And I, Nephi, did build a temple; and I did construct it after the manner of the temple of Solomon save it were not built of so many precious things; for they were not to be found upon the land, wherefore, it could not be built like unto Solomon's temple. But the manner of the construction was like unto the temple of Solomon; and the workmanship thereof was exceedingly fine.

—2 Nephi 5:16

Tuesday evening I entered a Latter-day Saint temple for the first time in over a decade.

Don't have a stroke—it wasn't a religious relapse. The LDS Church has taken its blocky, six-story meetinghouse near Lincoln Center in Manhattan and hewn from its rocky heart a new temple. (I've touched on the subject of this construction project in earlier writings.) This edifice is open to the public, more or less, through June 5, after which it will be closed to heathen, given a final hard spit and polish, and dedicated to Elohim, as God is known to His friends. My wife Laura and I, along with three intrepid friends, were fortunate enough to attach ourselves to a tour this week.

Having returned, I shall soon report. (If you happen ever to have experienced a Mormon temple endowment ceremony and possess an evolved sense of irreverence, you are busting a gut at that line. Otherwise you're either scratching your head or reaching for a firearm.) But first, a brief word about temples.

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There used to be a diner called Orloff's on Columbus Avenue between 65th and 66th. It occupied a storefront in a grand white six-story building across from Lincoln Center. But Orloff's isn't there anymore, having been displaced by its landlord, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. On August 7, the Church announced plans to turn two floors of the building, which already contains two Mormon chapels and a genealogical library, into a temple.

I don't begrudge the Mormons their temple, but I will miss Orloff's sorely. That was the place that demonstrated to me, five years after leaving Utah, that New York City was where I belonged.

It was 1995 when I moved here. I was twenty-eight years old. I came here with a girlfriend who challenged me to question the doctrines I'd been raised with. I studied all the Mormon research I could get my hands on, and I found I couldn't reconcile the Church's colorful and shaded history with the sanitized fables I heard from the pulpit every Sunday. I shed my faith in a leap that seemed precipitous at the time, but which in retrospect I realize I'd been working up to for years.

When my girlfriend and I parted ways in 1998, however, I wondered how much of my fervor for apostasy was my own, and how much had rubbed off on me from her. To find out, I started attending Mormon services again—at the building on Columbus.

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And I command mine handmaid, Emma Smith, to abide and cleave unto my servant Joseph, and to none else. But if she will not abide this commandment she shall be destroyed, saith the Lord; for I am the Lord thy God, and will destroy her if she abide not in my law.

—D&C 132:54

The modern LDS Church has plenty of embarrassing historical specters hanging around, but few haunt it the way polygamy does. The church has tried to distance itself from the practice in the past century, but with mixed results. If you ask most Mormons today whether or not they believe it's proper to practice polygamy, they'll tell you no. But if you ask them whether or not it's a correct principle, they'll say yes.

In fact, the practice of polygamy is an excommunicable offense, and has been for many decades. This has not always been the case, however—polygamy was once, deservedly (and still is, erroneously), the chief distinguishing characteristic of Mormonism in the minds of most Americans—and many Saints believe it may not always be the case in the future. They look forward to the day when the moral and political climate in the United States and other nations has cooled enough to permit the church to reinstitute the practice—though the more reasonable of these don't expect it to happen until Christ's Millennial reign on Earth. (Note that I specified "the more reasonable.")

So, what is polygamy, and how did the practice arise?

The word comes from Greek roots, and means, quite literally, "multiple mates." The more proper term for what Mormons practiced would be "polygyny," or "multiple wives," though a bit of polyandry ("multiple husbands") did creep in there at the beginning—much to the distress of the Saints to whom this fact is pointed out. (And lest we banish semantic confusion entire, I'll point out that Mormons prefer the term "plural marriage," though they're fighting a losing battle on that one, just as they are with the label "Mormon" itself.)

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This third edition of "Korihor's Corner" is something of a special event. Today—Tuesday, February 17, 1998—my good friend Bob Howe and I are swapping essays. When we discovered we were each writing pieces on the theme of panhandling, me for "Korihor's Corner" and him for his excellent “Fetish Weather Forecast,” it seemed only logical that we should share. So I'm running his along with mine, and he's running mine along with his. We hope you enjoy this two-fisted, stereoscopic examination of the problem of panhandling in American cities.

Bill's Essay | Bob's Essay

And also, ye yourselves will succor those that stand in need of your succor; ye will administer of your substance unto him that standeth in need; and ye will not suffer that the beggar putteth up his petition to you in vain, and turn him out to perish.

—Mosiah 4:16

Latter-day Saints hail King Benjamin as one of the greatest prophets of their holy volume of scripture The Book of Mormon, though the short section dealing with this character spans no more than twenty pages of this 531-page book. This is due largely to a single sermon delivered by Benjamin, which takes up most of the aforementioned twenty pages. The sermon in question covers such disparate topics as the characteristics of a good king, the foretelling of Jesus Christ's birth and ministry and sacrifice, the practical meaning of repentance and remission of sins, and the proper treatment of the poor and needy.

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But only an account of this earth, and the inhabitants thereof, give I unto you. For behold, there are many worlds that have passed away by the word of my power. And there are many that now stand, and innumerable are they unto man; but all things are numbered unto me, for they are mine and I know them.

—Moses 1:35

Hi, neighbor! Did you know that I'm special? Well, that's right—I'm special, uh-huh. And did you know what? You're probably not. Yep, that's right. At any rate, you're probably not as special as I am. You're special, all right, neighbor, but unless you were born a Mormon, then you're not nearly as special as I am. Uh-huh.

Now why don't you go ahead and put down that hammer, neighbor, so I can tell you why it is that being born into God's One True Church makes me so much more special than you. It's not that I'm the most special I could possibly be. Why, there are people a lot more special than I am, people like the prophets who talk with God face to face, or like Saul of Tarsus or Alma the Younger—guys who were so special that when they were bad God Himself came down and told them to stop it because they were special and shouldn't oughta act that way (see Acts 9:1-22 and Mosiah 27:8-37).

Still, I'm pretty darn special. How do I know? Well, the prophets have assured us that these are the Last Days before the Millennium, and only the most valiant of our Father in Heaven's spirit children were saved until the Last Days to come to earth and get bodies and be born into His One True Church. And what did I do to prove I was so valiant? Well, I fought bravely on God's side in the War in Heaven, that's what. (If you need a refresher on the War in Heaven, see "The Great Sacrifice.") That means I'm a great hero! See how special that makes me?

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. . . [W]e are sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all. And every priest standeth daily ministering and offering oftentimes the same sacrifices, which can never take away sins: but this man, after he had offered one sacrifice for sins for ever, sat down on the right hand of God; from henceforth expecting till his enemies be made his footstool.

—Hebrews 10:10-13

Okay, so here's the story of the universe in a nutshell, at least according to Joseph Smith:

Once upon a time, there was God, and there were also countless intelligences—or in other words, floaty thinking essences that were distinct and sentient, but which didn't have much substance, and which had existed for ever and ever. God saw these intelligences and did something mystical with his wife (or wives) whereby billions and billions of them (the intelligences, not the wives) were given greater substance, turning into what we call spirits.

(For you science fiction fans out there, the notion of intelligences is what formed the theological underpinning for the "philotes" of Orson Scott Card's novel Xenocide [Tor Books, 1991]. For what it's worth.)

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And it came to pass that the high priest said unto [Korihor]: Why do ye go about perverting the ways of the Lord? Why do ye teach that there shall be no Christ, to interrupt their rejoicings? Why do ye speak against all the prophecies of the holy prophets?     Now the high priest's name was Giddonah. And Korihor said unto him: Because I do not teach the foolish traditions of your fathers, and because I do not teach this people to bind themselves down under the foolish ordinances and performances which are laid down by ancient priests, to usurp power and authority over them, to keep them in ignorance, that they may not lift up their heads, but be brought down according to thy words.     Ye say that this people is a free people. Behold, I say they are in bondage. Ye say that those ancient prophecies are true. Behold, I say that ye do not know that they are true.

—Alma 30:22-24

For those of you tuning in late to this whole Mormon morass, a few words of explanation are probably in order for the moniker under which I've chosen to present my musings on the logical fallacies and moral shortcomings of that behemoth that calls itself the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

Korihor is perhaps the most infamous of the several "antichrists" put forth as characters in the Book of Mormon. He receives rather harsh treatment at the hands of that book's author, Joseph Smith, not to mention at the hands of other characters. This shouldn't be surprising, since the story of Korihor exists expressly to illustrate the evils of intellectualism. Brilliantly and briskly, it lays the foundation of the mindset which permits Mormons to dismiss any rational criticism of their beliefs out of hand as the work of Satan. All this in just a few short pages of tortured pseudo-Biblical prose. Wow!

Briefly, the story goes like this: Into the peaceful, God-fearing land of Zarahemla comes the sly and evil Korihor, who goes about preaching that the people should not believe in ancient prophecies, that there is no life after death, and so forth. Now, the law can't touch him, because the people of Zarahemla are free to believe as they like, but Korihor makes the mistake of wandering into the lands of Jershon and Gideon, where the laws against free speech are apparently more strict (and where, as the author is careful to point out, the people are "more wise"), and the people there tie him up and take him before their chief judge.

After a short theological debate, Korihor gets extradited back to Zarahemla, where he appears before Alma, who is not only governor of all the land but also God's head prophet. (Can you say conflict of interest?) After a somewhat lengthier debate, Korihor asserts that he will not believe in God unless he is given a sign. Alma handily obliges him, striking him mute by the power of God.

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