Inside The Fundamentalist Church of the Latter Day Saints

Blood Atonement Is Required For Certain Terrible Sins

Jeffs probably isn’t going to be sacrificed at the stake for forcing 80-ish young women and teenagers to marry him, but if he committed a different crime (a crime on the FLDS list of very, very bad crimes), he might have to shed some blood. This is because blood atonement is a very real thing for the FLDS church.

Mormon prophet Brigham Young taught that you would receive forgiveness for certain sins in the form of personal blood sacrifice. This was extended to include the blood shed of others and followers were encouraged to hurt those who committed serious sins. Jeffs preached that there was a 1-to-1 trade for getting into a heaven. If a sinner killed a sinner, they’d be forgiven.