Doctrine and Covenants 135

Emma Smith recalled her feelings when her husband Joseph crossed the Mississippi River to return to Nauvoo: “I felt the worst I ever did in my life,” she said, “and from that time I looked for him to be killed” (in Edmund C. Briggs, “A Visit to Nauvoo in 1856,” Journal of History, Oct. 1916, 454). When Joseph was leaving his home to travel to Carthage early in the morning on Monday, June 24, 1844, he turned to Emma and said, “Emma, can you train my sons to walk in their father’s footsteps?” Emma answered, “Oh, Joseph, you are coming back.” Joseph repeated the question twice more, and Emma gave the same answer each time. (In “Edwin Rushton, Related by his Son,” in Hyrum L. Andrus and Helen Mae Andrus, They Knew the Prophet[1974], 171.) At the time of the martyrdom, Emma was four months pregnant. She and Joseph also had four other living children: Julia (13), who was adopted, Joseph III (11), Frederick (8), and Alexander (6).

Outside the Mansion House, Joseph then addressed the crowd that had gathered in the early morning. While doing so, Joseph’s sons pulled on his clothing and cried, “Father, O Father don’t go to Carthage. They will kill you.” His mother asked if he could promise that he would return. (Dan Jones, “The Martyrdom of Joseph and Hyrum Smith,” manuscript, Jan. 20, 1855, Church History Library, Salt Lake City). Not answering her directly, Joseph said to the assembled Saints, “If I do not go there [to Carthage], the result will be the destruction of this city and its inhabitants; and I cannot think of my dear brothers and sisters and their children suffering the scenes of Missouri again in Nauvoo; no, it is better for your brother, Joseph, to die for his brothers and sisters, for I am willing to die for them. My work is finished” (in Dan Jones, “The Martyrdom of Joseph Smith and His Brother, Hyrum!” trans., Ronald D. Dennis, in Ronald D. Dennis, “The Martyrdom of Joseph Smith and His Brother Hyrum,” BYU Studies, vol. 24, no. 1 [Winter 1984], 85; see also Church History in the Fulness of Times Student Manual, 2nd ed. [Church Educational System manual, 2003], 277).

“After embracing his little children who were clinging to his clothes and after bidding a tender farewell to his wife whom he loved greatly, also in tears, and after giving the last comfort to his aged, saintly mother, he addressed the entire crowd with great effect, exhorting them to be faithful in the way and with the religion which he had taught them” (in Dan Jones, “The Martyrdom of Joseph Smith and His Brother, Hyrum!” 85–86).

As Joseph rode out of Nauvoo with those accompanying him, he paused at the temple site, “looked on the sacred edifice, then on the city, and remarked, ‘This is the loveliest place and the best people under the heavens; little do they know the trials that await them’” (History of the Church, 6:554; see also Church History in the Fulness of Times Student Manual,277).

Elder D. Todd Christofferson:

“Through his personal association with the Lord, his translation and publication of the Book of Mormon, and the sealing of his testimony with his martyr’s blood, Joseph has become the preeminent revelator of Jesus Christ in His true character as divine Redeemer. Jesus has had no greater witness nor more devoted friend than Joseph Smith” (“Born Again,” Ensign or Liahona, May 2008, 79; italics added).

The influence of Joseph Smith

In the spring of 1844, Josiah Quincy, former mayor of Boston, Massachusetts, and then president of Harvard University, along with his cousin Charles Francis Adams, son of former United States President John Quincy Adams, visited Nauvoo. They spent a day with the Prophet Joseph Smith. Years later, Josiah Quincy wrote of his experience:

“It is by no means improbable that some future text-book, for the use of generations yet unborn, will contain a question something like this: What historical American of the nineteenth century has exerted the most powerful influence upon the destinies of his countrymen? And it is by no means impossible that the answer to that interrogatory may be thus written: Joseph Smith, the Mormon prophet” (Figures of the Past: From the Leaves of Old Journals [1888], 376).

Doctrine and Covenants 135:3

President Joseph F. Smith:

“The work in which Joseph Smith was engaged was not confined to this life alone, but it pertains as well to the life to come, and to the life that has been. In other words, it relates to those who have lived upon the earth, to those who are living and to those who shall come after us. It is not something which relates to man only while he tabernacles in the flesh, but to the whole human family from eternity to eternity” (Gospel Doctrine, 5th ed. [1939], 481).

Doctrine and Covenants 135:6

President Gordon B. Hinckley:

“We do not worship the Prophet. We worship God our Eternal Father and the risen Lord Jesus Christ. But we acknowledge the Prophet; we proclaim him; we respect him; we reverence him as an instrument in the hands of the Almighty in restoring to the earth the ancient truths of the divine gospel, together with the priesthood through which the authority of God is exercised in the affairs of His Church and for the blessing of His people” (“Joseph Smith Jr.—Prophet of God, Mighty Servant,” Ensign,Dec. 2005, 4).

President Thomas S. Monson:

“[The Prophet Joseph Smith] left behind a legacy that enables [millions of] followers today on every continent to proclaim him as a prophet of God. May we, each of us, strive to continue the Prophet Joseph’s vision for this work and to magnify his legacy through our works and testimonies to others, that they may know him as we do and that they may experience the peace and joy of the gospel he restored” (“Brother Joseph,” Church News, Dec. 31, 2005, 4).