Without Disclosing My True Identity
The people believed in a God that could be everywhere and still dwell in each
person’s heart.^4 They believed that the Holy Spirit (Ghost) was a powerful entity that
allowed them to have God present with them always; and that Jesus Christ had died upon
the cross for their sins^5 and saved them through baptism and ordinations,^6 or through
merely professing belief in the name of “Jesus Christ.” They believed that God would talk to
them and direct and guide them in their daily activities, claiming, “Heavenly Father told me
this,” and “Heavenly Father wants me to do that.” The people were literally using the name
of God in vain through the vanity^7 of their ego and mindset, which subjectively motivated
their minds to assume that their thoughts were the very thoughts of God.^8
But it was the anger that the so-called “Christians” had towards each other and their
claims that this church or that one was the only true church^9 that most confused Joseph as a
young boy.^10 He saw them all as hypocrites and, in many cases, as lunatics. These members
set about during the week making money and worrying about their standing in the
community, all the while disregarding the notion that we all should be concerned about
everyone equally.^11 Nevertheless, they would return to church on Sundays^12 and worship a
God they knew only from the rantings of their ministers (which Joseph would soon come to
realize didn’t have a clue about the true nature of God).
Nothing about “God” made sense to Joseph at the time. Nevertheless, in spite of all
the religious rhetoric he heard at home from his mother and among the people of the
community, the young Joseph could not deny that he felt strangely and inwardly drawn to
find the truth, the real truth.^13 Like most teenagers, all he wanted was the straight answer,
something that made complete sense to him. Yet, before he would finally know the real
truth, Joseph would have to experience the conflict, confusion, and resulting mental
anguish generated from the hypocrisy of religion. This emotional angst, combined with
the strength and passion of his mother, the sorrow he felt for his father, and the adoration
and respect he had for his oldest brother, weighed heavily on the adolescent boy. The
emotional and intellectual exercise of being stretched from every direction opened up a
part of his true being, preparing him for what was soon to happen.
The Original “Official” Account of the “First Vision”^14
Being in his thirteenth year, two years were yet to pass before Joseph Smith was
introduced to the advanced human being whom he referred to in the plural sense as “two
personages (whose brightness and glory defy all description) standing above me in the air.”^15
However, the official description of the event was not given or known, even among
members of the LDS Church, until it was first published 22 years after the event in the Times
and Seasons^16 in March and April of 1842.
Joseph’s mother couldn’t report much about this time period or what happened to
Joseph at this time, because she didn’t know! He never told her anything about it. Writing
about this time period in her biography, her editors used what was given in the Times and
Seasons periodical many years after the event occurred.
The Times and Seasons was a bi-monthly periodical published in the city of Nauvoo
by the LDS Church, beginning in November of 1839. One will notice that the details of what
the LDS people refer to as the “First Vision” were not given until the 3rd Volume, almost
two and a half years after it began. It was in the March 15, 1842 issue that Joseph first
published what would become the official LDS Church history about his life. He prefaced
that history, writing: