What physical evidence today supports Mormonism?

[Bloodnut]

I'm still waiting.

[Krusader]

Blood-nut, Gospel Principles is a contemporary book. However, if you are unwilling to admit that Joseph Smith said that "you" must learn to be a god, as did all the gods before you - and that by that he really did mean that you must learn to be a god just in the same way as "all" the gods, including Elohim - which he asserted in the King Follett discourse - then why even waste my time discussing the issue with someone who would use subterfuge to promote his cultic system?

[Bloodnut]

== Blood-nut, Gospel Principles is a contemporary book.

But it doesn't say what you insist it says. S you're misrepresnting and most importantly, refusing to own up to the error.

== However, if you are unwilling to admit that Joseph Smith said that "you" must learn to be a god

This isn't what I'm referring to. Theosis is a classical Christian precept that Protestantism never grasped onto. I can cite Church Fathers out the yang who said the same exact thing. The caveat you keep inserting "a god equal to Elohim in power" and "ruling your own planet" is not LDS doctrine and it never was. So you are bearing false witness.

If you can't produce a citation, then you should admit the error. But you seem more interested in propogating this nonsense even though it is error.

Why?

Is the case against Mormonism so weak that falsehood, misrepresentation and Walter Martinism is your first resort?

[gratitude]

== Blood-nut, Gospel Principles is a contemporary book.

But it doesn't say what you insist it says. S you're misrepresnting and most importantly, refusing to own up to the error.

== However, if you are unwilling to admit that Joseph Smith said that "you" must learn to be a god

This isn't what I'm referring to. Theosis is a classical Christian precept that Protestantism never grasped onto. I can cite Church Fathers out the yang who said the same exact thing. The caveat you keep inserting "a god equal to Elohim in power" and "ruling your own planet" is not LDS doctrine and it never was. So you are bearing false witness.

If you can't produce a citation, then you should admit the error. But you seem more interested in propogating this nonsense even though it is error.

Why?

Is the case against Mormonism so weak that falsehood, misrepresentation and Walter Martinism is your first resort?

Bloodnut,

The Gospel Principles book states this:
Exaltation is eternal life, the kind of life God lives. He lives in great glory. He is perfect. He possesses all knowledge and all wisdom. He is the Father of spirit children. He is a creator. We can become like our Heavenly Father. This is exaltation.

This is something that will be expanded upon later.

President Joseph F. Smith said this:
… We must become like [God]; peradventure to sit upon thrones, to have dominion, power, and eternal increase. God designed this in the beginning. … This is the object of our existence in the world

He also said:
Had we not known before we came [to earth] the necessity of our coming, the importance of obtaining tabernacles, the glory to be achieved in posterity, the grand object to be attained by being tried and tested—weighed in the balance, in the exercise of the divine attributes, god-like powers and free agency with which we are endowed; whereby, after descending below all things, Christ-like, we might ascend above all things [see D&C 88:6], and become like our Father, Mother and Elder Brother, Almighty and Eternal!—we never would have come.

If you look in the back of our Bible, in the Topical Guide, you will find the following heading:
Man, Potential to Become like Heavenly Father

Read Doctrine and Covenants 132:19-20 and ponder words like "fulness" and "all power" and "everlasting."

Why don't we talk about this all that much? Because it is sacred. Extremely sacred.

To sit on the right hand of God! To learn at His feet.

These things are true, friend. Why do we stand all amazed? Because we do not fully comprehend the grace nor the bredth of the Atonement of the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.

Sincerely,

Gratitude

[Bloodnut]

Uh, do you think I disagree with any of that?

Read an article of mine. http://www.angelfire.com/ga/kevgram/jp7.htm

You'll see where I stand.

my kevingraham.net is down for the time being, so I switched this over to an older website for your perusal.

[Dee Dee Warren]

Gratitude it is nice to see you not denying LDS teaching.

[Bloodnut]

Im not denying LDS teaching. Grattitude was confused, but I provided the link whyere he can see clearly that we agree. Anyone remotely familiar with who I am and what I've written online would never say I disagreed with theosis. It is the "details" that anti-Mormons throw in that are not doctrinal. You're a fan of JP Holding right? Well I don't have his book with me, but the first thing he said in his chapter on this subject was that Mormons do not believe we will become greater or equal to God in power. He got it right. You, Trout and Crusader are getting it wrong. And getting you to admit it seems highly unlikely.

JP wasn't silly to bring up the "we get to rule our own planet" sidebar, either. I've been asking anti-Mormons for evidence of this teaching for decades. Nobody can produce. It is just folklore which nobody can pin down the source.

[Bill the Cat]

I've been asking anti-Mormons for evidence of this teaching for decades. Nobody can produce. It is just folklore which nobody can pin down the source.

Kevin,
I'll be glad to provide you with some LDS sources an LDS member collected on exalted LDS members ruling and peopling their own planet as its god. Give me a day or two as I am moving into my new house.

Bill

[Bill the Cat]

JD 6:274-75; Special Conference held in the Tabernacle, Great SLC; Brigham Young; August 28, 1852.

Perhaps in the case before us, as in others, we might say that men become children. We are children in the first place, then become men; and in the second place men become children in their understanding.... But I expect, if I am faithful with yourselves, that I shall see the time with yourselves that we shall know how to prepare to organize an earth like this---know how to people that earth, how to redeem it, how to sanctify it, and how to glorify it, with those who live upon it who hearken to our counsels.
The Father and the Son have attained to this point already; I am on the way, and so are you, and every faithful servant of God....
Joseph will come up in his turn, receive his body again, and continue his mission in the eternal worlds until he carries it out to perfection, with all the rest of the faithful, to be made perfect with those who have lived before, and those who shall live after; and when the work is finished, and it is offered to the Father, then they will be crowned and receive keys and powers by which they will be capable of organizing worlds. What will they organize first?
After men have got their exaltations and their crowns---have become Gods, even the sons of God---are made Kings of kings and Lords of lords, they have the power then of propagating their species in spirit; and that is the first of their operations with regard to organizing a world. Power is then given to them to organize the elements, and then commence the organization of tabernacles. How can they do it? Have they to go to that earth? Yes, and Adam will have to go there, and he cannot do without Eve; he must have Eve to commence the work of generation, and they will go into the garden, and continue to eat and drink of the fruits of the corporeal world, until this grosser matter is diffused sufficiently through their celestial bodies to enable them, according to the established laws, to produce mortal tabernacles for their spiritual children.
This is a key for you. The faithful will become Gods, even the sons of God; but this does not overthrow the idea that we have a father.

JD 1:356; Tabernacle SLC; President Heber C. Kimball; November 14, 1852. See also Life of Heber C. Kimball by Orson F. Whitney, p. 460.

When we escape from this earth, do we suppose we are going to heaven? Do you suppose you are going to the earth that Adam came from? that Eloheim came from? where Jehovah the Lord came from? No. When you have learned to become obedient to the Father that dwells upon this earth, to the Father and God of this earth, and obedient to the messengers He sends---when you have done all that, remember you are not going to leave this earth. You will never leave it until you become qualified, and capable, and capacitated to become a father of an earth yourselves.

Journal of Samual W. Richards, p. 113; March 11, 1856.

Evening with the Regency in the Upper Room of the President's Office, examining the spelling of the New Books in the D. Alphabet. A very serious conversation took place between President B. Young and Orson Pratt upon doctrine. O. P. was directly apposed (sp. opposed) to the President's views and very freely expressed his entire disbelief in them after being told by the President that things were so and so in the name of the Lord. He was firm in the position that the President's word in the name of the Lord, was not the word of the Lord to him. The President did not believe that Orson Pratt would ever be Adam, to learn by experience the facts discussed, but every other, person in the room would be if they lived faithful.

JD 4:271; Brigham Young; Salt Lake City; March 8, 1857.

If you look at things spiritually, and then naturally, and see how they appear together, you will understand that when you have the privilege of commencing the work that Adam commenced on this earth, you will have all your children come and report to you of their sayings and acts; and you will hold every son and daughter of yours responsible when you get the privilege of being an Adam on earth.


"A Few Words of Doctrine"; Brigham Young; Ms/d/1234/Bx 49/fd 8; an unpublished discourse given in the Tabernacle in Great Salt Lake City, October 8th, 1861, in the A.M.

Let me say one thing to the young girls, and what I shall tell you I wish you to ponder in your hearts. Say nothing about it, for the wicked world has no business with these things, nor half-hearted Mormons. If there is any[one] here who will not make a good use of what they hear, the evil shall be up[on] themselves.
I wish to say to my young sisters, if you can go into the hands of a man, that will lead you into the Kingdom of Heaven, and exalt you there to become an Eve--a Queen of Heaven--the wife of a God; if you can remain with that man [in] whom your soul delights, and you take to him your virginity, you have obtained a treasure that millions of worlds like this [one] could not buy from you--there is your glory to all eternity.

James Beck Journal (Notebook) 1859-1865; October 8th 1861. Spelling as in original.

:snip: …If faithfull (sp. faithful) a Man will attain to an Adam & the Wife to be an Eve & begat Millions of Spirits who will come forth & receive their Tabernacles upon an earth like this :snip:


J. D. 10:355; President Brigham Young; Delivered in the Bowery; November 6, 1864. After quoting D&C 107:53-55, President Young continues:

So, in like manner, every faithful son of God, becomes, as it were, Adam to the race that springs from his loins, when they are embraced in the covenants and blessings of the Holy Priesthood; and in the lapse of eternity, and in the progress of eternal lives, every true son of God becomes a king of kings, and a lord of lords, and it may also be said of him, as it was written of Jesus Christ, "Of the increase of his government and peace there shall be no end."


Journal of Wilford Woodruff; Ms/f/115, Church Historical Department; May 12, 1867.
At Fillmore public meeting:

President Young said there never was any world created & peopled nor never would be but what would be redeemed by the shedding of the blood of the savior of that world. If we are ever exalted and crowned in the presence of God we shall become saviors of a world which we shall create & people.

J. D. 12:97; Brigham Young; Bowery, Great Salt Lake City; June 30, 1867.

If you are not sanctified and prepared, you ought to be sanctifying and preparing yourselves for the blessings in store for you when it will be said of you, this is Mother Eve. Why? Because you are the mother of all living. You might as well prepare first as last. If you wish to be Eves and mothers of human families, you ought to bear the burden.

Minutes of Meetings Held in Provo City"; Film/979.2/Z99/v. 2, BYU Microfilm Room; Sunday, 2 p.m. 3 October 1869.

Pres. B. Young in the course of his remarks said: * * * All worlds have their God, their Savior, their sin, their priesthood, and can choose which they like, but beginning man rejected the priesthood by assuming to be a law unto himself--all other things abide this law.

Millennial Star 31:267; President Brigham Young; 1869.

Before me I see a house full of Eves. What a crowd of reflections the word Eve is calculated to bring up! Eve was the name or title conferred upon our first mother, because she was actually to be the mother of all the human beings who should live upon this earth. I am looking upon a congregation designed to be just such beings.

Deseret News, Vol. 22, No. 308; Brigham Young; discourse delivered in the New Tabernacle, Salt Lake City; Sunday Afternoon, June 8th, 1873.

The Christian world read of, and thing much about, St. Paul, also St. Peter, the chief of the Apostles. These men were faithful to and magnified the priesthood while on the earth. Now, where will be the mystery, after they have passed through all the ordeals, and have been crowned and exalted, and received their inheritances in the eternal worlds of glory, for them to be sent forth, as the Gods have been for ever and ever, with the command--"Make yourselves an earth and people it with your own children?"

J. D. 17:143; President Brigham Young, Delivered at the Funeral Services of Elder Thomas Williams, in the 14th Ward Assembly Rooms, Salt Lake City, Sunday Morning, July 19, 1874.

As for there labor and pursuits in eternity I have not time to talk upon that subject; but we shall have plenty to do. We shall not be idle. We shall go on from one step to another, reaching forth into the eternities until we become like the Gods, and shall be able to frame for ourselves, by the bequest and command of the Almighty. All those who are counted worthy to be exalted and to become Gods, even the sons of God, will go forth and have earths and worlds like those who framed this and millions on millions of others.


L. John Nuttal Papers; BYU Special Collections, Mss 188, Box 5, Folder #11; 14 May 1876

Every fixed star is a sun & it has its people & its God.



J. D. 18:258-59; President Brigham Young; Semi-Annual Conference of the Church, Tabernacle, Salt Lake City; October 8, 1876.

Spirits were begotten, born and educated in the celestial world, and were brought forth by celestial bodies.
These spirits I shall leave for the present, and refer to our first parents, Adam and Eve, who were found in the Garden of Eden, tempted and overcome by the power of evil, and consequently subject to evil and sin, which was the penalty of their transgression. They were now prepared, as we are, to form bodies or tabernacles for the reception of pure and holy spirits * * *--- when the mother feels life there is an evidence that the spirit from heaven has entered the tabernacle. * * *
Having fought the good fight. . .then will they become gods, even the sons of God; then will they become eternal fathers, eternal mothers, eternal sons and eternal daughters; being eternal in their organization, they go from glory to glory, from power to power; they will never cease to increase and to multiply world's without end. When they receive their crowns, their dominions, they then will be prepared to frame earth's like unto ours and to people them in the same manner as we have been brought forth by our parents, by our Father and God.


Jans Christian Anderson Weibye Daybooks, Daybook 5th, pp. 20-22; March 1, 1877.

Adam will worship his God and we will worship Adam, and our children will worship us.


"The Ultimatum of Human Life", from Poems Religious, Historical and Political, Vol. 2:8-9; Eliza R. Snow; 1877.
...'Tis not for you to pry
Into the secrets of the worlds on high--
To seek to know the first, the moving Cause,
Councils, decrees, organizations, laws--
Form'd by the Gods, pertaining to this earth,
Ere your great Father from their courts came forth,
The routine of his ancestors to tread--
Of this new world, to stand the royal head.
* * *
Adam, your God, like you on earth, has been
Subject to sorrow in a world of sin:
Through long gradation he arose to be
Cloth'd with the Godhead's might and majesty.
And what to him in his probative sphere,
Whether a Bishop, Deacon, Priest, or Seer?
Whate'er his offices and callings were,
He magnified them with assiduous care:
By his obedience he obtain'd the place
Of God and Father of this human race.
Obedience will the same bright garland weave,
As it has done for your great Mother, Eve,
For all her daughters on the earth, who will
All my requirements sacredly fulfill.
And what to Eve, though in her mortal life,
She'd been the first, the tenth, or fiftieth wife?
What did she care, when in her lowest state,
Whether by fools, consider'd small, or great?
'Twas all the same with her--she prov'd her worth--
She's now the Goddess and the Queen of Earth.
Life's ultimatum, unto those that live
As saints of God, and all my pow'rs receive;
Is still the onward, upward course to tread--
To stand as Adam and as Eve, the head
Of an inheritance, a new-form'd earth,
And to their spirit race, give mortal birth--
Give them experience in a world like this;
then lead them forth to everlasting bliss,
Crown'd with salvation and eternal joy
Where full perfection dwells, without alloy



Messages of the First Presidency, Vol 4:199-206; James R. Clark. See also Improvement Era, 13:75-81; November, 1909.

Man is the child of God, formed in the divine image and endowed with divine attributes, and even as the infant son of an earthly father and mother is capable in due time of becoming a man, so the undeveloped offspring of celestial parentage is capable, by experience through ages and aeons (sp. eons), of evolving into a God.

The Three Degrees of Glory; Melvin J. Ballard; (Deseret Book Co.: Salt Lake City, Utah); pp. 10-11; Discourse given in the Ogden Tabernacle; September 22, 1922.

What do we mean by endless or eternal increase? We mean that through the righteousness and faithfulness of men and women who keep the commandments of God they will come forth with celestial bodies, fitted and prepared to enter into their great, high and eternal glory in the celestial kingdom of God, and unto them, through their preparation, there will come children, who will be spirit children. I don't think that is very difficult to comprehend and understand. The nature of the offspring is determined by the nature of the substance that flows in the veins of the being. When blood flows in the veins of the being, the offspring will be what blood produces, which is tangible flesh and bone, but when that which flows in the veins is spirit matter, a substance which is more refined and pure and glorious than blood, the offspring of such beings will be spirit children. By that I mean they will be in the image of the parents. They will have a spirit body and have a spark of the eternal or divine that always did exist in them.
Unto such parentage will this glorious privilege come, for it is written in our scriptures that "the glory of God is to bring to pass the immortality and eternal life of man." So, it will be the glory of men and women that will make their glory like unto His. When the power of endless increase shall come to them, and their offspring, growing and multiplying through ages that shall come, they will be in due time, as we have been, provided with an earth like this, wherein they too may obtain earthly bodies and pass through all the experiences through which we have passed, and then we shall hold our relationship to them, the fulness and completeness of which has not been revealed to us, but we shall stand in our relationship to them as God, our Eternal Father, does to us, and thereby is this the most glorious and wonderful privilege that ever will come to any of the sons and daughters of God.

MAN KNOW THYSELF

Then comes the resurrection, by which you are prepared to receive a fulness of Celestial Glory, you and your companion, and by reason of that everlasting covenant you entered into when in mortality you are still husband and wife, and as such you will continue to live in everlasting progression, that is, to multiply, to beget children, sons and daughters; and as your mortal children were of the earth earthly, so also will your heavenly children be of the spirit world spiritual.
We commonly call our future estate heaven, so you are their Heavenly Father, and Mother, their Heavenly Mother, and all this by obedience to law, notwithstanding you have become a Heavenly Father, you still have a Heavenly Father, whom you love more and more each day as you grow in knowledge and advance in experience, and even your Heavenly Father had a Heavenly Father, and so we might continue, or, as is expressed in a hymn:

[Krusader]

Bill, what an excellent job in providing those references. What the Mormons will tell you is that they are not canonical. But, they sure as heck demonstrate what Mormonism has taught all along about multiple deities and evolved gods. Mormons would surely like to wipe out the past, because it doesn't fit in with their current drive to appear "Christian."

[Bill the Cat]

Crusader,

From the same list, (which I remind the readers is from an LDS member) there was an interesting letter from a Mormon from England to the President at the time explaining that he wished to resign from the LDS church over the doctrines of Adam-God and blood atonement, and the minutes of his excommunication hearing. Why would a Mormon be excommunicated by the First Presidency and the 12 apostles for disagreeing with mere opinions of former prophets? I can produce these letters if any doubt is brought up.

Bill

[Sparko]

JP wasn't silly to bring up the "we get to rule our own planet" sidebar, either. I've been asking anti-Mormons for evidence of this teaching for decades. Nobody can produce. It is just folklore which nobody can pin down the source.

Uh actually Trout did so in the other thread in this area. Here is his source again:

Joseph Fielding Smith Jr., Doctrines of Salvation, Vol.2, p.48:

The Father has promised us that through our faithfulness we shall be blessed with the fulness of his kingdom. In other words we will have the privilege of becoming like him. To become like him we must have all the powers of godhood; thus a man and his wife when glorified will have spirit children who eventually will go on an earth like this one we are on and pass through the same kind of experiences, being subject to mortal conditions, and if faithful, then they also will receive the fulness of exaltation and partake of the same blessings. There is no end to this development; it will go on forever. We will become gods and have jurisdiction over worlds, and these worlds will be peopled by our own offspring. We will have an endless eternity for this.

[Bloodnut]

Thanks for the website clone Bill. I had seen it in the past but lost track of it.

Some of the quotes are ambiguous, but others make it clear that at the very least, Brigham Young believed that ruling over another world is something all exalted beings will experience.

Having said that, I fail to see how this is "Mormon teaching" in the present tense. In the context it is usually presented it is implied that Mormons today are taught this, yet every single example provided takes place in the mid-19th century. i'm assuming these are all the examples, given the thoroughness of the research there. Yes, it is true that these statements were not canonized, and no, Young's opinion cannot be taken as official doctrine. But this is beside the point really. I never denied that this was true. Ruling over a planet is hardly something incongruous with biblical teaching. We know we'll be like God. We know we'll "rule over angels," so why not our own offspring? For all we know God has alot of unexpected things planned for us when we see him. In fact, I'm counting on being surprised.

Young's specultion on this point cannot be verified or refuted. It can only be accepted as his understanding that may or may not be true. Modern prophets failing to validate it is not a repudiation of it.

Now as for the second point of Crusader's post, can you support her claim that Mormonism believes we will become equal or greater to God?

[Sparko]

Now as for the second point of Crusader's post, can you support her claim that Mormonism believes we will become equal or greater to God?

See my post right above yours.

[Bloodnut]

Your post doesn't validate her claim that "Mormons believe" that we can become "equal in power."

Having power doesn't justify "equality" in power. God can create, and we will be able to create. In Mormonism, whatever power God grants us, we will always remain His children, and below Him in degree of power. No Mormon alive has denied this. Anti-Mormons like Crusader like to paint a picture of men become rivals to God. This is entirely inaccurate, and to say "Mormons believe" something isn't supported by one 19th century statement by someoen who admits his view is not doctrinal.