024 Q&R! Tough Questions with Paul Reeve

Episode Transcript
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Scott Woodward (00:05):
Some people see a connection between the church's past
restrictive policy toward blacksin the church and the church's
current restrictive policy towardsgays in the church, specifically
prohibiting gay temple marriage.
In what ways are these two issues similar,and in what ways are they different?
How can church members reconcile A, theteaching that the prophet won't ever

(00:26):
lead the church astray, with B, the factthat church presidents for over a century
taught false doctrine about blacks?
How might the scriptural basis ofthe Lamanites being cursed with a
skin of blackness have influencedearly church leaders' thoughts on
justifying the initial priesthoodand temple restrictions, and what
should we make of that curse anyway?
And why didn't God clearly communicateearlier to his prophets that it

(00:49):
was his will that all his childrenwould receive the blessings of
the priesthood and the temple?
In today's episode of Church HistoryMatters, we dive into all these questions
and more with our special guest, Dr.
Paul Reeve, a scholar on racein Latter-day Saint history.
I'm Scott Woodward, and my co-host isCasey Griffiths, and today we dive into
our seventh and last episode in thisseries dealing with race and priesthood.

(01:13):
Now, let's get into it.
Hello, and welcome, everybody.
This is exciting.
This is the end of our series onrace and priesthood and temple.
I have some good news,and I have some bad news.
The bad news is Casey is gone again today.

(01:36):
I don't know what it is about our Q+Repisodes, but—no, he had an important
family thing he needed to be to, so wewill miss Casey dearly—but the good news
is that we are here with Paul Reeve.
Paul, welcome.

Paul Reeve (01:47):
Yeah, thank you.
It's a pleasure to be with you.

Yeah.
Excited to have you on the show.
We've been touting your work a lot.
We've recommended your book, Let's TalkAbout Race and Priesthood, but before we
go into details about that book, let meread your bio to our listeners here: W.
Paul Reeve is the chair of the HistoryDepartment and Simmons Chair of Mormon
Studies at the University of Utah, wherehe teaches courses on Utah history,

(02:11):
Mormon history, and the history of the U.
S.
West.

His book Religion of a Different Color: Race and the Mormon Struggle for Whiteness (02:14):
undefined
received three best book awards, andthat was published by Oxford 2015.
He is author of Let's Talk About Raceand Priesthood, published by Deseret
Book in 2023, earlier this year.
He's a project manager and generaleditor of an award-winning digital

(02:34):
database called Century of Black Mormons.
If you haven't checked that out,you've got to go check that out.
It's designed to name and identifyall known black Latter-day Saints
baptized into the faith between 1830,the year the church is organized,
and 1930, and the database islive at centuryofblackmormons.org.
A tremendous resource.

(02:54):
OK, so Paul, I've got to ask rightout the chute here: How did you
become so interested in researchingrace in Latter-day Saint history?
Tell us your backstory.

Paul Reeve (03:04):
Yeah.
Well, the existing kind ofanswers when I started my
research weren't satisfying to me.

Mm-hmm.

Paul Reeve (03:11):
And I'm at a Research 1 university.
You're looking for your next book project.
You have to publish.

Yeah.

Paul Reeve (03:16):
And I had encountered a variety of what
are called “whiteness studies”—

Mm-hmm.

Paul Reeve (03:22):
—where scholars have suggested that Italian immigrants, Irish
immigrants, those who come to the UnitedStates in the 19th century, weren't
necessarily accepted as white on arrival.
They were racialized as not whiteenough, denigrated in a variety of ways,
and in a labor and immigration contexthad to claim whiteness for themselves.
And research in my previous scholarshiphad indicated to me that some of

(03:48):
this same kind of racializationwas happening to Latter-day
Saints, but it wasn't necessarilyan immigrant and labor context.
This was an insider religious groupwho is being racialized as somehow
racially other—not white enough.
By converting to the Latter-daySaint faith, somehow you
are racially degenerate.

(04:09):
And especially after the church openlyacknowledges polygamy, this just touches
off the imagination of outsiders interms of ways they imagine polygamy
not merely destroying the traditionalfamily but destroying the white race.

Wow.

Paul Reeve (04:22):
So anyway, then I tried to situate the priesthood and temple
restrictions within that context—

Mm-hmm.

Paul Reeve (04:30):
—and dug into that topic and situated it within this bigger framework,
and I found answers—also new sourcesthat previous scholars hadn't used.
These were speeches that were transcribedin the 19th century in Pitman shorthand,
but never—they were captured, I shouldhave said, in Pitman shorthand, but
never transcribed into longhand.

Mm-hmm.

Paul Reeve (04:52):
And those new speeches also added new information in terms of the
development of the racial priesthood andtemple restrictions inside the faith.

Hmm.

Paul Reeve (05:00):
So really, I mean, you know, there's—there's a scholarship
answer, and then there's also sort ofpersonal curiosity, and I was—I was
looking for, you know, answers thatbetter satisfied my questions about the
racial priesthood and temple restriction.

Mm.
Interesting.
OK, so you're a practicingLatter-day Saint.

Paul Reeve (05:20):
Right.

And did you grow up LDS?
Are you a convert?
Has your family been in thechurch for multiple generations?
Like, tell us your LDS backstory.

Paul Reeve (05:27):
Yeah, so I am multi-generational Latter-day Saint.
I had ancestors, Levi NewtonMerrick and Charles Merrick, who
were both killed at Haun's Mill.

Mm.

Paul Reeve (05:39):
The Reeve ancestors emigrated in 1853 from England.
They were sent by Brigham Young in1861 to help establish the cotton
mission in southern Utah, and myfamily's been there ever since.
I grew up in Hurricane.

OK.

Paul Reeve (05:54):
Small town just 18 miles north of the Utah-Arizona border.
My dad ran beef cattle on theArizona Strip, so I grew up
riding horses and branding cattle.
I served an LDS mission.
Deep LDS roots in my family.

Well, thank you, Paul.
So tell us just real briefly about theLet's Talk About Race and Priesthood.
We've been touting that as,like, something that everybody
should go get a copy of.
Did Deseret Book reach outto you to publish this?
Or how did that work?
Do you mind talkingabout that for a second?

Paul Reeve (06:25):
Well, first of all, thank you for your kind words
and also for promoting it.
That is very kind, andit means a lot to me.
I appreciate it.

You bet.

Paul Reeve (06:32):
Deseret Book reached out to me when they were conceiving
of the Let's Talk About series.

Mm.

Paul Reeve (06:38):
They explained that they were attempting to address sometimes
controversial topics, give peoplesomething more substantial than the Gospel
Topics essays to sink their teeth into,but still remain short and accessible.

Mm.

Paul Reeve (06:52):
Written to a Latter-day Saint audience.
And they asked me if I wouldconsider writing the volume on Let's
Talk About Race and Priesthood.

Mm.

Paul Reeve (07:00):
And I was really intrigued by the series, and encouraged, in fact,
that they were proposing this series,but I was immediately skeptical, and I—

And why was that?

Paul Reeve (07:11):
Well, I said to Lisa Roper—and I had a fantastic time working with Lisa.
Honestly, like the best editor, justexcellent beyond belief, but I just said
to her, you know, out of my skepticism,I just said, “I don't believe that
Deseret Book will be willing to publishanything that I write on this topic.”

(07:32):
I just didn't think that they would bewilling to be as open and honest as I
feel like the topic deserves, and so Ithink the first time we, Lisa talked to
me, I just expressed that skepticism.
And to her credit, shenever once backed down.
She said, in fact, “Well,that's the point of this series.
We want to be open and honest.
We want to engage these questions ina way that holds up to scholarship

(07:56):
but also remains faithful inthe Latter-day Saint tradition.”

Mm.

Paul Reeve (08:00):
And, you know, once again, she never backed down,
and the book is the result.

That's awesome.

Paul Reeve (08:05):
So, yeah, Deseret Book approached me.
I didn't approach them, because myskepticism simply said they wouldn't
be willing to tackle this topic ina way that I thought it required.

Well, honestly, I think that's so encouraging, and
what a marvelous nod to a propositionthat we believe in very much at
Scripture Central, namely that good,honest, and thorough scholarship
is entirely compatible with faith.

Paul Reeve (08:29):
Yeah.

In fact, the entire Let's Talk About series is this
testament that study and faithgo hand in hand, so I love it.
Those are great little books, andthe whole collection should be on
the shelf of every Latter-day Sainthome, in my opinion, so well done.
Now, we've got a lot of listenerswho are anxious to pick your
brain on this topic, Paul.
But first, let me tell you a littlebit about our listeners’ preparation.

(08:52):
So Casey and I now have done,let's see, six episodes.
We started out episode one, laying thatracial context of America into which
the church was born or established,and then we talked about Joseph Smith
and black Africans, and we could findno racial restriction or anything
like that in terms of priesthoodor temple in Joseph Smith's day.
So the question is, where did it start?

(09:13):
And so then we did another episodeon 1852 in the beginnings of the
priesthood-temple ban in the church.
And then the question is, “Well, how comeit stayed if that was an error there?
How did it stay for so long?
Like, how did nine church presidentsnot catch that error?” And so we
talked about how that became fullyentrenched policy in the church.
So our next episode then covered theperiod from 1907 to 1978, right before the

(09:36):
revelation, where there was disagreementamong church leaders as to whether or not
the ban was church doctrine or just churchpolicy and the circumstances that began
setting the stage for the revelation.
And then our final episode was allabout 1978 and what happened there.
So we've kind of paved the way andcleared the runway for you, Paul.
You can assume in your responses toour listeners' questions that they

(09:57):
know something about all that history.
They should have at least sixhours of it under their belt now.
If not, we highly recommend they goback and listen to those episodes.
So I think we're ready to dive in.
Anything else you want tosay before we jump in, Paul?

Paul Reeve (10:10):
No, that's great.
Great background, and yeah,thanks for doing all that work.
It sounds fantastic.

Let's just start with one of the most challenging questions, and
I will say this is one of the questionsthat came up most from our listeners.
It was about possible LGBTcorrelations with the priesthood ban.

I'll frame it like this (10:39):
Some people, essentially they see a connection
between the church's past restrictivepolicy toward blacks in the church and
the church's current restrictive policytoward gays in the church, specifically
prohibiting gay temple marriage.
And so if church leaders got it wrongabout race for so many years, the thinking
goes, then what's to say they're notcurrently getting gay marriage wrong?

(11:02):
Isn't it just a matter of timebefore there's a 1978 revelation
equivalent for gay marriage, right?
So that's kind of the framework ofa lot of people are coming from.
Let me give you a fewexamples from our listeners.
And a big shout out here to Steveand Austin and Brian and Nicholas and
Steph and Julie and Michael and Gemmaand Joseph and Ryan and—so many people
asked a version of this question, solet me just do a succinct one here

(11:24):
to kind of speak for all of them.
Let's do Steve from Saratoga Springs.
Now, Steve says, “I often hear peoplemake the argument that just like the
‘doctrine,’” air quotes, “of blacksand the priesthood changed, the church
or God will eventually change thedoctrine on gay marriage and allow it.
What are your thoughts onhow this differs or how it is
similar?” That's the question.

(11:44):
Can you address the meritsof making that parallel?
What are your thoughts?

Paul Reeve (11:48):
Yeah, I like how—I think you said Steve asked that question,
because he is asking for potentialparallels and potential distinctions,
and I think there are both.
So I'll start with potential parallels.

OK.

Paul Reeve (12:00):
And I think it's appropriate for us to ask those kind of questions.
Are we talking about simply takingour cultural assumptions in the
19th century about race and in the20th and 21st centuries about gender
and sexuality, and importing theminto our answers within the faith?

Mm.

Paul Reeve (12:21):
Right?
And we see that taking place with racialunderstanding in the 19th century.

Mm.

Paul Reeve (12:27):
Is there a potential parallel?
You know, what are ourcultural assumptions?
And certainly cultural assumptionsacross the course of the 20th century
about gender and sexuality have changed.

Mm-hmm.

Paul Reeve (12:36):
And, you know, I think it's OK to consider that, right?
Is that what is going on here?
And so those are potential parallels.

Mm.

Paul Reeve (12:43):
Then I think it's also important to understand
that there are distinctions.

Yeah.

Paul Reeve (12:48):
The first distinction that I see is simply the fact that
there was historical precedentfor black male priesthood
ordination and temple admission.

Yeah.

Paul Reeve (12:59):
That includes the First Presidency in 1840 talking about a
policy of welcoming people of everycolor into the temple they were
about to build in Nauvoo, right?

Yeah.

Paul Reeve (13:09):
We don't have historical precedent for gay marriage.

Mm-hmm.

Paul Reeve (13:12):
None that I'm aware of.

There's no Elijah Ables equivalent or no Q.
Walker Lewises to speak ofwhen it comes to gay marriage.

Paul Reeve (13:20):
Right.
So that's an important distinction.
And then the other important distinctionis the fact that in the 20th and
21st century, you can be openly gayand qualify for a temple recommend.
You could not be black andqualify for a temple recommend.

Hmm.

Paul Reeve (13:38):
In other words, I think of Frida Lucretia McGee Ballou, who I include
in the chapter on the 1978 Revelation.
She was a Latter-day Saint for 69years before she was allowed to enter
a Latter-day Saint temple, and allindications are, right, she could answer
the temple recommend questions exactlythe same as a white person, the white
person be admitted and Frida excluded.

Mm.

Paul Reeve (14:00):
So no matter how otherwise worthy they may be,
right, they are excluded accordingto Latter-day Saint policy.

Mm.

Paul Reeve (14:07):
You can be gay and qualify for a temple recommend, you know,
living according to church standards,so I think that's an important
distinction to keep in mind as well.

Yeah.

Paul Reeve (14:17):
I fully acknowledge that that doesn't include being same-sex
married—not trying to suggestotherwise—but the rituals that the
church suggests are necessary—youcan qualify for the endowment ritual.
You can qualify for washingand anointing, right?
All of those were barred from black peoplesimply because of their racial status.

Yeah.

Paul Reeve (14:36):
And it's also important to acknowledge that a fundamental tenet of
The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-daySaints is continuing revelation.
And so, you know, our canon is open.
Maybe there are unansweredquestions yet to be decided.
That's a possibility as well.
I'm not foreclosing that at all, simplysaying there are important distinctions

(14:56):
as well as potential parallels.

And the distinctions are, specifically, there's
no church history precedent.
And I think we could also say there's noscriptural precedent whatsoever, right?
There are scriptural passages thatare talking about open inclusion
for blacks, specifically right?
But there's no equivalencein terms of gay marriage.
Is that fair?

Paul Reeve (15:16):
Yeah, I haven't found any.

Yeah.

Paul Reeve (15:19):
But once again, right?
Like, I'm open to, youknow, possibilities.

Yeah.

Paul Reeve (15:23):
But yeah, I think that's an important distinction.

And then the second distinction you're seeing is that gays can
enter the temple and receive ordinancesif they're worthy, whereas blacks
could not enter the temple and receiveordinances, no matter how otherwise
worthy they may have been, right?

Paul Reeve (15:40):
Yeah.

And it seems like another distinction is—and you make a great
case for this in your book, but—the 1978revelation to President Kimball seems
to have been a corrective revelation,which effectively repairs the church's
departure from Joseph Smith's originalracially inclusive practices, right?
Whereas for gay marriage, there is nosanctioned past precedence to get back to.

(16:04):
There's nothing to correct in terms ofdivergence or drifting from the more
original or pristine thing, right?
So a revelation authorizing gay marriagewould be a major departure away from all
the precedents of ancient scripture andchurch historical practices and teachings.
And so that would have no parallelswith the 1978 revelation in that

(16:26):
sense as a divine corrective.

Paul Reeve (16:28):
Yeah.
No, I think so.
I mean, that's how I've come to understandthe racial history, right, is 1978
is a return to our universal roots.
So that would be a distinctionif we received a revelation
about gay marriage, right?
And that doesn't mean that it'snot possible, once again, right?
But we're talking about similarities anddistinctions, and the way that I see this
history, that would be a distinction.

So, of course, God could eventually give a revelation
to the First Presidency and Twelveauthorizing gay temple marriage,
if that's in his plan, right?

Paul Reeve (16:58):
Yeah.

That's his prerogative.
We believe God will yet revealmany great and important things
pertaining to the kingdom of God,and maybe that's one of them.
Maybe it's not.
Only God knows.
But what I'm hearing you say, Paul, isthat although the past priesthood temple
ban and current restrictions on gaymarriage both grew out of the cultural
assumptions of their times, thereseems to be at least three important
distinctions that make them different.

(17:19):
Let me see if I can summarizethese: first, precedent.
Yes with blacks.
None with gays.

Paul Reeve (17:24):
Yeah.

Second, temple worthiness.
Entirely possible for gays.
Impossible for blacks.

Paul Reeve (17:30):
Yeah.

And third, the 1978 revelation returned us to a
past practice we'd strayed from,whereas a revelation authorizing gay
marriage would be striking out intocompletely unprecedented territory.

Paul Reeve (17:44):
Yeah.

Here's our next most frequently asked question, and
this is—shout out to Ken and Loriand Bob and Matt and Vincent and
Joseph and Jennifer and Chris, allasking a variety of this question.
And let's let Ken be the voice for this.
Ken says, “How do we reconcile theerror of multiple prophets, starting
with Brigham Young, in denying theblessings of the priesthood and temple

(18:19):
covenants to black members of thechurch, with the statement made by
President Wilford Woodruff when hesaid, ‘The Lord will never permit me or
any other man who stands as presidentof this church to lead you astray’”?
How do you reconcile those two ideas?
Because we're talking about BrighamYoung all the way up to and through
President Kimball until 1978.
How do you reconcile that?

Paul Reeve (18:40):
Yeah, I think those are really good questions to ask, and
this is really heavy history, and itbrings up the question of prophetic
fallibility, and I think it promptsus to stare it squarely in the face.

Yeah.

Paul Reeve (18:52):
And I think and I hope that that's good in terms of causing
us to exercise our faith, right?
To think through these things in adeep way and come to terms with them.

Mm-hmm.

Paul Reeve (19:03):
Deseret Book actually asked me to grapple with that.
So there's a chapter in the bookthat deals with Woodruff's statement.

Mm.

Paul Reeve (19:10):
My sense as a historian is that we as Latter-day Saints
sometimes take that outside of itscontext and give it truncated meaning
that doesn't match the context inwhich Woodruff is expressing it.

OK.

Paul Reeve (19:25):
As I understand it—and there are, I think, three quotes that
are included with Official Declaration1 in Latter-day Saint scriptures,
quotes from Woodruff's speeches thathe is giving as he goes around Utah
Territory defending the manifesto,because he's facing the accusation
that he's a fallen prophet and he'ssimply bowed to political pressure, the

(19:47):
manifesto is not, in fact, a revelation.

Mm-hmm.

Paul Reeve (19:50):
And I think it's important to have in context that the Supreme
Court in May of 1890 has issued a ruling.

Yeah.

Paul Reeve (19:58):
You know, the church has argued that the Edmunds-Tucker Act is
unconstitutional, and the Edmunds-TuckerAct is a piece of anti-polygamy
legislation that is really kind ofgrinding the church to dust very slowly.
It's confiscating church propertyvalued at above $50,000, but had for
the time excluded properties usedstrictly for religious purposes.

(20:22):
Well, in this May 1890 Supreme Courtdecision, the Supreme Court actually
upholds Edmunds-Tucker and evenopens the door for the possibility of
the confiscation of properties usedfor religious purposes if they are
being used for things the governmentconsiders illegal—that means marrying
people into polygamous marriages.

Mm.

Paul Reeve (20:42):
And all of a sudden Latter-day Saint temples are on the chopping block.

Yeah.

Paul Reeve (20:46):
That's the context for the Woodruff revelation in September of 1890.
He's actually been subpoenaedby the government to testify.
They have to prove that temples arebeing used for illegal purposes, and
they're going to subpoena Woodruff in aneffort to try to make that determination.
And he goes to California, comesback, and issues the manifesto.

(21:08):
And as he defends the manifesto, he'ssaying, “God gave me a revelation.”

Yeah.

Paul Reeve (21:13):
He's defending it as revelation.

Yeah.

Paul Reeve (21:15):
He's basically articulating the trade-off as,
“We'll abandon polygamy and preservetemple worship,” something much more
central to Latter-day Saint theology.
And the reason why that little,short history, I think, is important,
in context, what he's saying is,“God won't give me a revelation
that will lead the church astray.”

Yeah.

Paul Reeve (21:35):
I think a profoundly defensible position, and we don't
ever have Brigham Young claiming arevelation for the racial restrictions.

Mm.

Paul Reeve (21:44):
And, you know, it develops across the course of the 19th century in
fits and starts, accumulating precedentwith each new generation of leaders,
some of them falsely rememberingback that it began with Joseph Smith
and that it was always in place.

Yeah.

Paul Reeve (21:59):
So you have a very different trajectory taking place there.
As a historian, I can sort of watchthat unfold across the course of
the 19th century in fits and starts,and I think firmly in place by
the beginning of the 20th century,without any claim to revelation.

Yeah.

Paul Reeve (22:14):
I only see one revelation in the Latter-day Saint canon
on that question, and it comesin June of 1978, and it restores
us back to where we started.

Hallelujah.

Paul Reeve (22:26):
I think that's the important context to keep in mind.

Yeah.

Paul Reeve (22:31):
Sometimes when we apply that statement by Woodruff outside
of that context and simply use itas a blanket statement, it sounds
as if then God revokes a prophet’sagency when he makes him a prophet.

Yeah.

Paul Reeve (22:42):
And as I understand it, the fundamental foundation of the
Latter-day Saint plan is agency.

Wait—that even includes prophets?

Paul Reeve (22:50):
It includes prophets, right?
Like, God doesn't revoke a prophet'sagency when he makes him a prophet.

Yeah.

Paul Reeve (22:56):
I just have no evidence that that's the case.
And in fact, the Old Testament isfilled with all kinds of examples of
prophets exercising their agency in,I think, sometimes poor ways, and I
think those stories are included inthe Old Testament in an effort to
get us to learn from their mistakes.

Yeah.

Paul Reeve (23:11):
Right?
Like, they're not being held upas the good example, but actually,
“Hey, here's what happens whenyou exercise your agency poorly.”

Yeah.

Paul Reeve (23:19):
David and Bathsheba is a good example.

Sure.

Paul Reeve (23:21):
Right?
But the Old Testamentis filled with those.

Yeah.
That's so good, and let me add twoquotes to that, I think just to bolster
what you're saying here—basically tohelp us to see, like, what Wilford
Woodruff could not have been saying.
So here's Brigham Young himself, andI think we shared this a few episodes
ago, but he said, “Can a prophet or anapostle be mistaken?” Good question.
Then he says, “Do not ask me any suchquestion, for I will acknowledge that
all the time, but I do not acknowledgethat I designedly lead this people astray

(23:48):
one hair's breadth from the truth.”He doesn't “designedly” do it, right?
He says, “I do not knowingly doa wrong, though I may commit many
wrongs.” I think that's great.
That's—clearly President Young was actingout of his own honest convictions in 1852.
I think that's true.

Paul Reeve (24:01):
Yeah.

And then you have President Joseph F.

Smith saying this (24:03):
he said, “If the president of the church should become
unfaithful, God would remove himout of his place.” That's a similar
language to what Wilford Woodruff says.
“He will not suffer the head of the churchto transgress his laws and apostatize.
The moment he should take acourse that would in time lead
to it, God would take him away.
Why?
Because to suffer a wicked man tooccupy that position would be to allow,

(24:24):
as it were, the fountain to becomecorrupted, which is something he will
never permit.” According to Joseph F.
Smith here, he's saying that thepromise that the church president
won't lead us astray is not a promiseof prophetic infallibility but
an assurance that God won't allowthe head of this church to become
corrupted and deliberately deceive us.
And again, Brigham Young and John Taylorand everyone afterwards, nobody was being

(24:47):
deliberately deceptive or malicious inmy reading of the historical record.
Is that where you come down as well?

Paul Reeve (24:53):
Yeah, no, I think they fully believed the positions that they
adopted, and it became so well entrenched,right, that you can account for the
1949 statement and the 1969 statementin defense of the racial restrictions
because they fully believed by thatpoint especially that, you know, they
were in place from the beginning.

Yeah.

Paul Reeve (25:11):
They coincided with the founding of the
faith or always been in place.
God put them in place.
They traced back through themidst of time to the eternities.
So they are defending whatthey understood, absolutely.

Yeah.
Thank you.
Next question.
This question comes fromAlex in Idaho Falls.
Alex says, “Although the evidencepresented seems to overwhelmingly

(25:45):
indicate that the priesthood andtemple ban was a mistake, I have not
seen the church or the apostles usethe word ‘mistake’ in explanations or
conversations about the ban.” And thenhe says, “‘mistake’ may be inferred
from the most recent devotional to BYUfaculty by Elder Cook, but he himself
did not use that specific language.” AndI think the quote he's talking about is

(26:06):
this one from 2020, where he said that“Brigham Young said things about race
that fall short of our standards today.
Some of his beliefs and wordsreflected the culture of his
time.” And Alex is right; he didn'tuse the word “mistake” there.

Paul Reeve (26:20):
Yeah.

So Alex's question is, and I sense this from especially
religious educators who are a littlebit sensitive about this, “Would it be
getting ahead of the church leadershipfor gospel teachers to explain the
ban using the “mistake” language?

Paul Reeve (26:34):
Yeah, so I can't, obviously, speak for church leaders.
I think when you get new information,right, then you have to reevaluate your
own assumptions, and I think PresidentUchtdorf has invited us to do that.

Mm.

Paul Reeve (26:50):
He wants us to look beyond the iron gate of what we
think we know and be willing toconsider new sources, new evidence.
A great talk Elder Maxwell gave, hecalls intellectual curiosity a sign
of meekness, a willingness to acceptnew evidence and new information.

Mm.

Paul Reeve (27:07):
And, you know, this has been a journey for me, and so when new
evidence comes to light, then I thinkwe have to, you know, challenge our
own existing cultural understandings.

Mm-hmm.

Paul Reeve (27:17):
And I think that the Latter-day Saint leadership
is going through that process.

Mm.

Paul Reeve (27:22):
I think they educated themselves around this issue,
and then that led to the 2013Race and the Priesthood essay,
right, where they are disavowingprevious teachings on this topic.
And if you understand Latter-daySaint history, you understand
that doesn't happen very often.

Yeah.

Paul Reeve (27:37):
Right?
And then I think theyare continuing to learn.
I would say that we do have PresidentKimball in 1963, who at least is
expressing somewhat of an open attitudeabout this and does point to the racial
restrictions as a possible error.

Yeah.
That's his language, right?
Possible error.

Paul Reeve (27:57):
Yeah.
Possible error.
His language.
So is it possible that theyget to the point where they're
openly saying “mistake”?
I don't know.
I have no problem saying it, and I saythat in the Deseret Book manuscript.

Yeah.

Paul Reeve (28:11):
So once again, Deseret Book asked me to be open and honest in
how I make sense of this for myself,and I do not see that the racial
restrictions are of divine origins.

Yeah.

Paul Reeve (28:21):
That's certainly where the evidence lands with me, but I think it
takes time for the new information, thenew scholarship, to kind of percolate, to
sort of get into the hands of people whoare making these kind of decisions, and
I have no assumption that the leadershipis reading anything that I write.

Sure.

Paul Reeve (28:39):
So I'm not suggesting that in any sort of way, but you
know, once again, it just takestime, sort of a slow process.
The leadership also learning aboutnew evidence, new information, and
coming to their own conclusions.

Yeah.
Oh, that's a great answer.
And for what it's worth, Alex, I'lljust add that I think church leaders
have already given the green light foryou to teach this honestly and frankly.
I mean, the “disavowal” language of theGospel Topics essay gets you quite a ways
down that road, and then Elder McConkie'sAugust 1978 comment where he asked us to
forget everything that he said or BrighamYoung said about the ban, and then admits

(29:15):
that they spoke with limited understandingand without proper knowledge.
Add to that Elder Cook’s statement thatyou cited and the fact that church-owned
Deseret Book sought Paul out forhis honest scholarship and printing
his conclusions that you just heard.
Add all of these elements together,and I don't think you need to
feel that you're somehow gettingahead of church leaders on this.
I think we're on really safe groundto just teach this openly and

(29:38):
honestly, and then just be carefuland thoughtful about how you apply it.

Paul Reeve (29:42):
Yeah.

All right.
Next question.
This one came up a lot, Paul.
This is probably the thirdmost frequently asked question.
So Allison from SaltLake, Erin from Boise.
Emily from Murray.
Kenneth didn't tell mewhere he’s from—that's OK.
I'm not offended.
Jeff from Herriman.
Joseph from Nottingham, England.
Rob, I don't know where you're from,Rob, but—they've all asked this

(30:15):
question in one way or another.

Let me see (30:17):
Who's the most succinct here?
OK․ Maybe Jeff.
Jeff from Herriman.
He said,
“How might the scriptural basisof the Lamanites being cursed
with ‘a skin of blackness’ haveinfluenced early church leaders’
thoughts on justifying the initialpriesthood and temple restrictions?”
Let me read anotherone: [Erin] from Boise.
“You've talked about how peopleerroneously use the Bible to justify

(30:38):
their racism,” talking about the Cainand the Ham stuff, ”but what about
the Book of Mormon, specifically theLamanite skin color curse, 2 Nephi 5?
I don't know how to explain that tomy kids or anyone else when it comes
up,” Erin says, so I guess there'sa few questions in there: first
of all, do you see any evidence,historically speaking, that any of
the brethren used this as reasoningfor the justification of the ban?

Paul Reeve (31:01):
The short answer is no.

Hmm.

Paul Reeve (31:04):
They are not drawing on the Book of Mormon.
They understand the Book of Mormon to be abook that, in their understanding, right,
is giving a history of native peoples,not of people of black African descent.

Mm-hmm.

Paul Reeve (31:17):
They are not drawing upon it as a justification for the racial
priesthood and temple restrictions.
I found no evidence of that,and it's important to make that
distinction just right up front.

Mm.

Paul Reeve (31:28):
That doesn't solve the racial questions about the Book of Mormon.

Yeah.
There's another question there.

Paul Reeve (31:33):
Yeah.
Right?

So question number one is no evidence that they drew upon this to
justify the ban against black Africans.

Paul Reeve (31:42):
Right.
Correct.

OK, so now what about the racial implications of those verses?

Paul Reeve (31:47):
Yeah.
We can talk through those racializedverses in a variety of ways.
And I don't know, Scott, if you haveyour favorite interpretation or not.
There are several that exist, andI think there are possibilities out
there, but I think it's important tokind of think through them and think
deeply, sort of get below the surface.

Yeah.

Paul Reeve (32:06):
So some have suggested that the language of
black and white is metaphorical.

Yeah.

Paul Reeve (32:12):
And I think there's an internally consistent way
of reading them that way.

Mm-hmm.

Paul Reeve (32:16):
That's one possibility, in other words.

That wickedness is equated with darkness and righteousness
with whiteness or lightness.

Paul Reeve (32:23):
Correct.
And Joseph Smith actually gives usa potential key for that, because in
1840, as he's going through the Bookof Mormon, he is making some word
changes, and one of the word changeshe makes is changing “white” to “pure.”

Mm-hmm.

Paul Reeve (32:38):
So from “white and delightsome,” he changes
it to “pure and delightsome.”

Mm-hmm.

Paul Reeve (32:43):
So is that a key, right?

Possibly.
Possibly.

Paul Reeve (32:47):
Can we read the language about white in the Book
of Mormon as a metaphor for purity?
And there are other verses, right?
That even uses “white” and “pure”coinciding with each other,
as if they, you know, they aresynonymous with each other.

Yeah.

Paul Reeve (33:00):
Is that a key to how we can approach those racialized verses?

It's an intriguing possibility that I'm not sure I'm fully
convinced by yet, but I'm open to it.
Because I read verses, like, you know,Alma 3 is probably the most explicit.

Paul Reeve (33:13):
Yeah.

“The skins of the Lamanites were dark, according to
the mark which was set upon theirfathers, which was a curse upon them
because of their transgression andtheir rebellion against their brethren.
And this was done that their seedmight be distinguished from the seed
of their brethren, the Nephites, thatthereby the Lord God might preserve
his people, that they might not mix.”Like, that kind of sounds very literal,

(33:35):
or at least more than a metaphor.

Paul Reeve (33:37):
Right.

So, yeah, there are a few theories about what this could mean.

Paul Reeve (33:41):
Yeah.

One you've mentioned is that it's metaphorical,
like dark equals wickedness.
Light equals righteousness.
Another is that the Lamanites somehowtribally mark themselves with dark
pigment in a similar way to how theAmlicites in Alma 1 marked themselves
with a red mark on their foreheads todistinguish themselves from the Nephites.

(34:02):
There's an intriguing article inthe Interpreter about this that
we'll link in our show notes.
Another theory is that thislanguage mostly reflects the
racial bias of Nephite authors.
So, like, maybe the Lamanites intermarriedwith some of the indigenous locals, and
so their children were darker-skinned orsomething, and then the Nephites began
to tell themselves the story that God wasthe one who actually changed their skin

(34:25):
color as a mark of a curse or something.

Paul Reeve (34:27):
Yeah.

And another theory is that God just actually
changed their skin color.
Who knows?
The jury's still out for me.
I don't know.
I'm not sure.
Which one do you findmost convincing, Paul?

Paul Reeve (34:37):
Yeah.
So thanks for walking through all ofthat, because, you know, there are
those explanations that exist out there.
I'm also intrigued by apossibility that occurred to me
in reading, you know, 2 Nephi 5.

OK.

Paul Reeve (34:49):
So we focus on, I think, verse 21.
That's the racialized language.
In verse 14, Nephi is telling ussort of the context for how he starts
to think about his brothers, right?
Remember, we're talking about hisactual, biological brothers, right?
In verse 14 he is telling usthat they're starting to make
weapons of war because you mightactually have to kill your brother.

(35:14):
As a historian, anytime nations go to waragainst nations, people against people,
rhetoric from one side looking acrossthe divide to the other side, you start
to dehumanize the enemy in preparationfor the potential of having to kill them.

Mm.

Paul Reeve (35:30):
I do an exercise in my Utah history class around the Utah War,
and there are Latter-day Saint hymnsthat result from that period that are
looking across at these federal soldierswho are marching on Utah, and “if we
have to kill them, well, what we'rekilling are godless heathens,” right?
You define the people you might haveto kill in terms that dehumanize them.

Mm.

Paul Reeve (35:54):
And the federal troops marching on Utah, they are, some
of them, anxious to get to Utahand kill some Mormons, right?
And they're using dehumanizinglanguage in that context as well.
I see one potential is Nephiis dehumanizing his brother.
They're filthy.
They're degraded.
God's cursed them.
We are very much justified in makingweapons of war and potentially having to

(36:19):
kill people who are, in fact, a relative.

Mm.

Paul Reeve (36:22):
That's a way of thinking through the kind of
language that Nephi is deploying.

So that would kind of lend itself toward that theory of racial
bias of the authors of the Book of Mormon.

Paul Reeve (36:32):
Right.

More than God himself doing the thing.

Paul Reeve (36:35):
Right.

OK.

Paul Reeve (36:37):
But regardless of how we think through this, I think the
important point to make is that cursesin the Book of Mormon are not racial.

Hmm.

Paul Reeve (36:46):
Even if we're talking about skin color—if you want to
take it literal, right, that Godzapped them with a different skin
color, I don't believe that's true.
That's just not how we function.

Yeah.

Paul Reeve (36:55):
Right?
Like he did it in this timeand then never does it again?

Mm-hmm.

Paul Reeve (36:59):
Right?

Yeah.

Paul Reeve (36:59):
Skin color is not related to righteousness.
It's simply not.

Right.

Paul Reeve (37:05):
And President Nelson is on record telling us that our relationship
to God is based upon our devotion tohim, not upon the color of our skin.
That's a universaltruth, in my estimation.

Yeah.

Paul Reeve (37:15):
So read the Book of Mormon holistically.
So if you are racially cursed,then if you understand how racism
works, you are racially incapableof overcoming your racial condition.

Mm-hmm.

Paul Reeve (37:29):
That's how people of black African ancestry were treated, right?

Right.

Paul Reeve (37:32):
You are racially inferior, and there's nothing you can do,
no behavior you can engage in—

Ugh.

Paul Reeve (37:38):
—that gets you beyond that.

Oy.

Paul Reeve (37:40):
But in the Book of Mormon, the Lamanites sometimes are more righteous—

Right.

Paul Reeve (37:44):
—than the Nephites.

Yeah.

Paul Reeve (37:45):
It's not a racial curse, in other words.
Repentance erases it, and if you wantto take the skin color literally,
then who wins the Book of Mormon?
The dark-skinned people win and annihilatethose who believe that white superiority
means that you're better than otherpeople because of the color of their skin.

(38:06):
It's a profound rejection as a book—theoverarching message, I should say, is a
profound rejection of white supremacy.

Yeah.

Paul Reeve (38:12):
So in other words, if you want to take those skin colors
literally, then the overarching messageis a rejection of white supremacy.

Mm.

Paul Reeve (38:21):
I don't think you have to take them literally, but it's
important, I think, to recognizethat the curses that are operating
in the Book of Mormon are not racial.
They are parallel, in my estimation,to the way that curses are being
deployed in the Old Testament.

Mm.

Paul Reeve (38:35):
Curses simply mean separation from God because of sin.
And how do you restorethe promised blessings?
You simply repent, andit erases the curse.
And that's what I see taking placeacross the Book of Mormon, even as it
deploys this racialized language thatI think we rightfully find disturbing.

Hmm.
That's interesting.
When you think of the mission of the sonsof Mosiah down to the land of Nephi to try
to convert their brethren, the Lamanites,like the first grand mission of the Book
of Mormon is a redemptive mission for thatgroup of people, our long-lost cousins.
And there's a profound conversion, right?
The whole story of theanti-Nephi-Lehites is amazing.

Paul Reeve (39:14):
Yeah.

And fast forward to the pinnacle of the Book of Mormon.
In 4 Nephi, when Mormonsummarizes this age, he says
there were no longer any -ites.
There was no Nephites, noJacobites, no Josephites.
They were all just one.
One name that unified them wasthey were the children of God.
So I like what you're saying, thatthe arc of the Book of Mormon, like
the scriptural arc is anti-racist.

(39:36):
It ultimately culminates in a—atleast at its best, at its peak of
purity, there is no distinctionsmade, no racial, no any type of -ites.

Paul Reeve (39:44):
Yeah.

They were unified.
They were known as the children of God.
Their only distinguishing characteristic.

Paul Reeve (39:49):
Yeah, I love that.
That's the ideal.

Yeah.

Paul Reeve (39:52):
I think that's the ideal of Zion.

Yeah.

Paul Reeve (39:54):
And it's the culmination.
I think you're exactly right.
After Christ's visit, we've erasedall of those ways that we invented to
create barriers between each other.
The way that we looked across thecultural divide and assumed the worst—

Yeah.

Paul Reeve (40:09):
—of our brethren, right, and denigrated them as racially other.
Inferior.
Filthy.

Yeah.

Paul Reeve (40:16):
Loathsome.
I think that's a central message, right?
I think that's the Zion message, right?

Yeah.

Paul Reeve (40:21):
Inclusion.

Yeah.

Paul Reeve (40:22):
And I think it's embedded in the Book of Mormon, even at the same time
that we have these ways in which thosein the Book of Mormon are attempting
to figure out, “Hey, who is differentfrom us, and how do we sort of negotiate
that?” And sometimes we're going touse language that is denigrating to
define someone who is different from us.

Yeah.

Paul Reeve (40:41):
But the Book of Mormon's message, Jacob says, right, remember your
filthiness before you engage in that.
Consider the beam in your own eye beforeyou start picking at someone else's mote.

Mm.
That's good.
So to summarize a response tothis question, neither of us know
for sure what exactly the curseof darkness on the Lamanites was.
There are some intriguing possibilities.

Paul Reeve (41:05):
Yeah.

But we can still say a few things about it, right?
First, that early church leaders neverdrew upon this Book of Mormon point to
justify the priesthood-temple ban onblack Africans, that was the short answer
to the first part of the question, andsecond that no matter where you come
down on how literal or metaphorical thecurse of darkness on the Lamanites was,

(41:26):
this isn't analogous to the ban on blackAfricans because the Lamanite curse could
be overcome by repentance, and they couldthereby be restored to full covenant
privileges, as we see happen frequentlyin the Book of Mormon text, but not so
with the ban on black Africans, right?

Paul Reeve (41:41):
Right.

The language of the 1907 policy, again, was “no matter how
otherwise worthy they may be,” they cannotparticipate in priesthood or temple.
They were black, and there wasnothing they could do about it.
So you're saying somethingintriguing about this.
You're saying the Lamanite curse wasn'tactually a racial ban in any sense.

Paul Reeve (42:00):
Right.

Yes, the text is clear that there was something that
distinguished them, but it was a somethingthey could overcome through repentance.

Paul Reeve (42:07):
Yeah.

And then I guess our third point is that you and I
both are thoroughly convinced thatthe narrative arc of the Book of
Mormon is toward anti-racism, right?
Toward unifying people in Christin ways that overcome petty
distinctions or tribal differences.
As we come into Christ, those thingsfall away and we are left with a
unified people calling themselvesthe children of God, and that's

(42:31):
the only distinction that matters.
OK, next question.
Since we're on the topic ofscripture, not the Book of Mormon,
but the Book of Abraham, here'sLance from San Tan Valley, Arizona.

(42:53):
He said, “It seems clear that the Bookof Abraham solidifies the so-called
Cain-Ham theory, supporting withscripture the church's old understanding
regarding race and the priesthood.
Please explain how this is either wrongor mistaken.” Then I got Jay, who said,
“Brigham Young and all church leadersafter that would've read and contemplated
Moses 7:6-8, and Abraham 1:21-27.

(43:16):
From these scriptures, it wouldbe understandable as to why they
might have some of their beliefs.
In your podcast, you never onceaddressed these scriptures.” He's
saying that to me and Casey, andthere's actually not a question mark
at the end of Jay's statement there.
That's not a question.
That is an indictment, Jay.
You're right.
We only quickly referencedAbraham 1 in passing.
We said that Parley P․ Pratt seemsto be drawing on that language in

(43:38):
his 1847 excoriation of WilliamMcCary in Winter Quarters.
But, yeah, we should probablyaddress those verses, if you
have a quick way of doing so.
Paul, anything you want tosay about the Abraham verses?
I know in your book you doa good job handling that.

Paul Reeve (43:53):
Yeah.
I think that they did providejustification for the racial
restrictions, especially as theygrow in accumulating precedent.
So the language in the Book of Abraham,“cursed as pertaining to the priesthood,”
starts to be used publicly by the 1850sto justify the racial restrictions.

Hmm.

Paul Reeve (44:12):
There are five publications after the 1852 legislative session, and
I deal with that directly in a new bookthat LeJean Ruth and Christopher Rich
and I co-authored on the 1852 legislativesession and then the aftermath.
There are five publications, andsome Latter-day Saint leaders
are using that shorthand.
So they are drawing upon the Book ofAbraham and never suggested otherwise.

Yeah.

Paul Reeve (44:34):
We just don't have indication that Joseph Smith draws upon it to
justify a racial restriction, but itdoes provide a justification later.
It's important to remember that the Bookof Abraham is not canonized until 1880.

After Brigham Young's gone.

Paul Reeve (44:48):
After Brigham Young's dead.
Exactly.

Yeah.

Paul Reeve (44:50):
And I think the same thing is true about those verses in the
Book of Abraham as is true with ourdiscussion with the Book of Mormon, right?

Mm-hmm.

Paul Reeve (44:59):
So some suggested that it's a racial restriction being
implemented in the Book of Abraham,but remember, Abraham is coming from a
father who is engaged in idol worship.

Yeah.

Paul Reeve (45:09):
So if it's a racial restriction, Abraham and his lineage
would not be allowed to be the fatherof, you know, the Abrahamic Covenant.

Mm-hmm.

Paul Reeve (45:19):
So it's not a lineage issue, it's a repentance issue.
Abraham abandoned the idol worshipof his father and therefore
became the father of the covenant.

He sought for the blessings of the fathers and
the right whereunto he should beordained to administer the same.
He wanted to become a rightful heir,high priest, holding the right belonging
to the fathers, and so, yeah, he'sseeking as one who's not an heir to that.
He wants to become an heir,and he successfully does it
through his righteousness.
That's a good point.

Paul Reeve (45:47):
Yeah.
So once again, I don't seea racial component there.
I think it was misread tojustify a racial restriction.

OK.

Paul Reeve (45:55):
And remember, we have Orson Pratt in 1856, fabulous news speech that
has been transcribed from Pitman shorthandwhere Orson Pratt says, “We have no proof
that Africans are descendants of Cain.”

Yeah.

Paul Reeve (46:08):
That's the only justification Brigham Young ever
gives, and Orson Pratt rejects it.
There is no proof that Africansare descendants of Cain.
And Orson Pratt is onrecord making that point.

Yeah.

Paul Reeve (46:18):
So if you set up sort of a racial lineage justification,
you're going to bump headlong intothe second Article of Faith, that we
are held accountable for our own sins,not for someone else's transgression.

Right.

Paul Reeve (46:32):
And yet Brigham Young's justification holds the supposed
descendants of Cain accountable fora murder in which they take no part.
So any kind of lineage-based explanationthat you're going to offer is going to
violate the second Article of Faith.

Mm-hmm.

Paul Reeve (46:46):
And violate the principle that President Nelson has articulated, right?
Our relations to God is basedupon our devotion to God.

Yeah.

Paul Reeve (46:54):
Not upon skin color or somehow lineage.

So let me read a few verses in Abraham.
How would you justexplain this real quick?
So it talks about how the Kingof Egypt descended from Ham.
I'm starting in verse 21, andhe was a partaker of the blood
of the Canaanites by birth.
There's a—kind of this backstory abouthow the land of Egypt was discovered by
a woman, daughter of Ham and daughter ofEgyptus, and then it goes on to talk about

(47:18):
how—that the first government of Egyptwas established by Pharaoh, the eldest son
of Egyptus, the daughter of Ham, and itwas set up in a patriarchal government.
But then it says, verse 27, “Now Pharaohbeing of that lineage by which he
could not have the right of priesthood,notwithstanding the Pharaohs would fain
claim it from Noah through Ham, therefore,my father was led away by their idolatry.”

(47:40):
So how would you just help someone seethat that's not actually a justification
for a priesthood ban on black Africans?

Paul Reeve (47:47):
Yeah, so some have suggested really the violation there is
matriarchal descent, coming through awoman, but I see really what's taking
place is the idolatry is the problem.

Mm.

Paul Reeve (47:58):
I think what's taking place in those verses, even though it was
used by some Latter-day Saint leadersto justify the racial restrictions, it's
telling us that Pharaoh, in the versespreceding the notion of a cursed lineage,
that Pharaoh is engaged in idol worship.
It also describes him as a righteousman in terms of the way that he's
presiding over his people, buthe's cursed as pertaining to the

(48:20):
priesthood, and if we take those versesin connection with Abraham, right?

Yeah.

Paul Reeve (48:25):
He's abandoning the idol worship of his father, and then
he is the person who the covenantrelationship is established through.
The real issue is idol worship,and repentance overcomes it.

Mm.

Paul Reeve (48:36):
Right?
It's not lineage based.

Yeah.
That's good.
And again, Abraham is showing thathe transcended that through his
righteousness and his seeking.

Paul Reeve (48:45):
Yeah.

I think that's a good reading of that.
I remember Russell Stevenson, he said,“I'll give somebody a 20-ounce steak
if you can show me that verse 27 istalking about those of sub-Sahara Africa.
I'll give you a 20-ounce steak.
Again, the assumptions that early churchleaders had to read into this text to

(49:05):
connect that to black Africans in America,they're taking some serious leaps there.

Paul Reeve (49:09):
Yeah.

But all that's in the air when the church is first established,
right, that blacks are descendantsof Cain and Ham, and all of that's
part and parcel of the nature andstructure of reality, but that's all
assumptive and certainly not scripturaland I think that's been disavowed.

Paul Reeve (49:24):
Yeah, absolutely.
Yeah.

This next question comes from Rob in Arkansas.
He said, “What are your thoughts abouthow to explain the origins of the
priesthood and temple ban in a faithfulmanner to others without throwing past
prophets under the bus, in spite of thefact that human error played a large
part in its implementation for 100years?” Or another person asked it like

this (49:55):
This is Marlene from Salt Lake.
She said, “I work as a therapist,” andshe asked, “If our past prophets were
not infallible and made mistakes withthe priesthood-temple ban for black
people, how can we be assured that thecurrent prophets are not making similar
mistakes about current social issues?
I'd like to know how to help myclients and kids and people in my
book club who have similar questions.”So we have listeners that are trying

(50:15):
to figure out, “How could I explainthis to others better?” Right?
If the reality of propheticfallibility is there, how do we
navigate our current situation?
So how do you explain all ofthis without, as Rob says,
throwing prophets under the bus?

Paul Reeve (50:29):
Yeah․ I value being a part of a religious tradition that is led
by a prophet, but in my estimation,a part of being on a stumbling walk
with God doesn't mean that I cede mymoral conscience over to anyone else.

Mm.

Paul Reeve (50:45):
I am still responsible for my own relationship with God and also
responsible for engaging in the work.
And sometimes, you know, just anobservation, it feels like sometimes
we cede that over to someone else.

Mm.

Paul Reeve (51:01):
Brigham Young in particular encouraged us not to do that.
He encouraged us, in fact,to find out for ourselves.

Yeah.

Paul Reeve (51:08):
To do the work that it takes.
We're supposed to workout our own salvation.
It doesn't mean that we letsomeone else figure it out and
then just blindly follow behind.
Brigham Young actually encouragedagainst blind devotion.

Mm-hmm.
I happen to have that BrighamYoung quote right here.
Would you like me to read it?

Paul Reeve (51:25):
Yes.

OK․ Brigham Young said,
“I am more afraid that this people haveso much confidence in their leaders that
they will not inquire for themselvesof God whether they are led by him.
I am fearful they settled down in astate of blind security, trusting their
eternal destiny in the hands of theirleaders with a reckless confidence that
in itself would thwart the purposesof God in their salvation and weaken

(51:49):
that influence they could give to theirleaders, did they know for themselves by
the revelation of Jesus that they are ledin the right way.” And then he says, “Let
every man and woman know by the whisperingof the Spirit of God to themselves,
whether their leaders are walking inthe path the Lord dictates or not.
This has been my exhortationcontinually.” So there you go.

Paul Reeve (52:11):
Yeah.
So I think, you know, it's a mistakesometimes for us as Latter-day
Saints to put our leaders onsuch high pedestals that it does
both them and us a disservice.
We become lazy in our own faith.
Faith doesn't grow unless you have toexercise it, unless it becomes challenged.
And that's a part of the path ofdiscipleship, in my estimation.

Yeah.

Paul Reeve (52:34):
I'm on a stumbling walk with God.
I continue to make mistakes, but alsomy engagement in the religious tradition
includes considering the things thatLatter-day Saint leaders are teaching and
consider them in all patience and faith,as the Doctrine and Covenants recommends.

Mm-hmm.

Paul Reeve (52:52):
And taking them to God and wrestling that out for myself,
and I then am accountable to God.
And I'm comfortable withthat relationship, and yet
it requires me effort, right?
And sometimes the other path feelslike you've just given over your
moral agency to someone else, andI don't know that that's what it

(53:14):
means to be a disciple of Christ.

I really like what you're saying, Paul.
Let me maybe add a related thoughtdirectly to Rob's question about
how do you explain all this withoutthrowing prophets under the bus.
Rob, I'd just briefly add thatwe don't need to throw prophets
under the bus, but we may in ourteaching need to recalibrate our
understanding of prophets just a little.
For instance, it's only shocking tolearn about the weaknesses and errors

(53:38):
of prophets if we begin with thebelief that they don't have weaknesses
and they don't commit errors, right?

Paul Reeve (53:44):
Yes.

So if we can begin with the more accurate premise that
prophets are flawed humans whom Godcalls to do his work, then when they
do display weaknesses or commit errors,it's not shocking or scandalous at all.
So if we can normalize propheticfallibility by noticing and learning
from the prophetic weaknesses and errorsmemorialized in our own scriptural canon,

(54:06):
then I think this will go a long wayin our study of church history as well.

Paul Reeve (54:09):
Yeah.

So that's a thought, for what it's worth.
And to Marlene's question about how wecan be sure that current prophets aren't
making mistakes in their stances oncurrent social issues, et cetera, Paul,
I think you hit that right on the head,but what you're saying is tough and

requires spiritual maturity (54:24):
you know, the ability to simultaneously sustain
God's prophets with patience and faithon the one hand, while on the other
hand not doing what Brigham Young warnedagainst and settle down in blind security,
trusting our eternal destiny in the handsof our leaders with reckless confidence.
Like, that's a delicate balance.

Paul Reeve (54:43):
Yeah.

And I believe it requires us to learn to discern, like, truly
discern the Spirit of God in our lives,just like Brigham Young was saying.
And so don't let anyonetell you that's easy.
What would you add to that?

Paul Reeve (54:56):
I love it.
I think that's just well said.
Yeah.

Let me ask another question.
Justin from Riverton asks, “Godcould have easily communicated his
will to any of the prophets, right?
He could have overruledany of their objections.
It didn't matter what theirsociety or culture told them.
God's supreme authority would've trumpedanything these prophets erroneously

believed.” Here's his question (55:20):
“So why didn't he clearly communicate to any of
them that it was his will that all hischildren would receive the blessings
of the priesthood and the temple?”

Paul Reeve (55:30):
Yeah, because he did.
Joseph Smith claims five revelationstelling him that the gospel is to
be preached unto every creature.

Mm.

Paul Reeve (55:38):
Who does that leave out?
It's in the Doctrine andCovenants five times.

Yeah.

Paul Reeve (55:42):
He did.
But he also gives us our agency toignore the revelations he gives us.

Mm.

Paul Reeve (55:47):
He tells Joseph Smith twice, “I am no respecter of persons,”
and he claims all flesh as his own.
What color of flesh doesJesus Christ not claim?
What color of flesh is excludedfrom his redemptive power?

Oof.

Paul Reeve (55:59):
And yet he gives us the agency to ignore those revelations.

Good point.

Paul Reeve (56:04):
And I think that's exactly what happens.
You know, the historical circumstancesand changing circumstances, and we
see this take on a life of its own andgrow in accumulating precedent, right?
Ezra Taft Benson, as an elder, talks aboutthe Samuel principle in a talk he gives.
I think it's 1975 or 1976.

(56:25):
He uses the notion that the childrenof Israel come to Samuel and say, you
know, “Give us a king,” and Samuel'slike, “No.” And they continue to insist.
And finally God says, “Well,Samuel, they haven't rejected you.
They rejected me.
Give them a king, and let them sufferthe consequences.” And that's, like,
a 400-year kind of consequence.

Yes.

Paul Reeve (56:44):
Like, this is not sort of, like, a on a whim kind of a
thing with short-term consequences.

Mm.

Paul Reeve (56:50):
You know, they fall into idolatry, and all of
those kind of challenges we seeplay out in the Old Testament.
And President Benson callsit the Samuel principle.
Sometimes God gives us what we wantand lets us suffer the consequences.
He did not come down and stop BrighamYoung from saying the terrible things
that he said on the 5th of February 1852.
He let him say those things and letthem grow in accumulating precedent.

Yeah.

Paul Reeve (57:14):
He doesn't save us from our own sins.
That's a violation of the plan, right?
He lets me sin every singleday if I want to sin.

Mm.

Paul Reeve (57:23):
That's agency.
If you give human beings agency,things are going to get messy.
It's inevitable.

Mm.

Paul Reeve (57:28):
If you study history at all, you understand that it's messy,
and that doesn't all of a suddenget tidy when I cross over and start
studying Latter-day Saint history.

Yeah.

Paul Reeve (57:38):
So I think the key to me is agency, and God is not
going to violate our agency.
He's not going to violatethe agency of a prophet.

Yeah.
So what about in, like, the 20thcentury after Brigham Young's day?
Like, why didn't God just comedown and correct the error?
What about that?

Paul Reeve (57:54):
Yeah.
You know, the answer in the 20thcentury is that these explanations
become so entrenched that theleadership believes that they
They're not doing historical research.
We have Lester Bush, who publishesin 1973 an article that called into
question the standing narrative.

Yeah.

Paul Reeve (58:15):
He says there is no evidence that the racial restrictions
So historians start to unravelthe cultural assumptions.

Yeah.

Paul Reeve (58:23):
But you also have those in the leadership who simply say, “Hey,
this is the way it's always been.
We shouldn't question it.

Right.

Paul Reeve (58:31):
And in the book, I use the quote from President
Romney, who says that.
He says, “I know President Kimballis praying about this and searching
about this and is really investing timeand energy in this, and I said, you
know, ‘Why are you wasting your time?
This is just the way that it'salways been, and we should
continue to stick with it.’”

Mm-hmm.

Paul Reeve (58:48):
That's a paraphrase.
The direct quote is in the book,but nonetheless, I'm saying
that's the inertia that PresidentKimball is fighting against.

Mm-hmm.

Paul Reeve (58:58):
The cultural assumptions is that it's always been in place and we
should just spend our energy defending it.
And President Kimball does the oppositeand starts to investigate, right?

Wow.

Paul Reeve (59:07):
And calls into question the standing narrative.

Yeah.

Paul Reeve (59:11):
And asks the leadership also, “OK, where are
the scriptural justifications?”And they can't come up with any.
And you have other leaders, like Hugh B.
Brown, who is saying there'sno revelation that begins it.
Let's get rid of it by policy vote, right?

Yeah.

Paul Reeve (59:27):
But you have some in the leadership who are resistant to that
and suggest that these teachings are soentrenched that it will take a revelation.
So there is no consensus.
And that helps us to account forwhy it, you know, drags into the
second half of the 20th century.

So it seems like, and maybe Casey and I have been too reductive
on this, but our simple response to thathas been the Lord never told them because
they never asked, certainly not unified.
There's some secondhand accounts thatPresident McKay was maybe asking and
the Lord said not yet, or something.
I don't know if you have anything else tosay about President McKay, but it seems
like this one needed a unified approach.
The Lord needed them to ask himhumbly and unitedly in order

(01:00:05):
for the revelation to come.

Paul Reeve (01:00:07):
Yeah.

Scott Woodward (01:00:07):
So I don't know: Is that too reductive, he didn't
tell them because they didn't ask?
And you're saying, Well, yeah, theydidn't ask because it was so entrenched
that they felt like that was just theway it was, that there was no reason to
ask, is kind of what I'm hearing you say.

Yeah.
Yeah, I think that's a goodway of putting it, Scott.
I think that's right.
And the accounts in the McKayadministration, the only accounts
that I could find were alwayssecondhand and in McKay's own diary.
He never claims that.

That he asked the Lord about this directly?

Yeah.
Right.

Yeah.

Right.
But what I see is a lack ofunity and a lack of consensus.
So I see people like Hugh B.
Brown and even President McKay movingtowards, I think, racial openness.

Mm-hmm.

And Hugh B.
Brown simply trying, I think, workingbehind the scenes in the 1960s, trying
to move the church forward on this issuebecause he's convinced it's just a policy.
And President McKay comes to thatconclusion himself, and Hugh B.
Brown simply says, “If it's a policy,let's get rid of it by policy vote, right?

Yeah.

And yet people like Harold B.
Lee are entrenched in the racial policies.

Yeah.
They're ready to defend it, right?
As they want to be defenders of the truth.

Yes.

Yeah.
I don't see them beingobstinate for obstinancy's sake.
I've thought about, as we've beenstudying Paul recently in Come, Follow
Me, that Paul was so determined to,like, stamp out this little movement of
Jesus freaks who were trying to do thisaberration from the true Judaism, right?
Until he met Jesus and thenhe realized, “Oh, shoot.
I've been defending the wrong thing.”And that's what I hear Elder McConkie

(01:01:41):
saying in 1978 in August when he's like,“Forget everything I've said about this.
I was trying to defend, yes, I was tryingto defend it because I believed it was
true, but now I have learned that itwasn't true.” And so I don't see Harold B.
Lee or Bruce R.
McConkie or anyone doing that to beobstinate, but they actually believed it.
They actually believed that thisbegan with Joseph Smith, and
it was something that deserveddefending rather than overturning.

Yeah, I think that's right.
I think that's a good way to put it.

Mm.
And before we move on to the nextquestion, Paul, let me just ask
about what your understanding isabout the importance of unity.
It seems like that was the key piecein 1978 when President Kimball was
able to get the First Presidencyand Twelve unified with him in
asking the Lord about this, that'swhen the magic happened, right?
That's when the revelation came.
Anything you want to say aboutthe importance of the unity

(01:02:26):
in the Twelve at that time?

I think that's key.
I think there's a lack of consensus duringPresident McKay's presidency, and I think
that President Kimball learns from thatand goes about a process wherein he is
cultivating for years, cultivating a newunderstanding and cultivating consensus—

Yeah.

—amongst the leadership, asking them to consider these questions,
asking them to study it out, askingthem to write some reports: where
are the scriptural justifications?

Mm-hmm.

And cultivating kind of a new understanding, asking them
to be open about the possibility.
So I think he's laying the groundwork,and I think he understands that principle
of consensus and is building consensusso that they have this unifying and
what everyone involved expresses as aprofound spiritual experience on June

(01:03:21):
1, 1978 in the temple, and I think hedid the work beforehand that opened
the door for that to take place.

I love that.
I was talking to a stakepresident yesterday.
He was just saying thanks for this series.
It's been helpful.
He said, “My major takeaway as astake president has been I need
to seek consensus more in my stakecouncil as I'm making decisions
relative to my stake rather thansaying, ‘This is where we're going.
This is how we're going to move forward,’instead slowing down a little bit and

(01:03:48):
making sure we build consensus, especiallyabout important issues.” And he said that
the feeling has been very different, thatfeeling of unity and peace and harmony
and a reassurance to him that, “Yes,I'm actually being guided by the spirit
here.” If there's ever any question,then let's counsel about it and make sure
that the Spirit of the Lord is in this.
And when you get consensus among adiversity of people like that, in that

(01:04:09):
setting, that can bolster your confidencethat you're doing the Lord's will.
I thought that was right on.

Yeah, I love that, and I think there are historical examples
where the lack of consensus leads,you know, in the opposite direction.
And I think the most horrific exampleis the Mountain Meadows Massacre,
where William Dame did call the highcouncil together, and they all said,
like, “Hey, if there are travelersstranded, we should go rescue them.
That's the consensus, right?

(01:04:35):
And then it's after the dismissal of thecouncil that Isaac Haight pins William
Dame one-on-one and gets a differentanswer from him to call out the militia.

Mm.

So without the mitigating council, right, you
have horrific consequences.

Mm.

And I'm also reminded of the entry that George Q.
Cannon makes at the end of BrighamYoung's life, where he says that, you
know, some members of the Quorum of theTwelve are concerned that Brigham Young
sometimes operated outside of consensus.
And I don't have the referenceright in front of me.
Scott, I know that youhave used that before.

Oh, I have it right here.

OK.

Yeah, George Q.
Cannon, he says, so this isjournal entry August 29, 1877.
So shortly after Brigham Youngdied, and Elder George Q.
Cannon says, “Some of my brethren,”speaking of the Twelve, “as I have learned
since the death of President BrighamYoung, did have feelings concerning his
course, that they did not approve of it.
They felt oppressed, and yet they darednot exhibit their feelings to him.

(01:05:39):
He ruled with so strong and stiff ahand, and they felt that it would be
of no use to let their voices be heard.
In a few words, the feeling seems tobe that he transcended the bounds of
the authority which he legitimatelyheld, and some even feel that in
the promulgation of doctrine he tookliberties beyond those to which he was
legitimately entitled.” That's the quote.

(01:05:59):
Now, that's not specifically about therace issue here, but I think that totally
applies, and we see a missed opportunityhere for the mitigating, I like what
you're saying, influence of a council.
If Brigham Young could have just sat down,especially with Orson Pratt and others,
and just said, “Here's what I'm thinking.
Here's my understanding.
Do you concur?
Do you feel in harmony with me about that?

(01:06:19):
Is this something that we can all agreeon and we can move forward in this way?
And it's clear that hedid not do that, right?
And we have Orson Pratt standing up andopposing him in the legislative meetings.
And so, yeah, it appears that therewas an opportunity lost there of the
power of consensus and harmony inthe highest councils of the church.
And so.

Yes.

That's lesson learned, right?
That's something about like,OK, how can we learn from this
history to be better, to improve?
What are the lessonsthat we can take away?
That's one of my big takeaways.
I agree with that stake president.
Let's just make sure we'recounseling together about our
decisions and our conclusionsin whatever sphere of influence.
We happen to occupy at the time, whetherin our own families or all the way up

(01:07:00):
to the leading councils of the church.

I like that.
And I think it's importantto include stake council,
not just high council, right?

Mm-hmm.
Mm-hmm.

And ward council, right?
And listen to all the voices.

Yes.

Give them weight.
Don't be dismissive.

Beautiful.
Well, Paul, this has been such a treatto get your thoughts and insights.
I know there's so much more to probe, andthere's more questions we were not able

(01:07:38):
to get to, but let me just ask you thislast question to bring us home: Paul, how
can we as Latter-day Saints heed PresidentNelson's call to lead out in abandoning
attitudes and actions of prejudice?

Yeah, I think that's really profound call to action and it
means we have to act, and it means,in my estimation, that we can't become
defensive or deny our own racial history.
I don't know as a historian how you rootout racism without examining its roots.

Mm.

And I think history, then, can actually serve as
a catalyst for greater good.

Mm.

If we can learn the weight of our own racial history,
not deny or defend it, not getdefensive, but actually own it.

Mm.

Then I think we can adopt a position of power.
We can actually lead out, becausewe can say, “We engaged in racism
and have learned its consequences.”

Mm.

“And now are ready to stand in places of empathy and move
forward in matters of racial justice.”

Yeah.

I think, what better people than Latter-day Saints to heed his call?
I think we should be at the forefrontof matters of racial justice.
That's what he's asked us to do.
I hear that as the call comingfrom the First Presidency.
And to do so, I think we have to cometo terms with our own racial history,
understand its consequences, and then bewilling to stand in places of empathy.

Hmm.

That includes listening to our brothers and sisters who might
be different from us, who might lookdifferent from us, and do so with
virtue and holiness—to esteem ourbrothers and sisters as ourself is
the call of the disciple of JesusChrist, and to esteem our brothers and

(01:09:25):
sisters as ourselves is to recognizethat because someone else's skin color
might be different from mine, theymight have different life experiences.
And rather than become defensive, I needto esteem them as myself in virtue and
holiness the Doctrine and Covenants says.

Mm.

That's my obligation as a disciple of Christ, right?

Mm.

I think that's the call of a disciple, and I think Latter-day Saints
are primed and prepared, but first of all,we have to own our own racial history,
understand its consequences, and likeMoroni asked us to do, to use the mistakes
of the past to learn to be more wise.
And our own racial history can teachus to be more wise on racial matters.

Yes.

I think we're a people who do well when we come together,
and the call is for us to, amidst ourdiversity, be inclusive and unified.
That's the vision ofZion that I believe in.

Thank you for listening to this episode of Church History Matters.
This concludes our serieson race and priesthood.
For more of Dr.
Paul Reeve's excellent scholarship, wehighly recommend beginning with his book,
Let's Talk About Race and Priesthood.
Today's episode was produced andedited by Scott Woodward, with show
notes and transcript by Gabe Davis.

(01:10:48):
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,
where everything is availablefor free because of the generous

(01:11:10):
donations of people like you.
Thank you so much for beinga part of this with us.

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