Faith & Spirit Quote by Joseph Smith, Jr.

Joseph Smith is doing something both pastoral and politically shrewd: re-routing the machinery of divine judgment through the social machinery of accusation. The line isn’t really about heaven as a far-off reward; it’s about community discipline in the here and now. “If you do not accuse each other” makes salvation sound like a group project, but the leverage is unmistakable: stop prosecuting one another, and God’s court supposedly goes quiet. It’s a promise that doubles as a warning about who gets to define wrongdoing.

The subtext is an attack on rival moral authorities. By declaring that “what many people call sin is not sin,” Smith doesn’t merely soften the rules; he claims jurisdiction over the very category of sin. That’s a radical clerical move, especially in a 19th-century American religious landscape crowded with ministers policing behavior, reputation, and belonging. He’s not abolishing judgment so much as relocating it from gossip, informal tribunals, and denominational norms to his own prophetic frame.

The “break down superstition” refrain is the rhetorical masterstroke. It casts dissent as enlightenment: any objection can be dismissed as old fear dressed up as piety. Yet it also reveals a leader conscious of how belief systems are enforced - not just by doctrine, but by accusation, surveillance, and the pleasure of moral condemnation. Smith’s intent reads like institution-building: lower the internal temperature, loosen inherited taboos, and create a community where loyalty outranks prying. In a world where charges (religious, legal, sexual, political) could destroy a movement, ending “accusing” isn’t only spiritual advice; it’s survival strategy.