ATTENTION BOOK OF MORMON BELIEVERS:
JOSEPH SMITH’S VISION CONTRADICTED
About 1832 Joseph Smith, Jr., begun on account of the origin of the Mormon church (the only account written in his own hand), that contradicts the official First Vision story he dictated some six years later. The account was never finished and has only recently been published (see text the in Brigham Young University Studies, Spring 1969, pp. 278ff).?
BIBLE READING VS. REVELATION
In this version Joseph presents himself between the ages of twelve and fifteen as being a committed and perceptive reader of the bible. He (claims that his study of the Scriptures led him to understand that all the denominations were wrong. He wrote:
by searching, the Scriptures I found that mankind did not come unto the Lord but that they had apostatised [sic] from the true and living faith and there was no society or denomination that built upon the Gospel of Jesus Christ as recorded in the new testament.
Six years later, when he set forth his official First Vision story, he decided that he never had reached the firm conclusion that all churches were wrong from his study of the Bible. Instead, he claimed that it was during a vision of the Father and the Son that he first learned this information. He presented this as coming as a great surprise, for he added parenthetically — “for at this time it had never entered into my heart that all were wrong” (emphasis added), That statement even contradicted what Joseph had said a few paragraphs earlier in that same account. There he claimed that, “I often said to myself….Who of all these parties are right; or are they all wrong together?” (emphasis added). Although the former statement appears in the original manuscript (see BYU Studies above, p. 290), such a serious contradiction could not be allowed to stand, and after Joseph’s death the embarrassing words were edited out.
Even without those words, however, the 1838 official account is in conflict with the 1832 version. In the 1832 account it is his Bible reading that stirs him to seek God, while in the 1838 story it is a non-existent revival that motivates him. In the 1832 version he claims to have seen only Christ, while in the 1838 rendition both the Father and the Son appear. In the 1832 account he already knows all the churches are wrong, while in the 1838 story it is the dual deities who first inform him of this. Different people may have different views of the same event, but when one person tells contradictory stories about an event, he completely loses his credibility.
PERSECUTION VS. ACCEPTANCE
The 1838 First Vision story not only runs into trouble with Joseph’s earlier 1832 version, it is also contradicted by what we know about his early years in Palmyra. In his official version Joseph claims he was persecuted by all the churches in his area “because I continued to affirm I had seen a vision”. However, Orasmus Turner, an apprentice printer in Palmyra until 1822, was in the same juvenile debating club with Joseph Smith. He recalled that Joseph “after catching a spark of Methodism…became a very passable exhorter in evening meetings” (History of the Pioneer Settlement of Phelps and Gorham’s Purchase, 1851, p. 214). Thus, instead of being opposed and persecuted as his 1838 account claims, young Joseph was welcomed and allowed to exhort during the Methodist’s evening preaching. Furthermore no one, either Mormon or non-Mormon, seems ever to have heard of Joseph’s encounter with the two divine Personages until after 1838 (see this admission in Dialogue, Autumn, 1966, p. 30).
From all available lines of evidence, therefore, Joseph’s First Vision story appears clearly to be a fabrication. There was no revival anywhere in the Palmyra area in 1820. Joseph was welcomed, not persecuted by the Methodists. His 1832 account represents him as perceiving from his personal Bible study that all the churches were apostate, while his 1838 account said it “never entered into my heart that all were wrong”. His 1832 version claimed only a vision of Christ. while the 1838 story transformed this into the Feather and the Son. No one ever heard such a story until after he dictated it in 1838. In the light of such strong contradictory evidence, the First Vision story must be regarded as only the invention of Joseph Smith’s highly imaginative mind. The facts and Joseph’s own words discredit it.
Jesus said, “…the truth shall make you free.” (John 8:32).