Possible explanations for the origin of a heavenly mother

[theplains]

Which is most likely for you?

For me, #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.

[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.

[Pyreaux]

9 hours ago, theplains said:

Which is most likely for you?

For me, #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.

[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.

"Most" likely? You've mapped out a very neat taxonomy, but a faithful Latter-day Saint doesn't need to pick one model. The Church merely affirms that we have a Heavenly Mother. Modern Latter-day Saint thought is entirely comfortable leaving the exact cosmic origin of the Heavenly Mother as an unrevealed mystery, meaning all four of your models can remain fascinating theological theories without any single one being forced as the answer. However, if you want me be a good sport and play the game, I will argue for the simplest model.

Model #4, the Co-Eternal Heavenly Mother, as LDS theology has the internal, scriptural space to accommodate a self-existent, fully divine Mother without getting dragged into either infinite regression nor creationism. 

D&C 93:29 states, "Intelligence... was not created or made, neither indeed can be." So, it's certainly possible for a core divine identity to be self-existent. If God the Father's core essence/intelligence is uncreated and co-eternal with the universe itself, the same principle would apply to the Heavenly Mother. In this model, she did not "become" a God. God is an uncreated Divine Binary, a fundamental cosmic pairing who together embody the full stature of God.

And I do favor Ancient Near Eastern literature, in which the origin stories for gods weren't written to satisfy neither modern philosophical demands nor LDS thoughts like "infinite regression". When you look at Ancient Near Eastern mythology and Israelite religion through modern scholarship (like Margaret Barker, Mark S. Smith, Frank Moore Cross), the concept of a co-eternal divine pair has incredible historical resonance. El and Lady Wisdom (Hokhmah) is portrayed as a primordial pair. So, arguing from silence, and ignoring tradition, #4 is "most" likely.

Edited Wednesday at 04:21 AM by Pyreaux

[Durangout]

Of course #4

[MrShorty]

I have no idea how to calculate probabilities here, so I'm not sure which is more probably.

#1 seems as plausible as anything. As you note, it introduces the possibility of infinite regress, that seems to generally make us uncomfortable. I can't tell if my reticence to accept this theory is grounded in truth or my own discomfort with infinite regress.

#2 seems to patriarchal to me. Why should the male God create His spouse instead of the other way around (the female Goddess creates Her spouse)? Of course, how much of my rejection of this one is grounded in real truth and how much is my own rejection of the complementarian/patriarchal notion that male is the default and female is a derivative of the male?

#3 seems to also bring up the whole infinite regress thing, which, for me, seems to be its main sticking point.

#4 would be my preferred belief, mostly because I prefer to believe God is truly self-existent and not dependent on some other being (like a parent) for His divinity. Again, how much of that is actual truth and how much is my preference to believe that God is in some way eternally self-existent? Of course, this tends to put an asterisk beside my own possible exaltation, in that my divinity at that point will always be derived from the divinity of my Parents and Their Christ rather than self-existent -- a kind of "lesser God" than my Parents.

It often seems to me that this notion of "eternally self-existent" (or similar) is the main driver of our comfort/discomfort with whatever we come up with here, since so much of the broader Christian notion of God includes the ideas that He is in some way eternally existent as Himself. His existence and nature are not dependent on anything else.

[telnetd]

On 10/13/2026 at 3:00 PM, theplains said:

Which is most likely for you?

There are two more scenarios.

One: she is really the queen of heaven mentioned by Jeremiah.  The Jews were burning incense
and pouring out drink offerings to her instead of God.

Two: she is the imagination from the mind of men.

[Pyreaux]

7 hours ago, telnetd said:

There are two more scenarios.

One: she is really the queen of heaven mentioned by Jeremiah.  The Jews were burning incense
and pouring out drink offerings to her instead of God.

Two: she is the imagination from the mind of men.

Though not mutually exclusive, the Queen of Heaven in Jeremiah could still exist and belong in the theology while still being wrong to worship her instead of the Lord of Israel. When King Hezekiah took out Nehushtan the Brazen Serpent of Moses (and Asherah which was there for 2/3rds of the temple's existence) because people were burning incense to it instead of the Lord has not much to do with whether Nehushtan had a rightful place in the theology of the temple when they first put it in there.

Edited Thursday at 11:41 PM by Pyreaux

[teddyaware]

On 10/13/2026 at 3:00 PM, theplains said:

Which is most likely for you?

For me, #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.

[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.

In case you missed it, in the beginning God created the human generations of the heaven and in His own image, a divine image that fully extends to the natures of both human males and human females. The context of Genesis 1 makes it clear that prior to the fall these human males and females were created by God to be sexual beings capable of bringing forth offspring by means of obeying the very first commandment God ever gave to man, which is to lawfully engage in the act of sexual procreation.

And since the generations of the heaven and earth were created in the very image of God as both male AND female, to many Latter-Day Saints (Yours Truly included) it’s perfectly reasonable and logical and to expect that the divine nature of God’s family circle would include both male and female natures. After all, God himself declared the divine nature to be both male and female. And when was there ever a father who was able bring forth a son without the indispensable contribution of a mother?

And let’s not forget that prior to the fall, while in Eden, that God commanded the then immortal and sinless Adam and Eve, to multiply and replenish the earth. In this regard, it always amuses me that it never seems to dawn on non-LDS Christians that redemption from the fall should include the redemptive blessing of being able to bring forth children while existing in a state of holiness since  prior to the fall Adam and Eve were an eternally married couple who were under the commandment to bring forth children while living without sin in God’s immediate presence. In other words, redemption from the fall should necessarily include a return to the state of eternal marriage that was enjoyed by our first parents before their fall, including the opportunity to fulfill the commandment to multiply while living lives of holiness in the presence of God.

We can actually get a glimpse of how the male and female divine natures combine to work in wondrous ways when it’s understood that by means of the sexual reproductive system of Mary God’s Son gestated in her womb and was born into the world with a human body. God wisely implemented the holy miracle of human sexual procreation for his eternal purposes, its spiritually blind men and women who ignore its sanctity and debase it. It’s fallen mankind who made sex “dirty” but In the beginning it was highly esteemed as the holy mechanism through which God’s great purposes in the creation to roll forward.

It’s the refusal to believe that human sexuality can continue beyond the grave that makes “first wave,” mid-19th century Mormonism appear so strange to many. Nevertheless, if we’re going to be raised from the dead with fully functioning human organs suited to a holier state, why is it so hard to imagine that the human sexual reproductive system can also be perfected in the resurrected to function in a holier state?  But I guess it’s easier and less icky to presume that all human beings are going to be raised from the dead with either anatomically incorrect Barbie and Ken bodies that will ultimately serve to prove that gender really is nothing more than a human construct.

“All human beings—male and female—are created in the image of God. Each is a beloved spirit son or daughter of heavenly parents, and, as such, each has a divine nature and destiny. Gender is an essential characteristic of individual premortal, mortal, and eternal identity and PURPOSE” (The Family, a Proclamation to the World)

Edited 11 hours ago by teddyaware

[telnetd]

16 hours ago, teddyaware said:

It’s the refusal to believe that human sexuality can continue beyond the grave that makes “first wave,” mid-19th century Mormonism appear so strange to many. Nevertheless, if we’re going to be raised from the dead with fully functioning human organs suited to a holier state, why is it so hard to imagine that the human sexual reproductive system can also be perfected in the resurrected to function in a holier state?  But I guess it’s easier and less icky to presume that all human beings are going to be raised from the dead with either anatomically incorrect Barbie and Ken bodies that will ultimately serve to prove that gender really is nothing more than a human construct.

Are you a child of heavenly parents who used their fully functioning sexual organs
to form you?

[AnchoredinChrist]

2 hours ago, telnetd said:

Are you a child of heavenly parents who used their fully functioning sexual organs to form you?

I used to assume that eternal progeny meant eternal sex too, but I think the theories of Monogamy as Divine Design make more sense:

 

MDD 3. "Wouldn't being a polygamist mean that God the Father can produce more spirit children more quickly?"

Many Latter-day Saints have assumed that if we teach of resurrected bodies, eternal marriage, and eternal progeny, then there must be eternal procreative sex too. This assertion has been used to argue for the validity (and even advantage) of eternal polygamy as well. While a woman living infinitely could be consecutively pregnant with an infinite number of children even if produced one-by-one, it is noted that a God-man with more than one immortal partner can produce an infinite number of children at an even faster rate than if He has only one partner. This has been an argument for eternal polygamy for at least a hundred years. It has caused outside critics to point out that such an idea means a heaven of men potentially having eternal harems of women who are eternally pregnant and burdened with child-bearing. This "women as eternal incubators" idea has sometimes been given as reason when asked why we do not hear more of Heavenly Mother, asserting that She is too busy spiritually birthing more spirit children, and so being more involved in our lives is therefore not part of Her role. But it would be worthy to consider why the mechanics of human reproduction are as they are, and consider if they are perhaps mechanics that only apply to humans —

            Males emit about 200 to 500 million sperm with each ejaculation. Even when conception succeeds, only one (or in rare cases, two or three) sperm ever successfully fertilize an egg. This "less than 100,000,000 to 1 odds" is an evolutionary feature to help ensure that only one of the highest caliber of sperm succeed in fertilizing the egg, but the inefficiency of having literally hundreds of millions of sperm be wasted with every emission in order to weed out any defective or weak sperm would not likely be a feature of reproduction in a heavenly realm with no risk of genetic imperfections.

            Having mothers carry developing babies in their own body is protective to the survival and the development of the child. It serves as a safety feature by which the developing baby cannot be separated from the mother; the placenta acts as a mechanism for all needed nutrients to reach the developing baby from the mother; and the placenta also acts as a barrier to protect the baby from environmental toxins. That women are usually only pregnant with one developing baby at a time is also a survival mechanism, as it helps ensure the survival of one baby by not having that baby be competing for nutrients with another.

These evolutionary protective mechanisms are potentially features that are only existent on earth. If we know that human fertilization is an act of evolutionary "one winner to many losers" feature, and that female childbearing is to protect a developing human fetus from the threats of a brutally-naturalistic earth, it could be reasoned that our fertilization and child-bearing mechanism for creating human life is solely a telestial-based model. The creation of spirit bodies in a higher realm would not necessitate any "survival of the fittest" competition between genetic material (if our spirit bodies have anything that could be termed "genetic material"), there would be no mortality-based threats against any "infant" spirit children being created, and no limitation of nutrient, space, attention, or anything else to hinder one Father and Mother God from forming an unlimited number of spirit children simultaneously.

 

MDD 4 ~ Perhaps born of the creation-mind of God, not of Their bodies ~

We have not been explicitly given any doctrinal answer as to by what mechanism God the Father and Mother formed our spirit bodies, but if we believe that God created the earth, and everything on it, through the organization of existant matter and the guided development of biological organisms, and that this was achieved solely through the intended will of the mind of God acting on natural laws, could our spirit bodies have also been formed by solely the intention of God? Could we suppose it to be possible that our spirit bodies were perhaps formed by the united mind of a Man & Woman God, rather than by some kind of resurrection-fluid passing between resurrected bodies? The idea that we were created by the will of God (as opposed to thinking that our spirit bodies exited out of a god-vagina) is a belief held by all the rest of Christendom, and it fits more closely with the language of Abraham 3:22 where we read, "Now the Lord had shown unto me, Abraham, the intelligences that were organized before the world was;"

Monogamy as Divine Design