theplains

So in your mind, Islamic leaders continuing to affirm the Quran's teaching that Jesus is not the Son of God and that he wasn't crucified are serious errors but they are not leading Muslims astray. They lacked the guidance of the Holy Spirit in this matter. LDS leaders being fallible means they can lead people astray. The Governing Body of the Jehovah's Witnesses also leads people astray by teaching Jesus is Michael the Archangel. The LDS Church is clear in stating that they have since disavowed theories for the priesthood ban. But this is not entirely true, since the reason for the ban was not taught as theory by the early leaders. The statement would be more correct if it said something like, "Today, the Church disavows the doctrines advanced in the past by LDS leaders and the words translated by Joseph Smith with the help of God in the Book of Mormon that black skin is a sign of divine disfavor or curse … Church leaders today unequivocally condemn all racism, past and present, in any form". By the way, it's not racism if God really did it that way in the Book of Mormon. Skin color being a factor on judgment day is associated with physical skin color in the Book of Mormon. Jacob 3:8 says the skin color of the Lamanites could be whiter than those of the Nephites when they appear before God's throne. The LDS Church, in its seminary manual, shows verses 8 and 9 are speaking of physical skin color differences between the Nephites and Lamanites, and associate it with spiritual cleanliness. "O my brethren, I fear that unless ye shall repent of your sins that their skins will be whiter than yours, when ye shall be brought with them before the throne of God. Wherefore, a commandment I give unto you, which is the word of God, that ye revile no more against them because of the darkness of their skins; neither shall ye revile against them because of their filthiness; but ye shall remember your own filthiness, and remember that their filthiness came because of their fathers". The LDS seminary teaching manual interprets that in the same way: "Book of Mormon prophets and modern prophets have taught it is wrong to revile or look down upon people because of the color of their skin (see Jacob 3:9)." (Book of Mormon Seminary Teacher Manual, 2024). Again, the LDS Church is leading people astray. The priesthood ban was from God or from man. Take your pick. If it was from God, the Latter-day Saints were acting in the light. If not, they were being led into darkness. It seems you believe false teachings and practices do not lead people astray (away from the truth). Being led astray by leaders happens either intentionally or through ignorance. "Howbeit when he, the Spirit of truth, is come, he will guide you into all truth" (John 16:13). I like these admonitions given in the 1997 version of Gospel Principles: "The most important things you will ever teach are the doctrines of Christ as revealed through the scriptures and modern prophets and as confirmed by the Holy Ghost. To do this effectively, you must obtain the Spirit of the Lord". "Never speculate about Church doctrine. Teach only what is supported by the scriptures and the Holy Spirit" It's obvious that the early LDS leaders did not have the Spirit of the Lord on this matter. I don't see precise words as if God revealed OD #2. Here is something that I replied to InCognitus: I'll suggest several possibilities regarding the origins and parentage of the woman who would later be known as the Heavenly Mother of Earth: [1] Daughter of an Exalted God and Goddess She was the spirit offspring of an earlier Heavenly Father and Heavenly Mother. Born into a previous generation of divine parents, she eventually progressed through mortality and exaltation, becoming a Goddess and the eternal companion of the Heavenly Father of Earth. [2] Created by Her Future Husband Heavenly Mother was created or formed by the God who would later become her eternal husband. She was made in his image but was not his literal spirit offspring. Her existence therefore originated through divine creation rather than genealogical parentage. [3] Daughter of a God from an Earlier Creation Her father was an exalted God who presided over an earlier creation or inhabited world. She may have been associated with his divine household without being his literal spirit offspring. After entering into an eternal marriage with the Heavenly Father of Earth, she progressed through mortality and exaltation. In this scenario, she may or may not have shared the same divine parentage as her future husband. [4] An Eternal, Rather Than Genealogical, Origin Heavenly Mother has always existed as a divine being. She did not originate as the offspring or creation of another God, nor did she progress from mortality to godhood. Her divine status is therefore eternal rather than the result of genealogical descent or exaltation. One conceptual distinction I'd make is that #1 is genealogical, #2 is creative, #3 is genealogical or familial but not necessarily biological, and #4 is eternal. That gives you four genuinely different models rather than four variations of the same parentage theory. Model #1 seems most probable. In that model, our Heavenly Father and Heavenly Mother would themselves be the children of an earlier Heavenly Father and Mother, who in turn had divine Parents, and so forth – an infinite regression of Gods. Teaching and practicing the error of the priesthood ban is not the sole hinge that casts doubt on the legitimacy of the Restored Gospel concept as taught by the LDS Church. The Jesus of the Quran is distinct from the Jesus of the Watchtower is distinct from the Jesus of the Latter-day Saints is distinct from Jesus (the God from eternity to eternity). Some LDS teachings also deny the eternal deity of Heavenly Father – he became a God. He is an exalted man. "God the Eternal Father was once a mortal man who passed through a school of earth life similar to that through which we are now passing. He became a God ... There was a time when the Deity was much less powerful than He is today... He grew in experience and continued to grow until He attained the status of Godhood" (Milton R. Hunter, The Gospel Through the Ages). The church's seminary manual states: "The doctrine that God was once a man and has progressed to become a God is unique to this Church". Brigham Young also taught, "It appears ridiculous to the world, under their darkened and erroneous traditions, that God has once been a finite being; and yet we are not in such close communion with him as many have supposed. He has passed on, and is exalted far beyond what we can now comprehend" (Journal of Discourses, volume 7, page 333). This is contradicted in several other places: "There is a God in heaven, who is infinite and eternal, from everlasting to everlasting the same unchangeable God, the framer of heaven and earth, and all things which are in them" (Doctrine and Covenants 20:17). "... and he is the literal and personal father of the spirits of all men ... If we are to have that perfect faith by which we can lay hold upon eternal life, we must believe in God as the possessor of the fullness of all these characteristics and attributes. I say also that he is an infinite and eternal being, and as an unchangeable being, he possesses these perfected powers and attributes from everlasting to everlasting, which means from eternity to eternity" (Joseph Fielding Smith) Prior to Joseph Fielding Smith reaching the age of six, Joseph Smith had already refuted the eternal deity of Heavenly Father in the King Follett Discourse. "In order to understand the subject of the dead, for consolation of those who mourn for the loss of their friends, it is necessary we should understand the character and being of God and how He came to be so; for I am going to tell you how God came to be God. We have imagined and supposed that God was God from all eternity. I will refute that idea, and take away the veil, so that you may see". The Bible gives us this admonition: “Beloved, believe not every spirit, but try the spirits whether they are of God: because many false prophets are gone out into the world” (1 John 4:1).

The two expressions aren't contradictory. John distinguishes the Word from the God with whom the Word was, while simultaneously describing the Word as θεός. John 20:28 is different. Thomas says directly to Jesus "ὁ κύριός μου καὶ ὁ θεός μου" Here ὁ θεός has the article. Breaking it down: ὁ = the, θεός = God, μου = of me / my. So the literal construction is "the God of me". The JST version alters the biblical meaning. "In the beginning was the gospel preached, and the gospel was the word, and the word was with the Son, and the Son was with God, and the word was God". The "gospel" is the "word" but the "word" is not the Son. The two (the gospel/word and the Son) are with each other. The Son is not God in verse 1. Instead, the "word"/"gospel" is with God and both the word and the gospel are God. A lower case "word" is used by Joseph Smith, whereas the Bible uses Word in John 1:1 and 1:14. The JST isn't simply translating the Greek differently. It introduces "the gospel" and "the Son" and changes the relationships described in the verse. In continues in verse 14: "And the word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, and we beheld his glory..." So it remains lowercase "the word." A literal reading shows that the "word" (or the "gospel") was made flesh. The Son is not made flesh as the "word" is separate, but with the Son in verse 1. So you have the "word" (the gospel) being with the Son and the Son being with God. "God" can reasonably be understood as referring to God the Father according to a literal reading – the JST does not explicitly identify "God" as the Son. We already know this relationship between the Father and the Son (God in human flesh). I was just showing that the phrase "THE God" is not always a reference to THE Father. Even the Book of Mormon shows this. But things get confusing when it refers to Jesus being both the Father and the Son – whereas Jesus did not teach that. Mosiah referring to Jesus as the Father shows a person can be a "father" without having spirit children or physical offspring in a biological (literal lineage) sense. We also become offspring (seed) of Abraham even though he is not our literal (biological) parent. John 1:1 ("In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God") is not telling us that God the Father is an additional God next to God the Son. It is showing that God = the Word = Jesus = God became flesh (from verse 14). It would make no difference if John 1:1 was worded "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was the God". It's the same we find in John 20:28. The KJV has it as "And Thomas answered and said unto him, My Lord and my God". The Greek Interlinear has it as "... the Lord of me and the God of me". If I'm not mistaken about LDS theology, Satan and all his other brothers and sisters are not created from nothing. They existed eternally as uncreated intelligences (Abraham 3:22–23; D&C 93:29). These intelligences were organized by heavenly parents into individual spirit children, forming a familial unit, and were given spirit bodies. Maybe it's safe to say only their bodies were created/organized from matter. This reminds me of the Star Trek episode "Return to Tomorrow," starring William Shatner as Captain Kirk. The episode involves three surviving beings from an ancient civilization: Sargon, Thalassa, and Henoch. Their civilization was destroyed by war, but their consciousnesses survived inside glowing spherical containers for thousands of years. Sargon explains that their minds had been preserved in the spheres. They then transfer their consciousness into the bodies of Kirk, Dr. Mulhall, and Spock. They had gender and identity in their body-less existence. Maybe the same could be applied to the intelligences in Abraham 3. They just needed bodies to progress further. It would seem plausible that Heavenly Mother, wife of Heavenly Father, was one of these intelligences, later to become an offspring of some God. The wording in John 1:3 is particularly strong. John doesn't merely say that Jesus created some things. He says "all things" were made through him. "All things were made through him, and without him was not any thing made that was made"). Colossians 1:16-17 is even more comprehensive: "For by him all things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities-all things were created through him and for him. And he is before all things, and in him all things hold together". But I understand your point because you believe no humans were made/created, but rather that they were organized from pre-existing matter. Stated more concisely: The New Testament teaches that Jesus created everything. John 1 identifies Jesus as the eternal Word who "became flesh" (John 1:14), and John says, "All things were made through him, and without him was not any thing made that was made" (John 1:3). Paul likewise says of the Son, "by him all things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible" (Colossians. 1:16), and then says, "he is before all things" (Colossians 1:17). Hebrews says that God created the world "through" the Son (Hebrews 1:2) and applies Psalm 102's Creator language to the Son (Hebrews 1:10). Thus the New Testament does not present Jesus as the first thing God created; it presents him as the one through whom the entire created order came into existence. If everything created was created through Christ, Christ cannot himself be one of the created things without making him the creator of himself. Scripture instead places Christ on the Creator side of the Creator/creation distinction. Does Jesus (as the Eternal God) even exist before all things created by Grandfather God? There's a doctrine found in the Religion 430-431 seminary manual which teaches Jesus became (was ranked) a God when he reached some pinnacle of intelligence. Do you believe Jesus became a god or God by having a share of the Father? In Against Celsus 8.12, Origen writes "We worship one God, the Father and the Son ... these, while they are two, considered as persons or subsistences, are one in unity of thought, in harmony and in identity of will". Origen explicitly distinguished the Father and the Son as two distinct "persons" or hypostases, while insisting that they are one God. He also acknowledged the biblical language of "many gods," but he did not mean that there are many supreme, independent Gods in the later LDS sense. https://ccel.org/ccel/origen/against_celsus/anf04.vi.ix.viii.xii.html He also speaks elsewhere of beings whom God has "honoured with the title of God" and who "partake of His divine nature." "... whilst he knows not who the gods and heroes are," we may reply that it is easy to know that God and the Only-begotten Son of God, and those whom God has honoured with the title of God, and who partake of His divine nature, are very different from all the gods of the nations which are demons; but it is not possible at the same time to know God and to address prayers to images". https://www.biblehub.com/library/origen/origen_against_celsus/chapter_lxv_in_regard_to.htm By the late fourth century, Origen's theology had become increasingly controversial. His teachings concerning things such as the preexistence of souls, restoration/apokatastasis, and the relationship between the Father and Son were debated and attacked. Jerome eventually became one of his opponents. In his Letter 90, Jerome speaks of the effort to have Origen condemned along with what he calls the heresy associated with him. Theophilus of Alexandria convened synods against Origenism around 400, and Origen's writings were condemned. The Oxford study of the controversy describes these as the "Anti-Origenist Councils of 400" and says they resulted in the condemnation of Origen and his followers. https://academic.oup.com/book/25589/chapter-abstract/192926967 But there is evidence that these synods condemned his books rather than formally excommunicating Origen personally. https://www.historicalchristian.faith/doctrine/doctrines/origen-condemnation/theophilus-of-alexandria.html Origen's name appears in the condemnation associated with Constantinople II. The traditional account is that the Second Council of Constantinople (553) condemned Origen. The transmitted text of its eleventh anathema says "If anyone does not anathematize Arius, Eunomius, Macedonius, Apollinaris, Nestorius, Eutyches and Origen... let him be anathema." https://www.newadvent.org/fathers/3812.htm His influence was enormous, yet some of his theological formulations later became associated with condemned doctrines. As the FAIRLDS article states: A vast number of anti-Mormon criticisms rely on the following straw man argument: LDS leader "L" said statement "X". Since it has been shown that "X" is in error this proves that Mormonism is false. Is something "official" LDS doctrine because a General Authority or Prophet said it? I would disagree in one regard. It does not prove Mormonism in its entirety is wrong. It's just a subtle admission that LDS leaders can and do lead their members astray. However, I'm not aware of condemnation of LDS leaders like what happened to Origen. Suppose there is only one God in existence anywhere and everywhere, and that God decides to take on human flesh. Would you then have 2 Gods? A few comments on your bullet points: Becoming a God (2 Corinthians 3:18, 2 Peter 1:4, 1 John 3:2). 2 Corinthians 3:18, 2 Peter 1:4, 1 John 3:2 do not portray humans becoming Gods. The emphasis is on likeness to Christ as God's children, particularly in the resurrection/glorification. 2 Peter 1:4 says believers become "partakers of the divine nature," which is strong language for genuine participation in God's life and character. But the immediate context explains this primarily as escaping "the corruption that is in the world through lust" (v. 4), developing faith, virtue, knowledge, self-control, patience, godliness, brotherly kindness, and love (vv. 5–7). So the passage clearly teaches transformation into godliness, but it does not explicitly say humans become Gods. Being made equal in power, might, and dominion (Revelation 3:21). Revelation 3:21 does not show people becoming Gods. "To him that overcometh will I grant to sit with me in my throne, even as I also overcame, and am set down with my Father in his throne". The phrase "equal in power, might, and dominion" comes from LDS teaching, not Revelation 3:21 Receiving thrones, kingdoms, powers, and dominions (Matthew 25:21, 23, Revelation 2:26, Revelation 3:21, Revelation 21:7). Revelation 2:26 is a strong verse for believers receiving authority ("And he that overcometh, and keepeth my works unto the end, to him will I give power over the nations"). The next verse explains what that authority involves: "And he shall rule them with a rod of iron" (2:27). So you can accurately say "Believers who overcome are promised authority to rule over the nations". This supports receiving dominion/authority. Matthew 25:21-23 and Revelation 2:26, 3:21 do not explicitly say: • they become Gods, • they receive their own kingdoms, • they possess divine power equal to Christ, • or they create their own worlds. Revelation 21:7 says, "He that overcometh shall inherit all things; and I will be his God, and he shall be my son". "Shall inherit all things" promises an enormous inheritance to the one who overcomes. "I will be his God". This is a reference to Jesus the Son. "He shall be my son". The believer is God's child. This is a reference to Jesus the Son. Again, it does not explicitly say that believers become Gods, receive their own kingdoms, or have eternal posterity. The specific list "thrones, kingdoms, powers, and dominions" is much more characteristic of LDS exaltation terminology than of these particular biblical passages. Having eternal families (1 Corinthians 11:11, 1 Peter 3:7) / having a continuation of posterity / "seeds" (Isaiah 55:3-5) "Neither is the man without the woman, neither the woman without the man, in the Lord" (1 Corinthians 11:11). This teaches mutual dependence of man and woman in the Lord, but it does not explicitly teach that marriage or family relationships continue eternally. "Husbands and wives are "heirs together of the grace of life" (1 Peter 3:7). This supports husbands and wives sharing in salvation, but again does not explicitly say that family relationships continue eternally. So "having eternal families" is not directly established by these verses. Isaiah 55:3 says, "I will make an everlasting covenant with you, even the sure mercies of David". The passage then speaks about David being a "witness," "leader and commander," and nations coming to Israel. It does not explicitly teach continuation of personal posterity/seeds in the exalted state. Your concepts are much more explicit in LDS scripture, particularly Doctrine and Covenants 132:19, 30, where "continuation of the seeds" is directly connected with eternal marriage and exaltation. Christ's words argue against your premise. "The children of this world marry, and are given in marriage: But they which shall be accounted worthy to obtain that world, and the resurrection from the dead, neither marry, nor are given in marriage: Neither can they die any more: for they are equal unto the angels; and are the children of God, being the children of the resurrection" (Luke 20:34–36). They are not equal unto God. The theme of "overcoming" is prominent. In Revelation, "he who overcomes" refers to the person who remains faithful to Christ despite persecution, temptation, false teaching, and sin. The expression appears repeatedly in Jesus' messages to the seven churches. For example: "He that overcometh, the same shall be clothed in white raiment..." (Revelation 3:5). "To him that overcometh will I grant to sit with me in my throne..." (Revelation 3:21). What does "overcome" mean? The surrounding passages show that it means persevering faithfully to the end, rather than merely having a moment of faith. Jesus tells the church at Smyrna, ""Be thou faithful unto death, and I will give thee a crown of life" (Revelation 2:10). And Revelation 2:26 connects overcoming with "he that overcometh, and keepeth my works unto the end". So overcoming involves faithfulness, perseverance, and continuing in Christ's works until the end. What happens if you don't overcome? Revelation gives some very serious warnings. "He that overcometh shall not be hurt of the second death" (Revelation 2:11). The implication is that those who do not overcome remain subject to the "second death". Revelation 21:7–8 contrasts the two groups. "He that overcometh shall inherit all things; and I will be his God, and he shall be my son". Then, "But the fearful, and unbelieving, and the abominable... shall have their part in the lake which burneth with fire and brimstone: which is the second death". So there is a significant biblical distinction: Overcomes → inherits, reigns with Christ, receives eternal life, is God's child. Does not overcome → faces judgment/"second death." Revelation itself essentially defines the second death as being cast into the lake of fire: • "He that overcometh shall not be hurt of the second death (2:11). • Those in the first resurrection are not harmed by the second death (20:6)." • "And death and hell were cast into the lake of fire. This is the second death" (20:14). • The wicked "shall have their part in the lake which burneth with fire and brimstone: which is the second death" (21:8). The Book of Mormon speaks of a first and second death (Helaman 14:16–18; Alma 12:16) but doesn't associate this with the lake of fire. Mosiah 15:21-26 contains some details too: • There is a first resurrection (verse 21). • The redeemed have part in it (verse 22). • Others are resurrected afterward (verse 26). • The wicked are subsequently judged (verse26). The basic framework is a little similar to Revelation's distinction between the first resurrection and the resurrection of "the rest of the dead" but it doesn't explicitly call the later resurrection of the wicked the "second resurrection." It simply distinguishes their resurrection from the first resurrection. The Book of Mormon itself does not use Revelation's specific language of "he that overcometh" as extensively, but the underlying idea of persevering in Christ to receive eternal life is present. The LDS Church itself connects the Book of Mormon's concept of overcoming with exaltation. "Only those who obey the fulness of the gospel law will inherit eternal life. ... Thus those who gain eternal life receive exaltation; they are sons of God, joint-heirs with Christ, members of the Church of the Firstborn; they overcome all things, have all power, and receive the fulness of the Father. They are gods" (Religion 430-431 - Doctrines of the Gospel Teacher Manual). The Doctrine and Covenants 76 also has some details about those who overcome. They "received the testimony of Jesus," were baptized, kept the commandments, were cleansed from their sins, and "overcome by faith." (verses 51–53). "These shall dwell in the presence of God and his Christ forever and ever" (verse 62). "These are they who shall have part in the first resurrection" (verse 64). So, "overcoming" is associated with attaining the highest celestial outcome-being among the Church of the Firstborn, receiving God's fulness, becoming "gods," dwelling in God's presence, and having part in the first resurrection. But at the same time in LDS theology, residents of the terrestrial/telestial/two lower divisions of the celestial kingdom had not overcome. They are not in the first resurrection. Which of your bullet points apply to the LDS Heavenly Mother and Father? I already addressed this by showing you how various Bible translations render it. I agree that Isaiah 44 is addressed to Israel and is concerned with Israel's exclusive allegiance to Yahweh. But the actual claim goes beyond 'Israel has only one God.' He says, 'beside me there is no God' (Isaiah 44:6), and then asks, 'Is there a God beside me?' and answers, 'there is no God; I know not any' (44:8). So the question is whether 'no God beside me' means merely 'Israel must worship no other gods' or whether Isaiah is making the broader claim that no other deity exists. The latter is certainly a legitimate reading of the text, and many interpreters understand these chapters as expressing explicit monotheism. You can add other verses too: Isaiah 43:10, 45:5–6, 18, 21–22, and Deuteronomy 4:35, 39. Isaiah 43:10's "before me no God was formed" is even more difficult for the "Israel's God only" explanation. "Ye are my witnesses, saith the LORD, and my servant whom I have chosen: that ye may know and believe me, and understand that I am he: before me there was no God formed, neither shall there be after me." Notice the temporal scope: before me → I am he → after me It's not merely saying "Israel didn't have another God." It makes a claim about whether other Gods exist before or after Yahweh. John's theology is "The Father is the only true God and Jesus is also God". Therefore, "only true God" cannot mean "the Father is one God among several true Gods." John 17:3 does not provide support for the idea that the Father and Jesus are two separate true Gods. It presents the Father as the one true God while the same gospel identifies the Son with God. In John 17:21, Jesus prays, "That they all may be one; as thou, Father, art in me, and I in thee, that they also may be one in us". What kind of "one" does Jesus mean? He doesn't simply say "Father, make them one". He says, "as thou, Father, art in me, and I in thee, that they also may be one in us." So the disciples' unity is supposed to correspond to the relationship between the Father and Son. "One" does not mean "one person". Jesus and the Father are clearly presented as distinct persons throughout John. Jesus is praying to the Father and says the Father sent him. Likewise, John 17:21 doesn't mean the disciples literally become one person. They remain distinct individuals. So "one" means unity, but the question becomes: unity in what sense? Jesus continues: "And the glory which thou gavest me I have given them; that they may be one, even as we are one". Then: "I in them, and thou in me, that they may be made perfect in one". The unity involves shared relationship, glory, love, and indwelling. Verse 23 says, "I in them, and thou in me." There is a relational participation here that goes beyond merely saying, "They should all agree." John 17 actually distinguishes the disciples' unity from the Father/Son relationship Notice the structure: Father + Son: "thou, Father, art in me, and I in thee". Disciples: "that they also may be one in us." The disciples are brought into the Father/Son relationship; they don't become additional Gods. And this fits John 17:3 ("that they might know thee, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast sent"). So John 17 presents: • Father and Son as distinct • Father and Son as one • believers becoming one with one another • believers being brought into the Father/Son relationship • yet the Father remains "the only true God" John 17:21 shows that Father and Son being 'one' does not mean they are the same person. But it also doesn't prove they are merely two separate Gods who happen to agree. John's gospel has to be read as a whole. Here's another key point: being one with Jesus and the Father in John 17 is not the same context as Jesus used in John 10. The connection is made with the Old Testament shepherd motif. It strengthens the argument that Jesus is doing more than simply saying, "I am a good religious teacher." Psalm 23 identifies God as the Shepherd of his people. Psalm 80:1 does the same thing. Again, the Shepherd is God Himself. Psalm 95:7 connects God with His sheep. So you have a very specific Old Testament combination: Then Jesus says: "I am the good shepherd" (John 10:11) and "I am the good shepherd, and know my sheep, and am known of mine". Jesus isn't merely using a random metaphor. He is stepping into an Old Testament description of God's relationship with Israel. John 10:27 deliberately continues the sheep language ("My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me"). So compare Psalm 95:7 ("the sheep of his hand... if ye will hear his voice") with John 10:27 ("My sheep hear my voice... and they follow me"). That's a very interesting connection. Isaiah 40:11 also makes this connection ("He shall feed his flock like a shepherd: he shall gather the lambs with his arm."). John 10 then presents Jesus as the Shepherd who feeds, protects, knows, gathers, and gives his life for the sheep. Isaiah 40:11 is explicitly cross-referenced with John 10:11, 14–16 in Bible translations. And then comes the really interesting part: John 10:28–30 ("And I give unto them eternal life; and they shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck them out of my hand"). Then "My Father, which gave them me, is greater than all; and no man is able to pluck them out of my Father's hand." And "I and my Father are one." Notice the parallel: • Jesus' hand → sheep cannot be taken from it • Father's hand → sheep cannot be taken from it • "I and my Father are one." This is one reason John 10:30 cannot simply be dismissed as "Jesus and the Father agree about things." Jesus is presenting His own shepherding authority alongside the Father's, using the very imagery in which the Old Testament identifies God Himself as Israel's Shepherd. And the reaction of His opponents is: "For a good work we stone thee not; but for blasphemy; and because that thou, being a man, makest thyself God". So there is a chain worth highlighting: • Psalm 23: GOD is the Shepherd. • Psalm 80: GOD is the Shepherd of Israel. • Psalm 95: God's people are the sheep of His hand and hear His voice. • Isaiah 40: God shepherds His flock. • John 10: Jesus says "I am the good shepherd," His sheep hear His voice, they are in His hand, and He gives them eternal life. • John 10:30: "I and my Father are one." • John 10:33: His opponents understand this as a claim to deity. Yes. Jesus is a distinct personage in the Godhead. One cannot view Jesus and the Holy Ghost as two separate true Gods, making three true Gods. One God taking on human flesh does not result in the existence of two Gods. The LDS Godhead currently consists of three Gods. But at one point in eternity past, the LDS version of Jesus and the Holy Ghost were not part of the Godhead. Even the LDS version of Heavenly Father was taught to have attained his godhood (became a God). "God the Eternal Father was once a mortal man who passed through a school of earth life similar to that through which we are now passing. He became a God ... There was a time when the Deity was much less powerful than He is today... He grew in experience and continued to grow until He attained the status of Godhood" (Milton R. Hunter, The Gospel Through the Ages). There's also an LDS Church manual that stated even more directly. "Our Father in heaven was once a man as we are now... By obedience to eternal gospel principles, he progressed from one stage of life to another until he attained the state we call exaltation or godhood" (Achieving a Celestial Marriage). The church's seminary manual explicitly states: "The doctrine that God was once a man and has progressed to become a God is unique to this Church". Notice how it doesn't say "to become our God". I already explained this "oneness" earlier. We don't become members of the Godhead. Earlier you said God the Father has a Father. I referred to him as Grandfather God. I assume you don't believe God the Father is above Grandfather God? People cannot fathom the Trinity so they try to simplify it as three separate Gods. I think it started with how it was recorded in the King Follett Discourse. "Many men say there is one God; the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost are only one God! I say, that is a strange God anyhow-three in one, and one in three! It is a curious organization." Then: "I have always declared God to be a distinct personage, Jesus Christ a separate and distinct personage from God the Father, and that the Holy Ghost was a distinct personage and a Spirit: and these three constitute three distinct personages and three Gods". Modern LDS scholarship itself recognizes that Smith's later theology rejected the traditional conception of the Godhead as one divine being, although it explains LDS "one God" language as referring to the unity of the divine community rather than identity of substance ("Reassessing Joseph Smith's Theology in His Bicentennial", BYU). "Joseph held and his successors hold to a "one perfectly united, mutually indwelling divine community" model of the unity of Godhead rather than a "one metaphysical substance" model. Thus, the Latter-day Saints do not see the doctrine of the trinity as a mystery in the sense of a doctrine that is incomprehensible, but in the sense of a spiritual truth that was once hidden but now re-revealed through Joseph Smith". I believe there's only one God in existence anywhere and everywhere. God coming down in the form of a human would not constitute two Gods. I found his bio at https://danielomcclellan.wordpress.com/about/ Is he authoritative for the LDS Church? If no, can you give me one or two official LDS sources which indicate "many Deities" in the Old Testament? Other Bible translations render it as "I am the God of Bethel", omitting "in the place of God". https://www.biblegateway.com/verse/en/Genesis 31%3A13 The Septuagint is still interesting, as it identifies the speaker as "the angel of God" (verse 11), then "I am God in the place of God" in verse 13. Is that two Deities or just one Deity and one with a title of Deity? Moses was a god to Aaron, but Moses was not a Deity even though he came in the place of God. "11 And the angel of God said to me †in a dream, Jacob; and I said, What is it? 12 And he said, Look up with thine eyes, and behold the he-goats and the rams leaping on the sheep and the she-goats, speckled and variegated and spotted with ash-coloured spots; for I have seen all things that Laban does to thee. 13 I am God that appeared to thee in the place of God, where thou anointedst a pillar to me, and vowedst to me there a vow ...". The Septuagint does not simply say "I am God who appeared to you at Bethel." It specifically contains "in the place of God." Regarding images of God, how do you believe Jesus is the image of the invisible God? This was your reply to my previous post: Who is the only true God in these Old Testament verses? Deuteronomy 4:35 - "the LORD he is God; there is none else beside him." Deuteronomy 6:4 - "The LORD our God is one LORD." Isaiah 43:10 - "Before me there was no God formed, neither shall there be after me." Isaiah 44:6 - "I am the first, and I am the last; and beside me there is no God." Isaiah 45:5 - "I am the LORD, and there is none else, there is no God beside me." Isaiah 45:22 - "I am God, and there is none else." I assume you mean a second God (the Father) instead of Jesus (the Son) is being referenced in these Old Testament verses. Oddly enough, the Book of Mormon identifies Jesus as the God of Israel and the whole world in several places: "And the God of our fathers, who were led out of Egypt, out of bondage, by Moses, who was lifted up upon the cross and slain for the sins of the world, and all those who look upon the Son of God with faith, having a contrite spirit, shall live, even unto that life which is eternal" (1 Nephi 19:10). "Arise and come forth unto me, that ye may thrust your hands into my side, and also that ye may feel the prints of the nails in my hands and in my feet, that ye may know that I am the God of Israel, and the God of the whole earth, and have been slain for the sins of the world" (3 Nephi 11:14). Now, getting back to the Bible. Jesus is the first and the last according to the New Testament, echoing what Isaiah 44:6 says. "Fear not; I am the first and the last: I am he that liveth, and was dead; and, behold, I am alive for evermore, Amen..." (Revelation 1:17–18). "These things saith the first and the last, which was dead, and is alive..." (Revelation 2:8). "And, behold, I come quickly; and my reward is with me, to give every man according as his work shall be. I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end, the first and the last ... I Jesus have sent mine angel to testify unto you these things in the churches..." (Revelation 22:12–13, 16). Do you believe Jesus is not regarding himself as truly God? Or do you believe he is not God, but just an agent of God standing in the place of God like, like the Septuagint said? Origen did call the Son a "second God". In Against Celsus 5.39, Origen writes, "And although we may call Him a second God, let men know that by the term 'second God' we mean nothing else than a virtue capable of including all other virtues..." The "Him" is the Son/Logos. He uses similar language in Against Celsus 6.61. Modern scholarship identifies these as instances where Origen calls Christ a "second God" (δεύτερος θεός). But Origen did NOT simply teach "there are two Gods". Origen explicitly says "we worship but one God, the Father and the Son" while simultaneously saying that the Father and Son are "two distinct existences" (δύο ὑποστάσεις), united in mental unity, agreement, and will. So Origen's position is roughly: Father and Son = two distinct existences/hypostases Yet = one God in unity/agreement/will That is much stronger historically than simply saying "Origen taught two Gods." As regarding the LDS teaching of the Trinity, there's more to it than that. The church's seminary manual teaches, "I have always declared God to be a distinct personage, Jesus Christ a separate and distinct personage from God the Father, and that the Holy Ghost was a distinct personage and a Spirit: and these three constitute three distinct personages and three Gods". However, modern LDS Church teaching generally prefers "Godhead" rather than specifically saying "three Gods." For example, Religion 430-431 - Doctrines of the Gospel Student Manual says, "Though each God in the Godhead is a personage, separate and distinct from each of the others, yet they are 'one God' ... , meaning that they are united as one in the attributes of perfection. For instance, each has the fulness of truth, knowledge, charity, power, justice, judgment, mercy, and faith. Accordingly they all think, act, speak, and are alike in all things; and yet they are three separate and distinct entities. Each occupies space and is and can be in but one place at one time, but each has power and influence that is everywhere present" (McConkie, Mormon Doctrine, 319)". Since the LDS Jesus and the Holy Spirit did not always possess these attributes, they were not always members of this Godhead. Jeffrey R. Holland similarly described them as "three divine beings" and contrasted this with Trinitarian belief that the three persons are "not three Gods but one." He mentioned the Council of Nicaea in 325 A.D. But there is an important nuance. Nicaea did not formulate the complete later doctrine of the Trinity in the detailed form Christians commonly state today. Its immediate controversy was primarily about whether the Son was truly God and whether the Son was eternal or a created being. In LDS theology, the relationship of Father-Son only takes form when that Jesus becomes the spirit child of heavenly parents. An uncreated, eternal being (intelligence) becomes a son, and then becomes a God, and then becomes of member of the LDS Godhead. At one point in LDS history, the Godhead only consisted of two personages; the Father and the Son. And even before that, the Godhead only had one member; the Father. This was the time when Jesus had not yet become a God. It is unclear when the Holy Spirit joined the LDS Godhead. The church's Doctrines of the Gospel Student Manual teaches: "Three glorified, exalted, and perfected personages comprise the Godhead or supreme presidency of the universe. ... They are: God the Father; God the Son; God the Holy Ghost. ... "Though each God in the Godhead is a personage, separate and distinct from each of the others, yet they are 'one God' ... , meaning that they are united as one in the attributes of perfection". If I'm not mistaken, being exalted means: • Becoming like Heavenly Father. • Receiving a fulness of glory and joy. • Becoming a god. • Receiving eternal increase/posterity. • Having eternal family relationships. • Receiving kingdoms, thrones, powers, and dominions. • Continuing to progress in God's presence. Several or all of these bullet points most assuredly also point to the Heavenly Father of Earth as taught below. It makes no sense in saying we follow the same path if we only follow some steps in the path. Same path necessarily implies the same steps. "The Father is a glorified, perfected resurrected, exalted man who worked out his own salvation by obedience to the same laws he has given to us so that we may do the same" (A New Witness for the Articles of Faith, Chapter 7, God the Father). "Through a continual course of progression, our Heavenly Father has received exaltation and glory; and He points us out the same path ... we shall eventually come in possession ... of everything that heart can desire" (Teachings of Lorenzo Snow, 3-4). See also Religion 430-431 - Doctrines of the Gospel Student Manual. "If we passed our tests, we would receive the fulness of joy that our heavenly parents have received" (1997, Gospel Principles, page 14). "We believe in a God who is Himself progressive, whose majesty is intelligence; whose perfection consists in eternal advancement; the perpetual work of whose creation stands 'finished, yet renewed forever;'-a Being who has attained His exalted state by a path which now His children are permitted to follow; whose glory it is their heritage to share" (Articles of Faith). "The progression of our Father in heaven to godhood, or exaltation, was strictly in accordance with eternal principles" (Achieving a Celestial Marriage Student Manual, p. 129). "God the Eternal Father was once a mortal man who passed through a school of earth life similar to that through which we are now passing. He became a God ... There was a time when the Deity was much less powerful than He is today... He grew in experience and continued to grow until He attained the status of Godhood" (Milton R. Hunter, The Gospel Through the Ages). "The doctrine that God was once a man and has progressed to become a God is unique to this Church" (Brigham Young). Notice that there are no words about "becoming a God in the sense of Fatherhood only". I would like to comment on something mentioned in chapter 3 of Doctrines of the Gospel Student Manual. "What did Jesus do? Why; I do the things I saw my Father do when worlds came rolling into existence. My Father worked out his kingdom with fear and trembling, and I must do the same; and when I get my kingdom, I shall present it to my Father, so that he may obtain kingdom upon kingdom, and it will exalt him in glory. He will then take a higher exaltation, and I will take his place, and thereby become exalted myself. So that Jesus treads in the tracks of his Father, and inherits what God did before; and God is thus glorified and exalted in the salvation and exaltation of all his children" (Smith, Teachings, 347–48). Philippians 2 is about Christ, but the "fear and trembling" (2:12) is about Christians. There is biblical language about Jesus [not the Father also] undergoing a process involving obedience, suffering, and ultimately salvation but the Bible never says Jesus did this "with fear and trembling". You can't find this [Father aspect] either in other books in the LDS canon. But Mormon 9:27 echoes the passage in Philippians 2 ("Come unto the Lord with all your heart, and work out your own salvation with fear and trembling before him"). The phrase "fear and trembling" is biblical, but Joseph Smith applies it to a theological concept about the Father's and Son's progression that Scripture does not state. If you believe Joseph Smith, then tell me how Heavenly Father worked out his salvation with fear and trembling. Was he the redeemer for the planet he grew up on? Did he die to atone for the sins of his wife?

It's odd that the LDS Church would create a doctrine of a heavenly mother but then not pose any possible explanations for her origin. I'll suggest several possibilities regarding the origins and parentage of the woman who would later be known as the Heavenly Mother of Earth: [1] Daughter of an Exalted God and Goddess She was the spirit offspring of an earlier Heavenly Father and Heavenly Mother. Born into a previous generation of divine parents, she eventually progressed through mortality and exaltation, becoming a Goddess and the eternal companion of the Heavenly Father of Earth. [2] Created by Her Future Husband Heavenly Mother was created or formed by the God who would later become her eternal husband. She was made in his image but was not his literal spirit offspring. Her existence therefore originated through divine creation rather than genealogical parentage. [3] Daughter of a God from an Earlier Creation Her father was an exalted God who presided over an earlier creation or inhabited world. She may have been associated with his divine household without being his literal spirit offspring. After entering into an eternal marriage with the Heavenly Father of Earth, she progressed through mortality and exaltation. In this scenario, she may or may not have shared the same divine parentage as her future husband. [4] An Eternal, Rather Than Genealogical, Origin Heavenly Mother has always existed as a divine being. She did not originate as the offspring or creation of another God, nor did she progress from mortality to godhood. Her divine status is therefore eternal rather than the result of genealogical descent or exaltation. One conceptual distinction I'd make is that #1 is genealogical, #2 is creative, #3 is genealogical or familial but not necessarily biological, and #4 is eternal. That gives you four genuinely different models rather than four variations of the same parentage theory. Model #1 seems most probable. In that model, our Heavenly Father and Heavenly Mother would themselves be the children of an earlier Heavenly Father and Mother, who in turn had divine Parents, and so forth – an infinite regression of Gods. Later in part 1 of your reply, you said that it is not defined what is meant by "we are the offspring of heavenly parents". You seem not to know yourself what literal "offspring" means, even though you claim to believe in eternal increase. Do you believe people (as eternal, uncreated intelligences) were divine in origin and nature before becoming spirit children of heavenly parents or did these eternal core elements only become present upon their spirit birth? By "same kind of being that God is", do you believe we are just humans like God is or that we are presently both a human and a god or both a human and a God? Before you answer, have a look at teachings by former LDS leaders. I find some ambiguity in statements like "we are Gods in embryo" [present], "we are gods in embryo" [present], "we will become Gods" [future], and "we will become gods" [future]. [1] John Taylor "Man is a dual being, possessed of body and spirit, made in the image of God, and connected with him and with eternity. He is a God in embryo and will live and progress throughout the eternal ages, if obedient to the laws of the Godhead, as the Gods progress throughout the eternal ages" (Journal of Discourses, volume 23, page 65). "In another point of view, we look at him as emanating from the Gods-as a God in embryo-as an eternal being who had an existence before he came here, and who will exist after his mortal remains are mingled and associated with dust, from whence he came, and from whence he will be resurrected and partake of that happiness for which he is destined, or receive the reward of his evil deeds, according to circumstances. ... ... What is [man]? He had his being in the eternal worlds; he existed before he came here. He is not only the son of man, but he is the son of God also. He is a God in embryo, and possesses within him a spark of that eternal flame which was struck from the blaze of God's eternal fire in the eternal world..." https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/manual/teachings-john-taylor/chapter-1?lang=eng [2] George F. Richards "We are placed here upon the earth for the purpose, in part, of improving, magnifying and perfecting those qualities and attributes; so that, while we are now but gods in embryo, having been born of God, in His likeness, in His image, and having received from Him the attributes of Deity, through perfecting those attributes in time and in eternity we will be like Him in very deed, and be glorified with him in His kingdom" (October 1914 General Conference). [3] Achieving a Celestial Marriage Student Manual "Can you see the implications of these two statements as they relate to you and to your eternal destiny? Elder James E. Talmage did. He declared, " ... in his mortal condition man is God in embryo. However ... any individual now a mortal being may attain to the rank and sanctity of godship .... " (Articles of Faith, p. 529 .) Later on ... MEN ARE GODS IN EMBRYO ( 1 -7 ) We Have the Potential to Become like Our Heavenly Parents "Man is the child of God, formed in the divine image and endowed with divine attributes, and even as the infant son of our 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 of aeons, of evolving into a God" (The First Presidency [Joseph F. Smith, John R. Winder, Anthon H.Lund ] , "The Origin of Man," Improvement Era, Nov. 1909, p. 81.) [4] James E. Talmage "But Mormonism is bolder yet. It asserts that in accordance with the inviolable law of organic nature--that like shall beget like, and that multiplication of numbers and perpetuation of species shall be in compliance with the condition "each after his kind," the child may achieve the former status of the parent, and that in his mortal condition man is a God in embryo" (James E. Talmage, The Story of Mormonism, chapter 1, "Man's Relationship to God.") I will withdraw my statement until I can find something more conclusive. Could there have been other Gods which were already in existence before Heavenly Father of Earth became a God and later became a heavenly father himself? I believe it's possible. Let me explain my rationale by putting some pieces of the puzzle together. I think we can agree that Joseph Smith taught God the Father had a Father. For the sake of simplicity I'll use the terms "Grandfather God" (the Father of Heavenly Father) and "Father God" (Heavenly Father of Earth). We have a few scenarios: [1] Grandfather God is married to a heavenly wife. [2] Grandfather God is not married. In scenario 1, Father God is the literal offspring of Grandfather God and Grandmother God. In scenario 2, Father God is not the literal offspring of Grandfather God. In both scenarios, we can suppose that Grandfather God had many children (either by creation or by procreation) and that he created many worlds. The worlds created by Grandfather God are at different stages of progression; some worlds have already passed through the process that our earth is undergoing. Several sources can support this: [1] Brigham Young: worlds are "continually coming into existence and passing from one state to another" (Journal of Discourses 17:140). [2] Brigham Young: heavenly beings from elsewhere have "passed through the same ordeals we are now passing through" and are now "in glory" (Journal of Discourses 8:81). [3] Joseph Smith: he saw "sanctified beings from worlds that have been". "I beheld round the throne, holy angels and hosts, sanctified beings from worlds that have been, in holiness worshipping God and the Lamb" (1843 statement/poem). This could also resemble the realm of Grandfather God and one of his Saviors (an only begotten Son on each of his many worlds). We can suppose that all the worlds created by Grandfather God had their own redeemer or Grandfather God chose one of his created/procreated children to be the redeemer for all of them. This/these redeemer/ redeemers would already have come to earth before Jesus became the God of our Earth. [4] But Brigham Young taught each world had its own redeemer. "Sin is upon every earth that ever was created, and if it was not so, I would like some philosophers to let us know how people can be exalted to become sons of God, and enjoy a fulness of glory with the Redeemer. Consequently every earth has its redeemer, and every earth has its tempter; and every earth, and the people thereof, in their turn and time, receive all that we receive, and pass through all the ordeals that we are passing through" (Journal of Discourses, Volume 14, pages 71-72). https://scriptures.byu.edu/jod/pdf/JoD14/JoD14_0071.pdf https://scriptures.byu.edu/jod/pdf/JoD14/JoD14_0072.pdf Now we have to consider all the children of Grandfather God and all his worlds. Which of these children progressed into becoming a God and Heavenly Father of their world even before Father God is created/procreated to Grandfather God. These scenarios show the possibility that many Gods and Fathers (originating from Grandfather God) came into existence before Heavenly Father (Father God) became a God through eternal progression and later became a heavenly parent of our Earth. The puzzle is not difficult to conceive of when you also factor in the LDS teachings of a regression of Gods. [1] Doctrines of Salvation, Joseph Fielding Smith "The Prophet taught that our Father had a Father and so on. Is not this a reasonable thought, especially when we remember that the promises are made to us that we may become like him?" (Doctrines of Salvation, volume 1). This is particularly useful because Joseph Fielding Smith explicitly interprets Joseph Smith's teaching as a succession of Fathers/Gods. [2] Brigham Young made the concept much more explicit in the Journal of Discourses. "How many Gods there are, I do not know, but there never was a time when there were not Gods and worlds, and when men were not passing through the same ordeals that we are passing through." "That course has been from all eternity, and it is and will be so to all eternity" (7:333). [3] Orson Pratt developed the idea into a systematic cosmology. "We were begotten by our Father in Heaven; the person of our Father in Heaven was begotten on a previous heavenly world by His Father ; and again, He was begotten by a still more ancient Father and so on, from generation to generation, from one heavenly world to another still more ancient, until our minds are wearied and lost in the multiplicity of generations and successive worlds, and as a last resort, we wonder in our minds, how far back the genealogy extends, and how the first world was formed, and the first father was begotten". But let me digress a little to the King Follett Discourse. I hope you don't mind. More details are recorded in Teachings of Joseph Smith (1938): "Learned men can teach you no more than what I have told you. Thus the head God brought forth the Gods in the grand council" (page 348). "I will transpose and simplify it in the English language. Oh, ye lawyers, ye doctors, and ye priests, who have persecuted me, I want to let you know that the Holy Ghost knows something as well as you do. The head God called together the Gods and sat in grand council to bring forth the world. The grand councilors sat at the head in yonder heavens and contemplated the creation of the worlds which were created at the time." (pages 348-349). "In the beginning, the head of the Gods called a council of the Gods; and they came together and concocted a plan to create the world and people it. When we begin to learn this way, we begin to learn the only true God, and what kind of a being we have got to worship" (page 349-350). The head God organized the heavens and the earth. I defy all the world to refute me. In the beginning the heads of the Gods organized the heavens and the earth. Now the learned priests and the people rage, and the heathen imagine a vain thing. If we pursue the Hebrew text further, it reads, "Berosheit baurau Eloheim ait aushamayeen vehau auraits." -"The head one of the Gods said, Let us make a man in our own image." I once asked a learned Jew, "If the Hebrew language compels us to render all words ending in heim in the plural, why not render the first Eloheim plural?" He replied, "That is the rule with few exceptions; but in this case it would ruin the Bible." He acknowledged I was right. I came here to investigate these things precisely as I believe them. Hear and judge for yourselves; and if you go away satisfied, well and good" (page 372). In the very beginning the Bible shows there is a plurality of Gods beyond the power of refutation. It is a great subject I am dwelling on. The word Eloheim ought to be in the plural all the way through-Gods. The heads of the Gods appointed one God for us; and when you take [that] view of the subject, its sets one free to see all the beauty, holiness and perfection of the Gods. All I want is to get the simple, naked truth, and the whole truth" (page 372). Who are the "heads of the Gods, the grand counsellors"? Joseph Smith does not provide a list of their names. He mentions, "The heads of the Gods appointed one God for us". It means that, in Joseph Smith's formulation, there are Gods who were involved in appointing another God specifically for "us." Joseph Smith does not teach that Heavenly Father was appointed by an older God. But what it does say is that "the heads of the Gods appointed one God for us." He does not identify that appointed God by name. However, when this passage is placed alongside Smith's other statements that the Father had previously lived on an earth and that Jesus was following in the Father's tracks, the broader LDS succession-of-Gods concept becomes much more apparent. The Joseph Smith Papers shows Joseph Smith reworked the first portion of Genesis 1:1 (traditionally, 'in the beginning God created') to read 'the head brought forth the Gods' in an attempt to demonstrate how the Hebrew version of this passage could be viewed as supporting his teachings on the nature of God and creation. It shows what he changed: Bereshit / Berasheeth Joseph Smith removed the initial bet (ב), which is the preposition meaning "in" or "by." He also removed the ending -it / -eet, which Seixas had identified as a grammatical termination. This left rosh / resh, which means "head." Joseph Smith then took Elohim, normally functioning as the grammatical subject of Genesis 1:1, and made it the object of the verb. He also interpreted bara ("created") as "brought forth." The Joseph Smith Papers show how he removed grammatical elements from bereshit, reinterpreted bara, and changed Elohim from the grammatical subject into the object in order to produce "the head brought forth the Gods." Note 33: The full logic of this statement is best reflected in the Times and Seasons account, which renders this passage as "Berosheit. I want to analyze the word; baith, in, by, through, in, and every thing else. Rosh, the head. Sheit, gramatical termination. When the inspired man wrote it, he did not put the baith there. A man, a Jew without any authority, thought it too bad to begin to talk about the head. It read first, 'The head one of the Gods brought forth the Gods,' that is the true meaning of the words. Baurau, signifies to bring forth." In this reconstructed passage, JS explained the way in which he reinterpreted the first word of Genesis 1:1 (Berasheeth/Bereshit) as "the head," meaning one of the Gods; retranslated the verb of this sentence (baurau/bara) from the traditional "to create" to the less conventional "to bring forth"; and shifted the plural noun Elōheem/Elohim ("Gods") from acting as the sentence's subject to serving as its direct object. Thus, JS reworked the first portion of Genesis 1:1 (traditionally, "in the beginning God created") to read "the head brought forth the Gods" in an attempt to demonstrate how the Hebrew version of this passage could be viewed as supporting his teachings on the nature of God and creation. For other examples of how JS or his associates interpreted Genesis 1:1, see JS, Discourse, 16 June 1844, JS Collection, CHL; and "The Living God," Times and Seasons, 15 Feb. 1845, 6:808–809. Comprehensive Works Cited Times and Seasons. Commerce/Nauvoo, IL. Nov. 1839–Feb. 1846. This is relevant to the "head God / heads of the Gods" material I mentioned above. It would seem Joseph Smith was reconstructing the Hebrew of Genesis 1:1 in a way that supported his plurality-of-Gods teaching. In your reply on September 20 2026, you said you don't know how we are "offspring" of heavenly parents. Is it disrespectful to say Heavenly Mother and Father reproduce in the same way that humans do? That's the way he designed it for humans, and he is said to be an exalted man. Is it a repugnant thought? I don't think so. What about "literal father of the flesh" (which only seems to have applied to Jesus) and literal father of the spirit (which applies to all)? How should the "literal" aspect be understood in the case of Jesus? Maybe these teachings could be used to explain it. [1] President Heber J. Grant "We believe absolutely that Jesus Christ is the Son of God, begotten of God, the first-born in the spirit and the only begotten in the flesh; that He is the Son of God just as much as you and I are the sons of our fathers". "Jesus is the Redeemer of the world, the Savior of mankind, who came to the earth with a divinely appointed mission to die for the redemption of mankind. Jesus Christ is literally the Son of God, the Only Begotten in the flesh". [2] James E. Talmage "The teachings of Jesus Christ endure because of their intrinsic worth; and many men respect His aphorisms, proverbs, parables, and His profoundly philosophical precepts, who yet reject Him as the Son of God, the Only Begotten in the flesh". [3] That Ye May Believe, Part 1 "Through the Prophet Joseph we also learn that Jesus Christ is the literal Son of God in spirit and in the flesh; He progressed until He became even as the Father".17 Point 17 is cross referenced to Doctrine and Covenants 93:11-14 ("And he received not of the fulness at first, but continued from grace to grace, until he received a fulness; And thus he was called the Son of God, because he received not of the fulness at the first"). That's a rather odd reason why Jesus was called the Son of God; because he received not of the fulness at the first. [4] Religion 430-431 – Doctrines of the Gospel Student Manual The church's seminary manual puts it more elegantly, with the phrase "celestial sireship": "That Child to be born of Mary was begotten of Elohim, the Eternal Father, not in violation of natural law but in accordance with a higher manifestation thereof; and, the offspring from that association of supreme sanctity, celestial Sireship, and pure though mortal maternity, was of right to be called the 'Son of the Highest.'" (James E. Talmage, Jesus the Christ, 81)."(Religion 430-431 – Doctrines of the Gospel Student Manual). The word "sired" is even mentioned in a Scripture Central article. I personally believe that Heavenly Father did not need to come down to become the literal father of Christ in the flesh. It was a miraculous conception. Do you believe the angels (not to be confused with spirit offspring) created by God are the same kind of being as He is? In some way, yes. But let me clarify what I mean. Paul's use of Greek poets in Acts 17 does not mean that he was endorsing pagan theology as true revelation about God. Paul was addressing a pagan audience and used ideas familiar to them as a starting point, but he then radically redirected those ideas toward the biblical God. In Acts 17:24–31, Paul describes God as the Creator of the world, the Lord of heaven and earth, the One who needs nothing from humanity, the Judge of the world, and the One who raised Jesus from the dead. He explicitly rejects the pagan conception of deities [Zeus and others] represented by images of gold, silver, and stone. Even if Epimenides originally applied the statement ("For in him we live, and move, and have our being ") to Zeus, Paul's quotation does not mean that Paul accepted Zeus as the true God. Paul regularly used concepts and language familiar to his audience without endorsing the religious system from which they came. The other part, "for we are also his offspring" is not attributed to Epimenides. It is attributed to Aratus of Soli, from his Phaenomena. "From Zeus let us begin; him do we mortals never leave unnamed; full of Zeus are all the streets and all the market-places of men; full is the sea and the havens thereof; always we all have need of Zeus. For we are also his offspring; and he in his kindness unto men giveth favourable signs and wakeneth the people to work, reminding them of livelihood. He tells what time the soil is best for the labour of the ox and for the mattock, and what time the seasons are favourable both for the planting of trees and for casting all manner of seeds. For himself it was who set the signs in heaven, and marked out the constellations, and for the year devised what stars chiefly should give to men right signs of the seasons, to the end that all things might grow unfailingly. Wherefore him do men ever worship first and last. Hail, O Father, mighty marvel, mighty blessing unto men. Hail to thee and to the Elder Race! Hail, ye Muses, right kindly, every one! But for me, too, in answer to my prayer direct all my lay, even as is meet, to tell the stars". https://intertextual.bible/text/aratus-phaenomena-5/acts-17.28 https://netbible.org/bible/Acts+17 Paul takes language originally used of Zeus and applies it to the God he is proclaiming-without implying that Paul regarded Zeus as the true God. John 8 provides a clear example where fatherhood language describes moral/relational affiliation rather than biological generation. Paul identifies God as the Creator, not as a biological parent ("God that made the world and all things therein"), then "he giveth to all life, and breath, and all things" and "hath made of one blood all nations of men". The emphasis is on God creating and sustaining humanity, not on procreation. The claim that Smith's statement was "only with regard to creation" is not quite right. The "worlds coming into existence" statement is certainly about creation, but Joseph Smith connects the Father's experience with working out a kingdom, obtaining kingdom upon kingdom, and receiving further exaltation. He did not provide a detailed account of the Father's earthly life. In the King Follett Discourse, however, he taught that the Father was once a man, dwelt on an earth as Jesus did, laid down His life and took it up again, and worked out His own kingdom. Joseph Smith also said that the Father obtained 'kingdom upon kingdom' and that Jesus was following in His Father's tracks ("The scriptures inform us that Jesus said, as the Father hath power in himself, even so hath the Son power-to do what? Why, what the Father did"). However, their God was Zeus – a pagan deity, like all the gods in the Greek pantheon. Before I show you Bible translations where "eternity" is used instead of everlasting for Proverbs 8:23 and Psalm 90:2, I’ll quote what a previous LDS President taught. From eternity to eternity is the same thing as from everlasting to everlasting. "... and he is the literal and personal father of the spirits of all men. He is omnipotent and omniscient; he has all power and all wisdom; and his perfections consist in the possession of all knowledge, all faith or power, all justice, all judgment, all mercy, all truth, and the fullness of all godly attributes ... If we are to have that perfect faith by which we can lay hold upon eternal life, we must believe in God as the possessor of the fullness of all these characteristics and attributes. I say also that he is an infinite and eternal being, and as an unchangeable being, he possesses these perfected powers and attributes from everlasting to everlasting, which means from eternity to eternity". The same wording is mentioned in the May 1971 Ensign article titled "The Most Important Knowledge". The same equating of the terms is also taught in the "New Testament Teacher Resource Manual". "Christ is the Great I AM, the I AM, the I AM THAT I AM, meaning that he is the Eternal One, the One ‘who is from all eternity to all eternity’ (D. & C. 39:1; Ex. 3:14), the God who is ‘from everlasting to everlasting’ (Ps. 90:2)". Now I turn to the Bible. Proverbs 8:23 Darby: "I was set up from eternity..." Douay-Rheims: "I was set up from eternity..." ISV: "From eternity I was appointed..." LEB: "From eternity, I was set up..." NASB 2020: "From eternity I was established..." NET: "From eternity I was appointed..." OJB: "I was set up [to reign] me'olam (from eternity)..." https://www.biblegateway.com/verse/en/Proverbs 8%3A23 Psalm 90:2 CJB: "from eternity past to eternity future you are God." CSB: "from eternity to eternity, you are God." CSBA: "from eternity to eternity, you are God." Darby: "even from eternity to eternity thou art God." EHV: "from eternity to eternity you are God." HCSB: "from eternity to eternity, You are God." ICB: "from eternity to eternity, You are God." ISV: "you are God from eternity to eternity." NABRE: "from eternity to eternity you are God." There are also translations that convey the same idea without using the exact word eternity. For example, GNT says "you were eternally God, and will be God forever" and the CEB says "from forever in the past to forever in the future, you are God." https://www.biblegateway.com/verse/EN/Psalm 90%3A2 I suggest that the Pearl of Great Price is not an accurate translation. The LDS Church, in its Gospel Topics page, says the following: "Most of the papyri that were in Joseph's possession are now lost, though some fragments have survived. They consist of two fragments of the Book of Breathing for Horos; four fragments and several scraps of the Book of the Dead for Semminis; and a fragment from the Book of the Dead for Nefer-ir-nebu. Both Latter-day Saint and non–Latter-day Saint Egyptologists agree that the characters on these fragments do not match the translation given in the book of Abraham". Maybe you would consider the idea that the Gods went down to create Adam from the dust of the earth is wrong (Abraham 5:4-7). You said, "The bolded portion above in the quote from Brigham Young is the only part of his address that is referenced in Nielson's article (pertaining to the presumption that "every earth has its redeemer"). And you'll notice that there is nothing in the quote from Brigham Young (above) that is remotely like anything you are attributing to Brigham Young. Maybe there is some other reference to Brigham Young saying those things? But here you only have Kent Nielson's interpretation and speculation on the items in his article". Yes. I understood your point in your reply. That's why I acknowledged your correction of me and introduced how the two statements differed. "One among these, it is presumed, was a savior for them, and through him they obtained a resurrection and an exaltation on an eternal, celestial world". That statement is a presumption. It's open to speculation. Brigham Young's statement is not a presumption. There is no speculation. "Consequently every earth has its redeemer, and every earth has its tempter; and every earth, and the people thereof ...". It's easy to see here that he is firstborn of his earthly mother. There is no scripture that speaks of Christ being firstborn of a heavenly mother. "Begotten" does not necessarily mean "made", as in being born of heavenly parents. Several good articles explain it: https://www.crossway.org/articles/what-does-begotten-not-made-mean/ https://nickcady.org/2026/04/11/what-does-it-mean-that-jesus-is-the-begotten-son-of-god/ The New Testament connects "begotten" with Jesus being "firstborn from the dead". Acts 13:33 - Paul applies Psalm 2:7 to Jesus ("Thou art my Son, this day have I begotten thee"). Immediately afterward, Paul speaks of Jesus being raised from the dead ("And as concerning that he raised him up from the dead, now no more to return to corruption"). This is significant because Paul connects "begotten" (Psalm 2:7) with Christ's resurrection. There are others: "He is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead; that in all things he might have the pre-eminence" (Colossians 1:18). "Jesus Christ... the first begotten of the dead..." (Revelation 1:5). The Greek in Revelation 1:5 is ὁ πρωτότοκος τῶν νεκρῶν (ho prōtotokos tōn nekrōn), literally "the firstborn of the dead." So there are two closely related expressions: "Begotten" → resurrection" and "Firstborn from/of the dead" → resurrection Various Bible translations render Revelation 1:5, using either firstborn or first begotten. Here are a few examples: "And from Jesus Christ, who is the faithful witness, and the first begotten of the dead, and the prince of the kings of the earth" (KJV) "...and from Jesus Christ, the faithful witness, the firstborn from the dead, and the ruler over the kings of the earth." (New King James Version). https://www.biblegateway.com/verse/en/Revelation 1%3A5 The Pearl of Great Price's creation account describes the Gods counselling together and coming down to perform this. See Abraham chapters 4 and 5 for all the creations of the Gods in respect to Earth. Here are two relevant parts: "And the Gods took counsel among themselves and said: Let us go down and form man in our image, after our likeness; and we will give them dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth. So the Gods went down to organize man in their own image, in the image of the Gods to form they him, male and female to form they them". On July 26 2026, you said something similar: "And God the Father would have also had an earthly father and mother when he dwelt on an earth the same as Jesus Christ did. And that's exactly the way Joseph Smith taught it". When the LDS Heavenly Father was born of his father and mother on that earth, which of his parents was a God at that time? Prior to him being born on that earth, was he a spirit offspring of Grandfather God? Is he (God the Father) greater (above) his Father (Grandfather God)? Is Grandfather God above or before God the Father before God the Father becomes a son of Grandfather God? Or is Grandfather God below God the Father? Is God the Father even a God when he is born or procreated by Grandfather God? We can be sure that he wasn't even married and having spirit children immediately when he becomes a spirit child of Grandfather God. We don't even know how long it took for God the Father to become a God in the presence of Grandfather God through his eternal progression. Maybe you are combining all the creations of Grandfather God with God the Father in the same sphere of influence or realm. I suppose you don't worship Grandfather God because he is not your God and you are not his spirit child. Do you believe Satan was evil before being born to his heavenly parents, when he supposedly existed as an eternal, uncreated intelligence? If yes, then God did not create evil. If no, then the LDS Heavenly Father knew he would become evil and used him to cause the Fall. Yes. This reminds me of the fortunate and necessary Fall in LDS theology. It's taught that people even celebrate Eve's act. [1] Joseph Fielding Smith "It was a part of this great plan, that he should partake of the forbidden fruit and fall, thus bringing suffering and death into the world, even for the ultimate good of his children". [2] Doctrines of the Gospel Student Manual "The Fall was a purposeful step in God's plan of salvation". "Adam's fall gave him and his posterity the opportunity to obtain the joy that comes from choosing good over evil". [3] Old Testament Teacher Resource Manual "Modern revelation testifies that the Fall was good, necessary, and a planned step in the eternal progression of all of Heavenly Father's children". [4] Preach My Gospel "Concerning the blessings of the Fall, both Adam and Eve rejoiced. Eve said, "Were it not for our transgression we never should have had [children], and never should have known good and evil, and the joy of our redemption, and the eternal life which God giveth unto all the obedient" (Moses 5:11; see also verse 10)." [5] BYU–Idaho President Alvin F. Meredith III "When Adam transgressed and he and Eve were cast out of the Garden of Eden, this was considered a fall downward, President Meredith said, but it could also be called a "fortunate fall" or a step forward". "After the Fall, Adam and Eve were no longer in the presence of God. And once out of the garden, they became subject to death and the vulnerabilities of mortality," President Meredith said. "But on the positive side, they were able to progress and experience joy. And they were also able to have children and create a family". [6] Religion 327 - Pearl of Great Price Student Manual "Some Christians condemn Eve for her act, concluding that she and her daughters are somehow flawed by it. Not the Latter-day Saints! Informed by revelation, we celebrate Eve's act and honor her wisdom and courage in the great episode, called the Fall". https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/manual/the-pearl-of-great-price-student-manual-2018/the-book-of-moses/moses-4-1-19?lang=eng The Religion 327 - Pearl of Great Price Teacher Manual says, "Each person on earth has a dual nature and is composed of a mortal, physical body born to earthly parents and of an eternal spirit created by our Heavenly Father in the premortal life". "We know, however, that there is something called intelligence which always existed. It is the real eternal part of man, which was not created nor made. This intelligence combined with the spirit constitutes a spiritual identity or individual" (Answers to Gospel Questions, comp. Joseph Fielding Smith Jr. [1963], 4:127). Did Heavenly Father and Mother take some pre-existing substance to create the spirit of Satan?

So exaltation is not being a Deity. Who is God in these verses? Deuteronomy 4:35 — "the LORD he is God; there is none else beside him." Deuteronomy 6:4 — "The LORD our God is one LORD." Isaiah 43:10 — "Before me there was no God formed, neither shall there be after me." Isaiah 44:6 — "I am the first, and I am the last; and beside me there is no God." Isaiah 45:5 — "I am the LORD, and there is none else, there is no God beside me." Isaiah 45:22 — "I am God, and there is none else." So it's a false teaching until it is canonized as the truth?

Those earlier teachings are not accepted as the truth today. Here are two more from John Taylor, third President of the LDS Church: "And after the flood we are told that the curse that had been pronounced upon Cain was continued through Ham's wife, as he had married a wife of that seed. And why did it pass through the flood? Because it was necessary that the devil should have a representation upon the earth as well as God" (Journal of Discourses, volume 22, page 304). "When he destroyed the inhabitants of the antediluvian world, he suffered a descendant of Cain to come through the flood in order that he might be properly represented upon the earth" (Journal of Discourses, volume 23, page 336). You never did say if you believed the truth as stated by George Q. Cannon as the thread started. Care to try? These are two independent things. Is the Watchtower Jesus (Michael the Archangel) the same person as Jesus (God)? What Christs were Matthew 24:24 and Mark 13:22 referring to – the same Christ or different Christs? Worshipping a being (Jesus) who you believe became the first spirit child of heavenly parents and who then became a God is distinct from the scriptural Christ. The New Testament warns against false Christs. One such false Christ is the JW version, Michael the Archangel. They are walking with a false Christ. See my last reply. The LDS Church's doctrine that Jesus was ranked as a God when he reached some level of intelligence is not an opinion.

There are currently 50 states in the United States of America. Is this a characterization or something we can state with clarity and confidence? Is the teaching of Jesus being the first born child of heavenly parents just a characterization of something the LDS Church can state with clarity and confidence using the scriptures? I'm amazed that you don't see leading people astray as being synonymous with leading people away from the truth. These teachings led the Latter-day Saints away from the truth and into believing falsehoods. I know you don't consider this as the LDS being led astray by false teachings. Let me borrow one of your earlier statements and apply it to what you said: It [meaning "they are not doctrine"] was characterized in that way, yes. Whether it actually was, however, is something we cannot state with clarity and confidence. Rinse and repeat: It [the current posture of the LDS Church] was characterized in that way, yes. Whether it actually was, however, is something we cannot state with clarity and confidence. If you believe the Lord didn't institute the priesthood ban, then you believe the LDS Church followed the commandments of men. Maybe false teachings do not lead people away from the truth in your mind. The Governing Body of the Jehovah's Witnesses lead their people astray (away from the truth) when they teach Jesus is Michael the Archangel, that he returned invisibly in 1914 and made them (members of that body) the faithful and discreet slave to dispense spiritual food to the world, and that only 144,000 belong to the Bride of Christ. It seems like you're saying Official Declaration #2 is the actual revelation they received from God and not something they wrote of their own impressions after prayer. These sound pretty clear to me: • 2 Nephi 5:21 - "And he had caused the cursing to come upon them, yea, even a sore cursing, because of their iniquity. For behold, they had hardened their hearts against him, that they had become like unto a flint; wherefore, as they were white, and exceedingly fair and delightsome, that they might not be enticing unto my people the Lord God did cause a skin of blackness to come upon them". • Alma 3:6 - "And the skins of the Lamanites were dark, according to the mark which was set upon their fathers, which was a curse upon them because of their transgression and their rebellion against their brethren, who consisted of Nephi, Jacob, and Joseph, and Sam, who were just and holy men". • 3 Nephi 2:15 - "And their curse was taken from them, and their skin became white like unto the Nephites". I know this. But I don't believe it. I'm from Iowa – show me a recorded revelation from God for the existence of a heavenly mother. If a revelation only comes from the First Presidency these days, then let's cast aside all the doctrines in the Religion 430-431 Doctrines of the Gospel Student Manual since many therein are not canonized. Who is the God and Father of the LDS Heavenly Mother when she was living on another world with a man who would later become her husband and Heavenly Father of our Earth? Christ atoned for original guilt (original sin). Here are just two: "It is most natural and just that he who commits the wrong should pay the penalty—atone for his wrongdoing. Therefore, when Adam was the transgressor of the law, justice demanded that he, and none else, should answer for the sin and pay the penalty with his life. But Adam, in breaking the law, himself became subject to the curse, and being under the curse could not atone, or undo what he had done. Neither could his children, for they also were under the curse, and it required one who was not subject to the curse to atone for that original sin. Moreover, since we were all under the curse, we were also powerless to atone for our individual sins" (Teachings of Joseph Fielding Smith, chapter 3). "There are two general divisions of sin, viz., original and actual. Original sin is that which was committed by the parents of the race, the consequences of which pass upon all of their posterity. Actual sin is that committed by each individual and for which he is personally responsible. Adam and Eve broke the divine law given to them in the garden, the penalty for which was death, natural and spiritual ; the first being the separation of the spirit and the body, and the second, banishment from the presence of God. The taint descended to their offspring. He died not only to atone for original sin but for actual sin, and to become the mediator between God and man. His blood was shed for the sins of the whole world. For original sin unconditionally, for actual sin conditionally" (Mormon Doctrine Plain and Simple). Even a false religion like Hinduism can be a moral hinge for its adherents. It sounds like you're saying that people can teach falsely about the Father and the Son and still be saved. Testing the truthfulness of the Book of Mormon, Doctrine and Covenants, and the Pearl of Great Price is the hinge for the LDS belief in a restored gospel. Despite the claim made by the Book of Mormon (Mormon 7:8–9), not everyone who believes the Bible also believes the Book of Mormon, or vice versa. The LDS Church's Guide to the Scriptures even states, "The Book of Mormon was written for the intent that we may believe the Bible". My faith in the Bible does not depend on Joseph Smith. They believe their Quran is the Word of God. Muslims don't view the Quran or the Hadiths as providing different perspectives or opinions. The Quran (which denies the deity of Christ and his crucifixion) is leading Muslims astray (away from the truth). Here's a better analogy. Person A says, "I believe Barack Obama was a great President". Person B says, "I believe Barack Obama was a terrible President". Person C comes along and says, "Barack Obama is Chinese, born in China, single, 40 years old. He can never be the US President. Persons A and B are not referring to the same person as C. It is not differing perspectives, but rather different facts about two separate Obamas. Now I turn to some biblical concepts: Matthew 24:24 - "For there shall arise false Christs, and false prophets, and shall shew great signs and wonders; insomuch that, if it were possible, they shall deceive the very elect". Mark 13:22 - "For false Christs and false prophets shall rise, and shall shew signs and wonders, to seduce, if it were possible, even the elect". 2 Corinthians 11:4 - "For if he that cometh preacheth another Jesus, whom we have not preached, or if ye receive another spirit, which ye have not received, or another gospel, which ye have not accepted, ye might well bear with him". Paul is warning the Corinthians about teachers who were presenting a Jesus different from the one Paul and the apostles had preached. A closely related passage is Galatians 1:6–9, where Paul twice warns about "another gospel": "But though we, or an angel from heaven, preach any other gospel unto you than that which we have preached unto you, let him be accursed. As we said before, so say I now again, If any man preach any other gospel unto you than that ye have received, let him be accursed". You gave me an question spanning different time frames so I had to consider all options. Person A's statement was most accurate decades ago – LDS leaders previously taught the ban and the reason for it were of God. Person B's statement is more accurate nowadays – "the priesthood ban and the reason for it were not of God, but from man". Previously I said: Person A's statement was most accurate decades ago – LDS leaders previously taught the ban and the reason for it were of God. Person B's statement is more accurate nowadays – "the priesthood ban and the reason for it were not of God, but from man". How do you view either of these statements as being inaccurate?

Were Ra, Dagon, and Baal humans that were worshipped? Who is the only true God in these six verses? Deuteronomy 4:35 — "the LORD he is God; there is none else beside him." Deuteronomy 6:4 — "The LORD our God is one LORD." Isaiah 43:10 — "Before me there was no God formed, neither shall there be after me." Isaiah 44:6 — "I am the first, and I am the last; and beside me there is no God." Isaiah 45:5 — "I am the LORD, and there is none else, there is no God beside me." Isaiah 45:22 — "I am God, and there is none else." Is Baal an exalted man – a real heavenly deity? Previous LDS leaders taught an infinite regression of Gods as truth.

You can keep using the word "theory" but it doesn't apply to previous teachings by LDS leaders. It was not taught as "theory" back then. That's why the LDS Church's essay on Blacks and the priesthood is not an entirely accurate – those past teachings were not portrayed as theory. Do all LDS Church teachings and policies in the past, present, and future need to be written down as revelation from God and canonized? Based on your earlier logic, the so-called doctrine of a heavenly mother is actually a theory because there is no formal revelation of her recorded in canon. Previous teachings that it was doctrine and a direct commandment of the Lord does not freeze the latter disavowal and referring to it as theory. It's just an admission that previous Latter-day Saints were led astray. Right. It was referred to as being spectacularly wrong by Dallin H. Oaks in lesson 26 of Foundations of the Restoration Teacher Manual, Religion 225, 2015. This is an admission that the LDS Church was leading its members astray before. George Q. Cannon, of the First Presidency, labelled that (the quote from the thread The Indians are the Red Men) as gospel truth. I view it as error, which led people who believed it astray. No, the LDS Church is not locked in. I commend the LDS Church in correcting doctrinal errors. It helps to prevent more people from being led astray. Building upon your earlier logic, canonizing teachings would help prevent you from viewing all non-canonized teachings as theories. The LDS Church currently considers it [the existence of a heavenly mother] as doctrine, so there's no need to add it to canon as Official Declaration 3 for example. I can't recall. This thread wasn't even about a priesthood ban; but rather an LDS gospel truth that the Indians are the Red Men. By the way, do you believe the LDS doctrine that Jesus reached some level of intelligence to be ranked as a God? "By obedience and devotion to the truth he attained that pinnacle of intelligence which ranked him as a God, as the Lord Omnipotent, while yet in his pre-existent state" (Doctrines of the Gospel Student Manual). Following a different Jesus leads one to a different destination.

The LDS Church taught that the dark skin was a sign of the curse and that it originated from God. It doesn't need to apologize for that or for the Pearl of Great Price teaching that Ham and their descendants were cursed as pertaining the priesthood (Abraham 1:24-27). See my previous replies. It was a doctrine and direct commandment from God. Right. They believed the previous LDS leaders were leading the people astray when they claimed it was a doctrine and a direct commandment from God. We have other sources. But you're admitting they were false teachings, which led past members astray. The Gospel Topics page states, "When the Lord wants to direct His Church, He speaks through the living prophet who serves as the President of the Church". So either the ban came from God or from man. Why didn't the LDS prophets reverse the ban before 1978? Because they believed they were not being directed by the Lord to do so at that time. Right. Because they now believe those previous LDS prophets were leading the people astray. But they don't want to phrase it that way. I asked this question of you the last time, but you didn't address it. The Governing Body of the Jehovah's Witnesses publish/teach Jesus is Michael the Archangel and that he returned invisibly in 1914 and made them (members of that body) the faithful and discreet slave to dispense spiritual food to the world. Only 144,000 belong to the Bride of Christ. Are they leading people astray? The LDS Church says the 1978 revelation came to President Spencer W. Kimball and was affirmed to other Church leaders in the Salt Lake Temple on June 1, 1978. But I've never seen this revelation. Kimball also says, "Aware of the promises made by the prophets and presidents of the Church who have preceded us that at some time, in God's eternal plan, all of our brethren who are worthy may receive the priesthood, and witnessing the faithfulness of those from whom the priesthood has been withheld…" But he's vague on why it was withheld and by whom. Early LDS leaders were dogmatic. We do know that black skin was put upon the Lamanites based on the three BOM passages I provided before. Is that a recorded revelation? Yes; if you believe Joseph Smith and other leaders. One could also refer to that passage in the Pearl of Great Price for Ham and his descendants being cursed as pertaining to the priesthood. There is no recorded revelation for a heavenly mother. Using your logic, therefore it is a theory, even though it is referred to as a doctrine nowadays. Right. Those LDS prophets were leading the people astray if the ban was not of God. The Pearl of Great Price refers to Adam's transgression as a sin. "Hence came the saying abroad among the people, that the Son of God hath atoned for original guilt, wherein the sins of the parents [Adam and Eve] cannot be answered upon the heads of the children [Abel, Cain, etc], for they are whole from the foundation of the world" (Moses 6:44). Alma 42:1-9 adds further support. Was this a restriction by commandment of men or of God? The priesthood ban and the reason for it is not a moral hinge. The only legitimacy of the Restored Gospel turns on believing what Joseph Smith said was told to him in supposed vision of two heavenly personages – "that all their creeds were an abomination in his sight; that those professors were all corrupt; that: "they draw near to me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me, they teach for doctrines the commandments of men, having a form of godliness, but they deny the power thereof". The LDS Church falls under the condemnation of the commandments of men if the priesthood ban was not of God. Needing to perform temple ordinances in New Testament times to return to live with Heavenly Father is another example of these "commandments of men". Yes, but not in this version of a different hinge (Jesus, aka Michael the Archangel) or Jesus (the first spirit child of heavenly parents who became a God) or Jesus (only an Islamic prophet). The door doesn't open when you have the wrong hinge. Maybe you believe the LDS Church needs a written revelation for everything it teaches or every policy it institutes. Same comment as above. Maybe you believe the LDS Church needs a written revelation for everything it teaches or every policy it institutes. When Muslims speak of Jesus, are you claiming that they are speaking of a numerically distinct Jesus wholly differentiated from the Jesus of the New Testament? Or is it that Muslims have different perspectives and opinions about the Jesus of the New Testament? Muslims base their teachings about Jesus on the Quran – not the Son of God, not crucified, not the Saviour of the world, not God. It's not their perspective or opinion unless you say it's only their perspective or opinion that the Quran is the Word of God. Similarly, one could have negative perspectives and opinions against LDS Church teachings. On the flipside, one could have favourable perspective opinions for LDS Church teachings. Perspectives and opinions do not determine truth. And yes, when I say Jesus has always been God and the LDS Church teaches Jesus was the first spirit child of heavenly parents who became a God, then we are talking about different Christs. They are not the same person. Person A's statement was most accurate decades ago – LDS leaders previously taught the ban and the reason for it were of God. Person B's statement is more accurate nowadays – "the priesthood ban and the reason for it were not of God, but from man". This is just an admission that past LDS prophets led the Latter-day Saints astray. Entity C is invalid – many recorded teachings from past LDS leaders are crystal clear on the origins of the practice. There was no ambiguity.

You lost me. Other than Satan, can you name a few heavenly gods who you believe Elohim gave authority over the nations? What’s the difference between those who are called “gods” but are not deity by nature as God is? How do you understand this passage in Galatians - “when ye knew not God, ye did service unto them which by nature are no gods. But now, after that ye have known God”? Weren’t they worshipping the false gods (Baals, Chemosh, and Dagon)? How were they not gods by nature? No being is equal to Yahweh, but I understand that the LDS Church teaches future exalted beings will be made “equal in power, and in might, and in dominion" as the Father (Doctrine and Covenants 76:95). For me, there is only one true God (Deity). There are not an endless backward and forward chain of deities. Is Baal a real deity but not exactly equal to God, another heavenly deity? What purpose do you believe Heavenly Father ordained this being to do? LDS theology presents hierarchically ordered spiritual realms, where there are many Gods and Heavenly Fathers before Heavenly Father of Earth became a Father himself, each presiding over his own respective realm.

Did the LDS version of Jesus have these attributes before he became the first spirit child of heavenly parents? Compared with the KJV of John 1:1, the JST changes the meaning. "In the beginning was the gospel preached, and the gospel was the word, and the word was with the Son of God, and the word was the Son of God" (JST). In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God" (KJV). "The Word" → "the gospel preached" "The Word was with God" → "the word was with the Son of God" "The Word was God" → "the word was the Son of God" There is no support for the JST changes in the Greek. Ἐν ἀρχῇ ἦν ὁ λόγος "In the beginning was the Word." καὶ ὁ λόγος ἦν πρὸς τὸν θεόν "And the Word was with the God." Here τὸν θεόν has the article and refers to God with whom the Word was. καὶ θεὸς ἦν ὁ λόγος "And the Word was God." Here θεὸς has no article. So if someone argues that "ὁ θεός always means God the Father," John 1:1 itself does not use ὁ θεός for the Word. It uses θεός without the article. Some other examples: • Matthew 5:33 — τὰς ὁρκωμοσίας σου τῷ κυρίῳ (related constructions, though not the exact phrase ὁ θεός) • Mark 12:29 — κύριος ὁ θεὸς ἡμῶν κύριος εἷς ἐστιν "The Lord our God, the Lord is one." • Luke 20:37 — ὁ θεὸς Ἀβραὰμ καὶ ὁ θεὸς Ἰσαὰκ καὶ ὁ θεὸς Ἰακώβ "the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob." • Hebrews 1:8 — πρὸς δὲ τὸν υἱόν· ὁ θρόνος σου ὁ θεός "But concerning the Son: ‘Your throne, O God...'" The key point for your question is that ὁ θεός is not a special grammatical form reserved for the Father. Also, you seem to interpret John 1:3 differently than other Christians. John is saying that everything that was created came into existence through the Word. Nothing that was made came into existence independently of him. That is why I believe Jesus created Satan. By the way, when Thomas addresses Jesus after the resurrection, the Greek of John 20:28 reads: καὶ ἀπεκρίθη Ὁ Θωμᾶς καὶ εἶπεν αὐτῷ ὁ κύριός μου καὶ ὁ θεός μου If you translate the Greek as literally as possible, you get: "The Lord of me and the God of me". The Greek has two definite articles—ὁ κύριός and ὁ θεός If you're comparing traditional Christianity with LDS theology, these verses raise the question of how Jesus can be called God while simultaneously having God as his God and remaining subject to the Father. Traditional Christianity generally answers this through the distinction between the persons of the Father and Son while maintaining that both share the one divine nature. By the way, who does the LDS Heavenly Mother refer to when she mentions "my God"? Several LDS teachings portray this "God" you refer to above as achieving godhood. Yes, he may have been a God before he became God in relation to us, but he has not always been God. A being who needs to achieve godhood has not always been God. In your July 13 2026 post, you said "I don't think anyone denies that God the Father is an "exalted man". He has "achieved Godhood" and "progressed to Godhood" in that he was once a man who is now exalted. But that's not the same thing as him "becoming God". God the Father received exaltation (his body was exalted)". From what I know of LDS theology, exaltation involves much more than getting an exalted body: • Becoming a heavenly father or mother (D&C 132:19; D&C 131:2–4). • Becoming a God (D&C 76:58–60; D&C 132:20). • Receiving a fulness of glory (D&C 76:56, 70; D&C 93:28). • Receiving a fulness of joy (D&C 138:17; D&C 93:33–35). • Being made equal in power, might, and dominion (D&C 76:95). • Receiving thrones, kingdoms, powers, and dominions (D&C 132:19–20; D&C 121:29). • Having eternal families (D&C 132:19; D&C 131:1–4). • Having a continuation of posterity / "seeds" (D&C 132:19). • Living in God's presence (D&C 76:62; D&C 130:3). It should be noted that both the LDS Heavenly Father and Mother also passed their tests and received a fulness of joy. But you didn't say who you believe formed Heavenly Mother into a God. These LDS teachings show a being becoming a God, not using only your definition of getting an exalted body: Maybe you'll want to acknowledge which you believe are not true. [1] "Through a continual course of progression, our Heavenly Father has received exaltation and glory; and He points us out the same path" (Religion 430-431 - Doctrines of the Gospel Student Manual). It's much more than receiving an exalted body. We are not on the same path if the LDS Heavenly Father was already a God when he became a man. Likewise, we are not Gods now. [2] "His work and His glory, He told us, is "to bring to pass the immortality and eternal life of man." He has already achieved godhood. Now His only objective is to help us—to enable us to return to Him and be like Him and live His kind of life eternally" ("But If Not ...", By Elder Dennis E. Simmons Of the Seventy, April 2004 General Conference). [3] "Less well understood, however, is the fact that God is an exalted man who once lived on an earth and underwent experiences of mortality . The Prophet Joseph Smith refers to this as "the great secret." (Times and Seasons 5:613, August 15 1844). See also Joseph Smith, Teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith, p. 345.) The progression of our Father in heaven to godhood, or exaltation, was strictly in accordance with eternal principles" (Achieving a Celestial Marriage Student Manual). [4] Joseph Smith taught in the King Follett sermon that God was once a man and lived on an earth. Other than the Prophet's statement in that particular address, this is all we know. When and how and in what manner he became God is unknown (God and Man, Robert L. Millet). Maybe he doesn't know how, using your definition, Heavenly Father received an exalted body. [5] "Mormon prophets have continuously taught the sublime truth that God the Eternal Father was once a mortal man who passed through a school of earth life similar to that through which we are now passing. He became God—an exalted being—through obedience to the same eternal Gospel truths that we are given opportunity today to obey" (The Gospel Through the Ages, Salt Lake City, 1958, p. 104) Nothing here about exaltation meaning only getting a glorified body. Scripture does not portray God as a being who became God before becoming God in relation to us. For example, you could also say that the LDS Jesus was God before he became God in relation to his future spirit children, but this doesn't mean he has existed eternally as God. LDS leaders taught he became a God in his pre-mortal existence. He was not God before being born to his heavenly parents. The LDS Heavenly Mother is a God before Jesus is even born to her. Scripture portrays Christ as eternally God: "from everlasting to everlasting, thou art God" (Psalm 90:2). God Himself says, "Before me there was no God formed, neither shall there be after me" (Isaiah 43:10), and "beside me there is no God" (Isaiah 44:6). In LDS theology, Gods are formed after Heavenly Father. It's not pointless to discuss things that you believe have not been revealed. Some in the LDS Church supposedly believe the doctrine of Heavenly Mother has been revealed. One elder of the LDS Church considers the doctrine revealed. For example, Dale G. Renlund's said in the 2022 General Conference, "The doctrine of a Heavenly Mother comes by revelation and is a distinctive belief among Latter-day Saints". But he doesn't say who received the revelation. But then, the LDS Church seems to walk it back. The historical page is particularly explicit: "there is no record of a formal revelation to Joseph Smith on this doctrine". So let's open up pandora's box for this supposed doctrine - is Heavenly Mother the offspring of a God? Are all her other spirit brother and sisters on the world she supposedly grew up on the offspring of a God? And which God? John 17:3 says, "And this is life eternal, that they might know thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast sent". Trying to comprehend that in simple fashion would lead one to conclude that Jesus is not a true God. Jehovah's Witnesses also run into this problem, as they refer to Jehovah as the Almighty God but Jesus as the Mighty God. Add the LDS version of the Holy Spirit and Heavenly Mother and you have four Gods – only the Father being the true God. Saying Jesus and the Father are "two Gods" doesn't make the Bible easier to understand—it changes what the Bible says. Jesus calls the Father "the only true God"), and Paul says "there is but one God" (1 Corinthians 8:4). Yet the Bible also calls Jesus God (John 1:1; John 20:28). So the biblical teaching is that the Father and Son are distinct, but there is still one God, not two. Saying there are two Gods simply avoids that tension rather than explaining it. And then you also have tension with other Old Testament passages: Deuteronomy 4:35 - "the LORD he is God; there is none else beside him." Deuteronomy 6:4 - "The LORD our God is one LORD." Isaiah 43:10 - "Before me there was no God formed, neither shall there be after me." Isaiah 44:6 - "I am the first, and I am the last; and beside me there is no God." Isaiah 45:5 - "I am the LORD, and there is none else, there is no God beside me." Isaiah 45:22 - "I am God, and there is none else." These are particularly strong against the idea that there are two or four separate Gods. Who is the only true God in the above six verses? Who is Heavenly Mother's God - her husband or her literal parent? I read that link. https://www.newadvent.org/fathers/04165.htm It does not portray Origen teaching the Father and the Son are two separate Gods. Also, there's no mention of a heavenly mother (the third LDS God) or the Holy Spirit (the fourth LDS God). The key phrase is: "by the term ‘second God' we mean nothing else than a virtue..." So Origen is not simply saying: "There are two Gods, the Father and Jesus." "We worship, therefore, the Father of truth, and the Son, who is the truth; and these, while they are two, considered as persons or subsistences, are one in unity of thought, in harmony and in identity of will. So entirely are they one, that he who has seen the Son, who is the brightness of God's glory, and the express image of His person, has seen in Him who is the image of God, God Himself". https://www.newadvent.org/fathers/04168.htm

Joseph Smith taught, "It is the first principle of the Gospel to know for a certainty the character of God. He was once a man like us; God himself, the Father of us all, dwelt on an earth, the same as Jesus Christ himself did". He was not alone on his earth. He apparently lived with a woman, who would later become his wife, and with millions or billions of other people. How did Heavenly Father become a God in relation to "her" and "them"? Was she and the others offspring of Heavenly Father (the God of our Earth), or were they the offspring of some God who came before Him? It seems you are trying to cloud what the term "offspring" means. Both "Gospel Topics – Heavenly Parents" and "The Family – A Proclamation to the World" state we are spirit children (offspring) of heavenly parents. Are you moving away from the LDS Church teaching that we are the offspring of a heavenly mother? If no, what does it mean to you that we are the offspring of heavenly parents? Not defined? Exactly how are you the offspring of your earthly parents? Were you solely made by your father and then you were brought up by only your mother, or were both involved to form you and rear you up? I think there are Latter-day Saints who believe in a God who has always existed as God. They cannot identify who he is though. After him came the formation of many Gods and Goddesses; an infinite regression of Gods as LDS leaders have taught. So it's not from zero to one but rather from one to many. LDS leaders, including Joseph Smith, taught many Father Gods existed before a being becomes the Father of our Earth. Don't forget the LDS concept of becoming children of heavenly parents in a physical sense. After all, you believe they have physical resurrected bodies of flesh and bones. How did Heavenly Mother become the offspring of Heavenly Father? I agree that Hebrews 12:9 calls God the "Father of spirits," but I don't think that necessarily means that our spirits are literally offspring of God in the sense of being spiritually procreated by him and a his spouse. In the biblical context, "Father" can describe God as our Creator, source, and rightful Father without implying that He physically or biologically fathered our individual spirits. The verse itself doesn't say that God and a heavenly wife produced us as spirit children. So I think there is a distinction between saying that God is the "Father of spirits" (Hebrews 12:9) and saying that we are literally "spirit sons and daughters of heavenly parents." The latter is a much more specific theological claim, and I'd want to see that established from Scripture rather than assumed from Hebrews 12:9. You never show that Paul or the early Church Fathers had "heavenly parents" in mind. Do you believe Paul was associating the God of the Bible with Zeus? That would mean all non-exalted beings (those who don't become Gods) are not children of the New Covenant. They are not the "sons of God". Whose sons are they? They are of the devil (John 8:44; 1 John 3:10). Joseph Smith said, "Why, what the Father did. The answer is obvious—in a manner, to lay down his body and take it up again. Jesus, what are you going to do? To lay down my life, as my Father did, and take it up again". So, if Heavenly Father was not the Redeemer and Lord of those on the planet that he grew up on, then who atoned for the sins of Heavenly Mother and all the other millions or billions of people which grew up with Heavenly Father on his earth? Who are the parents of these offspring; of Heavenly Mother and all these other co-inhabitants of the earth, where Heavenly Father laid down his body? It seems you believe Paul was equating Heavenly Father with Zeus and omitted mention of Heavenly Mother; the goddess Hera. Do you believe this "woman" of Proverbs 8:22-25 is a literal man, Jesus Christ, as the Jehovah's Witnesses do? If so, who are the women in Proverbs 7:4? "Say unto wisdom, Thou art my sister; and call understanding thy kinswoman". Who are the woman and her maidens in Proverbs 9:1-3? "Wisdom hath builded her house, she hath hewn out her seven pillars: She hath killed her beasts; she hath mingled her wine; she hath also furnished her table. She hath sent forth her maidens: she crieth upon the highest places of the city". Wisdom is not a literal man in one place but figurative women in other places. Proverbs uses distinctly feminine language for a divine/abstract figure, but the passage itself doesn't say that Wisdom is a literal female deity or a Heavenly Mother. In fact, the Hebrew word for Wisdom is grammatically feminine, and Proverbs poetically personifies Wisdom as a woman. Also, it's different from explicitly teaching that God has a female consort. In the 1844 discourse, Joseph Smith taught God the Father had a Father. "If Jesus Christ was the Son of God, and John discovered that God the Father of Jesus Christ had a Father, you may suppose that He had a Father also". Joseph Fielding Smith explicitly interpreted Joseph Smith's teaching as meaning that Heavenly Father had a Father, and that this continued backward. In Doctrines of Salvation, 2:47, he wrote "Our Father in heaven, according to the Prophet, had a Father, and since there has been a condition of this kind through all eternity, each Father had a Father, until we come to a stop where we cannot go further, because of our limited capacity to understand" (Doctrines of Salvation). Do you believe these teachings? Noted. In that April 1971 New Era article, then one could attribute the following statement to Kent Nielsen: "One among these, it is presumed, was a savior for them, and through him they obtained a resurrection and an exaltation on an eternal, celestial world". Nielsen's statement is a presumption. However, Brigham Young's statement is itself unequivocal. "Consequently every earth has its redeemer, and every earth has its tempter; and every earth, and the people thereof". https://scriptures.byu.edu/jod/pdf/JoD14/JoD14_0071.pdf In both statements, we are still left with a question: who atoned for the sins of a woman (later to become the LDS Heavenly Mother) when she was living with a man (later to become the LDS Heavenly Father of our Earth) and with all her other spirit brothers and sisters on some other world? Nielsen also explicitly brings in W. W. Phelps's hymn "If You Could Hie to Kolob." "Do you think that you could ever, Through all eternity, Find out the generation Where Gods began to be?" "The works of God continue, And worlds and lives abound; Improvement and progression Have one eternal round". The significance is that this hymn, written in the early LDS period, expresses the idea that Gods, creations, worlds, and progression extend backward and forward without a discoverable beginning. Nielsen uses this cosmological framework immediately after his discussion of God's previous existence. I mentioned previously what was taught by President Marion G. Romney, Second Counselor in the First Presidency, in 1974: "Saved as here used means resurrected and returned as a sanctified, celestialized, immortal soul to the presence and society of God, there to pursue an endless course of eternal progress. Man is a soul, that is, a dual being, a spirit person clothed in a tangible body of flesh and bones. God is a perfected, saved soul enjoying eternal life". Firstborn does not necessarily mean first born or first created. It depends on the context. You've never shown from scripture where the context clearly shows Jesus is the first born spirit child of a heavenly mother. However, we do have scripture where firstborn is first born, in relation to a female (Exodus 13:2; Deuteronomy 21:15–17; Luke 2:7). Doctrine and Covenants 93:21 says, "And now, verily I say unto you, I was in the beginning with the Father, and am the Firstborn". The verse itself does not say "firstborn spirit child," nor does it identify Heavenly Mother. The LDS interpretation adds those concepts from its broader theology. So if the question is "Does D&C 93:21 clearly say Jesus was literally the first spirit child born to Heavenly Father and Heavenly Mother?", then the answer is No. It says Jesus is the Firstborn, but it does not explain what "Firstborn" means in that passage or say that Heavenly Mother gave birth to him first. The three biblical verses I mentioned above do not establish that "firstborn" in D&C 93:21 means Jesus was literally the first spirit child born by a Heavenly Mother. That's an LDS theological inference. How do you understand Ephraim (Jeremiah 31:9), Israel (Exodus 4:22), and David (Psalm 89:27) being the firstborn? Based on the context of those three biblical verses above plus the one from D&C. The Bible's creation account does not describe God creating mankind as the offspring of a heavenly father and heavenly mother. It describes God Himself as the Creator of both male and female. If I'm not mistaken, from what I understand of LDS theology, man and woman are uncreated, eternally intelligences; later formed somehow into spirit children. The LDS canon distinguishes between "intelligence" (which is eternal, uncreated) and the spirit body that God organized (Doctrine and Covenants 93:29 - "Man was also in the beginning with God. Intelligence, or the light of truth, was not created or made, neither indeed can be"). Therefore, if I'm arguing from the LDS system, I wouldn't quite say: "Male and female were created by God." I would need to distinguish between: (1) the eternal intelligence — uncreated (2) the premortal spirit person/body — organized/begotten by Heavenly Parents (3) the physical body — created in mortality. Is that a fair analysis? What does Joseph Smith's teaching God the Father (of Earth) having a Father mean to you? In what way is that Father the father of Heavenly Father? In what way is that Father the father of Heavenly Mother? Also, in what way is that Father a Grandfather to Jesus and yourself? It seems you use the terms "head God" and "most high God" in the context of only Heavenly Father and his spirit children. Let's go beyond this context for a while. Is God the Father higher than his Father God? Is Heavenly Mother higher than her Father? Is that even a valid question since you haven't identified who her Father and God is? Do you believe Satan is a powerful angelic being? If I'm not mistaken, LDS theology puts the cause on Heavenly Father. It was part of his plan – no fall, no progression. [1] In Doctrines of Salvation, Joseph Fielding Smith stated: "When Adam was sent into this world, it was with the understanding that he would violate a law, transgress a law, in order to bring to pass this mortal condition which we find ourselves in today." This quotation is reproduced in the official LDS Doctrines of the Gospel Student Manual. That's one of the strongest statements for your question because it doesn't merely say God knew Adam would fall. It says Adam was sent into the world "with the understanding that he would" transgress. [2] Brigham Young — God designed that Adam would fall Brigham Young said: "The Lord knew they would do this, and he had designed that they should". The Book of Mormon Student Manual identifies this as Brigham Young, Discourses of Brigham Young, p. 103, and uses it specifically to explain that the Fall was part of Heavenly Father's plan. That's particularly significant because "he had designed that they should" goes beyond merely foreknowing the Fall. [3] Joseph Fielding Smith — the Fall was part of the plan The official LDS Teachings of Presidents of the Church: Joseph Fielding Smith says: "It was a part of this great plan, that he should partake of the forbidden fruit and fall..." It then explains that the Fall was an "essential part of man's mortal probation." "Therefore, it became essential to their salvation and to ours that their nature should be changed. The only way it could be changed was by the violation of the law under which they were at that time. Mortality could not come without violation of that law and mortality was essential, a step towards our exaltation. Therefore, Adam partook of the forbidden fruit... It had to be". [4] Bruce R. McConkie / seminary manual "The Fall was a purposeful step in God's plan of salvation." It then cites Joseph Fielding Smith and Brigham Young for the statements above. [5] Russell M. Nelson He likewise taught that Creation, Fall, and Atonement are the three pillars of God's plan. He said that Adam and Eve's partaking of the fruit was necessary for them to become mortal and have children, and concluded: "Adam fell that men might be." The seminary manual presents the Fall as necessary for the plan to be fulfilled. "Ordained to fall" is a fair summary of these statements. No fall, no progression. The Pearl of Great Price Student Manual, under Moses 4:11, quotes Joseph Fielding Smith saying of Adam and Eve, "for it was something that Adam and Eve had to do!" That's why the Latter-day Saints "informed by revelation, celebrate Eve's act and honor her wisdom and courage in the great episode, called the Fall", a quote found in the same manual. God knew Satan would become evil when God created him. Did God make a mistake? I would say no. Are you evil knowing that you want to have children who could potentially become drug addicts or mass murderers and you still decide to have a family? I would say no. Was Satan created as a good or evil being? I would say he was created a good being. Do you believe there was a time when Satan was not evil or that he became evil when he rebelled against God? Do you believe Heavenly Mother and Father made a mistake by forming him into one of their spirit children knowing the evil he would do?

Yesterday's doctrine and direct commandment from God became tomorrow's theory. Already addressed previously. The Joseph Smith Papers states, "Joseph Smith's earliest visions and other communications with the divine, which began in 1820, were likely not recorded when they occurred". It explains that some of Joseph's early divine communications were initially oral and private and were only recorded later, if at all. https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/church-historians-press/jsp-revelations/appendix2?lang=eng And the church's "Religion 324-325 - Doctrine and Covenants Student Manual" says there were "some revelations still in possession of the Church which were not included" in the Book of Commandments. I am not privy to all the records of the LDS Church so I don't know what all is there or not. It was called a doctrine and a direct commandment from God. One thing we know for sure – it was taught as doctrine. This won't change no matter how many times the current LDS Church tries to disavow them as theories instead. Then we have all the teachings recorded by President George Cannon in the book "Gospel Truth", mentioned at the start of the thread "The Red Men are the Indians" https://www.mormondialogue.org/topic/113467-the-indians-are-the-red-men/ I wonder if the LDS Church has disavowed those LDS "truths" as theories too. Recorded teachings from past LDS leaders refer to it as doctrine and a direct commandment from God. That's sufficient preservation. Doctrine back then, but theory today. That doctrine was of God or it was of man. This explains why the LDS Church cannot issue a simple "We are sorry, we apologize" statement. I suspect The Family – Proclamation to the World "doctrine" will become a theory in the LDS Church some day. Considered theory today, taught as doctrine back then. The Governing Body of the Jehovah's Witnesses publish/teach Jesus is Michael the Archangel and that he returned invisibly in 1914 and made them (members of that body) the faithful and discreet slave to dispense spiritual food to the world. Only 144,000 belong to the Bride of Christ. Are they leading people astray? Erring in teachings sounds more appropriate as some people don't consider all teachings to be doctrines. "But I am afraid that as the serpent deceived Eve by his cunning, your thoughts will be led astray from a sincere and pure devotion to Christ. For if someone comes and proclaims another Jesus than the one we proclaimed, or if you receive a different spirit from the one you received, or if you accept a different gospel from the one you accepted, you put up with it readily enough" (2 Corinthians 11:3-4). Paul is warning the Corinthian Christians that someone can present a different Jesus while still using Christian-sounding language.

Noted. But he never said "we are sorry" or "we apologize". Let's again focus on part of what he said: "Our position as a Church is clear. We do condemn all racism, past or present, in any form and we disavow any theory that black or dark skin is a sign of a curse. We are brothers and sisters and I consider you friends". But black or dark skin being a sign of a curse was taught as a truth, not a theory. "The dark skin was placed upon the Lamanites so that they could be distinguished from the Nephites and to keep the two peoples from mixing. The dark skin was the sign of the curse. The curse was the withdrawal of the Spirit of the Lord" (Book of Mormon Seminary Teacher Manual, 2012, President Joseph Fielding Smith) "Make sure students understand that the curse mentioned in this chapter was separation from God. The changing of the Lamanites' skin was only a mark or sign of the curse" (Book of Mormon Seminary Teacher Manual, 2017). "The Lamanites remained in the land and rebelled against the Lord. They "were cut off from his presence" (2 Nephi 5:20). The curse mentioned in this chapter was separation from God (see 2 Nephi 5:20-24). The changing of the Lamanites' skin was a mark or sign of the curse. The nature of this mark is not fully understood" (Book of Mormon Seminary Teacher Manual, 2024). I now see the references to "we" in a representative capacity. But still, no "we are sorry" and/or "we apologize". And the LDS Church still continues to propagate that what former LDS leaders taught were theories in regards to the priesthood ban. It's time to end this mantra. It was doctrine. "It is true that the Negro race is barred from holding the Priesthood, and this has always been the case. The Prophet Joseph Smith taught this doctrine, and it was made known to him, although we know of no such statement in any revelation in the Doctrine and Covenants, Book of Mormon, or the Bible. However, in the Pearl of Great Price, we find the following statement written by Abraham: "Now this first government of Egypt was established by Pharaoh, the eldest son of Egyptus, the daughter of Ham, and it was after the manner of the government of Ham, which was patriarchal. Pharaoh, being a righteous man, established his kingdom and judged his people wisely and justly all his days, seeking earnestly to imitate that order established by the fathers in the first generations, in the days of the first patriarchal reign, even in the reign of Adam, and also of Noah, his father, who blessed him with the blessings of the earth, and with the blessings of wisdom, but cursed him as pertaining to the Priesthood.' Pearl of Great Price, Abraham 1:25-26" (Joseph Fielding Smith, "The Negro and the Priesthood," Improvement Era, April 1924, p. 565). "The attitude of the Church with reference to the Negroes remains as it has always stood. It is not a matter of the declaration of a policy but of direct commandment from the Lord, on which is founded the doctrine of the Church from the days of its organization, to the effect that Negroes may become members of the Church but that they are not entitled to the Priesthood at the present time. The prophets of the Lord have made several statements as to the operation of the principle. President Brigham Young said: "Why are so many of the inhabitants of the earth cursed with a skin of blackness? It comes in consequence of their fathers' rejecting the power of the Holy Priesthood, and the law of God. They will go down to death. And when all the rest of the children have received their blessings in the Holy Priesthood, then that curse will be removed from the seed of Cain, and they will then come up and possess the Priesthood, and receive all the blessings we are entitled to'" (Official statement of the First Presidency, dated August 17, 1951, quoted in John Lewis Lund, The Church and the Negro, pp. 89-90). Then there's the First Presidency letter of 1969. I addressed some of this earlier. Their position continues to say it was a theory, but we know it was not. But still, no admitting "we are sorry", "we apologize", and "we taught a false doctrine". The LDS Church is not accurately depicting how it was taught in their past. History shows otherwise. It's time to get that skeleton out of the closet and finally bury it. I already addressed this earlier. Lot's of flip-flopping. Then you have Kimball's statement in the 1960 General Conference: "The work is unfolding, and blinded eyes begin to see, and scattered people begin to gather. I saw a striking contrast in the progress of the Indian people today as against that of only fifteen years ago. Truly the scales of darkness are falling from their eyes, and they are fast becoming a white and delightsome people. The day of the Lamanites is nigh. For years they have been growing de- lightsome, and they are now becoming white and delightsome, as they were promised. In this picture of the twenty Lamanite missionaries, fifteen of the twenty were as light as Anglos; five were darker but equally delightsome. The children in the home placement program in Utah are often lighter than their brothers and sisters in the hogans on the reservation. At one meeting a father and mother and their sixteen-year-old daughter were present, the little member girl—sixteen—sitting between the dark father and mother, and it was evident she was several shades lighter than her parents on the same reservation, in the same hogan, subject to the same sun and wind and weather. There was the doctor in a Utah city who for two years had had an Indian boy in his home who stated that he was some shades lighter than the younger brother just coming into the program from the reservation. These young members of the Church are changing to whiteness and to delightsomeness. One white elder jokingly said that he and his companion were donating blood regularly to the hospital in the hope that the process might be accelerated". Nothing to add regarding the FAIR article or the one by Gregory Prince other than to say they tried to reverse the ban which was a doctrine as taught by former LDS leaders. As I mentioned before, not all revelations were recorded. And the reason for the ban was considered a doctrine back then. But these days, it has become a theory. The Joseph Smith Papers states, "Joseph Smith's earliest visions and other communications with the divine, which began in 1820, were likely not recorded when they occurred". It explains that some of Joseph's early divine communications were initially oral and private and were only recorded later, if at all. https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/church-historians-press/jsp-revelations/appendix2?lang=eng The Muslim verse of Jesus is only a prophet. The JW version of Jesus is Michael the Archangel. The Hindu version of Jesus is only a great teacher. The LDS version of Jesus is the first spirit child of heavenly parents who became a God. Another Jesus is the Eternal God. These are examples of different Christs. As I mentioned before, not all revelations were recorded. The Joseph Smith Papers states, "Joseph Smith's earliest visions and other communications with the divine, which began in 1820, were likely not recorded when they occurred". It explains that some of Joseph's early divine communications were initially oral and private and were only recorded later, if at all. https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/church-historians-press/jsp-revelations/appendix2?lang=eng As shown earlier, it was called a doctrine and a direct commandment from God. Person A makes this statement: "The priesthood ban and the reason for it were of God". Person B makes the opposite statement: "The priesthood ban and the reason for it were not of God, but from man". It isn't a question of who (Person A or B) said it or when. The question is whether a statement is true.

Do you believe Baal, Asherah, Molech, Chemosh, Dagon, and Satan are real gods? If yes, how?

That would make you a god right now if you believe you have a divine nature.

Satan is a god-but-not-a-deity. I am not aware of God assigning one god-not-a-deity to rule over England and other respective gods-not-deities to rule over other countries. The Bible teaches there are gods are there who are not really deities. A few especially clear passages: 1 Corinthians 8:4–6 - "we know that an idol has no real existence,” and that although there may be "so-called gods” in heaven or on earth, "for us there is one God, the Father". Notice Paul's wording: "so-called gods". Galatians 4:8 - before knowing God, people were enslaved to those who "by nature are not gods". Jeremiah 2:11 - God asks, "Has a nation changed its gods, even though they are no gods?” 1 Corinthians 10:19–20 - idols themselves are nothing, but pagan sacrifices are offered to demons, not to God. Psalm 96:5 - "For all the gods of the peoples are idols, but the Lord made the heavens". There is also Deuteronomy 32:17, which says Israel's rebellious sacrifices were made to "demons, not God, to gods they had never known". So Scripture can use the language of "gods” while simultaneously denying that these beings are gods in the same sense that Yahweh is God. So, biblically speaking, you can have: "gods” as a title/reference to other beings? Yes. other gods who are equal to or independent rivals of the true God? No. "gods” who are "by nature” not God? Yes.

Thank you. Likewise. There is some historical tension with the church's portrayal of this. One article says it was Brigham Young who announced the policy restricting men of black African descent from priesthood ordination. https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/manual/gospel-topics-essays/race-and-the-priesthood?lang=eng https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/history/topics/priesthood-and-temple-restriction?lang=eng However, Joseph Fielding Smith explicitly taught that the priesthood restriction did not originate with Brigham Young, but with Joseph Smith. In The Way to Perfection, he wrote "This doctrine did not originate with President Brigham Young but was taught by the Prophet Joseph Smith". He then cited minutes from an August 22, 1895 meeting of Church general authorities, in which George Q. Cannon reportedly said that Joseph Smith had taught that the seed of Cain could not receive the priesthood until the seed of Abel had precedence. Joseph Fielding Smith made the claim even more explicitly in the April 1924 Improvement Era, saying: "The Prophet Joseph Smith taught this doctrine, and it was made known to him". But the current LDS Church considers it as a theory, not as a doctrine as the earlier LDS prophets taught. LDS leaders taught it was doctrine decades ago. But I can understand why today's leaders prefer to call it a theory. The Joseph Smith Papers states, "Joseph Smith's earliest visions and other communications with the divine, which began in 1820, were likely not recorded when they occurred". It explains that some of Joseph's early divine communications were initially oral and private and were only recorded later, if at all. The church says Joseph Smith received over 100 revelations that were recorded, but also explicitly says "Several of these revelations were not included in the Church's scriptures or published during Joseph Smith's lifetime. They are available today through The Joseph Smith Papers". And the church's "Religion 324-325 - Doctrine and Covenants Student Manual" says there were "some revelations still in possession of the Church which were not included" in the Book of Commandments. I wonder how many LDS members even read the church's article about Elder Stevenson or the above sources you mention. Yes. The LDS Church has spent an enormous amount of time and money in their effort, but they failed to provide a simple "we are sorry", "we apologize" statement. And they continue to refer to the reason for the priesthood ban as "theory" instead of "doctrine". Just tell the LDS membership, and the NAACP, that LDS leaders taught a false doctrine, leading people astray for decades and causing ham to others in some way. That the LDS Church resisted removing the ban even after Joseph Smith and Brigham Young died. See above. Early LDS leaders viewed it as a directive from God. He needed to add context so people inside and outside the LDS Church would know who the ban applied to. Believing the Book of Mormon teaching God put a mark of dark skin as a sign of a curse on people and then propagating it as "doctrine" to restrict people from holding the LDS priesthood leads people astray if it is not true. The "Religion 327 - Pearl of Great Price Student Manual" says "It must be noted that the mark that was set upon Cain was not the same thing as the curse that he received. The mark was to distinguish him as the one who had been cursed by the Lord. It was placed upon Cain so that no one finding him would kill him". Several LDS leaders explicitly taught that Cain's curse was associated with dark/black skin and that the curse continued through his descendants. Here are the clearest examples: [1] Joseph Fielding Smith In "The Way to Perfection", he wrote "A curse was placed upon him and that curse has been continued through his lineage and must do so while time endures. Millions of souls have come into this world cursed with a black skin... These are the descendants of Cain". [2] Brigham Young Brigham Young was even more explicit about the physical mark. In an 1859 sermon he said "The Lord put a mark upon him, which is the flat nose and black skin". He then connected that race to Cain's descendants and said the curse would remain until it was removed in the future. Journal of Discourses 2:179-91, 7:282-91, 11:266-72, 14:78-91 [3] Wilford Woodruff Wilford Woodruff also taught that the blackness/mark of Cain descended to his posterity: "What was that mark? It was the mark of blackness. That mark rested upon Cain, and descended upon his posterity from that time until the present". He further identified millions of Black people as descendants of Cain. [4] Bruce R. McConkie "Cain was cursed with a dark skin; he became the father of the negroes..". He also connected Cain, Ham, and Black people with the curse and priesthood restriction. The later LDS leaders interpreted these passages together and identified the blackness as the mark associated with Cain's curse. If this is false, then they have led their members astray. Either the priesthood ban was from God or it was from man. Either God put a skin of blackness on the Lamanites and cursed those who married them in the same way or he did not. Either Jesus is the Eternal God or he is the first spirit child of heavenly parents who became a God. Wrong teachings lead people astray. If I teach Jesus is Michael the Archangel or a spirit child of a heavenly mother who became a God, then I have made a Jesus according to my imagination.

In his speech, Elder Stevenson doesn't indicate that he is speaking in a representative capacity for the LDS Church. I didn't use the word "Church" as you did because he does not speak for protestant or catholic churches. A person doesn’t need to have a priesthood office or a priesthood responsibility to speak when invited to an event. One particularly significant part of the speech concerned the Church's history regarding race. Stevenson said: "Our position as a Church is clear. We do condemn all racism, past or present, in any form, and we disavow any theory that black or dark skin is a sign of a curse". Then "I am deeply saddened and hurt by this error". I don't find Elder Stevenson saying, "I apologize," "we apologize," or "the Church apologizes". I cannot find an official statement in which a Church President or apostle explicitly says, "We apologize for the priesthood ban/restriction". There are, however, increasingly strong statements of repentance, sorrow, condemnation, and disavowal. It's been almost 50 years. Just say a simple "we are sorry" and "we apologize". Just look at the example the Canadian Government set when it apologized to former students of Indian Residential Schools. https://rcaanc-cirnac.gc.ca/eng/1100100015644/1571589171655 Here is a brief snip: "To the approximately 80,000 living former students, and all family members and communities, the Government of Canada now recognizes that it was wrong to forcibly remove children from their homes and we apologize for having done this. We now recognize that it was wrong to separate children from rich and vibrant cultures and traditions that it created a void in many lives and communities, and we apologize for having done this. We now recognize that, in separating children from their families, we undermined the ability of many to adequately parent their own children and sowed the seeds for generations to follow, and we apologize for having done this. We now recognize that, far too often, these institutions gave rise to abuse or neglect and were inadequately controlled, and we apologize for failing to protect you. Not only did you suffer these abuses as children, but as you became parents, you were powerless to protect your own children from suffering the same experience, and for this we are sorry". The 1949 First Presidency called the restriction a "direct commandment from the Lord" and connected mortal circumstances with premortal conduct. "The attitude of the Church with reference to Negroes remains as it has always stood. It is not a matter of the declaration of a policy but of direct commandment from the Lord, on which is founded the doctrine of the Church from the days of its organization, to the effect that Negroes may become members of the Church but that they are not entitled to the priesthood at the present time". The 1969 First Presidency statement took essentially the same position, saying the restriction: "is not something which originated with man; but goes back into the beginning with God". This is important because it shows that the claim continued well after 1949. There was a lot of flip flopping on the priesthood ban. The Book of Mormon records that God was the cause of people receiving the dark skin. It even records the skins of the Lamanites becoming white after the curse was removed (3 Nephi 2:15, "Their curse was taken from them, and their skin became white like the Nephites"). Leading members astray also equals leading them away from truth. For example, the LDS Church's teaching that Jesus is the first spirit child of heavenly parents who became a God in his premortal life. This is a different Christ. Also, there are several teachings of a different Heavenly Father. "The progression of our Father in heaven to godhood, or exaltation, was strictly in accordance with eternal principles" (Achieving a Celestial Marriage Student Manual). "Man is a soul, that is, a dual being, a spirit person clothed in a tangible body of flesh and bones. God is a perfected, saved soul enjoying eternal life. He is both immortal and exalted to the highest glory. He is enjoying that blessed condition which men may attain to by obedience to the laws and ordinances of the gospel" (How Men Are Saved, President Marion G. Romney, Second Counselor in the First Presidency, October 1974 General Conference). Possibly. Nevertheless, it was referred to as direct commandment of the Lord. Some LDS Church teachings and policies are not specifically written down and classified as "revelation" or "official doctrine". As Boyd K. Packer said, "It isn't a question of who said it or when; the question is whether it is true".

Those gods were not real deities. Even Zeus was not a deity. The Jews sacrified to Baal, but Baal was not a real god in the sense of deity. He was either a being conceived in their mind or a demonic spirit. There is only one being referred to as the god of this world (2 Corinthians 4:4). The idea is that Satan has influence over the present world system and works to keep people from recognizing the truth of the gospel. There are not gods who are given ruling authority over specific countries.

The Bible uses the word "god(s)" in several different senses, and this is important because simply finding the word god does not mean the Bible is saying that the being is a true deity equal to Yahweh. The key Hebrew word is אֱלֹהִים (elohim), and the Greek equivalent is θεός (theos). Elohim can refer to Yahweh, pagan gods, heavenly/divine beings, and even human judges or authorities (Bible Hub). https://biblehub.com/hebrew/430.htm I would divide the Bible's use of "gods" into approximately five categories: 1] Yahweh/Jehovah, the true God (Deuteronomy 4:35; Isaiah 45:5; John 17:3). 2] Heavenly/divine beings (Psalm 8:5; Psalm 82; Psalm 97:7; Job 1:6) - real spiritual beings, but not deities. 3] Human judges/rulers (Exodus 7:1; 21:6; 22:8–9; Psalm 82). Not deities, but human beings exercising authority. I would put Psalm 82 into category #3. 4] Satan/demonic powers (2 Corinthians 4:4; Deuteronomy 32:17; 1 Corinthians 10:20) - real spiritual beings, but not deities. 5] Pagan gods/idols (Exodus 20:3; Psalm 96:5; Jeremiah 2:11; 5:7; 16:20; Galatians 4:8). Not deities. For example, Psalm 82:6: "Ye are gods" does not necessarily mean "You are individual gods who possess the same kind of deity as Yahweh." Likewise: 1 Corinthians 8:5: "there be gods many" does not contradict: 1 Corinthians 8:4: "there is none other God but one." And: Galatians 4:8: "them which by nature are no gods" shows that Scripture can use the word "gods" for beings/objects that are not actually divine by nature. Note: Exodus 7:1 says, "And the LORD said unto Moses, See, I have made thee a god to Pharaoh: and Aaron thy brother shall be thy prophet". The point is that Moses is placed in the position of God's authoritative representative before Pharaoh, while Aaron functions as his prophet/spokesman. But Moses is not a deity. Satan is not a deity either in 2 Corinthians 4:4.

There is no indication he was making an apology for the entire church. He used the individual "I" instead of the corporate "we". I am not aware of any apology from him or a church apostle prior to this NAACP event. I don't find it either in Official Declaration 2. If you know of at least one, then let me know. As I mentioned before, these [why certain races were barred from the priesthood and/or the curse of Cain] were not advanced as theories. If you could provide some words from pre-1960 leaders which depict them as theories, speculations, or opinions, then let me know. In the case of Cain, the mark was for his protection (Genesis 4:15). It was not a curse put upon him by God. And this mark was not put on his descendants. The Bible never connects Cain's mark with Ham, Canaan, or black Africans. As Dallin H. Oaks said, "Some people put reasons to the one we're talking about here [race and the priesthood], and they turned out to be spectacularly wrong". "It" being the reasons for the ban. Aaron made an honest mistake in constructing the golden calf for the people to worship. His action led the people astray. Regarding Gardner's comment, the Book of Mormon does not indicate the black skin came upon the Lamanites because they marked their forehead or other parts of their body. See 2 Nephi 5:21, Alma 3:6, and 3 Nephi 2:15. Regarding the comments by Scripture Central. 1] Dark Skins as Garments – the Book of Mormon does not depict God clothing them with special garments. Scripture shows Adam and Eve were clothed with coats of skin when God replaced their fig leaf aprons after the Fall. But neither God nor Cain clothed himself with a special garment for protection after he killed Abel. 2] Dark Skins as Body Paint – the Book of Mormon does not depict God using body paint to mark the Lamanites. Alma 3:4 is one clear example in the Book of Mormon where people deliberately mark/paint their bodies ("The Amlicites were distinguished from the Nephites, for they had marked themselves with red in their foreheads after the manner of the Lamanites"). The point is repeated in 3:13 ("they also had a mark set upon them; yea, they set the mark upon themselves, yea, even a mark of red upon their foreheads"). The Amlicites voluntarily put a red mark on their foreheads, apparently imitating the Lamanites and distinguishing themselves from the Nephites. There's an important distinction between them and the Lamanites. - the Amlicites explicitly marked themselves with red on their foreheads. - the Book of Mormon describes a mark associated with their skin, but it does not explicitly say that they painted their skin red in the same way the Amlicites did. Another interesting passage: 3 Nephi 2:15. Some Lamanites' skin became white after their conversion ("the curse was taken from them, and their skin became white like unto the Nephites"). We do not see Cain painting his body or that this body paint was inherited by his wife's children. 3] Dark Skins as Tattoos – the Book of Mormon does not depict God tattooing the Lamanites all over their body or a portion of it. While the Bible speaks about a visible mark on Cain, it does not depict this as tattoos all over his body. Scripture does not reveal Cain's descendants inheriting a mark of protection or similarly for other people who intermarried his descendants. The LDS Church is trying to distance itself from past doctrines of black skin being a sign of the curse upon certain people. According to the church's essay: President Brigham Young and subsequent Church Presidents taught that the priesthood and temple restriction would one day end. Several affirmed that lifting the restriction would require a revelation from God.7 [7] See Saints 3:245–46; Edward L. Kimball, "Spencer W. Kimball and the Revelation on the Priesthood," BYU Studies, vol. 47, no. 2 (2008), 22, 31–32, 35. Another article adds more: "In the case of Marie Graves, the First Presidency did not ask the congregation to integrate, for fear that challenging racial codes like those in the South put both Black and white Saints at risk. Nor did Church leaders encourage active proselytizing among Black communities, since the Church restricted priesthood ordination and temple blessings from people of African descent". The LDS Church, like other churches, fell prey to cultural stigmas. One cannot misinterpret what those verses (2 Nephi 5:21, Alma 3:6, and 3 Nephi 2:15) meant in the Book of Mormon. That's the way Joseph Smith supposedly translated by the power of God. The Book of Mormon, possibly even a portion in the Pearl of Great Price, led to the doctrine which would form policy in the LDS Church for centuries. Saints Volume 3, chapter 16 also adds: "David, I am as sympathetic as you are," President Grant had responded, "but until the Lord gives us a revelation regarding that matter, we shall have to maintain the policy of the Church". Beginning in the early 1900s, Church leaders taught that any Saint known to have Black African ancestry, however small, would be restricted". The church leaders used their position and influence to inadvertently lead the members astray. They were sincere, but they were sincerely wrong. Dallin H. Oaks referred to it as "spectacularly wrong". If there wasn't a revelation from God to institute the ban, then LDS leaders were creating a commandment of man; thus leading their members astray with supposed theories. But Ezra Taft said it [the priesthood ban] originated with God, but didn't use that specific phrase. See his speech in the October 1967 General Conference. "The arm of flesh may not approve nor understand why God has not bestowed the priesthood on women or the seed of Cain ... The Prophet Joseph Smith understood this principle when he said, "the curse is not yet taken off from the sons of Canaan, neither will be until it is affected by as great a power as caused it to come". It would only be revoked by as great a power as caused it to come (meaning by God, not by earthly men). LDS leaders sincerely believed they were being directed by God and used their influence and position to withhold the priesthood. They were spectacularly wrong and ended up leading their members astray for almost two hundred years. It's possible there is no available written record of this supposed revelation. I can't recall if I attributed the ban, using that word, to Joseph Smith. Can you send me the link to the thread? According to the church topic "Priesthood and Temple Restriction": "During the first two decades of the Church's existence, a few black men were ordained to the priesthood. One of these men, Elijah Able, also participated in temple ceremonies in Kirtland, Ohio, and was later baptized as proxy for deceased relatives in Nauvoo, Illinois. There is no reliable evidence that any black men were denied the priesthood during Joseph Smith's lifetime". Maybe you can count "a few" on one hand. But we find something to the contrary in an earlier publication. This is how it's recorded in The Way to Perfection. The doctrine was taught by Joseph Smith. "Piecing together the evidence as we discover it in holy writ and in tradition, we are brought to the conclusion that Ham, through Egyptus, continued the curse which was placed upon the seed of Cain. Because of that curse this dark race was separated and isolated from all the rest of Adam's posterity before the flood, and since that time the same condition has continued, and they have been "despised among all people. This doctrine did not originate with President Brigham Young but was taught by the Prophet Joseph Smith. At a meeting of the general authorities of the Church, held August 22, 1895, the question of the status of the negro in relation to the Priesthood was asked and the minutes of that meeting say: "President George Q. Cannon ‘remarked that the Prophet taught this doctrine: That the seed of Cain could not receive the Priesthood nor act in any of the offices of the Priesthood until the seed of Abel should come forward and take precedence over Cain's offspring. Joseph Smith has left very little on record in his own words outside of the Pearl of Great Price. During the course of a discussion in Nauvoo in 1842, on the question as to whether the negroes or the Indians have received the greater ill-treatment from the whites, the Prophet Joseph said: "The Indians have greater cause to complain of the treatment of the whites, than the negroes, or sons of Cain." ' (D. H. C. 4:501.) But we all ‘know it is due to his teachings that the negro today is barred from the Priesthood". The current LDS Church attempts to disavow reasons for the priesthood ban and calls those reasons "theories" instead of the way it was taught back then – as "doctrine". I can understand why LDS leaders are trying to bury some of its church history. Fortunately some of those older historical books are still available. Then there's this historical document: "The following year Elijah and Mary Ann migrated to Salt Lake City along with their children Moroni, Enoch, and Anna. That same year, Abel petitioned Young to receive the temple endowment and be sealed to his wife and children. While Young officially kept Abel's priesthood status intact, he denied the petition—marking perhaps the first documented instance of a person of color being denied this particular privilege. More broadly, this refusal was one of the first times that a person of color was denied participation in practices central to the Mormon faith. After Young's death in 1877, Abel again petitioned to be allowed to participate in the temple endowment and sealing ordinances. Once again, however, the church refused him". See above. Early LDS leaders viewed it as a directive from God. "Church leaders believed that a revelation from God was needed to alter this practice and prayerfully sought guidance" (Doctrine and Covenants and Church History Study Guide for Home-Study Seminary Students, Unit 32: Day 2, Official Declaration 2). I think the issue of Declaration #2 was primarily one of timing. It states, "Church records offer no clear insights into the origins of this practice". https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/scriptures/dc-testament/od/2?lang=eng We know this is not true when you read older church publications. President Kimball said, "As we have witnessed the expansion of the work of the Lord over the earth, we have been grateful that people of many nations have responded to the message of the restored gospel, and have joined the Church in ever-increasing numbers. This, in turn, has inspired us with a desire to extend to every worthy member of the Church all of the privileges and blessings which the gospel affords". Notice what inspired him? It was the growth of the church among many nations. And he specifically fails to mention those of African-descent. I said previously that it was one of timing. Was this the right time to override the ban? It seems so based on what he said next: "Aware of the promises made by the prophets and presidents of the Church who have preceded us that at some time, in God's eternal plan, all of our brethren who are worthy may receive the priesthood". That's another admission that previous LDS presidents and prophets taught their time was not the time to remove the priesthood ban. Hugh B. Brown, who served in the First Presidency under McKay, tried to get the ban removed in the 1960s. "According to Brown's later-published memoirs, he came close to getting approval from the First Presidency and Quorum of the Twelve to remove the restriction in the late 1960s. The attempt ultimately failed. Contemporary reporting on the memoirs describes it as an "aborted attempt" to lift the ban nearly a decade before 1978. The decision-making procedure, Brown explained, generally worked like this: (An idea) is submitted to the First Presidency and Twelve, thrashed out, discussed and rediscussed until it seems right. Then, kneeling together in a circle in the temple, they seek divine guidance and the president says, ‘I feel to say this is the will of the Lord.' That becomes a revelation. It is usually not thought necessary to publish or proclaim it as such, but this is the way it happens" (LA Times: Debates by Mormon Leaders Preceded ‘Revelations'). The sin of Adam in the Garden of Eden is taught in several LDS Church publications. Here are just a few: [1] Chapter 45 of the seminary manual (Religion 211–212 - New Testament Student Manual). "Jesus Christ is the Only Begotten Son of God the Eternal Father. He is our Creator. He is our Teacher. He is our Savior. His atonement paid for the sin of Adam and won victory over death, assuring resurrection and immortality for all men". [2] October 1979 General Conference talk by President Marion G. Romney, recorded in the November Ensign article "Faith in the Lord Jesus Christ". "It [the gospel plan] anticipated the need for a Savior to win the victory over death, atone for the sin of Adam, which brought death, and provide the means whereby men, through repentance, may receive forgiveness for personal sins and be readmitted into the presence of God". Satan led Adam and Eve astray. Regarding the JW teaching of Jesus being Michael the Archangel – it is both an incorrect teaching and incorrect belief. By "good", I assume you mean "good" from a moral perspective. There are many "good" Hindu and Muslim leaders who err in doctrines and lead their followers astray. For example, having the Quran deny the actual crucifixion of Christ seems like an honest mistake, but it has serious consequences because it's contrary to biblical teachings. Personally, I suspect Satan inspired that teaching and it has been propagated by Muslims down throughout the centuries. But if it was actually recited by Muhammad without satanic influence and he viewed it as the truth, then one could refer to this as an honest mistake. He was actually doing a good thing by showing that all the Christians were deceived by Allah; who made it appear as if Christ was hanging on the cross. Their explanation is that it may have been Judas Iscariot. When you really think about the implications from a Muslim perspective, Allah's deception led to the rise of Christianity. As you stated above – "Leading people astray means using influence". Islamic mullahs and imams do have influence in the lives of Muslims. Hindus have their pujaris and acharyas, Buddism has its monks, and the Jehovah's Witnesses have their Governing Body. In case you don't know, the Governing Body is the group of senior leaders that provides overall spiritual direction and organizational oversight for Jehovah's Witnesses worldwide. They have significant influence on what is taught to organizational members. JW missionaries can be excommunicated for teaching people contrary to the Governing Body. I suspect this is the same case for LDS missionaries or members who don't sustain the leadership and what they teach and preach contrary to what the leadership says. A person can be sincere but also be sincerely wrong at the same time. Like those "sincere" Israelites who were "sincerely" worshipping the gold calf. And many people in our day are sincerely worshipping a being they believe is an exalted man, but he's really a God made in their image.

To be divine is to possess the nature or attributes of God—such as perfect goodness, wisdom, power, or holiness. I don't view humans as being divine in essence, though they may reflect God's image or be close to God. Don't forget the dual nature of Christ. He is both God and man. And as man, God is his father. That does not make Christ a lesser God. In LDS theology, Heavenly Mother is above Christ (a higher God than Jesus) because she became a God before Jesus was born to her. She would also be a higher God than her other son who also became God (i.e. the Holy Spirit). Then you have to consider a few other things. I'll just throw in some possible events. Supposedly Heavenly Father was a man who lived on another world. He was married in mortality and had physical offspring. Let's call two of his sons John and Peter. His two sons on that other world each married one wife (John married Mary, Peter married Martha). These four people (John, Mary, Peter, Martha) progressed into becoming Gods before Jesus is born as a spirit child to Heavenly Father and Mother sometime later. His other brothers are technically John and Peter. So, the four additional Gods would be above Christ (higher Gods). And this doesn't include all the other millions of people who lived with Heavenly Father on his world who would progress into becoming Gods too, above Christ (higher Gods than he). Think about all those millions of people who grew up with Heavenly Father on his world. Whose offspring are they? God is already God before he becomes our Father. Where in the King Follett Discourse does Joseph Smith say God became our God and Father when his heavenly wife (or wives) gave us some form of spiritual birth? Do you believe Heavenly Father is a heavenly father before some heavenly mother gives birth to her first spirit child in some celestial home and before his wife in mortality gave birth to a physical child on that other world? Regarding Hebrews 2:7 and 1:2, it makes it easier to comprehend when you realize that Jesus and the Father are not two Gods. The LDS Heavenly Father supposedly was the Redeemer and Lord of those on the planet he grew up on. Whose offspring are they? Who created them?

I remember. You said, "How he came to be our God was in our relationship to him, and him providing a way for us to advance and become like him. That is the way Joseph Smith taught it in his sermon". In the King Follett Discourse, Joseph Smith does discuss the eternal nature of intelligence/spirits, but he does not explicitly teach that God and a heavenly wife produced spirit children. It does discuss humanity's existence before mortality, but its language is more about intelligence/spirits being eternal than the later familiar LDS formulation of Heavenly Father and Heavenly Mother having spirit children. So in short, it does not discuss how "God came to be God" (a phrase used in the sermon) before becoming "our God" (a phrase not used in the sermon). This is only in the sense of a spiritual relationship. Once a person is a literal offspring of God, he or she remains a literal child. In LDS theology, God continues to be the God (the literal parent) or all those spirit children who supposedly rebelled against him in some war in heaven. In the Protestant and Catholic views, one God is responsible for creating all planets, stars, universes, and everything relating to them. Offspring in two ways – [1] being created by God, and [2] in a spiritual sense (being adopted into his family), not in the sense of being born literally as spirit children to a heavenly mother. The LDS Heavenly Father supposedly was the Redeemer and Lord of those on the planet he grew up on. Whose offspring are they? You're making progress. We don't become God's offspring by being birthed by a heavenly mother. God being God from age to age = God being God from eternity to eternity = God being God from everlasting to everlasting. But I see your point if you only want to apply "age" to a human's perspective instead of to God's perspective. Joseph Smith and other LDS leaders taught there were Gods before (above) the God of Earth. Let me know which of the following 12 teachings are false and leading people astray and/or have another intended meaning: [1] [Joseph Smith] says: "If Jesus Christ was the Son of God, and John discovered that God the Father of Jesus Christ had a Father, you may suppose that he had a Father also". Then he asks: "Where was there ever a son without a father? And where was there ever a father without first being a son?" [2] [Joseph Smith] taught that our Father had a Father and so on. Is not this a reasonable thought, specially when we remember that the promises are made to us that we may become like him? [3] Evidently his Father passed through a period of mortality even as he passed through mortality, and as we all are doing. Our Father in heaven, according to the Prophet, had a Father, and since there has been a condition of this kind through all eternity, each Father had a Father, until we come to a stop where we cannot go further, because of our limited capacity to understand" (Joseph Fielding Smith, Doctrines of Salvation). [4] "We were begotten by our Father in Heaven; the person of our Father in Heaven was begotten on a previous heavenly world by His Father; and again, He was begotten by a still more ancient Father; and so on, from generation to generation, . . . we wonder in our minds, how far back the genealogy extends, and how the first world was formed, and the first father was begotten" (Orson Pratt, The Seer). [5] "Like man, He had a Father; and he was ‘the express image of the person of the Father.' Here "He" is God, in the preceding discussion of the true God. Thus Pratt explicitly describes God Himself as having a Father" (Orson Pratt, The Kingdom of God). [6] "He came here, was born, had a father and mother like you have. Well, who was his father? Why God was His father; and who was God's father? Why God had a father like you and I have". [7] "Now, with this information children can begin to understand something about their Heavenly Father. They can see that if Jesus is His Son, and we are His sons and daughters, that He must be the Son of some other personage, for He could not beget Himself, but must have a father even as He is our Father" (Gospel Truths, volume 1, George Q. Cannon, page 128). [8] "Long before our God began his creations, he dwelt on a mortal world like ours, one of the creations that his Father had created for him and his brethren. He, with many of his brethren, was obedient to the principles of the eternal gospel. One among these, it is presumed, was a savior for them, and through him they obtained a resurrection and an exaltation on an eternal, celestial world. Then they gained the power and godhood of their Father and were made heirs of all that he had, continuing his works and creating worlds of their own for their own posterity—the same as their Father had done before, and his Father, and his Father, and on and on" (Brigham Young, in Journal of Discourses, vol. 14, p. 71). [9] "If Abraham reasoned thus—If Jesus Christ was the Son of God, and John discovered that God the Father of Jesus Christ had a Father, you may suppose that He had a Father also. Where was there ever a son without a father? And where was there ever a father without first being a son? Whenever did a tree or anything spring into existence without a progenitor? And everything comes in this way. Paul says that which is earthly is in the likeness of that which is heavenly, Hence if Jesus had a Father, can we not believe that He had a Father also? I despise the idea of being scared to death at such a doctrine, for the Bible is full of it" (Teachings of Joseph Smith, 1938). [10] "We must be grafted into the true vine, and continue to partake of its fatness, and then we shall go back to our Father and God, who is connected with one who is still farther back; and this Father is connected with one still further back, and so on; and just so far as we respect our superiors and try to save our children, so shall we receive blessings from this time forth and forever, and shall become as numerous as the sands upon the seashore" (Journal of Discourses, volume 5, Temple and Endowments— Raising Grain and Building Storehouses—President Heber C. Kimball, April 6, 1857). [11] "Some people are troubled over the statements of the Prophet Joseph Smith. . . . The matter that seems such a mystery is the statement that our Father in heaven at one time passed through a life and death and is an exalted man. This is one of the mysteries. . . . The Prophet taught that our Father had a Father and so on. Is not this a reasonable thought, especially when we remember that the promises are made to us that we may become like him?" (Doctrines of Salvation, volume 1). [12] "Brother Kimball quoted a saying of Joseph the Prophet, that he would not worship a God who had not a Father; and I do not know that he would if he had not a mother; the one would be as absurd as the other" (Journal of Discourses, vol. 9, p. 286). I am not aware of better LDS sources today which show that the 12 teachings I provided above are false LDS teachings. If you have these better sources, then let me know. Those leaders did not express what you now believe they did. Latter-day Saints also don't understand what the Bible means when it says Jesus is the firstborn. Trying to divert people from how the early LDS leaders spoke or what the biblical characters wrote is a common tactic. If one doesn't agree with something the Bible says, it means the Bible was not translated correctly. Likewise, if the King Follett Discourse does not say what one expects it to say or how one wants to understand it, then it means it must not have been recorded properly or that the speaker had something else in his mind. On this "intending" or "not intending" to mean, let examine a few statements by Brigham Young before I move to Joseph Smith. What did he [Brigham] intend to mean when he taught the following: "When our father Adam came into the garden of Eden, he came into it with a celestial body, and brought Eve, one of his wives, with him". He continued: "He helped to make and organize this world. He is MICHAEL, the Archangel, the ANCIENT OF DAYS! about whom holy men have written and spoken—HE is our FATHER and our GOD, and the only God with whom WE have to do". This appears in Journal of Discourses, vol. 1, pp. 50–51, in a sermon titled "The Powers of the Priesthood". Do you understand his intended meaning or do you ascribe another meaning to what he is saying? In the sermon of July 24, 1870, titled "The Gospel—The One-Man Power," published in Journal of Discourses, volume 13, p. 271, Young said: "Who can tell us of the inhabitants of this little planet that shines of an evening, called the moon? … when you inquire about the inhabitants of that sphere you find that the most learned are as ignorant in regard to them as the most ignorant of their fellows". He then compared this with the sun: "So it is with regard to the inhabitants of the sun. Do you think it is inhabited? I rather think it is. Do you think there is any life there? No question of it; it was not made in vain". https://journalofdiscourses.com/13/31 Do you understand his intended meaning or do you ascribe another meaning to what he is saying? Now, Joseph Smith. According to Oliver B. Huntington, Joseph Smith described the inhabitants of the moon this way: "The inhabitants of the moon are more of a uniform size than the inhabitants of the Earth, being about 6 feet in height. They dress very much like the Quaker style & are quite general in style, or the one fashion of dress. They live to be very old; coming generally, near a thousand years". Huntington then wrote: "This is the description of them as given by Joseph the Seer, and he could ‘See' whatever he asked the Father in the name of Jesus to see". https://contentdm.lib.byu.edu/digital/collection/SCMisc/id/27480/ A slightly different version was published by Huntington in the Young Woman's Journal in 1892: "As far back as 1837, I know that he said the moon was inhabited by men and women the same as this earth, and that they lived to a greater age than we do—that they live generally to near the age of a 1000 years. He described the men as averaging near six feet in height, and dressing quite uniformly in something near the Quaker style". Do you understand Smith's intended meaning or do you ascribe another meaning to what he is saying? We also clearly know what Joseph Smith had in mind when he gave the King Follett discourse. "I will go back to the beginning before the world was, to show what kind of a being God is. What sort of a being was God in the beginning? Open your ears and hear, all ye ends of the earth, for I am going to prove it to you by the Bible". Then, shortly afterward, he says: "These ideas are incomprehensible to some, but they are simple". Then, "God himself was once as we are now". and: "I am going to tell you how God came to be God. We have imagined and supposed that God was God from all eternity. I will refute that idea". He then continues: "...God himself, the Father of us all, dwelt on an earth, the same as Jesus Christ himself did; and I will show it from the Bible". But he never shows these things about Heavenly Father from the Bible; even when one tries to use the words of Jesus in John 5:19. God himself was once as we are now – meaning we are not Gods now – meaning we are not heavenly parents now. Jesus is not getting married and having spirit children like he sees the Father do. Jesus is not an exalted man, meaning a man who becomes God. One can't make it any clearer than that. But I understand other passages teach the opposite – that God is God from eternity. It's one or the other; it can't be both. It's plausible that Smith originally held onto those biblical truths (and those recorded in the Book of Mormon and Doctrine and Covenants) but later changed his mind. I'll just focus on one. You quibble too much about whether one considers it a doctrine. Let's focus on whether it's true or false. This teaching of Joseph Smith leads no doubt as to what he intended to mean. There is no ambiguity. "If Abraham reasoned thus—If Jesus Christ was the Son of God, and John discovered that God the Father of Jesus Christ had a Father, you may suppose that He had a Father also. Where was there ever a son without a father? And where was there ever a father without first being a son? Whenever did a tree or anything spring into existence without a progenitor? And everything comes in this way. Paul says that which is earthly is in the likeness of that which is heavenly, Hence if Jesus had a Father, can we not believe that He had a Father also? I despise the idea of being scared to death at such a doctrine, for the Bible is full of it" (Teachings of Joseph Smith, 1938). Are you scared to death at such a doctrine? He even used the word "doctrine". Don't change the focus as to whether this is official or unofficial. That's like saying one truth is official while another truth is unofficial. Do you view that statement by Smith as a true or false doctrine? Powers can be angelic beings with power. God foreknew Adam and Eve would sin and bring death into the world. The fall has had severe consequences for mankind and the rest of creation. In LDS theology, God actually uses disobedience as the way for Adam and Eve to begin their progression and have children after blood formed in their veins. Likewise, God supposedly foreknew his spirit children would rebel against him in heaven and he would need to send them to outer darkness. But first, he would allow these evil beings to deceive the rest of his children. Jesus did not create Satan in an evil state. He became evil. Does God's foreknowledge of evil make him evil? No.

Elder Stevenson said, "Now I'm deeply saddened and hurt by this error and for any pain that it may have caused our members and for others". It's "I'm", not "we're". The church's essay does not contain an explicit apology—it does not say, for example, "we apologize" or "the Church apologizes". Does the essay explicitly admit that the restriction itself was a mistake or error? No. Does it acknowledge that explanations taught by past leaders were wrong? Effectively yes, although it uses the language of disavowing rather than explicitly saying, "those leaders made errors". There's another version here. It also doesn't mention the word "apology", "error", "regret", or "wrong". A more honest assessment is found spoken by Dallin H. Oaks in another church seminary manual (lesson 26, Foundations of the Restoration Teacher Manual, Religion 225, 2015). "Some people put reasons to the one we're talking about here [race and the priesthood], and they turned out to be spectacularly wrong". It doesn't mention the word "apology", "error", or "regret". The identity of the "some people" is left purposely ambiguous. But at least he calls it spectacularly wrong. It's a subtle admission that church leaders and Presidents of the church can lead and have led people astray. God permits it. Brant makes a valid point that "Nephite" and "Lamanite" were not always purely biological labels. People could join another group and be "numbered among" them, so group identity could involve religion, politics, and allegiance, not just ancestry. This weakens a simplistic idea that Nephites and Lamanites were always two completely separate racial groups. However, he seems to take that point too far. The fact that people could change groups does not prove that there were no physical differences associated with the groups. A person could join the Nephites or Lamanites politically or religiously without that automatically changing every physical characteristic associated with their ancestry. Likewise, Gardner correctly shows that words like dark, white, filthy, and loathsome can sometimes be symbolic or spiritual. But he then applies this symbolic interpretation to passages that specifically mention literal skin: • 2 Nephi 5:21 — God caused "a skin of blackness" to come upon the Lamanites. • Alma 3:6 — "the skins of the Lamanites were dark" according to a mark. • 3 Nephi 2:15 — after conversion, "their skin became white like unto the Nephites". So the main flaw is that Gardner moves from "group identity was flexible" and "color language can be symbolic" to "therefore references to skin are probably symbolic as well". Those conclusions do not necessarily follow. Historically, the dominant teaching among early LDS leaders was quite different from Brant Gardner's interpretation. They taught the passages to mean that the Lamanites experienced an actual, visible change in complexion or skin color. Orson Pratt stated this especially clearly in 1840. Speaking of the Lamanites, he said that before their rebellion they were "white and exceedingly fair, like the Nephites" but that God "cursed them in their complexions, and they were changed to a dark colour". That is plainly a literal complexion/skin-color interpretation, not merely an insider/outsider character identity. Brigham Young likewise connected the Lamanites' "mark" with their being a physically "dark" people and taught that eventually "they will become a white and delightsome people". So he also taught the change as involving actual physical appearance. Gardner is correct that the Book of Mormon itself says people could join the Nephites or Lamanites. Alma 3, for example, says that someone could be "called" a Lamanite or a Nephite based partly on which traditions and beliefs they followed. But the early LDS interpretation generally did not conclude from this that skin references were merely symbolic. Instead, they seem to have understood both ideas to be true simultaneously: 1. "Nephite" and "Lamanite" could function as group, religious, or political identities. 2. There was also a literal physical mark associated with the Lamanite lineage. In fact, Alma 3 itself presents both concepts side by side. It says that the Lamanites' "skins … were dark" according to the mark, but it also says that those who adopted Lamanite traditions could be "called under that head" and receive a mark. So the historical LDS view was not "Because people could switch groups, the skin language must be symbolic". Rather, early leaders taught the Book of Mormon as describing fluid group identities alongside a real physical mark or difference in complexion. Then we have chapters 15 and 16 in "The Way to Perfection" which teaches about Cain and his descendants. For comparison, the church's topic "Race and The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints" takes a more cautious position: it says "the nature and appearance of this mark are not fully understood," rather than affirming the older leaders' specific complexion-based interpretation. Removing the reference of dark skin being a sign of the curse from the Book of Mormon would indicate errors in the supposed translation work (the Book of Mormon). He also modified and added things to the Bible which he felt were wrong, missing, or ambiguous. So I believe the LDS Church will not remove the three references mentioned earlier in my analysis of what Brant Gardner wrote. The Jehovah's Witnesses organization is overwhelming good too. But they teach a false Christ. Jehovah's Witnesses teach that Jesus is Michael the Archangel and that Heavenly Father is not an exalted man. They are not worshipping the true God. A revelation from God was needed to institute the ban, so a subsequent revelation was needed to remove the ban. But the original revelation was not recorded, as far as I know, in a "Thus saith the Lord" way. In the October 1967 General Conference, Ezra Taft Benson taught, "The arm of flesh may not approve nor understand why God has not bestowed the priesthood on women or the seed of Cain ... The Prophet Joseph Smith understood this principle when he said, "the curse is not yet taken off from the sons of Canaan, neither will be until it is affected by as great a power as caused it to come". This teaching clearly shows the ban was caused by God and that it would only be revoked by as great a power as caused it to come (meaning by God, not by earthly men). Or the ban and it's removal were both man-made (the commandments of men). In the Garden of Eden, Adam and Eve believed a false teaching by Satan and they were led astray. Being led astray can involve several things: • Believing something false - accepting teachings or claims that contradict the religion's understanding of truth. • Following the wrong influence - allowing a person, leader, culture, temptation, or ideology to pull you away from your faith. • Acting contrary to God's commands - not merely believing incorrectly, but choosing a way of life considered sinful or spiritually harmful. • Losing spiritual direction - gradually becoming less devoted to God, prayer, worship, or the values of one's faith. • Being deceived - in many religious traditions, being led astray can involve deception that initially looks convincing or appealing. Teaching that a being became a God (before or after getting married on the world he grew up on) and then becoming the heavenly father of those on our Earth is a serious matter. Teaching that Jesus was the first spirit child of two beings who became Gods and then became a God himself before obtaining a mortal body on our Earth is a serious matter. It's the difference between a false god and the true God. Wrong is wrong. Jehovah's Witnesses are pulling people towards Michael the Archangel, their version of Jesus. That is a false Christ. See above. Sounds clear to me. What does it mean to you? Maybe he had 5 things in mind and he left his hearers to decide which of the 5 was right and which were wrong. It's like someone saying, "Well, I don't think Joseph Smith had in his mind that God was not God from all eternity when he said God was not God from all eternity. He had something else in mind and that something else is more palatable to me because I can understand it more or I can believe it more. To do otherwise would have me admitting that he's a false prophet leading me toward another god". A similar principle follows. The Joseph Smith Papers gives the passage from Thomas Bullock's contemporary notes of Joseph Smith's discourse on April 8, 1844, in Nauvoo. The full relevant section reads: "...it is my duty to teach those who err in doctrine— the Sp[irit] is will[in]g. but the flesh is weak— it God made Aaron to be their mouthpiece & made me to be their K[ing]. & their God— & if you dont like it you must lump it— I have given instr[ucti]on to [Elder George J. Adams] in some principles— if he makes a mistake I will tell it". What is happening immediately before this? Smith had been announcing what he described as a "great grand & glorious revelation". He was explaining a change concerning the gathering of the Saints and the location and role of Zion. He said that the whole of North and South America constituted the promised land and that Nauvoo would have a particular role in performing ordinances for the dead. He then says: "it is my duty to teach those who err in doctrine" and immediately follows that by comparing his relationship to the Saints with God's relationship to Aaron: "if God made Aaron to be their mouthpiece & made me to be their K[ing] & their God" followed by: "if you dont like it you must lump it". The important thing is that "lump it" isn't standing alone as a general statement about disagreeing with church leaders. It occurs in a discussion of Joseph's claimed divine authority. The apparent argument is roughly: 1. God made Aaron Moses' spokesman/mouthpiece. 2. Likewise, God had made Joseph Smith the Saints' "King" and "God" in the particular sense Smith was using those terms. 3. Therefore, Smith had authority to teach and correct them. 4. If someone disliked what he was teaching, they had to "lump it"—i.e., put up with it / accept it rather than reject it merely because they disliked it. That interpretation is strengthened by the sentence immediately preceding it: "it is my duty to teach those who err in doctrine".