Emma Goes to War with Joseph Smith over Polygamy

Introduction and Episode Overview

John Dehlin 0:00 Hello everyone and welcome to another edition of the Joseph Smith Podcast brought to you by Mormon Stories Podcast. I'm your host for today, John Dehlin. It is March 13, 2026. We have recorded three episodes in a row. Wednesday, Thursday, Friday of this week, we are going gangbusters reviewing this book, Joseph Smith the Rise and Fall of an American Prophet by Dr. John G. Turner. Last episode we covered chapter 27, second half of chapter 27 of his book. The chapter was called Deep Water. This episode for me is all about Emma Smith, the wife of Joseph Smith, confronting him and opposing him over his practice of polygamy. We're going to be talking about Joseph marrying the probably his most controversial wife, which is Helen mar Kimball, a 14 year old. We're going to be talking about Hyrum pressuring Joseph Smith to put to paper a revelation formalizing the practice of polygamy as instructed by Jesus Christ himself, which eventually turns into Doctrine and covenants section 132 that gets presented by Hiram, not Joseph, to the Nauvoo High Council. And then Joseph has to deal with Emma, his wife's opposition to polygamy. I kind of just told the whole episode we could pretty much wrap up John Turner.

John Turner 1:38 Yeah, but you know, the devil's in the details, John. There's, there's, there, there is a lot going on here and I think there are also a lot of things here that a lot of church members have questions about, a lot of outsiders to the tradition might have questions about. So we can, we can get into it.

John Dehlin 2:00 And I forgot to mention that this episode ends with perhaps the most secret and controversial ordinance of all in Mormonism, the second anointing. In fact, chapter 28 of your book is called Anointed in 1843. And we're going to end talking about the super secret practice of the second anointing that Joseph introduces. And I'm just going to introduce a sub theme here in addition to Emma's opposition to Joseph's polygamy. For me, the theme that came out of this chapter is selling salvation, promising salvation, selling salvation. And I'll explain maybe at the end why I arrived at that conclusion. But so let's back up and I'll just say, I'll tell everyone what I say every episode. This is going to be a 50 part series. Today is part 36. This series is best consumed sequentially. You can find the Joseph Smith podcast on Spotify in video and audio on Apple podcast or itunes as audio only. And you can best find it on YouTube under the Joseph Smith Podcast playlist or integrated into the Mormon Stories podcast feed. We don't care how you consume it, but it's best consumed sequentially. And then the only other thing I'll say is this episode, this series is brought to us generously by the donors to Mormon Stories podcast generally and to this project specifically. If you want to see this series, make it all the way through episode 50, where we talk about Brigham Young, where we finish this book and talk about Brigham Young. You can donate by going to donorbox.org Joseph Smith. And we're going to pay John Turner all the way through, along with Julia and all the people that help make this possible. So thank you. If you've supported us, please support us if you haven't yet. And we always enjoy your likes and comments. We're about 50 people away from 300,000 subscribers on YouTube, so this episode can push us over the top, possibly. Please take the time to subscribe on YouTube, on Spotify, on Facebook, TikTok, Instagram, wherever. Even if you can't donate, those things help. So, John Turner, the chapter is called Anointed 1843. It begins with the quote, you have a right to get all the wives you can. Joseph counseled William Clayton. So let's begin there.

John Turner 4:45 Wow. Yeah.

John Dehlin 4:46 So what's the context of that?

John Turner 4:50 I'm trying. Well, so one of the things that happened is once Joseph introduced the doctrine of plural marriage to his scribe, William Clayton. Clayton was an enthusiastic convert, and he took Joseph at his word. And so Clayton courted as many prospective plural wives as he could for the remainder of 1843. He struck out with some of them. He succeeded in some cases. And as I say in the sentence after that quote, Joseph practiced what he preached. He was also seeking to expand his. His family throughout 1843.

John Dehlin 5:45 I remember a friend of mine once saying that polygamy makes women pennies or nickels to the dollar. And basically what she's saying is, the mathematical implication of polygamy is that women are worth less than men. And this type of quote, you have a right to get all the wives you can. It just couldn't be more plain that women are, and I've said this in many episodes before, the implications of Mormon polygamy, of Joseph Smith's polygamy, is that women are discounted, their cattle, their property to be assigned by God or God's prophets to men. And I just, I can't. I probably won't be able to say enough how problematic it is, but I don't want to belabor that point. So let's keep going. John Turner.

John Turner 6:35 Yeah, I'm gonna. Actually, I'll just belabor it for a second myself because I've been thinking about that a little bit as well, you know, and we've talked throughout this series about, you know, Joseph's personality, his activities, also his, his theology. And at points I say very positive things about elements of Joseph's theological vision. My own tradition, my own Protestant tradition, I think, has a weakness in that Protestants, especially evangelical Protestants, we can get really focused just on our own individual salvation is the only thing that really matters and the only thing we have control over. And a lot of what Joseph Smith introduced really cuts against that in ways that can be powerful. You know, his focus on both family and community. So there are things I really admire about Joseph's theology, and I wanted to preface this comment with that. I think the theological teaching that connected the extent of a man's salvation to the size of his family, specifically to his number of wives, I do think that was a damaging, you know, damaging and dangerous idea. And, you know, for the reason that you mentioned in that, you know, it creates possibilities for men to focus on their own glory by accumulating wives. I think also more generally, it sort of breeds competitiveness and hubris. And so, yes, it's kind of a crazy quote, but I do agree that the theology behind it is dangerous.

The Controversies of Joseph Smith's Polygamy

John Dehlin 8:45 And I wasn't sure where I was going to bring out these two quotes, but I'm doing some of my own personal study, John Turner, and if you'll forgive me for sharing a couple quotes that don't come from your book, but you may be familiar with them, but I think they show the implications of polygamy down the road. Just a little bit of background. When I was at BYU in 93, six scholars were excommunicated. They're. They're known as the September Six. And I would say all of them were feminists, and the majority of them were excommunicated for being feminists, talking about feminism or doing feminist things. The church seems, the Mormon Church, modern times, seems to be most afraid or most reluctant to empowering women to be equal to men. And I, I think that that practice of women not holding the priesthood, we could talk forever about black people finally receiving the priesthood in 78, but it's really black men, women in 2026. Mormon women still don't have the same rights as men. And I've never really connected the patriarchy to polygamy, but I think you can make a pretty, pretty good argument that the reason why the Mormon Church is so patriarchal, could have many of its roots in polygamy. And I'm just going to read two quotes from the Journal of Discourses that I think you could argue trace their reasoning directly to polygamy. The first is Orson Hyde. Have we talked about Orson Hyde on this episode, John Turner?

John Turner 10:25 We have in this podcast. I think we last encountered him when he was on his mission and eating snails right on the coast of the Mediterranean. And Joseph Smith was sealed to his wife, Nancy Marinda, or Marinda Nancy.

John Dehlin 10:46 Well, Orson Hyde recovers, because here's something that. Here's a couple things that he says. This is in 1857. This is in the Journal of. Of Discourses. It's entitled man, the head of woman, kingdom of God, the seed of Christ, polygamy. And I'll just read the quote. The order of heaven places man in the front rank. Hence he is first to be addressed. For first to be addressed, woman follows under the protection of his counsels and the superior strength of his arm. Her desire should be unto her husband, and he should rule over her. I will here venture the assertion that no man can be exalted to a celestial glory in the kingdom of God whose wife rules over him. And as the man is not without the woman, nor the woman without the man in the Lord, it follows as a matter of course that the woman who rules over her husband thereby deprives herself of a celestial glory. And then Jededi Grant, who I don't know, that we've talked about in this series a year previously, was quoted as saying, then again, there are men that are used as tools by their wives, and they are just a little better in appearance and in their habits than a little black boy. They live in filth and nastiness, they eat it and drink it, and they are filthy all over. So I'm not sure which to be more repulsed by, the racism in that quote or the sexism. But how could it not be that quotes like that of man ruling over the woman, woman being subservient to the man, and you could even say today, the proclamation on the family, how could this all not be rooted in Joseph Smith's behavior Most pronounced in 1843? So back to you, John Turner. Sorry for my rant.

John Turner 12:53 Yeah, no, that's fine. I would actually say that at least some of what you read from Orson Hyde, it is actually not rooted in the original, in Mormon polygamy, but actually in language right out of the book of Genesis, chapter three, when the woman, along with the man and the serpent is cursed after eating the forbidden fruit. And part of that curse is, you know, you will have desire for your husband and he shall rule over you. So there's a lot of patriarchy that goes, of course, precedes the the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints and Joseph's polygamy. What I think you can see is that polygamy, which was sometimes called the patriarchal order of the priesthood, you know, this was a feature, not a flaw. It supercharges patriarchy. It's definitely the case that, that Joseph smith and other 19th century Mormon leaders, they don't have a corner on patriarchy. In 19th century America, monogamy is highly patriarchal. Women lose their property rights when they get married. Nevertheless, I do think the patriarchal order of the priesthood sort of supercharges patriarchy.

John Dehlin 14:38 So Mormons didn't invent patriarchy, they perfected it.

John Turner 14:42 Something like that. Yeah.

John Dehlin 14:45 Okay. All right, so let's, let's get back to your wonderful book. So let's talk about Heber C. Kimball. He has a gift for Joseph Smith.

Helen Mar Kimball and the Question of Consent

John Turner 14:59 So, yeah, this is, this is one of the more controversial episodes in Joseph Smith's polygamy, for sure. It's a case that gets a lot of attention because of the age of Helen Mark Kimball. In the spring of 1843, Apostle Heber C. Kimball, who, by the way, if he'd been a couple of weeks older, would have become president of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles and ultimately church president instead of Brigham Young. He begins talking to his daughter, 14 year old Helen, about plural marriage. And Heber C. Kimball wants a closer ritual, eternal connection to Joseph Smith, and he sees his daughter as a way of achieving that. Helen Marr herself explains it that way, that he had a great desire to be connected with the Prophet and therefore he offered me to him.

John Dehlin 16:22 Yeah. And later you write that it wasn't Joseph wanting Helen, but it was Heber wanting to be closer to Joseph. And just like I kind of challenged you a little bit in last episode, it could be both. It very well could be that Joseph dropped hints to Heber that he wanted his daughter and that Heber, we wouldn't know if Joseph had dropped hints to Heber that he wanted Helen. What we do know is that Heber was solicitous in wanting Joseph to have Helen, but both could be possible. It's not one or the other. Fair. Is that fair?

John Turner 17:03 I think that's a fair point. And so I'm not suggesting that Joseph was reluctant and that it could have

John Dehlin 17:14 Been the instigator, for all we know, could have been.

John Turner 17:17 I do think the sources in this case are striking in terms of underscoring Heber Kimball's enthusiasm for this match. And so that's why I sort of privilege that element of the story.

John Dehlin 17:36 And I mean, we could say that that makes Heber a detestable human. A faithful person would say it's just a sign of how faithful he was. Like the Abrahamic sacrifice. God asks Abraham to sacrifice his son Isaac. Heber sacrifices his daughter. Like it's almost. It could be viewed as a faithful Abrahamic sacrifice, right?

John Turner 18:02 Oh, very much. And there is, and I believe Helen once refers to it explicitly like that, that her father laid his one ewe lamb upon the altar. I do think Heber C. Kimball, his whole life was characterized by a fervency of faith. Like Oliver Cowdery, he was a Rodsman who used a divining rod as a conduit for personal revelation. I mean, he was very much all in. And one also senses, and this is a bit of speculation on my part, by the spring of 1843, he knows that his beloved Joseph Smith has this ritual connection to an increasingly large number of families, and he wants to ensure that connection for his own family. And he believes in the theology that this connection is going to enhance his family's eternal glory.

John Dehlin 19:23 A theme that I've spoken of in past episodes that occurs multiple times in this chapter. And I apologize to you, John Turner, for constantly invoking Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell. I just can't not make the association. Joseph Smith seems in this chapter, as in previous ones, to want to use others to do his bidding. So Joseph doesn't directly confront Helen Marr. Correct. He uses a woman again. Do you want to talk about that?

John Turner 19:56 So, well, really, in this case, you know, so Heber C. Kimball is the first to teach her. But then Sarah Ann Whitney, who's a few years older than Helen and has been one of Joseph's plural wives for almost a year, he introduces Sarah Ann Whitney to his daughter as one of Joseph's plural wives. And in terms of overcoming Helen's shock and anticipated repugnance, I do think Sarah Ann Whitney then plays an important role. As you know, here. Here you can see someone whom you know and whom you probably look up to to some extent as someone a few years older than you, she's one of Joseph's. Joseph's plural wives. Yeah.

John Dehlin 20:57 And psychologically, what does that do, to have a woman go to a teenager? How old was. Do you have a sense for how old Sarah Ann Whitney was at the time.

John Turner 21:07 She was either 17 or 18.

John Dehlin 21:09 So a teenager goes to a younger, an older teenager go. Goes to a younger teenager and says, hey, I'm doing it. It's great. You should do it too. Like there must be some psychological benefit to having a relative peer deliver the proposition, right?

John Turner 21:29 I, I think so. One presumes that's why she was included.

John Dehlin 21:34 Yeah. So how does Helen respond? Is she excited?

John Turner 21:39 So, no, not, not excited at first. I, you know, I think just shocked, confused, unsure. Probably doesn't really know exactly what this would mean. The next day Joseph came and talked to her himself. And according to her recollection, you know, he explained the theological eternal benefits that this would bring for her family and she ascents. And she says very clearly in later writings that the reason why she accepted was out of her affection for and fidelity to her father.

John Dehlin 22:28 Yeah. That's why I'm concluding that if you know how like Coke has a secret recipe, like if Mormonism over the ages has a secret recipe, it's selling salvation in the sense that how would Helen Marr, why would Heber see. Give his daughter to Joseph? Why would Helen Marr be willing as a 14 year old to be Joseph's, I don't know, 25th wife? It's that, it's that she and he, Heber and Helen were under the impression that this would get them salvation in the celestial kingdom. And that was, that was their prime motivation. Am I, is that wrong?

John Turner 23:12 So that it's that and I would say the. These are interconnected, that and the eternal connection to Joseph the prophet. So sort of the dynastic bond between the two families.

John Dehlin 23:29 Yeah. And that's just so much power. You know, I always say it should be illegal to tell people that you have a message from God because it just gives you so much power telling someone that you know what their salvation is dependent on and that it happens to be their relationship with you and their willingness to be obedient to you. Money, power, sex, whatever, it's just so much power. And this is like a foreshadowing of the second coming, the second anointing discussion at the end. It ends up all being about, you know, obtaining salvation by, by making sacrifices. So. So Helen Markimbell becomes, as you write in the book, Joseph's youngest wife. I put youngest known wife. We don't know if there were others. But, but just to address this head on, sometimes critics of Joseph want to go as far as to call Joseph Smith a pedophile and, and those who, like, really get into the nitty gritty like to remind me that pedophile means prepubescent children. I think there's some other term hebe or something for someone who likes, you know, post pubescent teenagers. Do you want to address that allegation that Joseph Smith was a pedophile?

John Turner 24:54 So, great question.

John Dehlin 24:57 I know they're strong words, but I

John Turner 24:58 mean, that's a tough question. So I guess my simplest answer would be no in the sense that usually that label is used to describe someone whose sexuality and orientation are directed toward, you know, that particular age group. Someone who as a general rule is attracted to and seeks sexual access to children. Or in the latter case, you described teenagers, Joseph, in terms of plural marriage. He was almost more of an equal opportunity sealer. Sort of in line with that first quote that you read, you know, get all you can. And so his wives ranged from 14 to the late 50s, I think, and I'm not saying this to defend Joseph, but I don't think, I don't see Joseph Smith as someone whose polygamy was first and foremost about sexual access to really young women.

John Dehlin 26:30 I should add here I get feedback a lot that it's wrong to call this a marriage, that we shouldn't call these things marriages, because first of all, marriage was only legal between one man and one woman in the 19th century United States. I don't even know that Joseph would have called it marriages. They were ceilings because they were religious or celestial in nature. But also, you can't marry a 14 year old when you're already married. It's illegal. And some would say it's child abuse. So I often have listeners and viewers express frustration that we call things like Joseph's marriage to Helen Marr a marriage. They say it's not a marriage. Stop calling it a marriage. At best it's a ceiling. At worst, it's child abuse. Is that fair?

John Turner 27:21 Well, it's a great question. I don't think you're, I think you're only going to have tough questions for me today.

John Dehlin 27:31 Chapter man, which is fine.

John Turner 27:33 Yeah, no, it's my own fault. So I would say, first of all, you know, let's not, you know, I don't, I don't want to make it a semantic argument. I think a fair question is, are these situations abusive? You know, Joseph referred to, referred to these as marriages. So when he, when he's talking about William Clayton and explaining the theology, he specifically says he has married for eternity. So these were marriages for eternity? Absolutely. They were Ceilings. But they were understood as eternal marriages. And so I think that's fair language.

John Dehlin 28:26 But legally they weren't legitimate marriages.

John Turner 28:29 Absolutely not. Bigamy was a crime in Illinois, I think punishable with, I don't know, I think physical punishment even. So, you know, actually contracting multiple civil marriages would be, would be something else.

John Dehlin 28:52 Would a 14 year old marriage to a 37 year old man be allowed legal and, or normal or proper? I know there's a lot of questions baked into that.

John Turner 29:04 No. So this is, that's also such a good question. And that's also been a point of debate among historians of Mormonism because some people want to say, well, you know, it was certainly not unheard of for men in their 30s to, to marry very young women. Other people will point to the fact that, okay, might have technically been allowed but would have been frowned upon. So this is what I would say. Yeah, you can find, you can find examples of men marrying very young women. Thomas Ford, the governor of Illinois at the time, I think when he was 28, he married a 15 year old Edgar. Here's another really shocking case. Edgar Allen Poe, the author, when he was 39, I think he married his 13 year old cousin.

John Dehlin 30:06 Oh, so that was legal.

John Turner 30:09 Well, so generally, you know, things would be legal at least with the consent of parents at ages such as 14 or even younger. So but as you pointed out, it's certainly illegal to marry more wife than one. More wives than one. So what I would say is that if, just, if just Julia, Julie is

John Dehlin 30:38 mentioning that Ed Allan Poe's wife or cousin lied on her marriage record to get married. She claimed to be 19. I don't know. That's what Julie's saying. Not to interrupt you. I didn't mean to interrupt you.

John Turner 30:49 No, no, no, that's fair. And I, and I think in terms of parental permission, I'm sure sometimes that was disregarded anyway if you could find a willing justice of the peace. So what I would say is that had Joseph Smith been single, if he had married Helen Mark Kimball civilly, it would have raised eyebrows and generated disapproval and criticism. It wouldn't have been absolutely unheard of, but it would have been frowned upon and would have been something that people would have talked about. Now, not in the same way that we in 2026 would assess such a union.

John Dehlin 31:45 Yeah, yeah. And that's oftentimes, you know, we're reminded not to apply presentism to the past, but because God's involved and Jesus is involved, we can assume that God and Jesus's morality are timeless. And not relative to the decade or century that the people live in. But anyway, let's not go off on that rabbit hole immediately. When apologists, Mormon apologists like Brian Hale Hale or Hales and others. What Hales, Brian Hales and others. When, when the discussion of Helen Mark comes up immediately the apologetic response is there's no evidence that Joseph had sex with Helen Mark Kimball. As if they would, as if they would expect a videotape or some type of MP3 or MP4 as evidence. I, I, I, I again just wonder what do they want? Helen Marta wrote to write as a 14 year old in her journal. Joseph and I had great sex this evening. Like I don't know what evidence they would require. But regardless, talking talk what you write about in your book about Helen, Helen's father, he's blessing to Helen and how it indicates that sex, sexuality or sex blood going to be part of this relationship, at least at some point.

Was the Marriage to Helen Consummated?

John Turner 33:08 So great question and I'm happy to talk about the general controversy about whether the marriage was consummated. So we do have a blessing that Helen's father gave her before the ceiling. William Clayton recorded it and some of the language is, you know, talks about the, the theological benefits. Thou shalt be blessed with immortal glory and enthroned with glory in the presence of the Lord, but then that also she would be blessed with a companion who was a man of God on earth and beyond the grave, and he would provide her with a numerous posterity. Her family would increase forever. So as was also the case in the language surrounding Joseph's ceiling to Sarah and Whitney, there's at least an anticipation of posterity and increase.

John Dehlin 34:21 Yeah. And Heber goes on to admonish Helen not to breach her contract. Right.

John Turner 34:27 So yeah, that's maybe we're just jumping ahead a little bit.

John Dehlin 34:31 Oh, keep going, keep going.

John Turner 34:33 Yeah. But then let me just say something about the question of whether the marriage was consummated. I think simply put, we don't know and I don't think you know, and I think a lot of weight is placed on this question and I understand why. But I will say if the marriage was not consummated, that doesn't mean that in general Joseph's polygamy is great, you know. No, no, no, no problems, no, no moral controversy. Let me just briefly mention some arguments on both sides of that question.

John Dehlin 35:14 So you're saying even if Joseph didn't have sex with Helen, it could still be bad or wrong. Is that what you're.

John Turner 35:19 Absolutely, absolutely. I mean, first of all, no sex, no foul.

John Dehlin 35:22 Right? No sex, no foul.

John Turner 35:24 Well, so let me just back up and say in our last episode we talked about Joseph sealing to 19 year old Emily Dow Partridge. And Emily later said very clearly that that marriage was consummated. So we know, or I feel pretty confident that we know that Joseph was secretly sealed to a young woman in his household and consummated the marriage and kept that a secret from his wife Emma. So, and we can talk about all sorts of different instances. So if the, the marriage to Helen Mar Kimball wasn't consummated, that doesn't therefore mean that Joseph in his practice of polygamy is beyond reproach. But, so let's, but let's entertain the question. I think there are actually good arguments on, on both sides. Brian Hales has actually made a reasonable argument in that Helen Mark Kimball was alive in the early 1890s in which several of Joseph Smith's living plural wives testified in the Temple Lot case that their marriages had been consummated and Helen Mark Kimball did not testify in that case. So, you know, that's evidence. Also, Brigham Young in the 1850s clearly taught that it was permissible for men to, to marry girls of ages, say 12 and 13 and wait a few years before consummating the marriage. So that, that certainly could have been Joseph Smith's idea in this case. I mean, I think, I think, I think this, this is a possibility. On the other hand, there's a quote from a woman named Catherine Lewis who left the church, I think, in 1846, who reports Helen having said, I would never have been sealed to Joseph had I known it was anything more than a ceremony. Now, she doesn't explicitly say, you know, therefore there was sex involved and I didn't like it. But, you know, that could be the implication there. More generally, I think Todd Compton has argued that in the absence of evidence to the contrary, the expectation of these ceilings was that they would be consummated, that they were real marriages. So I think historians and scholars, they've made good evidence for either side of that question. But the, the honest answer is we just don't know. We don't have evidence to, to say one way or the other.

John Dehlin 38:44 But what we do know for sure, John Turner, is that every other Mormon prophet's polygamy involves sex and that we know that Joseph Smith had sex with multiple of his own wives. And so it's absolutely special pleading to just feel uncomfortable with the age of 14 for Helen Marr and to try and Kind of bracket, some type of exception. It makes zero sense. Well, in my opinion.

John Turner 39:15 No, I under, I understand that argument. I, I would, you know, the, it does give me a little bit of pause that Brigham Young could counsel men if you marry really young, young women, if you marry girls, essentially wait a few years. I mean, we have a Mormon prophet explicitly on the record saying that. Now let me just say, if that were the case, by her own account, this was still a terrible life wrenching change for Helen Mar. So whether or not it involved sex, it was, you know, the immediate effects were, were dreadful as far as she was concerned.

John Dehlin 40:03 Yeah,

John Turner 40:06 I guess at the end of the day, I, I like to stick with if. I don't know. I don't know.

John Dehlin 40:12 Sure, sure, sure.

John Turner 40:14 And I think, you know, one of the, one of the things that's challenging about Joseph's polygamy is, you know, the evidence is fragmentary and often contested. And you know, what I do in the book is I give, you know, I give my best reconstruction of the narrative part possible. While, you know, I have to acknowledge that can be, that can be challenged and questioned on a lot of fronts.

John Dehlin 40:50 Yeah, I think for me it, it doesn't matter whether Joseph actually had sex with Helen or not. The whole polygamous enterprise was, was horrific and abusive in my view. And it if. Wouldn't surprise me at all if he did have sex with her, but he didn't need to have sex with her for the whole enterprise to be horrific. And there's no good argument to, to, to, to argue that he wouldn't have had it if he had had the chance. And you know, under the, under the right circumstances, how could anyone argue that he wouldn't have done it eventually if he had, if he didn't do it?

John Turner 41:32 Sure. No, I think that, I think that's fair. And yeah, to say Joseph absolutely wouldn't have because it would have been immoral for him to have had sex with her. It doesn't make any sense when thinking about his polygamous activity as a whole, do you?

John Dehlin 41:51 This is putting you on the spot. What's the youngest aged teenage girl that we know of that Joseph did have sex with?

John Turner 42:02 You are, you are doing a good job of putting me on the spot with that one.

John Dehlin 42:08 So it wasn't about having sex with teenagers. Right.

John Turner 42:12 He didn't like being absolutely certain. I am thinking Maria Lawrence. I'm trying to, I'm trying to, I'm trying to think of her age. I'm thinking 17, teen at the time. But I'm Not. Well, no. She was a little bit older. So I don't know. I mean, in terms of absolute certainty, it might actually be Emily Partridge, who was 19. But I agree with you. I don't think. I don't think there was an age cut off. You know, we talked in the last episode about, you know, Joseph having paid a considerable amount of attention to Flora Woodworth, who was 16. I'm not presuming that's a chaste courtship.

John Dehlin 43:07 Yeah, certainly he's not giving her a gold watch without some sex. Wow.

John Turner 43:13 I love.

John Dehlin 43:15 She was raven haired.

John Turner 43:16 Yeah. I love the bluntness of the question, but, yeah, I mean, later in this

John Dehlin 43:23 chapter, Emma ends up allegedly smashing the watch.

John Turner 43:27 Right.

John Dehlin 43:28 Wasn't over innocent activities.

John Turner 43:32 These were ceilings for earth and eternity.

John Dehlin 43:35 Yeah. Okay, so dispatch putting that to bed. No pun intended. Joseph continues to simultaneously be very greedy when it comes to women, but also being very protective of their loyalty and commitment to only him. Talk about Heber's admonishment to Helen.

The Human Cost for Plural Wives

John Turner 44:02 So a couple of things that I think are worth noting. And I mean, we have so much attention to Joseph Smith sometimes it's hard to remember that these are real people involved in all of these stories. And honestly, sometimes Joseph's escapades in these last couple years of his life, they're so crazy to be as to be almost comical. But, you know, these actions had real ramifications for human beings. So in Helen's case, we have a letter from her father, who left to head east on a mission shortly after the sealing, in which he encourages her to keep the vows and covenants she had made and, to quote, not make a breach. That's pretty strong language. And I read into it that Helen had serious misgivings after the sealing. And we also then know by her own account that. That the way the ceiling reshaped her life was difficult. You know, she was. She was a teenager. She liked going to parties, she liked dancing. And Joseph forbade her to attend dances at her residence to protect her from the attentions of other men. She described herself as a fettered bird with wild and longing heart. Makes me think of Maya Angelou's poem, Caged Bird. Caged bird that sings for freedom. You know, it's a. It's a. It's a powerful metaphor. And, you know, so I think in a lot of ways the ceiling to Joseph was really difficult now, and I think it's worth. It's probably fair to mention that Helen, like a lot of the other women we've talked about, she became a public defender of polygamy in later decades and certainly did not only say negative things about having been sealed to the prophet Joseph Smith.

John Dehlin 46:35 Yeah, yeah, yeah. It, it was tragic for the women. And we, I think Todd Compton's book In Sacred Loneliness is probably one of the best resources to really understand the toll that polygamy took on the women.

John Turner 46:53 Oh, I totally second that because, and you know, that's hard if you're writing a biography of Joseph Smith. You have a large number of women as necessarily minor characters in the story. And I really admire the way that Todd fleshes out the lives of these 30 plus individuals whose lives really, in every chapter of that book, they have such remarkable twists and turns.

John Dehlin 47:29 You write in the book and you may have. Yeah, you write in the book that Helen loved. This was heartbreaking to me that Helen, Mark Kimball loved dancing and that Joseph Smith even went as far as, as to forbid Helen from dancing because he didn't want other potential suitors going after his 25th. 14 year, 25th wife who was 14 years old. It's heartbreaking when you really sit with the emotions there. But then you've got Helen, Julie's asking me to ask you. But then you've got Helen defending the practice. So if, if. What do you have to say, John Turner, to an apologist that says no, no harm, no foul? Because many of these wives said that, that an angel told them it was okay or that God told them that was okay and that they got, you know, revolution revelation that, that, that, that God wanted them to do it.

John Turner 48:34 So it's a, I think the fact that Helen later defended the principle and specifically said that she's thankful that God, you know, brought her through the. I think her language was the furnace of affliction and that the promises that God made to her when she was sealed to Joseph, they will not be broken. I mean, I think we have to, we have to allow her and the other women in this story, we have to allow them a measure of agency and how they understood their lives. At the same time, I, I don't think that means that we can't say that it was an abuse of ecclesiastical authority for Joseph and in this case, Heber C. Kimball, to put theological pressure on women to enter into polygamy. It was clearly wrenching for her at the time. And part of that is that Joseph Smith, you know, we've talked about whether or not the marriage was consummated. But as was true in almost all cases, Joseph Smith paid very little attention to her after, after the sealing. So she was, she was adrift and sort of alone and, you know, talked about being sometimes the object of slander and gossip. So no matter what, no matter how she later understood it, this was a pretty dreadful situation to put a 14, soon to be 15 girl through.

John Dehlin 50:49 Yeah, it's definitely a low mark for Joseph. All right, so really quickly, anything else you want to say about Helen Marr and Heber? I guess. Is it Vilate or Volat?

William Clayton and His Role as Recorder

John Turner 51:06 You know, I always. It always occurs to me, John, when we get into these chapters, I should bone up on my pronunciation in advance so that it. That. That I don't need people to sucker me afterwards when I get things.

John Dehlin 51:21 I think it's the pronunciation succor.

John Turner 51:26 So. Yeah, well, you know, there's a. One thing I'll just mention that I haven't actually fully resolved my mind on is one story from the Whitney family. Helen later marries a Whitney, is that Joseph asked Heber to give him Violet. That's how I pronounce the name. I could be wrong as a plural wife. And that Heber was willing to do so. And that then Joseph said, essentially, that was a test. That was an Abrahamic test. And I don't actually need your wife. I actually don't. I don't give credence to that. That story.

John Dehlin 52:21 Oh, really? Because I was told it at BYU as heartfelt sign of how faithful Hebron. And what are you saying, Violet?

John Turner 52:30 I say Violet, that Heber and Violet were.

John Dehlin 52:34 That Heber was loved. The Lord loved the prophet so much he was willing to give his wife to her.

John Turner 52:40 So there's no shortage of sacrifice. So that story doesn't come from Helen Marr. I think it comes from Orson Whitney. It's possible. I think the reason why I'm a bit skeptical of it is we don't have a similar instance of Joseph testing one of his associates in that way. When Joseph at. When Joseph proposed plural marriage to already married women, he actually wanted to be sealed to the women. They weren't tests. And so it would be a bit of an outlier. It's a possibility, but I didn't include it in the book because it didn't quite fit with other instances.

John Dehlin 53:35 Julia's saying, didn't Joseph Smith do the same thing with John Taylor's wife? And I've never heard of that.

John Turner 53:43 I think I have also. I think I have also heard that story. And I mean, I think. I think in general there was a lot of, you know, there was a lot of consternation about the possibility of Joseph being sealed to people's wives. I Think I've mentioned Brigham Young's dream in which he sees Joseph riding away with his wife in a carriage. And we know about the cases of Nancy Marinda Hyde and Sarah Pratt.

John Dehlin 54:15 Not just that, but William Law doesn't.

John Turner 54:17 William.

John Dehlin 54:17 Aren't there accounts of Joseph having designs on Jane Law, William Law's wife? And also on. Is it Foster? Robert Foster?

John Turner 54:26 Yeah.

John Dehlin 54:26 So doesn't Robert Foster. Is it Robert find Joseph with his wife and she claims he was propositioning her?

John Turner 54:36 There are all sorts of claims along those lines.

John Dehlin 54:39 I mean, there's a lot of smoke for there not to be fire.

John Turner 54:42 Well, so I'm not saying that Joseph did not propose marriage to men's wives

John Dehlin 54:49 or marry other men, other women already married.

John Turner 54:52 Right, right. However, to require that of Heber as a test. Okay, I think that would be. Oh, that's not characteristic.

John Dehlin 55:03 Right, got it.

John Turner 55:04 I'm not saying Joseph Smith would never have asked a already married woman to be sealed to him. But the test in this case seems to have. For especially for Violet, it was a huge sacrifice, number one, for her husband, Heber, to take plural wives and then to be okay on some level, or to endure Helen being sealed to Joseph. So there were a lot of tests and sacrifices, but the particular sort of Abrahamic test of requiring Violet but then not really needing her, I didn't give credence to that.

John Dehlin 56:02 Okay, that's a good clarification. And. And what I'm about to read, it doesn't necessarily prove a case either, but Julia provided a source. I believe it's Wilford Woodruff's journals. It's. It says, Prophet Wilford Woodruff, John Mills Whitaker autobiography and journals, 1883-1960, November 1, 1890. I don't know what that means, but I'll just read it. I'll just read part of it. It says John Taylor was the only one who stood up for the prophet. And a short time after this, the prophet went to the home of President Taylor, meaning Joseph going to President Taylor's and said to him, brother John, I want Leonora, President's wife. And then it says, of all the requests coming from the prophet, this was the last straw. It is said John Taylor never answered. The prophet turned away and walked the floor all night. But the next morning went to the home of the prophet and said to him, brother Joseph, if God wants Leonora, he can have her. That was all the prophet was after to see when President Taylor stood in the matter where President Taylor stood in the matter and said to him, brother Taylor, I don't Want your wife. I just wanted to know just where you stood. And again, this is obviously a very, very late account. So I'm not claiming that it's in any way true, but it's, it's, I think a source for this, for Julia's suggestion that some said Joseph did the same type of thing with John Taylor.

John Turner 57:40 All I gotta say is you guys are good. Julia's good.

John Dehlin 57:45 Julia's good.

John Turner 57:46 So, yeah, so maybe I'll have to slightly correct myself and say, well, I guess there were is at least a second rumor of something similar. Let me look into that case. I'm not.

John Dehlin 58:00 Yeah, yeah, yeah. And please viewers and listeners, we love your emails@mormonstoriesgmail.com or your comments on these episodes. We get some of the best comments on YouTube. People really should check out the comments really quickly before we again put to bed Heber Violet and Helen Marr. No pun intended. I always, you know, there's a, I'll just say next week there's a Journal of Mormon Polygamy conference. I believe the Journal of Mormon Polygamy again is started by Michelle Stone, who I think is very, very smart, by the way, and Cheryl Bruno. They're starting this whole journal and an annual conference focused on Mormon polygamy and really scrutinizing the sources. But you know, when I talked to Michelle, what she basically wants to say is that he, he, William Clayton was a bad guy and that his journal isn't reliable, partly because she says it's a, it's right, at least presently a transcript because the church hasn't released it. But I think she would also argue that he would have made up or manufactured his journal and, or someone else after he died would have made up or manufactured his journal. I'm pretty sure people like Michelle Stone just refused to accept William Clayton's journal as authentic. My question is this. You've looked at the actual William Clayton journal. The church has let you look at it, correct?

John Turner 59:43 Correct.

John Dehlin 59:44 So if, if it would have been manufactured, how and when would it have needed to be manufactured? Because if you looked at the actual source journal, wasn't it written in 1843? And if so, that would mean that Heber or someone close to him was hatching a conspiracy of manufacturing all of these accounts of what Joseph was doing firsthand in 1843. They would have had to been manufacturing those accounts and writing them down in a journal in 1843. Is that right or wrong?

John Turner 1:00:24 So I think people who are skeptical about the Clayton Journal would presume that it was created later than that, I don't know exactly when they think it would have been created, but after, you know, it would be not contemporaneous. You know, I would say if Clayton fabricated the events in his journal to sort of fabricate Joseph's polygamy in order to provide a justification for his own and that of people like Brigham Young and Heber C. Kimball, he really makes himself look awful. And most people do not fabricate material that casts themselves in a terrible light.

John Dehlin 1:01:26 But also the level of detail, I am guessing that so much of what ends up in that account would be corroborated by lots and lots of other sources. So the level of sophistication to go to that level of detail, I, I think probably escapes anyone individual's intellectual abilities. But. But, I mean, don't we know the providence of, of William Clayton's journal? And is anybody, is anyone credible claiming that it was like a Mark Hoffman, like forgery years or decades or century later?

John Turner 1:02:09 No, certainly not. I think the claim would be that it was created after Joseph's death or at least these 1843, 1844, 1842 portions. They were created after Joseph's death and basically served the purposes of people like Heber C. Kimball, Brigham Young, Willard Richards, and they. And therefore it's not a strictly contemporaneous account of things in 1843. I don't, you know, I understand it as a contemporaneous account. I think, you know, I've heard scholars that I think are very reliable and fair. Talk about the Clayton journal as probably a longer, you know, a longer, not soon after the fact journal based on daily notes that Clayton would have kept. And, you know, that's not an unusual practice for journal keepers, particularly at the time. I agree. I think it lines up very well with the other sources that we have from these years. There's a lot of corroboration from Joseph's journal that was kept usually by Willard Richards at the time, time, and the recollections of a large number of individuals.

John Dehlin 1:04:04 Yeah, really quickly. And then we got to get on to Emma. Remind me what happens to William Clayton in terms of his association with the church and the saints after Joseph's death.

John Turner 1:04:17 So he is a faithful follower of Brigham Young. So he makes the exodus from Nauvoo in 1846, which is when he writes, come, come, ye saints. He, you know, he emigrates to Utah. I would say that he is not, as.

John Dehlin 1:04:45 Is he an apostle?

John Turner 1:04:47 He's not an apostle. And I was going to say, I would say that he's not as close to Brigham Young as he was to Joseph Smith. I would say, I would say that they were not friends. He continued to work as a scribe for the church on occasion. I think he had, you know, some, not all that successful business pursuits. But he's not as central to church history after Nauvoo as he was during the Nauvoo years.

John Dehlin 1:05:33 Okay. But he does come to Utah and, you know, bring his family here.

John Turner 1:05:38 Yep, he's, he's, he brings his family. He is a faithful church member for the, for the rest of his life.

John Dehlin 1:05:48 Okay. More, more to come on the Moon Sisters, by the way. Okay, so you mention in your book that Joseph, after Helen Marr, marries again or seals himself to some other women. You mentioned Nancy Winchester, who was only a dozen days older than Helen. Does that make her 14 as well?

Nancy Winchester and Other Young Plural Wives

John Turner 1:06:13 So Nancy Winchester, that's right. She's just a couple of weeks older than Helen Mark Kimball. The ceiling is not as well attested as some, but she is included, I think, in Eliza Snow's recollection of Joseph's wives. So she probably was 14 or maybe 15 at the time of her sealing to Joseph. There are a number of other ceilings in the summer of 1843, including some women who are older, such as an older unmarried sister of Willard Richards named Rhoda Richards. So Joseph continues to accumulate wives, continues to make marry a variety of wives.

John Dehlin 1:07:12 And I wondered, you mentioned Olive Frost who was around 27. Again, Nancy Winchester and Rhoda Richards. I off my immediate qu question was, are these kind of a cover like now that he's, now that he's possibly being with 14 year olds? You know, I'm sure he would know more than anyone about how the, the optics about being problematic. And a natural psychological response to that would be, let me marry some older women too, so that I can be able to claim it wasn't just about getting younger and younger girls. But I'd be speculating, but I wrote. Was this just a cover?

John Turner 1:07:58 Yeah, you know, good question. I would say no just because marital variety is just characteristic of Joseph. You know, from early 1842 on. I really think the best explanation is that quote from Joseph to William Clayton, get all you can. And so he is still pursuing plural marriages at a rapid climb clip through the summer of 1843. One thing that is perhaps noteworthy about that is there are these enormous conflicts with Emma about polygamy that summer. And she even forces him to back away from some of his plural wives. But he is continuing to be sealed to other women. During these months.

John Dehlin 1:08:59 Yeah, I was going to say you. You maybe. I'm gonna. I'm gonna lovingly suggest that in version two of this book. What do you call it? A new version of a book.

John Turner 1:09:13 Volume second edition.

John Dehlin 1:09:14 Second edition. You rename chapter 28. Get all you can instead of anointed. Get all you can. 1843, not anointed. But you write that Emma is humiliated. But also you write that Joseph, like he was with Helen Marr, as Joseph is more and more ambitious and generous about obtaining women, he tightens the screws on the women that he's married to. So talk about his paranoia around Emma's. Of all things, Joseph is paranoid about Emma's faithfulness. I could not believe this.

John Turner 1:09:58 Well, you can't blame Emma. I would say that that's true. So he asks William Clayton. This is in Clayton's journal. I forget the exact day, but sometime late in May, 1843, if he had used any familiarity with Emma. And he warns Clayton that Emma wants to lay a snare and that she might use Clayton to get even with Joseph. And further, she thought that if he would indulge himself, she would too. And you're right, Joseph. Joseph is not interested in abiding Emma having any other sexual outlets. Note in DNC 132, in Joseph's Revelation on marriage, it includes a commandment to Emma Smith. To abide and cleave unto my servant Joseph and to none else. If she will not abide this commandment, she shall be destroyed.

John Dehlin 1:11:11 Yeah, and that I like again, you. You can't make this stuff up. Like, this guy is got 30. He's accumulating wives like dozens of eggs, and yet he's obsessed with the wives that he's accumulating en masse. He's obsessed with their solitary commitment to him. And it. It. I mean, I wrote a not so kind word that I'm not going to repeat here just because I don't want to make you uncomfortable, John Turner. But like, that level of. What's the word? Of bold. Boldness. There's a better word for it. Of brazenness. Is brazen a word that applies here?

John Turner 1:12:01 What? Well, I think the word that might apply is patriarchal. To go back to our conversation from the beginning. I mean, so in the Bible, right? I mean, I'm saying this predates Joseph Smith. In the Bible, men can get married to multiple women, and for those women to have sex with other men, is adultery punished by death. For a married man to have sex with another unmarried woman would not have been biblical adultery. So there's a, there's a double standard about sexual fidelity that goes back millennia. And I think, I'm not saying that Joseph was guided by those specific biblical passages because I'm not sure that's the case. But this double standard is not, I would say, not just out of, you know, this is not just personal to Joseph. This is a larger double standard in the way that women, excuse me, that men have understood relations with, with women, that men can have multiple sexual outlets and their women cannot.

John Dehlin 1:13:37 And, and I know that Islam from the beginning and to this day, you know, allows polygamy in the Quran, as I understand it, up to four wives, I believe. And I'm, you know, the Old Testament, clearly. So you're saying that the Old Testament only defines adultery as, as a woman cheating on a man? Is that what you're saying?

John Turner 1:14:01 Well, I'm not a, I'm really not a biblical scholar, so. But yes, in essence, if a, if a man who was married had sex with an unmarried woman, he would not be committing adultery in the Old Testament. Correct.

John Dehlin 1:14:22 What about the New Testament? Do we know what Jesus thinks about that?

John Turner 1:14:27 I don't think Jesus explicitly alters that rule, but I think

John Dehlin 1:14:36 it's funny because the woman, Jesus found, the woman in adultery, she was the one that was on trial. There was no discussion of, of the husband.

John Turner 1:14:45 Right? No, man, I, I think that's still, I think that's still the reality. That's why, you know, that's, that's, that's the context.

John Dehlin 1:14:55 I did not know that. Yeah, that's wild.

John Turner 1:14:59 And I'm not saying this to defend Joseph because it's a terrible, terrible double standard. I just don't think it's, it's unique, not particular to him.

John Dehlin 1:15:09 Yeah, Mormons didn't invent patriarchy. They just perfected it really quickly. You may talk about this later, but there I, I've heard it, I've heard it said that there are possibly credible allegations that at some point Emma tried to poison Joseph Smith. Julie is mentioning this in the comments. I don't know if you talk about this in a subsequent chapter. It's not in this chapter. Are you familiar with those allegations that Emma tried to poison Joseph at some point or that. Or that Joseph thought in a paranoid way that Emma was trying to poison him?

Allegations Against Emma and Joseph's Character

John Turner 1:15:48 Yeah, so I'm aware of those allegations. I don't include them in the book because I don't, I don't believe them. So I'd have to, I'd have to refresh my memory on the details, I think the. Those accusations come from Brigham Young and others later in the 19th century, after the breach with Emma following Joseph's death. And that becomes. Well, it's already bitter in the 1850s because people, you know, they blame Emma for Joseph's death. And then after the reorganization of the church under Joseph Smith III that Emma supports, there is just so much hostile, even hateful rhetoric coming from Utah directed toward Emma. And so I think that story of Emma having tried to poison Joseph, I think. I think it's rooted. Rooted in that animosity.

John Dehlin 1:17:00 But. But we do know that Joseph was becoming paranoid. I mean, this exchange with Joseph and William Clayton about Emma maybe wanting to lay a trap or a snare, I can just imagine Joseph and Emma having a big fight. Emma's saying, you're humiliating me. You get all these women. I'm going to find someone to cheat on you with.

John Turner 1:17:27 Yeah, that.

John Dehlin 1:17:28 Making Joseph fearful and angry and possessive. That's got to be what led him to go ask William Clayton if he and Emma had had any inappropriate relationship. I mean, that's reasonable, right?

John Turner 1:17:43 Yes. So you can just imagine Joseph saying, now, William, when I said get all you can, I did not mean Emma.

John Dehlin 1:17:52 So

John Turner 1:17:56 I need to clarify, just in case you misunderstood.

John Dehlin 1:18:02 That's got to be a highlight of the series. That was. Great job, Turner. Get all you can. Just not Emma or any of my wives or the third moon sister. We'll get to her. Okay, so let's skip some of the political stuff with Joseph and Missouri and the governor just because I want this episode to be focused on polygamy and Emma. Maybe we'll. We'll incorporate the. The paragraphs in this chapter about the governor in Missouri and. And habeas corpus. We'll. We'll. We'll lump that into next episode, if that's okay. Is that all right?

John Turner 1:18:40 Absolutely.

Hyrum Smith and Codifying the Plural Marriage Revelation

John Dehlin 1:18:41 Okay, so let's skip now. Skip now down to. Yeah, I think it's time to talk about Hyrum. Hyrum. Wanting Joseph to actually codify this plural marriage revelation.

John Turner 1:19:04 Yeah. So in. Yeah. So in mid July of 1843, Joseph D. Dictates a long revelation on marriage. So Joseph's been teaching polygamy for more than two years, maybe two and a half years. And he has already articulated in conversation this connection between being married for eternity and exaltation. He's also become embroiled in fierce conflict about polygamy with Emma. Really? Just over the last two months, he finally broached the subject with her. She tentatively accepted the principle, did not like, and objected to its earthly implications. And so the two of them are at odds. And according to William Clayton, according to his later account, Hyrum Smith suggests that if Emma were presented with a revelation on the subject, it would convince her of the truth. Joseph's response is, you don't know Emma as well as I do. But Hyrum persuaded. Persuaded his brother to give this a try. This is, you know, this is very significant. Perhaps without the conflict with Emma, perhaps Joseph would never have dictated to this revelation. And, you know, that would. That would have had significant, I think, implications going forward for Mormon polygamy.

John Dehlin 1:21:14 Yeah. And so, you know, you write that Joseph had this revelation memorized. And it just occurred to me it must be because he had to tell people, dozens and dozens and dozens of people. He had to tell him, you know, recite to them the logic and the reasoning and the revelation. So he, he would have had it committed to memory pretty thoroughly by that point. Right. By. By mid-1843.

John Turner 1:21:41 Well, I mean, that's a good question. So what Joseph ends up dictating takes around 10 manuscript pages. So it's pretty long. And by the way, I would just tell listeners, if you don't have a background in the LDS Church and you've never taken a look at Doctrine and covenants, section 132, I'd encourage you to look it up and maybe look at it as we discuss it. It's a pretty remarkable document.

John Dehlin 1:22:17 So, so remarkable as in deeply disturbing.

John Turner 1:22:20 Well, so disturbing, Fascinating, everything. Yeah. So I'm not positive that Joseph had a revelation committed to memory that he'd sort of had in his brain since 1841, let alone 1831, as some people within the Church think it's possible that Joseph felt that God had revealed this doctrine to him and now he has to produce the actual language.

John Dehlin 1:23:06 Yeah. And I think it'd be worth it just to take a second to kind of explain the logic. And there's another quote that I mined from the Journal of Discourses, again, it's from Orson Hyde, you know, this man, the head of the woman kingdom of God, the seed of Christ, polygamy sort of argument. But let me just state how I think the justification ends up in mid to late 19th century Mormonism. And I think it becomes a natural outgrowth of D&C, 132 in Joseph's Revelation. And it's basically this, that God needed a chosen people, a chosen seed. He chooses Abraham. Abraham was a polygamist. From a polygamous Abraham comes a righteous chosen lineage Blood lineage, the twelve tribes of Israel. If, if, if the twelve. If God's chosen blood people are the twelve tribes of Israel and polygamy is involved number that. That's one evidence that polygamy is really important because God raises his chosen people in interwoven with. With the practice of polygamy. And then what comes out of eventually God's chosen people? In polygamy, Jesus Christ himself is a descendant of God's chosen people, righteous seed, direct lineage as an outgrowth of polygamy. And Orson Hyde goes on to claim that Jesus himself was a polygamist, that all these women who were constantly surrounding Jesus weren't just followers, they weren't just friends, they weren't just family members. The argument goes on that Jesus himself was a polygamist and had children with his polygamous wives. And then, you know, I'll never forget this. John Turner. Maybe I've told you this before, but my roommate at Brigham Young University, his name is Russ Watterson. He's gone on to be a stake president in the Denver area. He comes to me one day. He's taking a class from Margaret Pope, who is the sister of Bruce R. McConkie, and she gives him a true or false question as an exam on a university religion course. And the question is true or false? Joseph Smith was a blood descendant of Jesus Christ, meaning Jesus had sex with one of his wives, and Joseph Smith becomes the blood posterity of Jesus Christ himself. And that's what the Smith family meaning Hyrum Smith. We talked about Mary Fielding last episode. We talked about Joseph F. Smith and then Joseph Fielding Smith, who are descendants of Hyrum, who is a brother to Joseph. It becomes the belief in the lore of the Smith family that somehow Joseph was a direct descendant of Jesus, had the blood of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, the literal blood of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob in his veins, that somehow he gets it, Hyrum gets it. And then, you know, Joseph F. Smith and Joseph Fielding Smith. And then eventually, you know, Even Bruce R. McConkey's posterity get the blood of Jesus in their veins because Bruce R. McConkie marries into the Smith family line. It's all about literal seed, meaning sperm, meaning genetics, meaning lineage. Polygamy is interwoven with the way that God raises and perpetuates his righteous chosen seed and posterity. And that's how, you know, by the 1850s, that's how not just Orson Hyde, but Brigham Young and others. Joseph F. Smith, Joseph Fielding Smith. That's the story they're telling. Does that feel like a natural outgrowth not just of DNC132, not just of Joseph's revelation, but of what Joseph would have been telling people, even pre revelation.

John Turner 1:27:42 That's a fun question. I have not had that on my student exams at George Mason University, but if I did put that on there, I'm sure I'd get my students attention. Perhaps. So yeah, I mean that, that was a common belief not only in the Smith family. I think George Q. Cannon also believed that he was a descendant of Jesus Christ. He was a very powerful member of the church presidency in the late, late 1800s. I don't know if that's a necessary outgrowth of DNC 132. You know, Joseph, earlier in his life he had talked about Gentiles sort of non Jews who accept the gospel having sort of a spiritual blood transfusion and you know, therefore acquiring Israelite blood. Yeah, I think Joseph, at least I don't know If I'm not 100% sure if this is Joseph or people a little bit after his death certainly implied that Jesus would have done everything on earth that God required for exaltation in order to grow into the fullness of divine glory. I mean, I think that's often been the Mormon logic for a married, even polygamous Jesus.

John Dehlin 1:29:20 But even putting pause on the Jesus question specifically, if we go back to the original Book of Mormon Jacob exception, it says that polygamy is not okay except to raise a righteous seed. And so all I'm saying is that that exception in Jacob in the Book of Mormon grows into Joseph Smith's revelation and eventually D&C132 isn't at the core of Joseph's polygamy revelation and D&C 132 this book of Mormon Jacob inspired idea of raising a righteous seed.

John Turner 1:29:58 So I'm actually going to. My answer is going to be a little bit complex, but I'm going to say no. But. So I do see strong echoes of that in the church's contemporary defense of 19th century polygamy as a sort of divine necessity for preserving and raising up a peculiar people. So I think you can find echoes of that even in fairly recent church statements in defense of 19th century polygamy. However, when Joseph thinks about plural marriage and its past biblical practice and its present restoration, I don't see him really engaging this idea of, of this is needed to raise up seed or a righteous people. I see Joseph wrestling with two questions in the revelation that he dictates. Number one, how is it that biblical patriarchs who were righteous, how is it that they had multiple wives and concubines and that that God was okay with that? So that's one question. And then secondly, how can. Well, maybe there are three questions. Secondly, how can things on earth persist for eternity? Specifically, how can family kinship on earth persist for eternity? But then third, which I really see as the driving question as what is what do men need to do in order to attain exaltation unto godhood? And for Joseph, a key part of that question is they need to marry for eternity.

John Dehlin 1:32:07 Well, John Turner, I don't know that I want to make a habit of this, and I don't know that I'm disagreeing with you, although I know that you welcome disagreement. But I'm just going to read to you. And again, you may say that what I'm about to read doesn't contradict what you just said, and I'm sure I'll be fine with that. But I'm going to read verse 30 of D&C 132. Abraham received promises concerning his seed. I'm going to say sperm and seed are interchangeable. You can correct me if I'm wrong. Abraham received promises concerning his seed and of the fruit, fruit of his loins. From whose loins ye are? Ye are from his loins, namely my servant Joseph, which were to continue so long as they were in the world. And as touching Abraham and his seed out of the world, they should continue next life both in the world and out of the world. Should they continue as innumerable as the stars, or, or if you were to count the sand upon the seashore, you could not number them. And then I'll just jump on to the end of oh, also verse 19. It says. Where do I start? It says, then shall be written in the Lamb's book of life, that he shall commit no murder whereby the to shedness of blood. And if he abide in my covenant, and commit no murder whereby to shed in a sin blood it shall be done unto them and all things whatsoever my servant hath put upon them in time and through all eternity, and shall be full of force, and shall be of full force when they are out of the world and they shall pass by the angels and the gods, which are set there to be to their exaltation and glory in all things as hath been sealed upon their heads which glory shall be a fullness and a continuation of these seeds forever and ever. So I do think. I think DNC132 is dripping with seed.

John Turner 1:34:19 Oh, it is dripping with seed.

John Dehlin 1:34:24 Did I just say that that's gross. Yeah.

John Turner 1:34:28 I read seeds simply really as descendants in this case. But, you know, I need to say loins. Yeah, so this is loins. I mean, so, you know, the biblical story of Abraham, it, you know, it starts with that promise of innumerable descendants. And yes, absolutely. Out of Abraham comes the people of Israel. So I don't think what you're saying is totally disconnected from what I'm saying, but let me, let me kind of restate what I'm thinking. So Joseph says, this is verse 19 and 20 of section 132. If a man marry a wife, by my word, by the new and everlasting covenant. And then skipping to the end of that verse, he will pass by the angels and the gods, or they will pass by the angels and the gods, which are set there to their exaltation and glory, which glory shall be a fullness and a continuation of the seeds forever and ever. Then they shall be gods because they have no end. Therefore they shall be from everlasting to everlasting, because they continue along the lines of what we were talking about last episode. I think that's pretty clear. Exaltation unto godhood means, among other things, continuing to see one's progeny increase for eternity. So what I don't really see as central to Joseph's thinking is polygamy is a necessity for raising up a larger number of progeny on Earth. I don't, you know, I mean, and one reason I think that is because he doesn't have known, identified children from his plural marriages. I think he connects it more to eternal exaltation than heightened reproduction on Earth.

John Dehlin 1:36:45 Yeah, that is a pickle that we don't really have any genetic posterity of Joseph Smith. But yeah, we don't have to, we don't have to really make any firm conclusions here today. We're just sharing perspectives and conclusions and people can draw their own.

John Turner 1:37:03 Yeah, yeah. And I certainly encourage everyone. I mean, this is a remarkable document. You know, Joseph's revelation on marriage. It's definitely worth reading through, through from beginning to end. I think anyone who does well, who hasn't done it, I mean, this is still something that Latter Day Saints study, particularly the first 20 verses. And I think. But people who aren't familiar, it's definitely worth reading.

John Dehlin 1:37:33 Yeah, yeah. Most Mormons, I think most faithful active orthodox Mormons don't read DNC132 very closely. And if they do and really start thinking about it just the so many times it threatens Emma with damnation if she doesn't, you know, with destruction, sorry, destruction. And that it's supposed to be Jesus threatening Emma with destruction if she doesn't let Joseph be a polygamist, but Emma can't have other men. Like it's just an abusive document. And again, it discusses women being reassigned as property to men. Like it's a revolting document if you really spend time contemplating the implications. Having said that, it also lays out the true Mormon plan of salvation like probably no other document, because it's got ceilings, it's got eternal families, it's got eternal marriage, it's got. Has theosis. Humans becoming gods forever families. You know, that's. That's all there, right? It is. It's probably the single most definitive chapter in all of Mormon scripture that lays out the. The summative plan of salvation as outlined by Joseph Smith before he's dead. Am I right or am I wrong? You could disagree with me, please.

John Turner 1:39:06 Well, no, it's very significant. And one reason why it has enhanced theological significance is because it's the last revelation of Joseph Smith. It's the final revelation that he dictates. And so, yes, this isn't his last theological word. Occasionally people within the church have talked about the possible canonization of the King Follet discourse, and you could perhaps argue that some of Joseph's final sermons or sort of the summary of his theology as well. But the fact that this is Joseph's final revelation does give it great significance. And you know, it has that, like you said, some of those themes are very central. What is sealed on earth will be sealed in heaven. Exaltation unto Godhood. Absolutely.

John Dehlin 1:40:18 Yeah. Really quickly. You know, I view this as a manufactured scarcity, this idea that unless you have a Mormon. I mean, one of the implications that I wrote down from reading your chapter is that non Mormon Christian marriages aren't valid in heaven. Is that misstating Joseph's, you know, theological development?

John Turner 1:40:41 Not at all. No. I think. I think the language is pretty clear on that. If you look at verse seven, all covenants that are not sealed by the Holy Spirit of promise of him who is anointed, which is Joseph Smith, are of no efficacy, virtue or force in and after the resurrection from the dead. So it literally is till death do us part.

Eternal Marriage, Sealing, and Plural Marriage Theology

John Dehlin 1:41:08 And Mormons, if you ask them point blank, is it true that Mormons don't believe that Christian marriages are legitimate in heaven? They're not going to want to own up to that because it's embarrassing and elitist and kind of insulting. But it is factual and So I think how do Christians, can you speak for Protestants about what they think about their eternal family or eternal marriage? I know that Jesus says in heaven there's no marriage, but what do Protestants think about their marriage and, or their family relations enduring in heaven? Do you have any idea or even just speak for you?

John Turner 1:41:50 Yeah, so that, that is such a great question. So, and I actually think this, the answer to it has a lot to do with why Joseph's places such an emphasis on ensuring the eternity of family bonds. So you're right. So traditionally both Catholics and Protestants sort of through the 1700s Conceptions of heaven were very God centered, theocentric, that, you know, the, the purpose of heaven would be the eternal worship of God among the saints. By the early 1800s and particularly by Joseph Smith's lifetime, many Protestants begin seeing heaven as a sort of perfected continuation of their earthly lives and that included the persistence of family bonds. One reason for that is because Protestants become much more confident that most decent church going people are going to be saved. So you know, if you're living in the 1600s and hell is much bigger than heaven, you probably wouldn't want to spend too much time thinking about the persistence of family in heaven because you're probably setting yourself up for disappointment. But during, by Joseph's lifetime there have been some big shifts. So what I see in Joseph is providing a theological framework to ensure something that, that many Christians, many Protestant Christians are already hoping for. I don't know if that answers your question.

John Dehlin 1:43:59 Yeah, so it's a manufactured scarcity and that's why I talk about selling salvation. The Mormon plan of salvation at its core is you're not worthy, you are at risk of being damned in heaven and separated from your family. So make lots of sacrifices to the church, your own lives if necessary, but definitely your income. And maybe you can earn salvation if you sacrifice enough to the church. That's my summary of the secret ingredient of Mormon theology and the Mormon people. And as you note, it can create amazing community and it can create hard working, industrious, good people. Like it's both and, but at its core there's this idea of you're unworthy if you're not careful, you won't go to heaven with your loved ones. But the way that you do that is to be obedient and sacrifice everything for the church. I'm not asking you to endorse that summary, but as someone who's lived 56 years in this culture, that's how it's emerging for me as I listen and Watch Joseph's evolution.

John Turner 1:45:17 Yeah, you.

John Dehlin 1:45:18 It's your fault, John Turner.

John Turner 1:45:19 Yeah, well, well, I apologize for that, John de Lynn. I mean, I think Joseph, you know, he very much was aware and I think he felt it himself, this anxiety about, first of all, salvation, but also family. So as, as you, you said, I think on our last episode, this certainly goes back to Alvin Smith's death. So the death of Joseph's brother. And apparently a Presbyterian minister at the funeral or burial specifically said, you know, this guy, he had not had an experience of conversion. He wasn't saved. He's going to be in hell. And Joseph, by the mid to late 1830s, he has this hope that Alvin is going to be in the celestial kingdom. And what Joseph does is he articulates. Yeah. In order to be sure of that hope, baptism, being married in heaven, perhaps, you know, further rituals, endowments, second anointing. If you do these things, you can be sure. And I do think, you know, church members, Protestant, Mormon, they often have a mixture of anxiety and hope surrounding eternity. And, you know, Joseph's system, I think, is in many ways designed to provide assurance of that hope. You can see that in the King 4 follet discourse. Joseph believes that what he teaches about the nature of human beings and God should be consoling in the face of mourning and anxiety, like you suggested. And I think it's fair. It's very difficult for any theology to not at the same time stoke some of those human anxieties.

John Dehlin 1:47:36 Yeah, well said. Really quickly. I noted as I was reading through the revelation as you laid it out, that it just felt so hypocritical for Joseph to be threatening Emma that she can't have other men in this revelation, not just knowing that he had assembled almost three dozen wives by this point, but also that he had had that affair with Fanny Alger in, you know, 1836, 1838 time frame. But you answered that question in this episode that maybe Joseph was going by Old Testament standards. He didn't consider himself as having committed adultery, but if Emma had had another man, she would be. And so that explains the mindset that I thought was pretty hypocritical in d and c. 132 on Jesus, Joseph's part. But your Old Testament explanation of adultery explained that, so. Thank you.

John Turner 1:48:36 Well, Joseph repeatedly defends himself from the suggestion that he's committing adultery or other sexual indiscretions, that what he's doing is not, not fornication, certainly not adultery. I, you know, I mean, I think it's entirely possible that he, he genuinely thought that that was the case. Nevertheless, I actually do think the last 12 or so verses of DNC 132, I see them as, I see that as Joseph Smith at his revelatory worst. I mean it is, it's just pretty rough and I don't think there's any, any way to get, to get around that, you know, threatening Emma with destruction, ordering her to receive all those who have been given to my servant Joseph. Also suggesting that essentially if. If a wife will not accept this teaching, the husband will nevertheless, you know, receive an abundance. Like I said, I think the simplest way of putting it is this is Joseph at his revelatory worst.

John Dehlin 1:50:13 Yeah, it is. It is. Well said. All right, so Joseph writes down this revelation with Hyrum. Do we assume that Hyrum was the scribe or was Clayton the scribe? Who do we think was the scribe for this revelation?

The July 1843 Revelation and Its Origins

John Turner 1:50:29 Clayton. By several of his own accounts, including, well, in his journal. In his Nauvoo journal, he writes that he recorded a revelation on July 12, 1843. He doesn't specify the substance of it in his journal. By several later accounts of his, he's the scribe.

John Dehlin 1:50:55 Okay, so Joseph writes it down and like he is want to do, he doesn't take it to Emma. He sends someone else to deliver the message. So he sends the revelation with Hyrum. How does that go?

John Turner 1:51:14 Well, it doesn't do the trick. So the. Yeah, so according to Clayton's later account, now this is like technically that's a second hand account, but Hiram takes it to her and in return, Hiram, the most severe talking to of his life. She didn't believe a word of it.

John Dehlin 1:51:41 Yeah, she probably, she probably was super angry. And don't you say that she demanded it be destroyed. The. The revelation burned.

John Turner 1:51:52 So according to several later accounts, and you know, I don't, I don't know if we can absolutely trust these. I think I. I think they're mostly recollections of people like Brigham Young. But she apparently badgered Joseph until he agreed that she could destroy it and then may have burned it. Now it was pretty easy for Joseph to acquiesce to giving it up because he had had a copy made by Joseph Kingsbury.

John Dehlin 1:52:30 Yeah, so there was a copy, but Emma probably destroyed. Probably burned the original.

John Turner 1:52:36 Right, she could have burned the original. Maybe that's, you know, a fun flourish to the story. We don't know. Yeah, we do know she didn't accept it. We also know, and I don't think it's coincidental that, you know, she visited. And this is from Eliza Snow's contemporary diary. She paid a visit to Eliza Snow On July 20, about a week later. And Snow didn't record the substance of their conversation, but she did note Emma's forbidding and angry looks. So I think one thing that happens by July is Emma starts to understand the extent of her husband's practice. And Joseph certainly didn't give her the full scoop when he broached the. The subject with her. And I think now she's wondering which of my friends are sealed to my husband. And she's starting to confront people.

John Dehlin 1:53:47 And I imagine after Hyrum delivers the revelation to Emma, that Emma confronts Joseph about the revelation. I mean, that had to have been

John Turner 1:53:57 the very next step, you would presume so. I mean, one thing that we do know is that on the same day, Joseph deeded 68 parcels of Nauvoo land to Emma and their children. And a few days later, she. He deeds her some additional property and a half share of a steamboat that he owns. So which was. Which was not John de Lind, his party yacht, by the way, just in case you or others are wondering. But. And you know, this is speculation because we don't know for sure, but it's possible that she demanded this sort of element of financial security in response to Joseph's sort of revelatory insistence about polygamy.

John Dehlin 1:55:04 Well, I mean, Emma could have been not only furious at his deception, but also sincerely worried about his ruin because, in fact, ruin, polygamy ends up being Joseph's downfall or destruction with the Nauvoo Expositor and Carthage jail and the mob. So I'm sure she was saying, all this stuff we've built up, you're putting it in jeopardy. And I was just. I was. I did not know this, John Turner, except for your book. I did not know that on the same day that. That you know, and. Or around the same day that Emma finds out about DNC132, the polygamy revelation, that Joseph deeds her 128 lots of land in Nauvoo and half the share of a steamboat. It seems impossible that that's a coincidence. And I just have to add, you don't come down hard on this like me. That's not Joseph's money. Like, where does his money come from? Joseph doesn't have a job really, other than being prophet. So these are consecrated funds. This is people giving their sacred tithing to the church. And then Joseph gets to do with the money and the land whatever he wants. And he's gifting his wife 128 lots of land and half a steamboat, seemingly as a way to pacify, ameliorate and, or buy her off at her revulsion, repulsion and anger to his polygamous exploits. How is that not the most likely scenario?

John Turner 1:56:45 Well, I agree it seems unlikely that this is coincidental. Yeah, I think. And we don't, we don't. You know, one thing we just often don't know is we don't, we don't get inside Joseph's head during these months very easily. Nor do we get inside Emma's head. We know she's angry. We know that they have fierce conflicts. We don't know is she thinking, yes, this could ruin my husband, or is she thinking this could ruin and end our marriage? Regardless, it seems reasonable to think she is seeking some financial security for what might come to pass.

John Dehlin 1:57:33 Yeah. Okay, really quickly, Julia, this, this is just an aside going back to the posterity seed question. I'm sorry to derail us. I just don't know when else we're going to mention this, but Julia wanted me to mention that polygamy did not result in more, more, more children per woman on the frontier. And so in the sense of it increasing the overall population size per capita, it was a miserable failure. My, my response to Julia is it never was about increasing the overall population per woman. It was about increasing the population of the elite, well connected, established Mormon leadership or hierarchy. It certainly increased Heber's output in terms of children and Brigham's output in terms of children and you know, John Taylor and Wilford Woodruff and Lorenzo Snow and Joseph F. Smith and you know, the, the like, it was an elitist. And this, the, the second anointing plays into this polygamy was, it was an elitist practice that let the, the gray, the graybacks at the top of the Mormon patriarchy maximize their wealth and their progeny.

John Turner 1:59:09 No, that's true. I think Heber c. Kimball had 64 children or something like that. I think Brigham only had 59.

John Dehlin 1:59:19 Heber out. Brigham to Brigham.

John Turner 1:59:21 Yeah. So, yeah. What I would say also is you're right to point out that polygamy was not sort of really a strategy for population growth. You're also right that, you know, if the extent of a man's eternal glory is connected to the size of his family, again, the more wives and children, the more glory. I think more generally, you know, in terms of contemporary, you know, more contemporary defenses of polygamy, it's less about growing a population than creating a cohesive and righteous people in the 19th century.

William Law's Opposition to the Plural Marriage Revelation

John Dehlin 2:00:07 All right, let's go to now. Okay. The fact that the original of Joseph's revelation doesn't exist is part of what gives fodder to the Joseph never practiced polygamy crowd. Because we don't have the original. But also what we do have is the Nauvoo High Council minutes. So let's talk about the Nautil High Council meeting that Hyram goes to to try to get Nauvoo High Council support for this new revelation.

John Turner 2:00:46 So that's a great question. And so you're right. In keeping with the story that we just narrated, the original of Joseph's revelation doesn't exist. I will just say that's not unusual because that is the case for most of, or at least many, if not most of Joseph's revelations. We don't have the original. Often we have what John Whitmer copied into a book of Revelations. Sometimes the, the first extant copy is from the 1833 Book of Commandments, so. Or a publication in a newspaper.

John Dehlin 2:01:32 Wow, that's an important point.

John Turner 2:01:35 So that you know that this is not, you know, this is not unique. So one thing that Joseph does as 1843 progresses, and I think it's partly partly because knowledge of plural marriage has become more common and rumors about it more common in Nauvoo, Joseph at least permits other high ranking church leaders to examine the Revelation. So at the Nauvoo High Council in summer of 1843, Hyrum Smith shares the revelation and a number of the men on that council reject it, including stake president William Marx. Joseph also in maybe the late summer, fall of 1843, shows the revelation to William Law, who is one of his counselors in the first Presidency. So, and this will be very significant going forward, what happens is you end up with a group of men who are leaders in the church who have a knowledge of this revelation and become opponents of polygamy. None of those people seek to immediately break with Joseph. And Joseph is probably not particularly alarmed that anyone would not immediately accept this doctrine. But you start to have sort of this cadre of people within the church who have knowledge about polygamy and oppose it.

John Dehlin 2:03:39 Yeah, I wrote Sidney Rigdon, William Law, William Marx, Austin Cowles, Leonard Sobey. That's a lot of opposition. And it explains why Joseph hid it from so many people. Although he could just look to Hiram and, and Brigham and say many, many men who wanted to die, allegedly, when they were told about the revelation, became fast converts. But unfortunately, not everyone was built of the same metal as Brigham Young and apparently Hiram Smith because he was not able to convert those men that I just mentioned. The one thing that, you know, I tend to want to lionize William Law as one of the great heroes of, of my version of the Restoration. Why did. Why did William Law, Sidney Rigdon, William Marks, Austin Cowles and Leonard Sobey stay quiet for a time? Why didn't they blow up the church in summer of 1843 when they found out instead of waiting a full year to apostatize?

John Turner 2:04:42 So that is a great question. So this is how I would answer it is I think a lot of these individuals, they're simply sort of gobsmacked and flummoxed when Joseph teaches this to them. And they, you know, somebody like William Law, I mean, he's in the First Presidency. And when he's first met Joseph Smith, I mean, he's very impressed by Joseph. I think he says something like, he's everything I could ever want in a prophet. And so he's very willing to hear Joseph out and to wrestle with this. And I actually think into 1844, if Joseph had simply been patient, I don't mean they would have come around on the doctrine. But most of these individuals, they're not looking to break with Joseph Smith. They're certainly not looking to publicly break with him. As we'll see when we talk about the last couple chapters of the book, Joseph's stance toward his opponents becomes almost hyper antagonistic. So in a way, Joseph pushes these eventual breaks.

John Dehlin 2:06:14 Yeah. One thing that came to mind is understanding that William Law and Wilson Law had a lot of financial investments in Nauvoo. And if you're financially into something along with your reputation, it's probably going to take you some time to do whatever you can to secure your investments or make alternative plans because you've got a lot of personal investment, again, financially and reputation at stake. So that's just me speculating as to some of the reasons why they might have waited a year to really express their outrage. Or at least six, six or nine months. I also know that it takes time for Joseph to actually proposition Jane Law. And also foster like some of the antagonism comes when Joseph starts hitting up the wives of the men who oppose his polygamy as kind of last straws. That's how I read it. You may or may not make much of those accounts, but let's pause that and save it for a future episode. I feel like we're running out of time. What I want to talk about really quickly, one of the most table flipping moments in all of your book, John Turner, is the Lydia Moon revelation, I'm calling it, that Joseph Smith receives. But let's just back up and say tell us about the unraveling of the Clayton Moon marriages and tell us about the moment of, of, of the Lydia Moon revelation, which I think will go town, go down as one of the most crass moments of Joseph Smith's life.

John Turner 2:07:58 Yeah, so you know, if you're, if you're, if you're getting exhausted after, you know, while we get to the end of this episode, go get yourself another Mountain Dew or cup of coffee because you don't want to miss this. Right. So we talked in the prior episode that Joseph scribe, William Clayton, after Joseph introduces the doctrine of polygamy to him. He's really enthusiastic. He has sort of has his heart set on someone that he knew in England, but she's not present yet. So he teaches the principle to his sister in law, Margaret Moon, and she becomes his first plural wife. That leads to all sorts of anguish in the family. She's still in love with another young man and regrets the marriage. Clayton's mother in law becomes really distraught about this polygamous arrangement. She, she threatens to kill herself. Margaret Moon. So his first plural wife, she at one point tells Clayton that she wants to tell everyone in Nauvoo all that she knows and then kill herself.

John Dehlin 2:09:24 So it's driving people to suicide or.

John Turner 2:09:27 Suicide.

John Dehlin 2:09:28 This is serious.

John Turner 2:09:29 It's very serious. And if you read Clayton's journal, I mean, it's just, it's heartbreaking to, to read about the negative impacts on his family. Then it emerges, and I think this is in September of 1843. It emerges that Clayton would like to marry a third moon sister, Lydia Moon. And Joseph gets, somehow gets, maybe Clayton tells Joseph or Joseph gets wind of Clayton's intentions. And so Joseph tells him, and this is per Clayton's journal, that the Lord had revealed to him that a man could only take two of a family except by express revelation. And Joseph further explains that if a man married more than two sisters, it was bound to lead to quote, wrangles and trouble. That was definitely the case because just marrying one sister, you know, that that had led to considerable wrangles. So Joseph then asked Clayton if he would give Lydia to him. So he wanted her for himself. And Clayton is a very agreeable scribe, assents to this. And he actually sends Clayton to Lydia as his intermediary. And I don't know, maybe, maybe Clayton didn't give it the hard sell, I don't know. But Lydia Moon turns Joseph down. Down. And then he himself goes to Lydia a few days later to press his case. But her no meant no. So she did not become a plural wife of either man.

John Dehlin 2:11:40 And I'm calling her Lydia Legend, that's what I'm calling her. And I just think it's so deplorable that, that, you know, Clayton wants a third sister to be. To sleep with. So what, he's got three sisters in his bed instead of two. His mother in law is suicidal, one of his two wives is suicidal, yet he wants a third sister anyway. But then Joseph swoops in and says, sorry, God told me that you're not allowed to have more than two sisters. And so by the way, can I have, can I have her instead? Seriously, you cannot make this up.

John Turner 2:12:15 You can't make it up. I totally agree. And you and I, because it is so absurd, we can't help but laugh about it, right? And anybody I tell this story to, of course one response is you can't help but, but laugh about it because like you said, you couldn't make it up. And at the same time, the human cost, the toll within Clayton's household is just immense. So I just see it as, you know, this is a callous disregard on the part of both of these men for the damage that their actions have, have caused. And yeah, it's, it's, it's quite stunning.

John Dehlin 2:13:10 Yeah. And y' all will have to forgive me. I'm going to read one more quote from the Journal of Discourses that really, I mean, this is just one case study. So the, the William Clayton Moon sisters is just one case study of the damage that polygamy rot families. I can tell you stories of my, my grandmother. She, she was the daughter of a third of four wives. And I can tell you harrowing stories about what that Parkinson family was like in, you know, Franklin Preston, Idaho. Let me just read a little paragraph from Jedediah Grant. He gives a talk called rebuking. Julie's going to love this. He gives a talk called rebuking iniquity in the Bowery in the Great Salt Lake, September 21, 1856. Quote. And we have women here who like anything but the celestial law of God. Meaning what?

John Turner 2:14:13 John Turner, Anything but the celestial law of God. Well, plural marriage, I think, in this case.

John Dehlin 2:14:20 And if they could break asunder the cable of the Church of Christ, there is scarcely a mother in Israel, but, but would do it this day. And they talk it to their husbands, to their daughters and to their neighbors and say they have not seen a week's happiness since they became acquainted with that law or since their husbands took a second wife. They want to break up the Church of God and to break it from their husbands and from their family connections. And then again, that's when the quote comes. Then again, there are men that are used as tools by their wives and they are just a little better in appearance and in their habits than a little black boy. They live in filth and nastiness and eat it and drink it and they are filthy all over. That's what, that's what church general authorities in the mid-1800s are saying to the women who find the practice of polygamy to be deplorable or unhealthy or saddening or distasteful. That's the callousness that grows out of Joseph Smith's callousness and William Clayton's callousness, Heber C. Kimball's callousness and Brigham Young's callousness. Have you heard that quote before?

John Turner 2:15:58 I have heard that quote before.

John Dehlin 2:16:00 I'm sure you have.

John Turner 2:16:02 Yeah. So I have a bit of a comment because, you know, this is sort of Joseph Smith and William Clayton at their worst. Right. And at the same time, we know that many Mormon women defended celestial marriage. We can certainly find instances in which women exercise their agency to leave behind abusive husbands, monogamous husbands, and chose to attach themselves to Mormon polygamists in ways that may have improved their lives in individual cases. I mean, that's certainly possible. And we also know that monogamy was hardly non patriarchal in the 19th century. And so patriarchy and abuse, they, you know, they, they are elements of American society at the time. And, and, and now as well now those things being said and, and granted, I definitely think that part polygamy in, I mean it was the patriarchal order of marriage and it enhanced, you know, it enhanced patriarchal authority. And in this particular case, you know, I think, I think Joseph never had, he never articulated a long term plan for how his people were supposed to live out political polygamy. I think it's, it's sort of a rampaging principle without a plan during his lifetime. I think one thing that is true and is that Joseph just proceeded without a lot of reflection on what these ceilings and decisions would mean for others. Now maybe in his private moments he was more self reflective and gave more thought to that. I do think in some instances he responds to the concern, concerns of his plural wives. But for the most part, this is a good, pretty good example of, you know, a callous disregard for the human cost of these decisions.

John Dehlin 2:18:54 Yeah, yeah, it. It. There needs to be a book, just like there's in Sacred Loneliness, a book about how painful it was on the wives of Joseph Smith. Maybe this could be Julia's dissertation. There needs to be a book on the havoc that polygamy played in the lives of 19th century Mormon families. Because, I mean, we almost talk about it laughingly because it's so ridiculous and removed. But our culture of COVID up and silence and never criticizing the brethren and never airing dirty laundry, I think has hidden a lot of carnage. And it was really revealing to me to learn about the suicidality of at least two polygamy participants or family members in the Moon Sisters. That's got to be just a. Just a small sampling or case study in the carnage that polygamy actually wrought.

John Turner 2:19:57 Yeah. So, you know, you can find. You can find a variety of books on that subject for listeners who are interested. So I think Laurel Thatcher Ulrich's House Full of Females comes at this from a very different perspective and points to elements of female sociality and agency in polygamy. On the other hand, there's a book by Paula Harline, the Polygamous Wives Writing Club, that looks at some sort of late 19th century Mormon polygamist women's diaries and includes some, you know, extremely disturbing material. And I think, you know, these. This question doesn't really hinge on, you know, individual outcomes. You could probably find some individual outcomes in which men treat their wives with kindness and the wives get along. I do think the system as a whole, you know, at its core was about the exaltation of men, included the exaltation of women, but it was about the exaltation of men through the expansion of their families. And I do think that principle was, you know, that living out that principle there often was a human cost.

John Dehlin 2:21:41 All right, John Turner. Well, I think the next part of our story is that while Emma's been away, she now returns from St. Louis. I guess that gives me the impression that sometimes Joseph would make hay while the sun shone, so to speak. Or. Or as they said on my mission, when the cat's away, the mice will play. Did Joseph take advantage of Emma's departures?

Did Joseph Exploit Emma's Absences?

John Turner 2:22:05 So it's a good question. I mean, for the most part, you know, some, you know, the stretches in which he married, he was sealed to a lot of women. Some of those may have coincided with some of Emma being away but for the most part, she was in Nauvoo. What? The reason why she is traveling to St. Louis is because after the bog shooting, or particularly after the bog shooting, maybe even before then, it's just not safe for Joseph to set foot in the state of Missouri. So she. She takes some business trips, really, on his behalf.

John Dehlin 2:22:48 Oh, it's for him.

John Turner 2:22:50 Well, it's for him and. And for the church.

John Dehlin 2:22:55 Okay. And that would make it a teeny bit suspicious for me, because then if. If he's ultimately assigning her travel reason, might wonder if he's wanting to find reasons to have her go, but I'm just totally making that up.

John Turner 2:23:13 Yeah. I mean, I think Joseph, you know, from particularly early 1842 on, he simply was creative at finding ways to pursue polygamy undetected. From Emma in Nauvoo while she's in the city, there's simply a lot of homes that he can go to where other people will keep his confidence. And it seems, you know, it's. It seems outlandish, and it was certainly brazen, but for the most part, he seems to have been able to do things without Emma detecting it.

John Dehlin 2:23:51 Yeah. Between the Johnson bed in Heber's home, there's always vacancy.

John Turner 2:23:59 Oh, dear.

Emma Returns Angry and Confronts Joseph

John Dehlin 2:24:01 All right, so Emma comes back angry. Why angry when she returns?

John Turner 2:24:07 Well, she's been angry this. You know, she's been angry this whole late spring and summer. So ever since Joseph finally broached the topic of plural marriage with her, and then particularly once she found out a bit more about the extent and nature of her husband's polygamous marriages, it's been tumultuous. And, you know, the. The trip to St. Louis, it's a few weeks after Joseph presented her with the plural marriage revelation. And I think they probably had a lot of angry conversations during those weeks. And then when she's away, she has a chance to reflect on what has transpired and what Joseph's been telling her. And her conclusion is that I am completely rejecting what William Clayton refers to as the priesthood euphemism for polygamy in this context. And when she gets back, she tells Joseph he has to abandon all of his plural wives. You know, she wants to him to totally put this behind him. And I don't think she explicitly articulates that this. But Joseph is concerned enough by Emma's forceful opposition that he fears that if he doesn't do this, she might leave him or seek a divorce.

John Dehlin 2:25:41 And I don't. I mean, and I'm thinking in my mind, she has to have been wondering what he was up to while she was away once she returns. And. And he was with the Moon Sisters, trying to. Trying to take Whitney Clayton's desired third Moon Sister away from Whitney Clayton. So, I mean, I'm saying Whitney Clayton. Is that right?

John Turner 2:26:05 William.

John Dehlin 2:26:06 William Clayton. There are other reasons I'm thinking about a Whitney Clayton, but I'll. I'll save that for another time. Anyway, so he was up to no good. And she comes back angry and probably should have been. Okay, so what does Joseph promise Emma? This is reminding me of his confrontation with her dad.

John Turner 2:26:26 Yeah, well, way, way, way, way long ago, right? Yeah. He promises to relinquish all that. He's gonna. He's gonna give it up. And at the same time, did you think of his.

John Dehlin 2:26:41 His. His. His heartfelt promise to Isaac Hale when you. You know, to stop the treasure digging garbage? Did you think of that when you. When you hit the scene in your discoveries? Because I sure did.

John Turner 2:26:56 I. I didn't think of it. But yeah, you're right. That's a. That's a parallel where Joseph. Well, I mean, he at least indicates. I don't know how firm of a profit. Promise it is in that instance, but I think you're right. He. At least Isaac Hale thinks that Joseph is going to give up these youthful follies, and then he doesn't. And also in this case, Joseph does not intend to relinquish all because he privately tells William Clayton, who talks with both Emma and Joseph about these things. Apparently all the time. He tells Clayton he won't relinquish anything. Now, I think what Joseph also has in mind is, for the most part, he doesn't have that much to do with most of his plural wives. And so he can say, I'm relinquishing them, but they're still his for eternity. The covenants are not going to be annulled or anything like that.

John Dehlin 2:28:02 So I guess there's no way to know whether he was intentionally lying to Emma when he promised to stop or if. Or if he was sincere in the moment and then just couldn't stop. I guess there's no way to know that.

John Turner 2:28:16 Well, you know, my stated position is that it's hard to assess sincerity in the absence of good evidence. In this case, I do not think that Joseph was sincere. I think he.

John Dehlin 2:28:31 That's bold for you, John Turner.

John Turner 2:28:33 He. I think he makes that concession to Emma under duress, as evidence. On August 21st of 1843, Emma finds two letters from Eliza Snow in one of Joseph's pockets and she's vexed and angry and I mean, I guess that's incoming material. But if Joseph at the same time is telling William Clayton he's not going to relinquish anything, I think it was not, not a sincere confession. And regardless, he doesn't live up to it.

John Dehlin 2:29:14 I think you write in your book Back to Secrecy and Deception. I think I wrote that down as a quote.

John Turner 2:29:19 Correct.

John Dehlin 2:29:21 Okay.

John Turner 2:29:23 And you know Emma, of course, ever since Joseph has broached this subject with her and in particular ever since she discovered that these were not just ceremonial spiritual ceilings, of course she's probably been suspicious every time she hasn't been with her husband.

John Dehlin 2:29:44 Yeah.

John Turner 2:29:45 And so she finds letters from Eliza Snow that is cause for, you know, that's cause for suspicion. And then the day after that, Emma and Joseph ride to the home of Flora Woodworth. And Emma apparently has learned about the gold watch that Flora Woodworth has received from her husband. Because when the couple goes to the Woodworth house, Joseph goes off to the temple, probably with Flora's father. And when he comes back, he finds Emma demanding the gold watch that he had given to 16 year old Flora.

John Dehlin 2:30:35 And remind us why that's particularly triggering for Emma giving Joseph's past gifts.

John Turner 2:30:44 So he gave Emma a gold watch sometime early in their marriage and he also gave a watch to Eliza Snow, I think. Well, I guess he hadn't given it to her yet. She got a watch the next year. So it's a token of affection and it's an unusual token of affection for a man to give to another woman.

John Dehlin 2:31:18 Before we talk about Emma's reaction and then Joseph's reaction to Emma's reaction, help us understand what divorce might have meant, both in a frontier mid 19th century context, but also for the leader of a large religious movement. I don't even have a sense for what type of scandal or outcomes that that might have invoked why Joseph felt like he was truly between a rock and a hard place.

John Turner 2:31:49 Yeah. So divorce, first of all would have been largely unthinkable. It's not something that one can get as a matter of course, as is the case in 2026, one would have to file a suit, one would have to established grounds. Now, I think Emma probably could have found grounds for a divorce. However, there'd be a great deal of uncertainty about property and financial support and the scandal would have been tremendous for both Emma and Joseph. I do think that one reason, one reason that Emma has some leverage over Joseph is she, more than anybody else in his life, has The. Has the power to do significant damage to his reputation and his movement.

John Dehlin 2:33:03 You know, I'm thinking for the. And I hate to always be referring to them, but I'm always got. I've always got the polygamy deniers in my mind. Joseph, polygamy deniers. What's the. Do you. And I'm putting you on the spot, so you can just tell me next time, but what's the source that Emma threatens divorce? Because if there's a solid source on that, that sounds pretty. Pretty damning to those who want to say Joseph wasn't involved in mischief.

John Turner 2:33:32 That's from the William Clayton Journal.

John Dehlin 2:33:35 Okay, well.

John Turner 2:33:37 And I do think it's a solid source. However, I don't think it was. I don't think it was a serious threat on Emma's part. I don't. I think for Emma, divorce was largely unthinkable. It would have been humiliating for her to pursue that and financially precarious. So I think it is something that. I mean, Joseph. The way Clayton puts it is Joseph was worried that Emma would. And the quote is, pitch in on him and obtain a divorce and leave him. So it's almost even. This is Joseph's worry rather than necessarily Emma's explicit threat.

John Dehlin 2:34:31 And I imagine that if the Navo Expositor was the undoing and that's not his wife, if his wife comes out and says Joseph's got 30 other wives, that probably could have been even more explosive than the Nav Expositor, maybe.

John Turner 2:34:50 I think it could have been game over.

John Dehlin 2:34:52 Yeah. Yeah. So Emma. Emma folds in that regard. Okay, so Emma. What. Tell us about what. What Emma does in response to Floors. Watch again. And, you know, the lies. Yeah. And the Eliza stuff and all that.

John Turner 2:35:10 So this is a. This is a great. It's a great story. I don't actually have massive confidence, and I think it's a. It is a bit of a later source. I would have to check the details. But according to one story that was passed down, when Emma demands this watch back from. Or demands this watch from the Woodworths, she then puts it on the ground and stomps on it with her foot. Foot, Which, I mean, that's a fun story. It's not in Clayton's 1843 journal. You know, I included it with, you know, a little bit of qualification as a story passed down among church members. But what I think you. What I. I think you see Emma doing in August is confronting Joseph's wives and basically telling them, this is over. You can't have anything to do with my husband going forward, I'm 100% confident that's the message she delivered to Eliza Snow. She clearly delivers that message to the Woodworths. She delivers it to Emily and Eliza Partridge. I think part of the problem for Emma, she actually doesn't know the full extent of Joseph's marriages, but the ones she finds out about, she, she tries to put an end to them.

John Dehlin 2:36:53 So she probably didn't know about all 30 plus. You're thinking she knew about estimated. What's their evidence for an estimated, how many she knew about?

John Turner 2:37:04 I mean, clear evidence. I don't know that there would be incredibly clear evidence for more than six or so.

John Dehlin 2:37:14 The, the two sister pairs, Eliza, Flora.

John Turner 2:37:22 So the Lawrence sisters, the Parcher sisters, Eliza and Flora.

John Dehlin 2:37:27 Okay, wow. So she knew about a fifth.

John Turner 2:37:30 I mean, I, I, I, she probably knew about war. I mean, it's such a mess. I'm sure Emma had, you know, broad suspicions. I, I can, I imagine she might have confronted other people this summer. But, you know, that's a, it's a little bit awkward to say, march into somebody's home or confront somebody on the street and say, are you, are you secretly my husband's polygamous wife?

John Dehlin 2:38:07 Oh, man. So you write that Emma berates Joseph. What do we know about that berating?

The Flora Woodworth Incident and Emma's Reaction

John Turner 2:38:14 So this is William Clayton's account, and this is essentially what Joseph told Clayton after the episode, which is that after they left the Woodworth house as their writing home, Emma is just irate at Joseph, perhaps because she's just discovered about the ceiling to Flora Woodworth, and she's angry that he has deceived her to the extent that he has. And according to Clayton's account, and presumably this is what he heard from Joseph, Joseph had, and this is the quote, had to use harsh measures to put a stop to her abuse, but finally succeeded.

John Dehlin 2:39:09 And is that, was that a common euphemism of the day? And if so, what was generally meant by that? It reminds me of the Martin Harris and Lucy Harris incident.

John Turner 2:39:21 Well, I, in the end, John, I don't know. I've, you know, I spent some time poking around, trying to see if harsh measures was a phrase for physical abuse necessarily, or if it could be verbal abuse. I think it could have been either, either of those. So we don't know if Joseph simply browbeat Emma. We don't know if he struck her or threatened to do so. It could have been anything along those lines.

John Dehlin 2:40:06 It's just hard for me to think that an elevated voice would, would, would warrant the, that phrase. That phrase, if I'm just using my instinct, which historians can't do, but the rest of us have to make sense of history. It seems like harsh measures is a code word for. For a beating. That's. I'm just saying that's. I don't know. I don't. That. That makes the most sense to me. But it's good to be careful and to not ever make conclusions you can't back up. So.

John Turner 2:40:44 Yeah, well, certainly the passage in Clayton's journal, you know, it certainly caught my attention for those very reasons. But, yeah, I want to be cautious because to say from that quote that we can definitively know that Joseph beat Emma in the midst of a fight or struck her or grabbed her or. Or anything else, we just. We just don't know. It's certainly. It is a window into the intensity of the conflict between the two of them.

John Dehlin 2:41:25 Yeah. Okay. So does Flora Woodworth become the first. First official. I don't know if the word is like, polygamous wife, refugee, or ex. Ex polygamist. You know, we, we. I. I just attended recently a nonprofit there. There's a nonprofit here called Holding Out Help in Utah that acts as a sort of a halfway house for polygamous wives of the FLDS community or the. Any of the other offshoots. It's a halfway house for those wives who need to escape polygamy and then rebuild a new life. And so in Utah, every year, there's dozens or hundreds of wives fleeing their oppressive polygamous marriages. Is Flora Woodworth the first polygamous refugee wife that we know of and tell us her story of how she makes a break for it?

John Turner 2:42:29 Yeah, well, so I'm going to say we don't know what she's thinking during this time period because we don't have a retrospective account from her the way that we do from people like Helen Mark Kimball or Emily Dow Partridge. What is noteworthy is the very day after this fight or this conflict at her house, she goes to Carthage and gets civilly married to a man named Carlos. Not quite sure how to say his last name. It's either Gove or Gove G O V E, who was not a member of the church. Now, presumably this is somebody that she's known for some time who perhaps had been paying attention to her as well. And she was under 18 years of age, but signed a statement that she was 18. Her. I don't think her. I mean, she could have gotten married at the age of 16 or 17 with the consent of her parents, but apparently she Just signs for herself. The. And we know this to the date because there's a marriage certificate in the archives, and we don't really know what she's thinking. Apparently, according to some retrospective accounts, Joseph gave his consent to this wedding. If you think about it, on the one hand, this is not necessarily all that different from providing a husband for Sarah Whitney. Well, in the sense it's a solution. You know, she still. I mean, it is different because Joseph had been paying attention to Flora Woodworth, but it provides her with an earthly solution. She's still Joseph's for eternity.

John Dehlin 2:44:53 Oh, okay. Yeah. Because I was asking, like, what. So she's not. Yeah. When. When you said Joseph consents, what I thought is like, okay, Emma's shutting this down, so Flora might be worried if she makes a move in another direction. But then Joseph realizes his polygamous days are numbered, and so he consents. But you're thinking it's more consenting, possibly as a cover. But in Joseph's mind, she's still sealed. And even in her mind, she's still sealed.

John Turner 2:45:29 Well, we just don't know what's going through her mind, which is so unfortunate. So I, I, I think Julie's asking

John Dehlin 2:45:36 if maybe she was pregnant and the quick marriage was to have a. A father for the baby. But that's. I have no idea whether she even had a baby around that time.

John Turner 2:45:46 I don't, I don't think so. I think we would know if that was the case. But let me, Let me actually put it slightly differently in response to your question, because, you know, I'm saying on some level, this is a convenient solution. However, I'd also say this is a real. This is actually a loss for Joseph Smith in another sense. This, this is one of the relatively few plural wives to whom he did seem rather attached and smitten. And Emma is able to, you know, she confronts him and the Woodworths, and she prevails in this case. And so maybe it doesn't seem like that much of a concession, given the number of wives that he has. But she presses, and she. She does resolve the situation.

John Dehlin 2:46:52 And you write that as far as Emma's concerned, maybe, maybe this is six minus one for Emma.

John Turner 2:47:00 Right.

John Dehlin 2:47:00 In her mind.

John Turner 2:47:01 Right. And she continues to press the Smith household. The Smith family moved into a new residence at the end of August of 1843, which Joseph named the Nauvoo Mansion. And at that point, the Partridge sisters were still part of the household. But soon after the move, according to Emily's recollection, Emily Partridge's recollection, Emma essentially spoke with the two of them repeatedly and forcefully until they agreed to leave. Now, interestingly, she says, or Emily said, that Joseph asked Emma if we made her the promises she required, if she would cease to trouble us and not persist in our marrying someone else. Essentially, that had been on the table. You know, Emma wanted the two of them married to other men, but the compromise apparently is they simply leave the household, that there's not going to be any more contact between them and Joseph, and they can live their lives however they see fit. That does make me think that Emma would have been keenly interested in Flora Woodworth's marriage to another man.

John Dehlin 2:48:47 I mean, that that reintroduces a theme that for me was always one of the most disturbing parts of Doctrine and Covenant Section 132, this idea that women are just assigned to different men or reassigned to different men like cattle, and that marriage was just some weird thing that could be given and taken away, having nothing to do with the consent or the interest of the actual people sometimes being involved in the marriage. But the idea that Emma is excited or interested in the Partridge Sisters specifically marrying somebody else, that's a little condemning of Emma, but also of how Emma and Joseph viewed marriage at the time. But I don't know if I'm making too much of that, but it seems disturbing that Emma's life. Let's marry these Partridge Sisters off. Like, who is Emma to decide who the Partridge sister should or shouldn't be marrying?

John Turner 2:49:45 Well, yeah, no, I take your point. But I can also see the practical appeal of this to Emma Smith.

John Dehlin 2:49:54 Yeah.

John Turner 2:49:54 And so essentially two other. Two other plural wives leave the household.

John Dehlin 2:50:02 So women need a. In 19th century frontier America, Nauvoo women need a man to take care of them. It's not like they're going to be primary breadwinners. Right.

John Turner 2:50:14 No, that's true. And after Joseph's death, other high ranking church leaders marry.

John Dehlin 2:50:26 Scoop up.

John Turner 2:50:27 Right. You could say that Brigham Young marries Emily Dow Partridge and has children with her. So, yeah, this is, I mean, this is a. It's a crazy story, this saga between Joseph and Emma in the summer of 1843. And to some extent you're quite right to say, well, this is, you know, they're both in a way, treating these other women in ways that aren't necessarily giving them much agency. But I think, again, it speaks to the intensity of the con, of the conflict between the Church's first couple.

John Dehlin 2:51:19 Yeah. And I guess, I guess where this comes from, this even line of questioning Is I in some of my interviews on Mormon Stories podcast, where I've interviewed former polygamous wives and. And young men or whatever. You know, this idea of Warren Jeffs literally taking wives away from their husbands and reassigning them and, and. Or their children to other men was such a disturbing thing. And so it's one thing to just say, well, Warren Jess was a monster. But then if you realize that he may have just read his Mormon history really well and read DNC132, the revelation really well and knew about Joseph and Emma and how they handled everything, and he said, hey, if Joseph, you know, let's follow the prophet, let's do what the prophet did. And if women. If wives need to be reassigned, wives need to be reassigned. If there needs to be sham marriages, illegal stuff, so be it. I think that seems fair. Well, they. Warren Jeff's. A lot of his behavior was modeled after what, Joseph Smith's behavior.

John Turner 2:52:40 Well, I'll have to partly punt because I'm actually not all that familiar. I mean, I know the rough outlines of the Warren Jeffs case, but I'm not. I'm not familiar with. With details. I definitely don't think it'd be a good idea for anyone to imitate Joseph when it comes to women and marriages in the last several years of his life. I can be emphatic on that point. John De Lin.

John Dehlin 2:53:08 Or Emma. Or Emma. Okay, so it seems like Emma's thinking in her mind, if in her mind there's only six wives besides her. She's dispatched of Eliza R. Snow, she dispatched of Flora, and now she's dispatched of the part of the Partridge Sisters. In her mind, she's got it down from six to two, you know, additional wives. She's kind of cleaning up, cleaning things up.

John Turner 2:53:34 Well, then things take a unusual turn in this story, and I have to introduce the second anointing in order to give that twist and turn.

Open Conflict Between Emma and Joseph Over Polygamy

John Dehlin 2:53:50 All right, John Turner. Well, I hoped that we might be able to. To possibly complete, you know, this entire portion of the chapter of chapter 28 called Anointed. But there was just so much good stuff about Emma trying to destroy polygamy and, you know, Emma's epic battles with Joseph that I feel like that deserved its own episode. Sort of Emma fights Joseph on polygamy, or Emma goes to war with Joseph on polygamy. So that's going to be where we wrap up for part 36 of the series. We hope you've enjoyed. We hope you see Emma as a formidable counter to Joseph. And I Hope you've enjoyed learning about how Emma does everything she can to undo polygamy once she learns about it and gets upset about it. That's going to be the end of part 36. And what we're going to do is make your treatment. I mean, the whole chapter is called Anointed. So chapter, you know, chapter 28 is really, its culmination is Joseph's introduction of the second anointing or having your calling election made. Sure. And his introduction of that as a way, at least in part as a way to solve the Emma problem. But maybe it's about more than that. And so what we're going to do is we're going to have that become its own episode and leave that as a teaser for part 37 of this series. Anything, John Turner, you want to say in closing to what we've covered in part 36 or as a teaser for part 37 and the introduction of the second anointing?

Reflections on the Anointed Chapter and Looking Ahead

John Turner 2:55:44 Yeah, well, I would say it's such a wild ride over these three or four months when Joseph and Emma are having this open conflict over polygamy finally. And we know some of this history from sources like William Clayton's journal and some other accounts. There's so much we don't know. I mean, it's, it's hard to imagine that these two individuals who, you know, we know, we've got stomping of watches, we've got harsh measures, we've got burned revelations. It's hard to imagine that these two formidable individuals, both of them, Joseph and Emma, it's hard to imagine that they would find, find a way to coexist.

John Dehlin 2:56:40 Don't forget sham marriages.

John Turner 2:56:42 Sham. We've got, we've got everything. It's hard to, it's hard to see how they could continue to coexist with each other going forward.

John Dehlin 2:56:52 Or another way to stand is how does Joseph get out of this pickle?

John Turner 2:56:55 Right. Well, stay tuned for that because we will, we will explain next time.

John Dehlin 2:57:01 I didn't mean to cut off your conclusion there, John Turner.

John Turner 2:57:06 No, that's, it's exactly what I was going for. How do you, how do, how do they, how do they transcend this conflict and move forward? You know, one I think most of us would, would. We'd get hung up on. Well, why would she want to. But they do. And we'll reveal how next time.

John Dehlin 2:57:27 Yeah, I mean, no matter how critical you are of Joseph Smith, if you're being objective, you have to admire his resilience and his creativity. And I think that applies to Emma as well. If anybody was resilient, maybe Emma was resilient even more because she probably dealt with even more adversity than Joseph. You could argue with all of her dead children and, and all that she had to deal with, maybe less of the upside and more of the downside of Joseph's behaviors. So you could argue for a lot of resilience on Emma's part and a lot of creativity on Joseph's part.

John Turner 2:58:14 No question. And you know, we have resilient listeners who despite the intensity of each of these episodes that are coming back for more.

John Dehlin 2:58:26 You're resilient, John Turner. You're resilient. But yes, we love our resilient listeners. So thanks for joining us today on the Joseph Smith Podcast and on Mormon Stories podcast. As always, this series exists thanks to the generosity of donors to Mormon Stories and to this series particularly. Thank you. If you've donated, if you haven't, you can go to donorbox.org Joseph Smith to become a donor to this series. We've had generous donors offer to fund a Brigham Young miniseries, a 10 part Brigham Young miniseries, because as you know, this is not the only Mormon themed book by John Turner. John Turner also authored a book about

John Turner 2:59:12 Brigham Young which was called Pioneer Prophet.

John Dehlin 2:59:16 Okay, and if this book is an A, what grade do you give Pioneer Profit? JOHN Turner.

John Turner 2:59:25 Well, first of all, I don't think I would give any of my own books an A. I do, I do. But thank you. I don't know. So I leave that up to readers. I will say they are a bit different in style. I mean, I tried harder with the Joseph Smith biography to make it a fast paced narrative and keep it super readable and not digress into, you know, quite into the weeds quite as much some of the time. But we can do that on the podcast. So.

John Dehlin 3:00:04 Well, with only 10 episodes, we'll do our best to counter.

John Turner 3:00:08 Right. So it all works out. But I will say Brigham Young, Just an amazing body of sources in the Brigham Young Papers at the LDS Church archives. I was able to go through a lot of material that other historians either hadn't had access to or hadn't fully utilized. So I felt like I was able to Joseph Smith's life, a lot of it is the sources, especially because the Joseph Smith Papers project, the sources are out there with Brigham Young. I felt like there was, there was, there were a lot of new sources to go through. So I think there's a, you know, if people, depending on how familiar they are with the life of Brigham Young. I'm pretty confident, though. There'll be a lot of new material for people in that biography.

John Dehlin 3:01:09 All right. Yeah. And so if you want to donate to that, to support it, to make it happen, just go to donorbox.org Joseph Smith and we promise you that 50% of your donations will go to John Turner one way or the other. And the other just goes to support the operations on our side. We love your emails@mormonstoriesmail.com please like and subscribe. We did hit 300,000 subscribers recently, so we celebrate that. We're super happy about that. Let's go for 400 like Joseph. Let's take it to 12. Oh, wait, that's a, that's a foreshadowing of our next episode. But anyway, let's. Let's take it to 11 and give it. So please, like, please subscribe. Please email us@mormonstoriesmail.com we love your feedback on YouTube or on Spotify. We love your comments and suggestions. Be good to each other, be kind to each other, and we'll see you all next time on the More on Joseph Smith Podcast and on Mormon Stories podcast to talk about Joseph Smith's introduction of the second anointing to Emma, in part as a way to get out of this dilemma that, that Joseph's in. So stay tuned, take care, and we'll see you all again soon on another episode of Mormon Stories podcast and the Joseph Smith Podcast. Take care, everybody.

Transcript © 2026 John P. Dehlin. All rights reserved. Brief quotations are welcome with attribution and a link to mormonstories.org; all other use requires written permission.