{"id":54895,"date":"2026-10-22T05:35:27","date_gmt":"2026-10-22T11:35:27","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/?p=54895"},"modified":"2026-10-21T16:45:37","modified_gmt":"2026-10-21T22:45:37","slug":"the-framework-of-my-historical-argument-about-polygamy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/2026\/10\/the-framework-of-my-historical-argument-about-polygamy\/","title":{"rendered":"The Framework of My Historical Argument about Polygamy"},"content":{"rendered":"

So before I delve more into these issues related to our polygamy problems<\/a>, I thought first I\u2019d lay out the context of claims I\u2019m making relative to my argument that Smith was thinking of the idea of \u201cshared marriage,\u201d or men and women being able to have multiple spouses prior to a shift in 1843 highlighted by DC 132.<\/p>\n

So for that, let me summarize and refer to arguments I\u2019ve made on the blog over the last few years<\/p>\n

1) I argue that JS (and that Joseph Sr. played a big role also) was seeking a much bigger restoration than biblical practice. The Bible was important, but the \u201cJosephs\u201d (Sr and Jr.) felt that it was missing a lot. The Book of Mormon says plain and precious truth had been removed from the Bible (1 Nephi 11:26), and Smith declared in the introduction to DC 76<\/a> in his 1838 history that \u201cFrom sundry revelations which had been received, it was apparent that many important points touching the salvation of man had been taken from the Bible, or lost before it was compiled.\u201d Not only had truth been removed, but a lot of important truth never made it in the Bible: \u201clost before it was compiled.\u201d<\/p>\n

A jail mate of Joseph Sr. when Sr. in jail for debt in 1830, wrote in his journal Sr. saying that \u201cour Bible is much abridged and deficient.\u201d Early Mormon Documents<\/em>, vol. 3, p. 4.<\/p>\n

While the Bible was important, the overarching purpose of the restoration was to bring back what was missing, more than implementing what wasn\u2019t.<\/p>\n

I think the Josephs were onto something with modern scholarship<\/a> calling a lot of the Bible\u2019s historicity, especially the Old Testament, into question.<\/p>\n

The Book of Mormon also stated a much larger truth when it rejected sola scriptura in 2 Nephi 29 and declares, \u201cI shall also speak unto all nations<\/a> of the earth and they shall write it.\u201d (12)<\/p>\n

2) I argue that the Josephs became convinced that there was much truth in a contemporary concept most often referred to as \u201cthe ancient theology\u201d (also called names like \u201cthe universal religion,\u201d \u201cthe ancient religion,\u201d or just \u201cancient philosophy.\u201d) The idea was that Greek philosophy drew on ancient wisdom going back to sages like Zoroaster and Hermes Trimegistus, and Christians often argued that the ancient theology drew on biblical patriarchs as well. And many Christian Platonists claimed those patriarchs had a fuller truth also, not all of which was in Bible.<\/p>\n

Again, the Book of Mormon said there was a fuller truth beyond the Bible.<\/p>\n

Protestant scholar of the time argued that the ancient theology had corrupted early Christianity, a very popular idea in Smith\u2019s day taught in books that he owned. JS strongly rejected the claim of Platonic corruption, but instead asserted that it was the removal of the ancient theology that had corrupted early Christianity and that he was called to restore that fuller truth.<\/p>\n

3) I argue that the central group of doctrines that Smith sought to restore to Christianity are best framed around our concept of the plan of salvation. Here I note the major themes of that plan along with the Platonic dialogues that discuss those themes.<\/p>\n

A) We lived before we were born and the high God presented a plan to us that we needed to be sent to earth to be tested, and if we past that text we could become like the gods (Timaeus<\/em>)<\/p>\n

B) The test was to see if we would act \u201cjustly,\u201d by controlling out passions (Timaeus<\/em>) but Plato\u2019s Phaedrus <\/em>gave more details of things we needed to do. We needed to live according the right ethics and morals like a philosopher, receive the proper ordinances, and engage in holy love. If we did so, not only would we be able to become like the Gods, but will would be able to be with our love in the next life.<\/p>\n

C) The next life would have different states depending on what kind of life we lived here (Phaedo<\/em>).<\/p>\n

So pretty Mormon-looking to me, and the Republic<\/em> added the claim that living in the most holy city would allow its citizens to live the most pious lives and have the best afterlife. In the Republic<\/em>, there was no private property in order to have oneness and equality among the citizens, and among the most enlightened, all families were in common as well. The enlighten guardians of the city, male and female, were all married to each other.<\/p>\n

Naturally such claims bring up the question of how Smith encountered them and I go over that in my book. But I also talk A LITTLE about that in this presentation<\/a>.<\/p>\n

4) Such shared marriage ideas got mentioned among the most radical utopians, but were viewed as a major scandal. Such a practice is difficult to accomplish with Oneida (coming a little after Mormonism) as the most successful.<\/p>\n

As I\u2019ve said a lot, I argue that\u2019s what JS originally had in mind. He attempted to proceed cautiously, with a few individual marriages, which allowed for women have multiple spouses also (DC 132:41). Smith changed the policy to polygyny in c. 1843 and DC 132 was about that policy change.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

So before I delve more into these issues related to our polygamy problems, I thought first I\u2019d lay out the context of claims I\u2019m making relative to my argument that Smith was thinking of the idea of \u201cshared marriage,\u201d or men and women being able to have multiple spouses prior to a shift in 1843 highlighted by DC 132. So for that, let me summarize and refer to arguments I\u2019ve made on the blog over the last few years 1) I argue that JS (and that Joseph Sr. played a big role also) was seeking a much bigger restoration than biblical practice. The Bible was important, but the \u201cJosephs\u201d (Sr and Jr.) felt that it was missing a lot. The Book of Mormon says plain and precious truth had been removed from the Bible (1 Nephi 11:26), and Smith declared in the introduction to DC 76 in his 1838 history that \u201cFrom sundry revelations which had been received, it was apparent that many important points touching the salvation of man had been taken from the Bible, or lost before it was compiled.\u201d Not only had truth been removed, but a lot of important truth never made it in the Bible: […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10406,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[53],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-54895","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-latter-day-saint-thought"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/54895","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/10406"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=54895"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/54895\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":54960,"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/54895\/revisions\/54960"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=54895"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=54895"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=54895"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}