I was reading through a 1940s church magazine today and I noticed the following names of General Authorities:

Marvin O. Ashton
Thomas E. McKay
Joseph L. Wirthlin

That's when an angel with a drawn sword appeared unto me and revealed the purpose of the middle inital: it's to distinguish individuals in a hierarchy that came about through generations of inbreeding and nepotism among the Lord's anointed.

Indeed it is, but I didn't need an angel. ;)

Simple at looking at this chart, seeing that Joseph F. Smith picked up the initial to distinguish from JS, and then everyone else did it because it sounded cooler: https://www.lds.org/churchhistory/presidents/leaders.jsp

I think it was also to indicate which of your father's wives was your mother.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 11/24/2014 05:25PM by Stray Mutt.

^^^THIS

Do you have any graphs or documentation that would help visualize or demonstrate this point?

Middle names are cool. In our family it is common to have 2 middle names to help distinguish generations. That plus Roman numerals.

Middle names give you one more chance to stop doing whatever you are being yelled at for. First name only keep doing it. Next scream, first and middle name. Still don't stop, out comes the full name and it is time to run for the hills.

If you have a first name that can be nicknamed, Sue for Susan, Tom for Tomas, you get one additional chance to stop. I did not have one of those, three strikes and I was out.

The reason middle initials are used is to increased the perceived intelligence of that person:

http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/ejsp.2026/abstract

Thus spoke Wijnand A. P. van Tilburg and Eric R. Igou. Interesting article!

I LOVE leaving the middle initials OUT when I talk to TBMs about their leaders.

For those who don't HAVE middle names, I usually put in and extra initial, like the "H" like for Jesus H. Christ, Hartmann H. Rector and Charles H. Didier. :)

Too many relatives with simular names in the church line up.

Joseph Smith, Joseph F. Smith, Joseph Fielding Smith

George A Smith, George Albert Smith

Ezra T Benson Ezra Taft Benson

Joseph B Wirthling, Joseph L Wirthling

Hyrum Smith, Hyrum M Smith

John Taylor, John W Taylor

Marvin J Ashton, Marvin O Ashton

Etc etc etc

Obviously a badge of the peter priesthood power of naming rites.

Accordingly, lds the women lack such power names.

My grandmother was simply named Ruth Smith, with no middle name, as was the custom among plygs of the day. The women would be earning a middle name soon enough when they got their new last name.

So what's in a name anyway?