Adam-God Theory/Doctrine: Why should or shouldn't it have been accepted.

[CA Steve]

Lehi,

The Canada trip is an excellent example.

Thanks.

[Mudcat]

I am really perplexed by the logic that lies behind this.

Why is this problematic? The assumed understanding of the passages in Matthew and Luke doesn't even make sense.

Matt 1:18 said:

18 Now the birth of Jesus Christ was on this wise: When as his mother Mary was espoused to Joseph, before they came together, she was found with child of the Holy Ghost.

Luke 1:35 said:

35 And the angel answered and said unto her, The Holy Ghost shall come upon thee, and the power of the Highest shall overshadow thee: therefore also that holy thing which shall be born of thee shall be called the Son of God.

I have no idea why you are perplexed by the logistical problems I have with the notions of God and Mary having physical relations. I know LDS who don't think this was a physical action as between a man and woman. As a Trinitarian, my particular view is compounded even further. Though I try to be objective towards the views of others.. on this particular topic, it is quite difficult.

The issues I see that could arise from physical relations.

1. Mary would not be a virgin.

2a. Mary would have engaged in premarital relations.

or

2b. Mary would not have engaged in premarital relations because of marriage to God.

but possibly

3a. (Following 2b). If so, Mary was an adulterer to her husband with Joseph.

3b. (Also following 2b) Or God sanctioned polyandry and shared Mary with Joseph on some level.

Certainly the AGT taken in tandem with Adam and Mary having physical relations adds to the issue.

We could spend days discussing variant understandings of these verses. I'd point out that there are two things Gabriel said would happen: the Holy Ghost would prepare her for the event and the event Luke described as "the power of the Highest ... overshadow[ed her]". You'd doubtless insist on Matthew's telling us that Jesus' body was the "child of the Holy Ghost". That this can or cannot be reconciled with Luke's version would take days to resolve, if it ever were.

Bold mine. Knowing your temerity Lehi on a personal level, I don't doubt that we could spend days on the subject. It is a bit of topic, but if you feel there is a case that overshadowed epikaizo= physical relations. I would like to hear it.

I know this isn't actually your point. Later in your post you seem to remove emphasis from the topic. However, you come out of the gate with the stance that it isn't problematic.

Whatever Brigham Young (and many of the other Brethren who spoke on the subject) may have thought about it, he did not say God had sexual relations with Mary. He was vague (perhaps solely out of due modesty, a characteristic sadly lacking in much of XXI discourse, but possibly due to his not knowing exactly what happened), but the point he and they were making was that Jesus Christ was literally the Son of God, that He inherited, among other traits, immortality from His Father as a necessary component of His own DA because, without it, He would not have been able to make the Atonement on our behalf.

Your injecting a premise that God DNA is different from man DNA.

I would point out that the concept of DNA is a very 20th century notion. Watson and Crick didn't nail it until 1953. I certainly don't see this as germane to a disussion about what BY was saying in BY's era. However you have my curiosity aroused. Is this notion of God DNA/Man DNA your extrapolation or has the CoJCoLDS gone on record in some way to affirm your statement?

That's because, were He mortal (the trait he did inherit from His mother), His death could not have been a sacrifice, irrespective of how He died: all die. But He was the exception to that rule, not due to some sort of magic or preferential position, but because He did not have to die

[LeSellers]

I have no idea why you are perplexed by the logistical problems I have with the notions of God and Mary having physical relations.

The problem I keep hearing is based on the notion that God is beyond such "yucky" things as reproduction by means of sex (irrespective of the means, but especially by intercourse). Not wanting to get into whatever mechanics may have been the case, I won't go further.

However, the joining of gametes, and the means by which they are joined, was pronounced by God Himself, as "very good".

The issues I see that could arise from physical relations.

1. Mary would not be a virgin.

Only if we assume a very rigid definition of "virgin". If the meaning of the word is only a little more inclusive, then there is no problem.

2a. Mary would have engaged in premarital relations.

or

2b. Mary would not have engaged in premarital relations because of marriage to God.

A third option is available, too: there is a special calling as "Messiah mother", which excludes both of the above concerns.

3a. (Following 2b). If so, Mary was an adulterer to her husband with Joseph.

Technically, she'd be an "adulteress", not an "adulterer". But, since God makes the rules on adultery as with anything else, He could easily have made an exception, as He did with Hosea who married a prostitute at His command.

3b. (Also following 2b) Or God sanctioned polyandry and shared Mary with Joseph on some level.

It does not have to be black'n'white as you portray it.

if you feel there is a case that overshadowed epikaizo= physical relations. I would like to hear it.

I'm not equating them, I'm saying that the term ???????????? "episkiasei; will overshadow" is a euphemism for some physical contact (although I do not take the position that it was intercourse), and that this contract resulted in the conception of Jesus Christ. (I prefer the idea of something similar to in viro fertilization, but do not pretend to understand all the possibilities that God had at His disposal for this event.)

you come out of the gate with the stance that it isn't problematic.

Not exactly, I came out of the gate wondering why is was problematic, because, according to most biblicists I have heard weigh in on the subject are appalled that anyone could even (pardon the pun, it's not intentional) conceive of Father's actually being Jesus literal Father.

Your injecting a premise that God DNA is different from man DNA.

I'd be surprised if it were not with regards to mortality: Adam and Eve were immortal in the Garden of Eden and became mortal, a trait they passed along to their offspring. Father, however one may envision Him, is immortal. For these purposes (i.e., that He literally is the Father of Jesus) we must assume He passed along half the chromosomes Jesus inherited. For the case of mortality v. immortality, it is obvious to me that immortality was the patrimony He received of Father, not of His mother. In that, their DNA. mortal man's and Father's, are different.

I would point out that the concept of DNA is a very 20th century notion. Watson and Crick didn't nail it until 1953.

Whatever mankind may have understood at any specific point doesn't change the fact that DNA existed in 1859 and in 1 bc. I'm using XIX language to describe what actually transpired in the village of Nazareth two millennia back.

Brother Brigham worked under the same lack failure of knowledge that Joseph the carpenter did. But that didn't change the fact that Jesus had 46 chromosomes and only 23 of them came from Mary. The other half had to come from somewhere. One of them was a "Y" chromosome

[TAO]

Mudcat... if I remember right, another meaning of the word 'virgin' at the time the Bible was written was young girl or beautiful girl. Or something like that. Didn't always mean what it is today, if I remember reading it right in the thread that stated it long ago.

[thesometimesaint]

CA Steve:

Unfortunately we don't have BY around to answer your question and he gave contradictory explanations while alive. So to me it one one of those things that I'll just have to wait to ask him about. But as far as the Church is concerned Adam God is just a personal theory of Brigham Young and not Church doctrine. I don't foresee any time in the future where it will be accepted a doctrine.

There is much good sound doctrine in the King Follet Discourse, but it too does not meet the requirement for being doctrine. Same with the Proclamation on the Family it contains much that is doctrine but it in itself has yet to be accepted by the Church as doctrine. I hope to live to see the day when it will be.

[SkepticTheist]

It doesn't matter much which way the Savior was conceived. The only thing that matters is that without a polyandrous marriage relationship, the Savior would have been illegitimate. To me that is the much bigger issue than the mechanics. In that point, Brigham Young was spot on. Mary would have been an adulteress regardless by allowing the Savior's body to be conceived in her without a marriage relation. Period.

I have no idea why you are perplexed by the logistical problems I have with the notions of God and Mary having physical relations. I know LDS who don't think this was a physical action as between a man and woman. As a Trinitarian, my particular view is compounded even further. Though I try to be objective towards the views of others.. on this particular topic, it is quite difficult.

The issues I see that could arise from physical relations.

1. Mary would not be a virgin.

2a. Mary would have engaged in premarital relations.

or

2b. Mary would not have engaged in premarital relations because of marriage to God.

but possibly

3a. (Following 2b). If so, Mary was an adulterer to her husband with Joseph.

3b. (Also following 2b) Or God sanctioned polyandry and shared Mary with Joseph on some level.

Certainly the AGT taken in tandem with Adam and Mary having physical relations adds to the issue.

Bold mine. Knowing your temerity Lehi on a personal level, I don't doubt that we could spend days on the subject. It is a bit of topic, but if you feel there is a case that overshadowed epikaizo= physical relations. I would like to hear it.

I know this isn't actually your point. Later in your post you seem to remove emphasis from the topic. However, you come out of the gate with the stance that it isn't problematic.

Your injecting a premise that God DNA is different from man DNA.

I would point out that the concept of DNA is a very 20th century notion. Watson and Crick didn't nail it until 1953. I certainly don't see this as germane to a disussion about what BY was saying in BY's era. However you have my curiosity aroused. Is this notion of God DNA/Man DNA your extrapolation or has the CoJCoLDS gone on record in some way to affirm your statement?

I see the issue differently on this part.. and we are certainly off on a tangent here. But as I see it, the punishment of death for sin was passed along in a patriarchal sense. Patriarchal repercussions were bypassed through the virgin birth. At this point, I will note, I have gotten off the EV bus, in a speculative sense, to make such an assertion but I am doubtful that I am alone on the subject. Regardless, it's what I believe.

We find agreement on the points in I bolded. However there are methodological differences that are significant.

Bold mine. It makes me most grateful too.

Certainly the background pales in comparison, but I don't suppose either one of thinks it pales to the point of irrelevance.

Respectfully,

Mudcat

[David T]

Mudcat... if I remember right, another meaning of the word 'virgin' at the time the Bible was written was young girl or beautiful girl. Or something like that. Didn't always mean what it is today, if I remember reading it right in the thread that stated it long ago.

The hebrew in Isaiah meant Young Woman. The word in the Greek version (the Septuagint, or LXX), and in the NT (which is alluding to the LXX translation) is more literally a virgin as' we understand it today: one who has not had sex. The context of the Matthew and Luke accounts make this interpretation explicit.

(Which goes for a different explanation of the meaning of the title Son of God than Mark, John, and Paul appeared to teach - which was more of an adoptive, spiritual sense)