The Law of Adoption
After Joseph Smith died, Brigham Young had a vision of Joseph Smith in which he asked about the doctrine of sealing men to men. Brigham Young and had many men sealed to him that were not related to him. This became a common practice among the Utah Saints. What does this sealing entail? What was it implemented?
Brigham Young
February 23, 1847
I related the following dream: While sick and asleep about noonday of the 17th inst., I dreamed that I went to see Joseph. He looked perfectly natural, sitting with his feet on the lower round of his chair. I took hold of his right hand and kissed him many times, and said to him: “Why is it that we cannot be together as we used to be, You have been from us a long time, and we want your society and I do not like to be separated from you.” Joseph rising from his chair and looking at me with his usual, earnest, expressive and pleasing countenance replied, “It is all right.” I said, “I do not like to be away from you.” Joseph said, “It is all right; we cannot be together yet; we shall be by and by; but you will have to do without me a while, and then we shall be together again.”
I then discovered there was a hand rail between us, Joseph stood by a window and to the southwest of him it was very light. I was in the twilight and to the north of me it was very dark; I said, “Brother Joseph, the brethren you know well, better than I do; you raised them up, and brought the Priesthood to us. The brethren have a great anxiety to understand the Law of Adoption or sealing principles; and if you have a word of counsel for me I should be glad to receive it.”
Joseph stepped toward me, and looking very earnestly, yet pleasantly said, “Tell the people to be humble and faithful,... Be sure to tell the people to keep the Spirit of the Lord; and if they will, they will find themselves just as they were organized by our Father in Heaven before they came into the world. Our Father in heaven organized the human family, but they are all disorganized and in great confusion.”
Joseph then shewed me the pattern, how they were in the beginning. This I cannot describe, but I saw it, and saw where the Priesthood had been taken from the earth and how it must be joined together, so that there would be a perfect chain from Father Adam to his latest posterity. Joseph again said, “Tell the people to be sure to keep the Spirit of the Lord and follow it, and it will lead them just right.”
[“Manuscript History of Brigham Young,” February 23, 1847, typed copy]
Hosea Stout
Sunday February 28th, 1847
This morning there was to be a private meeting of the high Council at sun rise. About 9 o'clock I went & found only three members present so we staid awhile and come away home.
In the afternoon I went to the Council house to a meeting at which Elder Henry G. Sherwood spoke after that I was around as usual. At six went to a High Council as usual. There was not much done of interest except some remarks of President Young which I will give in short. It is in relation to a spell of sickness he had had lately. He spoke as follows.
"Another subject which I wanted to speak of is this.
On Wednesday morning I was taken ill and it has been asked if I had a vision I was taken so suddenly sick, just as I was getting out of my bed that I could not go out. I tried to return to the bed again, but could not even get back.
As to how I felt, No one can tell how I felt, until he dies and goes through the vail and when he does that he can then tell how I felt.
All that I know, is what my wife told me about it since. She said that I said, I had been where Joseph & Hyrum was.
And again that I said, it is hard coming to life again.
But I know that I went to the world of spirits; but what I saw I know not, for the vision went away from me, as a dream which you loose when you awake.
The next day I had a dream.
I dreamed that I saw Joseph sitting in a room, in the South West corner, near a bright window.
He sat in a chair, with his feet, both on the lower round.
I took him by the hand and kissed him on both cheeks, and wanted to know, why we could not be together, as we once was.
He said that it was all right, that we should not be together yet.
We must be separated for a season.
I said it was hard to be separated from him.
He said, it was all right and putting his feet down on the floor.
Now all you know know, how he looks, when he used to give council, know all about, how he looked then.
I told him that the Latter Day Saints was very anxious to know about the law of adoption, and the sealing powers &c and desired word of council from him.
Joseph said; do you be sure and tell the people one thing.
Do you be sure and tell the brethren that it is all important for them to keep the spirit of the Lord, To keep the quiet spirit of Jesus, and he explained how the spirit of the Lord reflected on the spirit of man and set him to pondering on any subject, and also explained how to know the spirit of the Lord from the spirit of the enemy.
He said the mind of man must be open to receive all spirits, in order to be prepared, to receive the spirit of the Lord; otherwise it might be barred so as not to receive the spirit of the Lord, which always brings peace and makes one happy and takes away every other spirit. When the small still voice speaks always recieve it, and if the peopel will do these things, when they come up to the father, all will be as in the beginning, and every person stand as at the first.
I saw how we were organized before we took tabernacles and every man will be restored to that which he had then, and all will be satisfied. After this I turned away & saw Joseph was in the edge of the light; but where I had to go was as midnight darkness.
He said I must go back, so I went back in the darkness.
i want you all to remember my dream for I it is a vision of God and was revealed through the spirit of Joseph."
[On the Mormon Frontier: The Diary of Hosea Stout, vol. 1, pg. 237-238]
Brigham Young
August 2, 1857
"I will acknowledge with brother Kimball, and I know it is the case with him, that I am a great lover of women. In what particular? I love to see them happy, to see them well fed and well clothed, and I love to see them cheerful. I love to see their faces and talk with them, when they talk in righteousness; but as for anything more, I do not care. There are probably but few men in the world who care about the private society of women less than I do. I also love children, and I delight to make them happy."
Brigham Young
April 6, 1862
"By this power men will be sealed to men back to Adam, completing and making perfect the chain of the Priesthood from his day to the winding up scene. I have known men that I positively think would fellowship the Devil, if he would agree to be sealed to them. 'Oh, be sealed to me, brother; I care not what you do, you may lie and steal, or anything else, I can put up with all your meanness, if you will only be sealed to me.' Now this is not so much weakness as it is selfishness. It is a great and glorious doctrine, but the reason I have not preached it in the midst of this people, is, I could not do it without turnign so many of them to the Devil. Some would go to hell for the sake of getting the Devil sealed to them."
Brigham Young
September 4, 1873
"There are many of the ordinances of teh house of God that must be performed in a Temple that is erected expressly for the purpose. There are other ordinances that we can administer without a Temple. You know that there are some which you have received --baptism, the laying on of hands, the gifts of the Holy Ghost, such as the speaking in and interpretation of tongues, prophesying, healing, discerning of spirits, etc., and many blessings bestowed upon the people, we have the privilege of receiving without a Temple. There are other blessings that will not be received, and ordinances that will not be performed according to the law that the Lord has revealed, without their being done in a Temple prepared for that purpose. We can, at the present time, go into the Endowment House and be baptized for the dead, receive our washings and anointings, etc., for there we have a font that has been erected, dedicated expressly for baptizing people for the remission of sins, for their health and for their dead friends; in this the Saints have the privilege of being baptized for their friends. We also have the privilege of sealing women to men, without a Temple. This we can do in the Endowment House; but when we come to other sealing ordinances, ordiancnes pertaining to the holy Priesthood, to connect the chain of the Priesthood from father Adam until now, by sealing children to their parents, being sealed for our forefathers, etc., they cannot be done without a Temple. But we can seal women to men, but not men to men, without a temple. When the ordinances are carried out in the Temples that will be erected, men will be sealed to their fathers, and those who have slept clear up to our Father Adam."
John D. Lee
1877
"I was the second one adopted to Brigham Young. I should have been his first adopted son, being the first that proposed it to him, but always ready to give preference to those in authority, I placed A. P. Rockwood’s name first on the list. I also had my children adopted to me in the Temple. Brigham Young had his children adopted to himself, and we were the only ones, to my knowledge, that had our children so adopted at the Temple at Nauvoo. As time would not permit attending to all the people, the business was rushed through day and night."
Wilford Woodruff
May 28, 1894
"I have not felt satisfied, neither did President Taylor, neither has any man since the Prophet Joseph who has attended to the ordinance of adoption in the temples of our God. We have felt that there was more to be revealed upon this subject than we had received. Revelations were given to us in the St. George Temple, which President Young presented to the Church of God. Changes were made there, and we still have more changes to make, in order to satisfy our Heavenly Father, satisfy our dead and ourselves. I will tell you what some of them are. I have prayed over this matter, and my brethren have. We have felt, as President Taylor said, that we have got to have more revelation concerning sealing under the Law of Adoption. Well, what are these changes? One of them is the principle of adoption. In the commencement of adopting men and women in the temple at Nauvoo, a great many persons were adopted to different men who were not of the lineage of their fathers, and there was a spirit manifested by some in that work that was not of God. Men would go out and electioneer and labor with all their power to get men adopted to them.
One instance I will name here: A man went around Nauvoo asking every man he could, “You come and be adopted to me, and I shall stand at the head of the kingdom, and you will be there with me.” . . . Men are in danger sometimes in being adopted to others, until they know who they are and what they will be. Now, what are the feelings of Israel? They have felt that they wanted to be adopted to somebody. President Young was not satisfied in his mind with regard to the extent of this matter; President Taylor was not. When I went before the Lord to know who I should be adopted to (we were then being adopted to prophets and apostles), the Spirit of God said to me, “Have you not a father, who begot you?” “Yes, I have.” “Then why not honor him?” “Yes,” says I, “that is right.” I was adopted to my father, and should have had my father sealed to his father, and so on back; and the duty that I want every man who presides over a temple to see performed from this day henceforth and forever, unless the Lord Almighty commands otherwise, is, let every man be adopted to his father. When a man receives the endowments, adopt him to his father; not to Wilford Woodruff, nor to any other man outside the lineage of his fathers. That is the will of God to this people. . . . I say let every man be adopted to his father; . . . It is my duty to honor my father who begot me in the flesh. It is your duty to do the same. When you do this, the Spirit of God will be with you. And we shall continue this work, the Lord adding light to that which we have already received. I have had friends adopted to me. We all have, more or less. But I have had peculiar feelings about it, especially lately. There are men in this congregation who wish to be adopted to me. I say to them to day, if they can hear me, Go and be adopted to your fathers, and save your fathers, . . . A man may say, “I am an Apostle, or I am a High Priest, or I am an Elder in Israel, and if I am adopted to my father, will it take any honor from me?” I would say not. . . . Those of you who stand here—I do not care whether you are Apostles or what you are—by honoring your fathers you will not take any honor from your heads; you will hold the keys of the salvation of your father’s house, as Joseph Smith does. You will lose nothing by honoring your fathers and redeeming your dead."
Kimball Young
1954
"That this masculine principle went deep, and far more fantastically than the Saints could comprehend, is shown in a sermon by Brigham Young, reported by John Read. In a letter to one of his wives Read said that Brigham referred to some future time "when men would be sealed to men in the priesthood in a more solemn ordinance than that by which women were sealed to man, and in a room over that in which women were sealed to man in the temple of the Lord."
[Kimball Young, Isn't One Wife Enough? The Story of Mormon Polygamy (New York: Holt, 1954), 280]
Juanita Brooks
1962
"At this time another ceremony was instituted, which though it was of short duration and never widely practiced, was significant and important while it lasted. This was the adoption of young men and their wives to one of the leaders. The idea behind it was that in establishing the Kingdom of God upon the earth there should be also a celestial relationship. If the Prophet Joseph were to become a God over a minor planet, he must not only have a large posterity but able assistants of practical skills. Brigham Young had been 'sealed' to Joseph under this law; now he in turn had some thirty-eight young men sealed to him.
Of this number, John D. Lee was second. . . . All of the men thus joined in the covenant seemed brothers in one sense, and for some of them Lee developed a genuine affection. Among others, jealousies grew up as they competed for favor.
In the same way, Lee had eighteen or nineteen young men with their wives adopted to him, most of them those he had brought into the church. He often spoke of them as George Laub Lee, W. B. Owens Lee, Miles Anderson Lee, James Pace Lee, Allen Weeks Lee, William Swap Lee."
Juanita Brooks
1964
Juanita Brooks also stated: “Joseph Smith had sealed to himself a number of his most faithful followers, among them the first members of the Council of Fifty, to help to establish the Kingdom of God upon this earth...Brigham Young had adopted at least forty young men with their wives and families in a temple ceremony. Many of these added his name to their own...”
[On The Mormon Frontier, The Diary of Hosea Stout, vol. 1, p. 178, n. 50]
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