Outsider Business Warrants Condemnable Shunning

Journal of Discourses 12:315; “And you, sisters, cease trading with any man or being in this city or country who does not belong to the church. If you do not, we are going to cut you off from the church, for we are determined not to be driven or broken up again, and we are determined to deal with love and sustain our nation, our community. We mean to live here. We came 1,400 miles to get away from that power which is trying to get into our midst to break us up again. … we calculate to stay here if you will do as I tell you, and cease trading with those who are not of us. Do you suppose that Jesus did not understand the spirit and the feelings of the world when He said, “He who is not for us is against us.” Every man and woman of intelligence that ever was or ever will be upon the earth is either for God or against Him.” – Brigham Young, Salt Lake City, November 29, 1868

Matthew 12:30; “He that is not with me is against me; and he that gathereth not with me scattereth abroad.”

Luke 9:50; “He who is not with Me is against Me, and he who does not gather with Me scatters.”

Brigham’s manmade rules provides an inside look at how the Church began its exclusionary lifestyle. Shunning in those days was a veritable death sentence, and threats, whether real or implied, served its purpose for keeping people in line.

As the population grew, so did the insular mindset, turning Mormons into a self-imposed landlocked nation of ‘peculiar people’. You can still see residual effects of this in the 21^st century when someone questions the doctrines of the Church, or with people losing jobs, homes, and families, after leaving the confines of Mormondom.

It obviously didn’t matter that Brigham took things out of context. He somehow convinced enough people to believe he knew what he was talking about by quoting Jesus, and just went with it.