6 Answers

Information here >>>http://ldsinfo.tripod.com/prophet.htm

No, he wasn't b/c Mormanisn is a cult. It's an off -shoot of masonry.

Question: "Who was Joseph Smith?"

Answer: Joseph Smith is widely known as the founder of the Mormon Church also known as Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. Joseph Smith from an early age was thought to have certain occult powers. He was known at a young age as a seer and reportedly used a seer stone to tell him where he could find such precious metals as silver. Both he and his father were known “treasure seekers” and used divination and magic to carry out treasure seeking excursions. This of course brought him a name and a reputation. To this day, he is considered by some a saint and by others a complete charlatan.

Joseph Smith grew up during a time of spiritual revival in America known as restorationism. It was at this time, 1820, that Joseph Smith claimed to have received a marvelous vision in which God the Father and God the Son materialized and spoke to him as he was praying in the woods. He reportedly said that the two “personages” took a rather dim view of the Christian church and for that matter the world at large, and announced that a restoration of Christianity was needed, and that Smith had been chosen to launch the new dispensation. Since its beginnings until the present day, the Mormon Church holds the position that they alone represent true Christianity.

Mormon leaders have consistently taught that after the death of the Apostles, true Christianity had fallen into complete apostasy, making it necessary for a “restoration”. But even after the supposed heavenly visitation, Joseph Smith and friends continued to dig for treasure using occult methods. These methods were illegal in that day, and Smith was convicted of “glasslooking” in 1826. But before that conviction in Chenango County New York, the new “prophet of the Lord” continued to stir up controversy with yet another amazing close encounter with heaven. In 1823, Smith claimed to have been contacted by an angel named Moroni who revealed that there were golden plates at a certain location near Palmyra, New York. On the golden plates was a history of an ancient man named Mormon and his fabled ancient Hebrew tribe, who were said to be a new revelation, “another witness” to the truth of the Christian gospel. It was recorded in Mormon historical documents that the angel had provided special spectacles needed to help Smith translate the writings from the golden plates. It was also reported that during the translation, the man who was helping him had the privilege of having John the Baptist, accompanied by Peter, James and John, come to Pennsylvania on that day May 15, 1829 to confer upon the men the “Aaronic Priesthood”. These and other amazing stories are recorded in Smith’s book, Pearl of Great Price.

Joseph Smith claimed to have special visions and an incredible opening up of heaven to him. But a statement signed by sixty-two residents of Palmyra, New York, who wanted others to know that they had known him, his family, his beliefs, and his occultic excursions to find treasure declared him to be “entirely destitute of moral character and addicted to vicious habits.” Yet, he claimed to be God’s mouthpiece, and when he spoke, he claimed that God was speaking. This powerful position was taken seriously by many followers, and when Smith had a vision it was to be taken seriously, no matter if it flew in the face of “Christian” moral standards. His new “revelation from God” on polygamy is but one example.

Popular or not, his pronouncements “from God” took him quite a ways for quite a few years. His highly imaginative stories always read like science fiction, mixing and twisting Biblical truth with imagination. He was always careful to imitate Biblical truth, and many times he rewrites the Bible. To many, his theology is a twisted mirror image of real theology. It tempts by using a smattering of the real thing, the things that people know as Bible truth.

Joseph Smith met his end at the hands of an angry mob. Having attempted to quiet the polygamy issue after the church had settled in Nauvoo, Illinois, Smith and his followers destroyed an anti-Mormon newspaper building and consequently were arrested and in a jail awaiting trial. The jail was stormed by an angry mob of two hundred people and Joseph Smith and his brother were murdered. After his untimely death, there was a split in the “church”. The church he established remains centralized today both in Missouri, (the Community of Christ-RLDS) and in Utah, where many Mormons had followed their new leader, Brigham Young.

Recommended Resource: Reasoning from the Scriptures with Mormons by Ron Rhodes.

Profits, if made honestly and by hard work are good.

Prophets, however, are best ignored.

I don't believe in prophits, so no I don't think he was. I think that people who are considered prophits simply possess three characteristics to a greater degree than most people. They are very intuitive, intelligent, and persuasive.

Every young child has a vivid imagination. As a young man, I was always playing out a roll of some imaginary world with my Lego, Playmobile Fischer-Price toys. If was able to write it down and tie it in to history through some fantastic truth that nobody else could see. He saw the truth about what was going to happen  on the new world continent. In his genius mind, he saw a world that was ready to hear about a new world truth that would free them from the religions of the world that she had just left across the Pond.

Joseph knew in his studies and prayers that when the stories of the bible happened, there wer other people in the city of Jerusalem that went another way. The Book Mormon is the story of those people. Read it. It's a good story. Sad thing is, There are no artificial or real evidences of the peoples that are written about in the book.

He was a profit if you consider that he said he was here to bring us a message of a new religion. It is the Mormon Religion and has stuck and become strong therefore in a way Joseph deliver the truth to us about that.