As expected, a recent post on Q Research Voat (QRV) brought out the usual anti-Mormon attacks. They are very predictable. I decided that this one comes up often enough to warrant posting here so I can just link it for future use:
Anti-Mormon: Also - God created all men....However, I was told that Mormons believed that when Cain killed Abel and was cast out - God marked Cain by turning him black and therefore all black people are descendants of Cain and inherently bad. In the 1970s at least - black people could join the Mormon church but not hold any positions of authority like Deacon, etc.
Can you shed any light on that?
LDSAnon: The doctrine that Cain was cursed by God and that his descendants were blacks was taught in Christianity long before the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints was established. You can see an example of it displayed in the poem of Philis Wheatley "On Being Brought from Africa," which was written in the 1700s, a century before the restoration that created the Church. Wheatley was a slave whose master gave an education. She became a Christian and a poet. In the poem, she wrote:
'Twas mercy brought me from my Pagan land,/ Taught my benighted soul to understand/ That there's a God, that there's a Saviour too:/ Once I redemption neither sought nor knew./ Some view our sable race with scornful eye,/ "Their colour is a diabolic die."/ Remember, Christians, Negros, black as Cain,/ May be refin'd, and join th' angelic train./
Early Mormon converts came from other Christian faiths, just like today. It took time for them to divest themselves of some of the false notions and beliefs they had acquired. As you can see, Wheatley clearly had been taught the "doctrine of Cain," which was used by American Christians to justify slavery. None of that had anything to do with Mormonism. Brigham Young had some latent racist feelings that derived from his earlier religious training. Joseph Smith actually advocated, not only to free the slaves, but to grant them equality. Even Lincoln wasn't that open-minded!
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