Lying for the Lord

Dear Readers,

I think there are times when the Lord has encouraged people to lie, and has encouraged people to purposefully lead others to believe something false. Of course, 99.999% of the time, God wants everyone to tell the truth. But the Scriptures record a few instances that constitute the remaining .001%. Here's three quick examples from the Bible:

1] Abraham tells people that Sarah is his sister, not his wife. (Genesis 20) That's a lie, and God seems to be OK with it.

2] Jacob and Rebekah conspire to make Isaac think that Jacob is really Esau, thus securing the birthright for Jacob, and God seems to be OK with that inter-familial conspiracy. (Genesis 27) That whole story has lots of deceptions and lies in it, and God seems to be OK with them. (Though with this story, I'm willing to believe that there are lots of mistranslations and interpolations in it. To quote the eighth article of faith of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints: "We believe the Bible to be the Word of God, as far as it is translated correctly.")

3] Rahab lied about the Israelite spies, and God seems to be OK with it. (Joshua 2)

There are more examples of righteous people lying in other scriptures. In the Book of Mormon, Nephi dons the garb of Laban, and misleads Zoram into thinking that Nephi really is Laban. (1st Nephi 4) In this case, God not only seems to be OK with Nephi's lie, but He actually performs a miracle to help further Nephi's deception. Nephi writes that he "commanded [Zoram] in the voice of Laban." So, unless Nephi happened to be an accomplished voice actor, his speaking in the voice of Laban was a miracle wrought by God.

OK, so I think that's enough examples of to show that sometimes God has people lie. Now, keep in mind that in every case, a greater good was brought about by the telling of the lie. Also keep in mind that these cases are the very rare exception, not the very common rule.

My next point is that God sometimes purposefully withholds information from people.

The most obvious example of withholding information is God's withholding of a sure knowledge of his own existence from just about everyone. Think about it. If He wanted to, God could appear to everyone and say, "I am God," and he could make water gush out of a rock just to make his point clear. With a single visitation, he could put centuries of theological debate to rest. But in his wisdom, God does not appear to everyone.

Another example of withholding information from some and giving it to others is temple work. Much of what goes on in LDS temples is not to be shared with the uninitiated. (Of course, everyone is invited to find out what happens in LDS temples. But first you have to have faith in Christ, repent of your sins, believe in the LDS Church, join the church through baptism and confirmation, be old enough, be a good member for a year or so, and then voila! You get a temple recommend and you get to go to the temple!)

The very act of calling prophets and speaking to them is an example of giving some people more information than other people. Sometimes withholding information is wise. Not discussing wages with co-workers, for example, is a good way to avoid conflicts.

God also asked people to withhold information about some of the miracles He performed. When He raised the daughter of Jarius from her near-deathbed, for example, Jesus told the parents not to tell people about the miracle. Jesus had his own wise reasons for telling people not to spread the miraculous news.

So... I'm finally getting to the meat and potatoes of this blog post... I know this is a hard pill for faithful Mormons to swallow, but maybe Joseph Smith lied. Just a little bit. Or maybe he withheld information, or misled people, only very slightly, and only on rare occasion. Maybe some of the lies he told had divine approbation, but maybe some of them did not. Joseph Smith was a mortal man who sinned, after all.

Now, I am not saying that Joseph Smith lied about the First Vision, or about his story of finding the golden plates and translating them into the Book of Mormon. I accept him as a true prophet. I have a testimony, etc. etc. And I trust him when he writes about his First Vision, "Many other things did he say unto me, which I cannot write at this time."

But, on a basic level, obviously Smith gave more information to certain individuals than to others. Some people saw the golden plates with him; others did not. Some saw angels with him; others did not. He confided in his friends. He gave more information to the faithful, just like Jesus did. Don't you think that the Apostles knew more about Jesus and his doctrine than the common disciples did?

And when it came to his plural marriages, Joseph Smith was... shall we say... less than forthcoming? Yes, it appears that Joseph Smith did not want the word about his polygamy getting out. Maybe it was for political reasons. Maybe God told him to keep his polygamy a secret. I don't know why. Maybe fewer people would be willing to investigate the Church if they knew that many of its leaders were practicing polygamy. Maybe it was part of the Lord's plan to keep polygamy on the down-low because most people weren't ready to handle the doctrine and the lifestyle.

I'm not going to go into details about how Joseph Smith concealed his plural wives, some of them teenage wives. You can read about Joseph Smith's wives here. That's not an official LDS Church site, but it seems to be pretty accurate and not too hostile to the Church. But then if you go to that last link, you need to go to this link. And actually, if you want to learn more about controversial early LDS history and stuff, I think FAIR is a great place to go. I mean besides the Scriptures and prayer.)

And today, I think the Church is perpetuating the obfuscation of its polygamous roots. But that's OK! In fact, it's more than OK! I applaud the Church for the job its doing telling its own history, both to its own members and to the rest of the world.

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints and its history is an open book. Literally! Read us! Just because the Church doesn't talk about polygamy in General Conference, that doesn't mean we aren't willing to talk about it. We just choose not to empasize polygamy anymore. And that de-emphasis makes sense, really. We de-emphasize polygamy the same way we de-emphasize animal sacrifice. We believe in it, we just don't practice it anymore.

I mean, even though Mormons "believe in animal sacrifice," we don't talk about it very much, because that was revelation for a different time.

But actually, in a way, we Latter-Day Saints still sort-of kind-of practice polygamy. A widower who was previously sealed can be sealed to another woman, so he will have two wives in the celestial kingdom. But LDS men can no longer be married to two living women at the same time.

I'm glad I have this forum to talk about things that have been on my mind lately. Maybe I'll write more LDS apologetics in the future. I like trying to provide a reason for the hope that is within me. Feel free to leave comments, as always.

Sincerely,
Telemoonfa