LDS: Why did the publication of the "Journal of Discourses" stop?

Question

Concerning the publication of the records, this is what Wikipedia states: "Publication began in 1854, with the endorsement of the church's First Presidency, and ended in 1886."
It is known that Brigham Young and other Church leaders accompanied those who would record their every sermons and keep it as a single series of teachings. And continuation of those compilations of teachings must've been a great material to be learned to study about the Church.
And my question is, why was the publication stopped?
Besides, what are the replacements that function as the JoD in these modern days? Is there a certain series of collection of the addresses and sermons given by the leaders? Help plz. Thank you.

Answer 1

The JOD was privately published in Liverpool. It's original readership subscribed to a 16 page semi monthly publication. It served members who did not have direct access to other church resources. With many Saints migrating to the US, the need was reduced. I assume that at the point where it was not practical to publish, it was discontinued.

Answer 2

This is just coming from me, I haven't heard that this is the reason, but it may be because the church saw that many members looked at the JoD as scripture, and they are not and never were.

In this day and age you can find practically all of the talks any General Authority has given since at least the early 1970's online. The May and November Ensign's have the talks from General Conference. There is also a website that has both a typed copy as well as (I think) the scanned handwritten copy of the JoD. The same site also has an index where you can find every talk that was given that referenced a particular verse of scripture. I'm pretty sure that that site contains the General Conference talks so you can read them as well. We are also using one of the meetings in our block of meetings on Sundays to study the writings of the modern day prophets as they relate to a particular topic. This year and next year it is Joseph Smith. The first one was Brigham Young and I think we've had 6 or 7 others, but they're not in order of them being President of the Church.

So there are many resources to find the words of the modern day prophets and study their addresses and talks.

Answer 3

Hmm, interesting question. I don't know why they quit compiling the Journal of Discourses. I'll have to look into it.

Today, we have the Ensign, New Era & Friend monthly magazines. We also are counselled to study the talks from the semi-annual general conferences. The Church also prints a number of manuals & books which are distrubuted through [wait for it] LDS Distribution. There is also Deseret Book which publishes many LDS related [though not accepted as doctrine] books from scriptural commentaries to inspirational to historical to fiction.

Answer 4

Conference twice a year are where we go for Modern day instruction from the Prophet and Leaders. The Ensign print's the conference talks in Nov. and May and you can find them on line. It's coming up next Sunday too, so you can watch it online and LDS.org. I don't know about the discourses but you can find modern day teachings in the ensign, as well as the aformentioned site. Also a lot of them have published books or biographies. Check deseret books on line if you don't have one where you live and if you're really interested.

Answer 5

We have all of his discources as we have of all the Prophets, the sermons and writings. My 3 CD set contains 3400 books, letters, manuscrips, etc. They are currently preparing every letter and scrap of paper Joseph Smith had, used, whatever, but I have to wait for the price to come down. We try not to hide anything, unlike any other church, and BY has said on 4 occasions some weird stuff. But it is all out there for you. Give meany other churches stuff, anything like what we do. Here is the last part of the Preface:



No liberties have been taken, in this book, with the words of Brigham Young. In a few instances, errors in language or spelling, which should have been caught by the printer, have been corrected. All distinct sentiments, as expressed in the discourses, are represented by one or more quotations, except such as refer to conditions now no longer existing. The excerpts are confined to the principles of the Gospel. The mass of historical and autobiographical detail could not be included without making this volume too large for popular use. As it is, severe pruning and elimination have been employed to enable the inclusion of the message of each of the 363 addresses in the Journal of Discourses, and the many others printed in the Deseret News, the Millennial Star and other periodicals. The many summaries of Brigham Young's discourses, appearing in the Deseret News have not been used. The excerpts contained in this volume are from verbatim reports. The figures at the end of each excerpt indicate the volume and page of the Journal of Discourses.

Brigham Young, Discourses of Brigham Young, selected and arranged by John A. Widtsoe, p.vii

These discourses are Brigham Young's witness to the existence of God, the divine mission of Jesus the Christ, the restoration of the Gospel in its fulness by Joseph Smith, the Prophet, and the possibility of securing happiness here and hereafter by obedience to the requirements of the Gospel. This volume is but another testimony that the Lord continues to speak through his prophets.

Brigham Young, Discourses of Brigham Young, selected and arranged by John A. Widtsoe, p.vii

PREFACE TO SECOND EDITION

Brigham Young, Discourses of Brigham Young, selected and arranged by John A. Widtsoe, p.vii

The reception of this book far surpassed the hopes of the publishers. The first edition of fifteen thousand was soon exhausted. The second edition of ten thousand is the same as the first edition except for some minor letter corrections.

Brigham Young, Discourses of Brigham Young, selected and arranged by John A. Widtsoe, p.vii

THE PUBLISHERS.

Feb. 15, 1926.

This 1941 Edition is the same as the previous edition, except as to size of type and the format.

THE PUBLISHERS.

Nov. 15, 1941.

Brigham Young, Discourses of Brigham Young, selected and arranged by John A. Widtsoe, p.vii

DISCOURSES OF

Brigham Young, Discourses of Brigham Young, selected and arranged by John A. Widtsoe, p.vii

BRIGHAM YOUNG

Answer 6

Because the JoD is opinions from church leaders, not doctrine. If you know anything about the LDS religion, you will know that they do not view their leaders to be infallible. We do not expect that every word that they speak has come directly from God. They are still human and are entitled to make choices and have opinions that may or may not reflect God's opinions. That is why the LDS are cautioned to pray and question everything to verify it's truth for themselves. We still have the leaders talks and they write books.....

Answer 7

They werent doctrine and so the church doesnt want it expressed as church doctrine.



You can go to LDS.org and read or listen to every single conference talk given by any of the general authorities and a lot of other talks and articles, too.



Its totally free and you dont have to give any personal info. You can download mp3 to listen to or put on an mp3 player or just read or print them out.

Pretty much all the resources of the church are on the website including lesson manuals, hymns, and the scriptures.

Answer 8

Members of the church were using it as Doctrine(which it isn't) in order to teach others. They were relying more on the opinions of those who wrote it than the word of God. It was stopped being published so that the members could get back to the basics of the Gospel and it's teachings instead of the opinions of men.

Answer 9

I think mormons will like this: this is from ex-mormon.org:

WIKIPEDIA CAUTION! Be careful with articles on Mormon topics at the popular online reference site Wikipedia! Since all articles there are subject to editing by all comers, the Mormon church regularly edits them to remove any information that criticizes the church.



For a very complete list of other websites critical of Mormonism, see Google's ranked listing HERE.

Answer 10

Tons of other items are analogous to them.



LDS.org has all of the general conference records, in fact this weekend conference is happening once again.



BYU speeches has tons of other discourses and devotionals.





Here are a few of those listings:

speeches.byu.edu

http://lds.org/ldsorg/v/index.jsp?vgnextoid=2b6f3c7ff44f2010VgnVCM1000001f5e340aRCRD&locale=0

http://lds.org/ldsorg/v/index.jsp?vgnextoid=a6246a008952b010VgnVCM1000004d82620aRCRD&locale=0

http://lds.org/conference/languages/0,6353,310-1,00.html

http://lds.org/library/page/display/0,7098,5344-1-2783-1,00.html



One must always remember the difference between eternal and everlasting truth and doctrine found in the scriptures and the other inspired council for our day which isn't scripture.



Also, the JOD has many problems with it, the accuracy of those speeches is always in dispute as there were no microphones and they are transcribed from notes that miss words and phrases here and there. The church leaders are more careful in their speech now, as video-tapes cement their actuals words and inflections into substance.

Answer 11

SIMPLE...because it's not faith promoting to the LDS church of today.PERIOD...same with many historical publications and talks...



When a statement is not faith PROmoting it is said to NOT be doctrine or the WORDS of a man, EVEN if its one of their prophets talking (the LORDS mouthpieces)



MUCH MUCH information is whitewashed or simply NOT taught to young mormon or potential converts (what happened to me)

Answer 12

Maybe it was an attempt to stop Brigham Young from voicing his opinions. He wasn't the most tactful guy, as I understand it.

Answer 13

They ran out of discourses.