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Our first real part two
S3E44 · Moroni Part 2
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Standard of Truth · Season 3 · Episode 44 · 1:01:28

Moroni Part 2

Before Moroni said anything about the plates, Joseph's account says the angel told him his sins were forgiven, the very thing that had sent him to pray in the first place.

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The question ·

What time of night did Moroni first appear to Joseph? I always assumed it was before midnight, since everyone would have gone to bed early by candlelight.

Kyle (listener)

Richard celebrates actually doing a part two and confesses his yearly tradition of buying Gerrit an anti-Mormon book for his birthday. Kyle, Rebecca's husband, reports that baby Heber William arrived and asks what time of night Moroni came; Gerrit says the sources don't say, but early bedtimes suggest a few hours before midnight. Then he pushes back on the claim that Joseph's poverty explains it all, because motive isn't evidence. He describes how the Panic of 1819 fed the Second Great Awakening, how Joseph felt as life and temptation crept back in after the First Vision, and how Moroni's first message was forgiveness. Gerrit compares Lucy Mack Smith's account with Joseph's 1838 history and sets up next week: did Joseph ever get the plates?

Who comes upJoseph SmithMoroniLucy Mack SmithJoseph Smith Sr.Franklin D. RichardsOliver Cowdery
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Our first real part two

Richard claims the show never finishes series, and Gerrit calls it vicious slander.

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Intro Welcome to the Standard of Truth Podcast. In this podcast, Dr. Gerrit Dirkmaat and Professor Richard LeDuc explore the early history of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and the life and teachings of Prophet Joseph Smith. They examine the original historical sources and provide context for events of the past. They approach the history of the Church with faith, expertise and humor.
Gerrit Hi, welcome to another episode of the Standard of Truth podcast. I'm your host, Dr. Gerrit Dirkmaat, and I'm joined by my friend, Professor Richard LeDuc.
Richard Hello, Gerrit. We're going to break from this season's tradition of starting a part one and then never doing a part two by...
Gerrit No, no, we have done part twos. This is a vicious slander.
Richard I'm just reading the emails.
Gerrit I feel like you are libeling me.
Richard I'm telling you...
Gerrit Have we not done two apostles and states and apothecaries?
Richard We have, but it was like... They were separated by about six moons. I mean, it was quite a distance between them.
Gerrit Jupiter-sized moons is what you're saying.
Richard That's what I'm saying. So I'm saying here, we're about to do Moroni Part 2. So we're on the heels of Moroni Part 1. We've got a lot of momentum. We've received many, actually, very positive... We've received... There are two episodes that we have done, or series episodes we've done. And by we have done, I mean, I've been here and then Gerrit did it. Where we... The first one that was... Where we got a tremendous amount of feedback that was very, very positive was the prosperity gospel. I think there were two, three, two and a half.
Gerrit There could have been like 10 of those.
Richard Yeah, I think there were two and a half episodes of something like that on the prosperity theology. The idea that, you know, only if you do good things and you're doing all the things right, then good things happen. And it's like, well, I mean, maybe, except for when it's not... When it doesn't, which is all the time.
Gerrit Which Elder Gong talked about, in fact, in the last demo conference.
Richard Yeah, obviously much better than we did. So then the other one, this hero worship or the problem with hero worship, part one and two, we've gotten a tremendous amount of very positive feedback. We got more feedback on those two than even polygamy or any of the other topics that we've talked about.
Gerrit Which I find it to be an odd thing that you're criticizing us for not being able to do more than one part when, in fact, we just completed doing a two-parter before that.
Richard I realize I kind of got caught up in the air on that one.
Gerrit Yeah, how much more, I mean, are you not going to allow me to change? Are you so cruel that I can't become something else?
Richard In fact, we just did hero's part two.
Gerrit That's what I'm saying.
Richard Yeah. You know what? Okay.
Gerrit So you can open up with, you know what Gerrit's really bad at? Doing a second part. That's how you open this. And the person who's paying attention is like, I'm pretty sure I just listened to a part two just an hour ago.
Richard You know what? I'm going to stand by my guns that we never do part twos. I'm going to say it. Yeah. You know what? I'm entrenched in my position.
Gerrit That's funny. I had someone come over to my house the other day. They were visiting my wife, who's recently had some, some pretty difficult surgery that she's trying to recover from. And they saw the painting that I have in my house, the reproduction of it, that we produced for the book, From Darkness and Delight, the book on the translation of the Book of Mormon that Mike McKay and I wrote on the history of the translation and publication of the Book of Mormon. Now that was eight years ago now, I think, when that was first published. And this woman who'd come over, she said, she's like, oh, where'd you get that painting? And I'm like, oh, that's actually one that we commissioned for our book. That's how it got created. We commissioned Anthony Sweatt to paint it for us. And she's like, are you serious?
Gerrit And then she referenced an antagonistic podcast, one that is, let's say, not pro-Mormon. And apparently, the person running that podcast had referenced that very painting. And it's a painting where Joseph Smith is holding a white hat in his hand, and he's kind of peering into the hat while over Cowdery's on the other side. And the plates are covered up on the table, right? So it's a more accurate rendition of what our sources say about it. And she said that this antagonistic podcaster had said, referencing that painting, that the only reason that the church created that was because they were getting, the church was getting so much pushback on the translation that they told him to paint that. And she was like, so that's not how that painting came about? And I'm like, nope.
Gerrit And this is going to come as a huge surprise to you that someone who's an antagonistic person towards the church isn't actually vetting their sources because they could have, A, read our book or B, talked to the artist. And in either case, they would have had an answer that was true. But you know what? In that field, you don't actually have to find out what's actually true. You just pretend that you know what's true. I'm sure the church told them they had to do that. That sounds right. That sounds right. Because that's what they do. In the absence of actually having an argument or having the ability to research, you should always just make condescending statements that sound like they might be true to people who agree with you.
Richard Well, Gerrit, on that note, on to our first, second part that we've ever done where you've been able to continue with one thought over two episodes for the first time.
Gerrit I have never in my life completed a second thought.
Richard I literally, I couldn't have been more off. Maybe I was thinking of previous episodes, but we literally just finished it. That's absolutely hilarious. How little I pay attention.
Gerrit Well, and even on our premium content, we're doing like Calvinism Part 11.
Richard Oh yeah, it's all Calvinism all the time.
Gerrit We don't receive as much feedback on our premium content because the only people that listen are missionaries.
Richard In Peru or Spain or anyone with a dot org.
Gerrit And also our friend Josh. So it's our friend Josh.
Richard Damien. Damien, Josh, yeah.
Gerrit Damien, Josh and everyone who's a missionary in Spain or Peru. Those are the only people. Although I think we sent one to Arkansas recently.
Richard We did send one to Arkansas. We did.
Gerrit But anyway, we don't get as much feedback on the premium content. And yet we got people emailing saying, boy, I don't know if I can take part two of Calvinist. Part one was so depressing.
Richard Yeah. Well, part three is coming out next week. Oh, no, no, part three will be, it'll be the end of November.
Gerrit We haven't gotten to part two yet.
Richard Well, part two drops. Well, this will drop on Thursday. So part two would have dropped a couple of days ago.
Gerrit Yeah. Part one alone was enough to just drive people. Yeah. And they're thinking, why are you talking about this? Well, because I need you to understand just how terrible this is.
Richard Well, it's not, I will say, while it's a difficult doctrine and theology, it is logically sound, right?
Gerrit As long as you logically accept the fact that God is a horrible, horrible being, everything else makes sense.
Richard Well, who are we to judge the inscrutable will of God?
Gerrit Anyway, back to our second episode.
Richard Well, so one other thing coming up. So Genriff's birthday is coming up this week. And it will have already passed by this time. And I believe I've mentioned in here one thing that I've started doing relatively recently, I think for the past five years, four years, is to buy Gerrit a book that either I know he hates or is anti. I have done that now for the past...
Gerrit Very helpful.
Richard For the past five years. And I'm excited for the book that I'm going to be giving him this year. And I can't wait to give it to him.
Gerrit We'll have the big reveal soon on that. I don't even know what it is.
Richard What terrible book did Richard buy for Gerrit for his birthday? Gerrit buys it by myself, my wife very thought, him and his wife, Angie, they buy very thoughtful and kind gifts. And I buy Gerrit anti books.
Gerrit Wouldn't it be hilarious if the book that he gave me that he said was so terrible was my own book? He bought it for me. He's like, I've got the worst book I've ever read. And I open it up and it's my book.
Richard Oh man, that would have been so funny if I'd have thought. So this email start off with the Phebe Draper mailbag. This comes to us from Kyle. We just have one email today that we're going to read and we're just going to jump right into it. Based on so much feedback, we're going to jump right into it, into our one and only part two. Dr. Mr. Dirkmaat and Professor LeDuc, thanks for reading my wife Rebecca's email. I was surprised to find her writing an email so close to giving birth.
Gerrit So if you remember last episode, Rebecca was the one who was giving birth who asked us the question about Moroni. This is her husband now weighing in.
Richard That's right. It was a fun surprise when I listened to Moroni Part 1. She and our son are doing well. That's great to know, Kyle. We resisted the urge to name him Moroni Joseph and stuck with Heber William. He'll thank us later. And yes, when I proposed to Rebecca, I was well aware that it was a Moroni day. I even waited until the sun had gone down. That's very funny. Heber's date of birth was also a fun surprise. Family members were speculating what day he would be born. I commented that it would be neat if he were born on the 200th anniversary of Joseph's first meeting with Moroni. His due date was about a week later, so I wasn't holding my breath. While I was at work on the 21st of September, I got a call from my wife. She said that there was an opening at the hospital and was already on her way. We arrived in the late afternoon, so the chances of Heber actually being born on Moroni day were still iffy, and frankly, we were both just excited he was going to arrive a little earlier than expected.
Richard The doctor arrived a few minutes before midnight and asked if we wanted a baby on the 21st or 22nd. Trying to sound casual, I said the 21st would be good. Heber was born a few pushes later at 11:58 p.m. I really feel like Kyle is understating the number of pushes and the general casual nature of the...
Gerrit Yeah, I mean, he was being casual. I'm sure Rebecca was not being as casual.
Richard Well, she was emailing us during delivery.
Gerrit You know what? That's true. She's got to be the most casual person giving birth ever. So I also put this on my Insta, you know.
Richard This actually brings up an opportunity. We have five children, and you know, my wife's been a real trooper. But during the birth of our second oldest son, the one that's on a mission in Peru, I had a physics class with some friends, and we, after our lab, we would go out and get lunch, and we tried a new Chinese restaurant in Boise called Din Fung's. It was an old roundtable pizza that was converted into a Chinese restaurant. And so on the bathroom doors, they still had like a knight and a maiden in a Chinese restaurant.
Gerrit Nice.
Richard Yes, it was actually, it was lovely. I had never been so sick to my stomach from food poisoning, from eating the day before. And what was frustrating is I know that my wife was experiencing discomfort, but so was I. And I don't feel like I received a proper level of concern.
Gerrit So when people came to the hospital or called to see how your wife was doing, giving birth, you were like, hey, I also ate a bad egg roll. That's what was going on.
Richard Well, I had eaten seven bad egg rolls. That's the problem. And so I'd come in and I'd hold her hand and tell her she was beautiful and I loved her and then I'd have to run to the restroom and then back. It was a real hectic day for me as well. And so I just feel like, you know, as I read Kyle saying a few pushes later, the baby was there. It reminded me of my experience with the five children we had. I'm like, you know what? Yeah, that's good. You know who's not going to think any of that is funny is my wife. Good thing she doesn't.
Gerrit Or my wife. Hopefully neither one of them are listening anymore. They used to sit in the room with us, but recently they've given up on us too.
Richard I don't know what time of night Moroni and Joseph first met. So that, I mean, I did get sick from den fungs, but the rest of that was a joke. I'm obviously teasing, being sarcastic.
Gerrit We're going to get a lot of hate mail from this.
Richard Yeah.
Gerrit Good work on that.
Richard Thank you. I don't know what time. Anyway, Moroni came to Joseph first met, but for years I assumed it was before midnight, because at the time of year, especially before daylight savings was a thing in the US, the sun goes down early, and with candles as the sole source of light in such small upstairs bedroom, everyone would have been asleep long before midnight. Clarification on that would be nice. Thank you both for what you do, and thank you for reading my wife's email. Kyle. Thank you, Kyle. That was very nice of you to respond and allow for us to have two emails and some level of continuity for our first ever part two.
Gerrit We've never done a part two before, so it's a good thing that we did it.
Richard Yeah, this is great. So, Gerrit, when exactly did Joseph Smith...
Gerrit Well, I don't know when exactly. I mean...
Richard What does the anti-blog say, Gerrit?
Gerrit Oh, so if we go to the anti-blogs, I don't think that they are... Oh, never?
Richard You never came?
Gerrit Yeah, they're not as keen as telling you exactly when Moroni appeared, as you might think they would be. They're not quite as keen on that. There's other things that they're more than willing to tell you about, but that's... That's not one of them. Yeah. So, I mean, look, historically speaking, I think he's drawn a lot of good conclusions there. And in fact, people did go to bed pretty early, usually, especially if you were a farm laborer, because artificial light was not just very difficult, it was also expensive. I mean, candles don't just, you know, create themselves. And if you've ever gone to, you know, the pioneer crafts place in Nauvoo, where you got to make your own candle, this is not going to happen overnight, right?
Gerrit So in general, people go to bed earlier and they get up much earlier. I mean, because everything is dictated by light, you are in general going to get up at the crack of dawn, as soon as there is light, because you can already start to get work done. And once it gets dark, I mean, what are you going to do? Sure, there are lanterns and sure, there's candlelight. You can do those things. I'm not saying people don't work into the evenings. Of course they do. If you happen to run a roadside tavern somewhere, yeah, you've got candles and oil lanterns out. But for your average farm worker, for your average person, they are going to have gotten up very early in the morning and they're going to retire very close to when it gets dark because you're not going to want to burn a candle unless you have to. Now, sometimes people would stay up later around the fire, right?
Gerrit So the fire is providing light. And so you stay up a little later, you know, talk around the fire. But it still doesn't change the fact that you still have to wake up early in the morning. And so that's going to, you know, that's going to make you want to go to bed. If listening to this podcast isn't going to make you want to go to bed, knowing that you have to get up at four in the morning is going to make you want to go to bed. You know, sunrise is a little later at that point. But I mean, you're going to start to get some of the light by, you know, pretty early by six in the morning or so around that time of year. But it is going to be around, you know, seven o'clock or so that you're going to have sunset. So I mean, you're probably going to be in bed around eight o'clock unless you, again, unless you've got something that you're doing and you're, you know, taking a journey or whatever. So that's what I would estimate. I would estimate sometime around eight o'clock is when, I mean, and we also don't know how often, you know, or how long Joseph was praying before he had this appear.
Gerrit So had this had this vision appear to him. So I would say that, I mean, that's that's very iffy. I can't be very definitive on that, but it is a pretty sound thing to say on the 21st. But before midnight, Moroni is going to appear to him first. So you probably have roughly a three to four hour window between eight and midnight that he appeared for the first time. And then he keeps appearing. So you're going to you're going to it's going to when he says that our conversations took up the whole night. Again, the whole night is probably going to be ending by 6 a.m. That's when it's time to get up, get ready and get get back to work because you're so limited by by daylight. Anyway, that was there any more to that email or is that the only was that?
Richard No, no, that was the question. But this is a perfect you kind of left kind of a bit of a, you know, does Joseph get the plates?
Gerrit Well, I mean, so when we last talked, we really just set the stage on Joseph's poverty, right? That in the midst of all these things that are going on, all the tumult of his life, that is when this religious revival also takes place.
Richard So, Gerrit, I know that you and I sat in on a meeting with a woman who she used that poverty thing a few times. I've seen you get pretty upset. I know that Joseph Smith's poverty was used as the reason for him to fabricate all of these things and make all of these things up.
Gerrit Right.
Richard Is that still a relatively popular argument that makes its way?
Gerrit It's an argument that you hear. In fact, we covered a book on this podcast quite a little while ago.
Richard It was a birthday gift, by the way.
Gerrit Yeah, it was a birthday gift. So it must have been last year for my birthday. That's right. Counterfeiting History was our podcast, I think we called it.
Richard It was also a two-parter, by the way.
Gerrit You know what? Every time my birthday rolls around, we're just going to dust off a two-parter and just traipse it on out there for people. Part of that book's argument is similar, right? Because the argument that's being made is that Joseph is a fraudster. Now, this is an argument that is not made by academics. It's an argument that's made by antagonists. Now, I know that they like to make you think that they're the same thing, but just because your cousin Lester has, quote, read a lot of stuff, quote, doesn't actually make him an academic. You find that actual academics, one of the things that they wrestle with is how do you deal with the fact that Joseph Smith appears to be in all of his correspondence, in all of his journal writing, in all of his letters, appears to be absolutely sincere about the fact that he saw God, that he saw an angel, that he had plates.
Gerrit And then, of course, you know, as an atheist historian, but he doesn't really have plates. He couldn't possibly have plates. He couldn't really have seen God because there's no God, right? They wrestle with this subject because the documentary record that we have does not lend itself to Joseph Smith making everything up on its own. If you're just making everything up on its own, then why are you writing into your journal things like, God, please help me find a way to share the gospel with other people? Well, because he knew that eventually we'd find his journal and that we would then read his journal. And that, I mean, those are the kinds of stupid arguments you then start to get from people who are trying to make that argument. So historians train people, even people who aren't believers, they don't try to make that argument. But when we covered that book, we noticed what?
Gerrit That person wasn't trained. And second of all, they were highly antagonistic and a fervent member of another faith. And so the argument they wanted to make was all that Joseph did was driven by poverty. And in the instance where Richard and I were counseling with this woman, this other woman, she made this argument that, you know, she said, I just really feel bad that Joseph Smith, because he was so poor, like just felt like he had to make all that stuff up to like save his family. I was like, what? I mean, I believe the scriptural term is that my countenance fell.
Richard That's what happened.
Gerrit Yeah. And because here was someone who hadn't read anything from Joseph Smith, who didn't even know what the academic arguments were, but knew what an anti-Mormon subreddit had to say about it, and was making this patronizing, condescending argument as if they were trying to defend Joseph. Like, I just feel really bad for him that he was so poor that he felt like he had to make all this up to make money for his family. Well, I don't know if you realize this, he did a really bad job of it then. Because we all know about the Smiths who then lived in the lap of luxury after Joseph said that he got plates. Oh wait, they lost their house after Joseph said he got plates. So he's doing a real bang up job with it. And by the way, what house they did have when they moved to Kirtland, they also lost. And then they moved to Missouri, also lost another house, moved to Nauvoo and also lost another house.
Gerrit If Joseph could be any more successful bringing untold wealth to his family, I mean, Joseph could have only made money on the side being a realtor basically, except no one would buy the house when you're being driven out of it by force. I guess that is a problem. Richard's a realtor though. He could probably let you know.
Richard So there is a difference. I got my real estate license because I want to pay commissions to sell my house and I've just maintained my license. I'm not actively, I don't mean to in any way, you know, attack me.
Gerrit You've got a lot of hate mail coming your way.
Richard Yes, I know.
Gerrit You are the problem with the real estate market. Yeah, it's true.
Richard I'm the reason that it's 8.5%.
Gerrit Anyway, so that's a really weird takeaway that well, Joseph was so poor that he clearly manufactured all this. That might give you motive, but it doesn't give you evidence, right? When you're trying to create your perfect crime, having motive is wonderful. But if the guy that you were trying to pin the crime on was in Australia when it happened, it makes it much more difficult. No, he had the best motive. I mean, he would inherit everything if Bill died. And he lived in another country. Right. But he probably still did it. It's a 17-hour flight.
Richard Well, that's just how deep the conspiracy goes.
Gerrit Exactly. Exactly. Then the conspiracy just keeps going deeper. But the reason why I set the stage of the poverty of Joseph, sorry, a little bit of a tangent there. Not that we've ever done them before. The problem is Richard brought up an anti-Mormon argument. And when that happens, the Gerrit train takes the switch track and just starts going down the other direction because I get so frustrated and annoyed at Richard, actually. And now I'm mad at Richard. He's not even my friend anymore. Anyway, the reason why I spent so much time on the first episode, and I'm going to circle back around here on the second episode, is it's essential to understand the worldview of Joseph Smith, not just which of these churches is right. The worldview of Joseph Smith has been one of growing up with poverty always, always pressing down on him.
Gerrit He has moved multiple times. He has watched his family struggle over the course of his young life. He's well aware that they're struggling, because he is hiring out his labor as a 12 and a 13 year old in order to try to help make ends meet for the family. And we talked about the reasons why, because they're caught up in this gigantic economic crisis of the Panic of 1819. But it's in that same context that Joseph is going to see his community swept up in this religious furor, which as he describes in his 1832 account, about the age of 12 years, my mind became seriously impressed with regard to the all important concerns for the welfare of my immortal soul. So now you're talking, Joseph is saying around 1818, and that would have been a year after they moved to Palmyra.
Gerrit So he says about 12, so I mean, I'm not trying to be precise, just like I don't know when Moroni came. I don't know what time of night he came. Sometime around 1817, 1818, Joseph is saying, that's when I started to really think about my soul. If you think about it, that's the time when the Smiths are the poorest because they arrive in Palmyra with nothing. So you have all of this external pressure from society on some pretty young shoulders to provide for the family, to get out from under the poverty realm. And at the same time, you have all of that confusion and difficulty when it comes to your economic circumstance. You have all this confusion and uncertainty coming religiously. One of the reasons for the second great awakening in America was things had changed so rapidly after the American Revolution.
Gerrit You went from this society where it was relatively easy for individuals to simply move west and get land and become culturally as well as economically self-sufficient, seen as important in the culture. As this early industrialization starts to hit the United States, as the upheavals of the wars hit the United States, that period following the War of 1812, is a period of great uncertainty. There's not as much available land as there once was. There's an economic depression that causes people to be dislocated. If your entire life, your entire self-worth, was based upon whether or not you owned enough land for your family, and you don't own enough land for your family, that's going to cause you to ask questions like, is God really there?
Gerrit So one of the things that actually spurs the second great awakening in America is all of this economic upheaval. Because when do you start asking questions about God? Well, you don't do it when things are going great. When things are going great, you're just like, I mean, for those of you who served a mission or served a mission in the United States, when you walked up to a house that was nice and fat and sitting there on the side of the hill, your odds of that person saying, you know what, I really am looking for Jesus in my life, are pretty low. When you knocked on the door of the trailer house, suddenly there were people there who were willing to listen. Because when are you asking, isn't there more than this? When life isn't turning out the way that you want it to? So many Americans, and that's not the only reason, but many Americans are caught up in this religious excitement.
Gerrit It's incredibly natural for Joseph and his family to get caught up in that religious excitement. We want to understand the will of God for us, because things aren't really working out the way we want them to. Anyway, back to his 1832 account. I was impressed with regard to the all-important concerns for the welfare of my immortal soul, which led me to searching the scriptures, believing, as I was taught, that they contained the Word of God, thus applying myself to them. And then he goes on to talk about other things, but he says, this was a grief to my soul. He talks about, as he's reading, he notices all the sins of the world. This was a grief to my soul, thus from the age of 12 to 15, I pondered many things in my heart concerning the situation of the world, of mankind, the contentions, the divisions, the wickedness, the abominations, and the darkness which pervaded the minds of mankind. My mind became exceedingly distressed, for I became convicted of my sins, and I felt to mourn for my sins and for the sins of the world.
Gerrit So you have two things that are going on here. You have a Joseph Smith who is in this poverty-stricken family, who is well aware of their circumstances because he's hiring out his labor to work on other people's farms in order to try to make up the difference. And at the same time, as there's this religious tumult going around him, he's also become very cognizant of his own sinfulness that he isn't living the way that he should. And again in his 1832 account, he describes what happens as he goes out to speak to the Lord. I cried unto the Lord for mercy, for there was none else to whom I could go to obtain mercy, and the Lord heard my cry in the wilderness. And while in the attitude of calling upon the Lord, a pillar of, this is where he writes fire originally, but crosses it out and writes light, above the brightness of the sun at noonday came down from above and rested upon me, and I was filled with the Spirit of God, and the Lord opened the heavens upon me, and I saw the Lord, and he spake unto me, saying, Joseph, my son, thy sins are forgiven thee.
Gerrit So in the midst of all of this uncertainty, as every good Latter-day Saint knows, Joseph has this incredible, unspeakable, miraculous experience. And then what? We only know a little bit about what happened after that, right? We know that Joseph tried to talk to a Methodist preacher who was his friend. Hey, hey, pastor, guess what? The other day I was praying, and God and Jesus appeared to me. And the response, Richard, I believe you would remember the response, as quoted by Truman Madsen in his lectures. What did he say that the pastor said? Shucks, boy, it's all of the devil. But Joseph's stunned by that, right? I mean, again, a 14-year-old sees and speaks with God.
Gerrit The whole thing that drove him out to the Grove in the first place was to get an answer from God about how he could be forgiven of his sins. And he gets the answer from Jesus. I mean, you can't have a better evidence that your sins have been forgiven than the Lord Jesus who took his sins from him, saying to him, your sins are forgiven. But then what? What happens? Joseph writes, My soul was filled with love, and for many days I could rejoice with great joy, and the Lord was with me. But I could find none that would believe the heavenly vision. Nevertheless, I pondered these things in my heart. So Joseph talks about, you know, look, that was a life-changing event. I saw and spoke to God and Jesus. Now, everybody listening, I want you to, you know, stop writing your email of how much you hate this podcast, even though you're still listening to it.
Gerrit Just set your phone down, push your keyboard away for just a minute. You'll be able to get back to writing hate mail soon. But just take a second, even if you have to pause this, I want you to go through the exercise of thinking about the most powerful spiritual experience you ever had in your life. Maybe there's a couple, but try to focus on one. How did you feel in the moment of that experience? How close to God did you feel in the moment of that experience? How overwhelming was the spirit in the moment of that experience? And then what happened?
Gerrit Well, life happened. I think back to my experience that I'm thinking of right now. Oh yeah, when I was having that experience, I was like, I'm going to go to the temple like multiple times a day. I'm not just going to go like, well, I'm going to go like four times a day. If I get up early, I can go before work, and then I could probably go on my lunch break, and then I could go after work. And then, you know, what if I just went to the temple and I stood and looked at the temple on Mondays when it's closed? Would that be similar to going to the temple? But you know, newsflash, I don't go to the temple four times a day now. So what happens? What happens is life happens. The reason why you don't feel today exactly the same way you felt on the day of your conversion or on the day that you had this powerful, miraculous spiritual experience is because most of life is mundane. We don't always feel the spirit to the point where our hearts about to burst.
Gerrit I think part of that is so that when we do feel it, it's powerful and it's meaningful. Now, I have witnessed multiple miracles in my life. I have not. Sorry to disappoint Richard and others listening. I haven't seen Jesus. I haven't had the Lord of all creation appear to me. I've certainly felt his presence. I've certainly felt the power of the Atonement. But I haven't seen Jesus. Joseph had seen the Father and the Son, as well as angels in that vision as well. What do you think it was like for him to go back to hiring out his labor to any old person in Palmyra who came calling? You know, I saw God two days ago, but right now I'm trying to build a fence. With a bunch of unsavory characters who are cursing every other word.
Gerrit I don't know if you know this, but construction manual laborers are not known for the most pristine of language. Now, certainly there are some who do have it. I have worked in manual labor industries to know that when someone does drop a hammer on their foot, they rarely say, Oh, bless my soul. And, you know, the conversation over the lunch counter is not always, Hey, what scripture did you read this week? It's usually something else. And so as time goes by, Joseph had this miraculous event that he can't really share with people, because when he does, they all turn on him and say, You're a liar. So he backs up and he doesn't tell people anymore. And he's left back to growing up as a teenager in this impoverished household, working, struggling, striving, until he gets to where he's 17, three years later.
Gerrit And as he says, I was left to all kinds of temptations and mingling with all kinds of society. And I frequently fell into many foolish errors and displayed the weakness of youth and the foibles of human nature, which I am sorry to say, led me to diverse temptations, offensive in the sight of God. So Joseph, as he recounts his history, he's trying to let us know, he's trying to let us in on the fact that hey, I sin. And you can almost tell the nature of those sins, right? I was mingling with all kinds of society. Look, whether I like it or not, I'm out there working with people who aren't as converted to Jesus as I am. And they're talking about all kinds of stuff. And instead of immediately turning away from the stuff they're talking about, maybe I listen or maybe I participate.
Gerrit The foibles of human nature and the weakness of you, which led me into diverse temptations offensive in the sight of God. You know, after you have a really powerful spiritual experience and you go down the road through life and you recognize that you're not where you once were spiritually, we can sometimes kind of beat ourselves up a little bit. We say, how could I have, how could someone like me who saw the miracle that I saw still have a problem with X or Y or Z? How is it I still can't, you know, whatever, whatever it is, control my impulsive gambling because of the tips I'm getting from Richard. Poor, poor tips that always end up wrong on the, you know, I come for the gospel, but I stay, I stay for the poor gambling tips.
Gerrit How is it someone like me still struggling with evil thoughts or struggling with anger or struggling with, we end up, we end up actually sometimes turning the powerful spiritual experience we had to something where we start beating ourselves up because someone like me should not have sinned like that. Right. Someone who saw what I've, and it really seems like this is what Joseph is feeling. I fell into transgressions and I sinned many things which brought a wound upon my soul. And there were many things that transpired that cannot be written. And my father's family has suffered many persecutions and afflictions. And it came to pass that when I was 17 years of age, I called again upon the Lord. Joseph knows. This isn't the first time he's called upon the Lord. The last time he did it, the Lord Jesus Christ and the Father appeared to him and told him that his sins were forgiven. And over the course of those next three years, you can tell that Joseph has steadily come to feel more and more and more guilty.
Gerrit Because I'm not just any old farm boy working, you know, as a day laborer siding wheat for somebody. I saw Jesus. And yet here I am sinning. Here I am not living this life of perfection. And so by the time Joseph gets to where he's 17, that September night, sometime at night, you know, between 8 and 12, whatever, he's driven by the fact that once again, I desperately need to be forgiven. I desperately need to be forgiven. And as he's praying, as he writes, at least in one of his accounts, the Lord, I prayed unto the Lord, and he showed unto me a heavenly vision. For behold, an angel of the Lord came and stood before me, and it was by night, and he called me by name, and he said that the Lord had forgiven me of my sins.
Gerrit Of all the things that Moroni is going to teach Joseph, I think that one is the message that Joseph most wanted to hear, because what drove him to ask in the first place. And so before Moroni recounts to him the ancient inhabitants of this continent and the source from whence they sprang, before Moroni says, you know what, there's a book, before Moroni says anything, the first thing Moroni says to him is, you've been desperately worried about your sinfulness in the last three years. Your sins are forgiven you. And once again, Joseph Smith has something that frankly, many of us listening, certainly me talking, wishes you could have. And that is the perfect assurance from an angelic being that your sins have been wiped away.
Gerrit This is not just, you know what? I pondered it out in my heart, and I think God's forgiven me. I've talked to my bishop and he says we're good. This is literally an angel from heaven standing in front of you, saying your sins are gone. Now that, that has got to be powerful. When we go to Lucy Mack Smith's account of this, now she of course isn't there, so everything she's getting is a second hand account, right? She obviously is getting it from Joseph. But this is what she wrote. The harvest time had now arrived since we opened our new farm, and all our sons were actively employed in assisting their father to cut down the grain and store it away for winter. One evening we were sitting till quite late, conversing upon the subject of the diversity of churches that had risen up in the world and the many thousand opinions in existence, as are the truths contained in scripture.
Gerrit Joseph never said many words on the subject, but always seemed to reflect more deeply than common persons of his age about everything of a religious nature. After we ceased conversation, he went to bed and was pondering in his mind which of the churches were the true one. But he had not laid there long till he saw a bright light enter the room where he lay, the room where he lay, and he looked up and he saw an angel of the Lord standing by him. The angel spoke, I perceive that you are inquiring in your mind which is the true church. There is not a true church on earth. No, not one. And has not been since Peter took the keys of the Melchizedek Priesthood after the order of God, into the kingdom of heaven. The churches that are now upon the earth are all man-made churches. Now, she originally wrote, Joseph, there is a record for you, and you must get it one day.
Gerrit Get it. But that, they cross out, so I don't know if she's editing on the fly there or not. There is a record for you, and Joseph, and the next line again is crossed out, but it read originally, and Joseph, when you have learned to keep the commandments of God, that's crossed out, so now it reads, and Joseph, but you cannot get it until you learn to keep the commandments of God, for it is not to get gain, but it is to bring forth the light and intelligence which has been lost, long lost in the earth. Now, Joseph, beware, or when you get the plates, your mind will be filled with darkness, and all manner of evil will rush into your mind to prevent you from keeping the commandments of God, that you might not succeed in doing this work, and you must tell your father of this, for he will believe every word you say. The record's on the side of the hill, Cumorah, three miles from this place. Remove the grass and moss, and you will find a large flat stone.
Gerrit There's apparently, at least in this account, the stone that the plates are buried in is actually covered up by grass, moss, plant life, is over the top of it. We always see images of Joseph just finding the rock there, grabbing the lever and popping it open. But at least according to Lucy Mack's account, that it was actually overgrown, and they did have to find it and uncover it. And you will find a large flat stone, pry that up, and you will find the record under it laying on four pillars of cement. Then the angel left him. Now, there's a lot of things different about this account. And again, she's getting it second hand, and she's also reflecting on this 30 years after it happened. Well, at this point, it's more like 20, 22 years. Sorry, I'm overstating. 22 years after it happened. And so, you know, apparently, at least in her mind, part of what they actually that same night were conversing about which church was true.
Gerrit Again, a question that Joseph had asked originally in the First Vision. She thinks that Joseph went and asked that question of which church is true that night when the angel came. Is that possible? Is she conflating it with Joseph's original First Vision? But also remember the reason why Joseph desperately wanted to know which church was true in the first place was he needed to know how he could be forgiven of his sins. So it's certainly at least possible that rather than conflating it, that they are having conversations again and again and again. This is not something that you could escape. I mean, one of the few things that everyone in your house has is a shared collective cultural religious experience where everyone every week is crying low here and low there. By this point, several of Joseph's family members have joined the Presbyterian Church.
Gerrit So they're not only experiencing this tumult, they are also leaning in to it and joining it. So you can see why there would be a lot of conversations about which church is true, because Father Smith doesn't really seem to believe it's the Presbyterian Church. In any case, whether it's a conflation or whether they are again having this discussion, because Joseph might have been told by the Lord originally, there is no true church, he hasn't heard anything else from the Lord in the past three years. But what he does know is, he's a sinner, and he needs to be forgiven. You'll notice Lucy also doesn't talk about the multiple appearances of Joseph. Now, the kind of cool part about that is, it means that Lucy is not directly reading what's in the published history of Joseph Smith at this point. She could have had access to that, because it was published in the Times and Seasons.
Gerrit And so she could have just, you know, because she does quote Joseph Smith's history other times. Here, she doesn't. Here, instead of quoting it, she kind of just gives her relation. So that is kind of a pretty nerdy thing. As a historian, yeah, no one cares about that. But it's a pretty cool thing that this is how she understands it, not how she's parroting it back from what she's reading right then. It's more of her memory rather than it is something that she's reading from Joseph at the time. But she doesn't talk about one thing you probably already noticed, is that she doesn't talk about the multiple times that Joseph was visited by the angel. So let's jump now to Joseph Smith's history in the Pearl Great Prize. Now, again, where do we get the Pearl of Great Prize? We get the Pearl of Great Prize. We get the Joseph Smith history in it from the editing of Franklin Richards.
Gerrit Franklin D. Richards took the published, serialized version of History of Joseph Smith that was being published in the Times and Seasons. He took those published versions and he edited it to create a concise story. I mean, he cut out some things like Oliver Cowdery a few times, much to Oliver Cowdery's chagrin, I'm sure. And he edited it together to make this more concise story and then called it Joseph Smith history. So that's where we get the text. The text comes from this published history of Joseph Smith that Joseph was working on in 1838 and 39 and 40 and then began to publish it in 42 and it's published throughout his life and they continue to work on it after he's murdered. But this early portion was done with Joseph. Verse 27, I continue to pursue my common vocations of life until the 21st of September, 1823, all the time suffering severe persecution at the hands of all classes of men, both religious and irreligious, because I continued to affirm that I had seen a vision.
Gerrit During the space of time which intervened between the time in which I had the vision in the year 1823, having been forbidden to join any of the religious sects of the day and being of very tender years and persecuted by those who ought to have been my friends and to have treated me kindly, and if they supposed me to be deluded, to have endeavored in a proper and affectionate manner to reclaim me, I was left to all kinds of temptations and mingling with all kinds of society and frequently fall into many foolish errors and display the weakness of youth and the foibles of human nature, which I am sorry to say led me into diverse temptations offensive in the sight of God. In making this confession, no one needs to suppose me of guilty of any greater malignant sins. Obviously, the very fact that Joseph said this, you had antagonist meetings. You said, yeah, he probably murdered somebody. I'm sure he did. Who's murder? Who's murder? Because that's right where you jump for a 14-year-old. It's either I got drunk on some corn shaw whiskey or I murdered somebody, right?
Gerrit Those are the only two ways to go. A disposition to commit such was never in my nature, but I was guilty of levity, and I sometimes associate with jovial company. I mean, he's probably with people that are telling inappropriate jokes and stories, which is what a lot of people in his level of circumstance would be doing. Not consistent with the character, which ought to be maintained by one who is called of God as I had been. But this will not seem strange to anyone who recollects my youth and is acquainted with my native cheery temperament. So essentially what Joseph's trying to say, I mean, look, I was around people who were telling jokes, and obviously some of those jokes should not have been the kind that I laughed at. And there I was laughing, because, look, if you know me, you know I like to laugh. I mean, he's trying to help people understand that or at least provide that justification.
Gerrit When he talks about this, so I'll skip over, he sees the vision, he's standing in the air. When I first looked upon him, the angel, I was afraid, but the fear soon left me. He called me by name and said that he was a messenger sent from the presence of God to me, and that his name was Moroni, that God had a work for me to do, and that my name should be had for good and evil among all nations, kindreds and tongues, or that should be both good and evil spoken of among all people. So he gets over the initial shock, and the first big message that Moroni is delivering is that everyone is going to hate you or love you. And, you know, congratulations, Joseph. You are, as a 17-year-old, you're now going to hear the reality that everyone's going to either hate you or love you. Tells him there was a book deposit written upon gold plates giving account of the former inhabitants of this continent and the source from whence they sprang, and also said that the fullness of the everlasting gospel was contained in it as delivered by the Savior to the ancient inhabitants.
Gerrit He then goes on to tell him about the seer stones, that also there were two stones and silver bows, and these stones fastened to a breastplate, constituted what is called the Urim and Thummim, deposited with the plates. And the possession and use of these stones were what constituted seers in ancient or former times, and that God had prepared them for the purpose of translating the book. Again, why we call them seer stones is they are stones prepared by God that are to be used by seers in order to translate. So after that, Moroni is going to then dive in to a set of different scriptures that he's going to begin quoting. And I thought it might be nice to actually take some time and discuss what those scriptures are, in part because the first message of the restoration, aside from the Lord and our Father appearing to Joseph, and again, as Brigham Young said, when that happened, Heavenly Father and Jesus couldn't tell him everything that was going to happen.
Gerrit They couldn't tell him, hey, you're going to be a prophet, you're going to be a seer, you're going to be a revelator, you're going to translate the Book of Mormon, you're going to have the high priesthood, you're going to be... Because Joseph would have said, what does that mean? I don't understand what you're talking about. That all they could really tell him was, God loves you and your sins are forgiven. So Moroni is going to be delivering what you might call the first sermon of the restoration, the first sermon. Because he's not just going to tell Joseph, hey, your sins are forgiven, God has work for you to do. He's then going to start trying to teach Joseph what Joseph needs to know for this dispensation. Joseph's first true gospel instruction is coming from a resurrected being, Moroni.
Gerrit So in our next episode, we're going to talk about what it is that Moroni says, why that's important, and then we're going to move forward to Joseph's attempt to get the plates. I probably let the cat out of the bag by saying the word attempt. You know what? Maybe he does get the plates. Whenever I read the Book of Mormon, like literally every time, I'm always kind of hoping that Laman and Lemuel turn out good. I don't know what it is. Like the whole time, I'm super excited when they're doing what's right. And then I read the next verse, and they're beating Nephi again. It's very hard, but you want to cheer for Laman and Lemuel for some reason, right? I mean, okay, granted they want to murder Nephi and his father and try to destroy everything, but you still want things to work out for them, right? I mean, right?
Richard Yeah, of course.
Gerrit Yeah, okay. Well, so you can tune in to our next, our episode next week wondering, I don't know, did Joseph ever get the plates? You'll have to tune in next week to find out. Thanks so much for listening.
Intro Thank you for listening to the Standard of Truth podcast hosted by historian Dr. Gerrit Dirkmaat. If you know anybody that could benefit from the material in this episode, please share it with them. And for more resources, visit standardoftruth.com. Until next time.

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No, no, we have done part twos. This is a vicious slander.

GerritBanter

As long as you logically accept the fact that God is a horrible, horrible being, everything else makes sense.

GerritBanter

Well, I had eaten seven bad egg rolls. That's the problem.

RichardBanter

That might give you motive, but it doesn't give you evidence, right?

GerritInsight

The reason why you don't feel today exactly the same way you felt on the day of your conversion or on the day that you had this powerful, miraculous spiritual experience is because most of life is mundane.

GerritInsight

I have worked in manual labor industries to know that when someone does drop a hammer on their foot, they rarely say, Oh, bless my soul.

GerritBanter

Of all the things that Moroni is going to teach Joseph, I think that one is the message that Joseph most wanted to hear, because what drove him to ask in the first place.

GerritInsight

This is literally an angel from heaven standing in front of you, saying your sins are gone.

GerritInsight

Whenever I read the Book of Mormon, like literally every time, I'm always kind of hoping that Laman and Lemuel turn out good.

GerritBanter

More from this episode

Claim checkThings people say, and what the episode shows.

Claim check

What critics say, and what the episode found
Joseph Smith made up his visions because his family was poor and needed money.
The Church commissioned the painting of Joseph translating with a hat because of pushback over the translation.
Joseph's confession of youthful sins means he did something terrible.
Take it to classReady to use in a lesson or a talk.

Take it to class

Ready to copy into a lesson or a text

Joseph went into the grove in 1820 and prayed again in 1823 for the same reason: he wanted to know his sins were forgiven, and both times that was the first thing he heard.

Most of life is mundane; feeling less than we did at our most spiritual moment doesn't mean we've lost what we received.

Poverty may give someone a motive, but motive isn't evidence, and the Smiths kept losing homes after Joseph claimed the plates.

Lucy Mack Smith tells Moroni's visit from memory rather than copying Joseph's published history, which makes her account an independent witness.

Banter binThe funniest moments in this episode.

Banter bin

The running jokes, for people who skip ahead
The Moroni seriesPart 2 of the five-part Moroni series, introduced as the first part two they've ever done (1:25, 6:25, 14:49).
We never do part twosRichard insists they never finish a series, moments after Hero Worship Part 2; he stands by his guns (0:48, 3:34, 6:36).
Anti books for Gerrit's birthdayRichard's five-year tradition; Gerrit hopes one day it's his own book (8:29, 9:22, callback 20:20).
Calvinism Part 11The premium series nobody can take, logically sound as long as God is horrible (6:51, 8:17).
The premium audienceMissionaries in Spain and Peru, friend Josh, Damien, and one in Arkansas (6:57, 7:15).
The labor emailKyle reports Heber William arrived at 11:58 p.m. on Moroni Day, "a few pushes later" (10:17, 11:23).
Seven bad egg rollsRichard's food poisoning from a Boise Chinese restaurant in an old pizza place during his wife's labor (12:01, 13:15).
Gerrit's gambling problemHe comes for the gospel but stays for Richard's poor gambling tips (41:11).
Richard the realtorRichard holds a real estate license and is personally the reason rates are 8.5 percent (24:30, 25:09).
Will Joseph get the plates?A cliffhanger, plus Gerrit's eternal hope that Laman and Lemuel turn out good this time (59:48, 1:00:45).
The Phebe Draper Palmer Brown MailbagSend Gerrit and Richard your question.

The Phebe Draper Palmer Brown Mailbag

Your question could be next week’s episode
Questions from Litners drive a lot of episodes. Send yours. If it makes the show, Richard reads it on air.
Go deeperWhere to read more.

Go deeper

Deep dives the episode points toward
Read Joseph Smith's 1832 history side by side with Joseph Smith—History 1:27-35 and note what each says Moroni said first (43:26).
Lucy Mack Smith's draft history, with its crossed-out lines, and why historians value it as independent memory (47:46, 52:04).
The Second Great Awakening and the economic upheaval after the War of 1812 (29:06).
How Franklin D. Richards created the Pearl of Great Price version of Joseph's history from the Times and Seasons (53:09).
SOT Litner · S3E44.