Book of Mormon Criticisms
(c) Copyright Michael R. Ash 2000. All rights reserved
Charge:
Some critics have charged that one or more of the three special Book of Mormon witnesses denied their testimony at some point in their lives (see Witnesses). When their testimonies cannot be impeached, these critics attack their character credibility in an attempt to demonstrate that the witnesses are unreliable or unstable. One of the common charges against David Whitmer is based on a statement he wrote in his Address to All Believers in Christ:
If you believe my testimony to the Book of Mormon; if you believe that God spake to us three witnesses by his own voice, then I tell you that in June, 1838, God spake to me again by his own voice from the heavens, and told me to ‘separate myself from among the Latter-day Saints, for as they sought to do unto me, so should it be done unto them.’ In the spring of 1838, the heads of the church and many of the members had gone deep into error and blindness. I had been striving with them for a long time to show them the errors into which they were drifting, and for my labors I received only persecutions. (Whitmer, 27.)
Rebuttal:
Did David Whitmer ever deny his testimony of the Book of Mormon? Is his Book of Mormon testimony suspect because he later claimed that God told him to separate himself from the Mormons? Let’s look at the second question first. Richard L. Anderson wrote:
[A]fter the excommunications of Oliver Cowdery and David and John Whitmer, Sidney Rigdon ...preached his “Salt Sermon,” warning dissenters not to interfere with Mormon society. The Whitmers and Cowdery were next told to get out of town, and with turmoil caused by forcible rejection, they left the Mormon center of Far West. Joseph Smith and the Twelve later criticized Sidney Rigdon’s aggressive speeches and also the secret threatenings of Sampson Avard, probably the chief mover in this expulsion. What kind of a “voice” did David hear then? David does not really say; he only implies that it was audible by comparing it with the command to testify of the Book of Mormon. But there are problems with that because David Whitmer did not treat the two experiences equally in his long lifetime. He only mentioned the undefined voice at Far West once, in this last writing to fellow believers-- but he had repeatedly testified of an audible voice authenticating the Book of Mormon. Those with him in 1830 in the New York grove certified that they had also heard God's voice then, but neither Oliver Cowdery nor John Whitmer, both of whom left Far West with David at this time, say anything about the heavenly command of 1838. Whatever came to David Whitmer, the later experience fails to contradict his earlier divine command to testify of the ancient record. David Whitmer could have received true spiritual comfort because of the unjust methods that his former associates were using against him; or he may have only felt that God spoke to him because of the powerful indignation that swelled up in his soul; or if he gave way to the spirit of anger and retaliation, he invited Satan to inspire him and deceive him. For instance, once in later life he was tempted to lead, thereby dictating several revelations that he later considered false. The Far West “voice” might fall into this category. (Anderson [1981], 163-64.)
One might argue that if the Far West “voice” was false, then so was the voice proclaiming the truth of the Book of Mormon. As Anderson notes, however, the two incidents are completely different. In Whitmer’s Far West “voice” he mentions the event once and it only involves a “voice”-- whatever that means. In his testimony of the Book of Mormon he hears a “voice” from God, sees an angel with the Book of Mormon plates and testifies to this fact frequently throughout his entire life.
In 1833 when Missouri vigilantes were harassing the Mormons, a mob of about five hundred men put David’s testimony to the test. The mob drove David and several others to the public square, stripped, tarred, and feathered them, aimed their guns then threatened these men to deny the Book of Mormon and confess it to be a fraud, or die instantly. David Whitmer raised his hands and bore witness to these angry men that the Book of Mormon was the Word of God. The mob trembled with fear and let them go. Afterwards, an unbelieving doctor, told David that his fearless testimony and the fear that gripped the mob had made him a believer in the Book of Mormon. (Ibid., 83-84.)
David Whitmer left the Mormon church in 1838 but continued to proclaim and assert his testimony and the truthfulness of what he had seen and heard. Although Whitmer never returned to Mormonism, in the fifty years he lived outside of the Church he insisted that he knew the Book of Mormon was divinely revealed. Anyone seriously interested in Whitmer’s testimony should read Lyndon W. Cook’s, David Whitmer Interviews: A Restoration Witness. Cook documents seventy-two interviews with David Whitmer concerning his experience with the angel and plates– the experience upon which his Book of Mormon testimony is based. All seventy-two interviews took place after David Whitmer had left the Church. If he had lost his testimony following his excommunication, he would have had ample opportunity to deny his earlier proclamation. Instead, however, we find that Whitmer continued to assert its truthfulness.
Throughout Richmond, Missouri, David Whitmer was known as an honest and trustworthy citizen by the non-Mormons. When one anti-Mormon lectured in David’s hometown, branding David as disreputable, the local (non-Mormon) paper responded with “a spirited front-page editorial unsympathetic with Mormonism but insistent on ‘the forty six years of private citizenship on the part of David Whitmer, in Richmond, without stain or blemish.’” (Anderson [1981], 74.)
...The following year the editor penned a tribute on the eightieth birthday of David Whitmer, who “with no regrets for the past” still “reiterates that he saw the glory of the angel.”
This is the critical issue of the life of David Whitmer. During fifty years in non-Mormon society, he insisted with the fervor of his youth that he knew that the Book of Mormon was divinely revealed. Relatively few people in Richmond could wholly accept such testimony, but none doubted his intelligence or complete honesty. (Ibid., 74.)
When another anti-Mormon published an article claiming that David had denied his testimony, David printed a “proclamation” testifying to the truth of the Book of Mormon and reiterating the fact that he had never denied that testimony. He wrote:
It is recorded in the American Cyclopedia and the Encyclopedia Britannica, that I, David Whitmer, have denied my testimony as one of the Three Witnesses to the divinity of the Book of Mormon: and that the two other witnesses, Oliver Cowdery and Martin Harris, denied their testimony to that book.
I will say once more to all mankind, that I have never at any time denied that testimony or any part thereof. I also testify to the world, that neither Oliver Cowdery nor Martin Harris ever at any time denied their testimony. They both died affirming the truth of the divine authenticity of the Book of Mormon. (Whitmer, 8; italics added.)
Attached to Whitmer’s proclamation was an accompanying statement signed by twenty-two of Richmond’s political, business, and professional leaders who certified that they had been “long and intimately acquainted” with Whitmer and knew him to be “a man of the highest integrity and of undoubted truth and veracity.” (Ibid., 9-10.)
A few days before he died an article in the Chicago Tribune read:
David Whitmer, the last one of the three witnessed to the truth of the Book of Mormon, is now in a dying condition at his home in Richmond. Last evening he called the family and friends to his bedside, and bore his testimony to the truth of the Book of Mormon and the Bible. (Chicago Tribune Correspondent 23 January 1888, quoted in Cook, 220.)
Following his death the Richmond Conservator wrote:
On Sunday evening before his death he called the family and his attending physician, Dr. George W. Buchanan, to his bedside and said, “Doctor do you consider that I am in my right mind?” to which the Doctor replied, “Yes, you are in your right mind, I have just had a conversation with you.” He then addressed himself to all present and said: “I want to give my dying testimony. You must be faithful in Christ. I want to say to you all that the Bible and the record of the Nephites, (The Book of Mormon) are true, so you can say that you have heard me bear my testimony on my death bed....
On Monday morning he again called those present to his bedside, and told them that he had seen another vision which reconfirmed the divinity of the “Book of Mormon,” and said that he had seen Christ in the fullness of his glory and majesty, sitting upon his great white throne in heaven waiting to receive his children. (Richmond Conservator Report, 26 January 1888, quoted in Cook, 226.)
The Richmond Democrat also added this comment:
“Skeptics may laugh and scoff if they will, but no man can listen to Mr. Whitmer as he talks of his interview with the Angel of the Lord, without being most forcibly convinced that he has heard an honest man tell what he honestly believes to be true.” (Richmond Democrat, Vol. 16, No. 6, February 2, 1888, quoted in Eldin Ricks, 16.)
Like Oliver Cowdery, and Martin Harris, David Whitmer bore the testimony to the truthfulness of reality of his encounter with the angel and the authenticity of the Book of Mormon until the day he died. Book of Mormon critics have not been able to impugn their testimonies but have instead resorted to character assassination. As history demonstrates, however, the honesty, integrity and reliability of these witnesses confound the critics every bit as much as the testimony of the three witnesses confounds those who refuse to accept the revealed word of God.
Michael R. Ash
Return to Mormon Fortress