I hope the research can eventually settle the truth or error of the remaining reputed children rumors. The DNA debate on children of Joseph Smith is far from over. The research is ongoing perhaps for a few years to come.

But Lucy Walker held her and Heber Kimball’s eight kids were Joseph Smiths children in the resurrection. I wonder if Sylvia meant something similar and thus confused the heck out of her daughter. So her daughter took it as a biological claim.

Angus Cannon reported hearing Brigham Young say before his death in 1877 that Patty Session’s said the same thing? If true then his statement is reliable. If Brigham Young never said it then Angus cannon made it up.

D.&C. 132:41-44 prevents a woman from having two husbands at the same time. It seems to require a divorce from the original husband in order not to be counted as adultury. With the 11 women living with the husbands again that requires a divorce from Joseph smith, or the woman would be guilty of adultury. So based on what i noticed i favor viewing these “time and for eternity” ceremonies as marriages in name only. I doubt the women thought it proper to live with Joseph Smith in life or have children.

I have read In Sacred Lonliness by Todd Compton on his list of 33 wives. I find these lists misleading as they seem to lump platonic marriages to Joseph Smith in name only with ones that may have involved sexuality. To me the ceremony wording just does not have to say only married for eternity to be a marriage only for eternity. To me its more of what the women and Joseph Smith thought was improper as far as sharing marital relations in the flesh meant. So to me the wording can be for “time and eternity” but sill be a platonic marriage in name only.

Joseph often had another male relative approach the woman; there were witnesses and a ceremony. None of this happened with Bennett.

Besides, the critics ignore that if Joseph was in it for the sex, then Bennett was the very best ally Joseph could have had. Exposing Bennett made everything worse for Joseph; he and Bennett were running things spiritually and temporally in Nauvoo respectively.

And, it won’t wash to claim that Joseph wanted to be the “alpha male” and be the only one with all the women–he was smacking Bennett down just as he was trying to persuade the 12 to practice plural marriage.

Far easier to say this was something God only required of him (and Bennett, if needed) than to push out the one guy who would have supported him, while trying to get up-tight Victorian prudish types like Heber C. Kimball, John Taylor, and Hyrum to follow suit….

I tried to post on the blog. Timothy Egan might just be repeating wrong stuff he picked up from uninformed others. If i did not know better i would think FLDS polygamy and LDS polygamy was not different. The wiki article on Joseph Smith’s marriages to young women article is useful. It helped me see statutory rape laws of today can be abused to attack someone who married young back then. Mr. Egan probably does not have that same correct knowledge.

It’s unlikely he read Todd Compton’s idea Joseph Smith’s relationship with Helen was platonic. Instead he probably has read from critics over and over again that she was Joseph Smiths bed-mate. I can’t really blame the guy for writing what he thinks true. Now if he knows better and promoted the same untruth anyway i would be less merciful to his conclusions.

If Joseph Smith were such a sexual animal, why bother to marry these women? Marriages means convincing people his plural marriage doctrine is correct, getting them to go along with it, getting witnesses together, and then having them keep quiet about it. If it blows up (as it did, thanks to the Nauvoo Expositor), there’s no plausible deniability.

If it was all about sex, sex, sex, why not just have affairs? That way if one of his lovers decided to go public, all Joseph would have to do is say, “That woman’s nuts.” Who’s going to take her word over the Prophet’s?

It makes no sense, and that’s clear evidence to me that Joseph’s critics are grasping at straws.

If his libido had been the problem he wouldn’t have waited for Helen Kimball until the afterlife. If his libido had been his motive we should have evidence of a bunch of verified children of his via plural wives.

As the recently departed Krister Stendahl wisely commented, “Don’t compare your best with their worst.” It’s not right to judge Joseph, Brigham, and all 19th (or 20th or 21st) century Mormons by the actions of a fringe element that we have disavowed.

I wonder if Mr. Egan would like it if we judged atheists by Joseph Stalin or Pol Pot, who each murdered multiple millions….

I hope you will explain and perhaps defend your reservations about Midgely’s scholarship. In my humble opinion, I think he does intellectual history in Mormon Studies better than anyone I know.

Accusations of poor scholarship are cheap and easy. Evidence of poor scholarship is harder to come by, and, in your case, notably absent.

You humbly failed to plug your own thoughts on Mr. Egan’s article. They’re worth linking to:

http://www.nine-moons.com/2008/04/24/monogamist-pot-meet-polygamist-kettle/

As for his personality – Bushman paints a Joseph who is compelling and fascinating, but not really a magnetic personality such as Brodie paints him to be. The Bushman image isn’t half as charismatic as Brodie’s apparently.