Quetzalcoatl Still Proves The Book Of Mormon True

[Calm]

How did we get this far into a thread with the word Quetzalcoatl in the title and I hadn't shown up yet? I'm slipping.

Yes, I was worried you had given up on the board completely...

[Robert F. Smith]

You're the opposite of the ancients - you say all the characteristics are different, but they are in reality the same person *grin*

I made no such suggestion at all. And, in any case, if there is a god, and if we all describe him in divergent ways, does that god change in character with each conflicting description? Or is that our error and our responsibility?

This is a vast oversimplification. It doesn't take into consideration things like Baal and Yahweh - who had extremely similar positions in their pantheons, and who shared each others' stories, titles, and appellations (trying to out power each other), being understood as substantial rivals.

At what point can the characteristics attributed to someone who may have originated as the same individual differ so much that they can only be understood as a different character?

While Mormons, Nicene Trinitarian Christians, Muslims, and Jews all believe that their God is the same one who shows up in the Hebrew Scriptures, their definitions and descriptions of that individual have substantial points of departure. While all claim to believe in the same individual, the characteristics that are worshiped are substantially distinct. At what point does this create a distinctive (different) mythological 'personage'?

This doesn't mean we need to believe they are rivals hanging around in competition a la the ancients with their Patron Gods. In fact, the funny thing is, most of the ancients agreed on the characteristics of their patron gods that they were the same, but simply believed theirs were better! They didn't try to say, for the most part, the other gods didn't exist.

...........................................................

We get caught up in semantics, but it's a significant difference. The God described by Jews is not the God described by Trinitarian Christians, and is not the God described by Muslims, or Mormons. All the above claim to worship the God of Abraham, but nobody can agree what the characteristics, or even significance of the identity of the God of Abraham were . As President Hinckley said, Latter-day Saints "do not believe in the traditional Christ. No, I don't. The traditional Christ of whom they speak is not the Christ of whom I speak. For the Christ of whom I speak has been revealed in this the Dispensation of the Fulness of Times. He, together with His Father, appeared to the boy Joseph Smith in the year 1820, and when Joseph left the grove that day, he knew more of the nature of God than all the learned ministers of the gospel of the ages. "Am I Christian? Of course I am. I believe in Christ. I talk of Christ. I pray through Christ. I'm trying to follow Him and live His gospel in my life."

There is substance to the claim we believe in a different ontological deity than others do. But it's an oversimplification to simply to simply say, "We believe in a different Jesus", because that implies we don't believe in the divinity of the personage Jesus of Nazareth in the NT. We do. But our understanding of the nature of that divine personage is radically different than many others, so that without clearly pointing out it's the same historical personage, just by describing what we understand about his ontology, characteristics, etc, it would be describing something - someone - different.

I think we can often be so defensive of what we believe and affirm and wish to label ourselves, that we don't tend to acknowledge the substance of their claim. President Hinckley has gotten a lot of slack for that above comment, as if it acknowledges a grand secret - but it is accurate.

On one hand, it may be accurate to say that all deity that are worshipped at their core have at their root a belief in the Original Deity, one can at the same time apply the principal in D&C 1:16, "every man walketh in his own way, and after the image of his own god, whose image is in the likeness of the world, and whose substance is that of an idol"

When we reflect ourselves onto the image of a historical personage, when does it stop being that person, and start being something different, or insubstantial, but with the same name?

One can seek to be as divisive or as ecumenical as one wants to be. One can ignore or focus on the technical details and nuances to the n^th degree, or not. But it is useful to seek balance and not to do violence to accepted norms among Classicists -- who recognize that the Roman and Greek gods were very closely cross-identified. The very different attitudes about YHWH and Ba'al (whom I did not mention in my brief post in this thread) and other ancient Near Eastern gods ought not put us off the trail of certain widely accepted iconographic norms and syncretisms. I have in fact repeatedly discussed YHWH and Ba'al on this Board in the past.

In part of central Africa, some Muslims have taken to killing any Christian who dares say that Allah is the same as the Christian God. These Muslims do not care that the Qur'an itself justifies these Christian statements. I am glad that we have not taken to that sort of ridiculous and deadly priggishness here in America. Despite our substantive differences, and despite the suspicion by Jews that Christians are really tritheists, we all get along and pray together. We have not taken to declaring Holy War on our neighbors. We do not seek ethnic cleansing or extermination of religious minorities here in America (even though the Germans, Serbs, and others, have done exactly that). Mormons sit down with rabbis, imams, and priests who happen to be members of local interfaith councils and fellowships, supposing that mutual respect and reasonable exchange of views is called for.

[Robert F. Smith]

Lavina Fielding Anderson, my editor, didn't like the Sunstone article and made me rewrite it (a little strong, but that was the effect). The section in volume 5 has a lot more information, including the discussion of the Maya version names.

Linguistic data places the Kukulcan/Gugumatz names post 1100 CE when the Toltec influence brings the symbolism and name to the Lowland Maya. The key is -can/-matz. The name has to be translated after Quiche has shifted away from the proto-Maya *kan for serpent, and that happens late.

I thought your Sunstone article very well written, Brant, and the strong case was certainly called for (Lavina is great, and so is Pat Bagley), even if it does nothing to diminish the strong identification of Christ with the Mesoamerican feathered-serpent. We should of course be very chary of associating that iconography with any particular name, and I thank you for emphasizing that point yet again here.

Bob

[maj]

Not much difference between this and someone giving a talk in a Sacrament meeting, with visitors sometimes attending.

Nobody stands up to correct false statements that are made then, either, and that's in an actual Church meeting.

Apparently someone believe we should be given a LOT of slack when it comes down to what we believe.

However, in a church meeting, the Bishop / Presiding Officer is meant to correct false statements when they occur. Not always easy to do, but this is supposed to lessen the chances incorrect ideas being accepted as true / right.