{"id":5846,"date":"2025-12-30T22:52:20","date_gmt":"2025-12-31T05:52:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/novus2.com\/righteouscause\/?p=5846"},"modified":"2026-01-02T16:23:39","modified_gmt":"2026-01-02T23:23:39","slug":"the-king-follett-discourse-did-this-one-sermon-prove-joseph-smith-was-a-fraud","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/novus2.com\/righteouscause\/2025\/12\/30\/the-king-follett-discourse-did-this-one-sermon-prove-joseph-smith-was-a-fraud\/","title":{"rendered":"The King Follett Discourse: Did This One Sermon Prove Joseph Smith Was a Fraud?"},"content":{"rendered":"
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In April 1844, just two months before his assassination, Joseph Smith delivered what would become his most theologically revolutionary address. The King Follett Discourse fundamentally challenged traditional Christian doctrine about the nature of God, the origin of human souls, and humanity’s eternal destiny. This sermon continues to shape Latter-day Saint theology while raising profound questions about the consistency and reliability of Smith’s prophetic claims.<\/p>\n

Historical Context and Delivery<\/strong><\/span><\/h2>\n

On April 7, 1844, during the semi-annual General Conference in Nauvoo, Illinois, Joseph Smith addressed an assembled crowd estimated between 8,000 and 20,000 people. The occasion was ostensibly a funeral sermon for King Follett, a faithful Mormon who had died on March 9th after being crushed in a well collapse. However, Smith transformed this memorial into a comprehensive theological manifesto that would redefine Mormon understanding of deity and human nature.<\/p>\n

Smith prefaced his remarks with an extraordinary claim about his prophetic authority: he staked his entire credibility on the doctrines he was about to unveil. According to contemporary accounts, he declared that if he failed to accurately teach the character of God, he deserved to be ranked among the world’s false teachers. This self-imposed standard would become central to later Christian critiques of the discourse.<\/p>\n

Revolutionary Claims About God’s Nature<\/strong><\/span><\/h2>\n

The Doctrine of Divine Progression<\/strong><\/span><\/h3>\n

The sermon’s most shocking assertion directly contradicted classical Christian theism: “God himself was once as we are now, and is an exalted man, and sits enthroned in yonder heavens!”<\/strong> <\/em><\/span>Smith elaborated that God the Father “once was a man like us” and “dwelt on an earth, the same as Jesus Christ Himself did.”<\/strong><\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

This teaching introduced what scholars call “theomorphism”<\/strong><\/span>\u2014the idea that God possesses a glorified human form and nature. More radically, it suggested God underwent a process of progression from mortality to divinity, fundamentally challenging the Christian doctrine of God’s aseity (self-existence) and eternal, unchanging nature affirmed in passages like Malachi 3:6 (“I the LORD do not change”<\/strong><\/em><\/span>) and James 1:17 (“with whom there is no variation or shadow due to change”<\/strong><\/em><\/span>).<\/p>\n

The implications were staggering: if God was once mortal, then by definition He had a God above Him, creating an infinite regression of deities\u2014a concept Mormon scholars later termed “the plurality of gods”<\/strong><\/span> doctrine.<\/p>\n

Challenging Orthodox Monotheism<\/strong><\/span><\/h3>\n

Smith explicitly rejected the traditional Christian understanding of God as an incorporeal spirit. He taught a form of henotheism\u2014the belief in multiple gods while worshiping one supreme deity. This represented a decisive break from the monotheism affirmed in Deuteronomy 6:4 (“Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God, the LORD is one”<\/strong><\/em><\/span>) and Isaiah 43:10 (“Before me no god was formed, nor shall there be any after me”<\/strong><\/em><\/span>).<\/p>\n

Redefining Human Nature and Origin<\/strong><\/span><\/h2>\n

The Eternal Intelligence Doctrine<\/strong><\/span><\/h3>\n

Smith proposed that the essence of human beings\u2014what he called “intelligence”<\/strong><\/span> or the human spirit\u2014has always existed and was never created. Using the illustration of a ring, he argued: “If I cut it in two, it would have a beginning and an end; but join it again and it continues one eternal round. So with the spirit of man.”<\/strong><\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

This teaching contradicts Genesis 2:7, which describes God forming man from the dust and breathing life into him, clearly indicating a point of creation. It also conflicted with passages like Zechariah 12:1, which states God “forms the spirit of man within him”<\/strong><\/em><\/span>\u2014suggesting spirits have a beginning point.<\/p>\n

The Path to Godhood<\/strong><\/span><\/h3>\n

Building on these foundations, Smith outlined what would become the doctrine of eternal progression or exaltation. He taught that humans possess the inherent capacity to become gods themselves through a process of learning and advancement: “You have got to learn how to be gods yourselves, and to be kings and priests to God, the same as all gods have done before you.”<\/strong><\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

This “ladder of progression”<\/strong><\/span> theology became enshrined in the famous LDS couplet: “As man now is, God once was; as God now is, man may be”<\/strong><\/em><\/span>\u2014though this precise formulation came from Lorenzo Snow, a later LDS president.<\/p>\n

The Children Controversy<\/strong><\/span><\/h2>\n

Perhaps the most problematic element for contemporary Latter-day Saints is Smith’s teaching about children who die in infancy. He declared unequivocally: “The child dies in infancy, but it will be all right. A child that was laid away in death would come up in the resurrection as a child… it will never grow; it will still be the child.”<\/strong><\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

He painted a vivid picture: “Eternity is full of thrones, upon which dwell thousands of children, reigning on thrones of glory, with not one cubit added to their stature.”<\/strong><\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

This teaching created theological chaos: if children remain eternally as children, they cannot progress to godhood\u2014the very purpose of Mormon soteriology. Later LDS leaders have quietly abandoned or reinterpreted this doctrine, with modern authorities teaching that children will indeed grow and progress in the afterlife. This represents one of many instances where subsequent Mormon prophets have modified or contradicted Smith’s definitive pronouncements.<\/p>\n

Historical Reliability of the Text<\/strong><\/span><\/h2>\n

Critics sometimes suggest the discourse’s radical content reflects scribal error or embellishment rather than Smith’s actual words. However, the historical evidence strongly supports the sermon’s authenticity and accuracy.<\/p>\n

Four independent, contemporary transcriptions exist from experienced Mormon scribes:<\/p>\n