Now, I’ve explained my position. Where’s that temple Joseph spoke about? And, is Joseph Smith still alive? I’m pretty sure the second coming hasn’t happened yet.
Much of what you said was reasonable, but now you ignore my point that Mormons don’t believe that the “generation” that was alive in the 1830’s is all gone. That’s what the prophecy said–not that Joseph Smith would still be alive.
Ok, I’ll address the Second Coming prophecy here, but don’t expect me to keep going on your giant list. That’s such a common tactic for forums like this–people can’t keep up with the topic under discussion, so they look up some anti-whatever web site or book, and find some list of “Questions to Ask Your Mormon/Catholic/JW/Whatever Friends,” and dump the whole list on everyone. Then they say, “If you can’t answer everything on this list, you are obviously wrong.” I’ve seen it SOOOOOOO many times. The polite thing to do would be to post ONE question that you are curious about, and if the thread is swamped and people don’t answer, post it again. Someone will answer. Instead, you just kept posting more, until you finally dumped this giant laundry list on everyone. Sorry, but at the time we were busy answering people who brought up points that were germane to the discussion of “Are LDS Protestants,” or even Christian at all, and what kind of evidence we can come up with that we are related to early Christianity. At least that stuff was fairly on-topic.
**Joseph Smith’s “Second Coming Prophecy”
**Here is the text of the actual revelation, with Joseph Smith’s comments about it.
“I was once praying very earnestly to know the time of the coming of the Son of Man, when I heard a voice repeat the following: Joseph, my son, if thou livest until thou art eighty-five years old, thou shalt see the face of the Son of Man; therefore let this suffice, and trouble me no more on this matter. I was left thus, without being able to decide whether this coming referred to the beginning of the millennium or to some previous appearing, or whether I should die and thus see his face. I believe the coming of the Son of Man will not be any sooner than that time.” (D&C 130:14-17)
So Joseph Smith was praying to know the time of the Second Coming, and God put him off by telling him that
IF he were to live to be 85 (ca. 1891), then
HE would see Jesus at that time. He said he had no idea whether that even meant the the Second Coming, and in fact, God ***never promised ***Joseph would live that long.
Not being sure what his answer meant, Joseph went on to say that
he believed the Second Coming wouldn’t be any sooner than 1891. And he was right, by the way.
Another
stupid charge against Joseph Smith. And I’m betting you didn’t look up the sources cited in your anti-Mormon book, once again? Because you don’t even care whether you “post falsehoods,” or not?
Do you see why your laundry list is annoying and rude? So far I have responded to several of your charges and shown that:
- Mormons don’t accept the Bible based on Catholic authority. We simply ignore Catholic opinions on the matter of the canon.
- Brigham Young never “prophesied” anything about the Civil War and slavery. He offered an opinion about it, based on his interpretation of some passages of scripture, but never indicated he was giving some kind of revelation.
- Mormons don’t believe that the “generation” alive in the 1830’s has “passed away,” so we are still waiting for the building of the New Jerusalem.
- The charge that Joseph Smith falsely predicted the time of the Second Coming is absolutely ridiculous if you read the text of the actual revelation.
I’ll stop there on your list. I think enough has been said that any reasonable person reading this thread could see that
whoever made up that list was just grasping at any possible criticism, whether it makes sense, or not.