054 The Beginnings of LDS Temple Worship

Episode Transcript
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Scott Woodward (00:05):
Temples
in the Latter-day Saint movement.
In fact, it could be said that whatis accomplished inside Latter-day
Saint temples is at the beating heartof the purposes of the Restoration.
In today's episode of ChurchHistory Matters, we begin a new
series exploring the developmentof Latter-day Saint temple worship.

(00:28):
We're starting at the very beginningand probing such questions as,
how early on did Joseph Smithunderstand the temple-centric
nature of his prophetic mission?
What is the meaning of the word endowment?
Which was the first temple commandedto be built in our day, and which
temple was actually built first?
And how are we to make sense of whatappears to be a failed prophecy in D&C 84

(00:51):
about the building of the Missouri Templein the first generation of the church?
I'm Scott Woodward, a managing directorat Scripture Central, and my co-host is
Casey Griffiths, also a managing directorat Scripture Central, and today Casey
and I dive into our first episode inthis series dealing with the development
of Latter-day Saint temple worship.

(01:12):
Now let's get into it.
Hi, Casey.

Casey Griffiths (01:23):
Hi.
How are you?

So good.

So good.
I'm better than good becausewe're starting a new series.

Yes.

And this is one we've wanted to do for a really long time.

And it's come highly requested by several listeners, actually.

Yeah, several of our listeners have said,
can you guys take this on?
The topic is the development ofLatter-day Saint temple worship.

Ah, shoot.

That's juicy.

This is juicy.

That's a big old watermelon, to be honest with you.
And you should know, too, Scott and Icame up with the idea for this podcast
while we were in Nauvoo doing a videoon the development of temple worship.

Yes.

On the drive back from Nauvoo to St.
Louis, we brainstormed all the stuff thatwe've been doing for the last year or so.

That's right.

This is a return.
This is us going back tothe mothership, Scott.
This is us going back to the source.

This is it.
And listeners will notice on ourChurch History Matters podcast,
like, logo, it is a temple.

That's right.
Temple being deconstructed.

Or is it being constructed?
We'll let you bring your owninterpretation to the symbol.
But I think the reason that we went withthe temple, especially the Nauvoo temple,
is because ultimately at the end of theday, dear listeners, the Restoration
is about what happens in the temple.

Absolutely.
Yeah.

That is the crowning capstone of Joseph
Smith's prophetic career.
He created the prototype of theRestoration, and his successors
have been scaling it ever since.
They've been scaling that.

Yep.

That's the thing.
And so, really, the story of theRestoration is the story of how
we get temples, isn't it, Casey?
And then what we do insidethem, why it matters and where
this is all going, right?

Yeah.
And another good reason why thisis timely is there are so many
temples being built right now.

All over the place.

There's been a quantum leap in the number of temples
and where they're being built.
It used to be that I'd get up in myclass and say, hey, there's going
to be a temple dedication in Payson.
You guys need to go, because it couldbe years before there's another one of
those, and now I get up in class andsay, if you guys don't go to the Orem
open house, it's going to be weeksbefore there's another open house.

Until you can go to Saratoga Springs or whatever.

Yeah.
If you don't catch it now, you're goingto have to wait until Lindon or Deseret
Peak or Taylorsville or Layton or—andI live in Utah, but man alive, we
live in the greatest season of templebuilding in the history of the church.

Yeah.

And that's saying something.

It's probably safe to say in the history of earth.

In the history of earth, yeah.

I don't think any time that the gospel has been on the earth,
there's ever been a proliferationof temples the way there is now.
So something is afoot, Casey Griffiths.

Something's going on.
Yeah.

And something is working really, really well, and it's where the
Restoration was intending to go all along,and so we're excited to talk about it.

Yeah.
And I've got to say, I teach in acity, Provo, where there's two temples.
You're in Rexburg.

Yes.

And there's going to be two temples in Rexburg.

It's so wild.
It is so wild.

There aren't two Walmarts in Rexburg.

There is one Walmart in Rexburg, and there's going to be two
temples that are, like, a mile apart,and they're both on the same street.

They're going to be on the same street?
Is that right?

Two temples on the same street, and
. . . Casey Griffiths: Wow.
Yeah.
They're really not veryfar apart from one another.
So it's very exciting to seetemples proliferating, and if
there's not a temple near you now,hold on: there will be, right?

Yeah.
We're going to get there.
We're going to get there.
More temples than Maveriks in Rexburgin the next couple of years, so.

Not false.

That's pretty cool.
At the same time, too, I teach aboutthe development of temple worship
in my classes, and I've noticedwhenever you bring this up, there's
a little bit of tension in the room.

Oh.
Why is that?

Well, you know, it's sacred, right?
The moment you take something sacredand you make it a little academic,
there's hesitation, like, hey,should we be taking this apart?
Or is a classroom theright place to do this?
Some people here haven't beenthrough the temple, and what
happens in the temple is sacred.

Yeah.

We could ask, is a podcast a proper place to talk about
the development of temple worship?

Is it appropriate for us to talk about this?

Yeah.
Well, I think it is, and I want tostress to our listeners, we're going
to err on the side of caution when itcomes to this, because we believe in
keeping things that are sacred, sacred.
But at the same time, too, when you reviewwhat the leaders of the church have said,
especially recently, I think we've got alot of leeway here to discuss how temple

(06:04):
worship has developed, what its historyis, what the theology is surrounding it.
We're going to keep sacred things sacred,but we've got a lot of room to explore.

Yeah, wanting to keep sacred things sacred is good, but not
talking about sacred things brings withit some unintended negative consequences.
And there's this reallyremarkable talk, one of the best
ever, honestly, on this topic.
It's back in 1985 byPresident Ezra Taft Benson.

Okay.

It's actually called, “What I Hope You Will Teach
Your Children About the Temple.”

Nice!

In there, he gives this caution
a sacred place, and the ordinances inthe temple are of a sacred character.
Because of its sacredness, weare sometimes reluctant to say
anything about the temple.”And that's what you're saying.
Your students are kind of feeling,uh, should we talk about this?

Yeah.

But then he says this
develop a real desire to go to thetemple, or when they go there, they do
so without much background to preparethem for the obligations and covenants
they enter into.” See, and that's thenegative unintended consequence of
not talking about the temple, right?
So it sounds like church leaderswould like us to talk about the

(07:11):
temple, but to do it in a sacred way.

Yeah.

And it seems like church leaders have recently been talking more
and more about this, haven't they, Casey?

Correct.
I will see your Ezra TaftBenson and raise you a David A.
Bednar.

Ah, shoot.

David A.
Bednar gave a talk in April 2019.
This was right after the big initiativeto make church more home centered.
“Home centered, churchsupported” was the mantra.

Yes.

Elder Bednar gave this talk where he said, hey, if we're
shifting to home centered, then themost important temple preparation
is going to take place in your home.

But he also said this (07:44):
many church members are unsure about what appropriately
can and cannot be said regarding thetemple experience outside the temple.
So Elder Bednar gave two guidelines,and I share these in my classes
before we start talking abouttemples, as to what we should follow.
And we're going to try andfollow these guidelines in

(08:04):
this series as we discuss it.
So this is directly from Elder Bednar.
“Guideline 1.
Because we love the Lord, we should alwaysspeak about His holy house with reverence.
We should not disclose or describe thespecial symbols associated with the
covenants we receive in sacred templeceremonies, neither should we discuss

(08:24):
the holy information that we specificallypromise in the temple not to reveal.”

Let the temple be your guide there, right?
The temple explicitly says,don't talk about this part.

Yeah.
Don't talk about this outside the temple.
That's part of the temple liturgy, okay?

Yeah.

But, “Guideline two.
The temple is the house of the Lord.
Everything in the temple pointsus to our Savior, Jesus Christ.
We may discuss the basic purposes andthe doctrine and principles associated
with temple ordinances and covenants.”So Elder Bednar is basically saying,
hey, there's stuff that we covenantnot to talk about that's described as
sacred that needs to stay in the temple,but the basic purposes of the doctrine

(09:04):
and principles associated with templeordinances and covenants, that's okay.

Yeah.

And I would also add, the basic history surrounding the development
of temple worship, probably okay.
I don't think I'm steppingtoo far if I say that.

A hundred percent.
And the things that we're explicitlyasked not to reveal in the temple
are a very small percentageof what goes on in the temple.

Correct.
Yeah.

It is very tiny.
And so, yeah, there's somuch we could talk about.
And I'd add a few just quick rulesof thumb here, and I think you're
already modeling this, Casey,but that is if it's taught by the
brethren, then we can talk about it.

Yeah.

Right?
They've actually taught a lot about thetemple, what goes on in the temple, and
another rule of thumb is if it's in thescriptures, we can talk about it, right?

Yeah.

And number three, if it's published by the
church, we can talk about it.
There's a ton of resources availableright now that you can go and learn
a ton about the temple, way morethan we could even twenty years ago.

Oh, yeah.

You know, videos showing temple garments and kind of talking about
the temple robes and stuff like that.
Super interesting videos insidetemples, showing the rooms, right?
Going on tours with apostlesthrough open houses.
I mean, there's some great stuff.

Yeah.
I have—there's a video where twoapostles, I think it's Elder Bednar and
Elder Rasband, correct me if I'm wrong,actually tour you through the Rome temple.

Yeah.
So cool.

And so there's a ton of stuff, and if you're familiar
with Gospel Library, there's aton of stuff under Gospel Library.
There's videos where they showthe temple clothing, where
they talk about its purpose.
They do so in a super classy andrespectful way, but it's there.
And also in the last two years, it'sbecome really common to talk about
the five covenants that we make withinthe temple, just in open discourse.

(10:43):
Like, they're right there inthe temple preparation materials
as well on Gospel Library.
So there's a lot of freedom, and, again,we're going to err on the side of caution.

Yeah.
I guess the final piece of guidance,I would say, that kind of overarches
all of it is D&C 63:64, which saysthis: “Remember that that which cometh
from above is sacred, and must bespoken with care, and by constraint
of the Spirit, and in this there isno condemnation, and you receive the

(11:14):
Spirit through prayer, wherefore withoutthis there remaineth condemnation.
So it's not just what wetalk about, Casey, but how we
choose to talk about it, right?
So our pledge with this series is tospeak of sacred things with the kind
of care and the kind of constraint thatthey deserve, but to speak of them.

Yeah.

We want to speak of them.

Yeah.

Because we believe that knowing the history of Latter-day Saint
temples and temple worship can makeyour experience of attending the temple
much more rich, much more meaningful,and when you have the chance to teach
others, teach your own children andteach whoever, wherever about the temple,
you'll do so with much more confidence.

Yeah.

That's why we want to do this, ultimately.

And let me add two things here
temple, I was surprised at how much ofit actually is already in the scriptures.
It's already out there.
It was just, like, the temple takesa little highlighter and highlights
these passages and says, hey, this wasmore important than maybe you realize.
The second thing I would say is,don't go to the temple unprepared.

(12:14):
Knowledge is power.
Preparation is power.
The more you know going intothe temple, generally the more
positive experience you'll have.
And even if you've been to thetemple hundreds of times, I think
what we're going to talk about herewill deepen the experience and make
it more meaningful for you the nexttime that you go to the temple.

That's what it's done for us.

Yeah.
You put in a quote herefrom President Benson.
President Benson said, “I believe a properunderstanding or background will foster
within us a desire to seek our priesthoodblessings just as Abraham sought his.”

Yeah.
When did it first enter into JosephSmith's mind, do you think, that he would
be asked by the Lord to build temples?

(13:08):
Should we walk through this?
We play this game called, when did JosephSmith first understand he'd build temples?

Let's do it.
Yeah.
What a name for a game, too.
I think the marketing department mighthave, like, a few suggestions, yeah.

Because it's interesting, right?
Like, is—if this is so central tothe Restoration, we might wonder
if it was presented to JosephSmith early on by the Lord, right?

Yeah.

Maybe let's go as early as we can.
Let's go to the First Vision.

So was the temple mentioned in the First Vision?
We've done a whole serieson the First Vision.

That's true.

Does it come up in any of the accounts?
What's your take?

Yeah.
So as we look at the various accountsthat Joseph Smith gave, and as we look
at the secondhand accounts of thosewho heard Joseph Smith share his First
Vision, we cannot find anything thatexplicitly mentions the temple, can we?
But there is a little in there.

Yeah.

There's some breadcrumbs that—the Lord did tell him that “the
everlasting covenant was broken.”That was in the Levi Richards account.

Right.

And then he promised him that “the fullness of the gospel
should at some future time be made knownunto me.” And that's the 1842 account.
So is the everlasting covenant andthe fullness of the gospel relevant
to temples and temple theology, Casey?

Oh, yeah.
And you mentioned Levi Richards.
It's in Levi Richards’ handwriting,secondhand account of the First Vision.

Yeah.

In 1843 is interesting.
That's when that account is writtendown, right when Joseph was in the midst
of setting up the Nauvoo temple and themen and women that are going to receive
the ordinances and pass them on there.
So it's on his mind.

Yeah.

It may have been a situation where it was always
there, too, he just needed somebodyto kind of point it out to him.

Yeah.
He was in a meeting where one of theelders had quoted Isaiah about the
everlasting covenant being broken there,and Joseph stood up and said, I want
to actually say something about that,because when I was a young man, 14 years
old, then he starts telling the FirstVision story, and he says, the Lord
actually told me that that's the case.
He actually told me thatthat's happening now, that the
everlasting covenant was broken.
And then he went on.

(15:13):
So that's the only time we get Josephexplicitly saying that phrase as part
of the First Vision, but there it is.
And then the equivalent termof the everlasting covenant
is the fullness of the gospel.
Doctrine and Covenants will usethese terms interchangeably.

Yeah.

So the 1842 account, right, saying “the fullness of the
gospel [will] at some future time bemade known unto me,” is really important.
Now, did Joseph have anyunderstanding when he was 14 years
old that this had any connectionwith temples or temple theology?
There's no real indication of that.

It'd be a little bit of a reach, right, if we said he did?

Yeah.
But in hindsight, we say, ooh, wecan see what the Lord is doing.
There's some breadcrumbs.

Yeah.

We'll call them temple breadcrumbs right there.

The Lord's laying the foundation.

Yes.
So not explicitly in the First Vision.

Not in the First Vision.
What about the second vision?
The experience with Moroni when he's 17.
Any mention of the temple inMoroni and Joseph's interactions?

Yeah, as we look at all the accounts of Moroni's first visit
to Joseph, he's 17 years old, we findnothing explicitly about the temple,
but Moroni does quote Malachi 4:5-6 in avery interesting way, where he's speaking
of Elijah revealing the priesthood, howthe promises made to the ancient fathers

(16:31):
will be planted in the hearts of theliving children, and how the children's
hearts will then turn to their fathers.
In all this the earth will realizethe measure of its creation.
Now all of that, Joseph will later cometo learn, was a slantwise reference,
an oblique reference, to the workthat the living children, the living
descendants of the ancient covenantpeople will do for their dead ancestors

(16:53):
in the temples of God in the last days.
Joseph will be explicitabout this in Nauvoo.

Yeah.

Particularly about the work of sealing children to their
fathers and fathers to their children.

Yeah.

But there's no indication that Joseph understood it
as such at the time, when he was 17.
More seeds being planted, morebreadcrumbs being laid out, but
no explicit mention of temple.
But foundation work isdefinitely being laid.

Yeah.
And a lot of stuff that's going to tieinto temple teaching found in that.
By the way, there's Joseph Smith'saccount, which mentions a bunch
of Old Testament prophecies.
There's Oliver Cowdery's accountof this visit from the Messenger
and Advocate that has a bunch ofOld Testament prophecies in it.
And so.
. . Scott Woodward: Yeah.
Yeah.
Kind of, I guess you'd say, thegroundwork is still being laid.

I mean, the upshot of most of those prophecies centers
on the ultimate work of gatheringand fulfilling God's covenant
promises with Israel, right?

Yeah.

If the temple is not about ultimately the gathering
of Israel, then I don't knowwhat the temple is about, Casey.

Absolutely.

So there you go.
Oblique references, butnothing yet explicit.

Right.
So next thing, I guess, would behe translates the Book of Mormon.
Is the temple in the Book of Mormon?
Eh

(18:17):
. . . Scott Woodward: There are temples in the Book of Mormon.
There are temples in the Book of Mormon.
For instance, I quote 2 Nephi 5:16.
This is after the Nephites havearrived in the Americas: “And
I, Nephi, did build a temple.
I did construct it after themanner of the temple of Solomon.”

Bam.

“Save it were not built of so many precious things.
For they were not tobe found upon the land.
Therefore it could not be like untoSolomon's temple, but the manner of
construction was like unto the templeof Solomon, and the workmanship
thereof was exceedingly fine.” Sothe Nephites had some kind of temple.

There it is.
And that would be, what, 1829 whenJoseph's translating that, right?

Yeah.
And it mentions a templein the land of Bountiful.
That's where Jesusappears to the Nephites.

That's right.

That's probably not insignificant.
And it also talks about their templeworship changing in 3 Nephi 9: “Ye shall
offer,” this is 3 Nephi 9:19, “offer upunto me no more the shedding of blood.
Yea, your sacrifices and yourburnt offerings shall be done away,
for I will accept none of yoursacrifices and your burnt offerings.”

And those are explicitly done at the temple.

Yeah, those are Old Testament, Law of Moses things.
So it appears that at these templesthat the Nephites built, they were
practicing the laws of liturgy that'sfound in the book of Leviticus.

Yeah.
So the Book of Mormon is a text abouta people who largely have in the
background some sort of temple liturgy.

Yeah.
And that's partially because, man, templeliturgy is so big in the Law of Moses.
It's impossible to talk aboutthe Law of Moses without
talking about temple liturgy.
And there's tons of discussions in theBook of Mormon about the Law of Moses and
what's to come and what will happen withthe Law of Moses, and the temple's kind of
wrapped up in all that stuff, too, right?

Right.
Okay, so the Book of Mormon itself isnot prophesying about any temples being
built in the latter days, though, right?

Well, kind of.

Ah, shoot.
Go, Casey, go.

There's two words that pop up in the Book of Mormon
that resonate with the earlymembers of the church in a big way.

Okay.

For instance, a guy named Grant Underwood did a survey of
early church literature and asked whatpassages in the Book of Mormon did early
members of the church quote the most.
And today we would think, oh gosh, 3Nephi 11, that's when Jesus shows up,
or 2 Nephi 2, that talks about thepurpose of life, or Moroni 7, which

(20:47):
is about charity, and it's beautiful,or Moroni 10, which has the promise
to know the Book of Mormon's true.
But weirdly enough, Grant Underwood'ssurvey came back and found that the
most quoted passages in the Book ofMormon and early church literature
were 3 Nephi 21 and Ether chapter 13.

Hmm.
Interesting.

At the top of your head, can you tell me
what those passages are about?

3 Nephi 21 is Jesus's sermon and prophecy about the future
of the house of Israel, isn't it?

Yeah.

And Ether 13 is Ether's prophecy about the New
Jerusalem and the Old Jerusalem andthen the other New Jerusalem, correct?

That's correct.
Yeah.
Ether 13, for instance, verses4 and 5, “Ether saw the days of
Christ, and he spake concerninga New Jerusalem upon this land.”

Oh, upon this land.

This land.

Okay.

“And he spake also concerning the house of Israel, and
the Jerusalem from whence Lehi shouldcome—after it should be destroyed it
should be built up again, a holy cityunto the Lord; wherefore, it could
not be a new Jerusalem for it hadbeen in a time of old; but it should
be built up again, and become a holycity of the Lord; and it should be
built up unto the house of Israel.”

Oh, so some people were, like, speculating that the
New Jerusalem could just mean therebuilding of the old Jerusalem.
And he's saying, no.

Ether's saying, nope, that's still the old Jerusalem.
Verse 6 in Ether 13, “A New Jerusalemshould be built . . . upon this
land, unto the remnant of the seedof Joseph, for which things there
has been a type.” So when you sayJerusalem, what makes Jerusalem special?
It's the temple, right?

Absolutely.
Yeah.
That's at the heart.

That's at the heart.
In fact, you and I have been to Jerusalem.

Yes.

They have a pretty good feeling for the outline of the city,
the boundaries of the city, in the timethat Nephi and Lehi would have left.

Yeah.

And it's fair to say that Jerusalem was a
temple with a city attached.

That's a great way to say it.

When you look at the size and the dimensions, the temple
dominated every part of Jerusalem.
It's built in the tallestpart of Jerusalem.
There's this immense platformcreated so that they have a
space to build the temple on.
And to any person in the 19th centurywho's literate in the Bible, and the
saints really were literate in the Bible—

Yeah.

—when you say Jerusalem, you're talking about a temple.

So New Jerusalem also implies a temple, is what you're saying.

Yeah.
Yeah.

Yeah, and Jesus explicitly mentions that in 3 Nephi 21, right?
Not the temple, but heexplicitly says—let's see.

I'm going to verse 23 (23:17):
“And they,” meaning the Gentiles, “shall assist
my people, the remnant of Jacob, andalso as many of the house of Israel as
shall come, that they may build a city,which shall be called the New Jerusalem.
And then shall they assist my peoplethat they may be gathered in, who
are scattered upon all the face ofthe land, in unto the New Jerusalem.

(23:41):
And then shall the power of heavencome down among them; and I also
will be in their midst.” So he's veryexplicit that in the future, on this
land, there will be a New Jerusalem.
These are the words of Jesus.
Doesn't get more pure than that.
If I understand what you're sayingright, Casey, you're suggesting
that even though this isn'tprophesying of a temple explicitly,
a prophecy about a New Jerusalemis implicitly suggesting a temple.

(24:05):
Is that correct?

Yeah, it doesn't seem like there's any way around
it if you're biblically literate,and the early saints were obsessed
with this idea of a New Jerusalem.
Just to illustrate, Doctrine and Covenants28, which is sort of the first big
ecclesiastical crisis in the church.

Yeah.
It didn't take long.

It didn't take long.
A couple months.
Hiram Page, who's one of the eightwitnesses of the Book of Mormon, is
receiving revelations for the church,and it raises the question of, well,
anybody can get revelation, so who canget revelation for the whole church?

Right.

What was Hiram Page getting revelations about?
According to several sources, theNew Jerusalem and its location.
And eventually they resolvedthe ecclesiastical crisis.
Doctrine and Covenants 28 says, hey,revelation comes to stewardship.

Yeah.

But it's also the first time the Lord gives a clue as to where the
New Jerusalem is going to be, and he saysit'll be on the borders by the Lamanites.
And the other thing that happens inDoctrine and Covenants 28 is Oliver
Cowdery, the second elder in thechurch—church really only has two
general authorities at the time.

Joseph and Oliver.

It's a big deal that Oliver Cowdery is called to lead a
mission to the borders of the UnitedStates and identify the New Jerusalem.

Yeah.

In fact, you've done some good research and found that
Oliver Cowdery might be the firstperson to explicitly say a temple.

That's right, yeah.

Yeah.
Tell us about that.

Shortly after D&C 28 is received, Oliver Cowdery, in connection
with three other gentlemen, who arecalled in sections 30 and 32 to join him
on this mission, he actually writes outand then signs a covenant that basically
outlines what his aims were, what heintended to accomplish on the mission.
Of course, number one was to preach tothe Lamanites, but number two, he said,

(25:52):
was, “to rear up a pillar as a witnesswhere the temple of God shall be built
in the glorious New Jerusalem.” So,bam, that's the earliest I can find.
That's the 17th of October, 1830,explicit mention of a temple.
And it does grow directly out of theNew Jerusalem prophecies that are in the

(26:15):
Book of Mormon and that are beginning toshow up in the Doctrine and Covenants.

Right.
And even before Oliver Cowdery leaveson this mission to the Lamanites, he
and Joseph have already embarked onthe second great translation project,
which is to translate the Bible.

Yes.

And in translating the Bible, new texts are received,
chiefly the book of Moses, whichgreatly supplements the early part
of the book of Genesis, and Moses 7,which is received about December 1830.
So this is after Oliver's left to go onhis mission but before Joseph Smith has
really left New York and gone anywhere,Moses 7 has—reads in part—this is verse

(26:53):
62 in the current Pearl of Great Price.

Okay.

“Righteousness will I send down out of heaven; and truth will
I send forth out of the earth, to beartestimony of mine Only Begotten; his
resurrection from the dead; yea, andalso the resurrection of all men; and
righteousness and truth will I causeto sweep the earth as with a flood,
to gather out mine elect from the fourquarters of the earth, unto a place which
I shall prepare, an Holy City, that mypeople . . . gird up their loins, and be

(27:19):
looking forth for the time of my coming;for there shall be my tabernacle, and it
shall be called Zion, a New Jerusalem.”

So this is a prophecy of the Lord to Enoch about the latter days,
and he explicitly connects New Jerusalemwith a tabernacle in the midst of it.

Yep.

Okay.
So, okay, I think you've madeyour case pretty well, Casey.
I think that you've convincedme that the New Jerusalem was
the seed that bore within it theidea or the concept of a temple.

Yeah.

And that that began to germinate, and with prophecies in the
Book of Mormon, layered upon with aprophecy in the book of Moses, now that
is starting to become very concrete.
Oliver Cowdery's already headedout west to identify the spot
where that New Jerusalem will beestablished, where that temple will
be built, and it's not even 1831 yet.

(28:13):
This is all within the first fewmonths of the church being official.

Yeah.
The church is less than a year oldwhen all this stuff is happening.
It's founded in April 1830.
The Moses 7 prophecy's given inDecember, and then a little context

here (28:39):
Oliver Cowdery has way more success on his way to the boundaries
than he does when he gets there.
On his way—

We should do a series sometime about just
missionary work, and just kind of,like, show that—like, the Lamanite
mission has got to be first, right?
And just, like, kind of showthat the success that they had.
Not—

Not what you expect.

—amongst the native Americans, but, yeah,
but in Kirtland, you know?

Yeah.
The Lamanite mission is a greatexample of you're not going to have the
success you think you're going to have.
They thought they were going togo to the boundaries of the United
States and convert hundreds ofthousands of Native Americans.
Instead, the biggest success theLamanite missionaries have is in
a little town called Kirtland—

Yeah.

—that's on the boundary of Lake Erie.
It's not even halfway to Missourifrom where they were leaving.
But what happens is one of theLamanite missionaries, Parley P.
Pratt, knows this guy named Sidney Rigdon.
Rigdon agrees to let thempreach to his congregation.
He reads the Book of Mormon.
He converts.
And then Oliver Cowdery andthe missionaries keep going,
and Rigdon travels back to NewYork to meet with Joseph Smith.

(29:46):
Sidney Rigdon's actually the scribewhen the Moses 7 prophecy is received,
and Sidney Rigdon is there whenDoctrine and Covenants 37 is given,
which is the first command to gather.

Which comes almost immediately after
Moses 7 was received, right?
Like, it's like, Moses 7, theprophecy about the New Jerusalem.
Okay, stop.
D&C 37 says, okay, now move to Ohio.
Go to Kirtland.
Go to where there's a few hundred saints.
It's going to be about 300in the next few months.
In New York there's onlyabout 100 saints at the time.

(30:18):
And so gather to the Ohio.
This is a command to the NewYork Saints to leave, right?
But the Lord doesn't give much context.
He doesn't explain why.

Yeah.

So church members are thoughtful and ask Joseph about that.
Like, why do we need to go?
And Joseph says,essentially, I don't know.

Yeah.

Let's inquire of the Lord.
And that's where we get section 38, whichis actually, John Whitmer says, received
right in front of the entire congregation.
Like, Joseph receives the revelation andthen shares that with them immediately.

Yeah.

And tell us why section 38 matters, Casey.

The command to gather, section 37, is four verses long.
Section 38, which is the reasonto gather, is 42 verses long.
It's ten times as long.
And there's a lot of stuff in here, butkind of the heart of it is the Lord says,

verse 32 (31:05):
“Wherefore, for this cause I gave unto you the commandment that ye
should go to the Ohio; [for] there I willgive unto you my law; and there you shall
be endowed with power from on high.” Sothe law is received almost immediately.
That's section 42.

Yeah.

And we just did a whole series on it.
It's the law of consecration, inpart, with a bunch of other laws, too,
but consecration is the main thing.

Yes.

But the mysterious phrase is this promise of an endowment,
which we bring a whole bunch ofcultural baggage to in our time.
But did they know what theendowment was in the moment?
And how would they haveseen the word endowment?
Not the same way we see it, correct?

Definitely not.
Yeah.
They don't have the sametemple context that we have.
They had no templecontext at all, actually.
In fact, the word endowment,that's not even specifically, like,
an LDS word, or even a uniquelyreligious word for that matter.

No.

In the 1828 Webster Dictionary at the time, it's defined as
“that which is bestowed or settled on.
Property, fund, or revenue permanentlyappropriated to any object.” So think
of, like, the university endowment.

Right.

The Harvard endowment, it's like $50 billion,
the wealthiest university onearth because of their endowment.
And then it goes on and says, “Also,that which is given or bestowed on
the person or mind by the creator.
Gift of nature.
Any quality or faculty bestowedby the creator.” So I could say,
Casey, you have been endowed witha quick wit and a wonderful memory.

(32:37):
And that would be true.

Thanks, man.

You betcha.
So I think to those early Latter-daySaints, this promise of being endowed
with power from on high probably soundedto them like God was offering them some
kind of gift of divinely bestowed power.

Yeah.

They wouldn't be wrong about that, but at first there was no
particular temple association at all.
That understanding, of connectingthis endowment of power with
temple will distill over thenext few years as we continue.

Yeah.
And today endowment is shorthand for goingthrough the temple ceremonies, right?

A specific ritual that we do in the temple, yeah.

Yeah.
But I want to stress when JosephSmith goes to Ohio, they don't
know what the endowment is.

No, not at all.

They keep looking at things and saying,
oh, maybe this is the endowment.
Like, there's a big experienceon the Isaac Morley farm.
They have a meeting of priesthood,and a bunch of people stand up and
prophesy, and amazing things happen,and some people at the time say, well,
this must be the endowment that theLord promised, that we would have
this massive spiritual outpouring.

(33:42):
That's the gift.

Because it was a gift of divine power.

Yeah.
And who's to say they're wrong?
I mean, it was a gift of divine power.

Yeah.
That's an endowment.

The question is was it the endowment that the Lord had
planned, or was it part of the endowment?
If you read through the Doctrineand Covenants, this wording
shows up as a consistent thread.
So section 39, which is given right asthey're preparing to leave New York to
gather to Ohio, the Lord says, “I havekept in store a blessing such as is

(34:11):
not known among the children of men.”

And that's actually kind of cool as far as,
like, a synonym for endowment.

Uh-huh.

His synonym is a blessing.

Yeah.

And the context is “inasmuch as my people shall assemble
themselves at the Ohio,” right?

Yeah.

Go to Ohio, and I have kept in store a blessing such as is
not known among the children of men.
Cool synonym for endowment.

Yeah.
Verse 16 of section 43, this isreceived after they get to Ohio,
the Lord says, “Sanctify yourselvesand ye shall be endowed with power.”

Okay.

So, again, I'm going to give you a gift.

So still not associating it with the temple at all.

Still not associating it with the temple, but the word
endowment continues to show up.
It shows up in section 95 in a house thatby this point, it's the Kirtland temple.
“I design to endow those whom I havechosen with power from on high.”

Ah, so June of 1833, that's the first time we explicitly
see endowment and the Kirtlandtemple connected with each other.

Right.
Right.

Nice.

And then section 105, which is right after Zion's
Camp has gone to Missouri.

So, like, a year later.

Like, a year later, the Lord actually tells
them, okay, the redemption of thecity or land of Zion cannot be
brought to pass until mine eldersare endowed with power from on high.
So the endowment eventually comes to beassociated with the idea of, you gather,
you build the temple, I'll give you thishuge gift that I have in store for that.

Yeah.
What was the first temple that theLord commanded the saints to build?

The first temple that they're commanded to build is in Missouri.

Oh, not Kirtland.

Not Kirtland.
That's the first one we managed to build,but the first one that we are commanded
to build is at the heart of the NewJerusalem, at the heart of this city of
Zion that the saints are going to build.
Right after Joseph Smith gets toKirtland, he's only there for a couple
weeks and is told the next conference ofthe church should be held in Missouri.

(36:21):
Go to Missouri, and when you getthere, await further instructions.
This location of the city ofZion will be made known to you.
If you turn to section 57, when JosephSmith gets to Missouri, he arrives
there in July of the summer of 1831.
He asks two questions.
These questions set off section 57.
The two questions are, when willthe wilderness blossom as the rose?

Mm-hmm.

That's question one.
When will Zion be built up in herglory, and where will thy temple
stand, unto which all nationsshall come in the last days?
So when Joseph goes to Missouri, andit's to identify the location of the city
of Zion, which is what this revelationdoes, he has temples on his mind, too.

Yeah.

He's saying, hey, where's the temple going to stand?
Because to him, the NewJerusalem is a temple city.
There's got to be a temple.
That's just the way it works.
And the Lord tells him, verse 3, “theplace which is now called Independence
is the center place; and a spot for thetemple is lying westward, upon a lot
which is not far from the courthouse.” So
. . . Scott Woodward: Bam.

(37:25):
And that's the templeof the New Jerusalem.
Yeah.

This is the place that the Book of Mormon had been prophesying
about, that Moses 7 was prophesying about,and now they've finally got a location.

They got a location.

Mm-hmm.

And here's the interesting thing
they're pretty direct, say that it wasn'tjust going to be one temple in Zion:
it was going to be twenty-four temples.

Twenty-four temples.

Now, we've got to understand that the concept of a temple
right here, in 1833, is very, verymuch in its infancy, so the design
of the temples that we have are veryclose to what the Kirtland Temple
is originally going to look like.

Yeah.

But there's no baptismal font.
There's no sealing room.
There's no endowment rooms.
There's nothing that we wouldcurrently associate with the temple.

Yes.

And they actually associate these temples with the offices
of the church as they exist at that time.
There's three temples for the deaconsand three temples for the teachers and
three temples for the priests and threetemples for the presiding bishopric
and three temples for the presidency.
And that's where you get tothe number of twenty-four.
They really only start building onetemple—we know the exact location

(38:33):
of this—but if everything had goneaccording to plan, there would have
been a temple complex at the heart ofZion that would have been a kind of
administrative center for the church.

Kind of like if you think about Temple Square today, right?

Oh, yeah.
Yeah.

You've got a temple proper, and then you've
got the conference center.
Is that a kind of temple?

Kind of, yeah.

They would have said so, yeah.

The way they thought of it, yeah.

Mm-hmm.
You've got the churchoffice building right there.

Yeah.

Was that kind of a temple?
Yeah, in a way.

You've got the church administration building.

Yes.

Which is probably the one that's most in line with what
they conceive these temples as being.

Yeah.

The design of these temples show large congregational spaces,
also spaces where there could be officesfor church leaders and things like that.

Yeah.

And it reflects the structure of the
churches that exist in 1833.

Yeah.

I mean, this is a snapshot of that time.

Mm-hmm.
If you go to Temple Squaretoday, for instance, there's
a Relief Society building.

Yeah.
If we built the New Jerusalem,would we have to have a
temple for the Relief Society?

Absolutely.

Or a temple for the young women, because they're
officers of the church, too.
They need a space to exist in.

Sunday school, and
. . . Casey Griffiths: Not Cub Scouts anymore, thank goodness.
But—
That temple has been bulldozed in the church.
No.

And I want to stress that the offices function differently today.
Deacons are 12-year-olds, 11-year-olds.
They could be 11-year-olds.
Back then a deacon was an adult man.
So it's not like the templesfor the deacons, we're going to
have, you know, an arcade and—

Bounce houses.

—and stuff like that.
This just shows their conceptof a temple is continuing to
evolve and stretch and grow.

And they're committed to the depths, right?
The revelations themselves aretalking about “build unto me an
house.” D&C 84 says, “an house.”

Yeah.

The revelation about the Kirtland temple is “an house.”

Yeah.

And so there is one particular, one specific building that
is going to be the place where you wouldhave the most holy type of worshiping.

Right.

Because in Kirtland the Lord actually wanted another house for
the presidency and another house for
. . . Casey Griffiths: Printing of the scriptures.
Printing place that looked a lot like the Kirtland temple, and—

Yeah.

—we're only able, eventually, to build the Kirtland Temple,
but of the three, that's the one you oughtto marshal all your efforts to build.
And they did, and the Lord's promise wasfulfilled about the endowment of power.

Yeah.
And let me mention just reallybriefly another promise.
That promise in section 84, in verse 5,where the Lord says, “this generation
shall not . . . pass away until anhouse shall be built unto the Lord,”

(41:14):
a lot of people have used that tosay Joseph Smith, the false prophet.

Yeah.
There's a false prophecy.
There's not a house built inMissouri, in Independence.

You guys didn't build the temple in Missouri.
But there's a coupleeasy workarounds here.

Okay.
Go ahead.

One would be the Lord said “this generation shall not
pass away until an house shall bebuilt unto the Lord.” And there were
several houses built unto the Lordbefore that generation passed away.
There's a house in Kirtland.
There's one in Nauvoo.
There were people that were alive whenthis prophecy was given that lived to see
temples dedicated in Hawaii and in Canada.

Yeah, but verse 4 says, “beginning at this place, even
the place of the temple, which templeshall be reared in this generation.”
Isn't he anchoring that to Independence?

Eh, could be.
I'm just saying verse 5 gives us alittle wiggle room because he says, “this
generation shall not pass away until anhouse.” So I think you could interpret
it and say it doesn't necessarilyhave to be the one in Independence.
It just has to be a house of the Lord.
But do you have a different workaroundthat you would use for this?

I do, yes.
I think the Lord, when he spoke of thisto the saints in Nauvoo, who were still
worried about this, after they had losttheir land, been kicked out of Missouri,
actually expelled by a government order,by order of His Excellency Lilburn W.
Boggs, they were worriedabout this prophecy.
How are we going to build thehouse in this generation if

(42:38):
we can't even go to Missouri?
He said it was supposedto be reared on that spot.

Right.

And the Lord alleviated that concern in Doctrine and Covenants
124, verse 49, where he says, “Verily,verily, I say unto you, that when I give
a commandment to any of the sons of mento do a work unto my name, and those
sons of men go with all their might andwith all they have to perform that work,
and cease not their diligence, and theirenemies come upon them and hinder them

(43:02):
from performing that work, behold, itbehooveth me to require that work no more
at the hands of those sons of men, but toaccept of their offerings.” And then he
says, “And the iniquity and transgressionof my holy laws and commandments I
will visit upon the heads of those whohindered my work,” in Missouri there.
He says, “Therefore, for this causehave I accepted the offerings of those

(43:22):
whom I commanded to build up a cityand a house unto my name, in Jackson
county, Missouri, and were hinderedby their enemies, saith the Lord your
God.” So essentially he's saying youare exempt from that commandment.

Yeah.

Your enemies hindered you, so I require that work no more
at your hands, but I will visitthe punishment of not fulfilling
that commandment upon your enemies.
You're exempt.
Focus on building a temple herein Nauvoo, which he had just
commanded a few verses earlier.

Yeah.

So that, to me, is a pretty satisfying
response to verse 5 of D&C 84.
Is this a failed prophecy?
Well, it's a lifted prophecy.

Yeah.

The Lord lifts it and says, you no longer need to do that.
I exempt you from that because yourenemies came upon you and hindered
you from performing that work.
I think that was a great release to a lotof members of the church in Nauvoo, not
least of which was Joseph Smith, who wasnow grateful that they didn't have to try
to figure out some way to surreptitiouslybuild a temple in Missouri.

Yeah.

How are they going to fulfill that when there's an
extermination order on their heads?
And this released themfrom that obligation.

Yeah.
So two ways to basicallysolve the question of that.

Yeah.

Do we just have to build an house, or the Lord says specifically,
I'm releasing you from this command.
And it's either I release you fornow, or I release you altogether.
You and I disagree on this.

We do disagree.

I think it's, I'm releasing you for now, but you're
eventually going to have to do it.

I think he says, I require this no more—

Yeah.

—at your hands.
So what you would say is, well,somebody's hands have got to do
it, just not that generation.

Yeah.
Yeah.

And I would say, I think that exempts all hands
from that particular work, but—

Yeah.

—we shall see.

We argued about this for hours while we drove around the
church history sites in Missouri.
And if you want to go watch ourvideo and see us actually arguing
in real time, it's on YouTube.
I think the editor of the videofavored your side and he made it
look like, yeah, I don't know.

He had good sense about him, I think.

Yeah.

So
. . . Casey Griffiths: Yeah.
I mean, you're a good guy, Scott,but you're wrong on this one.
At any rate, that's thetemple in Missouri, okay?
And that's the first temple commandedto be built in this dispensation, but it
is not the first temple to be built inthis dispensation, for obvious reasons.
The saints in Missouri faceintense persecutions starting
in the summer of 1833.

(45:47):
By the fall of 1833 they are forciblyevicted from Jackson County, and that's
when the Lord sends Zion's Camp, andnow we're back to section 105, where
the Lord has said, look, Zion cannot beredeemed “until mine elders,” this is
verse 11, “are endowed with power from onhigh.” So even before the fall of Zion,

(46:10):
which happens in the summer and autumnof 1833, the Lord has already given a
commandment for another house to be built.
And this is found in section 88 of theDoctrine and Covenants, which, huge
revelation and several revelationscombined together to make one big
section, but we go to verse 119.
So this is where the Lord commands the

(46:31):
building of the Kirtland temple.

Yeah.

Okay.

So here's his wording: “Organize yourselves; prepare every
needful thing; and establish a house,even a house of prayer, a house of
fasting, a house of faith, a houseof learning, a house of glory, a
house of order, a house of God.”

There it is.

So there it is.
They're going to build atemple in Kirtland also.
At the same time, they're trying tobuild this temple in Missouri, too, and
it's not a race or anything like that,because they don't really start to super
seriously focus on the Kirtland Templeuntil they know Zion is gone, but they've
got a couple of things in place here.
They've got a promise that they'regoing to receive an endowment.

(47:13):
They're looking for howthat's going to be fulfilled.
They've got a commandmentto build temples.
They've got a charge to build thenew Jerusalem, and in the way they
see it at the heart of every holycity of God is a temple, a house,
dedicated to God for that purpose.
So like we said, we don't want to spoilthe story, but the first temple to be
built is in Kirtland, Ohio still stands.

(47:35):
It's still there.
You can go visit it.
And that's where we pick up thenext part of the story, correct?

Yeah.
And here's the teaser to thinkabout, dear listener: how does the
Kirtland endowment occur if there'sno endowment ceremony in Kirtland yet?
What you and I know as the “endowment”ordinance is not developed until Nauvoo.
It's not in Kirtland.
And so if the ordinance that we callthe endowment is not what they're

(48:01):
doing in Kirtland, then what onearth is the Kirtland endowment?
It's not what you think,but it's really good.
But we're excited to talk about itnext time because remember his promise:
his promise was an endowment of power.

Yeah.

So that's what we'll be looking for in Kirtland, surrounding the
Kirtland temple, in the Kirtland Temple,what is the gift of power, the blessing
of power that the Lord gives the saintsin Kirtland, which fulfills that promise?
Stay tuned.
We'll talk about it next time.

Okay.
See ya.

Thank you for listening to this episode of Church History Matters.
Next week Casey and I dig deeper intothe somewhat surprising and unique
nature and purposes of the Kirtlandendowment and how it paved the way for
all the work that would be accomplishedin all future temples to come.
If you're enjoying Church HistoryMatters, we'd appreciate it if you
could take a moment to subscribe, rate,review, and comment on the podcast.

(49:02):
That makes us easier to find.
Also, we'd love to hear your suggestionsfor future series on this podcast.
If there's a church history topic youthink would be worth exploring for
multiple episodes, send us your ideato podcasts@scripturecentral.org.
We promise to consider all suggestions.
Today's episode was produced byScott Woodward and edited by Nick

(49:23):
Galieti and Scott Woodward, with shownotes and transcript by Gabe Davis.
Church History Matters is a podcastof Scripture Central, a nonprofit
which exists to help build enduringfaith in Jesus Christ by making
Latter-day Saint scripture and churchhistory accessible, comprehensible,
and defensible to people everywhere.
For more resources to enhance yourgospel study, go to scripturecentral.org,

(49:45):
where everything is availablefor free because of the generous
donations of people like you.
And while we try very hard to behistorically and doctrinally accurate
in what we say on this podcast, pleaseremember that all views expressed in
this and every episode are our viewsalone and do not necessarily reflect the
views of Scripture Central or The Churchof Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

(50:05):
Thank you so much for beinga part of this with us.

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