The Restoration provides impressive scope in the revelations we have received. They involve much more than the theological and spiritual realms, but dare to give us practical knowledge for living our mortal lives and resisting dangers in our day. When many today have abandoned faith in favor of human wisdom and the tenets of materialism which claim to be based on science, the Word of Wisdom (Doctrine and Covenants 89), given in 1833 to the Prophet Joseph Smith, comes as revelation from God urging us to take the material world and our physical bodies seriously. It touches upon issues in the scope of modern science as it gives guidance to help us avoid harmful substances and to discern between wholesome and unwholesome foods. The revelation implies that this information was needed then and still would be needed later, in spite of the flood of knowledge that modern science is bringing, due to the confusion that can be caused by “the evils and designs of conspiring men” (v. 4).
The reference to “conspiring men” seems to call for consideration of what the Lord had revealed shortly before 1833 in the majestic Book of Mormon. The Book of Mormon offers abundant explicit and implicit teachings on the nearly “unmentionable” topic of “secret combinations” – a topic that is often skipped over in lessons and talks to avoid “political” controversies or to avoid getting into the topic that our society is most trained to shun, crazy “conspiracy theories.” But unlike the wild, unfounded theories that are caricatured as “conspiracy theories,” the Book of Mormon has great nuance and plausibility behind its many teachings, with insights that resonate with the lessons of history and the reports of scholars studying organized crime and many forms of corruption. Perhaps there is more to consider in the Word of Wisdom when we combine its warnings with the Book of Mormon’s warnings and teachings.
Here we build upon the recent four part series in Meridian Magazine on the Book of Mormon’s teachings on secret combinations (see Part 1, Part 2, Part 3 and Part 4), now considering issues related to Section 89 of the Doctrine & Covenants.
Promised Blessings to Seek and Forewarned Dangers to Evade
The Word of Wisdom came in response to a mundane issue raised by Emma Smith regarding the nuisance of men soiling the floor with chewing tobacco in meetings of the School of the Prophets. When Joseph inquired of the Lord, the answer he received gave him much more information than expected.
It is unclear if the first three verses were added later by Joseph to introduce the revelation, or was the beginning of what the Lord revealed to Joseph (see the “Historical Note” for the revelation in the Joseph Smith Papers), but with verse 4 they form an interesting introduction:
1 A Word of Wisdom, for the benefit of the council of high priests, assembled in Kirtland, and the church, and also the saints in Zion—
2 To be sent greeting; not by commandment or constraint, but by revelation and the word of wisdom, showing forth the order and will of God in the temporal salvation of all saints in the last days—
3 Given for a principle with promise, adapted to the capacity of the weak and the weakest of all saints, who are or can be called saints.
4 Behold, verily, thus saith the Lord unto you: In consequence of evils and designs which do and will exist in the hearts of conspiring men in the last days, I have warned you, and forewarn you, by giving unto you this word of wisdom by revelation.
The Word of Wisdom is more than just a few dietary rules. It gives a “a principle with promise” (v. 3); it shows “the order and will of God in the temporal salvation of all saints in the last days” (v. 2); and it comes by revelation “in consequence of evils and designs which do and will exist in the hearts of conspiring men in the last days” (v. 4). These concepts are worth pondering further.
What is the principle with promise? Many have written about the promise blessings in the last four verses (vv. 18–21) for those who keep the “sayings” of the Word of Wisdom, when coupled with keeping the commandments in general. These include “health in their navel and marrow to their bones” (v. 18), finding “wisdom and great treasures of knowledge, even hidden treasures” (v. 19), and being spared from the destroying angel (v. 21).
The principle(s) behind this revelation, however, may be expressed in several ways:
- The Lord cares about our physical well-being as well as our spiritual health.
- What we do with our body can do more than just affect our physical health. It may hinder our relationship with God and impair our spiritual and intellectual progress.
- Our bodies are sacred gifts to be treated carefully.
- Revelation from God and healthy skepticism on our part can help us evade the clouds of deliberate deceit in our day that might affect our “temporal” well-being and our spiritual welfare.
Elder Boyd K. Packer discussed the significance of the word “principle” here:
That word principle in the revelation is a very important one. A principle is an enduring truth, a law, a rule you can adopt to guide you in making decisions. Generally principles are not spelled out in detail. That leaves you free to find your way with an enduring truth, a principle, as your anchor. (“The Word of Wisdom: The Principle and the Promises,” April 1996 General Conference)
He noted that there are many other harmful substances we may need to avoid that need not be listed, including “habit-forming, addictive things that one can drink or chew or inhale or inject which injure both body and spirit which are not mentioned in the revelation.” He explained that the Lord does not want to command us in all things (Doctrine & Covenants 58:26) and urged the young to “learn to use moderation and common sense in matters of health and nutrition, and particularly in medication.”
With the risk of “conspiring men” in mind, we can recall the lessons of the Book of Moses and Book of Mormon on the actions and goals of secret combinations and the reason why they are so chaotic and destructive, even irrationally so. In Moses 4:6, we learn of Satan’s goal in what he does here on earth: “he sought to destroy the world.” With Satan as the mastermind of persistent secret combinations, beginning with the persistent one described in Moses 5, blood and horror must be understood as a key feature, not a bug in an otherwise brilliant system. Those who rise to power through Satanic plots rarely enjoy the success they seek, but are likely to be destroyed by a co-conspirator or a competing secret combination or lead their conquered nation into endless, destructive war. But why even talk of Satanic plots and ancient secret combinations? Isn’t the concern addressed in the Word of Wisdom simply the problem of misleading modern advertising for alcohol and tobacco, a problem we have largely solved with legislation?
Tobacco, Alcohol, and Graver Threats from Conspiring Men, Then and Now
The fourth verse of the Word of Wisdom speaks of “evils and designs which do and will exist in the hearts of conspiring men in the last days.” Threats which required revelation for our “temporal salvation” (v. 2), suggesting great danger and great deceit or corruption, were present in that day and ours almost two centuries later. How great was the danger of deceptive advertising in 1833? It existed, certainly, and many people partook of harmful substances such as alcohol and tobacco. As far as I know, the marketing was largely done locally and didn’t seem to have anything close to the level of corruption and deceit that we saw with the tobacco industry in the mid-twentieth century (for a tiny reminder, see the 1994 testimony of multiple tobacco executives before Congress each stating that nicotine is not addictive). Extensive evidence shows that industry in the past century tried to ignore, suppress, or attack scientific results showing tobacco was harmful. Conflicts of interest abounded, all reflecting the work of “conspiring men” to continue profiting from deadly products. But there seems to be little evidence that this characterized the industry in Joseph Smith’s day.
When it comes to alcohol, many educated people understand the corruption of organized crime marketing alcohol during the Prohibition Era and the sophisticated efforts of marketers since then to portray alcoholic beverages favorably. However, many don’t realize how corrupt the hidden marketing of alcohol has been. For example, many of us have heard that science has shown that a little alcohol is good for you, a finding of the experts that some “sophisticated” members of the Church or investigators have used to justify a very loose approach to the Word of Wisdom. Only recently has the deception been made known. The studies that supposedly showed a little alcohol is good for your heart were poorly conducted. The alleged heart benefit of clearer arteries only showed up in heavy drinkers who were facing serious health risks from many other factors.
Larger, more comprehensive studies now show that when broader health factors are considered such as cancer, the optimum dose of alcohol for good health appears to be ZERO. A study published in one of the world’s leading medical journals is Max G. Griswold et al., “Alcohol use and burden for 195 countries and territories, 1990–2016: a systematic analysis for the Global Burden of Disease Study 2016,” The Lancet, vol. 392, issue 10152 (Sept. 22, 2018): P1015-1035. In the abstract, the authors give this summary:
Alcohol use is a leading risk factor for global disease burden and causes substantial health loss. We found that the risk of all-cause mortality, and of cancers specifically, rises with increasing levels of consumption, and the level of consumption that minimises health loss is zero. These results suggest that alcohol control policies might need to be revised worldwide, refocusing on efforts to lower overall population-level consumption.
An associated article at The Lancet is “No level of alcohol consumption improves health” by Robyn Burton and Nick Sheron, published on Sept. 22, 2018. This discusses the Global Burden of Disease 2016 study and explains that it is “most comprehensive estimate of the global burden of alcohol use to date.” The study reveals that alcohol’s impact is significantly greater than previously recognized. In fact, it is “a colossal global health issue.”
The conclusions of the study are clear and unambiguous: alcohol is a colossal global health issue and small reductions in health-related harms at low levels of alcohol intake are outweighed by the increased risk of other health-related harms, including cancer. There is strong support here for the guideline published by the Chief Medical Officer of the UK who found that there is “no safe level of alcohol consumption”. The findings have further ramifications for public health policy, and suggest that policies that operate by decreasing population-level consumption should be prioritised.
So for years we have been fed scientific misinformation with the enthusiastic support of many media outlets telling us a little alcohol is healthy when it may not be. But what about those healthy Italians and others who drink wine and have good health? They may also have much healthier diets. A little alcohol alone is just one of many factors to consider. Based on scientific studies, it is likely that they would be even healthier without the alcohol.
Maybe the flawed earlier scientific studies claiming health benefits just made good faith mistakes in processing the data and failing to properly point out the overall harms. But clear evidence for scientific fraud was detected in the alcohol industry’s efforts to influence a large-scale study in a large “secret combination” that was rather easily exposed and shut down. In 2018, good journalism discovered that a $100 million government study involving the National Institutes of Health on “moderate alcohol consumption” was being funded and partially designed by the alcohol industry, which obviously was seeking to influence outcomes to shore up the lie that a little alcohol is good for you. This represents a fraudulent effort to corrupt the science for marketing purposes. See “Federal Agency Courted Alcohol Industry to Fund Study on Benefits of Moderate Drinking” by Roni Caryn Rabin, New York Times, March 17, 2018. Also see my discussion of these issues at Arise from the Dust here and here. As with secret combinations in general, the “secret combination” rife with conflicts of interest was vulnerable to exposure and was soon shut down. But the audacity of the alcohol industry in attempting to guide this large study is a reminder of what conspiring men dare to do, and a reminder of how little resistance there is when big money is being applied to influence outcomes fraudulently.
This evidence of corruption in the alcohol industry is from very recent times. But in Joseph Smith’s day, it seems to have lacked the power and the need to manipulate scientific studies. So were alcohol and tobacco products in the 1830s really driven by “conspiring men”?
President Ezra Taft Benson, like Elder Packer (above), pointed to threats beyond alcohol and tobacco in the Word of Wisdom, and related them to the dangers of “conspiring men”:
The Lord foresaw the situation of today when motives for money would cause men to conspire to entice others to take noxious substances into their bodies. Advertisements which promote beer, wine, liquors, coffee, tobacco, and other harmful substances are examples of what the Lord foresaw. But the most pernicious example of an evil conspiracy in our time is those who induce young people into the use of drugs. (“A Principle with a Promise,” April 1983 General Conference)
When we consider harmful drugs as within the scope of the Word of Wisdom and how they might relate to the “designs of conspiring men” in Joseph Smith’s day and ours, some noteworthy connections may appear, particularly the deadly opium trade that the West imposed upon China. Though not explicitly mentioned in the revelation, opium and opiates, drugs extracted or derived from opium, made from the sap of the poppy plant, and synthetic opioids like fentanyl that opium has inspired, can clearly be considered in contrast to the “wholesome herbs” that “God hath ordained for the constitution, nature, and use of man” (Doctrine & Covenants 89:10). Similar to tobacco, which is explicitly mentioned and was the source of Joseph’s inquiry that led to the revelation, opium and related compounds are “not for the body, neither for the belly, and [are] not good for man,” but like tobacco can be called an herb (or herb-related product) that can be a useful medication in some severe medical situations, “to be used with judgment and skill” (v. 8). Unfortunately, “conspiring men” have used opium and opiates for profit and gain, exploiting, harming, and even killing millions. It’s a global crisis today, though most severe in the United States. But it was a severe crisis already in Joseph Smith’s day, one in which conspiring men in the West caused great tragedy in China.
The Gruesome Opium Trade
As trade between England and Asia grew in the 1700s, the English grew fond of many sophisticated Chinese products such as porcelain and fine tea, while the Chinese showed little interest in English goods. This trade imbalance forced England to send large quantities of silver to China. To remedy this, English businessmen found an opportunity in the opium being grown in Bengal, part of the British colony of India. The English outflanked Dutch merchants of opium as they developed a monopoly in Indian opium and ramped up production so their East India Company could sell more addictive opium to China. The East India Company, an early and very successful example of the “public-private partnerships” that are a key focus of prominent organizations promoting “global governance” such as the World Economic Forum, became one of the world’s leading businesses. Soon American entrepreneurs saw the profits being amassed by Britain and also got into the business. By 1805, they were shipping opium to Canton (see Van Smith’s 2014 investigative work on Baltimore’s connection to the U.S. opium trade). Americans were able to gain a monopoly on Turkish opium for their illicit drug trafficking.
Samuel Russell in Connecticut would form Russell & Company in 1824, and soon ran an extensive global opium trade, especially after partnering with two British powerhouses, British firms, Jardine, Matheson, & Co. and Whiteman & Co. As the opium trade expanded, devastating the lives of millions of Chinese addicts, the Chinese government wisely pushed back. They had been pushing back for some time, with ineffective decrees in the early 1700s, followed by a 1799 ban against the importation or production of opium and tougher penalties added in 1813. But the Western importers continued their trade, smuggling opium into China by transferring it to Chinese vessels a short distance off Chinese shores. Eventually the Chinese government took forceful action to enforce their laws. A bold Chinese official, Lin Zexu, led a vigorous response, as discussed by Professor Jack Patrick Hayes in “The Opium Wars in China,” writing for the Asia Pacific Foundation of Canada:
[Lin Zexu] attacked the opium trade on several levels. For example, he wrote an open letter to Queen Victoria questioning Britain’s political support for the trade and the morality of pushing drugs. More importantly, he made rapid progress in enforcing the 1813 ban by arresting over 1,600 Chinese dealers and seizing and destroying tens of thousands of opium pipes. He also demanded that foreign companies (British companies, in particular) turn over their supplies of opium in exchange for tea. When the British refused to do so, Lin stopped all foreign trade and quarantined the area to which these foreign merchants were confined.
After six weeks, the foreign merchants gave in to Lin’s demands and turned over 2.6 million pounds of opium (over 20,000 chests). Lin’s troops also seized and destroyed the opium that was being held on British ships—the British superintendent claimed these ships were in international waters, but Lin claimed they were anchored in and around Chinese islands. Lin then hired 500 Chinese men to destroy the opium by mixing it with lime and salt and dumping it into the bay. Finally, he pressured the Portuguese, who had a colony in nearby Macao, to expel the uncooperative British, forcing them to move to the island of Hong Kong.
The result was the tragic First Opium War that lasted two years as British ships attacked many regions, resulting in about 20,000 Chinese military deaths and perhaps many more civilian deaths. China yielded to British demands, allowing them to continue the opium racket and also giving them the island of Hong Kong, a vitally important port.
There would be a Second Opium War less than two decades layer, with even greater military and civilian casualties for China as the “right” to profit from destructive illicit drugs was again enforced with blood and horror.
As an expat living in Shanghai for nearly nine years, I loved walking along the beautiful western side of the “Bund” in downtown Shanghai, adorned with stately Western buildings like the Peace Hotel and the Astor Hotel. It would be a few years before I learned that essentially all of them were the fruits of the wealth from the opium trade, built on the backs of millions of drug addicts and tens of thousands of victims of military violence to preserve profits at all costs in an oppressed nation that wealthy elites of the England and the United States viewed as barbaric and in need of learning proper civilization.
The violence of the Opium Wars and the lives destroyed by opium addiction perhaps should be among the first horrors we contemplate when consider the Lord’s words about the “evils and designs which do and will exist in the hearts of conspiring men in the last days.” Those conspiring men need not have made dark oaths to deliberately kill. Some were just following the easy road of self-interest, enticed by the lure of easy profits in a profitable business they could paint as “honorable.” Perhaps it helped that they weren’t directly killing anyone, were just doing what other famous businesses were doing, and often were “just following orders.” Many would become esteemed pillars of society gain, praised by universities, medical institutions, politicians, and others for their great contributions to society. But among them, some surely understood what evil was being pursued.
While public opposition in the US and the UK about the opium trade and especially the Opium Wars may have led to a cessation of “respectable” businesses openly pushing an addictive drugs, opium has continued to be a major product of “conspiring men.” University of Wisconsin–Madison Professor Alfred McCoy in his groundbreaking book, The Politics of Heroin: CIA Complicity in the Global Drug Trade (first published in 1972), reveals how U.S. intelligence agencies, especially the CIA, facilitated the drug trade to achieve geopolitical objectives. The cloak-and-dagger operations of this entity, sometimes in partnership with other clandestine or questionable government agencies or private partners, raises painful questions about our nation’s connections with one of the most wicked businesses on earth, the illicit drug trade.
As we consider the Word of Wisdom’s implication of health-related dangers already present in Joseph’s day as well as in the future as the Lord “warned” and “forewarned” us about “evils and designs which do and will exist” (Doctrine & Covenants 89:4), we may find that the dangers of the opium trade also affected people in the United States. Opium had been in use in Europe as a pain killer and medicinal agent for centuries, and was coming into widespread use in the U.S. in the form of laudanum, a tincture made from opium. In Joseph’s day opium poisoning was becoming a problem, especially when laudanum was given to children. The U.S. Treasury Department began keeping records on opium imports and exports in 1827. A table of imports and exports from 1827 to 1845 shows especially high activity in 1827 and 1836. But in 1827, exports slightly exceeded imports, while in 1836, almost 40% of the imports were retained. Local demand for opium may have been rising strongly. The imports kept in the U.S. were likely dependent on the opium traders who doing their part to decimate millions of Chinese addicts. Smoking of opium was taking place in some areas and signs of addiction to laudanum as well as opium poisoning were increasing, but still at a small scale. “Patent medicines” were also being hawked that often included opium products. Their bogus claims and dangerous formulations strongly suggest conspiring men were involved with some of those products.
Criminals Without Borders
In an interesting twist, China may now be exacting revenge on the West for the opium trade of the past. Ironically, the U.S. is now being devastated by an opium-related drug, the opioid fentanyl, that is manufactured in China or by Chinese-controlled entities elsewhere and then illegally brought across our borders to exploit and afflict our people, a remarkable reverse parallel to what American and British parties did to China. Nearly 100,000 American a year are dying from this drug. This is a personal issue for me. My own niece, a beautiful young woman proud to have a beautiful young child, died of this pernicious drug that our government’s inaction allows to be brought over our southern border with ease. Her partner, the father of that child, also died earlier from an accidental overdose of the same drug. Their beautiful young child suddenly became an orphan. Many others share the grief that the opioid crisis is bringing as conspiring men afflict the bodies and minds of millions.
With U.S.-China roles reversed in the current opioid crisis, one thing is very different than it was in the nineteenth century, when China made vigorous efforts to enforce their laws and stop illegal drugs coming across their borders. In shocking contrast, for years the U.S. government seems to have made vigorous efforts to open its borders and to undermine or ignore its laws in ways that have made it easier than ever for drugs and criminals to cross our borders with ease. This is not meant as a political statement, but a cry for sanity as the health of our young people and all of is increasingly at risk from a disaster that members of both major political parties have supported, if only though inaction or feeble action.
How can a disaster like this be happening? One of the most basic symptoms of corruption and one of the most useful warnings signs of secret combinations is conflict of interest based on either direct or circumstantial evidence. Conflict of interest can be easy to detect when, say, a politician or official has investments or family members in a business for which that person gives support in ways that seem to be at odds with their role and sworn duties. But when we don’t know of a relationship, but see someone in power acting strangely in ways that benefit a powerful and wealthy organization, it is logical and sometimes necessary to assume a relationship must exist as the only plausible way to explain the strange behavior.
In this case, illicit drug cartels are making billions of dollars of added revenues by both drug trafficking and human trafficking across America’s porous borders. When politicians deliberately ignore the problem, refuse to stop the trafficking, obstruct those who try to stop it, downplay the problem, or even given financial support to those violating the law or to organizations that aid the cartels in various ways, all contrary to law and contrary to the pleas of the public, instead tolerating devastating dangers to the public, incompetence is no longer a viable explanation. What else but corrupt influence can possibly explain the dereliction of duty? Such outrageous, even treasonous behavior points to some terrible conflict of interest, perhaps at many levels, from entities known to use bribes or many other corrupt enticements to increase their profits. The circumstantial evidence points strongly to the actions of drug cartels, who are clearly examples of dreadful secret combinations, who may be influencing politicians in some way across both parties to do nothing to hinder them and, in some cases, even do much to help.”
Billions are being made. It is insane to think that mere stupidity and incompetence just happen to be doing all the right things to open doors and keep them open for the good of the cartels. Such “coincidence theories” deserve to be mocked and are far less credible than the “combination theory” that makes easy sense of the off behavior that brings profits to the cartels and devastation to hundreds of thousands of victims each year. The physical health of many is at risk from the drug cartels, both for drug trafficking and human trafficking, including the sexual exploitation of many thousands.
Conspiring Men and Opiates: A Problem Greater than Illegal Drugs
Evidence of massive corruption is not limited to illegal opiates, but extends to legal prescribed drugs. A front-page story in the New York Times on Dec. 17, 2024 was “Giant Companies Took Secret Payments to Allow Free Flow of Opioids” by Chris Hamby. The subtitle is telling: “Drugmakers including Purdue Pharma paid pharmacy benefit managers not to restrict painkiller prescriptions, a New York Times investigation found.” His report helps explain why addiction to prescribed opiates has become so out of control in the U.S. Why weren’t steps taken earlier to reduce the crisis, especially by the pharmacy benefit managers (P.B.M.s), the powerful middlemen like Express Scripts, CVS Caremark and Optum Rx? These large companies play a big role in controlling the costs of drugs and what drugs over 200 million patients receive. Working for insurers and employers to negotiate with pharmaceutical companies, they are supposed to take action to prevent the risk of harm and addiction. Why didn’t they? In essence, they were paid by pharmaceutical companies to ignore their duty, to bypass normal safeguards, and let the crisis and the profits grow. Hamby reports:
Purdue’s strategy to ensure broad access to its blockbuster painkiller OxyContin was explicit: “Offer rebates to remove payer restriction,” according to an internal presentation. The company didn’t want doctors to have to provide additional justification for prescribing a powerful narcotic, and it didn’t want strict limits on the number of pills that could be dispensed.
The approach worked. Purdue repeatedly boasted in internal reports that prescribers and patients faced few or no restrictions on access to the drug.
What could have been a backstop against overprescribing instead became a sales tool, records show. After striking deals with P.B.M.s, drugmakers touted the favorable coverage — no second-guessing or paperwork requirements from insurers — as part of an effort to get doctors to write more prescriptions.
Even as the epidemic worsened, the P.B.M.s collected ever-growing sums. The largest of the middlemen bought competitors and used their increasing leverage not to insist on safeguards but to extract more rebates and fees. From 2003 to 2012, for example, the amount Purdue was paying P.B.M.s in rebates roughly doubled to about $400 million a year, almost all of it for OxyContin.
Such ugly fruits of conflicts of interest and corruption involving harmful drugs, both legal and illegal, may extend even further into still other areas. Careful and prayerful attention and research may be needed as we contemplate the Word of Wisdom’s warnings. The Book of Mormon’s profound teachings and warnings for our day on secret combinations may be helpful in understanding many threats to our health from the “designs in the hearts of conspiring men,” related to but much broader than those that already existed in Joseph Smith’s day. These will be explored in Part 2 of this article on the Word of Wisdom, titled “The Word of Wisdom and the Science of Secret Combinations: Real Science vs. the Idolatrous ‘Cult of Science.’”
