Polygamy Excuses
Restored Church, pg 250; “In the early period of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints an unusual condition prevailed. More women than men joined the Church. This was true of the period at Nauvoo and for a number of years after the arrival of the Saints in Utah…It was not to stop prostitution that plural marriage was introduced. It was not to satisfy the lusts of himself or his followers that Joseph Smith taught and practiced the doctrine. The men and women who entered into plural marriage were among the most moral people this world has ever known.” – William E. Berrett
Hold on, here’s the real reason for polygamy and the previous reason isn’t correct…
Evidences & Reconciliations, pg 390; “The most common of these conjectures is that the Church, through plural marriage, sought to provide husbands for its large surplus of female members. The implied assumption in this theory, that there have been more female than male members in the Church, is not supported by existing evidence. On the contrary, there seem always to have been more males than females in the Church. Families — father, mother, and children — have most commonly joined the Church. Of course, many single women have become converts, but also many single men.” – John A. Widtsoe
However, we also have the words of an LDS prophet says polygamy was the answer to adultery…
The Seer, pgs. 123-124; “To be moral is to be innocent of crime: to be immoral I to be guilty of crime. It can neither be shown from reason nor the word of God that plurality is criminal, and hence it cannot be immoral, and therefore the morals of society are not in the least endangered by its practice. On the contrary, plurality is a great and powerful antidote against immorality…Because of the vast numbers of un-virtuous females with which the nations are curded, many young men neglect marriage, and seek to gratify their sexual propensities by unlawful and sinful connections. If no public female prostitutes existed, or if they rarely could be found, the natural consequences would be, that young men, instead of abandoning themselves to prostitution, would seek to unite themselves in honorable marriages with partners of their choice…if the cause be destroyed the effect ceases.” – Orson Pratt
So the females are the only culpable party. I see…
1 Cor. 6:16-20; “What? know ye not that he which is joined to an harlot is one body? for two, saith he, shall be one flesh. 17 But he that is joined unto the Lord is one spirit. 18 Flee fornication. Every sin that a man doeth is without the body; but he that committeth fornication sinneth against his own body. 19 What? know ye not that your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost which is in you, which ye have of God, and ye are not your own? 20 For ye are bought with a price: therefore glorify God in your body, and in your spirit, which are God’s.”
Here we have three opinions of why polygamy was practiced and the good it brings about and we have our Lord’s explanation of how we’re to conduct ourselves in this lifetime. Are any of the three explanations of their lifestyle compatible with the Lord’s directives to/for us?
The other truth to this situation is what was going on at the time the LDS Church was practicing polygamy. The US Census records are diametrically opposed to the first excuse for polygamy as you can see below.
What is the Church’s reasoning for it now? Silence. Except for the fact they keep leaving D&C 132 intact. The many excuses and the deafening silence about it today reveal this isn’t from the Lord.
History shows and has clearly proven there were always more men than women from the time the Mormons settled in Utah
Utah population:
1850 total 11,380 male 6,046 female 5,334
1860 total 40,273 male 20,255 female 20,018
1870 total 86,786 male 44,121 female 42,665
1880 total 143,963 male 74,509 female 68,454
1890 total 210,779 male 111,975 female 98,804
1900 total 276,749 male 141,687 female 135,062
Sources:
United States Census Bureau
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