The Story of the Mormons, From the Date of Their Origin to the Year 1901 Rating :
Customer Reviews
Most helpful customer reviews
3 of 3 people found the following review helpful.
Outdated anti-Mormon polemic that does not give a completely factual account.
By Brother Hamza
I am not and have never been a member of the LDS Church, and I certainly do not believe Joseph Smith, Jr. was a prophet of God. However, as an avid student of European and American religious history, this book is not a good place to start learning about early Mormon history. This author might be forgiven for bringing up the Spaulding manuscript theory for the origin of the Book of Mormon, but no modern critic of Mormonism could reasonably advance this disproved theory today. In the early 1800s, many American Christians speculated that Native Americans were the descendants of the Ten Lost Tribes of Israel. Some popular books of the time advanced this theory. Thus, there is no need to try to speculate that Sidney Rigdon met secretly with Joseph Smith sometime before and wrote the Book of Mormon based on an unpublished novel by Solomon Spaulding. Joseph Smith, who had witnessed revivals of religion by various Christian denominations of the time as teenager could easily have thought up the Book of Mormon himself.
Some fundamentalist Evangelical Christians have no understanding of early Mormonism and how it developed, and why some of the original members such as David Whitmer left the Mormon Church. Initially, Joseph Smith Jr. said he was only a revelator. That is, his only task was to translate the Book of Mormon as a second witness of the Christ. That's why the Book of Mormon has so many passages lifted from the Bible. The history is of course different than that of the Bible, but the same doctrines that Trinitarian Christians believe can be defended from the Book of Mormon. That doesn't make the Book of Mormon a true scripture, however. The original name of the church, which was incorporated in 1830, was simply The Church of Christ. Later, Smith changed the name of this church to "The Church of Latter Day Saints, though eventually the name became "The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints". David Whitmer warned Joseph Smith that if the Book of Commandments was published, there would be hell to pay because non-Mormons would see that the Centerplace for the Mormons would be Missouri. Sure enough, a mob destroyed the printing press and copies of the Book of Commandments had to be saved so they would not be destroyed. Alas, when the 1835 Doctrine and Covenants was published, revelations had been changed. Suddenly, Joseph Smith was now a Prophet who was to restore all things, and new doctrines began to be taught. The LDS Church, and later the RLDS Church (which did not teach polygamy nor some of the other latter doctrines) claimed the Book of Commandments was NEVER completely finished and had errors. However, some scholars have shown that the Book of Commandments was completed, and that copies were in circulation. David Whitmer and others had copies of the book. Thus, while Joseph Smith might have started (and I say "might") with good intentions, soon he was building his church. There were believers in the Book of Mormon who never believed in polygamy and other latter doctrines. These are called the Prairie Saints. However, some fundamentalist Evangelical Christians believe there is only the LDS Church as well as fundamentalist splinter groups who still practice polygamy. These anti-mormons many times don't realize that the Book of Mormon actually FORBIDS polygamy.
The US Constitution guarantees freedom of religion, though it does not allow polygamy or polyandry. However, polygamy was not taught by the early Church of Christ. Mobs who attacked early Mormons in New York were violating the Constitutional Rights of those early Mormons. Later, in Kirtland, Ohio, Joseph Smith Jr. founded a bank. To be successful, the bank needed to be licensed. Christians who were anti-Mormon did not grant the license. Thus, the bank failed like so many other banks did that year. But some anti-Mormon Christians even accused Joseph Smith of Wildcat Building. This is when a bank issues a bank note that can only be redeemed at certain offices, which might be located in a wooded area and not easily found. But everyone knew where the office of the Mormon bank
was, in Kirtland. Thus, the accusation is baseless. In Missouri, many settlers met by the Mormons when they moved there BEFORE the polygamy doctrine was taught saw settlers from southern states who owned slaves. The Mormons talked to the slaves as normal people. These settlers did not like the Mormons not only because of their religion but because of their anti-slavery views. Thus, mobs began attacking Mormons in Missouri. Much is made about the evil Danites and the also of the Mountain Meadows Massacre, but the reason the Mormons began to to arm themselves in the first place was because of attacks by Christian Mobs who violated their religious and civil rights. Those atrocities against Mormons seldom are mentioned in anti-Mormon books. Yes, there are conservative Evangelical Christians who keep the discussion to doctrine and do not make false accusations. However, even today there are still plenty of fundamentalist Evangelical Christians who still propagate false accusations against Mormons.
I suspect most folks, pro-LDS and anti-LDS, will not like my review of this book. However, I have friends who are members of the LDS Church as well as friends from the Prairie Saint denominations (but have not yet any polygamists) and they are great neighbors and great citizens. Because the LDS church bravely supported the concept of marriage as between a man and a wife in California, the LDS members now have a new enemy - a subset of Liberal Democrats. As a Constitutionalists and a conservative Libertarian, I find I must defend the right of LDS members to believe and worship as they choose though I would never accept Joseph Smith Jr. as a Prophet. God will work everything out in the end, anyway.
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful.
Skip this one
By readsalot
I couldn't finish this book. It is dated and inaccurate. Not very helpful in understanding its subject matter. I'd skip this one. Read "The Book of Mormon" and a modern history of the Mormons instead.
3 of 4 people found the following review helpful.Let he who is without sin.......
By S. Hall
While many people look for negative publications against the Mormon church, information can be invented and misconstrued by anyone who looks for it. Many of these persons who have written for this publication were not members, and were looking to discredit a great organization whose sole purpose is to lift up and benefit mankind. Shame on anyone who calls themselves 'Christian' and looks for truth in angry people's writings. There is more evidence written to the churchs' good character- don't go to a Cadillac dealer to learn about a BMW. Try studying the source, not a disgruntled former employee. The Mormon church will not ever need to 'stand up for itself', as "Love Thy Neighbor" always is practiced. Truth stands for itself.
Product Description
Unlike some other reproductions of classic texts (1) We have not used OCR(Optical Character Recognition), as this leads to bad quality books with introduced typos. (2) In books where there are images such as portraits, maps, sketches etc We have endeavoured to keep the quality of these images, so they represent accurately the original artefact. Although occasionally there may be certain imperfections with these old texts, we feel they deserve to be made available for future generations to enjoy.
Product Details
- Amazon Sales Rank: #3499903 in Books
- Published on: 2012-01-10
- Original language:English
- Number of items: 1
- Dimensions: 8.86" h x5.91" w x1.38" l,2.01 pounds
- Binding: Paperback
- 692 pages
No comments :
Post a Comment