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Discourse, 28 April 1842

Source Note

JS, Discourse, [
Nauvoo

Principal gathering place for Saints following expulsion from Missouri. Beginning in 1839, Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints purchased lands in earlier settlement of Commerce and planned settlement of Commerce City, as well as surrounding areas....

More Info
, Hancock Co., IL, 28 Apr. 1842]. Featured version copied [ca. 28 Apr. 1842] in Relief Society Minute Book, pp. [35]–[41]; handwriting of
Eliza R. Snow

21 Jan. 1804–5 Dec. 1887. Poet, teacher, seamstress, milliner. Born in Becket, Berkshire Co., Massachusetts. Daughter of Oliver Snow and Rosetta Leonora Pettibone. Moved to Mantua, Trumbull Co., Ohio, ca. 1806. Member of Baptist church. Baptized into Church...

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; CHL. Includes use marks. For more complete source information, see the source note for Nauvoo Relief Society Minute Book.

Historical Introduction

At a meeting of the
Female Relief Society of Nauvoo

A church organization for women; created in Nauvoo, Illinois, under JS’s direction on 17 March 1842. At the same meeting, Emma Smith was elected president, and she selected two counselors; a secretary and a treasurer were also chosen. The minutes of the society...

View Glossary
held on 28 April 1842, JS delivered a discourse on the gift of healing, the order of the
church

The Book of Mormon related that when Christ set up his church in the Americas, “they which were baptized in the name of Jesus, were called the church of Christ.” The first name used to denote the church JS organized on 6 April 1830 was “the Church of Christ...

View Glossary
, and related topics. This was the society’s sixth meeting and the third time JS addressed its members. JS took 1 Corinthians chapters 12 and 13 as his text, emphasizing to society members the importance of magnifying whatever callings they individually held, rather than aspiring to office. Responding to circulating criticism that the women leading the organization were acting improperly in administering blessings of healing by
laying on hands

A practice in which individuals place their hands upon a person to bestow the gift of the Holy Ghost, ordain to an office or calling, or confer other power, authority, or blessings, often as part of an ordinance. The Book of Mormon explained that ecclesiastical...

View Glossary
, JS spoke at length on the topic, opining that miraculous signs such as healing the sick “should follow all that believe whether male or female” and that “if the sisters should have faith to heal the sick, let all hold their tongues, and let every thing roll on.” Contemplating his own mortality, and echoing a previous assertion that he would make the society a “kingdom of priests,” JS declared that he would deliver over to the society and the church the “
keys

Authority or knowledge of God given to humankind. In the earliest records, the term keys primarily referred to JS’s authority to unlock the “mysteries of the kingdom.” Early revelations declared that both JS and Oliver Cowdery held the keys to bring forth...

View Glossary
of the kingdom.”
1

See Discourse, 31 Mar. 1842.


Secretary
Eliza R. Snow

21 Jan. 1804–5 Dec. 1887. Poet, teacher, seamstress, milliner. Born in Becket, Berkshire Co., Massachusetts. Daughter of Oliver Snow and Rosetta Leonora Pettibone. Moved to Mantua, Trumbull Co., Ohio, ca. 1806. Member of Baptist church. Baptized into Church...

View Full Bio
noted in the minutes following JS’s discourse that “the spirit of the Lord was pour’d out in a very powerful manner, never to be forgotten by those present on that interesting occasion.”
2

Relief Society Minute Book, 28 Apr. 1842, [41], in Derr et al., First Fifty Years of Relief Society, 61.


Comprehensive Works Cited

Derr, Jill Mulvay, Carol Cornwall Madsen, Kate Holbrook, and Matthew J. Grow, eds. The First Fifty Years of Relief Society: Key Documents in Latter-day Saint Women’s History. Salt Lake City: Church Historian’s Press, 2016.

It appears
Snow

21 Jan. 1804–5 Dec. 1887. Poet, teacher, seamstress, milliner. Born in Becket, Berkshire Co., Massachusetts. Daughter of Oliver Snow and Rosetta Leonora Pettibone. Moved to Mantua, Trumbull Co., Ohio, ca. 1806. Member of Baptist church. Baptized into Church...

View Full Bio
contemporaneously took notes of JS’s instructions, as well as the rest of the meeting’s proceedings, on a separate document—no longer extant—and then, presumably shortly after the meeting, made the copy featured here in the minute book.
3

On 27 August 1844 John McEwan copied the discourse from the minute book into the back of Wilford Woodruff’s 1841–1842 journal.


Footnotes

  1. [1]

    See Discourse, 31 Mar. 1842.

  2. [2]

    Relief Society Minute Book, 28 Apr. 1842, [41], in Derr et al., First Fifty Years of Relief Society, 61.

    Derr, Jill Mulvay, Carol Cornwall Madsen, Kate Holbrook, and Matthew J. Grow, eds. The First Fifty Years of Relief Society: Key Documents in Latter-day Saint Women’s History. Salt Lake City: Church Historian’s Press, 2016.

  3. [3]

    On 27 August 1844 John McEwan copied the discourse from the minute book into the back of Wilford Woodruff’s 1841–1842 journal.

Asterisk (*) denotes a "featured" version, which includes an introduction and annotation. *Discourse, 28 April 1842 Nauvoo Relief Society Minute Book Journal, December 1841–December 1842 History, 1838–1856, volume C-1 Addenda History, 1838–1856, volume C-1 Addenda “History of Joseph Smith”

Page [40]

contracted in their views. You must not be contracted, but you must be liberal in your feelings.
Let this
Society

A church organization for women; created in Nauvoo, Illinois, under JS’s direction on 17 March 1842. At the same meeting, Emma Smith was elected president, and she selected two counselors; a secretary and a treasurer were also chosen. The minutes of the society...

View Glossary
teach how to act towards husbands to treat them with mildness and affection. When a man is borne down with trouble— when he is perplex’d; if he can meet a smile, an argument— if he can meet with mildness, it will calm down his soul and soothe his feelings. When the mind is going to despair, it needs a solace.
This Society is to get instruction thro’ the order which God has established— thro’ the medium of those appointed to lead— and I now turn the
key

Authority or knowledge of God given to humankind. In the earliest records, the term keys primarily referred to JS’s authority to unlock the “mysteries of the kingdom.” Early revelations declared that both JS and Oliver Cowdery held the keys to bring forth...

View Glossary
to you in the name of God and this Society shall rejoice and knowledge and intelligence shall flow down from this time—
16

In an 1841 letter to members of the church in Kirtland, Ohio, JS’s brother Hyrum Smith used similar language in reference to the temple to be built “in this place [Nauvoo], wherein their dead may be redeemed, and the key of knowledge that unfolds the dispensation of the fullness of times may be turned, and the mysteries of God be unfolded, upon which their salvation and the salvation of the world, and the redemption of their dead depends.” (Hyrum Smith, Letter, Times and Seasons, 15 [1] Nov. 1841, 3:589.)


Comprehensive Works Cited

Times and Seasons. Commerce/Nauvoo, IL. Nov. 1839–Feb. 1846.

this is the beginning of better days, to this Society
When you go home never give a cross word, but let kindness, charity and love, crown your works henceforward. Don’t envy sinners— have mercy on them, God will destroy them.— Let your labors be confin’d mostly to those around you in your own circle; as far as knowledge is concerned, it may extend to all the world, but your administrations, should be confin’d to the circle of your immediate acquaintance, and more especially to the members of the Society.
Those
ordain’d

The conferral of power and authority; to appoint, decree, or set apart. Church members, primarily adults, were ordained to ecclesiastical offices and other responsibilities by the laying on of hands by those with the proper authority. Ordinations to priesthood...

View Glossary
to lead the Society, are authoriz’d to appoint to different offices as the circumstances shall require.
If any have a matter to reveal, let it be in your own tongue. Do not indulge too much in the gift of tongues, or the devil will take advantage of the innocent. You may speak in tongues for your comfort but I lay this down for a rule that if any thing is [p. [40]]
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Source Note

Document Transcript

Page [40]

Document Information

Related Case Documents
Editorial Title
Discourse, 28 April 1842
ID #
819
Total Pages
7
Print Volume Location
JSP, D9:400–407
Handwriting on This Page
  • Eliza R. Snow

Footnotes

  1. [16]

    In an 1841 letter to members of the church in Kirtland, Ohio, JS’s brother Hyrum Smith used similar language in reference to the temple to be built “in this place [Nauvoo], wherein their dead may be redeemed, and the key of knowledge that unfolds the dispensation of the fullness of times may be turned, and the mysteries of God be unfolded, upon which their salvation and the salvation of the world, and the redemption of their dead depends.” (Hyrum Smith, Letter, Times and Seasons, 15 [1] Nov. 1841, 3:589.)

    Times and Seasons. Commerce/Nauvoo, IL. Nov. 1839–Feb. 1846.

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