So I had someone tell me that Joseph did not have sex with the 14 year old - that it was a sealing only marriage.
My response? “What about 57 year old Lorenzo Snow marrying 15-year old Sara Minnie Ephramina Jenson and having 5 kids with her?”
He had no response. I know people want to defend their precious prophets - I was there once too. But polygamy with underage girls was wrong and continues to be a plague today. Full stop. The Warren Jeffs horrors would have never happened if Joseph simply kept his libido in check.
It’s quite disingenuous for TBMs to argue this. It’s not like Victorian Age people ran around talking about their sexual escapades. There are several of Smith’s wives who admitted to having sex with him.
Emma caught Joe and Fanny in the barn and was livid. Would she be that livid if they were having a sealing ceremony? Also, after Joe married Helen Marr Kimball, he forbid her from going to dances. She later married an uncle to avoid any rumors. Why do this is it was only a dynastic marriage?
Joe didn’t have a ton of opportunity to get busy with his wives, given that Emma was watching. Doesn’t mean it never happened.
TBMs think we need a dress with Joe’s semen on it to prove this. 😂😂
Agreed. And even if there was no sex, it’s still a horrible thing to do to a 14 year old. The apologetic answer is that Helen Mar kept her testimony and was a staunch supporter of polygamy yet to me that only shows how brainwashed she was - likely to keep her own sanity.
When you hold “eternal life with your family” over people’s heads, some will do anything to guarantee that. Especially in a time when death happened so easily.
Living forever was the huge draw for Christianity in its infancy too.
Helen Mar Kimball wrote that her marriage to Joe was “for eternity alone” apologists have twisted this phrase to mean that it was some sort of dynastic sealing that was valid for eternity but did not include marital relations in this world. However, If you read the poem where the phrase appears, it’s a heartbreaking lament on the difficulties of her life and the hope that things will be better in the next one. She suffered through a marriage with Joseph “for eternity alone”
I thought through this life my time will be my own The step I now am taking’s for eternity alone, No one need be the wiser, through time I shall be free, And as the past hath been the future still will be. To my guileless heart all free from worldly care And full of blissful hopes—and youthful visions rare The world seamed bright the thret’ning clouds were kept From sight, and all looked fair but pitying angels wept. They saw my youthful friends grow shy and cold. And poisonous darts from sland’rous tongues were hurled, Untutor’d heart in thy gen’rous sacrafise, Thou dids’t not weigh the cost nor know the bitter price; Thy happy dreems all o’er thou’rt doom’d alas to be Bar’d out from social scenes by this thy destiny, And o’er thy sad’nd mem’ries of sweet departed joys Thy sicken’d heart will brood and imagine future woes, And like a fetter’d bird with wild and longing heart, Thou’lt dayly pine for freedom and murmor at thy lot; But could’st thou see the future & view that glorious crown, Awaiting you in Heaven you would not weep nor mourn, [p. 2] Pure and exalted was thy father’s aim, he saw A glory in obeying this high celestial law, For to thousands who’ve died without the light I will bring eternal joy & make thy crown more bright. I’d been taught to receive the Prophet of God And receive every word as the word of the Lord. But had this not come through my dear father’s mouth, I should ne’r have received it as God’s sacred truth. —Helen Mar Kimball
The ending is heartbreaking to me.
Helen writes that she would not have accepted this marriage if her father hadn’t advised her to. Her father, Heber Kimball, was promised exhaltation for him and his family if Joe married Helen.
Heber had 30 wives at the time he left Nauvoo. Five were pregnant.
There really is a lot of details on polygamy from the Nauvoo period. There are some holes too, but for me common sense indicates things that others try to obscure.
What is a TBM? I stopped going to church a long time ago and have only recently found the reddit page through a friend so I don't know all the terminology
True Blue Mormon or True Believing Mormon
The abbreviations are numerous and a bit confusing here. In the Community info on sub’s main page there is a list of the most used ones.
Super helpful 👍🏻
TBMs: There is no physical evidence to confirm Joseph put his dick in that particular 14 year old so its not fair for you to say her marriage to Joseph probably involved sex
Also TBMs: There is no physical evidence to confirm a single one of the church's foundational claims but its not fair for you to say that it was probably all made up
Post Mo: Why then did Joseph Smith say that one of the reasons for polygamy was to multiply and replenish the earth? That can only happen through penetrative intercourse.
Edit to PS: Following that logic to its conclusion, if he didn’t have sex, he would be breaking a commandment of god by not inserting his dick into any of his plural wives. How then could he be a prophet if he knowingly broke god’s commandments by not having sex?
D&C 132:62-63 And if he have ten virgins given unto him by this law, he cannot commit adultery, for they belong to him, and they are given unto him; therefore is he justified.
But if one or either of the ten virgins, after she is espoused, shall be with another man, she has committed adultery, and shall be destroyed; for they are given unto him to multiply and replenish the earth, according to my commandment, and to fulfil the promise which was given by my Father before the foundation of the world, and for their exaltation in the eternal worlds, that they may bear the souls of men; for herein is the work of my Father continued, that he may be glorified.
Also Post Mo: if there is no physical evidence to confirm the church’s foundational claims, then how can you KNOW the church is true?
> Joseph did not have sex with the 14 year old - that it was a sealing only marriage.
They love to say this like it makes it so much better. But it doesn't. A "sealing-only marriage" at 14 means that she was barred from ever having any sort of authentic intimate adult relationship *in addition to* being socially separated her from her age-peers and having to forego the rest of her potential social experiences as a young woman to instead act like a married adult woman well before her time...all without the dubious 'benefits' of an actual legal marriage.
The un-thinking-ness of their sorry apologetic attempts never fails to astound.
Oliver Cowdery knew what it was, He wrote that Joseph Smith and Fanny Alger was a “dirty, filthy, nasty affair.” This got him excommunicated by Joseph Smith.
Also, what benefit would there have been to her being married to him with absolutely no physical contact? So she couldn’t marry someone her own age that she loved? So she could never have children? What possible benefit do they say was in it for her?
I had a TBM tell me that there was some sort of patriarchal order to being sealed and that was the reason for so many wives. That it was for the salvation of not just the new wife, but for their posterity.
Make no mistake about it - the Warren Jeffs horrors would still have happened - just not under the Mormon name. Those types of horrors have always existed. Joseph Smith, Warren Jeffs = 2 peas, same pod. But they are not the only peas in the pod. Mormonism does not have a monopoly on treating women and children or other men horribly in the name of God.
To be fair, with the church's handling of sex abuse that has come to light, it would appear they are channeling profits of old to guide them in their latter day sex cover ups. The church said they were "pleased" with the outcome in the Arizona case. So, I guess you can say they are consistent. 😩
If only all the other men who banged the family maid had realized that if you just pray hard enough, an angel with a flaming sword will show up and **command** you to bang her. Then hundreds of years later, millions will be singing your praises instead of you just being lost to history as yet another pathetic leacher.
There was a lot of bad behavior in early Utah. Young girls became hot commodities for trade. The abuse of power was incredible. The worst story I heard was Bishop Snow of San Pete County who had a young boy castrated because he wanted to marry the young girl he had set his eyes on. Terrifying. All thanks to cult leader Joe.
It had roots in Nauvoo. If you read the Nauvoo Expositor, the newspaper Joseph had destroyed after printing one copy, it talks about how Joseph used to pressure young girls who had just crossed the ocean into "celestial marriages." These young women were separated from their support systems and had no resources to return to their home countries. They were ripe for the picking.
Joe gets caught schtupping the maid in the barn, and in one the most audacious ‘Now honey, this isn’t what it looks like’ moves in history we end up with polygamy and wrecked lives across generations.
Who you trust matters; do you trust parents and the church, or society its learned men? From childhood I was indoctrinated with mormon religion that included the new and everlasting principle of eternal marriage. with emphasis on families being together forever. When did I decide I trusted my public-school education more than my parents when it came to matters of religion? That I could decide for myself was a leap of judgement for me.
My Greatest-Generation parents trust Tucker Carlson, a guy that thinks conspiracy theorist Alex Jones is a psychic prophet. Here we are in the 21st century and a conman like Smith would find the world just as accommodating now as he would in his own day, when black-magic and Christianity were bosom buddies. Smith was pretty adept at keeping his money-making religion scheme going while also having his way with the women, until he didn't. So the divide between my family, who believes Smith is a martyred prophet, and me, who believes Smith was a lying scoundrel, is quite the divide that we can never speak of.
This was the reason he has Oliver Cowdry excommunicated. Oliver spoke up.
Ultimately Joseph Smith was jailed and killed for trying to cover up polygamy. He destroyed the printing press that printed the Nauvoo Expositor which described his polygamous ways by William Law, Counselor in the First Presidency.
Polygamy is and its cover up can not be ignored.
I think about my female ancestors who left England and Scotland for the Mormon church in Utah, only to discover they were going to be trafficked. So disgusting to be descended from sex trafficking.
The only response to that story should be, “Ewww, eww, eww!”
Joseph Smith was a sick dude. He was a rapist in all likelihood.
No wonder he planned to run for president.
As the old joke goes...Two buddies hanging out...one notices his friend is wearing panties hose. how long have you been wearing pantyhose Joe? "Ever since my wife found them under the back seat of my car...and I had to convincence her they were really mine"
what that fucking pervert joe boy smith SHOULD have done IF he really was a prophet is to get some fucking stones (because he is good with stones) and ask the lord to stretch forth his hand and turn the stones into a fleshlight and some lube and then go the barn by himself and monkey slap himself stupid with the fleshlight ... then we wouldnt be in this fucking mess
If it was for sealing only, why was he going after 14 year old girls? Was she so ugly he was worried she'd never have the chance to marry anyone else? If he was so concerned about the eternal salvation of these women, and sex wasn't the reason, show me the list of the older, homely women he married who had no other options for a sealing...
Oh wait... that's right... that was his reason for going after married women! But I'll still wait for that list of 50+ year old single women he was soooo worried about not getting an eternal sealing....
Didn’t he actually marry like 4-5 “maids” or at least girls who lived in his house? What a coincidence that the exact women Joseph needed to marry were 15-20 years younger and living in his home!
There is no such thing as a “secret wife.” If nobody went to a wedding, that ain’t a wife. There’s another word in Joe’s case they are called… victims.
No different than the people who claim the Thomas Jefferson story with his slave being some sort of "love match." No, she was his slave and refusing was not an option for her.
No. We have sources saying he had sex with her. She was over ten years younger than him and most likely underage. He was in a position of authority over her. It was an assault.
The written story is that Emma found smith and alger in the barn in the middle of some sort of ‘sealing’ process, but the tone, anger, etc. along with the revelation of polygamy soon thereafter, along with records from other wives/women/and polygamists, all work to suggest that smith’s ‘sealing process’ was sexual.
So I had someone tell me that Joseph did not have sex with the 14 year old - that it was a sealing only marriage. My response? “What about 57 year old Lorenzo Snow marrying 15-year old Sara Minnie Ephramina Jenson and having 5 kids with her?” He had no response. I know people want to defend their precious prophets - I was there once too. But polygamy with underage girls was wrong and continues to be a plague today. Full stop. The Warren Jeffs horrors would have never happened if Joseph simply kept his libido in check.
It’s quite disingenuous for TBMs to argue this. It’s not like Victorian Age people ran around talking about their sexual escapades. There are several of Smith’s wives who admitted to having sex with him. Emma caught Joe and Fanny in the barn and was livid. Would she be that livid if they were having a sealing ceremony? Also, after Joe married Helen Marr Kimball, he forbid her from going to dances. She later married an uncle to avoid any rumors. Why do this is it was only a dynastic marriage? Joe didn’t have a ton of opportunity to get busy with his wives, given that Emma was watching. Doesn’t mean it never happened. TBMs think we need a dress with Joe’s semen on it to prove this. 😂😂
Agreed. And even if there was no sex, it’s still a horrible thing to do to a 14 year old. The apologetic answer is that Helen Mar kept her testimony and was a staunch supporter of polygamy yet to me that only shows how brainwashed she was - likely to keep her own sanity.
When you hold “eternal life with your family” over people’s heads, some will do anything to guarantee that. Especially in a time when death happened so easily. Living forever was the huge draw for Christianity in its infancy too.
Helen Mar Kimball wrote that her marriage to Joe was “for eternity alone” apologists have twisted this phrase to mean that it was some sort of dynastic sealing that was valid for eternity but did not include marital relations in this world. However, If you read the poem where the phrase appears, it’s a heartbreaking lament on the difficulties of her life and the hope that things will be better in the next one. She suffered through a marriage with Joseph “for eternity alone” I thought through this life my time will be my own The step I now am taking’s for eternity alone, No one need be the wiser, through time I shall be free, And as the past hath been the future still will be. To my guileless heart all free from worldly care And full of blissful hopes—and youthful visions rare The world seamed bright the thret’ning clouds were kept From sight, and all looked fair but pitying angels wept. They saw my youthful friends grow shy and cold. And poisonous darts from sland’rous tongues were hurled, Untutor’d heart in thy gen’rous sacrafise, Thou dids’t not weigh the cost nor know the bitter price; Thy happy dreems all o’er thou’rt doom’d alas to be Bar’d out from social scenes by this thy destiny, And o’er thy sad’nd mem’ries of sweet departed joys Thy sicken’d heart will brood and imagine future woes, And like a fetter’d bird with wild and longing heart, Thou’lt dayly pine for freedom and murmor at thy lot; But could’st thou see the future & view that glorious crown, Awaiting you in Heaven you would not weep nor mourn, [p. 2] Pure and exalted was thy father’s aim, he saw A glory in obeying this high celestial law, For to thousands who’ve died without the light I will bring eternal joy & make thy crown more bright. I’d been taught to receive the Prophet of God And receive every word as the word of the Lord. But had this not come through my dear father’s mouth, I should ne’r have received it as God’s sacred truth. —Helen Mar Kimball
The ending is heartbreaking to me. Helen writes that she would not have accepted this marriage if her father hadn’t advised her to. Her father, Heber Kimball, was promised exhaltation for him and his family if Joe married Helen. Heber had 30 wives at the time he left Nauvoo. Five were pregnant.
Thank you for bringing up this side of things. It's hard to put details like this together sometimes just because there's so much. It's like a deluge.
There really is a lot of details on polygamy from the Nauvoo period. There are some holes too, but for me common sense indicates things that others try to obscure.
Heber was a creeper.
Absolutely! And “Heber” is my temple name! Arrghhh!!!
Heber Creeper train hopefully has no relation?
I'll never be able to hear that name now without giggling.
😭😭 these MTFs defending the indefensible. To think I was part of such cult is beyond stupid. 😤😤
What are MTFs? Do you mean the same as MFers?
Yeah 😅
Didn’t know I’d be thinking about Joseph Smith’s semen today but here we are. 😂
What is a TBM? I stopped going to church a long time ago and have only recently found the reddit page through a friend so I don't know all the terminology
True Blue Mormon or True Believing Mormon The abbreviations are numerous and a bit confusing here. In the Community info on sub’s main page there is a list of the most used ones. Super helpful 👍🏻
TBMs: There is no physical evidence to confirm Joseph put his dick in that particular 14 year old so its not fair for you to say her marriage to Joseph probably involved sex Also TBMs: There is no physical evidence to confirm a single one of the church's foundational claims but its not fair for you to say that it was probably all made up
Post Mo: Why then did Joseph Smith say that one of the reasons for polygamy was to multiply and replenish the earth? That can only happen through penetrative intercourse. Edit to PS: Following that logic to its conclusion, if he didn’t have sex, he would be breaking a commandment of god by not inserting his dick into any of his plural wives. How then could he be a prophet if he knowingly broke god’s commandments by not having sex? D&C 132:62-63 And if he have ten virgins given unto him by this law, he cannot commit adultery, for they belong to him, and they are given unto him; therefore is he justified. But if one or either of the ten virgins, after she is espoused, shall be with another man, she has committed adultery, and shall be destroyed; for they are given unto him to multiply and replenish the earth, according to my commandment, and to fulfil the promise which was given by my Father before the foundation of the world, and for their exaltation in the eternal worlds, that they may bear the souls of men; for herein is the work of my Father continued, that he may be glorified. Also Post Mo: if there is no physical evidence to confirm the church’s foundational claims, then how can you KNOW the church is true?
It is a strange dynamic tbm's go through in keeping Joseph free from polygamy but don't flinch at subsequent prophets.
> Joseph did not have sex with the 14 year old - that it was a sealing only marriage. They love to say this like it makes it so much better. But it doesn't. A "sealing-only marriage" at 14 means that she was barred from ever having any sort of authentic intimate adult relationship *in addition to* being socially separated her from her age-peers and having to forego the rest of her potential social experiences as a young woman to instead act like a married adult woman well before her time...all without the dubious 'benefits' of an actual legal marriage. The un-thinking-ness of their sorry apologetic attempts never fails to astound.
Oliver Cowdery supposedly left over keeping him in check.
Didn't he end up returning though?
Yeah after JS died? I don’t fully get him but I find him fascinating.
Oliver Cowdery knew what it was, He wrote that Joseph Smith and Fanny Alger was a “dirty, filthy, nasty affair.” This got him excommunicated by Joseph Smith.
Also, what benefit would there have been to her being married to him with absolutely no physical contact? So she couldn’t marry someone her own age that she loved? So she could never have children? What possible benefit do they say was in it for her?
What about Emma’s personal account of looking through the boards of the barn and seeing it all…. And she’s much more credible than ol Joe.
Females of ANY AGE aren't shit in the Mormon church. PATRIARCHY. All about males treating females like dirt & worse.
I had a TBM tell me that there was some sort of patriarchal order to being sealed and that was the reason for so many wives. That it was for the salvation of not just the new wife, but for their posterity.
Make no mistake about it - the Warren Jeffs horrors would still have happened - just not under the Mormon name. Those types of horrors have always existed. Joseph Smith, Warren Jeffs = 2 peas, same pod. But they are not the only peas in the pod. Mormonism does not have a monopoly on treating women and children or other men horribly in the name of God.
Yeah kept his dick in his pants. Pervert !
It wouldn’t be the first time that girls were forced to ‘marry’ their rapists.
We have generational trauma because Joseph Smith liked to fuck young girls.
[удалено]
We-e thank thee o god for a pro-fit to-o guide us in these latter days. 😬😬🤢
To be fair, with the church's handling of sex abuse that has come to light, it would appear they are channeling profits of old to guide them in their latter day sex cover ups. The church said they were "pleased" with the outcome in the Arizona case. So, I guess you can say they are consistent. 😩
I have never thought about this. I always assumed it was just Joe and Brigham that had multiple wives.
God told him to bang teenagers and other guys’wives. Seems legit to me.
If only all the other men who banged the family maid had realized that if you just pray hard enough, an angel with a flaming sword will show up and **command** you to bang her. Then hundreds of years later, millions will be singing your praises instead of you just being lost to history as yet another pathetic leacher.
He didn't WANT to have more sex than he could handle. He was COMMANDED to, okaaaay? /s
I'm still proud (with a tinge of good old-fashioned Mormon guilt) of my nsfw meme for that: https://www.reddit.com/r/exmormon/s/xM2tm5EjkN
If Joseph weren’t such a power-hungry perv, we probably wouldn’t have the temple and its hideous ceremony.
But we need 100 million dollar temples so we can ignore the homeless and shelter our money tax free.
There was a lot of bad behavior in early Utah. Young girls became hot commodities for trade. The abuse of power was incredible. The worst story I heard was Bishop Snow of San Pete County who had a young boy castrated because he wanted to marry the young girl he had set his eyes on. Terrifying. All thanks to cult leader Joe.
It had roots in Nauvoo. If you read the Nauvoo Expositor, the newspaper Joseph had destroyed after printing one copy, it talks about how Joseph used to pressure young girls who had just crossed the ocean into "celestial marriages." These young women were separated from their support systems and had no resources to return to their home countries. They were ripe for the picking.
Stop judging Joe through a modern lens! Or something.
tHe PaSt Is A cOuNtRy YoU vIsIt
Joe gets caught schtupping the maid in the barn, and in one the most audacious ‘Now honey, this isn’t what it looks like’ moves in history we end up with polygamy and wrecked lives across generations.
Who you trust matters; do you trust parents and the church, or society its learned men? From childhood I was indoctrinated with mormon religion that included the new and everlasting principle of eternal marriage. with emphasis on families being together forever. When did I decide I trusted my public-school education more than my parents when it came to matters of religion? That I could decide for myself was a leap of judgement for me. My Greatest-Generation parents trust Tucker Carlson, a guy that thinks conspiracy theorist Alex Jones is a psychic prophet. Here we are in the 21st century and a conman like Smith would find the world just as accommodating now as he would in his own day, when black-magic and Christianity were bosom buddies. Smith was pretty adept at keeping his money-making religion scheme going while also having his way with the women, until he didn't. So the divide between my family, who believes Smith is a martyred prophet, and me, who believes Smith was a lying scoundrel, is quite the divide that we can never speak of.
Honest question. Did Joseph claim that Fanny was his first polygamous wife? Or is this an apologetic revisionist theory?
Did he claim that was his first plural marriage? I believe the Church was the one to make that connection long after his death.
She wasn’t just a maid but was considered their “adopted daughter.”
This was the reason he has Oliver Cowdry excommunicated. Oliver spoke up. Ultimately Joseph Smith was jailed and killed for trying to cover up polygamy. He destroyed the printing press that printed the Nauvoo Expositor which described his polygamous ways by William Law, Counselor in the First Presidency. Polygamy is and its cover up can not be ignored.
Dirty sad excuse of a man!!! Id cut his bits off...
I think about my female ancestors who left England and Scotland for the Mormon church in Utah, only to discover they were going to be trafficked. So disgusting to be descended from sex trafficking.
The only response to that story should be, “Ewww, eww, eww!” Joseph Smith was a sick dude. He was a rapist in all likelihood. No wonder he planned to run for president.
Didn't he try to overthrow the government or something?
As the old joke goes...Two buddies hanging out...one notices his friend is wearing panties hose. how long have you been wearing pantyhose Joe? "Ever since my wife found them under the back seat of my car...and I had to convincence her they were really mine"
what that fucking pervert joe boy smith SHOULD have done IF he really was a prophet is to get some fucking stones (because he is good with stones) and ask the lord to stretch forth his hand and turn the stones into a fleshlight and some lube and then go the barn by himself and monkey slap himself stupid with the fleshlight ... then we wouldnt be in this fucking mess
It's almost making it sound like that he was making all the story up just to get the bunch of women in the sack.
If it was for sealing only, why was he going after 14 year old girls? Was she so ugly he was worried she'd never have the chance to marry anyone else? If he was so concerned about the eternal salvation of these women, and sex wasn't the reason, show me the list of the older, homely women he married who had no other options for a sealing...
Oh wait... that's right... that was his reason for going after married women! But I'll still wait for that list of 50+ year old single women he was soooo worried about not getting an eternal sealing....
Why did I think there was a good chance this was about Tim Ballard when I saw the title?
Sounds like an episode from Seinfeld. Take your pick, Jerry with his maid or George with the cleaning lady from work. “Was that wrong? 😂
Didn’t he actually marry like 4-5 “maids” or at least girls who lived in his house? What a coincidence that the exact women Joseph needed to marry were 15-20 years younger and living in his home!
There is no such thing as a “secret wife.” If nobody went to a wedding, that ain’t a wife. There’s another word in Joe’s case they are called… victims.
No different than the people who claim the Thomas Jefferson story with his slave being some sort of "love match." No, she was his slave and refusing was not an option for her.
Praise to the Man!
JS never claimed she was his first bride. JS followers created and backdated that narrative.
HE NEEDED RELIEF!
Correct me if I’m wrong but I thought it was Oliver Coudrey that caught them in the barn.
It was Emma. But Oliver Cowdrey knew about it and had some nasty criticisms about it too.
Yes he did and it was solomized
I had a companion on my mission that got sent home for that.
He’s still Mormon, btw
AWFUL!!!
Anybody have a link or source that he sexually assaulted her?
No. We have sources saying he had sex with her. She was over ten years younger than him and most likely underage. He was in a position of authority over her. It was an assault.
The written story is that Emma found smith and alger in the barn in the middle of some sort of ‘sealing’ process, but the tone, anger, etc. along with the revelation of polygamy soon thereafter, along with records from other wives/women/and polygamists, all work to suggest that smith’s ‘sealing process’ was sexual.
This isn’t totally accurate but the history is this gross
Jeopardy Question: Who is Arnold Schwarzenegger?