- This topic is empty.
-
Posts
-
Some have commented that even if JS was not a prophet, he was a religious genius. What do you think he did that qualifies him as a religious genius? He got people to do what he wanted and it happened to do with religion. He produced something. His results prompt that discussion. A couple examples:
1) The Book of Mormon, whether you believe it to be true or not, is no small feat.
2) The Church is still around after all these years, and has grown world-wide to over 14 million members.
Whether you talk Shakespeare, Mozart, Bill Gates, or Joseph Smith … if what is produced can hardly be replicated, and becomes something significant, it is genius. It is based on results.
I think his genius is in how he entwined religious philosophy of the day with organizational goals. He created an organization that is self-perpetuating by the preaching of doctrine. For now, it irritates me, but it is also rather smart the way he melded the two. IF we are crediting everything he did, wrote, created, etc. strictly to him (and that’s a huge “IF”), he was a genius mostly, imo, in the sense of seeing things nobody else was able to see and presenting them in ways that others could understand and accept. I can’t call him a financial genius, since he was really, really, really bad with money. I can’t call him an organizational genius, since the basic organizational elements of the early church weren’t all that unique. I probably would call him an authorial and oratorial genius, since what he wrote and said has inspired many – especially if the Book of Mormon is included in the list. I absolutely would call him a theological genius – no doubt about it.
Again, that assumes it all came from him – and I’m not willing to make that assumption.
Because of his original ideas and new spin on old ones. I’m not so sure the whole enterprise would have come to anything if BY hadn’t taken the church west and away from everyone and everything. The restoration offshoots that stayed in the midwest inspite of preaching the same doctrines and using the same scriptures didn’t do all that well. When I look at the balance sheet I have a real hard time with JS and calling him a genius to me a a bit of a stretch. He was able to get people to follow him in spite of hardship and suffering and even give up their wives as a price for salvation for what he said was salvation. Maybe just a skill but genius, I don’t know. GBSmith wrote:I’m not so sure the whole enterprise would have come to anything if BY hadn’t taken the church west and away from everyone and everything.
BY was a different kind of genius — organizational. Building a religious and economic empire in the desert, and setting up a system to gather thousands of immigrants into the new empire. That was genius and determination in action.
Theological? Not so much. He hardly even claimed to be a prophet. He did have VERY strong opinions and views though. But he constantly claimed that everything he taught was sourced from Joseph Smith.
I agree that Joseph Smith was a religious genius. Like Ray pointed out, there are many types of intelligence. Joseph Smith had the gifts of near total inhibition when it came to religion. He melded all the great inspirations and themes in American frontier religion of his day. He boldly “invented” answers to vexing theological questions of his day that satisfied many who heard him.
(speaking of these people from a secular, historical perspective. not ruling out the possibility of divine intervention in any of this)
GBSmith wrote:I’m not so sure the whole enterprise would have come to anything if BY hadn’t taken the church west and away from everyone and everything. The restoration offshoots that stayed in the midwest inspite of preaching the same doctrines and using the same scriptures didn’t do all that well. When I look at the balance sheet I have a real hard time with JS and calling him a genius to me a a bit of a stretch. He was able to get people to follow him in spite of hardship and suffering and even give up their wives as a price for salvation for what he said was salvation. Maybe just a skill but genius, I don’t know.
Disagree… It would be far smaller, but we only have to look at the massive influx of European converts… and the fact that several other LDS churches have a membership in the hundreds of thousands combined.
SamBee wrote:GBSmith wrote:I’m not so sure the whole enterprise would have come to anything if BY hadn’t taken the church west and away from everyone and everything. The restoration offshoots that stayed in the midwest inspite of preaching the same doctrines and using the same scriptures didn’t do all that well. When I look at the balance sheet I have a real hard time with JS and calling him a genius to me a a bit of a stretch. He was able to get people to follow him in spite of hardship and suffering and even give up their wives as a price for salvation for what he said was salvation. Maybe just a skill but genius, I don’t know.
Disagree… It would be far smaller, but we only have to look at the massive influx of European converts… and the fact that several other LDS churches have a membership in the hundreds of thousands combined.
The influx from mainly England saved the early church and amounted in numbers to more than were in the US in Kirtland and Missouri at the time. Interestingly it came as a result of the preaching of BY and the members of the 12 that were sent to England. They didn’t even have copies of the BoM at the time and it was only after Young arrived that he was able to arrange for printing. JS was able to motivate some of the 12 to go but it was their preaching that did the job. Again he was a charismatic motivator but to me not a genius.
- You must be logged in to reply to this topic.