Scott Woodward:  
 In 1835 Joseph Smith briefly received into his Kirtland, Ohio home an eccentric visitor who claimed to be a Jewish minister named Joshua. According to Joseph’s journal, it was to this supposedly Jewish man that he recounted what we know as Joseph’s second recorded account of the First Vision. Today we’ll explore how Joseph’s perception that he was speaking with a Jewish man influenced the details he chose to share and the language he used to tell about his experience. Also, three years later, in 1838, Joseph moved to Far West, Missouri, after a season of severe persecution in Kirtland and the apostasy of several church members there. It was while in Far West, with the help of several scribes, that Joseph began recording his official history, which begins with the account of his First Vision that became the official version canonized in Latter day Saint scripture. We’ll explore the unique details of this account and why it makes sense as the official account of Joseph’s vision. And we explore in depth perhaps the most controversial line of this account, where Jesus said of the Christian sects of the day that they were all wrong and that all their creeds were an abomination to Him. What did this mean? And what did this not mean? All of this and more coming your way on today’s episode of Church History Matters, a podcast of Scripture Central. I’m Scott Woodward, a Managing Director at Scripture Central, and my co-host is Casey Griffiths, also a Managing Director at Scripture Central, and today Casey and I dive into our second episode in this series dealing with Joseph Smith’s First Vision. So let’s get into it.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
This is part two of our series on the First Vision. Now, before we dive in, we want to recap what we talked about last time. Scott, what do you remember about our conversation from last time?

Scott Woodward:  
Last time we talked about how the First Vision is foundational to the church. Absolutely can’t get around that, but it’s interesting: We discussed how its significance has grown over time. It was always significant, of course, to Joseph Smith personally, but its institutional significance has grown pretty remarkably. And what I mean by institutional significance is its significance for members of the church, right? And for how we tell the narrative of our church’s history. For Joseph, it may not have been immediately obvious why his own sacred, personal journey would matter to the institutional church, but over time, it seems that that became more and more apparent, and as he started to tell the story more and record the story more, that’s going to naturally help this come into the consciousness and into the historical narrative of the church.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
And one thing that we emphasized was that in recent years, it’s become well known that Joseph Smith wrote several different accounts of the First Vision. Essentially, there’s four firsthand accounts: 1832, which is what we discussed last time; 1835, which we’re going to talk about today; 1838, which we may get to today as well, we’re hoping; and 1842. We talked about how the 1832 account was written, at least in part, it seems because of experiences Joseph Smith had in 1832 in and around Greenville, Indiana. The 1835 account is an entry in Joseph Smith’s journal. So those first two aren’t official accounts. They’re not published. 1838 is the official history. That’s the one I think most people are familiar with. It’s the one that’s canonized in the Pearl of Great Price. And then probably the next most well known one is 1842, which is part of the Wentworth Letter, part of which is canonized and placed in the Pearl of Great Price. So…

Scott Woodward:  
Yeah. We also highlighted the fact that they’re—when you look at those four accounts and compare them, there are some significant differences and emphases, right, in each one. And what you make of these differences depends upon your hermeneutic. We used that word, which means, like, your mental lens by which you view and interpret things. If there is no way in your mind that Joseph Smith is a true prophet, like, if you’ve already concluded, like some people have, that he’s an imposter, then you’re going to interpret every difference with, we call it the hermeneutic of suspicion, right? Just trying to catch Joseph in his lies, right? Trying to watch, see if he makes a slip. But if you’re like us—we read through the hermeneutic of trust. And when you read it like that, you interpret these differences as rich and meaningful nuances that naturally arise out of the context in which he related the account. And when each context is understood, then the differences in the accounts make all the sense in the world. So, for instance, you know, last time we highlighted the highly personal, soul-searching context in which the 1832 account was written, which explains perfectly why this account includes so many personal details about Joseph’s inner world at the time of the First Vision. It’s definitely the most personal account, right? By far. It’s got—he talks about his feelings and what’s going on inside: his feeling that he was a convicted sinner and that he wanted forgiveness like crazy, talks about the love that he felt in his heart for many days, and none of those details come up in the other accounts. Most of them not at all, and others are very obscured. So this one, the highly personal nature of the account itself, helps us understand why he included certain details, which he won’t in some of the more public accounts.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
And so what we’re trying to do with each one of these accounts is just basically explain the context in which it was written, give you what’s unique about each account, and then we’ll also talk about how the context affects the content. So let’s jump in, but before we do 1835, there was one point about 1832 that we just wanted to take a brief moment and address, which is the First Vision takes place in 1820. The earliest account is written in 1832. Twelve years later, most historians will tell you the nearer to an event that an account is written down, the more accurate it tends to be. So, some people would say, “Why wait 12 years to write it?” Scott, how would you answer that question? Why did he wait 12 years before he wrote the First Vision?

Scott Woodward:  
Right. Yeah. Isn’t that historically suspicious, that he wouldn’t write it down until 12 years later? I’d say, well, through the hermeneutic of suspicion, yeah. Yeah. That’s suspicious. The likes of critic Fawn Brodie, we mentioned her a little bit last time, she’ll conclude from that fact that Joseph concocted the vision years after he said it happened just to bolster his claims of prophethood. And so I think that only works if you look at it superficially. If you look at the details in depth and you look at the context, we cannot emphasize context enough here in this podcast. Then a different story emerges. For instance, it’s important to note that prior to 1832, Joseph had never attempted to record his personal history. This is his first attempt, 1832. All record keeping prior to this had centered primarily on preserving his revelations, but as far as his personal history, that’s what I mean. He had never attempted this. So he’s 26 years old in 1832. He’s not a personal journal keeper. It wasn’t until the summer of 1832 that he starts his personal history, and then that fall, in November, he will start his own personal journal. And so it’s important to know that when Joseph did begin writing his history, the First Vision was one of the very first things he records. So if Joseph had kept a journal and had conveniently omitted the First Vision from this record, now, that would be suspicious, yes, from a historical perspective, right? But when you understand that he had never kept a history until 1832, and then one of the very first things that he records in that history is his First Vision account, that’s a different thing altogether.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
And honestly, if you were to ask 14 year old me, “Did you write anything down?” I mean, no. Just like we mentioned earlier, he sees this, it seems, as a personal manifestation. And I also think there’s a part of Joseph Smith that wanted the work to speak for itself. He wanted the Book of Mormon to be the first thing that people studied to gain a testimony of his message. But you’re absolutely right. The first time he writes down his story, he records the First Vision.

Scott Woodward:  
Yeah.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
That seems to fit with the context that we know.

Scott Woodward:  
It’s probably also important, in 1838, in that account, he’s going to tell us that when he did try to tell this story, he said it “excited a great deal of prejudice, and was the cause of great persecution, which continued to increase. I continued to attract the attention of the great ones of the most popular sects of the day,” he says, “and in a manner to create in them a spirit of the most bitter persecution and reviling.” So he’d learned early on, he’d gotten burned when he did try to tell that story. He got burned every time. And so I sense in him a reluctance. Whenever I tell that story, it just kicks up the hornet’s nest, right? I get persecution and reviling. So maybe there’s some of that, too, some psychological reason for not leading with the First Vision, right? Like you said, just let’s let the work speak for itself. Examine the Book of Mormon. You don’t have to take my word for it. Just look at the book.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
You know, if he’s got a book that is 500 pages long, it’s easier for him to defend himself. The First Vision is such a personal experience that he goes into these conflicts with no way to defend himself, basically, so—

Scott Woodward:  
Yeah.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
It makes sense. You know, you’re traumatized as a young man. The 1838 account, he mentions that he was really, really sort of taken aback when he told a minister that he had seen God, and the minister told him it was all of the devil. And, I mean, at that young age, receiving a strong rebuke from an authority figure, seems like someone that he trusted, you can understand would create a hesitancy for him to want to share this.

Scott Woodward:  
Yeah, so I just say in response to why did he wait 12 years, I just say, you know, when you look at the details, right, instead of supporting the conspiracy theory that Joseph’s concocting this idea in 1832 to bolster his prophetic claim, the historical evidence supports the narrative that A, Joseph was not inclined to tell his story because he’d been burned in the past when he did so, and B, that since he’d never kept a journal or personal history prior to 1832, we wouldn’t have expected him to have written it down before then, right? And then it’s important to note that the very first thing he does when he does start a history is tell this story. And so, yeah, I think upon close examination, that’s, that is not an issue, and it’s completely understandable within the context.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Yeah, I agree. Well, let’s move on to the 1835 account of the First Vision, which probably has the weirdest context of any account of the First Vision. This has some really, really crazy stuff happening when Joseph gives it. We mentioned earlier, this isn’t a public publication. This is written in his journal, and it’s recorded in his journal as part of an encounter that Joseph Smith has with a guy named Joshua the Jewish prophet, AKA Matthias the prophet, AKA Robert Matthews, who’s a colorful figure, deserves a book all of his own, who kind of shows up in Kirtland in 1835 and stays with Joseph Smith for a couple days. Tell us a little bit about Robert Matthews, Scott, and where he’s coming from.

Scott Woodward:  
Yeah, there’s some funny kind of quirky details that are recorded in the journal about him. Joseph says he was somewhere between 50 and 55 years old. He had a gray beard. He was slender. He said he wore a green coat and pantaloons and a black fur hat. He frequently shut his eyes with a scowl when he spoke, kind of—I’m trying to picture this guy with his gray beard, black fur hat, wearing a green coat and scowling when he talks, kind of, maybe squinting? Squinting, scowling, I don’t know. Kind of a fun description, but then Joseph learns a little bit more about the suspicions about his past, right? Do you want to talk about the—what he was suspected of?

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Yeah. There’s a journal entry that just, line by line, is crazy as you read through it, especially when you consider 1830 standards of hospitality, like, if one of these red flags came up today, I think every one of us would kick Joshua out of the house. But it’s like—he keeps staying there. So the journal reads as follows: “Suspicions were entertained that the said Joshua was the noted Matthias of New York, spoken so much of in the public prints on account of the trials he endured in that place before a court of justice for murder, manslaughter, contempt of court, whipping his daughter, et cetera.” And so they start to suspect that he’s this kind of well-known figure who’s been accused of, you know, everything from whipping his daughter up to murder, and then next thing, November 9, after equivocating he confessed he really was Matthias. And at this point, you’re like, kick him out of the house. Don’t let him stay with you. But he’s still there. In fact, he hangs in there for a couple more days. November 10, so this is the day after the guy confesses that he is the noted Matthias accused of murder. “I resumed conversation with Matthias and desired him to enlighten my mind more on his views respecting the resurrection.” And then it cuts, “I told him his doctrine was of the devil and that he was in possession of a wicked and depraved spirit, although he professed to be the spirit of truth itself and said that he also possessed the spirit or soul of Christ.” So this guy doesn’t just have delusions of grandeur, he’s claiming that he is the Holy Ghost, and that he possesses the spirit of Jesus Christ.

Scott Woodward:  
Geez.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Which, again, is an obvious pointer to say why Joseph Smith would recite the story of the First Vision to him. You know, he’s claiming that he’s both the Holy Ghost and Christ.

Scott Woodward:  
Didn’t—wasn’t it before he had confessed to being Matthias that Joseph told him that? Am I getting the chronology right on this? That he had told him first, and then later on in the account he said . . .

Casey Paul Griffiths:
The guy’s countering him, saying, “No, I possess the soul of Christ”?

Scott Woodward:  
Yeah, what?

Casey Paul Griffiths:
I don’t remember. Yeah, I don’t remember. We ought to pull up the journal itself on the Joseph Smith Papers.

Scott Woodward:  
I’m pulling it up right now. Okay.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
You look it up, and I’ll keep going, because it actually says after this conversation, when Joseph Smith tells him he’s possessed of a wicked and depraved spirit, Matthias still doesn’t leave. It’s not until the day after. “He tarried until Wednesday the 11th,” the journal reads, “after breakfast,” So they feed him breakfast first, “when I told him that my God told me his god was the devil, and I could not keep him any longer, and he must depart, and so I for once cast out the devil in bodily shape and, I believe, a murderer.”

Scott Woodward:  
That’s so funny. My God said that your god is the devil. That’s so awesome.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Yeah. So where does the First Vision fit into this narrative? Have you found where he tells Matthias, or Robert Matthews, or Joshua, or whatever name we’re going to use for him, the story of the First Vision? Where does that come into their conversation?

Scott Woodward:  
Yeah, so I’ve got it here. I’m on Joseph Smith Papers looking at this account, and he said, yeah, he doesn’t know who he is yet when he tells the story. All he knows is that this guy is a Jewish guy. And I think that’s actually important for how Joseph tells the story—which I’ll make the case here in a minute, but he says this: So after he says that he was dressed with a sea-green frock coat and pantaloons of the same color and a black fur hat with a narrow brim and he shut his eyes frequently with a scowl on his countenance when he spoke. He then just says this: he says, “I made some inquiry after his name but received no definite answer.” And then he said, next line, “We soon commenced talking upon the subject of religion, and after I had made some remarks concerning the Bible, I commenced giving him a relation of the circumstances connected with the coming forth of the Book of Mormon as follows.” And then he starts telling the First Vision story. So he tells his First Vision story on the way to telling about the coming forth of the Book of Mormon.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Hmm, interesting.

Scott Woodward:  
And then it’s after he tells the First Vision story that we get the next few days of journal entry where he, it really kind of dawns on him that this guy is Matthias the murderer from New York. So originally he thinks he’s a, some Jewish minister of some kind.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Yeah, because that’s how Matthews introduces himself, you know, as Joshua the Jewish minister.

Scott Woodward:  
Yeah, yeah.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
That’s interesting, because one thing that distinguishes this account of the First Vision is it’s the first mention that Joseph makes of someone besides the Father and the Son being there in the grove. It’s the first one he talks about some kind of demonic influence. And he doesn’t emphasize it as much as he does in the 1838 account, the one most of us are familiar with, but I wonder if from the beginning he sensed that there was something not quite right about his visitor.

Scott Woodward:  
Something satanic.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Something satanic. I mean, he tells the guy that his god is the devil. Which, again, is a pretty direct statement to make.

Scott Woodward:  
My God told me that your God is the devil. That’s the best line. That’s so great.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Yeah. Yeah. I’m going to, I’m going to try and work that into a conversation the next time I’m talking with someone theologically. Let’s look at the account itself.

Scott Woodward:  
Yeah.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
It’s fairly brief. It’s a couple paragraphs in Joseph Smith’s journal, but there’s a lot in this one that’s unique or original. In fact, I’d say after the 1832 account, this is probably the one that has the most unique features. It might be the one that has the most unique features among the Joseph Smith accounts that are given. For instance, one thing that is unique in this is this is the first reference to James 1:5, that he’s reading through the Bible. He says, “Being perplexed in mind, I retired to the silent grove and bowed down before the Lord under a realizing sense that he had said, if the Bible be true, ask and ye shall receive, knock and it shall be opened, seek and ye shall find. And again, if any man lack wisdom, let him ask of God, who giveth to all men liberally and upbraideth not.” So he makes a direct appeal to the scriptures. This part of James 1:5 and the idea of asking God coming from the scriptures is going to become a central tenet of the rest of the accounts. Maybe the most important part of the accounts, because he’s trying to, I think, explain later on how other people can do what he did—that anybody can ask God. That’s a unique feature. What else is unique about this as we go through?

Scott Woodward:  
1832 account, he doesn’t even mention Satan, but here, boy, let me read this. He said, “Information was what I most desired at this time, and with a fixed determination to obtain it, I called upon the Lord for the first time in the place above stated, or in other words, I made a fruitless attempt to pray,” he says. “My tongue seemed to be swollen in my mouth so that I could not utter. I heard a noise behind me, like some person walking toward me. I strove again to pray, but could not. The noise of walking seemed to draw nearer. I sprung up on my feet and looked around, but I saw no person or thing that was calculated to produce the noise of walking.” Yeah, this is the only account that mentions this, right? This noise of walking, this kind of sense that someone’s there. And then when I tried to pray, my tongue was swollen in my mouth. That’s interesting, right? So it’s almost as if the dark power is, like, trying to intimidate or scare him out of praying in this sense, and then trying to bind his tongue. He will mention the bound tongue in the 1838 account.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
This is the one, this is the account that kind of gives me shivers up my spine, right? Because I think about what it would be like to be, like, in a secluded place.

Scott Woodward:  
Yeah.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
And to just that sound of someone approaching you when you think you’re all alone. The very first time I went to the Sacred Grove, I was so excited. I left our hotel at, like, 11 p.m. We got there really late. And in a rainstorm, and just with my cell phone flashlight, I went to the Sacred Grove in Palmyra, just thinking, I want to be in the Sacred Grove. So I’m walking in, and there’s kind of a light rain and only dim light, and I was reflecting on “Wow. This is where the Father and Son appeared,” and then I heard something walking up behind me.

Scott Woodward:  
What? What?

Casey Paul Griffiths:
And it freaked me out. Like, the first thought I had was, “This is also where Satan tried to stop Joseph Smith,” and I made a beeline out of the grove. Now, the next day I saw that there’s raccoons all over the Sacred Grove. Like, I don’t think I’m as significant as Joseph Smith. Satan probably didn’t put in, you know, time just to try and stop me. But that walking up behind you effect has always kind of been the scariest or one of the scarier aspects of the First Vision to me.

Scott Woodward:  
You’re not suggesting that Joseph was just being scared by raccoons?

Casey Paul Griffiths:
I’m not. And like I said, the later accounts, where he becomes a little bit more bold in saying—the 1838 account, for instance, says “not from any imagined power, but from an unseen being”—

Scott Woodward:  
Yeah.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
—who had real power. Like, he talks about feeling like he was doomed to destruction.

Scott Woodward:  
Yeah.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
So this is a mild introduction to that. In 1838, he’s going to get even more specific.

Scott Woodward:  
Yeah, one more detail that’s unique here is once his tongue is liberated, he uses that word, he calls on the Lord in mighty prayer, and then he says, “A pillar of fire,” right? All of his other accounts call it a pillar of light, but “a pillar of fire appeared above my head, and it presently rested down upon me and filled me with joy unspeakable.” And then he says, “a personage,” one, “a personage appeared in the midst of this pillar of flame, which was spread all around and yet nothing consumed,” as if the fire, he thought, might consume the leaves. And then he says, “Another personage soon appeared, like unto the first. And he said unto me, ‘Thy sins are forgiven thee.’ He testified unto me that Jesus Christ is the Son of God, and I saw many angels in this vision. I was about 14 years old when I received this first communication.” And that’s the end of the account. So we’ve got pillar of fire, pillar of flame, Father and the Son appear not together, but one and then the other. That’s an interesting insight. And then “thy sins are forgiven thee.”

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Let me make sure I’ve got the sequence here. He says a personage appeared in the midst of this pillar of flame, and then another appeared, and he said unto me, thy sins are forgiven thee. So we’re assuming the Father appears first, correct?

Scott Woodward:  
Yeah.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
And then the Son appears, forgives him of his sins, and then he switches back to the Father, and he, meaning the Father, testified unto me that Jesus Christ is the Son of God. That seems to fit the whole thing together.

Scott Woodward:  
Yeah.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Another thing that stands out is in the Orson Pratt account—which we assume he’s drawing firsthand information from Joseph Smith. Both this account and Orson Pratt make it sound like the pillar of light is more than just light. Like, it has some kind of visceral force. Orson Pratt says he expected to have seen the boughs of the trees burst into flame when it came into contact with the light, but seeing that it did not, he was encouraged that he might be able to endure its presence, meaning this is more than just a powerful spotlight that flips on. It sounds like the light approaches—

Scott Woodward:  
Yeah.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
—and has some sort of force to it that he’s worried it’s going to destroy the grove. It’s going to set the grove on fire—

Scott Woodward:  
Yeah.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
—when it actually approaches.

Scott Woodward:  
Yeah, fascinating. And then we’ve got to highlight that this is the only account where he mentions that there were many angels in this vision.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
That is frustrating.

Scott Woodward:  
Yeah.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
That is one of the most frustrating details in any First Vision account, because there were other angels that appeared here? Did any of them speak to you? Were any of them identified? I wish that we knew a little bit more about that, but he seems to, again, keep the focus on the Father and the Son.

Scott Woodward:  
Hmm. So could I talk about how context here influences the text? Is that okay? Can I make some observations?

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Fire away. Yeah.

Scott Woodward:  
So here’s what we know, right? We know so far that his audience here was an audience of one. He was a man that hadn’t even yet told him his name. What Joseph knew about him is that he was a supposed Jewish minister, right?

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Yeah.

Scott Woodward:  
So, Joseph’s mind, this is me now doing some thinking here, Joseph’s mind calibrates the telling of this story to a Jewish man. Now watch how this, like, plays out, I think this is pretty powerful. So first of all, the guy’s a stranger, so this is going to account for the objective details, right? Very little personal feelings here. Way different than the 1832 account in that regard. He is also speaking here in religious generalities, which both Jews and Christians could relate with. Like he’s saying things like, “matters that involved eternal consequence,” right? He didn’t even bring up that he was trying to understand which church he should join. It’s “matters of eternal consequence.” And then he only briefly touches on the revivals, which would have been of little interest to a Jew, right? Christian revivals. And then I think telling about Satan in talking to a Jewish man is something that Jews understand. They’re called ordeals, right? Where a prophet, before his call, wrestles with the powers of darkness somehow. Feelings of fear, feelings of inadequacy. Isaiah comes to mind, like Isaiah 6. And then mentions of a pillar of fire instead of a pillar of light. Boy, if that’s not a direct reference to the shechinah, right, that the Jews would have recognized. Remember the cloud by day and the pillar of fire by night?

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Yep. Very Old Testament imagery.

Scott Woodward:  
Totally. Old Testament imagery. Pillar of fire is going to speak to his audience of one, this Jewish man, better than pillar of light.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Yeah.

Scott Woodward:  
And the pillar of fire would have been recognized as a symbolic representation of the presence of God, right?

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Yeah.

Scott Woodward:  
And then mentioning the presence of many angels at the same time in this vision of God. Jews would recognize this as what’s sometimes called the divine council. Again, Isaiah 6 is a good example of that. When Isaiah is called, there’s other angels there. He looks, he sees God. There’s also some seraphim or something that brings a coal and touches his mouth, and there’s kind of this ordeal of purification. He’s afraid, and there’s more beings than one there. Jews would have recognized this reference to a divine council. That’s a fairly strong Jewish concept. And yet he doesn’t hold back from testifying boldly of two divine beings, and that one was Jesus the Christ, who forgives sin. So he’s definitely being bold here, but I see all these unique details being perfectly explained, again, by the context and by the nature of who he understood his audience to be.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Yeah, and again, that’s part and parcel with what we’re trying to do is to say the differences in the accounts a lot of times are just simply explained by doing your homework and knowing what was going on when he shared the story. An organic story like this is going to be a little bit different based on where Joseph Smith is at, and I hadn’t thought about that before, that there’s a lot of Old Testament imagery—a pillar of flame—that might be better suited for a Jewish person than the usual Christian imagery that He invokes in his other First Vision accounts.

Scott Woodward:  
Yeah, can I quote two Old Testament texts just to show a little glimpse of this?

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Sure.

Scott Woodward:  
For instance, Psalm 82:1 says, “God has taken his place in the divine council. In the midst of the gods,” these spiritual, divine beings, “he holds judgment.” Then another one, 1 Kings 22:19, it’s the prophet Micaiah. He says, “Hear thou, therefore, the word of the Lord, Jehovah. I saw the Lord sitting on his throne, and all the host of heaven standing by him on his right hand and on his left.” So there’s two examples of the divine council. And so I think that’s pretty significant in terms of the only account that mentions a bunch of angels. How did he say it? He said, “many angels I saw in this vision,” right? He doesn’t say where they were. Were they surrounding God? That’s how I picture it. Surrounding the Father and the Son on both sides, like Micaiah said. But he doesn’t mention—like you said, it’s kind of frustrating. We wish we had more details about that, but I think his Jewish audience would be nodding his head as Joseph told that story.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
A divine council. Yeah.

Scott Woodward:  
Scott, one possible connection I wonder about, too, is how does this line up with the Kirtland Hebrew school? Like, isn’t this around the time that they’re studying Hebrew?

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Oh, yeah.

Scott Woodward:  
And he’s, he—Joseph hires this really great tutor named Joshua Satius, who is Jewish, who comes to Kirtland. We’ve got Hebrew lexicons from this time period that they used when they were studying, and I wonder how much that informs his interpretation of the First Vision under these circumstances, where he’s starting to notice all these parallels between Jewish scripture, the Old Testament, and the experience that he has.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
That’s kind of an interesting angle here that maybe we need to explore.

Scott Woodward:  
Yeah.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
At this point, too, he’s also translated the Old Testament as well. The Joseph Smith Translation of the Old Testament ends in July of 1833. And, you know, one fact about Joseph Smith is that his scripture study affected him. You know, if he’s read the Old Testament really, really intensely, in fact, making inspired additions and corrections to the text, that would play into him being a little bit more well equipped than he was in 1832 to talk to a person of the Jewish faith, who—I don’t even know if Robert Matthews was of the Jewish faith, he just claimed to be, basically.

Scott Woodward:  
Yeah. What matters is that Joseph thought he was, right? And so, therefore, he’s going to sort of adapt the way he tells it to what he thought a Jew would really appreciate.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Yeah.

Scott Woodward:  
I think that takes into account why he emphasizes the details that he does.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
And that’s a good example of, I guess, interfaith dialogue, we’d say here, too, where he’s trying to meet him halfway and use language that he’s familiar with to convey his experience.

Scott Woodward:  
Yeah.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
That’s interesting. I want to keep us moving on to the 1838 account.

Scott Woodward:  
Yeah.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
So let’s jump there. Now, this is the one that’s in your scriptures. It is the canonized account of the First Vision.

Scott Woodward:  
Yeah.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Now, this one is the start of Joseph Smith—History. Just to understand a little bit about it, this is the official history of the church that is started in April of 1838. This work is a collaboration. There’s a lot of fingerprints on it from different people, but this early part, which—the very first, we don’t have the original manuscript. It was copied into the history of the church, but we think that Joseph Smith starts writing it at Far West, Missouri, his scribes are George Robinson and Sidney Rigdon, and becomes the start of what becomes the six-volume History of the Church. It takes almost 20 years for the history of the church to be published.

Scott Woodward:  
Mm-hmm.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Most stories people know from church history come from the History of the Church at some point or other. Even books that people would be familiar with, like Teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith—all Teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith is is that Joseph Fielding Smith went in and clipped out Joseph Smith’s discourses that were in the History of the Church and then put them into one book. So this is Joseph Smith acknowledging, it’s time for me to tell my story. It’s time for me to set the record straight. In fact, I want to read the exact introduction he gives here because it’s so useful in just kind of understanding this, so.

Scott Woodward:  
Yeah.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Verse one. “Owing to the many reports which have been put in circulation by evil disposed and designing persons in relation to the rise and progress of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, all of which have been designed by the authors thereof to militate against its character as a church and its progress in the world, I have been induced to write this history to disabuse the public mind, to put all inquirers after truth in possession of the facts as they have transpired in relation to both myself and the church, so far as I have such facts in my possession.” So this is the one he intends for people to read. Like, he sits down, you can imagine, with his scribes and works out all the facts, makes sure that his dates and his locations are precise. There’s not that same kind of precision in the earlier two accounts. And to be honest with you, I mean, this should be the canon account. This is probably the most thorough, thoughtful, and well-considered of the First Vision accounts.

Scott Woodward:  
Right.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
1842 is close behind, but this one is—it has a professional polish to it, I guess you’d say.

Scott Woodward:  
Yeah, good way to say it. Yeah, it’s the most polished, and that opening line tells you the context and therefore should attune our minds in terms of what to expect, right? There are a ton of rumors going on about the church right now, and those rumors are all calculated to militate against the church, right? So this history, or at least this account of the First Vision and the subsequent discussion about Moroni and the coming forth of the Book of Mormon, this is intended as, like, Joseph Smith’s apology. Apology in the sense of a defense, right? A defense of the faith.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Yeah.

Scott Woodward:  
He is trying to set the record straight to disabuse the public mind. And for those who really want the facts, come to the source, and I will tell you what happened, right? Let’s cut through all the rumor.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Right.

Scott Woodward:  
And by the way, this is not theoretical. Like, the reason that Joseph Smith’s in Far West is because of the death threats that he had received in Kirtland, right?

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Yeah.

Scott Woodward:  
From apostates there. So January 1838, he flees Kirtland to Far West, Missouri. They’re going to experience mob activity in Missouri in October 1838 there, be imprisoned in Missouri jails for five months from November ’38 to April ’39, and so he starts this history sometime in ’38 and then kind of rounds it out in ’39, as far as we understand, right?

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Yeah.

Scott Woodward:  
But it’s all in the context of, like, not theoretical but very real persecution by fellow Christians, by Bible-loving people who have just heard the very worst possible interpretation of the Joseph Smith and the Church of Jesus Christ story. He just wants to, with bruises and black eyes, as it were, he wants to tell the story so people will stop persecuting, right? People fear what they don’t understand, and they persecute what they fear. And so if I can just help people understand.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Yeah.

Scott Woodward:  
Perhaps this can help at least mitigate to some degree the persecution that we’re receiving from fellow Christians.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
And if the date is April 1838, you’re exactly right. This is right after the Kirtland apostasy, which is. . .

Scott Woodward:  
Yeah.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Serious problems there. The Kirtland Bank, all the things that accompany that, and right before the Missouri persecutions.

Scott Woodward:  
Yeah.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
I tell my students, you know, he leaves Kirtland, and it’s out of the frying pan, into the fire.

Scott Woodward:  
Yeah.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
In Kirtland, they’re dealing with internal dissension within the church, and in Missouri, they’re dealing with external persecution.

Scott Woodward:  
Yeah.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Couple other things: this is—April 1838 is right after Oliver Cowdery and David Whitmer and a lot of the early stalwarts from the church have been excommunicated.

Scott Woodward:  
Yeah. It’s a brutal time.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
With that in mind, it’s kind of remarkable that the history itself, he doesn’t take to task the character of any of his compatriots. He doesn’t criticize Oliver. He doesn’t criticize Martin Harris, who’s left the church at this point, too. He’s very, very generous in the way that he speaks about the people that he worked with, and it’s a great example of a coolly composed historical account. He’s very straightforward with the facts. Like, this is probably the most well-written of the First Vision accounts.

Scott Woodward:  
Yeah. And it needs to be, right? This needs to be a compelling and persuasive narrative, primarily so that non-LDS Christians stop persecuting us. So yeah, so that’s—so hence all the facts, right? Should we go through them?

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Yeah. In fact, I want—can—I want to read one quote really fast just to talk about the writing here, though.

Scott Woodward:  
Yeah.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
This is from Arthur Henry King. He’s this British professor of English literature that converts to the church, and I love this quote. I share it with my classes just to show why the 1838 account is special. This is a professor of English at a British university, and he says that what converted him to the church wasn’t necessarily the Book of Mormon, it was the simplicity of the language in the 1838 account. Here’s what he wrote: “When I was first brought to read Joseph Smith’s story, I was deeply impressed. I wasn’t inclined to be impressed as a stylistician. I spent my life being disinclined to be impressed. So when I read his story, I thought to myself, ‘This is an extraordinary thing. This is an astonishingly matter-of-fact and cool account. This man is not trying to persuade me of anything. He doesn’t feel the need to. He’s stating what happened to him, and he’s stating it not enthusiastically, but in quite a matter-of-fact way. He’s not trying to make me cry or feel ecstatic.’ That struck me, and that began to build my testimony, for I could see that this man was telling the truth.” And so this British professor is basically saying the strength of this account is its simplicity. I mean, even comparing it to the 1832 account, which has a lot of kind of, I guess, grand language. This is a by the books, here’s exactly what happened to me. I went here, I did this thing, and this happened. And as a historian, you know, that’s one of those things where you’d say are they clear and neutral in their tone?

Scott Woodward:  
Yeah.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
And do they state the facts in a straightforward manner? That makes this one of the strongest, if not the strongest, account of the First Vision that we have.

Scott Woodward:  
Yeah, when he says he’s not trying to persuade me of anything, I would say, well, he is. It’s what you said, Brother King, at the end when he said, This man’s telling the truth. I think he’s trying to persuade you with the facts. Like, if I could just tell my story, I think the truth will cut its own way, right? In that way it’s persuasive. It’s persuasive in the simplistic, straightforward telling of the facts. I like that. He’s not trying to get you to cry when you tell this story. Sometimes I feel like as missionaries, we want people to feel it when we tell this story, right? If not cry, at least feel something deep in your heart, but Joseph’s approach was, I’m just going to tell you the facts as they transpired, and I’ll let you come to your own conclusion. I like that a lot.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
And I remember as a missionary, like, the first discussion had you quote this directly. And I remember always, like, building to this and wanting to quote the prophet’s words. Because this is the moment that we would connect with people, usually, is when we were reciting these words. There’s real power in the story, and I think this is the best written version of the story. So let’s talk about what makes it unique. What are the highlights here that we don’t see in the previous accounts and that maybe are unique to it?

Scott Woodward:  
Yeah. So we’re getting lots of facts, like you said. We’re getting—we’re going to get dates, factual details, like “early in the spring of 1820.” He hasn’t mentioned that yet. Now we‘ve got that pinned down.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Yeah.

Scott Woodward:  
He mentions the weather. It was a beautiful spring day. He tells us what time of day. It was early—it was in the morning. He’s going to give exact quotations, right? These are, like you’re saying, Joseph trying to pin down the details. I can see his team of historians saying, tell us more. Like, what can you remember? Can you tell any more detail? Like, help us understand. Help paint the picture here. And so he’s going back and grasping for all those details, which is super helpful in kind of recreating this in our minds. Oh, and by the way, he spends 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, almost, verses on the Christian revivals, right? What he barely even mentioned in 1835 account. But if his audience here is primarily Christian, it’s interesting that he’d spend so much time on the Christian revivals here. Just lo here, lo there, the feeling between the Presbyterians, the Methodists, how his family is kind of dividing along Presbyterian and is it Methodist lines? Yeah. You know, what is to be done? Who of all these parties are right? The real question that he’s highlighting here is which church should I join, right? I get Christianity’s divided, they’re not all united, they all have different claims, and I’ve been confused, and maybe Joseph’s hoping that his Christian readers are nodding their heads in recognition that, yeah, like, we know what you’re talking about, brother.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
He does mention it a little bit in the 1832 account, right? He says, from the age of 12 to 15, I visited the various churches. This one, like we said, is specific. You could imagine his scribes there saying, well, what churches were you interested in? I felt some desire to be united with the Methodist sect.

Scott Woodward:  
Yeah, put that in there.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
He mentions that his family had joined different churches and that they’re a split religious household. You know, some people are going to one church, some are going to another, and his family really comes to prominence in this part, too.

Scott Woodward:  
Yeah.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Mentions that the first person he speaks to after his experience is his mother. Later on, when he talks about the angel appearing, he talks about his father being involved. This is, again, him sitting down and saying, let’s get all the facts straight on this. Who did I talk to first after this occurred? What kind of churches was I interested in when I was going around? And what kept me from joining these churches? What were the problems that I saw?

Scott Woodward:  
And what led me into the grove in the first place? He really highlights the Bible, right?

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Yeah.

Scott Woodward:  
I went into the grove because the Bible told me to. That’s what James said. And so I thought, well, I need wisdom, and so I thought I might venture. What would happen when a kid follows the Bible and actually believes James’s testimony? Let’s see what happens, right?

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Yeah.

Scott Woodward:  
It’s just so Christian, so drenched in Christian language.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Its public focus here, too, is kind of a, I’m telling my story, but I’m also giving you a how-to manual to do exactly what I did. I mean, I think part of the big strength of our message when we speak to people about the Restoration is to basically say you can find out for yourself. You just have to pray and ask God. And that’s not wholly unique among Christian religions, but Joseph Smith is stating a how-to: I read this in the Bible. You’ve probably got a Bible. Why don’t you go read this passage? I went out in the woods to pray. You probably have a private place you can pray. I had this experience. You could have this experience, too. Takes me back to Joseph Smith saying, God hath not revealed anything to Joseph, but that he would reveal to the Twelve and the least Saint as soon as they’re able to bear it. Like, at this point he’s trying to not emphasize that he’s special because God spoke to him, but emphasizing process. Here’s how you can have the same experience that I had, too. If you just follow this pattern, God will show you what’s right.

Scott Woodward:  
And this isn’t some weird, crazy, fringy thing. This is something that grew directly out of me exercising faith in a promise in the Bible.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Yeah.

Scott Woodward:  
And, yeah, you can do the same thing. It’s what I did. It’s, like, the most natural thing in the world to expect that God would answer the faithful prayer that was based in a promise from a prophet in the Bible. I think all that’s happening at the same time.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Yeah. And another thing that’s unique to this is this probably has the most extensive description of the demonic force, of the force that tries to stop him before he sees the pillar of light. And, I mean, I can understand some of the earlier accounts, him not wanting to mention this. I did a paper a couple years ago on films about the First Vision, and all the filmmakers said, that was one thing that we ran into, is if we’re making a movie for missionary purposes, do we put in the part where he’s overcome by darkness before the light appears? I think a reason why this might not have been emphasized as much in ’32 and ’35 is it raises a whole other can of worms, right? Like as missionaries, we didn’t share the darkness part, but he’s relating all the facts here.

Scott Woodward:  
That’s interesting, because it seems like this was intended to be the missionary version, right? The one that Joseph’s writing here, he feels like, at least, that he wants people to know about the satanic attack. If this is the one that he knows is going to go very public, it’s very fascinating that he spends so much time on the satanic attack.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Yeah. He is very specific to say this wasn’t just, like, nerves or anxiety. “Thick darkness gathered around me. It seemed for a time as if I were doomed to sudden destruction, not to an imaginary ruin, but the power of some actual being from the unseen world who had had such marvelous power as I had never before felt in any being.” So he’s stating clearly this isn’t some sort of vague, I got a little bit nervous or I just got a little scared. Something happened to me that had a malevolent force behind it. There was some kind of being.

Scott Woodward:  
This was not raccoons.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Yeah. This wasn’t raccoons. This was something quite a bit more than that.

Scott Woodward:  
Well, and I think in the context of persecution, this is interesting, right, that he’s being persecuted so much. And he’s going to highlight persecution quite a bit in this account. But the very first instance of opposition is actually demonic. He did not want me to pray, I think is the conclusion we’re supposed to come to here. The powers of darkness didn’t want what was about to happen to happen. I was seized upon. “I was ready to sink into despair and abandon myself to destruction, not to an imaginary ruin, but to the power of some actual being.” Like, this—what happened next, the powers of darkness, Satan, the being from the unseen world. I don’t think he actually mentions him by name, does he?

Casey Paul Griffiths:
No.

Scott Woodward:  
But that being from the unseen world was against what was about to happen. So I think that actually sets the stage for what Joseph is saying about the source of the persecution against this church, right? That the only reason that this is being persecuted so intensely is because the powers of darkness don’t want it to succeed.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Yeah.

Scott Woodward:  
That’s the facts. It started in the grove. It’s been happening ever since.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
And if he’s constructing a how-to manual on how to get revelation, this is part of it, too, right? Expect some opposition. There is a force out there that does not want people to connect with God and will try to stop you before you make your breakthrough.

Scott Woodward:  
That’s good.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
So let’s talk about the actual appearance. And this is the language that—I loved to recite this as a missionary.

Scott Woodward:  
Yeah.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
“Just at this moment of great alarm, I saw a pillar of light exactly over my head above the brightness of the sun, which descended gradually until it fell upon me. It no sooner appeared than I found myself delivered from the enemy which held me bound. When the light rested upon me I saw two personages, whose brightness and glory defy all description, standing above me in the air. One of them spake unto me, calling me by name, and said, pointing to the other, This is my beloved Son.” So, again, very precise language, what he’s describing here, what he’s seeing. Two personages, whose brightness and glory defy all description. One spoke, Pointed to the other, said this is my beloved Son. There’s none of the vagueness found in the earlier accounts here. You can tell that he maybe was conscientious that ’35 and ’32 were vague, so he wanted the absolute plainest way of saying this that he could written down on the page.

Scott Woodward:  
Yeah, I’m back to my mission as well, but I’m hearing this in Thai. I’m hearing, nī̀ khụ̄x bu trng thī̀ rạk c k̄hxng reā. Cng fạng th̀ān!. So good. Well, isn’t it interesting that what he’s omitting here is anything about his own personal seeking for forgiveness, and what he doesn’t mention here, which he already has in the first two accounts, is that the first thing that was told him was, your sins are forgiven thee. He doesn’t make any mention of that here. I don’t know why. I think it would have fit fine here, because I think Christians all believe in the forgiveness of sin. Many Christians and members of the church who had recently left, apostates, believe Joseph was a sinner. So maybe that would have been a good thing to include, but I don’t know. I’m not critiquing Joseph’s account. I just wonder, that seems like it would have fit here, but for some reason, he omits it.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Yeah, and I don’t know why he omits this detail. I don’t have any theories except to say that it’s a personal detail. It has to do with him. And he also emphasizes, “My object in going to inquire of the Lord was to know which of all the sects was right, that I might know which to join.” In the ’32 account, he is seeking personal forgiveness of his sins, which—these motives overlap with each other, right? Yeah. “What church should I join” is directly connected to the forgiveness of sin, right? That makes sense because it’s through the grace of God mediated by the true church that I will have access to the forgiveness of sin, I think, would be the thinking of the time, right? So those do go together. He turns the volume way up on which church I should join here, and turns down almost to silent here that he was seeking for forgiveness of sin, whereas in the 1832, it’s exactly reversed, right? Turns the volume way up on, I’m seeking personal forgiveness and very little, just a brief mention, of the confusion about the churches, so. Just, again, emphasis based on the context, based on audience, based on the hoped-for outcome. In this sense, a public profession of what occurred here with an outcome hoping to diminish persecution and, like you’re saying, hopefully give people a pattern or a template how they can also know how to evaluate this church, this church that there’s so many weird rumors about. If you want to evaluate this church, I can relate. I can relate to that. I’ve been in that position where I’ve tried to be evaluating churches the best I could, and it’s so confusing, and a lot of churches are saying a lot of things about other churches, and does that sound familiar? A lot of people are saying things about this church right now, my church, Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, and so this is how I went about my journey, and so can you.

Scott Woodward:  
Yeah.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
And surprisingly, as the official account, this one doesn’t have the longest statement from the Savior. I think 1832 does. He just kind of cuts to the chase here. “No sooner did I get possession of myself so as to be able to speak, than I asked the personages who stood above me in the light, which of all the sects was right? For at this time it never had entered into my heart that all were wrong. And which I should join? I was answered that I must join none of them. They were all wrong. The personage who addressed me said that all their creeds were an abomination in his sight, that those professors were all corrupt, that they draw near to me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me, for they teach for doctrines the commandments of men, having a form of godliness, but they deny the power thereof.” Now, he just gets right to the point there, doesn’t he?

Scott Woodward:  
Yeah.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
And also makes some valuable statements. Number one, I don’t see this as a condemnation of Christian religion in general. Do you?

Scott Woodward:  
No, not at all.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
I think the language here is very carefully chosen as a way of saying, “I’m not condemning other churches. Here’s what I’m condemning.”

Scott Woodward:  
Yeah. Yeah. I think this is so important to get right, because this verse—this is verse 19 in the Pearl of Great Price version here, is so easily read as a condemnation of other Christians, right? Because he says “they were all wrong, and that all their creeds were an abomination in His sight,” and “those professors were all corrupt,” that “they [drew] near to me with their lips [and] their hearts were far from me.” In some ways it’s like, well, how could you not take that as a condemnation of other Christians? And for sure, yeah, the hypocritical ones. Yeah, those who are drawing near to him with their lips, but their heart’s far from him, yeah. He’s condemning hypocrisy here for sure, but I think this is more fundamental than sometimes we make it. Sometimes we make this, like, a doctrinal issue. Like, well, a lot of people didn’t have a correct understanding of the Godhead, and that just bothers the Savior to no end. And so he condemns their creeds that just don’t get it right, you know, and boy, I just wholeheartedly disagree with that based on Joseph Smith’s subsequent statements. A lot of them that he makes in Nauvoo, he actually says that their creeds have some truth in them. They also have some error, but that’s not the issue. For Joseph Smith, he was fundamentally anti-credal. It’s the creeds themselves. I think that’s what the Savior’s saying here, that their creeds are an abomination. So, what Joseph said about the creeds is this. He said, “I want to come up into the presence of God and learn all things. But the creeds,” speaking about the Christian creeds, “the creeds set up stakes and say, ‘Hitherto shalt thou come and no further,’ which I cannot subscribe to,” Joseph said. He also said, “The Latter-day Saints have no creed but are ready to believe all true principles that exist as they are made manifest from time to time.” So it’s not that what was in the creeds are so abominable, it’s that creeds make us believe too little. They make us believe too little. And God is bigger than creeds. The First Vision was not the Lord saying He hates Catholics, or He hates Methodists, or He hates Baptists or Presbyterians. Not at all, right? If we’re reading this carefully, we’re finding that what He hates is hypocrisy and limiting creeds that limit and confine people’s belief, sometimes to erroneous things, but sometimes not. I think that’s what Joseph was pushing back on in his Article of Faith 13 when he said, “We believe all things.” He’s actually trying to push back against this idea of you can summarize all your beliefs in one succinct document, and that’s it. So Joseph’s anti-credal. I think that’s the more fundamental issue here that he learned first in the Sacred Grove.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
He makes a good point in that quote you just shared that the creeds are kind of conversation enders.

Scott Woodward:  
Yeah.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
They were sort of a, “This is the way it is, no further,” when what Joseph was interested in was searching God. Understanding Him.

Scott Woodward:  
Yeah.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
You know, a creed would say something like, God’s incomprehensible, so don’t even try. Joseph Smith would say, “If men do not comprehend the character of God, they do not comprehend themselves.” In other words, there’s no limit in what God wants you to learn, and He doesn’t want to place you in this box where you can’t find out things. It seems like the whole point of the First Vision is God wants to tell us things.

Scott Woodward:  
That’s right. Here’s another just great one from Joseph. He said, “The first and fundamental principle of our holy religion is that we believe that we have the right to embrace all and every item of truth,” now catch this language, “without limitation or without being circumscribed or prohibited by the creeds or the superstitious notions of men.” Yeah. Creeds make you believe too little. We don’t want to be hindered, limited, circumscribed in believing all things that are true. That’s the issue here, not that, well, you know, sometimes it’s pretty confusing about the Godhead, the way that they kind of articulate it. Granted, sometimes that is the case, but I think it’s more fundamental here, what Jesus is saying.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
And it also brings up a fundamental point, which the creeds are fundamentally unbiblical. You know, they’re extrabiblical, and Joseph Smith is saying, the Bible doesn’t present this closed-off idea of God. The Bible is a story again and again and again of people approaching God and receiving revelation and then going out and doing good things on his behalf.

Scott Woodward:  
Right.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
And so I hope that this statement that the Savior makes doesn’t shut down conversations.

Scott Woodward:  
Yeah.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
I hope it opens doors for us to say, look, here’s what he’s telling Joseph to steer away from. Here’s why he told them not to join any church, because Christianity can’t be limited. It has to be a continual search for truth.

Scott Woodward:  
Yeah.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
And at this point in time there were certain Christians, not all, but certain Christians, that just wanted to close the door and say, the story’s finished. We’re just waiting for the grand finale, when Joseph Smith was saying, why can’t the stuff that happened in the Bible happen in the lives of women and men in our time, too? There’s no reason. There’s no limitation in the Bible itself. It’s an open book that’s still being written.

Scott Woodward:  
Yeah. And that seems to be the third issue we haven’t highlighted here is that Jesus says “they have a form of godliness,” other Christians of Joseph’s day, “but they deny the power thereof.” It’s not enough to have the form or go through the motions. This is—a fundamental principle of the Restoration is going to be how can we get the power of godliness back into the lives of men and women in the sense in which it was in the New Testament times? And that’s going to—we’re going to find out as the story unfolds. It’s going to have to do with ordinances, right? The ordinances are going to be the gateways to the power of godliness. It’s going to have to do with the priesthoods that mediate those ordinances. And so there’s a whole lot that’s coming down the pike here, but all Joseph knows initially is hypocrisy: I don’t like it; creeds: too limiting; and power of godliness is essential for the full Christian experience to receive all that God actually has to give, so yeah. This is not a condemnation of Christianity, but it is, I think, a commentary that there is more that needs to be opened up to at that time and ever after, and Joseph will say that to all of his Christian brothers and sisters. He’ll say, please, keep all the good that you have, and then come and see if we can’t add to that. I love that invitation. And what is it that we have to add? It centers in the ordinances, right? It’s about that power of godliness, peace, and so.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Yeah.

Scott Woodward:  
Those little seeds are right there in the First Vision from the beginning.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Yeah. One thing that I think separates this account from any of the others, too, is aftermath. He mentions this a little bit in 1842. In 1832 he says, “I was filled with the love of God for many days afterwards.” I think in ’35 he just ends it and moves on.

Scott Woodward:  
Yep.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
This one has a coda. “When the light had departed, I had no strength, but soon recovering in degree, I went home. As I leaned up to the fireplace, mother inquired what the matter was. I replied, Never mind, all is well, I am well enough off. I then said to my mother, I have learned for myself that Presbyterianism is not true.” As gentle a statement as he can make to his mom, who’s just become a Presbyterian. I’d want to clip out that as the central thesis, “I have learned for myself.” That’s the “and thus we see” of the 1838 account is I’ve learned for myself what is the path for me. And that seems to be the end of this how-to guide. Like, here’s what you do to find out for yourself, and here’s why it’s so important that you know for yourself, that you don’t just follow the traditions of your fathers, if that makes sense.

Scott Woodward:  
Yeah. Yeah, very helpful. So, Casey, can I just recap, then, the influence of the context on the text here?

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Yep. Go right ahead.

Scott Woodward:  
So we saw that this is written in a context of persecution, and we’ve tried to highlight that Joseph believes that persecution grows primarily out of misunderstanding. So this is his opportunity to give people the facts, which should have a kind of a double effect, right? To decrease persecution, but also, as you’re pointing out, give them a guide on how they, too, can personally get some sort of confirmation of the truthfulness, right? So this was the most factual by far, with details, early spring 1820, beautiful spring day, morning, direct quotations, things he talked about to his mom, things that people were saying back and forth to each other, what the Bible said, emphasis on the Christian revivals, I prayed because the Bible told me to. He also mentions, and we haven’t said this, he also mentions feeling like Paul, who was a revered Christian hero, who also saw a vision, right? And Joseph will ask, well, who am I that I can withstand God? Why does the world think to make me deny what I’ve actually seen? So he’s casting himself very much in that biblical role of prophets. This is not a fringy, weird thing that’s occurring amongst us. It’s actually the same thing that has occurred many times in biblical ages, right?

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Mm-hmm.

Scott Woodward:  
He mentions also in verse 20, “It seems as though the adversary was aware at a very early period of my life that I was destined to prove a disturber and annoyer of his kingdom, else why should the powers of darkness combine against me? Why the opposition and persecution that arose against me almost in my infancy?” So Joseph wants to say and make this very clear in the record, that all the persecution that’s happening against me and against this church, it’s been there from the beginning, and this is evidence that I am proving and this church is proving to be very disruptive to the devil’s kingdom, hence the persecution.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Yeah. The 1838 account is the account I think Joseph intended you to read. It’s the official account. It’s the canon account. And I think we could make an objective judgment to say it’s probably the most complete account of the First Vision.

Scott Woodward:  
Yeah.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
There’s a reason why it’s scripture to Latter-day Saints, and I think whenever we read another account of the First Vision, we need to have the 1838 account close by or in mind to just say, hey, here’s the point where Joseph Smith put all the pieces together and decided to publicly tell the story. This is the one he really didn’t just recite off the cuff, or on a day when he’s trapped in Greenville, Indiana. This is the one he intended. and put the work into to make something that could be not just useful in understanding him, but useful in understanding the process of revelation that he believes so strongly in.

Scott Woodward:  
Yeah.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
Well, thank you so much for joining us. We’ll continue on the First Vision next week. I’m Casey Griffiths.

Scott Woodward:  
I’m Scott Woodward.

Casey Paul Griffiths:
We’ll see you guys soon.

Scott Woodward:  
Thank you for listening to this episode of Church History Matters. Next week we continue this series on Joseph Smith’s First Vision by exploring his 1842 account, written in response to a newspaper editor’s request to Joseph for him to provide a brief sketch of the rise of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. We’ll also look at Orson Pratt’s own telling of Joseph’s experience, which he published in 1840, and the interesting influence it had on Joseph’s own 1842 account. Today’s episode was produced by Zander Sturgill and Scott Woodward, edited by Nick Galieti and Scott Woodward, with show notes and transcript by Gabe Davis. Church History Matters is a podcast of Scripture Central, a nonprofit which exists to help build enduring faith in Jesus Christ by making Latter-day Saint scripture and church history accessible, comprehensible, and defensible to people everywhere. For more resources to enhance your gospel study, go to scripturecentral.org, where everything is available for free because of the generous donations of people like you. Thank you so much for being a part of this with us.