Dallin H. Oaks and Martin Harris: The Remarkable Family Legacy of Faith in Jesus Christ
This article is a written summary of a Let’s Get Real conversation between Stephen Jones and historian Don Bradley exploring the remarkable family connection between Dallin H. Oaks and Martin Harris. President Oaks’s middle name is Harris, reflecting his maternal Harris ancestry. His mother, Stella Harris Oaks, descended from Emer Harris, the older brother of Martin Harris—one of the Three Witnesses of the Book of Mormon. But the discussion goes far beyond genealogy. It traces a remarkable legacy of faith in Jesus Christ, testimony of the Book of Mormon, repentance through the Savior’s Atonement, and a multigenerational calling to stand as witnesses of Christ.
TL;DR: How Are Dallin H. Oaks and Martin Harris Related?
Dallin H. Oaks and Martin Harris are connected through the Harris family. President Oaks’s mother was Stella Harris Oaks, and her great-grandfather was Emer Harris, Martin Harris’s older brother. Don Bradley argues that this family connection reveals a deeper spiritual continuity. Martin Harris helped finance and bring forth the Book of Mormon, experienced repentance and the grace of Jesus Christ, became one of the Three Witnesses, and helped select the original Twelve Apostles. Emer Harris accepted the Book of Mormon and became a devoted Latter-day Saint. Generations later, Dallin Harris Oaks became an Apostle and a lifelong witness of Jesus Christ. The larger message of the episode is that every disciple is called to receive a witness of Christ through the Holy Ghost and then become a witness of Him to others.
Watch the Let’s Get Real Discussion About Dallin H. Oaks and Martin Harris
What Does the “H” in Dallin H. Oaks Stand For?
The conversation begins with a deceptively simple question:
What does the “H” in Dallin H. Oaks stand for?
The answer is Harris.
President Oaks’s full name is Dallin Harris Oaks. His mother was Stella Harris Oaks, and her great-grandfather was Emer Harris.
Emer Harris had a younger brother whose name is deeply familiar to students of the Restoration:
Martin Harris.
This is the same Martin Harris who financed the publication of the Book of Mormon, served as an early scribe, became one of the Three Witnesses, and endured both remarkable spiritual experiences and painful personal trials during the early Restoration.
President Oaks therefore comes from the same extended Harris family that played a critical role in bringing forth the Book of Mormon.
Who Was Emer Harris, President Oaks’s Ancestor?
Emer Harris was the older brother of Martin Harris and a direct ancestor of President Oaks.
The Harris family lived in upstate New York and came from a deeply religious background. Don Bradley explains that Martin and Emer grew up in a Quaker environment that emphasized the inner light—the belief that God could communicate personally with individuals through conscience, revelation, and spiritual impressions.
This background becomes important because both brothers appear to have developed an expectation that God was preparing to do something significant.
Martin Harris Said His Restoration Story Began in 1818
One of the most fascinating historical details discussed in the episode concerns the year 1818.
In an 1871 letter, Martin Harris reportedly said that he had been connected with the work of the Restoration for 53 years.
That calculation takes the beginning of his Restoration experience back to 1818.
But Joseph Smith’s First Vision did not occur until 1820, and The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints would not be formally organized until 1830.
Why would Martin Harris identify 1818 as the beginning?
Martin Harris Received His Own Personal Revelation
According to the historical material discussed by Bradley, Martin said that in 1818 he was inspired by the Lord and taught by the Spirit not to join any of the existing churches.
He believed he should wait for the true Church of Jesus Christ to come forth.
This means that while Joseph Smith was going through his own period of spiritual preparation, the Lord may also have been preparing Martin Harris independently.
Bradley sees an important principle here:
Joseph Smith was the Prophet of the Restoration, but he was not the only person God prepared to make the Restoration possible.
God Prepared Many People for the Restoration
The speakers emphasize that Joseph Smith could not have performed every role required to bring forth the Restoration.
He could not simultaneously be:
- The Prophet.
- The translator.
- Every scribe.
- The financier.
- All Three Witnesses.
- All Twelve Apostles.
- Every missionary.
The Lord therefore prepared many people.
He worked with Joseph Smith.
He worked with Emma Smith.
He worked with Oliver Cowdery.
He worked with Martin Harris.
He worked with Sidney Rigdon and many others.
The Restoration was a divine work brought forth through a community of people whom God prepared for different responsibilities.
How Martin Harris Helped Bring Forth the Book of Mormon
Martin Harris became one of the most important early supporters of Joseph Smith’s work.
When Joseph needed financial assistance to relocate to Pennsylvania and continue the work of translation, Martin gave him a substantial amount of money.
He later served as a scribe and eventually placed his farm at risk to help finance the printing of the Book of Mormon.
Without Martin’s financial sacrifice, the publication of the Book of Mormon would have faced a serious practical obstacle.
Joseph Smith’s First Use of the Interpreters and Martin Harris
One of the more intriguing historical connections explored in the video involves Joseph Smith’s early use of the Nephite interpreters, often identified with the Urim and Thummim.
According to the account discussed by Bradley, Joseph wanted to know how the translation and publication of the Book of Mormon would be supported.
Through the interpreters, he was directed toward Martin Harris.
The Lord was providing a practical answer to a very real problem.
Joseph needed financial support.
Martin had been spiritually prepared.
Their paths came together.
The Feast of Tabernacles and God Providing for His Work
Bradley connects this event with the Jewish Feast of Tabernacles.
The feast commemorates Israel’s wilderness journey, when the Lord sustained His covenant people and provided manna.
For Christians, the feast can also point toward Jesus Christ coming to dwell—or “tabernacle”—among humanity.
The discussion sees a meaningful parallel.
Ancient Israel needed God to provide for them in the wilderness.
Joseph Smith needed God to provide the resources necessary to bring forth the Book of Mormon.
And according to the historical account discussed in the episode, the Lord’s answer was:
Martin Harris.
Martin Harris Was More Than the Man Who Funded the Book of Mormon
One of the episode’s most important arguments is that Latter-day Saints often remember Martin Harris too narrowly.
We remember him as:
- The man who financed the Book of Mormon.
- The scribe connected with the lost manuscript.
- One of the Three Witnesses.
All of those things are important.
But Bradley argues that Martin should also be remembered as something even more central:
A witness of Jesus Christ.
Did Martin Harris See Jesus Christ?
The episode discusses Joseph Smith’s 1832 history, where Joseph describes spiritual manifestations involving himself, Martin Harris, and Oliver Cowdery.
Joseph writes of seeing the Lord in connection with his own early prophetic experience.
He then describes the Lord appearing to Martin Harris in a vision and later uses similar language concerning Oliver Cowdery.
Bradley sees an important pattern:
Joseph Smith, Martin Harris, and Oliver Cowdery appear as multiple witnesses of Christ at the beginning of the Restoration.
This resonates with the scriptural principle:
“In the mouth of two or three witnesses shall every word be established.”
Why Martin Harris Went to Charles Anthon
Latter-day Saints are familiar with the story of Martin Harris carrying a transcription of Book of Mormon characters to scholars in the East, including Charles Anthon.
But Bradley highlights a detail that many readers may overlook.
According to Joseph Smith’s historical account discussed in the video, Martin did not undertake the journey merely because Joseph came up with the idea.
Martin had received his own divine direction.
The Lord had shown him that he should take the characters east.
This reinforces the larger message that Martin was not merely a passive helper.
He was an active participant receiving revelation within the unfolding work of the Restoration.
The Three Witnesses Were Also Connected to the Twelve Apostles
Martin Harris eventually became one of the Three Witnesses of the Book of Mormon alongside Oliver Cowdery and David Whitmer.
They testified that an angel showed them the plates and that they heard the voice of God affirming the divine translation of the record.
But the Three Witnesses were given another responsibility that is sometimes overlooked.
They participated in selecting the original members of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles in 1835.
This creates a remarkable connection in the Harris family story.
Martin Harris helped select the original Twelve Apostles.
Then, generations later, Dallin Harris Oaks became a member of that same quorum.
Dallin Harris Oaks and a Legacy of Witnesses of Jesus Christ
The role of an Apostle is fundamentally connected with witnessing of Jesus Christ.
Bradley therefore sees a spiritual continuity between Martin Harris and President Oaks.
Martin became a witness of the Book of Mormon and, in Bradley’s interpretation, a witness of Christ.
President Oaks was called to the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles in 1984 and has spent decades publicly testifying of Jesus Christ, His Atonement, His commandments, and His restored gospel.
For the speakers, the connection is not simply genealogical.
It represents a heritage of witnessing Jesus Christ.
Martin Harris’s Mistake With the Lost Manuscript
The episode does not romanticize Martin Harris’s life.
One of his greatest mistakes became one of the most painful episodes in early Restoration history.
Martin repeatedly asked Joseph Smith for permission to take the translated manuscript home and show it to selected family members.
Eventually permission was given under strict conditions.
Those conditions were violated, and the manuscript disappeared.
Martin was devastated.
According to the account discussed in the video, he cried:
“I have lost my soul.”
But this tragedy did not become the end of Martin’s story.
Doctrine and Covenants 19 and Martin Harris’s Experience With Repentance
The speakers connect Martin’s experience with one of the most moving revelations about the Atonement of Jesus Christ: Doctrine and Covenants 19.
There the Savior describes His suffering for sin—suffering so intense that He trembled because of pain, bled at every pore, and suffered both body and spirit.
Martin had tasted the pain of his own wrongdoing.
That experience gave him a personal understanding, however small, of the terrible weight of sin and the incomparable mercy offered through Jesus Christ.
Instead of being defined permanently by failure, Martin was invited to repent, rejoice, and preach faith in the Savior.
Martin Harris Became a Witness of Grace
This changes the way his story can be understood.
Martin was not only a witness that gold plates existed.
He became a witness that Jesus Christ can redeem imperfect people.
He failed.
He suffered.
He repented.
He continued serving.
His life becomes an example of the central message of the Restoration:
Jesus Christ saves, forgives, heals, and transforms.
Why Martin Harris Wanted to See the Gold Plates
After the manuscript loss, Martin strongly desired a physical witness of the plates.
Part of that desire was connected with serious conflict in his own family.
His wife, Lucy Harris, became increasingly suspicious of Joseph Smith and believed Martin was being financially exploited.
Legal accusations followed.
Martin wanted to be able to say with certainty that he had personally seen the plates.
This setting helps explain the revelation now known as Doctrine and Covenants 5.
Doctrine and Covenants 5 and the Calling of the Three Witnesses
Doctrine and Covenants 5 introduces the promise that there would be Three Witnesses who would receive a special testimony of the plates.
Martin was told that if he humbled himself, he could become one of them.
Interestingly, he did not receive that physical witness immediately.
Bradley argues that something else may have strengthened Martin’s testimony first:
The words of the Book of Mormon itself.
Did King Benjamin’s Sermon Strengthen Martin Harris’s Testimony?
Bradley attempts to reconstruct the translation timeline after the lost manuscript.
He argues that available manuscript evidence suggests Joseph resumed translation near the beginning of what we now call the Book of Mosiah.
If Martin was again assisting in the translation process, he may have been exposed directly to one of the Book of Mormon’s most powerful Christ-centered sermons:
King Benjamin’s address.
King Benjamin’s Prophecy of Jesus Christ
King Benjamin teaches that God Himself would come down among humanity.
He would take upon Himself a mortal body.
He would suffer for His people.
His name would be Jesus Christ.
The people are invited to take upon themselves the name of Christ and experience a mighty change of heart.
They recognize their dependence upon the Savior’s grace and understand that they are all beggars before God.
For Martin Harris, who had suffered through his own mistakes and was desperately seeking certainty, these teachings could have been deeply personal.
The Book of Mormon May Have Converted Martin Before He Saw the Plates
This becomes one of the strongest ideas in the episode.
Martin believed he needed to see the plates in order to have an unshakable testimony.
But Bradley suggests the testimony may have become powerful through the words about Jesus Christ contained in the Book of Mormon before Martin ever received the physical witness.
He eventually did see the plates.
But spiritually, the witness of Christ may have come first.
Spiritual Witness Comes Before Physical Witness
The speakers compare Martin’s experience with other scriptural witnesses.
Nephi believed before he received the full vision that his father had seen.
Peter confessed that Jesus was the Christ before the Mount of Transfiguration.
Jesus told Peter that this knowledge had not come from flesh and blood but from Heavenly Father.
The pattern is important:
The Spirit witnesses of Christ first, and that spiritual witness prepares disciples to stand as witnesses themselves.
Martin Harris, King Benjamin, and Taking Upon Us the Name of Christ
King Benjamin’s sermon strongly emphasizes taking upon ourselves the name of Jesus Christ.
The episode notes a fascinating continuity with President Oaks’s ministry.
One of President Oaks’s early general conference messages as an Apostle was titled “Taking upon Us the Name of Jesus Christ.”
For the speakers, this becomes another example of the Christ-centered continuity they see within the Harris family.
Martin was deeply affected by Book of Mormon teachings about taking Christ’s name.
Generations later, Dallin Harris Oaks would publicly teach the Church about that same covenant responsibility.
Emer Harris Received the First Printed Copy of the Book of Mormon
The conversation then returns to Emer Harris, President Oaks’s direct ancestor.
According to the historical account discussed, when the first printed copy of the Book of Mormon became available from the Grandin press, Martin Harris gave it to his brother Emer.
Emer had not yet been baptized.
But he began investigating the new scripture seriously.
How Emer Harris Tested the Book of Mormon Against the Bible
Emer described himself as a mechanic who used a square to determine whether something was properly aligned.
He applied that same idea spiritually.
He said:
“The Bible was my square.”
Emer carefully compared the Book of Mormon with the Bible and even created what he described as a concordance to compare ideas and language.
He wanted to know whether the Book of Mormon agreed with the scriptural truth he already trusted.
Eventually he accepted the Book of Mormon, joined the Church, and served as a missionary.
“For God and None Else”
At an 1831 Church conference, Emer reportedly expressed his determination to be:
“For God and none else.”
That statement captures the kind of faith the video sees continuing through the Harris family.
An Emer Harris Account and the Lost Book of Mormon Pages
The episode also discusses an unusual historical source from Emer Harris containing information he said came from the early Book of Mormon story.
Emer described details surrounding Mulek and members of the royal family escaping Jerusalem—details that do not appear in the current Book of Mormon text.
Bradley suggests this material may preserve echoes of information contained in the lost initial manuscript, since Martin Harris had served as a major scribe for that translation.
This part of the discussion is presented as historical reconstruction rather than something explicitly contained in today’s Book of Mormon.
Martin Harris Never Denied His Testimony of the Book of Mormon
Later in life, Martin Harris experienced periods of separation from the institutional Church.
But Bradley stresses something important:
Martin never abandoned his testimony of the Book of Mormon.
People repeatedly interviewed him.
They asked whether he truly saw what he claimed to have seen.
His answer remained consistent.
He continued affirming the reality of the plates and his experience as one of the Three Witnesses.
Eventually, Martin returned to fellowship with the Saints and spent his later years in Utah.
Dallin H. Oaks as an “Uncompromising” Witness of Jesus Christ
The discussion eventually asks how President Oaks fits within this larger legacy.
Bradley describes his apostolic ministry as an uncompromising witness of Jesus Christ.
Since his call to the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles in 1984, President Oaks has repeatedly testified of:
- Jesus Christ.
- The Savior’s Atonement.
- The Resurrection.
- The restored gospel.
- The Book of Mormon.
- Sacred covenants.
- Taking upon ourselves the name of Christ.
- The responsibility to witness of the Savior.
For the speakers, there is a striking continuity between Martin Harris standing as a witness at the beginning of the Restoration and Dallin Harris Oaks standing as an apostolic witness generations later.
Every Latter-day Saint Is Called to Be a Witness of Jesus Christ
The video ultimately moves beyond President Oaks and Martin Harris.
The responsibility to witness of Jesus Christ belongs to every covenant disciple.
The speakers reference the baptismal covenant in Mosiah 18.
Members covenant to:
- Bear one another’s burdens.
- Mourn with those who mourn.
- Comfort those who stand in need of comfort.
- Stand as witnesses of God at all times, in all things, and in all places.
This means the Harris family story is not merely something to admire.
It presents a pattern every disciple can follow.
The Holy Ghost Helps Us Become Witnesses of Christ
One of the most important spiritual ideas near the end of the discussion is the relationship between the Holy Ghost and personal testimony.
The speakers describe a simple but powerful pattern:
The Spirit witnesses to us of Jesus Christ so that we can become witnesses of Jesus Christ to others.
We first receive.
Then we share.
We receive grace, and then extend grace.
We receive mercy, and then offer mercy.
Christ bears our burdens, and then we help bear the burdens of others.
Witnessing of Jesus Christ is therefore not merely something done through words.
It is also done through Christlike actions.
Final Takeaway: The Harris Family Legacy Is Ultimately About Jesus Christ
The surprising answer to the question “What does the H in Dallin H. Oaks stand for?” opens the door to a much larger story.
It stands for Harris.
And behind that name is a Restoration heritage connected with Martin and Emer Harris.
Martin Harris was prepared by spiritual experiences before he met Joseph Smith.
He helped financially sustain the early work.
He served as a scribe.
He made serious mistakes and learned firsthand about repentance.
He received the grace of Jesus Christ.
He became one of the Three Witnesses of the Book of Mormon.
He helped select the original Quorum of the Twelve Apostles.
And he maintained his testimony of the Book of Mormon throughout his life.
Emer Harris investigated the Book of Mormon carefully, became converted, preached the gospel, and passed forward a heritage of devotion to God.
Generations later, Dallin Harris Oaks became an Apostle and devoted decades to testifying of Jesus Christ.
But the deepest message is not about possessing an impressive family history.
The deepest message is that Jesus Christ is the center of the Restoration.
The Book of Mormon exists to testify of Him.
Repentance is possible because of Him.
The Three Witnesses ultimately testify of a record centered on Him.
Apostles are called to witness of Him.
And ordinary disciples covenant at baptism to stand as witnesses of Him.
The legacy from Martin Harris to Dallin Harris Oaks therefore becomes an invitation to every believer: receive your own witness of Jesus Christ through the Holy Ghost, take His name upon you, extend His grace to others, and become a faithful witness of the Savior in both word and deed.