Helen Mar Kimball

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The circumstances of Helen Mar Kimball's marriage to Joseph Smith, Jr.

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• Question: What were the circumstances surrounding the sealing of Helen Mar Kimball to Joseph Smith?
• Question: Was Joseph Smith's marriage to 14-year-old Helen Mar Kimball indicative of "pedophilia"?
• Question: Was Helen Mar Kimball's marriage to Joseph Smith ever consummated?
• Question: Did Helen Mar Kimball "confess" to having marital relations with Joseph?
• Question: What were Helen Mar Kimball's views on plural marriage?
• Helen Mar Kimball: "I have encouraged and sustained my husband in the celestial order of marriage because I knew it was right"

The Prophet said...that it [plural marriage] would damn more than it would have because \so many/ unprincipled men would take advantage of it, but that did not prove that it was not a pure principle. If Joseph had had any impure desires he could have gratified them in the style of the world with less danger of his life or his character, than to do as he did. The Lord commanded him to teach & to practice that principle.

—Helen Mar Kimball Whitney, Letter to Mary Bond, n.d., 3-9 quoted in Brian Hales, Joseph Smith's Polygamy: History, Vol. 1, 26-27. off-site

Question: What were the circumstances surrounding the sealing of Helen Mar Kimball to Joseph Smith?

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• Question: What were the circumstances surrounding the sealing of Helen Mar Kimball to Joseph Smith?
• Helen’s father, Heber C. Kimball, had the most active part in bringing Helen and Joseph together
• Brigham Young instructed polygamous men to wait to consummate their sealings to younger brides until they were at least eighteen
• Helen was not called to testify in the Temple Lot case, in which the Church was attempting to prove that Joseph had normal marital relations with some of his plural wives, even though she was available
• Helen became an advocate of plural marriage and vigorously defended it

1. REDIRECT Question: Was Joseph Smith a "serial practitioner of statutory rape" or a "pedophile"?

Question: Was Helen Mar Kimball's marriage to Joseph Smith ever consummated?

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• Question: Was Helen Mar Kimball's marriage to Joseph Smith ever consummated?
• Critics generally do not reveal that their sources have concluded that Helen's marriage to Joseph Smith was never consummated
• Helen wrote a poem entitled "Reminiscences," which is often cited by critics
• Helen was disappointed that she was not permitted to attend a party or a dance

Question: Did Helen Mar Kimball "confess" to having marital relations with Joseph?

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• Question: Did Helen Mar Kimball "confess" to having marital relations with Joseph?
• Helen allegedly said "I would never have been sealed to Joseph had I known it was anything more than ceremony"
• The source of the statement is "suspect"
• In order for this story to be true, Helen would be telling a story at variance with all other things that she wrote
• If we accept the statement as valid, we may interpret it in other ways than conjugality.

Question: What were Helen Mar Kimball's views on plural marriage?

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• Question: What were Helen Mar Kimball's views on plural marriage?
• Helen disliked plural marriage because of the difficulties it placed on her mother

Helen Mar Kimball: "I have encouraged and sustained my husband in the celestial order of marriage because I knew it was right"

Jump to details:

• Helen Mar Kimball: "I have encouraged and sustained my husband in the celestial order of marriage because I knew it was right"

To see citations to the critical sources for these claims, [[../CriticalSources|click here]]

Notes