The King Follett Sermon, one of the
classics of Church literature, was given by the Prophet Joseph Smith at the
The account of the talk noted that it was the funeral sermon for Elder King Follett, a close friend of the Prophet’s
who had been killed in an accident on March 9. Longhand notes of the discourse
were made by Willard Richards, Wilford Woodruff, Thomas Bullock, and William
Clayton. This reprint was taken from the Documentary History of the Church,
vol. 6, pages 302-17. That volume notes: “This was not a stenographic report,
but a carefully and skillfully prepared one made by these men who were trained
in reporting and taking notes. Evidently, there are some imperfections in the
report and some thoughts expressed by the Prophet which were not fully rounded
out and made complete. …”
It should also be noted that this discourse was given two months before the
death of Joseph Smith. During these months the enemies of the Church were
extremely active, and the Prophet undoubtedly anticipated the coming events.
The first part of the sermon
is printed this month, with the conclusion planned for the May issue of the
Ensign. In future issues of the Ensign, other significant discourses and
articles from the past will be presented.
Joseph Smith
Jr., “The King
Follett Sermon,” Ensign, Apr. 1971, 13-14
Beloved Saints: I will call [for] the attention of this congregation while I
address you on the subject of the dead. The decease of our beloved brother,
Elder King Follett, who was crushed in a well by the falling of a tub of
rock has more immediately led me to this subject. I have been requested to
speak by his friends and relatives, but inasmuch as there are a great many in
this congregation who live in this city as well as elsewhere, who have lost
friends, I feel disposed to speak on the subject in general, and offer you my
ideas, so far as I have ability, and so far as I shall be inspired by the Holy
Spirit to dwell on this subject.
I want your prayers and faith that I may have the instruction of Almighty
God and the gift of the Holy Ghost, so that I may set forth things that are
true and which can be easily comprehended by you, and that the testimony may
carry conviction to your hearts and minds of the truth of what I shall say.
Pray that the Lord may strengthen my lungs, stay the winds, and let the prayers
of the Saints to heaven appear, that they may enter into the ears of the Lord
of Sabaoth, for the effectual prayers of the righteous avail much. There is
strength here, and I verily believe that your prayers will be heard.
Before I enter fully into the investigation of the subject which is lying
before me, I wish to pave the way and bring up the subject from the beginning,
that you may understand it. I will make a few preliminaries, in order that you
may understand the subject when I come to it. I do not calculate or intend to
please your ears with superfluity of words or oratory, or with much learning;
but I calculate [intend] to edify you with the simple truths from heaven.
The Character of God
In the first place, I wish to go back to the beginning—to the morn of
creation. There is the starting point for us to look to, in order to understand
and be fully acquainted with the mind, purposes and decrees of the Great
Eloheim, who sits in yonder heavens as he did at the creation of the world. It
is necessary for us to have an understanding of God himself in the beginning.
If we start right, it is easy to go right all the time; but if we start wrong
we may go wrong, and it will be a hard matter to get right.
There are but a very few beings in the world who understand rightly the
character of God. The great majority of mankind do not comprehend anything,
either that which is past, or that which is to come, as it respects their
relationship to God. They do not know, neither do they understand the nature of
that relationship; and consequently they know but little above the brute beast,
or more than to eat, drink and sleep. This is all man knows about God and His
existence, unless it is given by the inspiration of the Almighty.
If a man learns nothing more than to eat, drink and sleep, and does not
comprehend any of the designs of God, the beast comprehends the same things. It
eats, drinks, sleeps, and knows nothing more about God; yet it knows as much as
we, unless we are able to comprehend by the inspiration of Almighty God. If men
do not comprehend the character of God, they do not comprehend themselves. I
want to go back to the beginning, and so lift your minds into more lofty
spheres and a more exalted understanding than what the human mind generally
aspires to.
I want to ask this congregation, every man, woman and child, to answer the
question in their own hearts, what kind of a being God is? Ask yourselves; turn
your thoughts into your hearts, and say if any of you have seen, heard, or
communed with Him? This is a question that may occupy your attention for a long
time. I again repeat the question—What kind of being is God? Does any man or
woman know? Have any of you seen Him, heard Him, or communed with Him? Here is
the question that will, peradventure, from this time henceforth occupy your
attention. The scriptures inform us that “this is life eternal, that they might
know thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast sent.” (John
17:3.)
If any man does not know God, and inquires what kind of a being He is—if he
will search diligently his own heart—if the declaration of Jesus and the
apostles be true, he will realize that he has not eternal life; for there can
be eternal life on no other principle.
My first object is to find out the character of the only wise and true God,
and what kind of a being He is; and if I am so fortunate as to be the man to
comprehend God, and explain or convey the principles to your hearts, so that
the Spirit seals them upon you, then let every man and woman henceforth sit in
silence, put their hands on their mouths, and never lift their hands or voices,
or say anything against the man of God or the servants of God again. But if I
fail to do it, it becomes my duty to renounce all further pretensions to revelations
and inspirations, or to be a prophet; and I should be like the rest of the
world—a false teacher, be hailed as a friend, and no man would seek my life.
But if all religious teachers were honest enough to renounce their pretensions
to godliness when their ignorance of the knowledge of God is made manifest,
they will all be as badly off as I am, at any rate; and you might just as well
take the lives of other false teachers as that of mine. If any man is
authorized to take away my life because he thinks and says I am a false
teacher, then, upon the same principle, we should be justified in taking away
the life of every false teacher, and where would be the end of blood? And who
would not be the sufferer?
The Privilege of Religious
Freedom
But meddle not with any man for his religion: all governments ought to
permit every man to enjoy his religion unmolested. No man is authorized to take
away life in consequence of difference of religion, which all laws and
governments ought to tolerate and protect, right or wrong. Every man has a
natural, and, in our country, a constitutional right to be a false prophet, as
well as a true prophet. If I show, verily, that I have the truth of God, and
show that ninety-nine out of every hundred professing religious ministers are
false teachers, having no authority, while they pretend to hold the keys of
God’s kingdom on earth, and was to kill them because they are false teachers,
it would deluge the whole world with blood.
I will prove that the world is wrong, by showing what God is. I am going to
inquire after God; for I want you all to know Him, and to be familiar with Him;
and if I am bringing you to a knowledge of Him, all persecutions against me
ought to cease. You will then know that I am His servant; for I speak as one having
authority.
God an Exalted Man
I will go back to the beginning before the world was, to show what kind of a
being God is. What sort of a being was God in the beginning? Open your ears and
hear, all ye ends of the earth, for I am going to prove it to you by the Bible,
and to tell you the designs of God in relation to the human race, and why He
interferes with the affairs of man.
God himself was once as we are now, and is an exalted man, and sits
enthroned in yonder heavens! That is the great secret. If the veil were rent
today, and the great God who holds this world in its orbit, and who upholds all
worlds and all things by His power, was to make himself visible—I say, if you
were to see him today, you would see him like a man in form—like yourselves in
all the person, image, and very form as a man; for Adam was created in the very
fashion, image and likeness of God, and received instruction from, and walked,
talked and conversed with Him, as one man talks and communes with another.
In order to understand the subject of the dead, for consolation of those who
mourn for the loss of their friends, it is necessary we should understand the
character and being of God and how He came to be so; for I am going to tell you
how God came to be God. We have imagined and supposed that God was God from all
eternity. I will refute that idea, and take away the veil, so that you may see.
These ideas are incomprehensible to some, but they are simple. It is the
first principle of the gospel to know for a certainty the character of God, and
to know that we may converse with Him as one man converses with another, and
that He was once a man like us; yea, that God himself, the Father of us all,
dwelt on an earth, the same as Jesus Christ Himself did; and I will show it
from the Bible.
Eternal Life to Know God and
Jesus Christ
I wish I was in a suitable place to tell it, and that I had the trump of an
archangel, so that I could tell the story in such a manner that persecution
would cease forever. What did Jesus say? (Mark it, Elder Rigdon!) The
scriptures inform us that Jesus said, as the Father hath power in himself, even
so hath the Son power—to do what? Why, what the Father did. The answer is
obvious—in a manner to lay down his body and take it up again. Jesus, what are
you going to do? To lay down my life as my Father did, and take it up again. Do
you believe it? If you do not believe it you do not believe the Bible. The
scriptures say it, and I defy all the learning and wisdom and all the combined
powers of earth and hell together to refute it. Here, then, is eternal life—to
know the only wise and true God; and you have got to learn how to be gods
yourselves, and to be kings and priests to God, the same as all
gods have done before you, namely, by going from one small degree to another,
and from a small capacity to a great one; from grace to grace, from exaltation
to exaltation, until you attain to the resurrection of the dead, and are able
to dwell in everlasting burnings, and to sit in glory, as do those who sit
enthroned in everlasting power. And I want you to know that God, in the last
days, while certain individuals are proclaiming His name, is not trifling with
you or me.
The Righteous to Dwell in
Everlasting Burnings
These are the first principles of consolation. How consoling to the mourners
when they are called to part with a husband, wife, father, mother, child, or
dear relative, to know that, although the earthly tabernacle is laid down and
dissolved, they shall rise again to dwell in everlasting burnings in immortal
glory, not to sorrow, suffer, or die any more, but they shall be heirs of God
and joint heirs with Jesus Christ. What is it? To inherit the same power, the
same glory and the same exaltation, until you arrive at the station of a god,
and ascend the throne of eternal power, the same as those who have gone before.
What did Jesus do? Why, I do the things I saw my Father do when worlds came
rolling into existence. My Father worked out His kingdom with fear and
trembling, and I must do the same; and when I get my kingdom, I shall present
it to My Father, so that He may obtain kingdom upon kingdom, and it will exalt
Him in glory. He will then take a higher exaltation, and I will take His place,
and thereby become exalted myself. So that Jesus treads in the tracks of His Father,
and inherits what God did before; and God is thus glorified and exalted in the
salvation and exaltation of all His children. It is plain beyond disputation,
and you thus learn some of the first principles of the gospel, about which so
much hath been said.
When you climb up a ladder, you must begin at the bottom, and ascend step by
step, until you arrive at the top; and so it is with the principles of the
gospel—you must begin with the first, and go on until you learn all the
principles of exaltation. But it will be a great while after you have passed
through the veil before you will have learned them. It is not all to be
comprehended in this world; it will be a great work to learn our salvation and
exaltation even beyond the grave. I suppose I am not allowed to go into an
investigation of anything that is not contained in the Bible. If I do, I think
there are so many over-wise men here that they would cry “treason” and put me
to death. So I will go to the old Bible and turn commentator today.
I shall comment on the very first Hebrew word in the Bible; I will make a
comment on the very first sentence of the history of creation in the Bible—Berosheit.
I want to analyze the word. Baith—in, by, through, and everything
else. Rosh—the head, Sheit—grammatical termination. When the
inspired man wrote it, he did not put the baith there. An old Jew without any
authority added the word; he thought it too bad to begin to talk about the
head! It read first, “The head one of the Gods brought forth the Gods.” That is
the true meaning of the words. Baurau signifies to bring forth. If you
do not believe it, you do not believe the learned man of God. Learned men can
teach you no more than what I have told you. Thus the head God brought forth
the Gods in the grand council.
I will transpose and simplify it in the English language. Oh, ye lawyers, ye
doctors, and ye priests, who have persecuted me, I want to let you know that
the Holy Ghost knows something as well as you do. The head God called together
the Gods and sat in grand council to bring forth the world. The grand
councilors sat at the head in yonder heavens and contemplated the creation of
the worlds which were created at the time. When I say doctors and lawyers, I
mean the doctors and lawyers of the scriptures. I have done so hitherto without
explanation, to let the lawyers flutter and everybody laugh at them. Some
learned doctors might take a notion to say the scriptures say thus and so; and
we must believe the scriptures; they are not to be altered. But I am going to
show you an error in them.
I have an old edition of the New Testament in the Latin, Hebrew, German and
Greek languages. I have been reading the German, and find it to be the most
[nearly] correct translation, and to correspond nearest to the revelations which
God has given to me for the last fourteen years. It tells about Jacobus, the
son of Zebedee. It means Jacob. In the English New Testament it is translated
James. Now, if Jacob had the keys, you might talk about James through all
eternity and never get the keys. In the 21st [verse] of the fourth chapter of
Matthew, my old German edition gives the word Jacob instead of James.
The doctors (I mean doctors of law, not physic) say, “If you preach anything
not according to the Bible, we will cry treason.” How can we escape the
damnation of hell, except God be with us and reveal to us? Men bind us with
chains. The Latin says Jacobus, which means Jacob; the Hebrew says Jacob, the
Greek says Jacob and the German says Jacob, here we have the testimony of four
against one. I thank God that I have got this old book; but I thank him more
for the gift of the Holy Ghost. I have got the oldest book in the world; but I
have got the oldest book in my heart, even the gift of the Holy Ghost. I have
all the four Testaments. Come here, ye learned men, and read, if you can. I
should not have introduced this testimony, were it not to back up the word rosh—the
head, the Father of the Gods. I should not have brought it up, only to show
that I am right.
A Council of the Gods
In the beginning, the head of the Gods called a council of the Gods; and
they came together and concocted [prepared] a plan to create the world and
people it. When we begin to learn this way, we begin to learn the only true
God, and what kind of a being we have got to worship. Having a knowledge of
God, we begin to know how to approach Him, and how to ask so as to receive an
answer.
When we understand the character of God, and know how to come to Him, he
begins to unfold the heavens to us, and to tell us all about it. When we are
ready to come to him, he is ready to come to us.
Now, I ask all who hear me, why the learned men who are preaching salvation,
say that God created the heavens and the earth out of nothing? The reason is,
that they are unlearned in the things of God, and have not the gift of the Holy
Ghost; they account it blasphemy in any one to contradict their idea. If you
tell them that God made the world out of something, they will call you a fool.
But I am learned, and know more than all the world put together. The Holy Ghost
does, anyhow, and he is within me, and comprehends more than all the world; and
I will associate myself with him.
Meaning of the Word Create
You ask the learned doctors why they say the world was made out of nothing,
and they will answer, “Doesn’t the Bible say he created the world?” And
they infer, from the word create, that it must have been made out of nothing.
Now, the word create came from the word baurau, which does not mean to
create out of nothing; it means to organize; the same as a man would organize
materials and build a ship. Hence we infer that God had materials to organize
the world out of chaos—chaotic matter, which is element, and in which dwells
all the glory. Element had an existence from the time He had. The pure principles
of element are principles which can never be destroyed; they may be organized
and re-organized, but not destroyed. They had no beginning and can have no end.
(To be concluded)
Gospel topics: Church doctrine, creation, goals, Joseph
Smith, plan of salvation
[illustrations] Art by
Richard D. Hull
© 2003 Intellectual Reserve, Inc. All
rights reserved.