Difference between pages "File:Map-of-River-Adur-catchment.png" and "A Response to "Why Mormonism is not Christianity – the Issue of Christology""

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This is a Response to: "[https://www.patheos.com/blogs/bibleandculture/2012/08/27/why-mormons-are-not-christians-the-issue-of-christology/ Why Mormonism is not Christianity – the Issue of Christology]" by Dr. Ben Witherington, which appeared 27 August 2012  in Patheos’ The Bible & Culture
  
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<blockquote>''N.B.: Text in '''bold black''' color is the original article by Dr. Witherington. Text in '''<span style="color:darkred;">red</span>''' color is my response. Scripture quotations in my response are in '''<span style="color:blue; font-weight:bold;">blue</span>'''. A quotation from C. S. Lewis appears in '''<span style="color:green;">green</span>'''.'' </blockquote>
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'''While there are many reasons why Evangelical Christians of all stripes might disagree with Mormon theology, perhaps the most important of these is Christology and the related matter of soteriology.'''
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<blockquote><span style="color:darkred;font-weight:bold;">Note: “Soteriology” is the study of religious doctrines of salvation.</span></blockquote>
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'''I would encourage you to read carefully through the statement at the link below by a practicing Mormon scholar, presented at Harvard Divinity School a few years ago. Here is the link: What Mormons Believe About Jesus Christ (in order to actually find this page you will need to do a Google Search of ‘What Mormons believe’ and then scroll down to the entry from 2001 when Millet spoke at Harvard. It has been taken down from the Mormon website).
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<blockquote><span style="color:darkred; font-weight:bold;>Note: It isn’t accurate to say that it was taken down from the LDS website; it’s now absent from the Harvard Divinity School website. However, it can be found at the LDS website, at this link: [https://newsroom.churchofjesuschrist.org/article/what-mormons-believe-about-jesus-christ What Latter-day Saints Believe About Jesus Christ] </span></blockquote>
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'''Please note that these views, as expressed by Mr. Millet are not unusual or eccentric, rather they are typical.'''
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<blockquote><span style="color:darkred; font-weight:bold;>It is interesting to note that the author refers to Robert L. Millet, the author of the referenced statement, simply as ''Mr.'' Millet, as though he were unaware that ''Dr.'' Millet is a professor of ancient scripture and an emeritus Dean of Religious Education at Brigham Young University. Dr. Millet’s Ph.D. in biblical studies and contemporary theology was obtained from Florida State University, a non-LDS institution. This aversion to recognizing legitimate academic status of LDS scholars is telling.</span></blockquote>
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'''While it is true that in some respects, Mormons have more disagreements with Catholics and Orthodox Christians than they do with Evangelicals they certainly have major differences with Evangelicals as well. They could not, for example, in good conscious sign a faith statement that the Evangelical Theological Society might present to them for membership in that society. What are these major differences? Here it will be worth listing just a few in this post:'''
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'''1. Mormons are polytheists, not monotheists. That is, they believe that the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are three separate beings, thus denying the essential monotheistic statements of both the OT and NT that God is One.'''
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<blockquote><span style="color:darkred; font-weight:bold;>It is false that LDS are polytheists. The Book of Mormon itself testifies:</span></blockquote>
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<blockquote><span style="color:blue; font-weight:bold;">“And now, behold, my beloved brethren, this is the way; and there is none other way nor name given under heaven whereby man can be saved in the kingdom of God. And now, behold, this is the doctrine of Christ, and the only and true doctrine of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost, which is one God, without end. Amen.”</span></blockquote>
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<blockquote><span style="color:darkred; font-weight:bold;>What Latter-day Saints deny is that the description of deity in the Nicene and other creeds are accurate descriptions of the nature of God. Nor are the doctrines taught in the any of those creeds biblical, or supportable by biblical scripture. If adherence to scriptural doctrines of the nature of God as taught in the biblical scriptures is a prerequisite to being designated with the sobriquet “Christian”, then is it is the Latter-day Saints who are Christian, not either the Evangelical or Catholic confessions.</span></blockquote>
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<blockquote><span style="color:darkred; font-weight:bold;>When Jesus prays to the Father, he never seems to be praying to himself, which is what he would have to do, if the Father and the Son were one in person. When Jesus is baptized, the Father speaks from Heaven, and the Holy Ghost descends upon him in the form of a dove. If they were one in person, then why would all three manifest separately? We assert that they are one God, but three in person.</span></blockquote>
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'''2. Mormons, thus, not surprisingly, deny the doctrine of the Trinity, calling it an amalgam of Greek ideas with Biblical ideas. Their basic view is that the original doctrine of God and of the ‘priesthood’ and key ideas about sacrifice, and leadership of the NT era were lost, as the church became entirely apostate and needed to be renewed, and that the NT church was not renewed until Joseph Smith came along in the 19th century (who btw, had an interest in Methodism whilst he was in Palmyra N.Y. and apparently took part in some of the revivals in the ‘Burnt Over District’ there in the first part of the 19th century). Mormons see the ecumenical councils which produced the Nicene Creed or the Apostle’s Creed or the Chalcedonian creed as in essence contradictory to what Scripture teaches.'''
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<blockquote><span style="color:darkred; font-weight:bold;>This is an accurate assessment.</span></blockquote>
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<blockquote><span style="color:darkred; font-weight:bold;>Now, this being our belief, why should we crave admittance to a body of faith that we could unkindly call apostate? Our claim to Christianity is not based on harmony with the incorrect doctrines of traditional Christianity, but is based on a reasonable commonality: that we proclaim that Jesus of Nazareth is the Son of God and the Savior of all mankind, because His atonement, death on the cross, and resurrection has won for all mankind the opportunity to be resurrected and to enter into the Kingdom of God. If that commonality isn’t enough to be awarded the sobriquet “Christian”, then that sobriquet is meaningless. And we might as well deny it to all but ourselves. But we don’t; we grant it readily to all Christians.</span></blockquote>
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<blockquote><span style="color:darkred; font-weight:bold;>As Jesus Himself said,</span></blockquote>
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<blockquote><span style="color:blue; font-weight:bold;">Not every one that saith unto me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven; but he that doeth the will of my Father which is in heaven.” (Matthew 7:21) </span></blockquote>
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<blockquote><span style="color:darkred; font-weight:bold;>Doing the will of our Father in heaven does not obligate us to adhere to the Nicene creed, or follow the dictates of men.</span></blockquote>
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<blockquote><span style="color:darkred; font-weight:bold;>It could be argued that the Trinitarian doctrine of the Nicene Creed is partly an attempt to escape from the uncomfortable notion that the Godhead consists of three individuals, the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, who could otherwise be seen to be three Gods, and thus make Christianity polytheistic.</span></blockquote>
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'''3. Mormons believe that even God the Father has, and apparently, needs a body, denying that God in the divine nature is spirit. Indeed they believe that God the Father is an exalted man!'''
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<blockquote><span style="color:darkred; font-weight:bold;>Again, an accurate representation! Mostly.</span></blockquote>
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<blockquote><span style="color:darkred; font-weight:bold;>But we do not deny that God is spirit. The only thing we deny here is that God is only spirit. Man has a spirit as well as a body that was given him by God, and Jesus will restore ours to us after death through His resurrection. This strongly implies that God has a body as well. How is this, you might ask? Just answer the question, what did Jesus do with his body after His resurrection? Did He give it up again? If Jesus’s resurrection was only temporary, and having an immortal body is not important, then why was there a resurrection at all? Taking this further, in whose image were men created? Genesis says in the image of God. And far from God not having any body, parts or passions, as per the creeds, God demonstrated his body parts to the prophet Moses, in that he showed him his back parts, but not his face (Exodus 33:23). If God has a face, and back parts, then he must have a body.</span></blockquote>
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<blockquote><span style="color:darkred; font-weight:bold;>Ancient Greek philosophy was heavy into the idea of ideals, which denigrated physicality as being unideal. Under this concept God, being ideal, cannot have a body. But should Christian doctrine follow pagan philosophy? The Latter-day Saints say “No.”</span></blockquote>
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'''4. Just as they believe that the early church became apostate, they also believe the Bible as we have it is not inerrant or always truthful and trustworthy, even on major issues like Christology, and therefore needs to be supplemented (and corrected) by subsequent prophetic revelation in documents like the Book of Mormon, or even The Pearl of Great Price.'''
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<blockquote><span style="color:darkred; font-weight:bold;>To start with, does even the Bible proclaim that it is inerrant? No, it does not. And what is the Bible, anyway? Just like the Old Testament, the New Testament was not written all at once or by any one author. The Bible as accepted by Dr. Witherington did not take its final form until very late in early Christian history. At what point, then, did the Bible become inerrant? Was it errant up to that point? If having a whole Bible is important before we can say that it is inerrant, what actually is the whole Bible?</span></blockquote>
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<blockquote><span style="color:darkred; font-weight:bold;>Among Christian denominations there has been some disagreement about what should be included in the canon, primarily about the biblical apocrypha, a list of works that are regarded with varying levels of respect. But aside from the apocrypha, there was a great deal of disagreement early in Christian history, as to which “books” were part of the accepted canon.</span></blockquote>
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<blockquote><span style="color:darkred; font-weight:bold;>For example, of the seven New Testament codices that were developed before 500 AD, only about half of them accepted Revelation, and they variously excluded the Timothies, Hebrews, James, the Peters, the 3 Johns and Jude. Does this look like some kind of divine inerrancy? The Latter-day Saints say no, it does not. It looks like fallible men deciding what they did and did not like, or it reflects what they did and did not have.</span></blockquote>
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<blockquote><span style="color:darkred; font-weight:bold;>In addition, there are several epistles (or groups of epistles) that were accepted as genuine for varying amounts of time, but are not accepted any longer. There are seven epistles referenced in existing canon that have been lost.</span></blockquote>
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<blockquote><span style="color:darkred; font-weight:bold;>It needs to be pointed out that none of the canonical gospels or epistles of the New Testament, nor the Apocalypse of John (Revelation) were accorded the status of scripture at the time they were written. And of all these works, scholarly consensus is that almost none of them were written by the persons whom they are traditionally attributed to.</span></blockquote>
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<blockquote><span style="color:darkred; font-weight:bold;>According to modern biblical scholarship, if that is to be trusted, the only books of the New Testament that were actually written by their purported authors are these seven Pauline epistles: Romans; 1 and 2 Corinthians; Galatians;  Philippians; 1 Thessalonians; and Philemon. Philippians is believed to be genuine Pauline material, but it was not written as one unified letter. It is rather a compilation of fragments from three separate letters from Paul to the church in Philippi. The Pauline epistle to the Ephesians is not believed to have been written by Paul, but is believed to have been written by some unknown person 25 years after Paul’s death. And whether Paul wrote Colossians, 2 Thessalonians, 1 or 2 Timothy, Titus, or Hebrews, is also disputed in varying degrees.</span></blockquote>
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<blockquote><span style="color:darkred; font-weight:bold;>And as for the rest, James may have been written by some James, but it is unknown which one, 1 Peter may have been written by the Apostle Peter, but 2 Peter definitely was not. The consensus is that none of the three epistles of John were written by John the Apostle, the son of Zebedee. And it is uncertain which of three possible Judes wrote Jude, if any of them.</span></blockquote>
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<blockquote><span style="color:darkred; font-weight:bold;>So, not only do we not know who wrote the bulk of these Christian scriptures, we can only hope that none of them contain any false or misunderstood doctrine. So, we’re assuming a great deal, if we assume inerrancy.</span></blockquote>
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<blockquote><span style="color:darkred; font-weight:bold;>And then you say that Bible doesn’t need any supplementation?</span></blockquote>
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'''5. In terms of soteriology, Mormons deny the sufficiency of Christ’s death for salvation. They suggest, as the linked article says, that each of us must do all we can and then trust in the mercy of God. In other words, the de facto position is that Mormonism is to a significant degree a works religion even when it comes to salvation.'''
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<blockquote><span style="color:darkred; font-weight:bold;>Latter-day Saints do not deny the sufficiency of Christ’s atonement for salvation. Latter-day Saints believe that without Christ, no salvation is possible. But is salvation possible entirely without works? The book of James says not. The entire second chapter is an admonition of the need for works. James 2:14 asks:</span></blockquote>
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<blockquote><span style="color:blue; font-weight:bold;">“What doth it profit, my brethren, though a man say he hath faith, and have not works? can faith save him?”</span></blockquote>
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<blockquote><span style="color:darkred; font-weight:bold;>The answer is clearly “No!”</span></blockquote>
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<blockquote><span style="color:darkred; font-weight:bold;>The conundrum here is simply this: if no works are required to gain salvation, why does the Bible talk about them practically constantly?  It would take a smart theologian to explain this, and I’ve seen some really convoluted explanations for it.</span></blockquote>
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<blockquote><span style="color:darkred; font-weight:bold;>My question is then: how little can a Christian get away with doing in order to ensure himself salvation? When Jesus told Nicodemus that baptism was required, was he joking? When at Pentecost, when the men who heard Peter preach about Jesus were touched and asked what they should do, was Peter speaking heresy when he told them they had to repent and be baptized? Why didn’t he tell them that repentance and baptism (clearly "works") were nice, but not required?</span></blockquote>
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<blockquote><span style="color:darkred; font-weight:bold;>I know why this fear of works exists. It was a reaction to the Catholic doctrines that Martin Luther rebelled against, the ones that made men pay money, or take on difficult or painful tasks in order to ensure forgiveness for sin. </span></blockquote>
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<blockquote><span style="color:darkred; font-weight:bold;>This reaction went overboard, however. Christ still requires obedience to God’s law, and Christ’s grace still requires obedience.</span></blockquote>
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<blockquote><span style="color:blue; font-weight:bold;">If ye keep my commandments, ye shall abide in my love; even as I have kept my Father’s commandments, and abide in his love. (John 15:10)</span></blockquote>
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<blockquote><span style="color:darkred; font-weight:bold;>Reading this, does it still sound optional? Jesus himself proclaims his obedience to God's commandments! When some Christians ask "What would Jesus do?" are they not asserting the need to follow Christ's example?  And just a few verses later, when the Lord says:</span></blockquote>
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<blockquote><span style="color:blue; font-weight:bold;">These things I command you, that ye love one another,</span></blockquote>
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<blockquote><span style="color:darkred; font-weight:bold;>...does that sound optional, too? In my experience, love is not passive; love is active. It requires works. As John said in 1 John 2:4:</span></blockquote>
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<blockquote><span style="color:blue; font-weight:bold;">He that saith, I know him, and keepeth not his commandments, is a liar, and the truth is not in him.</span></blockquote>
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'''6. The goal of Mormon soteriology is that we all become as ‘gods’ become both immortal and divine, blurring the creator/creature distinction which was already badly blurred by a theology that suggested that God is actually a sort of uber-human being, with less flaws. One rather familiar teaching is ‘as God was, so we are. As God is, so we shall be’.'''
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<blockquote><span style="color:darkred; font-weight:bold;>What does God intend for us? Is our ultimate goal the awarding of wings and the flying around in the clouds strumming a harp? Not according to the Bible.</span></blockquote>
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<blockquote><span style="color:blue; font-weight:bold;">1 John 3:2 – Beloved, now are we the sons of God, and it doth not yet appear what we shall be: but we know that, when he shall appear, ''we shall be like him''; for we shall see him as he is. ''(emphasis added)''</span></blockquote>
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<blockquote><span style="color:blue; font-weight:bold;">Romans 8:16-17 – The Spirit itself beareth witness with our spirit, that we are the children of God: ''And if children, then heirs; heirs of God, and joint-heirs with Christ''; if so be that we suffer with him, that we may be also glorified together. ''(emphasis added)''</span></blockquote>
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<blockquote><span style="color:darkred; font-weight:bold;>Jesus teaches us explicitly throughout the Gospel that God is our Father. The Lord’s Prayer makes that quite clear. Now, if John and Paul both confirm that we are God’s children, and we are His heirs, and joint-heirs with Christ, then what are we? Are we not of the same species, if of lesser stature, as God?</span></blockquote>
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<blockquote><span style="color:darkred; font-weight:bold;>Is our “becom[ing] both immortal and divine” such an outlandish notion, then? Even the great Christian writer C. S. Lewis saw an inkling of this, when he wrote:</span></blockquote>
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<blockquote><span style="color:green;">'''“It is a serious thing to live in a society of possible gods and goddesses, to remember that the dullest most uninteresting person you can talk to may one day be a creature which, if you saw it now, you would be strongly tempted to worship, or else a horror and a corruption such as you now meet, if at all, only in a nightmare. All day long we are, in some degree helping each other to one or the other of these destinations. It is in the light of these overwhelming possibilities, it is with the awe and the circumspection proper to them, that we should conduct all of our dealings with one another, all friendships, all loves, all play, all politics. There are no ordinary people. You have never talked to a mere mortal. Nations, cultures, arts, civilizations - these are mortal, and their life is to ours as the life of a gnat. But it is immortals whom we joke with, work with, marry, snub, and exploit - immortal horrors or everlasting splendors.”''' – The Weight of Glory and Other Addresses</span></blockquote>
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<blockquote><span style="color:darkred; font-weight:bold;>In the parable of the talents, the Lord rewards the servants according to their success in using that which has been entrusted to them: </span></blockquote>
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<blockquote><span style="color:blue; font-weight:bold;">“His lord said unto him, Well done, good and faithful servant; thou hast been faithful over a few things, I will make thee ruler over many things: enter thou into the joy of thy lord.” (Matthew 25:23) </span></blockquote>
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<blockquote><span style="color:darkred; font-weight:bold;>In short, the Lord is looking for those whom He can entrust great responsibilities to. Would not inheriting rulership from God be a great divine responsibility? And would we not have become “as gods”?</span></blockquote>
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<blockquote><span style="color:darkred; font-weight:bold;>What did Jesus mean here, in John 10:31-35:</span></blockquote>
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<blockquote><span style="color:blue; font-weight:bold;">
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31 Then the Jews took up stones again to stone him.
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32 Jesus answered them, Many good works have I shewed you from my Father; for which of those works do ye stone me?
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33 The Jews answered him, saying, For a good work we stone thee not; but for blasphemy; and because that thou, being a man, makest thyself God.
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34 Jesus answered them, Is it not written in your law, I said, Ye are gods?
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35 If he called them gods, unto whom the word of God came, and the scripture cannot be broken...
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</span></blockquote>
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<blockquote><span style="color:darkred; font-weight:bold;>Sticky situation for the Pharisees, not so? Also for the modern Pharisees, who fain to judge who is Christian and who is not.</span></blockquote>
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'''I bring this issue up now, because of the general ignorance of the American public about whether or not Mormons are actually Christians or not. If they really embrace the official positions of their religious group, they are not Christians, though they often present themselves as such, for example, calling their meeting places churches sometimes (but notice— no crosses to be found on top, or worn either).'''
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<blockquote><span style="color:darkred; font-weight:bold;>Well, again, who is the gatekeeper who gets to say who is a Christian? And who gets to say that a building can be called a church? And why does a Christian have to wear a cross or his buildings be decorated with them? That is an outward show of religiosity, and I thought Jesus taught against that?</span></blockquote>
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'''What of course makes this whole deal slippery is that Mormon doctrine is a constantly evolving thing due to a belief in the living voice of prophecy. For example, the head of the Mormon Church in my lifetime corrected what had previously been taught by Mormonism’s original leaders (e.g. Brigham Young) that black people were the descendents of the least favored race of the big three (Shem, Ham, and Japeth), and as such could not become priests in the Mormon church. Not so, any more.'''
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<blockquote><span style="color:darkred; font-weight:bold;>Not to get too deeply into whataboutism, but slippery doctrines in the non-LDS world are endemic. How may Christian churches now accept gay marriage? How many Christian denominations practiced strict racial segregation and discrimination against blacks, and taught it from their pulpits? The origin of the African Methodist Episcopal Church is in the racism of the Methodist Church in America. The origin of the Southern Baptist Convention (SBC) was in the refusal of the southern congregations of the American Baptists to accept the idea of the abolition of slavery. And in turn, the origin of the predominantly black National Baptist Convention is in the racism of the Southern Baptists. And of course, today the SBC has switched sides, going from rejecting racial integration and preaching white supremacy, and now welcomes the minorities it used to discriminate against.</span></blockquote>
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<blockquote><span style="color:darkred; font-weight:bold;>Let’s check to see who was involved in opening it up that black members of the LDS church could be ordained to the priesthood. This was Spencer W. Kimball. He was the prophet at the time. He claimed that it was in accordance with a revelation from God. Given that, there are two alternatives: was it a genuine revelation; or was it a man’s decision? If it was a revelation, then presumably it came from God. Is God permitted to change His will, or must He be guided by man’s decisions? Which evangelical body does God need to come to in order to get His will ratified?</span></blockquote>
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'''It is of course true that there are Christians who are a part of the Mormon religion. I would call them confused Christians who know neither church history very well (including the history of the origins of Mormonism in America and the actual origin of the Book of Mormon), nor do they know what the NT actually teaches when it comes to things like Christology and salvation and the nature of the Scriptures.'''
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'''It is typical of groups like the Mormons (any of the branches) or the Jehovah’s Witness that they are actually split offs from some orthodox Christian group, in both cases from Protestantism. Not surprisingly then, they have more in common with Protestants in some respects than they do with Catholics or the Orthodox, except in regard to the matter of an all male priesthood and therefore the nature of worship.'''
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<blockquote><span style="color:darkred; font-weight:bold;>I’d argue against the idea of the LDS being some kind of Protestant offshoot. I don’t know enough to comment about the Jehovah’s Witnesses. The origin of the LDS is too different, and the doctrines in both cases are too uniquely different to be reasonably attributed to any kind of offshooting. As he points out, the LDS doctrine of male-only priesthood is closer to the Catholic model, at least in modern times, and the LDS political organization with respect to a central authority is more similar to the Catholic model than a Protestant one.</span></blockquote>
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'''Mormonism certainly is a highly patriarchal religion, modeled more in its praxis on Leviticus than say on what is said in the NT letters about male and female apostles, prophets, teachers, and this also extends to the Mormon view of the physical family which is far from egalitarian in character.'''
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<blockquote><span style="color:darkred; font-weight:bold;>So, where in the New Testament does it talk about female apostles, prophets, and teachers? To have it Paul’s way, women have to be silent in church. In any case, probably half the teachers in LDS Sunday School, Primary (under-12 children), Seminary (high schoolers) and Institute of Religion (college-aged) classrooms are female. And all of the teachers in Relief Society (adult women) and Young Women (teenaged girls) are female. There are also women in the leadership of the world-wide auxiliary organizations (Relief Society, Young Women, and Primary), and they regularly preach at the worldwide General Conference, twice a year.</span></blockquote>
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'''I am not suggesting for a moment that there aren’t many Mormons that would pass the test of being decent and honest and loving human beings. There are. I know some of them. Nor can one fault their zeal for their form of religion, indeed their missionaries often put actual Christian missionaries to shame. Nor would I suggest that these folks are deliberate deceivers of other people. The ones I know are not. They are sincere and committed to Mormonism, and truly believe it is the true religion.'''
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'''What I would say is that they are deceived about what the Bible really teaches about the nature of God, of Christ, of salvation, and of true humanity, not to mention the nature of the Scriptures which are indeed the sufficient rule of faith and practice for all true Christians and do not require supplements or corrections from Joseph Smith’s works.'''
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'''Why have I posted this now? Because of the many times I am asked these days, the question– Can Evangelicals vote for Mitt Romney? I have done a previous post, some time ago for Beliefnet about Mitt Romney in regard to his previous campaigns for high office. I will not repeat that here. I think deciding on who to vote for as President should involve a consideration of many different factors, many different pros and cons of the two candidates.'''
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'''I think each person must make up their own mind who they will vote for, but the point of this post is that such important decisions should not be made on the basis of false assumptions, and particularly not on the basis of false assumptions about a person’s actual religion.'''
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'''SPOILER ALERT: THINGS YOU SHOULD NOT SAY IN RESPONSE TO THIS POST'''
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'''1) ‘You’re just prejudiced, you don’t know what you’re talking about, and that’s just your opinion’.'''
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'''Wrong. These are the facts. I have taught classes on both world and American religions, and what I have said is based either on what Mormons themselves have said about their beliefs, and/or what their source documents say about the same.'''
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<blockquote><span style="color:darkred; font-weight:bold;>I appreciate your honest attempt to represent our beliefs, but your “facts” are nevertheless inaccurate and incomplete.</span></blockquote>
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'''2) ‘This is unkind and untimely. Everyone should have the right to their own religious beliefs and should not be criticized for them. If a person wants to call himself a Christian, then he or she must be a Christian.’'''
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'''Yes ... and no. Yes, a person has an American right to freedom of religion. No, a private individual does not get to decide for themselves what is and isn’t true or is or isn’t orthodox Christianity, and that includes me. Christian beliefs need to match up with what the Bible in fact claims, and what the historic creeds and confessions of the church have understood the Bible to say and mean. Furthermore, even if we were talking about genuine Christian groups, no single group has the authority to add additional books to the sacred canon of Scriptures, whether it be the Book of Mormon or something else. The Bible is both the necessary and sufficient revelation of God and God’s character and God’s will. All three great monotheistic religions recognize the Bible or some part of it as God’s Word. None of them recognize the Book of Mormon as the necessary appendix to the Bible.'''
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<blockquote><span style="color:darkred; font-weight:bold;>This last sentence about the non-recognition of the Book of Mormon is actually somewhat amusing. Because of the claimed divine origin of the Book of Mormon, if any of them recognized it as a necessary appendix to the Bible, they’d have to be in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, or at least one of the other Restorationist bodies, such as the Community of Christ (former Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints).</span></blockquote>
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<blockquote><span style="color:darkred; font-weight:bold;>When you write that “no single group has the authority to add additional books to the sacred canon of Scriptures” you completely gloss over the fact that the LDS don’t claim to be adding to it. The LDS claim that it is God who has added to it. Or are you saying that God doesn’t have that right?</span></blockquote>
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<blockquote><span style="color:darkred; font-weight:bold;>The Book of Mormon anticipated this. In 2 Nephi 29:3 it is recorded that God said:</span></blockquote>
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<blockquote><span style="color:blue; font-weight:bold;">And because my words shall hiss forth—many of the Gentiles shall say: A Bible! A Bible! We have got a Bible, and there cannot be any more Bible.</span></blockquote>
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<blockquote><span style="color:darkred; font-weight:bold;>To which is added in verse 10:</span></blockquote>
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<blockquote><span style="color:blue; font-weight:bold;">Wherefore, because that ye have a Bible ye need not suppose that it contains all my words; neither need ye suppose that I have not caused more to be written.</span></blockquote>
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<blockquote><span style="color:darkred; font-weight:bold;>Is there a closed canon? No more scripture? Where is this written in the Bible? There are two verses in the Bible, one in the Old and one in the New Testament, that warn men against adding to or taking away from the scriptures. But did God include Himself in this prohibition? He clearly did not, since presumably the New Testament was added to the Old Testament, and God was OK with that.</span></blockquote>
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<blockquote><span style="color:darkred; font-weight:bold;>When you say that the Bible is all we need, you are contradicting the Bible itself, are you not? When Paul says to Timothy, in 2 Timothy 3:16</span></blockquote>
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<blockquote><span style="color:blue; font-weight:bold;">All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness:</span></blockquote>
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<blockquote><span style="color:darkred; font-weight:bold;>We must then ask, what is scripture? If God gave us the Book of Mormon, is it not scripture? And therefore profitable for what Paul says? I accept that you don’t believe the Book of Mormon to be scripture. But your disbelief doesn’t mean that it isn’t scripture.</span></blockquote>
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'''3) ‘Aren’t we disputing about words and minor issues here.’'''
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'''No we are not. The attempt to trivialize important theological issues, and make them a mere dispute about words is frankly an insult to the earliest Christians, many of whom died for their monotheistic and Trinitarian beliefs. Yes indeed, it does matter what the content is of your religious belief.'''
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<blockquote><span style="color:darkred; font-weight:bold;>I dispute that either Peter or Paul were contemplating the Trinitarian idea of the Godhead while being crucified at Rome. Not least of which because that doctrine wasn’t compounded until they had been dead for over 200 years. Were they monotheists, though? Of course they were. And so are the Latter-day Saints.</span></blockquote>
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'''4) ‘But look at all the energy and zeal and earnestness and deep commitment of Mormons. Isn’t that to be commended?’'''
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'''Yes and no. Zeal that is not according to knowledge does not honor the real God, and is misguided. Sincerity is not the same thing as true faith. A person can be sincerely wrong, indeed badly wrong however convinced they are of what they believe. So, yes some of these traits are commendable, if they are properly directed and guided and serving the God of the Bible and the good of humankind.’'''
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'''I could go on, but this is more than enough for you to chew on. Think on these things.'''
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<blockquote><span style="color:darkred; font-weight:bold;>You’re right when you say “Zeal that is not according to knowledge does not honor the real God, and is misguided.” All that remains is for the real misguidance to be adduced. </span></blockquote>
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----
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Back to [[Writings#Apologetics|My Writings]]
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[[Category: Theological Writings]]
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[[Category: My Writings]]

Latest revision as of 07:19, 6 January 2024

This is a Response to: "Why Mormonism is not Christianity – the Issue of Christology" by Dr. Ben Witherington, which appeared 27 August 2012 in Patheos’ The Bible & Culture


N.B.: Text in bold black color is the original article by Dr. Witherington. Text in red color is my response. Scripture quotations in my response are in blue. A quotation from C. S. Lewis appears in green.


While there are many reasons why Evangelical Christians of all stripes might disagree with Mormon theology, perhaps the most important of these is Christology and the related matter of soteriology.

Note: “Soteriology” is the study of religious doctrines of salvation.

I would encourage you to read carefully through the statement at the link below by a practicing Mormon scholar, presented at Harvard Divinity School a few years ago. Here is the link: What Mormons Believe About Jesus Christ (in order to actually find this page you will need to do a Google Search of ‘What Mormons believe’ and then scroll down to the entry from 2001 when Millet spoke at Harvard. It has been taken down from the Mormon website).

Note: It isn’t accurate to say that it was taken down from the LDS website; it’s now absent from the Harvard Divinity School website. However, it can be found at the LDS website, at this link: What Latter-day Saints Believe About Jesus Christ

Please note that these views, as expressed by Mr. Millet are not unusual or eccentric, rather they are typical.

It is interesting to note that the author refers to Robert L. Millet, the author of the referenced statement, simply as Mr. Millet, as though he were unaware that Dr. Millet is a professor of ancient scripture and an emeritus Dean of Religious Education at Brigham Young University. Dr. Millet’s Ph.D. in biblical studies and contemporary theology was obtained from Florida State University, a non-LDS institution. This aversion to recognizing legitimate academic status of LDS scholars is telling.

While it is true that in some respects, Mormons have more disagreements with Catholics and Orthodox Christians than they do with Evangelicals they certainly have major differences with Evangelicals as well. They could not, for example, in good conscious sign a faith statement that the Evangelical Theological Society might present to them for membership in that society. What are these major differences? Here it will be worth listing just a few in this post:

1. Mormons are polytheists, not monotheists. That is, they believe that the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are three separate beings, thus denying the essential monotheistic statements of both the OT and NT that God is One.

It is false that LDS are polytheists. The Book of Mormon itself testifies:

“And now, behold, my beloved brethren, this is the way; and there is none other way nor name given under heaven whereby man can be saved in the kingdom of God. And now, behold, this is the doctrine of Christ, and the only and true doctrine of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost, which is one God, without end. Amen.”

What Latter-day Saints deny is that the description of deity in the Nicene and other creeds are accurate descriptions of the nature of God. Nor are the doctrines taught in the any of those creeds biblical, or supportable by biblical scripture. If adherence to scriptural doctrines of the nature of God as taught in the biblical scriptures is a prerequisite to being designated with the sobriquet “Christian”, then is it is the Latter-day Saints who are Christian, not either the Evangelical or Catholic confessions.

When Jesus prays to the Father, he never seems to be praying to himself, which is what he would have to do, if the Father and the Son were one in person. When Jesus is baptized, the Father speaks from Heaven, and the Holy Ghost descends upon him in the form of a dove. If they were one in person, then why would all three manifest separately? We assert that they are one God, but three in person.

2. Mormons, thus, not surprisingly, deny the doctrine of the Trinity, calling it an amalgam of Greek ideas with Biblical ideas. Their basic view is that the original doctrine of God and of the ‘priesthood’ and key ideas about sacrifice, and leadership of the NT era were lost, as the church became entirely apostate and needed to be renewed, and that the NT church was not renewed until Joseph Smith came along in the 19th century (who btw, had an interest in Methodism whilst he was in Palmyra N.Y. and apparently took part in some of the revivals in the ‘Burnt Over District’ there in the first part of the 19th century). Mormons see the ecumenical councils which produced the Nicene Creed or the Apostle’s Creed or the Chalcedonian creed as in essence contradictory to what Scripture teaches.

This is an accurate assessment.

Now, this being our belief, why should we crave admittance to a body of faith that we could unkindly call apostate? Our claim to Christianity is not based on harmony with the incorrect doctrines of traditional Christianity, but is based on a reasonable commonality: that we proclaim that Jesus of Nazareth is the Son of God and the Savior of all mankind, because His atonement, death on the cross, and resurrection has won for all mankind the opportunity to be resurrected and to enter into the Kingdom of God. If that commonality isn’t enough to be awarded the sobriquet “Christian”, then that sobriquet is meaningless. And we might as well deny it to all but ourselves. But we don’t; we grant it readily to all Christians.

As Jesus Himself said,

Not every one that saith unto me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven; but he that doeth the will of my Father which is in heaven.” (Matthew 7:21)

Doing the will of our Father in heaven does not obligate us to adhere to the Nicene creed, or follow the dictates of men.

It could be argued that the Trinitarian doctrine of the Nicene Creed is partly an attempt to escape from the uncomfortable notion that the Godhead consists of three individuals, the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, who could otherwise be seen to be three Gods, and thus make Christianity polytheistic.

3. Mormons believe that even God the Father has, and apparently, needs a body, denying that God in the divine nature is spirit. Indeed they believe that God the Father is an exalted man!

Again, an accurate representation! Mostly.

But we do not deny that God is spirit. The only thing we deny here is that God is only spirit. Man has a spirit as well as a body that was given him by God, and Jesus will restore ours to us after death through His resurrection. This strongly implies that God has a body as well. How is this, you might ask? Just answer the question, what did Jesus do with his body after His resurrection? Did He give it up again? If Jesus’s resurrection was only temporary, and having an immortal body is not important, then why was there a resurrection at all? Taking this further, in whose image were men created? Genesis says in the image of God. And far from God not having any body, parts or passions, as per the creeds, God demonstrated his body parts to the prophet Moses, in that he showed him his back parts, but not his face (Exodus 33:23). If God has a face, and back parts, then he must have a body.

Ancient Greek philosophy was heavy into the idea of ideals, which denigrated physicality as being unideal. Under this concept God, being ideal, cannot have a body. But should Christian doctrine follow pagan philosophy? The Latter-day Saints say “No.”

4. Just as they believe that the early church became apostate, they also believe the Bible as we have it is not inerrant or always truthful and trustworthy, even on major issues like Christology, and therefore needs to be supplemented (and corrected) by subsequent prophetic revelation in documents like the Book of Mormon, or even The Pearl of Great Price.

To start with, does even the Bible proclaim that it is inerrant? No, it does not. And what is the Bible, anyway? Just like the Old Testament, the New Testament was not written all at once or by any one author. The Bible as accepted by Dr. Witherington did not take its final form until very late in early Christian history. At what point, then, did the Bible become inerrant? Was it errant up to that point? If having a whole Bible is important before we can say that it is inerrant, what actually is the whole Bible?

Among Christian denominations there has been some disagreement about what should be included in the canon, primarily about the biblical apocrypha, a list of works that are regarded with varying levels of respect. But aside from the apocrypha, there was a great deal of disagreement early in Christian history, as to which “books” were part of the accepted canon.

For example, of the seven New Testament codices that were developed before 500 AD, only about half of them accepted Revelation, and they variously excluded the Timothies, Hebrews, James, the Peters, the 3 Johns and Jude. Does this look like some kind of divine inerrancy? The Latter-day Saints say no, it does not. It looks like fallible men deciding what they did and did not like, or it reflects what they did and did not have.

In addition, there are several epistles (or groups of epistles) that were accepted as genuine for varying amounts of time, but are not accepted any longer. There are seven epistles referenced in existing canon that have been lost.

It needs to be pointed out that none of the canonical gospels or epistles of the New Testament, nor the Apocalypse of John (Revelation) were accorded the status of scripture at the time they were written. And of all these works, scholarly consensus is that almost none of them were written by the persons whom they are traditionally attributed to.

According to modern biblical scholarship, if that is to be trusted, the only books of the New Testament that were actually written by their purported authors are these seven Pauline epistles: Romans; 1 and 2 Corinthians; Galatians; Philippians; 1 Thessalonians; and Philemon. Philippians is believed to be genuine Pauline material, but it was not written as one unified letter. It is rather a compilation of fragments from three separate letters from Paul to the church in Philippi. The Pauline epistle to the Ephesians is not believed to have been written by Paul, but is believed to have been written by some unknown person 25 years after Paul’s death. And whether Paul wrote Colossians, 2 Thessalonians, 1 or 2 Timothy, Titus, or Hebrews, is also disputed in varying degrees.

And as for the rest, James may have been written by some James, but it is unknown which one, 1 Peter may have been written by the Apostle Peter, but 2 Peter definitely was not. The consensus is that none of the three epistles of John were written by John the Apostle, the son of Zebedee. And it is uncertain which of three possible Judes wrote Jude, if any of them.

So, not only do we not know who wrote the bulk of these Christian scriptures, we can only hope that none of them contain any false or misunderstood doctrine. So, we’re assuming a great deal, if we assume inerrancy.

And then you say that Bible doesn’t need any supplementation?

5. In terms of soteriology, Mormons deny the sufficiency of Christ’s death for salvation. They suggest, as the linked article says, that each of us must do all we can and then trust in the mercy of God. In other words, the de facto position is that Mormonism is to a significant degree a works religion even when it comes to salvation.

Latter-day Saints do not deny the sufficiency of Christ’s atonement for salvation. Latter-day Saints believe that without Christ, no salvation is possible. But is salvation possible entirely without works? The book of James says not. The entire second chapter is an admonition of the need for works. James 2:14 asks:

“What doth it profit, my brethren, though a man say he hath faith, and have not works? can faith save him?”

The answer is clearly “No!”

The conundrum here is simply this: if no works are required to gain salvation, why does the Bible talk about them practically constantly? It would take a smart theologian to explain this, and I’ve seen some really convoluted explanations for it.

My question is then: how little can a Christian get away with doing in order to ensure himself salvation? When Jesus told Nicodemus that baptism was required, was he joking? When at Pentecost, when the men who heard Peter preach about Jesus were touched and asked what they should do, was Peter speaking heresy when he told them they had to repent and be baptized? Why didn’t he tell them that repentance and baptism (clearly "works") were nice, but not required?

I know why this fear of works exists. It was a reaction to the Catholic doctrines that Martin Luther rebelled against, the ones that made men pay money, or take on difficult or painful tasks in order to ensure forgiveness for sin.

This reaction went overboard, however. Christ still requires obedience to God’s law, and Christ’s grace still requires obedience.

If ye keep my commandments, ye shall abide in my love; even as I have kept my Father’s commandments, and abide in his love. (John 15:10)

Reading this, does it still sound optional? Jesus himself proclaims his obedience to God's commandments! When some Christians ask "What would Jesus do?" are they not asserting the need to follow Christ's example? And just a few verses later, when the Lord says:

These things I command you, that ye love one another,

...does that sound optional, too? In my experience, love is not passive; love is active. It requires works. As John said in 1 John 2:4:

He that saith, I know him, and keepeth not his commandments, is a liar, and the truth is not in him.

6. The goal of Mormon soteriology is that we all become as ‘gods’ become both immortal and divine, blurring the creator/creature distinction which was already badly blurred by a theology that suggested that God is actually a sort of uber-human being, with less flaws. One rather familiar teaching is ‘as God was, so we are. As God is, so we shall be’.

What does God intend for us? Is our ultimate goal the awarding of wings and the flying around in the clouds strumming a harp? Not according to the Bible.

1 John 3:2 – Beloved, now are we the sons of God, and it doth not yet appear what we shall be: but we know that, when he shall appear, we shall be like him; for we shall see him as he is. (emphasis added)

Romans 8:16-17 – The Spirit itself beareth witness with our spirit, that we are the children of God: And if children, then heirs; heirs of God, and joint-heirs with Christ; if so be that we suffer with him, that we may be also glorified together. (emphasis added)

Jesus teaches us explicitly throughout the Gospel that God is our Father. The Lord’s Prayer makes that quite clear. Now, if John and Paul both confirm that we are God’s children, and we are His heirs, and joint-heirs with Christ, then what are we? Are we not of the same species, if of lesser stature, as God?

Is our “becom[ing] both immortal and divine” such an outlandish notion, then? Even the great Christian writer C. S. Lewis saw an inkling of this, when he wrote:

“It is a serious thing to live in a society of possible gods and goddesses, to remember that the dullest most uninteresting person you can talk to may one day be a creature which, if you saw it now, you would be strongly tempted to worship, or else a horror and a corruption such as you now meet, if at all, only in a nightmare. All day long we are, in some degree helping each other to one or the other of these destinations. It is in the light of these overwhelming possibilities, it is with the awe and the circumspection proper to them, that we should conduct all of our dealings with one another, all friendships, all loves, all play, all politics. There are no ordinary people. You have never talked to a mere mortal. Nations, cultures, arts, civilizations - these are mortal, and their life is to ours as the life of a gnat. But it is immortals whom we joke with, work with, marry, snub, and exploit - immortal horrors or everlasting splendors.” – The Weight of Glory and Other Addresses

In the parable of the talents, the Lord rewards the servants according to their success in using that which has been entrusted to them:

“His lord said unto him, Well done, good and faithful servant; thou hast been faithful over a few things, I will make thee ruler over many things: enter thou into the joy of thy lord.” (Matthew 25:23)

In short, the Lord is looking for those whom He can entrust great responsibilities to. Would not inheriting rulership from God be a great divine responsibility? And would we not have become “as gods”?

What did Jesus mean here, in John 10:31-35:

31 Then the Jews took up stones again to stone him.

32 Jesus answered them, Many good works have I shewed you from my Father; for which of those works do ye stone me?

33 The Jews answered him, saying, For a good work we stone thee not; but for blasphemy; and because that thou, being a man, makest thyself God.

34 Jesus answered them, Is it not written in your law, I said, Ye are gods?

35 If he called them gods, unto whom the word of God came, and the scripture cannot be broken...

Sticky situation for the Pharisees, not so? Also for the modern Pharisees, who fain to judge who is Christian and who is not.

I bring this issue up now, because of the general ignorance of the American public about whether or not Mormons are actually Christians or not. If they really embrace the official positions of their religious group, they are not Christians, though they often present themselves as such, for example, calling their meeting places churches sometimes (but notice— no crosses to be found on top, or worn either).

Well, again, who is the gatekeeper who gets to say who is a Christian? And who gets to say that a building can be called a church? And why does a Christian have to wear a cross or his buildings be decorated with them? That is an outward show of religiosity, and I thought Jesus taught against that?

What of course makes this whole deal slippery is that Mormon doctrine is a constantly evolving thing due to a belief in the living voice of prophecy. For example, the head of the Mormon Church in my lifetime corrected what had previously been taught by Mormonism’s original leaders (e.g. Brigham Young) that black people were the descendents of the least favored race of the big three (Shem, Ham, and Japeth), and as such could not become priests in the Mormon church. Not so, any more.

Not to get too deeply into whataboutism, but slippery doctrines in the non-LDS world are endemic. How may Christian churches now accept gay marriage? How many Christian denominations practiced strict racial segregation and discrimination against blacks, and taught it from their pulpits? The origin of the African Methodist Episcopal Church is in the racism of the Methodist Church in America. The origin of the Southern Baptist Convention (SBC) was in the refusal of the southern congregations of the American Baptists to accept the idea of the abolition of slavery. And in turn, the origin of the predominantly black National Baptist Convention is in the racism of the Southern Baptists. And of course, today the SBC has switched sides, going from rejecting racial integration and preaching white supremacy, and now welcomes the minorities it used to discriminate against.

Let’s check to see who was involved in opening it up that black members of the LDS church could be ordained to the priesthood. This was Spencer W. Kimball. He was the prophet at the time. He claimed that it was in accordance with a revelation from God. Given that, there are two alternatives: was it a genuine revelation; or was it a man’s decision? If it was a revelation, then presumably it came from God. Is God permitted to change His will, or must He be guided by man’s decisions? Which evangelical body does God need to come to in order to get His will ratified?

It is of course true that there are Christians who are a part of the Mormon religion. I would call them confused Christians who know neither church history very well (including the history of the origins of Mormonism in America and the actual origin of the Book of Mormon), nor do they know what the NT actually teaches when it comes to things like Christology and salvation and the nature of the Scriptures.

It is typical of groups like the Mormons (any of the branches) or the Jehovah’s Witness that they are actually split offs from some orthodox Christian group, in both cases from Protestantism. Not surprisingly then, they have more in common with Protestants in some respects than they do with Catholics or the Orthodox, except in regard to the matter of an all male priesthood and therefore the nature of worship.

I’d argue against the idea of the LDS being some kind of Protestant offshoot. I don’t know enough to comment about the Jehovah’s Witnesses. The origin of the LDS is too different, and the doctrines in both cases are too uniquely different to be reasonably attributed to any kind of offshooting. As he points out, the LDS doctrine of male-only priesthood is closer to the Catholic model, at least in modern times, and the LDS political organization with respect to a central authority is more similar to the Catholic model than a Protestant one.

Mormonism certainly is a highly patriarchal religion, modeled more in its praxis on Leviticus than say on what is said in the NT letters about male and female apostles, prophets, teachers, and this also extends to the Mormon view of the physical family which is far from egalitarian in character.

So, where in the New Testament does it talk about female apostles, prophets, and teachers? To have it Paul’s way, women have to be silent in church. In any case, probably half the teachers in LDS Sunday School, Primary (under-12 children), Seminary (high schoolers) and Institute of Religion (college-aged) classrooms are female. And all of the teachers in Relief Society (adult women) and Young Women (teenaged girls) are female. There are also women in the leadership of the world-wide auxiliary organizations (Relief Society, Young Women, and Primary), and they regularly preach at the worldwide General Conference, twice a year.

I am not suggesting for a moment that there aren’t many Mormons that would pass the test of being decent and honest and loving human beings. There are. I know some of them. Nor can one fault their zeal for their form of religion, indeed their missionaries often put actual Christian missionaries to shame. Nor would I suggest that these folks are deliberate deceivers of other people. The ones I know are not. They are sincere and committed to Mormonism, and truly believe it is the true religion.

What I would say is that they are deceived about what the Bible really teaches about the nature of God, of Christ, of salvation, and of true humanity, not to mention the nature of the Scriptures which are indeed the sufficient rule of faith and practice for all true Christians and do not require supplements or corrections from Joseph Smith’s works.

Why have I posted this now? Because of the many times I am asked these days, the question– Can Evangelicals vote for Mitt Romney? I have done a previous post, some time ago for Beliefnet about Mitt Romney in regard to his previous campaigns for high office. I will not repeat that here. I think deciding on who to vote for as President should involve a consideration of many different factors, many different pros and cons of the two candidates.

I think each person must make up their own mind who they will vote for, but the point of this post is that such important decisions should not be made on the basis of false assumptions, and particularly not on the basis of false assumptions about a person’s actual religion.

SPOILER ALERT: THINGS YOU SHOULD NOT SAY IN RESPONSE TO THIS POST

1) ‘You’re just prejudiced, you don’t know what you’re talking about, and that’s just your opinion’.

Wrong. These are the facts. I have taught classes on both world and American religions, and what I have said is based either on what Mormons themselves have said about their beliefs, and/or what their source documents say about the same.

I appreciate your honest attempt to represent our beliefs, but your “facts” are nevertheless inaccurate and incomplete.

2) ‘This is unkind and untimely. Everyone should have the right to their own religious beliefs and should not be criticized for them. If a person wants to call himself a Christian, then he or she must be a Christian.’

Yes ... and no. Yes, a person has an American right to freedom of religion. No, a private individual does not get to decide for themselves what is and isn’t true or is or isn’t orthodox Christianity, and that includes me. Christian beliefs need to match up with what the Bible in fact claims, and what the historic creeds and confessions of the church have understood the Bible to say and mean. Furthermore, even if we were talking about genuine Christian groups, no single group has the authority to add additional books to the sacred canon of Scriptures, whether it be the Book of Mormon or something else. The Bible is both the necessary and sufficient revelation of God and God’s character and God’s will. All three great monotheistic religions recognize the Bible or some part of it as God’s Word. None of them recognize the Book of Mormon as the necessary appendix to the Bible.

This last sentence about the non-recognition of the Book of Mormon is actually somewhat amusing. Because of the claimed divine origin of the Book of Mormon, if any of them recognized it as a necessary appendix to the Bible, they’d have to be in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, or at least one of the other Restorationist bodies, such as the Community of Christ (former Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints).

When you write that “no single group has the authority to add additional books to the sacred canon of Scriptures” you completely gloss over the fact that the LDS don’t claim to be adding to it. The LDS claim that it is God who has added to it. Or are you saying that God doesn’t have that right?

The Book of Mormon anticipated this. In 2 Nephi 29:3 it is recorded that God said:

And because my words shall hiss forth—many of the Gentiles shall say: A Bible! A Bible! We have got a Bible, and there cannot be any more Bible.

To which is added in verse 10:

Wherefore, because that ye have a Bible ye need not suppose that it contains all my words; neither need ye suppose that I have not caused more to be written.

Is there a closed canon? No more scripture? Where is this written in the Bible? There are two verses in the Bible, one in the Old and one in the New Testament, that warn men against adding to or taking away from the scriptures. But did God include Himself in this prohibition? He clearly did not, since presumably the New Testament was added to the Old Testament, and God was OK with that.

When you say that the Bible is all we need, you are contradicting the Bible itself, are you not? When Paul says to Timothy, in 2 Timothy 3:16

All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness:

We must then ask, what is scripture? If God gave us the Book of Mormon, is it not scripture? And therefore profitable for what Paul says? I accept that you don’t believe the Book of Mormon to be scripture. But your disbelief doesn’t mean that it isn’t scripture.

3) ‘Aren’t we disputing about words and minor issues here.’

No we are not. The attempt to trivialize important theological issues, and make them a mere dispute about words is frankly an insult to the earliest Christians, many of whom died for their monotheistic and Trinitarian beliefs. Yes indeed, it does matter what the content is of your religious belief.

I dispute that either Peter or Paul were contemplating the Trinitarian idea of the Godhead while being crucified at Rome. Not least of which because that doctrine wasn’t compounded until they had been dead for over 200 years. Were they monotheists, though? Of course they were. And so are the Latter-day Saints.

4) ‘But look at all the energy and zeal and earnestness and deep commitment of Mormons. Isn’t that to be commended?’

Yes and no. Zeal that is not according to knowledge does not honor the real God, and is misguided. Sincerity is not the same thing as true faith. A person can be sincerely wrong, indeed badly wrong however convinced they are of what they believe. So, yes some of these traits are commendable, if they are properly directed and guided and serving the God of the Bible and the good of humankind.’

I could go on, but this is more than enough for you to chew on. Think on these things.

You’re right when you say “Zeal that is not according to knowledge does not honor the real God, and is misguided.” All that remains is for the real misguidance to be adduced.



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