=1. Jerusalem.=--"The city has, in different ages, borne a
variety of names, and even in the Bible it has several
designations. Salem, mentioned in Gen. xiv, 18, was perhaps its
name in the time of Melchizedek, and it is certainly so called in
Psa. lxxvi, 2. Isaiah (xxix, 1, 7) calls it Ariel. Jebus, or
Jebusi, the city of the Jebusites, was its name in the days of
Joshua and the Judges (Josh. xv, 8; xviii, 16, 28; Judges xix,
10, 11), and this name continued in use till David's time (I
Chron. xi, 4, 5). Some have thought that Jerusalem is itself a
corruption of Jebus-Salem, but it is a theory unsupported by
facts. Jerusalem is also termed 'the city of David,' 'the city of
Judah,' 'the holy city,' 'the city of God' (II Kings xiv, 20; II
Chron. xxv, 28; Neh. xi, 18; Psa. lxxxvii, 3). To this day it is
called el-Kuds, or 'the holy,' in most countries of the East. No
city in the world has received more honorable appellations; our
Savior himself called it 'the city of the great King.'"--_Bible
Dictionary_, Cassell & Co., p. 600.
=2. The Founding of Zion in Missouri.=--"... A company of Saints
known as the Colesville Branch--from their having lived at
Colesville, Broome County, New York--had arrived in Missouri, and
having received instructions to purchase the lands in the regions
around about Zion, they secured a tract of land in a fertile
prairie some ten or twelve miles west of Independence, in Kaw
township, not far from the present location of Kansas City. On
the 2nd of August [1831]--the day preceding the dedication of the
temple site--in the settlement of the Colesville Saints, the
first log was laid for a house as the foundation of Zion. The log
was carried by twelve men, in honor of the Twelve Tribes of
Israel; and Elder Sidney Rigdon consecrated and dedicated the
land of Zion for the gathering of the Saints."--_Outlines of
Ecclesiastical History_, by Elder B. H. Roberts, p. 352.
=3. Temple Site, Independence, Jackson County,
Missouri.=--"Taking the road running west from the Court House
for a scant half mile, you come to the summit of a crowning hill,
the slope of which to the south and west is quite abrupt, but
very gradual toward the north and east.... This is the temple
site. It was upon this spot on the third day of August, 1831,
that Joseph Smith, Sidney Rigdon, Edward Partridge, W. W. Phelps,
Oliver Cowdery, Martin Harris, and Joseph Coe, and another person
whose name I cannot learn, for there were eight in all--men in
whom the Lord was well pleased, assembled to dedicate this place
as the temple site in Zion. The eighty-seventh psalm was read.
Joseph [the prophet] then dedicated the spot, where is to be
built a temple on which the glory of God shall rest. Yea, the
great God hath so decreed it, saying: 'Verily this generation
shall not pass away, until an house shall be built unto the Lord,
and a cloud shall rest upon it, which cloud shall be even the
glory of the Lord, which shall fill the house.... And the sons of
Moses, and also the sons of Aaron, shall offer an acceptable
offering, and sacrifice in the house of the Lord, which house
shall be built unto the Lord in this generation, upon the
consecrated spot as I have appointed.'--(Doc. and Cov. sec.
lxxxiv, 5, 31.)"--Elder B. H. Roberts, _Missouri Persecutions_.
See "The House of the Lord," by James E. Talmage, Chapter V.