Timestamps:
00:31 – Historical background.
02:18 – Joseph Smith demonstrated majesty in chains while in custody in Richmond.
05:38 – Ten eternal truths we can apply to our lives from the Liberty Jail experience.
07:43 – #1: God is aware of your trials, you are not alone. The story of the yellow cup.
16:10 – #2: Your suffering will end. It will not last forever.
17:42 – #3: Be faithful in tribulation and endure it well.
23:09 – #4: Thy friends do stand by thee. Share your burdens.
29:35 – #5: Other people, like Job, survived their challenges.
30:53 – #6: God allows agency, but justice will prevail in the end. The Missourians eventually pay a bitter price for their actions.
34:37 – The classic problem of evil.
37:18 – #7: Mortality is oftentimes painful, but we are promised that joy will swallow up the suffering through divine compensation.
44:03 – Like Job and Joseph, we can communicate directly with God about our how we really feel.
46:36 – #8: All these things shall give thee experience and shall be for thy good.
50:13 – #9: Jesus is familiar with our pain and knows what we need to be saved.
52:50 – #10: Their bounds are set. Suffering is calculated for our benefit.
54:09 – An alternate view of D&C 122.9. Perhaps this verse applies to Joseph Smith only and is not universal in its application.
58:17 – An overview of the ten truths.
1:00:55 – Lyman Wight collects affidavits which are used to seek redress from the federal government. It is our duty to seek truth and light.
1:03:21 – The persecution in Missouri was both religious and political, but the main complaint against the Saints was their religion.
1:06:11 – A discussion about unrighteous dominion. Power comes from righteousness, not from position or compulsion.
1:16:37 – A description of God as a man of holiness, who invites his children with meekness to partake in all that He has.
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Podcast: Download (Duration: 1:22:19 — 56.5MB)
Who determined what was included in Section 121? There are massive amounts of text that were omitted from the letter. Anything I can read??
John, here is what Robert J. Woodford writes in his dissertation entitled, “Historical Development of the Doctrine and Covenants.” You can find this on pages 1566-1567: “Sections 121-123 were extracted from these letters (the March 25 letter and a later undated letter) by Elder Orson Pratt when he included them in the 1876 edition of the D&C. There is no record identified to indicate what criteria was used to determine which portions of these letters were to be included in the D&C, but it is known that Orson Pratt worked on this edition of the D&C under the direction of Brigham Young.”
Thanks so much. I have written somewhere that section 123 was partially a letter written to Emma. Do you know if that is true??
You can read the entire March 25th letter here. The highlighted portions of the letter are the parts that Elder Orson Pratt put into the canonized text of our scriptures. The letter is addressed as follows: “To the Church of Latter-day Saints at Quincy, Illinois, and Scattered Abroad, and to Bishop Partridge in Particular: Your humble servant, Joseph Smith, Jun., prisoner for the Lord Jesus Christ’s sake, and for the Saints, taken and held by the power of mobocracy, under the exterminating reign of his excellency, the governor, Lilburn W. Boggs, in company with his fellow prisoners and beloved brethren, Caleb Baldwin, Lyman Wight, Hyrum Smith, and Alexander McRae, send unto you all greeting.”
Emma is mentioned in the letter when Joseph writes, “We received some letters last evening–one from Emma, one from Don C. Smith, and one from Bishop Partridge–all breathing a kind and consoling spirit. We were much gratified with their contents.”
Joseph uses the phrase “dearly beloved brethren” throughout the letter, so to me, this is a general letter to the body of the Saints in a similar vein as some of the things written by Paul. But perhaps there is more information on this that could shed more light. If you have more information, please share!
Thanks so much for all your hard work and insights. I greatly appreciate it.