So in my quest to understand and educate myself on mormonism and understand its control over its members, I have decided to download a copy of the D&C and read it. As I understand there's a few sections that have been deleted and changed; I'll try to find those too..

Coffee. Lots and lots of coffee.

There is plenty of information on changes to the D&C from its precursor, the Book of Commandments. For example here:

https://www.ldsdiscussions.com/changes-to-revelations

Also here:

http://www.mormonthink.com/d&c.htm

Basically, when Joseph Smith decided he wanted something, he had a "revelation" in a series in the D&C.

If he wanted someone's farm, he wrote a section to say God said so.
If he wanted women to shut up and let the men have multiple sex partners, well surprise, God just told JS.
Some of the sections are so transparent.

I hope if you are really into LDS scripture, you will read the Book of Abraham in the "Pearl of Great Price" and the book about the papyrus fiasco, By Thine Own Hand Upon Papyrus by Charles Larsen. What a load of nonsense. To me it was the most revealing scam about how JS operated by pulling crap out of his rear.

Life is short. Don't waste it.

Valley of the Dolls would be a better choice.

Yeah... don't.

I don't know why anyone would choose to do this to themselves, but to each their own.

Section 132 is a real shit show. Just so you know, "the new and everlasting covenant" is code for polygamy.

If you have the misfortune of reading section 132, be sure to compare it to the original section 101 (which was later removed).

https://www.mormondialogue.org/topic/7103-dc-1014-1835-1876-forbade-polygamy/

You ought to read Fawn Brodie's classic No Man Knows My History, first. It will give you the context in which the D&C was created.

Amen. Best book on the subject for me.

OMG! All these people telling you things that take away from the sanctity of Joseph Smith, Jr.'s legacy!!!

I testify to you that JoJu was as much a profit of ghawd as any other self-proclaimed prophet, including myself! I'm batting around .333, well above the Mendoza line, which JoJu never even came close to!

Remember to read with "...a sincere heart, and with real intent..." otherwise it could all go horribly wrong and you wind up donating time and money to Recovery from Mormonism!!!

Pray until you agree it is true! If necessary, skip a few meals so you feel weak. That seems to help feel the "spirit" to let you know it is twue. You too can feel a burning in the boobies, err, I mean bosom.

So you’re looking a discount frontal lobotomy?

... than a frontal lobotomy...

After you read the 132 section let me know and I have some insight into William Clayton's and Hyrum Smith's participtation in its' creation.

Also look up Ron Jeremy. Joseph built an entire cosmology to satisfy his sexual mania, which is now understood as a psychiatric pathology. Why not save yourself some time?

The Mormonism movement was a valuable lesson in unconstrained power that the young republic needed to learn. The Josephs and Brighams of today are behind bars, where they belong.

Okay, that last part is wishful thinking. Temple square and its surroundings is the best society can do.

As with all things mormon they've changed the scriptures every 20 years or so.

First realise they feel no need to follow what is printed there.

Second try and find an older copy. Pre 1980 is good.

Third read the headers. They give tidbits of mormon history.


If you're looking for something more about mormon history I'd suggest B H Roberts history of the church.

Get a copy of the 1833 “Book of Commandments” and the 1835 book of “Doctrine” (meaning The Lectures on Faith) and “Covenants and Commandments” (meaning an 1835 version of the D&C).

There are side-by-side, three-column printings of these books, where one can see extensive editing.
Looks like making sausage.

Now go to the BoC section 100 (no longer existing in the canon), and read that marriage is to be held in an open meeting or feast.
Whoops!
With that old section still in the canon, one can’t have secret polygamy ceremonies, or exclusive, private modern ceremonies.

The sisters were the Rollins girls, who carried printer’s galley sheets of the 1833 BoC away from the burning printing office, and into a cornfield.
Enjoy!

Why not just sniff glue?

Snort!

There are a couple of options open to you.

Firstly, I'd recommend getting the D&C arranged by theme - I have this format at home somewhere, it makes for much easier reading.

Secondly, you can get hold of other versions of it like the CoC/RLDS' one. This contains a lot of their own material, sadly including some of the wooly liberal trash they've come up with in the last few years, and also excludes the two official translations, but it does have slightly different wording.

Thirdly, you'll need to have a guide to who the obscure people named in it are. I mean, who's Brother Marsh? You can look that up. When you find that out, and find out what these people did, it puts a different slant on it

Also get hold of Smith's Lectures on Faith and Kirtland Sermon. These have been excluded from recent LDS publications, but are probably among his more entertaining works.

Polygamy Revelation
D&C 132
It is recorded in William Clayton's diary
Joe jr., Hyrum,& William Clayton were sitting together. They were discussing polygamy. Hyrum suggested that if Joseph would write(not receive) a revelation where God gives instructions for Joe jr. to have other wives he would take it to Emma. Joe jr. doubted that Emma would believe it. However William Clayton wrote it down and Hyrum took it to Emma. Emma did not believe it!
From this point on polygamy is nothing more than a massive con. It leads one to wonder how many more so called revelations were the figment of of imagination from an exceptionally creative mind.
The man was a scam artist and compared to him Ponzi was a rank amateur.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 06/25/2020 09:17AM by thedesertrat1.

I really appreciate the responses. I'm making a list of the suggested readings to read was well. I was going to ask, but forgot, does the "church" add to the D&C canon still, or it is pretty much closed? Or could they if they wanted to? It seems like whenever the authorities need something to support a teaching, they pull a "revelation" out disturbingly quickly.

Don't read the D&C.

Only if you're stoned.

Yeah, don't.

Why bother?

You are better than me.

I like the suggestions that involve older editions and book of commandments, however, are you looking for historical perspective of an explanation of modern mormon belief?

For most of my years as an active mormon I beleived that the D&C that I was reading was the only version. I did not know about mormon history or revisions. I believed it because I prayed and felt happy...

No kidding...



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 06/26/2020 04:26PM by Lowpriest.

Don’t bother. It’s really, really, really boring. As a nevermo, I read both the BOM and D&C cover to cover. Just for kicks and giggles. No giggles and I could kick myself for having wasted the time.
That said, do think it was a great tool for developing self-discipline.
Again, key word: boring.

Here's a few of my impressions and takeaways as a nevermo, just through the first 10 sections.

Overall, the sense I get from this volume is "quantity over quality". It feels like every single idea that this book attempts to convey is presented in the midst of a word salad. Not only that, it appears to me that each "revelation" is so transparently motivated to support the "prophet's" cause that it is hard not to see it as such. In my view, it requires definite, focused, and maybe even intentional cognitive dissonance to see these "revelations" as anything other than invented commands from an invented god to support an invented religion. One personal note of interest is that the deity is insistent upon specifically naming "Joseph Smith, Jun." as the recipient of many of these "revelations". It seems that an omnipotent deity would not need to differentiate between the two in print by using a human-conceived name suffix; I would think if a true deity were giving the "revelation", the intended recipient would already be quite clear. Once again, just a personal thought.

Overall, this scares me. As I think generationally, I begin to see how it could be used to support just about anything if you tweaked the right word or deleted the right sentence or section. This would be true of any religious book I suppose, but this one seems especially dangerous in that regard.

codymac, "It feels like every single idea that this book attempts to convey is presented in the midst of a word salad. Not only that, it appears to me that each "revelation" is so transparently motivated to support the "prophet's" cause that it is hard not to see it as such."

You are exactly right. The 'revelations' were revelations of convenience. It is an excellent observation which Mormons (and I was one) fail to make. Thanks for posting.

Dusting and Cleaning just isn't that hard. No need to read a whole book on it.

Some of it is unintentionally hilarious. The one in which a few early movers were sent to the preachers (D&C 49?) is kind of hilarious because I'd like to think the other cult told them to pack sand.

*shakers