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Sacred
Stone: Distinctive Features of the Nauvoo Temple
by
Heidi S. Swinton
The
elliptical window on the east end of the Celestial Room is the largest
window in the temple. It includes 234 pieces of glass. The frame
was manufactured at BDL Mill in Salt Lake City, and Charles Allen
did the glazing. The frame alone is 22.5 feet wide, 8.5 feet tall,
and weighed approx. 1,000 lbs. The sill was made of redwood planks,
glued and clamped together, and the arch was made of sugar pine.
The Windows:
The
intended structure was massive by most standards and certainly far
exceeded any building effort underway for hundreds of miles. Joseph
Smith selected young architect William Weeks to design the temple
but retained the role as chief architect. At one point, the two
clashed regarding the design of round windows in the broad side
of the building. Weeks contended that the windows should be semicircular—that
the building was not tall enough to accommodate round windows. Joseph
Smith summarily dismissed his objection: "I wish you to carry out
my designs. I have seen in vision the splendid appearance of that
building illuminated, and will have it built according to the pattern
shown me."
Blowing
art without using molds is a centuries-old art. A hollow iron pipe
is dipped in molten glass, some of which sticks to the pear-shaped
end, and is called St. Gobain glass. A master glassblower then gently
blows through the pipe until the glass bulges and forms a hollow
bulb, which is stretched and twirled. This master glassblower, third
generation at his art, shapes the glass into a cylinder, called
a "muff."
The windows
of the temple rivaled the stone as a distinctive feature. In the
1840's, the windows were more than ornamentation; they illuminated
the interior with shafts of light. Even the shapes of the windows—some
round, some with rounding at the top with a half circle—suggested
light of a rising or setting sun, or of the sun high in the sky.
Between the two rows of main windows, Joseph Smith asked for a row
of round windows. Initially the architect, William Weeks, balked
at the variance to accepted practice, but the round windows became
a dramatic feature. Above the capitals and between each of the stone
stars ran another row of smaller circular windows of painted glass
that lit the rooms of the attic story used by the Saints for their
special ceremonies.
The varied sizes
of the rectangular windows, some with their half-circle top "give
the appearance of thrusting up to the stars at the top of the temple,"
Charles Allen suggest. He knows what he is talking about, having
been given the charge to design and craft all 127 windows. He talks
of mullions and putty, of moldings and wind tunnels as he describes
the process that required him to triple the size of his shop in
Nauvoo for this project. Allen uses a historic restoration method
that would have been appropriate for the 1840 period, using original
mortise and tenon square-peg joinery instead of nails in window
sashes and doors.
"I come to the
shop every day and look at the windows and just shake my head. I
marvel; it's a miracle that the windows came from our shop," states
Allen who heads up the family operation.
The glass for
the new temple was mouth blown—as the earlier glass would have
been—in France.
Click
to Enlarge
The Carved
Stonework:
The chiseled stonework on the temple pointed to its sacred purpose.
In the spring of 1844, the Prophet Joseph Smith escorted Josiah
Quincy, a notable from Boston, Massachusetts, about the already
imposing yet nowhere-near-complete structure. While the pilasters
were yet to stretch above the first floor, the stone carvings to
ornament the exterior were underway. Years later, Quincy published
his thoughts about the tour with the young Prophet:
Near the entrance
to the Temple we passed a workman who was laboring upon a huge sun,
which he had chiseled from the solid rock....'General Smith,' said
the man, looking up from his task, 'is this like the face you saw
in vision?'
'Very near it,'
answered the prophet. 2
A visitor to
Nauvoo from Pittsburgh later described the face on the sunstone
as one "seen in old almanacs."3 Looking at the sunstones conjures
up images of mallets, chisels, sanding devices, and ropes to haul
the one-ton pieces into place.
The carved stones
on the temple, the sunstone in particular, have been the focus of
much attention over the years. The original architectural features
have been reproduced with great care on the new temple. The pilasters,
ornamented with carved moonstones at the base and the sun and trumpers
on the capitals, stand as dramatic columns around the temple. These
dramatic features were more than decoration; they symbolized the
signs in the heavens. Joseph Smith saw the prominent stone ornamentation
in a vision prior to the temple's construction. He taught that these
astronomical symbols indicated the nature of the glorious blessings
performed within the temple's walls: "God has made certain decrees
which are fixed and immovable; for instance God set the sun, the
moon, and the stars in the heavens, and gave them their laws, conditions
and bounds, which they cannot pass except by His commandments; they
all move in perfect harmony in their sphere and order, and are as
lights and wonders, and signs to us."3
The
sunstone is actually two pieces of stone, the face rising above
what Brigham Young described as clouds, and two hands each holding
a trumpet. The two pieces would have been shimmied into place on
the top of the capitals using ropes, pulleys, and a crude crane.
"It is intended
that this temple on earth reproduce a temple plan or model which
exists in heaven. So this implies two or three things. First that
the temple on earth actually reflect the heavenly sphere in its
architecture, namely the presence of the heavenly bodies—stars,
sun, moon," explains Dr. John Lundquist. "These are reflected as
symbols in the actual architecture of the temple to underlie that
this is a meeting place of heaven and earth. Second, all of the
great temple-building traditions have had the idea of astronomy,
namely that the temple has always been like an observatory."
Of all the apparent
themes etched in stone, Dr. Richard Ahlborn, curator of the Smithsonian
Institute, suggests: "What creative power than making reference
to what was created." In one of the "largest single acquisitions"
by its Board of Regents, the Smithsonian purchased one of the two
remaining sunstones for permanent display. Dr. Ahlborn sees "the
sunstone as both a material object and visual presence that embodies
the values of the people, the culture. The Church of Jesus Christ
of Latter-day Saints obviously had, and you can feel it in the sunstone,
a presence, a purpose, a sense of what needed to be done and the
sunstone tells me all of that."
Dr. Madsen adds
his interpretation: "The Saints came to the temple and saw on its
exterior the very prophecy of the destiny of righteousness, meaning
the fullness of the light of God." The image of stars in the galaxy
is captured in the conversation between the Lord and Abraham, explains
Dr. Madsen. "And the Lord says, 'Look up Abraham.' And he looks
up at the night sky and sees the canopy of stars, and the voice
of the Lord says, 'Thy posterity shall be like these, they will
shine like stars of first magnitude.' So, temple and temple awareness
were to fulfill the promises of Abraham in our modern day. That
was their faith."
©
Covenant Communications, 2002
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