Interesting content:
First of all, the article mentions that David Hyrum Smith was the "last son" of Joseph Smith, Jr.'s...But was he (given all the wives he took, especially in the three years prior to Joseph Smith, Jr.'s death?)
#2, the article points out that this youngest acknowledged son of Joseph Smith -- David Hyrum Smith -- became a member of the reorganized (RLDS) church which split from the Brigham Young Utah Mormons. As a member, his brother, Joseph Smith III -- who served as RLDS "prophet" -- sent David Hyrum Smith as a "missionary" to Utah to try to convert the Utah Mormons to the Missourian RLDS!
In that process, David Hyrum Smith discovered the truth that so many RLDS Missourians were in denial for the longest of time: That Joseph Smith preached and practiced polygamy! (They blamed that on Brigham, vs. acknowledging the truth of history)
Young David Hyrum Smith discovered that even his own family could not be believed on the claims they were making (that Joseph Smith, Jr. wasn't a preaching/practicing polygamist!)
#3...well, I'll cover that next post...
I thought Free Republic was a conservative activism forum. Can’t you just post your stuff on a blog somewhere? If anyone is interested, they can go there and read it. Here, it is just spam. The country is going down the crapper, and I just don’t care about Mormonism, Catholicism or Unitarian Universalism, for that matter.
Just saying...
From the column: ...David...Smith took his...skepticism...further, arguing against...dogma that man can only seek important further knowledge from a selected prophet. This doubt struck at a key doctrine of both churches. He wrote: “If faith unto salvation was an eternal principle and true, it could be discovered and demonstrated so as to be of general benefit as the law of gravitation or the rules of mathematics. But as it comes to us it makes us subservient to our falable (sic) fellow Man for eternal life, a most absurd proposition. But you again might speak God has revealed himself. But here again is an absurdity our fellow man brings us a revelation, and we are only guided by our faith in him. We do not know he has had this revelation and eternal salvation depends upon our faith in our fellow man and his revelation. Unjust and absurd.”
Bingo. Joseph Smith's own youngest acknowledged son -- David Hyrum Smith -- realized what happens once his own father & the Mormon church reduced everything down to a mousetrap filter of having to believe just one man! He called it "unjust and absurd" that we have a non-divine being like his father, Joseph Smith, claim that "we are ONLY guided by our faith IN HIM. We do not know he has had this revelation and eternal salvation depends upon our faith in our fellow man and his revelation. Unjust and absurd."
From the column: ...David Smith...pointed out the inconsistency of ascribing belief based on one man’s claim of divine prophecy. For every Joseph Smith, he told his brother, there were Brigham Young, “Spiritualists” and Strangites” (an offshoot of Mormonism).
Yup. Multiple false prophets all making claims to being "prophets." (And here Mormons have the gall to repeatedly claim that with all the Protestant sects and denominations, we don't know which to follow...Yet the same thing is true with all the claims to prophecy!...At least, there's been more agreement among the Christian denominations on the key doctrines than all the offshoots of Joseph Smith!)
From the column: Young Smith’s ideas could be dismissed as heresy...by rigid believers...Any follower of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints…should acknowledge... inconsistencies demanded…which are: • ...belief is required without presentable evidence... • ...for every claim of a Joseph Smith or a Thomas Monson, there are thousands of similar claims from prophets with hundreds of millions of adherents...
Indeed. The Mormons, by the focus of a Mormon journalist, are inconsistent. No evidence required that Smith was a "prophet." And no distinction of such a claim than that made by Muhammad, who was illiterate.
Bears repeating. Mormonism is all about feelings with no FACTS, EVIDENCE, or LOGICAL ARGUMENT to support its wild claims of truth.
Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm
The authgor doesnt seem t5o point out that Breiggie Young treated the Smith boys with contempt when they finally went to Utah as adults
He made sure they found out all the nuanses anmd ugly bits of their fathers adulterous past ajnd the truth about polygamy
Thjeir Mom Emma hale Smith had kept the truth from them and even lied to herself for years after5 Joeys death...
Briggie Young was a mean spiteful creature and didnt hesitate to take his revenge out on Emmas sons for the slight he felt she had done him in refusing to go to Utah as one of his extra “wives” after Joey got his silly self killed in a gunfight and jail break..
ping — on David Hyrum Smith & Joseph Smith III.