Defense of the Faith and the Saints (Volume 1 of 2)Roberts, B. H. (Brigham Henry)
Religion
Defense of the Faith and the Saints (Volume 1 of 2)
Roberts, B. H. (Brigham Henry)
Latter Day Saint churches
Brigham Young succeeded Joseph Smith, and he set up a kind of kingly
rulership, not unbecoming to a man of his vast empire-building power.
The Mormons have been taught to revere Joseph Smith as a direct prophet
from God. He saw the face of the All Father. He held communion with
the Son. The Holy Ghost was his constant companion. He settled every
question, however trivial, by revelation from Almighty God. But Brigham
was different. While claiming a divine right of leadership, he worked
out his great mission by palpable and material means. I do not know
that he ever pretended to have received a revelation from the time
that he left Nauvoo until he reached the shores of the Dead Sea, nor
through all the thirty years of his leadership there. He seemed to
regard his people as children who had to be led through their serious
calamities by holding out to them the glittering thought of divine
guardianship. So firmly did Brigham establish the social order in
Utah that all of the people were equal, except the governing body.
This may be said to consist of the president and his two counsellors,
they three constituting the first presidency; the twelve apostles;
the presiding bishopric, consisting of three men, the chief bishops
of the church but much lower in rank than the apostles; the seven
presidents of seventies, who are, under the apostles, the subordinate
head of the missionary service of the church; and the presiding
patriarch. These altogether constitute a body of twenty-six men. There
are local authorities in the different stakes of Zion, as they are
called, corresponding to counties in a State, but with these it is not
necessary to deal.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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