Apostolic Coup D'é·tat - The History of Brigham Young's Seizure of Church Power

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The Red Pill
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Apostolic Coup D'é·tat - The History of Brigham Young's Seizure of Church Power

Post by The Red Pill »

This is very well researched, and one of those..."they didn't ever teach this in Sunday-school" moments.

This 2 part series covers how Brigham seized control of the church and made sure he stayed in control. Also discusses the "mysterious" death of Samual Smith shortly after Joseph and Hyrum were murdered.

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Fred
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Re: Apostolic Coup D'é·tat - The History of Brigham Young's Seizure of Church Power

Post by Fred »

That is too much to listen to right now. I heard the first half hour. I am glad to have it available.

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BenMcCrea
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Re: Apostolic Coup D'é·tat - The History of Brigham Young's Seizure of Church Power

Post by BenMcCrea »

I love a good fairy story….🤣

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Fred
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Re: Apostolic Coup D'é·tat - The History of Brigham Young's Seizure of Church Power

Post by Fred »

How did there become 15 Apostles instead of 12?

The 12 were to keep the Prophet in line. Today the profit keeps the 12 in line.

Where did the profit get the authority to fire the Patriarch whose authority is higher?

When did God change His mind about the authority of the 12?

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BuriedTartaria
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Re: Apostolic Coup D'é·tat - The History of Brigham Young's Seizure of Church Power

Post by BuriedTartaria »

Fred wrote: September 4th, 2022, 11:43 am How did there become 15 Apostles instead of 12?

The 12 were to keep the Prophet in line. Today the profit keeps the 12 in line.

Where did the profit get the authority to fire the Patriarch whose authority is higher?

When did God change His mind about the authority of the 12?
Didn't the LDS church always have a Smith family descendant patriarch until around 10 years ago? The one died and they decided to not replace him.

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Fred
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Re: Apostolic Coup D'é·tat - The History of Brigham Young's Seizure of Church Power

Post by Fred »

BuriedTartaria wrote: September 4th, 2022, 12:36 pm
Fred wrote: September 4th, 2022, 11:43 am How did there become 15 Apostles instead of 12?

The 12 were to keep the Prophet in line. Today the profit keeps the 12 in line.

Where did the profit get the authority to fire the Patriarch whose authority is higher?

When did God change His mind about the authority of the 12?
Didn't the LDS church always have a Smith family descendant patriarch until around 10 years ago? The one died and they decided to not replace him.
Yeah. Where did they get the authority to do that? I missed that revelation.

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BenMcCrea
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Re: Apostolic Coup D'é·tat - The History of Brigham Young's Seizure of Church Power

Post by BenMcCrea »

There’s still Twelve Apostles. The Quorum of Twelve has 12 men.

The First Presidency is a separate body. Three High Priests/Apostles.

There is no Q15. It doesn’t exist. It’s a lazy way of speaking collectively of two different priesthood quorums.

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Niemand
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Re: Apostolic Coup D'é·tat - The History of Brigham Young's Seizure of Church Power

Post by Niemand »

BuriedTartaria wrote: September 4th, 2022, 12:36 pm
Fred wrote: September 4th, 2022, 11:43 am How did there become 15 Apostles instead of 12?

The 12 were to keep the Prophet in line. Today the profit keeps the 12 in line.

Where did the profit get the authority to fire the Patriarch whose authority is higher?

When did God change His mind about the authority of the 12?
Didn't the LDS church always have a Smith family descendant patriarch until around 10 years ago? The one died and they decided to not replace him.
I thought that was the COC/RLDS who took the bulk of the Smiths with them.

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The Red Pill
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Re: Apostolic Coup D'é·tat - The History of Brigham Young's Seizure of Church Power

Post by The Red Pill »

BenMcCrea wrote: September 4th, 2022, 1:08 pm There’s still Twelve Apostles. The Quorum of Twelve has 12 men.

The First Presidency is a separate body. Three High Priests/Apostles.

There is no Q15. It doesn’t exist. It’s a lazy way of speaking collectively of two different priesthood quorums.
You OBVIOUSLY did not watch these. You don't even understand what's going on or the context. Watch first...then come back and comment.

EmmaLee
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Re: Apostolic Coup D'é·tat - The History of Brigham Young's Seizure of Church Power

Post by EmmaLee »

Fred wrote: September 4th, 2022, 12:47 pm
BuriedTartaria wrote: September 4th, 2022, 12:36 pm
Fred wrote: September 4th, 2022, 11:43 am How did there become 15 Apostles instead of 12?

The 12 were to keep the Prophet in line. Today the profit keeps the 12 in line.

Where did the profit get the authority to fire the Patriarch whose authority is higher?

When did God change His mind about the authority of the 12?
Didn't the LDS church always have a Smith family descendant patriarch until around 10 years ago? The one died and they decided to not replace him.
Yeah. Where did they get the authority to do that? I missed that revelation.

I missed it, too. When Eldred G. Smith died, they just left his seat absent.

https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/chu ... 6?lang=eng

"Elder Smith is the last person to have held the position of Patriarch to the Church. The office originated in 1833 with the calling of Joseph Smith Sr., father of the Prophet Joseph Smith. Elder Eldred Smith is the great-great-grandson of the Prophet’s brother Hyrum. Elder Smith's father, Hyrum Gibbs Smith, was Patriarch to the Church from 1912 until his death in1932. Eldred G. Smith was called as Patriarch to the Church on April 10, 1947, by George Albert Smith."

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Original_Intent
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Re: Apostolic Coup D'é·tat - The History of Brigham Young's Seizure of Church Power

Post by Original_Intent »

Wow, that was quite a bit to digest. There was some material that I was aware of, I was NOT aware of the fact that stake high councils were pretty much the supreme authority in their stakes and the Q12 really only had authority where no stake of Zion was established. It actually makes a lot of sense. Some new info for me regarding the shenanigans of Brigham and others in consolidating and centralizing power. It's quite disheartening, it seems this is just the nature of men.

My p[osition up until now has been that the leaders are generally good but imperfect men doing the best they can, and it may even be more true of the current leaders than, say Brigham Young for instance. I have always felt to stay within the membership of the church, but I do feel this new information is going to need to be pondered and prayed about for guidance of what to do next.

I loved how the presiding patriarch had the title of the Holy Spirit of Promise. This actually makes a good deal of sense to me if they are indeed called of God. It makes it much clearer why Calling and Election Made Sure is not taught or talked about much for the past few decades.

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Original_Intent
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Re: Apostolic Coup D'é·tat - The History of Brigham Young's Seizure of Church Power

Post by Original_Intent »

BenMcCrea wrote: September 4th, 2022, 10:52 am I love a good fairy story….🤣
I guess that means you are a good TBM...

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Robin Hood
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Re: Apostolic Coup D'é·tat - The History of Brigham Young's Seizure of Church Power

Post by Robin Hood »

EmmaLee wrote: September 4th, 2022, 1:51 pm
Fred wrote: September 4th, 2022, 12:47 pm
BuriedTartaria wrote: September 4th, 2022, 12:36 pm
Fred wrote: September 4th, 2022, 11:43 am How did there become 15 Apostles instead of 12?

The 12 were to keep the Prophet in line. Today the profit keeps the 12 in line.

Where did the profit get the authority to fire the Patriarch whose authority is higher?

When did God change His mind about the authority of the 12?
Didn't the LDS church always have a Smith family descendant patriarch until around 10 years ago? The one died and they decided to not replace him.
Yeah. Where did they get the authority to do that? I missed that revelation.

I missed it, too. When Eldred G. Smith died, they just left his seat absent.

https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/chu ... 6?lang=eng

"Elder Smith is the last person to have held the position of Patriarch to the Church. The office originated in 1833 with the calling of Joseph Smith Sr., father of the Prophet Joseph Smith. Elder Eldred Smith is the great-great-grandson of the Prophet’s brother Hyrum. Elder Smith's father, Hyrum Gibbs Smith, was Patriarch to the Church from 1912 until his death in1932. Eldred G. Smith was called as Patriarch to the Church on April 10, 1947, by George Albert Smith."
The full truth is, I believe, a little problematic.
Hyrum held the office of church patriarch. Later, one of those in the line of succession as church patriarch, although married, turned out to be homosexual and had a relationship of some kind with a teenage boy. He was released and sent away to some pacific island.
Eventually another in the Smith line was called to replace him but not as church patriarch, but instead as "patriarch to the church". This represented a reduction in the authority of the office and clearly placed the patriarch under the unquestioned authority of the FP/Twelve.

It is rumoured that Eldred Smith opposed the extension of the priesthood to Negroes in 1978, and the Q15 made his position emeritus shortly thereafter.
Thus ended the last flicker of what remained of the highest office in the church.

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gruden2.0
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Re: Apostolic Coup D'é·tat - The History of Brigham Young's Seizure of Church Power

Post by gruden2.0 »

Fred wrote: September 4th, 2022, 11:43 am How did there become 15 Apostles instead of 12?

The 12 were to keep the Prophet in line. Today the profit keeps the 12 in line.

Where did the profit get the authority to fire the Patriarch whose authority is higher?

When did God change His mind about the authority of the 12?
The 12 did not originally exist to keep the president 'in line'. He had counselors as well as the stake presidency to do that. The 12's jurisdiction was supposed to be outside the stakes of Zion in the mission field. So it was an amazing leap BY took to seize power. Sidney Rigdon and William Marks had better claims.

In Joseph's day the 12 had zero say in what happened in general church management, only in the mission field. Quite an astounding feat by Brigham to make that seizure, even more astounding that so many followed him.

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gruden2.0
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Re: Apostolic Coup D'é·tat - The History of Brigham Young's Seizure of Church Power

Post by gruden2.0 »

The Red Pill wrote: September 4th, 2022, 1:19 pm
BenMcCrea wrote: September 4th, 2022, 1:08 pm There’s still Twelve Apostles. The Quorum of Twelve has 12 men.

The First Presidency is a separate body. Three High Priests/Apostles.

There is no Q15. It doesn’t exist. It’s a lazy way of speaking collectively of two different priesthood quorums.
You OBVIOUSLY did not watch these. You don't even understand what's going on or the context. Watch first...then come back and comment.
Or read. There are books about this as well. Most Mormons don't really want to know.

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Original_Intent
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Re: Apostolic Coup D'é·tat - The History of Brigham Young's Seizure of Church Power

Post by Original_Intent »

gruden2.0 wrote: September 4th, 2022, 2:21 pm
The Red Pill wrote: September 4th, 2022, 1:19 pm
BenMcCrea wrote: September 4th, 2022, 1:08 pm There’s still Twelve Apostles. The Quorum of Twelve has 12 men.

The First Presidency is a separate body. Three High Priests/Apostles.

There is no Q15. It doesn’t exist. It’s a lazy way of speaking collectively of two different priesthood quorums.
You OBVIOUSLY did not watch these. You don't even understand what's going on or the context. Watch first...then come back and comment.
Or read. There are books about this as well. Most Mormons don't really want to know.
I was not eager to know and am sad to learn. I do tend towards wanting painful truths over comforting lies, but this was honestly more than I wanted and I need to commune with the Lord to help me integrate this.

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Luke
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Re: Apostolic Coup D'é·tat - The History of Brigham Young's Seizure of Church Power

Post by Luke »

The Church structure was definitely changed post-JS. And it was wrong.

But I don’t believe it was born out of maliciousness. I believe that they simply did not understand the Priesthood like Joseph did (this is just a fact).

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Luke
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Re: Apostolic Coup D'é·tat - The History of Brigham Young's Seizure of Church Power

Post by Luke »

When the Church abolished the office of Patriarch to the Church, Eldred G. Smith seriously kicked off. “The Church don’t know what they’ve done!” he raged. The Church had to do one of their “rescues” to calm everyone down.

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Luke
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Re: Apostolic Coup D'é·tat - The History of Brigham Young's Seizure of Church Power

Post by Luke »

Joseph was going to reorganise the Church but never did. He stated this publicly in 1842. I think it’s clear that BY and co. took over by virtue of their second anointings, but the “smatterings” of what they understood from Joseph’s teachings got meshed with what they previously understood and what they ended up doing out of expediency and here we are today with an utter confusing mess of teachings.

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gruden2.0
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Re: Apostolic Coup D'é·tat - The History of Brigham Young's Seizure of Church Power

Post by gruden2.0 »

Luke wrote: September 4th, 2022, 2:45 pm The Church structure was definitely changed post-JS. And it was wrong.

But I don’t believe it was born out of maliciousness. I believe that they simply did not understand the Priesthood like Joseph did (this is just a fact).
You might want to look at how Brigham strong-armed everyone to get his way. It started with Samuel Smith being mysteriously poisoned. People voicing objections to Brigham's leadership were followed by 'whittlers' or abruptly called on missions far away. Hosea Stout was a straight-up thug who did Brigham's bidding. After the fact many of Joseph's revelations and meeting notes were 'amended' to justify his takeover. How is that a misunderstanding?

No, it wasn't a misunderstanding, Brigham wanted the power. He wanted his wives.
Last edited by gruden2.0 on September 4th, 2022, 4:27 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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Luke
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Re: Apostolic Coup D'é·tat - The History of Brigham Young's Seizure of Church Power

Post by Luke »

gruden2.0 wrote: September 4th, 2022, 4:25 pm
Luke wrote: September 4th, 2022, 2:45 pm The Church structure was definitely changed post-JS. And it was wrong.

But I don’t believe it was born out of maliciousness. I believe that they simply did not understand the Priesthood like Joseph did (this is just a fact).
You might want to look at how Brigham strong-armed everyone to get his way. It started with Samuel Smith being mysteriously poisoned. People voicing objections to Brigham's leadership were followed by 'whittlers' or abruptly called on missions far away. Hosea Stout was a straight-up thug who did Brigham's bidding.

No, it wasn't a misunderstanding, Brigham wanted the power. He wanted his wives.
Fables for those with itching ears

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gruden2.0
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Re: Apostolic Coup D'é·tat - The History of Brigham Young's Seizure of Church Power

Post by gruden2.0 »

Luke wrote: September 4th, 2022, 4:26 pm
gruden2.0 wrote: September 4th, 2022, 4:25 pm
Luke wrote: September 4th, 2022, 2:45 pm The Church structure was definitely changed post-JS. And it was wrong.

But I don’t believe it was born out of maliciousness. I believe that they simply did not understand the Priesthood like Joseph did (this is just a fact).
You might want to look at how Brigham strong-armed everyone to get his way. It started with Samuel Smith being mysteriously poisoned. People voicing objections to Brigham's leadership were followed by 'whittlers' or abruptly called on missions far away. Hosea Stout was a straight-up thug who did Brigham's bidding.

No, it wasn't a misunderstanding, Brigham wanted the power. He wanted his wives.
Fables for those with itching ears
If you close your eyes and wish hard enough, one can certainly make that true.

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Luke
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Re: Apostolic Coup D'é·tat - The History of Brigham Young's Seizure of Church Power

Post by Luke »

gruden2.0 wrote: September 4th, 2022, 4:28 pm
Luke wrote: September 4th, 2022, 4:26 pm
gruden2.0 wrote: September 4th, 2022, 4:25 pm
Luke wrote: September 4th, 2022, 2:45 pm The Church structure was definitely changed post-JS. And it was wrong.

But I don’t believe it was born out of maliciousness. I believe that they simply did not understand the Priesthood like Joseph did (this is just a fact).
You might want to look at how Brigham strong-armed everyone to get his way. It started with Samuel Smith being mysteriously poisoned. People voicing objections to Brigham's leadership were followed by 'whittlers' or abruptly called on missions far away. Hosea Stout was a straight-up thug who did Brigham's bidding.

No, it wasn't a misunderstanding, Brigham wanted the power. He wanted his wives.
Fables for those with itching ears
If you close your eyes and wish hard enough, one can certainly make that true.
If you know the things I have previously believed and studied, you wouldn’t make such a comment.

A couple of years ago I was in this position and was posting all the evidence I could find in favour of it.

But it’s not true.

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The Red Pill
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Re: Apostolic Coup D'é·tat - The History of Brigham Young's Seizure of Church Power

Post by The Red Pill »

Original_Intent wrote: September 4th, 2022, 1:58 pm Wow, that was quite a bit to digest. There was some material that I was aware of, I was NOT aware of the fact that stake high councils were pretty much the supreme authority in their stakes and the Q12 really only had authority where no stake of Zion was established. It actually makes a lot of sense. Some new info for me regarding the shenanigans of Brigham and others in consolidating and centralizing power. It's quite disheartening, it seems this is just the nature of men.

My p[osition up until now has been that the leaders are generally good but imperfect men doing the best they can, and it may even be more true of the current leaders than, say Brigham Young for instance. I have always felt to stay within the membership of the church, but I do feel this new information is going to need to be pondered and prayed about for guidance of what to do next.

I loved how the presiding patriarch had the title of the Holy Spirit of Promise. This actually makes a good deal of sense to me if they are indeed called of God. It makes it much clearer why Calling and Election Made Sure is not taught or talked about much for the past few decades.
Joseph had a very flat leadership structure in place. The First Presidency, 12 Apostles, Quorum of the 70...all had same amount of power. This. created checks and balances similar to how the 3 branches of government were put in place with the founding fathers.

Each individual stake also held immense power. The Apostles had NO control over stakes...only in the mission field.

Had this structure remained...I think bone-head decisions such as all things covid related, could have been avoided.

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The Red Pill
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Re: Apostolic Coup D'é·tat - The History of Brigham Young's Seizure of Church Power

Post by The Red Pill »

Luke wrote: September 4th, 2022, 4:38 pm
gruden2.0 wrote: September 4th, 2022, 4:28 pm
Luke wrote: September 4th, 2022, 4:26 pm
gruden2.0 wrote: September 4th, 2022, 4:25 pm

You might want to look at how Brigham strong-armed everyone to get his way. It started with Samuel Smith being mysteriously poisoned. People voicing objections to Brigham's leadership were followed by 'whittlers' or abruptly called on missions far away. Hosea Stout was a straight-up thug who did Brigham's bidding.

No, it wasn't a misunderstanding, Brigham wanted the power. He wanted his wives.
Fables for those with itching ears
If you close your eyes and wish hard enough, one can certainly make that true.
If you know the things I have previously believed and studied, you wouldn’t make such a comment.

A couple of years ago I was in this position and was posting all the evidence I could find in favour of it.

But it’s not true.
No...you believe it's not true. BIG DIFFERENCE!!

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