Baptism for Health, Papers of Joseph Smith vol. 2 edited by Dean C. Jessee

I was reading through the year 1842 in Jessee's book. Mostly for the express purpose of finding out more about the condition of the relationship between Emma and Joseph at that time.

In the beginning of Oct of 1942 both Joseph and Emma had taken ill. On 5 October 1842 - Wednesday the entry reads in part:

QUOTE

Sister E. (Emma) is worse, many fears are entertained that she will not recover. She was baptised twice in the river which evidently did her much good. Jessee pg 486 emphasis added

The footnote to this entry reads:

1. On the practice of baptizing for health, see D. Michael Quinn, "The Practice of Rebaptism at Nauvoo," BYU Studies 18 (Winter 1978):226-32.

I wasn't able to locate Quinn's paper (who I find to be a wonderful historian.), so I turned to some friends for help. "LifeOnAPlate" was able to help in that he did a very nice post over at "Life On Gold Plates" on Re-Baptism and the early Saints. Anyway he gave me a link to Quinns paper. I have included the portions I found germain to the topic of this particular post, but the entire paper is well worth the read.

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Although Quinn is not the only source that mentions or discusses this type of Baptism, it is surely the most comprehensive. Nevertheless it leaves some questions unasked and unanswered.

1. How many baptisms are there that were practiced in the early days of the Church?

My guess is around 4.

1. Baptism for the remission of sins. Still practiced today.
2. Baptism for the dead. Still practiced today.
3. ReBaptism for Ecclesiastical purposes. No longer practiced.
4. ReBaptism for Health. No longer practiced.
   

Allowing the first two to go without comment, I would like to take a quick look at 3 an 4. Upon searching I found the documentation to be fragmentary at best. So for our purposes we can stick with Quinn and Jessee as source notes.

Quinn States:

"Rebaptism for Health


The frequent use of rebaptism at Nauvoo as a means of healing sickness
may have derived from evidences of healing that occurred upon original
baptism. For example, Rhoda Richards (sister of Apostle Willard
Richards and subsequently a plural wife of Joseph Smith) recorded in her
journal that when she was baptized a member of the LDS Church on 2 June
1838: “In obeying the commands of the Lord I found great good. Health
was improved, poison disappeared, the cake of ice was melted from my
stomach. I found no need of Thomsonian medicine.”20 The first instructions
concerning baptism for health were given by Joseph Smith when he
dedicated the baptismal font of the Nauvoo Temple on 8 November 1841,
as recorded in a journal of William Clayton:
Brother Samuel Rolfe being present, and being seriously afflicted with a
felon on one hand president Joseph instructed him to wash in the font, and
Rebaptism at Nauvoo 3
told him he would be healed, although the doctors had told him it would not
be well before spring, and advised him to have it cut. He washed his hands in
the font and in one week afterwards his hand was perfectly healed.
After this time baptism was continued in the font, and many realized
great blessings both spiritually and bodily.21
Word of this use of the temple font was widely circulated and within a
few months a Mormon in a distant branch of the Church wrote to the
Prophet: “I have confidence that if I can be Baptized in the font I shall be
healed of a hereditary disease I am, and ever have been laboring under.
what is known by the name of sick head ache. I hope to be with the Saints
soon.”22 In time, baptisms for health were extended to the outlying
branches of the Church, as indicated by the baptisms for health performed
in October 1843 at Philadelphia by Jedediah M. Grant.23
Although some were baptized for health purposes in the Nauvoo
Temple font, still others resorted to the Mississippi River for this ordinance.
The most notable example occurred when Joseph Smith baptized
his wife Emma twice in the Mississippi River on 5 October 1842 because of
her serious ill health, and then went with her on 1 November 1842, “to the
temple [the font being the only part completed] for the benefit of her
health.”24 The Prophet’s anxiety for his wife to receive baptism for health
was such that a non-Mormon businessman reported that Joseph Smith
had interrupted a business interview because “Mrs Smith lay Dangerously
ill at the time and they ware about to administer the Rights of Baptism to
her.”25 Apostle Willard Richards also baptized his wife frequently for her
health.26 Certainly one of the most extraordinary examples of baptism for
health at Nauvoo occurred in December 1842, when Horace S. Eldredge
cut holes in the frozen river seven mornings in a row for the purpose of
baptizing John Bills for rheumatism and bleeding lungs.27 For the Mormons
of Nauvoo, baptism for health was both a priesthood ordinance and
a dramatic demonstration of personal faith."

Now the Baptism for health seems very much like a Priesthood blessing that is rooted in the wonderful symbolism of that ritual. The immersion in death and uprising into life seems more than applicable, in fact it's very powerful and at the same time very lovely to me. This baptism as we've read was sometimes done in the unfinished baptismal font according to great faith by some, but the idea of someone walking out into the cold waters of the Mississippi in October, under the loving hand of her husband to seek comfort and healing is a testament of their faith and dedication to God and His Priesthood. I have to wonder thought what the words to the prayer were?

And Then I ask what of the Ecclesistical Rebaptism? Again we turn to Quinn:

Rebaptism for Entering a New Ecclesiastical Relationship
The earliest suggestion of rebaptism in LDS history was in the 1830
Book of Mormon description of the righteous Nephites being rebaptized at
the command of the resurrected Christ when he visited them.4 Then,
although Joseph Smith and Oliver Cowdery had baptized themselves and
others for remission of sins for nearly a year prior to the organization of
the Church in 1830, the previously baptized followers of Joseph Smith
were again baptized as members of the newly organized Church of Christ.5
These two examples have been described as necessary ordinances to introduce
gospel followers into a new Church organization.
Although the documents are fragmentary, there is evidence that during
the Nauvoo period of the Church, previously baptized Latter-day Saints
were baptized again when they moved from a distant branch of the Church
to the Nauvoo area. Between 1841 and 1843, for example, ten members of
the Church who moved to the Nashville, Iowa Branch were added to the
branch by being rebaptized.7 The specific reason for this rebaptism is not
indicated. It might have been an absence of records proving their prior baptism,
or it might have been that the newly arrived Saints wished to demonstrate
their rededication after making a long journey to the new branch.

The ecclesiastical ReBaptism makes sense on many levels. For the Saints in the 30's I think it was a necessary thing to get them committed and bound by covenant as soon as possible. It seems a wonderful stroke of Genius/Revelation on Josephs part. As Joseph strives to create Zion it seems obvious that an outward token of an inward conversion be displayed when new Saints arrive as well as those who currently may reside with the Saints but may be re-converting as the flood of new Doctrine continued to flow from Joseph to his people.

It also seems likely that this pattern was inspiration or genesis for that which Brigham was doing during the Mormon Reformation. Again there was a need to establish Zion and to take people into the waters of Baptism and reconvert and well as recommit these individuals.

Lastly, why are these versions of Baptism gone? I don't know, I could definitely guess, but that may be a two steps backward and one forward kind of game.

Big UP!

Sione