Orson Hyde

Role

LDS Apostle — dedicated Holy Land for gathering of Israel

Bio Notes

LDS apostle, author of the 1840-42 apostolic mission to the Holy Land. On October 24, 1841, dedicated the Holy Land on the Mount of Olves for the return of the Jews. PRIMARY-SOURCE FOOTING: four Joseph Smith Papers items (three Hyde 1841 letters plus the Times and Seasons March 1842). Documented pivot from claiming fraternal Israelite kinship to conversion-as-the-gate for covenant belonging, the lineage-vs-membership question at the heart of the covenant-bloodline lane. His self-declared Jewish descent reportedly birthed a persistent LDS folkloric tradition of Israelite-descent claims (REPORTED-BY-NB until the source article is read). Skousen documented the LDS connection in The Birth of Modern Israel (Ensign, May 1972). Andrew C. Reed explored Hyde's mission in Framing the Restoration and Gathering (2017).