I have given-up on trying to persuade others of the wonders of Mormon theology! Instead, I will here merely vent some of my enthusiasm.
Even Mormons regard their theology as very-much subordinate to specifics of this world practice in the CJCLDS.
And hardly anybody else outside the CJCLDS (although, a few!) is sufficiently interested even to engage with the subject - often because of ineradicable ignorant hostile prejudice.
But for me, I don't know that I have come across any richer source of metaphysical originality and genius across the span of Christendom, as in Mormon theology*.
One of the greatest insights of Mormon theology was that God (The Creator) is the eternal and loving marriage of Father in Heaven and Mother in Heaven; in other words God is a dyad, not one.
Properly understood and explored; this can be an astonishingly rich insight into the fundamental nature of reality - transcending centuries, indeed millennia, of false antitheses between monotheism and polytheism.
The Mormon concept of God can be the basis of a positive metaphysical concept in its own right (not some combination or compromise of pre-existing concepts); as such, it needs to be understood in its own right.
The Mormon church (the CJCLDS) has confused and distorted matters - in this as in several other ways - by claiming that such eternal "sealed" marriage is possible among mortal men and women, here on earth; and restricted to the administration and approval of the CJCLDS.
This is understandable, perhaps it is and was inevitable - yet we must distinguish the reality and truth of things, as separable from the compromises and practicalities of organizing and maintaining A Church, in this world.
But this is not merely something that demonstrably fails in practice (since many sealed marriages have ended in divorce); but is clearly impossible in theory, due to the basic nature of human beings and our life in this entropic and evil world.
The basic nature of this mortal life cannot be transcended by mortal Men - and the fact of Men organizing into churches.
Making claims of the church's transcendent power, or that church rules for living are mapped onto post-mortal and heavenly realities, are simply false - because they contradict the nature of this-world; and contradict too the whole rationale of Christianity as entailing death and resurrection.
We cannot make Heaven on earth - else there would be no need for Heaven.
(And Jesus Christ insisted that there was need for Heaven, and by his work showed why and how.)
We cannot replicate the eternal realities of Heaven with our mortal minds and bodies - and claiming that we can, acts against the core realities of what Jesus did and why.
Churches - and their rules and rituals - do not control our access to Heaven; and indeed, the behaviours of church members (since 2020, especially) demonstrates that nobody really believes that they do.
(They are merely too concerned at the implications of acknowledging they don't believe - which double-negative is not the same as - and much weaker than - positive belief. )
So, to understand the profound truth of the Mormon theology of God, requires that Mormons (as well as other Christians) set-aside the confusions related to how such spiritual realities are crystallized into material and mortal terms here in our lives on earth.
Yet, our aspirations can and should be heavenly and spiritual - even as we acknowledge that their practice is mortal and corruptible (not just corruptible, but actually inevitably corrupt-ed - to some degree, sooner or later - by entropy and death - even when not by evil).
(Thus the desire and aspiration towards eternal marriage in the Mormon sense is a new (as of 1830) beautiful and life-enhancing one - and a vital corrective to the destructive (indeed nihilistic) "mainstream" Christian doctrine that marriage is necessarily a temporary expedient that is dissolved by death, combined with the assertion that "there is no marrying in Heaven".)
This aspiration is true and good; although eternal marriage cannot be actually attained until after we are resurrected and have become wholly and eternally committed to live by love.
It requires resurrection to be able to make eternal commitments; for the reason that resurrection is itself the foundational eternal commitment - i.e. to live wholly by live (and leave-behind sin).
Earthly marriage, and the innate desires and motivations we have in relation to it - even when we may be unable to find it during this mortal existence, provide the basis for understanding the reality of Heavenly marriage; and of the original, originative, creative nature of God (originating, that is, in love - with creation, including but not restricted to procreation, understood as a manifestation of love.)
When Joseph Smith had his vision of the dyadic nature of God, he was both a prophet and a philosopher of genius; but when he tried to make this vision a concrete reality among the members of the new Mormon church, he was merely a gifted and able leader, a kind of "king and judge" perhaps.
Furthermore, the nature of God as from a Heavenly marriage need not be, and I think is not, a template for every man and woman - past, present and future.
Christianity is for individual persons, and entails that each individual person affiliates to divine creation; I don't see that this entails that everybody ultimately wants the same thing - indeed that would seem vanishingly unlikely. Since each is unique - surely there will "always" be genuine exceptions?
(As well as those making excuses to justify special treatment!)
And what we be the point of a creation consisting of everybody doing the same thing! Multiplicity would then have no function or reason!
Another of Joseph Smith's great prophetic insights was that Heaven was A Family, in a literal as well as metaphorical sense. And a loving family - even here on earth - can and often does incorporate many kinds of life-motivations and self-chosen roles, among its loving members.
Resurrected and eternal individual men and women will develop what is distinctive in their original and innate nature - and this may or may not lead them into eternal marriage of a kind analogous to that of God, our Heavenly Parents and the Primary Creators, and thence to procreating spiritual children - in the way that Joseph Smith seemed to regard as the proper goal of all people.
I include this, not because I am necessarily correct in contradicting this particular aspect of Joseph Smith's revelations - but as example fo how we ought to engage with them, as realities.
Realities we may know-about now, and experience temporarily and partially in mortal life; but realities that are only do-able in resurrected post-mortal life
*For all its essential insights (at least, they have been essential for me) there are significant deficiencies in Mormon theology. Two of the most important are an incoherent and double-negative understanding of Jesus's real vital importance and the true nature of his work, which error was (apparently) inherited from mainstream Protestant theology. Another mistake - I believe - is also inherited; which is to regard the Holy Ghost as a separate personage from Jesus Christ - which (as with mainstream Christianity) makes the HG into a nebulous abstract entity with no clear provenance or role.
14 comments:
thank you for the mention Bruce.
i too generally find the reaction underwhelming, compared to what those ideas did for me. still, and it might be a small consolation, by far my most popular post is the one on mormon theology. i don't think it has had any special repercussions, but one never knows what's cooking in the background. it definitely is still brewing within me anyway and giving me new insights and inspirations and intuitions all the time.
@Laeth - Superficially, there is an element of the "meme" you publish "What Mormons look like... What Mormon theology looks like." But, when people are finished with lambasting the CJCLDS for being square and boring; then they just turn to mock the sci-fi fantasy epic excitement of Mormon theology. Damned if they do, damned if they don't.
For "mainstream" Christians, any stick is good enough to beat Mormons with. e.g. I have many-times seen Mormonism described as "Gnostic" when it is the opposite of that - and Classical/ mainstream Christian theology is much, Much closer to Gnosticism than is Mormonism...
But then, people seem to be utterly deluded wrt the nature of Gnosticism. https://charltonteaching.blogspot.com/2023/07/what-gnosticism-is-not.html
It is clearly regarded as absolutely impossible that Mormon theology could be anything other than a ridiculous muddle consisting of bits and pieces of pre-existing theology. That's what they look for, and so that is what they inevitably find.
unfortunately I know exactly what you mean. it's all so tiresome. the gnosticism accusation is thrown against anyone that is slightly outside of the mainstream, really, and it can mean everything and its opposite. in fact, the problem is before that because so many ancient texts recently found are just labelled 'gnostic', regardless of what they say, guilty by proximity as it were. so that you can indeed have gnostic texts that say the world was created by an evil demiurge, and others who are essentially in line with the basic outlines of henotheism and even christian henotheism.
but i think you're right, the accusation is usually regarding those 'evil demiurge' gnostics, and it makes zero sense to say that of mormons, but it does make sense to say that of... mainstream christianity, when we take away all the contradictions and abstractions, we are left with nothing positive about incarnation (including Jesus' incarnation - as you point out, it's always double negative).
Thank you for that background information, surely it underlies the Mormon interest in family lineages. Another theology which very much incorporates this view is that of Emmanuel Swedenborg, the Godhead being understood in the human mind as the marriage of Love and Wisdom united in producing Use, somewhat echoed in the main three yogas of Hinduism (Bhakti, Jnana and Karma), or in terms of human experience the Good, the True and the Beautiful, or in abstract terms Substance, Form and Function. The Trinity in other words. Swedenborg's writings carry the three of Love and Wisdom down to the very wording of scripture where there are pairings everywhere eg Cain and Abel, image and likeness, Ismael and Isaac, Esau and Jacob. I shall check your link.
Thanks for this, Bruce. As one of those rare crackpots who jumped from a vanilla "science-is-everything-long-live-hedonism" existence with both feet into the ridiculous muddle of Mormon theology, I am always grateful when you revisit the subject. It was your writings on this that led me away from a self-destructive, soul-destructive path and back to religion, Christianity, and Mormon theology in particular.
As a card-carrying member now sealed to my wife, my perspective on eternal marriage (probably unorthodox) is that taking it up here on earth is part of spiritual growth. Yes, we always have agency to choose, and so unfortunately a lot of temple marriages fall apart just like all other types. But for those who enter and maintain one, the spiritual growth is tremendous -- I know it has been for me (granted, that's huge growth from a very small base). So not so much the actual making of Heaven on earth, but the aspirational (to take your term) practice of Heaven on earth.
@John - Swedenborg was certainty a remarkable creative genius; but Swedenborg's theology has an utterly different quality and flavour than Joseph Smith's. While Swedenborg is a development of various strands of Western philosophy/ theology (plus personal inspirations); Smith's is as original and distinct as anything since the ancient Greeks.
@Sol - Nice comment! That's an inspiring story.
I completely agree that the aspirational aspect of eternal marriage could be of tremendous value. I also believe that the right kind of public rituals can be greatly helpful.
The problem comes when (as I believe) there is an institutional assertion linking the mortal causally with the eternal (i.e. the assertion that a particular ritual - such as baptism - necessarily has eternal, or supernatural consequences).
To the modern and highly-conscious mind this is demonstrably false, and a cause of apostasy. I don't think it *always* was false, because people in the past were different - spontaneously immersed in a group mind and with the spirit world; and were acted-upon by the group, by ritual and symbol in a way that no longer happens.
For instance, the world of Joseph Smith was still one in which magic was a part of everyday life and experience. That world seems wonderful and remarkable to me, but it's gone because we are different.
And have been for several generations - as evidenced by the *colossal* changes in the CJCLDS, in almost every respect - appearance, behaviour, lifestyle, marriage, families, and the religion itself (e.g. for more than a century the Book of Mormon was almost wholly an instrument of conversion, and not studied as scripture)!
Joseph Smith himself was a wild, impulsive, passionate, charismatic, changeable, intuitive, volcanically-creative individual - who could not even become or remain a CJCLDS member nowadays - never mind the church President!
It’s interesting to me the attitude people in the Church seem to have about revelation, as though personal capabilities make no difference in one’s right to it. This leads to apologetics feeling the need to downplay Smith’s intelligence, constantly emphasizing the fact that he had no formal education, his normalness as a person, as though his status as an exceptional person, as a genius, means that he couldn’t be a prophet (and as though these vocations aren’t highly related to the point of sometimes being the same).
I stumbled upon these quotes in D. Michael Quinn’s book, and considered how foreign they would be to most contemporary LDS.
“ While Brigham Young as succeeding Church president had no desire to use seer stones himself, he endorsed their use. "Joseph said there is a [seer] Stone for every person on Earth," Young reminisced in 1855, then admitted, "I dont no (sic) that I have ever had a desire to have one" (Bullock 1855). Nevertheless, at the first general conference following the death of Joseph Smith, Young told church members, "The president of the priests has a right to the Urim and Thummim, which gives revelation" (HC 7:285), and, in an 1860 sermon, "Showed that the gift of seeing was a natural gift, that there are thousands in the world who are natural born Seers, but when the Lord selected Joseph Smith to be his vice-gerent and mouthpiece upon the earth in this dispensation, he saw that he would be faithful and honor his calling" (Deseret News [24 Dec. 1860]:337). Shortly after the publication of a summary of this sermon, Apostle John Taylor explained to a church congregation the meaning of Young's remarks in regard to seer stones and church authority: "Brigham Young in saying that He did not profess to be a prophet seer & Revelator as Joseph Smith was, was speaking of men being born Natural Prophets & seers. Many have the gift of seeing through seer stones without the Priesthood at all. He had not this gift (of using seer stones) naturally yet He was an Apostle & the Presidet of the Church" (Woodruff, 5:550). “
Nowadays the unspoken definition of a Prophet/seer is a retired and accomplished professional who has finally ascended the ranks in the latter part of life—only then could one be a Prophet/seer (and then, what does this look like?) I do believe Mormons are quite aware of these absurdities but ignore them because of all the positive aspects of religious life and belief. And of course these absurdities are not a big deal to me. They are colossal misunderstandings but they don’t have any bearing on the truthfulness of the original revelation. I can believe that the LDS Church is God’s Church, but only when I admit that He has, for whatever reason, perhaps because of unrighteousness, or complacency, or because of some higher consideration that I don’t know, abandoned it (or at least has allowed a course that hardly inspires confidence). But this goes back to how one receives revelation. Marvelous revelations require marvelous seekers in my opinion. The “non-idealized” biography of Smith is much more impressive and compelling, but instead, sensibilities being what they are, it’s a source of doubt and confusion.
@Henry - Interesting comment. Fits with my own researches, too.
I think that Smith was both a genius and a prophet - but I think the exaggeration of his simplicity comes from the line taken by (for example) Harold Bloom that Smith was *just* a genius.
Also, I think it is fair enough to emphasize that it is all but impossible that - from his background - Joseph could have laid the foundation for the first truly novel metaphysics since the Pre-Socratic Greeks. That surely goes beyond what even a genius like Shakespeare could have accomplished...
Except, having said that, there is a basis in simplicity and common sense that permeates Smiths work - as if he was uniquely able to proceed from what were genuinely spontaneous first principles, in a mind relatively uncluttered by preconceptions.
Yes, the business of personal revelations as the root of the Mormon revelation, yet their asserted hierarchical validity on the basis of a person's appointed church office, has always led to a kind of absurdity by putting church elections and procedures as above and controlling of God's relationship with individuals.
Or, more exactly, as regarding God as working primarily via the institutional church. But why would God do this? When the institutional church is so obviously and increasingly converged (in several vital respects) with the demonic totalitarian agenda?
This was evident to the discerning intelligence before 2020, but the events of 2020 (and that these decisions by the CJCLDS have been doubled-down upon, and continued - not repented) are about as clear as anything I personally could imagine.
(Given that evidence never dictates interpretation, because interpretation is controlled by concepts.)
"Marvelous revelations require marvelous seekers in my opinion. " - I don't agree with this, because I think it is a false framing of the question. The proper framing is - I think - to emphasize that we each have ultimate responsibility for our ultimate faith.
The marvelousness of a seeker is almost always going to be a decision based upon secondhand, usually historical, and often contaminated evidence - and in a world like this one, I personally feel that I should never (or very seldom) rely upon secondhand evidence for ultimate, bottom line, life and death convictions.
@ Henry,
spot on and beautifully stated.
@ Bruce,
Am I correct in inferring from the last bit that you consider it unlikely, or maybe even impossible, for a new revelation of the kind of Joseph Smith (or any earlier prophet) to occur in our age? Meaning, there won't be anything broadly applicable in terms of revelation from now on, and JS was the last of a kind? I don't know what I believe about this, not with any great confidence. Though it's hard for me to imagine someone more or less starting a new religion in our age, and it being a true one. At the same time, I can't quite discard the possibility completely.
@Laeth "consider it unlikely, or maybe even impossible, for a new revelation of the kind of Joseph Smith (or any earlier prophet) to occur in our age? Meaning, there won't be anything broadly applicable in terms of revelation from now on, and JS was the last of a kind? "
No, I certainly do not consider that to be true - and I wasn't even discussing the subject; so either I didn't express myself properly, or you misread me, or both!
More exactly, if a did address the subject; I think it is "unlikely" in the sense that there are very few geniuses now, compared with 1830 (when geniuses were almost falling out of trees among those of European-British Isles descent). And because something that happened once after 2000 years is probably unlikely to happen again after only 200. And, if it did, it would almost certainly be ignored by almost everybody.
People start religions all the tie, as they always have done; but hardly any stick, and of those that do most only thrive for a few decades (Christian Science for instance), and of those religions that have thrived institutionally for significant periods (e.g. Mormons, Seventh Day Adventists, Jehovah's Witnesses, Bahai) - all seem to be thoroughly neutralized by now.
But those are just guesses, and a long way from (in two words...) "Im-Possible".
Henry has left a comment:
"A lot of those who view Smith as just a genius see him still as essentially a conman (or sometimes a con and sometimes a genius, or a genius at being a con) while Bloom was convinced of his total sincerity and regarded him as a prophet in some kind of mytho-poetic sense (a rare view with certain problems such as when it comes to the plates). Or, he does say that Smith was a genuine prophet but he evidently has a relativistic conception of what this means... Ultimately I believe what prevented Bloom from becoming some kind of Mormon was not his evaluation of the case itself (he is one the few “learned men”, and maybe the only famous one, that I’ve come across who saw the phenomena in all its glory and, in a good sense, bizarreness) but his assumptions going in. I don’t know that much and won’t speculate on his spiritual life but he seems to have been deeply committed to a belief in the annihilation of the human personality or soul at death (while in some way part of you lives on); and then he would say that the aesthetic splendor of Hamlet and King Lear proved this (I can’t claim to be able to follow this intuition). I recall reading an amusing interview where he insists he believes in Yahweh, but doesn’t like him, while his wife believes he’s an atheist, but he insists otherwise. He was a melancholy man, but delightful."
@Henry - My impression of Harold Bloom wrt Mormonism was that he liked the early church because (and insofar as) it resembled the Ancient Hebrews. The early decades of Mormonism socio-politically seemed like a new kind of Judaism is some respects (even down to calling those outside the new and synthetic Israelite tribe by the term "gentiles"). Indeed, I think Bloom rather daydreamed (while writing American Religion, anyway) about the lifestyle possibilities of a polygynous patriarchy.
Although in practice I would guess that HB was more of a child of sixties-style polymorphous promiscuity - he certainly engaged in "French kissing" men on greeting them, as one of my blog commenters once described from personal experience!
One of my favorite teachers in the church said, "Over the years I have frequently taught an important principle: the end of all activity in the Church is to see that a man and a woman with their children are happy at home, sealed together for time and for all eternity."
I suppose this is part of why Mormons generally avoid theological discussions, as these often interfere with that ultimate goal!
I believe it is one of the legitimate hive mind projects of women to weave in-group cultural cohesion in order to make it easier for the young folks to engage in courtship and child-rearing. This is how I make sense of what goes on in my Relief Society meetings. Meanwhile I learn from my husband that the men in their Priesthood meetings are more likely to be touching on the cosmic questions, and the discussion often gets pretty far out. In these differing approaches to church purposes, it seems that men and women mostly tolerate and work around each other.
My feeling is that the nuts and bolts of relationship-building, maintaining, and protecting in mortal life really are potentially eternally significant.
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