Trinitarians Do Not View God As An Abstraction!

[Storm Rider]

"And in one Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God, (LDS believe this)

begotten of the Father, (LDS believe this)

Light from Light, true God from true God, (LDS believe this though we do not use the terminology)

begotten, not made, (LDS believe this)

of one substance with the Father, (LDS do not have a concept of substance unless it means that Father and Son are the same just as my son is the same as me)

through whom all things were made; (LDS believe this)

who for us humans and for our salvation came down and was made flesh and became human...." (LDS believe this)

In this context "begotten of the Father" clearly refers to the Son's divine, preincarnate relation to the Father, expounded in the following clauses about him being Light from Light, true God from true God, and so forth.

Second, I have already explained that "one being with the Father" is an accurate translation of the sense and intent of "one substance with the Father." This isn't a change to the meaning; it is a modern articulation of the same meaning.

Could you please identiy what LDS would disagree with in the above statement?In addition, IF LDS believe the above how are they not fully Christian? (Just focus on this concept)

In addition, reading this thread is interesting in that you have complained a few times about how disagreeable it is when others continue to misrepresent your theology even after being corrected several times. Knowing how disagreeable it is, why does your website persist in doing the exact same things about LDS theology? Would it not be better to represent true LDS teachings rather than miscontrue, twist, and misrepresesnt our beliefs?

Just for kicks, go to the Apostolic Creed and attempt to find where LDS theology disagrees with it.

Edited September 4, 2011 by Storm Rider

[Rob Bowman]

Storm Rider,

You wrote:

Could you please identiy what LDS would disagree with in the above statement?

First, the Nicene Creed was originally written as a statement rejecting Arianism. It did not claim to be a definitive statement of Christian theology that would anticipate and reject all possible heresies.

Second, the LDS Church's theology understands "begotten of the Father" differently than Trinitarians do. You may be able to use the same words, but the meaning will be different. In context, the creed is referring to the Son's eternal relationship to the Father by saying that he is "begotten" and not "made" by the Father. "Begotten" here does not mean that the Son was the literal offspring of the Father, as it does in LDS theology.

Third, "of one substance with the Father" expresses an ontological unity of the Father and the Son, which LDS theology rejects in favor of a functional unity.

You wrote:

In addition, IF LDS believe the above how are they not fully Christian? (Just focus on this concept)

As I said above, the Nicene Creed was never meant to be the exhaustive statement of orthodoxy in such a way as to anticipate and exclude all possible heresies.

You wrote:

In addition, reading this thread is interesting in that you have complained a few times about how disagreeable it is when others continue to misrepresent your theology even after being corrected several times. Knowing how disagreeable it is, why does your website persist in doing the exact same things about LDS theology? Would it not be better to represent true LDS teachings rather than miscontrue, twist, and misrepresesnt our beliefs?

When I complain about Mormons misrepresenting my theology, I always give specific examples. General, unsubstantiated accusations help no one.

You wrote:

Just for kicks, go to the Apostolic Creed and attempt to find where LDS theology disagrees with it.

What I said about the Nicene Creed applies as well to the Apostles Creed. But since you ask, LDS theology has some trouble with "conceived by the Holy Spirit" and clearly rejects "the holy catholic church."

[Storm Rider]

First, the Nicene Creed was originally written as a statement rejecting Arianism. It did not claim to be a definitive statement of Christian theology that would anticipate and reject all possible heresies. However, it has become the deining creed for a supposed calim to being Christian. the Bible Answer Man, Mr. Hank uses this without ceasing to claim LDS are not Christians.

Second, the LDS Church's theology understands "begotten of the Father" differently than Trinitarians do. You may be able to use the same words, but the meaning will be different. In context, the creed is referring to the Son's eternal relationship to the Father by saying that he is "begotten" and not "made" by the Father. "Begotten" here does not mean that the Son was the literal offspring of the Father, as it does in LDS theology. Though I am cognizant of the difference I also have to believe the definition Trinitarians use is not found int he dictionary. A Father always begets his son. Eternally begotten is meaningless and is not English and our language must be a very poor instrument to describe what you are thinking.

Third, "of one substance with the Father" expresses an ontological unity of the Father and the Son, which LDS theology rejects in favor of a functional unity. This is where philosophy entered into Chrisitanity in order to present that somehow Jesus could be divine and still not create two; only be one. LDS and the Bible just do not teach this concept; it is wholly an extrabiblical teaching. I agree that LDS and all that believe in this teaching will have a disagreement. Is this disagreement so significant that it negates the saving power of Jesus Christ?

As I said above, the Nicene Creed was never meant to be the exhaustive statement of orthodoxy in such a way as to anticipate and exclude all possible heresies. Yes, but then it is the one Creed that is the known as the bedrock of all Christianity. So much so, that If you don't believe in the Trinity you cannot be Christian has been stated continuously by apologists. Are you saying that a no Christian can believe in any heretical teachings; that (s)he cannot have any incorrect understandings of the Gospel of Christ? I assume then you are also saying that a believe in Jesus as the Savior of the world is only valid if the individual does not believe in any heresies after that one great belief. Where is your biblical support that Jesus can only save if all beliefs are orthodox as you define them?

When I complain about Mormons misrepresenting my theology, I always give specific examples. General, unsubstantiated accusations help no one. Are you saying that everything you write on your site is exact LDS theology without any misrepresentation? Further, that you have never been corrected on the information in the past? Careful, God is watching you at this moment. Now tell me truthfully.

What I said about the Nicene Creed applies as well to the Apostles Creed. But since you ask, LDS theology has some trouble with "conceived by the Holy Spirit" and clearly rejects "the holy catholic church." If holy catholic church means those who belong to the body of Christ, then you would be incorrect. If it means the Catholic Church, you would be correct. If it means a body of believers in the Christ, you would be incorrect. If you are speaking of a universal church, the Church of Jesus Christ, then you would also be incorrect. For that matter, do you belong to the holy catholic church?

It is good to clarify when people are using the same words but not the same definitions behind them. Rob, you are skilled at what you do and you have undoubtedly spent countless hours in study to arrive at your current understanding. When I talk with you, I am often reminded of a a US theologian, who stated, ""All theologians bring certain doctrinal presuppositions and biases to Scripture as they seek to construct from Scripture their theologies. The true Wesleyan admits this and does not make correct doctrine a condition for salvation. We understand that if our sins are forgiven at the time of our death, we will be taken to heaven, even if our theology is off base a thousand miles. We are Christians if God, for Christ's sake, forgives our sins. He is able to do this only because of the death and resurrection of the virgin-born God-man, Jesus Christ. But we do not need to believe in any given theory of the Incarnation or the Atonement in order to be forgiven through Christ." - J. Kenneth Grider

I think that LDS support the above statement because we believe wholly in the saving power of Jesus Christ. We also believe that all the ordinances from baptism to all temple ordinances will be offered to each person that has ever lived i.e. exaltation is achievable by all people. We still feel the need to teach and find that who are seeking the fulness of the gospel, but we are only searching for those who are looking for it. How does the blood of Christ come so cheaply in your doctrine that it is negated by heresy? If I am mistaken in my understanding of your teachings, then I apologize. However, if I am correct, then now is an opportunity for you to amend the way you teach your beliefs. Heresy never negates the blood of the Savior. His saving power is free to all that accept him and are forgiven.

[ldsfaqs]

First, the Nicene Creed was originally written as a statement rejecting Arianism. It did not claim to be a definitive statement of Christian theology that would anticipate and reject all possible heresies.

Actually no.... It was a "concise" statement to make clear the actual doctrine, contrary to all other so-called "heresies'. Arianism was simply the "major" one.

Second, the LDS Church's theology understands "begotten of the Father" differently than Trinitarians do. You may be able to use the same words, but the meaning will be different. In context, the creed is referring to the Son's eternal relationship to the Father by saying that he is "begotten" and not "made" by the Father. "Begotten" here does not mean that the Son was the literal offspring of the Father, as it does in LDS theology.

Not true.... LDS understand begotten the same way as you, we only "add" another aspect that you reject, that is the "literal" sonship.

Further, you can't say that. The Creed clearly states that the Father is the literal Father of the Son in "substance", thus, that most certainly IS a literal relationship.

Third, "of one substance with the Father" expresses an ontological unity of the Father and the Son, which LDS theology rejects in favor of a functional unity.

Not true.... In relation to the Godhead yes, but not in relation to the Son. The Son being the actual Son of the Father, is of the same substance.

As I said above, the Nicene Creed was never meant to be the exhaustive statement of orthodoxy in such a way as to anticipate and exclude all possible heresies.

Irrelevant. It clearly was the closer one to the "spirit" of what was originally was taught.

Also, as to your statement of "begotten before", LDS won't disagree per-se. But again, that's not the original, that's a changed version.

How many times do men who have no God given authority have to change something in order for it to be false for you?

The original Nicene Creed is in the Bible..... All later versions are not Biblical.

[ebeddoulos]

Okay, you've had your little laugh. Hopefully this wasn't meant as a serious argument but just a bit of sarcasm.

I must admit that I was having some fun at your expense. Hopefully, you saw the humor in it.

The Nicene Creed is clearly Trinitarian in its theology, although it does not use the word "Trinity." The Athanasian Creed did not "give birth to the Trinity theory," since Christians had been speaking about the Trinity (using that specific word) for over two centuries before the Athanasian Creed.

We must agree to disagree here. At best the Nicene Creed defines the Trinity Theory in an embryonic form. It may point to the trinity theory, but the full definition of trinity as it is "understood" today would not arrive until the Athanasian Creed. Yes, people were talking about the trinity theory for a while but only exploring the periphery. Even after the arrival of the Athanasian Creed, it would wait a few centuries before the eastern churches adopted it.

I've addressed this confusion before. Ideas can be abstract; realities can be explained in an abstract way. But the claim to which I objected was the claim that Trinitarians view God himself as a mere abstraction. That is a patently, flagrantly false claim.

Perception is reality. The French poet and novelist, Remy de Gourmont, said, “Two elements are needed to form a truth - a fact and an abstraction.” Sorry, but while I see the abstraction, I fail to see the fact. Therefore, from my perception, there is no truth in the trinity theory, at least as it is defined in the Athanasian Creed.

I've addressed this before, too. In fact, I addressed it so often I published a blog article on it.

Interesting. I read your post.

From key points of your blog, which I quote and underline below, it appears that we are in agreement.

Like you, we do not see the “need to use words like Trinity” nor do we feel the necessity to subscribe to “formulas like three persons in one God ” because like you, we know they “do not appear in the Bible.”

Like you, we “make a faith commitment to the three persons of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, as is evident from the injunction to make disciples by ‘baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit’. ” (Doctrine and Covenants 20:68-74)

Like you, we declare that Father, Son and Holy Ghost are divine and worthy of our “religious devotion, reverence, and worship. ” (3 Nephi 11:16-17, Doctrine and Covenants 20:28, Doctrine & Covenants 101:22)

Like you, we do not believe it is “quite accurate to say that belief in the doctrine of the Trinity is essential for salvation”, though that is what the Athanasian Creed quite explicitly states. The 44th line of the Athanasian Creed, in the original Latin, reads:

• 44. Hæc est fides catholicæ: quam nisi quisque fideliter firmiterque crediderit, salvus esse non poterit.

Schaff translated that as :

• 44. This is the Catholic Faith: which except a man believe faithfully[truly and firmly], he can not be saved. (Phillip Schaff, “The Creeds of Christiandom”, Grand Rapids: Baker Books, [1998 reprint of the 1931 edition], vol 2 of 3, pg 70).

It should be noted that the CARM website replaces the capital "C" with a lower-case "c" and offers the following explanatory caveat:

• “Please note that the term "catholic" with the lower case "c" is not a reference to the Roman Catholic Church, but is a reference to the universal Christian faith, since that is how the term was originally used.”

Other sites such as Wisconsin Evangelical Lutheran Synod substitute “Christian” for “Catholic”. Be that as it may, whatever word is used to translate "catholicæ" is now immaterial since both you and I agree that we do not need to use such formulas and that belief in the doctrine of the Trinity is not essential for salvation.

I just realized that the bottom line here is that for once I am in agreement with you. Now I feel the need to ponder that in wonderment for a wee bit.

Edited September 4, 2011 by ebeddoulos

[Rob Bowman]

ldsfaqs,

I can pass over all of your other comments and draw attention to your last statement:

The original Nicene Creed is in the Bible..... All later versions are not Biblical.

I'd issue a CFR, but your statement that "the original Nicene Creed is in the Bible" is so obviously incorrect that a CFR seems unnecessary. The "Nicene Creed" originated at Nicea in 325. The books of the Bible were all written before about 100. Your statement simply cannot be even taken seriously.

[altersteve]

ldsfaqs,

I can pass over all of your other comments and draw attention to your last statement:

I'd issue a CFR, but your statement that "the original Nicene Creed is in the Bible" is so obviously incorrect that a CFR seems unnecessary. The "Nicene Creed" originated at Nicea in 325. The books of the Bible were all written before about 100. Your statement simply cannot be even taken seriously.

I think he means that the doctrines within the Nicene Creed are in the Bible, not that the Creed itself is.

[LeSellers]

In this context "begotten of the Father" clearly refers to the Son's divine, preincarnate relation to the Father, expounded in the following clauses about him being Light from Light, true God from true God, and so forth.

It may "clearly refer" to His "preincarnate" relationship to the Father, but only in this context, that is, the context of a man-made, politically founded declaration designed to appease warring Christian factions (or to impose the "school solution" on the losers—victors write more than the history). In the scriptures, it means He was literally the Son of God, in exactly the same way Mary was His mother, with the appropriate and obvious allowances for the sex of each P/parent.

It is really hard for me to grasp how Evangelicals and other other-than-LDS Christians can choose to toss out the hundreds of scriptural references to His being the Son of God (by which we Saints understand the terms to refer to both His spiritual and His physical bodies), and prefer to substitute a nonsensical concept that they cannot even explain in any but "technical" theological* language.

* I say again, neither Peter nor John was a theologian. They did not need to resort to such obfuscations to deliver the message that Jesus

is

the Christ, the Son of the Living God.

The fact is the Bible tells us that Jesus was the Son of God, and that He is both the "First-born" (implying more than Him alone—i.e., all of us as spirits) and the Only-begotten (i.e., He is unique in being the only Son of God in the flesh—the rest of us have mortal fathers). Trying to make these two mutually contradictory titles merge in a single sphere (either spiritual or physical) creates unresolvable conflicts. Only when we recognize that they refer to the two kinds of existence, and do so independently, can we resolve the conflict.

Lehi

Edited September 5, 2011 by LeSellers

[JeremyOrbe-Smith]

ldsfaqs and others attempting to find Mormonism in the various Creeds, especially that of Nicea: Rob is entirely correct that the wording is deeply opposed to LDS theology. I'm actually kinda startled to see any Mormon attempting to defend it - as Joseph Smith said, “I cannot believe in any of the creeds of the different denominations, because they all have some things in them I cannot subscribe to, though all of them have some truth. I want to come up into the presence of God, and learn all things; but the creeds set up stakes, and say, ‘Hitherto shalt thou come, and no further’; which I cannot subscribe to.” It appears to me that you're misunderstanding the nature of the "one substance" and "essence" that is spoken of - neither Arius nor Athanasius taught a doctrine that had any close relationship to either our doctrine or a literal reading of the gospels; Christianity had been Hellenized at least a century before their great controversy.

Oddly enough, this is hardly a comfort to Trinitarians either, since homoousios simply does not appear anywhere in the Bible, and to attempt to beg the question by claiming, as so many do, that it is implied in the Gospels is to retroactively assert that a Trinitarian reading of the text is the only legitimate one, even though that is the entire issue at stake.

I think the crux of all this is whether anything can be said to "exist" if it is not composed of "stuff", of "substance" of some sort. To me, it seems so philosophically obvious that "there is no such thing as immaterial matter" that I'm finding it difficult to understand what is meant when people claim that their understanding of the Trinity is not an inherently unworkable contradiction in terms. How can something exist if it is "immaterial"? How can an immaterial being create material?

It is definitionally impossible for a Triad to simultaneously be a Monad. Positing a microscopically-thin semantic distinction between "three distinct personal beings/three beings in one" and "one being in three distinct persons" who is simultaneously not "only one person," as Rob has unsuccessfully attempted, is simply not tenable.

Mudcat, for instance, says that "I believe in a tangible Savior. Christ had a body and still does. I believe that the Holy Spirit, though intangible, lives within me and has communicated on occasions with me."

But this seems to me to be inherently unworkable. If the Trinity, composed of Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, is truly "one" in the sense I hear it used by Trinitarians, then it is a contradiction in terms to say that they can be tangible and intangible at the same time. This is simply logically indefensible.

I like what Hugh Nibley wrote: "The fact that those councils carry on their deliberations after the manner and in the artificial language of the schools of philosophy distresses [the people] even more. Throughout the Middle Ages the ablest men labored mightily to comprehend and restate in intelligible terms those ever-illusive definitions of God, school succeeding school exactly as in the fourth century. The Reformation, striving to correct administrative abuses and restate moral principles, left the basic doctrines untouched, and to this day the whole Christian world, from the cool recesses of high-church Gothic to the torrid canvas of the revivalist, owes allegiance to the angry and perplexed churchmen of the [early councils]." Hence the need, in my opinion, for a Restoration.

My experience agrees with Loran Blood's when it is stated that "[traditional] Christians conceive of God, whatever he or "it" is, as outside or beyond matter, and in a state of radical contradistinction to it." When I was an atheist, this was always what I was asked to have faith in - the mysterious paradox of it all was seen as one of the grand miracles of Christianity which was supposed to demonstrate why I should worship God.

But to any non-religious person, this is fundamentally silly. The atheist does not worship gravity. It is nonsensical to speak of giving honor to an undefinable "something" that is so radically different from me that it is literally beyond time.

I'll quote Loran again, because this has not been dealt with adequately: "The doctrine of the Trinity teaches that these three "persons" (which itself is a very difficult concept in the trinitarian sense, as they defy the law of identity) are a single ontological essence, or entity, which is both logically and conceptually unintelligible. Nothing can be conceptually understood in some fundamental, underlying ontological sense as one and yet three, or three and yet one (the difference in going either way, emphasizing one in three or three as one, not being particularly clear as to its philosophical consequences)." [Emphasis added]

This is why statements such as "the three persons are not three parts that collectively form something else" because "parts and composition presuppose material, finite objects," are so frustratingly incoherent from my perspective. To anyone but a Trinitarian, this type of statement is simply nonsensical, especially when they are followed immediately by utterly contradictory assertions such as "the triune God is real, genuinely existing, and concrete, not unreal, nothingness, or abstract."

If something is immaterial, how can it be concrete? This is not a profound existential paradox. It's simply logical incoherence.

And it is particularly frustrating to be told that I have merely "assumed that the Trinity was both nonexistent and impossible" [Emphasis added]. I "assumed" nothing; I quite consciously examined Traditional Christian claims and formulated reasons why the Trinitarian position was a hopeless muddle. I took nothing for granted, or on mere supposition. This is precisely why I was an atheist for many years; the arguments in favor of Trinitarian Christianity did not make sense to me.

The Trinity is not at all "clearly taught in the Bible", regardless of what "most" Christians historically have seen in it, and this was certainly very clear to me even as an atheist. It is not merely a "Mormon" claim that the God of the Philosophers is found nowhere in the Bible, and is in fact radically contradicted in all but the most miniscule fraction of ambiguous verses which, in the light of the overwhelming context, it is safe to say are less ambiguous than Trinitarians suppose.

To say that "an immaterial being is not itself an abstraction" is, I think, to fundamentally confuse what constitutes an abstraction in the first place; a mere denial of the term is not a demonstrable argument in favor of the coherence of the Trinity.

David Hart's philosophy, for instance, already presupposes the need for a First Mover as so many philosophies do; he's simply working backwards and assuming that his "elementary observation" of a transcendent "source" of being is demonstrable, when nothing could be further from the truth.

Mormonism is actually radically and deeply opposed to "contingency" of any sort - we are not contingent on anything except our own Free Will, which is the root of our agency. Every Intelligence is as uncreated and eternal as God - we reject the simplistic notion that a God cannot be God unless He is the creator of absolutely everything, including matter and time. (Incidentally, this is another area in which an absolutist understanding of God fails utterly, since it is fundamentally incapable of accounting for the existence of evil in the face of an all-powerful deity who could by definition cause it to cease to exist without losing any moral "teaching" utility that it might have.)

Edited September 5, 2011 by JeremyOrbe-Smith

[Flyonthewall]

ldsfaqs and others attempting to find Mormonism in the various Creeds, especially that of Nicea: Rob is entirely correct that the wording is deeply opposed to LDS theology. I'm actually kinda startled to see any Mormon attempting to defend it - as Joseph Smith said, “I cannot believe in any of the creeds of the different denominations, because they all have some things in them I cannot subscribe to, though all of them have some truth. I want to come up into the presence of God, and learn all things; but the creeds set up stakes, and say, ‘Hitherto shalt thou come, and no further’; which I cannot subscribe to.” It appears to me that you're misunderstanding the nature of the "one substance" and "essence" that is spoken of - neither Arius nor Athanasius taught a doctrine that had any close relationship to either our doctrine or a literal reading of the gospels; Christianity had been Hellenized at least a century before their great controversy. . . .

I agree with your post with the small exception of not being able to find Mormonism in the various creeds.

Joseph, while disagreeing with the creeds in their entirety, found truths in them. Once those stakes are removed, that Joseph could not subscribe to, I find it very easy to find Mormonism...afterall, don't we embrace truth wherever it may be found?

[Ahab]

The "3 persons in one being" is what throws a lot of people off because they can't imagine any way for that to make sense, but it's actually easy to understand once you correctly understand how to correctly define the word "being".

To understand the word "being" as it applies to the Trinity, think of a being as something like a "kind" of being, with that "kind" of being as the most supreme "kind" of being in all of existence. That is the "kind" of being God is.

Do you understand now?

A lot of confusion would simply disappear if instead of people saying "Gods" when referring to the Trinity they simply said "three persons who are God" while understanding there is nothing abstract about them.

[Ahab]

Steve,

When I say "God" without any qualification, I am very often referring to the Father, but what I say (again where there is no clear qualification) might also apply to the other two persons as well. I can also use the term in reference to the three persons in their unity. I don't know if I can quantify which usage is most common in my own personal speech.

Just so you know, we do the same thing, Rob.

When we say God we are usually referring to our Father in heaven, although we recognize the fact that Jesus and the Holy Ghost are persons who are God too and the term "God" can also apply them because they are the same being... or the same "kind" of being... as our Father in heaven.

And also, just so you know, LDS are Trinitarians, although some people have just as much trouble with that concept as they do in understanding what the Trinity really is.

Edited September 5, 2011 by Ahab

[Questing Beast]

...

"There is one and only one living and true God. He is an intelligent, spiritual, and personal Being, the Creator, Redeemer, Preserver, and Ruler of the universe. God is infinite in holiness and all other perfections. God is all powerful and all knowing; and His perfect knowledge extends to all things, past, present, and future, including the future decisions of His free creatures. To Him we owe the highest love, reverence, and obedience. The eternal triune God reveals Himself to us as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, with distinct personal attributes, but without division of nature, essence, or being."

...

By assigning a gender to this "personal Being", a limitation is placed upon imagination, ergo the God being described is less than we can possibly imagine and is fallacious as an asserted complete concept for God.

"God" IS a personal Being, because we are made as personal beings; and we cannot transcend or possess traits that "God" does not. But "God In Total" must be infinitely more than a personal, MALE Being.

I will pray to no Man. But I will do my best to worship the greatest concept of "God" that I can possibly imagine.

This means that if "God" were to manifest to me as a Man, no matter how glorious, I would not bow down and worship that manifestation. By appearing AS a human being, I expect to relate to "God" as such; or else "He" would not have manifested as a Man.

In times past, when Lords ruled the earth, and obeisance was expected (or else heads would roll), it would have been unthinkable for a mere human being to not bow down before God As Man manifesting. But that's why God manifested in apparently supernatural ways, e.g. Moses' burning bush vision - but later, he talks with God "face to face as a man speaks with his friend". And of course, the visitation of "God" to Mahonri Moriancumer, fully revealed and again face to face with no obeisance expected or required.

But none of those rare events where "God" visited earth as a personal Being ARE "God In Total"; anymore than any of us are, yet each sapient being is a manifestation of "God" of a lesser sort. To assert otherwise is to assert that intelligences can exist without Cause: yet separate from one another throughout infinity of time and space. The only explanation for Existence in the first place is "God"; and that word must only be attached to the total of all sapient concepts, attempting to define what "God" Is: and even if such a collection of concepts were possible (in a multiverse of infinitely expanding universes), yet the sum of them all would not amount to even a beginning of declaring the Being that "God" Is....

[Zeta-Flux]

By assigning a gender to this "personal Being", a limitation is placed upon imagination, ergo the God being described is less than we can possibly imagine and is fallacious as an asserted complete concept for God.

"God" IS a personal Being, because we are made as personal beings; and we cannot transcend or possess traits that "God" does not. But "God In Total" must be infinitely more than a personal, MALE Being.

I will pray to no Man. But I will do my best to worship the greatest concept of "God" that I can possibly imagine.

This means that if "God" were to manifest to me as a Man, no matter how glorious, I would not bow down and worship that manifestation. By appearing AS a human being, I expect to relate to "God" as such; or else "He" would not have manifested as a Man.

In times past, when Lords ruled the earth, and obeisance was expected (or else heads would roll), it would have been unthinkable for a mere human being to not bow down before God As Man manifesting. But that's why God manifested in apparently supernatural ways, e.g. Moses' burning bush vision - but later, he talks with God "face to face as a man speaks with his friend". And of course, the visitation of "God" to Mahonri Moriancumer, fully revealed and again face to face with no obeisance expected or required.

But none of those rare events where "God" visited earth as a personal Being ARE "God In Total"; anymore than any of us are, yet each sapient being is a manifestation of "God" of a lesser sort. To assert otherwise is to assert that intelligences can exist without Cause: yet separate from one another throughout infinity of time and space. The only explanation for Existence in the first place is "God"; and that word must only be attached to the total of all sapient concepts, attempting to define what "God" Is: and even if such a collection of concepts were possible (in a multiverse of infinitely expanding universes), yet the sum of them all would not amount to even a beginning of declaring the Being that "God" Is....

Orson Pratt preached something very similar to this, and was rebuked for it. One should not worship the concept of God, but rather the being who is God. That his perfection does not match your concept of what his perfection should be (i.e., unimaginable) is of no relevance.

Edited September 5, 2011 by Zeta-Flux

[Calm]

Just so you know, we do the same thing, Rob.

When we say God we are usually referring to our Father in heaven, although we recognize the fact that Jesus and the Holy Ghost are persons who are God too and the term "God" can also apply them because they are the same being... or the same "kind" of being... as our Father in heaven.

And also, just so you know, LDS are Trinitarians, although some people have just as much trouble with that concept as they do in understanding what the Trinity really is.

I would say we are not classical Trinitarians, but Social Trinitarians.

[elguanteloko]

I think the crux of all this is whether anything can be said to "exist" if it is not composed of "stuff", of "substance" of some sort. To me, it seems so philosophically obvious that "there is no such thing as immaterial matter" that I'm finding it difficult to understand what is meant when people claim that their understanding of the Trinity is not an inherently unworkable contradiction in terms. How can something exist if it is "immaterial"? How can an immaterial being create material?

It isn't 'philosophically obvious' that time and space can be curved or that such a thing as the singularity of Big Bang cosmology may exist and have zero mass. All I've seen in your posts here is a big confusion over terms. If you want an example of something that isn't material and affects matter then you can take the example of energy acting on matter. Our lack of ability in saying how this happens doesn't take from the fact that it does happen. A believer in the Trinity may say a similar thing in that the doctrine is revelation, not an inference. Also, what Mormons mean doesn't exist (that is, "immaterial matter") may be something Trinitarians don't talk about when they say "God is immaterial". Since few Trinitarians seriously engage in the practice of trying to discover what God "is made of", then I think this is a futile enterprise. Mormons may as well start talking about what "spirit matter" is in the first place seriously, but they don't because it's equally as futile.

To say that "an immaterial being is not itself an abstraction" is, I think, to fundamentally confuse what constitutes an abstraction in the first place; a mere denial of the term is not a demonstrable argument in favor of the coherence of the Trinity.

Well, I'm still waiting for you to address my response to your post where you bring up definitions which supposedly make the Trinity an "abstraction" instead of a concrete thing we simply don't understand or can't understand at the moment. That we can't understand or describe God doesn't mean God is an abstraction.

This is simply logically indefensible

and it isn't meant to be logically defensible. It is a mystery of the faith. Don't you have those in your religion?

But to any non-religious person, this is fundamentally silly

"The message of the Cross is foolishness to those that are perishing". Why do you expect it to be otherwise if you have faith?

Mormonism is actually radically and deeply opposed to "contingency" of any sort - we are not contingent on anything except our own Free Will

I want to know what you mean by "contingency" here. Our bodies, even in Mormonism, are contingent in some sense to God.

Edited September 5, 2011 by elguanteloko

[JeremyOrbe-Smith]

Ahab and calmoriah: We are not Trinitarians of any sort, classical or no - part of the definition of "Trinitarian" is for the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost to exist in a mystery of consubstantiality. This "Trinity" simply does not appear implicitly in any of our scriptures, and is indeed explicitly refuted.

Flyonthewall:

Of course we can agree with the basic propositions of the Creeds that God exists. I'm big on the "embracing truth wherever it may be found" riff myself. But beyond affirming the mere existence of God, the Creeds go farther than is warranted by claiming that the Gods are composed of a single substance, the homoousios. The existence of God is not the bit of truth embraced by some LDS in this thread - they were defending the clauses defining the substance, which I think it is clear they have simply misunderstood, as Rob correctly points out. Since the issue of "substance" is the entire point of this debate, it seemed pointless to try to defend the bits of the Creeds that we do believe.

Questing Beast:

Everything has limits. Even by saying that God exists, we have limited Him by implying that He cannot not exist. Or does He have the power to utterly snuff Himself out? To argue that the "greatest" concept of God is whatever idiosyncratic grandness our imaginations can come up with (rather than a living Father who loves His children) is to fall into the age-old philosophical trap that Christ argued against.

God is certainly not "the only explanation for Existence" - you've merely pushed the issue one step back, because you have offered no plausible account of God's existence. Mormonism sidesteps the issue entirely by saying that all Intelligence is eternal. As I pointed out earlier, I think part of the absolutely revolutionary identity of the religion of the Latter-Day Saints is to assert that Intelligences can indeed exist without cause.

Although we have been gifted by God with bodies He has organized, at the fundamental level we are contingent on nothing, which is why we have free will. We exist as the inherent light of eternal Intelligence, just as God does. We are a necessary part of the cosmos. If we're already positing one Being who existed without cause (God), then there is simply no philosophical impediment to believing in an uncountable number of such Beings. We do not search for a "cause" or an "origin" of Being; and anyway, it seems very odd to me to speak of an unimaginable and immaterial being creating material beings from nothing.

I like what Hugh Nibley said in one of his classroom lectures:

"Now ... as to the beginning in general. ... 'At the beginning of the universe, the Egyptians do not attempt to explain the first ultimate beginning. They begin with a given quantity.' The material of the universe is a given quantity to begin with. They don't argue about what must come before that because it is a waste of time, among other things. It's imponderable.

Should we be here? This idea of ontology: Should we exist at all? Is it right? Well, we could argue about that until the cows come home. But why bother? We are here, you see. As we used to say to the little kids when we went somewhere, 'You should have thought of that before you left home!' It's too late now; we're here already. Let's begin with that as a given quantity.

That's the thing that Professor Wormuth up at the University of Utah was very much impressed by. He was one of their most eminent professors up there. ... He said that Mormonism is the only non-speculative religion. Every other religion just speculates on the beginning of things - 'should we be here', etc. But we take certain things as given - that we are here and the world is here. We go on from there.

... Now the process of creation is, therefore, one (since [the Egyptians] accept material as there already) of organization, beginning with matter unorganized. So it isn't a matter of existence or creation out of nothing which, as we say, the 'Christian' world believes. The scientists say that's what you must believe if you are a Christian or a Jew. The Egyptians didn't believe that for a minute."

Most of your argument is sheer incomprehensible mysticism, and I personally do not find unintelligibility to be awe-inspiring or worthy of worship. If any God wants me as a follower, He's going to have to do some work explaining Himself and His purposes to me. Thankfully, He has:

What the Savior is like: "When the Savior shall appear we shall see him as he is. We shall see that he is a man like ourselves." (130:1)

What He asks of us: "I have decreed a decree which my people shall realize, inasmuch as they hearken from this very hour unto the counsel which I, the Lord their God, shall give unto them. ... they [are] set to be a light unto the world, and to be the saviors of men." (D&C 103:9)

Why: "For behold, this is my work and my glory - to bring to pass the immortality and eternal life of man." (Moses 1:39)

That is a cause I can get behind. That is living, breathing, physical person I can honor. Zeta-Flux is exactly correct: "One should not worship the concept of God, but rather the being who is God. That his perfection does not match your concept of what his perfection should be (i.e., unimaginable) is of no relevance." [Emphasis added.]

Edited September 5, 2011 by JeremyOrbe-Smith

[Calm]

Ahab and calmoriah: We are not Trinitarians of any sort, classical or no - part of the definition of "Trinitarian" is for the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost to exist in a mystery of consubstantiality. This "Trinity" simply does not appear implicitly in any of our scriptures, and is indeed explicitly refuted.

I had been under the impression that Social Trinitarianism did not include consubstantiality, rather the Trinity was one of relationship. Having just looked at wiki, it does seem to take it farther with this:

They often understand the idea of perichoresis of the persons of the trinity as providing at least part of this greater unity

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_trinity#The_Concept_of_one_.27being.27_in_Social_Trinity

Perichoresis being:

It refers to the mutual inter-penetration and indwelling within the threefold nature of the Trinity, God the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perichoresis

[ERayR]

By assigning a gender to this "personal Being", a limitation is placed upon imagination, ergo the God being described is less than we can possibly imagine and is fallacious as an asserted complete concept for God.

"God" IS a personal Being, because we are made as personal beings; and we cannot transcend or possess traits that "God" does not. But "God In Total" must be infinitely more than a personal, MALE Being.

I will pray to no Man. But I will do my best to worship the greatest concept of "God" that I can possibly imagine.

This means that if "God" were to manifest to me as a Man, no matter how glorious, I would not bow down and worship that manifestation. By appearing AS a human being, I expect to relate to "God" as such; or else "He" would not have manifested as a Man.

In times past, when Lords ruled the earth, and obeisance was expected (or else heads would roll), it would have been unthinkable for a mere human being to not bow down before God As Man manifesting. But that's why God manifested in apparently supernatural ways, e.g. Moses' burning bush vision - but later, he talks with God "face to face as a man speaks with his friend". And of course, the visitation of "God" to Mahonri Moriancumer, fully revealed and again face to face with no obeisance expected or required.

But none of those rare events where "God" visited earth as a personal Being ARE "God In Total"; anymore than any of us are, yet each sapient being is a manifestation of "God" of a lesser sort. To assert otherwise is to assert that intelligences can exist without Cause: yet separate from one another throughout infinity of time and space. The only explanation for Existence in the first place is "God"; and that word must only be attached to the total of all sapient concepts, attempting to define what "God" Is: and even if such a collection of concepts were possible (in a multiverse of infinitely expanding universes), yet the sum of them all would not amount to even a beginning of declaring the Being that "God" Is....

Perfection need not be unimaginable to be perfection. One can play a perfect game, perform a perfect dive, paint a perfect picture, play a perfect musical number and the list goes on. All are imaginable.

[Questing Beast]

Questing Beast:

Everything has limits. Even by saying that God exists, we have limited Him by implying that He cannot not exist.

I don't believe that I have ever said on this board, "God exists." I used to say that, many years ago. But doing a lot of thinking shows me that "God exists" is a fallacy. If "God is Existence in the first place", then all empirical existence (what Hugh Nibley and his Egyptians are talking about) derives from that uncaused Existence.

Or does He have the power to utterly snuff Himself out?

Yes. But Existence has always been. It can be a Void, Darkness with Nothing. And it must be that, as well as Infinite fecundity. Both states are equally Existence. "God" manifested (playing the game as such) can quit and become Void. And must do so. Or else the concept could not possibly be framed by a finite mind.

To argue that the "greatest" concept of God is whatever idiosyncratic grandness our imaginations can come up with (rather than a living Father who loves His children) is to fall into the age-old philosophical trap that Christ argued against.

Really. What trap is that?

The Being that manifests as human, who says "Beside me there is no other god", is not idosyncratic. He is contradictory. The scriptures that offer that "quote" from God also state that he has said we are gods, and sons of god, etc. Progeny of Deity make "Beside me there is no other god" either a lie or a seriously misunderstood concept. Mormons, of course, get around this just fine.

God is certainly not "the only explanation for Existence" - you've merely pushed the issue one step back, because you have offered no plausible account of God's existence.

I just did: "God = Existence in the first place."

Mormonism sidesteps the issue entirely by saying that all Intelligence is eternal. As I pointed out earlier, I think part of the absolutely revolutionary identity of the religion of the Latter-Day Saints is to assert that Intelligences can indeed exist without cause.

That is a trap if there is one at all. Because by "God the Father" asserting that he is the only one, and "Beside me there is no other", while at the same time asserting that all intelligences are coeternal and uncaused, is to open up the possibility of other gods; any of which in eternity could appear as manifestly greater than "our" GtF. In the Lectures on Faith, Joseph Smith attempted to prove that God the Father is absolutely the only God, thereby proving that we can have absolute faith in him. But by asserting the eternal existence of all intelligences, and reducing GtF to merely being the most intelligent of they all, the possibility of absolute faith in GtF becomes impossible. In the infinity of eternities, there can always arise a greater god.

Although we have been gifted by God with bodies He has organized, at the fundamental level we are contingent on nothing, which is why we have free will.

Eternally existing intelligences cannot have inherent free will; and GtF claim that agency of man is his gift to us. The concepts are mutually exclusive.

We exist as the inherent light of eternal Intelligence, just as God does. We are a necessary part of the cosmos.

Now you are waxing incomprehensible. What does "inherent light of eternal intelligence" mean? Whatever you say it means.

If we're already positing one Being who existed without cause (God), then there is simply no philosophical impediment to believing in an uncountable number of such Beings. We do not search for a "cause" or an "origin" of Being; and anyway, it seems very odd to me to speak of an unimaginable and immaterial being creating material beings from nothing.

As I already said: this is a trap, because it is impossible to have absolute/perfect faith in such a concept for God. I can become God, given enough time. I'll get smarter and more powerful until I pass the point that GtF was at when he set all this earthly stuff up and got us to "play". And what's to stop a greater Being from coming along, from somewhere "out there" in the infinite cosmos?

I like what Hugh Nibley said in one of his classroom lectures:

Always an entertaining man. But I have to say that here he is advocating for lazy assertion, in the place of the eternal quest for the ultimate reunion with the Necessary Cause. To settle for less is idolatry, sooner or later.

Most of your argument is sheer incomprehensible mysticism, and I personally do not find unintelligibility to be awe-inspiring or worthy of worship.

One of the things I always try to clarify, is that my paradigm of "God" is not the same as any other. The same holds for every sapient being. In effect, this planet this year has over seven billion religions inhabiting it (and the same number of egocentric universes, all individually connected to no other Being but God In Total, i.e. Existence in the First Place). A lot of what Joseph Smith said concerning God makes no sense. It is unintelligible because it does not fit with the other things he said about God. (e.g. the Lectures on Faith are incompatible with his later theology)

If any God wants me as a follower, He's going to have to do some work explaining Himself and His purposes to me. Thankfully, He has:

What the Savior is like: "When the Savior shall appear we shall see him as he is. We shall see that he is a man like ourselves." (130:1)

What He asks of us: "I have decreed a decree which my people shall realize, inasmuch as they hearken from this very hour unto the counsel which I, the Lord their God, shall give unto them. ... they [are] set to be a light unto the world, and to be the saviors of men." (D&C 103:9)

Why: "For behold, this is my work and my glory - to bring to pass the immortality and eternal life of man." (Moses 1:39)

That is a cause I can get behind. That is living, breathing, physical person I can honor. Zeta-Flux is exactly correct: "One should not worship the concept of God, but rather the being who is God. That his perfection does not match your concept of what his perfection should be (i.e., unimaginable) is of no relevance." [Emphasis added.]

That's all well and good. Until another comes along and offers some other "plan". Oh, yeah, that's already happened. Lucifer "is also a son of God". What's to prevent this from happening an infinite number of times? Where is the assurance beyond doubt, that we have been told the full skinny? Perhaps the Ori have visited Earth and given us our Judeo-Christian religions. And perhaps, as they have said (in so many words), they will be back, thus fulfilling the scriptures that they gave us to begin with. If our faith in God the Father is based on a game of claim jumping, then I want no part of that either. I will continue my quest for the Cause of my Existence....

[Anakin7]

From my lights when speaking to a non LDS Christian the word "Being" to describe GOD means "nature' to them, and I have spoken to 100s of non LDS Christians in my Life.

In His Debt/Grace

Anakin7

LDS JEDI KNIGHT

Edited September 6, 2011 by Anakin7

[Pahoran]

That's all well and good. Until another comes along and offers some other "plan". Oh, yeah, that's already happened. Lucifer "is also a son of God". What's to prevent this from happening an infinite number of times? Where is the assurance beyond doubt, that we have been told the full skinny? Perhaps the Ori have visited Earth and given us our Judeo-Christian religions. And perhaps, as they have said (in so many words), they will be back, thus fulfilling the scriptures that they gave us to begin with. If our faith in God the Father is based on a game of claim jumping, then I want no part of that either. I will continue my quest for the Cause of my Existence....

And nothing could be more noble than a "quest." Particularly one that lets you look down your lordly nose at those who aren't interested in joining it.

Please don't anyone tell QB that we can all envisage just as many angels dancing on the head of a pin as he can. Everything depends upon him fondly supposing that his imaginary "God" is so much "bigger" than anything we, with our puny little minds, could possibly grasp. If ever he realises that we simply aren't impressed by these kinds of trivial games, it might depress him too much.

Regards,

Pahoran

[BCSpace]

To understand the word "being" as it applies to the Trinity, think of a being as something like a "kind" of being, with that "kind" of being as the most supreme "kind" of being in all of existence. That is the "kind" of being God is.

For example, God is Love. So while the Three are separate individual persons in the trinity hypothesis, God (Being) is an abstraction that permeates the Three. Hence God is an abstraction.

By assigning a gender to this "personal Being", a limitation is placed upon imagination, ergo the God being described is less than we can possibly imagine and is fallacious as an asserted complete concept for God.

Unless such a "limitation" is a fact of the nature of God and the laws He abides by.

Edited September 6, 2011 by BCSpace

[ldsfaqs]

ldsfaqs and others attempting to find Mormonism in the various Creeds, especially that of Nicea: Rob is entirely correct that the wording is deeply opposed to LDS theology. I'm actually kinda startled to see any Mormon attempting to defend it.....

Hello Jeremy....

If you read what the "original" Nicene Creed actually said (I posted both a picture of it, and the link to Wikipedia), there is nothing in it at all which conflicts with LDS doctrine, in fact, it teaches basic LDS doctrine.

I used to think the same as you, but that was before I realized we've been reading LATER VERSIONS of the Nicene Creed, not the actual original.

It is only the LATER versions which changed and are not compatible with LDS theology.

The original version only states that the Father and the Son are of the same substance because Christ is the "Only Begotten Son".

It's only later versions which take things much further, creating an entirely new theology, making it the Godhead, changing the "substance" terminology, making "being", etc..

Read it carefully, you will see.

BTW..... I've been doing this for years, and I just this last week realized it when I decided to update myself on the Nicene Creed, and read the Wikipedia article.

I'm reading the very original creed, and I'm like WHAT......??? That's when I discovered, we've been lied to all this time by other Christians. They keep telling us "this is the Nicene Creed", when it's not at all, it's later versions. Christianforums.com for example uses what looks like the 381 version not the original 325 version. The 381 version already is starting to change. Although, even it can still be considered pretty much LDS theology. Then when you get to all the other versions, boy.... talk about cluster doggy's!

Here it is again for those who missed it.... and my added thoughts:

- We believe in One God, that is the Father

- We believe in One Lord, that is Jesus Christ

- We believe Christ is the Only Begotten Son of God, which would make him of the "same essence/substance"

- We believe the Creation occurred through Christ

- We believe he descended below all things to Save us

- We believe he was resurrected

- We believe he is the Judge of all

- We believe in the Holy Ghost

- We believe he's not a created being, but existed always with the Father

- We believe in One Lord, One Faith, and One Baptism

Edited September 6, 2011 by ldsfaqs

[Bill “Papa” Lee]

Thankfully, some of BCSpace's fellow Mormons disagreed with her criticism (thanks, Ahab and Mola). As I have explained to her in that thread, these are false statements. They are blatant misrepresentations of the doctrine of the Trinity. No Trinitarian views God as an abstraction. Here is what I said in that thread:

Could you paint him as Michelangelo did?