Latter-day Saints think of Joseph Smith as a visionary, and rightly so. During his life, he received heavenly manifestations, including visions from God, Jesus Christ, and angels. He introduced translated records of humanity’s past and received visions of the afterlife. If improperly interpreted, however, these experiences can turn Joseph into a caricature of himself, a man who was constantly tuned into heaven. Although Joseph received striking visions and visitations, he was a lonely soul who struggled to understand how to fulfill God’s will. But this loneliness—his experience of the absence of God’s presence or directions—was formative.
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Learn more. This is an excerpt from Know Brother Joseph: New Perspectives on Joseph Smith’s Life and Character. Read the book for the rest of the story.
Know Brother Joseph: New Perspectives on Joseph Smith’s Life and Character. Pages 138-142, © 2021 by R. Eric Smith, Matthew C. Godfrey, and Matthew J. Grow Published under license from Deseret Book Company.
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. No part of this work may be reproduced in any form or by any means without permission in writing from the publisher.
Loneliness shaped Joseph Smith’s prophetic voice, possibly even more so than the heavenly encounters did. But how did this work? How did Joseph’s inner isolation foster his visionary worldview?
When he found himself alone, Joseph reflected on and explored his inner world, which paradoxically was an experience tantamount to communing with God.1
Three moments from Joseph’s life demonstrate how loneliness fostered a rich communion with deity: his experiences before his First Vision, his time in Liberty Jail, and his instruction during the April 1844 conference.
Prologue to the First Vision
Joseph Smith recalled that as a boy he, at times, experienced great anxiety. He worried about his soul and the world—as if the fates of both were somehow connected.2 The idea of joining a church also concerned him because his choice carried “eternal consequences”—deep thoughts for a child.3
Finding no guidance in his religious culture, which was embroiled in a “war of words, and tumult of opinion,” Joseph turned inward.4 His mother, Lucy Mack Smith, recalled that Joseph differed from her other children because he was inclined to “reflection and deep study” over book learning.5
Before his prayer in the grove, he had already found God.
One, however, should not assume from his mother’s observation that Joseph never read. Hers, instead, was a statement about how Joseph preferred to learn.
Consider how he engaged with the scripture James 1:5, “If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God, that giveth to all men liberally, and upbraideth not; and it shall be given him.”
When Joseph read this passage, it impressed him deeply. “It seemed to enter with great force into every feeling of my heart,” he said. Joseph’s account indicates that he first focused on how the scripture affected him, after which he returned to the text, which he read not once but “reflected on . . . again and again.”
For Joseph, the act of thinking was not divorced from his emotions. This scripture first spoke to his heart and then to his mind.
Thinking about this verse, however, was only one of “many things” he reflected on during the lengthy period before his First Vision, which was a time of inner struggle. He said his “feelings were deep” and used phrases such as “exceedingly distressed” and “great uneasiness” to describe his mental state.
His lonely reflection, however, was fruitful, for it was during this time that he first discovered God. It is a mistake to assume that Joseph’s first encounter with Deity occurred during the First Vision. Before his prayer in the grove, he had already found God by observing nature, reading scripture, and pondering.
Joseph’s First Vision from God, then, was not triggered alone from a passage in the New Testament but was the culmination of years of deep and solitary reflection.
Incarcerated Isolation
When today’s Latter-day Saints reflect on the defining aspects of Joseph Smith’s life, four events are often mentioned:
- The First Vision
- The translation of the Book of Mormon
- Priesthood restoration
- The introduction of saving ordinances
These events were crucial aspects of Joseph’s mission, but an undertaking just as central to his prophetic identity was his attempt to build the New Jerusalem in Missouri, a city where the Saints would gather to prepare for Christ’s Second Coming.
Joseph experienced a deep loneliness in Liberty jail, for he did not know where God was.
Indeed, it cannot be overemphasized just how important building Zion was for Joseph Smith. It was one of his defining projects until the Saints were expelled from Missouri during the winter of 1838–39. After the Saints gathered in Illinois, Joseph spent the rest of his life seeking justice for their losses.
Joseph never built the New Jerusalem; instead, he ended up in prison, charged with treason for participating in the “Mormon War,” the conflict with Missourians that led to the Saints’ expulsion.
Even though he was incarcerated with others, Joseph experienced a deep loneliness in Liberty jail, for he did not know where God was.
As he had done as a boy, Joseph approached God for wisdom, this time petitioning his creator to explain his absence—”O God, where art thou[?]” God responded by comforting Joseph and offering him perspective.
This exchange appeared in a letter written to Church members on March 20, 1839, portions of which were later canonized in the Doctrine and Covenants. This and a letter written approximately two days later offer insights into Joseph Smith’s theological response to loneliness.
This isolation was not without meaning.
Part of the March 20 letter captures Joseph’s reflections on salvation, which include his instructions that one must think deeply and carefully to save a soul:
Thy mind O Man, if thou wilt lead a soul unto salvation must stretch as high as the utmost heavens, and search into and contemplate the darkest abyss, and expand upon the broad considerations of eternal expanse, he must commune with God.
Joseph Smith
While in Liberty jail, Joseph found himself twice incarcerated: his body was bound by visible walls, while his mind was imprisoned in a seemingly boundless chasm.
But this isolation was not without meaning. Stretching the mind, contemplating both heaven and hell, was an inner activity, Joseph wrote, that would bring one into the presence of God. Finding salvation and encountering God therefore required one, at times, to consider the abyss.
In a follow-up letter to the Saints, Joseph Smith returned to this deep theme of deep contemplation. He recorded more of God’s words, which transformed hell and the experience of darkness into a monster with a wide maw—”if the very jaws of hell shall gape open her mouth wide after thee.”
God informed Joseph that encountering this beast would provide him experience.
In his March 20 letter, Joseph had indicated that comprehending God’s designs required “time and experience and careful and ponderous and solemn thoughts.”
Thus, the experiences associated with Joseph’s incarcerated isolation would help him to better understand God. While imprisoned, Joseph was also told that Jesus had contemplated the abyss, descending lower than anyone.
As a boy, Joseph had encountered God in the light; now, he was encountering God in the darkness. God seemed to be present in both heaven and hell, and to commune with him, one had to discover him in both places.
A Lonely Heart
“You never knew my heart,” Joseph Smith told the Saints during the April 1844 semiannual conference. He continued, “No man knows my history; I cannot tell it. I shall never undertake it.”
As many as 20,000 people heard Joseph declare that his inner world was incommunicable. But one aspect of it could be shared—his views on God.
He believed the validity of his prophetic enterprise hinged on his ability to teach about God’s character: “if I fail [to explain his nature], it becomes my duty to renounce all my pretensions to revelations.”
Known as the King Follett sermon, this April 7 discourse is remembered for Joseph’s teaching that God is an exalted human being. This striking doctrine, however, is not the most remarkable aspect of the sermon and distracts from Joseph’s more profound teaching that God has a character, which can be known.
According to Joseph, to have eternal life is to live with a certain worldview, to have insight into God’s being.
The way to access this knowledge came through careful thoughts coupled with God’s inspiration. However, the problem with humanity was that they did not comprehend God’s designs; instead, they were given over to “a fanciful and flowery and heated imagination.”
“Few beings in the world,” Joseph said, “understand rightly the character of God.”
He, therefore, asked his listeners to “lift your minds into a more lofty sphere, a more exalted understanding; that [than] what the human mind generally understands.”
Joseph challenged the crowd, asking them if they knew who God was: “have any of you seen him, heard him, communed with him?”
Joseph had. But the encounter occurred within a lonely heart that no one knew.
Conclusion
The moments of loneliness that Joseph Smith experienced during his life were real. God’s absence was palpable. But this inner isolation was not without purpose. Loneliness, with its anxieties and worries, led the Prophet to commune with God, a being he found in a grove and a dungeon.
It was because of and during the lonely moments of his life that Joseph learned about his God. Loneliness forced Joseph to question, to doubt, and to reflect, which, for him, led to deeper insights about the nature of divinity.
During his life, Joseph came to know God through visions and visitations as well as during the moments when he felt separated from the being he worshipped.
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Book excerpt. From Know Brother Joseph: New Perspectives on Joseph Smith’s Life and Character. Pages 138–142. Copyright © 2021 by Robert Eric Smith, Matthew Charles Godfrey, and Matthew Joseph Grow. Published under license from Deseret Book Company. Style has been slightly modified to accommodate online reading.
About the Author
J. Chase Kirkham is a historian and documentary editor with The Joseph Smith Papers Project. He holds a PhD in Religious Studies from Claremont University, and is currently working on The Lost Discourses of John Taylor for the Church History Department. The project consists of approximately 80 unpublished sermons delivered by the prophet between 1852 and 1875.
Further Reading
Learn more about the Prophet Joseph Smith and the early history of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in these articles:
- Know Brother Joseph: Q&A with the Editors
- John Turner’s Forthcoming Joseph Smith Biography
- How Did Joseph Smith Translate the Book of Mormon?
- Let’s Talk About Church History Books
- In Sacred Loneliness: The Documents of Joseph Smith’s Wives
Joseph Smith and Loneliness Resources
- Know Brother Joseph: New Perspectives on Joseph Smith’s Life and Character (Deseret Book)
- Joseph Smith and the Problem of Loneliness (BYU Religious Studies Center)
- “Thy Mind, O Man, Must Stretch” (BYU Studies)
- Within the Walls of Liberty Jail: D&C 121, 122, 123 (Revelations in Context)
- Liberty Jail (Church History Topics)