How Was the Pearl of Great Price Compiled and Canonized?

LDS Perspective

The Pearl of Great Price emerged from a gradual process of compilation that began during the Prophet Joseph Smith’s lifetime and concluded decades later with its canonization as one of the Church’s standard works. The first materials that would comprise this volume appeared in Church periodicals in Nauvoo, with the Book of Abraham being published serially in the *Times and Seasons* beginning in March 1842. These writings were subsequently reprinted in the *Millennium Star* in England later that year. In 1851, Elder Franklin D. Richards, then serving as president of the British Mission, compiled these and other writings of Joseph Smith into a pamphlet titled *The Pearl of Great Price*, which he published in Liverpool, England. This original collection contained items that had appeared in Ch

Historical Perspective

The Pearl of Great Price emerged from Joseph Smith’s prophetic activities between 1830 and 1843, though the volume itself was not compiled until after his death. The collection comprises distinct textual units produced at various points during Smith’s ministry: the Book of Moses (an excerpt from Smith’s 1830–1831 revision of Genesis, also called the Joseph Smith Translation), the Book of Abraham (a translation of Egyptian papyri acquired in 1835 and published in 1842), Joseph Smith—Matthew (a revision of Matthew 24 produced in 1831), Joseph Smith—History (a narrative history dictated beginning in 1838), and the Articles of Faith (composed for a newspaper editor in 1842). These documents remained scattered until Franklin D. Richards, then president of the British Mission, assembled them int