While it was difficult for the Latter-day Saints to establish and build and furbish what became Nauvoo, Illinois, out of the little hamlets that existed there on the peninsula in the Mississippi River

in the community that later became known as Nauvoo,

it was also a very, very exciting time.

Coming up next on “The Joseph Smith Papers,”

Developments in Nauvoo.

KJZZ Television, in cooperation with the Church History Department of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, presents this weekly series highlighting the research of scholars and historians as they prepare for the publication of The Joseph Smith Papers. And now your host, Glenn Rawson.

Nauvoo was indeed an exciting and a growing place.

Joseph once described the Church as a child that had to come of age. On many respects, it was in Nauvoo where doctrines and practices were revealed that caused the Church to mature significantly.

In our show today, our scholars will discuss some of those developments in early Nauvoo, developments that were initiated

by Joseph Smith himself.

Joseph is now standing on his own. By 1842, ’43, he’s the subject of a major biography.

So more and more, Mormonism is identified with Joseph. Joseph is the center of the Mormon story.

It all revolves around his experiences, his visions, his directions. I think that’s important because, by the Nauvoo period, Joseph . . .

many of the people who had been close to him are now gone—

the Whitmers, even Sidney Rigdon has had less, is less of an influence because of some of their conflict.

Others who had been involved in so many things had either gone sour for a short time at the end of the Kirtland period or simply left the Church.

These men just couldn’t— they could,

they could accept the idea of continued revelation, but they couldn't accept the implications of continued revelation, that the Kingdom would grow, that it would change, that its institutions would change.

The coming to America by the British Saints after the Twelve Apostles’ mission to England enriched the city of Nauvoo in many ways.

Now, in the six years between the beginning of the British Mormon emigration and the exodus from Nauvoo, that would be 1840 to 1845,

more than 4,600 Latter-day Saints sailed from the British Isles and reached the United States, with Nauvoo as their primary destination. Toward the end of the Nauvoo period,

British Mormon immigrants made up about a fourth or so of Nauvoo’s population, and then there were people out

beyond that. The immigrants brought many skills,

but opportunities to use them in Nauvoo were often lacking.

They came from a highly developed industrial society,

and there was some hope that this would facilitate the establishment of industries in Nauvoo.

One area in which the immigrants made a noticeable impact was in keeping of records.

We're talking about both written records and visual records.

Everywhere one turned, it seemed,

a “clark,” as they would pronounce “clerk” in the British Isles, was keeping track of things.

William Clayton arrived in Nauvoo from England in December of 1840. He served as Joseph Smith's private secretary.

He played a major role in the preparation of the Prophet’s history.

We have Sutcliffe Maudsley from the British Isles, who was basically a profile painter.

Maudsley did a number of profiles of Joseph Smith, Emma Smith,

their children, other individuals in Nauvoo, and gives us a very valuable visual record of people in Nauvoo. Another artist who helped record Nauvoo is William W. Major from the British Isles, who was a portrait painter.

One of the best known of his paintings is called “Joseph Smith and His Friends,” painted shortly before Joseph Smith’s death in 1844. Other

Latter-day Saint immigrants to Nauvoo who helped preserve

Nauvoo history include George Cannon,

who was a coproducer of the death masks of Joseph and Hyrum Smith. Other British immigrants who had some kind of influence on Nauvoo society included William Pitt, with his

Nauvoo Brass Band, John M. Kay, who was a popular vocal soloist at the time and also played instrumental music. We could count probably Alexander Neibaur, who, although he was born in Alsace-Lorraine, was converted in the British Isles and taught German and Hebrew to the Prophet Joseph Smith.

We learned in an earlier show that Nauvoo was an opportunity for Joseph to more fully develop his vision for a city of the Saints. Now, in accordance with that,

there were doctrines that had been revealed to Joseph in earlier days that he now felt able to

or even compelled to implement in Nauvoo.

Joseph Smith had those wonderful series of visions that we know recorded in section 110 of the Doctrine and Covenants—

the appearance of the Savior, the appearance of Elijah,

who clearly brings the final priesthood keys to Joseph.

We know that that account was recorded a few days after it was experienced in the Kirtland Temple in Joseph Smith's own journal.

It’s recorded in Warren Cowdery’s hand.

Far as we know, it was never printed or available to a Church member while Joseph Smith was alive.

The average member of the Church I don’t think knew about what we have as section 110.

But they had it in an indirect way.

Joseph gave at least two, really three sermons during the Nauvoo period that we have some record of

in which he talked about the sealing powers and the need to do work for the dead and

how important that was to bind our departed ones with us now and how to bind each other together as living members.

It’s as if there’s no question that Joseph’s received it, but now let’s put it to work. Let’s now go do what we have the authority to do.

One of those events of great moment, when Joseph taught doctrine that changed the whole direction of the Church, came on the fifteenth of August 1840.

Joseph preached the funeral sermon of Seymour Brunson.

It proved to be very consequential.

Prior to this time, Joseph Smith had delivered to the Saints, periodically and from disparate sources, several things that had in some ways whetted their appetite for an understanding of

the postmortal world.

In a revelation that was received by Joseph Smith in September

1832, what we now know as section 84 of the Doctrine and Covenants, he said, “Verily, verily, I say unto you,

they who believe not on your words, and are not baptized in water in my name, for the remission of their sins, that they may receive the Holy Ghost, shall be damned,

and shall not come into my Father’s kingdom,

where my Father and I am.”

Here, Joseph Smith underscored the essential

need for baptism. On the twenty-first of January 1836,

in what we now call section 137 of the Doctrine and Covenants,

Joseph Smith received this information:

“The heavens were opened upon us, and I beheld the celestial kingdom.

I saw Father Adam and Abraham; and my father and my mother;

my brother Alvin, that has long since slept;

and marveled how it was that he had obtained an inheritance in that kingdom,

seeing that he had departed this life before the Lord had set his hand to gather Israel the second time,

and had not been baptized for the remission of sins.

Thus came the voice of the Lord unto me, saying, all who have died without a knowledge of this gospel, who would have received it if they had been permitted to tarry, shall be heirs of the celestial kingdom of God.

And all that shall die henceforth without a knowledge of it,

who would have received it with all their hearts, shall be heirs of that kingdom.” Well here, very clearly,

if one takes seriously what Joseph said about the necessity of baptism, and yet Joseph Smith was able to visualize his brother Alvin in the celestial realm,

there is a suggestion that something was required in order to facilitate that important status for his brother

and all people who were like that.

Clearly, line upon line, revelation had been received that

prepared the Saints for work for the dead.

This doctrine had an immediate impact on the people.

That was really revolutionary.

Oh, it’s true that, down through the years, a few groups had restored the principle.

There were some Baptists in Pennsylvania or Philadelphia, or in the Pennsylvania area that read the scriptures and then started doing some baptisms for the dead.

That was very, very unusual. But Joseph associated this ordinance with the temple as one of the first temple ordinances that was actually unfolded. And when the Latter-day Saints in the summer of 1840 learned the principle baptism for the dead, they were so excited, they went down the Mississippi and began performing baptisms.

They did it in the streams in the area.

The Lord allows us to make mistakes.

That's a good thing, isn't it?

But the members of the Church didn’t keep a record of what they were doing, and men stood for women,

and the Lord wasn’t too pleased, until eventually the people learned there needed to be a recorder

and there needed to be a witness for the particular ordinance.

In December of 1840, Joseph wrote a letter to the Twelve Apostles who were in England,

explaining to them the doctrine of baptism for the dead.

“I presume the doctrine of baptism for the dead has ere this reached your ears,

and may have raised some inquiries in your mind respecting the same. I cannot in this letter give you all the information you may desire on the subject.

I first mentioned the doctrine in public while preaching the funeral sermon of Brother Brunson and have since then given general instructions to the Church on the subject.

The Saints have the privilege of being baptized for those of their relatives who are dead,

who they feel to believe would have embraced the gospel if they had been privileged with hearing it,

and who have received the gospel in the Spirit through the instrumentality of those who may have been commissioned to preach to them while in prison. Without enlarging on the subject, you will undoubtedly see its consistency

and reasonableness. And it presents the gospel of Christ in probably a more enlarged scale than some have viewed it.”

Not even to Joseph did the Lord reveal everything all at once.

As Joseph’s understanding expanded of the doctrine, he taught it to the Saints.

In February of 1845, President Brigham Young said this in retrospect of Joseph and this doctrine:

“John said that full revelation is not always given at once.

I recollect when I first came back from England,

a revelation came to Brother Joseph informing him that it was the privilege of the Saints to be baptized for and redeem their deceased relatives,

but the particulars connected with the ordinance to be performed to bring about this redemption was not revealed at the time the revelation was first given.

Joseph, in his lifetime,

did not receive everything connected with the doctrine of redemption.

But he has left the key with those who understand how to obtain and teach to this great people

all that is necessary for their salvation and exaltation in the celestial kingdom of our God.”

It would be subsequently revealed to Joseph, and he would teach it to the Saints, that baptisms for the dead must be performed in the holy temple,

and that eyewitnesses

and recorders must be present at all times to conform to the will of the Lord.

Now as to how important this doctrine was,

please consider these two statements.

Underscoring the importance of this new revelatory ordinance to the Latter-day Saints,

this whole new concept about seeking after their dead to ensure that the ordinances of the gospel were performed for them,

he then said, “And now, my dearly beloved brethren and sisters,

let me assure you that these are principles in relation to the dead and the living that cannot be lightly passed over as pertaining to our salvation. For their salvation is necessary and essential to our salvation,

as Paul says concerning the fathers, that they without us cannot be made perfect,

neither can we without our dead be made perfect.”

I just want to underscore how important this revelation was to subsequent prophets. Again, to the Latter-day Saints in Paris, Idaho, on the 31st of August 1873,

President Brigham Young said, “This doctrine of baptism for the dead is a great doctrine—

one of the most glorious doctrines that was revealed to the human family—and there are light, power, glory, honor, and immortality in it.”

As baptism for the dead was revealed,

changes were made in the design of the Nauvoo Temple to accommodate the ordinance.

Because the baptism for the dead was to be under the other portions of the temple in the basement,

or at least other ordinances were to be performed above

the baptismal font, in most instances, the buildings of the age of the Prophet Joseph Smith have very shallow basements, like

the Kirtland Temple. If you had gone down to the Kirtland temple,

you’d see there would not have been space for a baptismal font.

And so at the same time that Joseph unfolded in public the principle of baptism for the dead,

he unfolded the principle that we're going to build a temple.

So, from the very beginning, William Weeks, the architect, had this responsibility of seeing that there was a basement sufficiently deep that it could hold a baptismal font. So when the Latter-day Saints built the Nauvoo temple, they built a deep basement,

and then they built a baptismal font similar to the ones in all of our temple today, with the 12 oxen. Another distinction that emerged in Nauvoo was Joseph’s greater visibility with the Church periodical, “The Times and Seasons.” It was the fourth of the Church periodicals, initially began in 1832. Joseph became the editor of Nauvoo’s “Times and Seasons” in the spring of 1842, and immediately he began to publish wonderful things to the Saints.

In the March 1, 1842, issue,

the opening article was the first publication of the three-part series that ended up in the Times and Seasons regarding the Book of Abraham.

It was very important— this revelation which had been of concern to Joseph,

was finally seeing itself in print. Following right on the heels, indeed the next article,

was a piece called “Church History.”

This piece called “Church History” we’ve come to know as the Wentworth letter.

It was very, very important in the Prophet Joseph Smith's lifetime.

It has become, we’ve become, I suppose, somewhat casual about it because of our knowledge of it, but no less a person than Elder Bruce R. McConkie once identified it as one of the five most important documents produced by the Church outside of the four standard works.

The Wentworth letter is named for newspaperman John Wentworth of Chicago. A friend of Wentworth’s, George Barstow of New Hampshire, was writing a history of his state.

He wrote a letter to Wentworth and asked him if he would request of Joseph Smith

a representative history of his people.

Joseph responded willingly and wrote the history.

Now while neither Barstow nor Wentworth included the history in their publications, Joseph did in the Times and Seasons.

It's a very interesting piece.

It's about 60 column inches long,

and it can be identified in really five segments.

The next segment after the introduction is about five inches regarding Joseph Smith's First Vision, and one might think, well, that’s a natural sequence.

The First Vision had never been produced in print by Joseph Smith prior to this time. This is the first publication about the First Vision by the Prophet Joseph Smith that had ever found its way into print. He then began a description of the coming forth of the Book of Mormon—

16 column inches, which gives some indication about the importance that Joseph Smith was applying to

the coming forth of the Book of Mormon.

And in it, he made the very interesting observation that,

during that period of time between 1823 and 1827,

he was visited by many angels,

note of which appears nowhere else in any of his production

regarding his past and the history of the Church. Following that is 17 column inches to the history of the persecutions of the Latter-day Saints,

of which Joseph Smith had just himself witnessed. It was still likely fresh on his mind, his experience both in the Liberty Jail and then the disappointment of going to Washington.

And he wanted the

people of America to to read of this.

The next segment of the Wentworth letter is widely known and often quoted.

It's a powerful statement of optimism and faith.

It has come to be called by us the Standard of Truth.

“Our missionaries are going forth to different nations,

and in Germany, Palestine, New Holland,” which was a reference to Australia and

“the East Indies, and other places,

the standard of truth has been erected:

no unhallowed hand can stop the work from progressing.

Persecutions may rage, mobs may combine, armies may assemble,

calumny may defame, but the truth of God will go forth boldly,

nobly, and independent till it has penetrated every continent,

visited every clime, swept every country,

and sounded in every ear, till the purposes of God shall be accomplished and the great Jehovah shall say the work is done.”

The last generalization that is in the

the Barstow Wentworth letter was eight inches of doctrine,

eight column inches of doctrine.

The statements began,

“We believe in God, the Eternal Father, and in his Son, Jesus Christ, and in the Holy Ghost.”

We know them today as the Articles of Faith,

but it was a public presentation by Joseph Smith,

a summarization of some of the most salient and important doctrines that had been given.

And very clearly their shelf life has lasted a very long time because they still have great place in Latter-day Saint thinking and Latter-day Saint theology.

It was also at this time, in May of 1842,

that the natural extension of work for the dead was revealed.

Temple endowments were administered for the first time.

The first week of May 1842,

after years of revelatory information, privately

the Prophet Joseph Smith introduced what we now consider today the endowment that was made available to 5,000 Latter-day Saints in the Nauvoo Temple in the aftermath of Joseph Smith's death.

This was a very, very important step in preparing the Latter-day Saints for the spiritual blessings that they needed in order to not only carry on in this life,

but also to serve them and their eternal destiny in the postmortal world.

This particular ordinance was so different that

the nine men found it difficult to embrace it. Hyrum was a little concerned. Joseph thought,

if these nine men—and three were apostles—and Hyrum found it a little difficult, then certainly the Church was not ready.

I think that's why Joseph waited one year before he began

continuing to administer the endowment.

Joseph, in Nauvoo, many times talked about the difficulty of getting new ideas in the head of the Saints.

It was no small matter to get new ideas in his own head, either.

It took a long time for him to grasp the full measure of his responsibilities and possibilities. But gradually, after he had the conceptions, he had the even larger challenge of conveying it to a new generation, to his people, to leaders who would follow after him.

Even the Saints are slow to understand.

“Every time I introduce a new idea, it breaks against you like glass,”

and many more statements that he made in Nauvoo about the process.

We’ve got to remember that, with this great influx of people who are coming into Nauvoo, there is, there’s clearly

training that needs to take place. And all of this freshness and newness just doesn't rub off by osmosis between people who have a little bit of tenure in the Church and the newcomers.

This was an exciting time. It was teeming with with opportunity

and teeming with optimism, all at the same time having to deal with the realities of how do you educate a church.

The temple was not yet ready for endowment work,

so Joseph performed these sacred ordinances in places like the upper floor of his red brick store, and then only to a select few friends that he felt he could trust.

And before Joseph died,

he probably administered the endowment to a little over 60, in addition to the nine who had received the endowment

initially in the red brick store.

So between the time that he initiated the endowment and died,

about 60 to 70 people had received it and about equal number of men and women.

Women did not participate in the endowment in Kirtland,

but now in Nauvoo, women were given this opportunity to receive the blessings.

They all receive these ordinances under Joseph,

but the first two were Brigham and Heber.

Heber could not wait to write

a letter to his friend Parley Pratt, who was carrying the torch in England

and didn’t come back when they did.

But what could you say about the temple?

He couldn't say very much.

He said Joseph has gathered around him a small company with whom he has confidence, a small company of friends.

You see, the time had come that he knew he had to go forward because he didn't have very long to finish his mission.

He had a number of allusions to the sense of temporality and urgency to get this job done.

So he went forward outside the temple to prepare for the day that the temple could be, extended the temple blessings to everyone.

Eventually, 70 men and women received the ordinances under Joseph Smith’s direction.

These were not an elite,

they were a vanguard,

and they understood they were preparing the way for all of the Saints who were worthy to receive the blessings in the temple. It was also during the Nauvoo years that, for the first time,

members of the Church grasped the concept that all spirit is matter and that God, the Eternal Father, and Jesus Christ have tangible bodies of flesh and bones.

Now, we don't know when Joseph initially learned it,

but he didn’t really specifically teach that until the Nauvoo years.

Joseph Smith once said,

“The Church was never perfectly organized until the women were thus organized.”

It's hard, then, to overstate in those early days the importance of those women who joined the Church and then strengthened it.

Next week on “The Joseph Smith Papers,”

it began very small and grew to become the largest organization of its kind in the world:

the Women’s Relief Society.

I’m Glen Rawson. Thanks for joining us.