LDS: Jesus is the "son" of God?

[BDawg]

Hi Carl,

In my experience, when I have thought some other group was really out to lunch, it helped to read their literature and try to get a handle on how they think differently than me about things. For instance, I couldn’t understand how anyone could believe in the Papacy until I read some Catholic books like “Pope Fiction,” by Patrick Madrid, and several others. It turned out that I still don’t agree, but you guys seem a lot smarter than you used to.

These forums are nice for asking specific questions, but I don’t think you’ll get a good idea of how Mormons think about things until you read a couple whole books, or explore some pretty large and organized web sites. Personally, I like this web site for skeptical beginners like yourself.

jefflindsay.com/LDS_Intro.shtml

 

[zerinus]

Hi again Z,

Sounds like you were offended ( sorry ) ( atleast I was honest )

Your welcome for my skepticism. ( though you should be thanking JS for the skepticism ). Allow me to assure you that as a slightly educated person, I have severe problems accepting most aspects of Mormon doctrine, especially the very Birth of it.
I can honestly say that there are so many shadows in my mind that it would not resemble a distant cousin of " truth ".
have serious reservations that will help.

God bless,
Carl

Well, thank you. I guess it is your opinion against mine. You are entitled to your opinion and I am entitled to mine. What else do you want me to do about it?

zerinus

 

[Carl_Nicholas]

Hi Carl,

In my experience, when I have thought some other group was really out to lunch, it helped to read their literature and try to get a handle on how they think differently than me about things. For instance, I couldn’t understand how anyone could believe in the Papacy until I read some Catholic books like “Pope Fiction,” by Patrick Madrid, and several others. It turned out that I still don’t agree, but you guys seem a lot smarter than you used to.

These forums are nice for asking specific questions, but I don’t think you’ll get a good idea of how Mormons think about things until you read a couple whole books, or explore some pretty large and organized web sites. Personally, I like this web site for skeptical beginners like yourself.

jefflindsay.com/LDS_Intro.shtml

Hello BDawg,

Thanks for a warm and kind reply/suggestion.

With very little personal knowledge ( probably quite obvious from my posts ’ LOL ) of all the why, what, where, when, and hows’ of the " flavors " available in religion today, I came across this forum.
Although it seems to me I am over my head at times ( armor / seasoning), I have greatly enjoyed learning about these above mentioned " flavors " ( and truly think that getting the back and forth directly from the sources has enormous value , as well as prospective.

To reply to some of your comments ( If I may ), Although I have read some of the literature ( I realize, not in full and maybe even out of context ) and truly have tried to get a handle on their views, The difficulty I have is when I consider the SOURCE of the literature. ( That seems to me to be a very important part in the process ).

Not to debate you ( that is NOT my desire and I feel confident you are much more experienced than I ) but I would not be totally honest with you if I did not atleast mention that your comparison of ( you couldn’t understand how anyone could believe in the Papacy) and my ( Having a real hard time reasoning the very " birth " of the BoM and thus all the things that are held togeher from and due to that " event ", seems a stretch.

Having said that, I do appreciate your advice ( I took it as sincere and trying to help )

God bless,
Carl

 

[BDawg]

Not to debate you ( that is NOT my desire and I feel confident you are much more experienced than I ) but I would not be totally honest with you if I did not atleast mention that your comparison of ( you couldn’t understand how anyone could believe in the Papacy) and my ( Having a real hard time reasoning the very " birth " of the BoM and thus all the things that are held togeher from and due to that " event ", seems a stretch.

Hi Carl,

The thing is that I grew up as a Mormon, and all I heard about the Papacy was arguments against it. With all that in my head to start with, it took a while before I could see it from another perspective. I’m suggesting that you might be in a similar situation.

Anyway, if you want to try to understand our whackiness a little better, why not start a new thread, and ask us why we think we have good reason to believe something that seems crazy to you. Hopefully, we can surprise you with not being as dumb as you thought. (I never start threads here myself, because I think it would be impolite.)

 

[Carl_Nicholas]

Hi Carl,

The thing is that I grew up as a Mormon, and all I heard about the Papacy was arguments against it. With all that in my head to start with, it took a while before I could see it from another perspective. I’m suggesting that you might be in a similar situation.

Anyway, if you want to try to understand our whackiness a little better, why not start a new thread, and ask us why we think we have good reason to believe something that seems crazy to you. Hopefully, we can surprise you with not being as dumb as you thought. (I never start threads here myself, because I think it would be impolite.)

Hi again BDawg,

Your first comment ( growing up Morman )
I completly understand and appreciate you sharing ( I have a similar history from a different base ) That is exactly why I have a thirst to try and understand and hear ( directly from ) these perspectives.

Second ( emplied that I think ( Mormans ) dumb and crazy )
COMPLETLY THE OPPOSITE, having read posts from and having back and forths with ( yourself included ) some of these Mormans is the EXACT reason I JUST DO NOT GET IT.

I will share this with you ( for what it’s worth ) I do not claim to “get” all of my own belief ( part of my jouney I guess ) but to me ( PLEASE, NO DISRESPECT INTENDED ) ( I realize I have my share of ignorance ) I have the foundation or the base from wich I can try and work from.

I will stop yapping for now.

God bless,
Carl

 

[mjf001]

Hi mj,

I never said that everyone who leaves a religion is one of those people I described. And naturally, if you leave a religion, it would most of the time be because you don’t believe it anymore. As I implied in my previous post, I think it is possible for a reasonable person to come to the conclusion that the LDS Church is false, and that the RCC is true (or vice versa). There are complicated issues involved.

Rather, I was talking about people who can’t recognize that fact of life, and have to paint all the adherents of their former faith as mindless sheep. Are you one of those people?

Obviously I can’t see into the hearts and minds of the people who choose to remain LDS. I don’t know why the people who remain can’t see what I saw. I pray for them, and hope that someday my family and friends come home to the one Holy and Apostolic church. I pray for everyone to come home.

 

[BDawg]

Hi again, Carl,

You may have noticed from recent threads about Mormonism that many of the Mormon beliefs people see as whacky stem back to our belief that God has a body in human form.

If you were to start a thread called, “Why do Mormons believe God has a body?” I would try to make a good argument for you.

 

[Carl_Nicholas]

Hi again, Carl,

You may have noticed from recent threads about Mormonism that many of the Mormon beliefs people see as whacky stem back to our belief that God has a body in human form.

If you were to start a thread called, “Why do Mormons believe God has a body?” I would try to make a good argument for you.

Hey BDawg,
( If I am ever in Utah, My bride and I will buy you a burger )
Seems the least I can do for one of my new friends ( lol )

I have indeed noticed threads that you speak of.
I have read some and have gained some perspective along the way. In addition I have also truly admired the passion, kindness, as well as respect that many of the Morman members have offered their contributions to this forum. ( including you )

It is not, TO ME, about the ( your reference ) " whacky " beliefs
people see the Mormons have on this or that. ( although if we could get that far it would be very interesting and lively “back and forth” on ALL sides, including scripture as well as interpreting scripture)

In MY very humble view, it is not this or that belief.
IT IS the source where the beliefs are rooted.
If the very source where these beliefs are “born” ( again in my opinion ) not solid , Then ???

Sincerly,
Carl
To begin

 

[BDawg]

In MY very humble view, it is not this or that belief. IT IS the source where the beliefs are rooted.
If the very source where these beliefs are “born”

So what, exactly do you find so hard to swallow about the source of our beliefs?

Consider how Christianity might seem to a secular non-believer. Christians believe that God had a human son, who was really God. This guy supposedly lived in Israel during the Roman era, and went around healing people, and such. Then he got himself tortured and killed by a Jewish mob and their Roman overlords, but rose from the dead a few days later. All Christian beliefs are supposedly derived from the teachings of this formerly dead guy.

Sounds pretty nuts to me. But the question is not whether it sounds nutty, but whether there are good reasons to believe the story is essentially true.

 

[zerinus]

To reply to some of your comments ( If I may ), Although I have read some of the literature ( I realize, not in full and maybe even out of context ) and truly have tried to get a handle on their views, The difficulty I have is when I consider the SOURCE of the literature. ( That seems to me to be a very important part in the process ).

The source of the literature is God. It came by revelation from God. What makes it so hard for you to believe that God should speak from heaven and give us scripture and revelation as He used to through His prophets in ancient times?

Not to debate you ( that is NOT my desire and I feel confident you are much more experienced than I ) but I would not be totally honest with you if I did not atleast mention that your comparison of ( you couldn’t understand how anyone could believe in the Papacy) and my ( Having a real hard time reasoning the very " birth " of the BoM and thus all the things that are held togeher from and due to that " event ", seems a stretch.

The birth and origin of the Book of Mormon is from God. The Book of Mormon is a book of scripture and the sacred record of the former inhabitants of the American continent, who were a branch of the house of Israel. They had prophets and holy men among them who preserved their sacred history and teachings, complied (or abridged) in the Book of Mormon. The Book of Mormon was written on gold plates by their last prophets, to come forth in the latter days by the power of God. Joseph Smith was chosen as an instrument in the hand of God to bring them forth in the latter days. He was visited by angels who delivered him the plates, and he translated them from an unknown tongue into English by the gift and power of God. Why is that such a hard thing for you to believe?

Have you actually read the Book of Mormon and prayed about it, and try to understand it? Don’t you think that your judgment of it would be premature until you did that?

I will share this with you ( for what it’s worth ) I do not claim to “get” all of my own belief ( part of my jouney I guess ) but to me ( PLEASE, NO DISRESPECT INTENDED ) ( I realize I have my share of ignorance ) I have the foundation or the base from wich I can try and work from.

The Catholic Church is an ancient and respected institution. The “foundation or the base” of it was originally the gospel, and the Apostolic authority of Peter, and Paul, and John, and other Apostles who founded it; and for that alone it deserves our respect. However, unfortunately that authority was eventually lost through the Apostasy of the early Christian church; which is why it had to be Restored by revelation and ministration of angels through the Prophet Joseph Smith in our time. That authority and “foundation” or “base” now rests with the LDS Church, not the Catholic Church.

It is not, TO ME, about the ( your reference ) " whacky " beliefs
people see the Mormons have on this or that. ( although if we could get that far it would be very interesting and lively “back and forth” on ALL sides, including scripture as well as interpreting scripture)

In MY very humble view, it is not this or that belief.
IT IS the source where the beliefs are rooted.
If the very source where these beliefs are “born” ( again in my opinion ) not solid , Then ???

The “source” of those beliefs and literature is as solid as you can get. They are based on the revelations of Jesus Christ to Joseph Smith and his successors in the day and age in which we live.

zerinus

 

[Catholic_Dude]

Hi CD,

Personally, I think the “dust of the ground” bit is a metaphor for evolutionary processes. Believing that God used evolution is permissible in Mormonism, as well as Catholicism.

But my point was Adam was not created on account of sex by humans (nor God), the human body was formed out of physical material. Further Lk 3 calls Adam “the Son of God.” My point is that God can (and does) create humans without sex being involved.

Hi CD,

I agree that this is the real heart of many issues between Catholics and LDS. Do you want to discuss that, instead?

Yes. Since this thread is pretty much dead and off track do you want to start a new one or should I?

Who says anything about DNA. You are bringing up DNA. We do not know how Jesus’ body was formed in the womb. The Bible teaches that Jesus was to be born of the “seed of David”. That may mean that He inherited all of His DNA from that line. We simply do not know. None of these things discounts the fact that Jesus was literally the Son of God in the flesh, because He was born by the miraculous intervention of God, and not through human intercourse—DNA or no DNA. That is the only thing that we know for sure about it. Nothing further has been revealed about how Jesus was conceived and born. The Bible teaches that Jesus was called the Son of God by virtue of the fact that He was born by divine intervention, and not by the natural process:
Luke 1:

35 And the angel answered and said unto her, The Holy Ghost shall come upon thee, and the power of the Highest shall overshadow thee: therefore also that holy thing which shall be born of thee shall be called the Son of God.Jesus was called the Son of God because that is how He was born—DNA or no DNA.

zerinus

This is where I consider LDS theology deficient (or at least your explanation). If someone is the literal son, in the sense humans understand sons and fathers, then DNA is certainly involved as far as chromosomes and fertilization and such. If God’s DNA was not combined with Mary’s DNA then Jesus was not the literal (better yet biological) “son of God.” This is employing standard definitions of terms and staying consistent.

Even if a miracle was involved it would have to mean God’s DNA somehow arrived. Catholics teach no male DNA of any kind was involved and yet a human was able to be formed in the womb, that is the miracle. This does not make Jesus the biological son of God.
Further the term “only begotten son” is already employed before Jesus is conceived,
1 Jn 4:9 In this was manifested the love of God toward us, because that God sent his only begotten Son into the world, that we might live through him.

 

[BDawg]

But my point was Adam was not created on account of sex by humans (nor God), the human body was formed out of physical material. Further Lk 3 calls Adam “the Son of God.” My point is that God can (and does) create humans without sex being involved.

If Adam’s body was created through evolutionary processes, then it was necessarily created via sex.

Yes. Since this thread is pretty much dead and off track do you want to start a new one or should I?

I would rather you do it. I consider myself a guest here, and I don’t feel comfortable starting threads. I would rather just try to address questions other people bring up.

 

[zerinus]

This is where I consider LDS theology deficient (or at least your explanation). . . .

That is because you are turning a deaf ear and blind eye to what I am saying. The Bible tells us that Jesus was called the Son of God because He was born without human intervention. It was performed by the power of the Holy Ghost, as a miracle:

Luke 1:

35 And the angel answered and said unto her, The Holy Ghost shall come upon thee, and the power of the Highest shall overshadow thee: therefore also that holy thing which shall be born of thee shall be called the Son of God.

Do you think that you could tell me what it is about that verse that you do not understand?

zerinus

 

[ibkc]

That is because you are turning a deaf ear and blind eye to what I am saying. The Bible tells us that Jesus was called the Son of God because He was born without human intervention. It was performed by the power of the Holy Ghost, as a miracle:
Luke 1:

35 And the angel answered and said unto her, The Holy Ghost shall come upon thee, and the power of the Highest shall overshadow thee: therefore also that holy thing which shall be born of thee shall be called the Son of God.Do you think that you could tell me what it is about that verse that you do not understand?

Wait a minute. I thought that the Mormons taught that Jesus was conceived directly of the Father, without the intervention of the Holy Spirit. That this was where non-Mormons got the misunderstanding that sex was involved, and also one of the many big things that separate the LDS church from Christianity.

Now you’re saying that the Holy Spirit was involved after all?

 

[wmscott]

But my point was Adam was not created on account of sex by humans (nor God), the human body was formed out of physical material. Further Lk 3 calls Adam “the Son of God.” My point is that God can (and does) create humans without sex being involved.

Yes. Since this thread is pretty much dead and off track do you want to start a new one or should I?

This is where I consider LDS theology deficient (or at least your explanation). If someone is the literal son, in the sense humans understand sons and fathers, then DNA is certainly involved as far as chromosomes and fertilization and such. If God’s DNA was not combined with Mary’s DNA then Jesus was not the literal (better yet biological) “son of God.” This is employing standard definitions of terms and staying consistent.

Even if a miracle was involved it would have to mean God’s DNA somehow arrived. Catholics teach no male DNA of any kind was involved and yet a human was able to be formed in the womb, that is the miracle. This does not make Jesus the biological son of God.
Further the term “only begotten son” is already employed before Jesus is conceived,
1 Jn 4:9 In this was manifested the love of God toward us, because that God sent his only begotten Son into the world, that we might live through him.

Catholic Dude, I have been following this post since my first few and poorly worded posts regarding LDS. Some of my questions that I was really curious about was taken as rude. Therefore, as not to offend anyone further, I have been mostly following the threads. I want to ask a question although it may seem to be more of a statement or observation. To me, and totally in my own opinion, it seems to me that the whole concept that the LDS has regarding the birth of Jesus Christ is that they try to transform God the Father’s divine and spiritual nature by dragging it down to meager human terms and understandings. God, Father – Son – Holy Spirit, is far beyond our comprehension and as simple humans how can we be expected to explain the mysteries of our Faith. To me it seems that in the LDS point of view they are not only trivializing our Lord, but that they are assigning themselves equal status as God. By their own words, they think that God the Father had flesh and bone. With all of this talk of DNA, this is what I see as another attempt to bring God down to our level. This is a total distortion as to who God is. Sorry if this offends anyone but this is how I see it.

 

[ibkc]

To me it seems that in the LDS point of view they are not only trivializing our Lord, but that they are assigning themselves equal status as God. By their own words, they think that God the Father had flesh and bone. With all of this talk of DNA, this is what I see as another attempt to bring God down to our level. This is a total distortion as to who God is. Sorry if this offends anyone but this is how I see it.

Look at it as they are trying to raise themselves up to the level of gods. I think that’s a much more accurate way of looking at it.

I’ve said before, but I will repeat it: because of this belief in “exalted men” and people having the ability to become gods, and because of the major influence of Freemasonry in their rituals, the Mormons have much more in common with Wiccans than they do with Christians. It’s occurred to me that they are the first modern neo-pagan religion. If I had more time to research, I might flesh this idea out more. Maybe someday I will.

 

[BDawg]

Wait a minute. I thought that the Mormons taught that Jesus was conceived directly of the Father, without the intervention of the Holy Spirit. That this was where non-Mormons got the misunderstanding that sex was involved, and also one of the many big things that separate the LDS church from Christianity.

Now you’re saying that the Holy Spirit was involved after all?

Hi ib,

I explained this earlier. In Mormon thought, a mortal must be transfigured through the action of the Holy Spirit to be in the presence of God. So the Holy Spirit was involved, but since we also believe the Holy Spirit is a separate being from the Father, it matters to us to say that Jesus was the son of the Father, not the Holy Spirit.

 

[BDawg]

this is what I see as another attempt to bring God down to our level. This is a total distortion as to who God is. Sorry if this offends anyone but this is how I see it.

Hi Dubya,

It seems like a legitimate thing to say, from your point of view. CD said he wanted to start another thread about the LDS concept of the nature of God. Do you want to join us there?

 

[ibkc]

Hi ib,

I explained this earlier. In Mormon thought, a mortal must be transfigured through the action of the Holy Spirit to be in the presence of God. So the Holy Spirit was involved, but since we also believe the Holy Spirit is a separate being from the Father, it matters to us to say that Jesus was the son of the Father, not the Holy Spirit.

The Holy Spirit was involved peripherally, but the Father did the actual deed? That is what I thought.

 

[Carl_Nicholas]

So what, exactly do you find so hard to swallow about the source of our beliefs?

Hi BDawg,
The very Man who " translated" the ancient gold tabs. ( " translate= look at unknown language and put it in a language peolpe can read") Well it would seem logical to me that if and when he performed this " translation " that the gold bars ( that had the ancient language written on them ) WOULD ATLEAST BE IN THE SAME ROOM as JS and the scribes. IF not, then what was JS " translating FROM???

Consider how Christianity might seem to a secular non-believer. Christians believe that God had a human son, who was really God. This guy supposedly lived in Israel during the Roman era, and went around healing people, and such. Then he got himself tortured and killed by a Jewish mob and their Roman overlords, but rose from the dead a few days later. All Christian beliefs are supposedly derived from the teachings of this formerly dead guy

I guess this can have some consideration ( and quite probable that indeed to this day some look at this as a fairy tale)

However, the historical facts that support it ( atleast to me ) FAR outweigh the account of JS that we are discussing.

Sounds pretty nuts to me. But the question is not whether it sounds nutty, but whether there are good reasons to believe the story is essentially true.

COMPLETLY AGREE with you,
The " good reasons to believe " is what we seem to respectfully disagree on.