First Vision accounts

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General criticisms:

1832 Account:

Others' accounts:

Other criticisms:

FAIR Wiki Topical Guide
FAIR web site
FARMS web site
  • [Pending]
Additional reading
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This page is a summary or index page. More detailed information on this topic is available on the sub-pages below.

Contents

Criticism

Joseph Smith gave several accounts of the First Vision. Critics charge that differences in the accounts show that he changed and embellished his story over time, and that he therefore had no such vision.

Source(s) of the Criticism

Response

Joseph's vision was at first an intensely personal experience—an answer to a specific question. Over time, however, illuminated by additional experience and instruction, it became the founding revelation of the Restoration.
—Elder Dennis B. Neuenschwander (of the Seventy), Ensign, January 2009, p. 28.
∗       ∗       ∗

Critics of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints often seek to point out differences between the various accounts which Joseph Smith gave of his First Vision. In defense of their position that the Prophet changed his story over a six year period (1832 to 1838) they claim that the earliest followers of Joseph Smith either didn’t know about the First Vision, or seem to have been confused about it.

Comparison to Paul's vision

Main article: First_Vision_accounts/Do Greek scholars solve the discrepancies in Paul's vision accounts

Paul the apostle gave more than one account of his vision of the resurrected Lord while on the road to Damascus. Like Joseph Smith's account of the First Vision, Paul's accounts differ in some details but agree in the overall message. Richard Lloyd Anderson made the following comparisons.

Many Christians who comfortably accept Paul’s vision reject Joseph Smith’s. However, they aren’t consistent in their criticisms, for most arguments against Joseph Smith’s first vision would detract from Paul’s Damascus experience with equal force.
For instance, Joseph Smith’s credibility is attacked because the earliest known description of his vision wasn’t given until a dozen years after it happened. But Paul’s earliest known description of the Damascus appearance, found in 1_Cor. 9:1, was recorded about two dozen years after his experience.
Critics love to dwell on supposed inconsistencies in Joseph Smith’s spontaneous accounts of his first vision. But people normally give shorter and longer accounts of their own vivid experiences when retelling them more than once. Joseph Smith was cautious about public explanations of his sacred experiences until the Church grew strong and could properly publicize what God had given him. Thus, his most detailed first vision account came after several others—when he began his formal history.
This, too, parallels Paul’s experience. His most detailed account of the vision on the road to Damascus is the last of several recorded. (See Acts 26:9–20.) And this is the only known instance in which he related the detail about the glorified Savior prophesying Paul’s work among the Gentiles. (See Acts 26:16–18.) Why would Paul include this previously unmentioned detail only on that occasion? Probably because he was speaking to a Gentile audience, rather than to a group of Jewish Christians. Both Paul and Joseph Smith had reasons for delaying full details of their visions until the proper time and place.[1]

The linked articles below are designed to help readers to see some of the weaknesses that are found in arguments that are made against Joseph Smith's First Vision accounts. Some of these arguments are currently being advocated in anti-Mormon literature that is handed out near the Sacred Grove in Palmyra, New York.

Specific First Vision issues

  • Was the Smith family in the proper area at the proper time for Joseph's 1820 vision? FAIRWiki link
  • Was Joseph Smith mistaken about religious revivals in his area in 1820? FAIRWiki link
  • Did Joseph Smith conflate his 1820 narrative with an 1824-25 revival? FAIRWiki link
  • Did Joseph Smith contradict himself about knowing which churches were wrong? FAIRWiki link
  • Was Joseph unsure about God's existence in 1823? FAIRWiki link
  • Did Joseph Smith join other churches after the First Vision, despite his later claim that he was told not to? FAIRWiki link
  • When missionaries said that the Prophet had seen "God" personally did they mean Jesus Christ? FAIRWiki link
  • Was the First Vision story fabricated to provide the Prophet with "Godly authority"? FAIRWiki link
  • Does D&C 84 say God cannot be seen without the priesthood? FAIRWiki link
  • Did the First Vision story become more detailed and colorful after 1832? FAIRWiki link
  • Was the 1838 account modified to offset a leadership crisis? FAIRWiki link
  • Is there no reference to the First Vision in 1830s publications? FAIRWiki link
  • What about the "Angels" of the 1835 account? FAIRWiki link
  • Controversy Concerning D&C 121:28 FAIRWiki link
  • The Father: A Spirit vs. Embodied FAIRWiki link
  • Is there a lack of contemporary evidence for a Father and Son vision before 1838? FAIRWiki link
  • Was there no mention of the First Vision in non-LDS literature before 1843? FAIRWiki link
  • Did the LDS Church seldom publicize the First Vision until after 1877? FAIRWiki link
  • Why is there no mention of Joseph's First Vision in the newspapers in 1820? FAIRWiki link

1832 account issues

  • Did Joseph Smith claim to see only one Personage in his 1832 vision account? FAIRWiki link
  • Did Joseph give a different age in the 1832 account? FAIRWiki link
  • Did Joseph's 1832 account not mention any religious revivals in his area? FAIRWiki link
  • Was Joseph's motivation in the 1832 account different than later accounts? FAIRWiki link
  • Was the idea of a new dispensation a later addition to Joseph's account? FAIRWiki link
  • Did Joseph really not mention being forbidden to join other churches in 1832? FAIRWiki link
  • Was persecution for his vision absent in Joseph's 1832 account? FAIRWiki link
  • Why isn't the Prophet's struggle with Satan in the 1832 account? FAIRWiki link
  • Why does the 1832 account mention destruction of the wicked but the 1838 account doesn't? FAIRWiki link
  • Is the 1832 vision set in heaven or on the earth? FAIRWiki link
  • Does the 1832 account say that eternal life is given to everyone regardless of church affiliation? FAIRWiki link

Other individuals' accounts of the First Vision

  • Did George Q. Cannon claim Joseph only had the ministering of angels? FAIRWiki link
  • Was Oliver Cowdery unaware of the First Vision as late as 1834–1835? FAIRWiki link
  • Did Orson Hyde really claim Joseph only had the ministering of angels? FAIRWiki link
  • Did Andrew Jenson call Joseph's heavenly visitor "an angel," rather than God? FAIRWiki link
  • Did Heber C. Kimball really deny that the Father appeared to Joseph? FAIRWiki link
  • Was Orson Pratt confused about who appeared at the First vision? FAIRWiki link
  • Did Parley P. Pratt only mention the appearance of God? FAIRWiki link
  • Was George A. Smith unaware of the visit of the Father and the Son? FAIRWiki link
  • Did Lucy Mack Smith, Joseph's mother, refer to "an angel," rather than God? FAIRWiki link
  • Where did William Smith get the idea that an "angel" appeared? FAIRWiki link
  • Did Orson Spencer say that the Prophet's first manifestation was of an "angel"? FAIRWiki link
  • Did John Taylor teach that Joseph Smith saw only one Deity? FAIRWiki link
  • Did Wilford Woodruff speak of an "angel" appearing during the First Vision? FAIRWiki link
  • Did Brigham Young really never mention the First Vision in his lifetime of preaching? FAIRWiki link
  • Did Brigham Young claim only an angel appeared? FAIRWiki link

Conclusion

Joseph Smith's various accounts of the First Vision were targeted at different audiences, and had different purposes. They, however, show a remarkable degree of harmony between them. There is no evidence that the early leaders of the LDS Church did not understand that the Prophet saw two Divine Personages during his inaugural theophany.

Endnotes

  1. [back]  Richard L. Anderson, "Parallel Prophets: Paul and Joseph Smith," Ensign (April 1985): 12. off-site

Further reading

FAIR wiki articles

First Vision wiki articles
Claims about the 1832 First Vision account
Claims about the 1835 First Vision account
Claims about the 1838 First Vision account
Claims about other members and the First Vision
Joseph Smith other visionary issues wiki articles
God wiki articles

Video

Revised or Unaltered?: Joseph Smith's Foundational Stories, Matthew Brown, 2006 FAIR Conference

FAIR web site

First Vision FAIR links
  • FAIR Topical Guide: The First Vision FAIR link
  • D. Charles Pyle and Cooper Johnson, "Did early LDS leaders really misunderstand the First Vision?" FAIR link
  • Craig Ray, "Joseph Smith's History Confirmed," (Mesa, Arizona: FAIR, August 2002) FAIR link (Key source)
Joseph Smith other visionary issues FAIR links
  • Craig Ray, "Joseph Smith's History Confirmed," (Mesa, Arizona: FAIR, August 2002) FAIR link

External links

First Vision on-line links

Primary sources

Articles about the First Vision

  • Richard L. Anderson, "Circumstantial Confirmation of the First Vision through Reminiscences," Brigham Young University Studies 9:3 (1969): 1–27. PDF link
  • Milton V. Backman Jr., "Awakenings in the Burned-over District: New Light on the Historical Setting of the First Vision," Brigham Young University Studies 9:3 (1969): 301. PDF link
  • Milton V. Backman, Jr., "Confirming Witnesses of the First Vision," Ensign (January 1986): 32. off-site
  • Milton V. Backman, "First Vision," Encyclopedia of Mormonism, 4 vols., edited by Daniel H. Ludlow, (New York, Macmillan Publishing, 1992), 2:515–516. ISBN 002904040X. off-site off-site off-site
  • Milton V. Backman, Jr., "Joseph Smith's Recitals of the First Vision," Ensign (January 1985): 8. off-site
  • Richard L. Bushman, "The First Vision Story Revived," Dialogue: A Journal of Mormon Thought 4:1 (Spring 1969): 82–93. off-site
  • Eugene England, "Orson Scott Card: The Book of Mormon as History and Science Fiction (Review of Homecoming, vols. 1-5; A Storyteller in Zion: Essays and Speeches; by Orson Scott Card)," FARMS Review of Books 6/2 (1994): 59–78. off-site PDF link
  • Dean C. Jessee, "Early Accounts of Joseph Smith (1831–1839)," Brigham Young University Studies 9:3 (1969): 275–294. PDF link
  • Dean C. Jessee, The Personal Writings of Joseph Smith, revised edition, (Salt Lake City, Utah: Deseret Book, 2002), 9–20. ISBN 1573457876. off-site  (Key source)

D. Michael Quinn, "Joseph Smith's Experience of a Methodist 'Camp-Meeting'," Dialogue: A Journal of Mormon Thought - Dialogue Paperless: E-Paper #3 (12 July 2006), PDF link

  • Elden Watson, "Joseph Smith's First Vision—A Harmony";—complete text of all Joseph Smith's accounts on-line off-site  (Key source)
  • Elden Watson, "Joseph Smith's First Vision (introduction)" off-site
Joseph Smith other visionary issues on-line links
  • Dean C. Jessee, "Early Accounts of Joseph Smith (1831–1839)," Brigham Young University Studies 9:3 (1969): 275–294. PDF link
  • David L. Paulsen, "The Doctrine of Divine Embodiment: Restoration, Judeo-Christian, and Philosophical Perspectives," Brigham Young University Studies 35:4 (1995–96): 6–94. PDF link (Key source)

Printed material

First Vision printed works
  • James B. Allen, "The Emergence of a Fundamental: The Expanding Role of Joseph Smith’s First Vision in Mormon Thought," Journal of Mormon History 7 (1980): 437–461.
  • James B. Allen, "Eight Contemporary Accounts of Joseph Smith’s First Vision–What Do We Learn From Them?," Improvement Era (April 1970): 4–13. GospeLink
  • Richard L. Bushman, Joseph Smith and the Beginnings of Mormonism (Urbana and Chicago, Illinois: University of Illinois Press; Reprint edition, 1987), 56–. ISBN 0252060121.
  • Richard L. Bushman, Joseph Smith: Rough Stone Rolling (New York: Knopf, 2005), 30–56. ISBN 1400042704
  • James B. Allen and John W. Welch, "The Appearance of the Father and the Son to Joseph Smith in 1820," in Opening the Heavens: Accounts of Divine Manifestations 1820–1844 (Documents in Latter-day Saint History), edited by John W. Welch with Erick B. Carlson, (Provo, Utah: Brigham Young University Press / Salt Lake City, Utah: Deseret Book Company, 2005), 35–75. ISBN 0842526072. See also BYU Studies version: PDF link
  • Milton V. Backman, Joseph Smith’s First Vision: The first vision in its historical context (Salt Lake City: Bookcraft, 1971).
  • Milton V. Backman Jr., Joseph Smith’s First Vision: Confirming Evidences and Contemporary Accounts, 2nd ed. (Salt Lake City: Bookcraft, 1980).
  • Dean C. Jessee, "The Earliest Documented Accounts of Joseph Smith's First Vision," in Opening the Heavens: Accounts of Divine Manifestations 1820–1844 (Documents in Latter-day Saint History), edited by John W. Welch with Erick B. Carlson, (Provo, Utah: Brigham Young University Press / Salt Lake City, Utah: Deseret Book Company, 2005), 1–33. ISBN 0842526072. (Key source) See also BYU Studies version: PDF link
  • Dean C. Jessee, The Early Accounts of Joseph Smith's First Vision (Mormon Miscellaneous reprint series) (Mormon Miscellaneous, 1984).
  • Dean C. Jessee (editor), The Papers of Joseph Smith: Autobiographical and Historical Writings (Vol. 1 of 2) (Salt Lake City, Utah: Deseret Book Company, 1989), 6–7, 127, 272–73, 429–30, 444, and 448–49.. ISBN 0875791999
  • Dean C. Jessee, The Personal Writings of Joseph Smith, revised edition, (Salt Lake City, Utah: Deseret Book, 2002), 5–6, 75–76, 199–200, 213. ISBN 0877479747. Rev. ed. off-site
  • Hugh W. Nibley, Tinkling Cymbals and Sounding Brass: The Art of Telling Tales About Joseph Smith and Brigham Young (Vol. 11 of the Collected Works of Hugh Nibley), edited by David J. Whittaker, (Salt Lake City, Utah : Deseret Book Company ; Provo, Utah : Foundation for Ancient Research and Mormon Studies, 1991), 55–101. ISBN 0875795161. GospeLink
Joseph Smith other visionary issues printed works
  • Hugh W. Nibley, Tinkling Cymbals and Sounding Brass: The Art of Telling Tales About Joseph Smith and Brigham Young (Vol. 11 of the Collected Works of Hugh Nibley), edited by David J. Whittaker, (Salt Lake City, Utah : Deseret Book Company ; Provo, Utah : Foundation for Ancient Research and Mormon Studies, 1991), 1. ISBN 0875795161. GospeLink
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