Joseph Smith, Jr., and necromancy

I'm presently reading Brandon G. Kinney's The Mormon War: Zion and the Missouri Extermination Order of 1838 (2011; Westholme).

The book provides a very good portrait of the extent of the Smith's (both senior and junior) delving in various occult practices such as necromancy.

 

Here is an article by David Padfield that sums up Mr. Smith's life quite well. He basically was nothing but a con-artist, drunk, and predator.

"Beloved, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits, whether they are of God; because many false prophets have gone out into the world" (1 John 4:1).

The first Mormon prophet, Joseph Smith, was arrested and convicted in New York and was found guilty of being a con-artist, an impostor -- he was a necromancer and a charlatan. This conviction was four years before he published the Book of Mormon! Court documents prove he was a convicted criminal.

My Lord knew no sin -- Jesus led a sinless life (1 Pet. 2:21-22, "For to this you were called, because Christ also suffered for us, leaving us an example, that you should follow His steps: 'Who committed no sin, nor was deceit found in His mouth.'").

Joseph Smith said that the moon was inhabited by people six feet tall who dressed like Quakers and lived to be 1,000 years old (Source: Journal of Oliver B. Huntington, a devout Mormon contemporary of Joseph Smith; copy at Utah State Historical Society, Vol. 2, p. 166). Smith said the "gulf stream" was the result of the city of Enoch's being taken out from the place where the gulf of Mexico is. My Lord always spoke where of He knew -- before Abraham was, He was -- He was in the beginning with God (John 1:1).

Joseph Smith had the ability to persuade men -- but my Lord had the ability to make the mute to speak, the deaf to hear, the blind to see, the lame to walk, and the dead to live. My Lord did not die amid blazing guns with a six-shooter in his hands.

Joseph Smith was murdered -- not by a group of "anti-Mormons," but by men whose wives and daughters he had tried to ruin! When the jail was stormed, Joseph Smith used a handgun to kill two men and wound another. My Lord was never accused of improprieties with women. He was never a party to developments that failed. He never took His follower's money in some promotional scheme that was doomed from the start. He never led His followers from one location to another, for His kingdom was not of this world.

My Lord has given me a simple book, the Bible, which will guide me safely through this world, comfort me in the hour death, and sustain my soul at the judgment -- it is this book I must follow. As Jesus said, "He who rejects Me, and does not receive My words, has that which judges him -- the word that I have spoken will judge him in the last day" (John 12:48).

"But even if we, or an angel from heaven, preach any other gospel to you than what we have preached to you, let him be accursed" (Gal. 1:8).



To further shed light on the character of Mr. Smith, here is a quote from Brigham Young some years after his death, about 1877.

Journal of Discourses 4:77; “If he acts like a devil, he has brought forth a doctrine that will save us, if we will abide it. He may get drunk every day of his life, sleep with his neighbor’s wife every night, run horses and gamble, I do not care anything about that, for I never embrace any man in my faith. But the doctrine he has produced will save you and me, and the whole world; and if you can find fault with that, find it.” – Brigham Young, Salt Lake City, November 9, 1856

1 Corinthians 15:33; “Be not deceived: evil communications corrupt good manners.”

 

I wish I knew where the golden leaves were so I could pawn them.