Transcription
And the CM of Salt Lake City, Utah, was rocked today by two booby trap bombs that left two people dead. Then, all of a sudden, we heard a boom and it shook the building. It began Tuesday with two fatal booby trap bombings in Salt Lake City. There was talk of a mysterious salamander letter criticizing Mormon Church doctrine. The 1830 document challenges the Mormon Church's account of its own origin. He's a dealer in Mormon Church documents, and NBC's Roger O'Neal reports tonight he may also have been a forger. Hoffman recently sold a controversial 160-year-old letter which contradicts the official Mormon version of how the church began.
Do you remember hearing about Mark Hoffman? He's been in prison for almost 40 years now. Experts today still talk about his incredible talent. If if all the charges approved, and he's probably the most prolific forger of this century. But this is not a man anyone should look up to or feel sorry for. He was a narcissistic liar and a cold-blooded killer killer. At one point, the LDS Church owned close to 400 documents that came from Hoffman. News agencies across the country kept accusing the Church of hiding the documents that cast doubt on their origin. [Music]
Story at a BYU symposium, Elder Dalan Oaks publicly denied their accusations. He also spoke about Hoffman's attempts to sell the church a collection of papers from early church Apostle William McLellin, who became a bitter enemy to Joseph Smith. Oaks made it clear that the church was not trying to buy the McLellin papers from Hoffman in order to suppress them. But there's more to this story, and the rest of it gets complicated. Several months after Hoffman was exposed, LDS Church leaders discovered that they had already owned the real McLellin papers for over 75 years. They had been in the First Presidency vault, which is like the LDS version of the Vatican Secret Archives. But the church decided not to reveal the discovery for more than 5 years.
We now have the original letter from President Joseph F. Smith to Samuel O. Tanner talking about the purchase of the real McLellin papers in 1908. President Samuel, we desire you to know that we would like very much to possess McLellan's Journal, if for no other reason than to prevent the writing of this unfortunate and erratic man whose attitude after his apostasy was inimical to the Prophet Joseph Smith from falling into unfriendly hands. And for this reason alone, we feel quite willing to pay the price for these things than your brethren, Joseph F. Smith, John R. Winder, and Anthon H. Lund of the First Presidency. I'm not sure how you would interpret that, but it seems clear to me that the church wanted to buy the McLellin papers so that they could hide them.
For those of you that might be thinking that 1908 was a long time ago and that the church wouldn't do that today, maybe you're right. But before you decide, wait until I show you what else was in the vault. Keys keys keys keysys keys keys keys keys keys keys keys keys keys keys keys keys keys keys keys keysys keys keys. 5 and A2 years before the McLellin paper deception, Hoffman approached the LDS Church with a document called the Anthon Transcript. In April of 1980, the First Presidency of the LDS Church instructed Don Schmidt to purchase this document from Hoffman. With the other documents which we have and a uh comparison brief thought may be it certainly appears to be just like the rest of them, and I don't think there any doubt. The church now believed they owned the oldest Mormon document in existence.
Less than one year later, in February of 1981, Hoffman came back to Schmidt with another offer. This time Hoffman had the transcript of a blessing given by Church founder Joseph Smith Jr. on January 17th, 1844. In that blessing, he named his son Joseph Smith III as his rightful successor. This supposed new discovery reignited the long-standing rivalry between the RLDS Church and the LDS Church about who was the rightful successor to Joseph Smith. The LDS Church believes Brigham Young was the rightful successor as the leader of the K of the 12, but the RLDS Church believes Joseph Smith the Third was the rightful successor by lineal descent. Several other churches were started by Sidney Rigdon, James Strang, and Alpheus Cutler, who also claimed to be the rightful successors to Joseph. Hoffman assumed Schmidt would want the blessing because it hurt the LDS Church's claims in the succession crisis debate. But Schmidt wasn't interested because he felt the price was too high. So that's when Hoffman reached out to the RLDS Church.
Hello, this is hello, this is Mark Hoffman calling from Salt Lake City. Oh yeah, uh you may remember me from Anthon Transcript. Okay, the reason why I'm calling is I just came across an interesting manuscript that I thought that the Reorganized Church might be interested in. Uh-huh. It's a blessing that was given to Joseph Smith III by his father. It's dated January 17, 1844, and it's in, according to Dean Jesse, it's in the handwriting of uh Bullock, Thomas B. Hoffman is referring here to Dean Jesse, who at the time worked as a senior researcher for the LDS Church's historical department. Jesse was considered the world's foremost expert on Joseph Smith documents. Should I read it to you and see what you think about it? So yeah, okay, let's hear it. Uh-huh. Okay, let me read it to you. It's headed, this is the title, and I'm quoting: A blessing given to Joseph Smith III by his father Joseph Smith Jr. on January 17th, 1844. And then this is the blessing: Blessed of the Lord is my son Joseph, who is called the third, for the Lord knows the integrity of his heart and loves him because of his faith and righteous desires, and for this cause has the Lord raised him up that the promises made to the fathers might be fulfilled, even that the anointing of the progenitor shall be upon the head of my son and his seed after him from generation to generation, for he shall be my successor to the presidency of the high priesthood, a seer and a revelator and a prophet unto the church, which appointment belongeth to him by blessing and also by right. Verily, thus saith the Lord, if he abides in me his day shall be lengthened upon the Earth, but if he abides not in me, I the Lord will receive him in an instant unto myself. When he is grown he shall be a strength to his brethren and a comfort to his mother. Angels will minister unto him, and he will be wafted as on eagle's wings and be as wise as serpents, even a multiplicity of blessings shall be his. Amen. Oh, for heaven's sake. So I thought you'd be at least interested in hearing it. Well, I sure am. Uh, uh, can we get a copy of that some way or uh well, actually what I was hoping was that you'd be interested in the original. Oh, well we are.
When LDS Church leaders received word that the RLDS Church was interested in the blessing, they started scrambling. Several senior leaders of the LDS Church were very concerned about the blessing, and they didn't know how they should respond to the RLDS Church's big announcement. But Dean Jesse pointed out that Joseph Smith's last charge to the 12 took place 2 months after the Joseph Smith the Third blessing. The last charge was when Joseph supposedly named the 12 as his successors in a Council of 50 meeting. But Jesse had never seen the minutes from those meetings because they were locked away in the First Presidency Vault. Jesse spoke with Gordon Hinckley and Boyd Packer, who were the two members of the 12 over the history department. He asked Hinckley for access to the Council of 50 minutes in the vault in order to put the blessing in the proper context. Surprisingly, his request was denied. A few days later, Leonard Arrington, the Church Historian and Jesse's boss, wrote a letter to Hinckley again requesting access to the original Council of 50 minutes in the vault. Although Arrington was the first professional historian to hold this calling, his request was also denied. A few weeks later, at the LDS General Conference, Hinckley officially responded to the Joseph Smith the Third blessing, dismissing any effect it had on the church's claims to authority.
I think I should like to say a few words this afternoon about the recently discovered transcript of a blessing. I do not wish to open old discussions, but for those who may feel that the document casts a cloud on the principle of transfer of authority through the Council of the 12 Apostles, I desire to review briefly a few facts concerning the document and the history of the period to which it is related, and then conclude with some observations that arise out of the circumstances. The winter of 1843-44 was a season of great tension in Nauvoo. Enemies were plotting the destruction of the church. During that winter, on a number of occasions, Joseph assembled the 12 in the upper room of his brick store on Water Street in Nauvoo. Our archives contain a number of documents attesting to these meetings and what was done in them. Hinckley is referring to the Council of 50 that was organized by Joseph Smith in early 1844 and met in his red brick store. We were glad to see our brethren of the Reorganized Church get the document which contains a father's blessing given upon the head of a son he loved. It is a precious artifact with great sentimental value for the family of Joseph Smith. It does not seriously raise any question concerning the validity of succession in the presidency through the Council of the 12 Apostles, as that body was established by the prophet and as it has functioned under the revelations of God. Of this I testify in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen. Amen.
Hinckley delivered a masterful talk that calmed the church's fears. Three and a half months later, he was called as the third counselor in the First Presidency of the Church. Not long after that, Arrington was privately released from his calling as Church Historian, with no mention or vote of thanks in the next General Conference. If you're like me, you might be wondering why Hinckley was promoted and Arrington was quietly dismissed. But 10 years after Arrington passed away in 1999, his diaries were made public, and that question was finally answered. A few days after Hinckley had denied his request to see the original source of the last charge, Arrington recorded the following in his journal: Elders Hinckley, Durham, and Olsen spent several hours in the Vault of the First Presidency looking through the minutes of the Council of the 50 for mention of the occasion when in March 1844 Joseph Smith told the 12 he was removing from his own shoulders the burden of administering the church and was placing it on the shoulders of the 12. They did not find this mention in the minutes of the Council of 50.
Did you catch that? Hinckley had discovered that there was nothing in the Council of 50 minutes about a last charge from Joseph to the 12, but the next month he reassured the church that that event had happened anyway, and they regarded him as the hero for it. So what exactly was the Council of 50? In 2010, the church finally released those secret minutes from the Vault to the historians of the Joseph Smith Papers Project, but they weren't made public until 2016. I recommend going through these minutes yourself, but I'll give you a quick summary. The first time the council met on March 10th, 1844, it was really just a group of guys getting together to talk about these two letters that had come from Apostle Lyman White and some other men logging up in Wisconsin. They wanted to settle in the Republic of Texas. The next day, 23 men came to the meeting, and they decided to formally organize themselves as a council. They continued to meet over the next 5 to 6 weeks until Joseph declared that they were full at around 50 members. The council met before Joseph's death a total of 17 times between March to May. The council included both members and non-members of the church.
So what were these meetings like? My impression is that at first the members of this Council believed it was the cool new club to join. The men sat in a circle in order by age, so every time a new guy came in they had to rearrange all the chairs. William Clayton was appointed as the clerk, and he kept detailed minutes of these meetings. Each meeting began with reading the minutes from the last meeting, which were sometimes 20 or 30 pages long. Then the men voted to accept the minutes, which gives us more confidence that they're accurate. The men were expected to attend the meetings if they were in town, and at least half of them were required for any voting. But after only a month, men had to be sent out to request the attendance of the members because they didn't have enough to hold a vote. At the beginning, the meetings were very orderly, with the men following formal protocols like making and seconding motions. They politely took turns making comments and voicing opinions. But toward the end, Clayton noted that there was so much disorder and confusion from members speaking over each other. The first 10 or so meetings involved some fairly interesting plans and discussions. They talked about religious persecution and the lack of support from the government. They also had many discussions about government structure and religious freedom, and they talked about the kingdom that God would establish, like the stone cut out of the mountain without hands in the Book of Daniel. They interpreted this as a political kingdom or theocracy that would begin in the last days and lead into the Millennium where Jesus Christ would reign as king. They also believed, on at least some level, that this Council was the first step toward establishing that theocracy. This is why Joseph was inspired to name the council The Kingdom of God and His Laws, with the keys and power thereof, and judgment in the hand of His servants. Thankfully, Joseph didn't have a problem with nicknames, so the council became known as the Kingdom of God or even just the Kingdom. It was also referred to as the Council of 50 because of the number of members. Council members were given various assignments during this time. Joseph Smith was running for president, and many of the council members were sent out to campaign for him. Others were given assignments to draft letters for Congress and deliver them. Some did research on potential new settlement locations, and one committee was assigned to draft a new constitution, but they never completed it. Right about the time the council was declared full, they decided to suspend meetings and focus on Joseph's presidential campaign. Small groups did meet briefly during the month of May, but then the meetings ended.
Just to give you a feel for these meetings, here is just one page from the minutes: March 26th, 1844. Elder Brigham Young motioned that a committee of three be appointed to draft and revise a memorial to the president of the US, which was seconded by President J. Smith. Elder Hyrum Smith was of the opinion that one was sufficient to draft said memorial. Elder Brigham Young withdrew his motion. Elder Hyrum Smith moved that a committee of one be appointed for the purpose of preparing the memorial to the president, which was seconded and carried unanimously. On motion, it was resolved that the recorder revise said memorial. You may have heard that in this Council Joseph appointed himself king of the world, but that's not what happened at all. Two years before this Council, Joseph taught this to the church: Here we learn in a priesthood after the order of Melchizedek, prophet, priest, king. I will advance from prophet to priest and then to king, not to the kingdoms of this Earth, but of the Most High God. That may have been why Amasa M. Lyman, after a discussion about theocracies, made a motion that the council accept Joseph as their prophet, priest, and king. It isn't clear exactly how Joseph felt about this motion, but he later made a comment that using the word King was a bad idea because that could be easily misinterpreted. Sidney Rigdon explained the purpose of the council in a way that made their intentions more clear: The design was to form a theocracy according to the will of Heaven, planted without any intention to interfere with any government of the world. We wish to have nothing to do with them. We have no violence to offer to governments, no rights to infringe. You need not fear that we design to trample on the rights of any man or set of men, only to seek the enjoyment of our own rights. Joseph also explained the purpose of this theocracy: Theocracy is for the people to get the voice of God and then acknowledge it and see it executed. Joseph wasn't trying to control anyone. He only ever talked about a kingdom that would allow everyone to follow the Lord as they saw fit. But again, the meeting notes don't really make it clear to what degree the council felt they were literally setting up this Kingdom. Mainly they all talked a lot.
Another thing you may have heard about this council is that Joseph Smith required the members to swear an oath of secrecy. The first time the group met to discuss moving to Texas, he asked them to keep the meeting private, and they all agreed. But at the next meeting, Lucian Woodworth, who was a member of the Masonic Lodge, suggested that members should take an oath of secrecy under penalty of death, and the motion was passed. About a month later, Sidney Rigdon brought up this oath, and Joseph Smith responded with the following: There was nothing to require a man to submit to the order of the council unless he was so disposed. Any man who did not acquiesce with our regulations could withdraw and say nothing about it. He could either go or stay as he saw proper. I get the idea that Joseph wasn't a big fan of Masonic oaths and [Music] threats. The council had lengthy discussions about the connection between the Council of 50 and the church. In a meeting on April 11th, Joseph talked about the non-members on the council. He explained that all men have equal rights and ought to be respected. Every man has a privilege in this organization of choosing for himself voluntarily his God and what he pleases for his religion. At the next meeting a week later, Brigham Young pressed the issue when he said: I cannot see the difference between a religious or political government. It's supposed we take our families and go where there is no other inhabitants and begin to govern ourselves. What would be the necessity to get up a constitution to govern us when we have all the revelations and laws to govern us and punish us according to our crimes? Willard Richards seems to have been agreeing with Brigham when he posed this question: It has been suggested that the Kingdom of God and the Church of God are one and the same thing, and it has been suggested that the church is one thing and the kingdom another. Where is the dividing line between the Kingdom of God and the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints? If the Kingdom of God and the church are one and the same, why this organization? If a man cannot belong to the church without the ordinances, how can they be members of the Kingdom of God without the ordinances? Several other members of the council also put forth their opinions, and at the end Joseph added some additional thoughts: The church is a spiritual matter and a spiritual kingdom, but the kingdom which Daniel saw was not a spiritual kingdom, but was designed to be got up for the safety and salvation of the Saints by protecting them in their religious rights and worship. The literal Kingdom of God and the Church of God are two distinct things. The gifts of prophets, evangelists, etc., never were designed to govern men in civil matters. The Kingdom of God has nothing to do with giving commandments to damn a man's spirit. It only has power to make a man amenable to his fellow man.
So Joseph saw the millennial Kingdom as permitting religious freedom and not exclusive to one church. He believed Daniel's vision with the stone rolling forth to fill the whole world represented this political Kingdom, not any organized religion. The council discussions helped Joseph to solidify his thoughts on government, and in this same meeting he expressed his preference to stay in Nauvoo and not to go to Texas. Joseph Smith was not against the United States government; he just wanted them to protect the rights that the divinely inspired Constitution had already defined. The Constitution provides the things which we want but lacks the power to carry the laws into effect. This was one of the main reasons that he was running for president. A month after the final meeting, Joseph and his brother Hyrum were killed. In February of the next year, Brigham Young restarted the council meetings. The first thing he did was expel all the non-members and any members who opposed his claim to leadership of the church. He then moved forward with his plan to do exactly what he had suggested in the meetings while Joseph was alive, which included combining the church and the government and moving it to the middle of nowhere. After the LDS Church released the Council of 50 minutes in 2016, they also published an article on their website where they openly admit that the council was a political or civic organization totally separate from the
Church, but they still avoid saying that the last charge happened in a Council of Fifty meeting. I assume that’s because they don’t like explaining why Joseph would have named his successors in a political group that had nothing to do with the Church. They also probably don’t want to mention that the Keys of the Kingdom were given to all 52 men of this Council, some of whom were not even members of the Church.
In the April 1995 General Conference, Gordon Hinckley was sustained as the new president of the LDS Church, and President Boyd Packer gave a talk explaining how succession works in the Church by relating an account of the last charge. If you listen, you will hear how purposely vague he is about the setting. The Twelve bridge the line of authority from one administration to another and keep the line unbroken.
Shortly before the martyrdom, in a meeting attended by nine members of the Twelve, the Prophet Joseph Smith prophetically said, “Brethren, the Lord bids me hasten the work in which we are engaged. Some important scene is near to take place. It may be that my enemies will kill me, and in case they should, and the keys and power which rest upon me not be imparted to you, they will be lost from the Earth. But if I can only succeed in placing them upon your heads, then let me fall victim to murderous hands, if God will suffer it, and I can go with all pleasure and satisfaction, knowing that my work is done and the foundation laid on which the kingdom of God is to be reared in this dispensation of the fullness of times. Upon the shoulders of the Twelve must the responsibility of leading this Church henceforth rest, until you should appoint others to succeed you individually and collectively. The Twelve hold the keys and have confirmed the authority to exercise all of the keys.”
Packer was not quoting Joseph Smith directly; he was quoting from this source: Source: Draft Declaration of the Twelve Apostles, reporting March 1844 meeting of Twelve. This draft Declaration was written by Orson Hyde around March of 1845 and is considered by the LDS Church to be the primary source for the last charge story. It includes details about the time and place that have allowed historians to pinpoint the setting for this event: a Council of Fifty meeting on March 26th, 1844.
In addition to the part Packer quoted, the draft declaration also claims that, as part of the last charge, the Twelve were confirmed by a holy anointing under the hands of Joseph and Hyrum, and that Joseph then said, “I roll the burden and responsibility of leading this Church off from my shoulders onto yours. Now round up your shoulders and stand under it like men, for the Lord is going to let me rest a while.”
Packer’s talk is interesting for many reasons. He talked about the importance of ordination, but then he admitted that only nine of the Twelve were present for this anointing by Joseph and Hyrum. He also failed to mention that this happened at a Council of Fifty meeting, even though he quoted from the very source that placed the event there. But what is most ironic to me is that Packer was using the last charge to legitimize the authority of the new Church president, the very man who couldn’t find evidence for this event when he searched the Council of Fifty minutes in the First Presidency Vault over a decade earlier.
So why was Packer still so confident that this event happened even though Hinckley couldn’t find any reference to it in the official minutes? Did you think Hinckley missed it somehow? Let me show you the minutes for that day so you can decide for yourself if this event happened or not. Here is a list of everything that occurred in the three-hour morning session on March 26th, 1844, where historians today believe this event happened: singing and prayer; seven pages of previous minutes read and accepted; nine new members proposed; group assignments explained to new members; Joseph Smith’s instruction on the kingdom of God to new members; discussion about William Law; speeches from nine new members; vote to accept new members; Joseph Smith’s instruction on heavenly things and other important subjects; new Brethren took their seats; Council name read and accepted; James Emmett’s mission discussed; proposed 13-page Memorial to Congress read and discussed; additional Memorial suggested; and the meeting adjourned until afternoon.
Wow, that was quite a busy meeting. But let’s see what the Joseph Smith Papers historians say about that meeting in their editorial note: “A significant event likely occurred in this meeting, probably in the morning session, about which the minutes are silent, but which council members discussed a year later in connection with a written summary prepared by Orson Hyde.” Now that’s the draft declaration we’ve been talking about. Clayton’s brief note that Joseph Smith spoke on heavenly things and many other important subjects likely marks what was later referred to as Joseph Smith’s last charge.
Now, in the meeting notes, Clayton actually says that Joseph *continued* to speak on heavenly things and many other important subjects. So why did the historian leave out the word “continued”? As Jeremy Hunsberger would say, this omission is an example of historical malpractice. It’s like they’re trying to force the story of the last charge into the minutes by making it look like the instructions from Joseph were a unique circumstance. But the truth is that Joseph was just following the same pattern that day as he had in previous meetings: first, he instructed the candidates about the purposes of the council; then each candidate was given an opportunity to speak; then they were voted on; Joseph continued his instructions to them; and then they changed chairs. Clayton used that same description in the previous week’s meeting. After Joseph instructed the new candidates, they each spoke and were voted on, they changed chairs, and then Joseph continued his instructions on the order of the kingdom of God.
Does it really seem feasible that Joseph would pause in the middle of his instructions to the new candidates, roll off his authority onto the shoulders of the Twelve, and then go right back to instructing and seating the new candidates? And then we are supposed to believe that this happened, but Clayton made no mention of it in the minutes. My guess is that the Joseph Smith Papers historians assumed that no one would look up these sources, because in that same editorial note they also cite as evidence for the last charge the *future* Council of Fifty meeting where Hyde’s draft Declaration was first discussed. That happened on March 22nd, 1845, in a Council of Fifty meeting where Brigham Young was now the chairman. Orson Hyde had been given the assignment of writing a pamphlet discrediting Sidney Rigdon as a farewell to Rigdon. Hyde wrote the draft declaration because he wanted to include it in the pamphlet as a way to weaken Sidney’s claim of authority. At this point, Sidney was the main opponent to the Twelve in the succession battle. The Declaration included a description he came up with of how Joseph transferred his authority to the Twelve in the Council of Fifty meeting. He read the full draft declaration to the council and wanted everyone who had been in that meeting with Joseph to sign it. But I will show you the minutes of that meeting, and you can see how it was received by the other council members:
“Councilman Hyde read a certificate which he had wrote for publication concerning Joseph Smith appointing the Twelve to take the responsibility of leading the Church. Councilman J. Young moved that the last expression in the article, ‘So help us God,’ be left out. Councilman Hyde said he had wrote this article and submitted it to this Council to find out how many of those here were present at the time it was done and who can sign it as witnesses. Councilman O. Pratt was present when observations similar to those in the document were made by President Smith, but would it not be carrying an idea abroad that this was the commencement of the authority of the Twelve? They had the same authority before the time referred to in the document. He should have no objections to the article going forth if the proper date of the authority and appointment was stated. Councilman Hyde gave further reasons why he had wrote the article in request of its publication.”
Now the minutes don’t state the reasons, but I assume that at this point he tells them that he wants to include it in the pamphlet discrediting Sidney Rigdon. Based on the next comments by Brigham Young:
“Chairman Brigham Young said he should not want the article to go into the history of Rigdon at all. He wants Elder Hyde to write his Farewell to Rigdonism and let the Twelve alone. He don’t care whether the world know the authority and power of the Twelve or not. When the time comes they shall feel our power and we shall not try to prove it to them. In regard to Joseph’s remarks, he did not mention anything about the anointing. He said it was this Council of Fifty which had to bear the responsibility of establishing the kingdom in all the world. Councilman Woodworth said it was his opinion that matters which pertain to the spiritual existence of the kingdom of God and belong not to this Council but to another one should not be mentioned here. He considers this Council was organized for the establishment of the temporal kingdom of God. He is opposed to anything which belongs to the other Council being brought up here.”
Okay, so let’s recap the reaction to Hyde’s draft: Joseph Young was uncomfortable with ending with, “We have told the truth and have not lied, so help us God.” Pratt actually thought it undermined the authority of the Twelve, who gained no new authority at the time when, as he said, Joseph made observations similar to those in the document. Brigham Young said there was no anointing and that Joseph gave this responsibility to the Council of Fifty, not only to the Twelve, and then he told Hyde not to publish the document. Woodworth said that spiritual matters had nothing to do with this Council and shouldn’t be brought up in their meetings. Bottom line: no one agreed with Hyde’s account or signed his draft. So why do the Joseph Smith Papers historians refer to this discussion as evidence that the claims in Hyde’s document are legitimate?
There is a reason that the Declaration is called a draft in the citations: it was never accepted, signed, or published. And if that’s not enough for you to question its legitimacy, consider that ten years after the council initially rejected it, it was again brought up in a meeting with the Quorum of the Twelve, and they rejected it a second time. In that meeting, Brigham Young said, “I don’t see that it adds or diminishes. All I have to say is, if I am not right, bring the man that can tell me right, walk up and take your place, and do as you ought to do.” In other words, Brigham didn’t feel like he needed a document to prove his authority. If any men thought they had more authority than him, he dared them to come and prove it. In that same meeting, the Twelve also discussed Joseph prophesying that he was soon going to die and how Hyde made that the reason Joseph was so anxious to roll off the kingdom onto their shoulders. To that Brigham responded, “I had no idea of him going to die.”
Even though Hyde’s draft Declaration was completely rejected by the early Church leaders twice, somehow it was filed away in Brigham Young’s papers, and then decades later it became the foundation for the LDS Church’s teaching on the succession and priesthood keys to this day. The Church still cites it as the main source for the last charge in conference talks, manuals, and books, including *Saints*, Volume 1. Curiously, though, the editors of the *Saints* book renamed it “Statement of the Twelve by Orson Hyde.” I guess they don’t want to call it a draft anymore.
I tracked down and read every source the Church lists to support the story of the last charge. The most frequently cited by far is Hyde’s draft declaration. Other than that, all we have is a handful of talks and letters that refer to Council of Fifty meetings and receiving the Keys of the Kingdom. Many of them also claim things that are just not supported by the Council minutes. For example, the last Church History Seminary manual before *Come, Follow Me* has a chapter called “Succession in the Presidency” to explain how the Twelve came to lead the Church. They quote from an account given by Wilford Woodruff fifty years after the meeting with Joseph in the Council of Fifty. Woodruff even recorded his account in his own voice with what was cutting-edge technology at the time. He’s talking about the Council of Fifty meeting on March 26th, 1844, where supposedly Joseph gave the last charge to the Twelve. He claims in his account that Joseph called all of the Twelve together, even though we now know that only nine of them were in town at the time. He also said that Joseph delivered them the ordinances of both the Church and the kingdom of God, but the Council of Fifty minutes make it clear that there were no ordinances or anything from the Church as part of their meetings. He does say that the meeting lasted three hours, which agrees with Clayton’s notes, but the minutes also show that most of that time was not Joseph delivering his last lecture, as he claimed. Before he says Joseph’s face was as clear as amber and he was covered with power. In other written versions of this account, he also described that the room was filled as with consuming fire and that Joseph’s words were like vivid lightning that penetrated every part of their bodies. If this was all true, you’d think it would be one of the most profound experiences of his life. So I checked his journal just to see how he described it on the day it happened. Woodruff was an avid journal keeper, but here is his entry for that day: “A rainy day. I met in council with the Brethren.” Well, that was underwhelming.
A couple of years ago, I made my first video called “The Global LDS Church.” It was about the Church’s response to the global health crisis that was going on at the time because I wasn’t very happy with it. A lot of people that felt the same way reached out to me, but they had one concern: they said, “I agree with you, but the Church holds the keys, so we have to do what they say.” And that made me start thinking about what exactly are these keys? I’d been hearing about them my whole life, but I didn’t really understand where they came from, uh, what they were required for, and what exactly that meant. And really nobody could explain it to me in a way that was satisfactory to me. So I started researching this topic, and one of the main things that came up was the last charge, and that led me to studying about the Council of Fifty where it supposedly happened. And as I was reading through those minutes, at first I just wanted to read that day and see if what happened, but they were so interesting I couldn’t stop reading them, and I read the whole thing.
One thing that really stood out to me was just understanding more what Joseph taught and believed, and I was just really impressed with how he ran these meetings. He didn’t control them; he didn’t tell other people what to think; he let other people talk and express their opinions; and he was always about religious freedom and about people having their own relationship with God. That was the whole point of this Kingdom they were trying to establish. I also just noticed how he and Brigham seemed to be totally opposed in what they believed. Joseph wanted to support the government and the Constitution; he just wanted them to do the things that they said they were—the freedoms that people had; he wanted them to protect them. But Brigham wanted to move the Church to the middle of nowhere and totally control everyone. He wanted the Church leaders to make the laws and tell everyone else what to do, and that’s what ended up happening. Um, as I saw how he changed the Council after Joseph died, it made me see how he made some of those same changes in the Church.
There really was only one place I could find where the words “last charge” were used in a source, and that was from Wilford Woodruff. He said that Joseph gave a last charge to the Twelve, and it was basically to be righteous and to go do their calling as missionaries to take the gospel to the world. But before there was a last charge, there was a first charge, and that charge to the Twelve Apostles told them that they needed to have a testimony that the Book of Mormon was true and they needed to see the face of God so they could testify of Him. At the end of that charge it said, “Your ordination is not complete until God lays his hand on you.” And that made me realize that that is really where authority comes from. You can’t get this authority from another man, and that’s what Joseph was trying to teach. I really want you to know how much I appreciate you listening, and until next time, God bless. [Music]