To Our Mormon Commenters

Recently, some comments have surfaced in the comboxes that deserve public attention on the front page.

Here are some samples:

Christ did not preach hatred. Your words are hate. So sorry for you.

You didn't listen carefully enough to the LDS missionaries. Jesus Christ allowed all faithful people to reside with him in heaven (even Catholics, Protestants and Evangelicals).

We try not to disparage your religious traditions, please try not to disparage ours.

In Steve's words:

Gene's post is quite mild compare to, say, Matthew 23. If you think that Gene's post is hateful, then, by your yardstick, Jesus was definitely preaching "hatred" towards the Pharisees in Mt 23.

Try brushing up on the Bible while your at it. As it is, you betray and equal ignorance of Mormonism and Jesus alike. Of course, Mormonism cultivates an ignorance of what Jesus is really like.

In fairness, the first in the above list of comments may or may not be from a Mormon. That's the problem with "Anonymous." If "Anonymous" would like to defend his beliefs about what Jesus taught, he's welcome to do so here.

I thought, however, I would simply supply some material first from the Bible and then from Mormonism itself.

What did Jesus teach?

Matthew 23

Pharisaism Exposed

1Then Jesus spoke to the crowds and to His disciples,

2saying: "The scribes and the Pharisees have seated themselves in the chair of Moses;

3therefore all that they tell you, do and observe, but do not do according to their deeds; for they say things and do not do them.

4"They tie up heavy burdens and lay them on men's shoulders, but they themselves are unwilling to move them with so much as a finger.

5"But they do all their deeds to be noticed by men; for they broaden their phylacteries and lengthen the tassels of their garments.

6"They love the place of honor at banquets and the chief seats in the synagogues,

7and respectful greetings in the market places, and being called Rabbi by men.

8"But do not be called Rabbi; for One is your Teacher, and you are all brothers.

9"Do not call anyone on earth your father; for One is your Father, He who is in heaven.

10"Do not be called leaders; for One is your Leader, that is, Christ.

11"But the greatest among you shall be your servant.

12"Whoever exalts himself shall be humbled; and whoever humbles himself shall be exalted.

Eight Woes

13"But woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites, because you shut off the kingdom of heaven from people; for you do not enter in yourselves, nor do you allow those who are entering to go in.

14["Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites, because you devour widows' houses, and for a pretense you make long prayers; therefore you will receive greater condemnation.]

15"Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites, because you travel around on sea and land to make one proselyte; and when he becomes one, you make him twice as much a son of hell as yourselves.

16"Woe to you, blind guides, who say, 'Whoever swears by the temple, that is nothing; but whoever swears by the gold of the temple is obligated.'

17"You fools and blind men! Which is more important, the gold or the temple that sanctified the gold?

18"And, 'Whoever swears by the altar, that is nothing, but whoever swears by the offering on it, he is obligated.'

19"You blind men, which is more important, the offering, or the altar that sanctifies the offering?

20"Therefore, whoever swears by the altar, swears both by the altar and by everything on it.

21"And whoever swears by the temple, swears both by the temple and by Him who dwells within it.

22"And whoever swears by heaven, swears both by the throne of God and by Him who sits upon it.

23"Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you tithe mint and dill and cummin, and have neglected the weightier provisions of the law: justice and mercy and faithfulness; but these are the things you should have done without neglecting the others.

24"You blind guides, who strain out a gnat and swallow a camel!

25"Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you clean the outside of the cup and of the dish, but inside they are full of robbery and self-indulgence.

26"You blind Pharisee, first clean the inside of the cup and of the dish, so that the outside of it may become clean also.

27"Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you are like whitewashed tombs which on the outside appear beautiful, but inside they are full of dead men's bones and all uncleanness.

28"So you, too, outwardly appear righteous to men, but inwardly you are full of hypocrisy and lawlessness.

29"Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you build the tombs of the prophets and adorn the monuments of the righteous,

30and say, 'If we had been living in the days of our fathers, we would not have been partners with them in shedding the blood of the prophets.'

31"So you testify against yourselves, that you are sons of those who murdered the prophets.

32"Fill up, then, the measure of the guilt of your fathers.

33"You serpents, you brood of vipers, how will you escape the sentence of hell?

34"Therefore, behold, I am sending you prophets and wise men and scribes; some of them you will kill and crucify, and some of them you will scourge in your synagogues, and persecute from city to city,

35so that upon you may fall the guilt of all the righteous blood shed on earth, from the blood of righteous Abel to the blood of Zechariah, the son of Berechiah, whom you murdered between the temple and the altar.

36"Truly I say to you, all these things will come upon this generation.

Lament over Jerusalem

37"Jerusalem, Jerusalem, who kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to her! How often I wanted to gather your children together, the way a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, and you were unwilling.

38"Behold, your house is being left to you desolate!

39"For I say to you, from now on you will not see Me until you say, 'BLESSED IS HE WHO COMES IN THE NAME OF THE LORD!'"

Here's another set from Matthew, this time I'll provide some commentary:

a. Matt. 8:6:

Do not give dogs what is sacred; do not throw your pearls to pigs. If you do, they may trample them under their feet, and then turn and tear you to pieces.

Note that this is written after the so often quoted “judge not that you be not judged” statement. One wonders how, if we are not to judge others at all, how we are to know what is a dog or a pig? “Dog” was a common derogatory term for “Gentile” and the “pig” is an unclean animal. Of course, Jesus does not advocate calling non-believers and Gentiles “dogs,” but he is telling us to judge justly and know the difference between what is right and wrong, true and false, “clean” and “unclean,” etc. One of these days maybe atheists, liberals, and, yes, Mormons will read Matthew 8: 1 - 5 and let their eyes drop down to verse 6. Better yet, let's hope their eyes drop down a few more paragraphs, where we find this:

b. Matt. 8:15

Watch out for false prophets. They come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly they are ferocious wolves. 16By their fruit you will recognize them. Do people pick grapes from thornbushes, or figs from thistles? 17Likewise every good tree bears good fruit, but a bad tree bears bad fruit. 18A good tree cannot bear bad fruit, and a bad tree cannot bear good fruit. 19Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. 20Thus, by their fruit you will recognize them.

21"Not everyone who says to me, 'Lord, Lord,' will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only he who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. 22Many will say to me on that day, 'Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and in your name drive out demons and perform many miracles?' 23Then I will tell them plainly, 'I never knew you. Away from me, you evildoers!'

Is it true that Mormons don't disparage Evangelical Christians? Let's see what some representatives from Mormonism have stated before. Perhaps our interlocuters will take the time, unlike the last, to actually read these statements before "talking all up out their heads."

"Both Catholics and Protestants are nothing less than the "whore of Babylon" whom the lord denounces by the mouth of John the Revelator as having corrupted all the earth by their fornications and wickedness." (Pratt, The Seer, p.255)

"And any person who shall be so wicked as to receive a holy ordinance of the gospel from the ministers of any of these apostate churches will be sent down to hell with them, unless they repent of the unholy and impious act." (Orson Pratt, OP-WA, "The Kingdom of God," no.2, p.6)

"...all other churches are entirely destitute of all authority from God; and any person who recieves baptism or the Lord's supper from their hands will highly offend God, for he looks upon them as the most corrupt people." (Orson Pratt, The Seer, pg. 255)

"After the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints was organized, there were only two churches upon the earth. They were known respectively as the Church of the Lamb of God and Babylon. The various organizations which are called churches throughout Christiandom, though differing in their creeds and organizations, have one common orgin. They belong to Babylon." (George Q. Cannon, Gospel Truth, p.324)

The Ontario Emperor, who linked back here, has provided an interesting quote from Hinckley, one that I would say either demonstrates LDS duplicity or his ignorance of his own faith. Given Hinckley's position, I am not inclined to believe the latter.

On whether his church still holds that God the Father was once a man, he sounded uncertain, "I don't know that we teach it. I don't know that we emphasize it... I understand the philosophical background behind it, but I don't know a lot about it, and I don't think others know a lot about it."

1. That quote is from Time Magazine, 1997. Here is Hinckley in 1998:

"In His image man was created. ...In the account of the Creation of the earth, 'God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness' (Gen. 1:26). Could any language be more explicit?" (Gordon B. Hinckley, First Presidency Message, "The Father, Son, and Holy Ghost," Ensign, March 1998, 2)

2. From Doctrine and Covenants:

"We are created in God's image. In the Old Testament God said, 'Let us make man in our own image, after our likeness' ...God the Father and His son Jesus Christ, appeared to Joseph Smith in the spring of 1820. Joseph revealed that the Father and the Son each have a 'body of flesh and bones as tangible as man's' (D&C 130:22)

“The Father has a body of flesh and bones as tangible as man's” (130:22).

3. Brigham Young on the virgin birth:

He [God] created man, as we create our children; for there is no other process of creation in heaven, on the earth, in the earth, or under the earth, or in all the eternities, that is, that were, or that ever will be. Brigham Young, Journal of Discourses, ed. George D. Watt, 26 vols. (Liverpool: F.D. Richards, et al., 1854-1886), 11:122, LDSCL.

The birth of the Saviour was as natural as are the births of our children; it was the result of natural action. He partook of flesh and blood was begotten of his Father, as we were of our fathers. Ibid., 8:115, LDSCL.

When the Virgin Mary conceived the child Jesus, the Father had begotten him in his own likeness. He was not begotten by the Holy Ghost. . . . Now, remember from this time forth, and for ever, that Jesus Christ was not begotten by the Holy Ghost. I will repeat a little anecdote. I was in conversation with a certain learned professor upon this subject, when I replied, to this idea if the Son was begotten by the Holy Ghost, it would be very dangerous to baptize and confirm females, and give the Holy Ghost to them, lest he should beget children, and be palmed upon the Elders by the people, bringing the Elders into great difficulties. Ibid., 1:50-51, LDSCL.

When the time came that His first-born, the Saviour, should come into the world and take a tabernacle, the Father came Himself and favoured that spirit with a tabernacle instead of letting any other man do it. The Saviour was begotten by the Father of His spirit, by the same Being who is the Father of our spirits, and that is all the organic difference between Jesus Christ and you and me Ibid., 4:218, LDSCL.

4. Joseph Smith:

We must come down to the simple fact that God Almighty was the Father of His Son Jesus Christ. Mary, the virgin girl, who had never known mortal man, was his mother. God by her begot his Son Jesus Christ, and he was born into the world with power and intelligence like that of His Father. . . . Now, my little friends, I will repeat again in words as simple as I can, and you talk to your parents about it, that God, the Eternal Father, is literally the father of Jesus Christ. (Joseph F. Smith, Box Elder Stake Conference Dec. 20, 1914 as quoted in Brigham City Box Elder News, 28 Jan. 1915, pp. 1-2).

"God himself was once as we are now, and is an exalted man, and sits enthroned in yonder heavens! That is the great secret, if the veil were rent today, and the great God who holds this world in its orbit, and who upholds all worlds and all things by his power, was to make himself visible,—I say, if you were to see him today, you would see him like a man in form—like yourselves in all the person, image, and very form as a man; for Adam was created in the very fashion, image and likeness of God, and received instruction from, and walked, talked and conversed with him, as one man talks and communes with another" (Teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith, p. 345. Also cited in Achieving a Celestial Marriage, p.129).

5. Lastly,

For Latter-day Saints, the paternity of Jesus is not obscure. He was the literal, biological son of an immortal, tangible Father and Mary, a mortal woman (see Virgin Birth). Jesus is the only person born who deserves the title "the Only Begotten Son of God" (John 3:16; Benson, p. 3; see Jesus Christ: Only Begotten in the Flesh). He was not the son of the Holy Ghost; it was only through the Holy Ghost that the power of the Highest overshadowed Mary (Encyclopedia of Mormonism).

Evangelicals are often told by Mormons that we should accept them as fellow Christians and/or we should not misrepresent their beliefs. However, as those involved in apologetics with Mormons consistently demonstrate, when it comes down to it, we're only taking Mormons at their own word with respect to what they believe. Perhaps the problem isn't our ignorance, but their own...