-This book doesn’t have all its facts and stories right, but here are some interesting things from it. These notes are not a through summary of all topics treated in the text.
-The current church policy is that anyone practicing polygamy is excommunicated. I do not advocate for the practice of polygamy, but rather for remaining in full fellowship in the church. For salvation we must do as God tells us. We follow God’s prophet and find salvation, not looking to the past for guidance, but the present word of God. Rejecting modern prophets in behalf of ancient or even recently passed ones is the classical narrative of the fall of nations. The people of Noah’s day rejected Noah in the name of Adam, thinking they were ok since they were in some form following the councils of Adam. The Jews rejected Jesus Christ in the name of Moses. Christians today reject Joseph Smith / Mormonism in the name of Jesus Christ. Some Mormons today reject the current president in the name of Joseph Smith. All of these are incorrect. God speaks today, hear him and find salvation.
-It’s also interesting to note that polygamy is so popular today in places like Utah and Nevada, that polygamists won’t be arrested for the practice, only if child marriages or forced marriages or government welfare fraud is involved. It’s still illegal in every state of the USA, but like speeding in a car, it’s too hard to enforce the law on this topic. At one point, the makers of the TV show “Sister Wives” about a polygamist family in Lehi Utah were about to be sued for breaking the law so flagrantly and making Utah look bad. The governor raised a law suit, but they moved to Nevada and Nevada didn’t want to mess with the case so it was dropped. The Lehi family was actually happy they were getting sued because you can’t ask for a law to be changed unless you are being harassed by its enforcement. With recent advances in marriage law (namely allowing premarital cohabitation without marriage and legalizing same sex marriage in 2015), if a polygamist case were to be brought to the federal court today, it may likely cause the law to change (for the state, not the church).

Book notes:

-to gather together was a very large emphasis; the women of the Mormons would gather together, and they would often do political things, calling for political things; 700 women at a meeting all spoke out to the government wanting their freedom and their free rights that they come from all over the world to obtain. They defended polygamy.
-Joseph Smith was teaching one woman about the order of the priesthood meeting polygamy and she said go teach it to someone else and Joseph Smith looked at her reprovingly and said will you tell me who to teach? I am to teach you and it is for you to decide whether or not you will believe what I teach but I must teach
-Joseph Smith taught Wilford Woodruff and other apostles that God would not reveal his secrets to his servants unless they were willing to keep them.
-Brigham Young said that the Relief Society would help the Saints to resist foreign Fashions and Gentile merchants
-one woman responded when someone said that it wasn’t fair when one man got 60 wives and other men got none, that what woman wouldn’t rather have 1/60 part of Parley Pratt then to have the whole of some other man
-Brigham told the saints that the US government had turned into a mob and was breaking the Constitution and that they would have to go forth and defend it; he asked them if they would be willing to give up all that they had worked for in the past 10 years and abandon their homes and flee into the mountains if necessary; the entire congregation shouted yes, there were thousands of people at that meeting. Harriet Thatcher who had recently arrived said she had never seen such unity in her life
-John Taylor preached a sermon where and he said that the Mormons had lived away from the other states and hadn’t bothered anyone but now like a wicked monarch pursuing it’s people wickedly, the United States was coming after the Mormons, and just like how the United States treated the Indians unfairly, they are treating the Mormons unfairly.
-Wilford Woodruff said that these are solemn times because the armies of the Gentiles are coming against us because of our religion and we have to defend ourselves against 25 million people
-it was said that whoever would speak against polygamy was in darkness (the book says who said this, I don’t recall.)
-Joseph Smith said that we’ll see so much blood that our hearts will be sick of it
-Brigham Young agreed to relent his position as Governor because the US was pressing upon them, but he said that he would not allow troops to occupy that land, he said that rather than do that he would burn his own village as others have done in Russia.
-The leaders made plans to take the 30,000 people on an exodus out of Salt Lake and to leave a group of Men Behind To Burn the City if the United States Army where to come.
-One man when reflecting on being driven from his home by the US Army pushing for living his religion said that though he was about to have the best garden he ever had that season, he would have to let it go, because being pushed from homes was the fate of every man in any generation who dared to worship the true and living God
-Patty Hogan said, I think I can take the spoiling of my things with joy, oh Lord help me so to do! this she said when they’re being driven from their homes yet again
-Brigham Young said there many women who care more about their husbands sleeping with them that they do about building the kingdom God, and if a man was to submit to such a woman he would not be worth shocks in building up the kingdom of God
-it was said that one woman complained to Brigham young wanting “pillow council” more than “ward council”, Brigham told her that even if she never got pillow council again, she should go home and do right.
-Wilford Woodruff said a man’s family was his kingdom, and no man had a right to interfere with him; his family was his throne and kingdom.
-a woman moved 30 times within 21 years as a Mormon. Before becoming a Mormon, she lived in one place, but she says she doesn’t know which was more pleasant, because even in the times of moving and at times even living in a wagon cover for a home, that she was comforted by the spirit of God. She reported that she had witnessed Gods guardianship over her in thousands of instances. She had to live in a place that smelt like a horse stall, she said to herself that if the baby Jesus could live in such a place, so could she.
-Eliza Snow wrote about the need to lay everything on the altar as a sacrifice for God; that like Eve, women shouldn’t care if they were the first or 50th wife; it mattered not, because Eve did what she was supposed to, and this is her eternal glory as a goddess; one was to be humble and not worry about being the center of attention even in the eyes of ones spouse.
-Heber Kimball chastised one of the sisters; he said that because she bore it like a Christian, he loved her ten times more; he reminded her that who the Lord loveth he chasteneth
-there was various incidences of speaking in tongues including a time when several saying a song in the language spoken by Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden and it was reported to have been one of the most Heavenly songs ever heard
-Wilford Woodruff said any almost any fool can go and preach the gospel but it takes a very wise man to be a patriarch of his home and save his family
-Joseph Smith said that it was men’s privilege to take as many wives as he could
-Joseph or one of the brethren said something along the lines of how you could even become like Abraham and have thousands on your own children, making a little kingdom, your own tribe/army, and that it’s basically your duty to get as many children as you can; those are the people that you basically rule; this was the Lord’s order and the way of establishing his purposes. No less than thrones of exaltation was the promise to all involved in the creation of these kingdoms.
-They were also allowed to divorce if both parties were not happy. This ability to divorce for reasons of unhappiness is a very modern idea, that marriage wasn’t just something that you have to stay in because you covenanted to enter, but that if happiness wasn’t there for both parties, the marriage could indeed be dissolved; it could be considered that the ability to divorce was what made the polygamy program healthy and successful
-if a man divorced he was required to continue to provide for the child or children he sired from that marriage.
-Heber Kimball said one of the great mysteries of this church is how someone in it could want some pants and everyone else not give them to him. Here he’s talking about how we should take care of each other in the church, but that such doesn’t always happen.
-Emma had eight children over course of 12 Years.
-a miraculous account reported that a baby slept 7 hours straight during an entire temple dedication, and then awake at the end, and shouted hosanna’s with them!
-the women didn’t keep a lot of journals and they didn’t want to sound like they were complaining, they didn’t want to sound like Sariah in the Book of Mormon who complained; the Mormon women often would write to their husbands and say it is very hard but I don’t regret that you’re gone preaching the gospel; they all expected the second coming neigh at the doors, and they were making great sacrifices for this.
-Each block of the settlements namely SLC had 10 units; each unit had about an acre and a half of land and a small house and so each household could have about a large orchard and garden.
-Travelers coming to see SLC marveled at how beautiful it was; even the streets had lovely brooks running along side them and so forth.
-Wilford Woodruff lived in one of the richest areas of Utah and was the second richest person that lived in that area, but even the more rich among them were not to be lazy; you had to work hard no matter how rich you were
-when the government was coming after the Saints, there was a saying that though the saints were like the worker bees, those coming after them would learn they could also sting.
-Eventually church leaders practicing polygamy had to live in hiding to not be arrested by the US government. Wilford Woodruff wrote as he officially ended this church practice, that he was acting for the temporal salvation of the church and had considered the matter in great length in prayer. There were rumors at that time that the US government was about to close down their temples if they would not cease the practice.