This week in Church history
E-mail story
It's easy. Send a link to the story you were just reading to a friend. Just fill out the form on this page and we'll send it along.
Your name and e-mail address are transmitted to the recipient. Otherwise, it is considered private information; see Privacy policy.
175 years ago
Referring to a conference of the Church held June 3-6, 1831, the heading of Section 52 of the Doctrine and Covenants states: "At this conference the first distinctive ordinations to the office of high priest were made."
Essentials in Church History, by President Joseph Fielding Smith, records the names of the first high priests to be ordained in this dispensation: Lyman Wight, John Murdock, Reynolds Cahoon, Harvey Whitlock and Hyrum Smith (p. 106).
A note in History of the Church (Vol. 1, p. 176) points out that the apostleship had been conferred upon Joseph Smith and Oliver Cowdery before the Church was organized. It states: "It was at this conference . . . that the special office of High Priest was for the first time conferred upon men in this dispensation, except in so far as Apostles are also High Priests (Doctrine and Covenants 84:63); and of course as there were men who had been ordained to the apostleship before this conference of June, 1831, in that manner there had been High Priests in the Church, but not otherwise."
