In the theology of the Latter Day Saint movement, an endowment refers to a gift of "power from on high", typically associated with the ordinances performed in Latter Day Saint temples. The purpose and meaning of the endowment varied during the life of movement founder Joseph Smith. The term has referred to many such gifts of heavenly power, including the confirmation ritual, the institution of the High Priesthood in 1831, events and rituals occurring in the Kirtland Temple in the mid-1830s, and an elaborate ritual performed in the Nauvoo Temple in the 1840s.
The term endowment has the most significance to adherents of the Latter Day Saint branch known as Mormonism, including most prominently the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS Church), which practices a form of the Nauvoo endowment. The Nauvoo endowment ceremony, introduced by Joseph Smith and codified by Mormon leader Brigham Young, consisted of symbolic acts and covenants designed to prepare participants to officiate in priesthood ordinances, and to give them the keywords and tokens they need to pass by angels guarding the way to heaven. In the LDS Church's modern practices, the endowment ceremony directs new participants to take a number of solemn oaths or covenants such as an oath of consecration to the LDS Church. Also in the LDS Church's modern practices, completing the endowment ceremony is a prerequisite to both full-time missionary service and temple marriage. In order to enter a temple and participate in the endowment ceremony, church members must hold a current temple recommend.
1830 endowments: Endowment of the Holy Spirit and confirmation
Although it was not generally referred to as an endowment at the time, in retrospect, Latter Day Saints have viewed the confirmation, first performed on April 6, 1830, and attendant outpourings of the spiritual gifts, as an early type of endowment. The term derives from the Authorized King James Version, referring to the spiritual gifts given the disciples of Jesus on the day of Pentecost, in which they were "endowed with power from on high". Subsequent to these early confirmations, Mormons exhibited what they viewed as spiritual gifts such as having visions, prophecy, gift of healing, gift of knowledge, gift of tongues. Unlike the other Latter Day Saint endowments, confirmation has continued to coexist with later endowments as a separate Latter Day Saint ordinance. In the Community of Christ, formerly known as the Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, the "endowment of the Holy Spirit" such as occurred on the day of Pentecost is the only recognized endowment.
1831 Kirtland endowment: Conferral of the High Priesthood
The first reference to an endowment by Joseph Smith, the founder of the Latter Day Saint movement, was in early 1831, some days after Smith was joined in his ministry by Sidney Rigdon, a newly converted Campbellite minister from Ohio. Rigdon's congregation also was converted to Smith's Church of Christ. Rigdon had apparently disagreed with the Campbellites in that he believed in a Pentecostal endowment of power beyond the abiding presence of the Holy Spirit endowed upon confirmation. While Rigdon believed the teachings of the early Mormon missionaries who converted him, he thought the missionaries were lacking in heavenly power.
In January 1831, Smith issued a revelation where he wrote that after Mormons relocated to Kirtland, Ohio, they would "be endowed with power from on high" and "sent forth". Smith reiterated this in February 1831, stating that the "elders of the church Smith reaffirmed that the faithful members would "be taught from on high" and "endowed with power", and that God would call the elders of the church together in Kirtland in a general conference and "pour out [his] Spirit upon them in that day they assemble themselves together". In a revelation given to an individual, Smith assured the man that "at the conference meeting he [would] be ordained unto power from on high".
This general conference of the church was held from June 3 to June 6, 1831, in which a number of men were ordained to the "High" or "Melchizedek" Priesthood for the first time, which ordination "consisted [of] the endowment--it being a new order--and bestowed authority". Later that year, an early convert who had left the church claimed that many of the Saints "have been ordained to the High Priesthood, or the order of Melchizedek; and profess to be endowed with the same power as the ancient apostles were".
1833 Kirtland endowment: School of the Prophets
In 1833, Joseph Smith established what he called a School of the Prophets,