The Teachings of Mormonism

1
The Teachings of Mormonism

• Many Books, Gods, Prophecies, Wives, Priesthoods,
  Temples, Baptisms

2
LDS Standard Works

• King James Version Bible or Joseph Smiths own
  translation
• The Book of Mormon
• Doctrine and Covenants (orginally the Book of
  Commandments)
• The Pearl of Great Price (containing the Book of
  Moses, the Book of Abraham, Matthew 24, some
  History of Joseph Smith, and the Articles of
  Faith)

3
Changes to the Book of Mormon

• Jerald and Sandra Tanner have found 3,913 changes
  to the Book of Mormon between 1830 and 1964.
• Most are typo and spelling changes.
• Some are significant.
• Since then 2 Nephi 306 has been changed from
  white and delightsome to pure and delightsome
  as regards what would happen to Indians who
  convert.

4
Current View of God

• God used to be a man who became good enough to be
  a god.
• He took his wives and created this world.
• His wives bear spirit children who go into the
  bodies of babies when they are born.
• Men today can become good enough to become gods.
• Then they can take their wives and create their
  own worlds.

5
The Book of Mormon on God

• The Book of Mormon is very Trinitarian.
• 2 Nephi 26 12And as I spake concerning the
  convincing of the Jews, that Jesus is the very
  Christ, it must needs be that the Gentiles be
  convinced also that Jesus is the Christ, the
  Eternal God

6
The Book of Mormon on God

• The Book of Mormon is very Trinitarian.
• 2 Nephi 11 7For if there be no Christ there be
  no God and if there be no God we are not, for
  there could have been no creation. But there is a
  God, and he is Christ, and he cometh in the
  fulness of his own time.

7
The Book of Mormon on God

• The Book of Mormon is very Trinitarian.
• 2 Nephi 31 21And now, behold, my beloved
  brethren, this is the way and there is none
  other way nor name given under heaven whereby man
  can be saved in the kingdom of God. And now,
  behold, this is the doctrine of Christ, and the
  only and true doctrine of the Father, and of the
  Son, and of the Holy Ghost, which is one God,
  without end. Amen.

8
The Book of Mormon on God

• The Book of Mormon is very Trinitarian.
• Mosiah 15 2-52And because he dwelleth in flesh
  he shall be called the Son of God, and having
  subjected the flesh to the will of the Father,
  being the Father and the Son3The Father, because
  he was conceived by the power of God and the
  Son, because of the flesh thus becoming the
  Father and Son4And they are one God, yea, the
  very Eternal Father of heaven and of earth. 5And
  thus the flesh becoming subject to the Spirit, or
  the Son to the Father, being one God, suffereth
  temptation, and yieldeth not to the temptation,
  but suffereth himself to be mocked, and scourged,
  and cast out, and disowned by his people.

9
The Book of Mormon on God

• The Book of Mormon is very Trinitarian.
• Mosiah 16 15Teach them that redemption cometh
  through Christ the Lord, who is the very Eternal
  Father. Amen.

10
The Book of Mormon on God

• The Book of Mormon is very Trinitarian.
• Alma 11 26-29
•   26 And Zeezrom said unto him Thou sayest there
  is a true and living God?
•   27 And Amulek said Yea, there is a true and
  living God.
•   28 Now Zeezrom said Is there more than one
  God?
•   29 And he answered, No.

11
The Book of Mormon on God

• The Book of Mormon is very Trinitarian.
• Alma 11 38-39
•   38 Now Zeezrom saith again unto him Is the Son
  of God the very Eternal Father?
•   39 And Amulek said unto him Yea, he is the
  very Eternal Father of heaven and of earth, and
  all things which in them are he is the beginning
  and the end, the first and the last

12
The Book of Mormon on God

• The Book of Mormon is very Trinitarian.
• 3 Ne. 11 27And after this manner shall ye
  baptize in my name for behold, verily I say unto
  you, that the Father, and the Son, and the Holy
  Ghost are one and I am in the Father, and the
  Father in me, and the Father and I are one.

13
The Book of Mormon on God

• The Book of Mormon is very Trinitarian.
• 3 Ne. 11 36And 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.

14
The Book of Mormon on God

• The Book of Mormon teaches that God does not
  change.
• Mormon 9 9-109For do we not read that God is
  the same yesterday, today, and forever, and in
  him there is no variableness neither shadow of
  changing? 10And now, if ye have imagined up unto
  yourselves a god who doth vary, and in whom there
  is shadow of changing, then have ye imagined up
  unto yourselves a god who is not a God of
  miracles.

15
The Book of Mormon on God

• The Book of Mormon teaches that God does not
  change.
• Mormon 9 19if there were miracles wrought then,
  why has God ceased to be a God of miracles and
  yet be an unchangeable Being? And behold, I say
  unto you he changeth not if so he would cease to
  be God and he ceaseth not to be God, and is a
  God of miracles.

16
The Book of Mormon on God

• The Book of Mormon teaches that God does not
  change.
• Moroni 8 18For I know that God is not a partial
  God, neither a changeable being but he is
  unchangeable from all eternity to all eternity.

17
The 1835 Lectures on Faith

• The fifth lecture (2) teaches that God is a
  spirit.
• They are the Father and the Son the Father
  being a personage of spirit, glory, and power,
  possessing all perfection and fulness. The Son,
  who was in the bosom of the Father, is a
  personage of tabernacle, made or fashioned like
  unto man, being in the form and likeness of man,
  or rather man was formed after his likeness and
  in his image.

18
The 1835 Lectures on Faith

• The second lecture (2) teaches that God had no
  beginning.
• We here observe that God is the only supreme
  governor, and independent being, in whom all
  fulness and perfection dwells who is omnipotent,
  omnipresent, and omnicient without beginning of
  days or end of life and that in him every good
  gift, and every good principle dwells and that
  he is the Father of lights.

19
The Pearl of Great Price

• The Book of Moses (16) teaches there is only one
  God (June 1830).
• And I have a work for thee, Moses, my son and
  thou art in the similitude of mine Only Begotten
  and mine Only Begotten is and shall be the
  Savior, for he is full of grace and truth but
  there is no God beside me, and all things are
  present with me, for I know them all.

20
The Pearl of Great Price

• The Book of Abraham (chapters 4 5) teaches
  there are many gods (published in 1842).
• For example Abram. 41And then the Lord said
  Let us go down. And they went down at the
  beginning, and they, that is the Gods, organized
  and formed the heavens and the earth.

21
A Misunderstanding of Elohim

• Joseph Smith was learning a little Hebrew but
  misunderstood the ending of the word elohim.
• Elohim can be translated either God or gods.
• The -im ending can either be intensive (thus God)
  or plural (thus gods).
• Compare the -s ending in English which can either
  be possessive or plural.

22
Doctrines Covenants

• DC 13022The Father has a body of flesh and
  bones as tangible as mans the Son also but the
  Holy Ghost has not a body of flesh and bones, but
  is a personage of Spirit. Were it not so, the
  Holy Ghost could not dwell in us.
• Instruction given by Joseph Smith the Prophet, at
  Ramus, Illinois, April 2, 1843

23
Problem with Book of Abraham

• In 1835 Joseph Smith and others purchased four
  Egyptian mummies and several pages of papyri.
• He claimed that the papyri contained works by
  Abraham and Joseph.
• He translated the Abraham papyri.
• Most of the work on the translation was done in
  1835, but the book was not published until 1842
  after some revision.

24
Problem with Book of Abraham

• Emma Smith sold the papyri and mummies in 1856 to
  Abel Combs, who later sold two mummies and some
  papyri to the Chicago Museum they were destroyed
  in the Great Chicago Fire.
• Other papyri found their way to Combss
  housekeeper and then to the New York Metropolitan
  Museum of Art in 1947.
• In 1967 they were given to the Mormon Church
  after receiving an anonymous donation .

25
Problem with Book of Abraham

• These papyrii contained the originals from which
  the Book of Abraham had been translated.
• However, they proved to be rather common copies
  of the Book of the Dead which was buried with
  mummies in ancient Egypt.
• Their translation by Egyptian scholars is very
  different from that of Joseph Smith.

26
Problem with Book of Abraham

• Compare the identification of individuals in
  Facsimile No. 3 of the Book of Abraham with a
  similar picture in a Book of the Dead.

Osiris
Olimlah, a slave
Prince of Pharaoh
The dead man named Hunefer
Isis
Pharaoh
Abraham
Shulem
jackal-headed Anubis
Maat
The dead man Hor
From the British Museum web site