page_title: First Vision
hierarchical_section_title: First Vision
context_page_description: The First Vision refers to a theophany that Joseph Smith said he received in the spring of 1820, in a wooded area in Manchester, New York, called the Sacred Grove by Latter-day Saints. Smith described it as a vision in which he received instruction from God the Father and Jesus Christ.
  According to the account Smith told in 1838, he went to the woods to pray about which church to join but fell into the grip of an evil power that nearly overcame him. At the last moment, he was rescued by two shining "Personages" who hovered above him. One of the beings told Smith not to join any existing churches because all taught incorrect doctrines.
  Smith wrote several accounts of the vision between 1832 and 1842, two of which were published in his lifetime. Consistency of the accounts is a subject of debate, whether variations are indicators of significant shifts in Smith's theology or are simply changing emphasis of minor details.
context_section_description: The First Vision (also called the grove experience) refers to a  theophany that Joseph Smith said he received in the spring of 1820, in a wooded area in Manchester, New York, called the Sacred Grove by Latter-day Saints. Smith described it as a vision  in which he received instruction from God the Father and Jesus Christ.
  According to the account Smith told in 1838, he went to the woods to pray about which church to join but fell into the grip of an evil power that nearly overcame him. At the last moment, he was rescued by two shining "Personages" (implied to be God the Father and Jesus) who hovered above him. One of the beings told Smith not to join any existing churches because all taught incorrect doctrines.
  Smith wrote several accounts of the vision between 1832 and 1842, two of which were published in his lifetime. Consistency of the accounts is a subject of debate, whether variations are indicators of significant shifts in Smith's theology or are simply changing emphasis of minor details. The First Vision is revered in Latter-day Saint theology as the first step in the Latter Day Saint restoration, but it was relatively unknown to early adherents to the Latter Day Saint movement; Smith's experience was published in 1842 and canonized in 1880 but not emphasized in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS Church) until the early 20th century. For Latter-day Saints, the First Vision corroborates distinctive doctrines such as the bodily nature of God the Father and the uniqueness of the Restored Gospel of Jesus Christ as the only true path to salvation.
caption: Stained glass depiction of the first vision of Joseph Smith, completed in 1913 by an unknown artist (Museum of Church History and Art).
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