bomgeography,
When I was LDS, my view of God was of an all loving being whose plan was necessary for us to follow to be able to learn the exercise the attributes that we inherited from him. The need to enter into mortality was a part of this both for reasons related to becoming matter and spirit united (to form a soul in the language of the D&C) and because practicing them took desire. We had to discover a true desire to become like our Heavenly Father to be able to realize the potential that was only the germ of God that we were born within us. The Book of Mormon's lessons regarding the laws of restoration conveyed why the atonement was necessary - not as an analogy of gift or debt but because we were caught in a Catch-22. We had to be mortal where we'd screw up to be able to become like God, but by screwing up we become unclean and thereby can't become like God. The atonement was necessary to address this dilemma.
I thought all of this made sense...but I also was aware it wasn't a shared view among all LDS. I was prone to assume I was figuring something out that others might be missing. But the reality was the canvas of Mormonism is so blank, so open that it allows people to compose their own big picture of what it all means and be able to make it work. There will be scriptures that support it, GA who seem to be teaching it, prophets who more closely embodied it, and days when it seems like God was confirming it. But there were also scriptures that contradicted it, GA's who clearly had contradictory views, prophets who seemed very much of the mold of those who had different views of what the purpose of it all was, and many more days when the heavens seemed sealed for eternity.
It was onto this backdrop that the reality of history began to reveal itself for me.
If you wish to start somewhere near the roots of the tree if not chronologically for how I became aware of it, the biblical basis for the Church begins with a mythological story (Genesis) that the LDS faith takes literally and the Book of Moses calcified the traditional view of it being literally penned by Moses. This is contradicted at every turn by evidence. The creation myth is untenable, flood story impossible, Abraham is clearly a combination of mythological tales and likely not about a real person, etc., etc. It includes morally outrageous stories taught as virtuous lessons, and has caused conflict with science that is potentially dangerous to the species even today if we consider how it influences climate change denial.
On top of which, it's clearly written by multiple authors separated by centuries who were editing and reediting the text to make it comply with their particular needs and views.
There are serious issues with the origin of the New Testament and it's composition. There is practically no evidence for the resurrection of Christ, many reasons to doubt the sources we have regarding it, and much evidence suggesting the views that became Christianity were evolved over time from very natural processes concerning human thought. See this thread for just one of the many, many examples -
viewtopic.php?f=1&p=970955The Book of Mormon relies on a decidedly 19th c. understanding of the Judeo-Christian tradition that has been largely left behind by new discovery and evidence. And while Joseph Smith seems to have been very interested in the controversies of his time, these did not include text criticism, higher criticism, the documentary hypothesis, Deutero-Isaiah, the reality of what it meant when the Assyrian empire conquered the northern kingdom, or any other number of issues that are baked into Mormonism almost like early Mormonism was a prehistoric mosquito captured in amber with the mosquito representing the religious views of the time, and it's doctrines with the Book of Mormon being amber that flowed over these views and preserve them.
We see example after example around us of people with power and influence come to declare they have unique access to sexual activities and partners given by God or some other higher reason beyond the ken of we regular folk. This usually covers very ugly examples of people left hurt and humiliated around them. We don't blink when we find out because it's so commonly the result.
With all of this as context, I wonder why you think that Joseph Smith lying to Emma Smith about what he was doing sexually with other women was sanctioned by God?
