“The brethren continued exhorting, prophesying and speaking in tongues until 5 o clock in the morning—the Saviour made his appearance to some, while angels min[i]stered unto others, and it was a pent[e]cost and end[ow]ment indeed, long to be remembered.”1
Joseph Smith’s Journal
The Kirtland Temple dedication was a multi-day visionary fest for the early Latter-day Saints. What is interesting is that it sits nearly at the pinnacle of the most visionary period of Mormonism in history. More visions are recorded between the months of January and April 1836 than any other time in LDS history.
This visionary period can be explained by a few different factors. First, Joseph’s theological developments culminate during this period in one of the two peaks during his lifetime (the second peak was achieved just prior to his death in Nauvoo in 1844). The occurrence is also explained in part, because this is likely the period where Joseph Smith’s use of entheogens, or psychedelics, also peaked. I think this is also when he finally figured out how to use them most effectively. There were a few mishaps earlier on in his tenure with psychedelic-laced sacraments going awry, but by this time he’d worked out many of the kinks. He’d also found another effective administration route—anointing oils. These were introduced during the School of the Prophets from January through March. More on this later in the essay.
There are two main supports for these visions being psychedelic (although they don’t necessarily have to be of course). First, the numerous charges of intemperance against the leaders in particular and secondly, the visions themselves. Further support can be found when the dedication is placed contextually among his previous psychedelic visions and sacraments too. The majority of the evidence is in the context, which I purposefully omit for the sake of time. This context is explored in other essays and podcasts of mine but will be the subject of a post in the near future. This essay looks specifically at the phenomena experienced within the dedication itself that links to the broader evidence. Now to turn to the famed Kirtland Temple Dedication
The Kirtland Temple Dedication Ceremony
The traditional narrative of the Kirtland Temple dedication emphasizes both its visionary and prophetic qualities with the implication that both happened during the initial temple dedication—at least this is the narrative on the surface. The actual story is a little more complicated and way more interesting. The dedication itself wasn’t much more than a tedious, organizational event. It certainly wasn’t a pentecostal experience for most. Obviously it was an incredibly important event and held substantial spiritual meaning. But compared to the meetings that followed it, it was quite the straight-laced, traditional meeting. It accomplished what it needed to and set the stage for the evening to come.
A few early church leaders present give a detailed itinerary of the events over the course of the week of the temple dedication. What is interesting is that the actual dedication did not have many things of note other than being a very long meeting (9 AM to 4:15 PM) with a lot of preaching, organizational information, a bit of singing, and a dedicatory prayer (and an instance of speaking in tongues).2 The dedication took place on Sunday, March 27, 1836.
It was the secondary meeting during the evening after the initial dedication that produced some of the famed visionary experiences, in addition to subsequent meetings in the coming days after the dedication. These meetings, the largest of which occurred the evening after the dedication, included 316 people compared to the reported 1000 people in attendance of the dedication. These later meetings are the prime candidates for entheogenic-induced visions.
So what makes these experiences psychedelic, rather than merely spiritual or pentecostal in nature? First off, I want to be clear, I am not saying that all of the experiences were absolutely psychedelic-induced events. Rather, I am suggesting that at some of the more excitatory meetings there likely was psychoactive substances involved. More on that in a moment. First, we’ll turn to the charges of intemperance (which you can skip if you’d rather get to the entertaining visionary stuff), then we’ll look more into the visionary experiences found during that week.
Charges of Intemperance
There is no question that the sacrament was passed around—a sacrament that included wine—during the dedication and the following meetings. What is in question, according to faithful scholars, is whether or not the participants became “drunk” and what that might mean. It is important to note that these charges of intemperance apply to the “endowment meetings”, the smaller meetings held after the initial temple dedication.
There are multiple accounts claiming that individuals were drunk during the dedication. William McLellan, a devout fellow who later left the church wrote in a letter to leader Orson Pratt:
“Orson, you cannot have forgotten the scenes of drunkenness during the pretended end[ow]ment in Kirtland in 1836. I shall never forget them, nor the hundreds of false prophecies delivered in the Temple on that occasion.”3
To Joseph Smith III he wrote:
“We remained there fasting until sunrise next morning. We however partook of some bread and wine in the evening. And some partook so freely, on their empty stomachs, that they became drunk! I took care of S[amuel] H. Smith [Joseph Smith III’s uncle] in one of the stands so deeply intoxicated that he could not nor did sense anything. I kept him hid from the crowd in the stand, but he vomited the spit-box five times full, and his dear brother [Don] Carlos [Smith] would empty it out of the window. But I would prefer to draw a curtain over the awful drunken scene! Others imbibed to[o] much also.”4
William Harris wrote in Mormonism Portrayed that
“In the evening, they met for the endowment. The fast was then broken by eating light wheat bread, and drinking as much wine as they saw proper. Smith knew well how to infuse the spirit which they expected to receive; so he encouraged the brethren to drink freely, telling them that the wine was consecrated, and would not make them drunk . . . they began to prophecy, pronounce blessings upon their friends, and curses on their enemies.”5
This account is pretty interesting. Joseph “knew well how to infuse the spirit which they expected to receive” could have a double meaning to it when highlighted alongside a possible spiked sacramental wine.
Another account (that I find particularly entertaining) reported:
It was on this occasion that one of the brethren, lying flat on his back so full of the spirit (of drunkenness) that he could not sit up, hiccoughed out: “Now is the time to see visions.”6
There are many other accounts I will include in the footnotes for those interested.7
So why aren’t William McLellin and the others correct, these visions were just drunkenness from the alcohol and perhaps fasting? Why must they be laced wines? Alcohol, even coupled with fasting, does not produce the types of visions found in the Kirtland dedicatory ceremonies. Mass visions and extended visions lasting all through the night are not side effects of alcohol use. Suggestibility is a clear side effect of alcohol and so if this were a strictly pentecostal or emotive experience, the alcohol could have helped that along. Hallucinations (and I’m not using this word pejoratively here), especially visual, are rarely side effects of alcohol and most commonly occur among those who are alcoholics that suddenly begin abstaining from alcohol. This was not the circumstance at the endowment.
Visions are however, a side effect of a psychoactive-laced alcohol—something that has been extremely common throughout history. I won’t go into all of the details here, but psychoactives like amanita muscaria, henbane, datura, psilocybin, acacia, and even ergot have all been used as common additives to beer, wine, and liquor throughout history.8 As I’ve argued in a paper that should be coming out soon, the Smith family had the herbal knowledge from their various exploits and from Lucy Mack Smith’s (Joseph Smith’s mother) life-long experience running a tavern and brewing particularly potent beer. Further, Bryce Blankenagel has noted that Joseph always had accomplished herbalists right by his side. This was literally true until the day he died.9 All of this is to say, Joseph had the skills, the know-how, and the people with him to lace alcohol and anointing oils with psychoactive substances.10
Due to the contemporary prohibition against alcohol by the modern LDS church, apologists attempt to downplay the accounts of drunkenness and attempt to discredit them because they come years after the fact or from individuals who subsequently left the faith (yet they have no problem accepting “faith-promoting” accounts from years after the fact). One account, by John Corrill reports the drunkenness in 1839, just three years after the fact.11 Perhaps the apologists are correct, but given the consistent claims of intoxication throughout the entirety of Joseph Smith’s life and ministry it seems unlikely that the Smith brothers wouldn’t have overly imbibed themself of the visionary wine.
The other facet of the denial of these accounts is that some of them, particularly McLellin and David Whitmer deny any sort of spiritual experience occurring. The assumption by some scholars is that they are lying because they hated the church and wanted to discredit it after leaving. But the fact that there are a number of accounts supporting a spiritual experience AND a number who had nothing seems indicative of a psychedelic use! Not everyone was affected in the same way by the psychoactives that were added to the wine or the anointing oils. And, because there were multiple meetings with multiple sacraments, each sacramental wine might have had a slightly different concentration of the substances—and some may have not contained any at all! It is absolutely plausible that not everyone had visions, though many did.
The Psychedelic Endowment
Perhaps the most important facet of these secondary meetings is that they were considered by Joseph to be an endowment for the brethren of the church. It was to these people the rituals were intended for and to these people the visions were promised. Joseph spent the preceding months, January through March, preparing the ceremony and testing it out on his inner circles one by one.
The psychedelic meetings after the dedication consisted of ritual washings and anointings that were first introduced by Joseph earlier that year to the School of the Prophets. The body was washed and prepared with a cinnamon-infused whiskey, making a prime surface for an entheogenic anointing oil to be applied.12 This pattern, as written in the Old Testament, has been used by occultists utilizing psychoactive substances since that time.
What is particularly interesting is that Joseph introduced the washings and anointings on two different days during the School of the Prophets. When the washing was introduced, there were no visions yet. It wasn’t until the anointings were added in, the visions began (the anointing oil most likely contained psychoactive substances in it—a topic I’m actively working on right now, so more on that and the visions from the School in a future post). These anointings weren’t the single drop of oil that contemporary LDS people might be familiar with. The anointing oil was rubbed all over the participant’s head and face in a thick coating. Enough was administered that an ample amount was set to be absorbed by the skin.
During the School of the Prophets, the participants were learning Hebrew and talking theology during the day, followed by washings and anointings which led to seeing visions all night, only to return and do the same thing again the next day. Joseph was building up to the next stage in their spiritual development. This stage was ushered in for many during the week consisting of the dedication event and all the visions in the days following the dedication where the endowment was undertaken.
Joseph Smith was an EntheoMagus. He was a master of set and setting. He’d been preparing people’s mindset for months telling everyone this was to be a grand pentecostal event. He’d spent months preparing them physically and spiritually for the visions in the School of the Prophets.
Joseph had been telling the School throughout the preceding months that what they were doing and preparing for would culminate in the practices of the temple. He would repeat during those meetings that they needed to “prepare their hearts for the solemn assembly and for the great day which is to come.”13 This was particularly important for those who would be sent out in service of the church:
“You need an endowment, brethren, in order that you may be prepared and able to overcome all things, and those that reject your testimony will be damned. The sick will be healed; the lame made to walk; the deaf to hear, and the blind to see through your instrumentality.”14
If they wanted to be successful in their preaching and miracle-working they needed to have this ceremony. All of this is to say that for the participants, a lot was riding on this event.
During the actual dedication everything said and done was preparing them towards the endowment ceremony. The hymns that were sung, particularly “The Spirit of God”, which was written for this occasion, reinforced Joseph’s message. The sermon that was given, the dedication prayer, all of this was preparing the mindset of the individuals.
The setting was exemplary: the beautiful Kirtland Temple, sitting among fellow Brothers in Christ, and re-enacting the Biblical stories together. This alone would provide an opportune place to facilitate a certain type of vision. Combine this with the previous sermons and instructions given by Joseph, it would be more impressive if they didn’t see angels or the divine.
The Visions of Old Are Returning: The Psychedelic Meetings
First we’ll look at some of the accounts of the visions and then we’ll dig into the nitty gritty details of some of the accounts and how it might fit with psychedelic use.
During the temple dedication, Frederick G. Williams (one of those important herbalists I mentioned earlier), stood up and said that he saw an angel come through the window and take a seat on the stand. Nine different accounts record Frederick saying this, with three mentioning that Joseph Smith said this fellow was Jesus. One account records how Frederick described the angel. “He was a very tall personage, black eyes, white hair, and stoop shouldered, his garment was white, extending to near his ankles, on his feet he had sandals.”15
As far as I’ve found, no one else reported seeing this particular angel (or Jesus) and Joseph named him based on Frederick’s description. This account comes from the dedication proper. Many, however, would see angels in later meetings. It was during all of these “afterparty” meetings angels were seen. The night of March 27th Brown reported that “Father Stephens . . . saw two rows of Angles through the House.” On March 29th, at another smaller meeting, “angels were seen over the Elders.”16
These meetings began lasting throughout the entire night. Brown again says that two quorums continued all night in the House and the twelve guarded it. This note is particularly telling. In the past there was a history of disorder at these psychedelic sacraments. Chaos could ensue if proper precautions were not taken, if the tripping brethren left, or if questioning eyes tried to get in and a hold of the sacramental wine (as J. J. Moss tried unsuccessfully to do so in 1831). As such, these twelve men also served as trip sitters to help people through problematic visions—the very same role Joseph played for them in the past.
Brown describes the visions of the meeting: “The H[e]avens were opened two saw the savior some saw chariots and . . . one lay about half an hour & saw from Eternity to Eternity. Many Miraculous Experiences told Many Visions told.” Everyone is seeing different visions, different angels, and experiencing the heavens. Seeing “Eternity to Eternity” is exactly like something someone tripping would attempt to describe. It’s the ineffability of the experience at work. I, too, have seen the infinite expanse of the universe and heavens in the space of half an hour and words fail to describe the vision.
It was during these meetings that they began fasting, except for the sacrament. These participants were being pushed to the brink. Lorenzo Barnes reported that they had a joyful time during a meeting that “continued with out intermission from 9 in the morning [on the 30th] until the dawn of the next day.”17 The next day, March 31st was the second dedication ceremony for those who could not fit into the temple on the 27th.
Joseph Smith reported in his history that he “left the meeting in the charge of the 12 and retired at about 9 o clock in the evening [on March 30th]; the brethren continued exhorting, prophesying and speaking in tongues until 5 o clock in the morning—the Saviour made his appearance to some, while angels minestered unto others, and it was a penticost and enduement indeed, long to be remembered.”18 Joseph had to be in tip top shape for the second temple dedication event and thus did not participate beyond the initial ceremony. But the results of the meeting were exactly as planned for most.
Can we just return to the fact that so many of the accounts report they were fasting during these meetings after the initial dedication on the 27th and reports of fasting include the days leading to the second dedication. They weren’t sleeping—they were busy staying up all night tripping. Their bodies were being pushed to the brink, which itself is known to cause visions and spiritual experiences. And in many other psychedelic-using societies, these techniques were used in conjunction with psychedelics to enhance the effects of each part. Sleep deprivation and an empty stomach would drastically reduce the onset of the visionary experiences as well as decreasing the amount of substance necessary to induce or aid in these visions. This would make it significantly easier to administer a psychoactive to a participant.
Rushing Winds, Visions of Angels, Cloven Tongues of Fire
By far the most common elements of the temple dedication, which all come from the evening session after the dedication, are reports of a rushing wind sweeping through the temple, cloven tongues of fire descending on some of the members, speaking in tongues (some report 40 members, others report a hundred or more), and Oliver Cowdery describes a great cloud coming down and resting on the temple.19
What is fascinating is that this entire scene plays out in the same way as the Pentecost is described in the New Testament. Acts 2 records that
“when the day of Pentecost was fully come, they were all with one accord in one place. And suddenly there came a sound from heaven as of a rushing mighty wind, and it filled all the house where they were sitting. And there appeared unto them cloven tongues like as of fire, and it sat upon each of them. And they were all filled with the Holy Ghost, and began to speak with other tongues, as the spirit gave them utterance.”
The other fascinating thing about all of the visions of Sunday evening lining up with Acts 2 is that the participants in Acts were similarly accused of having had too much wine (v. 13). Now let’s take a moment to recall that wine has never just been grapes in history. Today’s wine is very different from the wine 200 years ago. In fact, the wine from 200 years ago probably has more in common with wine from 2000 years ago than today. Beer and wine containers from all over the Mediterranean have anciently been found to contain psychoactive substances such as henbane, datura ergot, opium, cannabis, etc. It is possible that that day of Pentecost anciently, just like Joseph Smith’s contained vision-inducing wine.
This, at least in my mind, is further supported by Joseph’s overarching vision. He was intending to restore the ancient mystery religion, pulling truth from all different sources be it Christian, Greek (think Eleusinian Mysteries), Egyptian, or otherwise. (A side note, Sidney Rigdon compared the various ancient religions with the modern ones in his extended lecture during the dedication!) I’ve made cases for all of these traditions’ influences on him elsewhere and in a forthcoming paper. But for now, there are numerous interesting parallels there.
Joseph opened the Sunday evening meeting by saying that the day of Pentecost would continue, perhaps reading to them the very passage from Acts again (this passage was cited in the dedicatory prayer earlier that day). Joseph priming the participants just before they have those very same experiences makes perfect sense. One could write them off as “promises”, which to me is plausible as well. But he had to have a way to deliver on those promises.
So how do we understand these descriptions of the events? Hearing rushing wind and rushing water have been used to describe the come up or onset of various psychedelic substances. Rick Strassman in particular has cataloged “entrance sounds” of psychedelic experience and in particular links the sounds of DMT experiences with phrases in the Bible.20 There’s a rushing sound on the come up and then the psychedelic hits and a cloud descends just as Oliver says.
There’s a further, mystical way to understand the cloven tongues of fire resting on heads and being filled with the Holy Ghost.21 This imagery could be construed as the arrival of an enlightenment experience, one where the fire of enlightenment engulfs them. There’s a certain bodily feel to a spiritual experience and to a particular state of the psychedelic experience that lines up with Oliver’s description.
Or, they literally witnessed a vision of fire coming down from heaven and resting on the heads of certain participants. That could be either a sober or a psychedelic experience. This imagery is not unheard of among psychedelic users. One participant, Benjamin Brown, did describe the fire or sensation in much more vague terms: “at another time the glory of God came down on the Elders from the head down half way.”22 What he meant by this is up for interpretation. So while it is interesting that many described it in a single way, other’s did describe it differently.
What is important to remember though, is that according to William James, one of the hallmarks of a mystical-type experience is the ineffability of it. Words cannot describe the experience. This applies to endogenous and exogenous mystical experiences. When language becomes inadequate to describe experience, people often reach for metaphors and descriptors that they are familiar with to help give some framework to the experience. This was true in Joseph’s day just as it is in our own. In Joseph’s time the Bible was the framework for spiritual experiences and the language used to describe an ineffable experience so that your neighbor could understand what you are saying.
In our day, modern psychonauts have built an entire repertoire of language to describe psychedelic experiences that have been communicated among the culture and by figureheads like Terence McKenna and Alan Watts. Richard Doyle wrote an excellent book, Darwin’s Pharmacy, where he breaks down the modern day psychonaut’s rhetorical strategies and methods for describing their own experiences. He even goes so far as to argue that the rhetorical strategies used by psychonauts have actually shaped future psychonauts’ experiences. The language is a structure to be imposed on the experience.
Now let’s return to Joseph Smith for a moment. He has been working with many of these participants for three months, preparing them for this pinnacle experience. Many have had visions of their own directly facilitated and guided by his own hand. He can give them the prompting, the priming, the rhetorical framework for understanding the coming experience that would then be used to make sense of it. He likely did so with his direct comparison to the Pentecost mentioned in Acts 2.
A final note on this, I will emphasize that the majority of the descriptions we have of these visions are short and second hand. Someone is describing someone else’s vision. Perhaps they are quoting the visionary’s own words, but more than likely they are also applying their own framework and understanding onto the vision. These second hand descriptions are even more likely to be couched in a framework that has been given to them.
Speaking in Tongues
As few as 40 and as many as 100 participants were reported to have spoken in tongues during the various meetings. Speaking in tongues is one of the more difficult things to understand and address with a Mormon or non-pentecostal audience. This is illustrated in a discussion Bryce Blankenagel, Cody Noconi, and I had with Brian Hales, an LDS apologist. Hales claimed that the speaking in tongues found at the dedication was similar to his experiences on his mission. My guess is many people view this in a similar manner, someone spoke in a foreign language with skill they did not previously have but that they already had familiarity with. That is certainly possible. But “speaking in tongues” is a specific term for a broader phenomena within Christianity categorized as glossolalia. What actually happened at the dedication, the specific words that were spoken, we do not know.
There are no specific examples of languages given in the dedication or the following meetings, other than one instance. Benjamin Brown reports one fellow “spake in tongues to the lamanites.” This doesn’t give us a specific language spoken and the likelihood of a Native American tribe member being present for this is extremely small. What is more likely the case is that in one visionary experience a member saw what he thought were the Lamanites and began speaking to them in the vision. This is not unheard of within the realm of psychedelia. There are reports of individuals speaking what sounds like gibberish to onlookers, but is apparently a different language and they are speaking with beings they encounter during their trip. I’ll post a couple accounts in the footnotes.23 I’ve personally seen this happen to friends in their experiences as well.24
What more than likely happened, as is usual for glossolalia, is that all these individuals spoke what was essentially gibberish in the cadence of their natural tongue. Someone whose native tongue is English “speaks in tongues” in the cadence of their own language while someone whose native tongue is Spanish would speak in that cadence when “speaking in tongues”.
Another possible cause could have been individuals under the influence of the psychedelic sacrament were intending to shout Hosanna! But instead, it came out garbled. I wonder if this was one possible explanation because of the addition and frequency of the Hosanna shout during this period. Many of the participants in the ceremonies were formerly Methodists, for whom it was common to shout hosanna. Some thought that when one was feeling the spirit it was impossible not to shout hosanna. However, if they were under the influence of psychedelics, it’s possible they were attempting to shout it, but it didn’t come out the way they intended and sounded like speaking in tongues to those listening (who may also have been under the influence, further distorting what was said).
The reason I point all of this out is one common argument against the possibility of psychedelics being used is that there was speaking in tongues and it was a very particular language and psychedelic users never say anything other than gibberish. This is not to say that there are not authentic instances of speaking a foreign language in a spiritual experience nor a psychedelic experience, both have occurred before. But based on the information we have about the Kirtland Temple dedication, it cannot be said that psychedelics could not have been a cause of the speaking in tongues.
Concluding Thoughts
The Kirtland Temple dedication and the following endowment really are peak Mormonism. There are all the elements of occultism, order and propriety, ceremony, joint visions, individual visions, biblical call backs, and so forth. All details which would require significantly more time and space to cover. I want to make a few concluding points and interesting directions to explore later here.
First, I want to mention that I don’t necessarily think psychedelics were required for the fulfillment of these visionary experiences. I think they are possible and probably even likely, but given enough priming, the proper ritual, and set and setting, visions are probable—particularly in occult contexts. That doesn’t preclude the possibility that psychedelics were involved in the least bit. Low-dose psychedelics could offer the necessary suppression of the “natural mind” to enable the spirit to have visionary experiences. Low dose psychoactives have done exactly that for me when I otherwise might not have been in the correct frame of mind for visions to occur—particularly when used in proper ritual settings.
Secondly, and related to the first point, I am not attempting to discredit the visions had on these occasions in any way, shape, or form. Psychedelic visions are spiritual visions. They can be one and the same. What I tried to do here is point out the different ways of looking at the visionary descriptors and how they can be understood. Some think that the visionary accounts of the Kirtland dedication and endowment are proof that psychedelics could not have possibly been used. I think the jury is still out on that and I detect remarkable similarities.
I don’t think psychedelics are a sufficient or necessary cause either. Without the proper dose, set, and setting provided by Joseph Smith or the rigorous instruction he provided many of the elders in the months prior, I don’t think this would’ve been nearly as positive of an event as it was. Psychedelic visions usually require a decent set and setting to truly come to fruition. Obviously not always, but it drastically reduces leaving whether or not someone has a vision, or the correct vision, to chance.
The events of the Kirtland Temple dedication week, particularly the endowment, seem to be cases of psychedelic use. As with most history, it’s impossible to determine with certainty whether or not this was actually the case, but in my mind it seems possible.
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1 Journal, 1835–1836, p. 189, The Joseph Smith Papers.
2 Harper, Steven C.. ““A Pentecost and Endowment Indeed”: Six Eyewitness Accounts of the Kirtland Temple Experience.” In Opening the Heavens: Accounts of Divine Manifestation, 1820-1844, edited by John W. Welch, 2nd ed. (Brigham Young University Press/Deseret Book, 2017): 351–393. Found online here.
3 McLellin to Orson Pratt, 29 April 1854, p. 2; cited in Stan Larson and Samuel J. Passey (editors), The William E. McLellin Papers 1854-1880 (Salt Lake City, Utah: Signature Books, 2007), p. 436.
4 McLellin to Joseph Smith III, July 1872; The William E. McLellin Papers, p. 493-494.
5 William Harris, Mormonism Portrayed (Sharp and Gamble Publishers, 1841), 31–32.
6 https://icotb.org/resources/Braden-Kelley–Mormon.pdf
7 “As to the endowment in Kirtland, I state positively, it was no endowment from God. Not only myself was not endowed but no other man of the five hundred who was present—except it was with wine! McLellin to Mark H. Forscutt, 1 October 1871; The William E. McLellin Papers 1854-1880, p. 476.
“On the 6th of April, 1836, the ministerial authorities, about five hundred in number, entered that house at sunrise, and remained fasting until next morning, sun-rise, in order to receive an endowment, but utterly failed in their endeavor! It was more an endowment with wine than power from God.” McLellin to Dear Mary, 3 August 1872; The William E. McLellin Papers, p. 512.
“The endowment was sought for in Kirtland, O. on April 6th 1836, but was not received, and was an entire failure….[the members] assembled at sunrise, and remained fasting until the next morning sunrise. Then about five hundred ministers began to wend their way home from than noble building, many of them disappointed and dispirited. The scene through which they had passed was one long to be remembered. No display of power from God was given. Al the power given was the power of man….They had a little bread, sent in by the sisters in the evening, The Twelve as servants carried round to them on servers a little bread and wine, and some of them partook of the wine so freely so as to become badly intoxicated!
McLellin to John L. Traughber, 14 December 1878, The William E. McLellin Papers, p. 396.
“The morning arrived and some five hundred ministers assembled in the Temple at sunrise….We remained until sunrise next morning fasting, excepting a little bread and wine furnished us in the evening. Some partook of the wine so freely on an empty stomach, that they actually became drunken! And a scene ensued that would be hard to describe. One thing I state candidly, I saw no one man in that assembly that was endowed with super-human power–no not one. This wonderful enduement [sic] then was only a farce—a very great failure
McLellin, “Reasons Why I am Not A Mormon, ca. 1880; The William E. McLellin Papers, p. 421-422.
Mrs. Alfred Morley: “I have heard many Mormons who attended the dedication, or endowment of the Temple say that very many became drunk….The Mormon leaders would stand up to prophesy and were so drunk they said they could not get it out and would call for another drink. Over a barrel of liquor was used at the service.” in Naked Truths About Mormonism, (Oakland, Calif., April, 1888), p. 2.
Isaac Aldrich: “My brother, Hazen Aldrich, who as president of the Seventies, told me when the Temple was dedicated a barrel of wine was used and they had a drunken pow-wow.” in Naked Truths About Mormonism, (Oakland, Calif., April, 1888), p. 3.
Stephen H. Hart: “”Mr McWhithey, who was a Mormon…said he attended a service which lasted from 10 AM until 4 PM, and there was another service in the evening. The Lord’s Supper was celebrated and they passed the wine in pails several times to the audience, and each person drank as much as he chose from a cup. He said it was mixed liquor and he believed the Mormon leaders intended to get the audience under the influence of the mixed liquor, so they would believe it was the Lord’s doings….When the liquor was repassed, Mr McWhithey told them he had endowment enough, and said he wanted to get out of the Temple, which was densely crowded.” in Naked Truths About Mormonism, (Oakland, Calif., April, 1888), p. 3.
8 Christian Ratsch’s Encyclopedia of Psychoactive Plants: Ethnopharmacology and Its Applications is a goldmine of information on this topic.
9 See the original Entheogenic Origins of Mormonism paper, the EntheoMagus documentary, and he, Cody, and I’s forthcoming paper “I Know the Entheogenic Theory is True: Herbal Knowledge, The Smith Family, and Psychedelic Use in Early Mormonism.”
10 I will also mention that Joseph was commanded twice in revelations leading up to this to use “wine of [his] own make” for the sacrament (See D&C 27:3–4 and 89:6).
11 John Corrill, A Brief History of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, (Commonly Called Mormons;) Including an account of their doctrines and discipline; with the reasons of the author for leaving the church (Published for the author, St. Louis, Mo., 1839), 23.
12 Arrington. ed., “Oliver Cowdery’s Kirtland, Ohio Sketch Book,” 410–26.
13 History, 1838–1856, volume B-1 [1 September 1834–2 November 1838], p. 635, The Joseph Smith Papers.
14 History, 1838–1856, volume B-1 [1 September 1834–2 November 1838], p. 641, The Joseph Smith Papers.
15 Heber C. Kimball, Journal, quoted in Helen Mar Whitney, “Life Incidents,” Woman’s Exponent 9 (February 1, 1881): 130.
16 Seeing angels is an interesting topic, most of which will be the subject of a later essay. A brief series of thoughts on this: first, seeing things or beings that aren’t physically there but are interacting with consensus reality is a symptom of anticholinergic use. But if we want to take these things seriously spiritually, as I do, it could be said that they were there spiritually and only some of the participants saw them. But it is interesting that different participants report seeing different quantities of angels in different places at the same time. This raises interesting questions about why certain people saw certain angels but not others despite seeing angels at the same time. Were they accessing a different spiritual place? Were they seeing visions of different classes of beings that only some had access to? Were they seeing the angels with their physical or spiritual eyes (or their third eye)? There’s a lot of interesting things to dive into here, especially when explored in the light of the occult foundation of the church, in the anthropology of psychedelic spirituality, and the various traditions of angel-encounters.
17 Lorenzo Barnes, Reminiscences and Diaries 1834–39, 43.
18 Minutes, 30 March 1836, p. 189, The Joseph Smith Papers.
19 Leonard J. Arrington. ed., “Oliver Cowdery’s Kirtland, Ohio Sketch Book,” BYU Studies 12 no. 4 (1972): 410–26.
20 See Rick Strassman’s book DMT and the Soul of Prophecy: A New Science of Spiritual Revelation in the Hebrew Bible (Park Street Press, 2014).
21 Erik Davis has a particularly neat way of understanding the events of Acts 2 on his Technosis blog.
22 Steven C. Harper, “Pentecost Continued: A Contemporaneous Account of the Kirtland Temple Dedication,” BYU Studies 42 no. 2 (2003), 4–22.
23 “Do you guys ever experience speaking in tongues after tripping?
I tend to do it a lot, though almost exclusively with DMT and when I’m alone. It just flows out so easily, it even sounds like some actual ancient or dare I say alien language. There’s construction in there, almost like there’s grammar and a vocabulary involved. There are recurring sounds and words. I think the sounds often mirror the stuff I’ve felt during the trip, not so much in the meaning of the ‘words’ but in the way they sound.”
– Satyr604, Glossolalia (‘speaking in tongues’) #23468887 – 07/23/16
“I had it doing ayahuasca for the first time in Peru. It actually freaked me out. At one point I sat up and started speaking incessantly in weird multisyllabic words for a good 5 minutes or so. I couldn’t stop too, it’s like somebody took a hold of my mouth. I’ve never experienced anything like that before. I literally felt gripped. People around me thought I’m just speaking my native language of Russian but after I told them I didn’t know what the hell kind of language it was they were surprised because it definitely sounded like structured and intentional speech. To this day I don’t know what it was and what it means.”
– Reality_Node on Reddit in 2021
24 A further possibility could be something like the icaro, the healing songs learned in vegetal ceremonies in South America. The healers come out having learned a new song meant to heal from beings they encounter. I put this in the footnote because I wouldn’t classify this as glossolalia. It is not gibberish nor is it speaking in tongues the way some LDS members might consider. But I think it’s an excellent example of someone learning a new linguistic pattern in a sacred setting.