Catholics vs Mormons vs Protestants on the "Gates of Hell"

[paul_c]

Bdawg,
I asked you to describe the change in Catholic Doctrine over time that demonstrated the Apostacy claimed by the LDS. What you came up with was that some of the Early Church Fathers taught that God the father was the preeminant of the trinity while later that distinction was dropped and all the members of the trinity were declared co-equal (at Nicea, in 325 AD, actually). Is that really the Apostacy that made the Catholic Church lose the keys to heaven that were somehow recovered by Joseph Smith?
Mormons on the other hand teach that the Father, Son and Holy Ghost are separate and distinct. furthermore, Joseph Smith claimed he saw God the father and that he had a body. This is clearly in direct contradiction to what Jesus taught: God is spirit and that no one has seen him except the son.

 

[BDawg]

Bdawg,
I asked you to describe the change in Catholic Doctrine over time that demonstrated the Apostacy claimed by the LDS. What you came up with was that some of the Early Church Fathers taught that God the father was the preeminant of the trinity while later that distinction was dropped and all the members of the trinity were declared co-equal (at Nicea, in 325 AD, actually). Is that really the Apostacy that made the Catholic Church lose the keys to heaven that were somehow recovered by Joseph Smith?
Mormons on the other hand teach that the Father, Son and Holy Ghost are separate and distinct. furthermore, Joseph Smith claimed he saw God the father and that he had a body. This is clearly in direct contradiction to what Jesus taught: God is spirit and that no one has seen him except the son.

Hi Paul,

First, you merely asked for a single doctrine that had changed, and said that you didn’t think I could come up with a single one. I did. At least have the grace to admit that you went a little overboard with your claims.

Then, if you can find it in yourself to do that, I’ll post something about how the earliest Jewish Christians believed God had a body in human form. If you can’t even bring yourself to admit that you may have exaggerated a teensy bit, I’ll figure it’s not worth my time–you’re one of THOSE people.

 

[Techno2000]

Hi Bdawg,

Isn’t this all circumstantial evidence? Yes, I agree that the evidence you cite (NHM, ice core analysis, BoM-Egyptian parallels) is not evidence merely internal to the BoM, but it’s not nearly as compelling as the existence of Jerusalem is to lead me to conclude that the books in the Bible truly are of ancient origin. This says nothing about the validity of religious claims in the text, but it does increase my confidence that Jerusalem has been around for a very long time and that the city as described in the Bible is probably the same city we know today.

Besides, you keep saying NHM=Nahom. Nahom isn’t carved on the altar; NHM is. How do we know NHM in Arabia was pronounced Nahom? Are there other variants of NHM extant inancient literature? If not, then that would strengthen your case. Also, the ice core evidence is interesting, but was the sample taken from Mesoamerica or elsewhere (e.g. Greenland)? Are there enough layers in that same sample that a temporal distribution of volcanic activity can be determined? How frequent were volcanic eruptions in Mesoamerica 2000 years ago and how intense was the average eruption? I’m interested in learning whether the eruption you refer to represents a massive spike in the intensity of eruptions relative to the distribution mean. That would be very compelling evidence indeed of a major cataclysmic event (and it would have to be quite a large spike to represent enough power to cast down mountains and sink cities into the ocean). But, of course, the ice core must have come from Mesoamerica, or contain traces of material found only in Mesoamerica (if that is where BoM lands truly were) to be sure we’ve found evidence of a Mesoamerican eruption. Otherwise, it could be the evidence comes from some other volcanic eruption that occurred around the time of Christ (e.g. the eruption that destroyed Pompeii in 79).

Regarding Joseph Smith, I don’t think it’s a stretch for a backwoods farmer, Bible literacy, and a vivid imagination to come up with what he came up with. Perhaps he truly was a religious genius, like Albright and Howard Bloom both contend. I can buy that.

NS

Maybe he used his peestones to conjured up a little help from the Dark side to write his New Bible.

 

[BDawg]

Isn’t this all circumstantial evidence?

Hi NS,

Of course it is circumstantial evidence. What kind of evidence would you expect to make a historical case for the divinity of the Book of Mormon? If God wanted to appear in Madison Square Gardens and settle all these questions directly, I suppose he could. But he doesn’t seem to work that way.

Yes, I agree that the evidence you cite (NHM, ice core analysis, BoM-Egyptian parallels) is not evidence merely internal to the BoM, but it’s not nearly as compelling as the existence of Jerusalem is to lead me to conclude that the books in the Bible truly are of ancient origin. This says nothing about the validity of religious claims in the text, but it does increase my confidence that Jerusalem has been around for a very long time and that the city as described in the Bible is probably the same city we know today.

And since Jerusalem has continually existed since ancient times, nobody ever questioned that. But did you know that archaeologists can’t even find any evidence that the Israelites were in Palestine until a couple hundred years after the Bible says they were?

Besides, you keep saying NHM=Nahom. Nahom isn’t carved on the altar; NHM is. How do we know NHM in Arabia was pronounced Nahom? Are there other variants of NHM extant in ancient literature? If not, then that would strengthen your case.

But since they didn’t have vowels in their script, this is at least as much evidence as anyone could ever possibly be expected to find.

Also, the ice core evidence is interesting, but was the sample taken from Mesoamerica or elsewhere (e.g. Greenland)? Are there enough layers in that same sample that a temporal distribution of volcanic activity can be determined? How frequent were volcanic eruptions in Mesoamerica 2000 years ago and how intense was the average eruption? I’m interested in learning whether the eruption you refer to represents a massive spike in the intensity of eruptions relative to the distribution mean. That would be very compelling evidence indeed of a major cataclysmic event (and it would have to be quite a large spike to represent enough power to cast down mountains and sink cities into the ocean). But, of course, the ice core must have come from Mesoamerica, or contain traces of material found only in Mesoamerica (if that is where BoM lands truly were) to be sure we’ve found evidence of a Mesoamerican eruption. Otherwise, it could be the evidence comes from some other volcanic eruption that occurred around the time of Christ (e.g. the eruption that destroyed Pompeii in 79).

I haven’t read that work in a while, but here’s another example of where you are operating on false assumptions about what kind of evidence CAN be found. There are no glaciers in Mesoamerica, and typically you can’t distinguish between areas of eruption from the ash particles you find in ice cores. But there WAS an eruption of sufficient magnitude to produce the three days of darkness, and so on, in the right time period. And it wouldn’t take a particularly large pyroclastic eruption to accomplish this. Some particular eruptions in Mesoamerica have been found, but it’s not clear whether any of them are “the one.” See this article for more info.

Regarding Joseph Smith, I don’t think it’s a stretch for a backwoods farmer, Bible literacy, and a vivid imagination to come up with what he came up with. Perhaps he truly was a religious genius, like Albright and Howard Bloom both contend. I can buy that.

Note that Harold (not Howard) Bloom and Albright were baffled about where JS could have gotten the information he had to have to get the things right that he did. They were talking about very specific information, like names, in Albright’s case. They were not talking about general “insights” that a “genius” might generate on his own.

 

[paul_c]

Bdawg,
prior to your note, I was not aware that there was a raging debate about subordinationism. I had never even heard the term. Based on your post, I did some relatively quick research on the question (quick meaning an hour of reading (name removed by moderator)ut on the internet). In my mind, the Father, Son and Holy Spirit always existed per the Nicene creed (God from God, begotten not made, one in being with the Father). At the same time, Jesus always said he was doing the will of his Father

I looked up the official Catholic Church teaching in the catechism, which is summarized as:
261 The mystery of the Most Holy Trinity is the central mystery of the Christian faith and of Christian life. God alone can make it known to us by revealing himself as Father, Son and Holy Spirit.

262 The Incarnation of God’s Son reveals that God is the eternal Father and that the Son is consubstantial with the Father, which means that, in the Father and with the Father the Son is one and the same God.

263 The mission of the Holy Spirit, sent by the Father in the name of the Son (Jn 14:26) and by the Son “from the Father” (Jn 15:26), reveals that, with them, the Spirit is one and the same God. “With the Father and the Son he is worshipped and glorified” (Nicene Creed).

264 “The Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father as the first principle and, by the eternal gift of this to the Son, from the communion of both the Father and the Son” (St. Augustine, De Trin. 15, 26, 47: PL 42, 1095).

265 By the grace of Baptism “in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit”, we are called to share in the life of the Blessed Trinity, here on earth in the obscurity of faith, and after death in eternal light (cf. Paul VI, CPG § 9).

266 “Now this is the Catholic faith: We worship one God in the Trinity and the Trinity in unity, without either confusing the persons or dividing the substance; for the person of the Father is one, the Son’s is another, the Holy Spirit’s another; but the Godhead of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit is one, their glory equal, their majesty coeternal” (Athanasian Creed: DS 75; ND 16).

267 Inseparable in what they are, the divine persons are also inseparable in what they do. But within the single divine operation each shows forth what is proper to him in the Trinity, especially in the divine missions of the Son’s Incarnation and the gift of the Holy Spirit.

Wikipedia has a long article about subordinationism in which they list perhaps a dozen early church father’s views. They seem to consistently understand that the Trinity is consubstantial in the same way. The differences seem to be in describing the relative roles of the the three divine persons in the Trinity. This goes to #267 above, where it describes the different divine missions. This ends up being a very subtle thing. The roles are different and the son does the will of the father, but does that make it a lesser role? It seems more philosophical than theological in nature.
And certainly not to the level of apostacy.

Nevertheless, I learned something and that was helpful. I would love to see what you have on the physical nature of God…

 

[BDawg]

Wikipedia has a long article about subordinationism in which they list perhaps a dozen early church father’s views. They seem to consistently understand that the Trinity is consubstantial in the same way. The differences seem to be in describing the relative roles of the the three divine persons in the Trinity. This goes to #267 above, where it describes the different divine missions. This ends up being a very subtle thing. The roles are different and the son does the will of the father, but does that make it a lesser role? It seems more philosophical than theological in nature.
And certainly not to the level of apostacy.

Hi Paul,

Thank you for being gracious about this. I’m not here to bash anyone out of being a Catholic–I just try to do what I can to keep the discussions about Mormonism on some kind of rational level.

Anyway, what you are describing is “economic” subordinationism, which the RCC still teaches. “Ontological” subordinationism (which is what the pre-Nicene Church taught) is the belief that the Father is superior to the Son and Holy Spirit in rank and glory.

Now, among those who taught ontological subordinationism, there were those who 1) accepted a Greek philosophical definition of God as an immaterial, eternally unchanging, absolutely simple (i.e., w/o parts) spiritual “substance” or “essence”, or 2) accepted the standard Jewish belief in God as a material, yet spiritual (they didn’t take “spiritual” to mean “immaterial,” like the Greek philosophers did) person who had a human-like form. The ones who accepted the philosophical definition usually depicted Jesus as some kind of “offshoot” from the Divine Substance–sort of like a ray of light coming from the Sun. (The ray is not the Sun, but is generated out of the Sun.) The ones who accepted the Jewish definition tended to depict Jesus as sort of a “super-archangel.” This does not mean that they didn’t think Jesus was divine–they just had a different definition of what it means to be divine. Some of the early Christian teachers adopted elements of both approaches, with a philosophical definition of God, but also using the “angel Christology” language.

You say that this does not rise to the level of “apostasy,” and that’s fine. I just take issue with the Catholics here who say there have been no changes in doctrine.

I’ll post something about ancient Christian anthropomorphism in a few minutes.

 

[Snow]

Mormons on the other hand teach that the Father, Son and Holy Ghost are separate and distinct. furthermore, Joseph Smith claimed he saw God the father and that he had a body. This is clearly in direct contradiction to what Jesus taught: God is spirit and that no one has seen him except the son.

No so.

The bible is filled with numerous examples of people that had seen God:

Acts 7:55-56
Gen 32:30
Gen 17:1
Gen 18:1
Act 7:2
Ex 3:6
Ex 19:11
Ex 33:11
Num 12:7-8
1 Kings 9:2
1 Kings 11:9
Is 6:1,5
Ex 24:10-11
Deut 34:10
Deut 5:4
Jud 13:22
etc
etc
etc

So whatever John 1:18 means, it clearly does not mean that men have never seen God.

The Bible itself specifies the requirements for man to see God.

• Man must be of God: “Not that any man hath seen the Father, save he which is of God, he hath seen the Father.” (John 6:46)
• Man must have peace and holiness within him: “Follow peace with all men, and holiness, without which, no man shall see the Lord” (Heb. 12:14)
• Man must be pure in heart: “Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God” (Matt. 5:8)

Early Christian reconciled the the accounts of so many people having seen God with John 1:18. For example, Irenaeus translated it as “For “no man,” he says, “hath seen God at any time,” unless "the only-begotten Son of God, which is in the bosom of the Father, He hath declared [Him].

When Joseph Smith “translated” the Bible he used “except” intead of Irenaeus’ “unless.” That helps the Bible to agree with itself.

An early Christian document has Peter agreeing with this view: “For I maintain that the eyes of mortals cannot see the incorporeal form of the Father or Son, because it is illumined by exceeding great light. . . . For he who sees God cannot live. For the excess of light dissolves the flesh of him who sees; unless by the secret power of God the flesh be changed into the nature of light, so that it can see light.” [Apostle Peter (claimed), “Clementine Homilies,” (17:16) Ante-Nicene Fathers 8:322.]

As to God being a spirit: Yeah… and?

Being spirit doesn’t preclude having a physical body. The Bible describes God physical body in a number of places, some mentioned above. Man is spirit as well. Man also has a physical body. The ancient Jewish belief, and early Christian belief was that God was corporeal and embodied.

 

[Snow]

Wikipedia has a long article about subordinationism in which they list perhaps a dozen early church father’s views. They seem to consistently understand that the Trinity is consubstantial in the same way. The differences seem to be in describing the relative roles of the the three divine persons in the Trinity. .

“‘Subordinationism’, it is true, was pre-Nicean orthodoxy.” Henry Bettenson, editor and translator, The Early Christian Fathers:A Selection from the Writings of the Fathers from St. Clement of Rome to St. Athanasius, (Oxford University Press: 1969), 239

Writers who are usually reckoned orthodox but who lived a century or two centuries before the outbreak of the Arian Controversy, such as Irenaeus and Tertullian and Novatian and Justin Martyr, held some views which would later, in the fourth century, have been branded heretical…Irenaeus and Tertullian both believed that God had not always been a Trinity but had at some point put forth the Son and the Spirit so as to be distinct from him. Tertullian, borrowing from Stoicism, believed that God was material (though only of a very refined material, a kind of thinking gas), so that his statement that Father, Son and Spirit were ‘of one substance’, beautifully orthodox though it sounds, was of a corporeality which would have profoundly shocked Origen, Athanasius and the Cappadocian theologians, had they known of it. RPC Hansen, “The Achievement of Orthodoxy in the Fourth Century AD”, in Rowan Williams, editor, The Making of Orthodoxy (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1989), 151–152.

Eusebius, an early Church historian, was even termed “blatantly subordinationist” by a Catholic author. RL Richard, “Trinity, Holy”, in New Catholic Encyclopedia, 15 vols., (New York:McGraw-Hill, 1967) 14:298.

The victory over Arianism achieved at the Council was really a victory snatched by the superior energy and decision of a small minority with the aid of half-hearted allies. The majority did not like the business at all, and strongly disapproved of the introduction into the Creed . . . of new and untraditional and unscriptural terms. IF Bethune-Baker, An Introduction to the Early History of Christian Doctrine, 8th edition, (London: Methuen, 1949), 171.

 

[BDawg]

Hi Paul,

I’m going to post two essays I posted on this forum before. Both address the issue I brought up, especially the second one.

Mormon vs. Mainstream Trinity

For what it’s worth, here is a fairly precise explanation of the difference between the Mormon and mainstream Christian doctrines of the Trinity, from my Mormon point of view. There are several issues that need to be considered.

What is God?

Mainstream Christianity teaches that God is an indivisible, “simple” (i.e., “without parts” or completely homogeneous), eternally unchanging spiritual essence. This doctrine was adopted by Christians in the second century from the Greek philosophy current at the time. For example, here is a quotation from the pagan Middle Platonist philosopher, Numenius.

But let no one laugh, if I affirm that the name of the incorporeal is “essence” and “being.” And the cause of the name “being” is that it has not been generated nor will be destroyed, nor is it subject to any other motion at all, nor any change for better or for worse; but is simple and unchangeable, and in the same idea, and neither willingly departs from its sameness, nor is compelled by any other to depart. (Numenius, quoted by Eusebius, Preparation for the Gospel 11:10 )

Compare Numenius’s description with that of Irenaeus, a Christian writer of the late second century, who had adopted the philosophical view of God.

For the Father of all is at a vast distance from those affections and passions which operate among men. He is a simple, uncompounded Being, without diverse members, and altogether like, and equal to himself, since He is wholly understanding, and wholly spirit, and wholly thought, and wholly intelligence, and wholly reason, and wholly hearing, and wholly seeing, and wholly light, and the whole source of all that is good–even as the religious and pious are wont to speak concerning God. (Irenaeus, Against Heresies 2:13:3, in ANF 1:374.)

Tertullian, a Christian who wrote at the turn of the third century, explicitly stated that his idea of the Father was essentially that of the philosophers.

Whatever attributes therefore you require as worthy of God, must be found in the Father, who is invisible and unapproachable, and placid, and (so to speak) the God of the philosophers; whereas those qualities which you censure as unworthy must be supposed to be in the Son . . . . (Tertullian, Against Marcion 2:27, in ANF 3:319.)

Paul had warned the earliest Christians not to be deceived by philosophy. “Beware lest any man spoil you through philosophy and vain deceit, after the tradition of men, after the rudiments of the world, and not after Christ” (Colossians 2:8). Certainly earliest Christianity and Greek philosophy had some things in common. Was this one of them, or was it one of those things that Paul warned against?

Mormons believe that this was an alteration of original Christian teachings, because we believe that God is “anthropomorphic,” in that he has a body in human form. This contention is abundantly supported by modern historical scholarship. For example, Christopher Stead, a professor at the Cambridge Divinity School, wrote an excellent book on how Greek philosophy was incorporated into Christian teaching. He wrote this about how the Biblical authors pictured God.

(cont’d)

 

[BDawg]

(cont’d)

“The Hebrews . . . pictured the God whom they worshipped as having a body and mind like our own, though transcending humanity in the splendour of his appearance, in his power, his wisdom, and the constancy of his care for his creatures.” (Christopher Stead, Philosophy in Christian Antiquity, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996, 120.)

A clear example is found in the early Jewish Christian writing, the Clementine Homilies.

And Simon said: “I should like to know, Peter, if you really believe that the shape of man has been moulded after the shape of God.” And Peter said: “I am really quite certain, Simon, that this is the case . . . . It is the shape of the just God.” (Clementine Homilies 16:19, in ANF 8:316.)

Origen, a third-century Christian writer, said that while he and many other Christians accepted a philosophical view of God, the Jews and some Christians viewed God as anthropomorphic. He said this was not a settled teaching within Christianity at that time.

“The Jews indeed, but also some of our people, supposed that God should be understood as a man, that is, adorned with human members and human appearance. But the philosophers despise these stories as fabulous and formed in the likeness of poetic fictions.” (Origen, Homilies on Genesis 3:1)

We shall inquire, however, whether the thing which Greek philosophers call asomaton, or “incorporeal,” is found in holy Scripture under another name. For it is also to be a subject of investigation how God himself is to be understood,–whether as corporeal, and formed according to some shape, or of a different nature from bodies,–a point which is not clearly indicated in our teaching. (Origen, De Principiis Preface 9, in ANF 4:241.)

Mainstream Christians might object that the Bible says that “God is Spirit” (John 4:24). But what does that mean? John also said that “God is light” (1 John 1:5), and “God is love” (1 John 4:8). Paul said that “he that is joined unto the Lord is one spirit” (1 Corinthians 6:17), although men obviously have both spirits and bodies. Why do mainstream Christians automatically assume that “God is Spirit” means that God has no body? Anglican historian and Bishop of London, J.W.C. Wand, explained, “It is easy to see what influence this school of thought * must have had upon Christian leaders. It was from it that they learnt what was involved in a metaphysical sense by calling God a Spirit.” (J.W.C Wand, A History of the Early Church to A.D. 500, New York, Routledge, 1994, 140.) You guessed it—Christians got this idea from the Greek philosophers. On the other hand, Christopher Stead writes that the Hebrews would have given a completely different interpretation to John 4:24.

By saying that God is spiritual, we do not mean that he has no body . . . but rather that he is the source of a mysterious life-giving power and energy that animates the human body, and himself possesses this energy in the fullest measure. (Stead, Philosophy in Christian Antiquity, 98.)

How is God “One” or “More Than One”?

If God is an eternally indivisible, unchanging, essence that is absolutely homogeneous (without parts), then how do we deal with the New Testament’s assertions that the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are all “God,” when the Bible clearly says there is “one God”? They are clearly presented as separate persons, after all. Mainstream Christianity developed the idea that the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are distinct “Persons” within a single Divine Being. How there can be distinct “Persons” within a Being that is “without parts” is supposed to be a mystery too lofty for mortal minds to comprehend.

On the other hand, Mormons say that there is “one God” in the senses that 1) the Father is the monarch of the Universe, and 2) the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are completely unified in will, purpose, love, and covenant. This kind of oneness is familiar to humans, although we have never experienced it to that kind of degree. We can support our idea of the Divine Unity by appealing to Jesus’ prayer in John 17.

20 Neither pray I for these alone, but for them also which shall believe on me through their word;
21 That they all may be one; as thou, Father, art in me, and I in thee, that they also may be one in us: that the world may believe that thou hast sent me.
22 And the glory which thou gavest me I have given them; that they may be one, even as we are one:
23 I in them, and thou in me, that they may be made perfect in one; and that the world may know that thou hast sent me, and hast loved them, as thou hast loved me.

Note that Jesus said that the disciples were to be one in each other and one in the Father and Son AS the Father and Son are one in each other. Where else does the Bible define the Divine Unity? Nowhere. Therefore, I conclude that mainstream Christians got their idea of God in “one Being” by trying to reconcile the Bible with their philosophical definition of God, rather than from the scriptures.

(cont’d)*

 

[BDawg]

(cont’d)

And the fact is that even after Christians adopted a philosophical definition of God, they still conceived of the Trinity as three Beings, differing in rank and glory, but unified in will. Some of them even referred to Jesus as a “second God,” just as Mormons often do. here are some quotations to support this contention.

I shall attempt to persuade you, since you have understood the Scriptures,[of the truth] of what I say, that there is, and that there is said to be, another God and Lord subject to the Maker of all things; who is also called an Angel, because He announces to men whatsoever the Maker of all things–above whom there is no other God–wishes to announce to them… I shall endeavour to persuade you, that He who is said to have appeared to Abraham, and to Jacob, and to Moses, and who is called God, is distinct from Him who made all things,–numerically, I mean, not[distinct] in will. (Justin Martyr, Dialogue with Trypho 56, in ANF 1:223, brackets in original. The words “another God” are deuteros theos, which many translators render “a second God.”)

Our teacher of these things is Jesus Christ, who also was born for this purpose, and was crucified under Pontius Pilate, procurator of Judæa, in the times of Tiberius Cæsar; and that we reasonably worship Him, having learned that He is the Son of the true 167 God Himself, and holding Him in the second place, and the prophetic Spirit in the third, we will prove. (Justin Martyr, First Apology 13.)

[W]hile I recognize the Son, I assert His distinction as second to the Father. (Tertullian, Against Praxeas 7, in ANF 3:602.)

“We are not afraid to speak, in one sense of two Gods, in another sense of one God.” (Origen, Dial Heracl. 2:3)

“And these, while they are two, considered as persons or subsistences, are one in unity of thought, in harmony and in identity of will.” (Origen, Against Celsus 8:12, in ANF 4:643-644.)

“But the Paraclete being less than Christ, moreover, by this very fact proves Christ to be God, from whom He has received what He declares . . . .” (Novatian, On the Trinity 16, in ANF 5:625.)

Remember how Moses calls the Being, Who appeared to the patriarchs, and often delivered to them the oracles afterwards written down in Scripture sometimes God and Lord, and sometimes the Angel of the Lord. He clearly implies that this was not the Omnipotent God, but a secondary Being, rightly called the God and Lord of holy men, but the Angel of the Most High His Father. (Eusebius of Caesarea, The Proof of the Gospel 1:5.)

This idea that the Son and Spirit are gods, or part of the One God, yet separate and subordinate to the Father is called “Subordinationism.” This belief is now a heresy within mainstream Christianity, but Mormons hold to it, as did the earliest Christians. R.P.C. Hansen, a well-known Anglican historian of early Christianity, summarized as follows.

Indeed, until Athanasius began writing, every single theologian, East and West, had postulated some form of Subordinationism. It could, about the year 300, have been described as a fixed part of catholic theology. (Hansen, R., “The Achievement of Orthodoxy in the Fourth Century AD,” in Williams, ed., The Making of Orthodoxy, 153.)

 

[BDawg]

God as Invisible Spirit

Although some people will admit that the ancient Israelites saw God as anthropomorphic, they qualify this by saying that by the time the New Testament was written, they had given up such primitive notions. In support of this position, they cite two types of passages that either say God is spiritual, or that He has never been seen. I believe there is good evidence that early Jewish Christians would have interpreted these passages in a manner consistent with Old Testament anthropomorphism.

I have already quoted the early Christian philosophers, Origen and Justin, saying that in the second and third centuries, the Jews and some Christians believed God had a body in human form. I also cited the Clementine Homilies, a second-century Jewish Christian document, which says God has a body in human form. A number of Jewish scholars have also pointed out that, in the Rabbinic period (ca. 70-500 A.D.) the Jewish teachers were mainly anthropomorhites. For example, Guy Stroumsa of Hebrew University says, “Jewish anthropomorphism seems to have been notorious in the first centuries C.E.” (Gedaliahu G. Stroumsa, 1983, “Form(s) of God: Some Notes on Metatron and Christ,” Harvard Theological Review 76, 269-288.) More quotations by these scholars have been collected in a very nice (but LARGE) article by LDS philosophy professor, Dave Paulson. (David L. Paulsen, 1996, “The Doctrine of Divine Embodiment: Restoration, Judeo-Christian, and Philosophical Perspectives, 35, 7-94. This article can be downloaded here. byustudies.byu.edu/Products/MoreInfoPage/MoreInfo.aspx?Type=7&ProdID=665)

God is Spirit

Mainstream Christians often object that the Bible says that “God is a Spirit” (John 4:24 KJV), but Mormons can make a couple points about this.

First, there is no indefinite article (a, an) in ancient Greek, so modern translations usually render this “God is Spirit,” in parallel with their rendering of a couple other such statements by John-- “God is light” (1 John 1:5), and “God is love” (1 John 4:8). (We wouldn’t say that God is “a light” or “a love.”)

Second, saying something is “spiritual” obviously did not mean that it is disembodied or incorporeal to the first Christians. Paul called the resurrection body “a spiritual body” (1 Cor. 15:44), but clearly he didn’t mean that it was incorporeal, because he also said that Christ would “change our vile body, that it may be fashioned like unto his glorious body” (Phil. 3:21), and clearly Christ’s resurrection body was corporeal. “Behold my hands and my feet, that it is I myself: handle me, and see; for a spirit hath not flesh and bones, as ye see me have” (Luke 24:39). Embodiment must have been important, because Paul continued his statement about Christ’s glorious body in Phil. 3:21, saying that it is because of this body that Christ can subdue all things! “…according to the working whereby he is able even to subdue all things unto himself.” Anglican scholar Christopher Stead explains what it would have meant to a Hebrew mind to say that God is spiritual.

By saying that God is spiritual, we do not mean that he has no body . . . but rather that he is the source of a mysterious life-giving power and energy that animates the human body, and himself possesses this energy in the fullest measure. (Stead, Philosophy in Christian Antiquity, 98.)

Another Anglican historian (and Bishop of London,) J.W.C. Wand, explained that later Christians got the idea that spiritual things are necessarily incorporeal from Neoplatonism. “It is easy to see what influence this school of thought * must have had upon Christian leaders. It was from it that they learnt what was involved in a metaphysical sense by calling God a Spirit.” (J.W.C Wand, A History of the Early Church to A.D. 500, New York, Routledge, 1994, 140.) (Note: I would argue that they got the idea from Middle Platonism, and developed it further with Neoplatonism. Also, Tertullian believed God was a material substance, but not that the Father had a human form.)

(cont’d)*****

 

[BDawg]

The Invisible God

Another objection often raised is that God the Father can’t really have a body in human form, because John said, “No man hath seen God at any time; the only begotten Son, which is in the bosom of the Father, he hath declared him” (John 1:18; cf. 1 John 4:12). Maybe some people did have visions of God the Father, where he appeared in human form, but that must have simply been some kind of visionary image to help people relate to God. For instance, Stephen said he saw “the glory of God, and Jesus standing on the right hand of God” (Acts 7:55). The Father must have had some kind of human-like form for Jesus to be seen on his “right hand.” Likewise, John saw the Father seated on the heavenly throne in Revelation 4. If these visions represented physical reality, why did John repeatedly say that “no man has seen God”?

It must first be understood that although Mormons always talk about how some men (including Joseph Smith) have seen God the Father, we technically don’t believe that a “man” can see God. Rather, humans must be transfigured–i.e. transformed into a heavenly being to withstand the presence of a celestial being. For example, in the Book of Moses, part of the LDS book of scripture, the Pearl of Great Price, it says, “And he saw God face to face, and he talked with him, and the glory of God was upon Moses; therefore Moses could endure his presence” (Moses 1:2). But when Satan appeared to Moses, he was rejected because Moses did not have to be transfigured to see him. “For behold, I could not look upon God, except his glory should come upon me, and I were transfigured before him. But I can look upon thee in the natural man” (Moses 1:14).

This solves a significant riddle in the Bible, which is described in the Oxford Companion to the Bible.

A deity’s physical manifestation is seen by human beings. The appearance of gods and their involvement with humans are common motifs in acient Near Eastern and classical mythology. That similar phenomena are found in the Bible seems problematic at first, for a persistent tradition in the Hebrew Bible affirmed that death comes to any human who sees God (Gen. 16:13; 32:30; 24:10-11; 33:20; Deut. 5:24-26; 18:16; Judg. 6:22-23; 13:22; cf. Exod. 20:19; Isa. 6:5). In most of these contexts, however, the narration undermines this sentiment by depicting the pleasant surprise of those who survive. The text presents this perspective as a misperception to which human beings subscribe, for no humans in the Bible ever die simply because they have seen God. On the contrary, throughout the Bible God wants to communicate intimately with humans. the problem of how God can adequately show himself to humankind without harm is a conundrum that is never really resolved in the Bible. (Samuel A. Meier, “Theophany,” in Metzger and Coogan, eds., The Oxford Companion to the Bible, 740.)

But if the Bible never offers a solution to the conundrum, is our solution the correct one? It turns out that the Clementine Homilies (the same early Jewish Christian work mentioned above that teaches God has a body in human form,) gives essentially the same explanation for how a person can see God the Father.

For I maintain that the eyes of mortals cannot see the incorporeal form of the Father or Son, because it is illumined by exceeding great light. . . . For he who sees God cannot live. For the excess of light dissolves the flesh of him who sees; unless by the secret power of God the flesh be changed into the nature of light, so that it can see light. . . . (Clementine Homilies 17:16.)

This kind of thing was actually pretty common in the Jewish and Jewish Christian periods, especially in apocalyptic literature like the Enoch texts, the Ascension of Isaiah, and so on. The visionary was changed into a heavenly being (sometimes in stages if there was more than one heaven), and then had a vision of God on the throne. Sometimes God’s face couldn’t be seen, however, because of the overpowering Glory. For more information on early Jewish and Christian texts that talk about ascension through the heavens, and transformation of the visionary into heavenly beings that could behold God’s form, see Methodist scholar Margaret Barker’s book On Earth As It is in Heaven: Temple Symbolism in the New Testament.

All of this, of course, cannot guarantee that the mainstream Christian doctrine of God wasn’t a legitimate development. However, I think it does add plausibility to Joseph Smith’s claim to have restored some ancient knowledge about God.

 

[mfbukowski]

BDawg!
Dude you are THE MAN

 

[paul_c]

Bdawg, Snow, Bukowski,

Thank you so much for all the info on the Mormon view of God. It forced me to do some research into an area that I had not given a tremendous amount of consideration because I had not considered the subtleties you pointed out as significant to the faith. I am far from an expert in this area but I would like to give you my thoughts, nonetheless (in the hopes of fostering understanding but at the risk of embarassing myself.)

First of all, Snow, I looked through your list of references to a bodily God. I can see how you could conceive of at least some of these as references to a bodily God, especially in the references in the Penteteuch to Moses talking to God face to face. ( I don’t believe that God actually wrestled Jacob and lost. At best, that was an angelic messenger) . However, it seems to me that these references do not necessarily refer to a physical God in human form. After all, you would think if someone actually saw God physically, they would have made some attempt to describe what they saw. Yet that is never done. In fact, the actual meetings with God are very, very vague so it is unclear how God manifested himself in these meetings. In the very first meeting with God, Moses sees him as a bush that does not burn. Maybe he alway saw him that way and that constituted meeting him face to face. In some cases, God appears through dreams (like to St. Joseph). At other times, God is manifested by wind or a cloud.
Because of this ambiguity, it can not be stated from Scripture that God has a corporeal form. The fact that Jesus expressly says he does not in the Gospels has to be given weight in these discussions. In fact, I would propose that the one time God clearly showed himself in bodily form was as Jesus Christ.

Secondly, Bdawg, that was an immense section you pasted in. On the subordinationism discussion, I think the differences in understanding over time in the CC are very, very subtle. As far as I can tell, there was clear consensus that the three persons of the trinity shared the same Divine nature through out the entire life of the church. Perhaps there were a few dissenters, but they were a clear minority and were not in the Seat of St. Peter. There was also a clear understanding that all three members of the trinity had distinct but complementary roles. The only question that really remains is whether these roles were more important than the others. I’m not sure that an individuals opinion on that is very important to their understanding of the trinity and its nature. After all, Jesus humbly said, he was doing the will of his Father and its clear that all three persons of the trinity work together in perfect harmony.

Finally, the concept of the Trinity itself is admittedly mysterious.
I think of it as one god who manifests himself in different ways according to his purpose. I’ve already copied in the official Catechism view in my earlier post and I don’t think you’ve stated anything here that would make me think its incorrect.

In the end, how you come out on this is a function of how your rate the credibility of Joseph Smith versus the Catholic Church. Frankly, its hard for me to take Joseph Smith very seriously. I mean after all, he started out in life using seer stones to find treasure to earn his living after he was unsuccessful as a farmer. He then stated that he had visions where he was allegedly told that the lost tribes of isreal mysteriously relocated to America. He was baptised by John the baptist and then ordained into the priesthood of Melchizadek by Peter, James and John. He was charismatic enough to gather a group around him that believed him but within 3 years, they tarred and feathered him because they were angry because they percieved he was stealing their property. His group was chased from place to place by the local populace. Finally, he had another revelation that said he could marry multiple wives, including young teenagers and women already married. From this site en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_Smith,_Jr.,) Smith told one prospective wife that her submission would insure the eternal salvation of her father’s household. Furthermore, once sealed for eternity by priesthood authority, Joseph revealed that such couples would continue to procreate in the next life, becoming “enlarged” and, in effect, gods. He obviously went too far when he propositioned the wife of William Law, his second counselor who broke from him and published a paper exposing him. When Smith destroyed Law’s printing press, he ended up in jthe jail in which he was shortly assassinated, with the assassins acquited by a jury for carrying out the will of the people… Following this, his original wife (as opposed to the 27 plural wives) left the church because of property issues. (although she returned when her son took control) . Its hard for me to reconcile what seems like a man who manipulated his following for money and sex as a prophet of God, worthy of denouncing the one, holy , Catholic and Apostolic Church.

Furthermore, I am just not convinced that the Holy Spirit would allow the Cahtolic church to be mislead for 1800 years. Frankly, I don’t see any apostacy in the Church on doctrinal matters. Sure, there has been personal corruption in church leaders (although not much over the last 500 years), but the church has been firm on its principles. The issues you brought up, while interesting, certainly do not suggest any type of apostacy on the part of the church to me.

I’m sure you see this differently, or else you wouldn’t be Mormons.
Thanks for being so patient in defining your ideas…

 

[Snow]

Bdawg, Snow, Bukowski,

Thank you so much for all the info on the Mormon view of God. It forced me to do some research into an area that I had not given a tremendous amount of consideration because I had not considered the subtleties you pointed out as significant to the faith. I am far from an expert in this area but I would like to give you my thoughts, nonetheless (in the hopes of fostering understanding but at the risk of embarassing myself.)

First of all, Snow, I looked through your list of references to a bodily God. I can see how you could conceive of at least some of these as references to a bodily God, especially in the references in the Penteteuch to Moses talking to God face to face. ( I don’t believe that God actually wrestled Jacob and lost. At best, that was an angelic messenger) . However, it seems to me that these references do not necessarily refer to a physical God in human form. After all, you would think if someone actually saw God physically, they would have made some attempt to describe what they saw. Yet that is never done. In fact, the actual meetings with God are very, very vague so it is unclear how God manifested himself in these meetings. In the very first meeting with God, Moses sees him as a bush that does not burn. Maybe he alway saw him that way and that constituted meeting him face to face. In some cases, God appears through dreams (like to St. Joseph). At other times, God is manifested by wind or a cloud.

I’ll grant that the Bible does not explicitly address whether God is embodied, though one can certainly infer it from some of the citations I listed.

It was, however, the ancient Jewish and early Christian belief.

 

[majick275]

Snow:
I’ll grant that the Bible does not explicitly address whether God is embodied, though one can certainly infer it from some of the citations I listed.

It was, however, the ancient Jewish and early Christian belief.

no it was not. you are reading that into their statements just as you “infer” it from your citations. if you quit quote mining and look at the ECF’s in context you see a definite monotheistic God who is a different order being than humans.

 

[Snow]

Snow: I’ll grant that the Bible does not explicitly address whether God is embodied, though one can certainly infer it from some of the citations I listed.

It was, however, the ancient Jewish and early Christian belief.

majick: no it was not. you are reading that into their statements just as you “infer” it from your citations. if you quit quote mining and look at the ECF’s in context you see a definite monotheistic God who is a different order being than humans.

I guess your betting that I won’t bother to refute your claims or that I was bluffing. That’s a bad bet; you should know that I don’t make factual assertions I can’t support:

In a recently published study Alon Goshen Gottstein says: “In all rabbinic literature covering both the tannaitic (70-200 A.D.) and amoraic (220-500 A.D.) periods, there is not a single statement that categorically denies that God has body or form. In my understanding, the question of whether the rabbis believed in a God who has form is one that needs little discussion… Instead of asking “Does God have a body?” we should inquire, “What kind of body does God have?” Alon Goshen Gottstein, “The Body as Image of God in Rabbinic Literature,” Harvard Theological Review 87, (1994): 172

Jacob Neusner says that the understanding of God’s “incarnation” thoroughly influenced the basic concepts of formative Judaism. He describes the incarnation as “a commonplace for Judaism from the formation of Scripture forward” Neusner describes the incarnation that was common in Judaism as “the representation of God in the Flesh, as corporeal, consubstantial in emotion and virtue with human beings, and sharing in the modes and means of action carried out by mortals… doing deeds that women and men do in the way in which they do them." Jacob Neusner, The Incarnation of God: The Character of Divinity in Formative Judaism (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1988) 4, 6, 12, 17

Jacob Neusner (if you don’t know who) was educated at Harvard University, the Jewish Theological Seminary (where he received rabbinic ordination), the University of Oxford, and Columbia University. Since 1994, he has taught at Bard College. He has also taught at Columbia University, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, Brandeis University, Dartmouth College, Brown University, and the University of South Florida. Neusner is a member of the Institute of Advanced Study at Princeton, and a life member of Clare Hall, Cambridge University. He is the only scholar to have served on both the National Endowment for the Humanities and the National Endowment for the Arts. He also has received scores of academic awards, honorific and otherwise. Neusner’s scholarly activity is vast. Generally speaking his research centers around rabbinic Judaism of the Mishnaic and Talmudic Eras. wiki)

Christopher Stead if the Cambridge Divinity School says: “The Hebrews… pictured the God whom they worshipped as having a body and mind like our own, though transcending humanity in the splendor of his appearance, in his pow, his wisdom, and the constancy of his care for his creatures. Christopher Stead, Philosophy in Christian Antiquity (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1944), 120.

Very early Christianity suffers from a lack of historical record but their belief is a pretty straightforward demonstration. Christians believe that Jesus is God. Jesus is embodied and anthropomorphic. Ergo (this is simple math) God is embodied and anthropomorphic. The Bible, including the NT is full of scriptures that are consistent with an anthropomorphic God. I posted some of them earlier. Moreover, early Christians were Jews; Jews, for the most part, believed that God was embodied as posted above.

“In short, to use the forbidden word, the biblical God is clearly anthropomorphic (i.e. “in the form of man”)—not apologetically so, but proudly, even militantly.” Edmond LaB. Cherbonnier, “In Defense of Anthropomorphism,” in Truman G. Madsen (editor), Reflections on Mormonism: Judaeo-Christian parallels

“The Hebrews…pictured the God whom they worshipped as having a body and mind like our own, though transcending humanity in the splendour of his appearance, in his power, his wisdom, and the constancy of his care for his creatures.” Christopher Stead, Philosophy in Christian Antiquity (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994), 120.

As the apostasy took hold, beliefs began to morph, taking cues from Hellenistic philosophy. By the 2nd and 3rd century it was was a mixed bag as to what people believed.

“For it is also to be a subject of investigation how God himself is to be understood—whether as corporeal, and formed according to some shape, or of a different nature from bodies—a point which is not clearly indicated in our teaching.” Origen, “On First Principles,” (Preface, 9) Ante-Nicene Fathers 4:6.

Origin, who did not believe in an embodied God tells us where he got his ideas from: ?The Jews indeed, but also some of our people, supposed that God should be understood as a man, that is, adorned with human members and human appearance. But the philosophers despise these stories as fabulous and formed in the likeness of poetic fictions." Origen, “Homilies on Genesis,” (3:1) Ante-Nicene Fathers

 

[BDawg]

Because of this ambiguity, it can not be stated from Scripture that God has a corporeal form. The fact that Jesus expressly says he does not in the Gospels has to be given weight in these discussions. In fact, I would propose that the one time God clearly showed himself in bodily form was as Jesus Christ.

Hi Paul,

Jesus did not say “the Father does not have a corporeal form.” John said “God is Spirit,” but 1) it wasn’t a quotation of Jesus, and 2) I quoted Anglican historian Christopher Stead saying that Jews would not have interpreted such a statement that way.

Secondly, Bdawg, that was an immense section you pasted in.

Sorry–I had already written it, so I didn’t want to reinvent the wheel. I didn’t mean to flood you.

On the subordinationism discussion, I think the differences in understanding over time in the CC are very, very subtle. As far as I can tell, there was clear consensus that the three persons of the trinity shared the same Divine nature through out the entire life of the church.

Yes, but the question is, what did they mean by “sharing the same Divine nature”? If you want to get a handle on this issue, there is a good discussion in JND Kelly’s Early Christian Doctrines. The original meaning of the Greek word homoousios (the word that is translated as “of one substance” in the Nicene Creed) was something like “made of the same kind of stuff,” or “the same kind of thing.” So all humans would be “homoousios” with one another, as would all horses, and so on. This kind of meaning is totally compatible with how the LDS see the Oneness of God, but it would be considered heretical by Catholics after the 4th century or so.

Perhaps there were a few dissenters, but they were a clear minority and were not in the Seat of St. Peter. There was also a clear understanding that all three members of the trinity had distinct but complementary roles. The only question that really remains is whether these roles were more important than the others. I’m not sure that an individuals opinion on that is very important to their understanding of the trinity and its nature. After all, Jesus humbly said, he was doing the will of his Father and its clear that all three persons of the trinity work together in perfect harmony.

Finally, the concept of the Trinity itself is admittedly mysterious.
I think of it as one god who manifests himself in different ways according to his purpose. I’ve already copied in the official Catechism view in my earlier post and I don’t think you’ve stated anything here that would make me think its incorrect.

In the end, how you come out on this is a function of how your rate the credibility of Joseph Smith versus the Catholic Church.

When Mormons make historical arguments like these, we are not trying to “prove” our point of view. We are trying to establish “plausibility,” so that someone might be inclined to investigate further, and ask God whether it’s true or not. I’ve done that, and God told me clearly that it was.

Frankly, its hard for me to take Joseph Smith very seriously. I mean after all, he started out in life using seer stones to find treasure to earn his living after he was unsuccessful as a farmer.

1. He was just a kid. Maybe his father was somewhat unsuccessful as a farmer (many people lost their farms at that time, due to a temporary climate change caused by the Tambora eruption.
2. Most people in the frontier at that time engaged in a little “folk magic.”
3. Some scholars believe that the Urim and Thummim in the Bible were stones by which the High Priest divined the will of God. Just like Mormons believe.
4. Most modern people are a little prudish about that sort of thing. Note how Joseph (son of Jacob) used a cup for divining (Gen. 44:5). Most people don’t notice that sort of weirdness in the Bible, but it’s there.
5. One thing I admire about Catholicism is that you never lost the belief in miracles. On the other hand, at that time it was very common in Protestantism to discount any miracles after the Apostles. If Joseph Smith was involved in a little folk magic as a boy and young man, we see that as a sort of preparation. Such a person would be ready to believe that God could reveal things to people, nowadays.

He then stated that he had visions where he was allegedly told that the lost tribes of isreal mysteriously relocated to America.

This is not true. The “lost tribes of Israel” are a different group.

(cont’d)

 

[BDawg]

(cont’d)

He was baptised by John the baptist and then ordained into the priesthood of Melchizadek by Peter, James and John. He was charismatic enough to gather a group around him that believed him but within 3 years, they tarred and feathered him because they were angry because they percieved he was stealing their property.

Yeah. What fine, upstanding individuals. You should believe them.

His group was chased from place to place by the local populace.

“Blessed are they which are persecuted for righteousness’ sake: for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are ye, when men shall revile you, and persecute you, and shall say all manner of evil against you falsely, for my sake. Rejoice, and be exceeding glad: for great is your reward in heaven: for so persecuted they the prophets which were before you” (Matt. 5:10-12).

Finally, he had another revelation that said he could marry multiple wives, including young teenagers and women already married. From this site en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_Smith,_Jr.,) Smith told one prospective wife that her submission would insure the eternal salvation of her father’s household. Furthermore, once sealed for eternity by priesthood authority, Joseph revealed that such couples would continue to procreate in the next life, becoming “enlarged” and, in effect, gods.

I don’t see any problem with this.

He obviously went too far when he propositioned the wife of William Law, his second counselor who broke from him and published a paper exposing him.

One thing that is not often discussed in relation to this is that, since this was a new, charismatic religious group, and some unstable individuals were attracted to it. Joseph Smith was plagued with these people, and had to make sure they were reliable, considering the constant danger he was in. Heber Kimball, one of Smith’s apostles, was approached by Smith, who said that God had commanded him to take Heber’s wife, Vilate, as his own. Heber thought and prayed about it for a few days, in a deep depression. Finally, he came to Joseph and told him that he would go along with it. Joseph wept, and told him that it had all been a test.

Would it have gone the same way with William Law? I don’t know. But it gives some context to these types of activities.

When Smith destroyed Law’s printing press, he ended up in jthe jail in which he was shortly assassinated, with the assassins acquited by a jury for carrying out the will of the people…

Again, what fine, upstanding individuals.

The fact is that Joseph and Hyrum Smith were across the Mississippi River, and headed to the Rockies when the trouble about the Laws was brewing. Some of the Mormons in Nauvoo sent for Joseph because they were afraid of the mobs. Joseph said that if his friends didn’t care for his life, neither did he, and he went back and turned himself in. On the way to Carthage, he told several people that he wasn’t coming back from this one.

Does this seem like the action of some kind of sex-crazed imposter? I think not.

But when you string together everything in his life that can possibly be taken in a negative light, of course he comes off looking bad. If you want a balanced perspective, I suggest reading Richard Bushman’s Joseph Smith: Rough Stone Rolling. It’s the definitive biography, at this point.