What are the connections between freemasonry & the LDS Temple endowment? Cheryl Bruno discusses the latest findings in her book “Method Infinite.” Check out our conversation…
Don’t miss our other conversations with Chery! https://gospeltangents.com/people/cheryl-bruno/
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Freemasonry & Mormonism
Interview
GT 00:31 I feel bad because we have not talked about your amazing book on Freemasonry. I didn’t prepare you that that was going to be a question, but is that something that we can talk about?
Cheryl 00:44 Yes, I’m not saying I remember every date on that either.
GT 00:49 That’s okay, because it’s been a few years since I read that book too. Do you remember when it was published? Um,
Cheryl 00:55 2022.
GT 00:56 okay, so it’s been two years now.
Cheryl 00:58 Wow! I remembered a date.
GT 00:59 There you go. You wrote that with Nick [Literski] and Joe Swick. There we go. Why don’t you introduce us to the topic of Freemasonry? I’ve heard an argument that Joseph introduced Freemasonry, because there are all these secrets. It kind of does relate to polygamy in the fact that, okay, I’m going to swear you to secrecy for masonry. Then now you have to keep the polygamy secret too. What do you think of that argument?
Cheryl 01:39 In our William Marks book, we do talk about these. We have a chapter which talks about the several organizations that Joseph Smith set up to induce loyalty in his followers. One of them is Freemasonry. One of them is the Quorum of the Anointed, the Council of 50, even the Nauvoo Legion, the Danites, those are all organizations that came together to really that were secretive. People who were loyal to Joseph Smith could come together and have a community. I think Mike Quinn maybe did a study of who the people were, who were connected in at least, like, three or four ways through those organizations. There were a lot of them, and that’s your core group.
GT 02:30 William Marks would have been a Freemason as well.
Cheryl 02:34 Yes, he was a Freemason, and he was in all of the different groups.
GT 02:36 The Quorum of the Anointed.
Cheryl 02:39 Not the Danites; He wasn’t in Danites.
GT 02:41 Okay.
Cheryl 02:42 He was definitely Council of 50, Quorum of Anointed, Freemason, Nauvoo Legion.
GT 02:46 Quorum of Anointed would be those that had received the endowment. Is that right?
Cheryl 02:49 Right.
GT 02:50 Okay. Do you agree with the argument that Joseph introduced Freemasonry to the Church to help people keep secrets about polygamy?
Cheryl 03:05 Not so much. I think that loyalty was a part of it, but not necessarily polygamy that I see. To me, he was fascinated. Joseph was fascinated by Freemasonry and the way that it taught like ancient truths. He was very into presenting things in a way that was Masonic. He liked the Christian view of Freemasonry looking back at the Old Testament from a Christian lens. I think he really brought that into Mormonism a lot. So he was just fascinated by Freemasonry. I think he felt that Freemasonry was a true principle that had become apostate over the years. This is what we talk about in the book, a lot. In Joseph’s mind, there was a true masonry and a spurious masonry. It was almost the same as he thought about Christianity, where, over the years, it had become apostate and it needed a restoration. In the same way he was trying to restore true Freemasonry to the earth. I think that’s what he was doing in creating this lodge in Nauvoo, and then bringing all these men into the lodge. Now you have power in the state of Illinois, in the Masonic organization. He, I think, was on his way to restore, to fix Freemasonry into what it should have been, or what he thought it should have been.
Did Joseph Rip off Freemasonry?
GT 04:46 Okay. What do you say about people, especially critics of the Church let’s say, that just basically say the LDS endowment is just a rip-off of Freemasons?
Cheryl 05:00 Yeah, I don’t see that at all. I see Joseph Smith as a ritual genius. What was happening in the area in his in the United States at the time, you have to look at that. What they were doing was many people were getting the three basic Masonic degrees and then going and creating new degrees. We had, like an Indian degree. We had one with Abraham meeting Melchizedek, that little story. People would create these degrees, and they were Masonic degrees, like extra appendant degrees. They were called so they were appendant to the three degrees of blue lodge masonry. So he what he was doing wasn’t any different than this. What he was doing was using Freemasonry, using that system to create another degree. It wasn’t unusual, and it wasn’t odd, and it doesn’t bother me at all. So, like I said, I’m a practicing member of the Church. To me, it fits with my Mormon mindset, very well. I don’t have any anxiety over the fact that he used Freemasonry and created a ritual.
GT 06:15 Okay, so you’re the expert here. But to my knowledge, Joseph Smith, Senior was a Mason. There were some masons in the family. Of course we have the is it called the Dale Morgan affair. Who was the guy that got murdered?
Cheryl 06:36 William Morgan?
GT 06:37 William Morgan, the William Morgan affair, maybe you should tell that story, because that happened right before the publication of The Book of Mormon.
Cheryl 06:46 Okay, first of all, I have to go to Joseph Smith Senior. We have some evidence that Joseph Smith Senior was perhaps a Mason. But the thing is, Joseph Smith is a really common name, and so it’s not positive. We do have positive evidence that our Joseph Smith Jr was a Freemason. But his father, Nick, Joe and I all believe that he was a Freemason. We give reasons in our book of why we believe this, but we cannot nail it down that he was proof positive a Freemason.
GT 07:20 Because his name is so common.
Cheryl 07:21 Yes. And see, we have a lodge that has a member named Joseph Smith, but there were nine Joseph Smith’s in the area that could have been that person. So, we’ve battled that out with Dan Vogel a little bit.[1]
GT 07:36 Oh yes.
Cheryl 07:37 So, I mean, I can’t [say for sure.]
GT 07:38 I’m going to ask you some. Dan Vogel questions too.
Cheryl 07:40 Oh, no. I can’t say that I know for a fact that he was. I believe he was. We do know for a fact that some of his brothers were. We have cousins of Joseph Smith, uncles of Joseph Smith, and we have many of his neighbors. We have the people that worked on his leg operation. We have so many close people.
GT 08:03 They were Masons as well?
Cheryl 08:05 Yeah, they were all Freemasons. And so, you can read our book and see how many of his close associates and his family members were Freemasons. And so, yes, that makes a big difference in that he knew about Freemasonry from a very young age. Talking about the William Morgan affair, an incident happened very close to where Joseph Smith lived in New York, in Batavia, New York, where a certain man named William Morgan was threatening to expose Masonic secrets. He was writing a book. Before the book was published, it was eventually published with all the secrets revealed. Before the book was published, allegedly, a group of Freemasons kidnapped him and killed him. Then we never know what happened to him in the end. I believe that it was Freemasons that kidnapped him and killed him. But again, we don’t know that for sure. We have to say, alleged, but what happened in the United States at the time was these Freemasons. Freemasonry was a big thing in the early United States.
GT 9:09 George Washington was a mason.
Cheryl 9:11 People of very high caliber were Freemasons. They would participate in these symbolic vows. They would slit their throat before revealing their Freemasonry secrets. You know different ways that they would be put to death rather than reveal Masonic secrets. And so, I think that most of the Masons that that participated in these vows, saw them as symbolic. They’re symbolic vows. Right? It’s like saying, cross my heart and hope a dead eye, stick a needle in my eye. You’re not really going to stick a needle in your eye. But then when these masons,
GT 9:53 Nor do you hope to die.
Cheryl 9:54 No, exactly! So, when these Masons saw that actually, people would put someone to death for revealing Masonic secrets. They were like, Okay, I’m out. I’m not going to be part of this. So that started the decimation of Freemasonry in the United States. People left the lodge by the millions. Then there became anti Masons who would go around and reveal the ceremony by holding little plays in public places and showing what happened during the ceremony.
GT 10:25 It sounds like The Godmakers or something.
Cheryl 10:27 Right. Joseph Smith would have been very aware of what happened in Masonic lodges from a very young age, and continuing all the way through.
GT 10:37 William Morgan, I believe he died in 1826.
Cheryl 10:41 Yeah.
GT 10:42 Joseph married Morgan’s wife. Right? Supposedly?
Cheryl 10:46 Yes. William Morgan’s wife married again, George Harris. George Harris and the two of them joined the Mormon Church and moved to Missouri and lived very close to where Joseph Smith was living in Missouri. It is believed that he, at that time married her, Lucinda Morgan.
GT 11:03 That’s a very interesting tie,
Cheryl 11:06 A very interesting tie.
GT 11:07 That would have been 1840s when Joseph married Lucinda Morgan?
Cheryl 11:11 1838 or 1839. 1838 probably.
GT 11:16 Okay. See you’re good with dates. But anyway, the point, let me go back. So, if I’m right on the year 1826 when he died, so this would have been right before the publication of The Book of Mormon. I believe Dan Vogel has made the case that the Book of Mormon was quite anti-Masonic. And I know that you disagree with that. Let’s talk about that argument. Try to present Dan’s case the best way possible.
Cheryl 11:47 Okay, Good. This is an ongoing argument that we’ve had. Dan believes that the Book of Mormon is anti-Masonic, because there are several places where like the bad people like Lamanites are presented with very Masonic language. They’re wearing aprons, or that certain things they’re participating in, connect really well with Masons. And so, I agree with that part. I think that, yes, we can see masonry in the Book of Mormon. However, where I disagree is that not everything that has to do with masonry in the Book of Mormon is dark and ugly. We also have the other side of masonry where they’re building a temple. The temple they’re building is not a Christian temple. It’s a Masonic temple. We have several. In the book, you can go through that and I will outline all the things, not all, but some of the things I see in the Book of Mormon that are Masonic, but they’re good Masonic. Right? This has to do with the spurious masonry and the pure masonry. So in the Book of Mormon, we see pure masonry. We also see spurious masonry. When Joseph Smith rails against the Masons, Master Mahan and everything in the in the Book of Mormon, he’s talking…
GT 13:10 Isn’t that the Pearl of Great Price, Master Mahan?
Cheryl 13:14 He’s talking about spurious masonry when we see that. Right? But he also believes in a pure masonry. So we have apostate masonry. We have pure masonry. So, I don’t think the Book of Mormon can be lumped together and said it’s anti-Masonic. What it is it’s showing that masonry, like Christianity, can become apostate. Joseph is saying, I’m going to restore it into its pure form. We have this group of people that are pure masons in the Book of Mormon. Does that make sense?
GT 13:46 Yeah, it does. I think the other thing in the Book of Mormon specifically is this issue of secret combinations, which comes in a little bit later,
Cheryl 13:46 That’s definitely Masonic.
GT 13:56 I believe so, oh yeah. So it’s definitely those are Masonic elements.
Cheryl 13:59 Oh yeah.
GT 14:00 Those are always seen as bad masonry.
Cheryl 14:00 Apostate.
GT 14:00 Yeah, okay. But you’re saying that the people who built the temple are the good masonry people. And what does Dan say about that?
Cheryl 14:15 Well, I thought when we came out with our book that he would accept that, and he didn’t. It was very surprising to me that he did not. You can see in several podcasts, we’ve gone back and forth about it. He doesn’t like our narrative because he thinks it explains everything too neatly. But, I mean, I think that’s the strength of it.
GT 14:41 Okay, if somebody asked you, is the Book of Mormon an anti-Masonic Bible? You would say…?
Cheryl 14:50 No. I don’t think so. However, we do have quotes of people in the area who are reading the Book of Mormon. Some saw it as anti-Masonic. Some saw it as positive Masonic. Some of them said, oh, all the Mormons are becoming Masonic because they’d read the Book of Mormon and they’d see the masonry aspect of it. But then some said, it’s preaching against masonry. So, so you see the same kind of thing happening in the area where they could view the Book of Mormon in these two different ways.
Did Joseph Restore Something that Never Existed?
GT 15:24 Okay. So, what about the issue? I know there was a podcast a long time ago about Joseph Smith believed that masonry goes back to King Solomon’s temple. Well, as we see now, modern historians say Middle Ages as at best, as far back as it goes. So is that a problem for, say, believing church members? Joseph Smith, it looks like, pretty clearly, got that wrong, and that he’s trying to restore something that never existed.
Cheryl 16:05 Yeah. Yes, it can be a problem. It was believed all the way down to like Melvin J Ballard, who still thought that. I mean, Brigham Young said it often. [He] had a very literal view of masonry, where it went back to King Solomon’s temple, literally. I think Masons today, there are many Mormon Masons today, and just many Christian Masons today who believe that that’s very symbolic. I think Joseph Smith and Brigham Young felt it was symbolic, but they also definitely thought it was literal. That’s a little bit of a problem.
GT 16:42 Some people say it’s a big problem.
Cheryl 16:44 It’s the same thing as him saying that Adam was a real person that’s going to come back on the earth and bring all the keys at Adam-ondi-ahman and stuff. If you believe Adam and Eve is a symbolic story, then that causes a little bit of dissonance for you.
GT 17:00 Yeah. There are some people who do.
Cheryl 17:03 Yeah, yeah. We still have that. It’s the same with creation-evolution, that kind of thing. So we have some people that believe the Earth is literally 4000 years old and that kind of thing. And so it, this does cause a problem for Mormons. It’s hard to deal with. You have to grapple with it.
GT 17:25 Well, what would you say to someone who would say, hey, Joseph Smith got this wrong. It’s affecting my testimony. It’s making me not believe that temple worship is worthwhile. What would you say to them?
Cheryl 17:43 I just feel like, for me, temple worship is worthwhile because of its symbolic and it’s almost gnostic. We talked to Maxine Hanks, and she’ll tell you about Gnosticism and knowledge, gaining knowledge and through ritual and that kind of thing. So for me, the temple is valuable because of the ritual and because of the knowledge I can gain symbolically. That’s the kind of thing I would point them to. I guess you can say that I compartmentalize things in my own religious practice. So I can’t really suggest that anyone do that, but that is what I do.
Danites in Kirtland?
GT 18:20 Okay. I remember in our interview from years ago, before you had published your book, we were packing up. I think I had forgotten to turn off my recorder, and you said something about Danites in Kirtland. Could we go there?
Cheryl 18:41 Okay. Because it’s been so long since I’ve researched this. I don’t know if I’ll do a good job, but I believe it was John Whitmer who wrote an early history of the church. When he talked about Danites, he mentioned that they started in Kirtland. And so I go in my book, I talk about things that were said about like salt losing its savor that come from the Salt Sermon that was preached in Missouri, but that was also seen in the Doctrine and Covenants from back in the Kirtland days. There’s several things in the Kirtland days that show that this Danite idea was beginning to come forth before they actually moved to Missouri.
GT 19:26 Okay. So, Missouri is where the Danites become a little bit more famous in the fact that they’re at a secret organization, but Mormons are retaliating and burning homes in Missouri and that sort of a thing. So I was shocked. I remember when you said that, that it was in Kirtland. Do we have any in any more information from Danites in Kirtland? Were they much more benign back then?
Cheryl 20:00 I believe it was more of like, I do believe there were a group of people, but it was more an idea in Kirtland than actual, activist activities going on when it really happened in Missouri where they acted out their ideas.
GT 20:24 Okay, and in more of a secret combinations, kind of a way,
Cheryl 20:28 Yes. I don’t even know that there was a lot of secrecy when it existed in Kirtland, but it just became more of a secret organization in Missouri.
GT 20:38 Oh, okay, so we get that from John Whitmer’s history.
Cheryl 20:41 John Whitmer’s History definitely talks about it and how it started in Kirtland.
Masonic Elements in Kirtland
GT 20:44 Okay, the other thing that I thought was really interesting was when we look at the Salt Lake Temple and the St George temple, especially, you can see, if you know what to look for, the Masonic elements. But I remember being surprised that you said there were Masonic elements in Kirtland, because they’re not easy to see. Yeah. Can you talk a little bit more about that?
Cheryl 21:11 They’re not as overt. There’s Masonic elements in the ritual behind the School of the Prophets. That was held in the temple in Kirtland. If you go through our book, people say that one of those the weaknesses of our book is a chapter where I compare masonry to the First Vision. But I feel like that that’s actually pretty strong compared to like when we compare it to Kirtland. Because I think there are correspondences, but to me that feels kind of the weakest.
GT 21:45 The Kirtland stuff is the weakest.
Cheryl 21:47 Yes, there were definitely Masonic influences going on in Kirtland, but yet, there were other things really that came to the fore. I think the masonry isn’t as overt as it was in Missouri, as it was in Nauvoo, even as it was in New York. Kirtland is kind of a stretch, but it’s there.
Too Much Masonry in Cheryl’s Book?
GT 22:16 Okay. I’ve also heard if I can bring a criticism to your book that there’s masonry around every corner.
Cheryl 22:27 Yeah. Okay, so this is the one criticism that Nick and I talk all the time about, because seems many people, almost everyone that’s done a review, will say this. The criticism is that we think that everything Joseph Smith did have had to do with Freemasonry, and we don’t see the influences from other places. However, we very clearly in many, many, many places in the book, say that this is not every influence on Joseph Smith. We say it in the preface. We say it in almost every chapter. No, we don’t think Freemasonry was everything that was happening with Joseph Smith. We know that he had got influences from Christianity, from all kinds of places. He was like a sponge. He drew it all in, and he tried to integrate it into his religious philosophy. So yes, but my book is on Freemasonry. It’s not on these other things. So, it’s true. I do focus on what influences came in from Freemasonry, and I don’t focus on the others. But I do very clearly say this is not the only thing. Then critics say, well, she’s saying Masonry is the only thing. No! But that’s what my book is about.
GT 23:48 So take that! All right.
Were Masons Mad That Joseph Let Women be Masons?
GT 23:55 One other thing about masonry, it’s always been, and I think still is, an organization for males. One of the issues for masons in Joseph Smith’s day was he was allowing women, of all people, to participate in these ordinances. What do you think of that?
Cheryl 24:21 Okay, well, one, we don’t really see that. Oh, well, you mean in the endowment. he was [allowing women.]
GT 24:26 Right. In the endowment, that’s what I’m talking about.
Cheryl 24:27 Because we don’t really have the endowment going on a huge scale before his death. We have a select group of people.
GT 24:41 But there were still Emma.
Cheryl 24:42 Right. We have Rosanna Marks and others. So yes, but here’s also something that often people will say that the Masonic lodges were upset with Joseph because he allowed women to come into the lodge. I do not see that. I do not see that at all. I don’t see because it was apparent to these other lodges and to the Grand Lodge in Illinois. It was apparent that he was bringing [women.] They knew about it, but they didn’t criticize him for it. The things they were criticizing him for were other things. They had problems with him, but not because he brought women in. And so that’s interesting. I show in the book different places in the United States where women were allowed to participate in masonry, and eventually there became a Masonic organization that included women. That wasn’t widespread during Joseph Smith’s time, but it was happening. So, it’s not something that they were really worried about Joseph Smith doing. The Masons themselves were not worried about that. So, it might be something that modern day people have problem with, but back then, it was not okay.
GT 26:00 What were the issues they had problems with?
Cheryl 26:04 So one, it was that power thing, where you’ve got 10 lodges in, I don’t know exactly how many, but say 10 lodges in Illinois. They all have like seven or eight people in them. So that’s what 80 masons in Illinois. Then you have this Masonic Lodge in Nauvoo that starts with 40 members on day one, and on day two has hundreds. So, they’ve gotten by the end, they had 1500 members only in Nauvoo Lodge. We know that there were, like, eight other different lodges, at least five.
GT 26:03 Nauvoo was dwarfing them.
Cheryl 26:40 Right. So, I mean, Nauvoo was the biggest, but we had many others. So, we had more than, way more than 1500 members, Mormon Freemasons in Illinois. So what’s that going to do to the Grand Lodge? Who’s going to take over the Grand Lodge in the next few years? Right? And so there was also, at the time there was an and so their criticisms were, how are you bringing these people in so fast? Most Masonic lodges meet once a month. Maybe they make three members, or often it’s just one. But at the most, they’ll make three people a Mason once a month. Well, in Nauvoo, they were meeting every day, three times a day. They’re like, Well, how can you be doing that? You can’t allow more than three Masons to [join.] You can’t make more than three Masons at a time. Right? So, sometimes they were doing that, like, maybe five at a time. So that was a big criticism. Right?
GT 27:45 Breaking the rules
Cheryl 27:46 And they’re advancing so fast. So you make them. They have three degrees, and usually it takes a month to go through each degree. Well, in Nauvoo, you were doing it the next day. So, they get their three degrees in three days, or at least in a week. So, these are their criticisms.
GT 28:06 I think apprentice is the first level.
Cheryl 28:08 Entered apprentice.
GT 28:10 Don’t you have to memorize the entire ceremony, which would take a month, probably.
Cheryl 28:14 Right. And so, I mean there were in Nauvoo, we can see that there were like tutors that were helping people learn the ceremony and things like that. But I think they weren’t as strict either of making a member. So, it may be like we do in the temple, where we have someone who will help us if we don’t know the ceremony.
GT 28:33 Okay. And so that was breaking the rule, and that was bugging the other lodges. Yeah. Okay. Anything else?
Cheryl 28:41 So also at the time in the United States, there was a push to make a Grand Lodge of the United States that would be in charge of all these lodges, that would be over all the state lodges. And so, if you have Illinois being the biggest Lodge and having the most influence and the most power, then they could have taken over all the lodges in the United States with Mormons. Right? And so it was a big fear. It was a huge fear, and especially with Joseph Smith thinking that he’s going to change masonry and fix it, that’s a big problem, and that’s more of a problem than if a few women are having a Masonic-like ceremony?
GT 29:23 Was it just a few women? I guess most of them were men, because, I mean, we’ve got the two issues. We’ve got the endowment, and then we’ve got Freemasonry, and Joseph was having people be part of both. Right? But there weren’t very many women that were doing masonry at all, or were they doing masonry?
Cheryl 29:44 We have some evidence that shows women actually joining into real masonry. I don’t think the endowment was considered necessarily masonry. It was Joseph Smith’s conception. It was his Masonic-like conception of a ritual rite. So, I wouldn’t say when he brought women into the endowment that that was necessarily bringing them into masonry. But we do have, just three instances that we have uncovered where women actually get Masonic degrees in Nauvoo. So, we know that was going on, but we don’t know very many.
GT 30:27 Okay. They weren’t too worried about that. When you said Joseph was going to purify a masonry, I don’t remember if that’s the word you used, but was that only through the endowment ceremony, or was he going to fix masonry?
Cheryl 30:43 No, I think he intended to restore masonry and do it through the Masonic Lodge.
GT 30:48 Was he going to make it like the endowment or not?
Cheryl 30:51 No, I don’t think he I think the endowment was something different.
GT 30:53 Just something different. Okay.
Masonic Involvement in Joseph’s Murder
GT 30:55 Of course, the other big story about masonry in the Church is on the day that Joseph died, many of the members of the mob were masons. It seems like Joseph was doing the Masonic Call of dDstress as he was shot. Can you talk more about that?
Cheryl 31:15 Okay, so we don’t have a huge mob of Freemasons outside the door, underneath the window of Carthage Jail.
GT 31:23 But there were masons in the group.
Cheryl 31:24 So we have looked, and yes, there were masons in the group. We have looked to see who those Masons could have been. So I have that also in the book. We know who was that were members of the lodge in Carthage and in the surrounding lodges. And so who could have been those men? A lot of them we know were there because we have documentation that they were part of the mob. We have tables in the book that show exactly who could have been there. The most it could have been were all the members of the surrounding lodges, which would have been less than 20 people. Right?
Cheryl 32:00 Okay.
Cheryl 32:01 It wasn’t like a huge mob of masons. But this is speculative. Masons may have been involved in planning the assassination of Joseph Smith. We also go into greater detail in the book on that. So, I think it’s pretty clear, but it is more speculative than some of the things that we say that Masons were involved. So anyway, about the Masonic Call of Distress, we don’t know what was in Joseph’s mind when he said, “Oh Lord my God,” as he went out the window. It could have been part of the Masonic Call of Distress that starts with those words and then ends with, “Is there no help with for the widow’s son?” We don’t know if Joseph was actually giving the Masonic Call of Distress. But it was interpreted as such by every Mormon who writes about it. Right? So Brigham Young says, he’s giving the Masonic Call of Distress. Who is his wife that wrote about it? Zina? I don’t remember which wife it was. She said, Oh, my husband gave the Masonic Call of Distress as he fell from the window.
GT 33:15 Zina Huntington.
Cheryl 33:19 Yeah. And there were several accounts of it by Mormons. Every Mormon that writes about it says he was. John D. Lee says he was giving. In fact, John D Lee quotes the whole thing. He says as Joseph went out the window, he said, “Oh, Lord my God! Is there no help for the widow’s son?” So, they all interpret it as he was giving the Masonic Call of Distress. I think it was something that he knew would be recognized by his people, at least, as the Call of Distress. Now, whether he was actually expecting anyone in the crowd to come to his aid, we don’t know. Maybe he was just saying it as a witness to God that…
GT 34:00 I’m being killed by masons.
Cheryl 34:04 Right. Or that none of the Masons are coming to my aid. So, we give several possibilities in the book in the chapter. Okay, so here’s the other thing. What was it? Was it John Taylor and Willard Richards, who were in the jail with him?
GT 34:20 [Yes.]
Cheryl 34:21 Okay. Willard Richards takes John Taylor out of the room and hides him under a mattress in another room after Joseph jumps out the window. Right?
GT 34:29 I thought it was inside the room,
Cheryl 34:31 He takes him out of the room, brings him to another room and hides him under a mattress. Then he raises his hands above his head three times and prays.
GT 34:41 Oh.
Cheryl 34:42 So, doesn’t that sound like that Masonic Call of Distress almost? It’s very Masonic anyway. So, yeah, that’s a very interesting, I think, aspect to the to the martyrdom.
GT 34:56 Yeah, I didn’t remember that.
Gallatin Election Battle
GT 35:03 Another thought just popped in my head. I wondered if you could comment. I know this is going back to the Missouri period. Was it the Gallatin Election Battle?
Cheryl 35:15 Right.
GT 35:16 And there was a Danite. I don’t know what you call it, but some signs or tokens, or whatever they’re called so that Danites could recognize each other, different from masons, but very similar to masonic things.
Cheryl 35:34 Right. So it was a Danite sign of distress.
GT 35:39 Okay. And so I know in Gallatin, of course, this was over a county elections and that sort of a thing. But, it’s called a battle, but Alex Baugh said it was just a really big brawl. It was a brawl. So there were some Mormons there trying to vote. Citizens of Gallatin were trying to prevent them from voting. One of the Mormons did the Danite Call of Distress.
Cheryl 36:04 Yes. And I don’t remember who the Mormon was, but he’s in the middle of the crowd. They’re beating him with rods. He gives the Call of Distress. His fellow Mormons all just run into the battle and just help him. I think John D. Lee describes how they saw the sign of distress. They knew they needed to come to his aid. It was very interesting.
GT 36:27 And so this Danite Call of Distress, how similar is it to the Masonic Call of Distress?
Cheryl 36:35 It didn’t have any words associated with it that I know of.
GT 36:40 Oh, it’s just a sign or some actions?
Cheryl 36:42 Something like they rubbed their ear, their cheek, or something like that, in certain way. I can’t remember exactly what it was, but they describe what it was.
GT 36:52 Okay. Do you was that based on masonry?
Cheryl 36:55 Oh yes, oh yes, definitely.
GT 36:58 Do you have anything more on that?
Cheryl 37:01 Well, I mean, the Danite oaths were so similar in wording to the Masonic oaths, and they had signs that were very similar. We look at all these things, and again, I keep saying, Go back to the book, because they’re just so many details that I can’t mention right now, but that when you put them all together and you see all the details, it makes it very clear and very obvious that what the Danites were doing was a copy of masonry.
GT 37:28 Okay, okay, very good. Well, I’ve kept you long time and I’m running out of questions so I guess I better let you go.
Cheryl 37:36 Thank you.
GT 37:37 But why don’t you show everybody your book again, Secret Covenants. You’ve got to get it. It’s fantastic. It really is fantastic.
Cheryl 37:46 It’s a wonderful book. I’m so excited because I have these three books that have come out in the last two years. Method infinite on Freemasonry is still selling very well. This is a great book to get. And also William Marks [biography.] So all three of them are fabulous books, if I do say so myself. But really, I think this Secret Covenants is going to be a game changer. So I’m excited to see when people read it, what they think of it. Please let me know, and please leave a review on Amazon.
GT 38:19 Have you gotten any feedback from Brian Hales on it yet?
Cheryl 38:22 Not on this, not on this one. No.
GT 38:23 Because I remember I talked to him 2, 3, or 4 years ago. I don’t remember he’s moved on from polygamy.
Cheryl 38:31 Yes, that’s what I was going to say. I think Brian now has moved on and is doing other projects. And really he doesn’t want to do polygamy anymore. He’s being drawn into it by the polygamy skeptics, but I think he really has moved on. We should probably let him move on.
GT 38:49 Well, I was just going to say in my interview with him, we talked a little bit about polygamy at the first but the purpose of the interview was to talk about the Book of Mormon, his latest project. But one of the things he said was, there hasn’t really been anything new, which was true a few years ago. It’s not true anymore.
Cheryl 39:07 It’s not true anymore. It is not true anymore. And that is why I’ve been very public about because we do have Brian and others who are saying it’s all been said. I guarantee you, it has not all been said. There are new things being said, and I want us to respond to them, because I think there’s a response.
GT 39:26 Get it! It’s fantastic. And like I said, I’ve read five and a half chapters so far, and every single one of them has been great. You don’t have to read it in order. You can pick it up, put it down.
Cheryl 39:41 So you should write a review on Amazon.
GT 39:43 Yeah, I should. All right. Well, Cheryl Bruno, editor of Secret Covenants and author of Come Hither to Zion, and Method Infinite. Thank you so much. Thank you so much for being here. Gospel Tangents.
Cheryl 40:00 Thank you for having me.
[1] See https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1QwDsJCLeqw
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