If any man see his brother sin a sin which is not unto death, he shall ask, and he shall give him life for them that sin not unto death. There is a sin unto death:
Critics claim that during the administration of Brigham Young apostates were secretly put to death. They claim this is in line with the teachings of LDS leaders at the time that apostasy was the unforgivable sin, and that the only thing an apostate could do to redeem himself was to give his own life, willingly or unwillingly. H/T FairWiki
As outrageous as this claim is, it was a popular charge 150 years ago. The First Presidency responded formally to this preposterous charge in 1889.
Notwithstanding all the stories told about the killing of apostates, no case of this kind has ever occurred, and of course has never been established against the Church we represent. Hundreds of seceders from the Church have continuously resided and now live in this territory, many of whom have amassed considerable wealth, though bitterly opposed to the Mormon faith and people. Even those who made it their business to fabricate the vilest falsehoods, and to render them plausible by culling isolated passages from old sermons without the explanatory context, and have suffered no opportunity to escape them of vilifying and blackening the characters of the people, have remained among those whom they have thus persistently calumniated until the present day, without receiving the slightest personal injury.
We denounce as entirely untrue the allegation which has been made, that our Church favors or believes in the killing of persons who leave the Church or apostatize from its doctrines. We would view a punishment of this character for such an act with the utmost horror; it is abhorrent to us and is in direct opposition to the fundamental principles of our creed.
This illustrates in part the extreme lengths to which our enemies will go to in order to smear the Church. I submit that it is more of a reflection on them, then it is on us. Now I concede that the First Presidency issuing a statement is not proof that it never happened. Proving a negative is always difficult, that is probably why dishonest critics engage in such outrageous charges. Honest critics are never so outrageous. Dishonest ones practice this form of sophistry with regularity.
There grew between the Mormon leader and his congregation a bond that permitted...irreverence [toward Brigham personally]. Brigham cast himself as the Saints' gruff but loving father, alternately scolding and befriending his flock. As lawgiver, he felt he should preach without compromise.
"I will tell you what this people need, with regard to preaching," he said. "You need, figuratively, to have it rain pitchforks, tines downwards.... Instead of the smooth, beautiful, sweet, still, silk-velvet-lipped preaching, you should have sermons like peals of thunder."
True to his word, Brigham gave saints and sinners pitchforks aplenty. The latter might be especially hard hit if guilty of malicious anti-Mormonism....
But his outbursts were the exception rather than the rule, and even when thundering he often softened his blows with humor....He conjectured that some women's dresses might conceal a six-horse team, with "a dozen dogs under the wagon."....Far from rankling under his thrusts, the Mormon membership came to tolerate, expect, and even enjoy the show....
One did not have to go far to find the keys to his speaking popularity. For one thing, his audience sensed that behind his strong words lay a genuine concern". my heart yearns over [the Saints]... with all the emotions of tenderness, so that I could weep like a child," he said, but I am careful to keep my tears to myself." He assured his people that he never intended malice. "There is not a soul I chasten but what I feel as though I could take them and put them in my bosom and carry them with me day by day."
Brigham believed that his strong words had not separated him from his flock. "Although I may get up here and cuff... [the people] about, chastising them for their forgetfulness, their weakness and follies, yet I have not seen a moment when they did not love me The reason is, because I love them so well." He had rebuked with caution, he thought, employing a primary rule: "When you have the chastening rod in your hands, ask God to give you wisdom to use it, that you may not use it to the destruction of an individual, but to his salvation."...
The Saints also understood that there was little bite to his celebrated bark. Young admitted as much. "I have had some people ask me how I manage and control the people," he once remarked. "I do it by telling them the truth and letting them do just as they have a mind to."...
Thus, Young's words and platform manner were often calculated for effect. For a typical Tabernacle congregation, he thought normal and respectable words were like "wind," going "into the ear and... [soon] forgotten," Therefore, he used stronger measures. "When you wish the people to feel what you say," he once said revealingly, "you have got to use language that they will remember, or else the ideas are lost to them. Consequently, in many instances we use language that we would rather not use."
