Joseph Smith's Prophetic Powers

Mormons give Joseph Smith, Jr. supernatural powers that were due him as a prophet. Well, in order to say whether or not he had amazing prophetic powers we must first look at the prophecies delivered by the Mormon founder. Christians will point to the Biblical verse that says in order for him to be a true prophet of God, it only takes one failed prophecy, but that does not determine whether or not the uneducated farm boy from upstate New York had a gift for prophecy will depend on his record.

A war between the states was correctly predicted by the Mormon prophet, but this is hardly a case of supernatural intervention. Historians today can look back at the foundations of the country and see that a conflict would eventually arise. It was of course hard for Joseph Smith to see the events beforehand than it would be for someone looking at the issues that caused it after the event occurred, but it is the type of prediction based on looking at the trends of current events and see where their leading.

Because we cannot use the prediction of the civil war as a gauge of the founder of the Mormon Church's prophetic power, we must turn to other prophecies to see whether or not they come true. Some prophecies, such as the building of the temple on the temple lot in Missouri have yet to be fulfilled. Fortunately, he spoke on things that would come about in his own lifetime.

He also correctly predicted that the Mormons would end up making their home in the Rocky Mountains after much persecution, but how much of this is a self-fulfilling prophecy and perhaps with some of the things privately being practiced in the church at this time like polygamy, it may again have been a case of reading current trends and seeing where it would end.

Mormons often point out that how much the Word of Wisdom got right, but there is a huge difference between the Word of Wisdom as it appears in the Doctrine and Covenants and how it is followed by members of the Mormon Church. How many LDS today engage in an occasional beer as it is followed?

Not to mention, the Word of Wisdom as it is followed today tells the members to abstain from coffee and tea. Unfortunately, total abstinence from the beverage does not in and of itself provide any health benefits. In fact, coffee has been shown to be the major source of antioxidants in the American diet and several studies have been done on the health benefits of drinking tea. (The author personally abstains from both because she likes the taste of neither.)

There is however, one prophecy uttered by the founder of the Mormon Church that did not get fulfilled and that had to do with the second coming of Jesus Christ. Joseph Smith Jr. said that the second coming would happen in 1891. To be fair, the prophecy also says that if the prophet should live to see 1891, the entire world would see the second coming. Whether this means that the Mormon prophet needed to be alive in 1891 or that the second coming would happen in 1891 is open to debate. Shields, a Mormon apologetics site gives there answer, but it seems that the second coming is wishful thinking on the part of Joseph Smith. Shield's article which is linked to in the sources, is a typical example of the double-speak employed by apologists, and plays the role of convincing the reader that this could be true, rather than this most definitely is true.

Prophetic declarations coming from the Mormon leadership have decreased over the years, possibly out of fear they will be proven to be inaccurate. Right or wrong, good or bad, the early leaders of the Mormon movement possessed a boldness not seen in the church leadership today. (With the possible exception of Boyd K. Packer, who might cause a schism in the church should he ever obtain the first presidency.)

Sources:

http://www.tektonics.org/gk/josproph.html

http://www.shields-research.org/General/LDS_Leaders/1stPres/Joseph_Smith/56_Year.htm