The Angel Eve (Can someone go to the BYU library for me?)

November 9, 2007    By: Matt W. @ 8:40 pm   Category: Life

Recently, at Zelophad’s Daughters, Lynette expressed some concern that there were no examples of resurrected women visitng anyone, saying “What does it mean that we have all these exalted males, and not one example of an exalted female?”

In fact, I have a note here, on my list of 62 different angels or otherwise divine beings that visited Joseph Smith, one female: Eve.

Unfortuneately, I do not have the account of her visitation, merely a reference:

O.B. Huntington Diary, Pt. 2, . 244, BYU Library

Anyone want to stop by the Library for me and confirm this account exists and what it says?

15 Comments

  1. FAIRwiki cites the reference as p. 214, not 244.

    Comment by Christopher — November 9, 2007 @ 9:22 pm

  2. Zebedee Coltrin recounts a vision in which Joseph laid down on the grown in the shape of a cross with Coltrin and Oliver Cowdery on either side. They looked up into the sky and had a vision of Adam and Eve. He said, “Their heads were white as snow and their faces shown with immortal youth” (Salt Lake School of the Prophets, Minute Book 1883, (Palm Desert: ULC Press, 1891), 71). That is more of a vision, though.

    Comment by J. Stapley — November 9, 2007 @ 9:42 pm

  3. Christopher:
    My reference is from a list generated by Daniel Bachman, and definitely has page 244. I don’t know which is right… BYUhas only Digitized O.B. Huntington Diaries 8-11.

    J.- It’d be interesting to se if O.B. is referring to the same incident.

    Comment by Matt W. — November 9, 2007 @ 10:14 pm

  4. Eve visited Joseph Smith. Whoa.

    This is a new one for me.

    Comment by Todd Wood — November 9, 2007 @ 10:25 pm

  5. I think my friend has the quote, but it may not be more than what J. quoted.

    I recall it being a vision as opposed to a visitation as well.

    Comment by m&m — November 9, 2007 @ 11:15 pm

  6. And this is what I have:

    According to his own account, Zebedee Coltrin saw with Joseph Smith and Oliver Cowdery a vision of the resurrected Adam and Eve. “They were the two most beautiful and perfect specimens of mankind [I have] ever seen.” “Their heads were white as snow, and their faces shone with youth.” (The first quotation is from the Salt Lake School of the Prophets Minute Book, 1883, p. 70 [meeting of 11 October 1883]. The second quotation is from an extract of the Spanish Fork, Utah High Priests Quorum Minutes for 5 February 1878, extract in the Zebedee Coltrin Papers.

    Matt, I have a similar list, but it’s by H. Donl Peterson, right after a Backman chapter. My list also has p. 244. FWIW.

    Comment by m&m — November 9, 2007 @ 11:22 pm

  7. (The first quote was from Ehat & Cook, Words, 12 May 1844 Note, p.404)

    Comment by m&m — November 9, 2007 @ 11:23 pm

  8. m & m: Mine is Bachman “adapted from peterson” (when I read the fine print)

    Todd: I guess you can say the LDS church has some extra biblical reasons to say that the story of Adam and Eve is more than a myth. Since even the most basic LDS program teaches that Joseph Smith was visited by Heavenly Father, Jesus Christ, Moroni, John the Baptist, Peter, James, and John, I’m not sure why any of the others ought be surprising.

    Here’s hoping someone can go by the HBL and check the source for us.

    Comment by Matt W. — November 10, 2007 @ 7:28 am

  9. M&M, you have to be a bit careful when citing the SLC School of the prophet minute book, as there is a bit of an ambiguous provenance. It is important to cite the version. In the most readily accessible version (which I cited above), the page 71 account in the appendix is the account from Record 1, page 99 of the Spanish Fork High Priests as reprinted in Truth, (a fundie publication) 4:124-127.

    The other quote is found on page 45 (October 11, 1883 meeting). You can find a heavily edited version in Hyrum Andrus’ They Knew the Prophet. A major difference between the accounts is that the School of the Prophets account notes that they were “two aged personages,” while the Spanish fork account notes that their faces “shown with immortal youth.”

    Comment by J. Stapley — November 10, 2007 @ 11:22 am

  10. Alright y’all, I checked out the reference in the BYU Special Collections.

    It turns out that FAIR Wiki does have it wrong, and the correct page is 2:244, as originally noted.

    However, the entry is no different than the Zebide Coltrin account, and in fact was told to Huntington by Coltrin. This is the entry in full:

    Monday March 2nd, 1885 had been copying in the tithing office and took dinner with the Bishop in company with the Patriarch Zebide Coltrin who told of a time he had with the Prophet Joseph, who invited him and Oliver Cowdry out into the fields one day and upon a very beautiful place in a grove, where the grass was thick and mated he laid down upon his back and streched out both arms and bade them to lay down with their heads upon his arms and see some visions which they did and saw the heaven open in it a great golden throne and on it a man and woman with hair as white as snow. Joseph told them that the man and woman was Father Adam and Eve. They saw other things.

    Comment by Ben — November 10, 2007 @ 3:25 pm

  11. Nice, Ben. Interesting how Adam and Eve both share the same throne in the Huntington and SLC School of the Prophets accounts.

    Comment by J. Stapley — November 10, 2007 @ 5:00 pm

  12. Yea, thanks Ben.

    Good point about the throne J. That makes the quote even more relevant to this week’s discussions over at ZD.

    Comment by Jacob J — November 10, 2007 @ 7:49 pm

  13. Thanks Ben. That’s very helpful.

    Comment by Matt W. — November 10, 2007 @ 8:19 pm

  14. I think it is great that he saw Eve in a vision, but it would have been wonderful if he actually had some interaction with her, if she had something to say or a purpose in appearing.

    Comment by Sally — November 10, 2007 @ 11:04 pm

  15. Love the note about the throne, J.

    Comment by m&m — November 12, 2007 @ 12:21 am