The 1832 Account of the First Vision - Criticism 4

There is no mention in the 1832 account of the First Vision of a struggle with Satan. The 1838 account records this struggle as follows:

15 After I had retired to the place where I had previously designed to go, having looked around me, and finding myself alone, I kneeled down and began to offer up the desires of my heart to God. I had scarcely done so, when immediately I was seized upon by some power which entirely overcame me, and had such an astonishing influence over me as to bind my tongue so that I could not speak. Thick darkness gathered around me, and it seemed to me for a time as if I were doomed to sudden destruction.

16 But, exerting all my powers to call upon God to deliver me out of the power of this enemy which had seized upon me, and at the very moment when I was ready to sink into despair and abandon myself to destruction—not to an imaginary ruin, but to the power of some actual being from the unseen world, who had such marvelous power as I had never before felt in any being—just at this moment of great alarm, I saw a pillar of light exactly over my head, above the brightness of the sun, which descended gradually until it fell upon me.

Since this story element is not present in the earliest known account of the event, but shows up in later retellings, critics claim that it is evidence that this tale evolved over time - becoming more dramatic and elaborate.

Once again we find ourselves in a logical quandary - the only way to avoid our critics is to repeat the story of the First Vision identically each time you tell it. But if that were done the critics would certainly jump on the fact that the story never varies and therefore must be memorized. From that they would deduce that only a liar memorizes a story in order to avoid making mistakes. Its a case of "damned if you do, damned if you don't". In my experience honest people do not put others in such quandaries - only the dishonest resort to such tactics. Doesn't speak well for our critics does it? A sincere seeker after truth would be repulsed by such strategies.

PS In the dozens of written accounts by Joseph and others who recorded conversations with Joseph, it seems that Joseph included this detail (the struggle with Satan) less than half the times he told the story. He also omitted it in the Wentworth Letter, the only account written in the Prophet's own handwriting.