CASteinman Posted March 19, 2013 Posted March 19, 2013 (edited) ironically, the assertion applies to anything you can say about JS as well, since you accuse me of "unsupported speculation" without cause....Incorrect. Because whereas you asserted something to be a fact about an unknown... I did not.Moreover, I have in mind a statement that I would make that does not require I know either one to be correct. Edited March 19, 2013 by CASteinman
Questing Beast Posted March 19, 2013 Posted March 19, 2013 Share, by all means.It is a fact that God as JS understood him to be was JS's understanding. What else could JS talk about when explaining or describing God? So everything that JS ever said about God was JS's understanding. You can agree with it, either in part or entirely. Or you can disagree with it, either in part or entirely. Everyone will do either the one or the other approach when they are introduced to JS....
CASteinman Posted March 19, 2013 Posted March 19, 2013 It is a fact that God as JS understood him to be was JS's understanding. Yeah.. thats virtually a tautology... but that's not what you said.You said Joseph Smith's God was what Joseph Smith perceived God to be. Which is not the same thing.To compare: Your parents perceive you certain ways. Regardless of their perceptions, you are who you are. Even if they get alzheimer's or go crazy or lose contact with you.Their perception does not change reality.
Damien the Leper Posted March 19, 2013 Posted March 19, 2013 Any person who attempts to define God and project perspectives is simply responding to God. There is nothing authoritative about this tactic. I like what my World Religions professor said, "God stands beyond scripture, beyond human claims to revelation and experience, beyond mysticism and beyond myth. To confine God to any of these would be to inflict false ideas and assertions about a being of such magnitude."
Questing Beast Posted March 19, 2013 Posted March 19, 2013 Yeah.. thats virtually a tautology... but that's not what you said.You said Joseph Smith's God was what Joseph Smith perceived God to be. Which is not the same thing.To compare: Your parents perceive you certain ways. Regardless of their perceptions, you are who you are. Even if they get alzheimer's or go crazy or lose contact with you.Their perception does not change reality.Are you enjoying yourself? I will restate it the way I meant it: Joseph Smith's perception of God was how he taught about God. We get only JS's perception of God in his theology. Since JS's theology was inconsistent, i.e. earlier assertions do not agree with his last teachings on the Godhead, it is evidently impossible for any human being to offer anything in word or text that transcends his/her perception of God. As JS's perceptions on Godhead changed so too did his teachings on it. But we have no reason to assume JS's perceptions on Godhead are any more or less valid than our own, providing we are sincerely seeking to understand more about "God" all the time....
Questing Beast Posted March 19, 2013 Posted March 19, 2013 Any person who attempts to define God and project perspectives is simply responding to God. There is nothing authoritative about this tactic. I like what my World Religions professor said, "God stands beyond scripture, beyond human claims to revelation and experience, beyond mysticism and beyond myth. To confine God to any of these would be to inflict false ideas and assertions about a being of such magnitude."Yes, exactly my point. Joseph Smith's theology is HIS, and yet an entire religion bases its limited/limiting theology on the last words JS said on the subject, and said-theology has not advanced a jot or tittle since then....
CASteinman Posted March 19, 2013 Posted March 19, 2013 Since JS's theology was inconsistent, i.e. earlier assertions do not agree with his last teachings on the Godhead, it is evidently impossible for any human being to offer anything in word or text that transcends his/her perception of God.I am not sure exactly how this matters, but your logic of "this axiom therefore this result" does not follow. There is no reason to suppose that because Joseph Smith had ongoing revelations that this somehow limits all human beings in the way you have described (or even that it limits Joseph Smith). Some other logic might do that, but this does not seem to follow.In particular, I suggest that it is possible for some individuals to express words about God that transcend their actual perceptions of God. In a sense, I think it is possible that poets do this from time to time.Now, you may object and say that I cannot prove this, but that same limitation of proof also applies to you.But we have no reason to assume JS's perceptions on Godhead are any more or less valid than our own, providing we are sincerely seeking to understand more about "God" all the time....That is incorrect. We definitely have some reasons to think that. Among the various reasons would be Abraham 3:19.
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