This may have been addressed in an other thread but the idea of it never hit me until this morning.
Why would the LDS church accept the Bible, which from their view would be a product of the Great Apostacy, coming from the Catholic Tradition, in the first place? Since, by their own doctrines, no one had authority after the death of the last apostle.
I dont remember that issue even been addressed or thought about when I was LDS.
Just curious what the LDS Church’s stand on this? Anyone know?
Or is the LDS church sincerely grateful to the Catholic church for giving the world the Bible?
It’s just one of those cog. dis. things for me at the moment.
TIA.
Marie5890,
I hope I can give you some meaningful illustrations.
William Shakespeare is credited with having written some incredibly gifted dramatic works of great literature, even though history does not have very good evidence that he was in fact the writer of the plays and sonnets that are associated with his name. Be that as it may, does history applaud the finders and preservers of the plays, or the “writer” of the plays and sonnets? The big deal is made of the actual literature itself–not the finders or preservers, though they had an important role and made an important contribution to the world of literature through their careful interest.
Such is the case also with many wonderful symphonic works by various gifted musicians and composers.
The Jews wrote and preserved the Old Testament writings, such that Jesus had them and studied them and quoted from them. This was before the ECF were around.
Jews wrote the passages that are quoted in the New Testament. These were found, preserved, and translated by people who may or may not have been Jews by birth or tradition, but the words had been originally written by Jews. Who should get the primary “accolades” for the words of the writings of the New Testament? Christ Himself, of course, first and foremost, then John and Luke and Matthew and Mark and Paul and Peter, then the Jews who preserved the writings, then (and still important) those who continued to preserve and translate the writings, as long as they did so with as much accuracy as they could bring to their work.
The Bible is not a “product of the great apostasy”–it is a product of the inspiration of heaven working through inspired men and through the Holy Spirit, Moses, Christ, and the apostles first and foremost. The men who preserved the writings were doing probably their earnest best to preserve what they found, but as translating occurred they would bring their own background to trying to understand the phrases and underlying doctrines unless they had been there among the listeners. Such a process in doing a translation is inevitable.
But for anyone to think that God, who ultimately gave the world the Bible, would not want Mormons to have this important primary work which testifies of Him and of His Beloved Only Begotten Son, and that He would not want them to study it with deep joy and gratitude for His word including all of its prophecies and teachings, then they are profoundly mistaken themselves.
