Thanks Kenny. I’m a devout Christian, but even I have to admit that Christian apologetics when it comes to Mormonism can sometimes be embedded with sensationalism and polemic, and thus some discernment is necessary.
Thus the reason I feel this article makes such a strong case is that it was not written primarily for a Christian audience within a polemical apologetics context.
Rather, it was written by a scholar educated in Mormonism, for a Mormon academic/scholarly publication, where it was well-received, widely quoted favorably by Mormon scholars and academics, received an award for Mormon scholarship, and was then picked up for republication by arespected journal of gnostic/occultic religious movements in the English language. The extensive documentation and footnotes help too.
So fair to say, Joseph Smith Jr’s inspiration for Mormonism was likely found more in the occult than in Christianity.
Joseph Smith Jr’s inspiration for Mormonism was likely found more in the occult than in Christianity.
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Joey Smith was shooting for anything that was the opposite of Christianity...
he hated God and Christians...
Amongst his made up doctrines and his own rules for living he broke all 10 of the Ten Commandments...
For instance his d&c 132 is in direct violation of the Seventh Commandment You shall not commit adultery and yet Smith not only had sex with women under his wife’s own roof, he and later Brigham Young made doctrines so blasphemeous that they defy all sense of decency...
Thruout the Christian Bible are also warnings against practicing witchcraft. But the Smith family were deeply into the occult What better way to shake his fist in the face of the God he did not fear than to include the works of Satan in his religion?
Smith himself tells of the story of fimnding the “golden plates” but having to leave them there, anmd come back one night a year for several years to visit the spot but not to take them. Emma supposedly was with him on one of those occassions, however he did not allow her to get close enough to identify what he had hidden. She was not “worthy” enough to see it.
What he does not seem to explain is the fact that the date in September he mentions is a night when devils are said to show the place gold is hidden. It is also the Equinox, an important night for believers in the occult.
It is interesting that he would choose that particular night to include in his story of the “angel” appearing in his room and leading him to the “gold places” that were later supposedly “translated” into his book of mormon.
However as a man deeply involved in the occult since childhood, he would have known all the dates of the Satanic celebrations throughout the year and faithfully recognized each one along with his parents.
Smith remained an occultist all his life and died with his favorite Jupiter talisman in his pocket. That piece of metal had Satanic symbols to give him good luck and power over other people.