mfbukowski Posted September 23, 2014 Posted September 23, 2014 Every convert experiences objects being transformed into the sacred.Until I was 30 years old, I thought that big white weird looking building on Santa Monica boulevard was some strange cult organization, now for me, it radiates holiness.A crazy story about gold plates has become somehow impossibly the foundation for me creating meaning for my lifeThe very act of having a testimony has changed the entire world as I perceive it. 3
cinepro Posted September 23, 2014 Posted September 23, 2014 Would you say the same of the frequently maintained Messiah/Fraud dichotomy for Jesus?See C. S. Lewis, Mere Christianity (Macmillan, 1960), 40-41. I would say that the dotted line from Jesus to our day (meaning the record we have of his life, and how we got that record) leaves much more latitude for "interpretation" when it comes to who he was and what he did or didn't do (or say). But I can also see how that dichotomy would be useful for Christians as well.
Robert F. Smith Posted September 24, 2014 Posted September 24, 2014 Every convert experiences objects being transformed into the sacred.Until I was 30 years old, I thought that big white weird looking building on Santa Monica boulevard was some strange cult organization, now for me, it radiates holiness.A crazy story about gold plates has become somehow impossibly the foundation for me creating meaning for my lifeThe very act of having a testimony has changed the entire world as I perceive it.Yes.
tld Posted September 24, 2014 Posted September 24, 2014 (edited) I would say that the dotted line from Jesus to our day (meaning the record we have of his life, and how we got that record) leaves much more latitude for "interpretation" when it comes to who he was and what he did or didn't do (or say). But I can also see how that dichotomy would be useful for Christians as well.I also have come late to this thread. Perhaps it has already been noted, but the discussion has centered around something pre-existing being transformed. This would mean that something should have been left to look at and study. To my knowledge, this was not the case. All of the objects associated with the BofM coming forth seemed to spontaneously appear, and after they had served their purpose, to disappear. This sounds to me like materialization in the true sense, and the same can possibly be attributed to what happened after the "resurrection" of Jesus when he spontaneously appeared in a locked room, accomplished his purpose, and then disappeared. We perhaps should ask ourselves if materialization of a physical object is possible and if so, if this might not explain both what occurred at the time of Jesus and during the time that the BofM was being "translated." Edited September 24, 2014 by tld
mfbukowski Posted September 27, 2014 Posted September 27, 2014 (edited) Bump. This thread does not deserve to slide into the abyss. Besides, I'm not done with it yet. I was thinking about an example of some object we as LDS "make sacred" and I thought about consecrated oil. Elder's Quorums the world over "make" consecrated oil as a teaching exercise all the time. They make a big deal about it, as they should, but the ritual definitely involves the feeling of a magic incantation. Typically little bottles are prepared- and you can buy these by the dozen in any LDS book store. The olive oil must be the "best obtainable" which of course leaves a lot of leeway. Clearly the idea behind this is that we are dedicating the best we have to the Lord. But nowadays, the absolutely finest olive oil obtainable in a big city can be VERY expensive, so I suppose it means "reasonably obtainable". ($50. or more per 16 ounces) Usually a portion of oil is put into the small bottle, or perhaps many small bottles. The bottles remain open and uncapped, I suppose so the blessing can "get into" the bottle, as if it could not if it were closed. We are taught to dedicate the oil itself and "not the container" but the purpose of that instruction has always been rather vague to me. The bottles are then ceremoniously capped, and taken home, the date is marked on the bottle so that the oil does not go rancid. If it does, we are instructed it is ok to just pour it down the drain. But here is a perfect example of turning ordinary good quality olive oil into something "sacred" which is then treated differently than before. I have often thought about this process, because technically one can simply bless the olive oil oneself. I have sometimes been asked to give a blessing and have been out of consecrated oil. I take my little vial from my key chain into the kitchen, go into the pantry and pull out the olive oil, pour a little into the vial, say the dedicatory prayer, cap the vial, and I am off to give the blessing. No fancy ceremony, no fuss. But that action is the perfect analogy for what Taves is saying here about the plates. That which was ordinary has now become sacred because we have dedicated it to the Lord. I was once in a boy scout meeting where they were being taught about starting fires with a ball of cotton and a device which throws sparks into the cotton, catching it on fire. It works fine, but one cotton ball does not burn for long, and if that is the only dry tinder you have, that could be a serious problem in an emergency. The teacher suggested that if you had any oily substance with you- chap stick, lipstick, vaseline or any kind of oil, you could put it on the cotton and the cotton would burn longer. Then he mentioned that even in an emergency, you could use your vial of consecrated oil for the same purpose. People were shocked! How could you do that to sacred oil? That was a clear demonstration to me of the power of "making sacred" on a very small scale. Once that oil was sacred, it was no longer "oil" with the properties of oil in the minds of those observers. One should never use the sacred for a profane purpose. The flag is also a secular example, perhaps that has been mentioned. Edited September 27, 2014 by mfbukowski 3
DonBradley Posted September 28, 2014 Author Posted September 28, 2014 MFBukowski, I love this: " That which was ordinary has now become sacred because we have dedicated it to the Lord." It makes me think of Moses' stone tablets. One set he creates and takes to the Lord for the Lord to write on with His finger. When those are broken, the Lord makes a set and again writes on them with His finger. Yet nowhere in the text is the second set presented as more sacred than the second: although one was made God Himself and the other made by Moses and then offered to God for His sanctifying touch, they are equivalent in sacredness. By analogy, if modern tablets or plates were created, offered to God, and sanctified by Him, they would be sacred just as ancient tablets or plates would be. Don 1
mfbukowski Posted September 29, 2014 Posted September 29, 2014 MFBukowski, I love this: " That which was ordinary has now become sacred because we have dedicated it to the Lord." It makes me think of Moses' stone tablets. One set he creates and takes to the Lord for the Lord to write on with His finger. When those are broken, the Lord makes a set and again writes on them with His finger. Yet nowhere in the text is the second set presented as more sacred than the second: although one was made God Himself and the other made by Moses and then offered to God for His sanctifying touch, they are equivalent in sacredness. By analogy, if modern tablets or plates were created, offered to God, and sanctified by Him, they would be sacred just as ancient tablets or plates would be. DonTotally agree and that's a great example I hadn't thought about! That is what struck me about the oil- it is perhaps the easiest example we have as LDS. It is almost like transubstantiation for Catholics- for those at the scout meeting it was as if the oil no longer had the "substance" of oil- in effect it WAS no longer "oil"- it had another definition and function now that it had been made "sacred". The idea that one would burn it to start a fire was a little bit shocking- it was returning it to its normal, but now seemingly "profane" use. And yet the only difference was that it as an object had been dedicated to the Lord for this purpose. I have heard a temple president speak about the dedication of the oil that is used in the temple, and it is a fairly elaborate process, performed only by the temple presidency. It might be interesting to research this as a example even better than oil dedicated for healing the sick. One of these days I will have to get into why I think that your point is the case- that both sets of tablets were equally sacred. It is because we ourselves have changed its category in our minds - we have re-defined it. For me, the "sacred" is within our perception of the Ideal. God is within us and so is his kingdom. He is, at least for all we can know, the "Best" within us- or in more traditional language, He is our example of the best we can be. Prayer is addressing our best true selves, which is also God at least the best way we can know Him here. So when we dedicate an object to Him, by definition we have altered our perception/understanding of that object- we have now totally transformed the significance of that object in our perception into a whole new category. Phenomenologically it has become part of the sacred world within us, and is no longer "of this world"- the mundane world. It is, as we ourselves are supposed to be -- "IN" this world but no longer OF this world- it is now part of the Ideal or Sacred world, and so cannot be treated or handled or regarded any more as anything but "other-worldy" because indeed it is! We have made it that way. This is to me the genius of Mormonism postulating a Human God- we are all gods so we are creating these sacred worlds within ourselves and phenomenologically outside ourselves as well. The temple is just such a "world" as well. Worlds without number have we created and will continue to do so, as we continue to become more idealized and our powers to create phenomenological worlds grows. I don't know if that makes sense to anyone but myself, but I see that as an explanation in a similar realm to Taves' view. There are words, I think we can put together, which can be read and understood as "naturalistic" explanations and as traditional LDS explanations as well. I think once we figure out those vocabularies, so we can speak as Taves does, yet even with more nuanced meanings, the church really could fill the earth as the "stone cut without hands". We are completely compatible with a theistic view of humanism, we are materialists, and there are atheist philosophers who describe a god they would believe in terms of solidarity with humanity, with their god being a "friend" to humanity (Rorty and others) We are so dang close it drives me crazy. If we could just get past these sectarian linguistic blocks, and I think Taves work heads in that direction for us- we could actually suddenly have a Mormon revolution. If we can get the world to see it as Taves does, we are very close to being there.
Robert F. Smith Posted September 29, 2014 Posted September 29, 2014 (edited) .....................................................................................................I don't know if that makes sense to anyone but myself, but I see that as an explanation in a similar realm to Taves' view. There are words, I think we can put together, which can be read and understood as "naturalistic" explanations and as traditional LDS explanations as well. I think once we figure out those vocabularies, so we can speak as Taves does, yet even with more nuanced meanings, the church really could fill the earth as the "stone cut without hands". We are completely compatible with a theistic view of humanism, we are materialists, and there are atheist philosophers who describe a god they would believe in terms of solidarity with humanity, with their god being a "friend" to humanity (Rorty and others) We are so dang close it drives me crazy. If we could just get past these sectarian linguistic blocks, and I think Taves work heads in that direction for us- we could actually suddenly have a Mormon revolution. If we can get the world to see it as Taves does, we are very close to being there.Well, Mark,You might have to add Eliade to Taves to get the right mix to truly justify your effusiveness, and then it might fly with an appropriate private ad campaign (books, articles, firesides, and such). Some real possibilities there, even if a typical mainstream Mormon might wonder what sort of new members he finds himself mixing with. Might even look askance at them. Imagine atheists, humanists, and materialists joining and making common cause with the Mormons!! Mind boggling! Edited September 29, 2014 by Robert F. Smith
mfbukowski Posted September 29, 2014 Posted September 29, 2014 Well, Mark,You might have to add Eliade to Taves to get the right mix to truly justify your effusiveness, and then it might fly with an appropriate private ad campaign (books, articles, firesides, and such). Some real possibilities there, even if a typical mainstream Mormon might wonder what sort of new members he finds himself mixing with. Might even look askance at them. Imagine atheists, humanists, and materialists joining and making common cause with the Mormons!! Mind boggling!Well I really don't think we are going to get any atheists, and the whole point would be to change the opinion of the agnostics who don't understand our God who is not at all like the one they think they might not believe in. That's really the point. A god who is transcendent and the Platonic Form of Good is very easy in my opinion to debunk, but an immanent God who represents what is the best in humanity as an ideal to strive for, is an entirely different entity. That is the kind of God many many people could know and worship, I think, if they only knew where to find him under that understanding of our theology I had an email chat with Loyd Ericson and his friend was actually- no kidding- Richard Rorty's home teacher. http://works.bepress.com/scott_abbott/58/ Turns out his wife Mary was raised LDS, and Rorty himself makes at least one slightly sympathetic reference to Mormons that I know about. He also speaks sympathetically of a religion in which God is a "friend" to humanity And of course there are the similarities between the philosophy of William James- from whom Rorty inherits his pragmatism- and Alma 32 specifically, and Mormonism in generalhttp://www.juvenileinstructor.org/pragmatizing-mormonism-and-baptizing-william-james-or-was-william-james-a-closet-mormon-and-joseph-smith-a-proto-pragmatist-part-i-on-william-james-and-mormonism/ Interestingly James was raised in a Swedenborgian home, by his famous father Henry James, and of course the links between Mormonism and Swedenborgianism are well known.http://en.fairmormon.org/Plan_of_salvation/Three_degrees_of_glory/Swedenborg I am not making this stuff up- I knew about all these links before I joined the church and was probably converted to the philosophy of it all first and then God for his own reasons decided to wonk me over the head with a powerful spiritual experience for reasons of His own. I don't know if I am being "effusive" or not- sounds like pure logic to me. People don't realize that everything each of us knows is "only in our heads", so "it's only in your head" as an epithet is really not much of a criticism. 2
mfbukowski Posted September 29, 2014 Posted September 29, 2014 Incidentally I have still not finished the article, and my beliefs are that an angel delivered the plates. But if we want an alternative explanation, I have no problem with Taves' possibly explanation as I understand it so far. It's like evolution, say. What "really happened" is unknowable, so it's all up for grabs. Maybe Darwin was right, maybe God did it all, or a combination. No one will ever know. What matters is how our beliefs affect our lives and what we make of the information we have as we organize our individual world views. My personal opinion differs from Taves', but hers works too as far as I am concerned.
Robert F. Smith Posted September 29, 2014 Posted September 29, 2014 Well I really don't think we are going to get any atheists, and the whole point would be to change the opinion of the agnostics who don't understand our God who is not at all like the one they think they might not believe in.Don't be too quick to exclude the possibility. Atheists probably have more in common with Mormons than with Unitarians. ......................................................I had an email chat with Loyd Ericson and his friend was actually- no kidding- Richard Rorty's home teacher. http://works.bepress.com/scott_abbott/58/ Turns out his wife Mary was raised LDS, and Rorty himself makes at least one slightly sympathetic reference to Mormons that I know about. He also speaks sympathetically of a religion in which God is a "friend" to humanity.Extraordinary!! And of course there are the similarities between the philosophy of William James- from whom Rorty inherits his pragmatism- and Alma 32 specifically, and Mormonism in generalhttp://www.juvenileinstructor.org/pragmatizing-mormonism-and-baptizing-william-james-or-was-william-james-a-closet-mormon-and-joseph-smith-a-proto-pragmatist-part-i-on-william-james-and-mormonism/ Interestingly James was raised in a Swedenborgian home, by his famous father Henry James, and of course the links between Mormonism and Swedenborgianism are well known.http://en.fairmormon.org/Plan_of_salvation/Three_degrees_of_glory/Swedenborg I am not making this stuff up- I knew about all these links before I joined the church and was probably converted to the philosophy of it all first and then God for his own reasons decided to wonk me over the head with a powerful spiritual experience for reasons of His own. ....................................................................Surprising stuff, but in line with what a "Restoration" should really be. You have got to include all that in your article, or book, Mark.
bcuzbcuz Posted September 29, 2014 Posted September 29, 2014 Only if you can accept a liar as "sincere". I can accept someone believing that Joseph Smith fabricated the plates and believed he was inspired but I am not at the same time going to buy that he was sincere when he tells a very different story of where the plates came from.¿Accepting a liar as "sincere"? It´s not that hard. Anyone who has had experience with a mythomaniac, a compulsive liar, knows that some people can stretch the truth, or take totally invented events, to the point that they, themselves, believe in the lie.They either repeat the lie often enough to accept it as truth or they believe their own lies right from the getgo.Such "sincere liars" can even fool lie detector tests, because the normal triggers of raised pulse, increased sweating, etc.., do not show up in the test. They believe their own lies and therefore, are not "lying".
mfbukowski Posted September 29, 2014 Posted September 29, 2014 Surprising stuff, but in line with what a "Restoration" should really be. Exactly!To make it more obvious and clear this is a quote from a review of Rorty's "Future of Religion"Though coming from different and distinct intellectual traditions, Richard Rorty and Gianni Vattimo are united in their criticism of the metaphysical tradition. The challenges they put forward extend beyond philosophy and entail a reconsideration of the foundations of belief in God and the religious life. They urge that the rejection of metaphysical truth does not necessitate the death of religion; instead it opens new ways of imagining what it is to be religious—ways that emphasize charity, solidarity, and irony. This unique collaboration, which includes a dialogue between the two philosophers, is notable not only for its fusion of pragmatism (Rorty) and hermeneutics (Vattimo) but also for its recognition of the limits of both traditional religious belief and modern secularism.In "Anticlericalism and Atheism" Rorty discusses Vattimo's work Belief and argues that the end of metaphysics paves the way for an anti-essentialist religion. Rorty's conception of religion, determined by private motives, is designed to produce the gospel's promise that henceforth God will not consider humanity as a servant but as a friendhttp://cup.columbia.edu/book/978-0-231-13494-1/the-future-of-religion And then of course the obvious scriptural references - obvious to me, but perhaps in need of quoting here: Doctrine and Covenants 84:7777 And again I say unto you, my friends, for from henceforth I shall call you friends, it is expedient that I give unto you this commandment, that ye become even as my friends in days when I was with them, traveling to preach the gospel in my power; Doctrine and Covenants 84:7777 And again I say unto you, my friends, for from henceforth I shall call you friends, it is expedient that I give unto you this commandment, that ye become even as my friends in days when I was with them, traveling to preach the gospel in my power; Doctrine and Covenants 88:117117 Therefore, verily I say unto you, my friends, call your solemn assembly, as I have commanded you. Doctrine and Covenants 98:11 Verily I say unto you my friends, fear not, let your hearts be comforted; yea, rejoice evermore, and in everything give thanks; Doctrine and Covenants 93:4545 Verily, I say unto my servant Joseph Smith, Jun., or in other words, I will call you friends, for you are my friends, and ye shall have an inheritance with me— Doctrine and Covenants 97:11 Verily I say unto you my friends, I speak unto you with my voice, even the voice of my Spirit, that I may show unto you my will concerning your brethren in the land of Zion, many of whom are truly humble and are seeking diligently to learn wisdom and to find truth. Doctrine and Covenants 84:6363 And as I said unto mine apostles, even so I say unto you, for you are mine apostles, even God’s high priests; ye are they whom my Father hath given me; ye are my friends; Doctrine and Covenants 105:2626 Now, behold, I say unto you, my friends, in this way you may find favor in the eyes of the people, until the army of Israel becomes very great. Doctrine and Covenants 100:11 Verily, thus saith the Lord unto you, my friends Sidney and Joseph, your families are well; they are in mine hands, and I will do with them as seemeth me good; for in me there is all power. Doctrine and Covenants 88:6262 And again, verily I say unto you, my friends, I leave these sayings with you to ponder in your hearts, with this commandment which I give unto you, that ye shall call upon me while I am near— Doctrine and Covenants 104:11 Verily I say unto you, my friends, I give unto you counsel, and a commandment, concerning all the properties which belong to the order which I commanded to be organized and established, to be a united order, and an everlasting order for the benefit of my church, and for the salvation of men until I come— Doctrine and Covenants 88:33 Wherefore, I now send upon you another Comforter, even upon you my friends, that it may abide in your hearts, even the Holy Spirit of promise; which other Comforter is the same that I promised unto my disciples, as is recorded in the testimony of John. Doctrine and Covenants 94:11 And again, verily I say unto you, my friends, a commandment I give unto you, that ye shall commence a work of laying out and preparing a beginning and foundation of the city of the stake of Zion, here in the land of Kirtland, beginning at my house. Doctrine and Covenants 103:11 Verily I say unto you, my friends, behold, I will give unto you a revelation and commandment, that you may know how to act in the discharge of your duties concerning the salvation and redemption of your brethren, who have been scattered on the land of Zion; Doctrine and Covenants 45:5252 Then shall they know that I am the Lord; for I will say unto them: These wounds are the wounds with which I was wounded in the house of my friends. I am he who was lifted up. I am Jesus that was crucified. I am the Son of God. If we can link up those who seek the religion of solidarity or environmentalism, or care for the poor, we have indeed a powerful message. THIS is our link with humanism as we know it now. Those lines in that review- which obviously the reviewer was pulling from his own experience with those categories of people, types of people with whom he was familiar, (he was not inventing these categories of those he found "religious" yet not theists directly) capture the full potential here. First note the reviewer challenges "metaphysics"- in this context this is a buzz word for Cartesian Dualism, the correspondence theory of truth, and all it represents. What he is saying is that there is no difference between "reality as perceived" and reality as it "really is". Doing away with this distinction is what he is advocating. To put that in religious/ restorationist terms, I read that as doing away with what we would call "sectarian creedal Neoplatonism" and the ineffable god which cannot be known by mankind. In contrast, the proposed God is one of us, our friend, a being we can understand and to whom we can relate. THAT is the God of D&C, very clearly. One more important buzzword in the review is "irony" which is used here in an entirely different way than it is normally used. Rorty uses the term "Ironist" for one who creates his own world, his own reality, through disciplined thought and a disciplined construction of his own "vocabulary"- his own understanding and therefore description of the world as he sees it. The "Ironist" or "Strong Poet" (as described by Harold Bloom) is one who simultaneously constructs his world while at the same time knows that his construction is no more "true" nor "false" than other possible constructions. The Ironist fully understands the ambiguity of language and therefore knows there can exist no full descriptions which capture all the possible nuances of human experience, and therefore, since truth is a property of linguistic propositions, or sentences, there can be nothing we can speak about "beyond" human experience. So the Ironist knows that even his description, ironically, is not better than another good description, yet he puts it forth courageously anyway. He, with all of us, is creating his own world, his own universe. So this is how this all links to Taves, as I see it: She is proposing that we create the sacred by elevating our definition, our description, our understanding, of an object from ordinary to "sacred". This is not a metaphysical transition like "transubstantiation" which is belief that the ontological category of "substance" changes, but a change in belief and definition of the object from our mental category of "ordinary" to "sacred". She does not worry about the metaphysics, which are unknowable and therefore become irrelevant- she is speaking phenomenologically about how we experience the object I think many comments in the thread have criticized here based on the posters own personal metaphysical view of what is "real" and what is not- asking "Were the plates 'real'"? Well of course that all depends on what you mean by "real", doesn't it? From a perspective of someone like Rorty, what is "real" is what you perceive the object to be. Perception includes all that emotional "charge" we give objects- we see our wives not just as "woman" but as our eternal companion etc. We see the consecrated oil as "sacred" and not as ordinary oil. We see the plates also as "sacred"- one moment they are ordinary, but now we are experiencing them differently- and therefore they ARE different. So perhaps for a full understanding of Taves, I think we need to understand here point of view, (at least in the article) which I daresay corresponds more to that of Rorty and other secularists or "naturalists". But of course the important point is that we get to see the plates in the way which works best for us. But understanding the point of view of a Rorty or a Taves brings us much closer to a full restorationist perspective, in my opinion. We gotta drop the Neoplatonism and the Cartesian dualism and move on.
mfbukowski Posted September 29, 2014 Posted September 29, 2014 But let me issue a clarification here also- this does not mean I am personally seeking for an "anti-essentialist" religious view. What it does mean is that I can appreciate those who have these views as much as I would hope then can understand my view as an Ironist, believing that BECAUSE of the nature of language itself, we cannot intellectually describe "truth" as linking to some metaphysical sphere beyond our own experience and be able to expect to "prove we are right" All I want them to do is to acknowledge that we also have our own views similar to their views in many ways, yet different because indeed we have had a religious experience or "testimony" which allows us fully to transform the objects of our perception into the "sacred" whereas their lack of such an experience does not. In other words, it all comes down as always to Moroni 10 4-5, the experience itself of the sacred, and then Alma 32- the proof of the principles in our lives. The real point is to be able to speak the secular language well enough so we can be acknowledged for our unique perspectives and not be seen as we are often presented. And we need to know that with what we have, we can go toe to toe with any secular philosophy out there and come out just as "valid" and "justified" in our beliefs as anyone is justified in believing science or anything else. We do not need to allow the world to see us as cartoon characters if we only learn how to speak their language and let them see us the way we are, and not as Broadway plays represent us. 2
mfbukowski Posted September 30, 2014 Posted September 30, 2014 ¿Accepting a liar as "sincere"? It´s not that hard. Anyone who has had experience with a mythomaniac, a compulsive liar, knows that some people can stretch the truth, or take totally invented events, to the point that they, themselves, believe in the lie.They either repeat the lie often enough to accept it as truth or they believe their own lies right from the getgo.Such "sincere liars" can even fool lie detector tests, because the normal triggers of raised pulse, increased sweating, etc.., do not show up in the test. They believe their own lies and therefore, are not "lying".What you are calling a "lie" is only a lie if it can be proven to be one in court, really, and that means that some other evidence can be produced to show that it is not consistent with other evidence. I am not defending the kinds of liars you are mentioning here, but there is an instructive example here. We all tend to remember things as we THINK they "really were" but that only shows up when we discuss it with someone else who was also a witness who saw it differently. Ask any relative about one of your own memories, and they may well have a totally different take on what "really happened". So what IS "real" under such circumstances? Who is "correct"? How could we ever know? Perhaps ask others, etc, but it is still all hearsay evidence which may or may not be what really happened. Of course we know there are liars of the kind you reference, and again, I am not defending them. But still this illustrates the power of the mind to create new realities for events which, with other available evidence, might look quite different.
churchistrue Posted November 2, 2015 Posted November 2, 2015 Great discussion. This is getting really close to a theory I have of Joseph Smith.
mfbukowski Posted November 2, 2015 Posted November 2, 2015 The more I think about this the more I see it everywhere. We see it in the temple where human beings represent the Savior and Heavenly Father himself. For purposes of the ordinance the worker becomes another being,with the powers of the Savior himself.Can humans be "angels"?Were the angels who ordained Joseph living humans transformed? As proxies?The priesthood is the authority of God acting through human agents. Do we really believe that?If so,I believe that is possible.
mfbukowski Posted November 3, 2015 Posted November 3, 2015 There are several reasons... but one good reason may be that Joseph Smith Sr reportedly described the plates as having masonic images on them.Huge.I missed this the first time through last year. Still working on this Mike?
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