Posted by:
The 1st FreeAtLast
(
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Date: July 02, 2013 01:37AM
"An Insider’s View of Mormon Origins" by former LDS Church Educational System instructor and director Grant Palmer explains that JS “was brought to court three times for stone-gazing” (also called "scrying") for imagined buried treasure.
Throughout the 1820s, JS REPEATEDLY scammed people in his area with his bogus claim that he possessed the supernatural ability to help them - for a fee - find concealed wealth using his "peep" stone.
Palmer politely noted in his book that JS “never obtained any riches by this method” ("scrying"), a fact that “may argue against the efficacy of the endeavor.” No kidding!
In the summer of 1830, "Prophet" JS was jailed and later appeared before Justice of the Peace Joseph Chamberlin in South Bainbridge, Chenango County, New York. A physician who attended the court proceedings in July of that year, Dr. Abram Benton, reported that a witness, Addison Austin, asked defendant Smith about his touted mystical ability to see hidden treasure. Under oath, Mormonism's founder confessed: "To be candid, between you and me, I cannot, any more than you or any body else; but any way to get a living."
In early 1831, Dr. Benton wrote about JS and his stone-gazing, legal troubles, and budding religious movement in a letter to the editor of an American periodical, the Evangelical Magazine and Gospel Advocate, as follows (I've inserted a few paragraph breaks to make reading Benton's text a bit easier):
"In the sixth number of your paper I saw a notice of a sect called Mormonites; and thinking that a fuller history of their founder, Joseph Smith, Jr., might be interesting to the community, and particularly to your correspondent in Ohio, where, perhaps, the truth concerning him may be hard to come at, I will take the trouble to make a few remarks on the character of that infamous impostor. For several years preceding the appearance of his book [the Book of Mormon], he was about the country in the character of a glass-looker; pretending, by means of a certain stone, or glass, which he put in a hat, to be able to discover the lost goods, hidden treasures, mines of gold and silver, &c [etc.]. Although he consistently failed in his pretensions, still he had his dupes who put implicit confidence in all his words. In this town [Bainbridge Township, New York], a wealthy farmer, named Josiah Stowell, together with others, spent large sums of money in digging for hidden money, which this Smith pretended he could see, and told them where to dig; but they never found their treasure.
"At length the public, becoming wearied with the base imposition which he was palming upon the credulity of the ignorant, for the purpose of sponging his living from their earnings, had him arrested as a disorderly person, tried and condemned before a court of Justice. But, considering his youth, (he then being a minor,) and thinking he might reform his conduct, he was designedly allowed to escape. This was four or five years ago. From this time he absented himself from this place, returning only privately, and holding clandestine intercourse with his credulous dupes, for two or three years.
"It was during this time, and probably with the help of others more skilled in the ways of iniquity than himself, that he formed the blasphemous design of forging a new revelation [Mormonism], which, backed by the terrors of an endless hell, and the testimony of base unprincipled men, he hoped would frighten the ignorant, and open a field of speculation for the vicious, so that he might secure to himself the scandalous honor of being a founder of a new sect, which might rival, perhaps, the Wilkinsonians, or the French Prophets of the 17th century.
"During the past Summer he was frequently in this vicinity, and [with] others of the baser sort, as Cowdry, Whitmer, etc., holding meetings, and proselyting a few weak and silly women, and still more silly men, whose minds are shrouded in a mist of ignorance which no ray can penetrate, and whose credulity the utmost absurdity cannot equal.
"In order to check the progress of delusion, and open the eyes and understandings of those who blindly followed him, and unmask the turpitude and villany of those who knowingly abetted him in his infamous designs[,] he was again arraigned before a bar of Justice, during last Summer [July 1830], to answer a charge of misdemeanor. This trial led to an investigation of his character and conduct, which clearly evinced to the unprejudiced, whence the spirit came which dictated his inspirations.
"During the trial it was shown that the Book of Mormon was brought to light by the same magic power by which he pretended to tell fortunes, discover hidden treasures, &c. Oliver Cowdry, one of the three witnesses of the book, testified under oath, that said Smith found with the plates, from which he translated his book, two transparent stones, resembling glass, set in silver bows. That by looking through these, he [Smith] was able to read in English, the reformed Egyptian characters, which were engraved on the plates.
"So much for the gift and power of God, by which Smith says he translated his book.... Two transparent stones, undoubtedly of the same properties, and the gift of the same spirit as the one in which he looked to find his neighbor’s goods. It is reported, and probably true, that he commenced his juggling by stealing and hiding property belonging to his neighbors, and when inquiry was made, he would look in his stone (his gift and power), and tell where it was.
"As for his book, it is only the counterpart of his money-digging plan. Fearing the penalty of the law, and wishing still to amuse his followers, he fled for safety to the sanctuary of pretended religion."
Nine years after JS was killed at Carthage Jail, a book by his mother, Lucy Mack, was published. The title was "Biographical Sketches of Joseph Smith, the Prophet, and His Progenitors for Many Generations", and in it Lucy wrote:
"During our evening conversations, Joseph would occasionally give us some of the most amusing recitals that could be imagined. He would describe the ancient inhabitants of this continent, their dress, mode of travelings, and the animals upon which they rode; their cities, their buildings, with every particular; their mode of warfare; and also their religious worship. This he would do with as much ease, seemingly, as if he had spent his whole life among them."
By 1829/30, it had assuredly become apparent to con-artist and master story-creator/teller JS that unless he was able to dupe enough "weak and silly women, and still more silly men" to join his budding religious movement and part with a considerable portion of their earnings to support of his religious organization, he would face a difficult life of hard toil. Why? Because he'd received little formal education during his formative years, was a working-class nobody, and had gotten in trouble with the law for "scrying."
If JS continued to scam people as a "Glass Looker" to make a quick buck, he'd likely end up being jailed and/or heavily fined because of his previous convictions. He was poor, so he wouldn't be able to pay a hefty fine, and he'd likely do a full sentence of jail time. He needed another way of conning unsuspecting persons that wouldn't get him in trouble again with the law. So, "he fled for safety to the sanctuary of pretended religion."
The rest is early Mormon history.