Revelations printed in The Evening and the Morning Star, June 1832–June 1833

Source Note
Revelations published in The Evening and the Morning Star (
Independence
Located twelve miles from western Missouri border. Permanently settled, platted, and designated county seat, 1827. Hub for steamboat travel on Missouri River. Point of departure for Santa Fe Trail. Population in 1831 about 300. Latter-day Saint population...
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, MO), vol. 1, nos. 1–10 and 12, and vol. 2, no. 13; edited by
William W. Phelps
17 Feb. 1792–7 Mar. 1872. Writer, teacher, printer, newspaper editor, publisher, postmaster, lawyer. Born at Hanover, Morris Co., New Jersey. Son of Enon Phelps and Mehitabel Goldsmith. Moved to Homer, Cortland Co., New York, 1800. Married Sally Waterman,...
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. The copy used for this transcription is currently part of a bound volume held at CHL; includes marginalia, archival notations, stamps, and bookplates.

The initial issues of The Evening and the Morning Star present revelations prominently on the first or second page of the newspaper. Beginning with the November 1832 issue, however, revelations were placed near the end of each issue. Each issue comprises four leaves (eight pages) that measure 12½ × 9⅞ inches (32 × 25 cm). Each page is set in two columns.

The volume used for this transcription was donated to the Salt Lake Temple by Lycurgus A. Wilson on 8 September 1894, according to a bookplate on the inside front cover of the volume. It was transferred to the library of the Church Historian’s Office sometime before 1923.
1
“Library Record,” book no. 1239.
Comprehensive Works Cited
“Library Record for the Listing or Cataloguing of Books.” Historian’s Office, Library Accession Records, ca. 1890–ca. 1930. CHL. CR 100 429.

Footnotes
1. 1
  “Library Record,” book no. 1239.
  
  “Library Record for the Listing or Cataloguing of Books.” Historian’s Office, Library Accession Records, ca. 1890–ca. 1930. CHL. CR 100 429.

Soon after his into the church in 1831, was instructed by revelation to relocate to , Missouri, “and be established as a printer unto the church.” , who had been previously appointed to work on church publications, was directed to assist him. In early 1832, Phelps and his associates in Independence began work on the church’s first newspaper, The Evening and the Morning Star. Because of the difficulty of getting paper and other supplies to Independence, however, months passed before the first issue of the newspaper was printed in June 1832.

The newspaper’s prospectus announced that it would, in part, “be devoted to the revelations of God as made known to his servants by the , at sundry times since the creation of man, but more especially in these last days.” Though a small number of JS’s revelations appeared first in non-Mormon newspapers elsewhere, the Star was the first official periodical of the church to print them. As the church’s only periodical at the time, the Star also published counsel to church members, local and world news, editorials, hymns, and letters from missionaries. The Star regularly published general announcements to missionaries serving throughout the country and letters from church members in other states, evidencing that its circulation reached well beyond .

The press owned by , which was operated under the direction of the , was the only press in and indeed the only press for roughly one hundred miles. Reading material was scarce on the frontier, and it is likely that the town’s non-Mormon residents read the Star in addition to the Upper Missouri Advertiser, the secular paper published on the same press. In July 1833, when religious and political tensions between the Mormons and their neighbors had already created a tinderbox environment, an article titled “Free People of Color” appeared in The Evening and the Morning Star, quoting from statutes respecting the immigration of free persons of African descent. Many Missourians, largely sympathetic to the practice of slavery, interpreted the article as an attempt to invite free black people to settle in Missouri and were outraged. Four days after the editors of The Evening and the Morning Star printed a broadside extra in an attempt to calm the situation by clarifying the message of the offending article, a and most of the sheets of the still-unfinished Book of Commandments.

The destruction of the caused a six-month hiatus in the publication of the Star. In September 1833, was established in , Ohio, for the purpose of printing church materials, and was sent to to purchase a printing press and type. Upon his return, Cowdery resumed printing the Star in Kirtland from January until September 1834. Beginning in October 1834, the Latter Day Saints’ Messenger and Advocate succeeded the Star as the official church periodical.

Over the course of the Star’s fourteen-month run in , the paper printed nineteen full and seven partial revelation texts. Only two issues of the Missouri newspaper did not contain featured revelations: the April 1833 issue and the July 1833 issue, which was the final issue printed in Missouri. As in the Book of Commandments and the first edition of the Doctrine and Covenants (1835), little, if any, introduction or commentary accompanied the featured revelations. In addition to publishing the revelations as stand-alone pieces, The Evening and the Morning Star often published articles that quoted from the revelations—both from those printed as featured documents in the paper and from those that had not been published therein. Well before the Book of Commandments was expected to be completed, the editors of the Star advised readers to “search the revelations which we publish,” an admonition that presumed that the Latter-day Saints had access to earlier issues. In fact, for Mormons in , as well as those scattered around the country, the Star became the most accessible source for JS’s revelatory texts.

The revelations published in The Evening and the Morning Star appear to have been selected for their importance. Many of the published revelations addressed topics relating to church government, such as the roles of specific church officers, the laws and commandments to be kept by church members, and the proper administration of the of the Lord’s Supper. Other published revelations announced newly received theological principles or looked forward to the second coming of Christ. Revelations that were given to specific individuals providing counsel or were not published. After the Star moved to , no revelations were included in the ten issues of the newspaper published there.

The table that follows lists each of the revelatory items printed in the Star and its reprint, along with its bibliographic information. See Revelations Printed in The Evening and the Morning Star for a side-by-side comparison of the revelations printed in the Star and its reprint.

Key to column titles

Vol:Issue:	Volume and issue number
Star Print Date:	Month in which the item was printed in The Evening and the Morning Star
Star Pages:	Pages on which the item was printed in The Evening and the Morning Star
Reprint Print Date:	Month in which the item was printed in Evening and Morning Star
Reprint Pages:	Pages on which the item was printed in Evening and Morning Star
Date:	Date of item, followed by section number in Doctrine and Covenants, 1981 edition, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints

Vol: Issue	Star Print Date	Star Pages	Reprint Print Date	Reprint Pages	Date
1:1	June 1832	[1]	Jan. 1835	2–4	10 Apr. 1830 [D&C 20]
1:1	June 1832	[1]–[2]			16 Apr. 1830 [D&C 22]
1:1	June 1832	[2]	Jan. 1835	5–6	ca. 7 Mar. 1831 [D&C 45:1–67, 71]
1:2	July 1832	[1]	Feb. 1835	30–31	9 and 23 Feb. 1831 [D&C 42:11–77]
1:2	July 1832	[1]	Feb. 1835	26–27	7 Aug. 1831 [D&C 59]
1:2	July 1832	[2]–[3]	Feb. 1835	27–30	16 Feb. 1832 [D&C 76]
1:3	Aug. 1832	[1]	Mar. 1835	42–43	ca. 8 Mar. 1831–A [D&C 46]
1:3	Aug. 1832	[1]	Mar. 1835	43–44	9 May 1831 [D&C 50]
1:4	Sept. 1832	[2]	Apr. 1835	60–62	Sept. 1830–A [D&C 29]
1:4	Sept. 1832	[2]	Apr. 1835	62	30 Oct. 1831 [D&C 65]
1:5	Oct. 1832	[2]	June 1835	74	23 Feb. 1831 [D&C 42:78-93]
1:5	Oct. 1832	[2]–[3]	June 1835	74	Feb. 1831–A [D&C 43:15–35]
1:5	Oct. 1832	[3]	June 1835	73–74	1 Nov. 1831–A [D&C 68]
1:6	Nov. 1832	[7]	Sept. 1835	93–94	7 May 1831 [D&C 49]
1:7	Dec. 1832	[5]	Apr. 1836	105–106	12 Aug. 1831 [D&C 61]
1:7	Dec. 1832	[5]–[6]	Apr. 1836	106–107	4 Dec. 1831 [D&C 72]
1:8	Jan. 1833	[5]–[6]	Apr. 1836	125–126	2 Jan. 1831 [D&C 38]
1:8	Jan. 1833	[6]	Apr. 1836	126	30 Apr. 1832 [D&C 83]
1:9	Feb. 1833	[5]	May 1836	138	27–28 Dec. 1832 [D&C 88:117–126]
1:9	Feb. 1833	[6]–[7]	May 1836	140–141	30 Aug. 1831 [D&C 63:1–64]
1:10	Mar. 1833	[6]	May 1836	155	ca. Aug. 1830 [D&C 27]
1:10	Mar. 1833	[6]	May 1836	155–156	1 Nov. 1831–B [D&C 1]
1:10	Mar. 1833	[6]	May 1836	156–157	3 Jan. 1833 [D&C 88:127–137]
1:12	May 1833	[1]–[2]	June 1836	177–179	3 Nov. 1831 [D&C 133]
2:13	June 1833	97–98	June 1836	193–196	10 Apr. 1830 [D&C 20]

Footnotes

1
Revelation, 20 July 1831, in Doctrine and Covenants 27:5, 1835 ed. [D&C 57:11, 13]; Revelation, 14 June 1831, in Doctrine and Covenants 68:2, 1835 ed. [D&C 55:4].

Doctrine and Covenants of the Church of the Latter Day Saints: Carefully Selected from the Revelations of God. Compiled by Joseph Smith, Oliver Cowdery, Sidney Rigdon, and Frederick G. Williams. Kirtland, OH: F. G. Williams, 1835. Also available in Robin Scott Jensen, Richard E. Turley Jr., Riley M. Lorimer, eds., Revelations and Translations, Volume 2: Published Revelations. Vol. 2 of the Revelations and Translations series of The Joseph Smith Papers, edited by Dean C. Jessee, Ronald K. Esplin, and Richard Lyman Bushman (Salt Lake City: Church Historian’s Press, 2011).
2
William W. Phelps, The Evening and the Morning Star Prospectus, Evening and Morning Star, June 1832 (Jan. 1835), 1–2; Crawley, Descriptive Bibliography, 1:32.

Evening and Morning Star. Edited reprint of The Evening and the Morning Star. Kirtland, OH. Jan. 1835–Oct. 1836.
Crawley, Peter. A Descriptive Bibliography of the Mormon Church. 3 vols. Provo, UT: Religious Studies Center, Brigham Young University, 1997–2012.
3
See, for example, Articles and Covenants, ca. Apr. 1830, and Revelations, 16 Apr. 1830 and ca. Aug. 1830, in “The Mormon Creed,” Painesville Telegraph, 19 Apr. 1831, [4] [D&C 20, 22, and 27:1–5, 14–15, 18]; Revelation, 7 Dec. 1830, in “Miscellaneous,” Painesville Telegraph, 17 Jan. 1832, [1] [D&C 35]; Revelation, 9 Feb. 1831, in “Secret Bye Laws of the Mormonites,” Painesville Telegraph, 13 Sept. 1831, [1] [D&C 42:1–69]; and Revelation, Sept. 1830–B, in Ezra Booth, “Mormonism—Nos. VIII–IX,” Ohio Star, 8 Dec. 1831, [1] [D&C 28].

Painesville Telegraph. Painesville, OH. 1822–1986.
Ohio Star. Ravenna. 1830–1854.
4
See, for example, Notice, The Evening and the Morning Star, Aug. 1832, [7]; “Letters,” The Evening and the Morning Star, Nov. 1832, [4]; “Extract” and “Letters,” The Evening and the Morning Star, Jan. 1833, [7]; and “Extracts of Letters from the Elders Abroad,” The Evening and the Morning Star, Feb. 1833, [5]–[6]. JS, in a November 1832 letter to Phelps, added ten new subscribers to the Star, nine from Guyandotte, Virginia (now West Virginia), and one from Wooster Township, Ohio. (JS, Kirtland, OH, to William W. Phelps, [Independence, MO], 27 Nov. 1832, in JS Letterbook 1, pp. 1–4.)

The Evening and the Morning Star. Independence, MO, June 1832–July 1833; Kirtland, OH, Dec. 1833–Sept. 1834.
JS Letterbook 1 / Smith, Joseph. “Letter Book A,” 1832–1835. Joseph Smith Collection. CHL. MS 155, box 2, fd. 1.
5
Notice, The Evening and the Morning Star, June 1832, [6].

The Evening and the Morning Star. Independence, MO, June 1832–July 1833; Kirtland, OH, Dec. 1833–Sept. 1834.
6
The only known surviving copy of the Upper Missouri Advertiser—no. 3, dated 11 July 1832—is located at the American Antiquarian Society, Worcester, MA.
7
“Free People of Color,” The Evening and the Morning Star, July 1833, 109; “To His Excellency, Daniel Dunklin,” The Evening and the Morning Star, Dec. 1833, 114–115.

The Evening and the Morning Star. Independence, MO, June 1832–July 1833; Kirtland, OH, Dec. 1833–Sept. 1834.
8
The Evening and the Morning Star, Extra, 16 July 1833, [1].

The Evening and the Morning Star. Independence, MO, June 1832–July 1833; Kirtland, OH, Dec. 1833–Sept. 1834.
9
“To the Honorable Men of the World,” The Evening and the Morning Star, Aug. 1832, [6].

The Evening and the Morning Star. Independence, MO, June 1832–July 1833; Kirtland, OH, Dec. 1833–Sept. 1834.
10
See, for example, Articles and Covenants, ca. Apr. 1830, in “The Articles and Covenants of the Church of Christ,” The Evening and the Morning Star, June 1832, [1], and June 1833, 97–98 [D&C 20]; Revelation, 1 Nov. 1831–A, in “A Revelation, Given November 1831,” The Evening and the Morning Star, Oct. 1832, [3] [D&C 68]; and Revelation, 4 Dec. 1831, in “A Revelation Given December 4, 1831,” The Evening and the Morning Star, Dec. 1832, [5]–[6] [D&C 72].

The Evening and the Morning Star. Independence, MO, June 1832–July 1833; Kirtland, OH, Dec. 1833–Sept. 1834.
11
See, for example, Revelation, 9 and 23 Feb. 1831, in “Extract from the Laws for the Government of the Church of Christ” and “Items of Law for the Government of the Church of Christ,” The Evening and the Morning Star, July 1832, [1], and Oct. 1832, [2] [D&C 42:11–93].

The Evening and the Morning Star. Independence, MO, June 1832–July 1833; Kirtland, OH, Dec. 1833–Sept. 1834.
12
See, for example, Revelation, ca. Aug. 1830, in “Revelations,” The Evening and the Morning Star, Mar. 1833, [6] [D&C 27].

The Evening and the Morning Star. Independence, MO, June 1832–July 1833; Kirtland, OH, Dec. 1833–Sept. 1834.
13
See, for example, Vision, 16 Feb. 1832, in “A Vision,” The Evening and the Morning Star, July 1832, [2]–[3] [D&C 76].

The Evening and the Morning Star. Independence, MO, June 1832–July 1833; Kirtland, OH, Dec. 1833–Sept. 1834.
14
See, for example, excerpt of Revelation, ca. 7 Mar. 1831, in “A Prophecy Given to the Church of Christ, March 7, 1831,” The Evening and the Morning Star, June 1832, [2] [D&C 45:1–67, 71].

The Evening and the Morning Star. Independence, MO, June 1832–July 1833; Kirtland, OH, Dec. 1833–Sept. 1834.
15
Revelations addressed to individuals were officially restricted “to the parties concerned” until they could be published in the Book of Commandments. (Minute Book 2, 30 Apr. 1832.)

Minute Book 2 / “The Conference Minutes and Record Book of Christ’s Church of Latter Day Saints,” 1838, 1842, 1844. CHL. Also available at josephsmithpapers.org.

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January 1833 Issue

Revelation, 2 January 1831 [D&C 38]

Revelations.

REVELATION GIVEN, JANUARY 1831.

THUS saith the Lord your God, even Jesus Christ, the Great I AM, Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end, the same which looked upon the wide expanse of eternity, and all the seraphic hosts of heaven, before the world was made, the same which knoweth all things, for all things are present before mine eyes:

I am the same which spake and the world was made, and all things came by me: I am the same which hath taken the Zion of Enoch into mine own bosom:

And verily I say, even as many as have believed on my name, for I am Christ, and in mine own name, by the virtue of the blood which I have spilt, have I plead before the Father for them:

But behold the residue of the wicked have I kept in chains of darkness until the judgment of the great day, which shall come at the end of the earth, and even so will I cause the wicked to be kept, that will not hear my voice but harden their hearts, and wo, wo, wo is their doom.

But behold, verily, verily I say unto you, that mine eyes are upon you; I am in your midst and ye cannot see me, but the day soon cometh that ye shall see me and know that I am, for the vail of darkness shall soon be rent, and he that is not purified shall not abide the day: wherefore, gird up your loins and be prepared.

Behold the kingdom is yours and the enemy shall not overcome.

Verily I say unto you, that ye are clean but not all; and there is none else with whom I am well pleased, for all flesh is corruptible before me, and the powers of darkness prevail upon the earth, among the children of men, in the presence of all the host of heaven, which causeth silence to reign, and all eternity is pained, and the angels are waiting the great command, to reap down the earth, to gather the tares that they may be burned:

And behold the enemy is combined.

And now I show unto you a mystery, a thing which is had in secret chambers, to bring to pass even your destruction, in process of time, and ye knew it not, but now I tell it unto you, and ye are blessed, not because of your iniquity, neither your hearts of unbelief, for verily some of you are guilty before me; but I will be merciful unto your weakness.

Therefore, be ye strong from henceforth; fear not, for the kingdom is yours; and for your salvation I give unto you a , for I have heard your prayers, and the poor have complained before me, and the rich have I made, and all flesh is mine, and I am no respecter to persons.

And I have made the earth rich, and behold it is my footstool: wherefore, again I will stand upon it: and I hold forth and deign to give unto you greater riches, even a land of promise; a land flowing with milk and honey, upon which there shall be no curse when the Lord cometh, and I will give it unto you for the land of your inheritance, if you seek it with all your hearts:

And this shall be my with you, ye shall have it for the land of your , and for the inheritance of your children forever, while the earth shall stand, and ye shall possess it again in eternity, no more to pass away: but verily I say unto you, that in time ye shall have no king nor ruler, for I will be your King and watch over you:

Wherefore, hear my voice and follow me, and you shall be a free people, and ye shall have no laws but my laws, for I am your Law-giver, and what can stay my hand.

But verily I say unto you, teach one another according to the office wherewith I have appointed you, and let every man esteem his brother as himself, and practice virtue and holiness before me.

And again I say unto you, let every man esteem his brother as himself: for what man among you, having twelve sons, and is no respecter to them, and they serve him obediently, and he saith unto the one, be thou clothed in robes and sit thou here; and to the other, be thou clothed in rags and sit thou there, and looketh upon his sons and saith I am just.

Behold, this I have given unto you a parable, and it is even as I am, I say unto you, be one; and if ye are not one, ye are not mine.

And again I say unto you, that the enemy in the secret chambers, seeketh your lives: ye hear of wars in far countries, and you say in your hearts there will soon be great wars in far countries, but ye know not the hearts of them in your own land: I tell you these things because of your prayers:

Wherefore, treasure up wisdom in your bosoms, lest the wickedness of men reveal these things unto you, by their wickedness in a manner, which shall speak in your ears, with a voice louder than that which shall shake the earth: but if ye are prepared, ye shall not fear. [p. [5]]