🚨 (Episode 4) William Law: Government Overreach, God & Joseph Smith #mormon #nauvoo

There are certain people in history who become interesting because they hated a particular person. And then there are people who become historically fascinating because they once loved, trusted, followed, and defended that person and then turned completely and utterly against them. William Law belongs to the second category. William Law was not an outsider looking in at Joseph Smith. He was not a newspaper editor sitting somewhere in Chicago writing accusations about a religious movement he barely understood. He wasn't even simply a disgruntled church member. [music] William Law was once Joseph Smith's counselor in the first presidency of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. He was a trusted insider. He had sat with Joseph Smith. He had participated in the religious world Joseph was creating in Nauvoo. And he had been taught privately about priesthood and temple ordinances. He had served in the civic and military institutions of Nauvoo. [music] And then by 1844, William Law had become one of Joseph Smith's most determined opponents. He would eventually help publish a newspaper called the Nauvoo Expositor. That newspaper published accusations against Joseph Smith concerning plural marriage, theology, political power, and the conduct of the Nauvoo government. Joseph Smith's response was to have the press declared a public nuisance and destroyed. Within weeks, Joseph Smith and his brother Hyram would be dead. So, who exactly was William Law? And why did a man who had once been Joseph Smith's counselor become one of the people responsible for exposing him? But before we go any further, you guys know what to do. Please hit that subscribe button and give us a like if you have not already. You can also help this channel out by hitting the hype button and leave us a comment. If you don't know what to say, then please just put your country flag in the comment section so that we can see where you are from. A big special thank you to all of our Patreons, our producers, our Substack donors, and of course our YouTube members. Without you guys and your financial support each month, this channel and these deep dives, these exposees would simply not be possible. So, thank you guys so much for helping us out. If you love the work we do here on Essoteric Atlanta and you would love to help us out, then you can join any of those platforms to help us, all those links are down in the description box below. [music] >> [music] >> Let me show [music] you the sky below you. So close to heaven. [bell] All right, you guys. Just some notes before we get deeper into the story of William Law, who was probably one of the first bigger whistleblowers when it comes to exposing what Joseph Smith and his posi were actually up to. Um, I know we said our next episode, episode 4, would be over Brigham Young. And definitely you guys, we're probably going to be spending a few weeks on Brigham Young, which ties us actually back to um Fritz Springme's work into Brigham Y. Young and the Maravvenian line and the Mormons. However, I put a poll up on my post of esoteric Atlanta cuz I realized and and I don't mean any offense by this. Listen to me. when criticism of an organization is not necessarily being offensive. And we're going to get more into that because I realized in talking about the demise of Joseph Smith, everything that happened in Nauvoo through these last few episodes that there are a lot of ex Mormons and Mormons who believe that Joseph Smith was assassinated because of religious persecution. And I absolutely can totally understand how the church has been able to gaslight and manipulate this story. Now, when it comes down to his actual assassination, there's a lot of gray area there, which um again, I'm hoping we're going to talk about that with Lorine and a and a life because there's a lot of nuance when it comes to what was going on in Nauvoo at the time. It's it's very similar to what's happening now currently with the Islamic Shria law people. The the Mormons were very very similar to what's going on with with the Sharia law in that Mormonism itself is not compatible with the United States Constitution. We're going to get deeper into that. I know people are probably like, "What what the hell is she talking about?" Hold on. Just put a put a pin in that for a second because we are going to talk more about that with Lorraine uh in a live. But I I know that it's easy to especially when something happened almost 200 years ago. We're getting close to that 200-year [music] mark to believe that somebody was eliminated because of religious persecution. And that is absolutely not true. He was he was arrested um for treason. He was arrested for treason. And that's very simple. That that in itself there's not many things in this world that are black and white. This is pretty black and white. um what he did to the Navajo uh the Navajo the Nauvoo expositor. I know I keep saying Navajo cuz I do a lot of studies of the Navajo too. The Nauvoo the Nauvoo expositor. What Joseph did acting as mayor of Nauvoo and having the Nauvoo expositor demolished [music] is an infringement on the people's freedom of speech. Okay. So that's why he was charged with treason against the state of Illinois as the mayor. So this is him as a mayor, not as a prophet, but as a mayor. He was closing down someone's ability to speak freely. And you have to remember that the United States was not even a 100red years old yet. The [music] the people of the United States at this point were a lot of them remembered the American Revolution. A lot of them had fathers and grandfathers who fought in the American Revolution. And so this is a very it's still a very sensitive topic here in the United States today, but especially now they took this very seriously. He committed he absolutely by the book, by the law, the United States law committed treason for taking down the expositor. Now I want to remind the Mormons too and everyone for that matter in the United States. We have freedom of religion. We have freedom of the press. We have freedom of speech. Let me remind you guys. So what was going on with the Mormons in the Nauvoo area that accumulated that that this this melting pot this this straw that broke the camel's perveral back? You have religious freedom. Absolutely. [music] But your religious freedom ends where someone else's civil liberties begin. So what do I mean by that? If your religion requires polygamy or blood atonement, all that kind of stuff, you are free to believe that. However, you are not free to practice that if it infringes on somebody else's civil liberties. [music] So, this is part of what was going on in Nauvoo because I've been looking at this for a long few weeks now, really diving into it when it comes to the locals of Nauvoo who were not Mormon. Their civil liberties were starting to be infringed upon by Joseph Smith and his posi. And I don't think it was all the Mormons. Obviously, there were there a lot of really probably at that point were a lot of really good people in the early church, but I'm talking about like the head honchos. They were starting to harass women in the town, harass young daughters to try to get them [music] to be married into this polygamy. They were trespassing on people's property. So people's civil liberties were being basically the boundaries were being blurred because the Mormons were were claiming religious freedom. So once again, that still stands today. To this very day, that still stands. You're you you are free to believe whatever you want to believe in this country. That is the beauty of the United States of America. However, when your beliefs start to infringe on somebody else's civil liberties, it becomes a problem. We also have separation of church and state in the United States that that the government in the United States is supposed to be secular. It is secular because that ensures that everybody's religion is respected. Okay? That is why our founding fathers did separation of church and state. So with not Joseph Smith being the mayor of Nauvoo enforcing these this Mormonism on everybody and then infringing on people's civil liberties, things were coming to a boiling point. The locals were not happy about this rightfully so. This is why his assassination, you know, it's very gray. Were they wrong to assassinate him? Yes. Were they wrong to arm themselves and be pissed about him being there and him infringing upon their liberties? No. [music] So, we have some gray area here, which again, Lorraine and I will get into in deeper conversation about, in my opinion, what happened to Joseph Smith, knowing all the drama that was going on, it was kind of inevitable. He was kind of asking for it. It was wrong that he was unalived for sure, but he was kind of putting himself in a situation where he was kind of asking [music] for it. Anyway, we're going to get we're going to get deeper into that. You were not being persecuted, Mormons. You you really weren't. you were, what was happening [music] was people were pushing back. It's like when you're in a relationship with an abuser, like a narcissist, and they [music] they they abuse you and abuse you and you finally start to push back and say no. Then they get mad at you for saying no. That's the manipulation that was happening in Nauvoo at this time. Okay. Now, again, so Joseph Smith burns down, destroys the the Nauvoo expositor for exposing him. He gets charged with treason because [music] he is the mayor. So in my poll again, I saw people said it was religious persecution. Absolutely not. It was not. It was strictly he was arrested for treason. He ended up getting unalived by the mobs because he had pissed a lot of people off. He had severely crossed many lines with people, especially with people's daughters and their lands. It was he was stalking people. And so I understand where the fury came from. The fury didn't come from people being mad he was Mormon. [music] The fury came from people being mad that he was basically acting like he was above the law as the mayor for his religious rights, which again was infringing upon their their civil liberties. Now, I also want to remind the Mormons and everybody else for that matter, just because you have religious freedom in this country does not mean that you are free from the consequences of that religion or that you are free from people questioning that religion or maybe even talking about that religion. Okay? So, just because somebody questions your faith or thinks your faith is weird or thinks your faith is satanic, that that's not religious persecution. Okay, that is not religious persecution. Somebody having an opinion about what you believe is not persecution, my dears. That's not what that is. Okay? And what a privileged place we live to think that's what persecution is. Okay? There are many, many people across the world and planet right now that are being tortured, [music] continue to be tortured and alive because of what they believe. That is religious persecution. Not telling somebody, "You can't have my daughter to be your 17th wife." That's not religious persecution. Someone telling you to get off my land because you're trespassing. That's not religious persecution. Being arrested for treason because you're the mayor and you burnt down a printing press. That's not religious persecution. That's being accountable to the law. Your religion does not nullify the common law. Right? Okay. So, we need to get that very clear with the Mormons and with other people too, but specifically with the Mormons right now because of the situation we're talking about in Nauvoo of 1832. [music] If the Mormons had come in and just been really peaceful with the people and not bothered them, I don't think we would be where we are today. All right? Everything that happened was a reaction, a consequence of Joseph Smith's [music] actions. Cause and effect, right? All right. Right. So, with that being said, please listen with an open mind. You guys, if you're new here, you're welcome to hang out with us for this episode, but this is the fourth episode in our series. So, I'm going to be placing um the past episodes down in the description box below. All right. Um, also all I'm doing this in podcast form again because we like to show our receipts around here and so I will be putting them up on the screen and they're also going to be the links to those are also found in the description box below so you can see the receipts [music] for yourself. Most of the stuff in all these past episodes I have used, especially when it comes to cosmology and theology have been directly [music] from the Mormon website, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints website itself. [music] you know, because that's really I mean most of us who aren't Mormon, we know the truth and that's [music] you know that's just programming. You know, we have to have compassion for people who are programmed to believe something. And so I'm that's why I'm using the church's own website is because for the Mormons, they need to understand that these things they were taught are not true or that are anti- Mormon are actually on the church's website as part of their doctrinal belief. And so hopefully that will help some people. I think sometimes those that scream the loudest in the comment section that throw the biggest that temper tantrums in the comment section are probably the ones who faith is just hanging by hanging by a thread anyway. So um that's kind of human [music] psychology. So [laughter] um also one more note before we get into it guys um I am calling them Mormons because that is what my friends my friends including Lorraine who are ex Mormon they prefer to be called Mormon for most of the existence of this religion they were called the Mormons. [music] It wasn't until recently that some prophet got on his soap box and tried to confuse people and take that term away. And I believe that there is a very nefarious reason for that. I think they're trying to confuse people in the what what what Mormons actually believe. Um because a lot of Christians absolutely do not like that Mormons claim Christianity. Um and so I'm going to be respectful to my friends that I know personally. They prefer to be called Mormons. [music] That's their identity. That's what they want to be called. And so I don't care what some cult leader has to say. I'm gonna respect my actual friends and refer to this group of people as the Mormons because [music] that's what they prefer. All right, so with that being said, let's go ahead and let's get into the episode about William Law. God bless him. For all the ex Mormons out there, William Law was like your first big whistleblower. So, I think he deserves his own episode, don't you? All right, let's get into it. William Law was born on September 8th of 1809 in County Tyrone, Ireland. His parents were Richard Law and Anne Hunter. His family eventually immigrated to North America and by the 1820s, William was living in Pennsylvania. He eventually then moved to Canada. It was there that his life would intersect with a new American religion. The movement we now know as Mormonism was spreading rapidly during the 1830s. [music] Missionaries were traveling throughout Canada preaching the message of Joseph Smith, the Book of Mormon, and the restoration of this ancient Christianity. Among those missionaries were John Taylor and Alman [music] W. Babbot. Law became a convert. He was baptized into the Latter-day Saint movement by 1837 and was ordained an elder [music] on April 24th of that same year. He also became the presiding elder of the Churchville branch in Canada. So, William Law wasn't simply someone who had heard about Mormonism and thought it sounded interesting. He became an active [music] participant and eventually he would decide that the place for him was with the Saints themselves. [music] In 1839, William Law moved to Commerce, Illinois, the settlement that would soon be renamed to Nauvoo. This was a critical period for our friend Joseph Smith. The Latter-day Saints had been driven from Missouri. [music] Joseph Smith had recently been released from imprisonment and the Saints were now attempting to build an entirely new [music] city along the Mississippi River. Nauvoo would eventually [music] become one of the largest cities in Illinois. And William Law became one of its prominent citizens. He was a businessman. He opened a store. He owned mills. He accumulated considerable property. [music] He participated in local government. He became involved with the Nauvoo Legion and most importantly [music] he became increasingly trusted by Joseph Smith. The Joseph [music] Smith papers described law as a merchant, a milight and later a physician and records his movement from Canada to Nauvoo in 1839. This is important because William Law wasn't standing on the edge of Nauvoo. Then came January 19th of [music] 1841. Joseph Smith dictated a revelation that would eventually become doctrine in covenant 124. William Law was called to serve as a counselor in the First Presidency. [music] Think about what that means. The First Presidency was the highest leadership body of the church. William Law was now one of Joseph Smith's closest ecclesiastical associates. He was not merely just a follower. [snorts] He was an insider. The Joseph Smith papers record law service as counselor in the first presidency from [music] 1841 until 1844. He also served on the Nauvoo City Council and was involved in the Nauvoo Legion. So law occupied several worlds simultaneously. religious leader, a businessman, a politician, a military officer, and a personal friend and associate of Joseph Smith. For a period of time, there was no indication that William Law regarded Joseph Smith as an enemy. In fact, we have an extraordinary piece of evidence from January 1844. The Nauvoo City Council was investigating rumors concerning Law and another prominent denter, William Marx. At the meeting, Law reportedly said, "I am Joseph's friend, and he has no better friend in the world. I am ready to lay my life down for him." Interestingly, L's own diary gives us a [music] somewhat different version of this statement, saying that Joseph had nothing to fear from him and that he was not Joseph's enemy, [music] but adding importantly that he did not say he was Joseph's friend. This discrepancy [music] is fascinating cuz it shows us that even while the relationship was breaking down, [music] the historical record contains competing versions of exactly how L described his relationship with Joseph. In 1843, William Law was still [music] deeply involved in Joseph Smith's religious world. On May 26th of 1843, Law was among a select group who received temple related ordinances and instructions concerning [music] priesthood and the new and everlasting covenant. This is significant. Law wasn't discovering Joseph Smith's controversial teachings from a [music] newspaper. He was being brought into the inner circle. He was seeing the movement from inside. And this is precisely why his later testimony [music] became so controversial. Because law would eventually claim that some [music] of the teachings he encountered in Nauvoo were not simply unusual. They were evidence that [music] Joseph Smith had fundamentally changed the religion. But before we get [music] into that, let's take a brief word from our sponsor. What if I told you that you don't need a gym, expensive equipment, or even a traditional ballet bar to get stronger? And what if I told you that you can start exactly where you are at any [music] age? Welcome to Fusion Body Studio. 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You can modify. You can take it at your own pace. And yes, you can absolutely get stronger at 70, 50, 30, [music] or anywhere in between. If you'd like to try Fusion Body Studio, go to our website and use discount code Bryce [music] 20. That's B R Ice C20, all caps at checkout. You will receive 20% off your first 6 months, plus [music] a 7-day free trial. So, grab a chair, find a little space, and come and move with us. We'll see you inside Fusion Body Studio. [music] By the end of 1843, the relationship between William Law and Joseph Smith had begun to collapse. The exact combination of cause is complicated. [music] There were disagreements over theology. There were disagreements over Joseph's [music] behavior. There were disputes involving plural marriage. There were disagreements over political power in Nauvoo. And there were disagreements about the relationship between religious authority [music] and civil government. Law increasingly came to believe that [music] Joseph Smith was using his religious authority to exercise an extraordinary amount of political and personal power. And then there was the issue that would become one of the most explosive controversies in Mormon history, plural marriage. William Law became an outspoken opponent of plural marriage. Later he claimed that Hyram Smith had shown him a revelation concerning plural marriage. Law said that Hyram gave him the document [music] and asked him to read it. According to Law, what he read horrified him. However, we need to be careful here. That is William Law's testimony. That is not the same thing as an independently verified transcript of the conversation. And that distinction will matter throughout this story. William Law became one of the principal witnesses against [music] Joseph Smith. But some of Law's later recollections were given more than 40 years after the events. That doesn't automatically make them false, but it does mean that we should distinguish between what law personally recorded in 1844 and what other contemporary documents established and what law remembered in 1887. Law's 1844 diary is particularly [music] valuable because it was kept during the crisis itself. The BYU library describes the diary as covering January 1 through June 28th [music] of 1844, including his excommunication, a visit from Hyram Smith and the operation of the Nauvoo Expositor. [music] Now, what's interesting to me and and we have to talk about this [music] and we again will talk about this extensively with Lorine because [music] we we think of the Nauvoo Expositor and we watch all these other commentaries or [music] anti- Mormon commentaries or Mormon commentaries, we always think that Law's big problem was polygamy, plural marriage. And yes, rightfully so, he was horrified by it. But there was also another reason why law was personally horrified. [music] And again, this is why I say that someone questioning your [music] religious beliefs or speaking out against your religious beliefs is not religious persecution. That is freedom of [music] speech. Your religious beliefs again cannot infringe [music] on somebody else's civil liberties. We have freedom of speech in this country. So if you believe something and someone writes a piece [music] or makes a YouTube video today like I'm doing questioning those beliefs, [music] that is not religious persecution. That is simply freedom of speech. And as we've said in other videos regarding this, the big issue, the cracking point before plural marriage was the nature of God. And I asked over on a post earlier, and this is something we can get into deeper into another video, is I think sometimes, sadly, [music] sometimes whistleblowers from the Mormon church, I feel like sometimes their testimony, [music] their experiences get lost in translation because as somebody like myself who was never a Mormon, who has [music] studied Mormonism extensively for over 10 years because it's so fascinating, there are a lot of same words that are used in Mormonism but mean totally different things. For example, baptism means [music] something different to a Mormon as it does to a Christian. Jesus means something [music] different to a Mormon as it does to a Christian. Lucifer means something different to a Mormon [music] as it does to a Christian. What also is very different from a Mormon and a Christian is God. Kind of the main character of both religions, right? And it's a different God. Not claiming one to be right over the other, but God is different [music] in Mormonism. You see, Mormons believe God is a man of flesh and blood. And [music] if we look at the yoga sutras and we look at this idea of procriti, nature, and perushia, the soul, most religions, in fact, I personally cannot think of another religion [music] that thinks of God as being a person. As the Bible says, God is not God does not change. God has always been and always will be forever more. God is unchanging. [music] That means God is spirit. The Bible even says God is a spirit. God is like a parusha at each [music] because nature procriti changes. That's the rule of nature. It has a beginning, a middle and an end. And because of that, it's always in fluctuation of change. Whereas parusha, the soul or ish God, these are the Sanskrit words. Parusha is a Sanskrit word. Ishvada is a Sanskrit word meaning soul and God are not changeable. So that's where the Bible and the yoga sutras agree. They agree. Same with most religions. God is not a human. God is an omnipresent [music] consciousness, a soul, a spirit. So when this happened, [clears throat] when the nature of God when when the King Flet discussion happened, it pissed a lot of Mormons off. There were a lot of Mormons by that point that were like, "WTF, bro? What do you mean God's a man?" No, he's not. No, he's not. And this is another episode Loren and I want to do is when we're going to compare the Bible, the New [music] Testament, to the Book of Mormon. Now, you guys know I've gone up against the Bible a lot. I've got multiple videos on the Bible and how much it's been changed, but we have to acknowledge the Bible in this discussion because the Bible is canonized as part of Mormon doctrine. >> [snorts] >> So, how can you have two books, the Book of Mormon and the Bible, that say two completely opposite things [music] about Jesus, about God, about salvation? Salvation means something very different to Mormons than it does to mainstream Christians. And so, this is a problem. And when I first learned about the Mormon idea of God, it triggered me. It still triggers me. So I can't even imagine what it must have been like for people like William Law or other Mormons who had given up everything had trusted Joseph Smith completely gone all this way with him only to find out the God they are worshiping is not the God of the Bible not the same guy. I mean a lot of people fought back. A lot of people even though they did not agree with it or like it stayed because of the uh what is it the the sunk cost fallacy. they'd already given up so much. So this was a huge expose in the Nauvoo Expositor. Not just that he was Joseph Smith was practicing plural marriage which was absolutely illegal against civil rights here. That is absolutely a form of human trafficking. It's illegal. But also guess what Nauvoo the God that you've been praying to the God of Joseph Smith is not the God of of Christ of Christendom. It's not. It's just not that's just a fact. It's not the [music] same God. And so he wrote about that as well. He was trying to warn people, warn them about what this belief system was. So let's get into [music] it. Let's talk about the nature of God because plural marriage again wasn't the only problem. [snorts] William Law also objected to Joseph Smith's developing theology. By the early 1840s, Joseph was teaching increasingly complex ideas about the nature of God, humanity, exaltation, and eternity. The traditional Christian idea of one eternal God was being replaced by a much more elaborate cosmology. [music] Joseph Smith's April 1844 King Flet [music] discourse would soon become famous for its teachings concerning God and humanity's potential for exaltation. To William Law, these developments represented a departure. In Law's view, Joseph Smith was no longer simply restoring ancient Christianity. He was creating something fundamentally [music] different. And that distinction would become one of the central things of the Nauvoo expositor. Here's [music] the big difference too. When we look at the law of one and the all of one of whether you're polarizing service to others or service to self in the Christian cosmology, you are a part of God. You are not God. You are a part of God. That's a social memory complex. [music] In Mormonism, you can become a god. That's service to self. And Satanism, Luciferianism, I keep saying this, Mormons, you you really need to research this. You [music] really need to. In Luciferianism, they believe the exact same [music] thing. They believe that they will become gods of their own planet one day. That's why [music] they carpool, they transport children. for that reason. Hence why Mormons started transporting [music] young girls. Young girls that that young energy to take it [music] through a schmeckual act gives the dominator more power. It's the same it's the same lucifarian belief. And which brings me to another point. Um, I one thing I have against a lot of anti- [music] Mormon content creators is they don't give Joseph Smith enough credit. He [music] wasn't stupid. Neither was Brigham Young. They were born into this. Fawn [music] Brody does a really good job talking about this in her book, No Man Knows My History. These guys were born into [music] these these types of families. All right? They knew what they were doing. They weren't just making it up on the fly. They knew [music] what they were doing. and William Law, that was the straw that broke the camel's back. He did not want to be worshiping some human god that was different from the god of Christendom. So, with that being said, if you guys [music] want us to do an episode where we talk about the differences in theology, we are planning on doing that, but please leave your [music] questions in the comment section. So, when we do do that episode, we can make sure to answer everybody's questions so that whistleblowers are understood more fully and more thoroughly when telling [music] their stories. But there was another issue that may be just as important too, and that's the political power. Joseph [music] Smith was not simply the prophet of Nauvoo. He was also the city's mayor. He was [music] the leader of the church. He was the commander of the Nauvoo Legion. He was one of the [music] most powerful political figures in the region. Nauvoo possessed an unusual degree of political independence. It had its own municipal government. It had its own courts. It [music] had its own militia. And Joseph Smith stood at the very center, the nucleus [music] of this system. Law became increasingly convinced that this concentration of religious, political, and military authority was dangerous. In other words, his argument was becoming much larger than Joseph Smith is practicing plural marriage. His argument was becoming Joseph Smith has accumulated way too much power and [music] this is not only conflicting with a lot of Christian beliefs but also conflicting with the United States Constitution. By January of 1844, William Law had been removed from the First Presidency. And on April 18th of 1844, [music] he was formally excommunicated. The historical record confirms [music] that date. Just a side note, too, for the Mormons watching this, you know that Jesus said you can't do that, right? In the New Testament, Jesus, you [music] can't excommunicate people. That's not what Christians do. who follow Christ's teachings, [music] you also are not supposed to be following a prophet or a pope. That's also in the New Testament, too. Just something for the Christians to think about. I know that's probably shocking that you guys worship a different god than the Christians do. But maybe think about that like why does your prophet have the ability to excommunicate? Why do you do you worship Jesus God or do you worship your prophet? Because [music] Jesus said, "Don't do that." In the New Testament, Jesus said, "Don't do that. Don't follow a prophet. Don't do it." Uh-uh. So, why are you disobeying Jesus's commandments from the New Testament? [music] Anyway, we're going to get into that later on with Lorraine. Don't worry. But just something to like have a little think about. You can't be [music] That was the whole point of the covenant, right? Like Jesus came like according to Christian belief to give context here. Jesus came [music] to like fulfill the covenant, the covenant so that you would not have to do Old Testament You wouldn't have to do any more sacrifices or blood atments or anything like that. You would be able to like talk to God yourself. It's done. It is done. He has risen. It is done. That's from the the mainstream Christian to give context. So why in Mormonism, if you claim to be Christian, do you ignore the fact that Jesus was like, "I'm here to fulfill the covenant. You can do it yourself now. You can talk to God all by yourself." Why did Mormons ignore that? Why do Mormons go back to the archaic belief that Catholics carry, [music] same as Catholics, that you have a pope, you have like an intermediary between between [music] humanity and God, and the pope talks to God, the prophet talks to God. That's that goes totally against the teachings of Jesus. Absolutely. And I actually agree with that. That's one part of Christianity I do agree with. No one can talk to God for you. You cannot be excommunicated from [music] God. God is not the church. God is not the church. Not in Christianity. He's not. Not in Jesus's teachings. He's not. Okay? God lives in you. You have a direct line to God. Your bishop, your prophet doesn't know what's best for you. you do because you have a direct line to God and ignoring that direct line to God and going to a human for a human to tell you what to do is blasphemy. So I would just talking about excommunication [music] and prophecy. That's just something for the Mormons just to have a little think about giving of the context of what we're looking at. If the Bible is canonized as well as the Book of Mormon, then why do they conflict with each other? Why? Anyway, let's keep going. So all no, let's not keep going. Just one second. For all the people in the comments section that are, you know, saying the the God makers is false cuz they were excommunicated. [music] Again, I keep saying, "What does one have to do with the other?" Excommunication is It means nothing. It means [music] nothing. The Jesus Christ you claim to worship told you it meant nothing. So why do you take it seriously? How come your prophets that you say hold the ultimate truth are in the Epstein emails? Why? Why? If they're so holy and mighty and they're talking to God and they know what's best, why are they in Epstein's emails? Have a little think, Mormons. We're doing this for you. That's why we're doing this is to try to help people who are coming out of Mormonism. It Yeah. [music] All right. Let's keep going. So on April 18th of 1844, William Law was formally excommunicated. [music] The historical record confirms this date. After his excommunication, Law requested that his [music] case be reviewed at a general conference. His request was denied. The relationship was now beyond repair. And Law decided that he was not going to quietly [music] disappear. He was going to fight back. And this is one of the most fascinating [music] aspects of William Law. He did not initially present himself as someone who had discovered that Mormonism was entirely false. He presented himself as someone who believed that Joseph Smith had corrupted Mormonism. Law and his associates therefore began organizing a reformed movement. They believed Joseph Smith had fallen from his prophetic calling and L was selected to lead [music] the dissenting organization. In other words, L wasn't trying to destroy the restoration. He believed he was trying to restore the restoration. [music] The dispute then moved into the legal world. Law and his associates began producing affidavit and accusations concerning Joseph Smith. The accusations including [music] allegations of SA and other wrongdoings. And now we have to understand something about 19th century Nauvoo. This wasn't Twitter. This wasn't a television network. There wasn't an independent national press reporting on every argument. The information moved through letters, affidavit, sermons, newspapers, and personal testimony. So if William Law wanted the outside world to hear his side of the story, he needed a newspaper and that is exactly what he created. The newspaper was called the Nauvoo Expositor. [music] The first issue was published on Friday, June 7th, 1844. The publishers included William Law, Wilson Law, Charles Ivans, Francis N. [music] Higgby, Chanty L. Higgby, Robert D. Foster, and Charles A. Foster. The paper announced itself with an extraordinary slogan. The truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. The first issue was an attack on Joseph Smith's leadership. It presented the denters explanation of why they had broken with the church, and its accusations were explosive. The expositor accused Joseph Smith and his associates of corrupting the church. It attacked plural marriage. It attacked Joseph's teachings concerning God. It attacked the concentration of religious and political authority. It attacked the Nauvoo government. [music] It attacked what the publishers believed was the misuse of priesthood power. and it attempted to explain to the public why these men had separated from Joseph Smith. The paper itself says the denters believed it was important for the public to know the true cause of their separation because in their view falsehoods were circulating about the schism. The newspaper wasn't simply gossip. It was a political and religious [music] manifesto. And now the story reaches its most explosive point. Joseph Smith was the mayor of Nauvoo. The city council considered the Nauvoo Expositor a public [music] nuisance. The council ordered that the press be destroyed. On June 10th of 1844, the printing press was dismantled and destroyed. The city [music] government's decision to suppress the paper would become one of the most consequential decisions in Joseph Smith's [music] life because destroying the expositor did not make the controversy disappear. It made it explode. But before we get into the fallout, let's take a little peep into what we're doing in season two on our YouTube memberships. If you like legends, ghost stories, and all things creepy, you'll love going behind [music] the scenes with us around the campfire as we talk about blackeyed children. What if the stories you've heard weren't just stories? This season, Esoteric Atlanta Memberships takes you deep into one of the internet's most chilling mysteries, the Blackeyed Kids. Are they urban legends? psychological phenomenon, something paranormal, or something else entirely. Join us as we examine eyewitness accounts, medical theories, folklore, sleep paralysis, psychology, and the unsettling patterns that continue to emerge decades after the first report. We'll separate fact from fiction, explore the evidence, and ask the question most people are too afraid to ask. With exclusive investigations, extended discussions, expert analysis, and membersonly content, season 2 goes far beyond what we can really share publicly. If you love mysteries, folklore, unexplained phenomenon, and of course, critical thinking, this is your invitation. Become a member of Esoteric Atlanta today. Unlock season 2 and step into the investigation. But be warned, the next knock at your door might not be just your imagination. We'd love to have you around the campfire as we discuss these horrifying stories. If you want to join us around the campfire and talk about the blackeyed kids, you can hit the join button below. The destruction of the newspaper triggered an enormous [music] political crisis. Joseph Smith was charged with riot. He eventually surrendered to authorities. He was taken [music] to Carthridge jail and there on June 27th of 1844, Joseph Smith and his brother Hyram were killed. Joseph Smith was 38 years old. Hyram was 44 years old. And suddenly the religious movement [music] that had been centered around Joseph Smith had no living prophet at its head. William Law's newspaper had survived for exactly one issue, born on [music] June 7th, destroyed almost immediately afterward, and within [music] weeks, Joseph Smith was dead. So, was William Law responsible? Well, this is where we need to slow down because later Mormon historians would portray William Law as one of the people responsible for creating the circumstances that led to Joseph Smith's death. and Law himself strongly rejected the idea that he had orchestrated Joseph's murder. After Joseph's death, Law himself was arrested in connection with the alleged conspiracy surrounding [music] the killing, but he was released. The question remains historically fascinating. Did William Law merely expose [music] Joseph Smith's actions, or did his campaign help create the political crisis that >> [music] >> ultimately resulted in Joseph's death? There is no simple answer. [music] What we can say is that Law's actions were part of a rapidly escalating conflict in Nauvoo and the destruction of the Nauvoo Expositor unquestionably became one of the events that precipitated the final crisis. Now, my opinion of course says that Joseph Smith is actually responsible for Joseph Smith's unalivvening. [music] If he could have just left sleeping dogs to lie, let people talk Let [music] them, just let them, and just kept minding his own business, I don't think we would be in the situation we [music] are in Nauvoo. I think that William Law's concerns were very legitimate. Some of his concerns are the same concerns that we have now. The censorship, too much authority, government overreach, all that kind of stuff. So, I squarely put the blame myself personally. I know historically it's [music] still debatable, but I squarely put the blame on Joseph Smith himself. After the crisis, William Law left Nauvoo. [music] His life did not end in spectacular political power. He did not become the next Joseph Smith. Instead, he gradually moved into a quieter existence. He lived in several communities in Illinois and eventually settled in Slesburg, Wisconsin. He continued working in medicine. By the later decades of his life, he was known as Dr. William Law. The Joseph Smith papers identify him as a merchant, milright, and a physician, and records his later residency in Pennsylvania, Illinois, and Wisconsin. Now, let's fast forward to 40 years later. It's 1887, [music] and William Law is an old man. More than 40 years has passed since Nauvoo. Joseph Smith has been dead for decades. Brighgam Young himself has now passed away. The Mormon movement had become an established institution [music] in Utah and William Law was still alive. A journalist named W. Wild traveled to Shuttleberg, Wisconsin to interview him. The description of law is remarkable. The interviewer encountered an elderly physician living with his son, Judge Thomas Law. And Law began talking. He talked about Joseph Smith. He talked about Nauvoo. He talked about the Nauvoo Expositor. And he continued to defend his version of events. But this is where we have to be particularly careful as amateur historians. William Law's 1887 interview is so fascinating, but it did occur 43 years after the events of Nauvoo. Memory does change. People reinterpret their lives. People forget details. [music] People remember events through the lens of everything that happened afterwards. So, we should not simply accept every statement law made in 1887 as though he were writing a diary in 1844. At the same time, we shouldn't automatically dismiss him either because we also possess his 1844 diary. That gives historians something extremely valuable, a contemporary record from William Law himself. The BYU library confirms that his 1844 diary covers the critical period and discusses his excommunication, Hyram Smith [music] and the Nauvoo Expositor. So we can compare William Law in 1844 with William Law remembering 1844 and 1887. [music] William Law died in Shuttlesburg, Wisconsin in [music] 1892. He was 82 years old. He had lived through the entire transformation of Mormonism from a small restoration movement [music] into a major American religion. He had known Joseph Smith personally. He had served in Joseph's first presidency. He had participated in Nauvoo's government. He had been exposed to Joseph's [music] private teachings. He had become convinced that Joseph Smith had gone way too far [music] and he eventually became the publisher of the newspaper that attacked Joseph's leadership. So, what do we make of William Law? Was he a [music] bitter apostate? Was he a courageous whistleblower? Was he a disgruntled former insider? Was he attempting to save Mormonism from Joseph Smith? Or was he exaggerating his accusations [music] after his relationship with Joseph collapsed? What makes law so important is [music] not simply that he accused Joseph Smith. It's that he had once been one of [music] Joseph Smith's closest associates. And that changes the historical question. We aren't simply asking what did an enemy say about Joseph Smith. We're asking what happened inside [clears throat] Joseph Smith's organization that caused one of his own counselors [music] to become his most famous desenter. And that answer takes us directly into the final [music] months of Nauvoo, into plural marriage, into the changing Mormon concept of God, into priesthood [music] authority, into the political power of Joseph Smith, into the Nauvoo City Council, [music] and finally into the Nauvoo Expositor, a newspaper [music] that published exactly one issue, a newspaper that Joseph Smith ordered destroyed, a newspaper whose destruction helped help [music] set in motion the events that ended with Joseph Smith and Hyram Smith dead at Carthage Jail. William Law didn't pull the trigger at Carthage, but he helped create the document that became one of the most important pieces of evidence in a political and religious explosion and expose that followed. And that is why William Law remains one of the most fascinating figures in the final chapters of Joseph Smith's life. Because sometimes [music] the most dangerous critic isn't the person standing outside the movement. It's the person who [music] used to be standing beside you. >> [music] [music] >> Heat. Heat. [music] [music] >> [music] >> Heat. [music] Heat. [music] Heat. [music] Heat. [music] Heat. Heat. [music] >> [music]