What the Journal of Discourse Says about Polygamy

27 February

I’ve been receiving e-mails asking if I could publish a list of excerpts of what the Journal of Discourses says about polygamy. Well, today is the day I’ve listed some of them! Unfortunately, the JD doesn’t have an online index…one of these days…

For now I just started at the beginning – I’ll list a few every week until I’ve exhausted what we can find!

While reading over these, keep in mind many of the same mindsets are still present with Mormon dogma. Pray for the Mormons who still hold to the false beliefs!

With Love in Christ;

Michelle

1 Cor 1:18

Mormon Children Born into Polygamy Superior

Journal of Discourses 13:207-208; “I have heard it said, and seen it printed, that the children born here under this system are not so smart as others; that their eyes lack luster and that they are dull in intellect; and many strangers, especially ladies, when arriving here, are anxious to see the children…

But the testimony of Professor Park, the principal of the University of Deseret, and of other leading teachers of the young here, is that they never saw children with greater aptitude for the acquisition of knowledge than the children raised in this Territory. There are no brighter children to be found in the world than those born in this Territory. Under the system of Patriarchal Marriage, the offspring, besides being equally as bright and brighter intellectually, are much more healthy and strong.

Need I go into particulars to prove this? To you who are married there is no necessity of doing so; you know what I mean. … Another good effect of the institution here is that you may travel throughout our entire Territory, and virtue prevails.” – George Q. Cannon, Salt Lake City, October 9, 1869

Mark it in the books – having kids while married to your wife’s relatives makes for smarter kids. There’s obviously no loss of self confidence either.

Moral Superiority of Polygamy

Journal of Discourses 14:57-58; “…there is an immense amount of misunderstanding among the people of the world with respect to the Latter-day Saints and their belief in this peculiar doctrine. It is generally believed that we have embraced it for sensual purposes…What a silly idea! Why, any man with a grain of common sense might know better…

Why go to the trouble and expense and incur the odium of sustaining wives and children merely to gratify licentiousness, when we could do it to the fullest extent, on the popular plan,

without incurring odium or assuming responsibility and care? …you may find that men can gratify their lustful desire without incurring odium.

They can even destroy females by the thousands in the gratification of their sensual appetites, but because the Latter-day Saints choose to marry them, to make women and their children respected and honorable, all hell is moved against them. The devil does not like it. …they who have opposed this principle most bitterly when they understood it, have been the most corrupt men, the very men who have practiced adultery and whoredom in secret…” – George Q. Cannon, Salt Lake City, August 15, 1869

So marrying multiple women is much better in God’s eyes than having affairs, or worse yet, marrying one woman outside of Mormonism.

Adultery, UnHoly Wedlock Reduced by Polygamy

Journal of Discourses 24:74-75“And then to do the other thing, to form a union as God has enjoined in the holy bond of matrimony, we must enter into that bond for the purpose of multiplying our species and thus bring forth the fruits of our bodies. …

And I say before God, angels and men, that every man and woman who joins in unholy wedlock for the gratification of fleshly lust, and studiously plan to frustrate the command of God in the multiplication of their species, show that they are unworthy—what shall I say?—unworthy to be classed among the honorable of the earth. … …And when God sees this damnable doctrine taught…the Lord says, the time has come for Him to take measures to counteract this great evil, by introducing laws in the midst of those who fear Him and work righteousness and live according to the principles of life; men who are upright, honest and faithful, men who are willing to assume the responsibility; to take the daughters of Eve to wife and multiply and replenish the earth, for those men are unworthy of them…” – Erastus Snow, Salt Lake City, April 6, 1883

What about people like Billy Graham? Is he classed into the category of un-honorable men for not being married into a polygamous, or even non-Mormon, union?

Comparison of Polygamy with Immorality of ‘Gentiles’

Journal of Discourses 23:224-234“It was proposed that the bill, now being urged in Congress against polygamy, be so amended as to include adultery; the gentleman to whom the proposition was made was at first inclined to endorse the amendment, but on reflection, he turned to his friend and said, if that be done it would leave us without a quorum in the House.

No, my friends, it is not adultery they wish to punish; it is not whoredom they wish to punish; it is not the cause of public or private virtue they champion; it is merely the hue and cry of the bigotry of our time against a people who are aiming at a higher morality than now exists, who are aiming to do away with and effectually destroy out of their midst the evil that is sapping the strength and vitality of our nation—a community that does not seek to shun the responsibility and the cares and labors and expense and trouble of rearing families and of educating them and making their children honorable men and women, husbands and wives, fathers and mothers, citizens of the state and defenders of human liberty.

We are accused of being governed by priestcraft, and priestly influence. I do not believe there is any portion of this community in any part of the land who are moved by priestly influence to half the extent that Judge Edmunds and the advocates of the bill that he champions against us are; and their consciences must teach them that they are hypocrites, and that they are but pandering to bigotry, and that their acts are not the acts of statesmen, but the acts of cringing politicians and demagogues.” – Erastus Snow, Salt Lake City, February 26, 1882

Apparently, the immorality of the ‘Gentiles’ means those in charge of upholding the laws in the Utah territory.

Conditions Which Justify Polygamy

Journal of Discourses 26:123-124“… polygamy was not intended for the poor man, that it was intended for the kings of the earth, overlooking the fact, however, that Israel is a nation of kings and priests; so that when he said that polygamy or the practice of a plurality of wives was intended only for kings, it brought home a truth pregnant with thought; for God decreed that he would gather His Israel from the poor of all nations, and so in Rev. 5, 10, they are represented as singing a new song, “Thou hast made us Kings and Priests to God, and we shall reign on the earth;” and this principle was to extend not through time only, but through the countless ages of eternity, so that His people might occupy the position of eternal fathers and eternal mothers, and be indeed Kings and Priests forever and forever.” – Henry W. Naisbitt, Salt Lake City, March 8, 1855

Are they sure they’re kings and priests of God? How can they know for sure when they don’t believe the Bible has been translated correctly?

Consecutive Wives on Earth are Contemporaneous in Heaven

Journal of Discourses 18:55; “There are some cases in life where two women might die, and a man be still left in his young days without a wife, and he marries a third and perhaps a fourth; in the resurrection they are contemporaneously his wives. Plurality, therefore, would be perfectly consistent in the world to come, but, “Oh,” says a sectarian, “how awful it is in this world!”

Thus you see that the very moment we admit the eternity of marriage, the very moment that we admit that Adam and Eve were immortal beings, when they were married, and we undertake to follow that pattern, plurality necessarily comes along; either marriage has no bearing upon eternity, and no bearing upon immortality and immortal beings, or else plurality of wives necessarily must exist in eternity.” – Orson Pratt, Salt Lake City, July 11, 1875

They must’ve missed Mark 12:24-25 when Jesus said there are no marriages in heaven. Now what?

Polyandry Forbidden by God

Journal of Discourses 18:55-56“God has strictly forbidden, in this Bible, plurality of husbands, and proclaimed against it in his law.

I should be glad to touch upon a great many other points, in relation to plurality, but time will not permit.” – Orson Pratt, Salt Lake City, July 11, 1875

How convenient.

Journal of Discourses 21:295“He has ordained that every man who is worthy shall have a family of his own; but he never did ordain, neither before the foundation of the world nor during any of the dispensations that have existed on the earth, that a woman should have two husbands living at the same time.” – Orson Pratt, Salt Lake City, July 18, 1880

This obviously means Joe Smith broke God’s commandment. 8 of his wives were already married.

Polygamy is a Constitutional Right

Journal of Discourses 1:54; “…if I am not mistaken, that the constitution gives the privilege to all the inhabitants of this country, of the free exercise of their religious notions, and the freedom of their faith, and the practice of it.” – Orson Pratt, Salt Lake City, August 29, 1852

There’s not now, nor has there ever been any bill in the US Constitution specifying men have the right to be a polygamist

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