Would it make any difference, if we took this statement:

"Joseph probably did not have sex with his plural wives"

and re-phrased it as:

"Smith probably did not have sex with his polyandrous wives"

???

If the latter statement is the one we're really interested
in discussing, then perhaps Joe did avoid intimate relations
with women who were simultaneously married to another Mormon.
I don't know that to be true, but it's an interesting idea.

Didn't Mr. Hales actually write --- Smith did not have
"sexual polyandry."

UD

In this kind of discussion, my come-back question is always someting like "Why do it then, especially since he was hiding it from his wife Emma and basically everyone else?"

I'm afraid I've become more than just a little cynical about all things mormonism since running away from it several decades ago. If it walks like a duck, swims like a duck, flys like a duck, and quakes like a duck... It's probably a duck.

But just as you suggest, it is (and maybe always will be) an interesting idea for exmos to kick around and discuss. :)

I find this to be an area where the Mormon apologists like to have their cake and eat it too.

When you point out that the BOM is radically anti-polygamy, they'll pull out Jacob 2:30: "For if I will, saith the Lord of Hosts, raise up seed unto me, I will command my people; otherwise they shall hearken unto these things."

But this same scripture would prohibit sexless polygamy. The only reason found anywhere in the BOM where polygamy may be allowed is for "raising up seed."

This is where FAIR and others run off the plantation entirely attempting to claim dynastic relationships and such nonsense.

Polyandry is one of the most damning proofs against the church, IMHO.

I agree. Apologists should be arguing that he did, bacause it's the only justification given in the BoM or the D&C. Besides JS also broke every "rule" of polygamy provided in D&C 132. If God ever had a need to raise up seed, it would have been with the Nephites, but God told them it was an abomination?...dumb, dumb, dumb, dumb, dumb....

>Didn't Mr. Hales actually write --- Smith did
>not have "sexual polyandry." ?

I'm fairly sure that is what he wrote. If so, then we got off
on a tangent in the previous thread on this topic.

Mormon polygamy and polyandry are inter-related, but they are
not exactly the same practice.

UD

Doesn't matter in my opinion. Joseph Smith having sex with his wives doesn't mean the church isn't true, and Joseph Smith not having sex with his wives doesn't mean the church is true.

Nobody really knows if he had sex with ALL his wives, and I don't think we ever will know.

Personally, I think he probably did have sex with MOST of his wives. I mean, it's legal by church commandments to have sex with someone you're married to, so why not? However, it does seem Joseph Smith hardly knew some of them women he was married to, so I suspect there's probably some wives he never had sex with.

But I don't know why this subject is discussed so much. Nobody knows if he did or not (both TBMs and ex-mormons are both just guessing/speculating), and whether he did or didn't, it doesn't change anything anyway. Even if he only had sex with Emma, the church still isn't true.

There are plenty of other issues to discuss, but I think most people find polygamy offensive...it's an issue we think most TBMs would understand. It's an issue that brought on a lot of the early members' hardships, one that JS and others repeatedly lied about, and it's a big part of why JS died at Carthage. He died a martyr to polygamy...

Ok, if we conceded that Smith only married these women reluctantly and only did so to spare his life, then can the mormons argue that Brigham Young was only platonically marrying his 16 y/o bride, Lucy Bigelow, at 45? Or that Wilford Woodruff did not have sex with the 16 y/o, Emma Smoot, he married at 46? Or that L. Snow didn't have children with 15 y/o Sarah Ephramina who he married when he was 57?

They can try to take the high road that Smith didn't have sex, but they can't deny the succeeding prophets took child brides at older ages and fathered some children with them. Their structure around smith crumbles quickly as you examine his successors.

+1000000000000000

Problem is, most Mormons have no idea what the word polyandrous means.

It's not in the Bible Dictionary™ -- what do you expect? :-D

Which polyandrous wife was unsure whether Joseph or her other husband had fathered her child?

facsimile3 Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Which polyandrous wife was unsure whether Joseph
> or her other husband had fathered her child?

Wasn't Mr. Hales quoted here on RfM in a recent
thread, saying that one such "wife" was different
than the rest? I can't find the reference now.

???

UD

While Joseph Smith did make a pronouncement saying: "What a thing it is for a man to be accused of committing adultery, and having seven wives, when I can only find one.", he did NOT say "Yes, I have been SEALED to many women, but not married in the earthly sense--I have been sealed to many MEN as well, as directed by God!"

Not only would JS break the polygamy command to raise up righteous seed by NOT having sex with these women, there's nothing in D&C about being sealed to other people for "loose dynastic ties", as the apologists like to say.

Plus that whole secret ceremony thing...

No matter how to slice it, Joe broke the rules laid out in D&C 132.

Wife's Permission?
Raising Seed?
Virgin?

No matter which way they go with it, he broke D&C 132 he was an adulterer.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 08/26/2013 12:07PM by David Jason.

It looks like the Maxwell Institute is willing to concede polyandrous sex with Sylvia Sessions Lyon--presumably because her husband had been ex'd, so that somehow makes it okay in the mind of a deluded TBM.

http://maxwellinstitute.byu.edu/publications/review/?vol=10&num=2&id=290

I think it is also safe to count Mary Rollins Lightner (http://www.boap.org/LDS/Early-Saints/MLightner.html). Below is a VERY interesting excerpt from Mary. It makes me wonder if Joseph did not have henchman pose as angels on occasion.


"I asked him if Emma knew about me, and he said, "Emma thinks the world of you." I was not sealed to him until I had a witness. I had been dreaming for a number of years I was his wife. I thought I was a great sinner. I prayed to God to take it from me for I felt it was a sin; but when Joseph sent for me he told me all of these things. "Well," said I, "don't you think it was an angel of the devil that told you these things?" Said he, "No, it was an angel of God. God Almighty showed me the difference between an angel of light and Satan's angels. The angel came to me three times between the years of 1834 and 1842 and said I was to obey that principle or he would slay me. "But," said he, "they called me a false and fallen prophet but I am more in favor with my God this day than I ever was in all my life before. I know that I shall be saved in the Kingdom of God. I have the oath of God upon it and God cannot lie; all that he gives me I shall take with me for I have that authority and that power conferred upon me."

Well, I talked with him for a long time and finally I told him I would never be sealed to him until I had a witness. Said he, "You shall have a witness." Said I, "If God told you that, why does he not tell me?" He asked me if I was going to be a traitor. "I have never told a mortal and shall never tell a mortal I had such a talk from a married man," said I. "Well," said he, "pray earnestly for the angel said to me you should have a witness." Well, Brigham Young was with me. He said if I had a witness he wanted to know it. "Why should I tell you?" said I. "Well," said he, "I want to know for myself." Said he, "Do you know what Joseph said? Since we left the office the angel appeared to him and told him he was well pleased with him and that you should have a witness."

I made it a subject of prayer and I worried about it because I did not dare to speak to a living being except Brigham Young. I went out and got between three haystacks where no one could see me. As I knelt down I thought, why not pray as Moses did? He prayed with his hands raised. When his hands were raised, Israel was victorious, but when they were not raised, the Philistines were victorious. I lifted my hands and I have heard Joseph say the angels covered their faces. I knelt down and if ever a poor mortal prayed, I did. A few nights after that an angel of the Lord came to me and if ever a thrill went through a mortal, it went through me. I gazed upon the clothes and figure but the eyes were like lightning. They pierced me from the crown of my head to the soles of my feet. I was frightened almost to death for a moment. I tried to waken my aunt, but I could not. The angel leaned over me and the light was very great, although it was night. When my aunt woke up she said she had seen a figure in white robes pass from our bed to my mother's bed and pass out of the window.

Joseph came up the next Sabbath. He said, "Have you had a witness yet?" "No." "Well," said he, "the angel expressly told me you should have." Said I, "I have not had a witness, but I have seen something I have never seen before. I saw an angel and I was frightened almost to death. I did not speak." He studied a while and put his elbows on his knees and his face in his hands. He looked up and said, "How could you have been such a coward?" Said I, "I was weak." "Did you think to say, `Father, help me?'" "No." "Well, if you had just said that, your mouth would have been opened for that was an angel of the living God. He came to you with more knowledge, intelligence, and light than I have ever dared to reveal." I said, "If that was an angel of light, why did he not speak to me?" "You covered your face and for this reason the angel was insulted." Said I, "Will it ever come again?" He thought a moment and then said, "No, not the same one, but if you are faithful you shall see greater things than that." And then he gave me three signs of what would take place in my own family, although my husband was far away from me at the time. Every work came true. I went forward and was sealed to him. Brigham Young performed the sealing, and Heber C. Kimball the blessing. I know he had six wives and I have known some of them from childhood up. I knew he had three children. They told me. I think two are living today but they are not known as his children as they go by other names."

I am still looking for the polyandrous wife who was unsure of the paternity of her child. Any help out there?