I Baptize Dead People

[Calgaryborn]

Originally Posted by eddly

Give me an example to work with if you can.

Eph 2:8 says "For by grace are you saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God:"

In the book of Mormon you have the same verse except after the word "faith" the phrase "after all that you can do" is inserted. That totally changes the meaning of the verse and one does contradict the other. I was told that the phrase "after all that you can do" was left out of the Bible by some copiest over the centuries.

At any rate, that is the example that springs to mind. If you want the reference in the Book of Mormon I will find it for you. I just can't tonight. It's time for me to pumpkin. I've got to be up in 6 hours.

[photon]

Originally Posted by Calgaryborn

That's not a question that can be answered. If the book of Mormon is infaliable then the science would have to be wrong.

You're just restating my question in the form of a sentence with a condition, thanks. I'm asking about how Mormons view their beliefs.

Originally Posted by Calgaryborn

It does happen you know: Look at global warming.

"Right" and "wrong" are words that don't work well within the realms of science, at least not the way you are using them.

[eddly]

Originally Posted by photon

Not really IMO, one simply has to change the interpretation of the scriptures. To me it's amusing when interpretation of scripture changes organically over time to reflect the changing morals of society and that's fine, but when changing in response to new scientific evidence is suggested, people get all upset.

There lies the problem. You can't suddenly change the fact that the Book of Mormon starts out in Jerusalem. It is what it is. So if you have evidence against that fact, well it is done like dinner (or perhaps the Canucks near the end of the season).

The DNA issue is threatening to be this issue, but the majority of Mormons are totally unaware of it or disregard it because we apparently don't fully understand the science, or simply the science is wrong.

The church is starting to bend as I eluded to regarding the change in the introduction of the Book of Mormon where it is mentioned that the Book of Mormon people are among the inhabitants. However, there are portions of the Book of Mormon that work to contradict this... or the prophets of the Book of Mormon thought it was not important to mention these other inhabitants... especially when they went as far as to predict the coming of Christopher Columbus (doesn't outright say his name though) and the eventual settling of America etc. Oops. This is a concern for me.

[photon]

Originally Posted by eddly

There lies the problem. You can't suddenly change the fact that the Book of Mormon starts out in Jerusalem. It is what it is. So if you have evidence against that fact, well it is done like dinner (or perhaps the Canucks near the end of the season)..

I guess I see what you mean. From an external point of view it's easy enough to say "well interpret the whole account as myth rather than a statement of fact". But as an individual I guess it'd be more difficult to simply change one's view. "Right then, this part here that we've been telling you is fact, now we're going to treat it as a meaningful story". That's a tough sell.

Although this is also something that Christianity has has do deal with over the years; Christianity has its fair share of historical claims that have have fallen into question or have no support.. Christians that choose to not just ignore the evidence can still keep their core values intact while accepting the new knowledge. At least some do anyway.

[eddly]

Originally Posted by Calgaryborn

Eph 2:8 says "For by grace are you saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God:"

In the book of Mormon you have the same verse except after the word "faith" the phrase "after all that you can do" is inserted. That totally changes the meaning of the verse and one does contradict the other. I was told that the phrase "after all that you can do" was left out of the Bible by some copiest over the centuries.

At any rate, that is the example that springs to mind. If you want the reference in the Book of Mormon I will find it for you. I just can't tonight. It's time for me to pumpkin. I've got to be up in 6 hours.

Great example. There are several ways to rationalize this difference. First of all, saying the Bible is incorrect here is too strong of a way to describe it. As you implied, it would be considered to be not translated correctly in this particular instance. Or, perhaps it wasn't a complete thought... and it was implying that "yes... of course works are required still, but it wasn't explicitly stated".

In a different context Mormons do believe that we are saved by the grace of God. It just comes down to what being "saved" really means. Mormons would believe it to mean in this instance that you are saved from temporal death. We believe that receiving a resurrected body and eternal life is a free gift, so in essence, you are saved by the grace of God. However, through your good works we believe in addition to this you can achieve eternal salvation which would be eternal life in God's presence, which is not a free gift.

It is fascinating how one little scripture can be interpreted so many different ways.

[eddly]

Originally Posted by photon

Although this is also something that Christianity has has do deal with over the years; Christianity has its fair share of historical claims that have have fallen into question or have no support.. Christians that choose to not just ignore the evidence can still keep their core values intact while accepting the new knowledge. At least some do anyway.

The best example I can think of related to your point here is the whole idea that christianity believed that the world is in fact flat. There are numerous scriptures where prophets claim this. (False prophecy!).

Check it up on wiki, I don't have the url for it, it is a good read. I believe it was Galileo who challenged the claim, or perhaps he was saying the Sun didn't revolve around the Earth as Christianity claimed at the time... one of the two anyway.

Ok I found it, this is from a post I made to another forum a while ago about the Galileo thing...

I have always been fascinated by Galileo and the persecution he faced as a result of his research. He had discovered that the Earth in fact moves around the Sun, and not vice versa. This went against the Catholic Church's view at the time.


[blockquote]
Western Christian biblical references Psalm 93:1, Psalm 96:10, and 1 Chronicles 16:30 include text stating that "the world is firmly established, it cannot be moved." In the same tradition, Psalm 104:5 says, "[the LORD] set the earth on its foundations; it can never be moved." Further, Ecclesiastes 1:5 states that "And the sun rises and sets and returns to its place, etc."[59]
[/blockquote] - wiki


Imagine being Galileo and trying to convince a Catholic friend of yours that Earth isn't stationary. Good luck! He had ample evidence, but it fell on deaf ears.


Could evidence against the Mormon Church convince a friend that it is in fact false? It really depends on how entrenched they are in their beliefs. If Galileo went up to a complete stranger and said, "hey the Earth isn't stationary"... he obviously wouldn't have much success. This stranger would actually have to be open to finding out that (s)he was wrong about something. A TBM has to be open to finding out that (s)he could actually be wrong, (s)he has to have some doubts before being able to accept the truth.


Just like the Catholic Church's response, the Mormon church forbids members to read "anti" material (how do they really define anti material anyway??!!?). Galileo's published works were apparently taken out of circulation and he was under house arrest until his death.


My point is that even with the increased availability of Church history, I doubt we'll see a mass exodus from the Mormon Church. Even before the popularity of the Internet, evidence was still out there, you just had to want to find it. If you don't want the evidence, you can ignore it.


There is hope however, the Catholic Church now admits they were wrong.

[blockquote]
On 31 October 1992, Pope John Paul II expressed regret for how the Galileo affair was handled, and officially conceded that the Earth was not stationary, as the result of a study conducted by the Pontifical Council for Culture.[77][78]
[/blockquote]

My intentions for this post were not to bash the Catholic Church. I have no grudge against Catholics.

[photon]

Originally Posted by eddly

The best example I can think of related to your point here is the whole idea that christianity believed that the world is in fact flat. There are numerous scriptures where prophets claim this. (False prophecy!).

Check it up on wiki, I don't have the url for it, it is a good read. I believe it was Galileo who challenged the claim, or perhaps he was saying the Sun didn't revolve around the Earth as Christianity claimed at the time... one of the two anyway.

Very fascinating in my opinion. Science wins in this case.

EDIT: Ooops looks like you found it.

[photon]

But yeah that's a good example. And really you can easily take those scriptures and rather than interpret them literally as saying the earth doesn't move, and reinterpret them as poetic license.. not meant to be literal, but meant to communicate a bigger truth about God's immovability or some such. Same thing with scriptures that talk about a flat earth.

If I write something about my wife's eyes being brighter than the sun, it's not meant to be literal.

There's other stuff that doesn't get the same out though.. calling a bat a bird, or a global flood, etc.. But still Christianity has changed and adapted to accept new knowledge.

I think Mormonism would survive accepting evidence that the natives aren't descended from Israel.

[eddly]

Alright I'm off to bed soon. I enjoyed the discussion. It is nice to see a respectful discussion related to religion for a change.

[Rathji]

Originally Posted by photon

I think Mormonism would survive accepting evidence that the natives aren't descended from Israel.

Now that I have gotten some sleep I will give you my opinion, I apologize for basicly saying " read the Book of Mormon" last night but I couldn't figure out how to explain this in a condensed manner. What follows is not Church Doctrine but is in fact my own opinion on the matter, since photon is asking how I rationalize it.

Genetics aside, I think the biggest problem associated with beleiving that the Native Americans are decendents of Jewish blood stems from the fact that their skin isn't even the same color. It is my belief that if I can rationalize that problem that the DNA inconsistancies quite easily explain themselves.

// What follows if a super condensed readers digest version of the Book of Mormon from begining to end
// Btw am I a total dork for commenting my post?

So this guy Lehi is chilling in Jereuselum and God comes and says to him,"Hey Lehi, get your crew and jet from here because this place is gonna be flattened soon". So Lehi figures God has never let him down yet, so he gathers up his kids and some woman folk for them and they all take off into the wilderness. Long story short they make a boat, come over to North America. Now Lehi has 2 of his kids who really were not happy about leaving jereuselum, they figured their dad was nuts. So they rebel against their Dad and the other kids and they abandon the whole concept of worshiping God. Now God at this point is not pleased, so he curses these 2 kids with darkened skin. So the 2 bad kids go about their business and there ends up being 2 seperate kingdoms built up. To make another even longer story short, the bad kids decencents wipe the floor with the good kids decendents. So now you have one group of darker skinned folks chilling waiting for Columbus to come over and scam them outta manhatten.

Now I realize that story was simplified to the point of absurdity, but the point is, if you believe that God can do all this stuff and understand that he changed the skin color of these people. It really isn't that big of a stretch to believe that he changed this skin color by altering thier DNA. I mean he is God and all powerful and everything, but the stuff he does needs to follow the rules he set up when he made the world. Its not like he can just grab a can of paint and say "Bam, your brown", so he changes their DNA.

If you don't believe in God, or that he created the world, or that his is all powerful, then I can imagine that is is pretty nuts to agree with this explaination, but how could you deny that it makes total sense to someone who does beleive those things.

Rationalizing inconsistancy that I have found between what scripture says and what science says can be boiled down to one simple fact. If you beleive in the fact that God exists and believe that he has done everything people say he has done, then it is not a big stretch to believe that he did those things in a way that forced us to have faith that he existed rather than a way that give us proof he existed.

[Thor]

Originally Posted by RougeUnderoos

There is significant historical and scientific evidence that the Mayans, Aztecs and current native population of North America does not descend from a single family that left Israel 2600 years ago.

There was a great documentary on PBS some years ago called "Journey of Man" which used DNA to track human migration from a single family in Africa.

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/n...rneyofman.html

Highly recommend checking it out, its Fascinating.

13 parts on Youtube:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OV6A8oGtPc4

[photon]

Originally Posted by Rathji

Now I realize that story was simplified to the point of absurdity, but the point is, if you believe that God can do all this stuff and understand that he changed the skin color of these people. It really isn't that big of a stretch to believe that he changed this skin color by altering thier DNA. I mean he is God and all powerful and everything, but the stuff he does needs to follow the rules he set up when he made the world. Its not like he can just grab a can of paint and say "Bam, your brown", so he changes their DNA.

True, but would He do the change in such a way that it appeared exactly like was a natural progression of populations over very specific geographic areas at very specific times? To me that seems deceptive.

If you don't believe in God, or that he created the world, or that his is all powerful, then I can imagine that is is pretty nuts to agree with this explaination, but how could you deny that it makes total sense to someone who does beleive those things.

Well I can't deny it would make sense to someone who believes those things, but that's circular logic. I believe the things I do because they are right, and they are right because I believe them.

To me something written by God would be self evidently so... it would make clear predictions that come true (not veiled in the ambiguities of history and language), it would be perfectly self consistent, and it would address questions and issues far in advance of when it was written, instead of appearing to be entirely a product of the time it was written. I haven't read the book of Mormon so I don't know if it meets these criteria or not.

Rationalizing inconsistancy that I have found between what scripture says and what science says can be boiled down to one simple fact. If you beleive in the fact that God exists and believe that he has done everything people say he has done, then it is not a big stretch to believe that he did those things in a way that forced us to have faith that he existed rather than a way that give us proof he existed.

Right, but that's belief based on... nothing, just based on a desire to believe. Believing he did everything he said he did also requires believing that he actually said those things too. All this reasoning could be applied to Odin or Zeus and come to the same conclusions; why not believe in them?

And that's fine for some, but what about those that can't believe like that? Not everyone can believe based on no reason.

I don't think you mean forced to have faith do you? That would imply that God's chosen those who he's forced to have faith and those who don't.. meaning he chose those who don't believe to not believe, meaning there's no free will (and presumably sending those that don't believe to hell or whatever the Mormon equivilent is).

[Rathji]

Originally Posted by photon

I don't think you mean forced to have faith do you? That would imply that God's chosen those who he's forced to have faith and those who don't.. meaning he chose those who don't believe to not believe, meaning there's no free will (and presumably sending those that don't believe to hell or whatever the Mormon equivilent is).

I mean that to beleive in God takes faith. There is no indisputable proof that God exists and there never will be. So if you beleive that God exists then you have faith. There always will be circular logic when you discuss God, which is the basis of why many people refuse to believe. I do understand thier thinking though, because without faith there really isn't any other way to think.

And since you touched on it, free will is a huge part of what Mormons believe. If there is ever any thing that anyone claims about what the LDS Church teaches that doesn't involve you having 100% choice in all your actions, then it is not factual.

[photon]

In the Bible there are times in the past that God has clearly intervened in the affairs of man.. so in Christianity there is in theory indisputable proof that God exists.

Is it the same with Mormons? I.e. are there cases in history where God did something for/to/whatever someone that would be indisputable proof for that person? In the Bible God knocks Paul off his horse and blinds him, which would be pretty indisputable, plus all the miracles Jesus performed would be pretty indisputable.

And you didn't really address the part about those who can't just believe. I assume Mormonism is an exclusivistic religion (i.e. for salvation you have to accept the teachings, if you don't there's some punishment), so people who can't just believe get left out?

[Cheese]

DNA and Mormon Scripture


The Book of Mormon teaches that a tribe of Jews sailed from Jerusalem to the New World in 600 BC and split into two factions, at war with each other. On one side were the Nephites who were "God-fearing, white* and delightsome", and on the other were the Lamanites who were idolaters and received the "curse of blackness", meaning that their skin turned dark. According to the Book of Mormon, by 385 AD the idol-worshiping Lamanites had wiped out the Nephites.

The Mormon church considers the Lamanites as the principal ancestors of the American Indians (and teaches that if they returned to church, their skin could once again become white). However, DNA testing has shown that American Indians came from Asia and not the Middle East, leaving the Mormon church to try and explain the gap between scientific evidence that Native Americans were not descendants of a lost Hebrew tribe, and a 175-year-old book that the church regards as literal and without error.

Genetic testing of Jews throughout the world had already shown that they shared common strains of DNA from the Middle East. Southerton examined studies of DNA lineages among Polynesians and indigenous peoples in North, Central and South America. One mapped maternal DNA lines from 7,300 Native Americans from 175 tribes.

Southerton found no trace of Middle Eastern DNA in the genetic strands of today's American Indians and Pacific Islanders.

In "Losing a Lost Tribe," published in 2004, he concluded that Mormonism — his faith for 30 years — needed to be reevaluated in the face of these facts, even though it would shake the foundations of the faith.

In the fall 1997 issue of Dialogue: A Journal of Mormon Thought, LDS author Brigham Madsen discussed the difficulty that many Latter-day Saints are having with accepting the Book of Mormon as an historical document (Reflections on LDS Disbelief in the Book of Mormon as History). Many who have closely examined the contents of the book in light of scholarship have come to realize that it cannot possibly be true history.
and this...

Mormon leaders cannot acknowledge any factual errors in the Book of Mormon because the prophet Joseph Smith proclaimed it the “most correct of any book on Earth,”.
Bedrock of Faith jolted

[Rathji]

Originally Posted by photon

Is it the same with Mormons? I.e. are there cases in history where God did something for/to/whatever someone that would be indisputable proof for that person? In the Bible God knocks Paul off his horse and blinds him, which would be pretty indisputable, plus all the miracles Jesus performed would be pretty indisputable.

There are people who have spiritual experiences that have alot easier time than others, I still beleive that those people require faith though.

And you didn't really address the part about those who can't just believe. I assume Mormonism is an exclusivistic religion (i.e. for salvation you have to accept the teachings, if you don't there's some punishment), so people who can't just believe get left out?

I am not sure what you mean by can't just believe, however I will make an attempt at answering what I think you mean. This is serious paraphrasing, so if I am unclear about something feel free to ask.

There are multiple levels of glory within heaven. If you do everything you should you recieve the highest level of glory, if you mess up some stuff you get the middle level, and if you screw up even more you get the bottom level. Now not to confuse the issues, none of these levels are what a normal Chirstian church would call Hell. They are all heaven, but just varying degrees of glory. There is another level, for the real bad folks, called outer darkeness which would be the equivilent of Hell, AFAIK Murderers, rapists and other obviously very bad people go there.

So to answer your question, yes I suppose you could say that there is a punishment of not reaching the higher level of glory if you don't believe, but I wouldn't really call it punishment unless you fall into the category of people who are going to outer darkness.

I hope this makes sense.

[photon]

Yup makes sense.. so an atheist who lead a moral life would go to some low level of heaven then, but not outer darkness?

That seems more fair than Christianity's stance.

By can't believe I mean people who require some kind of evidence; people who can't take that leap of faith.

Let me illustrate with an example. You see a hoof print in your yard. It could be made by a horse, a zebra, or a unicorn. Most likely you could not bring yourself to believe it was made by a unicorn no matter how much you desired to. You might be able to convince yourself it was a zebra if you lived in a city with a zoo, but you still wouldn't be doing so with any good reason.

Same thing for some people with respect to God; they can't bring themselves to believe in something for which there is no evidence.

[Rathji]

Originally Posted by photon

Yup makes sense.. so an atheist who lead a moral lifewould go to some low level of heaven then, but not outer darkness?

Anyone who leads a moral life will obtain some glory, of that I am certain.

Originally Posted by photon

Same thing for some people with respect to God; they can't bring themselves to believe in something for which there is no evidence.

When I first started learning about the church, I didn't beleive in God or anything else they taught me. I was dead set against the whole idea and I needed evidence before I would continue with the lessons. The missionaries that taught me said that the only way to get that proof is through prayer. Of course with me being a cocky 19 year old with chip on my shoulder against Mormons and no beleif in God , I scoffed at the idea at first. Eventually I did pray about it and I got an answer.

Now for me that answer was like a gun shot, all of the sudden I had this indisputable proof that God existed. I had my evidence and there was no way to deny it. So you might be wondering how this relates to your comment and here it is: I needed to have faith, no matter how small that faith was, to actually get my cocky butt down on the ground and pray. So to answer your question, there is no way I know of that you can believe God exists without faith. Even if you saw him face to face, if you did not have the smallest degree of faith that he existed you would not believe it was Him. If you personally saw Jesus rise from the dead you would think it was trickery and deception before you would believe that it was the Son of God standing there before you if you didn't have even the smallest degree of faith.

You do need faith, it doesn't have to be a great faith, but it does have to be there.

[photon]

On the flip side would be someone who's spent decades praying, decades seeking, decades having faith, but never getting that similar kind of experience.

God doesn't seem to be playing fair.