Polygamy

            Many people have been distressed about the practice of polygamy in church history.  I personally have known about this issue, or at least part of it, since I was young, and I never fully understood what was wrong with it.  Ancient prophets whom we revere and look up to, such as Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, had more than one wife.  I considered the fact that we don’t practice it today to be a temporary break, so that we could have the right to continue to function as a Church.  I figured that the practice would be brought back someday, perhaps in the Millennium or the Celestial Kingdom.  But whenever a non-Mormon would ask about polygamy, I would get very defensive and insist that polygamy had nothing to do with our beliefs.

            The Church’s problem with polygamy goes beyond the simple fact that some men had more than one wife.  In D&C 132, the eternal law of plural marriage is defined and set forth.  In verse 61, the Lord states:

And again, as pertaining to the law of the priesthood—if any man espouse a virgin, and desire to espouse another, and the first give her consent, and if he espouse the second, and they are virgins, and have vowed to no other man, then is he justified; he cannot commit adultery for they are given unto him; for he cannot commit adultery with that that belongeth unto him and to no one else.

In this verse, we see two main stipulations for taking second wives: the first wife must “give her consent,” and they must be “virgins,” having “vowed to no other man.”  Joseph Smith broke both of these rules.  He married his first plural wife, Fanny Alger, who was 16 years old at the time, and he did it behind Emma’s back.  He married a lot of women without Emma’s consent.  In total, Joseph had over 30 wives, and 11 of them were already married to other men, some members of the Church.  10 of these wives were under 20 years old when he married them, and two of them were 14.  One of these 14-year-old girls, Helen Mar Kimball, was reluctant to accept the Prophet’s proposal, but did so after Joseph warned her that her family’s salvation was at stake.  These girls spent their whole youth in service to the Prophet, unable to go to dances, court young men, or do the things that they wanted.  It sounds a lot like Joseph Smith was using his authority to obtain more sexual partners.  Detailed historical information about each of these forgotten women can be found on the site wivesofjosephsmith.org.

            Under the first few presidents of the Church, polygamy was not simply allowed.  It was necessary for salvation.  In the first few verses of D&C 132, the Lord introduces this revelation as “the principle and doctrine” of “having many wives and concubines” (D&C 132:1).  He calls it “a new and an everlasting covenant,” and warns that “if ye abide not that covenant, then ye are damned; for no one can reject this covenant and be permitted to enter into [the Lord’s] glory” (vs. 4).  Some people try to disconnect verse 4 from verse 1, but that’s not how President Brigham Young read this passage.  In volume 3 of the Journal of Discourses, Brigham Young states, “Now if any of you will deny the plurality of wives, and continue to do so, I promise that you will be damned” (JD 3:266).  If that wasn’t clear enough, he also says, “The only men who become Gods, even the Sons of God, are those who enter into polygamy” (JD 11:269).  What was once a requirement for salvation is now grounds for excommunication.