LDS Discussions — A Faithful Response

LDS Expanded Essay — Race and the Priesthood (Annotated)

A scholarly response to LDS Discussions' annotated critique of the Church's Gospel Topics Essay on Race and the Priesthood.

Overview and Methodology

The LDS Discussions annotated essay on Race and the Priesthood raises serious questions that deserve serious answers. The Church's own Gospel Topics Essay on this subject is notable for its candor: it acknowledges that the priesthood and temple restriction applied to men of black African descent from 1852 to 1978, concedes that no satisfactory theological explanation for the ban has ever been established, and explicitly disavows every racial theory ever advanced by prior leaders. That combination of honesty and repudiation is the essential context the LDS Discussions annotations consistently obscure.

This response examines the annotator's specific claims in the order they appear, supplying the historical and theological context that is missing, engaging the best available scholarship — including the work of leading non-apologetic historians — and showing where LDS Discussions commits factual errors, logical fallacies, or misrepresentation of the Church's own acknowledged position.

Sources drawn upon include the Gospel Topics Essay itself, the scholarship of W. Paul Reeve (University of Utah, author of Let's Talk About Race and Priesthood and director of the Century of Black Mormons project), BYU Religious Studies Center publications, the Interpreter Foundation, FAIR Latter-day Saints, Bruce R. McConkie's contemporaneous account of the 1978 revelation, and the canonized text of Official Declaration 2.

Claim 1: “The church taught for over 130 years that white people were more esteemed by God”

LDS Discussions opens by asserting that the Church's own introductory statement — that “all are alike unto God” — is refuted by 130+ years of racist teaching. The annotation implies this is the Church's perpetual, institutional doctrine.

The factual record is more nuanced. The Church was founded with a genuinely inclusive theology. At the Church's establishment in 1830, Black men were ordained to the priesthood — Elijah Abel, Q. Walker Lewis, Joseph T. Ball, and others received ordinations during Joseph Smith's lifetime. An 1835 account by an outside observer quotes early Mormon missionaries teaching that God “denieth none that come unto him; black and white — bond and free, male and female.” W. Paul Reeve, one of the nation's foremost historians of race in Latter-day Saint history, has documented that the restriction originated not with Joseph Smith but with Brigham Young, specifically between December 1847 and January 1852.

As recently as March 1847, Brigham Young praised Q. Walker Lewis, a Black priesthood holder, calling him “one of the best Elders, an African.” By December 1847, Young had shifted dramatically following the William McCary incident — McCary was a Black man ordained as an elder who entered into unauthorized plural marriages with white women and claimed independent prophetic authority. After McCary's excommunication, Young's views on interracial relationships hardened rapidly, and by 1852 he had introduced the restriction publicly before the Utah territorial legislature.

This is not a defense of what followed. It is a correction of the claim that the Church from its founding taught white supremacy. The founding theology was inclusive; the restriction was a later aberration, originating in one leader's mid-19th-century racial anxieties, and one that the Church has now fully repudiated. LDS Discussions conflates the ban with foundational doctrine — the historical record does not support that conflation.

Claim 2: “A church restored by God should be ahead of the natural man — why did it take so long?”

This is the annotation's most emotionally resonant challenge, and it deserves an honest engagement. The force of the argument rests on a particular theology of prophetic infallibility: if God speaks directly through His prophet, then every action the prophet takes must reflect divine will, and therefore the ban, having persisted for 126 years, must either have been divinely authorized or must disprove prophetic authority entirely.

But the Church has never, in its canon or its formal theology, taught prophetic infallibility. Section 1 of the Doctrine and Covenants explicitly states that servants of God can err: “inasmuch as they erred it might be made known” (D&C 1:25). The second Article of Faith states that “men will be punished for their own sins, and not for Adam's transgression” — a principle Reeve has pointed out was violated by Brigham Young's own ban theology, which held the supposed descendants of Cain accountable for a murder in which they took no part. Young's justification contradicted not only foundational LDS doctrine but the explicit testimony of Orson Pratt, a fellow apostle who rejected Young's “curse of Cain” reasoning at the time.

The LDS theological framework is one of progressive revelation (“line upon line, precept upon precept” — Isaiah 28:10; 2 Nephi 28:30), not of a fully downloading, error-free oracle. BYU scholars and Reeve have both proposed what might be called the “Samuel principle” — just as God permitted Israel to have a king despite that being a poor choice (1 Samuel 8), God permitted institutional practices that did not reflect His ultimate will, allowing leaders to learn from their errors. This is a coherent theological explanation grounded in the same framework the Church has taught since its founding.

The annotation's question — why did it take 14 years after the Civil Rights Act? — actually supports the apologetic case. If the change were purely sociopolitical capitulation, it would have come in 1964–1965 when social pressure was at its peak. Instead it came in 1978, after a specific process of spiritual seeking initiated by President Kimball. Reeve documents that President McKay sought this same revelation and did not receive it — suggesting the timing was not merely institutional but genuinely awaited divine authorization.

Claim 3: Brigham Young's Full 1852 Quote Was Dishonestly Omitted

LDS Discussions provides extended quotations from Brigham Young's 1852 and subsequent speeches, including statements calling for death as the penalty for interracial marriage. These are authentic historical quotations. The annotation argues the Church dishonestly truncated the footnoted quote in the essay.

First, the Church's essay does not deny Young made these statements. It states explicitly that “over time, Church leaders and members advanced many theories to explain the priesthood and temple restrictions. None of these explanations is accepted today as the official doctrine of the Church.” The essay is designed for a general audience and provides footnotes for those wishing to trace the primary sources. Scholarly candor does not require reprinting every inflammatory quotation; it requires accurate historical characterization — which the essay provides.

Second, Reeve's scholarship demonstrates that Young's “curse of Cain” theology had no precedent in Joseph Smith's revelations, was not derived from any distinctively LDS scriptural text, and was borrowed from Protestant racial folklore already widespread in America since the 1730s. Young's sermons reflected 19th-century American racial culture, not uniquely Mormon theology.

Third, and most importantly: the annotation treats Young's sermons as binding prophetic pronouncements. If they were authoritative doctrine, they would still be doctrine — and they are not. Their disavowal is not a mark against the system; it is the system functioning precisely as its own theology describes it should.

Claim 4: Book of Mormon Racial Passages Contradict the Church's Anti-Racist Stance

LDS Discussions reproduces seventeen Book of Mormon passages as evidence that LDS scripture teaches dark skin as a divine curse and racial mixing as sinful. This is one of the annotation's most sustained arguments, requiring careful engagement at both the textual and hermeneutical levels.

A. The “Skin of Blackness” Question

The annotation treats “skin of blackness” (2 Nephi 5:21) and related passages as referring unambiguously to racial skin pigmentation. However, the Interpreter Foundation published a peer-reviewed study, “Demythicizing the Lamanites' Skin of Blackness,” presenting substantial linguistic and textual evidence that these passages describe a mark set upon a small founding group rather than a hereditary genetic change. Key observations include:

Textual Evidence for Figurative Reading

  • Unusual Terminology — “Skin of blackness” uses “skin” in a way that may denote an external covering, paralleling ancient Near Eastern usage for garment or covering
  • Selective Application — The mark was “set upon” only about a dozen founding adults; hereditary genetic change would be described and applied differently across centuries of narrative
  • Temporal Inconsistency — References to skin differences are sparse across the entire Book of Mormon narrative, inconsistent with a permanent heritable physical change
  • Reversal on Repentance — The curse is reversed when Lamanites repent (3 Nephi 2:14–16), which is genetically nonsensical but spiritually coherent if the mark is behavioral or symbolic
  • Joseph Smith's 1837 Revision — “White and delightsome” was revised to “pure and delightsome,” indicating the original intent was spiritual purity, not skin color

Critically, no LDS leader ever cited Book of Mormon passages as the justification for the priesthood ban. Brigham Young's 1852 rationale was rooted in the Protestant “curse of Cain” narrative from Genesis, not from the Book of Mormon. If these passages were understood as establishing racial doctrine applicable to the priesthood, they would have been cited. They were not. This is telling.

Furthermore, the Jacob 3 passage the annotation cites to condemn Nephite racism actually rebukes the Nephites for their racial contempt: “How much better are you than they, in the sight of your great Creator?” (Jacob 3:7). The text condemns racial contempt; it does not endorse it.

The annotation treats these passages as having a single, obvious racial meaning. The scholarly and textual record shows they are legitimately ambiguous, admit of non-racial interpretations, and were never connected by early LDS leaders to the priesthood restriction.

B. Moses 7:22 and Abraham 1:24–27

The annotation cites Moses 7:22 (“the seed of Cain were black”) and Abraham 1:27 (Pharaoh's lineage “could not have the right of Priesthood”) as the scriptural basis for the ban. These are genuine challenges that require honest engagement.

The strongest counter-evidence comes from Joseph Smith's own actions. Smith translated the Book of Abraham in 1835 and ordained Elijah Abel to the Melchizedek Priesthood that same year. If Smith understood Abraham 1:27 as a blanket prohibition on all persons of Black African descent holding the priesthood, his ordination of Abel is simply inexplicable. This is powerful evidence that Smith did not read the passage as establishing a universal, permanent racial restriction.

BYU Studies published a detailed analysis, “The Priesthood Ban and the Book of Abraham,” concluding that the Abraham 1:27 passage refers specifically to the ancient Egyptian pharaoh — a political figure whose claims to priestly authority derived from false lineage claims — not to all people of African descent in all ages. The passage is contextually limited to its narrative setting.

Moses 7:22 is part of the Enoch narrative describing an ancient pre-Mosaic condition. No LDS scripture states this condition is permanent or applies to priesthood access in the restored Church. The fact that Young invoked it does not mean the scripture teaches it — it means Young used a text selectively to rationalize a policy whose actual origins Reeve has traced to racial anxieties about intermarriage in the Winter Quarters period.

Claim 5: The Ban Was Lifted Only for Financial and Business Reasons

This is the annotation's most widely repeated argument. It reproduces the Apostle LeGrand Richards interview in which Richards describes the Brazil temple situation and the deliberation process preceding the revelation. The annotation concludes the revelation was merely a committee vote driven by financial pressure.

This is a fundamental confusion of occasion with cause. The Brazil temple situation created urgency — it was not the source of the revelation. The LDS account of how revelation comes has always involved study, prayer, inquiry, and collective seeking: “You must study it out in your mind; then you must ask me if it be right” (D&C 9:8). The Richards account describes exactly this process — years of Kimball's personal study, individual consultation with each apostle, group deliberation, and then definitive spiritual confirmation. That the revelation came through process rather than dramatic vision is entirely consistent with LDS revelatory theology.

Elder Bruce R. McConkie — who was physically present on June 1, 1978 — left a detailed firsthand account that directly refutes the “committee vote” characterization:

Elder Bruce R. McConkie — Eyewitness Account, June 1978

“The Spirit of the Lord rested mightily upon us all; we felt something akin to what happened on the day of Pentecost and at the Kirtland Temple dedication. … President Kimball knew, and each one of us knew, independent of any other person, by direct and personal revelation to us, that the time had now come to extend the gospel and all its blessings and all its obligations, including the priesthood and the blessings of the house of the Lord, to those of every nation, culture, and race, including the black race.”

Elder David B. Haight reported “an outpouring of the Spirit which bonded our souls together in perfect unity.” President Gordon B. Hinckley described “a conduit opened between the heavenly throne and the kneeling, pleading prophet of God.” These are contemporaneous first-person accounts by multiple independent witnesses — not retrospective hagiography.

The annotation dismisses these testimonies without engaging them. A genuinely open-minded inquiry would reckon with the fact that twelve apostles independently report the same extraordinary spiritual experience occurring simultaneously. Within the LDS framework of revelation — which requires the Spirit as authenticating witness — this constitutes the strongest possible evidence that the event was genuinely revelatory.

Claim 6: The Disavowal of Prior Prophetic Teachings Destroys Prophetic Authority

The annotation states: “This statement throws the authority of every prophet from Brigham Young until the ban was lifted into question if what they called doctrine is now disavowed.”

This argument assumes a model of prophetic authority that LDS scripture itself has never endorsed. If prophets must be infallible on every point to be genuine prophets, then Moses (who committed murder and was barred from the Promised Land), Peter (who denied Christ and later required apostolic rebuke from Paul — Galatians 2:11–14), and virtually every recorded biblical prophet are disqualified. The scriptures consistently depict prophetic authority coexisting with human error.

The distinction that matters is between speculative theological rationale and binding revelation. The various “explanations” offered for the ban over 126 years — the curse of Cain, pre-mortal neutrality, lesser valiance — were speculative rationalizations the essay correctly characterizes as never having been official doctrine. Brigham Young's legislative speeches were not canonized. Bruce R. McConkie's 1966 Mormon Doctrine entry was not canonized. The disavowal of those speculative rationalizations does not disavow prophetic authority — it distinguishes between speculative opinions and authoritative revelations, which is exactly what LDS theology has always asked members to do.

The annotation invokes Ezra Taft Benson's 1981 statement that a prophet need not say “Thus saith the Lord” to give scripture. This cuts in both directions: if correct, it means the 1978 revelation — formally canonized as Official Declaration 2 by unanimous sustaining vote of the entire Church — carries far greater authority than any of Young's territorial legislature speeches. The annotation credits Young's racial theories as binding “scripture” while dismissing the 1978 revelation as institutional pragmatism. This is methodologically inconsistent.

McConkie himself provided the most compelling reply in August 1978: “Forget everything that I have said, or what President Brigham Young or President George Q. Cannon or whomsoever has said in days past that is contrary to the present revelation. We spoke with a limited understanding and without the light and knowledge that now has come into the world.” This is not institutional embarrassment — it is precisely the prophetic self-correction that a living, continuing-revelation church should demonstrate.

Claim 7: Abel's Petition and Jane Manning James Prove the Ban Was Doctrinal

The annotation highlights that Elijah Abel was denied a temple endowment in 1879 and that Jane Manning James was restricted to proxy baptisms. These are historical facts the essay itself acknowledges. LDS Discussions uses them to argue the ban operated at the highest doctrinal level.

What the annotation omits is the historical complexity these cases reveal. Elijah Abel had been ordained by Joseph Smith and remained ordained — the restriction did not revoke his existing priesthood. This inconsistency is more consistent with a disputed institutional policy than with settled divine doctrine. Reeve's research further documents how Joseph F. Smith in the early 1900s attempted systematically to erase Black priesthood holders from institutional memory, even trying to retroactively claim Abel's ordination had been declared void by Joseph Smith himself — a claim the essay directly contradicts, acknowledging “there is no reliable evidence that any black men were denied the priesthood during Joseph Smith's lifetime.”

The treatment of Jane Manning James was a genuine injustice that the Church now acknowledges. That the Church includes these cases in its own essay, rather than suppressing them, reflects the institutional honesty the annotation claims to be promoting — but which the annotation actually undermines by refusing to engage with the very evidence the essay presents.

Claim 8: “It is impossible to reconcile the church narrative today to what the church was at its founding”

This is the annotator's sweeping concluding claim — and it precisely inverts the historical record.

The Church at its founding, under Joseph Smith, ordained Black men to the priesthood and admitted them to temple ordinances. The Church in 2026 ordains Black men to the priesthood and admits them to temple ordinances. It is the 126-year restriction period that represents the departure from the founding vision — a departure the Church has explicitly and publicly acknowledged. The 1978 revelation did not introduce something new; it restored something original. If any institutional narrative reconciles with its founding principles, it is the restored Church's current practice of universal priesthood access.

The annotation's conclusion rests on a misidentification of the “founding” position — treating Brigham Young's 1852 institutional restriction as the foundational doctrine when the documentary record, examined by Reeve and other scholars, places the founding position clearly in Joseph Smith's inclusive ordination practice.

The annotation's strongest argument is that the 126-year ban demonstrates prophetic leadership is unreliable. The honest answer is: yes, leaders can be wrong, and Brigham Young was wrong in a way that caused real suffering. The LDS framework — unlike frameworks that require prophetic infallibility — has the theological resources to acknowledge this without collapsing. What the evidence does not support is the conclusion that this episode disproves the Restoration or renders prophetic authority permanently incoherent.

What the Gospel Topics Essay Actually Establishes

A careful reading of the Church's Gospel Topics Essay — read in full rather than through adversarial annotations — reveals the following:

What the Church's Own Essay Establishes

  • Original Inclusivity — Black men were ordained to the priesthood under Joseph Smith; there is no reliable evidence of any denial under Smith
  • Admitted Origin — The restriction was initiated by Brigham Young in 1852, not by Joseph Smith and not by any recorded revelation
  • Full Disavowal — Every racial theory ever advanced to justify the ban — curse of Cain, pre-mortal neutrality, lesser valiance, mixed-race marriage as sin — is explicitly disavowed
  • Genuine Revelation — The 1978 lifting was received as revelation by all twelve apostles present, each independently confirmed by the Spirit according to their contemporaneous testimony
  • Current Condemnation — “Church leaders today unequivocally condemn all racism, past and present, in any form”
  • Restoration of Founding Vision — Current practice returns the Church to what it was under Joseph Smith: full and equal access to all ordinances regardless of race

This is not the record of an institution defending its racism. It is the record of an institution that experienced a departure from its founding principles, acknowledged that departure honestly, disavowed it fully, and returned to the original inclusive vision through what its most senior leaders attested was genuine revelation. That process is messy, painful, and deeply imperfect — but it is not the story LDS Discussions tells.

Conclusion

The LDS Discussions annotation on Race and the Priesthood raises genuine historical questions and legitimate moral challenges. But its analytical method is adversarial rather than scholarly: it selectively quotes to maximize harm, presents the worst-case reading of every ambiguous evidence point, treats 19th-century speculative sermons as equivalent to binding revealed doctrine, and dismisses the 1978 revelation as institutional pragmatism without engaging the multiple contemporaneous eyewitness testimonies of the apostles present.

The scholarly record — including the work of historians such as W. Paul Reeve writing from non-apologetic perspectives — supports a more nuanced reading: the priesthood restriction originated with Brigham Young, not Joseph Smith; it contradicted both the founding practice and the foundational theology of the Church; it was maintained by institutional inertia and 19th-century racial culture rather than by genuine revelation; and it was reversed by a genuine revelatory experience in 1978 attested to by unanimous apostolic witness.

None of this is painless history. The priesthood and temple restriction caused real and lasting harm to real people, including faithful Saints like Jane Manning James and Elijah Abel. The Church owns that harm. What it does not own — and what the evidence does not support — is the conclusion that this episode disproves the Restoration or renders prophetic authority permanently incoherent.

A framework that produces a Brigham Young who gets this wrong, acknowledges it was wrong, disavows it fully, and restores the original inclusive vision through what twelve apostles independently testified was genuine revelation — that is a framework with far more explanatory and moral coherence than the binary the annotation offers.

The truth is not served by refusing to look at history. Neither is it served by looking at history and calling every evidence of human failure proof of divine fraud. The race and priesthood history is painful, complex, and ultimately — in light of what the Church has acknowledged, disavowed, and restored — a story that reflects human weakness operating within a divine framework that proved capable of correcting it.

Sources and Further Reading

Primary and Scholarly Sources