Pros and Cons of Mormonism

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mjf001 said:
Zerinus,
I believe you’ll get much more out of the bible if you read the text as a whole. On sentence can be interpreted many different ways. It becomes much clearer if you read the whole thing.
Just a thought,
Michael
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I hope you do not mind my asking, Michael: Do you think, then, that my plan to read John 13 - 17, and prayerfully consider the truth of Jesus’ words in context is a good way to discover the truth?
 
Socrates4Jesus said:
Quote:
Originally Posted by zerinus forums.catholic-questions.org/images/buttons_cad/viewpost.gif
That, I fear, is the real cause of the problem. Your methodology is wrong. You are trying to discover spiritual truths by the philosophical method, which cannot be. That can only be known and understood by revelation. You are ignoring the advice of Paul: "But the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him: neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned" (1 Corinthians 2:14). That is where you are going wrong. You are trying to understand what is spiritual by the exercise of the natural mind, which is an impossibility.

Some months ago I was doing some research to find material for a talk I was preparing to give in the Church. I came across these words of advice that Elder Boyd K. Packer (one of the Twelve Apostles) gave to the young people of the Church whom he was addressing. I think it is applicable to you:There are two parts to your nature—your temporal body born of mortal parents, and your immortal spirit within. You are a son or daughter of God.Physically you can see with eyes and hear with ears and touch and feel and learn. Through your intellect, you learn most of what you know about the world in which we live.***But if you learn by reason only, you will never understand the Spirit and how it works—regardless of how much you learn about other things. ***
…

Zerinus:

Are you saying that faith is the opposite of reason?
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Or are you, Zerinus, saying that faith is opposed to reason?

🤷
 
Socrates4Jesus said:
Zerinus:

Are you saying that faith is the opposite of reason?

🤷
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That is not what it says. Sometimes you make me wonder whether you really want to know the truth or not. If you were, you wouldn’t be asking theses kinds of questions. Either you don’t really want to know the truth, or else you want to know it on your own terms, not God’s terms. You want to set the agenda yourself, rather than follow God’s agenda. I am afraid that can’t be done. If you want to know divine truth, you have to do it on God’s terms, not on your own terms.

zerinus
 
Read all of St John as well as the other three Synoptics.

Proof texting your way to enlightenment only works for those who are already sure of what they ‘believe’ and only seek verification of sorts.

Robert
 
zerinus said:
That is not what it says. Sometimes you make me wonder whether you really want to know the truth or not. If you were, you wouldn’t be asking theses kinds of questions. Either you don’t really want to know the truth, or else you want to know it on your own terms, not God’s terms. You want to set the agenda yourself, rather than follow God’s agenda. I am afraid that can’t be done. If you want to know divine truth, you have to do it on God’s terms, not on your own terms.

zerinus
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I want to know what you believe faith is.
 
zerinus said:
Faith is "the substance [assurance] of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen". (Hebrews 11:1)

zerinus
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My dictionary gives the following definitions of substance:


  1. *]matter or material
    *]density
    *]meaning
    *]likelihood
    By assurance, do you mean meaning or likelihood?
 
Socrates4Jesus said:
My dictionary gives the following definitions of substance:


  1. *]matter or material
    *]density
    *]meaning
    *]likelihood
    By assurance, do you mean meaning or likelihood?
Click to expand...

  1. It means we have the assured confidence that what we have “hoped for” will take place. Read the context of that verse, and you will get the idea.

    zerinus
 
Socrates4Jesus said:
I know i said this before, TOm, but i still find this fascinating!
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You say, “I believe the doctrinal integrity of the Biblical (and extra LDS scriptures)” but that the LDS church “[does] not even have inerrant scriptures”. Do you mean that the Book of Mormon and the Bible are errant in historical details but not in doctrinal teaching?
No. I could have been clearer, but I was not speaking of historical issues/errors at all (though it looks like I am about to do so).

I mean that inerrancy is not something that LDS demand of our scriptures, but that IMO the absence of this should not be used to question any specific teaching in the scriptures as they are all accepted by common consent.
So, in a small minority of cases I have occasional seen LDS apologist suggest that a specific verse may be part of the Bible that is not “’translated’ correctly.” I discourage this adamantly, since we accept the Bible and the rest of LDS scriptures by common consent.

I believe there are historical problems for the Bible and the BOM, but I believe both to be ancient documents. I generally do not believe in a world wide flood or young earth creationism. I believe the Exodus was not near so grand as the Bible claims it to be and this is why we have basically no historical or archeological evidence of this huge event. I hold similar “not near so grand” views concerning battles in the BOM. But on the whole, I think the Bible and the BOM present reasonable history consistent with what is determinable via archeology and textual remnants in the relevant regions.
The historical strength of the BOM in the absence of a historical pedigree (the BOM unlike the Bible or Homer’s Iliad burst upon modern America >1000 years later than the event therein purportedly occurred) indicates something supernatural. If the BOM is best explained (using approved methods of ethno history upon a translated document) as an ancient document, something extraordinary occurred in 1830. If it could be explained via the theories offered by our critics (numerous and varied they are since our critics instinctively know they have failed to explain the BOM), then perhaps nothing too revolutionary occurred in 1830. I think the authentic theories are superior to the fraud theories and thus before seeking spiritual confirmation, I think something extraordinary occurred in 1830.

Charity, TOm
 
zerinus said:
I don’t know and I don’t care. My only focus is in understanding the meaning of the verse correctly.

zerinus
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Words have meaning, and the verses of the Bible are made up of words. How can you truly understand the meaning of a verse if you do not understand the meaning of the words that make up that verse?

🤷

I’m asking because i honestly do not know the meaning of the passage you quoted. I have often prayed that God will reveal its meaning to me. My lack of understanding, i have determined, is based on the word substance, for i have no good idea in what sense the word is being used by the author of Hebrews.
 
Zerinus:

Perhaps the difficulty lies in the fact that the meaning of words change over time. The King James version of the Bible uses an archaic form of English. I found this translation (the New American Standard version):

Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.
Do you think this is an accurate translation?
 
Socrates4Jesus said:
I’m the kind who, when i make up my mind that something is the right course to pursue, stays on that path until i reach my destination or die trying. I’ve decided to seriously consider whether Mormonism is the right way for me.

Please tell me what you think is the best, strongest, most convincing reason to accept or reject Mormonism. More importantly, please tell me why. I’m hoping for a wide range of opinions pro and con.

http://101151.agchurches.org/SiteFiles/101151/Content/Media/One_way.jpg
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There is nothing to be said in favour of a so-called Christianity which:​

  • utterly denies the uniqueness of Christ by its polytheism, & by its refusal to distinguish between the Transcendent, Eternal, & Unique Triune God OTOH & creatures OTO
  • adds new revelations (which makes a mockery of the finality & definitiveness of the revelation of God in Christ)
  • used to condemn all other religions as parts of “the great and abominable church”
    is founded upon one lie after another about its foundation documents:
  • about the text of the BoM
  • about the “Book of Abraham”
  • about the contents of both
  • about the falsification of the Book of Genesis by the false prophet & arch-heretic Joseph Smith.
    There is no good in a fraud like Mormonism. What good can one expect, of a religion which promises men that they shall be gods ? That is the same lie the serpent uses in Genesis 3.
Smith ought to have tested the thing calling itself “Moroni” - Christians are to “test the spirits, whether they be of God”.

The BoM reads like a bad pastiche of the OT - unsurprisingly, since it is exactly that, with its cumoms & cureloms (whatever they are - Smith’s mendacity clearly extended to inventing animals). His God is strikingly ignorant of the effects of oxygen starvation:
  • 16 And the Lord said: Go to work and build, after the manner of barges which ye have hitherto built. And it came to pass that the brother of Jared did go to work, and also his brethren, and built barges after the manner which they had built, according to the instructions of the Lord. And they were small, and they were light upon the water, even like unto the lightness of a fowl upon the water.
  • 17 And they were built after a manner that they were exceedingly tight, even that they would hold water like unto a dish; and the bottom thereof was tight like unto a dish; and the sides thereof were tight like unto a dish; and the ends thereof were peaked; and the top thereof was tight like unto a dish; and the length thereof was the length of a tree; and the door thereof, when it was shut, was tight like unto a dish.
  • 18 And it came to pass that the brother of Jared cried unto the Lord, saying: O Lord, I have performed the work which thou hast commanded me, and I have made the barges according as thou hast directed me.
  • 19 And behold, O Lord, in them there is no light; whither shall we steer? And also we shall perish, for in them we cannot breathe, save it is the air which is in them; therefore we shall perish.
  • 20 And the Lord said unto the brother of Jared: Behold, thou shalt make a hole in the top, and also in the bottom; and when thou shalt suffer for air thou shalt unstop the hole and receive air. And if it be so that the water come in upon thee, behold, ye shall stop the hole, that ye may not perish in the flood.
    en.wikisource.org/wiki/Book_of_Mormon/Ether#2:14
IOW: you can breathe & sink - or float & suffocate. All the Jaredites need is some explosives from Acme, & they’d be set up for life. What a pity Smith never heard of Levi’s - now they are tight.

From Ether 3 comes this gem:
  • 14 Behold, I am he who was prepared from the foundation of the world to redeem my people. Behold, I am Jesus Christ. I am the Father and the Son. In me shall all mankind have life, and that eternally, even they who shall believe on my name; and they shall become my sons and my daughters.
    This is not compatible with any form of Christianity - not Catholicism, Orthodoxy or Protestantism. And it implies that the prophet was exceedingly mixed-up: he can’t even decide which heresy to follow: polytheism, or modalism. A man who cannot get even his own heresy consistent is no prophet.
 
Socrates4Jesus said:
Words have meaning, and the verses of the Bible are made up of words. How can you truly understand the meaning of a verse if you do not understand the meaning of the words that make up that verse?

🤷

I’m asking because i honestly do not know the meaning of the passage you quoted. I have often prayed that God will reveal its meaning to me. My lack of understanding, i have determined, is based on the word substance, for i have no good idea in what sense the word is being used by the author of Hebrews.
Click to expand...
I looked up Hebrews 11:1 in several different translations of the Bible online, here is the result:

New International Version (NIV):

Now faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see.

New American Standard Bible (NASB):

Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.

Amplified Bible (AMP):

Now faith is the assurance (the confirmation, the title deed) of the things [we] hope for, being the proof of things [we] do not see and the conviction of their reality [faith perceiving as real fact what is not revealed to the senses].

New Living Translation (NLT)

Faith is the confidence that what we hope for will actually happen; it gives us assurance about things we cannot see.

You can look up more different versions of the Bible here. It allows you to look up multiple versions (five at a time) at the same time. There are lots more Bibles to look up than the ones I did.

zerinus
 
TOmNossor said:
No. I could have been clearer, but I was not speaking of historical issues/errors at all (though it looks like I am about to do so).

I mean that inerrancy is not something that LDS demand of our scriptures, but that IMO the absence of this should not be used to question any specific teaching in the scriptures as they are all accepted by common consent.
So, in a small minority of cases I have occasional seen LDS apologist suggest that a specific verse may be part of the Bible that is not “’translated’ correctly.” I discourage this adamantly, since we accept the Bible and the rest of LDS scriptures by common consent.

I believe there are historical problems for the Bible and the BOM, but I believe both to be ancient documents. I generally do not believe in a world wide flood or young earth creationism. I believe the Exodus was not near so grand as the Bible claims it to be and this is why we have basically no historical or archeological evidence of this huge event. I hold similar “not near so grand” views concerning battles in the BOM. But on the whole, I think the Bible and the BOM present reasonable history consistent with what is determinable via archeology and textual remnants in the relevant regions.
The historical strength of the BOM in the absence of a historical pedigree (the BOM unlike the Bible or Homer’s Iliad burst upon modern America >1000 years later than the event therein purportedly occurred) indicates something supernatural. If the BOM is best explained (using approved methods of ethno history upon a translated document) as an ancient document, something extraordinary occurred in 1830. If it could be explained via the theories offered by our critics (numerous and varied they are since our critics instinctively know they have failed to explain the BOM), then perhaps nothing too revolutionary occurred in 1830. I think the authentic theories are superior to the fraud theories and thus before seeking spiritual confirmation, I think something extraordinary occurred in 1830.

Charity, TOm
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OK, thank you TOm. Now, i’d really like to know your opinions about my questions in the other post!

🙂
 
zerinus said:
I looked up Hebrews 11:1 in several different translations of the Bible online, here is the result:

New International Version (NIV):

Now faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see.

New American Standard Bible (NASB):

Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.

Amplified Bible (AMP):

Now faith is the assurance (the confirmation, the title deed) of the things [we] hope for, being the proof of things [we] do not see and the conviction of their reality [faith perceiving as real fact what is not revealed to the senses].

New Living Translation (NLT)

Faith is the confidence that what we hope for will actually happen; it gives us assurance about things we cannot see.
You can look up more different versions of the Bible here. It allows you to look up multiple versions (five at a time) at the same time. There are lots more Bibles to look up than the ones I did.

zerinus
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Yes, thank you, Zerinus. I realize my difficulty was, in part, based on the archaic English used by the King James version.

Would you say, then, that the New International Version is an accurate translation of the passage?

Now faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see.
******
​
 
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