Joseph Smith and the First Vision
Official Statement on Joseph Smith’s First Vision (document)
https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/manual/gospel-topics-essays/first-vision-accounts?lang=eng
How THIS RARE First Vision Account Made 'Ex Mormon' LDS Historian, Don Bradley Return to The Church (12 min)
Recounting how different versions of Joseph Smith’s first vision helped Don Bradley confirm his faith and helped him connect to ancient doctrine rather than destroy his faith.
Joseph Smith’s First Vision as Endowment (or Why I Came Back to the Church) - Don Bradley (46 min)
It’s funny how the deeper you dig into Joseph Smith’s history, the more authentic he becomes and the deeper the connections are found with ancient scripture and doctrine that Joseph himself didn’t even know about. If you are speaking truth, eventually the truth will defend itself.
Four Accounts and Three Critiques of Joseph Smith's First Vision (53 min)
Some have created a controversy out of nothing with regard to the various times Joseph Smith shared his first vision story. The various versions of the first vision were of course given many years apart, to various different audiences for various different purposes. It is obvious that he would have focused on various aspects of the vision to make different points in different circumstances. This presentation investigates these details and supposed controversies.
Joseph Smith's First Vision Accounts Explained! (21 min)
Join Casey Griffiths as he explores the locations and context where each primary account of the First Vision was written down. There are four accounts in which Joseph Smith was directly involved. Yet, these accounts aren't exactly the same. In this video Casey helps make sense of the context of each account. He also interviews Steve Harper, a Church History researcher who has studied this subject extensively.
Joseph Smith spoke honestly when he declared:
“I had seen a vision, I knew it, and I knew that God knew it, and I could not deny it.”
“But, exerting all my powers to call upon God to deliver me out of the power of this enemy which had seized upon me, and at the very moment when I was ready to sink into despair and abandon myself to destruction—not to an imaginary ruin, but to the power of some actual being from the unseen world, who had such marvelous power as I had never before felt in any being—just at this moment of great alarm, I saw a pillar of light exactly over my head, above the brightness of the sun, which descended gradually until it fell upon me. It no sooner appeared than I found myself delivered from the enemy which held me bound. When the light rested upon me I saw two Personages, whose brightness and glory defy all description, standing above me in the air. One of them spake unto me, calling me by name and said, pointing to the other—This is My Beloved Son. Hear Him!”
-Joseph Smith Jr.