While I was thus in the act of calling upon God, I discovered a light appearing in my room, which continued to increase until the room was lighter than at noonday, when immediately a personage appeared at my bedside, standing in the air, for his feet did not touch the floor.
He commenced, and again related the very same things which he had done at his first visit, without the least variation; which having done, he informed me of great judgments which were coming upon the earth, with great desolations by famine, sword, and pestilence; and that these grievous judgments would come on the earth in this generation. Having related these things, he again ascended as he had done before. Joseph Smith’s History (Pearl of Great Price) 5&8&14-17&30&45
The old Catholic church traditions are worth more than all you have said. Here is a principle of logic that most men have no more sense than to adopt. I will illustrate it by an old apple tree. Here jumps off a branch and says, I am the true tree, and you are corrupt. If the whole tree is corrupt, are not its branches corrupt? If the Catholic religion is a false religion, how can any true religion come out of it? If the Catholic church is bad, how can any good thing come out of it? The character of the old churches have always been slandered by all apostates since the world began. Joseph Smith, Teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith IV p375, 1843-44
There are two personages who constitute the great, matchless, governing and supreme power over all things ... They are the Father and the Son: The Father being a personage of spirit, glory and power: possessing all perfection and fullness. Joseph Smith, Lectures on Faith 5
The same God that has thus far dictated me and directed me and strengthened me in this work, gave me this revelation and commandment on celestial and plural marriage, and the same God commanded me to obey it. He said to me that unless I accepted it, and introduced it, and practiced it, I, together with my people would be damned and cut off from this time henceforth. We have got to observe it. It is an eternal principle and was given by way of commandment and not by way of instruction. Joseph Smith, Contributor vol 5 p259
The south will cry out against me as being uncharitable, unfeeling, unkind, and wholly unacquainted with the Gospel of Christ ... The first mention we have of slavery is found in the Holy Bible ... And so far from that prediction being averse to the mind of God, it remains as a lasting monument of the decree of Jehovah, to the shame and confusion of all who have cried out against the South, in consequence of their holding the sons of Ham in servitude ... I can say, the curse is not yet taken off from the sons of Canaan, neither will be until it is affected by as great a power as caused it to come; and the people who interfere the least with the purposes of God in this matter, will come under the least condemnation before him; and those who are determined to pursue a course, which shows an opposition, and a feverish restlessness against the decrees of the Lord, will learn, when perhaps it is too late for their own good, that God can do his own work, without the aid of those who are not dictated by His counsel. Joseph Smith, Journal of Discourses II:436
This afternoon I labored on the Egyptian alphabet in company with brothers Oliver Cowdery and W W Phelps, and doing the research the principles of astronomy as understood by father Abraham and the ancients unfolded to our understanding. Joseph Smith, diary
We then partook of some refreshments, and our hearts were made glad with the fruit of the vine. Joseph Smith, The History of the Church II:369
Wednesday 3 – Called at the office and drank a glass of wine with Sister Jenetta Richards, made by her mother in England, and reviewed a portion of the conference minutes. Joseph Smith, The History of the Church V:380
What a thing it is for a man to be accused of committing adultery, and having seven wives, when I can only find one. Joseph Smith, Salt Lake Tribune 13th December 1997 & History of the Church VI:408
What is it that inspires professors of Christianity generally with a hope of salvation? It is that smooth, sophisticated influence of the devil, by which he deceives the whole world. Joseph Smith, Teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith p270
Re: It was on the morning of a beautiful, clear day, early in the spring of eighteen hundred and twenty.
Yep. I’ve been to the sacred grove in the spring. I think it was in early May.
The ground was pure mush. The only thing that kept me from sinking was the thick layer of leaves.
I walked there via a modern day paved road. If I’d had to walk across fields to get there I would have been knee deep in mud. It would have been a mess. The sacred grove is a very wet woodland. There were droves of huge mosquitoes that made it miserable. I couldn’t wait to get out of there. I was told that they now spray to keep the mosquitoes from carrying off the tourists. They also put down thick mulch on the path to control mud.
The only time it wouldn’t be muddy is in the middle of summer, or when the ground is frozen in winter. Mia, board post 7th June 2012
There are many problems associated with the First Vision. While Joseph Smith had his First Vision in 1820, there is no documented proof of the First Vision until 1835. This includes newspaper accounts, journals, diaries, affidavits, letters or any other account of record prior to 1835. It was not until 1842 that the account of the First Vision was actually published. For fifteen years not a single document contains anything concerning the First Vision. According to Mormon Church History, Joseph Smith repeatedly told his story of the First Vision, first to his parents, and then to clergy in ‘apostate’ churches. As detailed in Mormon Church History, Joseph Smith received severe persecution from these clergy for his ‘outlandish’ story. Regardless, not a single piece of evidence exists concerning Joseph’s First Vision prior to 1835, fifteen years after receiving it. Infymus, board post 8th April 2006, ‘The First Vision – A Look at the Problems’
According to Joseph Smith, he told the story of the vision immediately after it happened the early spring of 1820. As a result, he said, he received immediate criticism in the community. There is little if any evidence, however, that by the early 1830s Joseph Smith was telling the story in public. At least if he were telling it, no one seemed to consider it important enough to have recorded it at the time, and no one was criticizing him for it ... The fact that none of the available contemporary writings about Joseph Smith in the 1830s, none of the publications of the Church in that decade, and no contemporary journal or correspondence yet discovered, mentions the story of the first vision is convincing evidence that at best it received only limited circulation in those early days. James B Allen, Dialogue: A Journal of Mormon Thought pp.30-34
Joseph Smith ordered the actual destruction of the Nauvoo Expositor printing press, he provided his enemies with a clearly legitimate means of arresting him for violation of the law. They seized upon this to inflame the public even more, and this led directly to assassination.
Some people may be disturbed by the suggestion that Joseph Smith acted illegally in this instance, but it is important to understand that under the tense pressures of the times he, too, may have made a mistake. James B Allen, assistant Church historian, Brigham Young University, Today March p10 1976
In his first handwritten history, Joseph Smith seems to have been unaware of the name of the angel who appeared to him. He merely stated that it was ‘an angel of the Lord’.
In 1835, however, Smith identified the celestial visitor as ‘Moroni’ and seemed to hold to this view until 1838 ...
When Joseph Smith published his official version of Mormon Church history in 1842 in the Times and Seasons vol 3, p753 it became obvious that he had changed his mind — the angel was really ‘Nephi’: ‘He called me by name and said ... that his name was Nephi.’ The Church at that time seemed to accept Joseph Smith’s identification of the angel. A few months later the Church’s Millennial Star printed in England also published Joseph Smith’s story stating that the angel’s name was ‘Nephi’ (vol 3 p53). On page 71 of the same volume, we read that the ‘message of the angel Nephi ... opened a new dispensation to man’. The name was also published in the 1851 edition of the Pearl of Great Price as ‘Nephi’.
By 1878, however, Church leaders had become concerned about Joseph Smith’s conflicting accounts and when Apostle Orson Pratt published a new edition of the Pearl of Great Price that year, the name had been altered to read ‘Moroni’. This falsified reading still appears in modern editions of the Pearl of Great Price: ‘He called me by name, and said ... that his name was Moroni’. Jerald & Sandra Tanner
The court record plainly shows that Joseph Smith was deeply involved in magic practices at the very time he was supposed to be preparing himself to receive the plates for the Book of Mormon. The court record shows that Smith was searching for buried treasure in 1826, and according to his own story, the plates for the Book of Mormon were taken from the Hill Cumorah the following year. Joseph Smith claimed that he had known that the plates were buried in the Hill Cumorah since 1823. He made this statement concerning the discovery of the plates: ‘Having removed the earth, I obtained a lever, which I got fixed under the edge of the stone, and with a little exertion raised it up. I looked in, and there indeed did I behold the plates....
'I made an attempt to take them out, but was forbidden by the messenger, and was again informed that the time for bringing them forth had not yet arrived, neither would it, until four years from that time …’ (Pearl of Great Price, Joseph Smith 2:52-53)