Still Impressive After All These Years

He was born 208 years ago today. He had about three months of formal schooling. He lived in poverty, away from most centers of civilization. He was shot to death in jail. The governor expected his death to put an end to him.

And yet . . .

He dashed off a work of five hundred pages in under three months that is still being read 180 years after its original publication.

He correctly claimed, while still a teenager, that his name would be known for good and evil all over the world.

He correctly noted that it is the nature and disposition of almost all men, as soon as they get a little authority, as they suppose, they will immediately begin to exercise unrighteous dominion.

Even if you do not think Joseph Smith was a prophet, that is pretty impressive.

Today's Maxwell Quote

From But For a Small Moment (1986), 13-14 (describing Joseph Smith's experiences in Liberty Jail):

The Prophet may have recalled Judas, too, for he observed that "Mormon dissenters" were being used "against us, because such misguided souls were "thinking thereby to gain the friendship of the world." Ironically, those of the world who used such dissenters would end up, said Joseph to the Church in this epistle, hating "them worse than they do us because they find them to be base traitors and sycophants" (Writings, p. 379). This was a foreshadowing of verses to be received several months later: "those that shall lift up the heel against mine anointed [saying] they have sinned when they have not sinned... and those who swear falsely against my servants . . . , they themselves shall be despised by those that flattered them" (D&C 121: 16, 18, 20). Judas knew what it was to be used and then despised (see Matthew 27:3-5).

Today's Maxwell Quote

From "But for a Small Moment" (Salt Lake City: Bookcraft, 1986), 1:

The lonely, limestone Missouri jailhouse (twenty by twenty-two feet) was more a dungeon than a cell. Ironically, because of its location in that city it was known as the Liberty Jail. Herein, during his incarceration (December 1, 1838, through April 6, 1839) as a result of betrayals and distortions by some "friends" as well as enemies, the Prophet Joseph Smith received some of the most rich and remarkable revelations ever given to any prophet. The double walls, four feet thick, kept Joseph and his companions in, but they could not keep the Spirit and revelation out. Though Joseph's physical vision suffered from incessant gloom, the "choice seer" had that vision which mattered most.

On Mind Reading

It is a somewhat surreal experience to see someone try to read one's mind about why one wrote the thing one has. And some of these same people wonder why I do not believe them when they try to read Joseph Smith's mind. They wish to tell us exactly what Joseph Smith was thinking when translating the Book of Abraham by using documents that we do not know that Joseph Smith wrote and which are anything but self-explanatory. I'm sorry; that simply is not scholarship.

Today's Maxwell Quote

In honor of the 207th anniversary of the birthday of Joseph Smith, from this talk:

Whenever we talk about the Prophet Joseph Smith, it is important to remember what he said of himself: "I never told you I was perfect; but there is no error in the revelations which I have taught" (Teachings, p. 368). He was a good man, but he was called by a perfect Lord, Jesus of Nazareth!