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Cnsl1 wrote:
What if God wanted his church to flourish and wanted everyone on earth to be a part of it, so authorized JS to baptise any race, but then understood and foresaw the growing racial mess, so decided his church would flourish faster if blacks were kept out of priesthood leadership positions until the race issues subsided. Then, maybe God and blacks had to wait until a later prophet figured out the church needs to have black priesthood members again in order to flourish worldwide and not stagnate and implode. Maybe it wasn’t about Blacks being ready, but the church being ready.This same sort of big picture idea to grow a church could be used to explain polygamy as well. Retention is better if you born ’em in, rather than convert ’em in. Once there is enough to roll, now we can stop that practice before it destroys us.
I don’t know… whadya think?
I believe something like this — but I take god out of the picture, and just attribute it to the intuition and wisdom of men who wanted to make something special ie the LDS church and than went and did it. I personally don’t think “god” had much to do with it.
I’ve heard variations of that line of thinking. It is a softer indictment, but still approaches the basic concept of being wrong. Perhaps they (the early members of the church) needed time to become more enlightened? Yes. But the sad part is it took a long time. We were dragging behind the movement in an embarrassing way. Although in the grand scheme of history, is 10 years late to the party as big a deal? *shrug*
The real problem a lot of people have is that, if the LDS Church was really under such direct guidance from God, then it should be expected to lead the world in justice and enlightenment, not drag behind it. So … if that was wrong, then everything else is tainted by association. (a particular way of viewing the world and religion in all-or-nothing terms).
It may very well be all-or-nothing. That is a natural expectation of a “perfect” God, with perfect love, knowledge and power. It’s a related tangent to the age-old debate of theodicy.
Brian Johnston wrote:The real problem a lot of people have is that, if the LDS Church was really under such direct guidance from God, then it should be expected to lead the world in justice and enlightenment, not drag behind it.
Yep… you nailed it. This is exactly my problem.
flowerdrops wrote:Yep… you nailed it. This is exactly my problem.
I see 3 main personal resolutions (there can be others though):
1. Stop depending on the expectation.
Change our expectation based on what we observe to be the trend, not the ideal we wish it would be. When we match our wants to our results, we are satisfied (a more Buddhist-like approach)
2. Blame it on humans not listening to God.
I think it reasonable to choose to believe that we started way ahead of the curve, being very progressive in relationship to the cultural context. The foundations were progressive towards social justice and equality. It got us in a lot of hot water, in the early days. But then later leaders caved to social pressures. This is a disappointment, but it leaves the foundation more intact as “divinely inspired.”
3. Put it on the shelf.
We can choose to see it as unknowable. We don’t know why God might have directed it that way (if He did). It’s better now, so let’s roll with that and keep moving forward to make the best of it.
I’m of the camp that denying the priesthood to blacks was simply a mistake on the part of the prophet that made the statement. And that it was an oversight on the part of the latter-prophets who might’ve reversed the doctrine. Just as its a mistake to force non-member brides and grooms to wait a year to go to the temple if they they choose to get married civilly so their non-member parents can be with them. Just as its a mistake to tie temporal wealth and your job to a temple recommend, just as its a mistake to lead the people to believe that everything a prophet says is absolute truth. Just as its a mistake to let our culture (both a strength and a curse) be so powerful that its above scrutiny or rapid change.
curt wrote:I wrote this post because it just struck me as a problem that I had never seen addressed before. Yes, I am preaching to the choir for those who think the ban was wrong, but that is not the point of my post. My point is that if the church is truly a restored church then that would have to mean that the original Christian church denied the priesthood to blacks, would it not? And if it can be shown that that was not the case, then there really is no way Joseph Smith was operating from revelation. So, yes, I think it casts serious doubts on the church’s veracity that is worthy of mention, something that I have never seen mentioned before. In fact, it seems to me a lot of things that the Church believes/practices could put up to the same judgment.
I am not looking for a debate. I could care less about that. I just wanted to post this as an idea for people to ponder. If you don’t want to go there, don’t. No worries.
I understand your point that this demonstrates a major problem with the assumption that the Church was supposedly restored and maintained according to very specific directions from God through continuing revelation to living prophets and apostles. You don’t even need to look at the New Testament for lack of any support for this racial discrimination in the original Christian church because the LDS Church has basically already admitted that this policy was wrong and discontinued it. So what we have now is already different from what we had for much of the Church’s history. Well how could it really be “the Church and kingdom of God” with a major doctrinal inconsistency like this?
However, I don’t think you can really blame the current members for whatever Joseph Smith and Brigham Young said and did so many years ago or for other leaders allowing some of these policies to continue as long as they did. I doubt that very many members are actually proud of the racial discrimination and polygamy at this point but I think many of them don’t really look at these things in detail and aren’t overly concerned about them simply because they think these issues have already been fixed and are no longer a problem because most members nowadays already don’t agree with these old doctrines.
Sure I think it would be better for the Church to tone it down with some of their claims and demands for unquestioning obedience to authority given their track record but I’m not going to resign my membership and make a big stink about it if they just keep doing things the same way they always have because I really don’t think they know any better in most cases. They have inherited this tradition and legacy and for many of them this belief system is all they have ever known so I don’t think they really understand why some members would have a harder time continuing to accept some of these things than they did.
I started this thread but then was told it was being discontinued so I never came back to it until now. I wish I had as I would have liked to have been involved in the conversation. I am actually a historian of the US so I like the way that the thread took a historical turn and believe I could have added some things there, although my fellow Americans did a fine job. Clearly, this is a topic that still interests people so i feel the decision to discontinue it was a bit hasty. I am glad the admins thought to reinstate it. At any rate, I don’t think at this point it would be worth adding anything more, as the time seems to have passed. I learned some interesting info at the Independence, MO visitor center (for the LDS church) today. The missionary tour guide explained to us that the first printing press in Independence, constructed and run by W. Phelps, which put out the Evening or Morning Star(?..Can’t remember the exact name) once a month, printed an article that was anti-slavery. The settlers became very upset with this with MO being a slave state, along with the other religious differences they didn’t agree on, and basically called a meeting and told them they had 15 mintues to decide to leave..or get ran out. Later on extermination orders were put in place. The tour ultimately concluded that the saints got kicked out of MO because they were against slavery. It sounded a little suspicious to me …. But then again maybe this is correct? I’d like to know if this information was correct or just faith promoting … If anyone cares to share their knowledge on the subject. 
This is one of my favorite topics, and I did a HUGE blog post on this topic a few years ago. It’s about 10,000 words (but still not comprehensive), and deals with many of these issues. John Dehlin interviewed Darron Smith about this period, and Darron gave some insights into this WW Phelps editorial that these tour guides spoke of. I am surprised to hear they were discussing it–were they RLDS? (j/k 
Quote:“African-Americans, blacks, have always been central to Mormonism since its earliest days, particularly when blacks [did he mean LDS here?] were expelled from Jackson County, Missouri. The whole expulsion from Jackson County, Missouri had to do with a newspaper article written by W.W. Phelps in the Times and Seasons in 1844. Phelps was so excited about all these Mormons congregating in Jackson county, Missouri, that he wrote this article entitled ‘Free People of Color’, where he talked about how the church would grow, and that the Laplander would join, and the hot pot would join, and that all these different nationalities and races and so on, would all come into Jackson County, Missouri.
That newspaper article obviously got into the wrong hands. It got into the hands of Missourians. As you know, Missourians at that time were a slaveholding state. So, the last thing the Missourians wanted to hear was the Mormons trying to incite black folks to come into a slave state, with the understanding that an insurrection might ensue. As a result of that, Mormons were expelled from Jackson County, Missouri.
Nobody knows that. A lot of people don’t even know that story. Leonard Arrington in his book about Mormons has written extensively about that. My very, very good friend and colleague, Newel Bringhurst has written about it. Armaund Mauss has written about it. Several other noted LDS scholars have written about this particular history.”
At this point of the interview, John Dehlin interjected that to be fair, there were other economic, social, and religious issues as well, but the slavery issue was a central issue during this time period. Darron agreed. “I don’t want to say that [slavery] was the only issue, but that was one of the main issues that drove the mobs to be formed in Missouri. In fact, it was so problematic that Phelps wrote an Extra [the next day], to retract what he said. The following day, he got word that Missourians had formed, and were conspiring to expel them. A secret manifesto went around which called on Missourians who were against Mormons to basically take action against Mormons for this particular article. So Phelps, responded by [issuing] this Extra, which was too late by then. A lot of people don’t understand that [slavery] is central to history of Mormonism, is the experience of blacks. “
I attended a screening of a soon to be released documentary called “Trouble in Zion” that discusses the 1838 Mormon-Missouri war. Ken Ballantyne referred to the Mormons as “abolitionists” which isn’t exactly correct, but neither were they “pro-slavery.” The early Saints were not fond of slavery. Coming from New England and New York primarily, they definitely held anti-slavery sentiments. It was a combustible mix with the Missourians, who were primarily slave-holding southerners. So the Phelps editorial ignited a tinderbox.
Joseph Smith certainly advocated freedom for slaves. Margaret Young said of Joseph,
Quote:Slavery was repugnant to him. We haven’t gone over all the things that he did. But as mayor, a man was charged with whipping his slave, and Joseph Smith came down very hard on it, [and] the whole idea of anyone being in bondage. When someone asked Joseph Smith, what if this person wants to come to Nauvoo, but he wants to bring 50 slaves with him. The answer was ‘Tell him – Free his slaves, educate them, and then come and join us in Nauvoo.’
Early missions to the South were successful, and some of the early converts were slaveholding apostles. The problem in the church came when slaveholders were baptized. Darius Gray said,
Quote:But there were seeds that had been planted by early Mormon missionaries, who had gone into the southern states, who had been teaching the gospel there, and in 1850, 12 Mormon slave owners, who possessed between 60 and 70 black slaves, came into the Deseret Territory, and one of those slave owners was the apostle Charles C Rich.
It really is a complex history, which explains the church’s often paradoxical positions on race. If you want to do a lot of reading, see
http://www.mormonheretic.org/2008/09/14/was-priesthood-ban-inspired/ My sense was that the extermination order wasn’t issued until after the mormon attacks and burning of Gallatin and several other towns. Any further information on that? I really doubt that antislavery was the root cause. Anti-slavery was the primary and most explosive politicalissue in Missouri. There were many other issues – there and elsewhere. Thank you! It seems like in Independence they take that story and run with it! It is a part of the tour .. complete with a room set up as a printing press. They also mentioned the article printed after the first to balance things out. I understand people from the North East being against slavery (as with J.S.) as I am from Boston and my DH is from AZ. Even our own families – those who are 60 and above – seem to look at things differently .. DH’s older family members from the west are racist. My family members are … well not racist. It could have been possible that not all saints agreed with WW Phelps and that the article was based off of his own ideals .. along with some others(?).The group out in MO seemed to have been on there own. (But that is really great if most of the saints were against slavery back then .. both in Ohio and MO.) Sent out there to make things work .. and once things got ugly J.S. received revelation that MO was not exactly Zion. I had to hold back rolling my eyes when the guide said “..and after the saints were being torn out of their homes etc …. the prophet recieved revelation that Independence was not going to be a place where they would be staying .. ” or something to that note. Convenient
When they were explaining it it did seem like there was some time between telling the saints leave now … and the extermination policy. I didn’t really understand it either. Why would they need it or use it if everyone was leaving basically immediately .. just to make sure they never came back? Were any saints actually killed b/c of the policy?
I just thought of something else. So if some of the more racist views came into the mainstream LDS church at a later date …. Would that mean that the smaller break offs of the mainstream church did not agree with the priesthood bans? … Or any type of segregation .. or unequal treatment in regards to race.
I couldn’t remember the timeline very well, but Kenny Ballentine goes over it in his upcoming film, “Trouble in Zion.” I don’t know when it will be released, but Kenny gives updates on his Facebook page. See http://www.facebook.com/pages/Trouble-in-Zion/244083709320?ref=ts I did a review of a pre-release version of the film and give a short timeline at
http://www.mormonheretic.org/2010/07/11/the-moral-panic-causes-trouble-in-zion/ Lookiing back at the timeline, the Phelps article was in 1833 I believe. Bishop Partridge is told to leave Jackson County immediately. He refuses and is tarred and feathered. Three days later, he signs an agreement to leave the county. Ballentine doesn’t really address the reasons why the Missourians were upset at the Mormons, though he does mention that the first Missourians wanted slavery to be legal, while the Mormons from the North were generally against slavery. WW Phelps published an article in the Evening and Morning Star that Mormons wanted to welcome people of all color. This is the reason the Missourians were upset, which is why they attacked Bishop Partridge, and destroyed the Mormon printing press. (Joseph was living in Kirtland at this time.)
(I think Darron Smith mentioned Times and Seasons as the newspaper, but I trust Ballentine a little more. Smith was speaking off the cuff from memory, while Ballentine researched this very well.)
Anyway, some Saints were expelled immediately, and there were hostilities for quite a few years. The missionaries were correct that some Mormons were forced out of Jackson County in the aftermath of the Phelps article, and the rest of the Mormons were expelled from Jackson County around Halloween when Missourians incited hostilities from Oct 31-Nov 7, 1833. (I don’t believe anyone was killed in 1833, but there were severe beatings.) Mormons and Missourians had many clashes over the years. The Mormons attacked Daviess county and Gallatin on Oct 18, 1838; the Extermination Order was Oct 27, 1838. (GBSmith has a great memory!)
Quote:Would that mean that the smaller break offs of the mainstream church did not agree with the priesthood bans? … Or any type of segregation .. or unequal treatment in regards to race.
Yes. The RLDS church was founded on the eve of the Civil War in 1860 and never had a priesthood ban. Like the LDS church, they didn’t go out of their way to proselyte blacks, but accepted them freely. They even have a black apostle, Bunda Chubwe. Here’s a photo view of their current apostles:
http://www.cofchrist.org/council-12/ I’m not clear about other Restoration groups, but I don’t believe any early groups had a race based ban. However, some fundamentalist groups such as the FLDS do have a race ban, I believe. (Don’t quote me, as I’m not sure.)Thanks. When it was explained it all seemed like it happened fast and that it included ALL saints. They never mentioned the saints fighting back – literally. One wouldn’t be too surprised to learn that they did (who wouldn’t protect themselves?) but still it just wasn’t mentioned. I knew hardly anything about the history in MO. I’m happy to have learned some of it. LaLaLove wrote:Thanks. When it was explained it all seemed like it happened fast and that it included ALL saints. They never mentioned the saints fighting back – literally. One wouldn’t be too surprised to learn that they did (who wouldn’t protect themselves?) but still it just wasn’t mentioned. I knew hardly anything about the history in MO. I’m happy to have learned some of it.
That’s interesting because the extermination order came as a result of the violence in August – December of 1838 and not the anti slavery controversy that resulted in expulsion from Jackson County in 1833.
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