Hey, listeners, this is Neil from Book of Mormon Central, and today's podcast addresses the question,

why was Joseph Smith murdered? On July 27, 1844, Joseph Smith and his brother Hiram were

butchered by a mob in Carthage jail. This was not a spontaneous or unexpected event.

Joseph himself anticipated that he went as a lamb to the slaughter,

and had in fact feared for his life for at least several months, perhaps longer.

And he had good reason to fear.

There was, in fact, a murderous plot to have him and his brother kidnapped and killed.

According to the recent analysis of legal scholar Joseph I. Bentley, the key

Navu apostates were a trio of brothers, William and Wilson Law, Robert and Charles Foster, and

Francis and Chauncey Higby. They colluded with prominent anti-Mormons, such as Thomas Sharp, a newspaper

editor in the nearby town of Warsaw. Whether or not they hatched a well-planned conspiracy, Bentley argues, they undoubtedly

went forward acting deliberately and concertedly.

They acted through a series of legal maneuvers that were intentionally designed for the purpose

of placing Joseph Smith's life in mortal danger in Carthage.

By early 1844, the plan was to file legal charges against Joseph and Hiram in Carthage, Illinois, the location of the Hancock County Circuit Court,

thereby forcing Joseph out of his stronghold in Navu to address the legal matters.

At one point, Dan Jones overheard the leaders of this group say that they did not expect to prove anything against Joseph, but that they had 18 accusations

against him, and as one failed, they would try another to detain him in Carthage. Then, anti-Mormon

mobs whipped up into a frenzy by charged rhetoric published by Sharp and others in various newspapers across the state would seize the opportunity to execute the prophet and his brother in an act of what they perceived as vigilante justice.

This plan was put into action as early as February 26, 1844, when the law brothers and their collaborators instituted or appealed a series of lawsuits to Carthage.

Already at this point, Joseph suspected a darker plot at work than merely resolving legal differences.

After those lawsuits were consolidated and dismissed, the dissenters initiated additional legal suits in May.

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