In various traditions, liturgy is very important in teaching various doctrines. Such is also the case in the Endowment. Commenting on Joseph Smith’s temple liturgy, Jonathan Stapley noted how it reveals that, at least implicitly, Joseph Smith did hold to a “divine feminine” (which would later develop into the modern concept of Heavenly Mother):
There are no
contemporaneous documents indicating that Smith taught the female corollary to
this idea—namely that women were to be exalted as queens and priestesses, and
that by extension God the Father reigned with God the Mother. Many accept from
the rapidity with which Smith’s closes associates publicly asserted this idea,
that Smith did indeed privately teach the concepts. But there is far more
compelling logic than the hymns of William Phelps (Joseph Smith’s amanuensis
and ghost writer) and Eliza Snow (one of Joseph Smith’s plural wives): the
entire temple liturgy is predicated on the incorporation of women and men
together into the material structure of heaven and earth—the “priesthood” to
use the contemporary term. And the necessity that women and men both be integrated
into this priesthood was essential from the first moments Joseph Smith revealed
it. Without women and men together, Smith’s cosmos would be fractured and wasted.
(Johnathan A. Stapley, “Brigham Young’s Garden Cosmology,” Journal of Mormon
History, Vol. 47, No. 1 [January 2021]:68-86, here, p. 74)
In a footnote to the above, Stapley noted
that:
While there is no documentation
for “queens and priestesses” during Joseph Smith’s life, he did explicitly incorporate
women into the “cosmological priesthood” of the Nauvoo Temple, further evidence
that the idea was revealed by him . . . [as seen in] Smith’s
sermon to the Relief Society, March 31, 1842: “The Society should move
according to the ancient Priesthood, hence there should be a select Society
separate from all the evils of the world, choice, virtuous[s] and holy—Said he
was going to make of this Society a kingdom of priests [as] in Enoch’s day—as in
Paul’s day.” JSP D9:312. (p. 74 n. 22)
As an aside, Stapley is the author of a great book I recommend everyone read:
The Power of Godliness: Mormon Liturgy and Cosmology (Oxford University Press, 2018)
