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Joseph’s polyandry was one of the few things that official church sources had never acknowledged. Not any more.
From LDS.org:
http://www.lds.org/search?lang=eng&query=%22polyandrous+marriages+took+place%22 Search results link to the following article on josephsmithpapers.org (an official church website):
Quote:
Several later documents suggest that several women who were already married to other men were, like Marinda Hyde, married or sealed to Joseph Smith. Available evidence indicates that some of these apparent polygynous/polyandrous marriages took place during the years covered by this journal. At least three of the women reportedly involved in these marriages—Patty Bartlett Sessions, Ruth Vose Sayers, and Sylvia Porter Lyon—are mentioned in the journal, though in contexts very much removed from plural marriage.58 Even fewer sources are extant for these complex relationships than are available for Smith’s marriages to unmarried women, and Smith’s revelations are silent on them. Having surveyed the available sources, historian Richard L. Bushman concludes that these polyandrous marriages—and perhaps other plural marriages of Joseph Smith—were primarily a means of binding other families to his for the spiritual benefit and mutual salvation of all involved.
I don’t agree with the practice, I personally consider it an error. But at least it’s now one that I can legitimately raise from a church source if relevant.
It’s hard to overstate how excited I am by the Joseph Smith Papers project, and this is one example of why I feel that way. mackay11 wrote:Quote:
Several later documents suggest that several women who were already married to other men were, like Marinda Hyde, married or sealed to Joseph Smith. Available evidence indicates that some of these apparent polygynous/polyandrous marriages took place during the years covered by this journal. At least three of the women reportedly involved in these marriages—Patty Bartlett Sessions, Ruth Vose Sayers, and Sylvia Porter Lyon—are mentioned in the journal, though in contexts very much removed from plural marriage.58 Even fewer sources are extant for these complex relationships than are available for Smith’s marriages to unmarried women, and Smith’s revelations are silent on them. Having surveyed the available sources, historian Richard L. Bushman concludes that these polyandrous marriages—and perhaps other plural marriages of Joseph Smith—were primarily a means of binding other families to his for the spiritual benefit and mutual salvation of all involved.
Documents suggest. . . .women were married or sealed to Joseph. . . .apparent marriages. . . .women reportedly involved. . ..complex relationships. . . .Smith silent. I really dislike all the passivity and attention-shifting. This style blurb is maddening to me. It’s like Joseph woke up on certain days and, whoa, found himself attached to yet another woman. Who did that?
I’m over Joseph having done it. Or, rather, I have the fallout from it more or less contained. I am not over the church trying to engineer my opinion of it. Put the information out there and let people think what they think. The church had a chance to shape my thoughts on polygamy, and they blew it.
Sorry. Feeling angry right now.
But, yes, this is better than complete denial or silence, but not by that much in my opinion.
Ann wrote:mackay11 wrote:Quote:
Several later documents suggest that several women who were already married to other men were, like Marinda Hyde, married or sealed to Joseph Smith. Available evidence indicates that some of these apparent polygynous/polyandrous marriages took place during the years covered by this journal. At least three of the women reportedly involved in these marriages—Patty Bartlett Sessions, Ruth Vose Sayers, and Sylvia Porter Lyon—are mentioned in the journal, though in contexts very much removed from plural marriage.58 Even fewer sources are extant for these complex relationships than are available for Smith’s marriages to unmarried women, and Smith’s revelations are silent on them. Having surveyed the available sources, historian Richard L. Bushman concludes that these polyandrous marriages—and perhaps other plural marriages of Joseph Smith—were primarily a means of binding other families to his for the spiritual benefit and mutual salvation of all involved.
Documents suggest. . . .women were married or sealed to Joseph. . . .apparent marriages. . . .women reportedly involved. . ..complex relationships. . . .Smith silent. I really dislike all the passivity and attention-shifting. This style blurb is maddening to me. It’s like Joseph woke up on certain days and, whoa, found himself attached to yet another woman. Who did that?
I’m over Joseph having done it. Or, rather, I have the fallout from it more or less contained. I am not over the church trying to engineer my opinion of it…
I was going to say this, but I feel like I’m on a tight leash right now as far as stsyLDS is concerned. Glad you brought it up. Thanks.
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Ann, I actually like the wording, since the project is trying to tackle everything based solely on the documentary evidence with as few preconceived notions and conclusions as possible. It’s a document project primarily and not a traditional attempt to tell a comprehensive history. Thus, the need for careful disclaimers to say only what can be said from the documents themselves. “Here are the actual documents and what they say and/or suggest,” is exactly what I want.
cwald, the yard fence is still in place, but I undid the leash. You just can’t dig under the fence. 
Old-Timer wrote:cwald, the yard fence is still in place, but I undid the leash. You just can’t dig under the fence.
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Ann wrote:mackay11 wrote:Quote:
Several later documents suggest that several women who were already married to other men were, like Marinda Hyde, married or sealed to Joseph Smith. Available evidence indicates that some of these apparent polygynous/polyandrous marriages took place during the years covered by this journal. At least three of the women reportedly involved in these marriages—Patty Bartlett Sessions, Ruth Vose Sayers, and Sylvia Porter Lyon—are mentioned in the journal, though in contexts very much removed from plural marriage.58 Even fewer sources are extant for these complex relationships than are available for Smith’s marriages to unmarried women, and Smith’s revelations are silent on them. Having surveyed the available sources, historian Richard L. Bushman concludes that these polyandrous marriages—and perhaps other plural marriages of Joseph Smith—were primarily a means of binding other families to his for the spiritual benefit and mutual salvation of all involved.
Documents suggest. . . .women were married or sealed to Joseph. . . .apparent marriages. . . .women reportedly involved. . ..complex relationships. . . .Smith silent. I really dislike all the passivity and attention-shifting. This style blurb is maddening to me. It’s like Joseph woke up on certain days and, whoa, found himself attached to yet another woman. Who did that?
I’m over Joseph having done it. Or, rather, I have the fallout from it more or less contained. I am not over the church trying to engineer my opinion of it. Put the information out there and let people think what they think. The church had a chance to shape my thoughts on polygamy, and they blew it.
Sorry. Feeling angry right now.
But, yes, this is better than complete denial or silence, but not by that much in my opinion.
When I showed this to my wife she said something similar to you. Along with: “so anything written by a critic at the time is unreliable but they completely trust the journal written by and for Joseph?”
I agree that this is still limited and I agree that this is still spun in Joseph’s favour. But the fact that an official church website has even acknowledged it happened is, for me, progress. I don’t pay much attention to what the church would like me to think any more. I have a couple of dozen quotes, also from church sources, that teach me to think for myself.
In order for the skeletons to start coming out of the closet they need to at least start to acknowledge what has been hiding in that closet.
My question, is, was their physical consummation of these marriages? [Or is it just plain naive to ask this question at all]. This is not addressed in the church statement, and if this happened, and these women were married, it does not bode well for the reputation of a prophet….And I’m not sure how this is for the spiritual benefit of these people if they already had legal families.
No doubt people will rationalize this somehow because it happened so long ago.
On the other hand, I’m glad we are seeing less whitewashing of history than in the past.
SilentDawning wrote:My question, is, was their physical consummation of these marriages? [Or is it just plain naive to ask this question at all].
The best answer is nobody knows except JS and these women for EVERY case. I think it is clear that in some cases there was physical consummation however which appears pretty bad.
SilentDawning wrote:This is not addressed in the church statement, and if this happened, and these women were married, it does not bode well for the reputation of a prophet….And I’m not sure how this is for the spiritual benefit of these people if they already had legal families.
No doubt. But I don’t believe or disbelieve in Mormonism because of the behavior and weaknesses of JS. Let’s suppose the JS had one or more experiences with God, but couldn’t deal with the responsibilities he felt for having that experience, embellished it, and started doing things he felt was best because he felt special as a result of having had that experience. Does that change the fact he had such an experience? In my view, no. To tie yourself to the idea that as a result of his experiences, JS was anything other than a human-being and quite capable of making mistakes and sinning, is extremely foolish in my view.
SilentDawning wrote:No doubt people will rationalize this somehow because it happened so long ago.
There is no reason to rationalize it. If it happened, it is deplorable. However, all it shows is JS was human and sinned. If people had the belief that JS was perfect and incapable of sin, they will need to adjust their view.
SilentDawning wrote:My question, is, was their physical consummation of these marriages? [Or is it just plain naive to ask this question at all].
Many will say it is naive, but I don’t think so. Part of our problem with the treatment of this kind of issue is that we look through black and white lenses. If they were still married, they couldn’t marry anyone else. If JS married a woman, he had sex with her. We allow for no gray.Some thoughts, below, but before I state this, let me reiterate that I think plural marriage in any form is terrible, evil, sexist, un-christlike, and embarrassing. It has been the cause of great suffering, both for those involved and for the Church as a whole. I wish it had never existed. My hope is that someday it will be acknowledged as a mistake and removed from our doctrine and that the Church will stop rationalizing it. Now on to points to consider in regard to your question:
– I don’t know about the specific women involved. Evidence is pretty clear that he had sex with some wives, but there’s evidence, too, that he wasn’t as prolific about it as we might suppose. BY had 48 children with polygamous wives, we don’ t have evidence of any for JS. This was such an elephant in the room for both mormon and anti-mormon camps that they both had to address it. In Utah, some women claimed that they had a child from JS, but those claims turned out to be invalid, based on later DNA evidence. On the anti-mormon side, allegations were made beginning in 1886 that John C. Bennett, a part-time physician, had performed abortions to cover polygamy. The problem is that while Nauvoo
soundslike it could be French, it’s unlikely that Bennett, working with American Frontier technology could have duplicated the abortion science that was just beginning to develop in Paris. – The terminology that was used in those days points to the “spiritual” nature of these marriage as holding preeminence. In other words, sealing is not necessarily “marriage in this life” as we think of it today. For example, after the publishing of the Nauvoo Expositor, JS met with the City Council to persuade them to declare it a public nuisance, so that the Mayor (JS) would have the right to destroy it. JS, in his forceful comments to the CC, said, according to the meeting minutes, “They make it a criminality for a man to have a wife on the earth while he has one in heaven”.
– In those days, there were many people that married again while they were still “legally” married to another person, but permanently separated. I have an ancestor, for example, who was married to a man in Nauvoo, but he did not stay in the Church and she left him. I don’t believe they were officially divorced, yet she married another man in Utah. That man had never been married before. So, this is by definition a polyandrous marriage… but I’m certain that they didn’t think of it in that way, or give it a second thought. BY’s first polygamous wife, Lucy Ann Decker, had been married to another man who left her. If you look around the internet, you’ll find that she was not divorced. I don’t know that the internet is a great source, but let’s assume. Again, polyandry if viewed from our perspective, but probably not to them. My point is not that every case is excusable, because JS did marry women who were clearly married by any definition at the time, but we have to resist the urge to put each case into the same bucket.
Quote:But I don’t believe or disbelieve in Mormonism because of the behavior and weaknesses of JS. Let’s suppose the JS had one or more experiences with God, but couldn’t deal with the responsibilities he felt for having that experience, embellished it, and started doing things he felt was best because he felt special as a result of having had that experience.[/quote[
Quote:There is no reason to rationalize it. If it happened, it is deplorable. However, all it shows is JS was human and sinned. If people had the belief that JS was perfect and incapable of sin, they will need to adjust their view.
I have to be a bit frank here. These kinds of statements disturb me….we DO make huge claims about prophets, about the need to live our lives clean, Moses shut out of the promised land because he didn’t follow basic instructions. That prophets will “never lead us astray”. To have a prophet that had sexual urges he could not control, and then led his people to practice a sanitized form of sexual promiscuity as a form of “covering his sines” is definitely leading the people astray.
At some BASIC level, prophets and leaders and the church should be accountable for providing at least a basic level of commitment to the gospel ideas – such as chastity. Otherwise, the church and JS wielded power without accountability. And its that power without accountability that I have a tremendous amount of concern about.
I think your comment that there is no need rationalize his behavior is a rationalization in itself.
SD, I agree with you about the claims that have grown up around prophets and apostles, but I also see clearly in our historical records (ancient and modern) that those claims have NEVER been grounded in reality. Even Jesus of Nazareth was rejected partly because he didn’t live up to the expectations of the people of that time for their anticipated Messiah. I’d rather jettison the unrealistic expectations than dismiss the people for not living up to them.
SilentDawning wrote:I have to be a bit frank here. These kinds of statements disturb me….we DO make huge claims about prophets,
Who is we? I have no such misconceptions about prophets. A prophet is only useful or relevant to me if they tell the truth. And I certainly don’t entertain any illusions that prophets are God, super-human, magical or incapable of sin.
SilentDawning wrote:about the need to live our lives clean,
Yes, and I try to conduct my life like that. I am not responsible for anyone else but myself though. I certainly am not accountable for JS nor am I his judge.
SilentDawning wrote:Moses shut out of the promised land because he didn’t follow basic instructions.
And JS was killed, in part, as a consequence of his own decisions and actions.
SilentDawning wrote:That prophets will “never lead us astray”.
That is nonsense in my view. This pseudo-doctrine came from a man and not from God. It is used to support a fiction that prophets are not human, are God, and incapable of sin. I find such concepts unreasonable.
SilentDawning wrote:To have a prophet that had sexual urges he could not control,
Welcome to the reality that prophets are human-beings too.
SilentDawning wrote:and then led his people to practice a sanitized form of sexual promiscuity is definitely leading the people astray.
I find that unlikely. People are completely capable of making their own decisions and saying ‘no’. I certainly feel no need to be a polygamist because JS was one. In fact, I view polygamy as a sin.
SilentDawning wrote:At some BASIC level, prophets and leaders and the church as a whole is accountable for providing at least a basic level of commitment to the gospel ideas – such as chastity. Otherwise, the church and JS wielded power without accountability. And its that power without accountability that I have a tremendous amount of concern about.
Only if you believe things like the LDS Church is the “one true church”, is perfect, is not man-made and other such nonsense. I share no such misconceptions about it in the slightest. We are dealing with human beings here and a man-made organization, nothing more. However, none of that has any bearing on whether or not the claims about seeing and experiencing God made in Mormonism have a basis in fact. If you are interested in that, you need to speak with God and make your own determinations. And that is exactly the true message of Mormonism – that each of us should ask God about it.
SilentDawning wrote:I think your comment that there is no need rationalize his behavior is a rationalization in itself.
No, I think my views are firmly grounded in reality.
Old-Timer wrote:SD, I agree with you about the claims that have grown up around prophets and apostles, but I also see clearly in our historical records (ancient and modern) that those claims have NEVER been grounded in reality. Even Jesus of Nazareth was rejected partly because he didn’t live up to the expectations of the people of that time for their anticipated Messiah.
I’d rather jettison the unrealistic expectations than dismiss the people for not living up to them.
So would I, but our church culture, and even its doctrine creates these high expectations in the first place. People join because of them. They commit to missions on the basis of them, and make huge financial sacrifices partly because of the belief in the supernatural character that is promulgated at church about our leaders. And when the pedestal tips over, many dedicated members testimonies topple with it. The pedestals on which my own leaders stood, started swaying after I read Truth Restored, believed it, and then found out on my mission that some non-member at the door knew more about The Mountain Meadows Massacre than I did.
At least this statement in the OP is a step in the right direction.
Better to be up front from the beginning. And again, at what point do you draw the line between “tolerating people not living up to their values” and relieving leaders of ALL accountability for their actions?
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