Several lines of evidence demonstrate
that Joseph Smith had an adoption theology in place by 1835, including concepts
of adoption into priesthood lineages and the divine family and the practice of
providing church patriarchs as proxy spiritual fathers for those without natural
fathers to bless them. . . . Smith drew adoptive concepts form passages of the
King James Bible that particularly interested him. Romans 8:14-17 explained
that Christians who receive the Holy Spirit “are the sons of God,” who “have
received the Spirit of adoption.” As God’s adopted children, they are “heirs of
God, and joint-heirs with Christ.” Thus Christians “groan” in anticipation of “the
adoption, to wit, the redemption of our body.” Expanding on this idea a few
chapters later, the same epistle compared Gentile Christian converts to “a wild
olive tree, . . . grafted in” to Israel (Rom. 11:17). Similar ideas appeared in
Galatians 3:26-4:5, in which Paul wrote that “God sent forth his Son . . . that
we might receive the adoption of sons” and that all who are baptized in Christ
become “Abraham’s seed, and heirs according to the promise.”
The Book of Mormon seized upon this
biblical notion. It began with a set of dramatic promises to the Israelite
prophets Lehi and Nephi that their numerous “seed” should inherit a “land of
promise” in the Americas along with other blessings, including salvation (1 Ne.
10;13, 12:1). However, it also provided that Gentiles could be “grafted” into
Lehi’s Israelite family line just as the branches of a “wild olive tree” could
be grafted onto a tame one (Jac. 5). Through baptism, “first with water, then with
fire and with the Holy Ghost,” the Gentiles could be “numbered among this the
remnant of Jacob, unto whom I have given this land for their inheritance,” and
could share in that inheritance (3 Ne. 21:22, Morm. 7:10). And in addition to becoming
the seed of Abraham and Jacob, believers could also become the seed of Christ.
All who hear the gospel, believe, and repent “are his seed, or they are the
heirs of the kingdom of God” (Mosiah 15:11). The Book of Mormon thus merged the
Pauline ideas of Chrisitan adoption with the idea of adoption into the House of
Israel (and of Israel’s forefather Abraham).
Lineage also featured prominently in
Smtih’s early revelations on priesthood. In a September 1832 revelation, he
taught that there are two priesthood orders—of Aaron and Melchizedek—both lineally
inherited. The Aaronic priesthood was conferred “upon Aaron and his seed,” and
the Melchizedek priesthood originated with Adma and was handed down generation-to-generation
to Melchizedek and then Abraham, “through the lineage of his father.” Both
priesthoods continued “in the church of God in all generations,” down to the
present day. (Joseph Smith, Revelation, Sep. 22-23, 1832) But one need not be
born a descendant of Aaron or Abraham to receive the priesthood. Rather, one
can become a descendant through a miraculous physical transformation by the
power of the Holy Spirit: “for whoso is faithful unto the obtaining of these
two priesthoods of which I have spoken and the magnifying their calling are
sanctified by the spirit unto the renewing of their bodies body that
they become the Sons of Moses and Aaron and the seed of Abraham.” (Smith,
Revelation, Sep. 22-23, 1832) (Don Bradley and Christopher C. Smith, “Of Generations
and Genders: Fanny Alger and the Adoptive Origins of Ritual Sealing,” in Secret
Covenants: New Insights on Early Mormon Polygamy, ed. Cheryl L. Bruno [Salt
Lake City: Signature Books, 2024], 206-7)
Alongside adoptive concepts, Smith
also developed sealing rituals. He found precedent for sealing in two biblical
prooftexts: Jesus’s promise that “Whatsoever ye shall bind on earth shall be
bound in heaven” (Matt. 18:18) and the Apostle Pual’s statement that those “predestined
. . . unto the adoption” can be “sealed with the holy Spirit of promise” as a
guarantee of their election (Eph. 1:5, 13-14). (See the allusions to these
passages in “minutes, 25-26 October 1831,” 10-12)
Smith and Sidney Rigdon introduced a
sealing as a ritual of the church at a church conference in October 1831. Rigdon
spoke first, telling the congregation “that he wished to make a few
observations connected with the object as our assembling our selves together,” for
God wishes to make “his children one, or he by his Holy Spirit binds their hearts
from Erath to Heaven.” Following Rigdon, Smith preached that “the order of the
High priesthood is that they have power given to them to seal up the Saints
unto eternal life.” These remarks envisioned a ritual that stamped the
individual soul with a “seal” guaranteeing salvation but that also “sealed” the
Saints together “with one heart and one mind.” (“Minutes, 25-26 October 1831,”
10-11) As historian Jonathan Stapley notes, this ritual made the assurance of salvation
“entirely relational.” (Stapley, Power of Godliness, 37)
According to Mary Elizabeth Rollins
Lightner, who attended a church meeting at Smith’s home in 1831, Smith stopped mid-meeting
and announced that Jesus Christ had been in their midst. According to Lightner,
Smith said, “I want you to remember this as if it were the last thing that
escapes my lips. He has given you all to me and commanded me to seal you to
everlasting life.” She further explained that they were given to him “to be
with him in his kingdom, even as he is in the Father’s Kingdom.” She did not
provide a precise date for this experience, but it may have actually preceded
the October 1831 conference and given rise to Smith’s teachings at that
conference.”
Over the next few years, according to
historian Samuel Brown, “Mormon elders sealed congregations to eternal life.
Reynolds Cahoon (1790-1861) recorded in November 1831 that he ‘Blest the Children
in the name of the lord & sealed the church unto eternal life.’ Orson Pratt
did the same in 1833, while Smith himself did so in 1832 and 1834.” (Samuel
Morris Brown, In Heaven as It Is on Earth: Joseph Smith and the Mormon Conquest
of Death [New York: Oxford University Press, 2012], 149)
A February 16, 1832, revelation
referenced this sealing ritual and linked it to both priesthood ordination and
adoption into the divine family. According to the revelation, faithful Saints
who are baptized and “sealed by the Holy Spirit of promise” become “priests and
kings . . . after the order of Melchizedek,” as well as “gods, even the sons of
God.” (“Vision, 16 February 1832 [D&C 76],” 5-6) Thus sealing conferred not
only the assurance of salvation, but also the rights and blessings of
priesthood lineage and divine sonship. (Don Bradley and Christopher C. Smith, “Of
Generations and Genders: Fanny Alger and the Adoptive Origins of Ritual
Sealing,” in Secret Covenants: New Insights on Early Mormon Polygamy,
ed. Cheryl L. Bruno [Salt Lake City: Signature Books, 2024], 209-10)
