Criticism of Mormonism/Books/Becoming Gods/Chapter 1

Preface

A FAIR Analysis of: Becoming Gods: A Closer Look at 21st-Century Mormonism A work by author: Richard Abanes

Chapter 2

Claim
Joseph's family survived by "money digging."

Author's source(s)

• David Persuitte, Joseph Smith and the Origins of The Book of Mormon (2nd edition), (McFarland & Company, October 2000), 35 ( Index of claims )

Response

• Joseph Smith/Money digging

Claim
Joseph was adept at "occult ritual."

Author's source(s)

• No actual reference given by the author: The note simply says "Smith was well-known as a money-digger throughout western New York and northern Pennsylvania."

Response

• Joseph Smith/Occultism and magic

Claim
Joseph's neighbors thought that he was "an imposter, hypocrite and liar."

Author's source(s)

• Eber D. Howe, Mormonism Unvailed (Painesville, OH, 1834). (Affidavits examined)

Response

• The Hurlbut affidavits
• Lightplanet Response

Claim
During the First Vision, Joseph was told that "all Christian creeds" were an abomination and that "all Christian teachers" were corrupt.

Author's source(s)

• No source provided.

Response

• This claim is also made in One Nation Under Gods: p. 377, n8(PB)
• Apostasy/Individual versus organizational  ^{[needs work]}
• First Vision/Contradiction about knowing all churches were wrong

Claim
Many Mormons believe that "their salvation, to a limited degree, rests upon Smith."

Author's source(s)

• In a note on page 332, the author says "I do not mean to say the Mormons hold Joseph Smith on an equal par with Jesus Christ. Smith holds a place just below Christ."
• Jerald and Sandra Tanner, The Case Against Mormonism, 2 vols., (Salt Lake City, 1967), vol. 1, p. 75.
• Joseph Fielding Smith, Doctrines of Salvation, p. 302

Response

• Joseph Smith/Status in LDS belief

Claim
Bruce R. McConkie said that "we must turn to Joseph Smith to gain salvation."

Author's source(s)

• Bruce R. McConkie, Millennial Messiah: The Second Coming of the Son of Man (Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 1982), 334. ISBN 0877478961. GL direct link

Response

•  Misrepresentation of source: Turn to Joseph to gain salvation?
• Joseph Smith/Status in LDS belief

Claim
Dallin Oaks said that "I have built my life on the testimony and mission of the Prophet Joseph Smith."

Author's source(s)

• Dallin Oaks, "Joseph, the Man and the Prophet," Ensign (May 1996): 71. off-site

Response

•  Misrepresentation of source: The author omits Elder Oaks' very next words:

In all of my reading and original research, I have never been dissuaded from my testimony of his prophetic calling and of the gospel and priesthood restoration the Lord initiated through him. I solemnly affirm the testimony Joseph Smith expressed in the famous Wentworth letter of 1842:

“… The standard of truth has been erected; no unhallowed hand can stop the work from progressing, persecutions may rage, mobs may combine, armies may assemble, calumny may defame, but the truth of God will go forth boldly, nobly, and independent, till it has penetrated every continent, visited every clime, swept every country, and sounded in every ear, till the purposes of God shall be accomplished and the great Jehovah shall say the work is done” (Times and Seasons, 1 March 1842, 709; quoted in Daniel H. Ludlow, ed., Encyclopedia of Mormonism, 5 vols. [1992], 4:1754).

In the name of Jesus Christ, amen.

• Joseph Smith/Status in LDS belief

Claim
Joseph Smith was "harsh and violent."

Author's source(s)

• No source provided.

Response

• Joseph Smith/Personality and temperament

Claim
James E. Faust said that Joseph Smith "was the greatest prophet who ever lived upon the earth."

Author's source(s)

• James E. Faust, "The Importance of Bearing Testimony," Liahona, Mar. 1997, p.3. off-site

Response

•  Misrepresentation of source: Note that the author removes all the surrounding text which discusses Jesus Christ (italic text is quoted by author; bold for emphasis):

As one of the special witnesses of the Lord, I desire to declare my testimony to you. I am grateful that I have always had a testimony of the gospel. I cannot remember when I did not believe. I have not always understood everything and do not claim to do so now, but through thousands and thousands of spiritual confirmations throughout my life, including my calling to the holy apostleship, I can declare my testimony to you that Jesus is the Christ. With every fiber and cell of my being, I know that He is our Savior and Redeemer. I testify that Joseph Smith was the greatest prophet who ever lived upon the earth and of great importance to the Savior in the work of God on the earth. I know this to be true.

• Joseph Smith/Status in LDS belief

Claim
Joseph Smith may have been a "pious fraud," who believed that he had been called of God while perpetrating fraud.

Author's source(s)

• Dan Vogel in Waterman, p. 50

Response

• Joseph Smith/Psychobiographical analysis of
• This is the fallacy of probability

Claim
Joseph Smith and other church leaders "often used deception to conceal their activities."

Author's source(s)

• No source provided.

Response

• Joseph Smith/Personality and temperament

Claim
Polygamy was practiced in secret and denied publicly.

Author's source(s)

• Times and Seasons, Mar 15, 1843, vol. 4, no. 9, p. 143

Response

• Joseph Smith/Polygamy
• Lying about polygamy? (non-wiki)
• Lying in Nauvoo era? (non-wiki)

Claim
Heber C. Kimball predicted that the world would someday see Joseph Smith as "a god."

Author's source(s)

• Heber C. Kimball, Journal of Discourses, 5:88.

Response

• Joseph Smith/Status in LDS belief
• Heber C. Kimball on Joseph as "a god"

Claim
Brigham Young applied 1 John 4:3 to Joseph Smith.

Author's source(s)

• Brigham Young, Journal of Discourses 8:176.

Response

• Joseph Smith/Status in LDS belief
• Brigham Young applied 1 John 4:3 to Joseph Smith

Claim
LDS claim that Joseph Smith "told but one" First Vision.

Author's source(s)

• Preston Nibley, Joseph Smith the Prophet (SLC: Deseret News, 1944), p. 30.

Response

•  The author's claim is false
• First Vision/Accounts
• Church publications have long described the multiple accounts of the First Vision:
  • Milton V. Backman, Jr., "Joseph Smith's Recitals of the First Vision," Ensign (January 1985): 8.off-site
  • Dean C. Jessee, "Early Accounts of Joseph Smith (1831–1839)," Brigham Young University Studies 9 no. 3 (1969), 275–294. PDF link
  • Dean C. Jessee, The Personal Writings of Joseph Smith, revised edition, (Salt Lake City, Utah: Deseret Book, 2002), 9–20.

Claim
The 1832 account of the First Vision states that Joseph was in his "sixteenth year," and that he "probably meant when he was 16 years old.

Author's source(s)

• Dan Vogel, Early Mormon Documents, 1:28

Response

• First Vision/Accounts/1832/Different age provided

Claim
The 1832 account does not mention two personages.

Author's source(s)

• Dan Vogel, Early Mormon Documents, 1:28

Response

• First Vision/Accounts/1832/Only one Personage appears

Claim
The 1832 account does not mention that "all the churches in Joseph's day were false."

Author's source(s)

• Dan Vogel, Early Mormon Documents, 1:28

Response

• First Vision/Accounts/1832/Doesn't forbid joining a church

Claim
Joseph claimed that he learned about the errors in Christendom through personal Bible study several years before the First Vision.

Author's source(s)

• Dan Vogel, Early Mormon Documents, 1:27

Response

• Contradiction about knowing all churches were wrong?

Claim
Orson Pratt said that the two personages "declared themselves to be angels."

Author's source(s)

• Pratt in "Biography and Journal of William I. Appleby, Elder in the Church of Latter Day Saints," 1848 reprinted in Vogel, Early Mormon Documents, vol. 1, pp. 146-147.

Response

• First Vision/Accounts/Orson Pratt confused about "angel" or Father-Son

Claim
Church historian Andrew Jenson said that "The angel again forbade Joseph to join any of these churches."

Author's source(s)

• Andrew Jenson, "Joseph Smith, The Prophet," Jan. 1888, vol. 3, nos. 1-3, p. 355.

Response

• First Vision/Accounts/Andrew Jenson called personage an "angel"

Claim
Joseph dictated the 1838 account of the First Vision to counter the leadership crisis in Kirtland.

Author's source(s)

• No source provided.

Response

• First Vision/Accounts/1838/Account modified to offset leadership crisis

Claim
The visit of Moroni was confused with the First Vision, and "was probably the real first vision."

Author's source(s)

• No source provided.

Response

• First Vision/Fabricated to give "Godly authority"

Claim
"Not a single piece" of literature published in the 1830's mentions a visit by the Father and the Son.

Author's source(s)

• No source provided.

Response

• First Vision/No reference to First Vision in 1830s publications

Claim
Joseph's mother said that the First Vision was of an angel.

Author's source(s)

• Lucy Mack Smith, letter to Solomon Mack Jr., Jan. 6, 1831, reprinted in Vogel, Early Mormon Documents, vol. 1, p. 216.

Response

• First Vision/Accounts/Prophet's mother said First Vision was of an "angel"

Claim
Joseph privately began reworking the story of seeing an angel into a vision of Christ.

Author's source(s)

• Oliver Cowdery, Messenger and Advocate, Feb. 1835, vol. 1, no. 5, pp. 77-80.

Response

• First Vision/Accounts/Oliver Cowdery not aware of First Vision in 1834-35

Claim
Without "Mormonism's so-called" Melchizedek Priesthood, no man can see God and live.

Author's source(s)

• DC 84꞉21-22

Response

• First Vision/Doctrine and Covenants 84 says God not seen without priesthood

Claim
Nobody knows "when or how" the Joseph received the Melchizedek Priesthood.

Author's source(s)

• Online reference to anti-Mormon site "lds-mormon.com"

Response

• Priesthood/Restoration/Melchizedek/Date

Claim
Joseph "had to backdate" the First Vision to 1820 in response to a leadership crisis.

Author's source(s)

• Grant H. Palmer, An Insider's View of Mormon Origins (Salt Lake City: Signature Books, 2002) 251. ( Index of claims )

Response

• First Vision/Accounts/1838/Account modified to offset leadership crisis

Claim
The First Vision originally stated that the personages were angels.

Author's source(s)

• William Smith, Vogel, Early Mormon Documents, vol. 1, p. 495.
• George A. Smith
• Lucy Smith
• Brigham Young, Journal of Discourses 2:171.
• John Taylor, Journal of Discourses vol. ?, p. 167.
• Heber C. Kimball, Journal of Discourses 6:29.

Response

• First Vision/Accounts/1835/Mentions "Angels"

Claim
There was no 1820 revival in Palmyra that converted "great multitudes" of people.

Author's source(s)

• Oliver Cowdery, Messenger and Advocate, Feb. 1835, vol. 1, no. 3, pp. 42.

Response

•  History unclear or in error
• First Vision/Religious revivals in 1820

Claim

• Joseph Smith is claimed to have joined other churches after having been told that churches were wrong.
• Joseph is claimed to have become a member of the Baptist Church after his First Vision.
• Joseph is claimed to have become an "exhorter" for the Methodists after his First Vision.

Author's source(s)

• Fayette Lapham, "Interview," pp. 305-306, reprinted in Vogel, Early Mormon Documents 1:458.
• Mitchell Bronk, "The Baptist Church at Manchester," The Chronicle: A Baptist Historical Quarterly [January 1948], vol. 11, pp. 23-24.
• Orasmus Turner, Lockport Daily Courier, May 5, 1854.
• Sophia Lewis, Susquehanna Register, May 1, 1834 reprinted in Eber D. Howe, Mormonism Unvailed (Painesville, OH, 1834), 269. (Affidavits examined)

Response

• First Vision/Joseph Smith joined other churches
• This claim is also made in One Nation Under Gods: p. 18, 487n62-63 (PB)

Claim
Newspapers reported in 1829 that Joseph Smith had a dream in 1827 about a spirit visiting him three times in one night.

Author's source(s)

• From the 'Palmyra Freeman: Golden Bible, Niagara Courier, Aug. 27, 1829, vol. 2, no. 18.
• "The Gold Bible," Rochester Advertiser and Telegraph, Aug. 31, 1829.

Response

• Moroni's visit/Joseph reported "a spirit" visiting in him in 1827

Claim
Joseph Smiths First Vision may have been a dream of a "bloody ghost dressed as a Spaniard.

Author's source(s)

• Hiel Lewis, letter to James T. Cobb, Amboy Journal, Apr. 30, 1879, reprinted in Wyl, pp. 79-80
• Fayette Lapham [May 1870], in Dan Vogel (editor), Early Mormon Documents (Salt Lake City, Signature Books, 1996–2003), 5 vols, 1:459.
•  Citation error: the reference to the dream and bloody clothes is on p. 458.

Response

• These supposed "early" accounts comes from hostile statements made forty to fifty years later!
• The 1870 account from Lapham says only that "a man" with "bloody clothes" appeared in a dream. (He also says this is what Joseph Jr. told his father, so this is hearsay.)
  • Mark Ashurst-McGee, "Moroni as Angel and as Treasure Guardian," FARMS Review 18/1 (2006): 34–100. [{{{url}}} off-site] wiki
  • Larry E. Morris, "'I Should Have an Eye Single to the Glory of God’: Joseph Smith’s Account of the Angel and the Plates (Review of: "From Captain Kidd’s Treasure Ghost to the Angel Moroni: Changing Dramatis Personae in Early Mormonism")," FARMS Review 17/1 (2005): 11–82. off-site

Claim
Joseph Smith was an "occultist."

Author's source(s)

• Lance S. Owens, "Joseph Smith: America's Hermetic Prophet," Gnosis, Spring 1995, no. 35, p. 60

Response

•  Prejudicial or loaded language
• Joseph Smith/Occultism and magic

Claim
Early Mormons believed in "witchcraft."

Author's source(s)

• John L. Brooke, The Refiner's Fire: The Making of Mormon Cosmology, 1644-1844, pp. 71-72.

Response

• Joseph Smith/Occultism and magic/Early members believed in "witchcraft"
• William J. Hamblin, "'Everything Is Everything': Was Joseph Smith Influenced by Kabbalah? Review of Joseph Smith and Kabbalah: The Occult Connection by Lance S. Owens," FARMS Review of Books 8/2 (1996): 251–325. off-site

Claim
Joseph's mother talked about "magic circles" and the "faculty of Abrac."

Author's source(s)

• Dan Vogel, Early Mormon Documents, vol. 1, p. 285.

Response

• Joseph Smith/Occultism and magic/Lucy Mack Smith on "faculty of Abrac" and "magic circles"
• William J. Hamblin, "That Old Black Magic (Review of Early Mormonism and the Magic World View, revised and enlarged edition, by D. Michael Quinn)," FARMS Review of Books 12/2 (2000): 225–394. [{{{url}}} off-site]

Claim
Joseph's family had a "magick dagger" that was owned by Hyrum Smith.

Author's source(s)

• No source given.
• The endnote describes the dagger and its alleged importance to Joseph without acknowledging the source of the information.

Response

• Joseph Smith/Occultism and magic/Mars dagger
• William J. Hamblin, "That Old Black Magic (Review of Early Mormonism and the Magic World View, revised and enlarged edition, by D. Michael Quinn)," FARMS Review of Books 12/2 (2000): 225–394. [{{{url}}} off-site]
• This claim is also made in One Nation Under Gods: p. 89

Claim
Joseph's family had "three magick parchments." One of these was owned by Hyrum Smith.

Author's source(s)

• No source given.
• The endnote mentions the ""Holiness to the Lord,"" the ""Saint Peter Bind Them,"" and the ""Jehovah, Jehovah, Jehovah"" parchments without showing how they are related to the Smith family.
• An indirect reference is made to the book Occult Sciences."

Response

• Joseph Smith/Occultism and magic/Magick parchments
• William J. Hamblin, "That Old Black Magic (Review of Early Mormonism and the Magic World View, revised and enlarged edition, by D. Michael Quinn)," FARMS Review of Books 12/2 (2000): 225–394. [{{{url}}} off-site]
• This claim is also made in One Nation Under Gods: p. 89-90, 519n53-57

Claim
Joseph had a "Jupiter talisman" with him the day he died.

Author's source(s)

• No source given.
• The endnote simply states the date of Joseph's death.

Response

•  The author's claim is false: there is no contemporary evidence that the talisman was on Joseph when he died.
• Joseph Smith/Occultism and magic/Jupiter talisman
• This claim is also made in One Nation Under Gods: p. 89

Claim
"Researchers of Mormonism" now believe that Joseph was influenced by "Jewish kabbalism."

Author's source(s)

• No source provided.

Response

• Joseph Smith/Occultism and magic/Kabbalah influence
• William J. Hamblin, "'Everything Is Everything': Was Joseph Smith Influenced by Kabbalah? Review of Joseph Smith and Kabbalah: The Occult Connection by Lance S. Owens," FARMS Review of Books 8/2 (1996): 251–325. off-site
• William J. Hamblin, Daniel C. Peterson, and George L. Mitton, "Mormon in the Fiery Furnace Or, Loftes Tryk Goes to Cambridge] (Review of The Refiner's Fire: The Making of Mormon Cosmology, 1644-1844 by John L. Brooke)," FARMS Review of Books 6/2 (1994): 3–58. off-site

Claim
Joseph considered the date April 6th to have "astrological significance."

Author's source(s)

• D. Michael Quinn, Early Mormonism and the Magic World View, revised and enlarged edition, (Salt Lake City: Signature Books, 1998), 76-79, 278-280 ( Index of claims )

Response

• The author provides no evidence for what Joseph believed about April 6.
• He fails to mention the one bit of evidence that we do have for what Joseph may have thought: DC 20꞉1 suggests that April 6 was seen as the date of Christ's birth.^[1] The author fails to cite D&C 20.

Claim
Joseph was arrested in 1826 for being a "disorderly person and an imposter."

Author's source(s)

• Dan Vogel, "Rethinking the 1826 Judicial Decision," Mormon Scripture Studies: An E-Journal of Critical Thought.

Response

• Joseph Smith/Legal trials/1826 glasslooking trial

Claim
No "statements of repentance by Smith" for money digging have ever been found.

Author's source(s)

• Sam Katich, "Joseph Smith," FAIR link

Response

•  The author's claim is false
•  Misrepresentation of source: in the quoted article, Martin Harris reported that Joseph had told him that the angel Moroni instructed him "...he must quit the company of the money-diggers. That there were wicked men among them. He must have no more to do with them."^[2]
• In Joseph's time and place, there was nothing shameful or disgraceful about money digging per se—it was the fact that some were wicked that was the problem.
• Joseph Smith/Money digging

Claim
Gordon B. Hinckley cited false documentation to support the story of an 1820 revival.

Author's source(s)

• Gordon B. Hinckley, Truth Restored, pp. 1-2.

Response

• Religious revivals in 1820/Gordon B. Hinckley cited false information
• Religious revivals in 1820

Claim
There is no evidence that Joseph Smith was "persecuted" for telling the story of his vision between 1820 and 1824.

Author's source(s)

• Dan Vogel, Early Mormon Documents, vol. 1, p. 29, 46-47.

Response

• First Vision/Accounts/1832/Doesn't mention persecution

Claim
Contradictions in the stories of Paul's vision were "long ago resolved by scholars analyzing the Greek texts. The discrepancies in Paul's account involve modern ignorance of the Greek wording used."

Author's source(s)

• W.E. Vine, Vine's Expository Dictionary of New Testament Words, p. 544.

Response

• Modern scholars disagree with the author's resolution, and the rule which he appeals to is broken by the NT text more than it is observed. Even Acts violates the author's claimed 'solution' three times!
  • Do Greek scholars solve the discrepancies in Paul's vision accounts?

Claim
Brodie's idea that the First Vision may have been "the elaboration of some half-remembered dream stimulated by the early revival excitement" is a satisfactory way to "explain things."

Author's source(s)

• Fawn M. Brodie, No Man Knows My History: The Life of Joseph Smith (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1945), 25. ( Index of claims )

Response

•  Quotes another author's opinion as if it were fact
• Joseph Smith/Psychobiographical analysis of

Claim
Brodie's idea that the First Vision may have been "created some time after 1830 when the need arose for a magnificent tradition to cancel out the stories of his fortune-telling and money-digging" "further weakens" Mormon claims.

Author's source(s)

• Fawn M. Brodie, No Man Knows My History: The Life of Joseph Smith (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1945), 25. ( Index of claims )

Response

•  Quotes another author's opinion as if it were fact
•  The author's claim is false: elements of the First Vision was being taught by LDS missionaries in 1830 (see First Vision/No reference to First Vision in 1830s publications).
• Joseph Smith/Psychobiographical analysis of

Claim
Joseph "continued practicing magick, divination, astrology, and soothsaying long after the LDS Church was founded in 1830."

Author's source(s)

• No specific reference is provided.

Response

•  History unclear or in error: The note simply mentions that seer stones continued to be used after the Church was organized in 1830—a fact that could be easily deduced from reading the Doctrine and Covenants.
• Joseph Smith/Seer stones

Claim
Brigham Young used Oliver Cowdery's divining rod to point out the location where the temple would be built in Salt Lake City.

Author's source(s)

• Anthon H. Lund Journal, under July 5, 1901.
• "The Psychological Needs of Mormon Women," Sunstone, volume 6, number 2, page 67.
• D. Michael Quinn, Early Mormonism and the Magic World View, revised and enlarged edition, (Salt Lake City: Signature Books, 1998), 206 ( Index of claims )

Response

• One Nation Under Gods/Use of sources/Divining rods to Kimball and Young

Claim
Brigham Young and Heber C. Kimball were given divining rods by Joseph Smith.

Author's source(s)

• Anthon H. Lund Journal, under July 5, 1901.
• "The Psychological Needs of Mormon Women," Sunstone, volume 6, number 2, page 67.
• D. Michael Quinn, Early Mormonism and the Magic World View, revised and enlarged edition, (Salt Lake City: Signature Books, 1998), 206 ( Index of claims )

Response

• Divining rods to Kimball and Young

Claim
Joseph received a revelation praising Oliver's gift of using his divining talents.

Author's source(s)

•  ^[ATTENTION!]

Response

• Doctrine and Covenants/Oliver Cowdery and the "rod of nature"

Claim
Joseph continued to discover and use new seer stones.

Author's source(s)

• D. Michael Quinn, Early Mormonism and the Magic World View, revised and enlarged edition, (Salt Lake City: Signature Books, 1998), 200 ( Index of claims )

Response

• Joseph Smith/Seer stones  ^{[needs work]}

Claim
Joseph "never stopped being" an occultist.

Author's source(s)

• Author's conclusion.

Response

•  Prejudicial or loaded language
• Joseph Smith/Occultism and magic

Claim
The activities of Joseph's family may have been "satanic."

Author's source(s)

• Author's conclusion.

Response

•  Absurd claim
•  Prejudicial or loaded language
• Joseph Smith/Occultism and magic

Endnotes

1. [note]  John Franklin Hall, "April 6," in Encyclopedia of Mormonism, 4 vols., edited by Daniel H. Ludlow, (New York, Macmillan Publishing, 1992), 1:61–62.
2. [note]  Katich cites Richard L. Bushman, Joseph Smith and the Beginnings of Mormonism (Urbana and Chicago, Illinois: University of Illinois Press; Reprint edition, 1987), 74. ISBN 0252060121.