Did Women Ever Hold The Priesthood

[Elphaba]

Sounds to me that you've been reading a bunch of Quinn.

And I do so with pride. Quinn is an excellent historian and scholar who earned his degree at Yale, and had enough integrity to continue to tell the hard facts about the Church's history before it became the popular thing to do. His reams of research are unparalled, and while excommunication seems, for some odd reason, to disqualify him to many members, it is a fact that it has no effect on the brain and does not cause instant amnesia. His skills as a historian are just as effective after the deed as before.

some sources that aren't disaffected scholars excommunicated for apostasy (read heresy)?

You are mistaken. Quinn was exommunicated for "conduct contrary to the laws and order of the Church" for refusing to meet with the stake president or attend the disciplinary council. There was no apostasy, and you should refrain from spreading such an untruth. He doesn't deserve it, and he never did.

The Mormon Hierarchy, Origins of Power by D. Michael Quinn

In Sacred Lonliness,The Plural Wives of Joseph Smith by Todd Compton

Rough Stone Rolling, Joseph Smith by Richard Lyman Bushman

Teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith

Ehat, Andrew (1982). "Joseph Smith's Introduction of Temple Ordinances and the 1844 Mormon Succession Crisis", Thesis, Brigham Young University, Provo, Utah.

Toscano, Margaret (1985). “The Missing Rib: The forgotten place of queens and priestesses in the establishment of Zion,” Sunstone Magazine, Issue 51, July 1985

A boxload of old papers I’ve had for years (that didn't really help a lot but I relived the '80s, so that was fun).

Egads woman. You claim to be an attorney

I have never, ever claimed to be an attorney. I am not, nor have I ever been one. If I were I'd sue you for the overuse of "Egads."

There is a person who you might have mistaken me for, and if it is, said person is one of your groupies. That's obviously not me. You figure it out.

and yet you post a bunch of quotes and then cite the references by listing a half dozen books?

Well, I did a little more than that. Unfortunately, you didn't get beyond the quotes and references. It's courtesy if you're going to post on one's thread to actually read one's thread. Just an FYI.

Elphaba

[Snow]

And I do so with pride. Quinn is an excellent historian and scholar who earned his degree at Yale, and had enough integrity to continue to tell the hard facts about the Church's history before it became the popular thing to do. His reams of research are unparalled,

His research is hardly unparalled - far from it. He is one of many and many who does good research, that's all.

and while excommunication seems, for some odd reason, to disqualify him to many members, it is a fact that it has no effect on the brain and does not cause instant amnesia. His skills as a historian are just as effective after the deed as before.

So effective is he that he lives with his mom and hasn't been able to get a job, in Mormon circles or out. I made more money last quarter than he's made in the past 5 years.

However, it not his memory that's at issue - something you certainly understand but are only playing dumb about. It's his choice of which facts to present and then his particular and very predictable way of interpreting those facts that is the real issu

You are mistaken. Quinn was exommunicated for "conduct contrary to the laws and order of the Church" for refusing to meet with the stake president or attend the disciplinary council. There was no apostasy, and you should refrain from spreading such an untruth. He doesn't deserve it, and he never did.

I have spoke with Dr. Quinn a number of times over the last couple years. He's a sometimes member of my Study Group. While he still maintains a belief in the veracity of the restoration and Church, he is most definately apostate - your silly attempts at self-righteousness notwithstanding.

I have never, ever claimed to be an attorney. I am not, nor have I ever been one.

So you took the Patriarch's advice while at BYU. I thought you did protest much too much.

Well, I did a little more than that. Unfortunately, you didn't get beyond the quotes and references. It's courtesy if you're going to post on one's thread to actually read one's thread. Just an FYI.

Elphaba

You didn't post references - you just printed a book/article list. Not only did I read the thread, I've read most of the items on your list and have half of them in front of me right now.

[Elphaba]

Not only did I read the thread, I've read most of the items on your list and have half of them in front of me right now.

Good. Then maybe we can stop this silly dance of diversion where you keep bowing towards me and I keep accepting, and we can actually discuss the subject.

So, instead of these endless insipid questions, would you like to discuss the The Quroum of the Anointed?

Elphaba

[Jason]

I thought Mike was ex'd for being gay? I've never heard him labeled an apostate by a Church authority.

[Snow]

<div class='quotemain'>Not only did I read the thread, I've read most of the items on your list and have half of them in front of me right now.

Good. Then maybe we can stop this silly dance of diversion where you keep bowing towards me and I keep accepting, and we can actually discuss the subject.

So, instead of these endless insipid questions, would you like to discuss the The Quroum of the Anointed?

Elphaba

I not terribly interested in the topic because it's too speculative to be useful. Some people's theory is that the Church originally bestowed the priesthood on women, either through the QoA or the temple endowment, that later the Church taught that women just shared in the priesthood through their husbands and now today we simply teach that women share in priesthood blessings through actual priesthood holders.

Some believe that if Joseph had lived that he would have formalized and mainstreamized a priesthood role for women.

The evidence is sketchy and ambivlent on the whole matter - at best. The proponent of such thinking, like Hanks and Toscano et all are driven first by their ideology, not the evidence. I don't know them all personally but at minimum I've heard them all speak about their thoughts and experience. If I recall correctly Hanks desperately wanted to hold the priesthood herself. Last I heard her speak, she had considered returning to the Church she says she loved, but instead she was now some sort of priestess in a Native American - of sorts - spiritualist movement. Seems having "power" was more important than theology or doctrine.

I think, like President Hinckley, that it is possible that at some point in the future, women could receive the priesthood pursuant to a revelation from God.

I thought Mike was ex'd for being gay? I've never heard him labeled an apostate by a Church authority.

No - he's gay but that's not why he was ex'd. It was apostasy: The Church's General Handbook of Instructions defines apostasy as teaching or following incorrect doctrines or "repeatedly act[ing] in clear, open and deliberate public opposition to the church or its leaders."

[Elphaba]

I thought Mike was ex'd for being gay? I've never heard him labeled an apostate by a Church authority.

As I said in the post to Snow, Quinn was exommunicated for "conduct contrary to the laws and order of the Church" for refusing to meet with the stake president or attend the disciplinary council.

According to Quinn, he was adamant that he not be contacted by any church representative regarding the disciplinary council, and despite his demands, he was contacted often. Additionally, he did not attend the disciplinary council. His claims seem to be supported by the findings of the council.

He did tell his parents about his homosexuality the same year he was excommunicated. I believe after that, he came out, so to speak, but I'm not sure.

Elphaba

[Adomini22]

<div class='quotemain'>

Interesting topic. God will do what needs to be done. As of now, I dont believe women do nor should have the priesthood.... and only because God has said as much in these latter days aka right now.

Actually God isn't saying anything on the matter. As usual he is silent. What we have is certain men who speak and say that's what God would say if God were saying.

Its called scriptures, prophets............ Do you ever read scriptures, Snow? Modern and past scriptures say this.

[Snow]

His claims seem to be supported by the findings of the council.

Please share with us the findings of the council.

Its called scriptures, prophets............ Do you ever read scriptures, Snow? Modern and past scriptures say this.

Are you under the impression that I don't know what scriptures and prophets are? Do you really think that I don't read the scriptures?

Apparently the point has escaped you. Prophets are men. Scriptures are the writings of those men. God is silent while men speak for God.

[Adomini22]

<div class='quotemain'>

His claims seem to be supported by the findings of the council.

Please share with us the findings of the council.

Its called scriptures, prophets............ Do you ever read scriptures, Snow? Modern and past scriptures say this.

Are you under the impression that I don't know what scriptures and prophets are? Do you really think that I don't read the scriptures?

Apparently the point has escaped you. Prophets are men. Scriptures are the writings of those men. God is silent while men speak for God.

And scriptures and prophets say.................. ? Thats right, the answer is right there. God has always spoken via prophets, just so ya know.

I am also referring to the priesthood with women. What do the scriptures and prophets say? My last post wasnt clear enough.

[Snow]

And scriptures and prophets say.................. ? Thats right, the answer is right there. God has always spoken via prophets, just so ya know.

I am also referring to the priesthood with women. What do the scriptures and prophets say? My last post wasnt clear enough.

The scriptures say nothing about women having the priesthood, but again I was responding to your point when you said that God has spoken on the matter and I pointed out that God Himself does not speak. Only men who claim to be prophets speak. It is not the same thing as God speaking. Men - prophets can be and have been mistaken about what God thinks and men have claimed to be prophets but are not. Additionally, when a prophet says 'thus sayeth the Lord' it is a matter of faith. Had God Himself spoken it would be different - not soley relegated to the realms of belief.

[Jason]

The scriptures say nothing about women having the priesthood, but again I was responding to your point when you said that God has spoken on the matter and I pointed out that God Himself does not speak. Only men who claim to be prophets speak. It is not the same thing as God speaking. Men - prophets can be and have been mistaken about what God thinks and men have claimed to be prophets but are not. Additionally, when a prophet says 'thus sayeth the Lord' it is a matter of faith. Had God Himself spoken it would be different - not soley relegated to the realms of belief.

That sounds like something I would say.

[CrimsonKairos]

I know!

When I first joined this board, I would've interpreted Snow's last post to mean that Snow doesn't believe in living prophets. Now, I feel to echo his statement (for my own reasons, i.e. the whole "atonement in Gethsemane" topic I've been delving into over the past year).

There is one thing more important than having living prophets, and that is having the gift of the Holy Ghost. Without our own spiritual compass, we can never know when a man is or is not speaking by inspiration from Almighty.

Now as for the women and priesthood and the Melchizedek priesthood...

Elphaba, you said: On September 28, 1843, “Joseph Smith “& Companion” [Emma Hale Smith] received the second anointing and were both “ordained to the highest & holiest order of the priesthood”;

As best as I can tell, and I've looked through every reference I have, Emma and Joseph received their second anointing on the same day. In other words, Joseph had not had a previous second anointing.

So this tells me this is also the day when he was initially ordained into the Melchizedek Priesthood. If "both" of them were ordained, then it has to be to the M.P.

I must have misread that, or you must have mis-typed that. You're asserting that Joseph Smith wasn't ordained to the Melchizedek Priesthood until 1843?

Joseph Smith said that Peter, James, and John appeared "in the wilderness between Harmony, Susquehanna county, and Colesville, Broome county, on the Susquehanna river" (D&C 128:20). Sometime before June 14, 1829, the Lord gave Joseph and Oliver instructions regarding their ordination as elders (a Melchizedek Priesthood office (HC 1:60-61)). We also know that when Peter, James, and John appeared to Joseph and Oliver, they ordained them also as apostles (D&C 27:12) and committed to them "the keys of the kingdom, and of the dispensation of the fulness of times."

So I don't get what you mean when you say that Joseph Smith wasn't initially ordained into the Melchizedek Priesthood until 1843. That's where I think you're getting mixed up. The word "ordain" has several meanings, one of which is: To order or decree. Furthermore, decree means: Official order issued by a legal authority.

Since I think we all agree we're talking about the endowments and temple marriage here, it seems that the phrase "being ordained to the highest and holiest order of the priesthood" simply means having blessings and promises decreed upon those being endowed and/or sealed...and these blessings and promises are decreed by one holding the priesthood keys required...i.e. by a "legal authority."

I don't think this use of the word "ordain" in connection with the endowment, sealing, or second endowment/anointing, has any reference to what we today think of when we say "ordain," and we pretty much all use "ordain" to refer to a worthy male being given keys and authority to officiate in the Aaronic or Melchizedek Priesthoods.

I think it's apples and oranges, and I think it's largely semantics. I don't believe women were ever ordained (given keys and authority) to either the Aaronic or Melchizedek Priesthoods. God--through His prophet--decreed that blessings be given to women who received their endowments/temple marriage (which are administered by the Melchizedek Priesthood). In that sense, women are "ordained to the holiest order of the Melchizedek Priesthood." I don't mean ordained as in laying on of hands, but ordained as in decreed by legal authority.

[checkerboy]

Very well put CK. That was what I was trying to say before.

[Adomini22]

I thought Snow was saying that he doesnt believe in prophets.......my bad interpretation. I apologize. Scriptures say that women are permitted to speak, and participate, but not rule. Now, we know that women are called to callings such as Relief Society President and etc, but I think we understand the meaning of such. Men have priesthood, and right now, only have the priesthood.

CK, from what I interpret from your last post......... maybe you thought that the second annointing gives men the priesthood? It does not. Men have to have the priesthood before the second annointing. So you are right in your post. There are sources I can pm you, if you wish, thought I dont think this may be an important post for discussion and may not need to be pursued much longer.

[Snow]

Scriptures say that women are permitted to speak, and participate, but not rule. Now, we know that women are called to callings such as Relief Society President and etc, but I think we understand the meaning of such. Men have priesthood, and right now, only have the priesthood.

Corinthians (14:34) says that women are NOT premitted to speak: "Let your women keep silence in the churches: for it is not permitted unto them to speak; but they are commanded to be under obedience as also saith the law."

We pick and choose which scriptures we think are true enough to follow.

[Jason]

<div class='quotemain'>

Scriptures say that women are permitted to speak, and participate, but not rule. Now, we know that women are called to callings such as Relief Society President and etc, but I think we understand the meaning of such. Men have priesthood, and right now, only have the priesthood.

Corinthians (14:34) says that women are NOT premitted to speak: "Let your women keep silence in the churches: for it is not permitted unto them to speak; but they are commanded to be under obedience as also saith the law."

We pick and choose which scriptures we think are true enough to follow.

I think that too was my point in the thread where we were talking about eternal families vs celibacy.

[Snow]

<div class='quotemain'>

<div class='quotemain'>

Scriptures say that women are permitted to speak, and participate, but not rule. Now, we know that women are called to callings such as Relief Society President and etc, but I think we understand the meaning of such. Men have priesthood, and right now, only have the priesthood.

Corinthians (14:34) says that women are NOT premitted to speak: "Let your women keep silence in the churches: for it is not permitted unto them to speak; but they are commanded to be under obedience as also saith the law."

We pick and choose which scriptures we think are true enough to follow.

I think that too was my point in the thread where we were talking about eternal families vs celibacy.

And divorce, and keeping the sabbath day holy, and the Word of Wisdom, and numerous commandments from the OT, etc, etc, etc. Obviously it must all be relative.

[boyando]

<div class='quotemain'>Well said. Well said. Elphie..... that was alot of info. I hope you didnt have to type that......

No, silly. I got it from one of your refrences. D. Michael Quinn wrote it, and I agree, it was well said. Exactly what I was trying to say, but wasn't.

Elphaba

My wife holds the Priesthood, every time she hugs me. Sorry, I know I should not make fun, but that is why I amallmosthumble

Your wife is the queen amongst all who claim to be, whomever she is hugging.

And I could use a bit of priesthood hugging myself.

Love,

Elphaba, sister of humble

Sis,

You flatter me. I look forward to the next chance, to give you a hug. And I'm not just saying that, so others will see that you really are human.

See you at Thanksgiving, if not sooner. And let me know if you are up too a Kurt Bestor, Christmas concert, cause I need to get the tickets now, before they sell out.

Love, allmosthumble, brother of Elphaba

(boy if that wont get other to switch over to another thread, nothing will).

[Elphaba]

Please share with us the findings of the council.

I have done so twice now. My source is Quinn himself.

On other message boards I've been on the thread starter has control over the direction the thread is going. I assume it is the same on this board.

This is my thread, and I do not want Quinn's personal life discussed in it anymore. Since I have relied on his schlarship, it is proper to comment on that, but not his personal life.

If anyone would still like to participate in the thread, please keep to the subject, which is did women hold the priesthood as members of The Quorum of the Anointed. There are some whose posts I haven't gotten to you who have done this, and I appreciate it.

Thank you for your consideration.

Elphaba

[Snow]

I have done so twice now. My source is Quinn himself.

Extraordinary. You claim to know the findings of the council. You claim the source of your knowledge is Michael Quinn. You also claim: "Quinn was exommunicated for "conduct contrary to the laws and order of the Church" for refusing to meet with the stake president or attend the disciplinary council.."

So your source of information is someone who wasn't there. Right.

This is my thread, and I do not want Quinn's personal life discussed in it anymore. Since I have relied on his schlarship, it is proper to comment on that, but not his personal life. If anyone would still like to participate in the thread, please keep to the subject, which is did women hold the priesthood as members of The Quorum of the Anointed.

This is America. I don't really care what you want discussed. One of the rules of the board is NOT that we'll only express opinions that Elphaba approves of... as if you are free to bring up sources, but the credibility of such sources is not open for discussion.

[prisonchaplain]

Corinthians (14:34) says that women are NOT premitted to speak: "Let your women keep silence in the churches: for it is not permitted unto them to speak; but they are commanded to be under obedience as also saith the law."

We pick and choose which scriptures we think are true enough to follow.

In the context of the passage, Paul seems to be taking certain women in Corinth to task for disrupting the services with their questions. He also wrote to the Galations that we no longer have male, nor female. By and large, the early Christians we seen as almost radical in the liberty they granted women.

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/sh...irst/roles.html

[CrimsonKairos]

CK, from what I interpret from your last post......... maybe you thought that the second annointing gives men the priesthood? It does not.

I know, that's what I was saying. I was responding to Elphaba who seemed to be asserting that Joseph Smith didn't receive the Melchizedek Priesthood until 1843.

[Elphaba]

Now as for the women and priesthood and the Melchizedek priesthood...

Elphaba, you said: On September 28, 1843, “Joseph Smith “& Companion” [Emma Hale Smith] received the second anointing and were both “ordained to the highest & holiest order of the priesthood”;

As best as I can tell, and I've looked through every reference I have, Emma and Joseph received their second anointing on the same day. In other words, Joseph had not had a previous second anointing.

So this tells me this is also the day when he was initially ordained into the Melchizedek Priesthood. If "both" of them were ordained, then it has to be to the M.P.

I must have misread that, or you must have mis-typed that. You're asserting that Joseph Smith wasn't ordained to the Melchizedek Priesthood until 1843?

No, you did not misread me. I was wrong and what you go on to describe is correct.

Joseph Smith said that Peter, James, and John appeared "in the wilderness between Harmony, Susquehanna county, and Colesville, Broome county, on the Susquehanna river" (D&C 128:20). Sometime before June 14, 1829, the Lord gave Joseph and Oliver instructions regarding their ordination as elders (a Melchizedek Priesthood office (HC 1:60-61)). We also know that when Peter, James, and John appeared to Joseph and Oliver, they ordained them also as apostles (D&C 27:12) and committed to them "the keys of the kingdom, and of the dispensation of the fulness of times."

So I don't get what you mean when you say that Joseph Smith wasn't initially ordained into the Melchizedek Priesthood until 1843. That's where I think you're getting mixed up. The word "ordain" has several meanings, one of which is: To order or decree. Furthermore, decree means: Official order issued by a legal authority.

As I said, you are correct.

However, in Nauvoo in 1841, Joseph’s understanding of the Melchizedek priesthood was expanding. According to Gary Beurger: “Smith announced another revelation.” . . . . For I deign to reveal unto my church things which have been kept hid from before the foundation of the world, things that pertain to the dispensation of the fulness of times" (D&C 124:37, 40-41).

In other words, previously anointed Saints were told the ordinances they had received in Kirtland were preparatory to the ordinances they were now going to receive in Nauvoo. The select group of husbands and wives Joseph to whome chose to reveal these ordinances are what comprised the “Quorum of the Anoited,“ or what was often called the “Holy Order.“

I suspect one of the reasons modern Saints do not practice what was to become known as the second anointing is because Joseph was mudered nearly two years before the temple was finished. He never participated in the temple ordinances his small group of Anointed Quorum Saints did, and that, combined with other reasons, seems to have led to its dissipation. But that’s just my opinion.

Still quoting Beurger: The establishment of "the fulness of the priesthood"—the crowning ordinance of developing Mormon salvation/exaltation theology—was an event Smith seems to have viewed as his future life mission, not as an accomplished fact.

"Almost a year later on 6 August 1843, Apostle Wilford Woodruff reported that Brigham Young thought the fullness of the priesthood was yet to be given: "If any in the Church had the fullness of the Melchisedec [sic] Priesthood, he [brigham Young] did not know it."

. . . .

"When Smith said late in August that the Patriarchal priesthood was the "greatest yet experienced in this church," he was well aware that the fullness of the Melchizedek priesthood was yet to be conferred through a higher ordinance.

"Until 1843, women had been excluded from these ordinances, possibly because of Joseph Smith's personal reluctance, Emma Smith's rejection of polygamy, John C. Bennett's lurid expose of polygamy, and/or the disaffection and subsequent reconciliation of Orson and Sarah Pratt over polygamy. However, Doctrine and Covenants 131 and 132 indicated that this exclusion deprived the men (who had received the previous ordinances) of the highest kingdom of glory—godhood. The higher ordinance was necessary to confirm the revealed promises of "kingly powers" (i.e., godhood) received in the endowment's initiatory ordinances. Godhood was therefore the meaning of this higher ordinance, or second anointing. The previously revealed promises in Doctrine and Covenants 132:19-26 implicitly referred not to those who had been sealed and ordained "kings and priests," "queens and priestesses" to God, not to those who had been sealed in celestial marriage. Such individuals, having received the "second anointing," would "be gods, because they have all power, and the angels are subject to them."

"This special priesthood ordinance was first administered on 28 September 1843 to Joseph and Emma Smith. According to Smith's personal journal: "Beurach Ale [Joseph Smith] was by common consent and unanimous voice chosen President of the quorum [of the anointed] and [was] anointed and ord[ained] to the highest and holiest order of the priesthood [as a king and a priest] (and companion [as a queen and a priestess])."21 His "companion" was his wife, Emma, to whom he had been sealed for time and eternity four months earlier on 28 May. Wilford Woodruff's record of this event, found in his 1858 Historian's Private Office Journal, is equally explicit: "Then by common consent Joseph Smith the Prophet Received his second Anointing of the Highest & Holiest order."22

"During the next five months this higher priesthood ordinance of the second anointing was conferred upon at least twenty men and the wives of sixteen of these men. Fullness of priesthood blessings during Joseph Smith's lifetime were reserved primarily for church leaders. An apparent reason for Smith's concern to complete the Nauvoo temple and administer the fullness of the priesthood to the twelve apostles was that these leaders were required to "round up their shoulders and bear it [the Mormon kingdom] off," for "the Kingdom will be established, and I do not care what shall become of me." As George Q. Cannon noted in 1869, "It was by the virtue of this authority [i.e., "endowment" and "holy anointing"], on the death of Joseph Smith, that President [brigham] Young, as President of the quorum of the Twelve, presided over the Church.

Since I think we all agree we're talking about the endowments and temple marriage here, it seems that the phrase "being ordained to the highest and holiest order of the priesthood" simply means having blessings and promises decreed upon those being endowed and/or sealed...and these blessings and promises are decreed by one holding the priesthood keys required...i.e. by a "legal authority."

I disagree. If you read the articles I’ve provided, I think you’ll see the “second anointing,” the “Quorum of the Anointed,” and especially Joseph’s evolutionary understanding of the ‘highest order of the priesthood,” indicates something it hadn’t meant before, I.,e., guaranteed exaltation and godhood.

To a modern LDS believer, this probably sounds like standard procedure; that is a trap we fall into called “prestentism.” That is where we judge the past by our modern day understandings.

Instead, try and put yourself in the room while Joseph is explaining the Second Anointing, and the highest order of the priesthood, the Melchizidek Priesthood, evolving before their eyes into Godhood. It literally gives me chills to think of the enormity of what was happening in that room.

I don't think this use of the word "ordain" in connection with the endowment, sealing, or second endowment/anointing, has any reference to what we today think of when we say "ordain," and we pretty much all use "ordain" to refer to a worthy male being given keys and authority to officiate in the Aaronic or Melchizedek Priesthoods.

I agree. I think this was a small moment in time that, as I mentioned above, was cut down with Joseph’s murder.

I think it's apples and oranges, and I think it's largely semantics. I don't believe women were ever ordained (given keys and authority) to either the Aaronic or Melchizedek Priesthoods. God--through His prophet--decreed that blessings be given to women who received their endowments/temple marriage (which are administered by the Melchizedek Priesthood). In that sense, women are "ordained to the holiest order of the Melchizedek Priesthood." I don't mean ordained as in laying on of hands, but ordained as in decreed by legal authority.

I understand that is the common belief, and I don't really expect to change anyone's mind completely. But don't you think there is enough evidence to at least consider that something different happened here?

I think there is just too much evidence proving otherwise.

For example:

Patriarch [John] Smith pronounced a patriarchal blessing on Maria Turnbow which specified that it was through the Endowment ceremony that women receive Priesthood: “Thou shalt have an Endowment in the Lord’s house [and] be clothed with the Power of the Holy Priesthood….. (John Smith patriarchal blesing to Maria Louisa Turnbow, 7 Nov 1845, in William S Harwell, “The Matriarchal Priesthood and Emma’s Right to Succession as Prsiding HIgh Priestess and Queen” 7.)

In fact after his ordination as patriarch to the Church in 1849, John Smith also described an *ancient* female priesthood.

In his blessing to Caroline Cottam in Mar 1853, he referred to the “Priesthood which Abraham sealed upon his daughters.”

He also blessed Elizabeth Bean in May 1853: “I seal upon you all the blessings of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, and all the Priesthood that was sealed upon the daughters of Jacob in the land of Egypt…”

(John Smith patriarchal blessing to Caroline Cottam, 26 Mar 1853, LDS archives; John Smith blessing to Elizabeth Bean, 1 May 1853, Goerge Washington Bean journal, Book 1, 79-80, Archives, Lee Library, BYU, and his blessing to Sophia Pollard, 9 Nov 1853; all are quoted in Irene May Bates, “Transformation of Charisma in the Mormon church , Ph.D. diss., UCLA 1991, 281-82.)

I could provide so many more examples, but everything I write ends up being so long, and I know that makes it difficult to read. I feel I’ve given enough evidence to show this was a very temporary, yet phenomenal time in the Church’s rich history. I would even go so far to say it’s one of the happier moments, not filled with persecution, apostasy, vexatious lawsuits, or any of that.

Rather, it was a time of communing with their God, and their God communing back. It feels like a peaceful, yet joyful time and I would love to have been a fly on the wall for this one.

Elphaba

Later edited to changed "Begara" to "Buerger"

[CrimsonKairos]

All those quotes to me are saying that the those worthy women had sealed upon their heads--or guaranteed to them--the blessings which flow from partaking of ordinances that were only administered by the Melchizedek priesthood.

I really do think you're misreading the intent of those passages, but I know we'll disagree so that's fine.

[Elphaba]

All those quotes to me are saying that the those worthy women had sealed upon their heads--or guaranteed to them--the blessings which flow from partaking of ordinances that were only administered by the Melchizedek priesthood.

I really do think you're misreading the intent of those passages, but I know we'll disagree so that's fine.

Actually the above post was to demonstrate the evolution of the Melchizidek Priesthood from Kirtland to Nauvoo. The way you wrote about, which prompted me to look into it more, gave me a better idea of wat happened.

I agree we won't agree. But I appreciate your participation in the thread.

Elphaba