Name: The Angel with the Flaming Sword by Ian McMurray
Duration: 2 min 39 s
Description: Joseph Smith told multiple people that an angel with a drawn or flaming sword appeared and threatened to destroy him if he didn't practice plural marriage. He used this divine threat to convince reluctant families and women to accept polygamy. A satirical cabaret about history's most convenient heavenly messenger - one that only Joseph could see and that always demanded exactly what he wanted.

Music for the faith transition journey. These songs tell the stories the LDS church doesn't want told - Joseph Smith's polygamy, convenient revelations, historical manipulation, and the emotional reality of deconstructing from Mormonism. For everyone processing the grief, anger, relief, and freedom that comes with walking away. Whether you left last month or decades ago, these songs validate what you experienced and give voice to what you've been thinking. You're not crazy. You're not alone. The truth matters.

The Loneliest Freedom

Rock in a Hat

Ask Us Our Names

Elect Lady

Helen Mar Kimball was 14 years old when her father told her Joseph Smith wanted to marry her. Joseph promised: 'If you will take this step, it will ensure your eternal salvation and exaltation and that of your father's household.' Helen's first reaction was anger, but she agreed to save her family. She later wrote about her mother's 'bleeding heart' and that she 'hated polygamy with my heart.' The LDS church's essay won't say she was 14 - only 'several months before her 15th birthday.

Fourteen

On August 18, 1842, Joseph Smith wrote to 17-year-old Sarah Ann Whitney and her parents, three weeks after secretly marrying her: 'burn this letter as soon as you read it; keep all locked up in your breasts, my life depends upon it... when Emma comes you cannot be safe.' He told them to knock at the window and 'escape observation.' Sarah's mother Elizabeth had helped Emma start Relief Society just months before. The letter survived. These are Joseph Smith's actual words in his own handwriting.

Burn This Letter

Joseph Smith told multiple people that an angel with a drawn or flaming sword appeared and threatened to destroy him if he didn't practice plural marriage. He used this divine threat to convince reluctant families and women to accept polygamy. A satirical cabaret about history's most convenient heavenly messenger - one that only Joseph could see and that always demanded exactly what he wanted.

The Angel with the Flaming Sword

Joseph Smith told the story of his First Vision at least nine different times with contradicting details. Early versions (1832) say he saw Jesus alone seeking forgiveness. Later versions (1838-official) say he saw God the Father AND Jesus to know which church to join. The church admits in its Gospel Topics essay that details differ between accounts - including who appeared, when it happened, and why he went. A theatrical romp through history's most inconsistent founding story.

The First Vision (Which Version)

The Nauvoo Expositor published ONE edition exposing Joseph Smith's polygamy on June 7, 1844. Three days later, he ordered the Nauvoo Legion to destroy the printing press. Twenty days after that, he was dead in Carthage Jail. The cover-up destroyed him faster than the truth ever could have.

One Edition Only

In 1835, Joseph Smith purchased Egyptian papyrus scrolls and claimed they were written by Abraham's own hand. He 'translated' them into the Book of Abraham, now LDS scripture. In the 1960s, the papyrus were rediscovered and Egyptologists confirmed they're common Egyptian funerary texts for a man named Hor - not Abraham. Every expert agrees Joseph's translation is completely wrong. The church now calls the papyrus a 'catalyst.' A campy look at scripture that doesn't match its source material.

The Angel with the Flaming Sword

Ian McMurray

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