The LDS Church claims that its doctrines come through direct prophetic revelation — that the Prophet speaks for God, and that what is "sealed by the Holy Spirit of Promise" carries divine authority. This claim raises an unavoidable question: what happens when one Prophet's revelation contradicts another's? The record below documents five major doctrinal areas where official LDS teaching has not merely developed, but been reversed or abandoned under social, political, or legal pressure — often after being explicitly declared eternal, scriptural, or salvific.
Plural Marriage (Polygamy)
Reversed
1831
Practiced
Private Practice Begins
Joseph Smith takes Fanny Alger as a plural wife, c. 1833–1835, while publicly denying the practice. LDS historical essays now acknowledge this marriage predates the 1843 written revelation.
— LDS Gospel Topics Essay: "Plural Marriage in Kirtland and Nauvoo," LDS.org, 2014
1843
Revealed
D&C 132: The Revelation on Celestial Marriage
"If any man espouse a virgin, and desire to espouse another... then is he justified; he cannot commit adultery... for they are given unto him."
— D&C 132:61–62, dictated July 12, 1843
Brigham Young declared: "The only men who become Gods, even the Sons of God, are those who enter into polygamy." The practice was taught as essential to exaltation.
— Brigham Young, Journal of Discourses, vol. 11, p. 269, 1866
1862
Defended
Morrill Anti-Bigamy Act Passed
The U.S. Congress passes the Morrill Act outlawing polygamy in territories. LDS leadership publicly rejects the law as unconstitutional interference with religious practice. Prophet John Taylor declares: "God is greater than the United States."
— John Taylor, Journal of Discourses, vol. 20, p. 318, 1879
1890
Reversed
Official Declaration 1 — The Manifesto
"Inasmuch as laws have been enacted by Congress forbidding plural marriages... I hereby declare my intention to submit to those laws, and to use my influence with the members of the Church over which I preside to have them do likewise."
— Wilford Woodruff, Official Declaration 1, September 24, 1890
The Manifesto followed the U.S. Supreme Court's upholding of the Edmunds-Tucker Act, which had disenfranchised Utah members and seized Church property. Utah statehood was contingent on abandonment of polygamy, granted 1896. D&C 132 — the revelation commanding polygamy — remains in LDS scripture to this day, unrevoked.
The Adam-God Theory
Abandoned
1852
Taught
Brigham Young Preaches Adam-God from the Tabernacle
"Now hear it, O inhabitants of the earth, Jew and Gentile, Saint and sinner! When our father Adam came into the garden of Eden, he came into it with a celestial body and brought Eve, one of his wives, with him. He is our Father and our God, and the only God with whom we have to do."
— Brigham Young, Journal of Discourses, vol. 1, p. 50, April 9, 1852
1854–76
Repeated
Taught Repeatedly as Doctrine
"It is true that the earth was organized by three distinct characters, namely, Eloheim, Yahovah, and Michael, these three forming a quorum, as in all heavenly bodies, and in organizing element, perfectly represented in the Deity, as Father, Son, and Holy Ghost."
— Brigham Young, Journal of Discourses, vol. 1, p. 51, 1852; taught continuously through 1876
Young insisted this was not speculation but revelation, and taught it from the tabernacle and in general conference settings over two decades. It was incorporated into the Endowment ceremony.
1976
Abandoned
President Spencer W. Kimball Condemns the Doctrine
"We denounce that theory and hope that everyone will be cautioned against this and other kinds of false doctrine."
— Spencer W. Kimball, Church News, October 9, 1976; also published as "Our Own Liahona," Ensign, November 1976, p. 77
The current LDS position is that Adam-God was a misunderstanding or misreporting of Brigham Young — despite Young's repeated, clear, unambiguous statements delivered as prophetic teaching over 24 years from the tabernacle pulpit. The Journal of Discourses, the official record, is now officially described as not "authoritative."
Blood Atonement
Abandoned
1856
Taught
Brigham Young's Reformation Sermons
"There are sins that men commit for which they cannot receive forgiveness in this world or in that which is to come, and if they had their eyes open to see their true condition, they would be perfectly willing to have their blood spilt upon the ground, that the smoke thereof might ascend to heaven as an offering for their sins."
— Brigham Young, Journal of Discourses, vol. 4, pp. 53–54, September 21, 1856
During the Utah Reformation of 1856–57, Young and other leaders taught that certain sins — including apostasy, adultery, murder, and interracial marriage — required the literal shedding of a sinner's blood to obtain forgiveness, since Christ's atonement was deemed insufficient for those sins.
1857–58
Applied
Mountain Meadows Massacre & Broader Context
Historians including Juanita Brooks and Will Bagley have documented the theological context of blood atonement teaching surrounding the 1857 Mountain Meadows Massacre, in which approximately 120 emigrants were killed. The doctrine was wielded as justification for violence against apostates and perceived enemies of the Church.
— Will Bagley, Blood of the Prophets (University of Oklahoma Press, 2002)
1978+
Abandoned
Quietly Discontinued
The LDS Church has never issued a formal repudiation or Official Declaration specifically retracting blood atonement. It has simply stopped teaching it. Current spokespersons describe it as a misunderstanding of metaphorical language. The original sermons, however, were explicit and were delivered as prophetic doctrine, not metaphor.
— See also: Bruce R. McConkie, Mormon Doctrine (1958), p. 92, which still defined blood atonement positively
Blacks and the Priesthood
Reversed
1849
Instituted
Brigham Young Codifies the Ban
"Any man having one drop of the seed of Cain in him cannot hold the Priesthood and if no other Prophet ever spake it before, I will say it now in the name of Jesus Christ."
— Brigham Young, Wilford Woodruff Journal, January 16, 1852; cf. Church History Library
The ban on Black members holding the priesthood or receiving temple ordinances was grounded in the "curse of Cain" theology — the belief that Black Africans bore the mark of Cain and were "less valiant" in the pre-mortal life. This was taught as doctrinal revelation, not policy.
1949
Confirmed
First Presidency Statement
"The attitude of the Church with reference to Negroes remains as it has always been. It is not a matter of the declaration of a policy but of direct commandment from the Lord."
— First Presidency Statement, August 17, 1949 (George Albert Smith, David O. McKay, J. Reuben Clark Jr.) — transcript confirmed by Church History Library, per B.H. Roberts Foundation
1978
Reversed
Official Declaration 2
"He has heard our prayers, and by revelation has confirmed that the long-promised day has come when every faithful, worthy man in the Church may receive the holy priesthood."
— Spencer W. Kimball, Official Declaration 2, June 8, 1978
The reversal came amid significant social pressure, including the threat of losing tax-exempt status and the exclusion of BYU from athletic conferences. The 2013 LDS Gospel Topics Essay "Race and the Priesthood" now states the ban "originated with Brigham Young" and that the "curse of Cain" justification was never "revelatory" — directly contradicting the 1949 First Presidency statement that it was "direct commandment from the Lord."
— LDS Gospel Topics Essay: "Race and the Priesthood," LDS.org, 2013
The Nature of God across Joseph Smith's Ministry
Substantially Altered
1830
Taught
Book of Mormon — Trinitarian / Modalist Language
"And now, behold, this is the doctrine of Christ, and the only and true doctrine of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost, which is one God, without end."
— 2 Nephi 31:21, Book of Mormon (1830)
"And because he dwelleth in flesh he shall be called the Son of God, and having subjected the flesh to the will of the Father, being the Father and the Son."
— Mosiah 15:2, Book of Mormon (1830) — classic modalist/monarchian language
1835
Shifting
Lectures on Faith — God as Spirit
"There are two personages who constitute the great, matchless, governing and supreme power over all things... The Father being a personage of spirit, glory and power: possessing all perfection and fullness."
— Lectures on Faith, Lecture 5, 1835 (canonized in D&C until 1921, then quietly removed)
In 1835 Smith still taught that the Father is a "personage of spirit" — not embodied. This directly contradicts what he would teach nine years later. These Lectures were canonized scripture until the LDS Church quietly removed them from the D&C in 1921 without announcement.
1843
Shifting
D&C 130 — God Gains a Body
"The Father has a body of flesh and bones as tangible as man's; the Son also; but the Holy Ghost has not a body of flesh and bones, but is a personage of Spirit."
— D&C 130:22, April 2, 1843
1844
Final Position
King Follett Discourse — God Was Once a Man
"God himself was once as we are now, and is an exalted man, and sits enthroned in yonder heavens!... 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."
— Joseph Smith, King Follett Discourse, April 7, 1844 (three months before his death) — original eyewitness accounts at the Joseph Smith Papers
In fourteen years, the theology moved from a single, spiritual, triune God (Book of Mormon, 1830) → a spiritual Father and embodied Son (Lectures on Faith, 1835) → an embodied Father (D&C 130, 1843) → a formerly mortal, progressed-to-deity Father (King Follett, 1844). These are not refinements; they are categorical reversals.
✦ What This Record Demonstrates ✦
The Catholic Church has also developed its understanding of doctrine across centuries — but development, rightly understood, means the same truth expressed with greater precision. It does not mean reversing what was previously declared to be a direct commandment from God, quietly removing canonized scripture, or abandoning a doctrine taught from the tabernacle pulpit as eternal salvific truth.
The pattern documented above is different in kind. Each reversal followed external pressure — legal, political, social — not new revelation correcting an error. In at least two cases (the priesthood ban, polygamy) the LDS Church's own current essays now contradict what First Presidency statements called "direct commandment from the Lord." A church whose prophets can be this wrong, this definitively, for this long, cannot sustain a claim to be the exclusive channel of divine revelation on earth.