Zion 

Summary

In JS’s earliest revelations “the cause of Zion” was used to broadly describe the work JS was called to do.1 However, the term Zion was soon used more specifically to describe a community of believers who live in harmony and equality.2 The Book of Mormon explained that in the last days Jesus Christ will gather the house of Israel and again establish Zion.3 In JS’s translation of the Bible, he added passages about the prophet Enoch establishing a righteous, unified, poverty-free community called Zion.4 Thereafter, Zion came to mean the ideal society JS sought to establish, patterned after Enoch’s community.5 The term also meant the location where the Saints were to build the city of Zion, also called the New Jerusalem or Mount Zion.6 On 20 July 1831, a revelation designated Missouri as the “land of Zion” and Independence, Jackson County, Missouri, as the “center place” at which to build the “city of Zion.”7 In the city of Zion, the “Lord’s house” was to be built on Mount Zion.8 Communities of Saints outside the central location of Zion were called stakes, figuratively tethered to the tent of Zion, and were to strengthen Zion and enlarge its borders.9 The term Zion subsequently referred to the Missouri church centered in Clay County and then Caldwell County.10 In 1844, JS further defined Zion as all of North and South America.11 Compare “Zion” in Geographical Directory; See also “New Jerusalem.”