LDS beliefs about Jesus Christ?

[ParkerD]

Parker, it is exactly this type of attitude that sticks in my craw. I mean nothing personal here, by the way. I realize that this comes from your faith tradition. This, my friend, is gnosticism. The idea that only a select group of people are worthy enough to have the truth unveiled for them; secret knowledge that you can only attain when you become as enlightened as they. If you don’t agree it is because you are not yet worthy and you will become worthy only when you join the group.

SteveVH,

The “select group of people” could be children in elementary school, if they learned grammar and followed the grammar of the passage we are talking about. How it got “hidden” and “veiled” is by those who wanted no such thing as eternal marriage, easily finding a way of looking at those verses in the way they wanted them to mean, and then everyone else following their lead.

The verses and the grammar are simple enough. A child, using grammar but not having the prior influence of “this is what it says” (i.e. tradition), could easily see the direct meaning in the passage, particularly with some basic knowledge of understood pronouns within verb conjugations.

Christ came to reveal truth to all of humanity, most especially sinners (which includes all of us). He did not come to reveal truth to those deemed worthy. We are all unworthy. He did not act selectively, reserving truth for some and keeping it hid from others. He spoke the truth and said if you have ears to hear, hear, and if you have eyes to see, see.

Which belief is completely contrary to the parables and the example of the apostles when they asked the Savior to “speak plainly” instead of in parables. It is also completely contrary to the very words you partly quoted. If you don’t have “ears to hear”, you won’t “hear”, and “eyes to see”, you won’t see. He and Isaiah repeated this, with a clear meaning that the apostles understood.

Jesus taught us about the sacredness of marriage and that no man should divide what God has joined. It is a sacrament; a source of grace to lead us to our eternal destiny. But when we have reached our eternal destiny there will be no more need for it. Yes, we treasure our relationships with our spouses here on earth, but I will make my point again. If eternal marriage were the necessary factor determining the level of happiness we might obtain in heaven, Jesus was remiss in not making that point very clear.

He did make it very clear. Others took what He said and made it less clear, less impactful to them and others who followed them.

Jesus spoke very plainly about the marriage of Adam and Eve, which marriage “God hath joined together” and man should not “put asunder”. Adam and Eve were given commandments for their happiness, not for less than their happiness. They were given to each other for an eternal purpose, not for a “time only” purpose. God is an eternal God, not a “time only” God and He joined them together.

 

[Peter_John]

I’ve never heard the LDS teach the Holy Spirit will get a body. Can you provide a reference.

It was speculation by a couple of people …

Including Joseph Smith. Here is one reference, I will find more.

"The Holy Ghost is yet a spiritual body and is waiting to take to himself a body, as the Savior did."Joseph Smith, Encyclopedia of Joseph Smith’s Teachings, edited by Larry E. Dahl and Donald Q. Cannon (Salt Lake City: Bookcraft, 1997)

For now I must ask that if this is not a true statement about the Holy Ghost, is it blasphemy for a prophet to teach it?

 

[zaffiroborant]

SteveVH,

Jesus spoke very plainly about the marriage of Adam and Eve, which marriage “God hath joined together” and man should not “put asunder”. Adam and Eve were given commandments for their happiness, not for less than their happiness. They were given to each other for an eternal purpose, not for a “time only” purpose. God is an eternal God, not a “time only” God and He joined them together.

Adam and Eve and only Eve no other woman, funny how that part is ignored.

 

[ParkerD]

Including Joseph Smith. Here is one reference, I will find more.

For now I must ask that if this is not a true statement about the Holy Ghost, is it blasphemy for a prophet to teach it?

The reference was from someone’s notes of a talk given in 1844. Joseph Smith selected those teachings during his life that he felt were “doctrinally binding” enough to be placed in scripture, and we have those doctrinal teachings in the Doctrine and Covenants. So the notes from a talk, from only one source, are just not binding nor do they reflect “blasphemy”. The statement could be misquoted, or the statement could be true, or it could be untrue. It is not important for anyone to know about the Holy Ghost’s role beyond what is included in the scriptures.

 

[RebeccaJ]

The reference was from someone’s notes of a talk given in 1844. Joseph Smith selected those teachings during his life that he felt were “doctrinally binding” enough to be placed in scripture, and we have those doctrinal teachings in the Doctrine and Covenants. So the notes from a talk, from only one source, are just not binding nor do they reflect “blasphemy”. The statement could be misquoted, or the statement could be true, or it could be untrue. It is not important for anyone to know about the Holy Ghost’s role beyond what is included in the scriptures.

The LDS version of the D&C has been modified several times since JS. Some things added that he didn’t put in, some things removed that he did put in.

 

[Chunnetter]

Orson Pratt taught:
“[God] had a lawful right to overshadow the Virgin Mary in the capacity of a husband, and beget a Son , …it may be that … He intended after the resurrection to again take her as one of his own wives to raise up immortal spirits (bear his children) in eternity.” ('The Seer, p. 158)

The 1985 edition of Gospel Principles teaches:
“Thus, God the Father became the literal father of Jesus Christ. Jesus was born of a mortal mother and an immortal father.” (p.57)"

There is much more, but I didn’t want to take up too much room.

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[Peter_John]

Peter John,

It was speculation by a couple of people, or one who others believed and repeated. If you heard it “taught”, then they were repeating the speculative belief and there would not be any scripture that backs them up on their speculation.

For fairness, i have found an oline source that tends to support your position, so I will post it here. What I find most interesting about this is that it makes it clear that the LDS Doctine of the nature of the Godhead was a very evolving thing for the first 50 years or more of the Chhurch, and that much of it emerged not from specific revelation from traditions of interpreting that revelation. Hence, this demonstrate the very revelation by tradition we embrace as Catholics which Mormonism dismisses as Apostasy.

signaturebookslibrary.org/?p=9436

Having shared this, I still maintain that both you and the author of this document equivocate on the issue in question – you by saying “a couple of people” speculated on it. The author of the linked document by burying it deep and aligning it with more truly speculative and much less common interpretations.

This was not a couple of people. It was hundreds, not counting thousands who just participated in discussions. During parts of five decades, in places all over the world, from people from mixed backgrounds, and in some books I read (which I unfortunately cannot specifially recall and no longer have) this doctrine was specifically taught and never once refuted or questioned: The Holy Ghost along with Jesus is our spiritual brother, a son of the same Heavenly Father as ourselves. He has like Jesus attained the status of a god in premortality, and his specific mission requires that he be the last of God’s spirit children to take on a body.

This was not a fringe teaching (like some recent speculation I have heard of that the Holy Ghost is Heavenly Mother – that makes no sense in the rest of LDS context), or a locally concentrated but largely rejected teaching (like some speculation regarding the priesthood restriction on African descendants, or Brigham young’s Adam-God statements-personally refuted by Spencer W. Kimball as non-doctrinal). Unlike some other non-doctrinal ideas that I found fairly universal in LDS culture (like the common discussions of future restoration of polygamy-discussed among individuals, but never preached or taught) this was formally presented in Priesthood meetings, sacrament meetings, Sunday school classes, everywhere I lived.

This is on a par with man’s potential for godhead, multiplicity of gods, or Satan as Jesus’s and our brother (longstanding doctrines, despite current denials), and taught along with Michael as Adam and Gabriel as Noah. It did not carry the same disclaimers as “Moses didn’t die, he was translated” and “John the Beloved still walks the Earth” (we do not know for certain these are doctrine, but have many reasons to believe it).

 

[Peter_John]

Orson Pratt taught:
“[God] had a lawful right to overshadow the Virgin Mary in the capacity of a husband, and beget a Son , …it may be that … He intended after the resurrection to again take her as one of his own wives to raise up immortal spirits (bear his children) in eternity.” ('The Seer, p. 158)

The 1985 edition of Gospel Principles teaches:
“Thus, God the Father became the literal father of Jesus Christ. Jesus was born of a mortal mother and an immortal father.” (p.57)"

There is much more, but I didn’t want to take up too much room.

The Orson Pratt quote is a rare exception in its lack of ambiguity, but is not doctrinal. The Gospel Principles quote is authoritative, but does not claim sex was involved in the transaction.

However, my recent exchanges on the Holy Ghost issue has me thinking that maybe the detractors who claim Mormon leaders just shifts around teachings as expedient are right. I can’t believe how many things presented as central for most of my life have been sidelined and so concealed on the Internet as to qualify as erased. I wish I had not gotten rid of all my old manuals and publications.

I suppose I should be glad. If I get into the Spirit World and find out that Mormonism is true after all (which should be obvious since it will be neither hell nor purgatory) having had as terrible teachers and leaders as the vast misinformation provided me apparently indicates, means my bases are covered.

 

[Peter_John]

The LDS version of the D&C has been modified several times since JS. Some things added that he didn’t put in, some things removed that he did put in.

I actually have the Community of Christ’s (the largest Mormonist spinoff sect) collection of LDS scripture, which differs from the Salt Lake Mormon version in the D&C, and includes the full Joseph Smith “Translation” (JST) of the Bible, not just the scattered excerpts in the LDS KJV. Community of Christ holds the copyright, and I think (though I am not sure) that when the LDS KJV edition was created about 1980 they had to limit the JST text used to what was permitted under fair use provisions of copyright law. So, the spinoff group gets the whole thing, and SLC Mormons have to sample it, like rap artists.

 

[zaffiroborant]

There doesn’t really seem to be a clear understanding of the nature of God in LDS “theology”. The ill defined situation with the “Holy Ghost” seems to underscore this lack of understanding.

 

[RebeccaJ]

I actually have the Community of Christ’s (the largest Mormonist spinoff sect) collection of LDS scripture, which differs from the Salt Lake Mormon version in the D&C, and includes the full Joseph Smith “Translation” (JST) of the Bible, not just the scattered excerpts in the LDS KJV. Community of Christ holds the copyright, and I think (though I am not sure) that when the LDS KJV edition was created about 1980 they had to limit the JST text used to what was permitted under fair use provisions of copyright law. So, the spinoff group gets the whole thing, and SLC Mormons have to sample it, like rap artists.

lol @ rap artists.

The CoC version is the 1844 version of the D&C, with their added “revelations” put in from over the years. The LDS stopped messing around with theirs about 90 years ago. Their most notable removal, IMO, is the Lectures On Faith.

 

[RebeccaJ]

The Orson Pratt quote is a rare exception in its lack of ambiguity, but is not doctrinal. The Gospel Principles quote is authoritative, but does not claim sex was involved in the transaction.

However, my recent exchanges on the Holy Ghost issue has me thinking that maybe the detractors who claim Mormon leaders just shifts around teachings as expedient are right. I can’t believe how many things presented as central for most of my life have been sidelined and so concealed on the Internet as to qualify as erased. I wish I had not gotten rid of all my old manuals and publications.

I suppose I should be glad. If I get into the Spirit World and find out that Mormonism is true after all (which should be obvious since it will be neither hell nor purgatory) having had as terrible teachers and leaders as the vast misinformation provided me apparently indicates, means my bases are covered.

It is the pragmatic morality of Mormonism coming through…it’s all well and good to believe what has been concealed, or not. The point for the LDS church is what needs to be done to convert Christians. As manifest here by the several LDS who were Catholic…not too many Catholics converting to Mormonism before all the weird stuff got boxed up and buried. Now this nonsense of Catholicism and Mormonism are the same. puhleeze.

 

[Peter_John]

The reference was from someone’s notes of a talk given in 1844. Joseph Smith selected those teachings during his life that he felt were “doctrinally binding” enough to be placed in scripture, and we have those doctrinal teachings in the Doctrine and Covenants. So the notes from a talk, from only one source, are just not binding nor do they reflect “blasphemy”. The statement could be misquoted, or the statement could be true, or it could be untrue. It is not important for anyone to know about the Holy Ghost’s role beyond what is included in the scriptures.

We have notes from only one source, and that not the original, regarding Moses’ words spoken but once that God found blasphemous enough to keep him out of the Holy Land.

You know it is not misquoted.

I must say that were I still LDS and suddenly learning that these things I had been taught my whole life, and read my whole life, are suddenly not valid teachings and never were, I’d be feeling like the kid who just learned there is no Santa Claus, Easter Bunny, or Tooth Fair, and now wonders about God.

I will retain caution in this criticism. In the first few centuries Christianity considered renouncing Christ under torture an excommunicable offense, and it took awhile after the persecution ended for the Fathers to recognize that God’s forgiveness even extended to that. Mormonism hasn’t been around a third of that long yet, so it deserves some leeway in recognizing its revelation through tradition.

 

[Peter_John]

lol @ rap artists.

The CoC version is the 1844 version of the D&C, with their added “revelations” put in from over the years. The LDS stopped messing around with theirs about 90 years ago. Their most notable removal, IMO, is the Lectures On Faith.

LDS have added since then, but haven’t taken anything away. They have revised the Book of Mormon at least twice since then, I think, once I know for certain as it happened in my lifetime. That was when they tried to make it more color neutral.

 

[Peter_John]

It is the pragmatic morality of Mormonism coming through…it’s all well and good to believe what has been concealed, or not. The point for the LDS church is what needs to be done to convert Christians. As manifest here by the several LDS who were Catholic…not too many Catholics converting to Mormonism before all the weird stuff got boxed up and buried. Now this nonsense of Catholicism and Mormonism are the same. puhleeze.

I will point to my last comments to ParkerD: It took Christians a few hundred years to get its ducks in a row, and then it still had problems dealing with power when it got it, and defining many dogmas for a few more centuries. I suppose that Mormons can’t acknowledge that what they experience inn these revisionist movements equates to our revelation through tradition which they call Apostasy.

 

[Tony888]

Your statement is invalid. What we believe about papal infallibility directly compares to what Mormons believe about the LDS President’s prophetic role. I expound on this in detail in my prior post. The sinfulness of many of our past leaders is right there for the world to see in history. The difference is, we do not try to justify it, as LDS apologetics does for the scandals committed by Joseph Smith and Brigham Young.

Now J. Golden Kimball offered some promise for this to change, but it never transpired. When Paul H. Dunn was caught having lied in official capacity for decades he was quietly retired, but kept his authority. The church employee who exposed him was fired. We could go back and forth on it all day. The simple fact is we do not consider our own leaders as far removed from humanity as you perceive, and you do not in practice acknowledge your own leaders imperfections as much as you profess.

I do agree that the JOD is not LDS Doctrine – However, that does not keep a lot of traditional Mormons from considering it so, as well as Bruce’s Bible – particularly in Utah, Idaho, and Western Colorado. When I was in the MTC 30 years ago it amazed me how many Utah missionaries considered it doctrine that blacks would be white in the resurrection.

Peter, my statement is valid because I was pointing out the irony of our dectractors and what they say about our respective leaders.

I can’t coimment on your gossip and I’m not familiar nor am I interested. I repeat that we are led by men like the rest of us. They will sin and we will have to deal with it. If you believe the Catholic church has handled their scandles much better, I caution you to reconsider.

 

[Tony888]

How long have you been LDS? I was taught this at the age of six, and heard this taught consistently in wards and branches in Vermont, Connecticut, Florida, Utah (MTC), Washington State, Colorado, Brazil, England, and Korea over a 30 year period.

Please post an offical reference to this teaching. The LDS chuch still has prior versions of their teaching manuals online, for you to reference. I will be the first to admit some teachings have been removed because they are not doctrine.

Again, please support your claim.

ps. I take it you now admit we believe the same on Jesus?

 

[Tony888]

It is solid LDS doctrine that advancement to Godhead requires a physical body. That is why Joseph Smith tsught that Cain will rule over Satan, because Cain had a physical body. In LDS doctrine Jesus had no physical boidy in the pre-existence, as did the Father, even though He had status in the Godhead (at least after the Council in Heaven). Jesus, in LDS Doctrine, cannot fulfill His Eternal mission without a body. He therefore HAD TO get a body. He could, I suppose have chosen not to, but then someone else would have to have been resurrected for everyone else to be, right?

In LDS theology beings with physical bodies always have an advantage over those without one. Therefore Jesus had to get a body to advance. The Holy Ghost in LDS Theology, is (like Jesus and ourselves) also a spirit child of the Eternal Father. He will be the last of all to get a body, but he HAS TO in order to advance. He is postponing this, according to LDS doctrine, because He cannot fulfill His mission to help us after He gets one. He has to remain as a Spirit until everyone else is taken care of.

If you know of some way within LDS theology that Jesus could advance to His Eternal Kingdom and father Spirit children, as all gods must, without a body, please enlighten me. I am not creating differences. This is LDS doctrine. Ask your Bishop, or maybe ParkerD wants to respond. He claims sufficient LDS status and experience to know this. I expect he will either confirm it, equivocate, or change the subject to the importance of following the Good Shepherd. In any of these you will know I am telling the truth. If he outright denies it then he has netiher the status nor the experience he claims.

So you are using conjecture and insisting it is logical and thus must be LDS Doctirne?

Have you ever bothered to apply your keen mind and logical intuition to your own faith?

 

[Tony888]

There doesn’t really seem to be a clear understanding of the nature of God in LDS “theology”. The ill defined situation with the “Holy Ghost” seems to underscore this lack of understanding.

Ill defined - what are tyou talking about?

And I take it you conversely believe the trinity is well defined and clearly understood by Catholics?
ROFL

 

[KathleenGee]

I am very aware of boxed up LDS materials within Mormonism. It uses some of the same language and symbols but is very different. There are so many disputes regarding Joseph Smith’s ability to even write the book of Mormon.

It is not only Mormonism’s every changing beliefs; it is also its practices in keeping people, and how Mormons treat their loved ones when they leave. The latter behaviors make Mormonism cult like. So my perception is that it wants to have a good image before people rather than truthfully reveal its own development, and I find that as well dishonest.

Christianity had its worship, the Gospels, the Letters, the episcopal – not commission-- form of governing drawn from the Jewish model, and the Apostles Creed set up around 100 AD. It was Arianism and seeing Christ as a separate being who came later after God that brought about the Council of Nicea 300 years later.