Thirty-Six (1841)Trying to Make Time to Complete His Mandates
It had not been easy for Timothy to abandon Joseph in 1839 to deal with his role alone;
and if it had not been a mandate from an advanced human above his “rank” and authority, he
would never have left Joseph when he did. As a mortal himself, Timothy still possessed human
propensities that would have encouraged him to intervene into matters that he might have
otherwise stayed out of if he were a more advanced human. Joseph’s time on earth was quickly
winding down.
There was only one thing left for Joseph to do before he was taken; give the people the
last and greatest stumbling block: the LDS Temple Endowment. The following year (1842)
Freemasonry would be sanctioned in Nauvoo and adopted by the LDS Church leaders.^96 This
“secret combination”^97 gave Joseph the blueprint for the presentation of the endowment and
also affected the minds of many of the most influential Church leaders who were later directly
involved in his murder.
In June of 1840, Joseph made one last attempt to alienate himself from the temporal
affairs of the LDS Church and the people’s desire to establish themselves as a secure stake in the
tabernacle of “the church of the devil.”^98 He wanted to isolate himself so he could fulfill the
mandates he had received to
take away the Lord’s plainness and deliver unto the Latter-day Saints many
things which they could not understand, because they desired it. And because
they desired it God commanded Joseph, that they may stumble.^99Joseph officially requested to be left alone to prepare these stumbling blocks. He wrote to the
High Council (referring to himself in third person as the “Memorialist”), saying that,
he thinks, and verily believes, that the time has now come, when he should
devote himself exclusively to those things which relate to the spiritualities of the
Church, and commence the work of translating the Egyptian records, the Bible,
and wait upon the Lord for such revelations as may be suited to the conditions
and circumstances of the Church.^100Joseph openly mocked the LDS Church with indiscernible facetious prose. He
specifically pointed out the ones directly responsible for “the genius of the constitution of the
Church, and for the well-being of the Saints”: “the constituted authorities of the
Church...assemble[d] together to act or to legislate for the good of the whole society.” When
read with the understanding that Joseph was acting in a role that would not allow him to
disclose his true identity, the memorial that Joseph attempted to create for himself in regards to
the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints becomes very clear:
Memorial of Joseph Smith, Jun., to the high Council of the Church of Jesus Christ of
Latter-day Saints, June 18th, 1840. The Memorial of Joseph Smith, Jun., respectfully
represents—That after the members of the Church of Jesus Christ had been
inhumanly as well as unconstitutionally expelled from their homes which they
had secured to themselves in the state of Missouri, and although very much
scattered and at considerable distance from each other, they found a resting
place in the state of Illinois:—That after the escape of your Memorialist from his