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201 - History of Women's Service in the Temple | Church History Matters I Women & Priesthood Series
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- [00:00]
A
This is a time when family relationships are often fractured by death.
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B
This sort of paves the way for this explosion of genealogy and temple work.
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C
This is the biblical end game.
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A
There's been great effort made to expand the availability of the temple experience, both as a patron and a temple worker.
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B
Just to emphasize how important St. George is. It's the first temple that has all the ordinances.
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C
This is an era when the word modesty starts becoming associated with clothing rather than just behavior.
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A
Temple ordinances, marriage ceilings, all of this is introduced at the same time as plural marriage.
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B
The principles haven't changed, but the practice has changed quite a bit.
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A
In the part of the presentation where they partake of the fruit, everyone partook of a raisin.
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C
That's fascinating.
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B
Hello, Scott. Hello, Lisa.
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C
Hey, guys. How are we?
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A
Yeah, hey, we're back.
- [00:58]
B
And today we're tackling the subject that, if I'm being honest, I've really wanted to talk about, which is women in the temple. Women serving in the temple. It overlaps with a lot of things that we've already discussed, but this is our focused episode where we're going to be going through the history of women serving in the temple. Because we're talking about the temple, which we did an entire series a few years ago on the development of temple ordinances. We kind of developed the standard disclaimer because this is an area where a lot of faithful Latter Day Saints sometimes get a little uncomfortable. What can we talk about the temple, outside the temple? And we were just talking a few minutes ago about how there's been kind of this beautiful opening up about the temple. Right. In the last couple years.
- [01:53]
C
Yeah, it's been marvelous. We've had conference talks about the covenants of the endowment, and we've got whole webpages on churchofjesuschrist.org that walk through the ordinances of the temple and the covenants that we're making. I mean, temple prep has never been better in this church than it is now.
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B
Yeah, it's on steroids now. And I remember a few years ago, just when they published a video that showed the temple garments and the temple clothing, that that was sort of surprising. But now not only those videos have been redone, there's actually a YouTube video where Elder Bednar and Elder Rasband walk you through the interior of a temple. The Rome temple, by the way. But just to make sure we're safe, Elder Bednar gave a talk in general conference a few years ago where he set down some guidelines, and we just kind of read these at the beginning of all our temple episodes. So you feel safe. You know, we're not going to go to a place that might be inappropriate. So Elder Bednar started by saying this. He said temple preparation is most effective in our homes. But many church members are unsure about what appropriately can and cannot be said right regarding the temple experience outside the temple. Then he gave two guidelines. Guideline one, because we love the Lord, we should always speak about his holy house with reverence. We should not disclose or describe the special symbols associated with the covenants we receive in sacred temple ceremonies. Neither should we discuss the holy information that we specifically promise in the temple not to reveal. That's guideline one. Guideline two. The temple is the house of the Lord. Everything in the temple points us to our Savior, Jesus Christ. We may discuss the basic purposes of the doctrine and principles associated with temple ordinances and covenants. So we're going to stick within those guidelines today. And what we're focusing on mostly is the history of temple ordinances, how they came into being, but particularly how they've changed. And we are in a very dramatic era of change, I guess, when it comes to the temple ordinances. Big stuff happening in the last five or six years.
- [04:03]
A
Yeah, absolutely. Kind of hard to keep up.
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C
So, Lisa, where should we start today in this discussion about temple and women's involvement? Where do we begin?
- [04:13]
A
Yeah, it's a good question. We've already, in previous episodes, we've said a lot of things that are going to overlap with what we're talking about today. And so I think it would be helpful to even maybe step one level back and talk about some of the foundational concepts to the development of temple theology and practice. And so the first thing that I think we need to understand, and I always say this about the early restoration in general, is that the early Latter Day Saints, Joseph Smith himself, they understood themselves to be doing the Bible.
- [04:55]
C
What do you mean by doing the Bible?
- [04:57]
A
Yeah, well, they understood the world. They understood God and faith and religion and everything in terms of the Bible. And they knew the Bible and they were looking for. I mean, we have so many accounts of this. They're looking for a restoration of what they understand to be the principles, the doctrines, the practices in the Bible. We talked about that with healing, for example, and the gifts of the Spirit. And so virtually every element of the restoration is based on these biblical precedents. So, for example, the idea of endowment itself. Let's talk about that for a minute. Very early in 1831, it's like January of 1831, Joseph receives the revelation that we now have a section 38 in the doctrine and Covenants, which, by the way, it's one of the least appreciated, wonderful revelations in the doctrine and governance, I think.
- [05:59]
B
Yeah, pivotal.
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A
So it's so amazing. But the Lord promises in this revelation, if the saints that they need to gather to Ohio and there they will be, quote, endowed with power from on high. Now, this verse is what we would call an intertextual reference, meaning it is using language for from Jesus's charge to the disciples in Luke 24, he tells them, tarry ye in the city of Jerusalem until ye be. And this is how the King James Version renders it, until ye be endued with power from on high. Now, the Greek word that's rendered here, as in dude in the King James Version, actually means clothed. And this is how it's rendered in many modern translations. And that seems significant given the role of clothing in temple worship. And that is a meaning that I think is mostly lost to us now, but I think is really important to understand. In some other modern translations, that word is rendered as armed. And if you remember in the prayer for the dedication of the Kirtland Temple, Joseph says that the servants will go forth from the house of the Lord armed with the power of God. And so this endow idea is very rooted in the New Testament, in the Bible, in Jesus's promises to the disciples. Now, what we hear these days, the way the church talks about endowment, is that endowment is a gift. That's not wrong. That is the meaning of the word endowment. But I don't think that is the way that Joseph and the early saints would have defined it or understood it.
- [07:43]
C
So this is. This is fascinating that I think most Latter Day Saints, if you use the word endowment, and you said, is this shared with biblical Christians? Most, I think Latter Day Saints would say no. This is kind of a unique Latter Day Saint thing. But, Lisa, you're blowing our mind here saying this is actually a biblical concept.
- [08:00]
A
That's right.
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C
That is now being revived in our day. And I guess. Let me ask you real quick. Is there a record of how that promise was fulfilled in the New Testament of the endowment of power?
- [08:13]
A
Yeah. And we might kind of miss it because the book of Luke and the Book of Acts were originally one book that, you know, got separated and somehow the Book of John got, you know, shoehorned in there between them. But if you read the end of Luke and then pick up in Acts, we see that this promise is fulfilled through the day of Pentecost. And so this is how Joseph and the early saints understand what they're looking for in this endowment of power is this kind of Pentecostal experience.
- [08:50]
B
Yeah. And it seems like an early fulfillment, at least in their minds, of this promise happens in June 1831, when Joseph Smith presides over a conference conference where he notes, men are first ordained to the high priesthood. Now, we've got a jump into our definitions of priesthood here, because it seems like the high priesthood just refers to. This is the first time high priests were ordained in the church. But at this conference, too, there's an outpouring of spiritual power that they believed was the fulfillment of that promise made in section 38 that was the endowment. So shortly after this, Joseph Smith teaches that, quote, the order of the high priesthood is that they have power given them to seal up the saints unto eternal life. A promise that gets repeated in section 68. 12. And in fact, around this time, high priests would sometimes declare that certain faithful congregations were sealed up to eternal life. And sealing at this stage wasn't associated with creating lasting relationships, but the concept of perseverance was there. The idea of that those who were authorized high priests in the church could perform a seal that would last beyond this life is there. So all the language, all the nomenclature is there, but it's being used very differently in these early years of the church.
- [10:16]
A
So we can see this understanding taking shape, and we can see that these three ideas are totally intertwined. So endowment, the high priesthood and the
- [10:29]
C
sealing power and other biblical concepts are implemented by Joseph smith in the 1830s, too. I'm thinking of the washing of feet, which is a New Testament practice of Jesus. Washings and anointings, which is more of an Old Testament practice, like foot washings, was part of the school of the prophets, the school of the elders in Kirtland, as outlined in doctrine and covenants 88, which is explicitly a temple preparation text, actually. And it explicitly ties this practice of washing the feet back to Jesus in John chapter 13. And they were doing this in the school of the prophets. And then there's another ordinance or ritual they called washing, and a connected one called anointing, which are implemented in the Kirtland Temple. And I guess a version of these rituals would be then incorporated into the Nauvoo Temple liturgy. It looked a little different. It's kind of morphing a little bit, but it's there as well. Kind of an Old Testament practice. And these rituals are part of what the saints called the Kirtland endowment, or to be more precise, and Casey And I have talked about this in previous series, but these rituals often immediately preceded manifestations of divine power. Visions, tongues, prophecy, Day of Pentecost type manifestations, like you were mentioning, Lisa. And just one example of this I think is really concrete is doctrine and Covenants 137. They had just gotten done with washings and anointings. In Section 137's context, when that. When Joseph says the heavens were opened and he saw the celestial kingdom of God, he saw God the Father and the Son. He also. This is where he sees his brother Alvin in the celestial kingdom, which perplexes him. And this is where he starts learning important doctrines about those who had died before they were baptized, or children who die before the age of accountability. And these visionary elements and revelatory elements were where the power was coming in in the Kirtland endowment as they understood it. So Pentecostal stuff was happening there on the heels of these rituals from the New and the Old Testament.
- [12:36]
A
Yeah. And because endowment then goes on to become a specific, what ritual ceremony in the temple, especially for a while, I think we kind of lost this understanding that it's endowment of power and that what the endowment is is receiving this power from God. Now, President Nelson, I think, did a lot to try to reconnect that. And so I think maybe we have a little bit more of that understanding now than was true even maybe 15 years ago.
- [13:11]
C
And what kind of helps me with this is to separate the ritual from the reception of the power. An easy example, this is the laying on of hands for the gift of the Holy Ghost. Like, that's not the moment where the power is. The power comes post ritual. So going to the temple and expecting that during the ordinance you're just going to be infused with all this power might be an expectation that is not quite right. Usually the power comes after the ordinance. Right. There's a ritual that prepares you for the power as a way that's been helpful for me to kind of think through that book.
- [13:45]
A
I love that. Yeah, that's really great. And just really quick. I mean, I think we're generally familiar with the outpourings of spiritual gifts and manifestations and everything that happened in conjunction with the dedication of the House of the Lord in Kirtland. And some of that happens on the day of the dedication. And we have accounts, accounts from women. We talked about Zina and Cressendia in some of our previous episodes, and we have accounts from them about what they experienced at the dedication. But then a few days later, I can't remember if it was Tuesday or Wednesday evening of the following week, the priesthood quorums meet together for the solemn assembly. And if you look at the revelations leading up to and instructing them to build the temple, they talk about this solemn assembly that they're to hold in the house of the Lord. And, and so this is where the priesthood quorums are participating and women are not part of this. This is where we brought in that great quote from George A. Smith about the women being right huffy about being excluded from the temple. But that solemn assembly experience. And they're washing feet, they're administering the Lord's Supper, they're engaging in these rituals and seeking the power of Go. And according to Joseph, it was a Pentecost and an enduement indeed that goes on all night long and is a really powerful thing.
- [15:21]
C
Very New Testament language.
- [15:23]
A
Yep, New Testament language, New Testament understanding. And we've talked about our friend Jonathan Stapley before in his recent book about the temple. And one thing he points out that we may not, that we may not fully know is that these experiences were meant to be repeated. This wasn't meant to be a one time thing. In Joseph's understanding, this endowment of power was to be repeatedly and continually received by the saints as they engaged in these ordinances and, and sought after it and were worthy of it.
- [15:57]
C
Can I ask a question here, a clarifying question?
- [15:59]
A
Yeah.
- [16:01]
C
So in all that I've read about the Kirtland endowment, I have never read anything that includes women beyond attending the dedicatory session of the temple. Like no washing and anointing for women, Nothing that would bring them into the inner circle of the Pentecostal experiences. Is that your reading? Both Lisa and Casey. I'm curious if you have found anything else that I've missed.
- [16:24]
A
No, I think that's right. It's interesting though. So, yes, there's no formal or official involvement of women in these meetings and experiences that are, that are for the priesthood in the Kirtland, in the Kirtland era. But it's really interesting if you look, I was just talking about this with a colleague the other day. If you go back and look at those discourses of Eliza R. Snow and what she's saying for the rest of her life when she talks about spiritual power and the roots of spiritual power, she always goes back to Kirtland. And so extrapolating from that, even if she and the other women were not in that solemn assembly and were not part of those meetings, they still felt that they had shared in the outpouring and the manifestation of spiritual power that came with the dedication of the temple and that became a foundational spiritual anchor for the rest of their lives.
- [17:24]
B
Yeah. I was just gonna say, if we're talking about the endowment as a ceremony, then no, I don't think we have any records of women participating in that. But it seems like their conception was that the whole Pentecostal season surrounding the dedication of the Kirtland Temple was the endowment. And so it might not be that weird if you walked up to Eliza AR Snow and said, did you participate in the endowment in the Kirtland Temple? And she'd say, yeah, I was there. I saw the spiritual manifestations and felt the power when the building was dedicated. The other thing I would point out, too, is that we need to be clear, too, that not every man participated in the ceremonies either. The model in the church was sort of closer to the way Catholicism and Protestantism does it now, where there's priesthood, but not every man is part of the priesthood. So there were men that didn't participate in those ceremonies either. In fact, the records seem to indicate that it was mostly the church hierarchy
- [18:16]
C
that participated in leadership. That's true.
- [18:18]
B
Yeah.
- [18:19]
A
The leadership.
- [18:19]
C
Good point.
- [18:20]
A
Which was still fairly widespread, relatively speaking. And I mean, let's be clear, and I know you didn't mean this, Casey. We don't have Eliza on record saying that.
- [18:30]
B
Yeah. Oh, yeah.
- [18:31]
A
We don't have Eliza on record saying I participated in the endowment, but I think you're right that if you asked her about it, that she would have felt that she was a recipient of some of those same spiritual gifts.
- [18:43]
B
So good clarity.
- [18:44]
A
I think that's exactly right.
- [18:45]
B
Okay, well, I want to jump to Nauvoo, because this episode's about women, and this is sort of where they are brought into the ceremonies. So to whatever extent Joseph Smith believed the endowment had been given in 1836, there were further developments to come in Nauvoo. It's in 1840s, Nauvoo, when we get an expansion of understanding of temple and women's essential role in the work of salvation. But we also need to point out it doesn't come prepackaged in a neat and tidy way. We're quoting Jonathan Stapley a lot here, but this is from his book Holiness of the Lord. He said this. The challenge for approaching Joseph Smith's Nauvoo revelation of temple ordinances is multifaceted. It wasn't a linear path. Complex developments occurred simultaneously over a period of years, elements that were later systematized were at first somewhat chaotic. Additionally, these revelations were nested with new constraints about privacy and secrecy. And Joseph Smith presented his revelation in language that the church no longer uses in the same way. The result is we have to piece together what happened from a fragmentary record. So to understand all that goes into Nauvoo and creating the Nauvoo endowment, we need to pick up a couple different threads here of the tapestry.
- [20:07]
C
Yeah, so let's identify some of those threads. I think this will be fun. First, let's start with the animating vision, the biblical foundation on which Joseph Smith's revelation of temple ordinances was built. So at the beginning of the Bible, let's start right there, Genesis 1, we learn that Adam and Eve were created to rule this world as God's image bearers with righteous dominion. Right. But because of the fall in Genesis 3, they lose their dominion of this earth to Satan, to the snake. Which sets up the ultimate question of how can mankind be redeemed Back to their Genesis one vocation to rule this world in righteousness. Then fast forward all the way to the other end of the Bible in Revelation 20:22, and we see how the story ends with men and women redeemed through the blood of Jesus ruling this world with Christ and God the Father. These people are called explicitly kings and priests. This is the biblical end game. This is what the whole story of the Bible is about. It's where it's been going from the beginning. So throughout the Bible, we see God trying to get a fallen humanity to qualify to be part of this group of righteous rulers who will reign with him over this world forever. For example, at Mount Sinai in Exodus 19, the Lord tells the children of Israel that he had redeemed them from their Egyptian bondage in order to make them His Language here. Quote, a kingdom of priests and an holy nation. This is why he then gives them the Ten Commandments. This is also importantly why he gives them the Temple the first time the temple shows up in Scripture. And he sets up a temple priesthood, the sons of Aaron, to officiate in ordinances that are designed to help Israel become holy. Jump back to the New Testament. Peter invokes this same theme in 1st Peter 2. 9, speaking of early Christians, which now include Gentiles as well. He calls them a royal priesthood, a holy nation, envisioning this new Jew and Gentile configuration of Israel as the fulfillment of the promise in Exodus. So note that Peter is calling this group the royal priesthood. The priesthood is a group here right now. These biblical threads matter because by the early 1840s, we see Joseph Smith using this language in anticipation of the Nauvoo Temple, particularly actually in his sermons to the Relief Society, where he's speaking about making them part of, quote, a kingdom of priests, or sometimes he says kingdom of priestesses. And just before his death, Joseph is teaching about how we need to learn to become kings and priests to God. A reference to, again, the end of the Bible, John, the Patmos phrase in the Book of Revelation, where he sees the faithful, exalted, faithful people singing praises around the throne of God. And here's what they're proclaiming. Thou hast redeemed us to God by thy blood and has made us unto our God. Kings and priests. That's in Revelation 5. So the Nauvoo Temple is where these threads come together. It's where this eternal priesthood would be created and where this biblical in game vision could be made real. All of the temple ordinances are calibrated to this end, and they're to be received not just by the living, but also by the living for their dead, so that all women and men in the human family can be invited into this eternal priesthood. So I think this helps us envision what the end game vision is. Right? The celestial kingdom is nothing more or less than exalted men and women in a network of sealed relationships of kings and queens, priests and priestesses living out their Genesis one vocation of ruling in righteousness with righteous dominion with God and the Lamb. All of that is coming together in the Nauvoo Temple.
- [24:18]
A
Great job on that explanation, Scott. That's. I think that's exactly right. And then, of course, the critical departure in the Nauvoo period is this explicit understanding that women have to be included in this priesthood of the temple and of the celestial kingdom. And we talked about this previously. You recall the thing that Newell K. Whitney says a couple weeks after he's among the first to receive the endowment, and he's speaking to the Relief Society, and he's just marveling about what he's experienced. And he says it takes all to restore the priesthood, meaning both male and female. And so this means that not only are women being invited into this eternal priesthood, but they are going to be necessary for performing the ordinances in the temple, because the key is that ordinances have to be performed, performed on a gendered basis, so men for men, women for women. And the women of the time knew, like they knew how significant this was. If we take George A. Smith's quote at face value, that they were offended about being left out of the Kirtland ceremonies. That just goes to show all the more how it would have been a new and exciting and really meaningful thing for women in Nauvoo to be included. And we also talked before about how Relief Society. Joseph specifically talks about Relief Society as preparing women to participate in this temple experience. Let's bring in a few voices here of some of these early women. So Mercy Thompson is someone that most people haven't probably heard of, but her sister was Mary Fielding Smith, and she recorded later, she said, I have been present at meetings of the Relief Society and heard him, meaning Joseph, give directions and counsels to the sisters calculated to inspire them to efforts which would lead to celestial glory and exaltation, and how my heart rejoiced. So that just captures a little bit of that excitement and how the women understood how important this was. So on May 4, 1842, Joseph first administers the endowment to a group of nine men. At that time, he seems to have known that the temple ordinances would need to include women, but he also believed that Emma needed to be the first to receive them on behalf of women. And at the time, Emma is really struggling with plural marriage, and there's a lot of tension and a lot of conflict and difficulties. We don't really even know a lot of details, but this seems to be the reason that she is not initiated into the temple ordinances until September of 1843. So almost a year and a half after they're first administered to this group of men. Now, she and Joseph were sealed in May of 1843. And this is something that you'll find in the. In these early records is they didn't always do these ordinances in order, as we would understand it today. So Joseph and Emma were sealed in May, and then finally in September, Emma is endowed, and then she takes charge of administering the ordinances to other women. So one of these women is our friend Bathsheba, Bathsheba Smith, wife of George A. And here's what she recalled, and this is actually from her diary. She says, I received the ordinance of anointing in a room in sister Emma Smith's house in Nauvoo. And the same day, in company with my husband, I received my endowment in the upper room over the prophet Joseph Smith's store. So that would be what we now call initiatory. And then endowment. The endowments were given under the direction of the prophet Joseph Smith, who afterwards gave us a lecture or instructions in regard to the endowment ceremonies. So there we have a First hand account of a firsthand participant. And since we're focusing on women and women's experiences, we should note that. And we talked about this with healing. Right. This is a time of high child and maternal mortality. This is a time when family relationships are often fractured by death. And for women particularly, it's really meaningful now to have the promise of these eternal ties, these eternal relationships with their families. Elizabeth Ann Whitney, who I believe is the first woman to receive the endowment after Emma, she is the first to give birth to a child who's quote, born in the covenant, as we would say it now. So she has a little daughter in January of 1844. And this was characterized as the first child born heir to the holy priesthood and the new and everlasting covenant in this dispensation. So that was, that was really significant. And we'll just say in passing as well, because we don't have time to dwell on this. But one of the complexities, and this gets back to the quote from Jonathan Stapley that Casey brought up a few minutes ago. One of the complexities of this whole process is that these temple ordinances, marriage ceilings, all of this is introduced at the same time as plural marriage. And so that is all interconnected, complicates things. Yep, that's all interconnected in this, in this period.
- [30:22]
C
Can I just go back to that phrase you used, Elizabeth Ann Whitney, about her daughter?
- [30:28]
A
Yeah.
- [30:28]
C
Is that her language, that she was born, quote, heir to the holy priesthood and in the new and everlasting covenant?
- [30:34]
A
Yes.
- [30:35]
C
And that was that language a lot.
- [30:37]
A
That was a very typical way that they expressed it. And, and heir to the whole. Heir to the priesthood. And that's, I mean, that's why we don't feel that, that we have to seal children to parents who are already, if the parents are already sealed and they're, as we say now, born in the covenant, they're already heir to the priesthood and to these, to these promises.
- [31:01]
B
I love that phrase too. If I ever do another baby blessing, I probably won't. I'm going to work that in.
- [31:07]
A
Well, you never know, Casey.
- [31:11]
B
Never know, never know.
- [31:12]
A
Okay, I love it though.
- [31:14]
B
Let's put this together. So by the time Joseph Smith has passed away, by the time he dies, 66 men and women had been initiated into the temple priesthood. And it was known by several names, such as the Order or the Holy Order or just simply the priesthood. And the group met regularly to receive and rehearse the ordinances, to receive instruction from Joseph Smith. And they would also do prayer circles Together again outside the temple, because temple hasn't been finished. And when they began administering the ordinances in the temple at the end of 1845, this group became the first of what we would call temple ordinance workers. They administer the ordinances and the rituals to others. In addition to this, Elizabeth Ann Whitney and Vilate Kimball oversaw the production of temple robes and garments, and Eliza R. Snow serves as the secretary or clerk to the Nauvoo Temple. And as the number of saints who received the endowment grew, there was no longer a need for this small, confidential sort of temple quorum of men and women that existed in Joseph Smith's lifetime. But just another story to personalize this. We've talked a lot about Elizabeth Ann Whitney and Vilate Kimball and Bath Sheba Smith, who were among the early temple workers. But this is where Emmeline Wells comes into the story. She's such a bridge because she's going to be around into the 1920s, but in January 1846, she is not quite 18 years old, and she receives her temple blessings under the hands of Elizabeth Ann Whitney. And how complex is her story? In fact, it's somewhat sort of tragic. A year earlier, Emmaline had been sealed to Newell K. Whitney as a plural wife after she lost her baby, a little boy, and had been abandoned by her husband, who was also a very young man. I think he took off and sailed away and sort of disappeared into history. Do we even know what happened to him, Lisa?
- [33:16]
A
To be fair, he was looking for work and went off looking for work. Many, many years later, Emmaline found out that he actually had lived. She found out more about it, but apparently his mother had intercepted and kept his letters and had not ever, Emmeline had never known. And so, decades later, she writes about it in her journal. It was a really, really tough experience
- [33:42]
B
for her, like, heartrending stuff. She's abandoned and she's really young. I guess she wasn't completely abandoned, but she must have felt that way.
- [33:50]
A
She was pretty close to abandoned because she had come to Nauvoo with this young man. Oh, gosh, it's such a long story. They are about the same age. They're like 15 years old.
- [34:00]
B
Yeah, they get married when they're 16, I think, don't they?
- [34:03]
A
Yeah, 15. And they come to Nauvoo with his family. So by this time, by the time she's sealed to Newell Whitney, not only has she lost this baby and her husband's abandoned her, but his parents have left the church and have also left. So Emmaline really is she's this little young teenage girl alone in Nauvoo. Her own family hasn't made it yet.
- [34:24]
B
Yeah. And it seems like she doesn't fully understand what it meant to be sealed to Whitney. She doesn't have a child with bishop Whitney until 1848. But by that time, she had decided that she loved Bishop Whitney, Noel K. Whitney, and wanted to be his wife in every sense of the word. And equally important, the marriage ceiling brought her into the Whitney family, where she was mothered and mentored by her sister wife, Elizabeth Ann Whitney. And this relationship is very close and very meaningful all the way up until Sister Whitney passes away in 1882. And we already talked in our episode on Healing about how Emmaline and Eliza and Bathsheba washed and anointed Ann Whitney for her burial. So, again, these interrelationships that are really beautiful and someone that has nobody all of a sudden has a family and feels like they're part of something because of the temple ordinances.
- [35:20]
A
Yeah. Let me just say, for the rest of her life, Emmeline calls Sister Whitney mother. So there's something real. And the thing is, she comes into this family and these relationships are being formed, and then her own mother dies between Nauvoo and Winter quarters. And so this family connection really does become important. And I think just really quickly, this story has a lot of the elements of early plural marriage that we find uncomfortable with a really young girl, an older man, you know, and all of those kinds of things. But it also, I think, illustrates how seriously the Latter Day Saint community took the imperative to take care of the orphan, the widow, the child, you know, the child, the people who were vulnerable and didn't have anyone else. And that became an important thing with plural marriage over the years as a way of providing for women within the community. It's a really beautiful story, and there's a lot of layers to it that I think we can appreciate.
- [36:31]
C
Well, let's swing back around to the development of the temple ordinances themselves. We have very little documentation of what the temple ceremonies look like actually in Joseph Smith's lifetime. So in many cases, as to the particulars, it's kind of impossible to say specifically what originated with Joseph Smith and then what came later. We know that Brigham Young had become the lead steward over the Nauvoo Temple. Its completion, and its ordinances after the death of Joseph Smith were on him. And we know Joseph Smith had explicitly charged him. To put things in order is how Brigham Young will later say it, and see that the temple ceremonies were arranged. Right. And this becomes kind of a life defining mission for Brigham Young up almost until the day of his death, as he's working on it in the St. George temple to get that all codified, systematized. And we know that Brigham Young and the quorum of the 12 in Nauvoo saw to the completion of the temple construction. They standardized temple robes and garments. They systematized the endowment presentation to some degree, including adding the characters of Peter, James and John to the endowment narrative. We know that, again, we don't know exactly what was original with Joseph Smith and then what was added later by Brigham Young, but it seems possible, maybe even likely, that Brigham Young added elements that emphasize male headship. And let me give you some evidence to kind of think about that leads us to this conclusion. So in 1842, Joseph Smith recorded a text for performing a marriage sealing in which the administrator would ask the partners if they both mutually agree, calling them by name to be each other's companion. That's the language. Both mutually agree to be each other's companion. But in 1853, Orson Pratt actually publishes the sealing text used in the Nauvoo temple seven years earlier. And in his version, the administrator asked the husband to receive the woman and then asked the woman to give herself to the man. There's no reciprocity, meaning men were not asked to give themselves to their wife, only the wife to the husband and the husband to receive her. Also, we don't know when the woman's covenant of obedience to the husband was included in the temple liturgy. It could have been original to Joseph Smith or it could have been added by Brigham Young. On that one, we just don't know. But it's also important, I think, to note that a vow of obedience was very common, if not virtually universal, in Christian marriage ceremonies of the time. It's likely part of the original marriage ceremonies of couples like the Kimballs and the Whitneys. That's not to say that Joseph or Brigham were just copying wholesale from Christian practice, But at whatever point that the covenant of obedience was added, it would not have been jarring to the original participants in the way that it would be for us now, since we no longer marinate in the cultural assumptions of male headship the way that they did. We do know that Brigham Young referred to women becoming a queen and priestess to her husband. That's important. While Eliza R. Snow and John Taylor spoke differently about that. They spoke of women becoming queens and priestesses, quote unto God. So Brigham has it becoming to their husbands Eliza and John Taylor, unto God. Of that language, we do know that it's Brigham Young's version that gets incorporated into the temple ceremonies. So this suggests, but doesn't prove that Joseph Smith's view of the marriage ceiling may have been a little more egalitarian than what comes later. But I think there's a lot of caveats there, too. Like, for instance, there is no such thing as egalitarian marriage at this time. That doesn't exist, as we've talked about in previous episodes. And to reiterate, there's no reason to doubt that Brigham Young believed he was doing anything other than preserving and transmitting what he had been taught by Joseph Smith. And so, anyway, as we try to trace all of this, it's very interesting to try to parse out what the original was versus what was added to later. I don't know that it fully matters, because what we have, we have. But I find it fascinating as a historical exercise.
- [40:59]
A
Yeah, it is really interesting. It's useful in helping us to understand the worldview, the mental horizons that people lived within in the past. And because some of these elements we don't, like you say we don't swim in that water anymore because they've been lost, then we cannot totally understand what was going on when we don't have that mental picture that they lived with. So it's useful. Okay, well, let's talk really quickly about the transitional period. So. So we know that the Saints throng the temple. They perform thousands of ordinances, literally as they're packing their wagons and leaving Nauvoo. And so from 1846 until 1877, we do not have another temple. But in the 1850s and 60s. And this speaks again to Brigham Young and how he internalized this mandate to take charge of the temple ordinances. He as soon as they get to Utah, like they are looking for, how can we do this? How can we reestablish these, even on a temporary basis? Because it became clear pretty quickly that it was going to take a long time to build a temple and the way that they had done before. So it was a priority to establish spaces where ordinances could be performed. The first place, the first really established place for this was in the council house, which was the first public building built in Utah. It was on the corner of South Temple and Main street, just to the west of where the Zion's bank corporate building is now, and kind of kitty corner from the Hotel Utah, Joseph Smith Memorial Building. That's where the council house was. And it operated until 1854 as a place to primarily do marriage ceilings. I think there were some endowments. They weren't really doing work for the dead at this point. And the numbers are small. So the records show that we had basically two women acting as temple workers in the council house, and that was Elizabeth Ann Whitney and Eliza R. Snow. And the numbers were small. They didn't need a lot more than that. The endowment house, then, is a structure purpose built to be a temporary temple while the Salt Lake Temple is under construction. And so this opens in 1855. It included a baptismal font that was used both for baptisms for healing and baptisms for the dead. Eliza and Elizabeth Ann Whitney are still the primary female workers here, although Bathsheba always served there. And there's some other women. We'll talk about that in a minute. Interestingly, it's in the endowment house where the role of Eve is introduced in the dramatic presentation. So up to that wasn't.
- [44:07]
C
That wasn't there before.
- [44:08]
A
Yeah. Isn't that interesting? Up to this point, each woman simply played Eve, considered herself Eve. And there wasn't. In the. In the presentation, apparently there was someone who did the character of Michael and, you know, some of the other characters. But until this point, there had not been a woman who portrayed Eve. And the records show that it was almost always Eliza that took that role. And then something else is just kind of a fun fact. In looking at the records, we see that they bought a lot of raisins because apparently in the part of the presentation where they partake of the fruit, everyone partook of a raisin as the fruit.
- [44:55]
C
Wow.
- [44:55]
A
So isn't that interesting? So, as I said, we know healing. There were healing rituals as part of the work in the endowment house as well. So this is carrying over from that understanding from Nauvoo that the temple is a place of healing. And then another connection of women to the temple that we don't, I think, fully appreciate is what I call the labor of the temple. And this was true all along. There's. There's stories from Mercy Thompson and others earlier. But in the endowment house especially, you start to have a cohort of women who are temple workers. And what do they do? They make lunch, and they do the laundry, and they do the labor that keeps the temple going. So, for example, Juliana Smith, who's the wife of Joseph F. Smith, is called. She and her sister, actually Edna, are both called to be workers in the endowment house. And they would go between cooking and preparing food and then filling in as ordinance workers and whatever was needed. So it's something that I don't. It's, like, invisible to us, but it's there all along. And there are really meaningful stories of women's labor in the temple over the years. I mean, we had cafeterias in temples until recently. Right. And so there's been a lot of labor that women have done in the temple. And the endowment house is where that kind of really starts taking off and becoming more systematic.
- [46:28]
B
Okay. So the endowment house is, like you said, a temporary setting, but it's really with the St. George Temple, which is dedicated in 1877, when a lot of these threads come together. So just to emphasize how important St. George is, Wilford Woodruff is appointed as the president of the temple. So temple president is going to be an apostle. It's the first temple that has all the ordinances that we practice in our temples today, both for the living and the dead. Baptism and sealing were the only proxy ordinances in Nauvoo and the endowment house. And this expands the need for temple workers and also expanded the opportunities for saints to participate in temple work. Up to this time, you'd go to the temple to receive your own endowment and sealing. But now you could go back repeatedly and act as a proxy on behalf of someone who was deceased. And so we probably ought to introduce another key person here. This is Lucy Bigelow Young. She was the head of the women workers in the St. George Temple. And Elisa, I think you mentioned, this is the mother of Susie Young Gates, wife of Brigham Young. She's the first woman to ever act as a proxy in doing an endowment on behalf of someone that is deceased. And so we've all heard about Wilford Woodruff doing the temple work on behalf of the founding fathers of the United States and other eminent men. But Lucy B. Young did all the endowment work for eminent women. So she's the one that stands in for Martha Washington, for instance. And she's also prolific in the healing that she does in the temple. So, as we mentioned, her daughter, Susie Young Gates is a prolific writer. She writes a few things about her mother, saying that the temple work was her life's work. And she said, no one who has not lived in this sacred work can tell of the joy and comfort this work has brought to her soul. And Susa also wrote about her mother. When her hands are upon the head of another in blessing, the words of inspiration and personal prophecy that flow from her lips are like a stream of living fire. And she wrote, again, the number of times childless women have sought out the prayers and faith of sister young in her temple duties, and have afterwards returned as hannah of old to bring up their promised child to receive further blessings in the temple. Interesting old Testament parallel there. February 1, 1877. Wilford Woodruff and lucy bigelow young, the two presiding over the work in the St. George Temple, dressed in white to officiate. This was the first example in any time of the lord in this last dispensation. So the practice of changing into white clothing Became official here and official throughout the church. In the 1890s, Wilford Woodruff also starts to gather names. He gathers 3100 names of family members for whom he wanted to complete temple work. And he knew that he couldn't complete all the work himself, not least because women had to officiate for women. But until this time, it hadn't been clearly established that anyone could stand proxy for another without necessarily being related to them. And as he prayed about it in the temple, Wilford woodruff received an answer from the lord. Call upon the saints and St. George and let them officiate. For me, this is a revelation to us. We can help one another in these matters. If we have not relatives sufficient to carry this on, it will be acceptable to the lord. And this is an example of something that seems totally obvious to us. You don't have to be related to the person that you're acting as proxy for. But it was a big deal. It was a significant change at the time. So on March 1, 1877, which is Wilford Woodruff's 70th birthday, 154 women assembled in the temple to complete washings, anointings, and endowments for his female relatives. And this further expands opportunities for temple work for those who might not have family names to carry out. And I should mention, Can I mention just parenthetically here, we just went to St. George with Jennifer mackley, who's the head of the wilford woodruff papers project, and she did a beautiful job laying out all this. I had no idea how important St. George was. I mean, I knew in a general sense, it was a big deal, but all these little nuances of things that just kind of came together under wilford woodruff's direction. And I put lucy young right there with him, Helping kind of work out the nuts and bolts of how the temple is going to operate.
- [51:05]
A
Well, and brigham young, too, right? I mean, this is the temple that is dedicated in Brigham young's lifetime, and he's right there. He spends most of the first half of of the year in St. George doing temple work, getting the ordinances, getting them written down. They had never been written down before, so there's a lot that's going on here. They self consciously understand the significance of this first temple in Utah and what that's going to enable them to do. But there's a lot to work out in how it's to be done and so forth.
- [51:46]
C
Then fast forward a couple decades and we get to the dedication of the Salt Lake temple in the 1890s. So in April 1893, to commemorate the dedication of the Salt Lake Temple, Susa Young Gates published a collection of life sketches of women temple workers in the young Women's Journals. This captures a lot of cool stuff relevant to what we want to talk about. It's interesting that these sketches focus primarily on, guess what, healing practices and spiritual manifestations in the temple, which emphasizes that the temple for them was a place of charismatic spiritual practice. If we could say that a place where God's spirit comes down and there is actual healing or some manifestations maybe akin to some of the things people experienced in Kirtland. Reading these sketches, it's clear that women found special power and meaning in their work in the temple. For example, Minerva W. Snow, here's a quote from her. I have received many blessings from my heavenly Father in the holy temples dedicated to his name. I have seen the power of God made manifest many times. I have seen the sick healed, the lame made to walk, and the blind to see. And I wish to repeat my testimony that this gospel was established by divine revelation. Awesome. Here's another one. Francis E. Brown, worker in the Manti Temple. She said, I have had no particular or open manifestations by dreams or visions. But as I have been seriously and very earnestly engaged in this work, there has been an influence working with me and urging me forward in a way that I have been able to learn of my ancestry in a most marvelous manner in such a way that I am forced to believe that the key is my mother.
- [53:37]
A
So in other words, her mother is on the other side helping her to get this information to do the temple work. And I mean, this is a story we recognize, right? We still have these stories of the miracles that we experience through the Spirit of Elijah. And you can see that way of talking about it taking shape in these quotes.
- [53:59]
C
Yeah.
- [53:59]
B
Now let's pick up the thread with another revelation that has huge implications for women, and that's the 1894 Wilford Woodruff revelation, which I'm guessing most church members are not aware of. But let's talk about how this Changes things.
- [54:16]
C
This is so underrated. We need to talk more about this.
- [54:18]
B
It's a big deal. It's a game changer. So after the dedication of the Salt Lake Temple, questions arose about adoption, which in the early church, adoption was the practice of sealing men and their families to church leaders rather than their direct ancestors. And the reason for this practice was that they understood that sealing should happen in a line of the faithful. So if someone's father, for example, rejected the gospel or maybe even rejected their child for joining the church, they did not believe the father would be worthy of having his children sealed to him and would not be a reliable link in this chain of priesthood they're trying to create. At the 1894 April conference, Wilford Woodruff completely changes our thinking on this matter. As with other revelations he received, this one was initiated by his own questions, Wilford Woodruff's about his family. The Lord revealed to him that he should be sealed to his own father and extend those family lives back as far as possible without worrying about the priesthood or the faith status of those involved. He said this we want the Latter Day Saints from this time to trace their genealogies as far as they can and to be sealed to their fathers and mothers. And this basically ends the practice of adoption, though that continues to be used as a synonym for a little while. And emphasize that we're not supposed to judge the status of others who may have died without hearing or accepting the gospel that President Woodruff is emphasizing. They're going to have an opportunity to hear it in the next life in the spirit world. And he believed that most people would accept it there, but that in this life, it was most important to create generational links by sealing children to parents as far back as possible. This is a big deal for women in particular, because previously women whose husbands were not members of the church or did not remain faithful were counseled that they should be sealed to a priesthood leader instead. And President Woodruff acknowledges this. He actually says, many a woman's heart has ached because of this, and as a servant of God, I have broken that chain. He's basically saying he didn't feel like it was right to deprive a woman of being sealed to her husband. And he goes on to say, what do any of us know with regard to him? Will he not hear the gospel and embrace it in the spirit world? And this change also has implications for children who could now be sealed to their biological parents rather than creating artificial and sometimes convoluted relationships through adoption. And this sort of PAVES the way for this explosion of genealogy and temple work that's going to take place in the 20th century. So this makes me think of Mary Elizabeth Rollins Lightner, who says, I was sealed to Joseph Smith because my husband wasn't a member. And everybody in my classes will raise their hand and say, well, why? Why didn't she just get sealed to her husband after he passed away? And you have to explain, oh, well, they were thinking, if he hasn't accepted it here, that's it. That's his chance. And Wilford Woodruff sort of opens the door to say, we don't know what's going on in the spirit world. And he frankly says, they're probably more successful over there than we are right here.
- [57:33]
A
It's kind of like a moment of like, do we believe our own theology? Yeah, because the idea of preaching the gospel to the dead and salvation for the dead had been established early on. But, like, did we really believe that? Wilford Woodruff says, yeah, we can believe it and, you know, takes our understanding to a new level. So it's really interesting. The early 20th century is a critical hinge point in the history of temples and temple work in the church. What we now understand as temple work takes shape in the first three decades or so of the 20th century, and there's a lot going on, there's more than we can than we have time to talk about here, and we want to keep particularly focused on women and what this means for women. And first of all, we have to talk about our friend Susa Susan Gates, because she becomes the driving force in the expansion of temple work and establishment, especially of genealogy, or as we would say now, family history work as an area of expertise for Latter Day Saints. So if Latter Day Saints are known as experts in genealogy, you really have to trace that back to directly to Susie Young Gates. So she had had this miraculous experience. She'd struggled with her health. She received some blessings that reoriented her away from the kind of activist women's organization kind of work that she had been doing and helps her to understand and feel that she has a mission to fulfill in the rest of her life regarding temple and genealogy. And it's something she'd always been interested in. She had been corresponding with genealogists and taking trips to genealogical societies and collecting books and so forth for a long time. I mean, we mentioned before, like, she, you know, her mother was the first president of the Sister workers in the St. George temple. Susan was a temple worker in St. George. She was the first woman baptized for the dead in the St. George temple. So her roots in temple work go back very deep. And the thing that she realized, and again, to just summarize a whole lot of history here, she is instrumental in getting Relief Society to incorporate genealogy into their lessons. And this, as we talked about a couple of episodes ago, about how the Relief Society starts to implement a standardized curriculum in the early 20th century as a way of being more progressive and attracting younger women and so forth. And Susan's right there saying, okay, genealogy and temple have to. To be part of it. And so for a very long time, that was one of the standard lessons that they had in Relief Society. But they would get reports back from the stakes, you know, Stake Relief Society presidents and so forth, saying, these lessons are kind of hard because they were literally lessons on, okay, get a notebook. Here's where to draw the lines. These are the columns. These are the information that you need to have. I mean, it was very step by step training in how to do genealogy work. And you have to think about this as a time of kind of transition in terms of literacy. There were probably a lot of women, especially older women who had emigrated, maybe English wasn't their first language, who had spent their lives in combat with the elements just to make a living. And so their level of literacy was not what. What we have come to expect in the modern world. And so there's a real generational change taking place there where doing this kind of detailed clerical literate work might have really been difficult for some women, but generationally, that's changing. And Susa is trying to make sure that we are teaching people how to do it right. They come back with these complaints about how complicated these lessons are. And can't we just have lessons that are inspirational? We just talk about the doctrine and the inspirational side of it. And Susan's response to that is like, inspiration's great. We need inspiration, but without information, the inspiration doesn't help us. We've got to have the information. And so this was a line that she repeated many times. We need information and inspiration. And she saw that there was a need to develop the ability to have that information. So she wrote lessons, she taught classes, she traveled all over the church. She lobbied. She. She really worked to make temple and genealogy a priority for for Latter Day Saints. Let me just give you a couple of things that she said here that I think will resonate with us today. And we can see. And so what's happening with Susa as an individual is taking hold in the church far and deep, broad and Wide that this experience is happening for many other people during this time. She says, I must speak of the intensely fascinating quality about this wonderful work. It is a marvel to the outside world. Once taken up, it is impossible to ever lay it down again. The world does not know what prompts them to do this work, meaning genealogy. But we know, and this was a common discussion at this period because there is an absolute explosion of genealogical societies and genealogical research and so forth that's taking place in the 19th and 20th centuries. And the Latter Day Saints are saying, huh, okay, well, we know why this is happening because we know what work this is supposed to lead us to do. So another, another statement that she makes. She says, this latter day work is for each individual, and there is not one soul that has a long line of ancestors for whom temple work should be done. There will always be a way opened for every soul in this church and kingdom to engage in temple work, in recording or in personal labor in the house of the Lord. Do not fancy that you are not called to this labor. So again, like, there's so much more we could say about this, but it. By the second decade of the 20th century, we're finding references like in the journals of apostles and in other sources where they're talking about how there's so many people coming to the temple, they're having to turn them away. And so there's just this real outpouring of what we would call the spirit of Elijah in the church. And it becomes like this is also a period where, like, our modern life patterns are taking shape. So men are off working, and Susan's message is, hey, women, you have time to do this. These changes in the way the world works are registering. This is when, like, the white collar economy is coming, taking shape. Susan's husband is an insurance agent, as opposed to, you know, being farmers or whatever in previous generations. She says most men are too busy to spend time in searching out genealogies and far too busy to do individual work for their dead kindred. Women are born detectives. They have a keen aptitude for securing clues. And their fine natural instinct or spiritual perception often gives them hidden clues and puts them in possession of hitherto undiscovered facts. Most of the genealogists of the east and Europe are women. The patriotic societies, like Daughters of the Revolution or whatever, have sent hundreds of women hunting for their progenitors. Women can do much of this genealogical work in their own homes, over the baby's cradle, and in the long evenings when children are studying and husband is reading the paper. So whatever else we can say about that, what she's picking up on is changing life patterns. And she believes that this gives women a particular opportunity and a particular role to play in the expansion of temple and genealogy work. And then what's also taking shape in this era, and maybe even a little bit later, is retirement and the fact that we now have people living, you know, good, long lives and having a period of time towards the end of their life when they're still healthy, they're still able, and they can engage in this work. And we all know that that's kind of the pattern that really took hold for a long time. But it's hand in hand with the idea of retirement.
- [66:13]
C
And after Joseph F. Smith had his vision of the spirit world at a time in 1918 when there was so much death because of world war and because of a pandemic, and death was on the mind of so many people. And when that vision came, here's a great quote from Susie Young Gates about that. She felt like it came at a critical time. She said, to have this given at a time when our temple work and workers and our genealogy need such encouragement. No words of mine can express my joy and gratitude because that vision of Joseph F. Smith gives, like, this picture of the other side of the veil and what's going on there and what is needed to happen there. And that those who die on this side of the church engagement get to go there and preach the gospel. And so we get another view on the other side of the veil that I like. How she said it is so encouraging to those who are engaged in the work of genealogy.
- [67:17]
A
Can I just mention as well, I wrote an article about this. It's in the Revelations in Context collection. It's one that I'm really proud of and that I really enjoyed writing. Susa was the first woman to see that revelation. She went over to visit the Smiths, and Joseph F. Smith was basically on his deathbed. I mean, he was really, really ill. And he calls her into the back room and says, here, let me show you this. And so she's able to read a transcript of it. And this quote that you just read is from her diary that she goes home that night just rejoicing and so excited about. About what she has experienced.
- [67:54]
C
Amazing. And where can people find your.
- [67:56]
A
Your gospel library app. Church history section in the Doctrine and Covenants resources? It's that collection called Revelations in Context.
- [68:05]
B
Yeah.
- [68:06]
A
And it's a short article, but it was really fun to do that research and tell that story.
- [68:13]
C
That's great. Thank you. Thank you for writing the article and thank you for pointing that out. Go check that out, everybody. I want to just sketch a couple changes that happened in the 1900s relative to women in the temple. There's actually a lot of stuff that happened in terms of just the temple itself in the 1920s. There's this temple reform era where George F. Richards, he's an apostle, becomes appointed as president of the Salt lake Temple in 1921. His wife Alice was called to preside over the women workers in the Salt lake Temple in 1922. This basically, in effect, makes George F. Richards the head of temple work throughout the church. And this is also when they start using the term matron and the role becomes associated with the wife of the temple president. And that's a practice that those who go to the temple today will recognize that we have a matron of the temple. As we pointed out before, until the early 20th century, the general president of the Relief Society had been considered the president over women's temple work in the Salt Lake Temple and elsewhere. And so Bathsheba W. Smith was the last until her death in 1910. It was the Relief Society president who was over that. But now that's shifting. Now we're seeing the wife of the temple president being called the matron or the woman over women's work in the temple. George F. Richards and Heber J. Grant initiate like a whole slate of substantial reforms in the early 1920s, which should probably be seen as an extension of the priesthood reform movement, or at least as a result of that same zeitgeist. But there's a lot of changes, some relevant to women, some relevant to all of us. But like, for instance, evening endowment sessions, opening the temple for more days, allowing more than just one session a day to happen, increasing it to four or five sessions, making rooms bigger so that there's more capacity for more patrons to be involved, reducing the length of the ordinance substantially, initiatory and endowment, altering the temple robes, etc. But for women specifically. So we have introduction of the matron title. We also have the removal of healing from the temple so women stop participating in the healing practice in the temple. As we have mentioned in a previous episode, this is a time where the temple garments go through some redesigns. We talked previously about how clothing styles had been changing radically in the 1910s and 1920s, just in the broader culture. This meant that modern clothing styles were no longer compatible with the temple garment, which went from neck all the way down to wrists and all the way down to ankles. Okay, so you can picture that. And women either had to keep wearing the kind of cumbersome old fashioned styles, or alter their garments or not wear them at all. And so there was actually a lot of angst and discussion about this, and much of it actually focuses on young women. This is an era when the word modesty starts becoming associated with clothing rather than just behavior. That's fascinating. President Heber J. Grant and the quorum of the 12 actually do an interesting study where they study the history of the temple garment and they find that there was actually no revealed pattern for the garment. I think this is really important. There is no revealed pattern for the garment. And so they decided that the garment could be redesigned to acknowledge the reality of changing times. And we have seen that super recently in our day. And I know there's been some angst. Some people have felt like, ooh, maybe we're going too far, moving the sleeve up to above the shoulder now with some of the garments that are now available. But I think this principle is super important. There is no revealed pattern for the garment, and therefore the first presidency has the prerogative of modifying and adjusting it according to the needs of the time. And so that's not to say that the old style garment didn't still get worn by a lot of people. In fact, all the way up to the 1970s, we know that was the case. The two piece garments were introduced in 1979, and so that's a pretty recent development as well. Anything else you guys want to say about the temple garment before we move on?
- [72:48]
A
Some of us remember our parents wearing the old one piece styles.
- [72:56]
B
I remember my dad saying to me, son, do you know how I know Spencer W. Kimball is a prophet? And I was expecting something profound. And then he said two piece garments. And it flew right over my head at the time. But then when I received my own endowment, I thought, oh yeah, oh yeah, that was an inspired choice.
- [73:16]
A
And to be clear, to be clear, the old style garments were worn as part of the temple ceremonies until the 1970s. So it wasn't just that some people continued to wear them because that's what they preferred. That was true. But if you went to the temple to do a session, part of changing into your temple clothes was wearing the old style garment for a long time. We tell this story in volume three of Saints. So if anybody wants to go check that, to look at that. And of course, we cite all the sources behind this temple garment redesign. So if people want to look into that, there's. There's more resources available.
- [74:01]
C
Yeah. Anything else you would say, Lisa, about Just some of the angst. I've just seen some angst out there about temple garments recently and the changes, and there's kind of a frenzy to go get your own version of the sleeveless garments, and some members of the church saying maybe we've gone too far in making these too short. And. And I just think there's a really important lesson here. Anything you want to say about that?
- [74:28]
A
I mean, I think that's been the case. That's always the case when there's change, and especially really significant change. I mean, there were people who freaked out over the end of plural marriage with the manifesto, you know, who felt like that was too far. And it's. I mean, any change that you can point to somebody, you know, generally has problems with it. And, you know, I think a lot of times it comes from a place of faith and good intentions, but it also can be the result of kind of misguided assumptions or understanding of how things work or maybe unpacked assumptions on where temple practice comes from. It can be, you know, like, people who are worried about the most recent change to the garment may not know the history of how many changes there have been to the garment in this past, how many changes there have been to the temple ordinances in the past. In fact, change over time is really a defining feature of the endowment and the temple ceremonies.
- [75:29]
B
Yeah, I was going to say anybody that's having a lot of heartburn over that needs to read the history, and that's a good antidote for a lot of the struggle that they have to just understand that the principles haven't changed, but the practice has changed quite a bit over time. And I was going to say that the most angst I've seen over the change to the garments recently has been availability.
- [75:55]
C
The other side of the equation.
- [75:57]
B
In particular, women saying, oh, my goodness, how do I get the new temple garments? And how do I. There were lines out the door of the distribution center in Saratoga Springs, where I live the day they were first released here. And there's been nothing but positivity for my students so far, although I know a couple people that have been a little sour on the changes.
- [76:21]
C
Yeah. But this is why church history matters.
- [76:26]
B
Oh, you did it again, Scott.
- [76:29]
A
Well said. Yes. But also, if we can look at it historically and we can see how, for example, this process of redesigning the garment in the 1920s was driven by contemporary concerns, by culture, but it was also something that they engaged in prayerfully that they received revelation and guide and spiritual guidance for if that was true in the 1920s, it's true in the 2000s. It's an evidence of the ongoing revelation, the ongoing inspiration, and also, just like the fact that the church is part of a. A human world that's constantly changing, and we need that revelation to, as I've talked about before, figure out what are the babies and what are the bathwater. And, you know, maybe the specific shape or length of a garment is more bathwater than baby, but the garment itself is. Is the critical thing.
- [77:31]
B
And we should mention, since our focus here has been on women, that. But they just flat out said some of the changes to the garments were to accommodate women, to make the garments more comfortable, especially women living in warmer climates, tropical climates. Yeah. And so I have a hard time getting too riled up when I think to myself, yeah, that's an eminently practical thing. That doesn't change the fundamental meaning of the covenants made in the temple or the function of the temple garment to remind us of those covenants.
- [78:04]
A
One thing Mormons have been over time, Casey, is eminently practical. And you can see that, you know. Yep. And there are like to be delicate about it. There are aspects of female health that have made garments wearing very difficult for some women. So it's a. It's a blessing to have to have different options. And, you know, it. People who don't like it and are worried about it don't have to adopt the new styles. And that's also part of it. Right. Is that there is just more choice available, more agency.
- [78:41]
C
Yeah. One more change that I wanted to point out in the 20th century. And then, Lisa, maybe you can take us home. Talk about the 21st century that we're living in now. But I think a significant one relative to women was in the 1990s. Among other things, the Curse of Eve and the Covenant of Obedience were removed from the endowment ceremony, though clear elements of male headship still remained. But some things were removed there relative to that. And I just want to highlight that.
- [79:12]
A
Yeah. I'm old enough to have experienced that. I first went to the temple in 1986. So when this change happened in 1990, it was something that I experienced and was aware of. I think, in the 21st century. I mean, there's a lot we could say. I think our audience is going to be generally familiar with, with what we've been experiencing in the last 10, 15 years in terms of changes in the temple. If we can step back and look at it in larger Perspective, what we're seeing is a real expansion in terms of numbers of temples, numbers of people that can participate, availability of the temple around the world, but also just like the encouragement of young people to have temple recommends and go to the temple regularly. You know, most of us, I think, grew up in the era of youth temple trips. And your ward had the opportunity to go to the temple once or maybe twice a year and do baptisms. And there was a piece of paper with everybody's name on it, and that was your temple recommend that the leaders took and got you into the temple. Right. And that's. We've seen a real shift in that to the temple becoming an anchor experience for people much younger in their lives, being something that families can do together in a way that wasn't the norm in the past. And so. And then also changes in policy about who can be a temple worker. Like, how many shifts do you have to commit to to be a temple worker? Like, there's been great effort made to extend, expand the availability of the temple experience both as a patron and a temple worker in recent years. You know, just to be specific about some of the specific changes. So from 2019 to 2023, we get women being authorized to act as witnesses of ordinances, and that includes in the temple and I have sat in on temple ceilings where the mothers of the bride and groom or the witnesses. So that's a really lovely development. There been further changes in the language and the covenants to diminish that male headship element even more. I think we've seen the changes in the presentation of the endowment that have given Eve a bigger role, that we've been able to get Eve's words in there, which is really beautiful and kind of give her the last word, which I love, and just give more focus on Eve as a character. So we've seen, you know, some pretty significant things happen in recent years. What do you guys think? I mean, we can talk about, you know, we've talked about kind of the specific things, but what's your impression and sense about these changes over the last however many years?
- [82:15]
B
I'm entirely positive about the changes, honestly. And I guess I'm just kind of a sunny person by nature, but I'd
- [82:23]
A
never picked that up about you, Casey.
- [82:26]
B
There hasn't been a one thing that they've done that I haven't said and thought, oh yeah, love that. I think that the temple endowment has become more clear, more Christ centered and more easy to understand to where I got through my endowment by thinking to myself well, this is Old Testament Y. I could see Moses doing this. Right. But today if I took one of my kids kids to the temple to receive their endowment, I'd feel very strongly that they would come out with the feeling that they're valued as a child of God and that Jesus Christ is at the center of our religion. And so I can't think of anything negative to say, to be honest with you, but I guess that makes me some kind of church apologist or something like that.
- [83:10]
A
Well, I don't think we have to say anything negative. I mean, there are still some complexities and if you differences in the experiences of men and women in the temple, we should acknowledge that. But we can clearly see the direction that the changes have been taking.
- [83:28]
C
Right? Yeah, there is still some disparity, but directionality is incredibly encouraging. So, yeah, that's well said.
- [83:37]
A
Sometimes when I'm in sacrament meeting on Sunday, as I bow my head and pray and meditate during the administration of the sacrament, I kind of do this zoom out where I picture all over the world, how many places is this exact same thing taking place right now? How many people are experiencing and participating in this? And that's a really powerful image for me. And then when you think about the temple and how the work of the temple has just quietly and consistently gone Forward for almost 180 years and how this has been a place where women, particularly women and men, but where women have found power, peace, revelation, really meaningful work where relationships are enriched and that work itself as well just quietly goes on. The world doesn't know anything about it. It's, you know, people look at these temples, they don't know what, what goes on there. They don't understand it even when it's explained. You know, there's a real, there's a real depth and I think just a real beauty in the way that this has played out over time and continues to. And I've had the experience, I think you have too, whether it's Zina or Susa or our own mothers, holy women who have the power of God in their lives through the temple. And I think that's just a, it's just a beautiful and powerful thing that I hope we recognize and hold on to and pass on to our daughters and our sons.
- [85:35]
C
Yeah. Hugh Nibley once said work for the dead is an all important phase of Mormonism about which the world knows virtually nothing. Just to tack on to what you're saying there, Lisa, not just for the dead, but we would add for the living, for the men and women who participate in those ordinances in that sacred work.
- [85:58]
B
Well said. Well, this has been a wonderful journey. We've still got, I think, one or two more episodes to go where we're going to try and pull all these different threads together and come to some conclusions and open questions that we still need to kind of answer as we're moving forward. But thank you both very much for this. This has been really enjoyable.
- [86:22]
C
Yeah, absolutely.
- [86:23]
A
Thanks, you guys.
- [86:24]
C
Thank you both. We'll see you next time.
- [86:26]
B
Okay, see you next time.