Another Big Batch Of Temple Ordinance Changes

[pogi]

1 hour ago, Durangout said:

(Gasp).
 

That’s not at all what the penalties meant, and judging by how well received this post was, that is the common understanding of them by members—how sad.  Is this why every time they make changes the endowment is dumbed down even further?  Every time they makes changes, important and beautiful symbolism is removed.  With said removal, doctrine, principles and truths     are removed as well.  

EVERYTHING in the temple can easily be understood through a study of the scriptures with just a little effort.  If I can come to a much deeper understanding of the temple anybody can.

 For example the penalties that were mentioned:  has no one read Lehi’s amazing discourse on the Fall?  The answer is there.  It’s also in multiple places in the OT (hint Elijah and the priests of Baal).  Another example is Adam and Eve…you mean people really didn’t know that A&E represented each of you before these most recent changes?  Really?   It explicitly stated it at the beginning of the endowment and people still didn’t get it? In reality, A&E have at least 4 levels of symbolism / meaning and the Church as a whole couldn’t get to level 2 w/o revisions.

Why?

1.  People are lazy and would rather spend time golfing, watching sports, having lunch w girlfriends, getting their nails done…

2. The Church leadership doesn’t teach the concepts of the temple—probably bc they don’t understand them as well as they should.  I know for a fact that temple presidents don’t.  When I was a temple ordinance worker they couldn’t answer any question that I had.  I remember at BYU, Jospeh McConkie ( BRM’s son) said and I quote “I give Nephi a C for his explanation of the Tree of Life vision”  what a nincompoop!  No, it was JM that didn’t understand the vision (and how it relates to the temple).
 

Instead of teaching an understanding of the beautiful, uplifting symbolism of the temple, they, via surveys,  remove the parts that cause concern.  For example, instead of placating feminist by having the women’s veil be essentially taken out of the ceremony, why didn’t they teach what it meant, why it is important, what we learn by it’s use…?  Had they taught instead of removed, women would have felt uplifted, peace, enriched and holier by the wearing of the veil.  It’s the same with everything that has been removed.
 

Again it’s just sad.

 

Why are supposedly spiritually enlightened people so condescending? 

I am open to different interpretations, but I am not old enough to have witnessed the penalties and have had no reason to study them, so my interpretation is rather superficial - not because I am “lazy”, etc.   But the very idea sounds fear based to me.  It certainly would induce terrible fear if I was in a faith crisis and had performed those covenants - even if that was not the purpose, it has the appearance of cult like manipulation.  I could see Calms interpretation though.  
 

PS people were not necessarily agreeing with or liking my comment on the penalties, but the first part.  Calm liked my comment for example but disagrees with my interpretation of the penalties.

Edited February 18, 2023 by pogi

[Rain]

3 hours ago, Durangout said:

(Gasp).
 

That’s not at all what the penalties meant, and judging by how well received this post was, that is the common understanding of them by members—how sad.  Is this why every time they make changes the endowment is dumbed down even further?  Every time they makes changes, important and beautiful symbolism is removed.  With said removal, doctrine, principles and truths     are removed as well.  

EVERYTHING in the temple can easily be understood through a study of the scriptures with just a little effort.  If I can come to a much deeper understanding of the temple anybody can.

 For example the penalties that were mentioned:  has no one read Lehi’s amazing discourse on the Fall?  The answer is there.  It’s also in multiple places in the OT (hint Elijah and the priests of Baal).  Another example is Adam and Eve…you mean people really didn’t know that A&E represented each of you before these most recent changes?  Really?   It explicitly stated it at the beginning of the endowment and people still didn’t get it? In reality, A&E have at least 4 levels of symbolism / meaning and the Church as a whole couldn’t get to level 2 w/o revisions.

Why?

1.  People are lazy and would rather spend time golfing, watching sports, having lunch w girlfriends, getting their nails done…

2. The Church leadership doesn’t teach the concepts of the temple—probably bc they don’t understand them as well as they should.  I know for a fact that temple presidents don’t.  When I was a temple ordinance worker they couldn’t answer any question that I had.  I remember at BYU, Jospeh McConkie ( BRM’s son) said and I quote “I give Nephi a C for his explanation of the Tree of Life vision”  what a nincompoop!  No, it was JM that didn’t understand the vision (and how it relates to the temple).
 

Instead of teaching an understanding of the beautiful, uplifting symbolism of the temple, they, via surveys,  remove the parts that cause concern.  For example, instead of placating feminist by having the women’s veil be essentially taken out of the ceremony, why didn’t they teach what it meant, why it is important, what we learn by it’s use…?  Had they taught instead of removed, women would have felt uplifted, peace, enriched and holier by the wearing of the veil.  It’s the same with everything that has been removed.
 

Again it’s just sad.

 

I know what the penalties meant and honestly I don't think it is any better.  It did not affect me the same way it affected you. My husband and I went less than a year apart. He was not bothered at all, but he gets why I felt/feel about them.

It was so bad for me that I have never felt comfortable in the temple and I spent a lot of time counseling with leaders, the Lord and attending trying to figure out how figure out what was wrong with me.  I figured out nothing was wrong with me.  I just had experiences and feelings that were different than all those people going who it didn't bother.  

I have similar feelings to @MustardSeed about the veil.  And again your experiences and feelings are not the same as many women have.

I get that you feel sad about some things being removed.  For many it means that they can finally feel ok about the temple. This isn't a question about ignorant people not knowing what those things mean (though I do think that knowing may help some people). It's about helping people whose feelings and experiences different than yours because  it caused them not to find peace and light at the temple.

  

 

Edited February 19, 2023 by Rain

[Durangout]

58 minutes ago, MustardSeed said:

This is insulting to me personally.  I’m a woman .  I’m not a feminist.  I understand the veil.  I’m also glad it’s gone.  
 

But thank you for the male opinion. 

I’m curious what u think it means?  

[MustardSeed]

33 minutes ago, Durangout said:

I’m curious what u think it means?  

Edited February 18, 2023 by MustardSeed

[MustardSeed]

42 minutes ago, Durangout said:

I’m curious what u think it means?  

Sorry, this feels like a trap.  I have no reason to trust you. 

[Rain]

4 hours ago, Durangout said:

(Gasp).
 

That’s not at all what the penalties meant, and judging by how well received this post was, that is the common understanding of them by members—how sad.  Is this why every time they make changes the endowment is dumbed down even further?  Every time they makes changes, important and beautiful symbolism is removed.  With said removal, doctrine, principles and truths     are removed as well.  

EVERYTHING in the temple can easily be understood through a study of the scriptures with just a little effort.  If I can come to a much deeper understanding of the temple anybody can.

 For example the penalties that were mentioned:  has no one read Lehi’s amazing discourse on the Fall?  The answer is there.  It’s also in multiple places in the OT (hint Elijah and the priests of Baal).  Another example is Adam and Eve…you mean people really didn’t know that A&E represented each of you before these most recent changes?  Really?   It explicitly stated it at the beginning of the endowment and people still didn’t get it? In reality, A&E have at least 4 levels of symbolism / meaning and the Church as a whole couldn’t get to level 2 w/o revisions.

Why?

1.  People are lazy and would rather spend time golfing, watching sports, having lunch w girlfriends, getting their nails done…

2. The Church leadership doesn’t teach the concepts of the temple—probably bc they don’t understand them as well as they should.  I know for a fact that temple presidents don’t.  When I was a temple ordinance worker they couldn’t answer any question that I had.  I remember at BYU, Jospeh McConkie ( BRM’s son) said and I quote “I give Nephi a C for his explanation of the Tree of Life vision”  what a nincompoop!  No, it was JM that didn’t understand the vision (and how it relates to the temple).
 

Instead of teaching an understanding of the beautiful, uplifting symbolism of the temple, they, via surveys,  remove the parts that cause concern.  For example, instead of placating feminist by having the women’s veil be essentially taken out of the ceremony, why didn’t they teach what it meant, why it is important, what we learn by it’s use…?

Why don't you share what you feel it meant, why it was important etc? Please use references. Then it doesn't put @MustardSeed in a place where she has to answer exactly what you would say or be convicted of being ignorant.

4 hours ago, Durangout said:

 Had they taught instead of removed, women would have felt uplifted, peace, enriched and holier by the wearing of the veil.  It’s the same with everything that has been removed.
 

Again it’s just sad.

 

 

[bluebell]

4 hours ago, pogi said:

Why are supposedly spiritually enlightened people so condescending? 
.

It’s handy though, because then I know right away I can stop reading. Saves a lot of time. 

[Calm]

14 hours ago, Durangout said:

Every time they makes changes, important and beautiful symbolism is removed.

Symbolism is only important if it is understood.  If it is no longer understood or understood a different way, it should be removed.  There is not an inherent understanding of complex symbology that one picks up just by being born human.  We need to get taught either indirectly by our culture or directly through education…like taking English classes helps us recognize symbols in literature by discussing actual symbols (Moby D-ck, anyone?).  One only needs to look at Primary lessons and the hymns we sing to realize we are constantly being explicitly taught the symbolic meaning of the Sacrament and the symbolism of Priesthood blessings and ordinances is taught as well for the most part.  If someone wants a more in depth understanding, there are books written about it and teachers and others willing to answer questions in class.  All you have to do basically is raise your hand and ask.

However, the Church was not great at teaching what the temple symbolism meant, there was even an expressed attitude of disdain from many about ritual—associated with apostate churches like the Catholics in my experience—so that many were put off by the ceremony when first encountering it.  I happened to have holy envy over ritual having studied religious rituals of the past some, so I did not have that problem, but almost everyone else I talked to about it (the few that would speak) expressed confusion and disappointment because it was so unexpected.  

There was among my friends and acquaintances a lack of recognition that the sacrament itself as well as priesthood blessings and ordinations were complicated rituals.  The Church, imo, had in fact created a culture where symbolism often needed to be understood by the individual on their own because we weren’t talking about the temple ceremony in any detail and certainly not about the penalties and what they meant.  People were and are told to “go and see for yourself” rather than directly engaged with what goes on then and now in my experience.  This is not inherently a bad choice, but it means the symbolic language that is used needs to be reflective of people’s general experiences as it will lead to confusion if the symbolic language of a particular rite moves out of the understanding of the general society and becomes a specialized knowledge of initiates, yet the initiates are not taught it.

It would be like Catholics never being taught by leaders, etc what Latin means.  And even those using it picking up the meaning only if they had the chance to ask someone in the know at very limited times.  

And while I was told if I had questions, I could talk about it with my husband in the Celestial room or discuss it with the temple president or matron, since my husband knew less about symbology than I did and I was too shy to think it appropriate for me to request the temple president or matron give up their precious time for me, that counsel was pretty much useless.  And from what I have been told, the concept behind temple instruction is to let the Spirit be the teacher, so temple workers are not to tell patrons what something means.

I think the Spirit as instructor in the temple is a generally brilliant approach as it creates a chance for a very personal encounter with the divine when each is ready to receive it (which is why we are given the opportunity to go and learn over and over again), but that requires leadership to pay close attention to what the Spirit is choosing to teach as well as what patrons are actually learning and to be willing to adapt the rituals so learning can continue unimpeded by misunderstandings as much as possible.  And that means there could be changes for more than one reason.

When I was in my late 30s, we had a stake patriarch come and teach all the adults about the temple in a joint meeting in RS/PH…or maybe it was a fireside as I was likely a Primary teacher at the time.  Anyway, he pushed us to discuss with our children everything about the temple save the specifics we had covenanted not to share.  Said there was a tremendous lack of teaching in the Church about it and it was important for parents to be finding ways to share with their children not only their commitment to and reverence of the temple, but their knowledge.  This was a new idea to many there, including myself even though I had known one could pick up a lot of knowledge about the temple outside of the temple.  But because my experience was learning from nonChurch materials about other faiths, it hadn’t occurred to me to talk about them as part of teaching about my faith…at least not in a planned way, they came out at times because my kids were, like me, interested in mythology and religion in general.

However, he was the only leader who taught we need to teach the temple experience in detail to our children in my experience.  I wonder how many have come encountered someone like him, someone in authority not only saying it is okay, but it is a duty.

Question to all…how have you been taught over the years to teach about the temple to others?  Has it changed?  I haven’t been to church much the past 4, 5 years and perhaps it has changed (though my guess is culture takes longer to change than a few years).

Also…

Serious question for those who mourn the loss of old symbols…do you disagree with the temple strategy to let the Spirit do the teaching and if not, how do you think patrons can learn what symbols mean?  Or if you believe I am wrong about the “go and see for yourself” approach, that such is not how the Church most often tells us in general to respond to those with questions about the temple, please share how you see the Church is teaching temple symbolism outside the temple to prepare the understanding of new patrons.  And for those who recognize leadership has chosen not to teach it and yet believe it should be, why does the Lord allow this?

Edited February 19, 2023 by Calm

[Calm]

13 hours ago, Rain said:

This isn't a question about ignorant people not knowing what those things mean (though I do think that knowing may help some people).

It is not just definitions that need to be taught, but connotations and nuances and emotional shades if one expects everyone to have a similar experience and this requires a frequent, if not constant personal exposure to the experience with very controlled parameters….something that is very difficult with the temple being only accessible to adults since much of our emotional language/context is created in our youth and made more difficult for the aspects of the temple that don’t have obvious linking to rituals or experiences outside.  (Temple trips for the youth started to be a thing when I was 15 iirc, there was no expectation of going yet, just a fun activity, my parents never even suggested I go if they were even told about it, my first temple experience was as a BYU student.). Plus there is all of our other experience that adds a very thick layer of uncontrolled nuance, that may be positive as it was in my case for the most part or negative as it has been for many of my friends and relatives.  This is not something we have control or choice over as so much is from our childhood or a result of what others have done to us (think of how being told to obey one husband in righteousness is going to feel differently to a woman who doesn’t have a husband and believes it is unlikely they ever will in this life, a woman who has a loving, righteous husband, a woman whose husband is righteous but has difficulty expressing affection, a woman with a husband who isn’t a believer in God, and a woman who has an abusive, controlling husband and then add in all the variation of experiences with fathers and older brothers in childhood that affect an adult woman’s relationship with men).  It is remarkable in my view that we get as much commonality of temple experience that we appear to have given the limited opportunities many of us have to go through it.

Women no longer wear veils or even hats generally except for protection from weather in our western culture, it is an alien experience and if one is physically uncomfortable when wearing a veil, it is going to even more difficult to get to the symbolic meaning when in the middle of the unusual physical experience.  I suspect veils in the temple were a somewhat different experience for those who had occasion to not only see other women wear them at times in their day to day life, but even wear a veil themselves or at least expect it.

My own relationship with veils is an odd one as I adore (seriously, both emotionally and intellectually, though of course not in the religious sense of worship) the idea of them, but I have always had a problem with overheating easily, I need to move or feel air moving on my face even when the air is cool to be comfortable and too much heat makes me lightheaded.  And long sleeve, maxi length multi layered polyester is borderline doable, thank goodness most temples are very well air conditioned with great ventilation.  But veils are always problematic for me.  I have to do relaxation techniques to cool me down instead of paying attention to the instructions at times.  And yet I personally love the symbolism it has for me of creating my own personal sacred space in which I encounter God…I just wish I could feel that way while experiencing it as well as later when thinking about the experience.  Instead I kind of dread those moments of the endowment as they approach.

Edited February 19, 2023 by Calm

[Calm]

15 hours ago, Durangout said:

The Church leadership doesn’t teach the concepts of the temple—probably bc they don’t understand them as well as they should.  I know for a fact that temple presidents don’t.  When I was a temple ordinance worker they couldn’t answer any question that I had.  I remember at BYU, Jospeh McConkie ( BRM’s son) said and I quote “I give Nephi a C for his explanation of the Tree of Life vision”  what a nincompoop!  No, it was JM that didn’t understand the vision (and how it relates to the temple).
 

Why hasn’t the Lord chosen men like yourself who more easily understand the concepts to be our leaders, to teach what it all means to us?  Serious question, not mocking.  I never got called to be an adult SS or RS teacher myself.  My in-depth OT study wasn’t exactly needed as a Primary teacher.

Edited February 19, 2023 by Calm

[Tacenda]

4 hours ago, Calm said:

Symbolism is only important if it is understood.  If it is no longer understood or understood a different way, it should be removed.  There is not an inherent understanding of complex symbology that one picks up just by being born human.  We need to get taught either indirectly by our culture or directly through education…like taking English classes helps us recognize symbols in literature by discussing actual symbols (Moby D-ck, anyone?).  One only needs to look at Primary lessons and the hymns we sing to realize we are constantly being explicitly taught the symbolic meaning of the Sacrament and the symbolism of Priesthood blessings and ordinances is taught as well for the most part.  If someone wants a more in depth understanding, there are books written about it and teachers and others willing to answer questions in class.  All you have to do basically is raise your hand and ask.

However, the Church was not great at teaching what the temple symbolism meant, there was even an expressed attitude of disdain from many about ritual—associated with apostate churches like the Catholics in my experience—so that many were put off by the ceremony when first encountering it.  I happened to have holy envy over ritual having studied religious rituals of the past some, so I did not have that problem, but almost everyone else I talked to about it (the few that would speak) expressed confusion and disappointment because it was so unexpected.  

There was among my friends and acquaintances a lack of recognition that the sacrament itself as well as priesthood blessings and ordinations were complicated rituals.  The Church, imo, had in fact created a culture where symbolism often needed to be understood by the individual on their own because we weren’t talking about the temple ceremony in any detail and certainly not about the penalties and what they meant.  People were and are told to “go and see for yourself” rather than directly engaged with what goes on then and now in my experience.  This is not inherently a bad choice, but it means the symbolic language that is used needs to be reflective of people’s general experiences as it will lead to confusion if the symbolic language of a particular rite moves out of the understanding of the general society and becomes a specialized knowledge of initiates, yet the initiates are not taught it.

It would be like Catholics never being taught by leaders, etc what Latin means.  And even those using it picking up the meaning only if they had the chance to ask someone in the know at very limited times.  

And while I was told if I had questions, I could talk about it with my husband in the Celestial room or discuss it with the temple president or matron, since my husband knew less about symbology than I did and I was too shy to think it appropriate for me to request the temple president or matron give up their precious time for me, that counsel was pretty much useless.  And from what I have been told, the concept behind temple instruction is to let the Spirit be the teacher, so temple workers are not to tell patrons what something means.

I think the Spirit as instructor in the temple is a generally brilliant approach as it creates a chance for a very personal encounter with the divine when each is ready to receive it (which is why we are given the opportunity to go and learn over and over again), but that requires leadership to pay close attention to what the Spirit is choosing to teach as well as what patrons are actually learning and to be willing to adapt the rituals so learning can continue unimpeded by misunderstandings as much as possible.  And that means there could be changes for more than one reason.

When I was in my late 30s, we had a stake patriarch come and teach all the adults about the temple in a joint meeting in RS/PH…or maybe it was a fireside as I was likely a Primary teacher at the time.  Anyway, he pushed us to discuss with our children everything about the temple save the specifics we had covenanted not to share.  Said there was a tremendous lack of teaching in the Church about it and it was important for parents to be finding ways to share with their children not only their commitment to and reverence of the temple, but their knowledge.  This was a new idea to many there, including myself even though I had known one could pick up a lot of knowledge about the temple outside of the temple.  But because my experience was learning from nonChurch materials about other faiths, it hadn’t occurred to me to talk about them as part of teaching about my faith…at least not in a planned way, they came out at times because my kids were, like me, interested in mythology and religion in general.

However, he was the only leader who taught we need to teach the temple experience in detail to our children in my experience.  I wonder how many have come encountered someone like him, someone in authority not only saying it is okay, but it is a duty.

Question to all…how have you been taught over the years to teach about the temple to others?  Has it changed?  I haven’t been to church much the past 4, 5 years and perhaps it has changed (though my guess is culture takes longer to change than a few years).

Also…

Serious question for those who mourn the loss of old symbols…do you disagree with the temple strategy to let the Spirit do the teaching and if not, how do you think patrons can learn what symbols mean?  Or if you believe I am wrong about the “go and see for yourself” approach, that such is not how the Church most often tells us in general to respond to those with questions about the temple, please share how you see the Church is teaching temple symbolism outside the temple to prepare the understanding of new patrons.  And for those who recognize leadership has chosen not to teach it and yet believe it should be, why does the Lord allow this?

My experience with the temple, was this. I'm doing it for another person so I can feel good about it. I tried to communicate mentally with the person, pondered what their life had been. I usually couldn't wait for it to be over. And felt guilt for that. I was always the last one to be finished at the veil, while my MIL, FIL and brother and sister in-laws and husband waited in the celestial room. I didn't have it memorized. My memories was with them mostly, for MIL and FIL's birthdays. My first was the worst, in '84 when going through the first time. Didn't like that I had to "obey" my husband. But later I realized that was said in civil marriages long ago. Nervousness abounded throughout because of worrying about doing anything the wrong way. I had many many questions, but like you mention Calm, it was difficult to get answers because of the sacred information. I even worried I shouldn't let my children see the temple clothing put on after arriving at the temple. I even couldn't wait to leave the celestial room, it felt awkward looking around at everyone and them being very content about their experiences I thought. So needless to say the temple experience wasn't something I looked forward to. Like my sister, the initiatory was kind of nice having women giving you blessings while anointing. I'm sure it would be even better now. And after speaking with a friend, maybe I'd like the temple now, with the new changes. At least I'd feel the love of the Saviour more from what she told me. 

Edited February 19, 2023 by Tacenda

[manol]

9 hours ago, Calm said:

Question to all…how have you been taught over the years to teach about the temple to others?  

While there were (if I recall correctly) relatively few things that we actually covenanted to never reveal, I was under the impression that virtually nothing about the temple was to be spoken of in specific terms outside of the Celestial Room, and even there only in hushed reverent whispers.  Nor do I recall ever having an actual conversation, much less a discussion, in the Celestial Room.  For me it was always sit or stand there silently for a few minutes, careful not to disturb anyone and having whatever internal experience I was having, then leaving for the locker room. 

I do not recall ever receiving temple-content-related instruction outside of the temple, nor ever being told it was okay to engage in temple-content-related conversation outside of the temple.  But it's been a while so things may have changed.

9 hours ago, Calm said:

Has it changed?

I'm not sure how representative of the church this board is, but I have both observed and engaged in far more specific dialogue about the temple here than in all my years as an active member combined.  I get the sense that, on this board at least, the line is drawn fairly close to where the actual "never reveal" covenant language draws it. 

9 hours ago, Calm said:

Serious question for those who mourn the loss of old symbols…do you disagree with the temple strategy to let the Spirit do the teaching... ?

I am not in your target audience for this question, but imo the deliberate removal of old symbols is itself symbolic.  I think it is symbolic of laying aside the unnecessary such that connection between us and the divine is streamlined.

9 hours ago, Calm said:

I think the Spirit as instructor in the temple is a generally brilliant approach as it creates a chance for a very personal encounter with the divine...

Agreed! 

With no formal instruction about what we're supposed to believe from our temple experiences, THAT part of our relationship with God is (imo intentionally) just between us and God.  It would be out of place for me to tell someone what their understanding of this or that aspect of the temple should be.  It would be even more out of place for me to claim or imply some sort of high ground based on my personal understanding of some aspect of the temple being different from theirs.  Since no official interpretations are presented, our understandings of and reactions to temple content are inherently individualized and at liberty to evolve.  Imo this is a feature, not a bug. 

Imo it would be appropriate for me to respect as sacred others' understandings of their temple experience... for all I know, their experiences and understandings fall within the umbrella of "all truth may be circumscribed into one great whole."

(I never would have used that phrase out loud back in the day.) 

Edited February 19, 2023 by manol

[mfbukowski]

23 hours ago, Durangout said:

. The Church leadership doesn’t teach the concepts of the temple—probably bc they don’t understand them as well as they should.  I know for a fact that temple presidents don’t.  When I was a temple ordinance worker they couldn’t answer any question that I had.  I remember at BYU, Jospeh McConkie ( BRM’s son) said and I quote “I give Nephi a C for his explanation of the Tree of Life vision”  what a nincompoop!  No, it was JM that didn’t understand the vision (and how it relates to the temple).

I have questioned at least 3 different temple presidents, in their offices, about the second endowment, one of whom was a personal friend for 30 years, and have gotten the same answer, virtually verbatim, which in itself makes me suspicious.

As I recall, shaking head and shrugging shoulders, they say something like "Well really, I can't say that I know much about that, I guess we just need to stay on the path until we are ready to know"

That can be taken literally in at least two different ways.

It takes a genius,  OR a lot of inspiration OR training to come up with a statement that ambiguous!

Edited February 19, 2023 by mfbukowski

[Bernard Gui]

On 2/18/2023 at 5:17 PM, pogi said:

I am open to different interpretations, but I am not old enough to have witnessed the penalties and have had no reason to study them, so my interpretation is rather superficial - not because I am “lazy”, etc.   But the very idea sounds fear based to me.  It certainly would induce terrible fear if I was in a faith crisis and had performed those covenants - even if that was not the purpose, it has the appearance of cult like manipulation.  I could see Calms interpretation though.

The wording was “rather than….,”  not “ if I….” It emphasized maintaining the sacredness of the ordinance even when threatened to reveal them, and had nothing to do with fear of reprisal for revealing them. The penalties were explained as symbolic of that defense of sacredness….that one would not reveal them, not out of fear for one’s life, but out of fidelity and honor to the covenant. Now that covenant violators have deceitfully revealed the ordinances to the world, that sense of sacredness has pretty much been rendered moot. 

I am reminded of what happened in the Southern States Mission back in the 1870s and 80s at the time of the Cane Creek massacre when mobs would stop young men they didn’t recognize and rip open their clothing to see if they were wearing temple garments, resulting in beatings and assaults for those who were. Would I hide my garments under such conditions and violate my covenants to keep from getting hurt ? I hope I am never tested that way, but I also hope I could have the courage to fear God more than men as have many faithful Saints in the past.. 

Edited February 20, 2023 by Bernard Gui

[Chum]

On 2/16/2023 at 12:09 AM, Bernard Gui said:

Your were responding to this…

I assumed you were referring to the previous generational understanding of the temple covenant that wives obey their husbands. I did not know she was Catholic.

Some of that is on me. When I carve out a facet (of the larger topic), I need to properly frame what I'm addressing. I'll get better.

[pogi]

18 minutes ago, Bernard Gui said:

The wording was “rather than….,”  not “ if I….” It emphasized maintaining the sacredness of the ordinance even when threat to reveal them, and had nothing to do with fear of reprisal for revealing them. The penalties were explained as symbolic of that defense of sacredness….that one would not reveal them, not out of fear for one’s life, but out of fidelity and honor to the covenant. Now that covenant violators have deceitfully revealed the ordinances to the world, that sense of sacredness has pretty much been rendered moot. 

I am reminded of what happened in the Southern States Mission back in the 1870s and 80s at the time of the Cane Creek massacre when mobs would stop young men they didn’t recognize and rip open their clothing to see if they were wearing temple garments, resulting in beatings and assaults for those who were. Would I hide my garments under such conditions and violate my covenants to keep from getting hurt ? I hope I am never tested that way, but I also hope I could have the courage to fear God more than men as have many faithful Saints in the past.. 

Thanks for sharing, I wasn’t aware of the wording.  The word “penalties” has a different connotation for me which implies a punishment for breaking a rule or oath - as in “if I…”.  Seems like “pledge” or “troth” (or something like it) rather than “penalty” would have been a more accurate word to describe it if that is the case.  May have cleared up some confusion.

Edited February 20, 2023 by pogi

[Rain]

1 hour ago, Bernard Gui said:

The wording was “rather than….,”  not “ if I….” It emphasized maintaining the sacredness of the ordinance even when threatened to reveal them, and had nothing to do with fear of reprisal for revealing them. The penalties were explained as symbolic of that defense of sacredness….that one would not reveal them, not out of fear for one’s life, but out of fidelity and honor to the covenant. Now that covenant violators have deceitfully revealed the ordinances to the world, that sense of sacredness has pretty much been rendered moot. 

I am reminded of what happened in the Southern States Mission back in the 1870s and 80s at the time of the Cane Creek massacre when mobs would stop young men they didn’t recognize and rip open their clothing to see if they were wearing temple garments, resulting in beatings and assaults for those who were. Would I hide my garments under such conditions and violate my covenants to keep from getting hurt ? I hope I am never tested that way, but I also hope I could have the courage to fear God more than men as have many faithful Saints in the past.. 

This is in part how I understood the meaning as well. As someone who has been on the edge of committing suicide it isn't any better to me than an actual penalty and makes the atonement feel less than.

[mfbukowski]

22 hours ago, Calm said:

Symbolism is only important if it is understood.  If it is no longer understood or understood a different way, it should be removed.  There is not an inherent understanding of complex symbology that one picks up just by being born human.  We need to get taught either indirectly by our culture or directly through education…like taking English classes helps us recognize symbols in literature by discussing actual symbols (Moby D-ck, anyone?).  One only needs to look at Primary lessons and the hymns we sing to realize we are constantly being explicitly taught the symbolic meaning of the Sacrament and the symbolism of Priesthood blessings and ordinances is taught as well for the most part.  If someone wants a more in depth understanding, there are books written about it and teachers and others willing to answer questions in class.  All you have to do basically is raise your hand and ask.

However, the Church was not great at teaching what the temple symbolism meant, there was even an expressed attitude of disdain from many about ritual—associated with apostate churches like the Catholics in my experience—so that many were put off by the ceremony when first encountering it.  I happened to have holy envy over ritual having studied religious rituals of the past some, so I did not have that problem, but almost everyone else I talked to about it (the few that would speak) expressed confusion and disappointment because it was so unexpected.  

There was among my friends and acquaintances a lack of recognition that the sacrament itself as well as priesthood blessings and ordinations were complicated rituals.  The Church, imo, had in fact created a culture where symbolism often needed to be understood by the individual on their own because we weren’t talking about the temple ceremony in any detail and certainly not about the penalties and what they meant.  People were and are told to “go and see for yourself” rather than directly engaged with what goes on then and now in my experience.  This is not inherently a bad choice, but it means the symbolic language that is used needs to be reflective of people’s general experiences as it will lead to confusion if the symbolic language of a particular rite moves out of the understanding of the general society and becomes a specialized knowledge of initiates, yet the initiates are not taught it.

It would be like Catholics never being taught by leaders, etc what Latin means.  And even those using it picking up the meaning only if they had the chance to ask someone in the know at very limited times.  

And while I was told if I had questions, I could talk about it with my husband in the Celestial room or discuss it with the temple president or matron, since my husband knew less about symbology than I did and I was too shy to think it appropriate for me to request the temple president or matron give up their precious time for me, that counsel was pretty much useless.  And from what I have been told, the concept behind temple instruction is to let the Spirit be the teacher, so temple workers are not to tell patrons what something means.

I think the Spirit as instructor in the temple is a generally brilliant approach as it creates a chance for a very personal encounter with the divine when each is ready to receive it (which is why we are given the opportunity to go and learn over and over again), but that requires leadership to pay close attention to what the Spirit is choosing to teach as well as what patrons are actually learning and to be willing to adapt the rituals so learning can continue unimpeded by misunderstandings as much as possible.  And that means there could be changes for more than one reason.

When I was in my late 30s, we had a stake patriarch come and teach all the adults about the temple in a joint meeting in RS/PH…or maybe it was a fireside as I was likely a Primary teacher at the time.  Anyway, he pushed us to discuss with our children everything about the temple save the specifics we had covenanted not to share.  Said there was a tremendous lack of teaching in the Church about it and it was important for parents to be finding ways to share with their children not only their commitment to and reverence of the temple, but their knowledge.  This was a new idea to many there, including myself even though I had known one could pick up a lot of knowledge about the temple outside of the temple.  But because my experience was learning from nonChurch materials about other faiths, it hadn’t occurred to me to talk about them as part of teaching about my faith…at least not in a planned way, they came out at times because my kids were, like me, interested in mythology and religion in general.

However, he was the only leader who taught we need to teach the temple experience in detail to our children in my experience.  I wonder how many have come encountered someone like him, someone in authority not only saying it is okay, but it is a duty.

Question to all…how have you been taught over the years to teach about the temple to others?  Has it changed?  I haven’t been to church much the past 4, 5 years and perhaps it has changed (though my guess is culture takes longer to change than a few years).

Also…

Serious question for those who mourn the loss of old symbols…do you disagree with the temple strategy to let the Spirit do the teaching and if not, how do you think patrons can learn what symbols mean?  Or if you believe I am wrong about the “go and see for yourself” approach, that such is not how the Church most often tells us in general to respond to those with questions about the temple, please share how you see the Church is teaching temple symbolism outside the temple to prepare the understanding of new patrons.  And for those who recognize leadership has chosen not to teach it and yet believe it should be, why does the Lord allow this?

The reason that concepts are taught symbolically is so that people seek the guidance of the spirit INDIVIDUALLY for their interpretation.

The idea that there should be instruction about what symbols mean defeats the whole purpose of using them in the first place.

[Grug the Neanderthal]

On 2/19/2023 at 4:24 AM, Calm said:

Symbolism is only important if it is understood.  If it is no longer understood or understood a different way, it should be removed.

There use to be a lecture at the veil that explained what a lot of the symbolism meant, but this was removed. 

I haven’t been to the temple to see the most recent changes yet, but from what I have heard from people who have, is that more explanation for what symbols mean has been added. 

I don’t think that symbolism should be removed from the endowment (not to mention the scriptures) because people have difficulty understanding it. I think the symbols should be explained, at least at a basic level. 

[Grug the Neanderthal]

10 hours ago, Bernard Gui said:

The wording was “rather than….,”  not “ if I….” It emphasized maintaining the sacredness of the ordinance even when threatened to reveal them, and had nothing to do with fear of reprisal for revealing them. The penalties were explained as symbolic of that defense of sacredness….that one would not reveal them, not out of fear for one’s life, but out of fidelity and honor to the covenant

Yes, in more modern times this is how it was worded. There is evidence that originally the penalties may have been worded as a reprisal for revealing them. But this would have also been symbolic and not literal. It was meant to convey how serious keeping one’s covenants with God is, particularly the covenant not to reveal sacred things he has forbidden us to reveal. 

10 hours ago, Bernard Gui said:

Now that covenant violators have deceitfully revealed the ordinances to the world, that sense of sacredness has pretty much been rendered moot. 

I don’t think the covenant not to reveal certain things from the endowment and the associated penalties have been rendered moot by the exposés of apostates. 

There have been detailed exposés of the endowment, since the 1840s, when the endowment was first administered to the body of the church in the Nauvoo temple. I don’t think it was ever really about keeping things hidden from the world, but rather about testing the fidelity of the endowed individual to keep their covenant not to reveal certain sacred things. 

[pogi]

29 minutes ago, Grug the Neanderthal said:

There use to be a lecture at the veil that explained what a lot of the symbolism meant, but this was removed. 

I haven’t been to the temple to see the most recent changes yet, but from what I have heard from people who have, is that more explanation for what symbols mean has been added. 

I don’t think that symbolism should be removed from the endowment (not to mention the scriptures) because people have difficulty understanding it. I think the symbols should be explained, at least at a basic level. 

Perhaps there is something that you can learn from the prophets about the fluidity of it.  That might be part of the teaching process and symbolize the nature of progression and enlightenment in and of itself.  It has been explained that revelation and enlightenment happens in gradation over time, like a sunrise. 

[Grug the Neanderthal]

5 minutes ago, pogi said:

Perhaps there is something that you can learn from the prophets about the fluidity of it.  That might be part of the teaching process and symbolize the nature of progression and enlightenment in and of itself.  It has been explained that revelation and enlightenment happens in gradation over time, like a sunrise. 

So in your opinion removing a lot of instruction and symbolism from the endowment that people misunderstood is a sign that the church membership is now more enlightened and better understands the meaning of the endowment? 

[pogi]

1 minute ago, Grug the Neanderthal said:

So in your opinion removing a lot of instruction and symbolism from the endowment that people misunderstood is a sign that the church membership is now more enlightened and better understands the meaning of the endowment? 

It could be a sign that the church itself (like revelation and enlightenment) is like a rough stone rolling, removing jagged edges of the endowment as it rolls along and becomes more and more smooth as the core salvific principles of spiritual progression are revealed without the cultural baggage. 

[Bernard Gui]

10 hours ago, pogi said:

Thanks for sharing, I wasn’t aware of the wording.  The word “penalties” has a different connotation for me which implies a punishment for breaking a rule or oath - as in “if I…”.  Seems like “pledge” or “troth” (or something like it) rather than “penalty” would have been a more accurate word to describe it if that is the case.  May have cleared up some confusion.

I understand the confusion. There is more to it, but here is not the place.

[Bernard Gui]

8 hours ago, Rain said:

This is in part how I understood the meaning as well. As someone who has been on the edge of committing suicide it isn't any better to me than an actual penalty and makes the atonement feel less than.

I don’t understand this comment.