Criticism of Mormonism/Books/Blood of the Prophets: Brigham Young and the Massacre at Mountain Meadows/Use of sources/Unpardonable sin

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Use of sources: Unpardonable sin

A FAIR Analysis of: Blood of the Prophets: Brigham Young and the Massacre at Mountain Meadows A work by author: Will Bagley

Double standard: violence in immigrants‎

Questions

• Brigham Young and others taught blood atonement for the "unpardonable sin," which set the stage for the Mountain Meadows Massacre.

To see citations to the critical sources for these claims, click here

Answer

Even if this was a doctrine that was implemented (of which there is scant evidence), the Fancher party cannot have been subject to it, since none were Mormons whose "calling and election" had been "made sure"—the only ones who can commit the unpardonable sin.

The claim is thus illogical.

Detailed Analysis

There is also a man down the street who tried to exhibit the endowments to a party who was here. You will see what becomes of that man. Do not touch him. He has forfeited every right and title to eternal life; but let him alone, and you will see by and by what will become of him. His heart will ache, and so will the heart of every apostate that fights against Zion; they will destroy themselves. It is a mistaken idea that God destroys people, or that the Saints wish to destroy them. It is not so. The seeds of sin which are in them are sufficient to accomplish their destruction.

- Brigham Young, Journal of Discourses 11:262. (12 August 1866).

Noted one reviewer:^[1]

Even assuming that Bagley is right and that Brigham Young and others believed in blood atonement as something more than a rhetorical device, the doctrine would have called for the death of only those very few individuals whose calling and election had been made sure by being sealed by the Holy Spirit of promise and who afterward committed murder. This meaning is clear in the scripture that Bagley cites, DC 132꞉26-27, which itself never mentions atonement. Ignoring his source, however, in a rhetorical flourish he argues, "Whatever the doctrine's precise practice, the sermons of Brigham Young and Jedediah Grant helped to inspire their followers to acts of irrational violence."^[2]

Thus, even if this was a doctrine that was implemented (of which there is scant evidence), the Fancher party cannot have been subject to it, since none were Mormons whose "calling and election" had been "made sure."

The author's stance is inconsistent, and does not follow.

Notes

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1. [note]  Thomas G. Alexander, "Review of Blood of the Prophets: Brigham Young and the Massacre at Mountain Meadows," Brigham Young University Studies 31 no. 1 (January 2003), 167–. off-site (Scripture citation converted to wiki format.)