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Originally Posted by Goatnapper'96
I just genuinely believe that she gets a pedestal more as a consequence that she is Joseph's wife and because we must convince ourselves that things were do difficult that her that she was unable to carry on carry on carry on.
I think most, if not all, of the women who travelled west to SLC faced the same challenges and many had endured similar trials. I wish not to denigrate Emma, but rather point out that there are examples of folks who endured likewise and yet we are more concerned with giving Emma the prestige.
I am sure she is solid and the reality is that if she does not end up in the Celestial Kingdom, I don't have a prayer. I just think there are others who demonstrated more fortitude and commitment to the entire cause, and not just the cause of Joseph, who we ignore to reinforce our artificial opinion of Emma.
I believe she had a deep disdain for Brigham Young and polygamy. That is a fact. I believe it played a huge role in her decision as her later involvement with the RLDS faith and its eschewing of all polygamy teachings indicates. I believe she was very attracted to her status as the Prophet's wife, or first one at least. She did not want to share that catbird seat with anyone. I can empathize with her not going west for a variety of reasons, but if Emma was such a chosen and elect lady of the Restored Gospel, why did she not teach it to her children? Not going west is actually understandable, but abdicating the religious principles that her husband gave his life to restore strikes me at odds with the romanticized picture we have of Emma.
I also think she kicked Eliza R. Snow's ass. But Eliza was knocking boots with her hubby, so I can believe she was fully justified in her anger.
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Well stated. Lots of people have opinions about Emma but very few of them are very informed in my experience. Notwithstanding such want of knowledge, most of those people have a very strong opinion about her that IMO is almost completely a reflection of who they need her to be in order to fit her into their belief/non-belief system.
I personally think there are good reasons to resist deifying anyone because none are perfect but one. I also think that we often take "judge not" to mean only "don't condemn" when I think there is an equally important corrolary along the lines of "don't exalt." I'll straddle the fence and say that Emma is a good example of both good and bad behaviors.