By Marvin W. Cowan

            On July 12, 1843 Mormonism’s founder, Joseph Smith, recorded a revelation about plural marriage which was published in 1852 as Doctrine and Covenants Sec. 132. The introduction to it says, “It is evident from the historical records that the doctrines and principles involved in this revelation had been known by the Prophet since 1831.”  That explanation was given because Joseph Smith had secretly practiced polygamy since about 1831.  In fact, Joseph Smith married all but two or three of his 34 known wives before this revelation was even recorded!

D. & C. Sec. 132:1-4 says, “Verily, thus saith the Lord unto you my servant Joseph, that inasmuch as you have inquired of my hand to know and understand wherein I, the Lord,  justified my servants Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, as also Moses, David and Solomon, my servants, as touching the principle and doctrine of their having many wives and concubines—Behold, and lo, I am the Lord thy God, and will answer thee as touching this matter.  Therefore, prepare thy heart to receive and obey the instructions which I am about to give unto you; for all those who have this law revealed unto them must obey the same.  For behold, I reveal unto you a new and everlasting covenant; and if ye abide not that covenant, then are ye damned; for no one can reject this covenant and be permitted to enter into my glory.”

In D. & C. 132:1 “the Lord” was answering Smith’s inquiry about how Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Moses, David & Solomon were “justified” in having many wives and concubines.  So, Smith had been thinking about polygamy.  In D. & C. 132:34-39 “the Lord” told Smith that He gave them their wives, concubines and children and accounted them for righteousness and no sin was committed except in the case of David and Uriah’s wife.  But, Jacob 2:24 in the Book of Mormon, says that David and Solomon’s wives were an “abomination” to Him!  Did God give David and Solomon wives and concubines and justify them even though they were an abomination?  Or, was Smith’s “revelation” from God?  In verse 4, “the Lord” told Smith He was revealing a “new and everlasting covenant” regarding polygamy.  But, if Abraham, Isaac, Jacob and others practiced polygamy in ancient times, how could it be a new law in 1843?  Verse 3 says, “All those who have this law revealed to them must obey the same” and verse 4 says, “If ye abide not that covenant, then are ye damned.”  It also says, “No one can reject this covenant and be permitted to enter into my glory” and verse 21 says, “Except ye abide my law ye cannot attain to this glory” (of godhood).  D. & C. 132 is still LDS scripture, so all Mormons have this law revealed to them.  But LDS today denounce polygamy and deny that they practice it, so are they damned and excluded from God’s glory as verses 3, 4 & 21 say?  Or, doesn’t LDS scripture mean what it says?

Joseph Smith’s first wife, Emma, was angry when she heard about her husband’s involvement in polygamy and she refused to accept it.  In order to “encourage” her to accept it “God” said in verse 52 “And let my handmaid, Emma Smith, receive all those (wives) that have been given unto my servant Joseph”… And in verse 54 “God” said, “And I command mine handmaid, Emma Smith, to abide and cleave unto my servant Joseph, and to none else.  But if she will not abide this commandment she shall be destroyed, saith the Lord; for I am the Lord thy God, and will destroy her if she abide not in my law.”  Joseph lived the law of plural marriage, but just eleven months after this “revelation” was recorded he was shot dead at the age of 38 while he was in jail for treason.  Emma rejected Smith’s revelation and refused to accept polygamy, but she lived 35 years longer than Joseph.  After he died she married another man and lived until she was 75.  So, how was Emma “destroyed” in a worse manner than Joseph?

D. & C. 132:61-63 says, “If any man espouse a virgin, and desire to espouse another, and the first give her consent, and if he espouse the second, and they are virgins, and have vowed to no other man, then he is justified; he cannot commit adultery for they are given unto him; for he cannot commit adultery with that that belongeth unto him and to no one else.  And if he have ten virgins given unto him by this law, he cannot commit adultery, for they belong to him, and they are given unto him; therefore is he justified.  But if one or either of the ten virgins, after she is espoused, shall be with another man, she has committed adultery, and shall be destroyed…”.  Joseph Smith never received permission from his first wife, Emma, to marry his other wives, but he married them anyway.  At least eleven of the wives Joseph married were already married to other men when Joseph married them, so they were not virgins!  Therefore, Joseph broke this “law of God!”  Several of Smith’s plural wives married other men after marrying Joseph, but they were not destroyed and all of them lived longer than Smith!  Joseph married at least seven girls between the ages of 14 and 17.  Warren Jeffs, the Prophet of the FLDS (Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints), is now in prison for marrying girls that age to other men!  If that made Jeffs a criminal, was Joseph Smith a criminal for marrying 14 to 17 year old girls himself?

Mormons claim that polygamy ended in 1890 when the fourth LDS Prophet, Wilford Woodruff gave “Official Declaration-1” in the D. & C.  It says, “I now publically declare that my advice to the Latter-day Saints is to refrain from contracting any marriage forbidden by the law of the land.”  But D. & C. 132:1 says, “Verily, thus saith the Lord..” which sounds a lot more authoritative! If it was an “everlasting” covenant,as D. & C. 132:4 says, could it be cancelled by Prophet Woodruff’s words?  And if it did end, can everlasting life also end?  LDS claim their scriptures clarify things better than the Bible, so there should be no problem understanding the words “everlasting covenant.”

By Marvin W. Cowan

             On Sunday Morning at the 1981 LDS Semi-Annual Conference, President Ezra Taft Benson, the thirteenth LDS Prophet said, “The ultimate test of a true prophet is that when he speaks in the name of the Lord, his words come to pass” (Deseret News, Oct. 6, 1981, p. 6A).  That article says that “President Benson also spoke of the prophecy concerning Stephen A. Douglas who was promised by Joseph Smith that if he ever spoke out against the (LDS) Church, the wrath of God would come down against him.  That came to pass when in 1857 Douglas was aspiring to the presidency (of the USA), he spoke out against the Church, was badly defeated in the election and died a broken man one year later.”  Benson was quoting from History of the Church, (H. of the C.) vol. V, pp. 393-398 by Joseph Smith and trying to show that Smith was a true prophet.  But that quotation also shows that Smith’s prophecy about Douglas is only part of the prophecy in which Smith predicted the demise of the United States if they didn’t do as he said.

On May 18, 1843, Smith was talking to Judge Stephen A. Douglas when he said, “I prophecy in the name of the Lord God of Israel, unless the United States redress the wrongs committed upon the Saints in the state of Missouri and punish the crimes committed by her officers that in a few years the government will be utterly overthrown and wasted and there will not be so much as a potsherd left, for their wickedness in permitting the murder of men, women and children, and the wholesale plunder and extermination of thousands of her citizens to go unpunished, thereby perpetrating a foul and corroding blot upon the fair fame of this great republic, the very thought of which would have caused the high-minded and patriotic framers of the Constitution of the United States to hide their faces with shame.  Judge (Douglas), you will aspire to the presidency of the United States; and if ever you turn your hand against me or the Latter-day Saints, you will feel the weight of the hand of Almighty upon you; and you will live to see and know that I have testified the truth to you; for the conversation of this day will stick to you through life” (H. of the C., vol. V, p. 394).  In this prophecy the last five lines are about Judge Douglas and are in italics.

The first part of the above prophecy says that unless the United States redresses the wrongs committed against the LDS in Missouri, the government will be overthrown and wasted so that nothing is left of it.  Seven months later on December 16, 1843, while discussing the LDS request for redress for their losses in Missouri, Smith said, “I prophesied, by virtue of the holy Priesthood vested in me, and in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, that, if Congress will not hear our petition and grant us protection, they shall be broken up as a government, and God shall damn them, and there shall nothing be left of them—not even a grease spot” (Millennial Star, vol. 22, p. 455).  That prophecy was republished in the H. of the C., vol. VI, p. 116, but the underlined words at the end of it were left out.  Both of these prophecies warned of the demise of the United States Government if it didn’t do as Smith requested.  But, all Mormons who lost their property in Missouri and who requested special protection from the US Government died over a hundred years ago without receiving redress or protection, yet the US Government was not overthrown or broken up, so this was a false prophecy!

The first prophecy in this article contained Smith’s prophecy about the demise of the US Government and the one about Stephen A. Douglas.  Smith told Douglas that he would live to see these prophecies fulfilled, but Douglas died over 150 years ago without seeing Smith’s prophecies fulfilled!  Yet the footnotes in the H. of the C., vol. V, pp. 395-396, say that “The prediction concerning Stephen A. Douglas in this chapter is one of the most remarkable prophecies either in ancient or modern times.  It was impossible for any merely human sagacity to foresee the events predicted.  Stephen A. Douglas was a bright, but comparatively an unknown man, nationally, at the time of the interview, May 1843, and but thirty years of age.  It is a matter of history that Stephen A. Douglas did, however, aspire to the presidency of the United States, and was nominated for that office by the Democratic convention held in Charleston, South Carolina, on the 23^rd of June 1860…Twenty days less than one year after his nomination by the Charleston convention, while yet in the prime of manhood–forty-eight years of age,–Mr. Douglas died at his home in Chicago, a disappointed, not to say heart-broken man.”

The Encyclopedia Americana presents a very different story of Douglas.  It says, “His rise as a power in the Democratic Party was phenomenal…by 1840 he was chairman of the Democratic state committee and secretary of state (in Illinois).  A year later, at the age of 28, he became judge of the Illinois Supreme Court.  In 1842 he was elected to Congress and served from March 4, 1843 until he resigned to become senator in 1847.  He held this position until his death…Douglas bolted the (Democratic) party and ran on an independent ticket (for President) in 1860.  This action split the Democratic vote, assuring the election of the Republican candidate, Abraham Lincoln.  With the threatened outbreak of war, Douglas loyally supported the new administration and devoted his talent and influence to preservation of the Union.  He died of typhoid fever shortly after the war began.”  Douglas did speak against polygamy and other LDS practices that were not a part of American values, but did he feel the weight of the hand of the Almighty upon him for doing so, as Smith said?  He died when he was 48 years old, not because he lost the election in 1860, but because of typhoid fever.  Some LDS say that was “the weight of the hand of the Almighty” on Douglas.  But Joseph Smith, died at the age of 38 in a gun battle while in jail for treason!  Was that also “the weight of the hand of the Almighty?” At the beginning of this article we quoted Ezra Taft Benson, the thirteenth LDS Prophet, who said, “The ultimate test of a true prophet is that when he speaks in the name of the Lord, his words come to pass.”  So, was Smith a true prophet?  Can such a “prophet” lead people to eternal life in God’s presence when this life ends?

By Marvin W. Cowan

            Mormon Apostle Bruce R. McConkie wrote, “Our Lord’s true Church is established and founded upon revelation.  Its identity as the true Church continues as long as revelation is received to direct its affairs…No one but the President of the Church, who holds and exercises the fullness of the keys, can announce revelation to the Church” (Mormon Doctrine, p. 648).  He also said, “Any message, whether written or spoken, that comes from God to man by the power of the Holy Ghost is scripture.  If it is written and accepted by the Church, it becomes part of the scriptures or standard works” (p. 682).  Early Mormon leaders often criticized other churches for not having current revelation and new scripture.  LDS Apostle Orson Pratt said, “That the Romanists (Catholics) have continued in their apostasy until the present day is demonstrated from the fact that they have not added one single book to their canon (scripture) since they first formed it” (Divine Authenticity of the Book of Mormon, No. 3, p. 38, Dec. 1, 1850).  On page 16, the editor of the weekly LDS “Church News” wrote on Sept. 3, 1966, “One of the signs of the true Church of Jesus Christ is the presence of living prophets who direct its work under the guidance of heaven… Revelation therefore, is an essential part of the true Church, constant, current revelation …With prophets and new revelations for the current guidance of the people also comes new scripture; for as the divinely-given revelations are recorded they are added to the existing volume of holy writ and in this way the body of scripture grows…The powers thus given to Joseph Smith have been bestowed upon each of his successors, even to the present day.  Each then has been the prophet of the Lord in very deed, in the same sense as Moses, Elijah, Abraham, Isaiah and Ezekiel.”

The LDS “standard works” are their four books of scripture: The Bible (as far as it is translated correctly), Book of Mormon, Doctrine & Covenants and Pearl of Great Price.  The Bible, Book of Mormon and “the Book of Abraham” in the Pearl of Great Price are “translations” of earlier records so they are not “current revelation.”  Joseph Smith claimed he received two small books by revelation in the Pearl of Great Price entitled “Moses” and “Joseph Smith—Matthew”.  They are also part of his “inspired  translation” of the Bible and are just revisions of Biblical accounts so they aren’t current revelation either.  The Doctrine & Covenants contains all other “revelation” from God in LDS scripture.  In it are 138 Sections or revelations.  All Sections through Sec. 133 as well as Sec. 137 are by Joseph Smith who died in 1844.  Sec. 134 is a statement about governments and laws that the LDS Church adopted on Aug. 17, 1835.  Sec. 135 was written by John Taylor about Smith’s death.  Taylor was with Smith when he was killed and later became the third LDS President.  In Sec. 136 Brigham Young told the LDS in January 1847 how to organize and live when they began their move to Utah.  Sec. 137 says it was revealed to Joseph Smith on Jan. 21, 1836, but it was not accepted as scripture until 1976, over 140 years later!  Is that “current” revelation?  Sec. 138 says it was revealed to Joseph F. Smith, the sixth LDS prophet on Oct. 3, 1918, but it didn’t become a part of LDS scripture until 1976 which was 58 years later!  And that is the most recent revelation added to LDS scripture!

There are two “Official Declarations” at the end of the Doctrine & Covenants that are statements by LDS Presidents but are not revelations themselves.  President Wilford Woodruff gave Official Declaration-1 in 1890 which told the LDS to obey the law of the land and stop practicing polygamy even though they were commanded to practice it by a revelation recorded on July 12, 1843.  That “revelation” is still in Doctrine & Covenants Sec. 132 and is the reason “Mormon fundamentalists” practice polygamy today.  Official Declaration-2, made by LDS President Spencer Kimball in 1978, allowed the LDS Church to ordain black men to the LDS priesthood, which they had not done until then.  This Official Declaration just says that Kimball had a revelation about this matter, but the revelation itself was never published.

Notice that the last revelation added to LDS scripture was given in 1918, which was nearly 100 years ago!  And the next most recent “revelation” in LDS scripture was Brigham Young’s instructions for the LDS move to Utah on January 14, 1847 which was 165 years ago!  Can that be “constant, current revelation?”  The LDS claims to have had 15 Prophets after Joseph Smith, yet only three have one section each in the D. & C. and two others each have one Official Declaration.  Joseph Smith, who died in 1844, wrote all the rest of the D. & C.  So, have the LDS added “continuous revelation to their “standard works?”  How much has the LDS “body of scripture” grown since Joseph Smith’s time?  While Mormonism says that the Prophet’s words can be scripture without being written, the LDS leaders quoted in this article certainly indicated that at least some of those words will be added to their volume of scripture so that it “grows.”  But, what “revelation” can be added to “scripture” that will improve the Biblical message of salvation through Jesus Christ alone?  Heb. 7:25 declares that God is able to save them to the uttermost who come to God by Him (Christ).  And Col. 2:10 declares we are “complete in Him.”

By Marvin W. Cowan

            Mormonism’s founding prophet, Joseph Smith said, “When a man goes about prophesying, and commands men to obey his teachings, he must either be a true or false prophet” (Teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith, p. 365). The Doctrine and Covenants (D. & C.) is LDS scripture and contains “revelations,” commandments etc. that Joseph Smith claims he received from God.  D. & C. 1:37 says, “Search these commandments (in the D. & C.) for they are true and faithful and the prophecies and promises which are in them shall all be fulfilled.”  D. & C. 3:1-3 further says, “The works and the designs, and the purposes of God cannot be frustrated, neither can they come to naught… it is not the work of God that is frustrated, but the work of men.”  On April 6, 1830 Joseph Smith founded the Mormon Church and claimed that God said his followers should “give heed unto all his (Joseph’s) words and commandments…for his word ye shall receive as if from mine own mouth, in all patience and faith” (D. & C. 21:4-5). Smith’s words and commandments with prophecies and promises are still in the D. & C. which also says the work of God can’t be frustrated or stopped.  Therefore, Smith’s prophecies in the D. & C. must all be fulfilled or he was a false prophet.

The gathering of the LDS to Independence, MO was a prophecy and a doctrine in early Mormonism.  Even after Smith’s death and the LDS move to Utah, LDS Apostle Orson Pratt said “Joseph Smith…professes to have received, through revelation and commandment from God, a dispensation for the gathering of the Saints from all nations.  Now the doctrine of the gathering of the Saints in the last days must either be false or true; if false, then J. Smith must be an imposter.  It matters not how correct he may have been in all other points of his system, if this one point—the doctrine of the gathering be false, he must be a deceiver.  Why?  Because he professes to have received this doctrine by direct revelation and commandment” (“Divine Authority,” in A Series of Pamphlets, pub. by Orson Pratt in 1851).  There are many prophecies in the D. & C. and elsewhere about the gathering, but our limited space here will allow a summary of just a few.  See our references for more of Smith’s revelations.  Below are someof Smith’sprophecies in the D. & C. about the “gathering” in chronological order and how they were fulfilled.

1. Joseph Smith said the Lord revealed D. & C. 29:1-11 to him just before September 26, 1830.  It says, “Ye are called to bring to pass the gathering of mine elect” to one place to prepare them for His coming “from heaven with power and great glory” and His reign “in righteousness with men on earth a thousand years.”  It also says “The hour is nigh and the day soon at hand” when the wicked will be burned up so “that wickedness shall not be upon the earth.”

Result: Smith had the LDS start gathering in MO in 1831, but they had to move often because of conflicts with their neighbors and all LDS left MO by 1838.  LDS are now told “to remain in their homelands rather than immigrate to the United States” (Ensign, March 2000, p. 79).  Christ hasn’t returned and set up His kingdom and wickedness is still on earth even though Smith received this revelation in 1830.

2. Smith said he received D. & C. 45:62-71 on March 7, 1831.  It says to “gather up your riches that ye may purchase an inheritance which shall hereafter be appointed unto you.  And it shall be called the New Jerusalem, a land of peace, a city of refuge, a place of safety for the saints of the Most High God… and the wicked shall not come unto it, and it shall be called Zion…The righteous shall be gathered out from among all nations, and shall come to Zion.”  In D. & C. 57:1-5 Smith said the Lord consecrated Independence, Missouri as the place for the gathering and as an everlasting inheritance.  And D. & C. 133:4-7 commands “Gather ye together, O ye people of my (LDS) church, upon the land of Zion… the time has come when the voice of the Lord is unto you…gather ye out from among the nations.”

Result: LDS in 1831 were told to buy land around Independence, MO, and gather there.  But they were driven out, so it was not a place of peace, safety and refuge for them.  LDS from all nations never occupied “Zion” nor is it an everlasting inheritance for LDS today.     

3. Smith said he received D. & C. 84:1-5 on September 22-23, 1832 in which the Lord said that Zion or New Jerusalem “shall be built, beginning at the temple lot…in the western boundaries of the State of Missouri…by the gathering of the saints beginning at this place, even the place of the temple, which temple shall be reared in this generation.  For verily this generation shall not all pass away until an house shall be built unto the Lord.”  D. & C. 97:19-20 also says “Zion (in Independence, MO) is the city of our God and surely Zion cannot fall, neither be moved out of her place, for God is there, and the hand of the Lord is there and he hath sworn by the power of his might to be her salvation and her high tower.”

Result: The second LDS Prophet, Brigham Young said that a generation only lasts from 27 to 29 years (Journal of Discourses vol. 12, p.118).  The generation alive in 1832 all died long ago, yet nothing in D. & C. 84:1-5 was fulfilled.  Conflicts with the people in Independence, MO, led LDS leaders to enter a treaty to leave two weeks before D. & C. 97: 19-20 was given by Smith (History of the Church vol. I, p. 394).  He didn’t know that because he was in Kirtland, OH when he gave that prophecy, but the Lord surely should have known it!  Since these prophecies weren’t fulfilled like D. & C. 1:37 said they would be, they didn’t come from God and Smith was a false prophet.

We will continue our discussion of LDS Prophets and Prophecies next time.  More is available on this subject in my book Mormon Claims Answered.

By Marvin W. Cowan

The Profile of a Prophet is the title of an article by Hugh B. Brown in the LDS magazine Ensign for June 2006 (pp. 34-39).  Brown was an LDS Apostle and a member of the First Presidency with the ninth LDS President and Prophet, David O. McKay.  The article is a summary of a discussion Brown had with an English friend about Joseph Smith being a true prophet.  In it he listed some characteristics that he said should distinguish a man who claims to be a prophet.  One of the characteristics he mentioned was that a prophet “would predict future events in the name of the Lord, and they would come to pass as did Isaiah and Ezekiel” (p. 37).  While that is what the Bible teaches, Brown didn’t give any examples of such prophecies by Joseph Smith or any other Mormon prophet.  Instead of giving examples of Joseph Smith’s fulfilled prophecies, Brown later said, “Only by the whisperings of the Holy Spirit can one come to know the things of God.  By those whisperings I say I know that Joseph Smith is a prophet of God.  I thank God for that knowledge”(p.39).  So, it was not because of fulfilled prophecies that Brown knew that Joseph Smith was a prophet.  It was because of an experience he called “the whisperings of the Holy Spirit.”  Many Mormons claim to know something is true by “the whisperings of the Holy Spirit” but they differ on what that means.  Some say it is a feeling or “a burning bosom” while others say they heard a voice speak to them.  The Bible doesn’t say such things prove a man is a true prophet.  The Biblical proof of a true prophet is that all of his prophecies come true (Deuteronomy 13:1-5 and 18:20-22).  It also warns that if a man prophecies in the name of any god other than the God of Israel, he is still a false prophet even if his prophecy comes to pass.

In his article, Hugh B. Brown also said that Joseph Smith “predicted many things which have come to pass, things which only God could bring to pass” (p. 38).  Again he gave no example of such prophecy.  When Mormons are asked for examples of Joseph Smith’s true prophecies, most of them mention Smith’s “Civil War prophecy” which is now LDS scripture in Doctrine & Covenants 87.  But everything that is true in Smith’s “prophecy” was published in secular newspapers before his revelation.  Smith’s Civil War prophecy is dated December 25, 1832, and the first three verses declare: “Verily, thus saith the Lord concerning the wars that will shortly come to pass, beginning at the rebellion of South Carolina, which will eventually terminate in the death and misery of many souls; and the time will come that war will be poured out upon all nations beginning at this place.  For behold, the Southern States shall be divided against the Northern States, and the Southern States will call on other nations, even the nation Great Britain, as it is called, and they shall also call upon other nations, in order to defend themselves against other nations; and then war shall be poured out upon all nations.”

Mormons point out that the Civil War did begin in South Carolina and ended with the death and misery of many.  But four days before Smith’s revelation, the Painsville, OH newspaper near Smith’s home predicted that war would begin in South Carolina between the Northern and Southern states.  That was also predicted in many newspapers even earlier because on July 14, 1832, Congress had passed a tariff act which South Carolina considered so bad that they declared it null and void on November 24, 1832.  President Andrew Jackson responded by sending Gen. Scott with armed troops and a warship to Charleston, SC on December 10, 1832, and many expected war to begin in So. Carolina two weeks before Smith received his revelation!  However, things temporarily settled down and the Civil War didn’t begin in South Carolina until about 28 years later.  But it began because the same old issues had never been resolved.  So, when Smith prophesied war would begin in South Carolina between the Northern and Southern states, it was information that had already been in the newspapers.  But Smith also predicted that the Southern states would call on Great Britain for help and that Great Britain would call on other nations to help and then war would be poured out upon all nations.  The South did call on Great Britain for help, but Britain refused to help and did not call on any other nation to help and war was not poured out upon all nations as Smith had predicted.  So, there is false prophecy even in the first three verses of Smith’s Civil War prophecy.

But nothing in the remaining verses of Smith’s Civil War prophecy happened.  He said that slaves would rise up against their masters in the war (v. 4).  But there was no great uprising of slaves against their masters nor were slaves major participants in the war.  Slaves were freed by Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation.  The main participants in the war were Northern white people fighting Southern white people.  Smith’s prophecy also said the “remnants of the land” would “vex the Gentiles with sore vexation” in the war (v. 5).  LDS authorities identify the “remnants of the land” as American Indians.  Did the Indians vex the white “Gentiles” with a great vexation or have any major part in the Civil War?  Did the sword, bloodshed, famine, plague, earthquake, thunder and lightening etc. “make a full end of all nations” as Smith said in v. 6?   It is too late for these things to be fulfilled now, so it is false prophecy.  Yet, it is this prophecy that Mormons almost always use as evidence that Smith was a true prophet of God!

Our next article will continue our discussion of prophets in Mormonism.  More can be read on this subject in my book Mormon Claims Answered.

By Marvin W. Cowan

The President of the LDS Church is also the Presiding High Priest of the LDS Priesthood as their scripture says in Doctrine & Covenants 107:65-66.  No one on earth has more authority in Mormonism than the President of the Church.  He is a Prophet, Seer, Revelator, Translator and Trustee-in-Trust of the LDS Church.  LDS Apostle Bruce R. McConkie said, “He is the one man on earth at a time who can both hold and exercise the keys of the kingdom in their fullness” (Mormon Doctrine, p. 592, see D. & C. 132:7).  Since Mormons believe the President of the LDS Church is a “prophet” to whom God reveals the future and His will for mankind, they believe they have information that no one else on earth has.  LDS claim that Amos 3:7 in the Bible supports that belief.  It says, “Surely the Lord God will do nothing, but He revealeth His secret unto His servants, the prophets.”  But, the context of that verse shows that God told Israel that He would not punish them without warning them first.  God did not promise to reveal everything He was going to do to prophets before He acted and history shows He has never done that.

Mormon history also shows that their Prophets usually either didn’t know what God was going to do, or if they knew, they ignored it and didn’t tell anyone, so it was of no value.  For example, in 2006 Mormons celebrated the 150th anniversary of the 1856 LDS handcart trek from Iowa City, Iowa to Salt Lake City.  But was it the great success their celebrations seemed to indicate?  In 1856 the last two handcart companies to leave Iowa City were led by James G. Willie and Edward Martin respectively.  Willie’s left on July 15 and Martin’s on July 28 because their handcarts and tents weren’t ready until then.  Mormon Prophet Brigham Young said, “The (hand) carts can be made without a particle of iron” (Handcarts to Zion, pp. 29-30).  Mormon Apostle Franklin D. Richards who oversaw the handcart project said, “The (handcart) plan is the device of inspiration, and the Lord will own and bless it” (ibid. p.32).  But the handcarts were poorly constructed and without iron in the axels the wood wore out so fast the pioneers had to stop often for repairs.  Those delays caused “the greatest single tragedy in the history of the nation’s move west in the nineteenth century” (Forgotten Kingdom, by David L. Bigler, p. 118).  Willie’s and Martin’s companies arrived in the high elevations of Wyoming so late in the year that they were caught in terrible snowstorms and freezing weather.  Many of the pioneers froze or starved to death while others died of exhaustion.  B. H. Roberts, a respected Mormon historian said, “One of the chief contributing causes to the handcart disaster was the frailness of these carts, and the unfitness of the material put into them.  They were hurriedly made of unseasoned timber, and so much was sacrificed to lightness that the necessary strength and durability was impossible…the wheels were devoid of iron except in some of them there was a very light iron tire.  The whole weight of a cart was about sixty pounds (A Comprehensive History of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, pp. 95-96).  Roberts went on to say, “The exact number of those who perished in this (Martin’s) company is not of record in our official annals…the estimate of Chislett and Jacques—putting their estimate at 145—is perhaps not far from the facts.  And these added to Willie’s seventy-seven deaths, brings the total of deaths to 222.  The number who were frost-bitten was also large, and some were crippled for life” (ibid. pp. 101-102).

The very day that the Mormon Church was organized their scripture commanded them to keep records (D. & C. 21:1).  Mormons probably have more records than almost any other organization.  So, why doesn’t the LDS Church have records of those who died or even how many died in the Willie and Martin handcart companies of 1856?  Some think that LDS leaders kept that information from being made public because they didn’t want potential converts to know how bad the tragedy was or they might conclude that Mormonism was not led by a true Prophet of God.  What urgent need resulted in the handcarts being built so quickly out of unfit material that they often broke down?  Why did those handcart companies in 1856 want to get to Salt Lake that year?  It was not persecution as the June 2006 issue of the LDS Ensign magazine says on p. 78: “This influx of Mormon settlers (to Iowa City), who had faced persecution elsewhere, found a safe harbor in Iowa City where, Mr. Horton says, members of other denominations often helped the Saints build handcarts and prepare for their journey.”   If it wasn’t persecution that caused those handcart companies to risk traveling so late in the year, what was it?  It was the prophetic warning by LDS leaders that the Lord was coming soon to judge the nations and the only safe haven was in Zion (Utah).  That message combined with Joseph Smith’s “revelation” concerning gathering the LDS to one place (see D. & C. 29) motivated Mormons to try to get to Utah as fast as possible.  One thing is obvious; having a Prophet as the head of the Mormon Church in 1856 didn’t help those LDS pioneers who lost their lives trying to obey him.