Minutes of December 28, 1835

Joseph charges Almon Babbitt with misrepresenting him in the matter of the debating school incident. Testimony on both sides. Almon confesses to doing harm, but not to lying §. Age of Reason referenced §.
Date		December 28, 1835
Location		Kirtland, Ohio
Description		… a meeting of the High Council of the Church of the Latter Day Saints …
Presiding		Sidney Rigdon
Clerk		Not named
Counselors		William E. McLellin (h) D. W. Patten (h) John Smith Orson Johnson Jared Carter Luke Johnson (h)	Orson Hyde (h) Lyman Johnson (h) Samuel H. Smith Martin Harris Brigham Young Parley Pratt (h)		Original: W. E. McLelin
Open	¶	Prayer by Sidney Rigdon.
Joseph's complaint	¶	[132] Joseph submits a complaint:
	¶	To the Presidents of the High Council,
Almon Babbitt misrepresenting me	¶	Brethren, Almon Babbtt has been misrepre{pre}senting me to certain of the brethren. I therefore prefer a complaint to the council that the subject may be investigated, that my character and influence may be preserved as far as it can in righteousness.			Original throughout: Babbit For Almon Babbit, see Minutes of August 19, 1835.
	¶	Yours in the bonds of the New & everlasting covenant. Joseph Smith Junr.
Counselors speak	¶	Three counselors are selected to speak on each side.			Three speak on each side for less difficult cases. meeting: likely the debate Joseph broke up.
Lyman Wight		Lyman Wight (h) (swh): Difficulty arose over a difference of opinion about "keeping their meeting."
Babbitt: Joseph mad because lost argument		Elder Babbitt said J. Smith Junr. got mad because he got overpowered in argumint as Babbitt had remarked before			Beginning with the decision to appoint three speakers, the minutes are one paragraph. While it is impossible to know with certainty whether Babbit's words here are spoken by him or by Lyman, I suspect they are the latter.
		L. Wight, said men would get over the Mark, in advocating error.
		Babbitt said a man must be a very weak man if he could not argue aginst the truth without being swerved. Babbit said he (Smith) got mad because he was overpowered in argument. There would have been no disturbance if he had not got mad.
		Elder Orton agrees with Lyman, adding that he didn't know if anyone else heard the conversation [between Almon and Joseph].
Can read Paine without being persuaded Joseph's bad spirit		Babbitt said he could read Tho. Paine > or any other work without being swerved. B. Said this by the door of the House, and appeared dissatisfied with J. Smiths bad spirit.
Lyman Wight: Babbit has bad spirit		Elder L. Wight thought Babbitt showed a bad spirit against J. Smith.
	¶	L. Sherman testifies he has not heard Babbitt say anything against Joseph. When the council asks if he has seen Babbitt "exhibit a restless or a dissatisfied spirit," he responds:			Lyman Sherman
Lose debate, knock opponent down		… on the Flats one or two days after the transaction at the debate, Babbitt said of his party. If it was not able one way, it was another, by knocking down. Sherman understood, that if they could not [133] overpower by argument, they would by knocking down but said in a jesting way.
		Babbitt said we would not have had any difficulty, if J. Smith had not have got mad.
Babbitt's singular spirit		Babbitt has a singular Spirit. Babbit gave him an idea that he had a difficulty with J. Smith.
Benjamin Johnson: riled v. mad		Benjamin Johnson testifies Joseph seemed "riled" and William was "mad."			Original Benj
Brigham: Babbitt and Bishop on debating		Brigham Young testifies that Babbitt "agreed with Bishop about being swerved when debating questions, must be weak minded."			Possibly Francis Gladden Bishop (1809–1878), president of the branch at Westfield, New York. Minutes of September 28, 1835
Babbitt: because Joseph lost		Babbitt said Smith would not have wanted the school broke up, if they had not got defeated.
Brigham supports Joseph		Young did not hear any thing from Smith at school that was calculated to hurt feelings and character,
Babbitt denigrated presidency, mean		he also thinks he Babbitt cast reflections on the whole Presidency, as well as J. Smith Junr. and that what Babbit said was calculated to hurt J. Smith.
		Babbitt said that Smith was against the school.
Orson Hyde:	¶	Orson Hyde: Babbitt wanted the school to continue.
Joseph attended school until disturbance, then changed mind		Joseph had attended until the disturbance. If it had not been for that, he would have allowed it to continue.
Bishop, not Babbitt, made comment about reading Paine		Orson heard Elder Bishop—not Babbitt—make the statement about reading Thomas Paine "without having his faith shaken" < >.			Joseph Sr.'s father urged him to read Paine's Age of Reason >.
Lyman Sherman: maybe Almon didn't mean it Joseph the problem	¶	Elder [Lyman] Sherman opines that if Babbitt meant everything he says, "he is a singular man." Babbit said if it had not been for J. Smith getting mad there would have been no difficulty.
Babbitt doesn't hold anything against Joseph		[Elder Rich: ] … from what he heard from Babbitt, he thought he had nothing against J. Smith Junr.			Charles C. Rich or Leonard Rich? Charles brought Word of Wisdom charges against Almon. Minutes of August 19, 1835. Leonard and Roger Orton were partners in the butcher business. ¶ Leonard Rich. Roger Orton (1799-1851), Zion's Camp, seventy, Kirtland high council, Excommunicated November 30, 1837, later returned, sustained as one of the seven presidents of the Seventy in 1845, but never set apart.
Orton: Babbitt said school would have continued if Joseph hadn't got mad		Elder Orton stated that Babbitt said the school would have continued if J. Smith Junr. had not got mad.
Babbitt and Bishop liked debate		He also thought that Babbit and Bishop had the spirit of the debating school.
	¶	Hyrum and [134] Frederick speak.			Comments not recorded.
Verdict	¶	Sidney decides Almon shall publicly confess that he:
Public confession		… let the adversary get the possession of his heart in consequence of which, he has spoken things falsely to the injury of J. Smith Junr., and by injuring him he has insulted the feelings of the church of Christ …
	¶	Council agrees.
Confession		[Almon confesses:] … that he was to blame, for speaking about Brother Smith as he did, & that he said them in anger, And that he never meant to rise up in rebellion against the {church} government of the church, And that in a bad spirit he said what was proved and sees it was wrong to talk as he did about Brother J. Smith, and that he thought he would give B[rother]. J. Smith as good as he [sent?], as he did.
But didn't lie	¶	He admits he injured Joseph's character, and he is sorry for that, "but is not willing to confess that he lied," nor to all Sidney declared. The council has decided that he has "done wrong," and he agrees.
		Brother Babbitt confessed to all present the charges above stated to the satisfaction of most of the brethren present.
		Tom Paine (1737–1809) and the Age of Reason
Franklin Common Sense (1776)		Thomas Paine was born in England to Quaker parents. In 1774 he met Benjamin Franklin in London, sailed to America, where he became editor of the Pennsylvania Magazine in Philadelphia. Anonymously he wrote and published Common Sense (January 1776), directing profits be for Continental army supplies.			Eric Foner, ANB 16:925–928.
The American Crisis (1776) Washington		After the Declaration of Independence he joined the Philadelphia militia and later joined the forces of George Washington as they retreated across New Jersey. In December 1776 he wrote The American Crisis, which begins, "These are the times that try men's souls." By 1783 he had published twelve more Crisis pamphlets.
Jefferson		In 1787 went to France in an unsuccessful effort to raise funds for a wrought-iron scheme. But in Paris he managed to win the friendship of American ambassador Thomas Jefferson.
Rights of Man (1790)		In 1790 he published Rights of Man, in praise of the French revolution. In January 1793 he spoke in the Convention against execution.
The Age of Reason (1794, 1795)		While imprisoned by the Jacobins (December 1793 to November 1794), Paine, a deist, wrote the first part of The Age of Reason, an attack on organized Christianity and the inspiration of the Bible. A second part appeared in 1795. He was roundly denounced by clerics and believers in both Europe and America.
Obscurity		When Paine returned to America in 1802, Thomas Jefferson was president. But he embarrassed the administration by persistently contributing deist essays to The Prospect, and he fell into obscurity <.
		Age of Reason quotes
Believe in God	¶	… I believe in one God, and no more; and I hope for happiness beyond this life.			Chapter 1
Equality, justice, mercy, etc.	¶	I believe the equality of man, and I believe that religious duties consist in doing justice, loving mercy, and endeavoring to make our fellow-creatures happy.
Do not believe in:	¶	But, lest it should be supposed that I believe many other things in addition to these, I shall, in the progress of this work, declare the things I do not believe, and my reasons for not believing them.
Creeds of any organized religion	¶	I do not believe in the creed professed by the Jewish church, by the Roman church, by the Greek church, by the Turkish church, by the Protestant church, nor by any church that I know of. My own mind is my own church.
Churches	¶	All national institutions of churches, whether Jewish, Christian, or Turkish, appear to me no other than human inventions set up to terrify and enslave mankind, and monopolize power and profit. …
Scriptures	¶	EVERY national church or religion has established itself by pretending some special mission from God, communicated to certain individuals. The Jews have their Moses; the Christians their Jesus Christ, their apostles and saints; and the Turks their Mahomet; as if the way to God was not open to every man alike.			Chapter 2
	¶	Each of those churches shows certain books, which they call revelation, or the Word of God. …
Jesus Christ	¶	… Jesus Christ wrote no account of himself, of his birth, parentage, or anything else. … The history of him is altogether the work of other people; and as to the account given of his resurrection and ascension, it was the necessary counterpart to the story of his birth. His historians, having brought him into the world in a supernatural manner, were obliged to take him out again in the same manner, or the first part of the story must have fallen to the ground. …			Chapter 3
		Age of Reason and the Smiths
Joseph Sr.'s father: believe it!		… while we were living in the Town of Tunbridge [1796–1802] … I endeavored to persuade my husband to attend the methodist meeting with me … But as soon as his Father and brother Jesse heard that we were attending Methodist meeting they were much displeased and his father came to the door one day and threw Tom Pains age of reason into the house and angrily bade him read that untill he believed it.			Lucy, 291.
		Richard L. Bushman maintains that Asael:			JS New England, 207n183.
But  Asael was a believer		by no means agreed with Paine's theology, however, for the Age of Reason ridiculesthe divinity of Christ, the atonement, the resurrection, and the authenticity of the New Teatament all of which Asael deeply accepted, as shown in his family address, written about this time [1799]. His act may have been scornful, an association of the then unpopular Methodism with the deviations of Paine—or an agreement with Paine's attack on religious superstition, though Asael Stopped far short of the extremism of the Age of Reason <.			Asael and sons Joseph Sr. and Jesse founded a Universalist society in Tunbridge in December 1797. Lucy, 168.
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