Joseph Smith—History 1:66–75
Verse-by-Verse Commentary
Joseph Smith—History 1:66–67
66 On the 5th day of April, 1829, Oliver Cowdery came to my house, until which time I had never seen him. He stated to me that having been teaching school in the neighborhood where my father resided, and my father being one of those who sent to the school, he went to board for a season at his house, and while there the family related to him the circumstances of my having received the plates, and accordingly he had come to make inquiries of me.
67 Two days after the arrival of Mr. Cowdery (being the 7th of April) I commenced to translate the Book of Mormon, and he began to write for me.
Oliver Cowdery’s account of these events, found at the end of Joseph Smith—History, provides a second witness to Joseph’s account of the manifestation of John the Baptist. While Joseph’s written history began in 1838, Oliver recorded his account in a series of letters written four years earlier to W. W. Phelps and published in the Latter-day Saints’ Messenger and Advocate. After he was excommunicated from the Church in 1838, Oliver also provided separate accounts of the angel’s visitation. In 1846 he wrote a letter to his friend and brother-in-law Phineas H. Young (who was the brother of Brigham Young and was married to Oliver’s half-sister Lucy) in which he briefly shared his testimony of the restoration of the priesthood.
When Oliver returned to the Church in 1848, he was invited by Apostle Orson Hyde to speak in a meeting. Reuben Miller was present at the meeting and recorded Oliver’s statements in his journal and published them in the Deseret News in 1859. In addition, in 1907 Samuel W. Richards published a report of an interview in January 1849 in which Oliver described the restoration of priesthood keys through John the Baptist as well as Peter, James, and John.
Joseph Smith—History 1:68–70
68 We still continued the work of translation, when, in the ensuing month (May, 1829), we on a certain day went into the woods to pray and inquire of the Lord respecting baptism for the remission of sins, that we found mentioned in the translation of the plates. While we were thus employed, praying and calling upon the Lord, a messenger from heaven descended in a cloud of light, and having laid his hands upon us, he ordained us, saying:
69 Upon you my fellow servants, in the name of Messiah, I confer the Priesthood of Aaron, which holds the keys of the ministering of angels, and of the gospel of repentance, and of baptism by immersion for the remission of sins; and this shall never be taken again from the earth until the sons of Levi do offer again an offering unto the Lord in righteousness.
70 He said this Aaronic Priesthood had not the power of laying on hands for the gift of the Holy Ghost, but that this should be conferred on us hereafter; and he commanded us to go and be baptized, and gave us directions that I should baptize Oliver Cowdery, and that afterwards he should baptize me.
In his 1834 letter, Oliver recorded a more precise account of what led them to inquire about the authority to baptize: “After writing the account of the Savior’s ministry to the remnant of the seed of Jacob, upon this continent, it was easily to be seen, as the prophet said would be, that darkness covered the earth and gross darkness the minds of the people. On reflecting further, it was easily to be seen, that amid the great strife and noise concerning religion, none had authority to administer in the name of Christ.” We do not know what passage Joseph and Oliver were translating when this question arose, though it is likely they were reading 3 Nephi 11:21–23, where the Savior bestows the authority to baptize on the Nephite disciples.
Oliver offered a slightly different account of the angel’s words than Joseph does in his 1838 history. Oliver records the angel’s blessing as, “Upon you my fellow-servants, in the name of Messiah, I confer this Priesthood and this authority, which shall remain upon the earth, the Sons of Levi may yet offer an offering unto the Lord in righteousness!” In his 1834 letter, Oliver refers only to “this Priesthood and this authority,” though Joseph later specified that it was the “priesthood of Aaron” restored at this time (D&C 13). In later reminiscences, Oliver also specified that what John the Baptist restored was the Aaronic Priesthood.
In his 1846 letter to Phineas Young, Oliver worried about how his character had been presented in the Church after his excommunication, writing, “I have been sensitive on this subject, I admit; but I ought to be so—you would be under the circumstances, had you stood in the presence of John, and with our departed brother Joseph, to receive the Lesser Priesthood.” When Oliver returned to the Church in 1846, Reuben Miller recorded him saying in a public address, “I was also present with Joseph when an holy angel from God came down from heaven and conferred on us, or restored, the lesser or Aaronic Priesthood, and said to us, at the same time, that it should remain upon the earth while the earth stands.” In an interview recorded in the final months of Oliver’s life, Samuel W. Richards recorded Oliver speaking of “John the Baptist, holding the keys of the Aaronic Priesthood” and saying that both the Aaronic and Melchizedek Priesthoods “with their authority, are now, and must continue to be in the body of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.”
Joseph Smith—History 1:71
71 Accordingly we went and were baptized. I baptized him first, and afterwards he baptized me—after which I laid my hands upon his head and ordained him to the Aaronic Priesthood, and afterwards he laid his hands on me and ordained me to the same Priesthood—for so we were commanded.
Why did Joseph and Oliver baptize each other instead of asking for the ordinance to be performed by John the Baptist? Sidney B. Sperry reasoned that “baptism, like marriage, is an earthly ordinance and must be performed by mortal men having the proper authority. The heavenly messenger gave Joseph and Oliver the proper authority and then commanded them to baptize each other in order to set the proper example among men from that time forward.”
Precedent for this ordinance was set in the Book of Mormon, when the Savior, in His resurrected, glorified state, bestowed the power to baptize upon His disciples but did not baptize them Himself. Later, in 3 Nephi 19:10–13 the disciples baptize each other, and the Holy Ghost descends on them, as it does on Joseph and Oliver following their baptism.
Joseph Smith—History 1:72
72 The messenger who visited us on this occasion and conferred this Priesthood upon us, said that his name was John, the same that is called John the Baptist in the New Testament, and that he acted under the direction of Peter, James and John, who held the keys of the Priesthood of Melchizedek, which Priesthood, he said, would in due time be conferred on us, and that I should be called the first Elder of the Church, and he (Oliver Cowdery) the second. It was on the fifteenth day of May, 1829, that we were ordained under the hand of this messenger, and baptized.
While we know the precise date and approximate location of the restoration of the Aaronic Priesthood, the details of the restoration of the Melchizedek Priesthood are less well known. In Doctrine and Covenants 128:20, written in 1842, Joseph speaks of the “the voice of Peter, James, and John in the wilderness between Harmony, Susquehanna county, and Colesville, Broome county on the Susquehanna river, declaring themselves as possessing the keys of the kingdom, and of the dispensation of the fulness of times!” This verse would appear to give us an approximate location, and perhaps an approximate time, of the restoration because Joseph and Oliver left the Harmony area in June 1829 moved to Fayette, New York, where they completed the translation in the company of the Whitmer family.
In Doctrine and Covenants 27:12 the Lord speaks of “Peter, and James, and John, whom I have sent unto you, by whom I have ordained you and confirmed you to be apostles, and especial witnesses of my name, and bear the keys of your ministry.” This verse was first added after 1833 and speaks of Joseph and Oliver becoming special apostolic witnesses without mentioning the title of Melchizedek Priesthood. After their arrival at the Whitmer farm, Joseph and Oliver also received a special visitation related to the restoration of the priesthood. Joseph records, “We now became anxious to have that promise realized to us, which Angel that conferred upon us the Aaronic Priesthood has given us, viz: that provided we continued faithful; we should also have the Melchizedek Priesthood, which holds the authority of the laying on of hands for the gift of the Holy Ghost.” He continues, “We had for some time made this matter a subject of humble prayer, and at length we got together in the chamber of [Peter Whitmer, Sr.] . . . we had not long been engaged in solemn and fervent prayer, when the word of the Lord, came unto us in the chamber, commanding us; that I should ordain Oliver Cowdery to be an Elder in the Church of Jesus Christ, and that he should ordain me to the same office.” Joseph and Oliver, however, were also commanded to defer their ordinations “until, such times, as it should be practicable to have our brethren, who had been and who should be baptized, assembled together, when we must have their sanction to our thus proceeding to ordain each other.”
While we do not know the exact date of these events, a circumstantial case can be made that Peter, James, and John must have appeared in late May or early June 1829, shortly after the visit of John the Baptist. In Doctrine and Covenants 128:21, Joseph speaks of “the voice of God in the chamber of old Father Whitmer,” which seems to place this event in sequence behind the visit of Peter, James, and John. Some scholars have argued that the experience in the chamber of Father Whitmer was the restoration of the Melchizedek Priesthood and that Peter, James, and John later restored the keys of the Apostleship.
Though the restoration of the Melchizedek Priesthood is more complicated than it initially appears to be, astute students of Church history should not miss the forest for the trees. Joseph and Oliver both consistently testified of the involvement of Peter, James, and John in the event. In an 1839 discourse, Joseph taught, “How have we come at the priesthood in the last days—they came down in regular succession. Peter, James, and John had it given to them, and they gave it [to others].” In 1846 Oliver Cowdery testified that he had stood “in the presence of Peter, to receive the Greater [priesthood],” and in 1848 he proclaimed that “I was also present with Joseph when the higher or Melchizedek Priesthood was conferred by the Holy Angel from on high.”
The Church’s official position on the restoration of the Melchizedek Priesthood was simply stated in the April 2020 proclamation on the Restoration: “We affirm that under the direction of the Father and the Son, heavenly messengers came to instruct Joseph and re-establish the Church of Jesus Christ. The resurrected John the Baptist restored the authority to baptize by immersion for the remission of sins. Three of the original twelve Apostles—Peter, James, and John—restored the apostleship and keys of priesthood authority.”
Joseph Smith—History 1:73–75
73 Immediately on our coming up out of the water after we had been baptized, we experienced great and glorious blessings from our Heavenly Father. No sooner had I baptized Oliver Cowdery, than the Holy Ghost fell upon him, and he stood up and prophesied many things which should shortly come to pass. And again, so soon as I had been baptized by him, I also had the spirit of prophecy, when, standing up, I prophesied concerning the rise of this Church, and many other things connected with the Church, and this generation of the children of men. We were filled with the Holy Ghost, and rejoiced in the God of our salvation.
74 Our minds being now enlightened, we began to have the scriptures laid open to our understandings, and the true meaning and intention of their more mysterious passages revealed unto us in a manner which we never could attain to previously, nor ever before had thought of. In the meantime we were forced to keep secret the circumstances of having received the Priesthood and our having been baptized, owing to a spirit of persecution which had already manifested itself in the neighborhood.
75 We had been threatened with being mobbed, from time to time, and this, too, by professors of religion. And their intentions of mobbing us were only counteracted by the influence of my wife’s father’s family (under Divine providence), who had become very friendly to me, and who were opposed to mobs, and were willing that I should be allowed to continue the work of translation without interruption; and therefore offered and promised us protection from all unlawful proceedings, as far as in them lay.
Both Joseph and Oliver reported that after their baptism and experience with the angel the Holy Spirit descended upon them and they received the gift of prophecy and spoke many things about the rise of the Church and the fate of their generation. Another effect of their baptism was that the scriptures became more plain to them, with “the true meaning and intention of their more mysterious passages revealed unto us in a manner which we never could attain to previously, nor ever before had thought of” (verse 74). While academic and scholarly tools can greatly contribute to our understanding of God’s word, the Holy Ghost is essential to our clear understanding of the scriptures. In a discourse given near the end of his life, Joseph expressed his gratitude for a work of scholarship and then remarked, “I thank God I have got this book, and thank him more for the gift of the Holy Ghost. . . . The Holy Ghost within me comprehends more than all the world.”
Footnotes
