Here is the definition of “beard” in the Bible Dictionary.
Beard. Regarded by the Jews as of great importance (whereas Egyptians always shaved); the trimming of the corners was forbidden (Lev 19:26-28), such a practice being a mark of idolatry (Jer 41:5). See also 1 Sam 21:13; 2 Sam. 10:4. A leper was compelled to shave (Lev 14:9).
Do you think current views about beards make us spiritual lepers? Is it a sign of idolatry?
Wheat & Tares 
Considering my husband currently has a fantastic bushy beard, I suppose my opinion is a given. I think the mormon view on beards is pharisiacal and culturally dated.
There is a lot of fun when you start noting that God and Christ are always portrayed with beards, and that we should have a Celestial style of our own.
On the other hand, I’m not always big on wearing a beard and enjoy the flexibility to not wear one.
I have a beard and don’t attend the temple much but when I heard about temple and veil workers having to be clean shaven, it made me feel second class. I’ve done lots of things over the years to disqualify me from those callings, but a beard?
*sigh*
Tempest in a teapot. I had a beard when I was a bishop (twice) and then shaved it to work in the temple. And now I have it back again. Someday when my wife and I go on a full time mission together, I’ll shave it again.
The LDS church has been quite active lately, with media promotion of Josh Weed and other young LDS gay men who claim to be deleriously happy in opposite-sex marriages. In popular culture, such women are referred to as “beards.” Ergo, beards are gaining new popularity in LDS circles! 😉
In C. S. Lewis’s fictional (but thought-provoking) Screwtape Letters, the senior devil teaches the junior devil how they use fashion for their purposes — he even addresses beards, saying “We have made certain secondary characteristics of the male, such as the beard, disagreeable to nearly all the females…and there is more in that than you might think.
Paul, I’m guessing you weren’t a bishop with a beard in Utah County.
No, MH, thankfully I was not. Once in Michigan and once in Latin America. The first time (in Latin America) it didn’t even occur to me to ask if I should shave. The second time (in Michigan) I asked, and my SP told me it was up to me. One of my fellow bishops also had a beard in that stake.
(I have a hunch, though I don’t know it for sure, that if I were asked again to serve similarly, they might ask me to shave; if they did, I would.)
The stake I grew up heard prohibition against beards from the pulpit during a stake conference some time in the 70s. My Dad, having been so inspired, had removed his the night before, thankfully. It’s one thing to have everyone turn and look at you, because you have a beard, on hearing the prohibition, and another for them to turn and look and see hey it’s gone already 🙂 . Talk about putting people in a position to be judged by others! He’s had a beard on and off throughout my life. I believe it was last removed for the the prohibition on beards for set-apart veil workers.
I did hear tell of one member I know who was in the temple with a GA who was criticising his beard. He turned to the pictures, in the temple, of former prophets all sporting beards. His point didn’t go down too well apparently.
I can’t see what the fuss is personally. Each to their own, beard or no, surely.
I’m apparently too inactive to know whether this is really a big deal. I still sweat whether there was authenticity to the claims of JS and whether the LDS Church is the “only true and living Church”. It is disconcerting to realize that while the world debates whether Mormons are Christians, it is obvious that they are Pharisees.
As I’ve stated in the past, I’ve had a beard for most of my time as a member of the Church. the only time I shaved it was for the 18 months I was Ward Mission Leader (but kept the mustache) and that was because I was asked. Otherwise, through all my other callings in the bishopric, Stake and High Council, I had the beard. I served as a veil worker for 5 years with a beard. When I moved to Colorado, the Temple President said I would have to shave it off. When asked why, he gave the typical response. I asked again recently and got pretty much the same answer. “It’s in their manual that way.”
Still makes no sense to me.