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Home , Angel Moroni, Golden plates, Nephites, Reformed Egyptian

World Religions (The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints)

History of the Church

The late 1700’s and early 1800’s marked a period of spiritual revival in the United States known as the . It was into this spiritually charged country that , Jr. created . In 1820 a young Joseph Smith, Jr. had a in which he claimed that God the Father and the Son told him not to join any denomination because they were all corrupt. At this point in his life, the adolescent Smith was involved in occult practices connected with searching for treasure. Smith used “seer stones” to lead him to treasure, a practice similar to “water witching” or “divining”. In 1823, Smith claimed to have seen the Moroni who told him where a book written on was buried. These golden plates supposedly contained the history of God’s working with the peoples of North America, written in “”, and when added to the would represent the full gospel.

Smith used seeing stones which he called the “” (Ex. 28:30) to translate the golden plates during a ceremony in which he dictated their meaning to a scribe. A wealthy farmer and supporter of Smith, Martin Harris, sought to legitimize the plates and translation by claiming that Professor of Columbia College recognized them as “Egyptian, Chaldaic, Assyriac, and Arabic”. In later correspondence with Mormon historians, Anthon denied having validated the inscription that he saw. He claimed it was “anything else but Egyptian hieroglyphics.” In 1830, Smith published his translation of the plates as the and the Mormon Church began to grow rapidly. During the 1830’s Smith continued to receive visions directing him and his church in the direction they should go. Some of these concerning how the Mormon Church should be organized were published under the title . Also during this time period, Smith purchased remnants of Egyptian text from a traveling mummy exhibit which he claimed were histories written by Moses and Abraham which were translated by him and published as The Pearl of Great Price.

Mormon strongholds began to spring up along the American frontier. In this lawless area of settlement, many non-Mormons saw the Mormon Church and its followers as unfair competitors for resources. Smith and his church acted as a self-contained, exclusive society, including a church run banking system, militia, court and government. When the Nauvoo Expositor, an newspaper, began publishing a series of articles detailing some of the stranger doctrines of the Mormon Church, polygamy, their view of the Godhead, creation and destiny of the human race and others, Smith used his 4,000 man militia to seize and destroy the newspaper. This act got Smith arrested and while awaiting trial an angry mob attacked the jailhouse in Carthage, Illinois. In this attack, Smith was killed.

Following Smith’s death, the Mormon Church splintered into groups lead by lower ranking church leaders. Smith’s wife and son, Joseph III, started a group known as the Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints which still exists today in Independence, Missouri. The largest group of Mormons followed , who grabbed power from other church leaders and lead the church to Great Salt Lake, Utah in 1847. Although Young’s Mormon Church has become the dominant strain of Mormonism, the splintering of the church has caused various other Mormon-like communities to spring up throughout the western USA.

In the 20th and 21st century, the Mormon Church has embarked on a multi-million dollar advertizing campaign to legitimize itself as a denomination of Christianity. This campaign has focused on presenting the core purpose of Mormonism as service, clean living, building healthy families and a commitment to Christ while downplaying the history of the Church and its stranger doctrines. These doctrines have not been renounced or changed but they are not the first thing that new Mormon converts are exposed to.

The Mormon View of Scripture

In general, the Mormon Church denies the closing of the canon of Biblical . In other words, God was still revealing truth to Joseph Smith, Jr. and is still revealing truth to Mormon Apostle-Prophets today. Therefore, no one document is seen as the final authority on how a person should live, rather the Apostle-Prophets are the ones who authoritatively interpret these scriptures. The following is a brief summary of each major book recognized by the Mormon Church

The King James Bible and Joseph Smith Commentary/Translation:

The King James Bible was the version that Joseph Smith used in his day and the Mormon Church still recognizes it as their official version. However, during Smith’s life he asserted himself as a scholar of ancient languages and his commentary on the Bible constitutes the Churches view of it.

The Book of Mormon:

This is the translation that Joseph Smith, Jr. made from the golden plates buried under the Hill in Palmyra, New York. It is supposedly the account of Mormon, the commander in chief of the army of the , one of the lost tribes of Israel that migrated to North America during the time period of the Old Testament. The Book of Mormon supposedly chronicles the history of this tribe and others from the time of the Old Testament up to the appearance of Jesus Christ in North America following His resurrection, when he explained the gospel to these descendents of Israel. Another missing tribe of Israel, the , destroyed the Nephites in battle and went on to become the many Native American tribes in North America. The golden plates that tell this story were passed down from Mormon to his son Moroni who buried them and later revealed them to Joseph Smith. This is asserted despite DNA evidence to the contrary, a lack of archeological evidence for the civilizations mentioned in the book and a complete lack of manuscripts regarding the golden plates. Smith claimed the took them back once translated.

Doctrines and Covenants:

This is a record of major church leadership meetings that were held between 1823 and 1890 with the majority of the records coming from the 1830’s. This record has been edited and reorganized various times throughout the churches history and these revisions have affected Mormon theology and the organization of the church. Throughout Doctrines and Covenants the KJ Bible and Book of Mormon are heavily quoted but interpretation of a verse is frequently out of context and used as a jumping off point for further “revelation”.

The Pearl of Great Price:

This is the translation that Joseph Smith, Jr. made of the papyri which he purchased from a traveling exhibition of Egyptian mummies. He claimed that these documents were records of historical texts written by Moses and Abraham. The original papyri that Smith used for this translation were believed lost or destroyed, however, fragments of these original texts resurfaced in 1967. Upon examination by Mormon and non-Mormon scholars it was discovered that they were simply directions for Egyptian burial methods and not historical records at all. The Mormon Church’s response to this is that Smith was inspired by these texts and received revelation from God based on this inspiration.

The Mormon View of God

According to Mormon theology, the only Prime Reality is eternal matter. Eternal matter has always existed in an uncreated state. Their view of god is essentially polytheistic. Father god, according to Mormon theology, was created by another spirit being or god. All spirit beings can evolve through a process called “eternal progression”. Father god was created as a spirit being who was then sent to another planet, not Earth, to live and die as a man and then be resurrected as a god. As a resurrected god with a body he was able to have children with Mother god. The millions of spirit children that they created are the humans that populate Earth. Firstborn of these children was Jesus and second was his brother Lucifer. When Jesus was chosen to be Savior of Earth, Lucifer rebelled and was cast down to Earth to live as a spirit without a body. The other spirit children that rebelled with Lucifer were punished by being born as mortals with black skin as descendants of Cain.

For the Mormon church-member, the implication of this is that they too can progress down this path of spiritual evolution. Jesus’ role as Savior made it possible for all humans to be resurrected; this is referred to as general salvation. However, what they become when resurrected is dependent on the way they lived their lives as humans. Following the teachings of the Mormon Church allows a Mormon to become a god; this is referred to as individual salvation. In fact, the Mormon “celestial” marriage ceremony, performed only in a Mormon , allows a man and wife to become gods of their own planet someday and continue on the path that Father god has walked.

The Mormon Worldview

Source Information:

Ridenour, Fritz. So What’s the Difference? A Look at 20 Worldviews, Faiths and Religions and How they Compare to Christianity Ventura, CA: Regal, 2001. Print.