Scriptural evidence for "pre-mortal existence". Is there any?

[KathleenGee]

One of the problems, though is Mormonism clearly misreading the Sacred Scriptures to mean what they are not as well as Catholic Teachings.

This is an issue that seems to becoming to the forefront in the past 5 years…Proverbs 8:23-30 implying mortal man when it is obviously God Himself speaking as Wisdom, the first and greatest gifts of the Holy Spirit…as well as other passages…when we as Catholics read them…have explained that God is outside of time, He created time…He knows the past, the present and the future…He knows us before we are born…but we begin at conception…it is God Himself who makes a created being have spirit and grow. Without Him, there is no life.

Also, Mormons follow the Protestants in opposing Catholicism in the Sacred Scripture omitting the Books of Wisdom, Sirach and others that would give one a greater insight into the nature of God, nature law, and the nature of creation.

It took the Church many people and many years to approve those books appropriate for public use by the Church as inspired by God for the Church, and the greatest intent was to insure that what was assembled for the Bible was truly inspired by God…vs Joseph Smith, one man, who was unchallenged…and you have these ongoing changing beliefs…many that do not stand up to natural law and science based on experience…there are no signs of past civilizations to indicate such claims by Smith…

And there is no evidence whatsoever of any great apostasy at the beginning of Christianity…but proof of formity of faith and practice by 100 AD, thus contradicting corrupt doctrine…the universal Christians professed the creed at all liturgies as well as readings of the Old and New Testaments and the Gospel that were available at time.

The Church did not fall out of the sky ready made…just as the people of faith, the Jews journeyed in thier history and evolved, so did Christ’s Church, beginning in the first 300 years of persecution, the latter part the most destructive…overcome by the help of pagan Emperor Constantine who gave the Church freedom to worship and helped build many churches and aided in rebuilding the episcopacy and priesthood, not becoming baptized until days before his death.

I highly recommend the Mormons who are sincere in wanting to learn more about Catholicism go to the same honest and objective sources that we use…

 

[theidler]

Have you missed the obvious fact that it’s the anti-LDS crowd here that are starting these ‘soapbox’ threads?
The LDS posters are primarily responding to correct repeat and egregious misstatements of LDS doctrine.

Go ahead and look who starts these threads!

Do you honestly expect us not to defend against sectarian lies

Suppose I should jump in here before Tony888 really digs too deeply into my statement.

Tony, note the word becoming that I used in my statement.
“I have spoken to the moderator about all the Mormon-related threads, as they are going nowhere, and seem to be merely becoming soapboxes from which LDS members can spread their doctrines.”

Sure, these thread were started by Catholics - they have become ridiculous cesspools of excuses, confusion, and dodging on the part of many (not all) of the Mormon posters. All, I think, anyone is asking for is some actual straight answers - not the party line.

Consider the actual words I used before spouting off in a huff about everything.:tsktsk:

 

[Tony888]

I stand by what I said.

Why can’t you accept DOCTRINE = Party Liine

 

[TexanKnight]

I stand by what I said.

Why can’t you accept DOCTRINE = Party Liine

And I stand by the truth

 

[KathleenGee]

I just added reference…to a past thread…on another present one…‘Theosis Contrasted with Exaltation’…back in November, 2011…there was another one going back so many months more…when CCC460 was brought up again …

I do wonder about Catholics starting threads regarding Mormon topics…especially because same words are used but have different meanings, or there are no answers to challenged Mormon claims, or there are those who joined later than sooner and do not know of the other changing beliefs of Mormonism…

 

[Miriam1947]

paracletepress.com/didache.html

The Didache - The Complete Text
1 There Are Two Ways

1:1 There are two ways, one of life and one of death! and there is a great difference between the two ways.

1:2 The way of life is this: First, you shall love God who made you. And second, love your neighbor as yourself, and do not do to another what you would not want done to you.

1:3 The meaning of these sayings is this: Bless those who curse you, and pray for your enemies, and fast for those who persecute you. For what reward is there for loving those who love you? Do not the heathens do the same? But you should love those who hate you, and then you shall have no enemies.

. . .

2 The Second Commandment

2:1 The second commandment of the teaching is this:

2:2 Do not commit murder; do not commit adultery; do not corrupt boys; do not have illicit sex; do not steal; do not practice magic; do not practice witchcraft; you shall not murder a child, whether it be born or unborn. Do not covet the things of your neighbor.

. . .

11 Welcome the Teacher

11:1 Welcome the teacher when he comes to instruct you in all that has been said.

11:2 But if he turns and trains you in another tradition to the destruction of this teaching, do not listen. If he teaches so as to increase righteousness and the knowledge of the Lord, receive him as the Lord.

. . .

We have believed this from the beginning. Go to the link for the whole thing. It’s not all that long. I have this on my Kindle.

Also:

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Didache

The Didache ( /ˈdɪdəkiː/; Koine Greek: Διδαχή) or The Teaching of the Twelve Apostles (Didachē means “Teaching”[1]) is a brief early Christian treatise, dated by most scholars to the late first or early 2nd century.[2] The first line of this treatise is “Teaching of the Lord to the Gentiles (or Nations) by the Twelve Apostles” (Διδαχὴ κυρίου διὰ τῶν δώδεκα ἀποστόλων τοῖς ἔθνεσιν).

The earliest Church writings.

 

[theidler]

I stand by what I said.

Why can’t you accept DOCTRINE = Party Liine

Good for you - while you’re ignoring the meaning of the word “becoming”, I’ll be busy not critically examining false claims of pseudo-prophets and believing every changing doctrine they spew out.

 

[StephenKent]

“. . . Mormons follow the Protestants in opposing Catholicism in the Sacred Scripture omitting the Books of Wisdom, Sirach and others that would give one a greater insight into the nature of God, nature law, and the nature of creation.”

As used in this thread’s question, the phrase “pre-mortal existence” seems to be correctly understood by all posters to refer generally to the belief held by Latter-day Saints that the soul of each human had an existence prior to the time the person’s mortal body was formed in the womb. Everyone apparently agrees that just as much as the question of the fate of the soul *after death *can arise in people’s minds, so, too, in the Latter-day Saint tradition did the question arise of the origin of the soul prior to birth. For both the Roman Catholics and the Latter-day Saints, the matter is considered settled; for the Roman Catholics the question of the origin of the soul prior to birth simply does not arise, for the soul did not exist prior to formation of the body in the womb; for Latter-day Saints, the question does arise and their theology teaches the soul did so exist pre-mortally.

In the postings seeking to discuss the question, the Roman Catholics understandably and justifiably reject the notion of the pre-mortal existence of the spirits of humans, as it was understood by Origen, because his teaching was rejected in the opening Anathema of the Second Council of Constantinople (Fifth General Council) in A.D. 553, convened by the Emperor Justinian.

Apart from the question whether he appealed to scripture to support his view, Origen not only taught that souls enjoyed separate, conscious, personal existence in a previous state, he went beyond that to teach also that souls are sent to this world on account of sin, born into material bodies as a condemnation. (This aspect of his teaching was also rejected by the Council.) While Latter-day Saints accept the view that the existence of man’s soul predates the formation of his body in the womb, they join with Roman Catholics in rejecting Origen’s negative view of embodiment (that it is a punishment for sin).

Latter-day Saints join Roman Catholics and Protestants (and most world religions) in the belief that the soul of man can have continued existence apart from the body after death. Jewish and Christian belief on this account appeals to Psalm 88:10; Isaiah 26:14, 19; Proverbs 2:18; Job 26:5. I think we all agree that is tenable, sound and reliable.

Kathleen is correct in stating that Protestants oppose Catholicism’s acceptance as Sacred Scripture those books that the Protestants flatly and wholly reject (what the Protestants call the “Apocrypha”). She points to Protestants’ “omitting the Books of Wisdom, Sirach and others that would give one a greater insight into the nature of God, nature law sic], and the nature of creation.” But she is actually somewhat misdirected in stating that the Latter-day Saints follow or join the Protestants regarding the Protestants’ rejection of those books.

Although it is true that the Latter-day Saints use the King James Version of the Bible as their authoritative text (which omits the Apocrypha), they do not either reject those additional books of scripture that otherwise are found in the Catholic versions nor do they “oppose Catholicism” in referring only rarely to those books. On the contrary, the Latter-day Saints believe – as a matter of canonized scripture (D&C 91:1, 5) – that in those other books of scripture “there are many things contained therein that are true . . . and whoso is enlighted by the Spirit shall obtain benefit therefrom.” The Latter-day Saints, far from rejecting those texts, accept them, only they do so with caution. Again, the Latter-day Saint view of those scriptures is not at all the Protestant view and the two views should not be lumped together and rejected together.

Take the eighth chapter of the Book of Wisdom, for example. Latter-day Saints likely would accept at face value what is taught therein. Of course, both Catholics and Latter-day Saints, in the end, could be charged with the fallacy of reading into Wisdom chapter 8 their own respective opposing theologies, but one must admit that the text says what the text says (and the rest is left up to interpretation, which some, no doubt will offer).

In chapter 8, the author clearly and unmistakably differentiates between himself, on the one hand, and the *eternal principle of Wisdom *on the other (“Wisdom I loved” (v. 2); "I resolved to have her as my bride: (v. 2); “I fell in love with her beauty” (v. 2); “I therefore determined to take her to share my life” (v. 9); “When I go home I shall take my ease with her” (v. 16)).

Yet, in verses 19-20 we read the following: “I was a boy of happy disposition, I had received a good soul as my lot, or rather, being good,* I had entered an undefiled body*.” Interpret that as one may, it is simply a straightforward reading of the text itself. It seems to constitute “scriptural evidence [not “proof” mind you, but scriptural evidence”] for ‘pre-mortal existence.’"

The foregoing quotations from Wisdom 8 are taken from the New Jerusalem Bible (NJB), a Catholic translation of the Bible published in 1985, the most widely used Roman Catholic Bible outside of the United States, enjoying the imprimatur of Cardinal George Basil Hume. The same texts may be quoted, too, from the Douay-Rheims 1899 American Edition, as follows: “Her [wisdom] have I loved” (v. 2); “* have desired to take her [wisdom] for my spouse” (v. 2); “I became a lover of her [wisdom’s] beauty” (v. 2); “I purposed therefore to take her [wisdom] to me to live with me” (v. 9); “When I go into my house, I shall repose myself with her [e.g., with wisdom]” (v. 16); and “I was a witty child and had received a good soul. And whereas I was more good, I came to a body undefiled” (vv. 19-20).*

 

[Jerusha]

While Latter-day Saints accept the view that the existence of man’s soul predates the formation of his body in the womb, they join with Roman Catholics in rejecting Origen’s negative view of embodiment (that it is a punishment for sin).

Mormon apologists admit that this is a difficult issue, because of previous statements of their prophets. en.fairmormon.org/Mormonism_and_racial_issues/Blacks_and_the_priesthood/Repudiated_ideas/Neutral_in_%22war_in_heaven%22
Perhaps they need to openly repudiate previous prophets more often.

 

[StephenKent]

The post immediately above completely sidesteps any discussion about chapter 8 of the book of Wisdom and, once again, diverts from the discussion of the main issue (whether there is “scriptural evidence for ‘pre-mortal existence’.” One wonders whether the topic for discussion is merely a pretext for bashing Mormons and their beliefs.

How about some cogent, responsive commentary on Wisdom chapter 8?

 

[Mormon_Cultist]

Mormon apologists admit that this is a difficult issue, because of previous statements of their prophets. en.fairmormon.org/Mormonism_and_racial_issues/Blacks_and_the_priesthood/Repudiated_ideas/Neutral_in_%22war_in_heaven%22
Perhaps they need to openly repudiate previous prophets more often.

It’s something else I have noticed since joining and discussing with others on here; non-LDS don’t find it obvious which statements made by previous leaders are held as correct (/binding) and which are not (or they bring them up just to cause argument, but I hope abd assume not). And I suppose I can see why. It seems to me that the Catholic church has always been very outspoken against heretics and heretical teachings, denouncing them and their assosciates very publically, even if some of the things they teach are stil perfectly sound and accepted doctrine, and they are still abiding by the laws of God. Because LDS members know that such individual statements are not automatically accepted as doctrine, there is no need for such a public show of disapproval. The channels through which revelation may come are clearly defined.

 

[StephenKent]

It is simply a matter of Hebrew parallelism where in Wisdom 15 the author also says (this time of the wicked man) that “he [the wicked man] failed to know the one [namely, God] who formed him and inspired him with an active soul and breathed into him a living spirit.” (Wis 15:11.) The word “inspire” means, literally, to put or breathe a spirit into. (From Latin “īnspīrāre.”) To breath a spirit into someone is the same as the inspire him with an active soul. They are one and the same. It is simply a parallelism. The two phrases are saying the same thing, most common in Hebrew texts. The phrase “inspire him with an active soul” is simply repeated a second time later in the verse, using parallel phraseology, “breathe into him a living spirit.” Examples of this abound in the scriptures, such as:

Psalm 19:1-2–

The heavens are telling the glory of God;
and the firmament proclaims his handiwork.

Day to day pours forth speech,
and night to night declares knowledge.

Wisdom 8 and Wisdom 15 both set forth evidence (not proof, mind you, but evidence) of the pre-mortal existence of the human soul. In Wisdom 15, the author clearly identifies two acts committed by God in the formation of each of us: (1) he forms us, and (2) He inspires us with an active soul and breaths into us a living spirit.

Take or leave it as evidence. Latter-day Saints take it.

 

[KathleenGee]

Thank you StephenKent for your clear and understandable explanation of differences.

The Book of Wisdom in the Old Testament is understood as well as ‘nuptials’ between Solomon and his lover…I use that word as he had many…and in the New Testament, the Holy Spirit now as hermeneutical interpreter, relaying to us now Solomon’s nuptials now through Christ’s resurrection and being at the Altar of heaven before the Father, standing as the Lamb…allows the Church now to be the Bride of Christ…Solomon now interpreted as the relationship between Christ and Believers.

Here one must go further into understanding what the Mass is and what it ‘does’ for believers who are nurtured in Eternal Life…now… in the Eucharist, and made clean in the sacrament of penance (mortal sin breaks this relationship and the sacrament of penance restores us.)

We understand Wisdom as the Spirit of God, and as I indicated to you earlier, Wisdom is the greatest and primary gift of the Holy Spirit…so you are seeing One God with distinct functions…Creator and Spirit…this foreshadowing as well as God as communion, of which He is calling us to participate as adopted sons and daughters through Baptism…and the concurring indwelling of the Holy Spirit at Baptism…

The same parallel process as to a human being coming into existence likewise begins with the mutual giving of self by parents…and at the moment of conception, God gives Spirit and Life. Without God, nothing can grow.

We see God as all being…Who lives outside of time…God created time…He created the universe…going back to that one single line of the Book of Wisdom…He created the world through numbers, weights, measurements…the natural order.

He is all knowing, and knows all the past, the present, and the future…and in this capacity as God He ‘knows us before we are born’…He provides us our own unique characteristics…but our coming to being begins at conception…

Otherwise I perceive God with all these spirit people moving and thinking, fully cognizant inside of him…not to be crude…but like a pregnant Mother/Father being…when He has no form of this created world as He is Creator…

The other point is that God wants us to be one, we pray as Catholics for all believers in God --whatever the idea and form…for people of all good will to be one…and for believers in Christ, we are called to be of one heart and one mind as was the beginning church of Jerusalem…the first Christians…and all Jews.

So this communion of heart, soul, and mind cannot be realized if we are a divided house and do not come to the sacred banquet table to break bread.

Judeo Christian history has always upheld the belief in One God and no other…and although there are musings of individual reflections, these reflections however, do not give birth to faith realized and defined within this belief system and history, nor does the belief in premortals bear to living out the Gospel of Christ.

One sees the Spirit of God as Wisdom from the Catholic point of view…never do we believe in premortal existence…St. Augustine has been brought up…prior to his conversion, he lived a promiscuous life, and also was involved in a sect that practiced birth control…a form used in those days…in spite of his theological treatises…nevertheless, he had his personal musings and reflections…thinking if you take an object and put a string through it, and swing it back and forth over a pregnant woman, you can determine the gender of the unborn…

So we must not look at individual men, even saints. We must look to the consistency of faith, practice of belief, and the working of the Holy Spirit among those chosen and authorized by God in those chosen to spirit and truth, to determine for believers…with our assent affirmed in the communion of faith…we as Catholics recognize to this day…to discern what is a false leading and that which is true among members in our own Church…what is to be held in the deposit of faith in God, in Christ, and that what is not.

So we do not believe in testimonies of single men. We instead look at the continuity of faith developed among the gathering of faith documented, witnessed and endured.

 

[KathleenGee]

Yes, if Mormons now profess that God breathes into the soul life and spirit…that part, we are the same…

but we see it happening at the moment of conception…just like we become members of Christ’s body at baptism. Our history of faith does not recognize or understand premortal existence…and in the development of theology, the erudite tradition of St. Thomas Aquinas elaborates on God vs human existence in his book,’ Summa Theologica, book on God’…studied that under a Dominican…and it is very heavy reading…need to do it in a class to ask questions…

Yes, if Mormons can do it, I greatly encourage Mormons to take a class on the Summa on God…with a Dominican friar…it will help you who are sincere in seeking more unity with Catholics…and help you grow in His understanding as it did all of us.

And Book of Wisdom 8, 15…we must realize that references to immortality are conditional…a wise man believes in God…but it is only through Christ that we are given eternal life fulfilled…immortality…joined with our union with God as Wisdom.

Recall that Christ descended into ‘hell’ to take with Him the souls of the just…and Solomon was given a prophetic inspiration of his way to eternal life in believing in Wisdom, in the Holy Spirit of God…but he could not enter heaven except through Christ.

The souls of the just in Old Testament times could not enter heaven and the blessing of eternal life with God, but had to wait for the fulfillment of Scripture…Jesus Christ – His teachings, miracles and healings for mankind, His death on the cross for atonement of sin,to Holy Saturday, where He encountered, we assume, Solomon, Moses, all the just and His resurrection that made all of creation new and restored…with our cooperation in Christ…to His glorious ascension where He stands at the alter, The Lamb of God…united with the Mass here on earth…

It is Christ Who then opened the doors of heaven for the souls of the just, faithful to God, who lived in times prior to His coming.

Yes…it is the duty of the teaching Church to fight heresy…because it is the universal Catholic Church that has the full deposit of faith and leads people to Christ. Again, we come to the Church for God and to learn how to please Him, and for atonement of our sins.

But the Church does not take the place of God or salvation. She is a mother nurturing us and guiding us. Yes, the Church has the mission to proclaim the Good News and to bear the truth of Who Jesus Christ is and His mission to us. It is only made possible by the life of Christ within the Church Who is guided by the Holy Spirit.

For Catholics, then, we do not look at man…we look instead at the office of the hierarchy and their functions. Yes, we have affections and distastes for certain clerics…but our faith is not to be entrusted to any man, including them.

We trust in God alone, and for some of us, it takes a long time. Do not put your trust in man, but in God alone.

 

[TexanKnight]

It’s something else I have noticed since joining and discussing with others on here; non-LDS don’t find it obvious which statements made by previous leaders are held as correct (/binding) and which are not (or they bring them up just to cause argument, but I hope abd assume not). And I suppose I can see why. It seems to me that the Catholic church has always been very outspoken against heretics and heretical teachings, denouncing them and their assosciates very publically, even if some of the things they teach are stil perfectly sound and accepted doctrine, and they are still abiding by the laws of God. Because LDS members know that such individual statements are not automatically accepted as doctrine, there is no need for such a public show of disapproval. The channels through which revelation may come are clearly defined.

Actually, the problem is that LDS do not know which are binding. You have BY declaring that what he says id doctrine re; Adam/God and you guys still claim it is and was never doctrine. That makes BY a liar, which I guess is ok with you

 

[KathleenGee]

As Peter was given the keys to heaven…there is a difference in the perspective of faith having faith in the Church that has its successors as coming from the actual witnesses of Christ Himself in His apostles.

The Orthodox is verifiably based on its establishment by Christ’s apostles.

I do not want to enter into Orthodox issues on CAF at this time.

But what the Orthodox have lacked for the past 900 years or so is the break with the primacy of Peter. Peter was given primacy by Christ when he first began to follow Him, and again prior to Christ’s arrest during Holy Week.

The faith in Christ through Peter as primary apostle affords us communion with God, and likewise as our beliefs are binding as Christ told Peter they would be, to affirm binding articles of faith is also strengthening and life giving…(and note…keys…only fits particular opening…into heaven)…this binding of faith in belief gives us both strength of faith and living faith…given by Christ Himself 2000 years ago. Consider the martyrs who died for Christ.

The Primacy of Peter not only provides us strength of faith, a living faith that is rooted in the Tree of Life, Jesus Christ…but also provides us the universal perspective of faith…apostolic, to go out to share the Good News for all of mankind.

Again the perspective now is both on Scripture and the universal Catholic Church that again in consistency of faith – re- affirms that perspective and truth of life…that we have but one Creator, that our faith is universal…having some kind of connection to all human beings, morality, and that retains the stress on ourselves as deeply human beings…connected with Christ…the Incarnation realized in us…not the emphasis on spirit world and premortal existence.

 

[SteveVH]

As used in this thread’s question, the phrase “pre-mortal existence” seems to be correctly understood by all posters to refer generally to the belief held by Latter-day Saints that the soul of each human had an existence prior to the time the person’s mortal body was formed in the womb. Everyone apparently agrees that just as much as the question of the fate of the soul *after death *can arise in people’s minds, so, too, in the Latter-day Saint tradition did the question arise of the origin of the soul prior to birth. For both the Roman Catholics and the Latter-day Saints, the matter is considered settled; for the Roman Catholics the question of the origin of the soul prior to birth simply does not arise, for the soul did not exist prior to formation of the body in the womb; for Latter-day Saints, the question does arise and their theology teaches the soul did so exist pre-mortally.

I think there is another question here that has not been adressed. To discuss whether or not our soul came into existence prior to our body is one thing. But there is something else that exists in Mormonism that is most troubling to me, and that is that the ultimate source of the human being was not created by God, but is thought to be self-existent; co-eternal with God in the form of some vague “intelligence”. Please correct me if I am wrong in making this statement. To argue that God created our souls prior to creating our bodies is not the argument made in Mormon theology. It is that we existed, in some form (intelligence) apart from God and quite independent of God. God then was dependent upon this “intelligence” in order to form spirit children who then took on flesh.

This completley contradicts the omnipotence of God, making Him dependent upon something other than Himself in order to bring about the human being. Mormon thought goes even further in saying that inert matter is also co-eternal with God, therefore making God dependent upon it as well in order to even create a rock.

I would appreciate your thoughts on this.

 

[StephenKent]

“I think there is another question here that . . . .”

I think Latter-day Saints will be honored to give you their thoughts about your new question. I for one would be honored also to hear your thoughts about the original question. The pending question is at the point of asking about the relevance of the cited passages from chapters 8 and 15 of the Book of Wisdom, scripture that Kathleen mistakenly stated the Latter-day Saints reject but to which, in reality, Latter-day Saints feel fully comfortable citing and upon which they feel perfectly free to place reliance as support for or evidence of (though of course not proof of) their belief in the pre-mortal existence of man.

If we’d like to turn to a different discussion about the ultimate origin of the essence of man, that’s fine. But let’s finish the first topic, too. I myself feel it appropriate to take up the new topic, too, and will attempt to do so in a later posting, still attempting there to be circumspect and respectful in doing so.

Insofar as the original topic is concerned, various definitions of pre-mortality have been allowed by the discussion so far: “fully self-aware moral agent” at one extreme to “raw material” at the other extreme; both would qualify as a pre-mortal “something” in the discussion to date. Now that we are being invited to delve into some discussion not just of *whether *there is scriptural evidence for “pre-mortal existence” but into a discussion of the question of what, if anything, is the *substance or identity *that pre-dates man’s mortality, we get into as you rightly observe, a more fundamental question.

As a final note on the original question, what, indeed, we may ask, was the *ecclesia *of which Paul taught? In the foreknowledge of God, was the “Church” of which he speaks something known only in God’s mind? Romans 8:28-30 forces us to ask, when addressing the notion of the pre-mortal existence of the soul, “When did the election take place?” “Was it before the world?” “Was it at the creation?” “Is it at the resurrection?” Most commentators believe the election took place before the creation of the world, in the eternal councils of God. (*See *O. Michel, Der Brief an die Römer, Meyer iv (Göttingen, 1963) p. 211; C. K. Barrett, The Epistle to the Romans, Harper’s New Testament Commentary (New York, 1957), p. 169.)

This is suggested by the order of the verbs in verse 30. “The Church is thought of here as having been foreordained in the mind of God,” say R. G. Hamerton-Kelly in his Pre-Existence, Wisdom, and The Son of Man: A Study of the Idea of Pre-Existence in the New Testament (Cambridge: Oxford University Press, 1973), p. 154. Says Hamerton-Kelly:

If the commentators are correct in saying that προοράω (I know beforehand) shouold be understood as it is inthe Old Testament and not as a designation for abstract intellection, then the apparent transportation of categories is not complete. If the very means ‘to take note of’, ‘to fix regard upon’, the objects of this knowing must have been sufficiently existent to fulfil their proper function as objects of such activity. The very, therefore, faintly implies that the elect (8:33) really existed when the choid was made."

(Hamerton-Kelly, page 155.)

Any way, enough voluntary commentary on the initial question; I’ll respond to responses on that if any responses are forthcoming. I’d truly like to see commentary on Wisdom 8 and 15. But meanwhil, I’ll also respond for the first time, later, to this new question about the *nature *of what existed pre-mortally and give my personal thoughts on the matter (not binding on the LDS Church, of course).

As a sort of post-script to Kathleen, I think she confused the term “Orthodoxy” (as generally it is used in scholarly literature to describe the pre-Nicene orthodoxy/heresy divergence) with the term Orthodox Catholic Church (referring to Eastern Rite Catholics).

If anyone wants to address Wisdom 8 and Wisdom 15 in a substantive way, that might be interesting to read.

 

[Pepband_Mom]

Precisely the point regarding those one or two early “Church Fathers” in the Latter-day Saint tradition who held *personal *views about Roman Catholicism that the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints *rejected *as not at all conveying the feelings, sentiments, teachings or doctrines of the LDS Church.

Sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander.

Perhaps Kathleen can feel inclined to modify her statement that it was the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints that referred to the Catholic Church as the “harlot church” (her phrase). The LDS Church has never, ever said any such thing.

To paraphrase a well-known authority on the subject: “early Church Fathers can speak from their own opinions but not all their ideas or teachings are within orthodox Church teachings.”

I’ll comment more on Origen at some other point later today. It is interesting that the first anathema against him on the point of pre-mortal existence of man does not mention any *scriptures * in otherwise countering the point he attempted to make whereby he did make reference to scriptures.

Kent Re: Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints “never” referred to the Catholic church as the “harlot church” - maybe they don’t say HARLOT CHURCH per se but:

1. See "The Evening and the Morning Star (1832, vol. 1, No. 1, p.3 said that the changes in the Bible were made “by the Mother of Harlots while it was confined in that Church, – say, from the year A.D. 460 to 1400.”
2. See Orson Pratt’s Works, “The Bible Alone An Insufficient Guide,” pp.38-39
   "…Even the Catholic Church herself, evidently places no confidence in the popes and bishops, the pretended successors of St. Peter and the rest of the apostles; if she did, she would have canonized their revelations along with the rest of the revelations of the New Testament…Well might the revelator John,…call her ‘THE MOTHER OF HARLOTS AND ABOMINATIONS OF THE EARTH!’ "

What was that about NEVER, EVER…I’m sure I can find other examples - Church of Harlots, Mother of Harlots all the same, eh???

What about the “sacred” “Temple” ceremonies - surely there’s something we can find about the Catholic Harlot there :hypno: or at least “abomination”

Hmmmm, your writers equate the Bride of Christ is the “Mother of Harlots”…

Most NON-CHRISTIAN WORLD BELIEF SYSTEMS as well as many Prot groups strangely say the same thing about the RCC - To my estimation, this comes from pure ignorance or some other source & it’s not good… woe to those who call evil good and good evil… (see Proverbs)

 

[StephenKent]

“The Evening and the Morning Star (1832, vol. 1, No. 1, p.3 . . . Orson Pratt’s Works . . .”

We’re all beyond that Pepband Mom. (See the many prior posts on this topic, a topic begun by Kathleen.) William W. Phelps (editor and publisher of the Evening and Morning Star) did not speak for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Orson Pratt in his personal writings also did not speak for the Church. Indeed, the Church ordered his writings destroyed. Not one poster, either Catholic or LDS, has cited or quoted one statement by the Church. Not one. That discussion is exhausted. Sorry you’re late to it.

Right now, as far as concerns the topic of scriptural evidence for “pre-mortal existence,” we are addressing the meaning of passages found in the Book of Wisdom, chapters 8 and 15. And then the prospect will be to move to a related, more fundamental topic, invited by the originator of this topic. (See posts immediately above.)