FAIR is a non-profit organization dedicated to providing well-documented answers to criticisms of the doctrine, practice, and history of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
Mormonism and Freemasonry/Claims made by critical works and websites
Jump to Subtopic:
- Jesus Christ/Joseph Smith or Search for the Truth DVD
- Response to claims made on MormonThink page "The Temple"
- Response to claims made in One Nation Under Gods, "Chapter 2: Moroni, Magic, and Masonry"
Jesus Christ/Joseph Smith or Search for the Truth DVD
Response to claims made on MormonThink page "The Temple"
Jump to details:
- Response to claim: "a strong connection between Masonry and the LDS temple ceremony"
- Response to claim: "We were somewhat startled to find that FAIR admits that Masonry does not date back to Bible Times"
- Response to claim: Joseph Smith "may have introduced the temple ceremony as a way of keeping polygamy a secret"
- Response to claim: "Another possibility is that Joseph believed in magical and mystical things such as seer stones; he believed that putting symbols on clothing would protect him from harm"
- Response to claim: "Garments are the Mormon burqas - just worn on the inside"
- Response to claim: "There seems to be an absence of love in the actual temple marriage ceremony"
- Response to claim: "very few people honestly say that their first temple experience was a complete joy"
- Response to claim: "We've been hearing more and more stories that temple names are being recycled"
- Response to claim: "The St. George Temple endowment included a revised thirty-minute 'lecture at the veil'"
- Response to claim: "Why would the church place such emphasis on the temple?...Money...Control...Church importance...Peer pressure"
- Response to claim: "If they were just used for public weddings, sealings and special worship services, then the temple would be viewed by members and nonmembers alike as holy places"
- Response to claim: "The temple ceremony seems almost pagan in nature... Very few members are really spiritually uplifted when they first go through the temple"
- Response to claim: "the temple ceremony is not factual, as Adam and Eve are very likely a myth"
Response to claims made in One Nation Under Gods, "Chapter 2: Moroni, Magic, and Masonry"
Jump to details:
- Response to claim: 23 (HB) - The author states that "LDS documents" are "strangely silent" about Joseph Smith's activities between 1820 and 1823
- Response to claim: 25 - The author states that Moroni claimed that the golden plates were "buried in the hill Cumorah, just outside the village of Manchester"
- Response to claim: 25 - The author states that the angel that appeared to Joseph was originally named "Nephi" instead of "Moroni"
- Response to claim: 25, 492n17 (HB) 490n17 (PB) - "Obviously, if the angel in Smith's room spoke about Moroni, then he certainly could not have been Moroni"
- Response to claim: 26, 492n19-20 (HB) - Oliver Cowdery said that the First Vision took place in 1823 when Joseph was in his 17th year
- Response to claim: 26, 492n21 (HB) - Joseph's brother William associated Moroni's visit with a revival
- Response to claim: 27, 493n23 (HB) - George A. Smith merged the First Vision and Moroni's visit
- Response to claim: 27, 493n24 (HB) - Lucy Mack Smith, Joseph's mother, said that the First Vision was of the angel in 1823
- Response to claim: 27 (HB) - The author claims that Joseph engaged in "ritual magic and divination"
- Response to claim: 28 (HB) - Joseph Smith was a "money digger"
- Response to claim: 28 (HB) - Joseph used a "peep stone" to search for buried treasure
- Response to claim: 29, 494n30 (HB) - Joseph's father was a "firm believer" in witchcraft and the supernatural
- Response to claim: 29, 494-5n33-34 (HB) - Martin Harris said that Joseph was associated with a company of money diggers
- Response to claim: 29, 495n36 (HB) - Joshua Stafford said that Joseph's family "told marvelous stories about ghosts, hob-goblins, caverns, and various other mysterious matters"
- Response to claim: 30, 495n38 (HB) - William Stafford stated that Joseph used a seer stone to see "the spirits in whose charge these treasures were, clothed in ancient dress"
- Response to claim: 30, 495n40 (HB) - Joseph Capron stated that Joseph encouraged others to participate in money digging in order to obtain wealth
- Response to claim: 31, 495n42 (HB) - William Stafford stated that Joseph believed that the state of the moon determined the best time to obtain treasures
- Response to claim: 33, 495n48 (HB) - Joshua Stafford said that Joseph showed him a piece of wood from a box of money that had "mysteriously moved back into the hill"
- Response to claim: 36 (HB) - The author states that Joseph Smith adapted Masonic rituals for the temple endowment
- Response to claim: 40 (HB) - Does the Book of Mormon denounce Freemasonry by condemning "secret combinations," "secret signs," and "secret oaths"?