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Latter-day Saint Communalism The outlines of early Latter-day Saint communalism have long been understood by scholars.1 The Latter-day Saint gospel, with its emphasis on the restoration of the primitive Christian chinch of the New Testament, appealed to those who read in the Book of Acts that early Christians had \"all things common.\" In 1830, for instance, in the same year as the establishment of the Church of Christ by Joseph Smith, but before Sidney Rigdon had become acquainted with Latter-day Saint missionaries, Rigdon had stated at a gathering of the Mahoning Baptist Association that \"our pretension to follow the apostles in all their New Testament teachings, required a community of goods; that as they established this order in the model church at Jerusalem, we were bound to imitate their example. According to the editors of The Joseph Smith Papers, the core shift was to establish \"a new basis for economic reorganization that featured individual stewardships rather than common ownership. When an inquirer asked Joseph Smith in 1835 if \"a member of our church could move into this vicinity and purchase lands and enjoy his own possessions & property with out making it common Stock,\" Joseph replied that he himself owned a \"valuable farm\" and that we have no commonstock business among us, that every man enjoys his own property, or can if he is disposed, consecrate liberally or illiberally to the support of the poor & needy, or the building up of Zion.10 In 183 8, in a Church newspaper, Joseph Smith and others published a series of questions and answers.

Late one night in 1823 Joseph Smith, Jr., was reportedly visited in his family's farmhouse in upstate New York by an angel named Moroni. According to Smith, Moroni told him of a buried stack of gold plates that were inscribed with a history of the Americas' ancient peoples, and which would restore the pure Gospel message as Jesus had delivered it to them. Thus began the unlikely career of theBook of Mormon, the founding text of the Mormon religion, and perhaps the most important sacred text ever to originate in the United States. Here Paul Gutjahr traces the life of this book as it has formed and fractured different strains of Mormonism and transformed religious expression around the world. Gutjahr looks at how theBook of Mormonemerged from the burned-over district of upstate New York, where revivalist preachers, missionaries, and spiritual entrepreneurs of every stripe vied for the loyalty of settlers desperate to scratch a living from the land. He examines how a book that has long been the subject of ridicule--Mark Twain called it \"chloroform in print\"--has more than 150 million copies in print in more than a hundred languages worldwide. Gutjahr shows how Smith's influential book launched one of the fastest growing new religions on the planet, and has featured in everything from comic books and action figures to feature-length films and an award-winning Broadway musical.

This chapter begins by discussing the debates that led to the tarring and feathering of the Mormon prophet Joseph Smith Jr. and his scribe Sidney Rigdon in Ohio. It then explores the tensions between pluralism and committed faith displayed in Mormon apostate Ezra Booth's letters. In Booth's rendering, tolerance seems only possible for those religious rivals who are not so bold as to assume the miraculous powers of the apostles. These letters exacerbated a wider set of conflicts that had been unfolding as two upstart churches battled for adherents in Ohio country. In many ways, the battle over the souls of Rigdon and Symonds Ryder would represent, in miniature, the battle between the Disciples of Christ and the Mormons for converts on the Western Reserve. The chapter then analyzes narratives concerning “spiritual wifery” and polygamy, showing how Mormon families were imagined as a heresy against the companionate marriage ideal.

McClellan examines Sidney Rigdon's activities and relationships during the 1820s that \"prepared the way\" for the Mormons in northern Ohio. He also documents Rigdon's pre-Mormon development of skills that earned him the sobriquet \"mighty spokesman.\"

Nourished on the spectacular, Mormonism can count heroic martyrs, epic treks, and seemingly supernatural manifestations. The events surrounding Brigham Young's victory for church leadership against Sidney Rigdon after Joseph Smith's untimely 1844 murder, metamorphosed into a mythical marvel. A reprint of The Making of a Mormon Myth: The 1844 Transfiguration of Brigham Young by Richard S. Van Wagoner that first appeared in Vol. 28, No. 4 (Winter 1995) of Dialogue: A Journal of Mormon Thought is presented.

Sidney Rigdon made a remarkable contribution to Joseph Smith and the cause of the Restoration. He was baptized by missionaries in late 1830 while serving as a minister in a Campbellite-tradition church in Mentor, Ohio. Many of his congregants followed him and were baptized as well.

This home in Orange, Ohio, which once belonged to Sirenes Burnett, was the site of an important church conference held Oct. 25-26, 1831.

When [Lucius Nelson Scovil] and family arrived in Illinois they were penniless. Further, his family was incapacitated by what was described as \"the bilious fever\" and malaria. His daughter succumbed to \"black canker,\" which ate a hole through her lip, two of her teeth and her chin. Scovil worked hard to get back on his feet and renew his family's health and well-being.

Review.

An Ohio court \"got it wrong\" when it convicted early Mormon leaders Joseph Smith and Sidney Rigdon for illegally running a controversial financial institution in 1837, says a Mormon apologist. \"Now why weren't they, when Joseph Smith and Sidney Rigdon were?\" [R. McKay White] said. \"It couldn't be because of religious persecution. Well, it was. It was intended to get Joseph out of town, and it worked.\"