{"id":3791,"date":"2016-04-17T08:00:05","date_gmt":"2016-04-17T14:00:05","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/stallioncornell.com\/blog\/?p=3791"},"modified":"2016-04-16T21:46:38","modified_gmt":"2016-04-17T03:46:38","slug":"ces-reply-joseph-smith-trinitarian-part-ii","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stallioncornell.com\/blog\/ces-reply-joseph-smith-trinitarian-part-ii\/","title":{"rendered":"CES Reply: Joseph Smith – Trinitarian? (Part II)"},"content":{"rendered":"

The following verses are among many verses still in the Book of Mormon that hold a Trinitarian view of the Godhead:<\/span><\/p>\n

Alma 11:38-39:<\/span><\/p>\n

38: Now Zeezrom saith again unto him: Is the Son of God the very Eternal Father?<\/span><\/p>\n

39: And Amulek said unto him: Yea, he is the very Eternal Father of heaven and of earth,<\/span>and all things which in them are; he is the beginning and the end, the first and the last;<\/span><\/p>\n

Mosiah 15:1-4:<\/span><\/p>\n

1: And now Abinadi said unto them: I would that ye should understand that God himself\u00a0<\/span>shall come down among the children of men, and shall redeem his people.<\/span><\/p>\n

2: And because he dwelleth in flesh he shall be called the Son of God, and having\u00a0<\/span>subjected the flesh to the will of the Father, being the Father and the Son \u2013<\/span><\/p>\n

3: The Father, because he was conceived by the power of God; and the Son, because of\u00a0<\/span>the flesh; thus becoming the Father and Son \u2013<\/span><\/p>\n

4: And they are one God, yea, the very Eternal Father of heaven and of earth.<\/span>
\n Ether 3:14-15:<\/span><\/p>\n

14: Behold, I am he who was prepared from the foundation of the world to redeem my\u00a0<\/span>people. Behold, I am Jesus Christ. I am the Father and the Son.<\/b> In me shall all mankind have life, and that eternally, even they who shall believe on my name; and they shall become my sons and my daughters.
\n<\/span>
\n 15: And never have I showed myself unto man whom I have created, for never has man believed in me as thou hast. Seest thou that ye are created after mine own image? Yea, even all men were created in the beginning after mine own image. (Emphasis added).<\/span><\/p>\n

Mosiah 16:15:<\/span><\/p>\n

15: Teach them that redemption cometh through Christ the Lord, who is the very Eternal\u00a0<\/span>Father. Amen.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Yes, and these verses take the bottom out from under your argument. If Joseph\u2019s purpose in altering 1 Nephi was to purge Trinitarianism from the Book of Mormon, why would he leave these untouched? Also, you left out a big one from your list. The same title page that announces the Book of Mormon is not inerrant also says the purpose of the Book of Mormon is \u201cto the convincing of the Jew and Gentile that JESUS is the CHRIST, the ETERNAL GOD, manifesting himself unto all nations.\u201d [Caps in original]<\/p>\n

Again, there it is, right on the first page. The verses you quote, coupled with the announcement of its purpose, make it clear Christ is God and that he is the Eternal Father as well as the Son, and it does so more explicitly than the verses Joseph changed. Even if he somehow forgot about all these other verses \u2013 highly unlikely – surely he wouldn\u2019t let that Trinitarian title page hang out there like a big steaming matso ball, would he?\u00a0 In addition, the Doctrine and Covenants makes no attempt to shy away from these doctrines \u2013 several revelations begin by announcing that it is the Father speaking, and they end in the name of Jesus Christ.<\/p>\n

What\u2019s going on?<\/p>\n

The answer, paradoxically, is that these verses are no more intrinsically Trinitarian than the changes are un-Trinitarian.<\/p>\n

The Trinity relies on extra-Biblical creedal language to interpret scripture. In other words, one has to learn from creedal texts outside the Bible that God doesn\u2019t make any sense at all and then graft that interpretation on the scripture after the fact. The plain meaning of the text will not automatically guide you to that bizarre conclusion. So these verses are consistent with Bible verses that make similar pronouncements, and no one, including Joseph Smith, has to apply the external Trinitarian lens to read them correctly.<\/p>\n

After all, Jesus stated that \u201cthis is life eternal, that they might know thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast sent.\u201d (John 17:3) If our eternal life depends on us knowing God, how can we do that if he\u2019s incomprehensible?<\/p>\n

That verse comes from what I believe to be the most profoundly spiritual chapter in all of scripture. John 17, the Great Intercessory Prayer, offers the solution. It provides the clearest possible understanding of what God means when he says he is the Father and the Son, and it does so in what seems to me to be explicitly Mormon terms:<\/p>\n

John 17: 20-23
\n20\u00a0Neither pray I for these alone, but for them also which shall believe on me through their word;<\/i><\/p>\n

\u00a021\u00a0That they all may be one; as thou, Father, art in me, and I in thee, that they also may be one in us: that the world may believe that thou hast sent me.<\/i><\/p>\n

\u00a022\u00a0And the glory which thou gavest me I have given them; that they may be one, even as we are one:<\/i><\/p>\n

\u00a023\u00a0I in them, and thou in me, that they may be made perfect in one; and that the world may know that thou hast sent me, and hast loved them, as thou hast loved me.<\/i><\/p>\n

So we\u2019re all supposed to be one, just as Christ and his father are one. Do we imagine that involves all of us becoming the same person? To be saved, does Jeremy Runnells have to become Jim Bennett and become Jesus Christ, too? Are we all to be some giant blobular God together, and yet be somehow also separate at the same time?<\/p>\n

As Paul would say, Heaven forbid! This is a unity of purpose Christ is talking about, not an esoteric Trinitarian paradox. These verses in the Book of Mormon, and similar-sounding verses in the Bible, are teaching the essential nature of unity. To paraphrase BYU professor Robert Millet, they\u2019re to teach us that the Father and the Son are infinitely more alike than they are separate. I think we often overcorrect in the Church and go out of our way to emphasize their distinct physical forms and lose sight of their innate and magnificent spiritual unity. These verses remain in order to teach us a profound lesson that we overlook at our spiritual peril.<\/p>\n

When I teach this doctrine, I liken it to children who try to play one parent off the other. Kids often hold out hope that if Mom says no, maybe they can convince Dad to say yes. A perfectly united marriage wouldn\u2019t have this problem, as the mother would be able to perfectly speak for the father, and vice versa.<\/p>\n

In the Godhead, Jesus\u2019s agenda is identical to the Father\u2019s agenda \u2013 you can\u2019t play one off of the other. So when people read scriptures and ask, \u201cwell, is this the Father or the Son speaking,\u201d Jesus\u2019s answer is \u2013 doesn\u2019t matter in the least. We speak for each other without the slightest deviation. I am so in line with the Father that I can speak for the Father, in the first person as the Father, as if I were the Father.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s what Christ expects from us \u2013 to become one, to have His agenda be our agenda, for all of to be perfectly united and \u201cknit together in love.\u201d It\u2019s a beautiful doctrine, and, at its core, astonishingly simple, as opposed to the Trinity, which is ridiculously complex and impossible to understand.<\/p>\n

LDS scholar, Boyd Kirkland, made the following observation: <\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cThe Book of Mormon and early revelations of Joseph Smith do indeed vividly portray a picture of the Father and Son as the same God…why is it that the Book of Mormon not only doesn\u2019t clear up questions about the Godhead which have raged in Christianity for centuries, but on the contrary just adds to the confusion? This seems particularly ironic, since a major avowed purpose of the book was to restore lost truths and end doctrinal controversies caused by the \u201cgreat and abominable Church\u2019s\u201d corruption of the Bible…In later years he [Joseph] reversed his earlier efforts to completely \u2018monotheise\u2019 the godhead and instead \u2018tritheised\u2019 it.\u201d \u2013 LDS scholar, Boyd Kirkland, \u201cAn Evolving God\u201d\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

I googled Boyd Kirkland, and all I came up with was a Wikipedia article<\/a> about “an American<\/a> television<\/a> director<\/a> of animated cartoons<\/a>. He was best known for his work on X-Men Evolution<\/i><\/a>.\u201d So I googled him again, adding the word \u201cMormon\u201d to the search, and the same article popped up. Sure enough, under his biographical information, it points out that he was a Mormon who wrote articles about controversial issues. To twice reference him as an \u201cLDS Scholar,\u201d however, implies some kind of unique authority or academic status that he didn\u2019t have \u2013 his educational background is a B.S. in business administration from Weber State, and he was an animator by profession. He\u2019s no more an \u201cLDS scholar\u201d than I am \u2013 he was an unofficial critic to counter us unofficial apologists.<\/p>\n

Sad to read that he passed away at age 60. Far too young.<\/p>\n

Again, he\u2019s welcome to his opinion, as are you, but I don\u2019t see any need to agree with either, and I don\u2019t think his argument necessarily carries any more weight than anyone else\u2019s. Although I\u2019m thrilled that he was, in fact, the \u201cproducer for Attack of the Killer Tomatoes: The Animated Series<\/i><\/a>,\u201d which may well be the greatest thing I\u2019ve ever heard.<\/p>\n

Attack of the Killer Tomatoes!
\nAttack of the Killer Tomatoes!
\nThey\u2019ll beat you, bash you,
\nSquish you, smash you
\nServe you up for brunch<\/i><\/p>\n

And finish you off<\/i><\/p>\n

For dinner or lunch!<\/i><\/p>\n

Assuming that the official 1838 First Vision account is truthful and accurate, why would Joseph Smith hold a Trinitarian view of the Godhead if he personally saw God the Father and Jesus Christ as separate and embodied beings a few years earlier in the Sacred Grove?\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

I don\u2019t think he would or did hold a Trinitarian view. I don\u2019t think these verses, both the changed and unchanged ones, suggest otherwise. Again, it\u2019s very hard to \u201chold a Trinitarian view\u201d in practical terms anyway, and a good deal of people who call themselves Trinitarians actually think of God in very Mormon terms because the Trinity, by definition, makes no sense at all.<\/p>\n

To sum up, \u201cNuns on the Run\u201d should be required viewing for all seminary students, as long as they cut out the nude scene in the girl\u2019s locker room.<\/p>\n

Tomorrow – A Rock in a Hat!<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The following verses are among many verses still in the Book of Mormon that hold a Trinitarian view of the Godhead:Alma 11:38-39:<\/span>38: Now Zeezrom saith again unto him: Is the Son of God the very Eternal Father?<\/span>39: And Amulek said unto him: Yea, he is the very Eternal Father of heaven and <\/span> ... Read more<\/a>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3791","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stallioncornell.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3791","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stallioncornell.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stallioncornell.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stallioncornell.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stallioncornell.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3791"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/stallioncornell.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3791\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3792,"href":"https:\/\/stallioncornell.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3791\/revisions\/3792"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stallioncornell.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3791"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stallioncornell.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3791"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stallioncornell.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3791"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}