah. Just keep in mind that Helen is mentioning there on that quilt how hard it was for her mom and I'll. When we explain the context and why would it was extra hard for. For her mom will make more sense.

John Dehlin [01:56:00] But, but that, but that, Jen, you reading that now helps us. It makes future comments even more outrageous for sure because Kate Holbrook and others have read that. Have read that.

Jenn Kamp [01:56:10] They know like they know they know that. I think that's even why it's so. It hurts so much more when you find this out. Is that you. They know like the apostles know. They know better. They, they're just not saying, they're not telling because I think we would not be okay with that.

John Dehlin [01:56:37] And several of the viewers are saying Jen, that was powerful and they're thanking you for sharing. So Jen, thank you. Yeah. Okay, now we're going to talk about Fanny Alger and why Fanny Alger is not a problem. Are you guys ready for that?

Sandra Tanner [01:56:54] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:56:54] Because God's is the house of order. Okay, here we go. Why Fanny Alger isn't a problem.

Kate Holbrook [01:57:02] And let's, let's talk about when this revelation. We talked about how this revelation came in July of 1843, but that is not the beginning of plural marriage. And, and we again, there are a lot of question marks, but it looks like Joseph Smith was probably in about 1833 sealed to what was probably his first plural wife. And we don't know, with some unions because women spoke later in Utah signed affidavits on this. We know that there were. There was a sexual relationship that was part of some of these marriages. And we also know that a lot of these marriages didn't have a sexual component. And we also don't have evidence of any of Joseph Smith having children with any of his plural wives. So what. What that ends up looking like is not all of these were marriages in the sexual sense. And even if they were marriages in the sexual sense, it wouldn't have been a lot or there would have been children resulting from the unions. So in.

John Dehlin [01:58:12] So first of all, that's a lot of like, possibilities or probably or I'm not so sures for a house of order. Did that strike you, Sandra, as well?

Sandra Tanner [01:58:22] Yes, she's. Why are we assuming he wasn't having sex with all these women? Some women may not have been able to have children. Some girls could have been too young to conceive. It's not like Stark. Oh, yes, that they were that young. So there's so many questions there that they want to speculate. Everything was good, but why should we assume that maybe everything was not just that they didn't sleep together, but did they sleep together, have children and have them aborted? Did they give them away to somebody else? There are other options of why no children surfaced. We know on a couple of the women that they had children that died in the Nauvoo time period. So we wouldn't know whether they were Joseph's child because in today's world, you can't get any DNA from that source. So there are a lot of other options. He may have had a number of kids, but there's just a lot of unanswered questions there. But they're making a lot of assumptions that there was hardly any sex and certainly no children.

Gerardo Sumano [01:59:42] Well, we have several testimonies of the actual women who, who testified that they. The relationships were sexual in nature. And then there's also the fact that a third of the women that he married were already married to other women. So they were having sex. Sorry, two other men. Yeah. And so they. So they were having sex simultaneously with. With their husbands and with. And. And Joseph at the same time. So if you really want to learn more about this, which is really fascinating, you need to watch Dan Vogel's series on Joseph Smith's polyandry, where he goes through every wives, every wife of Joseph Smith that was already married to other men. And basically he shows how on each case it is Very, very likely that Joseph was having sex with every of the. Of those women. And he goes really in detail with that.

John Dehlin [02:00:47] We'll add that to the show notes. Yeah, that's a great idea. I. I do think it's preposterous that they're mentioning Fanny Auger in 1833 and not mentioning that no sealing power had been given yet and no polygamy revelation had been given yet. And somehow she's assuming that God told Joseph it was a ceiling, that it was a ceiling. And there's literally. Is there any evidence of that, Sandra?

Sandra Tanner [02:01:13] No. It's just trying to back right into history, things that would make it more acceptable to people. But, I mean, she gets put out of the home. Some speculate that she was pregnant at that point. We don't know for sure, but it's a possibility. But Emma has her leave the house. So, I mean, of course the record is that she found out about the union and whether it produced a child or not. The result anyways, was that Fannie had to leave and go live with other people. When Emma found out about the whole situation, she. Fanny, is out of time, sorts with the Mormon story, and she's a fly in the ointment. She fouls up the narrative of how they want to tell the story, so they have to find inventive ways of getting around her.

John Dehlin [02:02:13] And again, if Oliver Cowdery's calling Fanny Alger an affair and he's assistant president of the church, that's a problem. That's not a house of order.

Sandra Tanner [02:02:22] No.

Jenn Kamp [02:02:23] Yeah. And he's not just calling it an affair. An affair. He's saying Emma found them together in the barn.

Gerardo Sumano [02:02:31] Yeah.

Jenn Kamp [02:02:31] And then there was a ruckus made, and then that's how she found out about the affair. And it was, you know, therefore called an affair. Like Emma, bless her heart. Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:02:48] And what. And why. If. If Brigham Young to whatever the prophet was before, like David O. McKay, like, if all the Utah polygamist men were having sex with their wives, is there any question that they were all having sex with all their wives and having kids with. Why. Why do apologists feel like it's in any way honest or ethical to try and downplay Joseph's sex when every other polygamous marriage was all about kids and sex and children. And the Book of Mormon even says in Jacob that if there's going to be an exception made for polygamy, it's for what reason?

Sandra Tanner [02:03:30] Seed.

Gerardo Sumano [02:03:31] Seed.

John Dehlin [02:03:31] Seed. Which implies what?

Sandra Tanner [02:03:33] Sex.

John Dehlin [02:03:34] Sex. So it's dishonest for people like Kate Holbrook or Brian Hales or any of the apologists to go, well, okay, there was some sex, but it wasn't a lot of sex or it wasn't all sex or there's no evidence of sex. That feels disingenuous to me.

Sandra Tanner [02:03:54] Right. Of course, if these are legitimate marriages, why would they try so hard to get him from having any children? I mean, I would think they would be proud that he was fulfilling the Jacob command to raise up seed and. But everyone wants to try to prove he didn't have sex and there weren't any kids, as though they were ashamed of that if he had. So it doesn't fit with the rest of the narrative.

The Temple Lot Case and Early Polygamy Evidence

John Dehlin [02:04:22] Yeah.

Jenn Kamp [02:04:23] And the Temple Lot case, I think Gerardo was talking about this a little bit earlier. Melissa Lott and Lucy Walker both testified that they did and so under oath. So, you know, there, there is evidence that the women said that there was.

Gerardo Sumano [02:04:48] Brian Hales has a section on his website where he go where he has like the women that he accepts that there is enough evidence that. That there was sex and which ones we don't have enough evidence, according to him. But then Dan Vogel provides the evidence for almost the rest of them.

Sandra Tanner [02:05:06] Yeah, well, I mean, if you were trying to prove I had sex with Gerald, my only proof would be I got three kids. But you're not going to find some diary entry where I'm keeping track.

Gerardo Sumano [02:05:20] Yeah, yeah, for sure.

John Dehlin [02:05:22] Yeah, that's true. Yeah. So it's. It's a. It's a rhetorical, manipulative attempt to downplay the sex.

Gerardo Sumano [02:05:30] Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:05:31] As it relates to Joseph because it's so seedy and chaotic and out of order.

Sandra Tanner [02:05:38] And also it was obvious that he was teaching it in a way that meant they were free to have children. Because you see William Clayton, that Joseph Smith taught polygamy. He gets his second. His wife's sister pregnant there in Nauvoo. Obviously, Joseph's instruction to him on polygamy gave the go ahead to have a family by a polygamist wife. So why would I think Joseph would have lived it any different?

John Dehlin [02:06:07] Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Gerardo Sumano [02:06:09] I'll bring this up later, but Heber C. Kimball be. Before Joseph proposes to Helen or, you know, the marriage happens. Haversey Kimball already had a polygamous wife and he already had a kid with that polygamous wife.

John Dehlin [02:06:24] Yeah.

Gerardo Sumano [02:06:25] Approved by Joseph. So it was. Yeah, yeah. It was not like Joseph was talking about, like he tries to say, like this just union of families and not thinking about it sexually.

Sandra Tanner [02:06:38] It's all just Paperwork, Right?

John Dehlin [02:06:40] Yeah. Okay. A little bit more about Fanny Alger and the angel with the flaming sword really quickly.

The Angel with the Flaming Sword Narrative

Kate Holbrook [02:06:48] So in 1843, he has this revelation because even though. Even though God told him to practice this, you know, 10 years earlier, and he. More than 10 years, he. He resisted and resisted and resisted. And. And as he describes it, an angel came to him three different times saying, you have to do this, and finally threatened him with death and destruction. And, like, problems in the ever, it's a threat to his exaltation if he didn't do this. He finally. He finally began to practice plural marriage. But it was sort of a little bit at a time. And this period in Nauvoo is when he's practicing it a lot more. He has a number of wives by the time this revelation comes. And that has led some people to speculate that he asked for this revelation in order to appease Emma, because there were times when she was aware of what was going on and she felt okay about it, felt like it was God's will. And there were other times when it was so painful for her that she couldn't stand it and she was against it. So when.

John Dehlin [02:08:03] Yeah. So what do you. What do you guys think about, you know, Sandra, what do you think about this idea that God told Joseph to practice polygamy in 1833? Again, where is Kate Holbrook getting this?

Sandra Tanner [02:08:17] Well, you can't have Fanny Alger be an affair. So Joseph has a union with her. They have to admit that. So you have to someway posit that there was some kind of revelation before that, because surely he wouldn't have committed adultery. So because they start from a premise, he couldn't do adultery. Therefore, if he did have an affair with this girl, he had to be sealed to her. It's just a way of trying to put him in the best light. But there's nothing to show that that's the case. But then she makes it sound like time after time, God's trying to get him to accept polygamy. No, time after time, they're trying to get one particular girl to practice polygamy with him. He's already accepted polygamy. He's already living that he's had any number of women through the years. So each time the angel comes with a flaming sword or whatever it is, it's to convince the girl.

Gerardo Sumano [02:09:18] A new woman.

Sandra Tanner [02:09:19] A new woman. Not for Joseph to practice polygamy.

Kate Holbrook [02:09:22] He's.

Sandra Tanner [02:09:22] I mean, how many times you got to do it to prove to God you accepted it?

John Dehlin [02:09:28] Yeah.

Sandra Tanner [02:09:29] I mean, he's got 22 wives. Before he tells Emma that he's got a revelation on it.

John Dehlin [02:09:37] He's keeping those angels, really. He's keeping those angels really busy. Like, I just. I just have to say this. I've made this point before. Like, think of all the horrible things that have happened in the history of the world. Child rape, child murder, like, Janice literal genocide, world wars, famine, disease. Do I need to go on? What is God? When God really wants something to happen or to stop something, he's going to send an angel with a flaming sword. And it wasn't for, you know, Auschwitz. It wasn't for the pogroms in Russia. It wasn't for to prevent the spread of COVID 19. It was to make sure Joseph could have sex with these teenage girls. Is that. Is that God? Is that your top priority? Your most urgent, essential priority? Does that make any sense?

Speaker F [02:10:28] No.

Sandra Tanner [02:10:28] And it's one of the marks that we see in coercive cults, that it's a repeated pattern of a man putting himself forward as God's prophet, who then includes in that the abuse of women in the group. And it may be a selective number of women in the group, but it seems to be a common thread going through, like, David Koresh, Jim Jones, whoever you want to bring up, that there is this thread of sexual misbehavior.

John Dehlin [02:11:01] Keith Rer. With Nexium.

Sandra Tanner [02:11:03] Yeah. That. That they then try to normalize.

Gerardo Sumano [02:11:08] Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:11:08] Yeah.

Gerardo Sumano [02:11:10] Very interesting.

John Dehlin [02:11:11] Yeah. Jen, you want to add anything? I. Angel with the flaming sword.

Jenn Kamp [02:11:20] Yeah, angel with the flaming sword. I just. It's just so wrong to me. And I. I don't like how they're like, oh, Emma. It was really, really hard for her sometimes, but then it was. It wasn't sometimes. And I'm like, no, you don't know.

Gerardo Sumano [02:11:39] Yeah.

Jenn Kamp [02:11:39] Like, you don't know that. You don't know. Maybe it was really, really hard for her all the time.

Gerardo Sumano [02:11:45] Yeah.

Jenn Kamp [02:11:46] And.

Sandra Tanner [02:11:48] Yeah. When did she ever feel good about this? I want to know the reference.

Gerardo Sumano [02:11:53] Exactly.

Jenn Kamp [02:11:53] Yeah, exactly.

Gerardo Sumano [02:11:55] To say.

Jenn Kamp [02:11:56] I don't. I don't think that was correct.

Gerardo Sumano [02:11:58] Because we have Emma even editing Joseph's stuff, you know, and then presenting it to the Relief Society so that. To prevent women from accepting polygamy later if Joseph's proposed. And. Yeah, we have Emma resisting all along, I think.

Jenn Kamp [02:12:18] And even. Even when he, you know, finally asked her to be there to, like, give the two sisters to him or whatever. And then. And then it's recorded right after that. She was like, no, this is not okay. Out of my House.

Gerardo Sumano [02:12:34] Yeah.

Jenn Kamp [02:12:34] You know, I don't see any sign of her ever, Ever writing down. Oh, it was. It was great. I was okay with it. Even after Joseph passes, she won't even admit to ever being polygamous.

Gerardo Sumano [02:12:49] Right.

Jenn Kamp [02:12:50] So I never see her saying it's okay. Ever.

Gerardo Sumano [02:12:53] Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:12:54] And what's more likely, that God sends an angel with a flaming sword to make Joseph Smith have sex with a teenage girl? Or that. That sort of story or narrative, that Joseph didn't want to do it, that he was so against doing it that God had to force him to do it? What's more likely? Occam's razor. Let's Occam's razor this a little bit.

Gerardo Sumano [02:13:20] Yeah.

Sandra Tanner [02:13:22] Well, it's just like those preachers of those different splinter groups or heretical groups that have through the years taken advantage of women in their congregation. It's very easy when you're a religious leader to pull the God card. Oh, it wasn't my idea. I didn't want to have sex with that 14 year old. That was God's idea.

Gerardo Sumano [02:13:47] Yeah.

Sandra Tanner [02:13:48] Yeah, it does. It doesn't pass the smell test.

John Dehlin [02:13:52] No.

Gerardo Sumano [02:13:53] I also want to bring up the fact that she mentions. We can't really trust the idea that the revelation was.

John Dehlin [02:14:01] Should we play that clip?

Gerardo Sumano [02:14:02] Given. I think it was that one.

John Dehlin [02:14:04] No, it's next. This is the next one. Okay, let's play that. So the question is, can we trust William Clayton? So, Sandra, can we trust. We'll play the clip, but.

Sandra Tanner [02:14:12] Yes.

John Dehlin [02:14:13] What do you think, Cedric? Can we trust William Clayton? I. I'm guessing he's going to say something that doesn't make the church look good. Is that. Is that safe to say that when they're questioning whether you could trust a source?

Sandra Tanner [02:14:24] Yes.

John Dehlin [02:14:25] I'm guessing he wasn't saying something very favorable. But let's see, let's see.

Kate Holbrook [02:14:30] So when Joseph Smith received this revelation, he already had some plural wives. He was in the red brick store, which is such an important building upstairs. And you know, it was a store, so that's important for the community. That's where they could go to buy supplies and food. And upstairs is where they were studying together. Where I think at this point it was still only men were preparing for the temple endowment, although that became women. Those early meetings were up here on the second floor. That Relief Society was formally organized and had a lot of their early meetings here on this second floor of the red brick store. So this building is a big deal. And Joseph Smith was in his office there. And William Clayton is the one who Was scribe who. Joseph spoke the revelation, and William Clayton wrote it down. And William Clayton said. Well, he's the one who said, well, Hyrum came to Joseph and said, emma is still resisting this, and so try to have a revelation. Maybe that will help her. But that's. William Clayton is the source on that. So a lot of people have taken that to be the actual story, and it very well could be, but I'm not 100% convinced that that is the story.

John Dehlin [02:15:55] What do you think, Sandra? Not sure.

Sandra Tanner [02:15:58] Well, she's not convinced because she can't have Joseph doing anything wrong. Whatever he does must have been right. Clayton is the trusted scribe. And for the prophet of God who stays faithful, who goes into polygamy, who comes out west and raises a big family, why aren't we trusting what he says? There's no reason not to trust him other than you want to save Joseph's reputation.

Gerardo Sumano [02:16:26] It sounds really bad to say, well, literally, how she paints it is like Hyrum telling Joseph, well, Joseph, try to have a revelation about this, because Emma is not still resisting this. So here, let's put a revelation down, Jen.

Jenn Kamp [02:16:45] Yeah. Yeah. Just think of that in your head for a second. William Clayton comes to Joseph. He's like, joseph, buddy, Emma's still not having it. She's upset. She doesn't like it. This is not. She's not gonna go along with this. You're gonna. You need to do something. You need to make revelation. You need to make a revelation. Maybe have a flaming sword in there. No, I'm adding my own words now. But he did. He comes to Joseph and says, emma's not having it. She doesn't agree with this.

John Dehlin [02:17:19] It was Hiram, right? Was it Hiram?

Jenn Kamp [02:17:20] Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:17:21] Coming to Joseph.

Jenn Kamp [02:17:22] Yeah. Yes. Thank you. And it's just because didn't Joseph send

John Dehlin [02:17:28] Hyrum to Emma to try and make Emma okay with it? Because Joseph was afraid to tell Emma himself.

Jenn Kamp [02:17:35] Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:17:35] Isn't that right?

Jenn Kamp [02:17:36] Yes.

John Dehlin [02:17:37] Yeah. Yeah. So Hiram comes back and. Yes.

Jenn Kamp [02:17:40] And he's like, no, she's not having it, Joseph.

John Dehlin [02:17:42] William's just writing it down.

Jenn Kamp [02:17:44] You gotta do. Yeah, William's writing it down. You gotta do something else, Joseph. It has to be a revelation from God or she is not going to be okay.

Gerardo Sumano [02:17:53] And I think even after she gets to a revelation, doesn't this story go that she destroys it? Or she says, like, no, I'm still not gonna accept this.

Sandra Tanner [02:18:02] Yeah, Sir. And the question is, did she get Joseph to throw it in the fire and destroy it? So there's a story to that effect. And so then the question would be, well, then how do they have a copy of it? Well, it was supposedly copied before it was taken to Emma. And so then I guess Joseph could be magnanimous and say, oh, well, dear, if you don't approve, I just throw it in the fire. We're done. You know, who knows what happened as far as what happened in the room when the two of them were just there. But obviously a copy had been left in the office, and that's how we got to have the one that's in the Doctrine of Covenants. And we can see that it fits what we know of the time period, that it's not a later invented revelation because it has phrasing and different people's accusations and things that are in the later. In the Nauvoo Expositor, there's echoes of things in the revelation that I think you can build a case that we have what he wrote.

John Dehlin [02:19:15] Yeah.

Sandra Tanner [02:19:16] So.

John Dehlin [02:19:18] And again, I. I just. I. Somebody said they don't like us invoking Occam's razor. But again, I'm going to ask my viewers and listeners what's more likely that Joseph Smith had been busted for adultery before, that he has 22 wives without getting Emma's consent. He's been lying to her and the whole church about it. He sends Hiram to go try and convince Emma to be okay with it. She says no, and he comes back and says, joseph, she's not having it. You better come up with the revelation that. Or God just happened to coincidentally. God, who's a God of order, God, who's a God of structure, just happens to then come up with a revelation. 22 wives in to Joseph Smith's polygamy.

Gerardo Sumano [02:20:05] Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:20:06] What's more likely.

Gerardo Sumano [02:20:08] Well, and then maybe she's ignoring or not mentioning the fact. Well, actually. Well, definitely ignores it because they don't mention it and they don't talk about it. That a third of this revelation is directed to Emma and threatening her with destruction.

John Dehlin [02:20:20] Exactly. Yeah. Why was that important? Why in the world would that have been an important theme? That Emma's gonna be destroyed?

Sandra Tanner [02:20:28] Yes.

John Dehlin [02:20:29] That's a great point, Gerardo.

Jenn Kamp [02:20:30] Yeah. And what. What number was emma? She was 23.

John Dehlin [02:20:34] 22 or 23. Something.

Jenn Kamp [02:20:35] Yeah. 22 or 23.

John Dehlin [02:20:37] Violating the lot.

Jenn Kamp [02:20:38] That was never. Yeah, never. That was something new that I learned just actually a few months ago, I think.

John Dehlin [02:20:46] Yeah.

Jenn Kamp [02:20:46] That she. She was really far down the line in Joseph being sealed to her.

Gerardo Sumano [02:20:52] Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:20:53] I'm a little. I like. I really. Again, I really like Kate Holbrook. Her demeanor, she seems kind. She seems sincere, heartfelt. But this is really deceptive, and I don't even think she probably realizes.

Sandra Tanner [02:21:05] Yeah, no, it's your training. You're set up this way your whole life to put this filter on that filters out negative thoughts about Joseph and only lets the positive ones through.

John Dehlin [02:21:21] She's like, I'm not 100 convinced that, you know, that's the story. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. We're. This is just. This is important. This is all really important stuff. So, anyway, can't trust Clayton.

Sandra Tanner [02:21:34] Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:21:35] All right. Can't trust Clayton. Okay, so next. Next quote. Yeah, don't. This is about how you can't trust memories that are too far removed. So here we go.

Weighing the Reliability of Early Accounts

Gerardo Sumano [02:21:49] Yeah.

Speaker G [02:21:50] And, Kate, will you correct this if I'm wrong? Because I love being corrected, actually. But a lot of what we know about Nauvoo doesn't come till decades later when people are talking about it finally, in the 18, I don't know, 60s, 70s. And I. As a historian, aren't I supposed to. I'm not a historian, but as a historian, as I'm trying to be a historian, aren't I supposed to be a little bit more careful with memories that are 20, 30 years after the fact than I am with maybe a contemporary source? Can you talk about that just a little bit? That what we know about polygamy maybe comes from these lighter sources that. Oh, as much as people, I don't think they're lying. I just think that memories can change over. Over time.

Kate Holbrook [02:22:39] Yes, that's absolutely true, Hank. Our best friends as our best tools as historians are things that are written at the. Really close to the time something happened.

John Dehlin [02:22:53] Jen, you were raising your hand.

Sandra Tanner [02:22:56] This.

Jenn Kamp [02:22:56] When I watched this, the first thing that popped into my mind was, if we're going to use that same rule that he was talking about, then we should also accept the first. First vision account of Joseph Smith.

John Dehlin [02:23:13] Because it says.

Jenn Kamp [02:23:15] Because it says he saw God.

John Dehlin [02:23:17] No, the Lord.

Jenn Kamp [02:23:18] The Lord? Yeah, the Lord. One person. Yeah, he saw. He saw one person when he went into the grove to pray. So if we're. It seems like they use it when they want to, and then they don't use that same logic when it doesn't fit into their narrative. So that. That was disturbing.

John Dehlin [02:23:37] That's a great point. Yeah.

Gerardo Sumano [02:23:39] Because the one that's canonized is literally 18 years later.

John Dehlin [02:23:43] 1838.

Gerardo Sumano [02:23:44] Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:23:45] Yeah. So the official first version is about 20 years after it actually happened.

Gerardo Sumano [02:23:49] Right, right.

Jenn Kamp [02:23:50] And not the first.

Gerardo Sumano [02:23:51] Hank Smith says we should trust the first One?

John Dehlin [02:23:54] Yeah, the closest. The one closest one to happen. Yeah. Sandra, what are Hank Smith and Kate Holbrook doing here? When they're talking about later accounts are less credible. What are they trying to do?

Sandra Tanner [02:24:06] Well, they're trying to make it appear that we don't know anything about this stuff until way after Joseph stuff death. But we do have sources at the time. I mean, you've got Bennett's book, you have the Navo Expositor, you have.

John Dehlin [02:24:27] Well, she's William Law. William Law who was Joseph's assistant or co president or first presidency.

Sandra Tanner [02:24:32] Right. Who leaves over polygamy.

John Dehlin [02:24:34] Yeah.

Sandra Tanner [02:24:34] And Clayton, faithful Mormon all his life. He's got polygamy stuff in his journal. These are not. He is not a person trying to discredit Joseph. He's a full believer.

Gerardo Sumano [02:24:46] It just happens that it matches what everyone else is saying.

Sandra Tanner [02:24:52] So it's just amazing when they want to pick something that's a later reference, if it suits them, then they want to use it. But if someone else brings it up that, oh, well, that's a late memory. I mean, granted you want to get as close to the event as possible in what you have of sources, but because it's a late source in and of itself does not mean it is not true or not reliable. You look for supporting evidences around the statement. And I mean, the Reorganized Church tried for years to dismiss polygamy on that kind of logic. But the evidence is there that we know there was polygamy. We know Joseph Smith slept with different women. We know he slept with. I think Brian Hales admits to something like nine of the women having been consummated. Well, why should I assume that it wasn't any more than nine? I mean, what would be the problem with it being more than nine? I don't know why they even have a problem with this. But so you have to weigh out the sources. Just because it's late, it can still be reliable and it could. Maybe it's not reliable, but we have enough evidence on polygamy to show that really was the case in the situation that was going on. And they know that.

John Dehlin [02:26:18] I just wonder how many things of William Clayton does the church rely on as an important part of its history? Right. Such that William Clayton is legitimate source.

Sandra Tanner [02:26:27] Yes.

John Dehlin [02:26:28] Buttresses the church, but he's an illegitimate choice or source. I think saying something inconvenient.

Gerardo Sumano [02:26:34] Yeah, right.

Sandra Tanner [02:26:35] Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:26:36] Well, the biggest describe about more things than just.

Sandra Tanner [02:26:38] Right, right.

John Dehlin [02:26:41] Is the Book of Abraham. Wasn't he a book of Abraham? No. Anyway, I don't want to.

Sandra Tanner [02:26:44] But he was. He had diaries, he had different accounts of things that they would rely on.

John Dehlin [02:26:49] Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Sandra Tanner [02:26:52] I need a break.

John Dehlin [02:26:53] Okay. Okay, go. Go ahead. And what we'll do.

Sandra Tanner [02:26:55] You guys can continue.

John Dehlin [02:26:56] We'll go ahead and play the next clip and then Sandra, you. You come right back as soon as you're ready, and we'll incorporate Sandra back in. Okay, the very next clip, we're going to go ahead and roll. Here we go. The next clip, John, by the way, is going to give us some wisdom.

Kate Holbrook [02:27:12] And it doesn't. I mean, I believe those people would want us to be honest. It doesn't mean we whitewash anything, but it does mean that we. We approach this with empathy and respect for their.

John Dehlin [02:27:24] Okay, really quick, let me give it a little precursor. So, by the way, before this point sort of makes the point that, that we need to use our faith when the history doesn't add up. So that's the first thing that we didn't hear is, by the way, saying, hey, whenever the history doesn't add up, use your faith. And then Holbrook goes on to tell a story about Richard Bushman where Richard Bushman says we should write history where if we end up meeting the person in the afterlife, they would be happy with what we wrote. So that's the precursor to. To what Kate Holbrook is about to say. So that's just setting up the context.

Gerardo Sumano [02:28:05] Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:28:05] Okay, so here's now the actual follow up.

▶ Video Clip 3

Video Clip 3 [02:28:08] And it doesn't. I mean, I believe those people would want us to be honest. It doesn't mean we whitewash anything, but it does mean that we, we approach this with empathy and respect for their humanity.

Video Clip 3 [02:28:21] Beautiful.

Video Clip 3 [02:28:22] Oh, that is so well said. I. I tell my students I get my medical advice from trained doctors, I get my dental advice from trained dentists, and I get my history from trained historians. I. You know, not everyone is a historian. Despite what the Internet tells you, not everyone is a historian. Just because they have a source doesn't mean that they've. They've done the work.

John Dehlin [02:28:46] Gerardo, you liked that quote from Hank Smith. Would you want to say about that? He gets his history from trained historians, so case closed.

Gerardo Sumano [02:28:54] Yeah. Is he really considering all trained historians or just the one he likes? Yeah, the ones that are actually. I mean, it's hard not to say that they're whitewashing the history. Like, when you listen to Kate telling the story, it's hard not to say that she's not whitewashing it and trying to make Joseph come out squeaky. Clean of this whole thing. So, yeah, it's hard. So when Hank Smith says he gets his history from trained historians, that's interesting, because most of these arguments about polygamy and how Joseph didn't have sex with most of his wives and how he didn't have sex with the polyandrous wives, most of these arguments that Kay uses come from Brian Hills, who's not a trained historian.

John Dehlin [02:29:46] That's a good point. He's an anesthetologist. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Gerardo Sumano [02:29:51] And anesthesia anesthesiologist.

John Dehlin [02:29:54] Yeah. And.

Gerardo Sumano [02:29:56] And then the actual trained historians like Michael Quinn, like Dan Vogel, Von Brody, who have fought and actually had interactions with Brian Hills, telling him like, no, Joseph did have sex with his polyandrous wives, it seems like Hank Smith is not talking about them, not acknowledging them. He'll give more credit, probably, if you ask him to. Brian Hills, Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:30:23] And of course they're going to say, well, Richard Bushman is a trained historian. He went to Harvard and he taught at college.

Gerardo Sumano [02:30:28] I don't think he says no. I don't think he has the same arguments as Brian Hills. Richard Bushman, he probably just. He just avoids the subject as much as he can, I think.

Sandra Tanner [02:30:39] Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:30:39] But he does cover it a little bit in Rough and Rolling. But the only point I want to make there is he is biased. Like, he has been a stake president. He's been a, you know, a patriarch, and he basically was commissioned to write that book, as we know now through Hans Matzon. The church commissioned him to write Rough Stone Rolling. So it's kind of like trusting a pharmaceutical company who ran a story, who ran a study claiming that the. That the. That the drugs are healthy. Like, you can't trust the producer of the, you know, the biased producer of the drugs. Richard Bushman is a great historian, but he is probably the least credible because of his admitted bias. Is that fair to say?

Gerardo Sumano [02:31:25] Yeah, probably.

John Dehlin [02:31:27] Yeah, I think so. And Sanders, back in the house, which is good. Sandra, it's always better when you're here.

Sandra Tanner [02:31:35] Wait a minute.

John Dehlin [02:31:36] Okay. All right, so let's go ahead and go on to the next point where they're going to read a quote from Brittany Nash about. From a book called let's Talk About Plural Marriage that we'll include in the show notes.

Women's Testimonies About Polygamy Scrutinized

▶ Video Clip 4

Video Clip 4 [02:31:50] So here we go with Brittany. She says, when I first began my journey studying polygamy, I was angry by what I saw as an injustice, that God required such a difficult principle to be lived by these faithful, tried people. But as I studied the personal writing stories and testimonies of polygamists accepting them on their own terms. That's a lot what Kate just mentioned. She says, I found peace. The practice could have never been sustained for a half century by compulsion, manipulation, or simple sexual desire. Those who set the foundation of the Latter Day Saint faith were not two dimensional superheroes as they are sometimes portrayed, but they were complex, strong, intelligent, full bodied kingdom builders who are willing to leave loved ones, wealth, comfort and native countries for what they believe to be true. This same willingness drove them to accept polygamy, a practice they accepted as a commandment of God, instituted in their time for his unique purposes. And I'll finish here. I have since come to view plural marriage as part of the Latter Day Saint history, to unapologetically own and to hold as one of the most valuable testaments of the faith in the history of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. I love that boy.

Video Clip 4 [02:33:07] She should be a writer.

Video Clip 4 [02:33:08] Shared that, Hank. She is a writer and she's a. She's a great researcher and she worked on this for a long, long time. You can trust the work she did on that book.

Video Clip 4 [02:33:19] Yeah, well, you sold me. That is a beautiful way to put it. And to go to original sources, what did the people involved actually say? I'm so appreciative of that kind of a thing. Instead of all of us judging this, you know, decades later, looking back and making our own judgments. So that's a great one, Hank.

Video Clip 4 [02:33:40] That's Brittany Nash and you can listen to her podcast with Morgan Jones on All in, or you can pick up the book let's talk about polygamy or let's talk about plural marriage. I think it's one or the other. And I will say this too, John, you bring up a great statement in my mind from McLean Heward. Remember Dr. Heward when he came on way back, section 40 or something, back when we were brand new at this, and he said, please stop being offended on their behalf and start being inspired by them. I've always remembered that. Stop being offended on their behalf and be inspired by these people. Read their stories. Read what they actually have to say. All right, John and I have taken over too long. Kate, let's go back to you and let you take over.

Video Clip 4 [02:34:21] No, Hank, but that important quotation you just read also reminds me of our brothers and sisters of color say that same thing to white people who want to do the right thing, but then end up making up things that are a little off the mark or defending them in ways that don't feel true to Them, The. The brothers and sisters of color. It's this. It's the same thing. Listen to them. Listen to their voices. Listen to their stories, their testimonies.

Video Clip 4 [02:34:53] Absolutely.

John Dehlin [02:34:55] So, Sandra, what's wrong with that argument? The women. The women bore testimony that polygamy was awesome. We need to listen to their testimonies. And then I'm going to ask you, Jen, after what's wrong with that argument, we should just believe the women who said polygamy was amazing.

Sandra Tanner [02:35:11] Well, I'd like to know how the stacks would be of statements by women that thought it was wonderful with the statements that said it wasn't. Clearly, there were a lot of women that did not have happy marriages in plural marriage. I mean, I could look at the pioneers and appreciate their commitment and their zeal, their accomplishments in building the West. But that doesn't mean you have to say that the religious practices they were going through were something to be admired or something to be happy about. I know in my own family, there are records of my ancestors not being happy with polygamy. So we'll look at the polygamous groups. There are plenty of women that have suffered terribly in those different polygamous groups. Then there are those that would say it's wonderful, but I end up wondering how many say it's wonderful because they're still in it and aren't able to leave it. It's a very sad. What's the word. Heritage that we have in polygamy. I mean, we can love our grandparents, great grandparents that were all stuck in a horrible situation and have loving thoughts of them, but that doesn't prove what they were practicing was true. If you have a Muslim family that's practicing polygamy, they may have wonderful stories of how it works for them. But I think that you would also find a lot of the Muslim women that feel polygamy is a very great burden on them in their country, wherever they're living. So I don't think it's a convincing argument to say that some women could say, I had a good life as a polygamist wife.

John Dehlin [02:37:19] Yeah. Jen, really quick, I want to hear your view on why it's not enough necessarily to just believe the women who said polygamy was awesome.

Jenn Kamp [02:37:28] Yeah. So I have a cousin that's polygamist, and, well, a few cousins and an uncle, an aunt. And I think if I asked them, they would definitely tell me that they're happy and that they are living it. I know some of them are. Are public with it. I don't know them personally. But the stories that I hear, they, they're happy where they, where they are. But I also know that they're very isolated within their, their group and that don't really have the life experience to make a educated. I don't know. An educated. Yeah. Informed decision on that because they, they only know one thing. They only know one thing. And, and then you hear stories, you just, you just can't do that. You just can't. Can't get one. One story or, or one person's view and, and then everyone else is that same way. If you look into, you know, the wives that kept journals or you look into the stories and you read and, and learn from them, you just know that's not true. You know that they weren't all happy and it wasn't all okay. And it wasn't all happiness. And the picture that's painted for us within the church, it just isn't so.

Sandra Tanner [02:39:17] It reminds me a lot of stories of, in the south of owners trying to say, my slaves are all happy. It's a wonderful system. Well, there probably were some farms where the people were well treated, but to be a slave is never the end product of what you would want for your life. So even if their life was well cared for, they still were slaves. And the same with these polygamous wives. Some may have been happy, but they were stuck in situations that you're out here in Utah and some farm out in the middle of nowhere. What are your options? A lot of women were just plain stuck.

John Dehlin [02:40:03] I'm pretty sure Rod Meldrum tried to make the argument that there are accounts of, of black slaves that were happy, that were, that were happy in their slavery in the south before, you know, slavery was abolished. Yeah, that's not, that's not really compelling. There's some other quotes like Chris Murphy says, why do women stay in bad marriages? You know, it's very common for victims of abuse to say that their abusers are good people. I mean, that's very, very common.

Gerardo Sumano [02:40:37] Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:40:37] And Gerardo, I want to come to you just one, one quick thing. I'll make the other point that. Do you think the follower, the. The wives of Warren Jeffs believe that. That they were happy? Do we believe them? If. Is it good? Because the wives of Warren Jeff. Jeff's say that it's happy if. If the wives of, of Keith Renari of Nexium.

Gerardo Sumano [02:40:59] Right.

John Dehlin [02:40:59] Or the, or the plural, you know, the people he's sleeping with. If they say that it's good. Is it good if. If Jim Jones women that he slept with. Say it's good. Is it good? David Koresh's women, You know, like, I think we've made that point.

Speaker F [02:41:14] Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:41:15] Like, lots of followers of cults. If you watch any cult, go watch Wild Wild country on Netflix. Go watch Holy Hell on Netflix. Watch any cult and watch the Vow. Any. Anyone is going to say, unless they were, like, severely abused. The happiest time of my life was being in the cult. So just testifying that you're happy literally means nothing, I think.

Gerardo Sumano [02:41:43] Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:41:43] Unless you're going to then grant all the other cult followers that it must. Must have been true for them too, right.

Gerardo Sumano [02:41:52] Yeah. And I think a good way to. So it's hard because then we're in the. There's the argument where, well, then, when can we trust people? That people know better, you know, or that people know. When can we trust people? When is it okay to say, okay, I'm going to trust this person, it's okay, but not this one. And I think a good way for me to do it would be just studying what are the factors that play into undue influence. And if any of those factors, like, if there's not informed consent, if there are. If they are being, you know, like, just. If they're using the byte model, if they're, you know, being cornered into situations like this, if that's their whole worldview, like, you know, there's a good way in which we can judge, you know, if the system is good, that maybe would be better than just trusting anyone that says that there's. The system that they're in is amazing.

John Dehlin [02:43:05] Also, if they're Sincere believers in DNC132, if they've read it, and if all their friends and family are devout Mormons, what are the consequences of them saying, yeah, my marriage to Joseph was awful.

Gerardo Sumano [02:43:18] Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:43:20] How? Well, you know, what would that have been like for them to say, yeah, I was married to Joseph. He was horrible to me. It was terrible. I hated polygamy. And then all your family disowns you and they smear you and they run you into the mud.

Gerardo Sumano [02:43:34] Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:43:34] Could they even have said what they really thought?

Jenn Kamp [02:43:37] And not only in this life, but in the eternities like there, that'd be damning to their whole eternal existence. Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:43:46] Yeah.

Sandra Tanner [02:43:47] Okay, let me give you a Brigham Young example. So he gets up one day in conference and says, okay, this is it as of such and such a date. And all the women better shut up and shape up. And if you don't stop complaining on that date, I'm going to set you all free. You're going to be divorced. And so, yeah, that's good. I'm going to just, you know, that's it. Anyone's complaining, you're out of the church, you're out of your family, you're gone. That's. It's over. Well, years later, Marianne angel, his first wife, and my great, great grandma, she left a statement saying, if God doesn't recompense us for all the agony and sorrow we've had through polygamy, there's no justice. Now, that's a paraphrase. I don't remember exactly how the words go, but that's the sentiment. I mean, she doesn't end her life sounding like, oh, yay, this was the greatest thing that ever happened to me. I'd like to. Sharing my husband with 50 other women. No, she says there's no justice if God doesn't make up to her all this pain.

John Dehlin [02:44:57] And why, by the way, why is he saying that? If everybody's loving polygamy. Yeah.

Sandra Tanner [02:45:02] Why is Brigham gonna ship them all out? You know?

Jenn Kamp [02:45:05] Good point.

John Dehlin [02:45:06] So we have a. We have a viewer. Chris Murphy's asking for that quote.

Sandra Tanner [02:45:10] So I would put in the show notes. I have to get it for you.

John Dehlin [02:45:14] Okay. So, Jen, make a note of that if you can. Or Jennifer, when she does the show notes, we'll have her taken out of that. Yeah. And so, Jen, I just want to say you gave this heartfelt sort of like, protestation of how hurtful polygamy was. And what they're saying here is, Jen, camp, stop being offended on their behalf and start being inspired.

Jenn Kamp [02:45:39] Inspired to out everything that they are trying to cover up. Like, no, we're not. No, sorry, I will disagree with that.

John Dehlin [02:45:51] Yeah, yeah. Okay. All right, let's continue. And there's. There's still more. Let's go to the next clip.

Gerardo Sumano [02:45:59] Oh, my goodness, there's so much.

Speaker G [02:46:02] Let's keep going.

Kate Holbrook [02:46:03] If we look in verse 40 again, we have that mention of, I give unto thee, my servant Joseph, an appointment and restore all things. So again, we're being reminded that this is a restoration. Just an important thing to remember. Then we have all of these verses about adultery and when what somebody thinks might be plural marriage isn't plural marriage, it's actually adultery. And for those listeners, for those people out there who will read this carefully, you'll see a little bit of contradiction. You'll see that what it says here isn't how it always played out in Joseph Smith's practice of plural marriage. And so Then again, I think we need to go back down here to verse 66 at the end. And now, as pertaining to this law, verily, verily, I say unto you, I will reveal more unto you hereafter. So that's not only a sentence for us. It was ascendance for Joseph Smith himself, and it was a sentence for the saints as life in Nauvoo wrapped up and they traveled west and they kept staying with this principle in Utah. And plural marriage looked different then than it did in Nauvoo. And then in 1890, when Wilford Woodruff announced that there should be an end to plural marriage, that was very devastating for a lot of saints who had sacrificed so much for this principle. And they felt not only the sacrifice, but they just felt it was a key thing that set them apart. And it was a crucial part of their testimony to hear the prophet whom they would honor, because these were orthodox believers, say that this will no longer be a part of our system. That was a whole new, new trial. So. So continuing revelation, or the way it says in here, I will reveal, reveal more unto you. That's another really important thing to keep in mind in studying both this section and the practice of plural marriage.

John Dehlin [02:48:08] What a turnaround.

Speaker G [02:48:09] That's such a fascinating turnaround. Is it so hard to accept and then so hard to let go of?

Speaker F [02:48:15] I see. I'd never thought of that. I thought they'd be glad that's over, but it's more like, but wait, these are our families. These are our relationships. This is. We have a testimony of it, you know. Interesting.

Kate Holbrook [02:48:26] Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:48:27] How about, it is good to be the king. How about that? For why they didn't want to give it up. Like, what do you make of their argument?

Sandra Tanner [02:48:35] I see people that had sacrificed so much for this. Remember, many of them had been in hiding so they wouldn't get arrested. Some had gone to prison because of polygamy. And I can just see them thinking, well, what was all of that about? What was the last 30 years of my life about? Running from the law, sacrificing everything, hiding away, maybe from my family. So to me, it's that they're looking back on horrible things they went through to live the principle. And then just like that, click of a finger, turn around. Oh, sorry, guys. It's all over now. It's like when I think of the two girls that. The Partridge girls that. When he calls them into the parlor after Emma's giving him such a fit about him, and he brings them in, and he says to him, you know, well, sorry, girls, it's all over. Emma's mad, so you'll have to move out. And they're like, what? You know, it's just when you've made these kind of sacrifices, how do you keep believing when you have this kind of betrayal of the sacrifices they've asked of you? And to trivialize it, to just turn around and say, oh, oops, we're not going to do it anymore. I don't know. It's hard either way. But it would be very confusing to suddenly just say, well, yeah, the last 50 years don't count, or 40 years, you know, sorry about that. We're giving it all up. It would be devastating.

Gerardo Sumano [02:50:12] Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:50:12] John Sawyer writes the continuing Revelation card trumps all other cards. Unfortunately, the church can always fall back on that.

Sandra Tanner [02:50:20] Yes.

John Dehlin [02:50:21] Whenever there's a change, even if it's a reversal, it's all revelation. The November 15th policy was revelation when it was given, and then when it's reversed four years later, that's also Revelation. The house always wins. As Kara has said before. Also, Alyssa, both Elisa and Donnell both write sunk cost Fallacy. That once you've committed and dedicated so much time and your reputation, so many sacrifices, you're actually inclined to justify and conclude that it was a good thing.

Sandra Tanner [02:50:55] Right.

Jenn Kamp [02:50:56] Yeah, I don't. I also. This is one phrase that I do not like that believing members use, which I used when I was also a believing member. Like, they. Like, I can't remember who was saying it in the video just then, but if you don't understand it, if it's not feeling right to you, if something's telling you something is off, don't worry, it'll all be okay in the after, in the hereafter. Like, it'll all make sense in the afterlife. Like, it'll be better than. You'll get all your blessings that, you know, you're not seeing come true in your patriarchal blessing. Don't worry, you'll get them in the afterlife. Like, that's what they meant in that. Like, there's so many, so many ways that they use that phrase when they can't explain something or don't want to say the truth of it. And I. So I just disagree with that saying that they said in that clip.

John Dehlin [02:51:59] Yeah, we're actually going to show a clip of Elder Holland saying just that in just a few minutes. So you're a prophetess. Okay, let's go ahead.

Whether DC 132 Was Actually Followed

Gerardo Sumano [02:52:09] There was. There was a point. I mean, let's give her kudos for admitting that the instructions laid out on DC 132 did not always apply to Joseph. She tried to justify it by saying, well, it's because here in the revelation it also says says that God is going to reveal him more. So maybe that's why he got permission to violate all these rules that God laid out. I don't know. But I mean, at least she's admitting that members are going to see a contradiction between what Doctrine Covenants 132 says and how Joseph practiced polygamy.

John Dehlin [02:52:49] When was DNC 132 ever really followed? Because she's saying it wasn't followed later. It certainly wasn't followed when Joel was alive. When was it followed? Seriously? Anybody know? I think it was, it was never followed.

Sandra Tanner [02:53:02] It was never done the way it's written.

John Dehlin [02:53:04] I mean didn't it, didn't you say it didn't even get published in the Doctrine and Covenants until like the 76.

Sandra Tanner [02:53:11] 1876.

John Dehlin [02:53:12] So it wasn't even canonized until 1876. And then they ended by. Well, they don't end it in 1890. They claim to end. To end it in 1890. And then they lied.

Sandra Tanner [02:53:22] They advised the members to quit practicing it.

John Dehlin [02:53:27] All right, here's one of the biggest whoppers of the whole thing. Gerardo, I'm going to have you comment on this first. First this, this is just a whopper of all whoppers. And I'm just gonna play it.

Speaker G [02:53:36] Kate, I think, and I want to ask this correctly, I think on our listeners mind might be the fear that Joseph or Brigham is using this to get that they want. Is there anything in there in the historical record that says Joseph and Brigham or any others were, were this didn't think this was from God. They knew it wasn't from God and they were just kind of sneaking in something because they knew the people would buy it. I just, I want to calm that fear coming from anyone. Is there anything in the history that says they, they were trying to pull the she. The wool over someone's eyes?

Kate Holbrook [02:54:11] Good. No, no. I mean nothing, nothing in any letter. Nothing. It, it, it's very clear to me that this was something that they believed God want, didn't just want, but commit commanded them to do. And, and also Kathleen Flake is the one who first mentioned this perspective. So I'm roughly quoting her. But there are a lot easier ways to have extramarital sex or to have sex with a lot of women than to marry them, you know, and be

Speaker F [02:54:47] responsible for the offspring and everything.

Kate Holbrook [02:54:49] Too coarse. But yeah. And to, and to Invent this elaborate. There are plenty of other religious leaders, not Latter Day Saints, who also had vibrant sexual lives. They did not. They. They just did it.

Speaker G [02:55:07] You know, theology.

Kate Holbrook [02:55:08] There was no theology. There was no revelation. There was no explanation. And bringing, bringing people in carefully and telling them. And telling them to go and pray about it. That there, there was none of that. This is, this is an exceptional situation. This does not look like those other cases.

Speaker G [02:55:26] I think that's important to. Thank you, Kate. I think that was very important to, to for people that just kind of calm their fears a little bit that Joseph isn't the man they thought he was.

Speaker F [02:55:36] Right.

John Dehlin [02:55:38] What do you think?

Gerardo Sumano [02:55:39] Well, that's a lie. I mean it. I know the word lies. Harsh but. But that's a lie. Like where Kate is saying that, that it's unprecedented how Joseph came up with all this theology around polygamy. So we can't believe that it was just for sex because there was so much theology around it.

John Dehlin [02:56:00] He was drowning in theology.

Gerardo Sumano [02:56:04] And that. No. Unprecedented. There was. There's no other person in history our cult leader has ever done this before. So. So Joseph is an exception. That's what she says. It's a lie. And John and Jonathan Streeter on that video that I keep talking about, he. Two years ago, he completely debunks Kate's point and he gives really good examples of different cult leaders who literally come up with very.

John Dehlin [02:56:32] With theology.

Gerardo Sumano [02:56:34] With theology. Yeah. Around how. Why. Why they needed to. To practice polygamy or other kinds of, you know, like sex with other women and stuff. So. So yeah, that's a misrepresentation. And then another misrepresentation is when she says that there's nothing in the historical record that says that Joseph was just trying to have sex, which. Or you know, like lie or not being truthful about this being from God. I mean there's so much out there. Like we already covered it, like funny Fanny Alger, you know, like that. That was an affair. We have Sarah Pratt, we have. I mean even Nancy Rigdon. We have John C. Bennett and the people that were involved with him. We have the Navu Expositor, you know,

John Dehlin [02:57:28] like his denials to Emma, his denials to the church. But okay.

Gerardo Sumano [02:57:32] Oh, we have literally what's. What's his name? Sorry. Oh, William McClellan. Who, who says that. That Emma admitted to him that Joseph had a full on affair with Fanny Auger. And not. Not only with Fanny Auger, but with also someone called the.

Jenn Kamp [02:57:53] He.

Gerardo Sumano [02:57:53] He says Ms. Heel. So he had two affairs, you know, around Fanny Alers time. So, I mean, there's so much out

John Dehlin [02:58:01] there, plus Emma's denials. But. But. Yeah, but Gerardo. So I agree with that, that. That there's so much evidence that that shows that it was sketchy, that he knew he was doing something wrong. But. But maybe there's another way to look at it. And this is just me playing devil's advocate. What if what she's saying is, yes, he lied about it or didn't tell Emma or the Fanny Alger thing, but she. I think she was saying there's no evidence where he admits it's an intentional fraud. In other words, she believes that in his mind, he believed it was approved of by God. And there's nothing to suggest because also, dad Vogel makes this point, the pious fraud point, which is that Joseph believed that God was okay with righteous lies like deceiving people about Laban and killing Laban if there's a greater purpose. So I think she was making the point not that there isn't problems with the narrative, but that there's no evidence that Joseph believed he was lying. She believes that Joseph. That all the evidence points or there's a lack of evidence refuting the idea to refute the idea that Joseph was sincere believing his polygamy was of God. Sandra, what do you think?

Sandra Tanner [02:59:18] Well, that may be true in Nauvoo, but it's not true for Fanny. There's. He's not putting out a religious argument on her. It's just plain meeting her in the barn and getting caught. There's no evidence there was religious talk involved in this, but it's the same issue.

John Dehlin [02:59:41] But she would say there's no evidence that there's nothing. So how do we know that Joseph didn't bring her. Fanny into the barn, tell her about the revelation and say, hey, God's. I've got this angel. The angel's hanging over me. Fanny, we got to do this because, like, the angel. Well, like, there's no evidence that that wasn't happening.

Sandra Tanner [03:00:02] Do we have evidence that David Koresh or any of these other guys fully believed or didn't believe? I mean, they always said they believed, so. But how do you know if they didn't believe? I mean, it's a silly argument because you could make it of any group that had one of these leaders that insisted on his own way with women in this group.

Gerardo Sumano [03:00:26] And another issue is that Joseph's theology, by this point, what he's. The historians are able to prove or. Or talk about how Joseph internal beliefs were so expansive by this point, that anything went. So by this point, Joseph has a view that anything that he wanted, God would give to him. And he didn't really have to have God's permission because he was the anointed.

John Dehlin [03:00:55] But I think you're making point.

Gerardo Sumano [03:00:58] Right.

John Dehlin [03:00:58] Which is that he just felt God was okay with anything he did.

Gerardo Sumano [03:01:01] Yeah.

John Dehlin [03:01:02] If he felt good about it, God was okay with it.

Gerardo Sumano [03:01:05] But how do we know? I mean, like, it's like Sandra is saying, how do we. How. How are we able to test faith?

John Dehlin [03:01:10] And they would say, faith, Jen, you need faith.

Jenn Kamp [03:01:13] But then he had a rule. Remember, everyone forgets about the rule, the order, the structure. Rule and structure. Remember when he made this, like, rule and structure? And he didn't. Joseph didn't follow the rules and structures. So, like, it doesn't make sense. That doesn't make sense. The argument.

John Dehlin [03:01:32] Yeah. What about the argument that there are easier ways to have sex? Cedra, it's true. You just go have sex. You don't need to create a theology around it.

Sandra Tanner [03:01:41] Well, obviously you don't need to because he did it with Fanny Alger without a doctorate.

Jenn Kamp [03:01:47] That's exactly what I would say.

John Dehlin [03:01:51] Without a theology. And he married 22 women without a theology. Right.

Jenn Kamp [03:01:55] Yeah. Before Emma breaking the rule. Because he didn't ask Emma about them.

John Dehlin [03:01:59] Yeah.

Sandra Tanner [03:02:00] Well, and he. And these were not marriages. I mean, the people, the Mormons want to keep talking about it like it was some sort of legitimate thing that they were truly married. They weren't married. It was adulterous affairs. It wasn't recognized by anyone in the community as legal. They weren't presented as legal wives. And he didn't support them.

Gerardo Sumano [03:02:22] Right.

Sandra Tanner [03:02:24] He didn't have 22 women living at his house. Well, at least we don't know that he had that many. But he had some women living there, but it really was not setting up a household or living polygamy as a community would do in the homes like they did later in Utah, which she kind of is conceding when she was saying, well, it's a little messy and Nauvoo. And they did a little different out here in Utah. And yes, when it got down to practical stuff, it was kind of hard to get all that to work. And so they made some changes in how they did it. Makes you wonder what Joseph thought it would be going forward if he had lived. Did he really think he was going to support all these women? Maybe he's expecting a big raise from the church. But, I mean, how would you support that many women?

Gerardo Sumano [03:03:17] Yeah. And I think what they're trying to do is put the burden on us, the critics, to prove that it was false. And I don't think the burden is on us to prove this false. I don't think we should be talking about this. Oh, this is actually from God or. No, this was actually. We're presenting the evidence, we're giving the actual context of what they're talking about. And then people can decide whether or not they want to believe in this God that allows all this kind of. Yeah, Messy things to happen.

John Dehlin [03:03:47] Yeah, definitely. David Willis writes, it's impossible to prove a negative. There's another common quote which is the absence of evidence is not the evidence of absence. And so just the fact that no one can provide evidence of Joseph having sex or like a videotape or nobody can find evidence that, that Joseph believed it was a fraud. That doesn't mean there weren't. There wasn't evidence.

Sandra Tanner [03:04:16] Right? Right.

John Dehlin [03:04:16] Yeah. Yeah. Okay. We've already talked about Helen Markimble, but they actually want to wait in. They. They're going to weigh in on Helen Mark Kimball. Are you ready, Jen? Are you excited? Maybe you excited for this? All right. This is why Helen, our Kimball was okay. Why 14 year old was okay. Here we go.

Helen Mar Kimball's Age and Historical Context

Kate Holbrook [03:04:36] So Helen Markimbell was 14 when she married Joseph Smith. And some of us want to think, oh, people regularly got married at age 14 back then. Well, that was young back then. It wasn't unheard of and it was legal, but it was young. Joseph Smith didn't approach Helen markimball. Helen, Mark's father, approached Joseph Smith because he wanted, through his daughter, for his family to be sealed to Joseph Smith. And there, there's an article on this by Spencer Fluman. It's available online. Yeah. And it's terrific. So I highly recommend that for anybody who wants to look closely into this and the theology. My husband, Sam Brown has written a lot about this in different venues, including a book called In Heaven as It Is on Earth. But it helps explain why the plural marriage, it sometimes involved sex. And with Helen Mark Kimball, we have her reminiscences about plural marriage. We have actually a lot of records about her, which is great because she was so young that she's the one that troubles us the most. She never mentioned there was a sexual component to this marriage. But we do know she suffered on account of it because she lost her hopes for romance. And, you know, all those things a teenager has of who am I going to marry and what will my wedding be like? And all of that. That that was all gone for her. And she stayed, she lived for decades. She lived to be an old woman and she stayed faithful to the church the whole time, which I think helps. That I think is an important context for that, for that union.

Speaker G [03:06:19] When we hear these people.

Kate Holbrook [03:06:20] Yeah.

Speaker G [03:06:21] See them.

Kate Holbrook [03:06:21] Yes, yes.

Speaker G [03:06:23] See her whole story.

Kate Holbrook [03:06:24] She didn't run screaming.

John Dehlin [03:06:26] And so Jen, she never wrote down Helen Mark Kimball never wrote down Joseph and I had sex and she stayed faithful and she didn't run away screaming. So is that okay?

Sandra Tanner [03:06:42] No.

John Dehlin [03:06:43] What's wrong with the art? So let's take each one. She never wrote it down. Helena Markivel never wrote down, hey everyone, hey Pastority, Joseph Smith and I had sex. She didn't do that.

Jenn Kamp [03:06:56] Who cares? Like, that's not.

Sandra Tanner [03:06:59] Well, like.

Jenn Kamp [03:07:01] Yeah, that's not it to me, for me, that's not even an important factor.

John Dehlin [03:07:08] Like, do you know I'm 52 and I've never written on a piece of paper Margi and I had sex, not one time. And I'm 52.

Jenn Kamp [03:07:15] Because. Because. And why I say that, like why I say that is because.

John Dehlin [03:07:21] Yeah.

Jenn Kamp [03:07:21] Is because it shouldn't ever have been an issue. Like it shouldn't ever have been.

John Dehlin [03:07:28] Yeah.

Jenn Kamp [03:07:29] She shouldn't ever have been put in that position to where she would even have to. Like someone would question a 14 year old about writing down or telling or even talking about anything sexual in that time and day, day. Like it just wouldn't happen. She shouldn't be, she shouldn't be asked historically or in when she was alive to do that, to even think about doing that. It's just, it wouldn't happen. And if you read all, if you read her journals and you, you can feel her heart being shattered and like torn apart on the pages and you know as like you just see her longing to just be a kid, to just. She did not want to be in this relationship like they had. And there wasn't a lack of boys her age there. In her journal, she writes, quoting from her journal, during the winter of 1843, there were plenty of parties and balls. Some of the young gentlemen got up a series of dancing parties to be held at the mansion once a week. I had to stay home as my father had been warned by the prophet to keep his daughter away from there. And then she longs for no girl loved dancing better than I. And I really felt that it was too much to bear. I long for the freedom that that was denied me. Like feel that, feel that, don't care. I don't care if she didn't write down if she had sex with Joseph or not. Like it's, it doesn't, it just tears my heart apart as a mother and as a woman. She. There was no reason, there was no reason for him to marry her. None. He could have sealed that family together without Helen. Like, you're the prophet, right? You're the king. Go do it. Go do it. And leave the young girl who wanted to be a young girl alone.

Speaker F [03:09:46] Yeah.

John Dehlin [03:09:47] And it's worse because like I think about all the victims of sexual abuse, all the victims of childhood sexual abuse that we've had on Mormon stories and can you imagine saying to them, why didn't you run screaming? Yeah, like why don't children run screaming from their sexual predators?

Jenn Kamp [03:10:08] I'll tell you why. Because they're scared and because they're threatened and because they're in fear. They're in fear of their life and their family's life and they're told not to by people who are in authority above them. And that is why. So don't ever ask a victim why they didn't tell, why they didn't say anything. There's many, many, many reasons why they didn't say anything. And it doesn't matter. It doesn't matter the reason they didn't say anything. What matters is that they're a victim and that's what matters.

Sandra Tanner [03:10:52] I would just say to, to anyone that's a church going person, when you're at church next week, just look around at the 14 year old girls in your congregation and imagine an older gentleman coming to you and wanting to take your daughter into a marriage relationship. But it's not going to be legal, it's not going to be public, it's not going to be authorized by the community. It's something she will have to live with in secret and never talk to anyone about. And tell me that 14 year old girl looks ready for that.

Jenn Kamp [03:11:33] And she's telling you, she's telling you in her own words she's not ready. She's not. She told her mother that, she told her father that she's not and it's not okay and it shouldn't have happened. And they act like, oh, but everyone had grand spiritual experiences and they all loved it and it was all happiness and, and everything. No, it wasn't. It wasn't. And you need to stop saying it.

John Dehlin [03:12:03] Yeah. And to rely on this idea that she never wrote it down just ignores the fact that how many childhood victims never tell about their abuse or don't tell about it until they're adults, right?

Gerardo Sumano [03:12:14] Yeah.

John Dehlin [03:12:14] You know that. That's every. That's almost all. Yeah, almost all childhood sexual abuse goes unreported. So it's the norm for it to be reported, you know, not the exception. Gerardo.

Gerardo Sumano [03:12:30] I mean, there's so much context around the Joseph Smith marrying her. Helen Kimball. I'll give some of this. Some of it. I. I did want to say one of the reasons why apologists and the church once. Once to claim that Helen Martin Kimball was. Was just so faithful and like, never had a problem with it is because later on on her life, once she was. When she moved on, you know, after Joseph died, she. She became a very vocal advocate of polygamy and became really judgy of the people who complained about polygamy.

Jenn Kamp [03:13:06] Me.

Gerardo Sumano [03:13:06] So her later writings reflect that. And like a very, very strong advocate and believer of the faith and polygamy and all that. And that's. That's where most apologists and the church want to say, well, look at how she ended up, you know, like, thinking about this stuff. But as Jen brought up, well, that was way different what she was thinking when she was 14, you know, and then so around also.

John Dehlin [03:13:35] How many sexual abuse victims stay Mormon?

Gerardo Sumano [03:13:37] Right, right.

John Dehlin [03:13:39] Gazillion, you know, like. Yep, right. Okay, keep going.

Gerardo Sumano [03:13:46] So there was this story. So before when. When Helen was around nine years old, have. Heber was being sent into missions a lot. And I think it was during one of his missions he sent his Helen to China dolls. And one time Joseph came into the Kimball's home and picked up one of the dolls, took his head off, her head off, and said, as that has fallen, so as the heathens God shall fall. It's just like an interesting interaction of Joseph with Helen, you know, breaking her doll. And Helen says, like, she didn't understand what all that was about. And that was kind of weird. But anyway, in 1843, then Kimball is in. In on the se. Secret happenings of Navu. And. And sorry, it. Todd Compton talks about how in 1842, Joseph approaches Kimball and says, hey, I need to marry your wife. And. And that's when, you know, like, Kimball and his wife go and pray about it for like three days. And. And then they come back and say, okay, Joseph, yeah, you can take my wife. But then Joseph said, oh, that was just an Abrahamic test. And then it is thought Lindsay Hansen park says that it was after that that then Joseph asks for Helen. And. And then Heber goes and talks to Helen and, you know, has him, tries to convince her to Accept polygamy. But by, by this point, Haver also had already married another wife, Sarah. Sarah Peak.

John Dehlin [03:15:38] You mean Hebrew?

Gerardo Sumano [03:15:39] Hebrew, yeah, sorry. Hebrew seeking.

John Dehlin [03:15:41] Okay. I just want to make sure I know who you're talking about.

Gerardo Sumano [03:15:43] Yeah. And she was a convert from England and she had two children and, and then Heber had another child with her. So there was definitely, like, sex going on between, you know, Heber C. Kimball and, and his plural wife, which, when, When Joseph proposes marrying Helen. That's why, I think in my mind, that's why the mom was so devastated, because she knew what it meant. Like, it was not just something on paper or for ink. Helen also wrote a poem later on where she says that she thought originally she thought that the marriage was going to be for eternity alone, but then she later found out that it was for time and eternity, which usually that's code for sex, and that's a poem Helen wrote. So. Yeah, just all interesting context around the whole marriage thing.

John Dehlin [03:16:43] I, I just. Oh, I, I. Sorry. I just had an ex Mormon revelation. The most damaging thing that could probably ever be done to the church would be for someone to do a documentary or a, Or a biopic on Helen Markimble. Yeah, yeah, just do a movie on. Hell, on the life of Helen Markimble.

Gerardo Sumano [03:17:04] Yeah.

Jenn Kamp [03:17:05] And I don't. Yeah, exactly. And I don't. That will blow up their whole narrative. And I don't, I don't like how in the clip that we just saw that they are. I just lost my train of thought. Give me one sec.

John Dehlin [03:17:25] No, no worries at all. Like, I, I just, I think about man, someday Hulu or HBO or Amazon. We all, we. Everyone wants kind of the Joseph Smith documentary of like, Joseph Smith's life overall. Just skip, just skip Joseph and go to, Go to Helen.

Gerardo Sumano [03:17:44] Yeah, right.

John Dehlin [03:17:46] And Jen, as soon as you come up with that thought, just jump right back in. I know it's.

Jenn Kamp [03:17:50] Well, one of the, one of the things that she said too is like, you know, 14, you know, it was still young back then, but it, you know, it wasn't like, too young.

Gerardo Sumano [03:18:00] Yeah.

Jenn Kamp [03:18:01] And the census of that year, women got married at 20 and a half years old and men were 26.

Gerardo Sumano [03:18:10] Yep.

Jenn Kamp [03:18:10] So she was very, very young. It was still so like that. That argument is just. I've heard that all my life too, you know, or how they. Not all my life, I should say, just as, as long as I've heard about it. But that argument that believing members make that, you know, it was normal back then. It was normal back then. It was Normal in the West. No, it wasn't. Let's stop that narrative. Also, it was not normal.

Sandra Tanner [03:18:43] And when they did marry that young, it was a public marriage, recognized in the community. She had rights of inheritance and was honored for her position in the community. This is not what was offered to these young girls.

Gerardo Sumano [03:18:59] Yeah, well, and it wasn't it with a husband of a similar age or

Sandra Tanner [03:19:04] wouldn't matter if they could show some cases where there were older men. I had a girlfriend that after divorce she married a guy that was, I don't know, 20, 25 years older than her. And so she was like, I don't know, 30 and he was 55

Kate Holbrook [03:19:25] and

Sandra Tanner [03:19:25] they had a good second marriage. I mean there are quite a few people probably that have that bigger age gap, but I mean they're not the norm.

Gerardo Sumano [03:19:36] Yeah, but I mean when the women is a minor. When the woman is a minor, Yes.

Sandra Tanner [03:19:41] A minor brings in another situation. And I keep hammering on this. They weren't marriages. Yeah, these were hidden affairs labeled marriages.

John Dehlin [03:19:52] Jen.

Jenn Kamp [03:19:54] Sorry, my mind's just bouncing all over with this Helen story. But they also said that Heber came to Joseph and offered his daughter to Joseph. But that's not why Heber was going back to Joseph. He was going back to Joseph because of his wife. And that talk that was going on because of Heber and his wife. He wasn't going there to offer up his daughter just like out of the blue, oh, let's go over to Joseph's house and tell him to marry Helen. No, that was Joseph asked to take their daughter and they had to go back in.

Gerardo Sumano [03:20:36] From what I know. Well, I was talking with LDS discussions this morning and he was telling me that when he studied this, it was hard for him to find somewhere where Joseph was the one asking for Helen. I mean that doesn't mean that didn't happen. I know. Lindsay Hansen Parker listened to the episode this morning and she says that it was Joseph who asked for Helen. So I don't know, I would have to visit it back. Like how it act like what documents

John Dehlin [03:21:04] we have, what dad wants to offer his 14 year old daughter up to a 36, 37, 38 year old man.

Gerardo Sumano [03:21:10] And then we have the fact that the mom was super devastated too.

Jenn Kamp [03:21:13] Especially when the mom's like when, when my husband came and asked me that Joseph, you know, wants to marry her, that I was so devastated and distraught and heartbroken and everything like that. You think that if it was something that was they were going to offer their daughter, it would be. They would already had talked about it, and they would go to him, and that would be, like, a thing they would do together.

John Dehlin [03:21:38] Right.

Kate Holbrook [03:21:38] And it.

Jenn Kamp [03:21:39] It didn't. In her journal. It doesn't sound like that. Yeah, it sounds like he came to.

Gerardo Sumano [03:21:44] I agree.

Jenn Kamp [03:21:44] Yeah.

John Dehlin [03:21:46] All right, well, so that's a call for anyone who knows, anyone who's wealthy, any filmmakers. We want the idea of a biopic on Helen Mark Kimball to have originated here on Mormon Stories podcast. Help us make it happen. Ex Mormon, post Mormon, progressive Mormon gods. Let it happen. Okay, we're almost done. Believe it or not. Now we're gonna get an. An explanation as to why there was polyandry. You ready? Of course, they're not gonna be. Pay close attention. They're not gonna actually use the word, but we're gonna hear why polyandry's. Okay, here we go.

▶ Video Clip 5

Video Clip 5 [03:22:29] Plural marriage was a lot. We didn't. We didn't practice sealings then the way that we do now where you're. You're sealed. Like, my husband and I are sealed, and we were married in the temple, and so our children were part of the covenant with us, or another couple can join the church or get married in the temple after they're married, and then their children are sealed to them. That wasn't. That came much, much later. Right now in the church, sealing's meant just being part of a family network with people that would help secure your salvation. And so this is why even there are women who were married, who are sealed, who were sealed to Joseph Smith while their husbands were alive. And that's the way to make sense of that, is maybe their husband wasn't a member of the church. You know, and getting sealed to a really valiant person, especially the prophet. There are all kinds of people sealing themselves to the prophet even after his death, sealing themselves as a child, sealing themselves. You know, all these things.

Video Clip 5 [03:23:37] They just want to be connected to him in an ordinance.

Video Clip 5 [03:23:39] They want to be connected to him, and they want to be saved. And they saw being sealed to him as a way to secure their own salvation.

John Dehlin [03:23:48] So basically, polyandry wasn't sexual. It was basically just a bunch of people wanting to get sealed to Joseph. Cassandra.

Sandra Tanner [03:23:57] Well, why wouldn't these women want to be sealed to their husbands?

Gerardo Sumano [03:24:05] Well, she says that they were not members. She says that.

Sandra Tanner [03:24:07] Well, some were members and some weren't.

Gerardo Sumano [03:24:12] I think both of them had. Their husbands were members. Members.

John Dehlin [03:24:16] Right?

Sandra Tanner [03:24:16] Yeah. And they weren't just on paper. They obviously included regular marriage relationships, because we know. Is it Sylvia Sessions that had the daughter that

Kate Holbrook [03:24:35] is.

Sandra Tanner [03:24:35] That Gonna.

John Dehlin [03:24:36] No, it's fine.

Sandra Tanner [03:24:37] Sylvia Sessions had a daughter that she named Josephine. And so in her dying days, the. Did you want me to stop there? Where is it? It's in my purse over here.

John Dehlin [03:24:53] Yeah. Jen's going. Keep going. Keep going.

Sandra Tanner [03:24:55] Yeah. Okay. Sylvia Sessions daughter was named Josephine. And on Sylvia's deathbed out here in the west, she tells Josephine that your dad was really Joseph Smith. Now, the Mormons want to try to make Josephine not Joseph's child. And we know from DNA, evidently that she wasn't Joseph's child. But the question is, why did Sylvia think it was? I mean, I don't have problems thinking of who the parent, the husband man was that authored my kids, you know, So, I mean, how could she make this mistake? I mean, I don't sit around thinking, huh, now I wonder if it was Harry down the street, you know? I mean, it just. That she would tell her on her deathbed, I named you Josephine because you're Joseph's child means that she did have sex with Joseph. And it's right in the middle of this period when Brian Hales wants to make this argument that she was separated from her husband for a while, and so it was okay for her to have a child by Joseph during that period. They were sort of like. She was sort of, like, divorced. Not really, but sort of. And then she went back to her husband. But he tries real hard to keep her from having sexual relations with both men at the same time. But the only way you could confuse who the father was is if you had sex with both of them in a very short period of time.

Gerardo Sumano [03:26:36] Right, Right.

Sandra Tanner [03:26:38] So the whole story is just really crazy. But they say, you know, well, he didn't have any children. Well, we don't know what the situation with Joseph is on that, but we know he did have intercourse with one Mormon woman who believed the child she had was Joseph's.

Gerardo Sumano [03:26:56] Right, Right. If you. Dan Vogel gives an expose on this whole story, and it's just amazing to see how Brian Hales will. Do acrobats with the evidence to fit whatever he wants it to fit. Because when we. When. When everyone before DNA evidence and when everyone believed that Joseph Finn was actually Joseph's daughter, Brian Hell's whole argument, he was pulling from, like, really weird sources to prove that she had. What's her name?

Sandra Tanner [03:27:39] Josephine.

Gerardo Sumano [03:27:39] No, but.

Sandra Tanner [03:27:40] Oh, Sylvia.

Gerardo Sumano [03:27:41] Yes. That Sylvia had stopped having sexual relations with. With his. Her husband. Her husband, and was only having sexual relations with Joseph. But when the evidence came up that, oh, she's actually not Joseph's daughter. Then Brian hells had to change his whole argument and say like, oh well, maybe he never had. She never had sex with Joseph all along. And maybe she was only talking about Josephine being Joseph's daughter in a spiritual sense. So it's just. It's just ridiculous.

John Dehlin [03:28:21] Wait, her order. Are you saying that Brian Hill starts with the conclusion and then rearranges the evidence to support the conclusion he's already arrived at? Is that what you're saying?

Gerardo Sumano [03:28:31] That seem he's not a trained historian, so.

John Dehlin [03:28:37] Well, this whole thing is an attempt by. By Kate Holbrook to justify polyandry. And it's basically saying in God's wisdom, God needed these women to be. Cause it's a house of order. There's structure. So God needed these women married other men to be sealed to Joseph. And what I wanted to do was pull a clip from none other than Jeffrey R. Holland, where he's in some fireside somewhere, I think in Latin America, I'm not sure. And they're asking him, wait a minute, what if a woman is sealed to a man? The man dies and then a subsequent man won't want to be married to the woman because she's already sealed to her first husband and this other man wants to be sealed to someone. And. And so there are all these predicaments members are bringing to. To Jeffrey R. Holland about all these confusing ceiling scenarios. And I just think it's really important and Sandra, you may enjoy this to hear what Jeffrey Holland says about ceilings and their necessity. Are you ready?

Sandra Tanner [03:29:40] Yes.

John Dehlin [03:29:40] You ready? Sandra?

Sandra Tanner [03:29:41] I've got to see this.

John Dehlin [03:29:42] Okay, here we go. You can watch it on the screen right there.

Sandra Tanner [03:29:46] Well, do you know what you do in a case like that? You do what obviously you would do what you should do. You trust in God's goodness. When there are questions to which we do not know the answer, then you trust in what you do know. And what you do know is that God is good and fair and just and merciful. He is not going to deny those children with their father or that father with his own children. How he works it out, it doesn't matter. It's not your problem. God will figure it out.

John Dehlin [03:30:21] Look, he has to bring the flowers up every spring.

Sandra Tanner [03:30:25] He has to keep the planets in

John Dehlin [03:30:27] their orbit and the solar system working.

Sandra Tanner [03:30:29] If he can do that, he can take care of your family. He can take care of a father and some children. Trust in God and know that these sealing arrangements can all be worked out and that no one's action can block Your exaltation, all of this is handled by.

John Dehlin [03:30:49] Yeah. So what do you think, Cedra?

Sandra Tanner [03:30:52] Well, he kept talking about the father and the children. I don't know where the mother was in the picture, but I thought the whole issue was sealing families together so that you would have your mom and dad and five kids all together. And it doesn't work out with polygamy because especially not with divorces or whatever because you can't keep all those different family groups together. When you have these different wives, these different husbands, then you have all this mixed children stuff that it's impossible to keep all those families together. I mean, you take my own family where there was polygamy, each wife has her group of kids sealed to where. Yeah, but she doesn't have a full time husband sealed to her. It doesn't matter how you approach this. It just is a system that isn't going to work out when you make these family groups being different units because you got to split up parents somehow to get it all to work.

John Dehlin [03:32:04] And my question is, if God, if God's fair and just and is going to make it all work in the end, why does he need Joseph Smith to be sealed to these women who are sealed, other men? Why couldn't God have just said, you know what, Joseph, you've got plenty women. You're already, you've already got husbands. If Joseph needs something in the afterlife, we'll work that out later. Why, why were the women at that point compelled to be married to Joseph when God can work it out in the afterlife and just be fair, then. Well, does that make sense?

Sandra Tanner [03:32:38] Well, it's just like with polygamy. I mean, it's, everyone's going to have everything work out later. I don't know how this all can work out with any logical thought because they make it so literal.

John Dehlin [03:32:50] Yeah, but that's when they always say, well, trust in your faith, trust in faith because it doesn't make sense, but trust in your feelings. Trust in faith. All right, so we're almost done. We're going back to a little more Helen. Sorry Jen, we've got a little more Helen to go.

Helen's Situation and Family Motivations

Kate Holbrook [03:33:09] So that is what Helen's father was trying to achieve for their family. Helen then did have a choice about whether to enter this marriage. And it was something that she prayed about. But unlike some other women who entered plural marriages, she said she had no angel appear. She did not have a large, brilliant revelation. She said she decided to enter this marriage because of logic, because it made sense of sense to her. For the things we were talking about her own salvation and the salvation of her family. And her records say that it was difficult, but she felt that she made the right choice in it also. And I know when I was 14, you know, I would have been influenced. I don't want to whitewash this. I would have been influenced by what, what my bishop, let alone my prophet, wanted me to do and what my parents wanted me to do. But it's, it's important me, to me still to honor the decision that she made. Joseph smith was also 14 when he had the first vision. You know, it's important to me to honor the agency that she did have, the decision she made, and particularly her legacy of staying not just true to the church, but really continuing to build Zion throughout her life.

John Dehlin [03:34:35] Jen, what do you want to say about Helen? I mean, the argument basically is that, you know, she, she consented. She was 14, but she had a choice and we should honor her choice.

Jenn Kamp [03:34:50] She didn't have a choice. And I think we, we've made this a death. Yeah, we've beat this.

John Dehlin [03:34:55] Yeah.

Jenn Kamp [03:34:56] She didn't, she didn't want it. We, we have. From her own words in her own hand. And, and for them to compare helen to at 14, being put into a polygamous relationship with Joseph, to him at 14 getting a vision like from a prayer, are. That's not comparable. It's not. That's not comparable.

John Dehlin [03:35:26] What's extra disturbing is it's a woman making this argument. I don't mean to be rude, but it's a woman. It's awful if a man makes it too, but it just seems extra awful that a woman somehow is making this argument.

Jenn Kamp [03:35:38] Yeah, I don't, I don't understand. I don't. I would. I, you know, maybe she can call me and let me know, like, what her, like how she as a woman could come to this conclusion after reading that journal. Because me as a, as a woman and a mother and just reading that crushes me. Like, and I, there's no way I would be like, oh, and she consented and she said it was okay and you know, it was okay. Just like when Joseph was 14 and had a vision. Like, it's not.

John Dehlin [03:36:17] No, I mean, flip it around. Let's say that, let's say Kate Holbrook has a daughter who's 14 who's meeting alone with the bishop in his office, and the bishop is able to convince the 14 year old daughter that God wants him to marry the daughter. So they have sex there in the bishop's office, which by the way, has happened. Right. And the daughter walks away thinking, no wait, he loves me and he's a man of God and God told him that we're supposed to be together. So trust the child. Would Kate Holbert go, oh, well, the 14 year old came out of the bishop's office saying that, that God inspired her or it was a logical decision to make and the bishop was her leader. So is she going to trust her 14 year old child and say that's good Bishop, Good job, bishop, good job 14 year old daughter. You did the right thing?

Jenn Kamp [03:37:05] Yeah. No, she's not going to trust that and it's not okay. And Helen, and, but Helen, even, even in that kind of comparison, Helen didn't come out of the bishop's office saying, oh it's great. And he me and I'm happy. She, after she was sealed and married to Joseph, she's still saying, I want to go to the dance, I want to go to the dance. I want to like have this love that all the other 14 year old girls, you know, get to have. I, I feel, she even says, I feel abused. Like where is that? I'm going to pull that up so I don't misquote it. I long for the freedom that was denied me and thought myself a much abused child. Those are her words. Those are her words. Like no.

John Dehlin [03:37:58] Yeah.

Jenn Kamp [03:37:59] Not okay.

John Dehlin [03:37:59] Yeah.

Sandra Tanner [03:38:01] We have sort of a parallel case with George P. Lee, the Navajo General authority that was excommunicated a number of years ago. He approached a couple of teenage girls in his ward about polygamy and he got excommunicated. They didn't think it was okay in today's world.

John Dehlin [03:38:25] Yeah, well, the truth is there's a couple things that are true. Number one is we've gone three and a half hours. Number two is that we have several more slides. But what's also just, just incredibly strange is that they only get through verse 40 of DNC 132.

Gerardo Sumano [03:38:47] And how many, how many verses?

John Dehlin [03:38:49] And there, and, and there are a total of 66. So they, they basically have left off like another 26 verses. And by the way, Sandra, what did you say about those remaining 26 verses?

Sandra Tanner [03:39:01] Well, they're all about Emma. Isn't it convenient that their program ends right when it gets to the part about all the commandments to Emma on how she has to live this polygamy

John Dehlin [03:39:13] or is going to be destroyed.

Sandra Tanner [03:39:14] Or be destroyed.

John Dehlin [03:39:15] But, but the revelation had nothing to do with Emma.

Sandra Tanner [03:39:18] Oh well, no, other than the fact that Joseph asked God about it. How do you justify my servants Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob in having polygamy? You know, that's. That was. The whole thing was about.

John Dehlin [03:39:30] Yeah, yeah. So what we've decided is we're going to have a third episode. So, like, once we hit 3 hours and 40 minutes, it's late. We are going to have a third episode, and the third episode is going to finish these final slides. Have we talked enough about Helen Markimble today, Jen, what do you think?

Jenn Kamp [03:39:49] I don't know. I don't know if you can ever talk enough about her, because people need to know and learn about her.

John Dehlin [03:39:55] She's like the silver bullet. Maybe she is the silver bullet. Maybe it's not Book of Abraham. Maybe it's not horses. Maybe it's. Maybe Helen, Mark Kimball is the smoking gun.

Sandra Tanner [03:40:06] No.

Jenn Kamp [03:40:07] Yeah, for me, she was.

Gerardo Sumano [03:40:09] There's so many.

Jenn Kamp [03:40:10] So. Thank you, Helen. Thank you, Helen.

Sandra Tanner [03:40:13] Yes.

John Dehlin [03:40:14] You said there's so many smoking guns.

Gerardo Sumano [03:40:16] Yeah. To me, I think it was more designer story was more disturbing to me first. I don't know why, but I think one of the. One of the reasons why the main apologetic argument about polyandry was that, oh, Joseph didn't understand. Understand really how to live it. He was trying to get away, get out of it. So he tried to marry women that were already married so he didn't have to have sex with them. But. But then really looking at how. What Sina tells us about how it actually played out, like, the. That argument doesn't hold up.

John Dehlin [03:40:50] Yeah. So, Sandra, will you come back for a third episode?

Sandra Tanner [03:40:55] If I live through this one, yes.

Closing Remarks and Sandra Tanner's Contributions

John Dehlin [03:40:59] All right. Well, we've had, like, almost 700 continual viewers throughout this episode. It's been very popular. Sandra, you're a legend. We love you. We appreciate you. We honor and respect you. And all of our viewers and listeners are saying, sandra, hooray. Sandra's back. So thank you, Sandra, for coming.

Sandra Tanner [03:41:17] Okay. Thank you, Gerardo.

John Dehlin [03:41:19] Thank you for arranging this. And you. You. You set up all these clips so that we could easily watch them. So her and her other. You're the one that got Sandra to come and schedule it all. So, Gerardo, thank you again for all you do for Mormon stories.

Gerardo Sumano [03:41:32] Yeah, thank you're welcome.

John Dehlin [03:41:34] Yeah. And, Jen, it's so happy to have you on the Open Stories foundation team. And thanks for running the sound and. And the lights and the cameras today and making all this possible.

Jenn Kamp [03:41:46] You're so welcome.

John Dehlin [03:41:47] And for your heartfelt analysis and. And perspective.

Jenn Kamp [03:41:52] Thank you. I appreciate that.

John Dehlin [03:41:53] You're a natural. This is only like your second Episode, right?

Jenn Kamp [03:41:56] Yeah, I think I did. Just Kara got sick one day and I filled in for a couple hours. So thanks for being so nice to me today, everyone.

Sandra Tanner [03:42:03] Yeah, so it's good.

John Dehlin [03:42:05] I think we need more Jen. Yeah, more Jen. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. And Kara, we wish you a good happy vacation and we are excited to have you back as co host for episodes in the future along with lots of other co hosts, including Gerardo and Nemo and Jen and others. So anyway, great episode, everyone. Thank you so much. Thanks for your support. Really quickly, we have a Discord channel. A Discord channel is where you can go text and talk. Even after this episode's over, it can. The conversation continues on Discord. So please go to MormonStories.org up in the top left you'll see the social media buttons. You can click on the Discord channel, join it and continue the conversation there. And join an amazing community of Mormon stories listeners, Mormonism Live Radio Free Mormon and Bill, real fans. They're all kind of working there. Maven has been in the chats. Maven, we salute you. You're helping Mormonism live out. Thank you so much. Sandra, you. You own a bookstore. Do you want to tell people how to support you and your bookstore?

Sandra Tanner [03:43:06] Well, that's a good question because I'm getting closer to retirement. But yes, we still have the bookstore open and we have a website@utlm.org and a book list is on there. You can order online. And we just got all more information than you want to read, so a lot of free stuff. You can read our newsletters forever.

John Dehlin [03:43:34] Yeah. And we, we are paying Santa to do these episodes and so we would love it, number one, if you could support Sandra, go to utlm.org buy her books or you can donate to her organization. And also we would love it if you could go. There's a fundraiser button here in YouTube that you can click on and donate to this episode or you can go to mormonstories.org click on the donate button. Please support Sandra. Please support her work. We want to pay our participants. We want to pay our women, and. And we need your support to do that. And we need to pay Gerardo and Jen and this whole operation. So please become a monthly donor@mormonstories.org we need your support and, and we've had a great year and we would love you to join the host of people that are making all this amazing work possible. We did 17 million downloads and views in 2021, and it's because of your support and we're bigger than the Salt Lake Tribune. Now we're big, and we'll just get bigger with your support. Thanks to all our viewers and listeners. Email us@mormonstoriesmail.com with feedback. Give us a positive review on Apple Podcasts or on Spotify. People who don't even listen to the podcast, who don't like the podcast are giving us bad reviews. We need your positive reviews to fix that. Please. Especially on Apple Podcasts. You can give us a positive review at Mormon Stories Podcast Facebook page and share this. Share this episode with everyone. Friends, family, wherever it's safe. Share it. And then subscribe at TikTok Mormon Stories podcast, TikTok, Instagram, YouTube, Facebook, Twitter, wherever you can follow us. And that helps with the algorithm. Is there anything I forgot, Gerardo? No, you got it all, Jen.

Jenn Kamp [03:45:24] Sounds great.

John Dehlin [03:45:25] All right, Sandra?

Sandra Tanner [03:45:27] Yeah.

John Dehlin [03:45:28] You good?

Sandra Tanner [03:45:28] I. I think I'm going to make it home. Yeah.

John Dehlin [03:45:32] All right. Thanks again, Sandra. Thanks all the listeners and viewers. We'll see you guys all again soon on another episode of Mormon Stories Podcast. Take care, everybody.