| Smith, Joseph (1805-44),
American religious leader, who was the founding prophet of the Mormon
religion.
Smith was born of poor parents in Sharon, Vermont, on December
23, 1805. The family moved near the town of Palmyra, in upstate
New York, where between the ages of 14 and 25 Smith experienced
visions calling him to restore the true Christian religion. According
to his account, an angel guided him to a set of golden plates buried
in a hill near the Smith farm; these contained a narrative written
in a hieroglyphic script, which he translated, "by the gift
and power of God." The result was published in 1830 as the
Book of Mormon, which he believed to be a religious record of the
ancient inhabitants of North America.
The church Smith founded on April 6, 1830, soon known officially
as The Church
of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints
I. Introduction
Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, major world religion
of 11 million members, established in 1830 by Joseph Smith, known
as the prophet. Followers of this religion are called Mormons. From
a handful of members at the beginning, the movement has grown steadily
through proselytizing and a relatively high birth rate. By the early
1990s there were 5 million Mormons in the United States and the
number in other countries around the world totaled slightly more
than that. Before World War II conversions had been most numerous
in the United States, the United Kingdom, and Scandinavia, but during
recent years the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints has
grown rapidly in developing countries. In Mexico, for example, there
were 850,000 Mormons in 2000, most of them converted since 1975.
In South Korea, the Latter-day Saints had no adherents before 1950,
but by 2000 there were 71,000 members. A vigorous missionary program-a
rotating force of about 60,000 preaching Mormon doctrine in more
than 330 missions in the United States and abroad-assures a steady
influx of new members.
II. Characteristics
The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is a Christian
religion.Its founding doctrine was based on the assumption that
Christianity was more or less corrupt and that restoring the true
Christian gospel was necessary. Such a restoration, however, required
a new revelation from God to give the truths of Christianity in
pure form and to reestablish the divine sacerdotal authority of
the ancient apostles, which, having been lost, could be recovered
only through divine initiative. The Mormon church is thus in its
self-definition Christian as well as restorationist.
A. Doctrine
Mormons support religious toleration and hold that all religions
contain elements of truth and do much good. Nevertheless, the Mormon
church sees only itself as fully authorized and recognized by God-"the
only true and living church upon the earth." This exclusive
claim to truth and authority explains the determination of Mormons
to carry their message worldwide, even to Christians of other denominations.
Mormon doctrine is derived from four basic scriptures: the Bible,
the Book of Mormon, the Doctrine and Covenants (135 revelations
and other statements, almost all of them issued by Joseph Smith
in the 1830s and early 1840s), and the Pearl of Great Price (1842;
a compilation of shorter works, both ancient and modern). The truths
enunciated in the various scriptures are subject to interpretation
and expansion by church leaders, who are believed to receive additional
revelations and inspiration.
Certain Mormon doctrines diverge sharply from traditional Christian
orthodoxy-a belief in the prenatal existence of human souls; a definition
of the Trinity as three separate individuals, God the Father and
Jesus Christ being physical persons united in purpose; and a belief
that human beings can, if they live the commandments of God to the
full, attain the status of godhood in future eons. Critics have
charged that Mormons, in proclaiming their own prophets, give insufficient
attention to Christ. In response, Mormons have argued that Christ's
disciples have always been misunderstood and persecuted. Like Anabaptists
and other restorationists, they have maintained that even a basic
statement such as the Nicene Creed (AD 325) is a departure from
the purity of original Christian teachings. As a result, Mormons
have not sought to participate in the ecumenical movement or organizations
such as the World Council of Churches.
B. Structure
The Mormon church is lay, hierarchical, and authoritarian. The offices
in the individual congregations (wards) are staffed by lay members
on a rotating basis. The bishop, who with two counselors presides
over a ward, usually serves for about five years. Because some 200
positions are assigned to each ward, participation among active
Mormons is high. Most members have opportunities to teach classes,
deliver sermons, perform humanitarian services, and participate
in committee assignments and social activities.
The church polity, or organization, is arranged vertically. Above
the ward is the stake, a collection of several wards, presided over
by a stake presidency of 3 and a high council of 12. Collections
of stakes form regions. At the top are the general authorities,
who are full-time leaders. Because they too were lay members before
their selection to the general office, they cannot be thought of
as professional bureaucrats or seminary-trained clergy. Although
officials on the local level are encouraged to exercise judgment
and sometimes even to initiate experimental programs, in general,
programs and policies are centrally determined.
The general authorities of the church include a three-man presiding
bishopric and the First Quorum of the Seventy, with seven presidents.
Above them, as the effective authoritative policymaking body, is
the Council of Twelve Apostles. At the top of the hierarchy is the
president of the church, often referred to by Mormons as the prophet.
This president and his two counselors (the First Presidency) regularly
meet in conjunction with the council of apostles, as well as separately.
New apostles are chosen by the apostles themselves. By a seniority
principle, an apostle moves gradually up the hierarchical ladder.
When the president of the church dies, the senior apostle becomes
the next president.
C. Worship and Activities
Worship is simple, consisting of hymns, prayers, the sacrament of
the Lord's Supper (celebrated with bread and water), and sermons
delivered by lay members of the congregation. Auxiliary organizations
for children, teenagers, and women provide additional activities
and service projects. In temples-of which 95 exist throughout the
world-vicarious ordinance work is performed, in which Mormons of
certified faithfulness act as proxy for dead ancestors, and marriages
between devout Mormons are consecrated "for time and all eternity."
In addition to their vigorous missionary program, Mormons are well
known for their welfare program, an organized effort to provide
for those in need, and for their Word of Wisdom, a code of health
prohibiting tea, coffee, alcohol, and tobacco. The church also supports
the world-famous Mormon Tabernacle Choir, in Salt Lake City, Utah,
and Brigham Young University, at Provo, Utah.
III. History
The Church
of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints came into existence during
the early 19th-centuryAmerican movement of religious revivalism
called the Second Great Awakening. About 1820, according to his
own account, when Joseph Smith was 14 years old and living with
his family near Palmyra, New York, he had a vision of God the Father
and Jesus Christ, informing him that the true church was not on
the face of the Earth.
A. Founding of the Church
During the 1820s, Smith worked as a farm laborer and developed his
religious ideas, inspired by other supernatural encounters.
After 1827, by his own account, he yearly visited a book written
in a hieroglyphic script on golden plates buried in a nearby hill;
the book's location, he said, had been disclosed to him by an angel.
In 1830 he completed the translation of these plates, "by the
gift and power of God," and published the Book of Mormon, which
he believed to be a religious record of the ancient inhabitants
of North America. On April 6, 1830, he organized the Church of Christ,
soon known by its present title, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day
Saints.
The organization of the church is traditionally said to have been
established in Fayette, New York. Within a year, by early 1831,
the center had moved to Kirtland (now Kirtland Hills), Ohio, where
former Campbellite Sidney Rigdon and much of his congregation had
heard the message of Mormon missionaries and been baptized. At almost
the same time, another Mormon settlement was made in Missouri, primarily
in the area around Independence, which was designated by Smith as
the place to which Jesus Christ would return. Converts flocked into
both northeastern Ohio and western Missouri.
B. Persecution
The established residents of these areas, however, became hostile
to the Mormons, who were soon confronted with threats and then violent
persecution. By 1839 the Mormons were fleeing from Kirtland and
their Missouri settlements and settling on the banks of the Mississippi
River at Commerce, Illinois, which they renamed Nauvoo. The faith
continued to attract new converts, many of them from England. To
help assure that mobs would be unable to drive them out again, Smith
and his associates gained permission from the Illinois legislature
to form a local militia, the Nauvoo Legion, which was in reality
a virtual private army. The Nauvoo settlement grew steadily, reaching
a population of more than 12,000 in 1845.
The early opposition to the Latter-day Saints seems to have been
triggered largely by fears of economic competition and a dislike
of Mormon bloc voting. By the early 1840s, however, the hostility
was intensified by Smith's apparent assumption of monarchical powers
and by the rumors, officially denied but subsequently confirmed,
that Mormons were beginning to practice polygamy. In 1844 Joseph
Smith and his brother Hyrum were put in prison in Carthage, Illinois,
on charges of treason and conspiracy. Then, despite the Illinois
governor's promises of safety, the two brothers were assassinated
by a mob.The prophet's oldest son, Joseph Smith III, was only 11
years old at the time of his father's death. Other potential heirs
to the leadership backed down and some led splinter groups into
schism, among them Lyman Wight, James J. Strang, and William Bickerton.
Eventually, more than 20 different splinter groups appeared, most
of them small. In 1860, when Joseph Smith III decided to accept
the leadership of the largest number of dissident Mormons, mostly
still in the Midwest, the Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of
Latter Day Saints came into existence. Rejecting polygamy and some
of the doctrinal and theological innovations of the Nauvoo period,
the Reorganized Church slowly grew, and today it has a worldwide
membership of 250,000 in 40 countries. Its headquarters is at Independence,
Missouri. In 2001 the Reorganized Church officially changed its
name to Community of Christ.
C. The Move to Utah
In the meantime, the leadership of the majority of the Mormons had
been exercised by the Twelve Apostles. Brigham Young, head of the
Twelve, became president and prophet of the church in 1847 after
successfully leading an exodus from Illinois to the Great Basin
in the Rocky Mountains in the area now known as Utah, where Salt
Lake City was established as the new center. Eventually, more than
300 other settlements were established, in an area stretching from
California to Colorado and from Mexico to Canada. Most of the Mormons,
however, were concentrated in Utah, with some living in immediately
surrounding states.
Conflict was not over for the Mormons. Their experiments in economic
communitarianism and cooperatives were regarded as a restraint of
trade, and their practice of bloc voting through a single, church-approved
political party still aroused resentment. Polygamy, openly acknowledged
in 1852, was promulgated and practiced by a minority of Mormons
(between 10 and 20 percent) for the next 38 years. Incited by reports
of disloyalty, the federal government sent an army to Utah in 1857
and 1858, resulting in the so-called Utah War, which, despite many
blunders and few casualties, came close to being a major catastrophe.
This was followed by a series of legislative and judicial efforts
to force Mormon compliance with the national norm of monogamous
marriage. After a series of delaying actions, church president Wilford
Woodruff issued a manifesto in 1890 that has traditionally been
seen as the end of polygamy. Although some plural relationships
continued, and a small group of Mormon fundamentalists later defied
the threat of excommunication by the church and punishment by the
state in order to continue a form of polygamy, the church gave up
its public espousal and encouragement of the practice. Within a
few years the Mormons had entered, or tried to enter, the American
mainstream.
D. The Contemporary Church
Mormons are commonly perceived as a conservative Christian church
and are often identified with Protestant fundamentalists. In theology,
however, conservative Protestants and Mormons differ on fundamental
questions, such as the nature of God, the concept of the church,
and the definition of salvation. With respect to social issues,
on the other hand, the two groups have much in common. The Mormons
are lukewarm, if not hostile, to ecumenism, basically opposed to
abortion and birth control, and unreceptive to "unbiblical"
practices such as women in the priesthood; like many Protestant
fundamentalists, they see themselves as resisting the forces of
secularism and liberal compromise. The present conservative stance
of the Mormons is somewhat ironic, given their earlier history of
bold social and economic innovation. In practice, however, Mormons
are often more pragmatic than their reputation suggests. Birth rates,
although higher than the national average, have declined considerably,
and members are allowed individual discretion in the practice of
birth control. Divorce, although discouraged, is not prohibited,
and the divorce rate essentially follows the national trends.
For many years the Latter-day Saints refused to ordain blacks to
the priesthood; this was an important issue, because all worthy
Mormon males above the age of 12 receive such ordination. That policy
was reversed in 1978, when the First Presidency stated that ordination
would henceforth be granted "without regard for race or color."
The question of the role of women in the church is perhaps more
problematic. Although Mormon women have numerous opportunities to
serve on the congregational level and are encouraged to develop
their talents and pursue higher education, they are not ordained
to the priesthood and do not serve in the hierarchy.
An unusual combination of biblical Christianity, American pragmatism,
millennialist expectations, economic experimentation, political
conservatism, evangelical fervor, and international activity, the
Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is still a dynamic,
rapidly growing religion in an uneasy relationship with the surrounding
culture.
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