Gospel Topics Chapter 9 Bringhurst Part 5

Viewpoint on Mormonism, the program that examines the teachings of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints from a Biblical perspective. Viewpoint on Mormonism is sponsored by Mormonism Research Ministry. Since 1979, Mormonism Research Ministry has been dedicated to equipping the body of Christ with answers regarding the Christian faith in a manner that expresses gentleness and respect. And now your host for today's Viewpoint on Mormonism. Welcome to this edition of Viewpoint on Mormonism.

I'm your host, Bill McKeever, founder and director of Mormonism Research Ministry, and with me today is Eric Johnson, my colleague at MRM. This week we've been looking at Chapter 9 in the book, the LDS Gospel Topics series, a scholarly engagement. Chapter 9 was written by a man named Ewell G. Brinhurst, and it deals with the Christian faith in the Christian faith. It deals with the subject of the Manifesto, the document that came out in 1890 that allegedly officially ended the practice of plural marriage. Now, of course, the whole reason why a Gospel Topics essay on the Manifesto and the end of plural marriage had to be written is because the Manifesto really didn't end plural marriage.

And that's what this chapter is talking about. We're looking at some of the topics essay that was released by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints on October 25th, 2014. He has some praise for the essay, as we do as well. We do feel that the church has been a bit more transparent on this issue, certainly more so than they have in the past.

But he also has some of his problems. We were looking at some of the problems in yesterday's show, and we're going to continue in this program. Today, at page 238. Let's look at that statement, because that is true. John Taylor, the third president of the church, allegedly did have this revelation where he was encouraged to keep the course, if you will.

Now, here's what's fascinating about this, Eric. In the Gospel Topics essay under the subheading, the Manifesto, it says this, and this is what Newell Brinhurst is talking about. Church leaders prayerfully sought guidance from the Lord and struggled to understand what they should do regarding continuing plural marriage or abandoning it. And then it goes on to say, Both President John Taylor and President Wilford Woodruff felt the Lord directing them to stay the course and not renounce plural marriage. The question I raised at the beginning of the show is this, did Wilford Woodruff sin by coming forth with the Manifesto and encouraging the church to abandon the practice of plural marriage? And this is why I asked the question, if in fact both President John Taylor and President Wilford Woodruff felt the Lord directing them to stay the course and not renounce plural marriage, the fact is Wilford Woodruff did. Now, if he really felt the Lord was telling them not to renounce it, he goes ahead and he does it.

John Taylor's off the hook because he passes away in the late 1880s. He's a hero, too, to the fundamentalists who will talk about this, well, what the essay called a purported revelation, and I guess my question, Bill, is what is a purported revelation versus an authentic revelation? How do we know that this is purported and really not what God intended, and yet the Manifesto was a true revelation? I think the answer would be probably very simple according to the standards of the LDS Church, and I think Bringhurst mentions it on page 239. That particular revelation, though it may or may not have been given to John Taylor, we assume John Taylor did receive this revelation, was never submitted to the councils of the priesthood nor the church.

Technicality, it sounds like to me. My question is, is if this church is really a restoration, as the way things were done anciently, where do we find in the Old Testament that revelations were supposed to be submitted to any such councils before they were accepted as being the will of God for God's people? Neither in the Old Testament nor the New Testament do we see anything like that. Newell Bringhurst goes on on page 241 to talk about the fundamentalist movement, which he feels has been largely ignored in this Gospel Topics essay. Largely ignored in the Gospel Topics essay is fundamentalist Mormonism relative to its impact on the mainstream LDS Church. The essay simply states that, quote, some LDS Church members who were excommunicated coalesced into independent movements and are sometimes called fundamentalists, and then it adds, these groups are not affiliated with or supported by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, end quote. I do remember when Gordon B. Hinckley was president, he wanted to make that very clear.

These groups have nothing to do with us. He was like in damage control because that is an embarrassing part of Mormonism, and today's Latter-day Saints don't like being associated with the fundamentalist groups who still believe that plural marriage should be practiced today. He writes, in fact, LDS leaders considered the fledgling fundamentalist movement an existential threat and acted accordingly.

By the 1920s, Heber J. Grant, who succeeded Joseph F. Smith as president, asserted himself as an intractable foe of fundamentalist plural marriage, despite himself having earlier taken plural wives. Grant issued a series of stern warnings during the late 1920s and early 1930s condemning Mormon fundamentalist teachings and practices as heretical.

In June 1933, Grant issued what became known as a third or final manifesto. This seminal directive, actually written by J. Reuben Clark, Grant's second counselor, denounced the, quote, few misguided members of the church who had secretly associated themselves together for the avowed purpose of perpetuating the practice of polygamy or plural marriage, end quote. Such individuals lacked authority, making their actions both illegal and void because the Lord has laid down without qualification the principle that there is never but one on the earth at a time on whom this power and the keys of the priesthood are conferred. Bringhurst goes on towards the bottom of page 242 to say, shortly after the final manifesto, the LDS church issued an ecclesiastical loyalty oath that suspected fundamentalist sympathizers were required to sign. Those who refused faced excommunication.

Talk about things being turned on its head. The next minute, you're being encouraged that you should be practicing this if you want to get the best this religion has for you. The next minute, now if you're involved in that kind of a practice at all, you're going to get kicked out of the church. At the bottom of page 242, he writes, clearly LDS officials wanted to stamp out fundamentalist Mormonism. All such punitive measures, however, had the opposite effect, transforming a ragtag collection of polygamous sympathizers into a cohesive movement by the early 1940s. Fundamentalist Mormonism attracted an increasing number of adherents throughout the remainder of the 20th century and into the 21st. This is something that can't be overlooked because, as he's going to go on and explain, a lot of the people who belong to these fundamentalist groups, many of them were members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

Newell Bringhurst makes his point in the next paragraph. Basically, all individuals embracing fundamentalist Mormonism have roots in and or are former members of the mainline LDS church. Also, the vast majority claim early Mormon polygamous ancestry. All of this underscores the fact that although the 1890 Manifesto facilitated the end of plural marriage within the LDS church, the practice continues to flourish outside of mainstream Mormonism. Its adherents claim to be the truest, most orthodox of Latter-day Saints, embracing what they call old-fashioned Mormonism, or the fullness of the gospel, as taught by Joseph Smith Brigham Young and all other early LDS leaders. Would you agree with that though, Eric?

Oh yeah. We once did a series on the different splinter groups. Many of them are polygamous, and they still hold to the idea that they are the rightful heirs of Joseph Smith. I think this is absolutely correct, at least in the minds of those who are fundamentalist Mormons. They are going back in their history, and they are looking at leaders such as Joseph Smith, Brigham Young, and John Taylor. Definitely, Wilford Woodruff is looked upon by many fundamentalists as being the treasonous leader of the church, and they don't respect him for turning his back on the practice of plural marriage.

But Joseph Smith never denounced the practice, Brigham Young never denounced the practice, and we know that John Taylor never denounced the practice. And if we are to believe that that revelation that is so controversial that John Taylor had towards the end of his life was really a revelation from God to John Taylor to pursue in keeping this belief going, then obviously they would look at those three leaders as being the true leaders of the Mormonism that they choose to practice today. And they would rightly, I think, in that context, view modern members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints as belonging to a group that is apostate. And we've talked to some of these fundamentalists, and they do look upon the LDS Church headquartered in Salt Lake City as being apostate. If you'd like to read more about some of those groups we're talking about, go to our website mrm.org slash splinter groups with the hyphen between splinter and groups, and you can read about the Apostolic United Brethren, which is known as the work or the group or the priesthood.

You can read more about the FLDS, and also you can learn more about the Kingston clan. There are a number of groups out there that claim that they hold the rightful reigns of Joseph Smith and Mormonism that followed. At the end of Newell Bringhurst's chapter under the subheading conclusion, he says, I would tend to agree with that to a certain extent, though I do sympathize with Mr. Bringhurst's complaints about what is either treated very lightly or completely ignored. But I think the bottom line is this. If you're a Latter-day Saint, you have to ask yourself, is this really the way God, who's supposed to know the end from the beginning, operates with his people?

To give a command at what point, and then just a few decades later to rescind it. I want to end by citing from the Book of Mormon. This is Alma 41.8. It says, Remember, remember that it is not the work of God that is frustrated, but the work of men. If anything, reading this essay on the manifesto and the end of plural marriage, it certainly seems to point to the fact that the doctrine of polygamy was not a work of God because it was frustrated, but in fact was the work of men. For more information on Mormonism Research Ministry, we encourage you to visit our website at www.mrm.org, where you can request our free newsletter, Mormonism Researched. We hope you will join us again as we look at another viewpoint on Mormonism.