Mormon Church And Polygamy: Much More Than Muslims

Published on 12 November 2014, by M. Tomazy.

In a bombshell they hoped would go unnoticed, the Mormon Church just publicly acknowledge the fact that its founder, Joseph Smith, probably had around 40 wives — and more disturbingly, at least one was only 14-years-old.

Statue: Joseph Smith, founder of the Mormon Church 

The announcement was buried in a series of essays that the church published on its website.

During the era in which plural marriage was practiced, Latter-Day Saints distinguished between sealings for time and eternity and sealings for eternity only. Sealings for time and eternity included commitments and relationships during this life, generally including the possibility of sexual relations. Eternity-only sealings indicated relationships in the next life alone.
Evidence indicates that Joseph Smith participated in both types of sealings. The exact number of women to whom he was sealed in his lifetime is unknown because the evidence is fragmentary.

In the footnotes of the paper, the author was a bit more precise:

“Careful estimates put the number between 30 and 40.”

Source: Addicting Info