Today I read the 4th section of Joseph Smith's History, from verses 55 - 65. In this section Joseph Smith is employed by a man to dig for a silver mine near Harmony, Pennsylvania and meets and marries his wife. So many Latter-day Saints have a problem with Emma because of the choices she made later in life, but they are forgetting what the Lord said about Emma in the Doctrine and Covenants section 25, that she is an elect lady.
Emma was a true helpmeet to Joseph during all his trials and she probably had a harder life than anyone else in the church during those years. She had children die as a direct result of mob violence on Joseph. She had to move multiple times, under less than ideal circumstances. She had her husband imprisoned for months at a time on false charges. She put together the first hymnal of the church. And through it all, she stood by Joseph and her own testimony of the truthfulness of the work.
Not only that, but she went against the wishes of her parents and married Joseph by eloping because her father would not consent to her marrying the prophet. She is not the first, nor the last to go against her family by aligning herself to the church. I have always had great respect to those who can give up so much for the truth and the Gospel. I feel very sad and downhearted for those families which cannot accept that their son or daughter, brother or sister choose to go another way and would rather pretend that they have no such son or daughter than enjoy the time they have with them here on the earth in whatever fashion they have. Hopefully I will not have to find an answer to that question on my own, but time will tell.
The rest of this section deals with Martin Harris and the lost 116 pages, or rather the first part of that story where he takes the translated pages and the rubbings of the characters to two noteworthy professors of linguistics. I remember once I was in a Sunday School lesson about something that I cannot now recall, but we were talking about Pride at the time and what professions have a lot of pride, again I cannot now recall why. But I remember a member of the ward who was a professor mentioned that few industries, as a whole, can match the pride that one can find in academia. Even then I agreed with him that it is very true but as I have grown I have really come to appreciate his statement. Anyone who has attended college has likely come across a man, or woman, who is very full of their own self importance and knowledge and acts like they are the best thing to walk the earth. I was able to attend BYU and luckily most of those men and women who chose a life of service in teaching are humble but I did come across one or two of them who nicely fit into the former category.
We do not have a complete account of the conversation that Martin had with the second professor but it sure seems that we have a clear example of the haughty and the humble professor in Martin's story. Most Latter-day Saints are very familiar with this story. Martin took the pages to Professor Anthon who said that the translation was most correct and that the characters were of Egyptian origin as well as Chaldaic, Assyriac and Arabic. He even gave him a certificate stating as such. However, when he learned that this was a record that had been obtained through the power of God, he tore up the certificate and said that there were no more visitations. This action has always intrigued me because, if he did not want his name associated with the plates, as is the only reason I can think of that would cause him to tear up the certificate, why would he then agree to translate the book himself? For the glory of the world certainly, but did he not realize that even if he did it himself, it would always be said he got it from Joseph Smith and STILL he would be associated with a visitation of God? Sometimes I wonder if people think at all.
And then Martin took the rubbings and the translation to a Dr. Mitchell who agreed with what Professor Anthon had said 100%. Now, the story does not tell us whether or not Martin offered up to Dr. Mitchell that these came from a record that was revealed of God or not. I would assume that he did and that Dr. Mitchell was ok with it, but we are not told. This instance, as we have already discussed, is a fulfillment of prophecy given by Isaiah many hundreds of years ago, almost 2000 years from the time when it happened by current reckoning. It is strange that there are all these proofs out there for the learned and yet they will always turn their noses up at them because it is of God and really a testimony of the truthfulness is required, which most men and women will not obtain because it requires a certain level of humility.
Now, obviously I am making a gross generalization here and not all of academia is this bad, not by a long shot. But as with all stereotypes and generalizations, there is an element of truth in them and they get started for a reason. But academia does not have a monopoly on people too proud to give the Book of Mormon a chance, not even close. The world is an enemy to God and will be forever until it learns humility and to put the things of God before its' own wants. Sadly, we know from the scriptures that this will never happen and so it is up to us to remove ourselves our of the world instead. Only when we have done that can we become profitable servants to God. Until tomorrow.
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