Prophecy of the Then-Future Cold War Attributed to Joseph Smith in 1890

In the following from the March 15, 1890 issue of the Juvenile Instructor, we have a late recollection of various prophecies from Joseph Smith. To be sure, many can be dismissed as being evidence of divine inspiration as the source is late, and many of the events happened pre-1890 when it was recorded. However, there is also a prophecy of the then-future Cold War between Russia and the USA, something that would not take place until after 1945 (55 years later):

 

Elder Jesse W. Fox, Sen., received the narration from Father Taylor, the father of the late President John Taylor. The old gentleman said that one time the Prophet Joseph was in his house conversing about the battle of Waterloo, in which Father Taylor had taken part. Suddenly the Prophet Joseph turned and said, “Father Taylor, you will live to see, though I will not, greater battles than that of Waterloo. The United States will go to war with Mexico, and thus gain an increase of territory. The slave question will cause a division between the North and the South, and in these wars greater battles than Waterloo will occur. But,” he continued with emphasis, “when the great bear (Russia) lays her paw on the lion (England) the winding up scene is not far distant.”

 

These words were uttered before there was any prospect of war with Mexico, and such a thing as division in the United States was never contemplated. Yes, these fierce struggles came, and though Joseph himself was slain before they occurred, Father Taylor lived to witness some of the world’s most remarkable battles.

 

The struggle between the Bear and the Lion has not yet happened, but as surely as Joseph the Prophet ever predicted such an event, so surely will it not fail of its fulfillment. ("A Russian Naval Station," Juvenile Instructor 25, no. 6 [March 15, 1890]: 162)

 

Further Reading

 

Resources on Joseph Smith’s Prophecies

Brigham Young on the Absolute Necessity of Divine Revelation to Know of the Reality of God and Truth of the Gospel

In his journal for September 1, 1849, we find the following record of a sermon Brigham Young himself delivered, showing the absolute necessity of divine revelation for us to truly know the reality of God and the truth of the Gospel:

 

I look upon my own existence to the li[gh]t within me, if I have talent given me I shall venture to tell them in part—for an exp[anatio]n on this point wo[uld] require many worlds to convey the idea unless h[eav]n[l]y words r given, it wo[ul]d require vol[umes] to explain—there is a Sp[irit] in every human being & living creature [and] the insp[iratio]n of the Al[might]y giveth it understanding, without that, we co[ul]ld not convey it to ano[the]r man—consequently my doctrine is [that] absolutely no man or woman can understand the things of God unless the Al[mighty] giveth understanding—the whole of the Gospel is founded on that prin[ciple that] we must [k]no[w] by the rev[elatio]n of J[esus] C[hrist]—[To[ recollect[,] I apply a Sp[irit]—yet philosophy applies life to all. (George D. Smith, ed., Brigham Young, Colonizer of the American West: Diaries and Office Journals, 1832-1871, 2 vols. [Salt Lake City: Signature Books, 2021], 1:160)

 

Orson Hyde (1857) on the Origin of Polygamy

In his Brigham Young's office journal entry for April 12, 1857, we read the following:

Orson Hyde spoke on Polygamy. gave some arguments, rather strange—if true, to the missionaries which they might use in the world. The original order seemed to be one man & one woman,—Adam & Eve, they had corrupted themselves & had not multiplied in purity[,] did not do as God required of them and he had a right to institute another order to hasten his work, that his feast might be full of guests. (George D. Smith, ed., Brigham Young, Colonizer of the American West: Diaries and Office Journals, 1832-1871, 2 vols. [Salt Lake City: Signature Books, 2021], 1:539)

 

Eleonore Stump vs. the “Citation” Reading of Jesus’ Use of Psalm 22:1 and Cry of Dereliction on the Cross

 

On this sort of interpretation of the cry, then, Christ is making use of a Jewish convention that cites the first line of a Psalm to express the whole of the Psalm. The cry therefore is not to be understood as an expression by Christ of an experience of desolation.

 

But this is an implausible interpretation of the cry, in my view. After all, nothing about the convention that lets the first line of a Psalm serve as a reference for the Psalm as a whole prevents a person from uttering any particular lines of the Psalm, as the citation of lines from the Psalms in the New Testament makes clear. So it was possible for Christ to give utterance to the lines at the end of the Psalm, as well as to the cry that expresses the Psalm’s opening line; and doing so would obviously have been a much wiser thing to do in the circumstances. Since the rebukes of the bystanders include the derisory innuendo that God has in fact abandoned Christ, it is at least highly misleading, not to say damaging to the faith of his followers, for Christ to cite this Psalm by its first line if its last lines are that he intended to express.

 

As far as that goes, the first line itself is not cited by Christ but rather uttered as a cry by Christ on the cross as he is dying. In that context, it is strongly evocative of desolation. The context in which the line is uttered colors its meaning. “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” has one sort of resonance when it is expressed as a liturgical line in a context of ritual prayer, for example. It has another sort of resonance entirely when it is expressed as a cry by a lone man who is being tortured to death by political and religious authorities hostile to him. (Eleonore Stump, Atonement [Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2018], 148)

 

Further Reading

 

Was Jesus Abandoned by God on the Cross?

 

Does Jesus’ Cry on the Cross Support Penal Substitution?

Eleonore Stump (Thomist): God, being in an eternal now, Always Assumed Human Nature, not at the Time of the Incarnation

  

. . . on the doctrine of eternity, God’s having an assumed human nature is not something true of God at some times but not at others, rather it is something of characteristic of God always in the limitless eternal now. God is therefore never in the state of not having an assumed human nature. For this reason, the human capacity for suffering is something that is never not characteristic of God, in the human nature whose assumption is never absent from God.  (Eleonore Stump, Atonement [Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2018], 134)

 

Randal Rauser on the A Priori Assumptions as to Why Isaiah 44:7 is Privileged Over Genesis 22:12 by Critics of Open Theism

While a critic of Open Theism, one does appreciate the intellectual honesty Randal Rauser demonstrates in his assumptions and how they colour how he exegetes and privileges certain texts over others (in this case, Isa 44:7 being the “controlling verse” of Gen 22:12 as opposed to vice versa):

 

But on what do I base this assumption of divine omniscience? Like a biblicist, I could limit my case to biblical passages which suggest that God has intimate foreknowledge of creaturely actions (e.g. Psalm 139:16; Isaiah 44:7) and treat those as control verses for interpreting passages like Genesis 22:12 where God is described as learning. But that method is insufficient because it simply puts the question back a stap: what ultimately justifies privileging passages like Isaiah 44:7 as the interpretive control over passages like Genesis 22:12 (This point has been effectively pressed by Open Theists)? At this point, I would argue that we can justify a specific set of interpretive control texts by way of a prior theological intuition, an a priori commitment to the priority of a particular concept of perfection, a concept that includes perfect omniscience. It is because I believe God is perfect and perfection includes comprehensive knowledge that I would prioritize Isaiah 44:7 as a control text for Genesis 22:12. (Randal Rauser, Jesus Loves Canaanites: Biblical Genocide in the Light of Moral Intuition [Canada: 2 Cup Press, 2021], 129)

 

E. T. Mullen Jr. on the Divine Council in 1 Kings 22

  

The meeting of the council is described in some detail in the vision of Micaiah in 1 Kgs 22:19-23. Ahab of Israel and Jehoshaphat of Judah, having received a favorable oracle from the four hundred prophets (22:5-6), summoned Micaiah (vv. 8-9), whose oracle (v. 17) differed quite drastically from that of the other prophets. The vision of the proceedings in the council reveals the reason for the discrepancy—Yahweh had commanded a false oracle from the prophets and one of his council members carried out his decree. The vision of Micaiah is introduced with an imperative and the announcement of his authority: š^ema’ d^ebar-YHWH, “Hear the word of Yahweh” (v. 19). Like the messengers in the Ugaritic texts, the message to or from the council is accompanied by the explicit mention of the sender, tḥm DN, the semantic and literary equivalent of debar YHWH. Having stated the authority for the message he was to deliver, Micaiah proceeds with his vision: “I saw Yahweh enthroned upon his dais, and all the host of heaven (kol-ṣ^eba’ haššāmāyim) were standing about him (‘ōmēd ‘ālāw) on his right and on his left” (v. 19). The heavenly scene is clear: Yahweh, like ‘ēl, is enthroned among the members of his council (cf. CTA 16.V.9-28; Ug. V.2I.2-4 [RS 24.252]). He then directly addresses his council: “Who will entice Ahab . . . ?” (mî y^epatteh ‘et-‘aḥ’āb, v. 20; compare ‘ēl’s question, “Who among the gods will drive off the illness . . .?,” my b’ilm ydy mrṣ, CTA 16.V.10-11, 14-15, 17-18, 20-21). Unlike the Ugaritic council, where the gods sit helplessly by, unable even to answer (‘in b’ilm ‘nyh, 16.V.12-13, 16, 19, 22), the members of Yahweh’s council discuss the matter among themselves: “One said one thing and another said another” (v. 20). When the matter has been decided among the members, one of them addresses the head of the assembly: “The spirit came forth and stood before Yahweh” (wayyēṣē’ hārū^aḥ wayy’ămōd lipnē YHWH, v. 21). The volunteer from the council is designated as “the spirit” (hārū^aḥ), a common designation of Yahweh’s messengers (cf. Pss 104:4; 18:11 [= 2 Sam 22:11]; 148:8; Job 30:22; Jub. 2:2; etc.). The “spirit” volunteers and is questioned by Yahweh as to his plan (v. 21). When he reveals that he will become “a lying spirit in the mouth of all the prophets,” Yahweh pronounces that he will succeed (v. 22). Finally, the messenger o the council is commissioned with imperatives, “Go forth and do so” (ṣē’ wa’ăśēh-kēn, v. 22), in the same manner that messengers in the Ugaritic myths were dispatched. Verse 23, the final part of the vision, recounts that the messenger has carried out his function—the decree of the assembly has been fulfilled. The parallels with the Ugaritic council are evident. The gods surround the high god, who is enthroned in their midst. They “stand” (‘md) before him and respond to his questions. Yahweh selects his messenger and commissions him to proceed, after guaranteeing the succession of the mission. The word and decision of the council are the same as the decree of Yahweh. The council only serves to reemphasize and execute his decision. Its members carry out his decree exactly as commissioned. (E.T. Millen, Jr., The Divine Council in Canaanite and Early Hebrew [Harvard Semitic Monographs 24; Chico, Calif.: Scholars Press, 1980; repr., Leiden, Brill: Brill, n.d.], 205-6)