Joseph Smith's children from polygamy

[NorthwestUteFan]

Correct me if I am wrong, but wasn't he sealed to somebody who was currently married to somebody else? That would introduce quite an ick factor to the dialog.

[Uncle Ted]

It is a moot point because there is overwhelming evidence that he did have sex with his plural wives.

But just to humor you for a moment, what is the logic behind the "yeah but he didn't have sex with them" argument? If that is what happened, why was JS the only one that did it that way? Was it supposed to be done that way? Was everyone else from BY on down doing it incorrectly? I don't get it.

Maybe so. Didn't Bushman in JS:RSR make the claim that in being sealed to other women JS "did not marry women to form a warm, human companionship but to create a network of related wives, children, and kinsmen that would endure into the eternities."?

Of course, the law of adoption seemed to accomplish the same end result without all the speculation whether someone was sleeping with a lot of other women and, in some cases, someone else's wife.

[Moliere]

Correct me if I am wrong, but wasn't he sealed to somebody who was currently married to somebody else? That would introduce quite an ick factor to the dialog.

I think there was documented evidence of this (polyandry) in 10 of the marriages.

[NorthwestUteFan]

I think there was documented evidence of this (polyandry) in 10 of the marriages.

THERE is the underlying ick factor. That raises the spector of an enigmatic leader using his position of spiritual authority to 'get his groove on' and proves that perhaps absolute power DOES in fact corrupt absolutely.

[sarc]

Imagine being part of that conversation. "Honey, the prophet told me you aren't 'worthy' enough for me in the eternities. In this life you still get to house me, clothe me, and feed me, but now you also get to be 'tunnel buddies' with the prophet! Isn't that wonderful?"

With a hat tip toward Mel Brooks, It's good to be the King! (or in this case the spiritual, business, and governmental leader of a closed community). It seems very Koreshian, and I wonder just what would have happened had he lived a few decades longer.

[/sarc]


I read somewhere in here or on another forum that the early church wanted desperately to prove that JS DID have children from these marriages, because the RLDS church claimed that B.Y. had led the church astray. IIRC one of J.S.' sons travelled to SLC to find proof that his father's plural marriages were solely 'spiritual in nature', and the church proved otherwise. I find it interesting that they have essentially swapped positions on the issue now we are a century later.

[Pheidippides]

THERE is the underlying ick factor. That raises the spector of an enigmatic leader using his position of spiritual authority to 'get his groove on' and proves that perhaps absolute power DOES in fact corrupt absolutely.

[sarc]

Imagine being part of that conversation. "Honey, the prophet told me you aren't 'worthy' enough for me in the eternities. In this life you still get to house me, clothe me, and feed me, but now you also get to be 'tunnel buddies' with the prophet! Isn't that wonderful?"

With a hat tip toward Mel Brooks, It's good to be the King! (or in this case the spiritual, business, and governmental leader of a closed community). It seems very Koreshian, and I wonder just what would have happened had he lived a few decades longer.

[/sarc]


I read somewhere in here or on another forum that the early church wanted desperately to prove that JS DID have children from these marriages, because the RLDS church claimed that B.Y. had led the church astray. IIRC one of J.S.' sons travelled to SLC to find proof that his father's plural marriages were solely 'spiritual in nature', and the church proved otherwise. I find it interesting that they have essentially swapped positions on the issue now we are a century later.

Joseph Smith III refused to believe in his father's polygamist lifestyle even when given the evidence by Emma. Eventually he simply said something to the effect of he wasn't responsible for his father's sins.

IIRC, there are documented children from at least on polyandrous JS marriage. No source on that though.

BY took the polygamy (if not the polyandry) to a whole new level. He was on record as saying that it was okay for brothers and sisters to marry. The sources I read couldn't find any evidence of that kind of iciness happening in Utah, but they did find plenty of first cousins, stepfather and stepdaughter (think Woody Allen) and similar types of marriages. Incidentally, divorce was not an infrequent action either - BY divorced at least one (I think several) of his wives when they asked for it. Seems like a "no hard feelings" type of split, although that's my own conjecture.

Btw, some of the stories of the early Utah leaders hiding out from authorities and then later trying to put a stop to the practice are quite funny. The series on Correlation on BCC is full of them.

[wuapinmon]

Btw, some of the stories of the early Utah leaders hiding out from authorities and then later trying to put a stop to the practice are quite funny.

When we got sealed in the St. George Temple, they gave us a tour of the upper part, and showed us some of the rooms where the leaders had to "hide out" from the law. I got the feeling that they were almost bragging about it.

[NorthwestUteFan]

Joseph Smith III refused to believe in his father's polygamist lifestyle even when given the evidence by Emma. Eventually he simply said something to the effect of he wasn't responsible for his father's sins.

One of his most prominent wives was Eliza R. Snow.

From Wiki:

It is alleged she secretly wed Joseph Smith, on 29 June 1842, as a plural wife. Derr claimed that Eliza wrote fondly of Joseph “my beloved husband, the choice of my heart and the crown of my life”.[1] However, Snow organized a petition in Summer 1842, with a thousand female signatures, denying Smith was connected with polygamy.[2] Furthermore, as Secretary of the Ladies' Relief Society she organized the publishing of a certificate in October 1842 denouncing polygamy and denying Smith as its creator or participant.[3]

IIRC somewhere it is claimed that she was pregnant with JS' child when Emma threw her down the stairs, resulting in a miscarriage.

After JS died she married BY.

My wife's grandmother was E.R. Snow's grand-niece, so I wonder if there is some family knowledge about this.

[Pheidippides]

One of his most prominent wives was Eliza R. Snow.

From Wiki:



IIRC somewhere it is claimed that she was pregnant with JS' child when Emma threw her down the stairs, resulting in a miscarriage.

After JS died she married BY.

My wife's grandmother was E.R. Snow's grand-niece, so I wonder if there is some family knowledge about this.

I think I read the miscarriage claim in Quinn, but don't quote me.

The entire debate about sex strikes me as funny. Of course they had sex. If you are married, why wouldn't you? No sex is grounds for annulment (assuming the marriage is legal in the first place).

But, see BY's various comments about sex being only for procreation and should probably only happen once a month or so - any more is adulterous. Both from the pulpit in GC (may not have been BY but that era - I'll have to look up the sources again). I guess in that context many wives makes a lot of sense for the guy at least.

[Jacob]

It is a moot point because there is overwhelming evidence that he did have sex with his plural wives.

But just to humor you for a moment, what is the logic behind the "yeah but he didn't have sex with them" argument? If that is what happened, why was JS the only one that did it that way? Was it supposed to be done that way? Was everyone else from BY on down doing it incorrectly? I don't get it.

You are not humoring me. I was making a minor point that there is a substantial difference between a sexual and a non-sexual relationship in response to Moliere's implication that there was no real difference:

So what if he did or didn't [consumate], he still married them.

I think it would be an important distinction whether or not the non-sexual relationship was referred to as a "marriage."

With respect to polygamy as practiced by JS and the LDS in general, I agree with you that it doesn't matter because that's not the way it worked. So I can't respond to your other questions about the logic of the argument, even if I were clear to me what you are asking. I don't know who is making the argument you cite. I personally find the entire practice of polygamy repugnant.

[Sullyute]

One of his most prominent wives was Eliza R. Snow.

IIRC somewhere it is claimed that she was pregnant with JS' child when Emma threw her down the stairs, resulting in a miscarriage.

I think I read the miscarriage claim in Quinn, but don't quote me.

In Sacred Loneliness discusses this claim. Eliza Snow's journal only states that she left the Smith home on a certain day. There are no other contemporary records. The claims about miscarriage are all from second hand sources and appear decades later. So there is no solid proof that it actually happened.

[Color Me Badd Fan]

This is like Pulitzer or Peabody award-winning journalism in that it uses letters, sentences and paragraphs -- and is also the exact opposite in every other respect.

With such hard-hitting, in depth and fair articles, it's hard to believe that the Deseret News has to operate with a skeleton crew just to get by.

[Pheidippides]

In Sacred Loneliness discusses this claim. Eliza Snow's journal only states that she left the Smith home on a certain day. There are no other contemporary records. The claims about miscarriage are all from second hand sources and appear decades later. So there is no solid proof that it actually happened.

That sounds right. I think it is only a claim. I have not read Compton directly however - just a lot of quotes in other materials.

[NorthwestUteFan]

But, see BY's various comments about sex being only for procreation and should probably only happen once a month or so - any more is adulterous. Both from the pulpit in GC (may not have been BY but that era - I'll have to look up the sources again). I guess in that context many wives makes a lot of sense for the guy at least.

once or twice a month times 30-some odd wives = The Iron Lion of Zion got significantly more action than the rest of us plebes. In fact, I would posit he got more action in a month than most of us get in a year.

But it wasn't just about making sexy time...

[il Padrino Ute]

Does he still work with Scott Woodward at the Sorenson Molecular Geneology Foundation? I was one of Woodward's students while he was still at BYU. I just found out recently he had left BYU and started the SMGF. Kind of surprised he left. He was sort of a rock star in his department.

Yes, Ugo is at the SMGF. Not sure about Woodward.

[Northwestcoug]

I don't know whether to laugh or cry at that article. They (the church) have already found DNA matches and the JS-polygamous children links are documented on the publicly available LDS genealogy database. It is astounding to me that De Groote would not mention this in his article.

There is also overwhelming evidence that JS consummated his plural marriages. As I read the comments for the article I find myself wondering why these folks are doing so much high-fiving over the lack of a match in these cases.

A facebook friend linked to this article, and said 'since birth control was not widely available in the 19th century, what does this tell us about the kind of plural marriage Joseph lived?'

I laughed, then cried...