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Guide Home > Early LDS History > Millennialism
Additional TopicsThe following are additional topic areas related to Millennialism. If there is a bracket number after the topic, that number indicates how many actual articles there are related to that subject. If the link for the topic is not live, it simply means the topic is a 'planned area' for future growth. FAIR ResourcesThese links are either to Web pages hosted on the FAIR Website, or to FAIR Papers. FAIR Papers are short articles about specific topics or questions, written by members of FAIR. These articles can be downloaded and read in PDF format and are intended to be distributed by e-mail or print for the general use of our patrons. (To read FAIR Papers you will need to have Adobe Acrobat Reader. It can be downloaded free from the Adobe Web site.) Click on a title below to visit a FAIR Web page or to read the latest version of a FAIR Paper. "Government during the Millennium," FAIR Wiki (City Unknown: FAIR) This FAIR Wiki article responds to the following comments and questions: During the millennium, will there be a secular government in addition to Christ's reign? It seems that I had heard that there will be a "government headquarters" in a different location to the "church headquarters". Do we know where they will be located? Encyclopedia of MormonismThe resources listed below are articles available in the Encyclopedia of Mormonism. These links are to information not located on the FAIR Web site. Paul B. Pixton, "Millennium," Encyclopedia of Mormonism, Edited by Daniel H. Ludlow (New York: Macmillan Publishing, 1992), 906-908 Other ResourcesThe resources listed below are related items available on the Web that should be of interest. These links are to information not located on the FAIR Web site. Richard L. Anderson, "Joseph Smith and the Millennarian Time Table Joseph Smith and the Millennarian Time Table," BYU Studies, 55-66 “Of that day and hour knoweth no man” (Matt. 24:36), though claims to date the millennial coming are no historical rarity. In the past year newspapers carried stories of more than one group which separated itself to await the appointed day. Failures become miscalculation or misdefinition to persistent believers—and illusion to others. Joseph Smith joins the ranks of discredited visionaries in current publications reaching various intellectual levels. But the image is not a true one. Corrective historical analysis is not only in order, but also a word to those accustomed to dismiss him under the rubric of millennialism. A recent article of widely influential protestant distribution does essentially this: “Like leaders of other groups in the early nineteenth century, Smith believed that Christ’s coming was imminent, ‘even 56 years should wind up the scene.’” This statement of Joseph Smith, made on the occasion of choosing the Twelve on February 14, 1835, has been given more direct treatment. Most elaborate is a curious exposé, Harrison’s Mormons Are Peculiar People, in which no less than fifty-seven false prophecies of Joseph Smith are formally listed. With minor exceptions this parade of instances is a redundant application of three techniques: making ultimate promises immediate, precluding human agency by affixing total responsibility on the author of the revelation, and giving relative statements of time absolute value. The last method well matches the lack of sophistication claimed by the author for Mormons. Promises that “the hour is nigh” and “I come quickly” are now discredited in Harrison’s perspective of history, despite Joseph Smith’s express words that Millennial events “are now nigh at hand”—”speaking after the manner of the Lord.” Distortion is carried further; in spite of citation of correct explanatory sources, “even fifty-six years should wind up the scene” becomes number seven in the list of “false prophecies”: “According to Joseph Smith, Christ’s second coming should have taken place no later than February 14, 1891.”
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