Learn more about Joseph Smith and the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Following the Prophet’s “First Vision” in 1820, the Latter-day Saints have grown to comprise nearly 20 million members around the world.
FromtheDesk features interviews and commentary on the latest Joseph Smith research, including frequent check-ins with scholars from the Joseph Smith Papers project.
The nature of Joseph Smith’s revelatory experiences has become a subject of intense academic focus. Some scholars have looked at what the Prophet meant by translation, while others have mused about the purpose of the gold plates. In this interview, Jeffrey Bradshaw talks about the relationship between Freemasonry and the Latter-day Saint temple endowment.
The relationship between Joseph Smith’s ministry and Freemasonry and the temple endowment has long been a topic of interest. In this interview, Cheryl Bruno discusses some of the ways in which the Prophet may have been influenced by Freembookasonry throughout his life, from Palmyra to Nauvoo.
The Work and the Glory is a nine-volume historical fiction series about Joseph Smith and the beginnings of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. The successful books also led to three Work and the Glory movies. In this interview, author Gerald Lund looks back on the series more than 30 years laterbo—and reveals that it almost never got written.
The Church History Department and Relief Society General Presidency recently published Relief Society general board minutes covering the years 1842–2007. The minutes include notes from the first meeting of the Nauvoo Relief Society, preparations for World War II, and the impact of global events. Anne Berryhill explains that the Relief Society minutes also contain accounts of prominent Latter-day Saints such as Emma Smith, Eliza Snow, and Zina D. H. Young.
The Prophet Joseph Smith translated the Book of Mormon from a set of gold plates given to him by an angel named Moroni. Interestingly, Joseph Smith rarely consulted the plates during the translation process. In this interview, historian Richard Bushman says that raises an interesting question: What was the purpose of the gold plates if Joseph Smith didn’t often look at them?
Joseph Smith is known for telling his family very little about the First Vision. The Prophet’s history in the Pearl of Great Price records that he simply told his mother, “I have learned for myself that Presbyterianism is not true.” Historian Kyle Walker discusses newly discovered sources from the Smith family, lending weight to Steven C. Harper’s assertion that no one knows how many First Vision accounts Joseph Smith gave.
William W. Phelps was closely associated with many key events in the early history of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. He was called “a printer unto the church” in D&C 57, and wrote popular hymns like The Spirit of God. According to biographer Bruce A. Van Orden, W. W. Phelps was also a prolific ghostwriter for Joseph Smith.