In my view, Joseph Smith not clearly assigning someone to replace him is proof of a Independent Mormon living as a legitimate interpretation. In other words, even Mormon historians and scholars often admit that Joseph Smith did not designate a clear successor other than his brother who was killed and perhaps Joseph Smith III. This is why there was debate and confusion among Mormons after Joseph Smith was killed.
This to me proves that being Mormon today is not about belonging to a particular Mormon sect or denomination but belonging to the Mormon tribe. For me this means that my belonging to the tribe of Ephraim, according to my patriarchal blessing (and my great grandfather's being told they are the pure blood of Ephraim as anglo-saxons), turns Mormonism into as an indigenous Anglo-Saxon religion for me personally. For it is my own blood relatives whose names are in the Doctrine and Covenants. In other words, those born in the Covenant are part of a tribe and quasi-ethnic indigenous Anglo-American culture and ideals, with a set of scriptures filtered through the Anglo-American Joseph Smith: which replaces the ideas filter through the middle eastern Apostle Paul.
So that with my Full Circle Theory, just as Christianity went through a cultural evolution from Paul to pseudopographic to Constantine and then Augustine and eventually the Protestant Reformation, so too Mormonism repeated this full trajectory creating a full circle restoration of all things. As Mormonism went through a near identical transformation toward an eventual Protestant-Reformation-type transition toward the legitimate option of being an Independent Mormon and every Mormon receiving their own revelation based and living by the dictates of their own conscience; and finding in the LDS revelations/scriptures the grounding for truthful ideals and principles that takes precedence over any edicts of any Mormon sect or denomination from Prophets or Bishops in these various Mormon denominations that all conflict with each other when it comes to claims to divide authority from their top leaders.
Now if any Mormons sect or denomination wants to convince me that they are the "true and living church" then they need to demonstrate that: if they are living church with an actual prophetic prophesying seer seeing through a sear stone and revelating as a revelator (meaning translating scripture), either producing something like the inspired Bible (the Joseph Smith Translation) or translating gold plates into the Book of Mormon (as Joseph Smith claimed), let's see it. Put up or shut up as they say.
There has been attempts by some to do this. For example, the Remnant Movement claims to be translators of new translations of the Mormon Standard Works but I'm simply unconvinced that this is supernaturally led versus mere psychological creation. But at least they are trying.
As for most other Mormon sects and denominations, I do not see anything close to an actual living church, an actual living source of prophetic prophesying or Seers engaged in seership and seeing with a seer stone nor revelating as revelators producing New Revelations in published scriptures to be voted on by common consent which was all signs and evidence of a living Church during Joseph Smith's lifetime. I see nothing of that sort today. Instead, in the Utah-base Church for example I see a Corporation functioning like a business and top leaders functioning more as administrators and guardians of the original revelations in the Standard Works; and making mere policy decisions and producing new handbooks of instructions not new and living scriptural Revelations where it says Thus saith the lord. Instead, in almost every attempt to claim revelation it seems to be to correct a prior policy. So I do not see any evidence of actual revelation but instead a business administration. This is not to criticize the Utah-based LDS Church because I do consider it part of my Mormon tribe as a quasi-ethnic tribal fraternity so to speak, who is retaining the memory of my 19th century Pioneer polygamous Mormon ancestors (whose names are contained in the Doctrine and Covenants: as most of the names in there are my own relatives). So I'm not against the Utah-based Salt Lake administrative Church functioning like a business because what it is "selling" so to speak is my ancestral tribe in the form of the Standard Works and the ideals and principles of an anglo-americanized Christianity based on my ancestry. But that does not mean that I consider them to be the "mouthpieces of God" in all things or that they alone have the right to speak for God and try to control my every thought and behavior down to the underwear I wear or whether or not I'm allowed to drink coffee before I am allowed into their temples.
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