My neighbor and I were watching all our other neighbors driving off to church about an hour ago (half our neighborhood is mo) and he asked me what mormons really believed. I thought, "well, I might as well go for it", and went ahead and told him. He just said "WTF?"

Since I went though in 97 I don't think I'm supposed to take my own life buy maybe I still am?

Anyway, that's a first for me, it did feel kind of weird. Do they ex people for that?

Has it a name?

It has

Will you give it to me?

*that's what she said*

LOL

I thought that we were supposed to sell those...



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/27/2014 01:33PM by sonoma.

You can buy anything in this world for money.

I forgot about the name thing. I haven't been in probably five years. I can't remember the different names. I'll have to check YouTube to brush up on my signs and tokens.

when the aaronic priesthood joined me I don't remember getting any tokens.

"We, and each of us, covenant and promise that we will not reveal
any of the secrets of this, the first token of the Aaronic priesthood, with its accompanying name, sign or penalty. Should we do so, we agree that our throats be cut from ear to ear and our tongues torn out by their roots. All bow your heads and say Yes."

Is that for real how it used to be done?

Yes, until the early 1900s. Don't know the year they changed. The penalty was dropped in 1990.

That's insane. Was that JS or BY who put that in.

JS got it from Masonry:

". . . the Worshipful Master approaches him, and says, "Mr. A.
B., you are now placed in a proper position to take upon you
the solemn oath or obligation of an Entered Apprentice Mason, .
. . The following obligation is then administered:

I, A. B., of my own free will and accord, . . . do hereby
and hereon most solemnly and sincerely promise and swear that I
will always hail, ever conceal and never reveal any part or
parts, art or arts, point or points of the secret arts and
mysteries of ancient Freemasonry . . . To all of which I do
most solemnly and sincerely promise and swear, without the
least equivocation, mental reservation, or self evasion of mind
in me whatever; binding myself under no less penalty than to
HAVE MY THROAT CUT ACROSS, MY TONGUE TORN OUT BY THE ROOTS, . .
. "

--William Morgan, "Illustrations of Freemasonry," N.Y. 1827.

Morgan was killed for revealing Masonic secrets in this book.
His murder lead to a fierce anti-Masonic movement with
anti-Masonic newspapers, rallies, and even an anti-Masonic
political party. The Gadianton Robbers of the book of Mormon
are but a thinly disguised representation of how Freemasonry
was discussed in the time of the coming forth of the Book of
Mormon.

It is also interesting that William Morgan's widow, Lucinda,
later became a plural wife of Joseph Smith.

Yes, except the date was a typo--early 1990s. We also would slit our breasts open and disembowel ourselves. All this came from Masonry. Over the years phrases such as "have our tongues cut out" were eliminated. Gee, I wonder why?

Ex Aedibus Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> "We, and each of us, covenant and promise that we
> will not reveal
> any of the secrets of this, the first token of the
> Aaronic priesthood, with its accompanying name,
> sign or penalty. Should we do so, we agree that
> our throats be cut from ear to ear and our tongues
> torn out by their roots. All bow your heads and
> say Yes."

That's some crazy shit there. Wow.

I went after the penalties were taken out. How did anyone go through when the penalties were still in and not run away screaming? I thought the watered down temple ceremony was creepy enough.

My guess is that it was Brother Brigham who put that in. I went through the temple in temple to witness the penalties though (take part in them). It was visually gruesome.

Brigham Young formalized the temple ceremony at the request of JS, so he put in what he wanted. There was also a covenant back then to avenge the deaths of Joseph and Hyrum. Obviously, that was put into the ceremony by Brigham.

george Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> My guess is that it was Brother Brigham who put
> that in. I went through the temple in temple to
> witness the penalties though (take part in them).
> It was visually gruesome.


So in the movie did they actually show people getting their throats cut?

Darling. In the olden days we didn't have movies. Lol. The ceremony was acted out live, like a play.

sonoma Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Darling. In the olden days we didn't have movies.
> Lol. The ceremony was acted out live, like a play.

The movies started in new temples in the 1960s. The penalties were not eliminated until 1990.

So for almost 30 years the movies did indeed show the throat-slitting, etc. (Although I must admit that during that time I never was worthy enough to watch the film.)

I was a teenager when I first came across some written depictions of what the endowment ceremony was like. I've always been an avid reader of newspapers and I grew up in Arizona. So, when the ceremony was changed in 1990, I learned all about it thanks to the Arizona Republic.

To be honest, it freaked me out. I could not believe that this was the thing my parents were driving four hours down to Mesa every month to do.

While I didn't go through pre-90's, the places in the script where it would have been mentioned were after the film portion of the endowment ceremony, so I don't think they would have actually been shown in the films at all anyway.

I crossed my fingers. Then I forgot the signs. I kind of remember and would be willing to show them and tell anyone who would ask, especially after I resigned. No one has been inquiring.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/27/2014 04:16PM by rhgc.

From 1921 until 1927, Mormon apostle George F. Richards was given permission to write down the entire ceremony, including parts which had previously only been passed down orally. It was then that the gruesome oaths, like the one I mentioned above, were taken out and replaced with, '...rather than do so, I would suffer my life to be taken.'

Oh yes, I made that promise on my wedding day. I had no clue that I'd signed up for such insanity. I was only 18.

Haha, that came along after the divorce. After all, it was the 70's, and I was young, single, and hated mormonism.

Funny this topic came up...I regularly tell people my Temple name and the Secret not Sacred BS they tech in the temple. I work for the Department of Defense and routinely work with young soldiers and airmen who are stationed in Utah and totally unfamiliar with Mormonism. I showed one soldier the handshakes. He went up to a guy that we knew was Mormon and shook the guys hand using the "Patriarchal Grip". The guy visibly grew pale and mouth dropped open when it happened. It was pretty funny.

Last Friday an airman I work with was asking about Mormonism and said a coworker of mine was always talking about the Ogden Temple and the upcoming open house, he said the guy was willing to answer any question he has...I told him to ask him what his temple name is and that will shut him up....He said he would.

Does it strike anyone else as odd that the ONLY party that could be accused of "selling the tokens or signs for money" is the church itself, with its "full tithe payer" requirement for a TR? There's some irony for you... Other than the church itself, I seriously doubt there's even a market for them.

I put mine on Ebay..... yeah, no bidders... sigh

I also work for the Department of Defense. A couple of months ago we had a visitor from one of the European defense agencies. In talking to him I found out he used to be a Mason. He didn't want to talk about anything specific to the Masons. So I'd mention various parts of the mormon temple ceremony and ask if anything sounded familiar. He was laughing his head off and saying the mormon temple ceremony was a total rip off of the Masons.