The universal depravity of the human family

[telnetd]

On 2/28/2023 at 11:25 AM, Benjamin McGuire said:

Agency comes with the fall - or perhaps a better description is that agency comes with our entry into mortality.

Do you believe Adam and Eve had agency in the Garden of Eden before the fall and
what are your thoughts about the following teachings?

https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/general-conference/2021/04/51oaks?lang=eng

"God has given His children moral agency—the power to decide and to act"

https://speeches.byu.edu/talks/d-todd-christofferson/moral-agency/

"When we use the term moral agency, then, we are appropriately emphasizing the 
accountability that is an essential part of the divine gift of agency. We are moral 
beings and agents unto ourselves, free to choose but also responsible for our 
choices".

Edited March 1, 2023 by telnetd

[Benjamin McGuire]

16 hours ago, telnetd said:

Do you believe Adam and Eve had agency in the Garden of Eden before the fall

I believe that the Garden narrative is largely allegorical. So if you are asking a question about some sort of real historical context, I don't think this narrative can actually assert an answer of this sort.

Having said that, the Book of Mormon makes the case that Adam and Eve had a very limited agency. Agency, the Book of Mormon argues, in 2 Nephi 2, requires that we have a commandment, and that there is enticement in both directions. So, for example, in 2 Nephi 2:16 - "Wherefore, the Lord God gave unto man that he should act for himself. Wherefore, man could not act for himself save it should be that he was enticed by the one or the other." So without the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil (and the command not to partake of it), there couldn't be agency. And without the presence of Satan tempting Adam and Eve, there couldn't be agency. So Adam and Eve have agency, but only in this one thing - it is a very limited agency. The use of the narrative in the Book of Mormon is to explain the conditions necessary for agency to exist and to illustrate the use of agency and the resulting consequences of agency. For all of us (including the individuals in the Book of Mormon), the question of whether Adam and Eve had agency in the Garden of Eden isn't particularly meaningful on its own, unless we somehow experience the Garden of Eden for ourselves. Mormonism has (as I noted earlier) created something like this in the pre-existence, where change was not possible (like the Garden of Eden), but a choice could be made in which we were presented with the 'right choice' and an enticement was presented to us for the other choice. It is from this perspective that I believe that the Garden of Eden narrative is largely allegorical (just as the idea of a war in heaven is allegorical). They are useful in teaching the principles that underlie our mortal existence but they use events with which we have no familiarity or practical experience.

16 hours ago, telnetd said:

what are your thoughts about the following teachings?

In general, I don't think that they have much relevance to this discussion. They discuss the implications of agency through the notion of consequences (which is important as I point out, to the Garden of Eden narrative). But, they have little interest in dealing with the theology of agency or its causes, or the necessary conditions for agency to exist.

[Islander]

On 2/18/2023 at 12:34 PM, telnetd said:

I found a statement in a church manual which says the human family is not depraved.

"If we correctly understand the role of Adam and Eve, we will realize that those who have labeled them
sinners responsible for the universal depravity of the human family are misguided". 

When I read Mosiah 16:3 however, it describes a universal depravity.

"For they are carnal and devilish, and the devil has power over them; yea, even that old serpent that
did beguile our first parents, which was the cause of their fall; which was the cause of all mankind
becoming carnal, sensual, devilish, knowing evil from good, subjecting themselves to the devil".

Which is it?

As a side question - I understand how Satan beguiled Eve but how did he beguile Adam?

I think people cringe at the word "depravity". In the modern parlance we relate it to the superlative in the sinfulness scale. It was not always so. In the past its meaning related to:  "the quality or state of being corrupt, evil, or perverted : the quality or state of being" according to Webster.

And because we are three-dimensional beings, we love scales, degrees and categories. That's why we use multichromatic scales like: mistakes, trespasses, fallen, sin, depravity, evil, diabolical...etc. "I have made some mistakes..." sounds better than "I've done evil before the Lord my God". But,  Mosiah 3:19 says : “For the natural man is an enemy to God, and has been from the fall of Adam, and will be, forever and ever, unless he yields to the enticings of the Holy Spirit, and putteth off the natural man and becometh a saint.” [by faith and adoption but still a sinner]

So, though I sin now and again, those are "mistakes" but she!...she has an OnlyFans page so she is depraved!!!  We deceive ourselves thinking that one sin is significantly more horrible than another. Maybe socially (its impact) but not in the eyes of God. ALL sin is sin and abhorred by God. Even the sins of the mind. We are all sinful, broken and lost human beings dependent entirely on the grace and mercy of God for salvation and strength to overcome our sinful nature and endure to the end. The rest is just a shell game to shed our guilt and pacify our guilty conscience.

Cheers! 

 

 

[telnetd]

On 3/2/2023 at 8:35 AM, Benjamin McGuire said:

So, for example, in 2 Nephi 2:16 - "Wherefore, the Lord God gave unto man that he should act for himself. Wherefore, man could not act for himself save it should be that he was enticed by the one or the other."

What is the identity of the one and the other and who enticed Adam and Eve to eat the one or the other?

[Benjamin McGuire]

2 hours ago, telnetd said:

What is the identity of the one and the other and who enticed Adam and Eve to eat the one or the other?

The one or the other in 2 Nephi 2:16 refers to the two trees in verse 15:

"And to bring about his eternal purposes in the end of man, after he had created our first parents, and the beasts of the field and the fowls of the air, and in fine, all things which are created, it must needs be that there was an opposition; even the forbidden fruit in opposition to the tree of life; the one being sweet and the other bitter."

God told Adam and Eve that they could eat of the fruit of the tree of life. And in verse 18, it is the devil who tells them to eat from the tree of knowledge: "the devil, ... said: Partake of the forbidden fruit, and ye shall not die, but ye shall be as God, knowing good and evil." I wouldn't say that the devil enticed Adam and Eve - the devil presented the tree of knowledge as something that should be eaten so that Adam and Eve could "be as God". He lied by telling them that they would not die. The idea of enticement takes us back to Genesis 3:6 - "And when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was pleasant to the eyes, and a tree to be desired to make one wise, she took of the fruit thereof, and did eat, and gave also unto her husband with her; and he did eat." This is the enticement. The one tree allowed Adam and Eve to live forever in the Garden of Eden, the other tree made them wise. This is the enticement provided by both trees.

Lehi (back to the Book of Mormon) sees the choice (of knowledge) as a necessary choice. The fall has to occur, the redemption has to occur, and the end of man in a redeemed state represents God's purpose for humanity.

[The Nehor]

On 3/2/2023 at 1:59 PM, Islander said:

I think people cringe at the word "depravity".

Nah, I get curious and ask for more details.

[telnetd]

On 3/3/2023 at 1:40 PM, Benjamin McGuire said:

God told Adam and Eve that they could eat of the fruit of the tree of life. And in verse 18, it is the devil who tells them to eat from the tree of knowledge: "the devil, ... said: Partake of the forbidden fruit, and ye shall not die, but ye shall be as God, knowing good and evil." I wouldn't say that the devil enticed Adam and Eve - the devil presented the tree of knowledge as something that should be eaten so that Adam and Eve could "be as God". He lied by telling them that they would not die. The idea of enticement takes us back to Genesis 3:6 - "And when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was pleasant to the eyes, and a tree to be desired to make one wise, she took of the fruit thereof, and did eat, and gave also unto her husband with her; and he did eat." This is the enticement. The one tree allowed Adam and Eve to live forever in the Garden of Eden, the other tree made them wise. This is the enticement provided by both trees.

Moroni 7:12-13 says, " Wherefore, all things which are good cometh of God; and that which is evil cometh 
of the devil; for the devil is an enemy unto God, and fighteth against him continually, and inviteth and 
enticeth to sin, and to do that which is evil continually. But behold, that which is of God inviteth and 
enticeth to do good continually; wherefore, every thing which inviteth and enticeth to do good, and to love 
God, and to serve him, is inspired of God".

Based on those verses in Moroni, I see that the enticement to eat from the forbidden fruit is really
attributable to the devil who used the tree as the object of his temptation. Neither God or the devil
enticed them to eat from all the permissible trees. Eating from the forbidden one was the original sin 
LDS church teachings attest to.

How do you believe God telling Adam and Eve that they could eat of the fruit of the tree of life can be
viewed as being enticed?  Do you also believe God telling Adam and Eve to be fruitful and multiply is 
an enticement?

[Benjamin McGuire]

49 minutes ago, telnetd said:

Based on those verses in Moroni, I see that the enticement to eat from the forbidden fruit is really
attributable to the devil who used the tree as the object of his temptation. Neither God or the devil
enticed them to eat from all the permissible trees. Eating from the forbidden one was the original sin 
LDS church teachings attest to.

How do you believe God telling Adam and Eve that they could eat of the fruit of the tree of life can be
viewed as being enticed?  Do you also believe God telling Adam and Eve to be fruitful and multiply is 
an enticement?

Ok, so there is a lot to unpack here. You should understand though that these scriptural passages don't exist in a vacuum - they are interpretations of the Genesis account. I also want to stress (again) that I don't think that these accounts should be understood as literal histories or that they are describing some real event.

You asked: "How do you believe God telling Adam and Eve that they could eat of the fruit of the tree of life can be viewed as being enticed?"

I don't believe this is what the text says. The idea of enticement first shows up in 2 Nephi 2:15-16 (my emphasis) -

Quote

And to bring about his eternal purposes in the end of man, ... it must needs be that there was an opposition; even the forbidden fruit in opposition to the tree of life; the one being sweet and the other bitter. Wherefore, the Lord God gave unto man that he should act for himself. Wherefore, man could not act for himself save it should be that he was enticed by the one or the other.

The one or the other doesn't refer to God and the devil, it refers to the two trees and what they represent. Lehi here says that the fruit of the tree of life was sweet, while the fruit of the forbidden tree was bitter. This idea of enticement in terms of the fruit of the trees is central to the story in Genesis 3:6. The bitter fruit is recast as being 'good for food,' 'pleasant to the eyes,' and 'desired to make one wise.' The sweetness of the fruit of the Tree of Life doesn't somehow change - it is still there. In contrast, in 1 Nephi 8:10-12, Lehi describes the fruit of the Tree of Life that he sees and eats in a vision as 'desirable to make one happy,' 'sweet, above all that I ever before tasted,' 'white, to exceed all the whiteness that I had ever seen,' and 'desirable above all other fruit.' Later in 1 Nephi 11, we are told that the fruit that Lehi saw and tasted was symbolic, and Nephi is given an interpretation of the fruit from Lehi's vision. The point of this last part is to emphasize that there is a certain degree of symbolism in these narratives.

So, when you ask how God telling Adam and Eve that they could eat of the fruit of the tree of life can be viewed as being enticed - it's not God telling them, it is the nature of the fruit itself. What Lehi later tells us about this is that we don't exercise meaningful agency if we aren't given choices that are enticing.

You ask: "Do you also believe God telling Adam and Eve to be fruitful and multiply is an enticement?"

Not particularly - for the reasons that I hope I have explained.

Now there is where things get a bit more messy to unpack. The Garden of Eden narrative is one of the most discussed passages of scripture over the past three thousand years. We note from the outset that there is a difference between the two commandments in that one is something that should be done, and one is something that shouldn't be done - active versus passive. Apart from that, one of the things the Book of Mormon suggests (and it is not alone in this view) is that while Adam and Eve had been given the commandment to multiply and replenish the earth while in the Garden of Eden, they couldn't actually comply with that commandment. 2 Nephi 2:22-23 tells us:

Quote

And all things which were created must have remained in the same state in which they were after they were created; and they must have remained forever, and had no end. And they would have had no children; wherefore they would have remained in a state of innocence, having no joy, for they knew no misery; doing no good, for they knew no sin.

So until the fall, Adam and Eve couldn't have children. The Book of Moses provides a different distinction (Moses 3:16-17):

Quote

And I, the Lord God, commanded the man, saying: Of every tree of the garden thou mayest freely eat, But of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it, nevertheless, thou mayest choose for thyself, for it is given unto thee; but, remember that I forbid it, for in the day thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die.

Here, there is a difference between the commandment to multiple and replenish the earth and the commandment not to partake of the forbidden fruit. The conflicting nature of the situation is spelled out. They are given the forbidden fruit. They are commanded not to eat it. But they are also told that they have agency in this particular case - they are given a choice. This creates a separation between the two.

Now, to get back to Moroni 7. Moroni 7 is references this idea of opposition in all things in his comments - he is not trying to re-frame the garden of Eden narrative. He is applying Lehi's statement to a circumstance where we have much more choice than Adam and Eve. Lehi says "Wherefore, man could not act for himself save it should be that he was enticed by the one or the other." And Moroni contextualizes it this way: "for the devil is an enemy unto God, and fighteth against him continually, and inviteth and enticeth to sin, and to do that which is evil continually. But behold, that which is of God inviteth and enticeth to do good continually; wherefore, every thing which inviteth and enticeth to do good, and to love God, and to serve him, is inspired of God".

I hope that helps.

[telnetd]

On 3/9/2023 at 2:52 PM, Benjamin McGuire said:

Quote

And to bring about his eternal purposes in the end of man, ... it must needs be that there was an opposition; even the forbidden fruit in opposition to the tree of life; the one being sweet and the other bitter. Wherefore, the Lord God gave unto man that he should act for himself. Wherefore, man could not act for himself save it should be that he was enticed by the one or the other.

The one or the other doesn't refer to God and the devil, it refers to the two trees and what they represent.

So how do you believe Adam and Eve were enticed by the tree God allowed them to eat from?   

Do you believe they were enticed by all the permitted trees or just by a total of two trees?

Why does Nephi consider none of the other permitted trees being in opposition to the forbidden one?

Edited March 11, 2023 by telnetd

[Benjamin McGuire]

2 hours ago, telnetd said:

So how do you believe Adam and Eve were enticed by the tree God allowed them to eat from?

I am not really sure what you are looking for in this question. The way that you ask this, it sounds like you want to know how Adam and Eve made their decision. I don't believe that any of this is literal - it is a metaphor of sorts that is meant to help us understand the nature of agency and of choice and the importance of mortality (death, the existence of sin and evil, and so on). For us it is enough to understand that both trees had good qualities. And in particular, that it wasn't the things that we normally associate with fruit that were the enticements - it wasn't the way it looked, or smelled, or tasted, or whether or not it was good for food (both trees shared all of these qualities). It was the fact that the one represented, in essence, an eternal safety in an Edenic state in the presence of God, and the other represents knowledge of good and evil, agency, and a chance to progress to become like God - a fall, death, a subsequent salvation event, a resurrection, and a return to the presence of God - only this time, with an agency that is absolute - except for the conditions required by God's judgment relative to the choices we made with our agency during mortality.

The whole point of the Adam and Eve narratives is that regardless of the ways in which they were specifically enticed, they made a choice. From an LDS perspective, the same sort of thing exists with the War in Heaven. We all made a choice. The fact that we are here is evidence of that choice. The details of how we were enticed for one side or the other isn't really even knowable. Our descriptions of those events (whatever those events really were) are neither historical nor valuable in the sense of being understood historically.

[telnetd]

On 3/12/2023 at 10:13 AM, Benjamin McGuire said:

I am not really sure what you are looking for in this question. The way that you ask this, it sounds like you want to know how Adam and Eve made their decision. I don't believe that any of this is literal - it is a metaphor of sorts ...

The whole point of the Adam and Eve narratives is that regardless of the ways in which they were specifically enticed, they made a choice.

This Ensign article says the church teaches it was actual fruit.

https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/ensign/1994/02/i-have-a-question/what-is-the-latter-day-saint-view-on-the-forbidden-fruit?lang=eng

Back on March 3, you said  "The one tree allowed Adam and Eve to live forever in the Garden of Eden, the other tree made
them wise. This is the enticement provided by both trees."

Do you believe that God allowing Adam and Eve to eat from all the permitted trees before the Fall were all enticements?  What
is your definition of "enticement"? 

Prior to the Fall, Adam and Eve were making choices in whatever they did.  They were making choices of how to interact with
each other, with God, with the animals, with deciding what permitted tree to eat from, and how they tended to the garden God
provided.  Enticement was not involved.

That is why I don't agree with the Book of Mormon statement in verse 16 about enticement being required for them to act on
two trees: "Wherefore, man could not act for himself save it should be that he was enticed by the one or the other".

Prior to Adam and Eve being created, verse 14 says "and he hath created all things, both the heavens and the earth, and all things
that in them are, both things to act and things to be acted upon".  Even the animals and plants were acting and being acted upon;
without being enticed.  

Edited March 14, 2023 by telnetd

[Benjamin McGuire]

2 hours ago, telnetd said:

This Ensign article says the church teaches it was actual fruit.

And the "I Have a Question" feature of the Ensign isn't really a source of doctrine ...

I could also point to President Spencer W. Kimball who, in this Ensign article says: "The story of the rib, of course, is figurative." Different people are going to have different views about how to understand a several thousand year old text. My point is that is that I am not going to answer a question for you that requires me to assume a view that I don't hold.

2 hours ago, telnetd said:

Do you believe that God allowing Adam and Eve to eat from all the permitted trees before the Fall were all enticements?  What is your definition of "enticement"? 

No. And I don't think that Lehi in the Book of Mormon did either. Lehi separates out the Tree of Life and the forbidden tree as representing two ideas. And then we get from Lehi (and from Genesis) that the things that all of these fruits have in common - that they were good to eat, and so on - those things aren't really what makes the fruit enticing. Lehi describe his vision of the Tree of Life - and his experience of the fruit (and Nephi has an angel tell him that the fruit is a symbol and explains the meaning of it to him). The ideas that the different fruits are believed to represent - those are the enticements. What is enticing about the forbidden fruit is that it represents knowledge and it represents becoming more like God (in knowing good and evil). And the fruit of the tree of life represents the love of God and standing in God's presence. Those ideas are the enticements.

2 hours ago, telnetd said:

Prior to the Fall, Adam and Eve were making choices in whatever they did. They were making choices of how to interact with each other, with God, with the animals, with deciding what permitted tree to eat from, and how they tended to the garden God provided.  Enticement was not involved.

Perhaps - but they weren't doing so with agency. They didn't know the difference between good and evil - and so they couldn't be making choice on that basis. Or, as Lehi would argue, in the garden, before the fall, Adam and Eve were not acting, but were merely being acted upon. The story isn't interested in any of this. It doesn't have any of these choices you mention in there. And you need to add it in, if you want the story to make sense as some sort of literal history. After all, they had to be doing something for that potentially very, very long period before they decided to eat the fruit. But, as Lehi argues - in that indeterminate period, nothing changed. So, until Adam and Eve made this one choice, none of their choices matter. And while their motivations may matter, they don't really matter to Lehi - because he isn't as interested in how they were enticed, he is just interested in the fact that they were - and it is this enticement that Lehi believes indicates the opposition necessary for Adam and Eve to exercise agency in this one specific choice.

2 hours ago, telnetd said:

Even the animals and plants were acting and being acted upon; without being enticed.  

I think that you are over-reading this here. For Lehi, being able to act is a specific idea about agency - and agency only comes through this knowledge of good and evil.

It's not a problem if you disagree with me.

But, I think that if you are really trying to make sense of it all, the Ensign article that you offer isn't very helpful. It noted: "Perhaps the forbidden fruit contained elements that changed Adam’s and Eve’s bodies from being immortal to mortal." Perhaps the fall was triggered by eating the fruit. Perhaps those elements that changed Adam's and Eve's bodies also corrupted them, making them (and all of their descendants) universally depraved. Maybe we really are what we eat ...  But, rationally, I just don't see it. And when I understand the text is describing these ideas figuratively, I stop needing to worry about how long Adam and Eve were in the Garden, or how the Garden fits into a universe that (as far as I can tell) has never had a period without change or death. I don't have to be overly concerned by what specifically was tempting about the fruit, because this isn't the point of the narrative.

A lot of the details you ask about are simply not there in the text. And the reason why they aren't there is because they are not all that important to what is being taught.

[telnetd]

On 3/14/2023 at 12:57 PM, Benjamin McGuire said:

And the "I Have a Question" feature of the Ensign isn't really a source of doctrine ...

I make no distinction between LDS Church teachings and her doctrines. They are either
true or false.  Maybe Latter-day Saints believe it was an actual tree without actual
fruit.
 

On 3/14/2023 at 12:57 PM, Benjamin McGuire said:

I could also point to President Spencer W. Kimball who, in this Ensign article says: "The story of the rib, of course, is figurative." Different people are going to have different views about how to understand a several thousand year old text. My point is that is that I am not going to answer a question for you that requires me to assume a view that I don't hold.

A figurative rib makes no sense when you consider these Pearl of Great Price teachings:

"And I, the Lord God, caused a deep sleep to fall upon Adam; and he slept, and I took 
one of his ribs and closed up the flesh in the stead thereof; And the rib which I, the 
Lord God, had taken from man, made I a woman, and brought her unto the man. And Adam 
said: This I know now is bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh; she shall be called 
Woman, because she was taken out of man" (Moses 3:21-23).
 

On 3/14/2023 at 12:57 PM, Benjamin McGuire said:

What is enticing about the forbidden fruit is that it represents knowledge and it represents becoming more like God (in knowing good and evil). And the fruit of the tree of life represents the love of God and standing in God's presence. Those ideas are the enticements.

Isn't Satan's enticement really about becoming a God?
 

On 3/14/2023 at 12:57 PM, Benjamin McGuire said:

But, I think that if you are really trying to make sense of it all, the Ensign article that you offer isn't very helpful. It noted: "Perhaps the forbidden fruit contained elements that changed Adam’s and Eve’s bodies from being immortal to mortal." Perhaps the fall was triggered by eating the fruit. Perhaps those elements that changed Adam's and Eve's bodies also corrupted them, making them (and all of their descendants) universally depraved. Maybe we really are what we eat ...  But, rationally, I just don't see it. And when I understand the text is describing these ideas figuratively, I stop needing to worry about how long Adam and Eve were in the Garden, or how the Garden fits into a universe that (as far as I can tell) has never had a period without change or death. I don't have to be overly concerned by what specifically was tempting about the fruit, because this isn't the point of the narrative

But it is what the LDS Church teaches as "doctrine".

https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/manual/doctrines-of-the-gospel-student-manual/8-the-fall?lang=eng

“Adam had a spiritual body until mortality came upon him through the violation of the 
law under which he was living, but he also had a physical body of flesh and bones.

“... Now what is a spiritual body? It is one that is quickened by spirit and not by blood. ...

“... When Adam was in the Garden of Eden, he was not subject to death. There was no blood in 
his body and he could have remained there forever. This is true of all the other creations” 
(Joseph Fielding Smith, Doctrines of Salvation, 1:76–77).

[Benjamin McGuire]

5 hours ago, telnetd said:

I make no distinction between LDS Church teachings and her doctrines. They are either true or false.  Maybe Latter-day Saints believe it was an actual tree without actual fruit.

There isn't anything that requires LDS members to view it this way. There is no official position on this within the Church.

5 hours ago, telnetd said:

A figurative rib makes no sense when you consider these Pearl of Great Price teachings:

That doesn't change the fact that a prophet made the statement that it was a figurative rib, and did so in the General Relief Society meeting. You see, this is all problematic stuff if we want to insist on such literal readings of scripture.

5 hours ago, telnetd said:

Isn't Satan's enticement really about becoming a God?

That's more or less what I said. Satan is pointing out that by eating the fruit (by knowing good and evil) Adam and Eve would become like God. And in Genesis, God confirms this, right? Gen. 3:22 tells us: "And the Lord God said, Behold, the man is become as one of us, to know good and evil: and now, ..." And then Adam and Eve are kicked out of the garden (they can't both know good and evil and live forever in the presence of God without some sort of intervention). In the Book of Mormon, Lehi understands all of this to mean that the fall was necessary. That mortality was a necessary step. That through the salvation provided by God through the atonement, Adam and Eve would eventually gain eternal life in the presence of God - only when they get there the second time, they will have what they didn't have the first time - absolute agency and the knowledge of good and evil that such agency requires.

5 hours ago, telnetd said:

But it is what the LDS Church teaches as "doctrine".

I disagree. But, I am not trying to tell you what to believe. You are welcome to believe that this is doctrine. It won't affect me one way or the other. But, if you want to take a literalist approach to the text, then you aren't really ever going to get satisfying answers to your questions. The questions you are asking are not answered in the scriptural narratives that we have.

[telnetd]

On 3/15/2023 at 9:07 PM, Benjamin McGuire said:

That doesn't change the fact that a prophet made the statement that it was a figurative rib, and did so in the General Relief Society meeting. You see, this is all problematic stuff if we want to insist on such literal readings of scripture.

I understand.  But if you accept the prophet's statement of a figurative rib, the Pearl of Great Price passage
makes no sense. I suspect the same prophet might have also taught about figurative trees, figurative fruit,
and a figurative Garden of Eden too.

If you have a figurative, instead of literal, explanation for the POGP passages I quoted, then please share
your view.

[Benjamin McGuire]

On 3/15/2023 at 2:57 PM, telnetd said:

"And I, the Lord God, caused a deep sleep to fall upon Adam; and he slept, and I took one of his ribs and closed up the flesh in the stead thereof; And the rib which I, the Lord God, had taken from man, made I a woman, and brought her unto the man. And Adam said: This I know now is bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh; she shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of man" (Moses 3:21-23).

7 hours ago, telnetd said:

If you have a figurative, instead of literal, explanation for the POGP passages I quoted, then please share your view.

Sure. Moses 2:27 (and I should note that these verses are generally following the text of Genesis in the Old Testament) reads: "And I, God, created man in mine own image, in the image of mine Only Begotten created I him; male and female created I them." There is a long standing recognition of the problem that this creates with the second creation account in Moses 3 (Genesis 3). The Book of Moses offers a resolution to part of this problem (the double creation) by suggesting that this first creation is purely spiritual (Moses 3:5): "For I, the Lord God, created all things, of which I have spoken, spiritually, before they were naturally upon the face of the earth." Whether this is meant to suggest that Moses 2 (and by extension Genesis 2) is describing that spiritual creation is ambiguous in the text (parts of Moses 2 seem to make this sort of assumption more than a little problematic). However, the other part isn't resolved - that God created male and female in God's image. One of the oldest interpretations (predating Christianity) of this issue is to argue that in the Hebrew, male and female genders don't exist in the text until we read them after the rib surgery. And the interpretation is that the first man is androgynous - and that, until God separates man into two genders by pulling Eve out of Adam, Adam contains both genders (as does God). This idea becomes the basis for Moses 3:24 (and Genesis 3:24): "Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife; and they shall be one flesh." Their beginning as one flesh ("This I know now is bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh;" from 3:23) then culminates in their returning to that condition of one flesh in their union.

What is the figurative explanation of the passage? Like other creation narratives in the ancient near east, this text is a metaphor trying to explain the reason for gender differences, and for the role of passion as part of the human nature. The idea that the uniting together of man and woman as one flesh (which is clearly figurative), is represented in their creation. Mormonism has, for the most part, lost the need for sort of reading because it gendered God (and created a Heavenly Mother - a change that occurs quite early), and because it moved gender into a pre-existent condition (a change that wasn't quite so early). There is no need for God to turn Adam into two genders. But, this doesn't mean that Joseph Smith, in his editing of Genesis (what becomes the Book of Moses) has moved far enough along this particular line of thinking to change it to reflect these eventual views.

Like the issue with the rib, early Mormonism also questioned the idea that Adam was created from clay (Moses 3:7): "And I, the Lord God, formed man from the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul" - as evidenced in the current thread on the Adam-God theory. Or, to provide a couple of examples here, as Brigham Young said (recorded in the Journal of Discourses😞 "When you tell me that Father Adam was made as we make adobes from the earth, you tell me what I deem an idle tale." Apostle Parley P. Pratt wrote (in his Key to the Science of Theology😞 "Thus the holy man [Moses] was forced again to veil the past in mystery, and in the beginning of his history assign to man an earthly origin. Man, moulded from the earth, as a brick. Woman, manufactured from a rib."

It isn't a particularly difficult thing to understand the creation narrative as told in Moses as largely figurative - and there has been a tradition to do so within Mormonism since its beginnings. This is especially true as Mormon theology outgrew (with it's doctrine of eternal progression rooted in a pre-existence) the simple descriptions presented in Genesis.

[telnetd]

On 3/18/2023 at 6:32 PM, Benjamin McGuire said:

This is especially true as Mormon theology outgrew (with it's doctrine of eternal progression rooted in a pre-existence) the simple descriptions presented in Genesis.

Does this mean Mormonism now denies a literal garden, trees, and fruit in the creation narrative?

[Benjamin McGuire]

1 hour ago, telnetd said:

Does this mean Mormonism now denies a literal garden, trees, and fruit in the creation narrative?

Mormonism isn't a monolithic entity. As a religion, a belief in a literal Garden of Eden isn't a litmus test in terms of orthodoxy. Individual Mormons are allowed to believe in a literal Garden of Eden or in a figurative/metaphorical Garden of Eden. I am in that second group. But you can see discussions (and even debates) over this issue - because it was connected at the beginning of the 20th century to the debate over young earth creationism that was going on among both members and leaders of the Church. There is no formal statement of belief on that question either (in fact, we only have official statements that there is no official doctrine).

To the extent that I can partially answer your question, I turn to 1 Nephi 11:9-11, 21-23:

Quote

And it came to pass after I had seen the tree, I said unto the Spirit: I behold thou hast shown unto me the tree which is precious above all. And he said unto me: What desirest thou? And I said unto him: To know the interpretation thereof— ... And the angel said unto me: Behold the Lamb of God, yea, even the Son of the Eternal Father! Knowest thou the meaning of the tree which thy father saw? And I answered him, saying: Yea, it is the love of God, which sheddeth itself abroad in the hearts of the children of men; wherefore, it is the most desirable above all things. And he spake unto me, saying: Yea, and the most joyous to the soul.

One of the problems with the idea of a literal tree is that it falls apart on the other end. In Genesis 3:22 (which I have discussed already to some extent) we get this:

Quote

And the Lord God said, Behold, the man is become as one of us, to know good and evil: and now, lest he put forth his hand, and take also of the tree of life, and eat, and live for ever:

Mormonism (and Christianity more generally) doesn't believe that the resurrection and the subsequent eternal life that we receive happens because we eat of the fruit of the Tree of Life in some literal sense. Religion replaces this idea with doctrines of atonement, resurrection, and judgment (just as occurs in the Book of Mormon). But the Tree of Life is still used metaphorically to represent those doctrinal ideas (as also occurs here in the Book of Mormon). So, the Tree of Life is a symbol on the back end of mortality. Whether the Tree of Life is literal or not (or even the rest of the Garden of Eden narrative) doesn't change whether or not the narrative contains these symbolic representations. And, in this sense, the representations of the things in the narrative are what are important to us. Even if the Garden of Eden was a real place with real trees, not a single one of the rest of humanity (apart from Adam and Eve) will ever experience it. Those that wrote the scriptures could not have experienced it personally. So we get their descriptions that, even if it comes from experiences like the one Nephi has, are only representations of what may (or may not) have literally happened.

So, LDS members are free to believe in a literal interpretation of the garden narrative. They are free to believe that it is entirely metaphorical. They are free to believe that the reality is somewhere in between. I happen to believe that the descriptions we have are entirely metaphorical.

[Kevin Christensen]

It wasn't just Spencer Kimball, the endowment for many years used to explicitly state that the rib story in particular was figurative. 

As to what is and is not LDS "doctrine," the older I get, the more impressed I am with this definition:

Quote

Behold, verily, verily, I say unto you, I will declare unto you my doctrine.

32 And this is my doctrine, and it is the doctrine which the Father hath given unto me; and I bear record of the Father, and the Father beareth record of me, and the Holy Ghost beareth record of the Father and me; and I bear record that the Father commandeth all men, everywhere, to repent and believe in me.

33 And whoso believeth in me, and is baptized, the same shall be saved; and they are they who shall inherit the kingdom of God.

34 And whoso believeth not in me, and is not baptized, shall be damned.

35 Verily, verily, I say unto you, that this is my doctrine, and I bear record of it from the Father; and whoso believeth in me believeth in the Father also; and unto him will the Father bear record of me, for he will visit him with fire and with the Holy Ghost.

36 And thus will the Father bear record of me, and the Holy Ghost will bear record unto him of the Father and me; for the Father, and I, and the Holy Ghost are one.

37 And again I say unto you, ye must repent, and become as a little child, and be baptized in my name, or ye can in nowise receive these things.

38 And again I say unto you, ye must repent, and be baptized in my name, and become as a little child, or ye can in nowise inherit the kingdom of God.

39 Verily, verily, I say unto you, that this is my doctrine, and whoso buildeth upon this buildeth upon my rock, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against them.

40 And whoso shall declare more or less than this, and establish it for my doctrine, the same cometh of evil, and is not built upon my rock; but he buildeth upon a sandy foundation, and the gates of hell stand open to receive such when the floods come and the winds beat upon them. 3 Nephi 11:31-40

The desire for something "more or less than this", and the legitimacy of building on sand, in my experience, is rooted in a desire for rhetorical advantage, for leverage, whether directed for or against LDS belief.  (That is, an authority said this or that, and therefore, I am right, and have nothing more to learn, or in the other direction, because some authority said it, all LDS are bound to it, and therefore, all are wrong.) But that sort of thing is explicitly ruled out by the formal definition of "the authority of my servants" in D&C 1, where what we have is declared as imperfect, incomplete, subject to further light and knowledge, which itself is subject to both our making inquiries, and God's own sense of what is expedient at any given time, to either test faith, or provide further light and knowledge.

FWIW,

Kevin Christensen

Canonsburg, PA

[telnetd]

On 3/21/2023 at 11:32 AM, Benjamin McGuire said:

I happen to believe that the descriptions we have are entirely metaphorical.

What do you believe caused the Fall?

[Benjamin McGuire]

4 minutes ago, telnetd said:

What do you believe caused the Fall?

I don't think that there needs to be a cause in the sense that we are discussing here. Genesis fits into a tradition of ancient creation narratives. One of the features that is shared by many of them is this question of why the world is the sort of place it is today if God created it. Either God wanted it to be this way, or something happened that changed it from what God wanted so that it became the way it is. Genesis even includes a do-over, with the flood and Noah - and yet the world didn't return to some sort of paradisaical state. My favorite debates are the sort that we see in Leibniz over the idea that this is the best of all possible worlds - that is, that while evil was necessary, this was the creation that God could create (and still carry out all of his intentions) in which evil was minimized. The point of this is that I think that these narratives of the fall exists because we want to have a perfect God building a perfect creation - and yet we clearly don't live in a perfect world - and we want an explanation of how it went from A to B.

Mormonism has, to some extent, removed the need for this sort of explanation in the Garden of Eden narratives specifically. Mormonism removes the idea of absolute creation in the context of our mortal experience - it creates a spiritual existence (pre-existence) that comes before this creation - and in some ways, this spiritual existence is that paradisaical state in which all mankind (not just Adam and Eve) existed before entering mortality. Mormonism removes the need to make the fall the first act of agency of humanity - it defines an agency that existed in the pre-existence, along with a war in heaven, and even has a class of beings that experienced a fall (and who then exist in a state of depravity) long before we have to deal with Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden (the fall of Satan and those who fell with Satan). Mormonism teaches that the fall of Adam (whatever that encompasses) simply triggered mortality - it did not make humanity sinful. So in all of this, the idea of the fall in terms of the Genesis account really has only a very limited role in LDS theology. Perhaps the only thing really that is left is that Mormonism still uses Adam and Eve as a way of demarcating the beginning of the human family - although even this gets tied up at the beginning of the 19th century in questions about young or old earth creationism and the potential existence of pre-Adamites (a concept itself that really questions how we understand the Garden of Eden and the idea of no change or death prior to the fall).

So what causes the fall? To the extent that the fall represents agency and mortality, the simple act of being born represents the fall (from that spiritual paradise we inhabit in the pre-existence) that every member of the human family experiences. And within LDS belief, we made the choice (we opted for the fruit so to speak) to experience the fall in the pre-existence (when we first exercised our agency) by agreeing to be born into mortality. And here we are.

I think that the idea of a fall is itself problematic within LDS theology. And we see evidence of this in the popularization of the idea of a "fall upward" that circulated within Mormonism in the mid-20th century. Mormonism views the idea of the fall as necessary - especially once it strips it of these other assumed negative effects of that fall.

[MustardSeed]

On 3/15/2023 at 11:57 AM, telnetd said:

make no distinction between LDS Church teachings and her doctrines. They are either
true or false.  Maybe Latter-day Saints believe it was an actual tree without actual
fruit.

I’m not sure what you classify as LDS church teachings. However, I do want to share that it is definitely possible to separate what is born of culture versus what is born of God. While there are people like you who think in terms of black and white where it’s all right or it’s all wrong tend to muddy the waters for those who are trying to determine the difference between culture and doctrine, as a person who my whole life has worked to separate the two I’m here to say that I do believe that differentiating and making allowances for human error sets me up to be able to Roll with the tide so to speak. It is a peaceful place. If I were thinking in terms of black-and-white, I probably would’ve left long ago.  FWIW. Everything I shared comes from my opinion only.

[telnetd]

On 3/23/2023 at 10:32 AM, Benjamin McGuire said:

Mormonism teaches that the fall of Adam (whatever that encompasses) simply triggered mortality - it did not make humanity sinful. So in all of this, the idea of the fall in terms of the Genesis account really has only a very limited role in LDS theology.

The idea of the fall having only a very limited role in LDS theology is not in line with redemption.

Unless you believe Christ's redemption has a very limited role.

... that Adam did fall by the partaking of the forbidden fruit, according to the word of God; and thus
we see, that by his fall, all mankind became a lost and fallen people (Alma 12:22).

And the Messiah cometh in the fulness of time, that he may redeem the children of men from the fall.
And because that they are redeemed from the fall they have become free forever, knowing good from
evil; to act for themselves and not to be acted upon, save it be by the punishment of the law at the great
and last day, according to the commandments which God hath given (2 Nephi 2:26).

[telnetd]

On 3/23/2023 at 11:40 AM, MustardSeed said:

I’m not sure what you classify as LDS church teachings.

Anything taught at General Conferences, in magazines, in seminary manuals, and other books
(past, present, future) printed by the church or by its publishing arm.

[Benjamin McGuire]

2 hours ago, telnetd said:

The idea of the fall having only a very limited role in LDS theology is not in line with redemption.

No, you didn't understand what I was saying. What I wrote was:

2 hours ago, telnetd said:

the idea of the fall in terms of the Genesis account really has only a very limited role in LDS theology.

This doesn't mean that the fall isn't important or central to LDS theology. Rather, Mormonism believes that all mankind experiences the fall in some way - moving from an innocent state in the pre-existence to a mortal condition in which sin is possible, followed by a redemption through the atonement. There isn't some event in the mythical Garden of Eden that defines the fall for all of mankind in the way that Christianity traditionally views it. The decision to experience mortality isn't one made by Adam and Eve that then becomes applicable to every member of the human family - within LDS theology, each member of the human family made a deliberate choice to experience mortality - and so each person who is born into mortality went through the same decision that is represented by the Adam and Eve narrative in the Book of Genesis (and Moses). This is why the events described as occurring in the Garden of Eden can be considered symbolic of what happens to everyone.

The  Book of Mormon is scripture used by the LDS faith, just as the New Testament and Old Testament are. But, the core of LDS belief on these issues comes from modern revelation. In this context, the way that the Book of Mormon reinterprets the account in Genesis doesn't have to be in complete alignment with the way that LDS members interpret the Genesis narrative.

We seem to be going around in circles here. The Book of Mormon says very little about the pre-existence (if anything at all). And yet the doctrine of the pre-existence (which is a significant part of LDS theology) plays a very important role in understanding the issue of the fall (as I have suggested in this thread). So it seems clear (at least to me) that we shouldn't define the LDS doctrine of the fall and redemption entirely by an appeal to the Book of Mormon, wouldn't you agree?