This video discusses the remarkably detailed prophecy Joesph Smith made about the Civil War in 1832 and reiterated in 1843. It also discusses a lessor known prophecy of after the exhaustion of this war, the focus would move to Germany (think of World Wars 1 and 2!)
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So in this video on the Evidences series, I’m going to be talking about Doctrine and Covenants section 87, which is often called the prophecy on war, specifically the Civil War, in detail. There’s also a little bit from D&C section 130 verses 12 and 13. So just really quickly to read the actual verses, and then we’ll talk about how they were fulfilled very specifically. I’ll read four verses in D&C 87 and then those two verses in D&C 130.
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“Verily, thus saith the Lord concerning the wars that will shortly come to pass, beginning at the rebellion of South Carolina, which will eventually terminate in the death and misery of many souls.
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And the time will come that war will be poured out upon all nations, beginning at this place. For behold, the Southern States shall be divided against the Northern States, and the Southern States will call on other nations, even the nation of Great Britain, as it is called, and they shall also call upon other nations, in order to defend themselves against other nations; and then war shall be poured out upon all nations. And it shall come to pass, after many days, slaves shall rise up against their masters, who shall be marshaled and disciplined for war.”
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And then D&C 130 verses 12 and 13. This was 11 years later. So that that I just read was on Christmas Day in 1832, and this was in Ramus, Illinois in 1843.
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“I prophesy, in the name of the Lord God, that the commencement of the difficulties which will cause much bloodshed previous to the coming of the Son of Man will be in South Carolina. It may probably arise through the slave question. This a voice declared to me, while I was praying earnestly on the subject, December 25th, 1832.”
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So let’s just take… There’s six items in here, specifically. First, the war would begin with the rebellion of South Carolina. That is where the Civil War started. South Carolina seceded from the Union in 1860 towards the end of that year, and they were the first of 11 states to do so. It was also at Fort Sumter who was the first shot fired in the civil war. So it definitely did start at South Carolina.
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Number two, it would cause the death and misery of many souls. If you look at the death count in the Civil War, it was over 620,000 people that died, which was more than all of the deaths in World War I and World War II combined. It was the greatest of all wars in U.S. history as far as death count goes. So it was definitely right on that verse. The Southern States would be divided against Northern States. That’s what the entire Civil War was. It was a split between those two, there. The Southern States would call upon other nations for assistance even upon the nation of Great Britain. And that is exactly what they did. In fact, they used “king cotton”, as they called it, to try and really pull Great Britain into the civil war, which according to international treaties, they were not supposed to do.
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They ended up getting fined 15 and a half million dollars for their involvement in the Civil War from an international accord. But in fact the south even caused cotton shortages, destroyed cotton, to to be able to create problems for Great Britain to pull them in and use that as a little bit of a lever for them to participate and help and assist.
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Number five, Great Britain would call upon other nations for assistance. Now this one, France, Belgium and Holland were approached by the South to have help. Great Britain may have correlated a little bit with France to pull them in a bit because they were in the same boat as far as the cotton, a desire for a cotton resource from the South. But, in the way that this is worded in D&C 87, it’s specifically talking about in that area about later wars that would be poured out upon all nations and that that’s when Great Britain would call upon others, which is exactly what they did in the World Wars. So that’s another interesting point.
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The last thing on here, “War would eventually be poured out upon all nations.” It says it would start from this place. Well critics actually use that to say, “Well, the Civil War was not a world war.” Well, that was the beginning of modern warfare. It really started a new level of wars that took place and we had the two great world wars that really followed after the Civil War. We got 140 wars that took place after World War II. World War I, we lost 20 million people worldwide. World War II, we lost over 40 million people.
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Also, I’ll share a quote from Orson Hyde that he published in the Millennial Star in 1862 after the Civil War had started, and he said, “You have scarcely yet read the preface of your national trouble. Many nations will be drawn into the American maelstrom that now whirls through our land; and after many days, when the demon of war shall have exhausted his strength and madness upon American soil, by the destruction of all that can court or provoke opposition, he will remove his headquarters to the banks of the Rhine.” Which is Germany and that’s really where the focus was of the World Wars I and II.
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So that was a pretty eerie quote there for Orson Hyde. We do not know where this came from. Most believe that that Orson Hyde had this from Joseph Smith, but we don’t have the documentation of where that came from. Now others say, well, many could’ve predicted these things that Joseph talked about. There was a secession crisis in 1832 at the end of 1832 in South Carolina. They were looking at tariffs that were being applied on the federal level to the South and they wanted to… Essentially it was a secession crisis then and saying they were potentially going to leave. The crisis was averted. Nobody thought it was going to turn into civil war by any stretch there. But that’s why I mentioned that D&C 130 was interesting because it was 11 years later that Joseph’s basically doubling down on South Carolina being the place for this to start.
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Then he also brought slavery into the issue. Now that’s another point that some will say, “Well, slaves didn’t rise up against their masters in the Civil War.” Well yes and no, possibly. It depends on how you look at it. There were approximately 187,000 soldiers fighting for the Union that were past slaves. In a sense, you could say they rose up and were fighting against their masters there. The way that it’s worded in D&C 87, it says, “after many days” this would happen, and I think this could easily have been talking about much later of people rising up against oppressive regimes, against Communism, et cetera. That easily could have been what that was referring to on there.
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So one last quote I wanted to read to you, Orson Pratt shared this. He said, “When I, Orson Pratt, was a boy I traveled extensively in the United States and the Canadas preaching this restored Gospel. I had a manuscript copy of this revelation on Civil War, which I carried in my pocket, and I was in the habit of reading it to the people among whom I traveled and preached.” How did his listeners respond? Did they say, “Well, it takes no prophet to see war will start in South Carolina.” “No,” said Orson “as a general thing, the people regarded it as the height of nonsense, saying that Union was too strong to be broken, and I, they said, was led away the victim of an impostor.”
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When South Carolina secession threats cooled down after 1832, did Orson begin to doubt the prophecy? “No, because I knew the prophecy was true for the Lord had spoken to me and had given me revelation. But year after year passed away without war, and now and then some of the acquaintances I had formerly made would say, ‘Well, what is going to become in that prediction? It’s never going to be fulfilled.'” Orson replied, “Wait, the Lord has his set time.”
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When the war broke out in April, 1861, 28 years after the prophecy was pronounced, the Philadelphia Sunday Mercury newspaper carried a lengthy article entitled “A Mormon Prophecy.” And there’s a piece of that he said, “We have in our possession a pamphlet published at Liverpool in 1851,” the article began, referring to the civil war prophecy. “In view of our present troubles, this prediction seems to be in progress of fulfillment, whether Joe Smith was a humbug or not.” The article reprinted the entire prophecy, then noted how events were fulfilling it, and concluded regarding Joseph Smith, “Have we not had a prophet among us?”
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As Fort Sumter surrendered, others, like the Mercury’s editors, remembered hearing about the prophecy. Perhaps some of those once scoffed when youthful missionary Orson Pratt pulled the prophecy from his pocket and read it now had cause to wonder, to worry, and to wish they had listened more closely to what the rest of the prophecy said.
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Hope you enjoyed this video. Subscribe for more.
Resources:
Articles:
Jeff Lindsay’s blog discussing details of the prophecy: https://www.jefflindsay.com/LDSFAQ/FQ…
Kerry Shirt’s refuting critics of the prophecy in article entitled ‘A War Against the Critics of Joseph Smith’s Civil War Prophecy’ https://web.archive.org/web/201205141…
Video:
Harold B Lee Lecture Series House of Learning; Speaker – Dr Scott Esplin; Title ‘Have We Not Had a Prophet Among Us?’ – Joseph Smith’s “Civil War” Prophecy YouTube Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FActx…
Latter-day Saints’ Q&A is a video series not produced by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, but by me, an ordinary member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, an independent voice, with a passion for studying Church history and defending the faith. In this series, I provide evidences for the restoration, and address tough questions posed by critics of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, offering faithful answers based on accurate research and historical references which will be posted at the end of each video.
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