Section 101

Many critics of plural marriage like to point at section 101 (the Article on Marriage) in the original (1835) edition of the Doctrine and Covenants. Unfortunately, this section was removed in 1876, but I don’t see any reason why it should have been.

First, this section is concerned with “the Church”, as opposed to “the Priesthood” (which is what the current section 132 is concerned with). Altho these two distinct bodies have been conflated in the minds of most latter-day saints, it was not always so. Nowadays, it is commonly accepted that the Church is the source of Priesthood.  In other words, Priesthood is dependent upon the Church; therefore, no Priesthood may exist independently, or outside of, the Church.

All one must do to unravel this falsehood is look at history. Both Priesthoods were restored BEFORE the Church was re-established; thus showing that they are NOT dependent upon, nor issued from “the Church”. The Aaronic was restored in mid-May of 1829 and the Melchizedek in early June of 1829 (I realize there is some uncertainty here). Therefore, it is the Church that was established by the Priesthood, and not the other way around (the Church was not established until early April 1830)!

Monogamy has always been the rule for the Church generally, and all those early saints who said as much were not lying when they affirmed this – they just understood more of the gospel than their critics and accusers do now.

Another feature of this document that I find so telling is the accusation (“reproach”) of fornication and polygamy.  The wording is as follows (from verse 4):

“Inasmuch as this church of Christ has been reproached with the crime of fornication, and polygamy: we declare that we believe…”

The amazing thing here is the SINGULAR use of the word “crime”.  When the critics read this sentence, they gloss over this and read it as tho it were plural, “crimes”.  I chuckle at the irony of mistakenly interpreting “crime” as being plural, because you mistakenly believe being plural is a crime!  It is my opinion that this wording is precise and carefully chosen, like the parables of Jesus (see Matthew 13:10-17), to allow people who do not have understanding eyes and ears to read into it what they will.

In reality, the singular “crime” is only applied to fornication – which is clearly a crime, as thoroly attested in the scriptures.  There is an additional accusation of polygamy, but it is not a crime.  To help make this clearer, here is another sentence with an analogous grammatical structure:

“Inasmuch as this church of Christ has been accused with the crime of theft, and of liking green Jello too much, and of habitually starting meetings late: we declare that we believe…”

Lastly, I want to point out another passage from this section that the critics of plural marriage totally ignore:

“We believe that it is not right to prohibit members of this church from marrying out of the church, if it be their determination so to do, but such persons will be considered weak in the faith of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.”