Introduction and Episode Overview

John Dehlin [00:00:00] Hello, everyone, and welcome to another edition of the Joseph Smith Podcast, sponsored by Mormon Stories. I am John Dehlin. Happy new year. It's January 6, 2026, and today we are here to review again. This is episode 27 in our series on Joseph Smith. We're covering Joseph the Rise and Fall of an American Prophet by Dr. John G. Turner. Today's episode is all about Joseph Smith's first year of polygamy in Nauvoo. It's chapter 23 in Dr. Turner's book. The chapter is called Ceilings and It covers the 1841-1842 time period. And it's all about Joseph Smith's first 12 or so polygamous marriages. It's a heavy topic and we have John Turner back for a new year. Happy New Year, John Turner.

John Turner [00:01:01] Thanks, John. Happy New Year to you. Happy New Year to everybody listening. I am thrilled to be back. And you're right, this is a thorny and often emotional and charged and still controversial topic. I think we know a lot more about Joseph's practice of polygamy than we did. Say, even 20, 30 years ago, there's still a lot we don't know. I'm excited to talk it through with you.

John Dehlin [00:01:33] Yeah, well, everyone needs to hold on to your hat because if you haven't been gripped by this series so far today, it goes into overdrive. I was finding myself getting emotional and I've been around the block a few times. So I'll just say really quickly, please subscribe and like to this channel. We're just a couple thousand away from 300,000 subscribers on YouTube if you like and comment and subscribe. That helps with the algorithms. We want to thank all the donors to Mormon Stories Podcast that make all this possible and also to those who donated specifically to this project with John Turner, the Joseph Smith Project. If you want to donate and help help keep this series alive on Joseph Smith, you can go to donorbox.org Joseph Smith and become a monthly or a one time donor to this project. Thanks to everyone who has donated in one way or another to make this possible. All right, John Turner, there's probably places where you were ready to begin. I wanted to begin by just asking the question. It's clear that Joseph Smith just begins this polygamy in 1841. And I wonder if there's any indication of what led to him flipping that switch and all of a sudden doing it with such fervor when all we had previous to this were some ponderings about it. One adulterous affair with Fanny Alger around 1830. What, 5. 1836.

Early Plural Marriage Before Nauvoo

John Turner [00:03:17] Ish.

John Dehlin [00:03:19] What? What? Do you have any idea what turned on this switch in Joseph Smith's brain?

John Turner [00:03:25] Yeah, it's a great question, and I don't have a definitive answer to it, so I'll give you my best thoughts. So I don't think Joseph had resolved to practice polygamy certainly prior to the summer of 1839. He spends a lot of time that summer introducing deep theological topics to the 12 apostles before their mission to England. He doesn't raise the subject of eternal marriage, let alone polygamy. I do think that Joseph had, on some level, been thinking about this since at least 1829. We have that verse in the Book of Mormon, that passage in which the polygamy of David and Solomon is called an abomination by God. There is a loophole for divinely sanctioned polygamy to raise up seed, but otherwise no polygamy, no concubines. So I think Joseph had thought about the subject as he read the Bible, and I think he thought about it maybe episodically in the 1830s. In my mind, it comes to the fore and Joseph embraces it as he contemplates what humans, or specifically what men on earth, must do in order to achieve exaltation, which is also a subject that Joseph had been thinking about on some level since the early ish, 1830s, but thinks about more intensively in Nauvoo. It seems that Joseph begins introducing the doctrine privately to a few individuals in the fall of 1840. So in the end, I can't really answer your question as to why does Joseph move forward at this time. On some level, I think it's certainly connected to his theological trajectory, I think in terms of his willingness to move forward and move Forward decisively in 1841 and early 1842. Joseph, to some extent is. Is feeling safe in Nauvoo. He's a bit on top of the world. He moves forward in a number of directions, boldly and even recklessly. And I see this as one of those directions

John Dehlin [00:06:30] you had. I think in an interview with historian Sandra Tanner months ago, she had noted that up until late 2025, the LDS Church had never actually published an official list of Joseph Smith's wives. And then miraculously, and I think it's coincidentally, just a few weeks later, the Church actually did publish a list of Joseph Smith's wives. And we'll include the link in the show notes. But interestingly, in that official list that the Church just published, it lists Fanny Alger as His first plural wife. I guess my question to you is really quick, and I know we covered this in the Fanny Alger chapter. Did you find any indication that Joseph Smith considered Fanny Alger to be his first plural wife, sealing, etc. I know we're covering some ground that we covered previously, but for those who just jump in on this chapter, specifically, if the church is listing Fanny Alger as a plural wife, is there any historical merit to calling that a plural wife and not an adulterous affair, in your opinion?

John Turner [00:07:49] Well, sure, there's some sources that definitely identify Fanny Alger as such in the 19th century. I think Eliza Snow, perhaps, in conversation with church historian Andrew Jensen, identified her as such,

John Dehlin [00:08:14] and she becomes Joseph's plural wife. Well, Eliza Snow does.

John Turner [00:08:20] Correct. Correct. Yeah. So in. In the summer of 1842. So if you, you know, if you want a quick way to work through all of those pieces of evidence, you could take a look at the chapter in the first volume of Brian Hales's Joseph Smith's Polygamy. He works through and discusses all of the sources about Fanny. His conclusion is there's slightly more that I talk about her as a wife. And so he reaches that conclusion. As you know, we discussed that pretty exhaustively a number of episodes ago. I won't rehash it. I don't find those pieces of evidence conclusive. Oliver Cowdery regarded their relationship as an affair. Other people close to Joseph identified Louisa Beaman, who I think we're probably going to talk about in a few minutes.

John Dehlin [00:09:28] First.

John Turner [00:09:28] Yeah, yeah. As Joseph's first wife and first polygamous wife. Excuse me. Yes. First polygamous wife, first plural wife. Yeah, I find. I find that, you know, that evidence more persuasive.

John Dehlin [00:09:43] Okay. All right, the next question we're about to talk about him approaching family of Luisa Beeman to make her his, I guess, first plural wife. And he's going to reference a revelation he received. So before we talk about that, what can you tell us about this alleged revelation that he claims to have received that clearly didn't follow his pattern of how he dealt with revelations he received?

John Turner [00:10:16] Right.

John Dehlin [00:10:16] So what do we know about that alleged revelation he claims to have received that was unpublished at the time?

John Turner [00:10:23] Not a lot. You know, we've also discussed the possibility that Joseph had announced or sort of promulgated a revelation on the subject as early as 1831, which I also don't find conclusive. But in conversations with Louisa Beeman's family and in conversations with other plural wives, Joseph apparently referenced having a Revelation on the subject. I think what we don't know is that in those contexts, does revelation mean an extended message from God that in theory could be dictated, or does that simply mean, I think this is what God wants me to do. And I think it's quite possible that it's the latter, you know, that Joseph thinks or is saying, at least this is something that God wants me to practice. This is a principle that is true. I don't think it necessarily means that Joseph has an extensive theological treatise on the subject ready for dictation.

John Dehlin [00:11:37] So he could have gotten it as an impression in his mind, but chose not to write it down for whatever reason. Tell us really quickly who he doesn't tell about the revelation before you tell us who he did tell about the revelation. Sure.

John Turner [00:11:54] So. Well, in some ways, you might think if God has revealed a significant and possibly controversial, well, certainly controversial principle to Joseph, you might expect that he would first share it with those who are closest to him or perhaps would most need to know. You know, that could include his wife, Emma. I don't think there's evidence that he broaches the subject with Emma until May of 1843,

John Dehlin [00:12:34] two years after he begins practicing it.

John Turner [00:12:37] Two years after he begins practicing it. Joseph certainly didn't tell Hyrum Smith, his brother, with whom he was also quite close. We know that because Hyrum, up until Brigham Young, introduces the principle to him in May of 1843, Hyrum rejects the idea that his brother is practicing polygamy and he's opposed to it at first. Joseph also doesn't tell his counselors in the First Presidency. Signe Rigdon, William Law. John C. Bennett's also an assistant president. I don't think he tells Bennett privately either. So as Joseph begins teaching this principle to a select number of families and women, he does keep some significant people in his life very much in the

John Dehlin [00:13:45] dark, pretty much all the really important people. And I want to note that later on, when Joseph does release a revelation which becomes DNC132, it includes in that revelation the Law of Sarah. Will you remind us what the Law of Sarah is and why it's a problem for how he approaches polygamy?

John Turner [00:14:08] Well, sure. So the idea is that a man who wishes to take a plural wife should, I don't know if it's formally ask for permission, but at least discuss with his first wife. Now it also. That revelation also suggests that if she hinders him, he can move forward anyway. But in this case, yes, there's no discussion.

John Dehlin [00:14:39] So he violates the revelation that he violates the rules of the revelation that he ends up producing.

John Turner [00:14:47] I think that's fair.

John Dehlin [00:14:49] Yeah. Okay. So with all that context laid for, why it already seems. I don't know if it's poisoning the well, to call it dubious or problematic. It's certainly fraught.

John Turner [00:15:03] Yeah. So, I mean, I'm just going to say I think it might be useful for listeners to know at the outset that I do think Joseph's polygamy is a mess, practically and morally. That's not because all of the issues involved are necessarily simple and clear cut. But yes, this, I think, was very much in its entirety. I think it was a moral quagmire for those who were introduced to it.

John Dehlin [00:15:46] Yeah. Amen. All right, well, let's talk about his first. His first encounter.

Joseph Smith Introduces Plural Marriage in Nauvoo

John Turner [00:15:54] Sure. So Joseph introduces plural marriage. And this is as best as we can tell it, you know, that you could. There are arguments about the first step, but I think I'm relying on the recollections of a man named Joseph Bates Noble who was married into a family, the Beaman family, that Joseph had long been close to on some level. So Mary Noble's father was Alva Beaman, who was a rodsman and treasure hunter that Joseph had on some level been friendly with back in the mid to late 1820s. The sources are a little bit murky, but it seems that Beaman may have participated in helping Joseph hide the golden plates from his enemies. So he was right there at the outset. The Beamans eventually moved to Kirtland and were baptized into the church. Both Alva Beaman and his wife had died by early 1840. One of their daughters was married to Joseph Bates Noble. There was another unmarried daughter, Louisa Beaman, who, who was around 25 years of age at this time. Joseph paid a visit to the house of Joseph Bates Noble and shared that he'd received a revelation on the principle of celestial marriage or plurality of wives. Joseph also stated that an angel of the Lord had commanded him to move forward. Forward. And he made it clear that Louisa Beaman was the woman with whom he intended to move forward. Just a couple of notes. It's really hard to generalize about Joseph's polygamy in part because he married resealed to all sorts of women in a variety of circumstances. But there are a couple of things that are characteristic here. First is Joseph approaching a trusted family and not approaching a woman directly, but through a male associate that he trusted. In some cases later on, it was a female associate, but often a trusted male friend and family. And then secondly, there are quite a few sources in which Joseph tells a family or prospective wife that he's doing this because an angel of the Lord has commanded it. So he makes it very clear that his reason for doing so is obedience to a divine command.

John Dehlin [00:19:19] And sometimes the, that God or the angel will kill him if he doesn't. In fact, John Turner, something that you, I think did, that I tried to do as well, is put together kind of a framework for what his pattern was. And I'm just going to list all the things that I noted as elements to these approaches or proposals and people can watch for them as we discuss each one. So again, yes, they often approach a family member, some sort of intermediary. Oftentimes there ends up being some sort of quid pro quo. In other words, the person that is approached sometimes, if not often ends up with their own plural wife as part of the bargain. They're usually very obviously very loyal, devoted people that Joseph could trust or some would say manipulate.

John Turner [00:20:18] There

John Dehlin [00:20:21] it's always secret, right? It's always justified as something God wants or an angel wants. But, but it's, but it's put on God as being the author of it. And there's often threats and, or promises and the threats are often Joseph being killed if it doesn't happen. And often a promise that the woman will receive eternal salvation and potentially her family as well. And so there's a lot of pressure that's put on, on the, the woman. So those are some of the elements. And often the woman is vulnerable in vulnerable situation, either a bad marriage or foster children or in some way in a compromised position. Her parents are dead. Not always, but these are some of the things that I have learned to look for as I've read through your accounts. Do those all seem like they're common characteristics? Not in every instance, but yeah, those

John Turner [00:21:34] are on the nose and you framed it quite properly. You can't always document those characteristics and you could find exceptions to all of them. But yes, those are, those are common elements of the situations in which Joseph introduces polygamy.

John Dehlin [00:21:57] And then other things to watch for are how young does the, is the girl? Is she already married? Is she already pregnant? And the age and pregnancy and marriage they send, they seem to follow a trend over time, their own trends. But early on, you know, watch for him marrying women who are already married and women who are already pregnant. So with all that, let's, let's jump into, let's, let's pursue Luisa Beeman further with whatever you think is noteworthy sure.

The First Plural Sealing: Louisa Beaman

John Turner [00:22:30] Well, just to sort of date it as best as we can, this first sealing takes place on April 5th of 1841 in Nauvoo.

John Dehlin [00:22:46] It's the day before the church's 11th birthday or anniversary, which I thought was interesting.

John Turner [00:22:52] Correct. And there's a grand celebration of that planned in Nauvoo for April 6th of 1841. And I will say that, you know, the dating is a little bit uncertain because Joseph Bates Noble's memory led him to different dates on different occasions. But there are quite a few sources that refer to the ceiling, and the majority of them date it specifically to April 5th of 1841. The ceiling takes place outdoors in early evening, so it's kind of dark. Apparently, Joseph and Louisa, along with Joseph Bates Noble, who performed the ceiling, they stood under a tree. According to one source, Louisa disguised herself with a coat and a hat so that she looked like a third man. Third there. According to Noble, he repeated the words that Joseph told him to use. We don't know exactly what those words are, though by the next year, we do have some sources that point to the language and theology that was used. And I think the other thing that is documented through Joseph Bates Noble's recollection is that the ceiling was consummated afterwards. Joseph Bates Noble was really blunt on the point. I saw him in bed with her.

John Dehlin [00:24:49] Yeah. Well, how in the world is Joseph Bates Noble seeing them in bed?

John Turner [00:24:54] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:24:55] So context of that.

John Turner [00:24:57] I've thought about that too, and I don't know. I think he had just built a house in Nauvoo. And so he leaves the pair, Joseph Smith and Louisa Beeman in his Nauvoo home. He returns across the river to Montrose. I. I find it hard to believe, actually, that he got them into the home and verified this consummation through the window before he departed. He may simply mean that he took them to the home, they went inside, he understood that the marriage which was consummated. But I don't. I don't have any further, further insight than that. Now when he makes that statement, that's in the 1890s, it's quite a few decades later. And it's in the context of documenting Joseph's practice of polygamy against others who insist that he didn't practice polygamy. So maybe he's a little bit over emphatic on seeing them in bed. I don't know.

John Dehlin [00:26:23] Yeah. And the fact that Joseph had her dressed like a man and in disguise, and they whispered and it was at night and Emma didn't know, these are all signs of, of them knowing that at a minimum, knowing that what they were doing is deeply problematic. But it, but it has all the signs of, of being deceptive, right?

John Turner [00:26:49] I mean, necessarily so. I mean it's, it's a bit odd that they choose to do it outside under an elm tree instead of just in Joseph Bates Noble's house. Perhaps in some ways maybe they thought a meeting in a house might attract more notice than trying to be out of the way outdoors. But yeah, I mean, this is designedly secret and that, you know, that remains the case for the remainder of Joseph Smith's life.

John Dehlin [00:27:28] In the middle of this accounting in your book on page 255, you talk about some of Joseph's potential motives. I think it's okay to maybe to touch on those. What in the world was Joseph thinking here? What, what, what do, can we, what can we estimate about his motives?

John Turner [00:27:55] So, great question. So one thing that we really don't have is any extensive self reflection from Joseph Smith himself about what the heck he was doing and why. So that is a real challenge for historians writing about Joseph's polygamy. And I also think that it's hard to have, I'd say a fair dispassionate discussion of this because it tends to get wrapped up in the question of was Joseph Smith a good guy or fundamentally, or fundamentally depraved. And it tends to, you know, I think what often happens is you hear suggestions that if Joseph's motive is primarily theological and he's sincere about it, then maybe it's more okay. If it's primarily sexual, then it must be, must be really bad. Or if Joseph had sex with only these women, then maybe it's okay. If Joseph had sex with those women, then, then it's, then it's really evil. I don't think the subject is quite so simple. It seems clear to me that there is a theological impetus that explains Joseph's behavior. The reason why I reached that conclusion is that especially once the practice really gets going. In 1842, Joseph pursues polygamy with astonishing speed and also not a lot of selectivity in the sense of. He does seem to get sealed to as many women in a wide variety of circumstances at a very rapid clip. And I think Joseph had concluded that the size of a man's earthly family and specifically his number of wives was directly connected to the extent of his eternal glory. That's why he later tells his associate William Clayton to get all you can. And that does seem to be What Joseph is doing, especially in 1842 and early 1843 at the same time, I do think Joseph would have been a lot less likely to embrace this practice had he not on some level wanted additional sexual encounters. And in a few cases wanted, I would say, something akin to an emotional relationship with a few of the wives. That's a long way of saying, as I see, I see a variety of motives. I do see a clear theological foundation, if not fully articulated until Joseph dictates his revelation on the subject. But I'm willing to consider a number of motives coming together.

John Dehlin [00:31:52] Yeah, you also mentioned at the end, and we'll hit this, I'm sure, kind of the thrill, like he starts acting recklessly in lots of ways, you know, in 1841. And I wonder if part of it is just dopamine hits. There's probably a lot of stress, he's experienced a lot of trauma. There's probably a lot of drudgery and downside to this work. And I wonder if some of this can just be reduced to like the thrill and the dopamine and serotonin and oxytocin hits of really risky behavior. I think that's something that occurred to me as I was finishing this chapter.

John Turner [00:32:33] No, absolutely. I think that's a through line in Joseph's adult life. From the high stakes, sometimes clandestine, sometimes running through the woods nature of the Book of Mormon project to dodging enemies in a cornfield with sidney Rigdon in 1837 in Kirtland. Joseph did like, high stakes activity. When I say liked, I mean was drawn to it, pursued things that were risky, wasn't prudent. And so, yes, as I say at the end of the chapter, clandestine ceilings and meetings were exhilarating. And I think, I think that is part of what drove him on at such a pace.

John Dehlin [00:33:31] Yeah. So as I, as we think about this, this little framework that I put together, we don't need to do this for everyone, but this was a relationship where there was a quid pro quo. Right. Because doesn't Joseph end up with the plural wife himself? Is that right?

John Turner [00:33:49] So that's correct.

John Dehlin [00:33:51] Meaning Joseph Noble.

John Turner [00:33:52] Joseph Bates Noble, apparently, and I'm not sure who it was, there was one woman that he wanted to make his plural wife, that didn't work out, but apparently exactly two years after Noble seals Joseph Smith to Louisa Beaman, Joseph Smith sealed Noble to a woman named Sarah Alley. And that could just be a coincidence or that could be more of an explicit indication of that quid pro quo, as you put it.

John Dehlin [00:34:37] Yeah. And I've mentioned this, I think in a past episode, but we actually recently interviewed a woman on Mormon Stories podcast. I don't think we've released her episode yet. But she was raised FLDS and her husband, she was the second wife. Her husband delivers to Warren Jeffs his own 12 year old daughter and in exchange eventually receives two or three new wives. And so there is this, there seems to be this kind of legacy that is a really dark legacy in the history of practiced Mormon and fundamentalist Mormon polygamy that really does seem to have its roots in Joseph Smith. You can't just pin it on Warren Jeffs. This idea of a quid pro quo. You get me a wife and I'll give you wives. That we have to say that starts with Joseph. Is that, is that unfair?

John Turner [00:35:52] I think that's fair. And I think, I would also say that Joseph more generally liked to reward loyalty. And so Joseph Bates Noble, I think, had been part of the Zion's camp march to Missouri back in 1834. So Joseph understood him as a very loyal follower, which is probably one reason why he approaches the family in the first place. But then, yes, there's, there's clear loyalty on Noble's part. He maintains Joseph's confidence. And two years later, then Joseph, you know, Joseph seals Noble to his first plural wife.

John Dehlin [00:36:46] Yeah, okay. As far as the other parts of the pattern he uses, Joseph uses an intermediary to approach the woman. The intermediary is very loyal, as is the woman I mentioned the reward later, we don't know if this one was justified, the God. I guess there is justification that God approves of it because it's, it's, it's framed as, as revelatory. Do we know about a threat or a promise given or offered in this case?

John Turner [00:37:23] I don't recall one. So Joseph Bates Noble had a lot to say, or at least he spoke about this on a number of occasions. If we went through all of those, we might, we might turn up something along those lines, but I don't think so.

John Dehlin [00:37:42] Okay, and is it fair to say that these are relatively gullible or highly influential or superstitious? If there's a spectrum of followers that are more or less gullible, more or less superstitious, or influence, you know, easily influenced, do you think these people kind of fall on that side of the spectrum?

John Turner [00:38:10] That's a great question. I don't know that I want to necessarily want to say that there are a few instances in which Joseph proposes plural marriage to a woman, either directly or through an intermediary. And there are some instances in which deeply faithful women, deeply faithful church members turn him down. So what exactly differentiated those individuals from someone like Louisa Beeman? We don't know. I do think that as a woman in her mid-20s with her mother having recently died, I agree that, you know, she's in a bit of a vulnerable position.

John Dehlin [00:38:59] Yeah,

John Turner [00:39:01] I will. Just as a bit of a coda to her story. I think one thing that's that I very much appreciate about the scholarship of Todd Compton in his book In Sacred Loneliness and in other publications is that he takes the lives of Joseph's wives so seriously in their own right. And they're all such fascinating and varied individuals. And Louisa Beeman's story is simply poignant and tragic. So it doesn't seem that she has much to do with Joseph Smith. After the sealing and initial consummation of their marriage, she, she may only have seen him on a few occasions afterwards. After his death, she became the plural wife of Brigham Young. And she had five children with Brigham Young, two sets of twins, and one other infant. The first set of twins was named Joseph and Hyrum. They died in infancy. The third child also died in infancy. The last set of twins also died very young. They both lived for a little while and then got sick and died. She writes about it in letters that are extremely poignant and heartbreaking. And by 1849 she develops breast cancer and there's no treatment for this painful and fatal affliction at the time. She died in 1850 in Salt Lake City. George A. Smith, Joseph Smith's younger cousin, named what is now Parowan, Utah, Fort Louisa, in honor of, as he explicitly said, the first woman to have embraced this principle of celestial marriage.

John Dehlin [00:41:36] And did you mention that she was married off to Brigham Young after Joseph died?

John Turner [00:41:42] Correct.

John Dehlin [00:41:44] And did she have a choice in that, or was that just what she was told she needed to do? Or do we know?

John Turner [00:41:53] Yeah, I think she could in theory have said no. A number of Joseph's plural widows become wives of Brigham Young. Others become the plural wives of other high ranking church members. I imagine that when Brigham Young offered himself to her as a husband, I, I, I, I, I find it hard to believe that she hesitated. She would have felt, at the very least, a need for economic protection.

John Dehlin [00:42:36] Yeah, he was powerful and rich and I, I had to wonder, I know that oftentimes cancer, we don't know the cause of it, could be genetic, but I had to wonder whether her life ending so soon of cancer could have been at all related to whatever internalized stress she may have experienced. Because what a stressful thing, right? To be the first plural wife, but to be secret about it, but to carry that with you, she had to have known that Emma didn't know. Right. Like you don't have sex with the Prophet without asking, hey, does your wife know we're doing this? So she's in some ways complicit, knowing that this is being kept from not just Joseph's wife, but also from his brother and from the First Presidency and most of the world in the Church. And that. That has. That has to be a really big burden to carry. And I wonder what that would do to your health to be harboring that for so long. Yeah, I'm speculating. I'm speculating now.

What We Know About Louisa Beaman

John Turner [00:43:47] Well, and again, this is why I'm so grateful to Todd Compton for combing through what sources we do have for women like Louisa Beeman. We actually know more about her experiences in the late 1840s because of those letters than we do of those years in which she was Joseph's plural wife. Unfortunately, we just don't know. We don't know what Joseph told her about the subjects that you just mentioned. I suggest that she probably had very little contact with him after the spring of 1841. That's not definitive, but it seems. But it seems likely.

John Dehlin [00:44:40] Okay. And, yeah. And again, this idea of her marrying off Brigham Young reminds me of one of the most disturbing themes of DNC132, which is that God kind of treats women like cattle in the sense that they get assigned and reassigned and pressured on who they get married. And their. Their value seems to be discounted, to only be a fraction of the value of a man in that sort of process. So that's. I mean, that's. That's kind of all I really have written about this first one. And of course, we won't take as much time on the next marriages, but hopefully we've laid out a decent framework. You did mention that she was financially compensated by Joseph. What can you tell us about that? Was that hush money? And is that part of the pattern as well? Is it common for Joseph in some way to financially compensate his plural wives over time?

John Turner [00:45:46] That is a great question. I don't remember what the exact compensation was in this case. There are a number of instances which I think are actually documented on the Joseph Smith Papers Project website, in which Joseph gave property to his plural wives. I don't think that's a large number of women, but there may be three, four, or Five cases of that sort of compensation. There are also a smaller number of instances in which we can trace Joseph giving valuable gifts, even potentially romantic tokens to a small number of women, namely Flora Woodworth, I think, and Eliza Snow in this case. I can't remember what the, what the compensation was. I wouldn't necessarily describe it as hush money. My sense is Louisa Beeman was deeply faithful and loyal to the church, and I don't think payment to buy her silence would have been necessary.

John Dehlin [00:47:07] Okay. And we talked about rebaptism, the practice of rebaptism in recent episodes. You also mentioned that, that Louisa, along with one of Joseph's other plural wives in Issera Ali, were rebaptized in 1843 by Joseph. Is that right?

John Turner [00:47:28] That's correct. And I don't. And again, we don't know. I don't know that much about the circumstances. If that was meant to be, you know, of particular importance because it was those three women or if it was simply part of a larger rebaptism. I don't recall.

John Dehlin [00:47:52] All right, well, that's one. One wife down. 30, 32 or 34 to go. The next morning was a, was a celebratory morning. So what's, what does one, what does a prophet do after his first plural marriage? The morning after?

John Turner [00:48:11] Yeah, so I don't think, I don't think the celebration was, yeah, I got my first plural wife. Let's have a party. But it's April 6th and it's the church's 11th anniversary. And as I said before, Joseph is kind of feeling on top of the. On top of the world because it's about two years since the church began settling what became Nauvoo. And it was really tough going at first. A lot of malaria, a lot of poverty. But the Saints have streamed into this new place of gathering. The church, through the efforts of John C. Bennett, had obtained generous privileges and charters for Nauvoo. So things are going well. The, the city is booming. And so the, the celebration involves Joseph appearing in full military costume, reviewing six hundred and fifty members of the Nauvoo Legion. There's a lot of pageantry. There are salutes, trumpets, cannon fire. A delegation of Mormon women present Joseph with a beautiful silk American flag. Joseph and church leaders, they have grand future plans. There's gonna, they're gonna start working on a new temple that's gonna contain a font for baptisms for the dead. So there are about 10,000 people there. And they watch Joseph preside over the laying of the temple's Cornerstone. And there are also powerful outsiders who come to watch Thomas Sharp, who's a nearby newspaper editor who later becomes very antagonistic to Joseph. He comes to the. Dedicated to the April 6th celebration and dedication. He praises it in print a little bit later on. Stephen Douglas, famous for the Lincoln Douglas debates in the late 1850s, and other politicians. They're coming. So Nauvoo is on the up. I think Joseph is feeling confident, which I think is one reason why he is willing to take the step of practicing polygamy.

John Dehlin [00:51:28] Wait, what. What's the connection there?

John Turner [00:51:31] Well, I just think he feels. He feels emboldened, generally. I think you can see that in other respects, he's willing. Well, I don't know if this is only particular to this time, but he's. He's willing to. He's willing to pick. Pick fights with some powerful newspaper editors and antagonists. He, I think, is feeling politically safe. So I see. I see Joseph kind of striking out in. In a certain amount of grand grandeur and recklessness.

John Dehlin [00:52:19] How. How big? You said a militia of like 650@ the. this time. Is that right? How big is that by. By, you know, mid 19th century standards in. Is this frontier America? Is it safe to say so?

John Turner [00:52:38] It's. It's impressive. So I don't. I think at its Nauvoo peak, I think the legion numbered. Might have numbered 2,000 men. So it's going to continue to grow.

John Dehlin [00:52:51] It's going to triple, more than triple.

John Turner [00:52:53] But I think for the standards of western Illinois in 1841, it's an impressive display.

John Dehlin [00:53:03] And you mentioned that he was dressed in a way that reminded people of Napoleon or General George Washington. Yeah, I thought that was noteworthy. And what I. What I had to write is megalomania. I kind of wrote the megalomania begins. I don't know if that's fair or unfair, or maybe it began back in Missouri or earlier. But I had to come up with the word mega. I had to write down the word megalomania. Is that unfair?

John Turner [00:53:33] I think that's fair. And I think I say that somewhere in the closing chapters of the book that there's an element of megalomania in Joseph's later years, both in terms of sense of grandeur and importance, but also immunity from danger. A belief that no matter what he does, he. He's going to come out ahead of his enemies and evade the threats that are out there. I do think this embrace of pageantry and grandeur, it is a shift in Joseph's behavior from, say, in the early 1830s. So sort of through the Kirtland time period, Joseph, you know, his means were much more modest, his dress was plainer. I think his demeanor in public was a little bit more humble as well. And when we get to these last several years, we see Joseph loving public pageantry and, you know, appearing in sort of fancy military dress. I do think that's a shift.

John Dehlin [00:55:01] The truth is there's a, there's probably a value from the standpoint of leadership in, in, in acting sort of this way. Like just coincidentally this past week, you know, the, the president of Venezuela was abducted through a military exercise. And the president's popularity has increased as a result. Like the common person seems to value and appreciate exercises of power by their leaders. That seems to increase popularity for the leaders, at least for a certain group of people. And so I'm sure there was value in acting this way for Joseph's leadership and for his followers.

Political Tensions and Missouri Threats in Illinois

John Turner [00:55:53] I'm sure that's true. But this was also extremely risky and provocative because, yes, when the Mormons show up in western Illinois, they at first have sympathy from a lot of other folks in Illinois, including both political parties. They're refugees from Missouri. These are downtrodden, impoverished people, but, you know, parading grandly in front of a huge militia and talking about, you know, creating a temple as glorious as Solomon's and a magnificent city that very quickly gets dressed like Napoleon. Yeah, that gets the hackles up of non Mormons in the region. So already by the summer of 1841, there's some anti Mormon meetings in places like Warsaw and Carthage. And the prophet's brother notes that persecution is kindling up again against the Saints. I mean, I think sometimes Joseph just didn't know how to keep his head down and, you know, couldn't help but provoking opposition.

John Dehlin [00:57:26] Yeah, and you meant. Yeah. So Thomas Sharp becomes an important antagonist mentioned on pages 257 and 258. And I, and I wrote, you know, why is Thomas Sharp so antagonistic? And I think you answer it because you, you know, you write, you write that Joseph Smith was, was exhibiting, quote, inordinate power. And I think people get nervous.

John Turner [00:57:53] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:57:54] And so people get too much power.

John Turner [00:57:56] Yeah, Sharp, Sharp makes that comment in print. So he edits a paper in Warsaw, also in Hancock County, Illinois. And he doesn't like the fact that, you know, the Mormons are winning some political offices and appointments in the county and he complains that Joseph's exercising inordinate power. Now, I think Joseph could at that point have tried to tamp down this potential conflict. Joseph doesn't do that. Instead, he writes this fiery letter to Sharpe, asking to cancel his subscription to Sharp's filthy sheet. Tissue of lies, sink of iniquity. And then from that point on, you know, insults are just flying back and forth. And I think that's partly because Joseph, he just doesn't have a keen sense for coming danger and just stirs up the pot, it seems, at almost every opportunity. And that really get, you know, that that causes him and the church a lot of trouble over the next several years.

John Dehlin [00:59:23] Now, I think we've used the word hubris in the past, but he just. He starts feeling invincible and too powerful. And a lesson I've learned is don't pick a fight with the news media. You'll likely regret it. And I think he does really quickly. Yeah. And he's compared by Sharpe to despot and even to, like, the czar of Russia. Is that right? Like, there's a fear, you know, the United States had just gotten out of what it considered to be despotism. So there's going to be an. An allergy to new signs or emerging signs of despotism, even at a local or regional level. Right.

John Turner [01:00:09] Yeah. And. And critics of. Of Joseph are very quick to portray him as a potential pope, sort of Pope Joseph the first, who's going to unite church and state. There's this deep sort of Protestant fear of that. And, you know, Joseph, as I say, he just doesn't lay low. You know, he. He courts the support of certain politicians. He takes partisan sides in. In Illinois, he parades at the head of this growing militia. It's not. It's not surprising. This gets other people alarmed.

John Dehlin [01:01:00] And then there's. And then the ghosts of Missouri emerge to haunt him because he starts to be pursued, even though I thought this was odd, even though he was let go in Missouri, that Missouri starts to come after him again to bring him back to. To finish the job. And what I didn't realize until I read your book was that he kind of. He kind of started it. He kind of picked a fight with Governor Boggs a little bit.

John Turner [01:01:33] So sort of. I mean, I don't actually, I don't blame Joseph for this. So apparently a group of Missouri vigilantes, there's nothing. If you read church sources in the early 1840s, you know, Missourians are pretty much all the devil incarnate. So there's a group of Missouri vigilantes that abduct four church members in Illinois. And church leaders then persuade the governor of Illinois to extradite them to obtain their extradition back to Illinois to face justice. That gets Governor Boggs riled up. So in return, he demands the extradition of Joseph and the other defendants from back in 1838, 1839. Fortunately for Joseph, the governor of Illinois at the time, George Carlin, is not particularly interested in cooperating with Missouri. He doesn't want to put the screws on Joseph. He does sort of grudgingly comply with the request. Joseph then has a hearing before none other than Stephen Douglas, who rules that the warrant for Joseph's arrest isn't valid. And so, you know, Joseph doesn't get extradited. From this point forward, though, the possibility of extradition back to Missouri is something that Joseph is keenly aware of as a potential danger. And so the subject will come up again.

John Dehlin [01:03:35] Yeah, I guess Joseph couldn't have just let that pass the vigilantes. But it certainly was part of what agitated Boggs to come back after Joseph again.

John Turner [01:03:49] Correct.

John Dehlin [01:03:50] But I guess you're saying it's a reasonable thing to do if vigilantes are coming, crossing state lines to abduct, you know, to abduct your people, you're probably not going to lie down and let that happen, huh?

John Turner [01:04:05] I think that's reasonable.

John Dehlin [01:04:08] Okay. And so Joseph was able to, at least for now, avoid being. Is it extradited back. Back to Missouri?

John Turner [01:04:20] Correct.

John Dehlin [01:04:21] And that. I don't know if that. That generous Nauvoo charter that. That John C. Bennett helped him procure was. Was a part of him being able to evade it, the habeas corpus thing, or was that unrelated?

John Turner [01:04:37] So it's not actually related at this point. In later years, Joseph obtains writs of habeas corpus which lead to him evading arrest and extradition on the basis of that charter in Nauvoo. In this case, he gets a hearing. Not in Nauvoo itself, but before Stephen Douglas in Quincy, Illinois. And Douglas rules that his arrest is. Is not legal. And so it sort of punts the real question of could he be extradited to Missouri with a proper warrant, sort of kicks that legal can down the road. But for now, Joseph is in the clear.

John Dehlin [01:05:32] But it's certainly got to stress Joseph out to know that he's constantly being. He's constantly under threat of being kidnapped and extradited back to Missouri where he could be killed. You know, he could be lynched or even put to death.

John Turner [01:05:49] That is exactly what Joseph's lawyers argue at the time, that to send Joseph back to Missouri is to send him back to his death death. That he's not going to get justice in Illinois, that a mob will simply kill him. And yes, if I were facing that, I would be totally stressed out. Joseph seems to manage that danger, you know, with a certain amount of aplomb. He doesn't hesitate to engage in other risky behavior in the face of that threat.

John Dehlin [01:06:30] Yeah. And the fact that Stephen Douglas kind of lets him off is kind of a funny coincidence or serendipity in U.S. history. But he lets. But. But you write that Douglas lets him off on a technicality, which then makes Missouri just sort of reissue.

John Turner [01:06:55] What, they just keep going after him.

John Dehlin [01:06:58] Yeah. A warrant. They reissue a warrant.

John Turner [01:07:01] Right. Joseph is going to have a lot of encounters with the law over the last several years of his life.

John Dehlin [01:07:10] Yeah, yeah. All right, so you mentioned a couple anti Mormon conventions that happen around Warsaw and Carthage. What in the heck is an anti Mormon Convention in 1841? What does that look like? Do we even know?

Anti-Mormon Opposition and Local Conventions

John Turner [01:07:28] Okay. To call it a convention, it makes it sound like something bigger and more organized than it was. But essentially that simply means a group of locals getting together.

John Dehlin [01:07:41] Like in a bar or something.

John Turner [01:07:43] Yeah. Or a courthouse. Who knows, Masonic lodge. And usually that involved, you know, passing, you know, some sort of rev resolution or issuing a declaration. I don't know what those particular meetings issued. Usually when anti Mormon sentiment was at its highest, the resolution was usually along the lines of the Mormons need to clear out. In this case, it may simply have been the Mormons need to, you know, avoid, you know, seeking and grasping for political power.

John Dehlin [01:08:24] And do you know if those conventions are loosely government affiliated, like with mayors or city councils, or is it totally informal, unrelated to local government, or do you even know?

John Turner [01:08:36] So I don't know in this case, but if we look at earlier examples and later examples, there are almost always prominent citizens such as judges, elected officials, and militia officers involved.

John Dehlin [01:08:51] Okay. All right. So you mentioned the success of the LDS missions in the. In. In Western Europe. We'll say probably mostly England. And it turns out that many of these successful missionaries return home and become Joseph's early polygamous co. Conspirators. So do you want to talk about that next?

Apostles Abroad While Polygamy Begins at Home

John Turner [01:09:16] Sure. So Joseph began practicing polygamy while the apostles were leading the British mission.

John Dehlin [01:09:24] And pretty much all of them, or most of them,

John Turner [01:09:28] almost all of them, I think, you know, Orson Hyde ends up being diverted to Jerusalem, but for the most part, they're. They're all out of Nauvoo. And these are men that Joseph regards as loyal and trustworthy. Associates. And when they start returning to Nauvoo in the summer and fall of 1841, Joseph takes them into his confidence on the subject of marriage. And it's clear that part of what he teaches them is that this is a step that they need to prepare themselves to take according to their own recollections. They are deeply hesitant. And, you know, you can find statements along those lines from Brigham Young, John Taylor, George A. Smith. They all eventually become prolific polygamists. Some of them, namely, I think, of Heber C. Kimball and Brigham Young. They overcome their scruples fairly quickly and currently. What's that? And exuberantly and prolifically. Right. So, you know, Brigham Young's first polygamous proposal is in the spring of 1842, and he seals Joseph to one of his plural wives, I think, in January of 1842. So, for the most part, these men are, you know, fairly quick and, like you said, enthusiastic converts.

John Dehlin [01:11:29] And so do they follow this pattern of first being asked to perform the ceilings of Joseph to wives, and then later, possibly as a quid pro quo, they end up with their own plural wives as well? Do they fit that pattern loosely?

John Turner [01:11:48] Well, I know that's the case for Brigham Young. I think that's the case for Heber C. Kimball.

John Dehlin [01:11:55] Okay.

John Turner [01:11:56] It may. It may generally be the case.

John Dehlin [01:11:59] Okay. Do you believe when Brigham Young said he wanted, he desired the grave, when he was told that they were supposed to practice polygamy? Or do you think that's just cover deception when really he was super stoked?

John Turner [01:12:15] That's such a great question. So that's.

John Dehlin [01:12:21] That's.

John Turner [01:12:21] That's a tough question, because there are some statements from, I think, Brigham Young himself and maybe from some of the other apostles, that God has already revealed this principle to them while they are in England. I think there's something from Brigham Young to that effect. I'll have to check in my Brigham Young biography. So part of this could be. All right. Polygamy is controversial. We'd better emphasize how unenthusiastic or opposed we were. So, I mean, I do think that's possible. On the other hand, I also think these men did have a basic sense that to embrace polygamy necessarily meant the potential disruption of their current marriages and lives to some extent. So they had to have had a

John Dehlin [01:13:27] sense that it could be the undoing of the church as well, perhaps.

John Turner [01:13:31] Yes, absolutely.

John Dehlin [01:13:33] So I can end their reputations. Yeah.

John Turner [01:13:37] So I. I don't necessarily take all of these statements at face value, but some reaction along those lines doesn't seem unreasonable.

The Revelation on Plural Marriage Takes Shape

John Dehlin [01:13:47] And then something that I, I don't think was mentioned, this chapter that our, our dear friends Michelle Stone and others would remind us of is, is that when, when Joseph is coming out, you know, and secretly revealing this new revelation about polygamy, it directly contradicted canonized scripture of the day that was in the Doctrine and Covenants that they were all carrying around and preaching from. Do you want to remind us about section 101 of the doctrine and Covenants at the time? And then the follow up question is how does Joseph reveal a revelation that contradicts, that explicitly contradicts canonized Scripture that they're all consulting as apostles?

John Turner [01:14:43] So yes, as published In Kirtland, the 1835 Doctrine and Covenants included a very blunt statement against, I forget the exact language, but essentially against polygamy. You know, Brigham Young I believe, later commented that Oliver Cowdery managed to get that into the Doctrine and Covenants either without Joseph's knowledge or somehow over his objection, I would say, you know, my sense is from the apostles who discuss Joseph introducing this subject to him, this is really never addressed that there's existing teaching against it. I also don't think there's much discussion of is it Jacob 2 in the book of Mormon. I don't think that that tends to come up either. Joseph simply introduces this as a principle and commandment from the Lord. And there's not, there doesn't seem to be a need to set it in the context of prior instruction.

John Dehlin [01:16:15] Let me read it. Inasmuch this is 1835 Doctrine and Covenants section 101. Most Mormons don't know this ever existed. This was definitely a blow to my own faith when I learned that there were previous versions of the Doctrine and Covenants which I was never taught growing up. And certainly I wasn't taught that sections were yanked and replaced. Sometimes contradictory. But you know, the article on marriage was printed in the 1835 Doctrine and Covenants as Section 101 and in the 1844 Doctrine and Covenants as Section 109, which I didn't know even today, but it basically says, quote, inasmuch as this Church of Christ has been reproached with the crime of fornication and polygamy, we declare that we believe that one man should have one wife and one woman, but one husband, except in case of death where either is at liberty to marry again. And what I just heard you say is even though that was canonized scripture, nobody ever really talked about it. What does that say? About the value, the perceived value or import of. Of canonized scripture in the 1841 Nauvoo time period. I'm confused. That seems obviously a problem, a significant problem, if people believed Joseph's revelations were of God.

John Turner [01:17:49] So it's a great question. I think the way I would answer it is that for Joseph and those close to him, the ongoing unfolding of revelations and commandments was always the most important thing. And for Joseph, there doesn't seem to be a perceived need to square everything. And I think, you know, looking back, I think, you know, I think in a general sense, a lot of Christians today have a perceived need to harmonize everything in the Bible, to want to avoid a sense of contradiction or even sometimes change over time. For members of the early church of Christ, I think the most significant thing was that they were following a prophet who was continuing to reveal dramatically new things. Now, a lot of people did fall away when they didn't like a new thing that was being revealed, But I don't think there was as much of a perceived need to harmonize and square everything.

John Dehlin [01:19:24] I mean, that's what the church would say today. They would turn this bug into a feature and say, that's the blessing of continuing revelation, is you're always getting the newest and latest stuff. That's a good thing, not a bad thing.

John Turner [01:19:39] I mean, in my mind, I think Joseph should have stuck with the 1835, but he might have lived longer, maybe. And I think it would have been easier on a large number of individuals.

John Dehlin [01:19:54] Yeah. Well, speaking of that, Joseph's next foray into plural marriage comes at the top of page 260. Towards the top of page 260, he decides to go for sisters. Let's talk about the Huntington sisters.

The Huntington Sisters and Polyandrous Sealings

John Turner [01:20:10] Yeah. So Joseph is sealed first to Zina Huntington and then to her older sister, Presendia. This is another family that's close to Joseph Smith. Joseph is in particular close to their brother, Dimmock Huntington. And Dimmock serves as an intermediary in. In this case. So, yeah, one of the obvious complications here is that both Zina and Presentia are already married. In Zina's case, she's married to a man named Henry Jacobs, who's a faithful church member. He's a 70. He's in good standing. There's no reason to question his loyalty. And it seems that Joseph sends Dimmick Huntington to talk with Zina either shortly before or after her marriage to Henry Jacobs. And in this case, it's the angel with the drawn sword. Tell Zina Joseph Told Dimick Huntington, I put it off and put it off till an angel with a drawn sword stood by me and told me if I did not establish that principle upon the earth, I would lose my position and my life. You know, according to her own reminiscence, Zina was easy to convince. Apparently. You know, she felt that God had already revealed this principle to her through dreams. And when she is six months pregnant with a child by her husband, Henry Jacobs, Dimmock sealed her to Joseph.

John Dehlin [01:22:30] Do we know if Dimmock ends up with plural wives as well? Do we know?

John Turner [01:22:36] I think he does. I can't remember when.

John Dehlin [01:22:41] Okay, that would fit the pattern. And you know, what a bold move for Joseph not just to marry sisters, but to marry women who were already married. And in at least in one case, to a faithful, devout member of the church who was a 70. Like, again, this should be something that, like, rocks the church to its core. You know, if Fanny, if Fannie was a problem in 1836 and, you know, along with the Kirtland bank scandal, you know, almost led to the undoing of the church, certainly Joseph marrying a sister pair who were already married, one of which whose husband was faithful, and assuming they knew that the husband's new right.

John Turner [01:23:34] So Henry Jacobs definitely at some point knows because he. He stands in the. I think he. I hope I'm remembering the detail correctly. I believe he stands as a proxy for Zina's eternal marriage.

John Dehlin [01:24:03] Well, Joseph,

John Turner [01:24:07] let me back up and say that again. Zina also becomes a plural wife of Brigham Young after Joseph's death. And then she is sealed to Brigham Young for time and to Joseph for eternity in the Nauvoo Temple. And I think there's a note that Henry Jacobs is there and approves. Now, what later happens is Brigham Young sends Jacobs on a mission to England, I think, and at that point, Zina becomes part of Brigham Young's household. And so this ultimately leads to the dissolution of the marriage between Henry Jacobs and Zina Huntington, which causes Jacobs, of course, a tremendous amount of anguish. We don't actually know that the ceilings to these sisters really upsets their lives during Joseph's lifetime. So there's clearly an eternal purpose. We don't really know much about, you know, Joseph's ongoing relationship with them. We don't know. We don't know whether or not the marriages were consummated. In the case of Zina, she was very circumspect when talking about the nature of her marriage to Joseph Smith. I think it's possible that the Marriage was consummated, but we don't know. We don't know for sure.

John Dehlin [01:26:10] Like, I could see a Mormon apologist saying, hey, this was legitimate because these faithful, or at least in one case, Henry's case, faithful husbands were okay with. Was consensual. Everyone knew, and they remained faithful. Like, this must be from God, because everyone was cool with it. And. And faithful.

John Turner [01:26:38] Yeah. So that's a great question. And that is an argument that one hears. And I think, first of all, I would say I would grant an overall difference in evidence about Joseph's marriages to unmarried women, to single women, previously single women, versus his marriages to married women, in that there's a good amount of evidence that at least most of the marriages to previously single women were consummated. And we don't have. We don't have the same level of evidence for the married women. You know, some scholars, like Todd Compton, tend to presume those marriages were also consummated. Other scholars, like Brian Hales, conclude that the marriages were eternal and ceremonial. I like to say, when we don't have evidence that we. We don't ultimately know. Now, your question really is sort of if the marriages were eternal and ceremonial, is this therefore okay? And I would say no, just, you know, for myself. And I realize I'm making a, you know, I'm making a moral rather than a historical judgment here, but I would say that if the pastor of my church wanted to have an eternal ceiling to my wife so that she would be his forever rather than with me, I would find that objectionable. Now, I don't think it was necessarily explained to.

John Dehlin [01:28:28] Well, that's because your pastor isn't a prophet of God.

John Turner [01:28:31] Well, I know I'm just a, you know, I'm a lowly Presbyterian. What can I. What can I say? I think one thing that's tricky is we don't always know exactly what Joseph tells individuals involved with this. I imagine that if he approached one of these husbands and said, you know, I want to be sealed to your wife, this connection between our families is going to be for the eternal benefit of both of you and your children. I can see how some husbands might have been persuaded by that. If Joseph had said, you know, I want to be sealed to your wife, she's going to be with me for eternity instead of you, I think they would have objected. So I don't think Joseph always lays out the full theological import, and that's

John Dehlin [01:29:40] what I was going to ask you is how in the world do you explain Joseph getting away with this is it money? Is it power? Is it charisma? Is it trauma? I guess one element is people's desperate fear of hell and. Or desire for exaltation. And in some sense, you know, whether by Joseph, threatening Joseph's death by the sword of an angel or the promise of manufactured exaltation for the obedient members, I guess that carrot was pretty motivating to 19th century latter day Saints. The carrot of the manufactured promise of eternal salvation, that's motivating.

John Turner [01:30:30] I think that is powerful. You know, I don't. I don't know that it's always a single thing. So in Zina's recollection, she is clearly deeply attached to Joseph Smith. She has these recollections, that of him speaking to the saints with the spirit of revelation, with his countenance being clear and bright. Zina and Presentia, these are fervently faithful church members. I think when Joseph, you know, tells her this is. This is a divine commandment and if she doesn't do it, it threatens his life and his position, that's probably, you know, that's deeply persuasive and overcomes the fact that she has just married Henry Jacobs, which, you know, that seems incredible, but I think it speaks to the depth. Depth of her attachment to Joseph Smith as a prophet. You know, in some cases, there is a lot of, I guess you could say, theological carrots. So another previously already married woman is Mary Leitner. She's married to a man who is not a church member but is reasonably friendly toward the church. Well, Joseph, you know, Joseph tells her that God has been telling him that she should become his wife for at least eight years. And again, there's an angel with a drawn sword. Joseph's emphasizing to her that he doesn't have any choice. He also says that this marriage will ensure her salvation. All that God gives me I shall take with me, for I have that authority and that power. So as Joseph explains this theologically, there is a lot at stake and there is a lot that might persuade people to accept his overtures.

John Dehlin [01:33:00] Now, who. Who was that last wife you mentioned?

John Turner [01:33:02] Mary Leitner.

John Dehlin [01:33:04] Okay.

John Turner [01:33:04] Mary Rollins Lightner. Lightner. Her married name.

John Dehlin [01:33:08] Okay. Yeah. Yeah. Well, that clearly is part of it. I guess it's fair to say that part of what made people willing to engage in polygamy or to let their wives get engaged in polygamy, the promise of salvation. It's also fair to say that that was at least part of Joseph's motivation, this desire to seal everyone up together as one big Eternal family up in heaven.

John Turner [01:33:35] True. I mean, I definitely think Joseph could have done that without poly, Polygamy and

John Dehlin [01:33:39] having sex with the wives.

John Turner [01:33:42] I mean, I, I, yeah, there's, there's definitely a, you know, a positive, laudable sort of theological foundation in terms of connecting the human family. You know, in. After Joseph's death, church leaders introduced the, the law of adoption in which couples are sometimes sealed into a prominent church leaders sort of extended family tribe. I mean there would have been other ways of pursuing that more general theological objective without polygamy.

John Dehlin [01:34:30] Yeah, certainly that's true. So really quickly, going to the next wife you list in on the mid page 262, I had not realized that Joseph married his own widowed sister in law.

John Turner [01:34:49] Correct.

John Dehlin [01:34:50] So the wife of his dead brother, basically that had never registered with me.

John Turner [01:34:56] The widowed Agnes Kulbrit Smith. So she's the widow of Don Carlos Smith, the prophet's younger brother who had died the previous summer. And that's a ceremony that's performed by Brigham Young in January of 1842. Interestingly, it to me, this is sometimes described as a levirate or levirate marriage in which it's following a biblical commandment that if a woman's husband dies without having borne him a son, then her husband's brother should take her to him as a wife, sort of produce a son and an heir for a deceased brother. But actually I don't, I don't really, I don't really see it that way because there aren't any resulting children. And again, this points to the fact that Joseph's polygamy was not about raising up some seed, at least not in this world. I think it was about eternal glory.

John Dehlin [01:36:25] Okay, so, but, but, but that, you know, it's fair to say Agnes Culver Smith was vulnerable. Right. Her, her husband had died, she was a widow.

John Turner [01:36:39] I don't really think that the prophet would have been her only option.

John Dehlin [01:36:45] Sure.

John Turner [01:36:46] So, yeah, I mean, I don't know if you're, if you're the widow of the prophet's brother, you probably could have remarried somebody else.

John Dehlin [01:36:55] Yeah. Okay. And is there any, is there any indication of, of consummating that marriage?

John Turner [01:37:08] Not directly, I don't think. However, the fact that Joseph spends time with her does become a point, a bit of a scandal in Nauvoo by the spring of 1842. So I think there's at least rumors of sexual activity.

John Dehlin [01:37:34] Okay, there are rumors and it's interesting because you mentioned that, that Joseph used the justification, the, you know, a biblical justification for his marriage. To his dead brother's widowed wife. But, but that justification never came true in the form of raising up a righteous seed, right?

John Turner [01:38:01] Yeah, well, and I don't, I don't really know that that was Joseph's justification. But historians have sometimes categorized this marriage as following that biblical commandment. In reality, by the time we get into 1842, Joseph is being sealed to women basically once a month or so. So I think Joseph is simply pursuing polygamy as quickly as he can with trusted families with women who will keep his confidence. And I think in this case his widowed sister in law sort of fits, fits that profile. It's somebody who might say yes.

John Dehlin [01:38:53] Okay, so it wasn't necessarily a bait and switch.

John Turner [01:38:56] I don't think so.

John Dehlin [01:38:58] Okay. All right, well if that weren't enough, okay, we, we have the marriage of Lucinda Pendleton Harris. Now I think I mentioned to you before that I had read somewhere that there some have theorized that Joseph had a little dalliance with her, I don't know, around 1839. Ish. Was it in Far west where they were from?

John Turner [01:39:24] Correct.

John Dehlin [01:39:25] Co located. And some have theorized that she could have been taken as maybe Joseph's second plural wife. If you count Fawn Brody as the first. Or first, if you don't count Fawn Brody. I think in a previous episode you said you didn't find any compelling evidence that Lucinda became Joseph's. Lucinda Pendleton Harris became his wife in 1839, is that right?

John Turner [01:39:55] So that's true. So first of all, just to back up this is astonishing coincidence, so Lucinda Pendleton's first husband was William Morgan, who back in 1826, not very far from Palmyra, was abducted and murdered after making plans to publish an expose of Masonic rites. So that was her first husband. A few years later she married a second time to a man named George Harris. She and George Harris were baptized

John Dehlin [01:40:45] in

John Turner [01:40:45] I think 1834 while they were still in Indiana. They then moved to Far West. Joseph and Emma and their children stayed in the Harris home briefly after their flight from Kirtland. So on that basis, some researchers have suggested that a ceiling to Lucinda could have taken place in 1838 or some other sort of relationship. We actually can't document when Joseph and Lucinda Harris were sealed, when she became his plural wife. But when Joseph died dines with Agnes Smith In January of 1842, Willard Richards notes that Sister Harris was present. I think that's a good indication that she's a polygamy Insider by early 1842 and likely becomes one of Joseph's Plural wives. About that time.

John Dehlin [01:42:08] Okay. Yeah, yeah. That. That Masonic connection is always kind of mind blowing. For sure. And she was already married. Correct. So she was another polyandrus wife.

John Turner [01:42:26] Correct. And in this case, George Harris seems to have been okay with this. He was not in any way alienated from the church. And he actually, I think like Henry Jacobs, he stands in the Nauvoo Temple as a ceremony, confirmed his wife's eternal union with Joseph Smith.

John Dehlin [01:42:53] Yeah, yeah. Why do you think Joseph. Do you have any. Do you have any opinion or data on why Joseph chose to engage in polyandry or marrying women who are already married? This was definitely one of the top three biggest blows to my testimony. When somebody. When somebody said to me, john, it's not the polygamy that bothered me, it's the polyandry. And I'm like, I think you said it wrong. And he's like, no, I said it right. It's polyandry. And I'm like, what's that? Do. Do you have an explanation or. Or theories on why Joseph Smith chose to marry women who are already married?

John Turner [01:43:33] So I have a theory, but it's just a theory. And so one theory would be that in. In some respects, this seems a little counterintuitive, but being sealed to women who were already married was, in a way less risky than being sealed to single women. So in these instances, it really didn't produce any apparent change in the lives of the plural wives or their husbands and families. So Zina Huntington, for instance, continued to live with Henry Jacobs and, you know, bore him children. Lucinda Harris continued to live with D. George Harris, and she could do so. We do know, and we'll discuss this in later chapters, when Joseph is sealed to young single women, it very much upsets their lives. They're off. You know, they need to be off the marriage market. It produces a lot of awkwardness. They often have other young suitors who need to be told to beat it, because the women aren't actually available, even though they, you know, you would think they were. So in a way, these are less risky choices. And I think that might be why so many of Joseph's early plural marriages that I. By early, I mean late 1841, first half of 1842. Most of the women are previously married. There are some researchers who question the date of the Louisa Beaman ceiling. Namely, Don Bradley argues that for a slightly later date, that would then put the marriages to already married women first with Joseph only then approaching single women a bit later on. I stick with the April 1841 date for Louisa Beeman. But thereafter, the majority of Joseph's early marriages are polyandrous. They're to women who are already married.

Joseph's Practice of Marrying Already-Married Women

John Dehlin [01:46:07] So it's safer, you're saying it's possibly safer, less risky for Joseph to marry women who are already married. It's less. Are you saying it's less potentially scandalous? Are you saying that if Joseph would have happened to have fathered a child, that it could then be dismissed as the child of the existing husband? Is that part of what you're saying?

John Turner [01:46:32] I mean, that's actually a good additional thought, but yes, that is basically what I'm saying. I mean, we know that in the instances we've just talked about, the women's lives do not change in any outward or obvious way. So essentially nothing happens that would attract unwanted attention. Now, I mentioned that one of the, you know, one of the early sources of polygamy rumors is Joseph's marriage to Agnes Smith. And so that's not a single woman, but it's a recently widowed woman, and that attracts a bit more attention. And then subsequently, Joseph's. Some of Joseph's ceilings to very young women, teenagers in particular. Those create far. They seem to create more anguish for the wives who feel that they have to live differently, who have to break off things with other suitors. So I realize this is a bit of a counterintuitive theory because the plural marriages to married women, that. That seems, on the face of it, more controversial, but in a. In a way, I think those marriages upset fewer apple carts in Nauvoo at the time.

John Dehlin [01:48:21] Okay. And it's about. It's a. It's a little over a third of his marriages are polyandrous or to women already married. Correct.

John Turner [01:48:33] That's. That. I think that is correct. So, but again, there's a bit of a timeline here. So through the summer of 1842, the majority of the plural marriages are women who are already married. Thereafter, most of the marriages are to women who are single at the time.

John Dehlin [01:49:01] Yeah. Okay. Well, that's clearly, I would say, for people who leave the church over church history. I think the polyandry is one of the top three reasons people are leaving the Mormon Church, at least in my experience. It's definitely a big one. So, you know, it's. And honestly, it's something that Richard Bushman's book Rough Stone Rolling seems to completely leave out and avoid even discussing, if I remember correctly, at least in any substantive way, which is, I think, one of the biggest criticisms that people have made of his book. And I think that I've even heard him admit that he regrets that he shied away from discussing the polyandrus marriages. Does that sound right to you?

John Turner [01:49:54] Well, so I've heard. I've heard Richard say more generally that he should have spent more time on polygamy in general. I know, I know. He at least introduces the subject of polyandry or the fact that a number of Joseph's wives were already married. I think, you know, and I, I don't engage other biographers explicitly overly often in my book. I do here note that Richard Bushman states that at the heart of Joseph's polygamy was his lust for kin, which is a contrast to Fawn Brody's portrayal of Joseph as, on some level, a libertine, someone who is, you know, lusting for women for sexual reasons. For me, the key is not so much Joseph's desire for kinship, but his thirst for eternal glory and power. There are plenty of ways that Joseph could have formed deeper connections with family in kinship, like ways that didn't involve polygamy.

John Dehlin [01:51:27] Yeah. So sex, sex and power are at least two possible theories. I don't know if money was tied up in, in these polyandrous marriages, but

John Turner [01:51:45] I don't think Joseph, I don't think Joseph made money off of them. I, I do agree with Kathleen Flake's observation that if a man wants to have sex with a bunch of women, polygamy is not the simplest way to go about it. And I also think that in at least.

John Dehlin [01:52:07] But it is the way to make it divinely sanctioned.

John Turner [01:52:09] You could make it divinely sanctioned, though you wouldn't necessarily need to be sealed to, you know, 30 some women for that purpose. I also think that on balance, sex in at least most cases was probably rare. I think in some cases, perhaps in many cases, Joseph consummated a marriage and then often didn't have that much to do with a plural wife thereafter. One reason I lean toward that conclusion is because of the lack of children. I do think Joseph had, you know, the overall orientation toward the accumulation of eternal glory and power of exaltation. And I think that that is the basic reason why he pursues polygamy so recklessly and with such rapidity during these months.

John Dehlin [01:53:21] All right, well, we cover several other wives in. You cover several other wives in the chapter. Did we talk about Sylvia Lyon?

John Turner [01:53:34] We did not. So this is, this is another, you know, it's just kind of crazy. He's, he is sealed to 23 year old Sylvia Lyon and also sealed to her mother. Patty Sessions.

John Dehlin [01:53:58] So this is a mother, daughter pair. Now we've got a mother daughter pair.

John Turner [01:54:03] I think it's the only mother, daughter, pair.

John Dehlin [01:54:05] Okay.

John Turner [01:54:08] So, yeah, I mean, it's, it's. It's sort of crazy. Apparently, you know, this Windsor Lion, Sylvia's husband, he has a brief period In, I think 1842, 1843, where he's in, you know, his sort of church standing is in jeopardy. I forget. I forget the exact details. Also, she's a somewhat important instance because there's a daughter, Josephine Lyon, who many decades later states that her mother tells her that she is Joseph Smith's child rather than Windsor Lyons. Now, this is, you know, this is a bit of a point of some controversy. People who have done some genetic research on, I think her descendants and known descendants of Joseph Smith do not think that Josephine is Joseph Smith's child. I noted that in his volumes on Joseph Smith's polygamy. Brian Hales nevertheless thinks that that research is not conclusive and that this could be an instance of a Joseph Smith descendant by a plural wife. But I sort of stick with. We don't have any known children of Joseph Smith from his plural wives.

John Dehlin [01:56:04] Is it fair to say that the story that was handed down in the Lion Sessions family, that Josephine was indeed the daughter of Joseph Smith implies or provides further evidence that Joseph did consummate his marriages, his polygamous marriages. Is that pretty good evidence of that, do you think?

John Turner [01:56:31] No, I think that. I think that's fair and I think this would be an instance. And if that's true, that would be an instance of Joseph consummating a plural marriage with an already married woman.

John Dehlin [01:56:48] Yeah. Okay. So, yeah, a lot of people want to say that, that Joseph Smith may have had these marriages, but he, but he didn't have sex with the wives. And I guess you're. What you're telling us today is there's lots of evidence suggesting that he did.

John Turner [01:57:10] Well, I, there's, as I said before, there's a lot more evidence for the previously single women. I think Sylvia, Sylvia Lyon is a strong possibility. It's. Yeah. I mean, I think the thing is, most, most people in the 19th century, they didn't have much to say about their sexual activity on the record or even in, you know, private. Private journals.

John Dehlin [01:57:42] Right. Yeah.

John Turner [01:57:43] Most people are circumspect about. I would go back to one thing I said at the beginning. I don't think, you know, I think Joseph's practice of plural marriage is deeply problematic in a number of respects. I think it's problematic to tell women if you're in a position of religious authority that God is commanding you to marry them. Honestly, even if they were single, I find that a little bit dubious. Even if, even if this wasn't involving polygamy, I think it's, you know, I think it's deeply problematic to make a marriage a matter of theological benefits or punishment. I think it's problematic to marry single women and upset their lives and those of their family and force them to break off attachments to others. So I don't really think there's a way to make all of this simply okay and not problematic. So even if we conclude that all of the polyandrous ceilings, even if we conclude there was no sex involved in any of them, I don't think that overall makes Joseph's polygamy okay. You know, I think, I think there. I think this is deeply, deeply unwise on Joseph's part. Deeply reckless, focused primarily on the eternal power and glory of himself and his associates, and not stopping to think about the consequences for all of the individuals and families involved.

John Dehlin [02:00:02] Yeah, it makes no sense. Somebody who's trying to weigh the evidence about polygamy thoughtfully and fairly. It makes no sense that every prophet and every polygamist after Joseph had sex with all their wives, as far as we know. I mean, sex was inextricably linked with Mormon polygamy for every prophet and participant after Joseph Smith until it ended. Why would we want to make an exception for Joseph's underaged or polyandrous wives? That's clearly just special pleading when there's no reason to think that they should be exempted from the sex. It would just be special pleading. It seems to me like that just seems like a unre, you know, unreasonable argument which Brian Hales really wants to do. Brian Hales really wants to create every reason to believe that Joseph Smith's underaged and.

John Turner [02:01:09] Or

John Dehlin [02:01:11] we shouldn't even call them wives because they weren't wives. The Joseph Smith under underaged relationships and. Or relationships with already married women. There's just no reason to believe he didn't have sex with them, even though Brian Hills seems to want us to think that. The other thing is, this just gets more and more outrageous. It's like if you were going to write this as scandalous fiction, you would say, all right, Joseph, well now you've, now let's have you marry your dead brother's wife. All right, now marry sisters. All right, now marry mother, daughter, pairs. All right, now marry women who are already married. Like it's just more and more now. Now let's throw in an angel threatening to kill you if you don't do it. Like, the audaciousness and the just level of risk is just. It's jaw dropping now. Now let's have the daughter who you're married to attend your marriage to her mom. You know, I mean, it's just. It.

John Turner [02:02:19] Yeah. All I can say is just wait for the later chapters.

John Dehlin [02:02:23] Wait. It gets worse.

John Turner [02:02:25] It gets worse. Yeah, I mean, I, I.

John Dehlin [02:02:29] Now let's do pregnant women, Joseph. Let's do pregnant women. Like, it's just, it's ridic.

John Turner [02:02:35] Yeah, I agree. I think audacity, recklessness, megalomania, and we're

John Dehlin [02:02:43] laughing, but I guess to bring it back to soberness, we're laughing because it's so unbelievable and outrageous. But I do think Todd Compton's In Sacred Loneliness is a really good source to read how actually heartbreaking and painful and even treacherous these marriages actually were not just on the women, but on many of the family members or husbands, correct?

John Turner [02:03:16] Oh, I think that's. I think that's absolutely the case. I think one other thing that's important to keep in mind in terms of Joseph's practice of polygamy is Joseph is murdered in June of 1844. And after his death, when Brigham Young leads the Saints west, that is the first opportunity that Mormons have to openly live out this principle. I think Joseph, he was pursuing a principle without a plan. And I, I do think his most basic impulse was to, and I don't mean to put this overly crudely, was just to get all that he could. And, you know, he explained that to William Clayton. You know, get all you can be sealed to as many women as. As you can. And that's what, that's what Joseph was doing. And we just don't know what Joseph had in mind for the long term, how he intended to structure the practice of polygamy on earth. We don't know. His life is cut short. And so others had to figure out how to actually live this out. So, yes, it gets more audacious, it gets more reckless. And the marriages that we've described so far, with some exceptions, you know, we, we don't know that much about the nature of those relationships. We know a bit more for some of the later examples because some of the individuals involved had. Had more to say about them.

Mary Rollins Lightner and Other Plural Wives

John Dehlin [02:05:18] All right, well, so, yeah, so going on to the other wives, and it's about a dozen that you talk about in this chapter. Mary Rollins Lightner was pregnant when Joseph married her. She was carrying her third child. She was married. So that was a polyandrous wife. I've heard and speculated that Joseph married pregnant women so that if he did impregnate him would. Well, so he couldn't impregnate him, which again would fly in the face of the Book of Mormon justification that you entered into polygamous marriages to raise up a righteous seed. And that actually is problematic because on the one hand, apologists could say, well, you know, Joseph didn't have sex with these wives because there were no kids. And so no harm, no foul, there was no sex. But if there was no sex and no posterity, then that takes away the whole Book of Mormon Jacob exception. That the only reason polygamy should be done would. Was was to raise up a righteous seed, meaning to have children or posterity. That's a problem, right?

John Turner [02:06:34] Well, maybe it's a problem. I think if you look at Joseph's July 1843 revelation, so DNC 132, it's more about eternal increase and glory than it is about raising up seed on the earth. I don't think there's any reference to the Jacob exception in the Book of Mormon. And that's certainly not how Joseph, as far as I know, Joseph does not introduce that as a rationale to anyone in Nauvoo,

John Dehlin [02:07:11] which is interesting because. Yeah. And I guess he just goes back to this idea of ongoing revelation. Right. It's just whatever the latest thing is is what people are excited to accept and follow the past. Past revelations are very expendable and I think we've covered that quite extensively in this series. Anything else worth mentioning about Mary Rollins Leitner?

John Turner [02:07:38] Well, I mean the. One of the. And I've already referred to it, but one of the things that is so great about Todd Compton's In Sacred Loneliness is that he takes the lives of all these women seriously. Mary Leitner lived a very long life. So she was at what is now Brigham Young University, I think, in 1905, talking about her marriage to Joseph Smith. And I mean, I find. So she left a lot of records behind and, you know, talked, talked publicly and proudly about these events in her life. In a way that's a little bit different than somebody like Zina Huntington. Zina Huntington, fervently faithful woman, you know, sort of renowned as a significant 19th century female Mormon leader. You know, when she looked back on, when she talked about plural marriage, she suggested, you know, this was tough, this was not easy, this was, this was a burden. And I think that's because in her instance, plural marriage ultimately dissolved a preexisting marriage, whereas in the case of Mary Rollins Lightner, she continued living with Adam Lightner and didn't become part of Brigham Young's household or something like that.

John Dehlin [02:09:28] Okay. All right, let's see. Yeah, it was. It was with you mention it towards the bottom of 263 that it was again with Mary Leitner that Joseph uses the justification that an angel appears to him three times threatening to slay him. What. What do you think that says about God? If God is using an angel to threaten to murder Joseph Smith, if the women won't get married to him and have sex with him, what does that say about God and angels to you?

The Angel with a Sword and Coercive Elements

John Turner [02:10:11] So, first of all, I would say that the idea of an angel with a drawn sword, I think there's a few biblical passages with that image, and I'm sure that's where Joseph is getting the idea. I certainly don't think that God threatens to slay people who don't engage in polygamy. So I think that's. That's a little bit. You know, that's not my view of God. So I. I can understand how this would put a lot of pressure, you know, pressure on somebody like Mary Leitner.

John Dehlin [02:11:00] So that, I guess that would mean Joseph was either lying that an angel threatened to kill him, he was either lying or somehow had actual visions of an angel. Well, either that it really happened, which is problematic, or that he was lying that it happened, which is problematic. Or the third option, I guess, is that he really indeed had a vision or a dream where he believed that an angel was threatening to kill him. Where do you come down on. Those are probably the only three options.

John Turner [02:11:36] Which of those do you think is the scariest option? John Deloitte. Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:11:42] The least scary is that he just had a bad dream, because we can all have bad dreams that are kind of crazy.

John Turner [02:11:49] Yeah. So I'm not quite sure how to. How to parse that. So, you know, we talked quite quite a few times in this series, and I talk some in the book about the. The difficulty of sincerity. So it's very hard to assess whether Joseph's being sincere or is he simply introducing this as a way to pressure people, you know, for his own purposes? We don't know. I think if he's sincere, that doesn't make it okay. You know, it's still not okay to put theological pressure on people to accept a polygamous proposal, even if you sincerely think that's what. What God wants. I think it's still. I think it's still problematic. I think it's also possible. It is possible to me, conceivable that Joseph understands polygamy as a principle and adds in this sort of stuff as embellishments when he's introducing it to people. I mean, he's. He's kind of got to kind of make a pretty good sales pitch in order to overcome what are going to be strong objections from women. So I think that's also a possibility. The reason why I think it's reasonable or at least conceivable that Joseph believes that this is a divine principle is, you know, look at the opening to D&C.132. Joseph wants to know why it was that God was okay with Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Moses. I forget everybody he names one. Why is it okay for them to have had many wives and concubines? I certainly can understand how somebody could read the Bible and conclude that God is fine with polygamy. So Joseph, being bent on the restoration of all things, I could see him reaching that conclusion. Could Joseph have had a vision of an angel with a drawn sword? Well, of course he could have. He's very much steeped in biblical imagery. I would say that no matter what, what I find problematic is, you know, Joseph doesn't. Doesn't seem to have stopped in 1841 or 1842, and to have thought about what his actions and decisions are going to mean for the large number of people who are ultimately affected by this. In some instances, and we'll talk about one in a later chapter, Joseph does have to reckon with the fact that. That a ceiling to him creates anguish and upset for young women and their families. And Joseph sometimes has to devise solutions for that anguish. So there are instances in which he's aware that at the very least, ceilings are creating complications and difficulties for people, but he doesn't, for the most part, seem to have given that too much thought before plunging ahead.

John Dehlin [02:15:35] Yeah, this is a. I mean, you say it gets worse in subsequent chapters, but, like, if you just look at this paragraph at the bottom of 263 on how he engaged Mary Lightner, he says that God. God told him to do it. That God told him to do it as early as 1834. Now God's telling him, not her. That's suspect. Then he mentions the angel threatening to slay him three times with the drawn sword. Not just a sword, but with the drawn sword, like so, the angel appears a third time and draws the sword. That's potentially very Manipulative. He goes on to say that to Mary that he has no choice, that he's being forced. That feels manipulative, even though she's already married. And then he tells her that she always had been meant for him. That's pretty manipulative and disturbing, potentially, that she was created for him before the foundation of the earth was laid. That language is disturbing, like God, ha. I want to make something for Joseph. Let me create a woman for him. It makes women again. It follows this narrative that women are like cattle or prize their possessions of men. So that's disturbing. I don't know if she experienced that as flattering at the time, but finally he gives this carrot that it's going to ensure her salvation, which again, is highly manipulative. And he's saying, I shall be saved in the kingdom of God, and I will take thee with me, for I have that authority and power. And then you write, mary must have felt intense pressure. Joseph was her prophet. His life was at stake and so was her eternal glory. Well said, John Turner.

John Turner [02:17:40] I mean, I think if you wanted to apologize for Joseph, you'd say, well, he's been reluctant. You know, God's been telling him to do this. He hasn't wanted to do it, so he's put it off. But I just think there's no, I don't think there's any way out of the fact that Joseph, he puts the theological screws on people when he discusses the idea of plural marriage with them. And I don't want to say. I don't want to say that the women have no agency in these situations. Um, I think if you take human beings seriously, you don't really want to reach that conclusion. There are women who turn Joseph down, but Joseph does have a lot of authority and theological power. And in some instances, this isn't the case. In this instance, in some instances, there's a lot of pressure from families, from women to accept Joseph's proposals. In this case, that's not what's going on here. But there is a lot of theological pressure.

John Dehlin [02:19:10] Yeah, to say the least. Okay, and really quickly, what do we make of what you account that later, Mary Leitner receives her own witness from God that she should engage in polygamy. And she's not the only one. In fact, I think many of Joseph's plural wives receive their own manifestations from God or angels. That God or angels endorse the marriages. Isn't that checkmate? John Turner. God and angels must be approving because the women themselves, who are we to Tell the women, or to state that the women didn't, you know, weren't told by God and angels that this was something God and angels wanted.

John Turner [02:20:03] Yeah, well. Well, like I said, I don't want to totally deny the agency of Joseph's plural wives and the fact that they sometimes, you know, they had. They had sometimes more and sometimes less power to make choices for themselves. In Mary Leitner's case, yes, she's anguished by Joseph, she's skeptical, but she's willing to pray about it. She also discusses it with Brigham Young. You can guess what he said. Right. Which I think would be something along the lines of, go ahead. But, yeah, she sees an angel in front of her bed, white, bright, beautiful, with piercing eyes. And she understands that as spiritual confirmation of what Joseph has proposed to her. And there are other women with similar experiences. I mean, I think many of these individuals, they are fervent believers. The Huntington sisters and Louisa Beaman, for instance, they speak in tongues. They're accustomed to visions and ecstatic experiences. And Mary Lightner was probably open to them as well. Yes. As your question suggested. Suggested. I don't think an angel actually appeared to Mary Lightner and told her that she should marry Brigham Young. She definitely believed that that was the case.

John Dehlin [02:21:38] Yeah. Yeah.

John Turner [02:21:40] Well, that's Brigham Young. I'm sorry, Joseph Smith. To Joseph Smith.

John Dehlin [02:21:44] Yeah. Well, that's something that apologists are always going to say, is that the women received their own. Most of the women received their own witnesses, and that they were happy to be obedient to God, I guess. I will note that many of Warren Jeff's wives have testified the same sorts of witnesses. And I'm sure that David Koresh's wives and many other what. What I think even faithful Mormons would be comfortable describing as cult leaders. Polygamous wives have also claimed to receive divine manifestation of their union with their. Their prophets. But it is. It is a complicating factor. Right.

John Turner [02:22:33] Yeah. I think the other thing that I'd want to say to listeners is, you know, my criticism of Joseph's polygamy isn't based on the fact that monogamy was egalitarian and always lovely for couples in the 19th century. And it's not based on an argument that polygamy was always a terrible experience for women, women in the 19th century. It's also not based on the idea that women did not sometimes actively choose polygamy out of their agency in a desire to better their lives. You can find examples of women in monogamous marriages to abusive or Alcoholic husbands in the 19th century who abandon those terrible husbands and become the plural wives of church members and are more content. I mean, it's not as if this has to be a simple. You know, it's not always a simple subject. I nevertheless think that as Joseph pursued it, you know, the amount of his religious authority and the pressure put on women and their families and the fact that being sealed to Joseph, at least in some cases, created this worldly difficulties for the wives, all of those, those are the reasons why I'm critical of Joseph's polygamy.

John Dehlin [02:24:30] Yeah, valid. All right, well, you write at the top of 264that by the middle of 1842, Joseph Smith had around a dozen plural wives. Do you want to talk about that? And, oh, you write that they were ranged from ages 17 to 53. So we don't have, you know, 14 year olds, 15 year olds yet. Many, we, we have the polyandry. Many of his early marriages were polyandrous and. Yeah. Anything else you want to say to summarize Joseph's first year of polygamy in Nauvoo? Yeah.

Analyzing Joseph's Motivations and Recklessness

John Turner [02:25:17] So I'll just read a few sentences that I think, Please illustrate my conclusions. The diversity of cases makes generalization challenging. I mean, this is tough. I mean, as, as you pointed to, these are women who could be single, married or widowed. They could be very young. They could be considerably older than Joseph. One of the, one of the few constants is that Joseph knew these women well, or at least knew and trusted members of their families. He approached families and women that he thought would accept the doctrine. And it seems that most women and families did accept what Joseph taught, which is pretty remarkable. They were willing to do something that they at first considered repugnant because they believed so strongly in Joseph as God's prophet. I think in terms of the already married women, Joseph underscored the eternal benefits for those families, including for those first husbands who belonged to. To the church. I think the fact that most of the husbands remained friendly toward Joseph in the church suggests that Joseph told them that the ceilings wouldn't affect their marriages. Then I think a big question for me when thinking about this subject is not so much why did Joseph practice polygamy, but why so many wives? You know, if God's telling Joseph he has to practice polygamy, well, maybe you could satisfy God by marrying one or two. But, you know, why so many women and why so quickly? Some. This is from the book. Some of the prophet's followers later connected the size of a man's family to the extent of his celestial glory. And it seems likely that Joseph thought along such lines. Joseph thirsted for eternal glory and power. It's the simplest explanation for the proliferation of marriages, one that fits within the reality that in many instances there was little relationship, sexual or otherwise. After the ceilings, Joseph's marriages also fit into a pattern of growing recklessness, present as well in his finances and political strategy. Once he embraced plural marriage, he pursued it with audacity and in caution. Joseph, it turned out, enjoyed living dangerously,

John Dehlin [02:28:21] that is for sure. You do mention that, that, you know, Joseph's. The husbands of these wives remain generally on good terms with Joseph. I think that just goes to show how powerful and charismatic he was. I don't know how else to, to explain that. It's kind of weird that he was able to keep all these 12 plus marriages from Emma, from William Law, and even from John C. Bennett. I mean, John C. Bennett at some point is going to get involved in this polygamy, spiritual wifery stuff. But it seems like somehow Joseph was able to marry at least 12 women and keep it from Emma and William Law and Sidney Rigdon and his own brother Hyrum and many others in the church. Is that right? And the general public?

John Turner [02:29:19] Well, sort of, yes and no. So we've basically made it to the middle of 1842 as far as the ceilings go. But by the end of March 1842, at early meetings of the Relief Society, there are rumors of polygamy and there are rumors of Joseph's activities that he needs to find ways to refute. So only yes and no. And by the summer of 1842, John C. Bennett is out of the church and he publishes a book that, among other things, exposes Joseph's political polygamy, including to women such as initials lb. So Louisa Beeman. I can't remember all of the names that Bennett includes, but it's clear that he knew about some of the ceilings. And so, yes, this remains a secret, but rumors are always rampant. I think Emma either simply believes Joseph's denials through May of 1843, or doesn't want to know and reckon with the truth of what her husband is doing.

John Dehlin [02:30:49] Yeah, The, the, the chapter ends with sort of an analysis of Joseph's recklessness because the recklessness wasn't confined only to the polygamy. Do you want to, do you want to discuss that as we wrap up this, this episode in this chapter?

John Turner [02:31:15] Sure. So as I said earlier today, you know, Joseph just didn't know how to keep his head down and avoid Stirring up trouble. So, for instance, one of the blessings of the early Mormon settlement in Illinois is that both political parties are sympathetic to the Saints. Well, for the most part, Joseph ends up supporting Democratic candidates and antagonizing Whig candidates and Whig political editors. So it would have been probably wiser to cultivate good relationships with both parties. Instead, Joseph, Joseph pretty baldly trades Mormon votes for political promises. So he ends up antagonizing a lot of Illinois politicians. We've mentioned before that Joseph's accumulation of debt created all sorts of trouble for him in Kirtland, but he puts himself in a similar bind in Nauvoo. And I would say even if Joseph is convinced of the theological necessity of plural marriage, it certainly would have been wiser to proceed more cautiously or slowly. But he just plunges in to all of these things. And as we'll see, even when polygamy becomes a public rumor and scandal, Joseph continues to plunge ahead. So he doesn't really adopt a more cautious approach even when things begin to unravel.

John Dehlin [02:33:25] Yeah, yeah, this is, this is for sure. If there were a beginning of the end, you could say that kind of 1842, you could make an argument that 1842 is sort of the beginning of the end. Is that unreasonable?

John Turner [02:33:43] I think you're starting to be able to foresee what's going to happen. And honestly, as much with the politics as with the polygamy, if you recall when we started this chapter, things are going extremely well for the Mormons in Nauvoo. They've kind of overcome the disease of the first couple of summers. Converts have been streaming in. There's going to be a lot more coming from England in the years ahead. There's a lot of economic possibility and promise, and as unfortunately happened with prior Mormon settlements, it's all going to go south pretty quickly.

John Dehlin [02:34:39] Yeah, and I, we. I've already talked about this earlier today, but just in closing, I've been trying to figure out, was Joseph just a lustful man? Did he have mental illness? Was he narcissistic? Was, did he just have too much hubris? Was, was he a victim of ptsd? You know, was he just a megalomaniac and caught up in, in the excitement, was he just, you know, a risk taker, going for the thrill of the risk? Do you have a, do you have a conclusion about, in summary, what's going on with Joseph here, why he's becoming so reckless? What's your summary, John Turner?

John Turner [02:35:29] Yeah, well, so Joseph had always been tolerant of risk and, you know, could do Harebrained things. So it's an acceleration of this than a totally new thing in Nauvoo. I do think. I don't know. I don't think there's a single answer to the question. I do think in the wake of Missouri, Joseph wants to accumulate power and exercise it, ostensibly, you know, for some good reasons, he wants to protect himself and his people from their enemies. And when I'm saying that, there are some explicit statements from Joseph in later chapters that it's good if you have power to exercise it. And so Joseph, he wants a powerful militia that will deter enemies. He wants powerful political allies. In terms of polygamy, I don't think there's a great explanation other than Joseph's theological, you know, conclusion for why he engages in this rapid and reckless pursuit of polygamous marriages. I do think that's his. You know, I do think that's his, you know, that's what undergirds this, why Joseph was unable to stop and think about the earthly consequences. I think that's. I think that's hard to understand. He doesn't really reflect on it.

John Dehlin [02:37:14] So you don't. You don't have a conclusion yourself necessarily.

John Turner [02:37:18] I don't have. I don't have a great conclusion. So what I think in terms of the theology is Joseph has been wrestling for years with how do humans achieve the glory, the fullness of the glory that Jesus Christ grows into and achieves? You know, Joseph, he's clearly thinking about that theological endpoint. As early as, say, 1833 in Nauvoo, he begins to try to. He begins to answer that question. And there's not a single answer. There are the other ordinances that Joseph introduces that become known as the endowment and ultimately the second anointing. But we don't really know exactly when Joseph reaches this conclusion, but at least by 1843, he articulates the idea that sealing in marriage is also a precondition for that eternal glory. And I think Joseph's, Joseph's many and rapid polygamous marriages, they reflect that conclusion. You know, the more wives, the more family, the more glory, the more eternal power.

John Dehlin [02:39:00] So it sounds like in your mind, you hold open the real possibility that he believed he was adding to his eternal increase with these polygamous marriages.

John Turner [02:39:10] I do hold out that possibility. I mean, that's part of Joseph's by far fullest statement on the subject in DNC132. I don't think that makes it okay. If Joseph sincerely believed it, therefore all of his actions are justified. But I do think he believed that.

John Dehlin [02:39:32] Yeah. So, I mean, that would mean that he either was receiving revelations from God and angels, or he was deluded into thinking he was, or he made that up, but still somehow believed that he was being led by God, even though he was lying about receiving revelations and angelic visitations, which, frankly, reminds me a lot of the Book of Mormon, you know.

John Turner [02:40:02] Yeah. So I guess the other thing I'd say is one thing I try to do in the book and in our conversations is, you know, I try to be bluntly generous and critical of Joseph. So the, you know, we talked about baptism for the dead an episode or two ago, which, you know, is also about, you know, honoring and cementing these bonds among generations. And when Joseph introduces this what I would call ritual innovation, church members love it. You know, they eat it up. They're all racing into the Mississippi. Like it's. It's like Joseph Smith's religious leadership at its most effective. And it met this deep anxiety that many church members had about the eternal fate of their loved ones. In the. In the case of Joseph's teachings on marriage, Mormons share a general 19th century hope that heaven will be a family reunion. That's not a Mormon innovation. A lot of Protestants are thinking in that direction. And at the same time, you know, there's. There's always anxiety about whether I will be reunited with my loved ones. And Joseph's teaching of eternal marriage and the ritual connected to it can speak to those, you know, can speak to that anxiety in a way that's effective. It clearly spoke that way to Hyrum Smith, whose first wife had died. You know, he wanted to be reunited with her. And you can find other instances like that. Polygamy, on the other hand, is an innovation that just generates. In my opinion, it generates anxiety and rancor rather than responding to it. You know, there was. It's. It's. It's just a different, you know, it's a very different dynamic than those more positive aspects of Joseph's leadership.

Reflections, Reactions, and What Comes Next

John Dehlin [02:42:58] So does this. Does this in the end? You know, I know we've got. Maybe the worst is yet to come as far as polygamy goes, but does this bring you a sense of disgust for Joseph Smith and how he behaved? Is that. Is that even fair to ask a historian?

John Turner [02:43:16] Yeah, well, I always say you can ask me any questions, John. So, yeah, no, it does. And I do think, you know, his. The main job of a historian isn't to pass moral judgment on. On their subjects. And so I don't primarily you know, I don't think I primarily write about polygamy in that vein because, frankly, it's such a challenge simply to document and narrate it. But at the same time, yeah, there are times where I think that's. That's fair. I do feel. I do feel disgust for some of the actions that Joseph takes and the consequences for the people involved. Similarly, you know, I feel that way with Brigham Young at times. So it's Brigham Young who's really responsible for the dissolution of Zina Huntington's first marriage.

John Dehlin [02:44:34] Yeah. And I, you know, I remember, I guess, to some extent, you know, whether it's Martin Luther King Jr. Or Thomas Jefferson, it's probably hard to find powerful, successful leaders that don't do really disappointing things, you know, John Adams or Alexander Hamilton. So I guess we're all stuck with trying to figure out how far is too far, what's the level of foible or error or sin that, like, is within the realm of reasonable versus, like, what's. What's beyond the pale and makes this person just a truly despicable, deplorable bad person. I guess that's a decision we all have to kind of make.

John Turner [02:45:22] Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:45:23] When reviewing someone's history.

John Turner [02:45:25] Yeah, that's such a. That's a good observation, because we're all. I mean, I think we're all a mixture of good and bad as. As human beings. But I think when we encounter, you know, when we don't necessarily just also want to brush aside, you know, historical behavior on that basis. But at the same time, I think we also. I mean, as a historian, I also want to be a little bit humble and careful about exercising moral judgment, especially when we don't have, you know, complete information. So particularly as. As we move forward, there are some instances in which, you know, Joseph's polygamous behavior is simply mind blowing, sometimes, I think, abusive to the women involved. And I don't always, you know, end those narratives with a statement to that effect, but I think a lot of readers and listeners would probably draw that conclusion on their own.

John Dehlin [02:46:57] Yeah. Yeah. Well, that's up for you, the viewer and listener to decide. Well, what an important and thoughtful episode today. What a great chapter. John Turner. I've mentioned this before. Fawn Brody's no Man Knows My History, Richard Bushman's Rough Stone Rolling, Even Dan Vogel's biography and Joseph Smith, or even Ben Parks. I don't even know if Ben Parks. I haven't read his Nauvoo book, but this is the first. Other than Todd Compton's. Book. This is the only biography I'm. Well, which isn't a biography of Joseph Smith. Yours is the only biography of Joseph Smith I'm aware of that is a comprehensive biography of his life and goes into this much detail about his plural marriages. And so for that I'm really grateful and I just really love this book. So I want to encourage everyone to buy it. Please buy Joseph Smith, the Rise and Fall of an American Prophet. Please like and subscribe to this channel. Please comment and like and subscribe on these episodes. Please email us with any feedback. Mormonstoriesmail.com thank you to our donors who have made this possible. And if you value this series and you want to see it continue, want to make sure John Turner gets paid for his great work, please go to donorbox.org Joseph Smith and you can donate to this series as well. John Turner, do you want to talk about what's coming up in the next chapter?

John Turner [02:48:38] So, yeah, we're going to be busy. We've got Book of Abraham, it's back. We've got masonry, it's back. We've got a relief society. We've got what becomes the endowment ceremony. We've got more marriages. It's going to be crazy.

John Dehlin [02:49:03] And you're saying it gets more intense. Like it's hard to imagine more intensity than today. JOHN Turner.

John Turner [02:49:11] We're going to keep it's going to ratchet up right until the end, I'm afraid.

John Dehlin [02:49:16] Yeah. And we're on page 266 and the text goes all the way to 376. So we've got still 110 pages to go.

John Turner [02:49:28] They are full of things that we'll want to talk about.

John Dehlin [02:49:33] What an epic series. John Turner. Chris Thomas emails me every time and says how much he's loving this series. We're going to do like 35 or more chapters, I think. 35 or more episodes.

John Turner [02:49:46] Nobody else has ever wanted to talk to me this much outside of my immediate family.

John Dehlin [02:49:53] We might wear you out on Mormonism, John Turner. You might want nothing to do with us after this series is over.

John Turner [02:49:59] I mean, I'm hard to wear out

John Dehlin [02:50:01] on Mormonism, so we may do the opposite and get you to write a third book on Mormonism.

John Turner [02:50:07] You just never know.

John Dehlin [02:50:10] All right, John Turner, well, thanks so much for your generosity in scholarship and in your time on this podcast. I find it fascinating and I'm really grateful.

John Turner [02:50:19] Thanks, everybody.

John Dehlin [02:50:21] All right, everyone, thanks for joining us today on Mormon Stories. Please donate, please email us, please subscribe and like, please give us your feedback please buy this book. Be kind to each other. Be good to each other. We'll see you all again soon on another episode of the Joseph Smith Podcast and Mormon Stories Podcast. Take care, everybody.