Early Anointing’s

 

 

When Wilford Woodruff and William Clayton were invited to visit a Sister Lea in 1840, how did the pair anoint the sick sister?

a.      On her head only

b.      Internally only

c.       No oil at all-they didn’t use oil in the early Church

d.      On her head and internally

Yesterday’s answer:

b.   Taylor

One of the principal factors that alienated federal officials and convinced them that the Mormons were disloyal was the intemperate rhetoric used by Mormon leaders.  Brigham Young, Heber C. Kimball, Jedediah Grant, and George A. Smith, all popular speakers in Mormon meetings, used excessive and sometimes violent language as they attacked their opponents and defended their doctrines and practices. Since preaching was a principal form of communication and entertainment in pioneer times, and since most of the leaders spoke extemporaneously, it should not be surprising that statements were made that offended non-Mormon officials.

     This problem became apparent when the first non-Mormon territorial officials arrived in Utah and attended their first Mormon meeting. The occasion was the Twenty-fourth of July celebration, commemorating the fourth anniversary of the pioneers settling in Salt Lake Valley, and the speaker was Daniel H. Wells. General Wells, in reviewing Mormon history, asserted that the United States, which had required the Mormons to furnish a battalion of five hundred men to fight in the war against Mexico, “could have no other object in view than to finish by utter extermination, the work which had so ruthlessly begun.”

     Brigham Young also addressed the assembly “in his usual interesting strain of intelligent eloquence” according to the chronicler of the occasion. The exact words of Governor Young are not extant, but the tenor of the speech was uncomplimentary about the late President Zachary Taylor and turned on the idea that those who worked against the Saints would die an untimely death and end up in hell. President Taylor was not a popular president even in Washington, but no one registered such pity disapprobation of him as Young did when he said: “Zachary Taylor is dead, and in hell, and I am glad of it.”

Journal History of the Church, 24 July 1851 Archives, Historical Department, Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Salt Lake City, Utah