Joseph Smith's Quorum of the Anointed, 1842-1845: A Documentary History

ISBN: 1560851864

Author: Anderson, Devery S.

Condition: New

Joseph Smiths Quorum of the Anointed The first Latter-day Saint temple ceremonies were performed, not in Kirtland, Ohio, but on the second floor of Joseph Smiths Red Brick Store in Nauvoo, Illinois. For nearly four years beginning in 1842, the prophets modest mercantile functioned as the de facto temple?the site of the first washings, anointings, endowments, and sealings. In contrast, the grand edifice known as the Nauvoo Temple was in operation for only two months before the Saints left Illinois for the West.Preparations to initiate the first members of Joseph Smiths Quorum of the Anointed, or Holy Order, as it was also known, were made on May 3, 1842. The walls of the second level of the Red Brick Store were painted with garden-themed murals, the rooms fitted with carpets, potted plants, and a veil hung from the ceiling. All the while, the ground level continued to operate as Joseph Smiths general mercantile.In this companion volume to The Nauvoo Endowment Companies and The Development of LDS Temple Worship, 1846-2000: A Documentary History, the editors have assembled all available primary references to the Anointed Quorum and its regular gatherings, both in the Red Brick Store and elsewhere (women were initially washed and anointed in Emma Smiths bedroom and then escorted to the store) prior to the opening of the Nauvoo Temple. The sources include excerpts from the diaries of William Clayton, Joseph Fielding, Zina D. H. Jacobs, Heber C. Kimball, John Taylor, Willard Richards, George A. Smith, Joseph Smith, Wilford Woodruff, and Brigham Young; autobiographies and reminiscences by Joseph C. Kingsbury, George Miller, and Mercy Fielding Thompson; letters from Vilate Kimball and Lucius N. Scoville; the Manuscript History of Brigham Young; General Record of the Seventies, Book B; Bathsheba W. Smiths unedited testimony from the 1892 Temple Lot Case; other manuscripts such as the Historians Office Journal and Meetings of Anointed Quorum; and published records such as the History of the Church, Latter Day Saints Messenger and Advocate and Times and Seasons.from the jacket flap:Despite the secrecy imposed upon members of the Anointed Quorum, word of the gatherings above Joseph Smiths store soon spread. In one instance, housekeeper Maria Jane Johnston helped prepare the special ceremonial clothing for John Smith to wear at the groups meetings. In another, Ebenezer Robinson innocently opened the upstairs door at the mercantile and was startled to see church apostle John Taylor in a long white robe and turban, carrying a sword. Only Nauvoos elite were invited to participate in these new ceremonies?never more than ninety individuals and even fewer during Joseph Smiths lifetime?and, as the editors of the current volume write, only those who had been introduced to the prophets doctrine of plural marriage.An unusual aspect of the Quorum of the Anointed, compared to the membership in the Nauvoo Masonic Lodge, was that women were initiated as regular members. However, the women effectively disappear after Brigham Youngs assumption of leadership in 1844, following Joseph Smiths death, and remain virtually absent until the Nauvoo Temple is completed nearly a year and a half later. Readers will also note some of the differences in protocol between what Smith instigated and what Young eventually settled on, for instance that members could be washed and anointed repeatedly but were endowed only once. There were not yet proxy ordinances.Among Latter-day Saints today, temple worship is a sensitive topic; but the editors of this volume do not reveal anything that would be considered invasive or indelicate. In fact, the accounts, which come almost exclusively from the early LDS leadership itself, manifest discretion about what to report.Never before have these primary, authoritative sources been correlated by date for comparison and fuller understanding of the gradual development of the temple ceremonies. Readers may fin