Dr. Jonathan Stapley, author of Holiness to the Lord, dives deep into the complex history of women & temple sealings, the historical evolution of the sealing ceremony, the persistent changes to the endowment, and the shifting architectural purposes of Latter-day Saint temples.

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Complex History of Women & Temple Sealings: Egalitarian Sealings? 

When examining the history of the sealing ceremony, Stapley points out a stark contrast between Joseph Smith’s era and Brigham Young’s era. The earliest known sealing text, written by Joseph Smith in 1842, was much more egalitarian than the Nauvoo Temple text later published by Orson Pratt in 1852, which incorporated Brigham Young’s views subordinating women. While the Church has made significant revisions since 1990 to reintroduce more egalitarian language, certain disparities between men and women remain.

Dilemma for Widows

A poignant example of this is the church’s current sealing policy regarding widows. Before the 1890s, women were regularly sealed to multiple men sequentially, but by the 1920s, a rule was formalized restricting living women to a single sealed husband. Curiously, in the 1960s, the church changed the rules to allow deceased women to be sealed to multiple men to fix family history roadblocks, yet the restriction remained for living women. This leaves many modern widows feeling anxious or hesitant to remarry, and Stapley notes that the current theological answer regarding how these complex marriages will be resolved in the afterlife is simply, “we don’t know.”

Debunking the 4-8-Hour Endowment Myth

Stapley also pushes back against modern fundamentalist assumptions that the original Nauvoo endowment was a massive, 4-8-hour ordeal. In reality, historical records from William Clayton indicate that the Nauvoo endowment took roughly 90 minutes. When the ritual did take longer, it was often because every participant was acting as a main character, and there were limited temple workers to facilitate the liturgy.

Stapley emphasizes that the endowment has never been static; it has always been iterating. Significant milestones include the formalization of temple worker roles in the Endowment House, the writing down of the liturgy and introduction of proxy endowments in the St. George Temple, Wilford Woodruff’s introduction of white pants for men, and the monumental 20th-century shift from live acting to film presentation.

Assembly Rooms and the 24 Temples of Zion

We also explore how the physical space of the temple has changed. The Kirtland Temple was a semi-public building that hosted private, charismatic “solemn assemblies” for priesthood officers. Later pioneer temples—like Manti, St. George, and Salt Lake—were built with massive assembly halls that are rarely used today, rendering them “architectural anachronisms.”

Finally, Stapley addresses Joseph Smith’s famous “Plat of Zion” which outlined 24 temples for the city of Independence. He cautions against comparing these to modern temples, explaining that in the 1830s, the term “temple” was used aspirationally to describe multi-purpose civic buildings, not the private liturgical spaces we know today. Ultimately, the church’s theology simply outgrew the 24-temple model.

Dr Jonathan Stapley takes us inside LDS temple ceremonies, including the Initiatory, Endowment, and Sealing ceremony changes over the years. Was the sealing ceremony more egalitarian under Joseph Smith than Brigham Young?

Myth of the “OG” Endowment

When asked about fundamentalist groups attempting to reconstruct an “original” eight-hour endowment complete with wrist-and-ankle-length garments, Stapley states bluntly that a static, “Platonic ideal” of the endowment never existed. Because the early liturgy was transmitted orally, the ceremony has continually adapted and changed from its very inception. It wasn’t until the Wilford Woodruff era in the St. George Temple that the endowment ceremony was finally written down. Stapley pushes back against the idea that changes to the wording prove apostasy, noting that Brigham Young continuously made changes to the ritual in Nauvoo, the Council House, the Endowment House, and finally the St. George temple.

Kirtland vs. Nauvoo Ordinances

Stapley clarifies a common historical misconception: in the Kirtland era, the washing and anointing was a completely separate event from the “endowment”.

  • Washing and Anointing: This was an annual ritual limited strictly to male priesthood officers, purposely patterned after the biblical consecration of ancient Israelite priests.
  • The Kirtland Endowment: This was a solemn assembly where participants feasted on the Lord’s supper, washed each other’s feet, and experienced charismatic spiritual outpourings. It wasn’t until the Nauvoo era that these concepts merged and expanded to include all men and women. Furthermore, Stapley notes that there is no compelling historical data to support the idea that the modern temple liturgy is hidden within the text of the Book of Mormon as Don Bradley has suggested.

Masonic “Social Technology”

In 1842, Joseph Smith participated in a Masonic initiation, a fraternity ritual that used dramatic progression, hand clasps, and promises of secrecy to tell the mythical story of Hiram Abiff, the builder of Solomon’s temple. Stapley explains that Joseph Smith borrowed this Masonic “social technology”—the structural framework of the ritual—but used it to tell a completely different story. Instead of Masonic lore, Latter-day Saints used this interactive format, alongside biblical priestly clothing, to teach the plan of salvation, including the creation, the fall, and humanity’s return to the presence of God.

The Evolving Sealing Ceremony

The episode also reveals fascinating details about the first sealing ceremonies. The earliest known text is an 1842 polygamous sealing ceremony written by Joseph Smith for the Whitney family, which is currently available on the Joseph Smith Papers website. When historians compare this 1842 text to a Nauvoo Temple sealing ceremony published by Orson Pratt in 1852, they find substantive differences. According to Stapley, the 1842 ceremony under Joseph Smith was notably more egalitarian, while the later Nauvoo versions incorporated Brigham Young’s views on the subordination of women. (To be fair, Jonathan stated there is no such thing as egalitarian in the 19th century, just varying levels.)

Ultimately, Stapley reminds us that early Latter-day Saints simply did not value word-for-word repetition the way modern members do; even foundational prayers, like the sacrament and baptismal prayers, were often extemporized during Joseph Smith’s lifetime.

Thoughts?