Manual on Brigham Young ignores polygamy
Salt Lake City - The absence of any mention of polygamy is
just one criticism being leveled at a new manual being used by
Mormon Church members. The manual used since January by Mormons
in 22 languages, paints America's most famous polygamist,
who had 55 wives, as a monogamist. The LDS Church claims that the
manual was never intended as a portrait of Brigham Young. Instead
they say, it is a selective compilation of Young's teachings
on gospel topics that church leaders consider relevant today. A
1954 compilation of Young's teachings by Apostle John A.
Widtsoe's was the primary source for the new manual.
Widtsoe's work, winnowed from hundreds of Young's
speeches in the multi-volume "Journal of Discourses",
sanitized the rough and ready frontier prophet for modern
audiences. Widtsoe eliminated many of the cantankerous,
contradictory, humorous and hyperbolic rantings for which Young
was known. Polygamy, which church founder Joseph Smith secretly
established as "the new and everlasting covenant of
marriage" and which Young publicly championed, was dropped
13 years after his death in 1877 and appears nowhere in the
Widtsoe index or the new manual.
Casper Star-Tribune, May 16, 1998