Blood Atonement — The Doctrine, the Distortion, and What Was Never Taught
Critics present “blood atonement” as proof that early Mormonism sanctioned religious killing. The reality is narrower and far more defensible: the teaching concerned a principle of divine justice — that for the gravest sins, the only recompense a person can offer is the voluntary giving of his own life — and it never once authorized the Church, or any man, to take that life.
The Principle — Correctly Stated
At its heart the teaching is about justice, not violence. Some sins — above all the deliberate taking of innocent life — are so grave that ordinary repentance cannot make the wronged whole or restore what was taken. For a sin of that magnitude, the only recompense the guilty person can personally offer is the willing surrender of his own life. Brigham Young’s much-quoted language must be read in exactly that frame:
Journal of Discourses 4:54 (Brigham Young, 1856)
“There are sins that men commit for which they atone themselves by repentance, and shedding of their own blood.”
Note what the sentence actually says: they atone themselves, by shedding their own blood. The act in view is the sinner’s own offering — not someone else putting him to death. Joseph Fielding Smith later stated the principle as carefully as anyone has:
Joseph Fielding Smith, Doctrines of Salvation, vol. 1, pp. 135–136
“Man may commit certain grievous sins … that will place him beyond the reach of the atoning blood of Christ. If then he would be saved he must make sacrifice of his own life to atone — so far as in his power lies — for that sin, for the blood of Christ alone, under certain circumstances, will not avail.”
Nor is the willing surrender of one’s own life for a higher spiritual end foreign to scripture — it is praised in the very chapter the New Testament holds up as its roll of faith. The author of Hebrews honors those who chose death over deliverance precisely because they valued their standing in the resurrection above their mortal lives:
“… and others were tortured, not accepting deliverance; that they might obtain a better resurrection.”
Scripture, then, already knows the category of a person who willingly gives up his mortal life with the resurrection in view — and counts it not as horror but as faith. Blood atonement, correctly stated, lives in that same biblical territory: the sinner’s own willing offering before God, never an execution carried out by other men.
The principle, then, concerns two sober truths: that there exist sins so serious that ordinary repentance does not reach them, and that the recompense for such a sin — where it can be made at all — is the sinner’s own willing offering of his life. That is the entire substance of the doctrine. Everything beyond it is the critic’s addition.
What Was Never Taught
This is the distinction the critic collapses — deliberately or carelessly. At no point did Brigham Young, or any Church leader, teach that the Church would carry out the shedding of a man’s blood, that ecclesiastical authority should execute sinners, or that members should hunt down and kill the guilty:
The Line That Was Never Crossed in Doctrine
- The Church was never the executioner. No leader was authorized to shed a man’s blood for his sins, and none claimed to be.
- It was never an ordinance, rite, or practice. Nothing was ever instituted, administered, or performed as a sanctioned ecclesiastical act.
- Any civil expression belonged to the state, not the Church. It could only ever have application under a full theocratic legal order administering capital law — which never existed — and even then through the civil magistrate, not priesthood authority.
The lurid picture of Danites slitting throats on ecclesiastical orders is a caricature, not a doctrine. The principle described a person’s own willing recompense before God; the caricature describes an institution killing its dissenters. These are not two versions of the same idea. They are opposites, and only one of them was ever taught.
The Historical Context
The principle was preached most forcefully during the “Reformation” of 1856–57, an intense season of religious renewal in Utah that coincided with the approach of the federal army during the Utah War. The Saints had already been driven from Ohio, Missouri, and Illinois by mob violence, and federal troops were now marching on the territory. The rhetoric of that season was vivid, urgent, and confrontational — deliberately so.
But the rhetorical heat of that moment changes neither the substance of the principle nor the line it never crossed. Strong language about a man answering for the blood he has shed is not the same thing as a program of religious execution — and no such program was ever instituted.
What the Standard Works Teach
Scripture supports both halves of the distinction. On one hand, Christ’s atonement is infinite — no man’s death adds anything to it for the purpose of salvation:
“Wherefore, it must needs be an infinite atonement — save it should be an infinite atonement this corruption could not put on incorruption.”
On the other hand, the same canon treats murder as a sin of singular gravity that ordinary repentance does not reach — and, crucially, it assigns the punishment of the murderer to the civil law, not to the Church:
“And it shall come to pass, that if any persons among you shall kill they shall be delivered up and dealt with according to the laws of the land; for remember that he hath no forgiveness; and it shall be proved according to the laws of the land.”
The Gravity of Murder in Canon
- D&C 42:18 — “He that killeth shall not have forgiveness in this world, nor in the world to come.” Some sins are placed beyond ordinary remission.
- 1 John 3:15 — “No murderer hath eternal life abiding in him.” The New Testament makes the same judgment of the deliberate taking of life.
- Alma 34:10–16 — Christ’s infinite and eternal sacrifice is the only atonement that saves; no mortal blood substitutes for it.
Taken together, these passages establish precisely the principle as stated: Christ’s atonement alone saves, and yet the gravest sins demand a recompense ordinary repentance cannot supply — while the killer himself is “delivered up” to the laws of the land, never to an executioner wearing the authority of the Church. The canon affirms the principle and forbids the caricature in the same breath.
The Status Today
The Church’s formal position draws exactly this line. In 1978, under the direction of President Spencer W. Kimball and the First Presidency, Elder Bruce R. McConkie addressed the question directly, distinguishing the atoning blood of Christ from any notion that men must shed their own blood at another’s hand:
“If by blood atonement is meant the atoning sacrifice of Christ, the answer is Yes. If by blood atonement is meant the shedding of the blood of men to atone in some way for their own sins, the answer is No. … We do not believe that it is necessary for men in this day to shed their own blood to receive a remission of sins.”
McConkie is denying exactly what was always denied: that the Church requires or performs the shedding of human blood. He is not inventing a reversal — he is restating the line the doctrine always observed. The principle of a man answering before God for the blood he has shed is left where scripture leaves it; what is denied is any human-administered execution dressed as religion. Thus, that a man can in some manner make restitution — and so have his judgment lessened — does not mean he receives a remission of his sins; rather, it means that because of that restitution his punishment may be lessened.
The Biblical Parallel
The critic’s argument must be tested against the standard it claims to apply. The Bible contains extensive passages prescribing lethal sanctions in a specific theocratic context:
Biblical Capital Law in Historical Context
- Deuteronomy 17:12 — Death prescribed for those who refuse to obey the judgment of the priest.
- Leviticus 20 — Death prescribed for adultery, certain sexual acts, and cursing parents.
- Numbers 25:7–13 — Phinehas kills an Israelite and a Midianite woman in flagrante and is rewarded with a covenant of peace from God.
Critics do not conclude from these passages that biblical religion is fundamentally violent. They contextualize. They distinguish between commands given to Israel in a specific theocratic context and the enduring doctrinal core of the faith.
That same contextualizing standard, applied consistently, is exactly what the LDS teaching deserves — and it survives the test more easily than the biblical material does, because the LDS principle never authorized anyone to do the killing in the first place.
The Verdict
Blood atonement, correctly understood, is a coherent principle of divine justice: there are sins so grave — the deliberate taking of life chief among them — that ordinary repentance cannot reach them, and the only recompense the guilty person can offer is the willing surrender of his own life. Even then, it is Christ’s atonement alone that saves; the sinner’s offering is recompense, not redemption.
What was never taught — and what the entire caricature depends upon — is that the Church, its leaders, or its members would carry out that shedding. The canon delivers the killer to the laws of the land. The Church was never an executioner. Nothing was ever instituted or practiced as an ecclesiastical rite.
The critic’s real target is a doctrine the Church never held. The principle Brigham Young actually taught is narrower, sterner, and more defensible than the picture drawn of it — and, kept to its actual terms, it stands.