Endowment (Mormonism)

Endowment (Mormonism)

In Mormonism, the endowment is an ordinance (ritual ceremony) designed to prepare participants to become kings, queens, priests, and priestesses in the afterlife. As part of the ceremony, participants take part in a scripted reenactment of the Biblical creation and fall of Adam and Eve. They also are taught highly symbolic gestures and passwords, thought to be needed to pass by angels guarding the way to heaven, and are instructed not to reveal these gestures and passwords. The ceremony also includes a washing and anointing, and receipt of a "new name" which they are not to reveal to others except at a certain part in the ceremony, and the receipt of the temple garments, which Mormons then are expected to wear under their clothing day and night throughout their life. As practiced today in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS Church), the endowment also consists of a series of covenants (promises to God) which participants make, such as a covenant of consecration to the LDS Church. All Latter-day Saints who choose to serve as missionaries for the LDS Church or who choose to contract a celestial marriage in an LDS Church temple must first complete the endowment ceremony.

The endowment was instituted by founder Joseph Smith, Jr. in the 1840s with further contributions by Brigham Young and his successors. The ceremony is performed in Latter Day Saints' temples, special places dedicated specifically for the endowment and certain other rituals sacred to Mormons, and is closed to all but worthy Mormons. There was a brief period during the construction of the Salt Lake Temple where a small building referred to as the Endowment House was used to perform the ritual. The endowment is currently practiced by the LDS Church, several denominations of Mormon fundamentalism, and a few other Mormon denominations. The LDS Church has simplified its ceremony from the way it existed in the 19th century, and has removed some of the more controversial elements.

A distinct endowment ceremony was also performed in the 1830s in the Kirtland Temple, the first temple of the broader Latter Day Saint movement, which includes non-Mormon faiths such as the Community of Christ. The term endowment has various meanings historically, and within the other branches of that movement.