You're entering outer brightness. Hey, Fireflies. This is the final installment of our conversation with Steve James, picking up where we left off in part two.
Hope you enjoy. Yeah, I think that's one issue at least that I kind of had is when I was latter-day saints, when I see Christians, you know, evangelicals or Protestants talking about inerrancy, it's more of the dictation theory, you know, the mechanistic transcribing of scripture where, you know, they see like every single letter as, as perfect. And so he just sits there and he's kind of an automaton, you know, just robotically writing every character, but yeah, no, it's, it's much more organic. And I think it's, I think in terms of the actual process, I think the evangelicals and LDS agree that it's not just like a mechanistic, you know, transcription that it is more organic and, you know that it is God working through them. But I think maybe, and I'm not sure, maybe we would agree actually, but like the final product that it was actually written down and trans, you know, given to the saints that is inspired and without error and errors could come later through copies or whatever, but, but what God inspired through them and what they wrote and gave is, is infallible and inerrant. So would you agree with that?
Or would you? I mean, I'd say that that's, if there is a time when scripture is inerrant, that's the time it is when it's originally given. I think my issue with that is that, and you guys probably know this from studying your mnudics is that, you know, the moment we start to interpret words, we're bringing in our own milieu, we're bringing in our own schema. And so regardless if it's written perfectly, just the fact that we're reading it sort of makes it imperfect or adds imperfections to it.
But, you know, I think that, yeah, there is a time when scripture was like perfect that in area and like, you know, Islam style, like hand, Lord of God, that's when it was originally came out. Okay, cool. Yeah, we could, we could talk more about the rich man of Lazarus.
I haven't gotten through his entire paper. I could send that to you if you're interested, but yeah, that's pretty new to me as well. So that'd be like, I'd definitely like to read it. The other one we talked about was, was it Psalm 104 that I brought up? And this one is, this is one where you could parallel with the hymn to Aten, which is a Egyptian, you know, God at the time.
And I can post the link, but there's, there's websites you can find Project Augustine is the one I found that has them just next to each other. And I mean, you can read them and it's clearly, it's not like it's a word for word, but it's, it's just about pretty darn close to the point where it's really hard to say that these didn't have at least a common source. Now, you know, most scholars would say either there's a common source that both of them got it from, maybe there was a, you know, Egyptian influence or that, or that David was using Egyptian writing as a way kind of the polemic against it, which is an argument I hear a lot from the evangelical side. Anytime we see similar language, it somehow becomes polemic, which, you know, we could get into that and why, why I kind of have my reservations. But what is clear is that it's, it just seems impossible that they came about independently. Yeah, it seems almost guaranteed that the one came from the other or they both came from a similar source. I'd be curious to hear your thoughts on why you disagree with the concept of it becoming polemic.
Oh, sure. I mean, I think that's often just kind of read into the text. Like, like the examples all here is, well, Psalm 82, you know, we read in Psalm 82, Elohim stands amidst the Elohim, God stands amongst the gods, He tells them He's judged unrighteously, He banishes them to death. And a lot of Protestant tile here will say, well, these gods aren't really gods, they're actually humans, and it's all just like polemic against that language. Or another example is Isaiah 43, 10, which we've probably talked about, there's no God beside me, behind me, beside me, there is no other, which we know, and we could find elsewhere in the Bible, that is a, this is an expression of supremacy, not an ontological declaration.
This is me saying, you know, I'm so great, there's none greater than me, there's no one else beside me, it's not saying, my nature is such that there's nothing like me. And so, you know, and we see that language used in the surrounding cultures, but I'll hear people say, well, when the Israelites used it, it was polemic, when I don't see how they used it any differently, if that makes any sense. Well, I think the argument for polemic comes from the ways that the Old Testament prophets are interacting with the literature and the teachings of the religions of the peoples around them. They do so in a polemic way, they're arguing for, like you said, the supremacy of Yahweh. So that's kind of where scholars argue that it becomes a polemic, right? That they're arguing for, you know, and you know, Heizer, right? Heizer talks about, you know, the view that Psalm 82 is talking about other divine beings who are divine because they're spiritual beings, but they are created beings and Yahweh is supreme over them, right? Which the Psalm itself says Yahweh has taken his place in his council, right? He rules the council. So even if you're going to, I guess just to keep things short on that, that's where the idea that it's polemical comes from.
It's just the writings of the Old Testament prophets are polemical against other gods. Okay. Okay. Yeah, that sounds like a topic worthy of its own.
It's on podcast as well. Any thoughts, Matthew? So, Paul's been trying to, trying to drag me into the Michael Heizer train, but I'm not 100%. I've started reading his stuff and watching his stuff and I have questions and, and he sometimes interacts with opposite views that, that are not how I view that passage. So it's kind of a little bit hard for me to get on board with what he's saying because he's countering something that I don't, you know, I'm like, well, I don't agree with that.
Why would I, you know what I mean? It seems like he's kind of like, it's either on their side or my side. And I'm like, I'm not really on either. So I don't know.
Sure. So I struggle with it, but no, he's, he's got a really great insights. And I do agree that the straightforward reading of the text is more persuasive for what he's advocating. But anyways, yeah, that's, I find just like in general, just, just like a comment is like, I've, I've found that, you know, when I was questioning and leaving into Christianity and like, you know, a lot of what I thought was like, well, Christianity, they don't even agree on all this stuff. You know, it's just confusion.
It's mass confusion. They don't really agree on stuff, but I've actually found it very intellectually, you know, stimulating to know that, Hey, there's some, there's a lot of stuff that we agree on, but there's a lot of stuff that we, that we're not so sure about, or we disagree on and we can have debates on it. And I don't know, I think it's great to be able to do that. So okay. Well, I don't want to, I don't want to take things over too much.
Did you guys have a specific thing we wanted to get into next or a cover? No, keep going with your outline. So let's see. The next thing I had was, you know, I mentioned a few other Psalms you've got Psalm 29 originally written to Baal or Baal Psalm 20. I mean, there's several that biblical scholars have sort of connected to, to works that preceded them.
I don't know how big a deal that is to the argument. But article four, I asked, so the article four says we further denied that the corruption of human culture and language through sin has thwarted God's work of inspiration. So I read that to understand that despite cultural and language barriers, we should still be able to get God's word out of the scripture. Is that, does that sound accurate? Like what it's, what it's describing?
Let me jump over to it and take a quick look. So article four, we affirm that God who made mankind in his image has used language as a means of revelation. We deny that human language is so limited by our creatureliness that it is rendered inadequate as a vehicle for divine revelation. We further deny that the corruption of human culture and language through sin has thwarted God's work of inspiration.
Yeah. So this is just now, first of all, it's an affirmation that, that, that God uses human language to speak to people, right? He used the, the, the human language of the authors of the Bible to inspire what he would have written.
That seems kind of straightforward, but, but it's not like Matthew was pointing out. Sometimes people have that dictaphone type, type view of how revelation and inspiration come came to the authors. But then there's also the denials here, which is denying that, that that cultural gap and that time gap that exists between us and the authors of scripture and the, and the original readers and hearers of what we found that what we find in scripture is so great as to make it impossible for God to get his word and his intent across to us from scripture. So yeah, I would deny that as a biblical studies guy, I think it's important that we we understand that when we're dealing with the Bible, we're dealing with, we are dealing with a cultural gap.
We are dealing with a time gap. Like you were saying earlier, Steve when we bring our ideas to it and we start reading it in English, you know, what the ideas that form in our minds may be completely different than the ideas that would have formed in an ancient Israelites mind reading the Torah or, or someone hearing Jesus preach, right. The sermon on the Mount. So but this, yeah, this, this article just kind of denies that, that those, those difficulties while they are difficulties are not so great as to be insurmountable in terms of us gathering what, what it is that God would have us know from scripture.
Okay. So that the first thought that came to my head when I read that, and this might be a little curt, but why does it take a math, a master's degree or a grad school degree to understand some of the stuff? If, if that language and culture is not a barrier, you know, why, why can't your average Joe just reading it in any translation get the gist of it?
Why does it, do we need to go and, and, you know, do all this exegesis and do all these breakdowns and, you know, rediscuss the schema of the ancient peoples? Oh, well, I think one, I would push back a little bit and say that I think any average Joe can read the Bible and, and, and get the message that, that God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son, that whosoever believes in him shall have eternal life and shall not perish, but have eternal life for God to not send a son into the world to condemn the world, but that through him, the world will be saved. Right. So, so I don't think it's impossible for anyone to sit down and read the Bible and understand what, what God's messages to us.
Are there greater insights that be, that can be garnered from sure. Sorry. You're good. That's okay. Hi.
Say hi. Are there greater insights that can be gained from a scholarship? Absolutely. I I've loved the studying that I've done. I don't think that it's necessary to go to seminary as I did to, to really understand the message of the Bible. But there are certainly ways in which people misinterpret and misunderstand the Bible to you know, great error. And for that reason, I think scholarship is important and it's always been a very important part of the Christian tradition you know, throughout the centuries. And that's one of the things that, that draws me to it, you know, that the scholarship and, and and study that the faithful men have done throughout the centuries ensures that the deposit of faith that was given the, the, the, the faith once for all delivered to the saints doesn't get corrupted. That, that, you know, anyone who's, who comes along and claims to have another gospel or, or interpret things in ways that, that aren't accurate when, when you look at what the scriptures say can be countered by, by those who study. So, you know, faithful shepherds of the flock. Yeah. I would just add that the reformers, they, they wrestle with this too, because, you know, their, their whole philosophy was ad fontes going to the source because they felt that for centuries, you know, tradition had been seen as, as a source of revelation alongside, well, a source of authority alongside scripture.
And so they wanted to return to the source and see scripture as the, the sole infallible role of faith and practice. And so they came up with a word that's complicated, but the meaning is not complicated. So it's called perspicuity. I'm sure you've probably heard of that.
Yeah. Perspicuity of scripture just means scripture is easy to understand in terms of its basic message, but when you get into the fine details and, you know, a lot of the, the many, you know, the stories, the parables understanding, you know, the context, the historical background, the geographical cultural background, that's all complicated and that requires a lot of study. And, and I think it's also the work of, you know, when you say the church broadly, you know, like the, the body of believers to kind of dig into this and try to understand it from all these different aspects and try to understand what the original intent God wanted us to understand.
And so that's, that's hard part. And yeah, you know, there's somebody that could spend their whole lives, you know, studying one particular passage and publishing on it. And I don't think there's any contradiction there because you don't need to, you know, to study one particular passage to understand what God wants you to know for your life.
Like when Paul, the apostle Paul, not, not Paul Nurnberg, but when the apostle Paul was, you know, talking to Timothy in chapter three, in chapter three, usually evangelicals quote verses 16 and 17, but the entire chapter, he's giving him instruction. You know, this is, it's contains a word of truth. It's trustworthy, you know, it's, it's, it's leading, leading you into the faith and it's what you've been raised up into as a believer, as a child even. And so that's kind of, you know, it's suitable for, for everybody, you know, not just the scholars, you know, everybody can find spiritual truth and profit by it.
Yeah. I like that last sentence. I think anyone can read any book of scripture, including ours, or even ones that I don't believe in and find something good in there. And I do think the central message of most scripture is apparent. I do think that there are doctrinal issues that arise because of some of this ambiguity. And I think that that's a little problematic in terms of inerrancy, especially if we're in the business of excluding certain people based on those doctrinal views. But again, that's kind of its own conversation. It seems like we've already talked about cultural views as well.
Like that, that's, that's not something that's going to inhibit. So even if Paul had a view about what women's hair, what that entailed and what that was all about, why it should be covered, even though that's in the scripture, that doesn't necessarily taint the scripture in any way, even though it's his cultural view, you both would agree with that. I think Kaiser's view on this is interesting. I'm still working through what, what the meaning of that whole thing is, but I don't know if I've seen that. I see talking about how the angel's saw hair is something desirable and sort of like protection from them.
Yeah. I mean, you know, it's easy for us to think some ideas are so crazy and, you know, there's no way that someone would believe that, but it's, you know, it's just, we need to remember it's not all that long ago that ideas like this were quite common. I mean, even in Joseph Smith's time, ideas that people today would see as Holcomb were quite common place, even amongst Christians, you know, things like dousing robots, for example. I think that actually helped because the environment wasn't so negative towards those things that Joseph had that gift.
It made him a little more accepted, obviously not accepted enough because he was killed, but it made him at least a little more accepted than, than he would have been today. And there's, and there's a lot of debate as to, yeah, whether, you know, the Bible has a lot of doctrinal teachings and, you know, there's, there's normative descriptions of what happened versus, you know, you know, what is actually prescribed for Christians to follow through all time and whether, you know, that same principle, that same idea should be applied to every culture in their own culture, you know? So like some say that the modern equivalent of covering your hair to signify that you're married back then today would be wearing a wedding ring, you know? So there's, there's a lot of, you know, interpretations that way that, that there's a moral principle still being taught there, but it's applied different culturally.
And that's kind of like what R.C. Sproul, I think that's kind of, he's described that, but then he kind of ultimately still believed that the women ideally should wear a head, you know, head coverings, at least if I remember correctly. So, you know, it's kind of interesting that, you know, they'll, they'll acknowledge that view, but a lot of times they'll still take the view that, well, you know, he says what he says, so maybe we should just follow that just to be safe, I guess. So yeah, so there's that passage in particular, I just brought that up in a group once and man, like the first started flying, you know, like people are jumping at each other, like, you know, I've been saying, like, you don't have no right to tell me what to wear. And I was like, well, I was just bringing up, yeah, yeah, yeah, something like this. Yeah, it can, it can rile some feathers. Sure, sure.
Well, and you know, when you're dealing with different cultures, different norms, you know, that kind of thing tends to happen for sure. Yeah, for sure. Okay.
I mean, that covers most of what I was going to be looking at. I know that we've, we've kind of been around about weight, covered a few things. I have a few other questions, but I don't know kind of where you guys are at time wise, or if there's a topic that we haven't talked about either, if you wanted to get into. I'm good. However, if you want to keep going with your stuff, we can do that. Or we could try to schedule a later time to go over more. Okay. So, so one question I had was progressive revelation. It's an article five. We affirm that God's revelation in the Holy Scriptures was progressive. What does that mean?
And has it ended? Yeah, so the idea there is that God's revelation of himself and his plan for humanity is progressive, right? It's a, to me, it seems like a self-evident principle. If you look at the Old Testament, and then move to the New Testament, there's a lot more clarity there around who the Messiah is and what the intent of the coming of the Messiah was. So that's, that's the idea of progressive revelation, right?
From something that's less clear to something that's more clear. And so your question, why has it stopped? You know, for me, the answer to that question again, is tied to, I'm not, I'm not coming from a place where I think additional scripture is impossible, right? I'm not, a lot of times the, the accusation that will be thrown at Christians by Latter-day Saints who are kind of commenting on a Christian saying, well, I believe in a closed canon. They'll say, oh, well, you're trying to put God in a box, or you're trying to put a muzzle on God, you know, things like that.
My position is, is no, I'm not, I'm not trying to, trying to do that. I believe God could speak, right? Who am I to tell, tell God that he can't speak if he were to do so? My question is, has he spoken?
Right? And so, you know, for me, the idea that he has spoken through Joseph Smith, it's unbelievable. I don't, I don't believe that that's what took place there. But it is possible that he could speak and future inscripturation could happen in your view? I don't, I say yes, but I don't see a need for it. Because, you know, as the New Testament says, Jesus, Jesus is the, the ultimate revelation of God, right?
Once he comes and dies on the cross and pays the penalty for sin, aside from the apostles whom he called to tell that story and that aspect of God's revelation to the world, right? What, what more is needed? It would be the question that I, that I have.
Okay. I mean, I would say what's more, you know, we don't have a unity within Christianity. Clearly, that's an issue that could be resolved. I think that, you know, when we look at history, within the Christian worldview, you know, the standard argument is the Bible is what we need is the that's the main standard. However, we've seen that people using the Bible have done things that were clearly not Christian, you know, used to justify slavery here is used to, you know, justify misogyny there, whatnot, however you want to slice it.
So clearly, it seems there's something more needed, because if they were all that was needed was in there, everyone who reads it would come to the exact same conclusions. And I don't know that that's necessarily the case, you know, the fact that there's thousands of denominations. And then you look at things, you know, in the book of Revelation, there's clearly going to be prophets who were speaking in Israel or Jerusalem at those last days, whether or not that's a prophet that like LDS would see, or that's more broad kind of preaching repentance type profit.
I don't know. But it seems like clearly there will be prophets. And the fact that we receive warnings against false prophets sort of implies that there will be real ones in the future as well. So those are kind of the points I would hit on that. Matthew, anything to say there? Oh, yeah.
I've had a lot of thoughts trying to kind of focus at all. Yeah, I would agree with Paul that, like, especially Hebrews one, it talks about how Christ is kind of like the apex, he's like, the zenith of everything was leading up to him. And he was kind of the climax of all history, you know, it says, you know, he's even Jesus said that, in terms of the Old Testament prophets, John the Baptist was the last one.
So like, you see this, this, this particular role of prophesying of Messiah, you know, is kind of completed. And so you do have like apostles and prophets in the New Testament, but they serve a different role where they're kind of instruments of revelation, and foundational and Christians also point to Ephesians chapter 220. I think that's the one where it talks about, you know, the church is built on the apostles and prophets, you know, Christ the chief cornerstone, but they see that their ministry as being a foundational ministry, though, you know, once you've built that ministry, that foundation of the church, you know, we are the spiritual stones, as Peter says, that are built on Christ. So that foundation is laid in the teachings of apostles and prophets. And so we are built upon what came before us. And God is building us up, you know, through the work of the Holy Spirit and church today, but we don't need to constantly have new apostles and prophets to keep building up that foundation, you know, that foundation was laid, you know, like Jesus said that the Old Testament prophets were finished, you know, all their work was done. And so it's the same with the apostles, when their work was done.
And, you know, they laid foundations for the church and the canon of the scriptures completed, you know, that was no longer needed. So yeah, it's progressive in the sense, I also wanted to bring up the fact that when we talk about scripture being progressive, we don't believe that, you know, what comes later replaces what came before, you know, all scriptures God breathed. And so when we talk about the doctrine of the Trinity, for example, a lot of times people say, Well, that's not in there. But when we look at all of scripture, from the very beginning, God was very clear that there's no other God of this of any kind of caliber type or kindness, like he is, you know, there are the the Elohim and the Ben Elohim, but those are subordinate to God, you know, they're clearly in subjection and subordination to God. So in terms of Yahweh, you know, there's no other God or being anywhere close to what he is.
And there's none that came before or after him. And there's another there's an interesting passage, I think it's in second Kings, I should have looked it up, but basically says that any God that didn't create the world will be destroyed. And that's speaking of like the gods of the nations, you know, so he's, he's clearly saying that because God created, you know, Yahweh created everything, he owns everything, it's all his and the gods of the other nations worship, or, you know, they have no power. And so when we look at that, there's that foundation of one single God. And then when there's hints and shadows of, I think you mentioned, you know, like, the second power in heaven or something like that, yeah, two powers in heaven.
Yeah. I mean, we also see too, in the early rabbinical tradition, where they were, they really talked about the angel of the Lord, which is mentioned in the Old Testament, that's worshiped, you know, as God, not just a messenger of God, but is is God. And there are passages in the Old Testament where, you know, the, I think it was the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah, where it says, you know, like, the, the fire, right. So there, there are, there are hints and shadows there that, you know, that God is not absolutely simple in terms of being unipersonal, so that there, there are multiple personalities in God. And that's even that's shown most clearly in the New Testament, when we see that God has revealed himself as Father, Son and Spirit. And so we take all of that together. And that's where we come up with the doctrine of the Trinity. And all of our doctrines, you know, like Paul, he mentioned, he's a biblical guy, I'm more, I think more systematically. So we kind of butthead sometimes when we when we look at texts, and that's why I kind of like Heizer and I'm like, I don't know about that. So I start going with it sometimes. Oh, no, you sounded a lot like him just earlier. Oh, yeah. Yeah.
We talk about, about, you know, second Kings. I mean, I get where you're coming from, I can understand how a person could assume Trinity and some passages, I still think it's read into them. You know, that's my view. I think that people have a tendency to see plurality, or they see unity of multiple persons, and they automatically assume Trinity, like anytime it says God is one, that must mean Trinity.
And I don't think that's the case. I think it's more that God means one, but doesn't have to be in this, you know, highly philosophized ontological distinction, that's super unclear and unknowable. Like, I think it could be just as simple as the LDS view of a Godhead, it's similar to like a social Trinity, you know, three separate beings united in a purpose and will that makes them that one God. But I can also understand people seeing that throughout scripture. So, um, okay.
Yeah, let me, I just like to throw something in here. So you, yeah, you kind of, you kind of mentioned that, that we don't have unity in Christianity and that, that, that suggests a need for additional scripture. I would just push back a little bit and, and, you know, suggest that there's not unity within the Latter-day Saint faith tradition, either, even though there's additional scripture, um, you know, you may, there may be unity on, on the various groups believing in the book of Mormon. Um, but there's not unity in belief on the document covenants or the book of Abraham or, um, you know, the rest of the Pearl of the great price.
So, uh, and there's, you know, certainly not unity on, on topics such as, uh, polygamy and some other aspects of Latter-day Saint faith traditions. Yeah. I would agree with that. I think, I think the distinction. No, go ahead.
I'll finish afterwards. No, I would just say the only distinction is we were making different truth claims where the traditional Christian is claiming that the Bible is all that's needed. Whereas LDS aren't saying we need the Bible and these other scriptures and that's it. We're saying we need all that. Plus we need profits. Plus we need an actual organization. So we're not setting a bar that, you know, with the book of Mormon, we're going out complete.
We're never complete. And so I think that it's kind of a apples and oranges comparison, although I think it is an apt comparison to point out. Yeah. Yeah. I see. I see what you're saying. Um, yeah, I'll just share quickly, uh, uh, an experience I had on my mission.
Um, they kind of got, got me thinking on this, um, because it's, you know, it's an often used critique, um, by Latter-day Saints of, of Protestants, especially, Oh, there's so many foundations, you know what I mean? Um, so I was, I was doing some street contacting on my mission, uh, at Kellethi Payat Udvadam, Budapest. That's the Western train station, uh, on the Peche side of the river. And those were always great places to do street contacting because you had the trains coming in from the various parts of the country. Um, and then there was a Metro station and a subway station just underneath.
So there was lots of people traveling in and out. Um, there was always a great place to do street contacting and I stopped a guy and I'm talking to him. Um, and I'm sharing with them, you know, Hey, I'd like to share a message with you about Jesus Christ and talking to him, you know, would you be interested?
He stops. Sure. So, you know, first thing you start in on to, cause you want to, you want to make sure you're getting, um, you're distinguishing yourself from, from, uh, everyone else. And so you start in with like the Joseph Smith pamphlet, right. And, and his testimony, uh, his, his history.
And so, you know, you read, I read passages from the Joseph Smith history pamphlet to this gentleman. Um, you know, and he's following me all, all, all the way along. He's like, Oh yeah, young seeker, you know, praise to know which church to join.
Um, and we get to the point where it's like, you know, the answer is none of them. Um, you know, and then he asked me, so what happened next? So, well, you started our church, you know, he's like, wait a minute. So the young boys confused that there's so many churches and too much competing and, and too much, uh, disunity and he prays to God and the answer is start another church. He just, he just walked away.
He's like, that's ridiculous. I don't know the one to the confusion. I get that. That's it.
Yeah. So I would just say, you know, my point there is really just that, um, you know, we have, we have latter day saints claiming additional scripture, um, and, and, and kind of seeking to be a corrective to that. Um, but it certainly hasn't created unity. Um, so to the, to the ultimate question though, is, um, is the Bible enough and, and why don't we see unity? Uh, I would say that, you know, as I, as I moved, uh, out of the LDS faith and into broader Christianity, you know, I, I mentioned I attended seminary. There were people there, uh, from all different denominations. Um, the, the church and the seminary attended are, are part of the broader American restoration movement. So like Alexander Campbell and that movement, um, and, but not ever, you know, there are people from many different denominations studying at Cincinnati Christian university because, you know, just for locality, right.
Uh, close, uh, proximity to their homes. Um, and so, you know, what I found there is, is Christian brotherhood and, and, and sisterhood and fellowship, uh, among people who maybe held some different doctrinal views and we discussed those in classes. Um, but ultimately, uh, there's the unity of the faith of, of, of Christ crucified. And, and I found that within the broader Christian world, uh, generally. So, and you think that would apply to LDS too? Cause like we clearly believe he was crucified.
Yeah. I mean, yes, uh, there, there are some, there are some very thorny doctrinal differences, uh, that I think exist, right. The nature of God is, is, is chief among them. Um, you know, the, the lectures on faith, um, you know, and, and Joseph Smith, what he talked about, you know, understanding the nature of God, um, is kind of like the first step, right. Uh, according to Joe Smith, I think any, any systematic theologian would begin, uh, they're writing the same way, right? You begin with the doctrine of God, um, and, and Latter-day Saint theology says, uh, some very different things than Christian theology about the nature of God. And so if, if, if Latter-day Saint faith is revealed religion from God, progressive revelation, addition to, uh, clarify what has come before, um, then those doctrinal differences are really important. And, you know, what I, what I see some Latter-day Saints do recently more is to try to downplay those, um, which I, to which I say, you know, that's, um, that's inconsistent with the way at least the Joseph Smith view that and the writer of the lectures on faith viewed it. Um, so yeah, I would just say that there's, there's some very significant doctrinal differences.
Um, you know, I mean, maybe just ask you the question, right? Like, um, do you think Trinitarians worship a different God than you worship? You know, I could understand the idea conceptually, but I don't like to play that game because it, it, it puts God into the, just the realm of ideas. You know, it, it puts this idea that there's this Trinitarian God that exists and there's this Mormon God that exists. And there's two different gods when in reality, there's one Jesus Christ. And it's a matter of some of us are, you know, more accurate than others in how we view. And then that's, you know, is what it is in terms of the differences.
I think most of it's metaphysical. Like, I think that if Joseph Smith taught all the same theologies that he did, but never claimed to be a prophet and claimed that he was doing this through, you know, exegesis or whatever other means, I think that Christianity would be very different today. They would have accepted him.
He wouldn't have been killed. You know, we see a lot of things that Joseph taught that are kind of coming back to Christianity today. One of the example is the suffering savior. Um, I mean, for centuries, uh, the idea of God's aseity sort of precluded him from suffering. You know, in other words, God can't suffer because he can't be moved upon by anything else. That makes him, he's immutable. So, uh, the other term is impassable. God is impassable.
He can't be acted on in any way. Whereas Joseph taught the opposite, that God was extremely passable and that, uh, God's aseity did not prevent him from that type of suffering. And we've seen Christianity sort of come around to that view now, but at the time Joseph dropped it, it was just insane and out of the park. Um, and I think we see a lot more of that kind of stuff.
Maybe that's a whole nother topic for another day, but there's a great video. If you go to LDS truth claims, there's the YouTube channel and it's just the lesson, uh, some kind of class that, uh, the professor gives and he just touches on a lot of these, but I think it's episode it's called, uh, criticism from theology or something like that. But there's a lot of things that Joseph did from the theological side that resolve some of the paradoxes we find in traditional Christianity, that answer some of the questions of traditional, traditional Christianity hasn't really clearly answered. Um, and I think that that's where the distinction, uh, kind of lies because like, I believe Jesus is the Messiah. You believe Jesus is the Messiah.
I believe that enough makes both of us Christians, but there are, like you say, differences. I just say that more metaphysical than they are, uh, scriptural, if that makes any sense. So do you think that different views of the nature of God affect how we worship? Oh yeah. Yeah.
No, for sure. I think that it would be hard for me to worship if I didn't think God was knowable. If I didn't think God was tangible, if I didn't think God has been in my shoes, it would be really hard for me to worship that.
Cause it would be more like a, you know, an idea, I guess it'd be more like a concept that's out of reach. Um, and so yeah, it would definitely affect my worship, but you know, I think, uh, you'd look at the, like a Baptist versus Methodist versus Protestant or versus, uh, so I don't know, uh, you know, Catholic or Eastern Orthodox, you look at all these, there's different types of worship. There are slightly different. Jesus is being taught. And I don't know where the line is drawn between, Oh, your Jesus is too different from ours to be excluded from the group. If that makes any sense, Matthew thoughts. Yeah. I mean, I think the difference though is that we, well, most of Protestant history, they've accepted at least the first six ecumenical councils.
Um, and then the seventh is kind of up in the air. There's people that disagree with that because that's, that's on the use of icons. I think personally, but, uh, but anyways, that's cause I'm a reform guy. So, but yeah, um, the first six ecumenical councils, historically the Protestants all reformed Lutherans Catholics, they all agreed on, you know, those fundamental doctrines, like the unity of the essence of God, you know, the tri personality of God, the hypostatic union where Jesus is a divine person, but he is, has both divine and human natures united to his person inseparably.
Uh, but you know, without confusion, without, uh, without mixture. So all these different things about God and Christ were, you know, basically agreed upon, you know, across the board. Um, that kind of started changing later, you know, like you have oneness, you have, um, so sinions, they have, you know, various different people, groups that have started to crop up in the past few centuries that are kind of just repackaged, uh, you know, for lack of a better term, heresies from the early church. So, um, subordinationism, you know, Arianism.
So, yeah, it's so, you know, I, and I would personally consider those who embrace a lot of those really aberrant teachings to be, you know, really in danger, you know, because I think when you start picking up, picking apart a lot of those early, you know, those, those beliefs about God, you know, like making them separate beings, then it really causes division. Um, in, you know, in God, uh, like the Arian controversy was that they believe that there was a time when the son was not, that he was a created being and he was subordinate to God, the father, but they saw that as making Jesus not truly divine because divinity is not something that can be conferred, you know, like you're either divine by nature or you're not, you know, we, you know, believers become participants in the divine nature, but they're not by nature divine. So when you say that Jesus was, there's a time when Jesus was not, or there was a time when Jesus was not God that they saw it as meaningful. That means he's not truly God.
So, so there's, there's a lot of these issues that I think that are important. Um, we've kind of, we've kind of gone far in a stray from the text of scripture, but, but I think that's those early councils going back to that, they appealed to scripture for these things, you know, you can't find homo usios in scripture, but I think you can clearly, you know, teach the doctrine of homo usios in scripture. Um, so they, it's, it's, it's when it came later, you know, I think that like, like I said, the seventh, the communical council, they started talking about icons, being windows into heaven and means of grace. And I don't see that in scripture. And that's, that's kind of more appealing to tradition. And that started getting farther away from what scripture actually taught.
Um, and you, and you see more additions to, you know, um, like indulgences and things like that. And that's, that's why the reformers wanted to get back to scripture because they said, there's all this other stuff, you know, we just got to strip that out, get back to what, what's core of the faith. And they re-examined everything. And they said, well, these first councils, they're, they're pretty good. You know, like they, we can, we can find scriptural support for them, but not these other things.
So anyways, I was kind of really reiterating that I've already said, but yeah, that's a good breakdown. And I guess I would, I would push back just a little bit on, on you, Steve, like, you know, when you, when you say that, you know, there, there seem to be a lot of things that are coming around where Christianity is coming around to LDS views. That's a, that's a very common, um, LDS apologetic tactic that I, that I used to see a lot when I was LDS.
Um, and you know, it's, it's really the reason why I personally dug into Michael Heiser's scholarship, because I saw a lot, a lot of Latter-day Saints saying, see divine council. It's just like our council in heaven. But when you really dig into the details, it's, it's really nothing like the Latter-day Saint council. I wouldn't say nothing like it.
I mean, I think it fit pretty well. I think we landed different places because Heiser's a Trinitarian and I'm Bob, but I don't know, but I look at that and I think, well, how is this guy not a Mormon kind of thing? Well, I mean, it is very different the council in heaven and in, um, you know, the LDS view and LDS scriptural view is all about free giving men free agency.
Right. And that's, that's not at all a part of the council of in heaven as you see it in the old Testament. Um, and so there are, you know, I think, I think Latter-day Saints are often want to see some similarities and say, see that that's Christianity coming around. Um, but like I say, when you, when you dig into the details, um, you know, it's not really the same, like, like they'll, they'll want to say, well, Heiser, Heiser says that there are these other divine beings. So that supports our view of, you know, uh, intelligences and the preexistence, uh, eternally existing as Joseph Smith taught. Um, but that's not really at all what you see in the old Testament with regards to the B'nai Elohim and angels and demons. And, um, even what you see, you know, outside in the ancient near Eastern literature, you know, first Enoch that, um, you know, informed so much of Heiser scholarship. And so it just, um, I guess just that, that, that would be my, you know, kind of gentle pushback is, is there may be some similarities. Um, but what Joseph is teaching is very, very different than, than kind of what you see in Christian scholarship. Yeah, I think that's fair. I think we probably disagree on where that literature goes, but I think it's fair to say, I mean, obviously Heiser hasn't joined the church, so clearly he's not completely sold on the idea that the way he's finding is, uh, shadows of the restoration. I don't know that he's really familiar with the church, frankly, he's written one article that addresses us that I know of. And it was, uh, not as best work.
It was good, but not, not as much attention to detail. I think he could have given, but, uh, anyway, deviating from Heiser, it sounds like we need to have a Heiser, uh, Heiser thread in our group and to get some of these Christians on board. Um, you know, we've really covered most of what I've got and, uh, you know, you guys have been great giving me like three hours. Um, is there any, any final things we want to do, I guess, and then we can, uh, coordinate later on another time, perhaps.
Yeah. So, um, I guess I would just ask you what, what, what's stopping you from accepting the true biblical Jesus and being saved? Oh, I'm totally there, man. I'm, I'm with the true biblical Jesus and I, you know, I think that we just talk past each other when we, when we look at it that way, you know, the thing that keeps me from being a Protestant. Um, I don't want to say this the wrong way.
I pushed, I pushed pretty hard. You can, you can, the thing that keeps me away from Protestants, uh, in general is Protestant people, the way that they, that they treat me, uh, the way that they treat other Latter Day Saints, you guys are obviously exceptions to that, but I look at, uh, you know, you guys have seen it in the group, some of the behavior of these people. And I think, okay, if that's what their religion is, give me the opposite of that, because I don't want to end up like that. Um, and you know, you could say the same about Latter Day Saints too. And so I'm not saying all Protestants are bad people, but, um, I think it's a, it's a, it's a product of that diversity within Protestantism. I mean, there's a lot of people who hold really extreme views who are called themselves Protestants who are really kind of insulated from the larger academic community of evangelicals.
And yet they seem to kind of be driving the boat a lot of the time, which worries me. In terms of theology, I can't believe in a God that's unknowable. I can't believe in a God that's incomprehensible. I can't believe in a God who, um, isn't logically coherent. And I'm, and I am completely forced to believe that Jesus Christ is the son of God and that that has to be an actual, not just a title, not just an inscription of his position, but a real thing. And I get that because of the way he speaks with the father, because the way he speaks about the father. And, uh, so, yeah, I don't know of any traditional Christianity that really accepts Jesus as literally the son of God that's that's subordinationism and heresy, as far as I understand. I know some will say he's the son of God kind of entitled, or maybe one of his, he's got the hypostatic union and one of his natures is and what's not that just doesn't do it for me. You know, to me, I want the real actual son of God, and this is the only place I found that. So that's kind of where I stand. Isn't that what the book of Mormon says, the son of God, because of the flesh?
Oh, no, but yeah, we could talk about that too. But the Book of Mormon, you know, it talks about Jesus being the father through salvation. And that's clearly LDS doctrine. You know, I think that there's that one passage you're probably talking about, the Theta Penedae speaking, and that that's that really deserves its own literary criticism. The Book of Mormon itself needs more literary criticism.
We're, we're in the very, very beginning front end of that thing. But, you know, the Jesus Christ of the Restored Gospel is the Son of God. And that's who I believe in. And if you can find me a traditional Christian church that believes that, I might be intrigued to, more intrigued, at least to take a look, but I can't, I can't do with anything less than that. You know, it's, that's actually interesting, because recently, I've been diving into, like, historical, more, a more historical view of the Trinity.
And it seems like in modern Protestantism, we've kind of gone away from that, even since the reformers, because they looked in the past, and they saw, and they agreed with what they said. And actually, like, historically, the church saw Jesus as truly being begotten of the Father. But we have to understand the fact that God is eternal, you know, He's uncreated and unchanging in the Trinity past. So when we talk about Jesus, Jesus being begotten of the Father, we have to understand it somewhat analogically, because He has eternally existed as the Son. And if He's eternally existed as the Son, He's been eternally begotten as the Son. So He really is begotten by the Father, He's generated by the Father, but it's eternal generation, it's an eternal begottenness. So there's not a specific moment in time where we can say He was unbegotten, and then became begotten. So He's begotten in eternity past. And it's always happened, you know, He's always being generated by the Father. And His, His divine essence is being generated, you know, by the essence of the Father.
But they're not two essences, but one essence. And I've been diving into Thomas Aquinas, when he really gets into this stuff, and it's like, kind of mind blowing, but he, he kind of, he kind of analogically compares it to the intellect. So, and it's not too far afield from what Scripture says of Jesus, you know, He says He's the Word. And so when you think of the Word, the Logos, like the Word is something that represents an idea or a concept. And so Jesus is, is a perfect representation of the Father. And Aquinas compared it to a thought in your mind, so the intellect. So if you have a thought about yourself of who you are, and what you, what you look like, you know, how you act, things like that, that's a concept in your mind, it's an imperfect concept, but it's a concept nonetheless, and it's something distinct from you, but it's also in you. And so Aquinas made this comparison where he said, the Father, you know, He has the fullness of the divine nature, and He has a concept of Himself, but it's a perfect concept. And it's a generated concept that's also within His same nature, that is being generated, you know, with the same nature as well. So they're distinct persons, but they're still within the same essence of God.
And it gets pretty, it gets pretty, it gets pretty crazy. But it made me had to re-evaluate what I thought of, because yeah, I kind of thought of Father and Son is more like, in terms of just love between them, you know, like, well, the Father loves the Son, like a son, and the son loves his father. And, and, you know, but there's not an actual beginning. But historically, they saw this, the monotonous, the oss, or monogamous huios, you know, only begotten son, they saw that as like an eternal, so it's a begottenness, but it's an eternal sense, not in terms of like a, like, because we, you know, when we're creatures, we, we create a son, there's a moment in time when you can say I have no son. But in God, there's no time when God can say I have no son, you know, He's always had a son. So it's, it's a begotten, but, but without change, and without, you know, coming into existence.
So it's pretty crazy. If you want, if you want like the easier version, I just finished an audio book, Simply Trinity by Matthew Barrett. And he talks about this, how, like, you know, the modern church's concept of the Trinity has kind of been watered down a little bit, you know, and we make it more about social issues, like we adapt the Trinity to combat, you know, feminism or whatever, you know, rather than like going to the going to the sources and how the fathers read scripture and saying, Okay, how did they read it? And let's just understand what scripture says, rather than trying to take the Trinity and say, how can I use this as a battering ram versus this social group or this injustice, you know, so it's a really great book. I think it's like, might be like 10 or 12 hours, but I listened to it a little bit faster.
So on audible, but I'd really recommend that. And, you know, Paul, you mentioned the guy, Jared Anderson before, and then there was another name you mentioned that was the skill from it. In what context did I mention it? You'll have to forgive me. I'm old. No, I know.
And it's, you know, it's blanket for me to, I'll have to see it when I go back, watch the video or I'll remember it, but I like to gather names of people to read. Was it a Christian scholar that I was referencing? I think so. I think so. I don't know.
We'll go back and watch it again. Yeah. Okay.
Yeah. So Steve, thanks for coming on. We appreciate it. You know, as I said, we, we try to be a place where Latter-day Saints would feel comfortable coming on. Latter-day Saints would feel comfortable listening to us. You know, can certainly appreciate when you push back gently on me and hope you know that, that everything, even when I asked you about coming to the true Jesus was good natured.
I certainly can appreciate what that feels like. You know, I, like you, I grew up LDS and I grew up in, in a period of time when, when, you know, so let's just put it this way. So I, I left on my mission the same year that the Southern Baptist convention held their, their big meeting in Salt Lake City.
Right. And they were going door to door and in Salt Lake City and Latter-day Saints were kind of up in arms about it. Who are they to come here and knock on our doors?
And I'm going out on splits with the missionaries, knocking on other people's doors. Who are they to do exactly what we do? Right.
Exactly. So yeah, I mean, you know, and I, and I married into a Southern Baptist family, so, you know, there's certainly, I've certainly been through that, that journey of feeling like you know, the broader Christian world didn't accept me as a Latter-day Saint. But you know, I hope you can appreciate also that, that, you know, that we feel there are important differences and important theological aspects of LDS teaching that, that, that are problematic from a, from a historical standpoint, from a, from a theological standpoint, I think it's, you know, we can have a broader conversation about the question I asked you, you know, does, does our, our view of the nature of God affect our worship? Cause I think it does in important ways.
So I think it's, I think it is important to know the one true God because that's eternal life, as Jesus said. So I appreciate you coming on, you know, I kind of pitched this to you earlier in the week, kind of out of the blue and you were willing to come on and have a conversation. And I hope, I hope this is another example of us modeling what it is to have respectful conversation and dialogue with people. Yeah, I really enjoyed it. You guys both did a great job of being respectful, making me think, asking good questions. I feel like, you know, me personally, I got a lot out of this conversation.
Yeah. Hopefully you contributed something as well. And yeah, a good three hours long. Hopefully someone gets something good out of it. I certainly enjoyed your company, both of you gentlemen. Thank you very much, Steve. Appreciate it. Thank you guys. Love you guys and take care. Likewise. Take care.
You too. God bless. The Faith After Mormonism Conference is an annual conference that provides encouragement and insight for people leaving Mormonism to explore a new faith home in historic biblical Christianity. Through speakers, workshops, exhibitors, and individual interactions, you will receive helpful resources and meet others on a similar journey. This year, the featured guests are going to be the folks from Adams Road Ministry.
Adams Road is a Christian nonprofit ministry dedicated to sharing the gospel of Jesus Christ through song and testimony. Its members are former Mormons who have been brought into a saving relationship with Jesus through the grace of God. This year, there will be two events. The north event will be held at Alpine Church in Layton, Utah, on September 10th and 11th. And the south event will be held September 24th and 25th at Center Point Church in Orem, Utah.
For those of you who are in Utah, I encourage you to make a trip either to Layton or Orem to these events. I think you'll be greatly blessed by them and just wanted to share that information with you. We thank you for tuning into this episode of the Outer Brightness Podcast. We'd love to hear from you. Please visit the Outer Brightness Podcast page on Facebook. Feel free to send us a message there with comments or questions by clicking send a message at the top of the page, and we would appreciate it if you give the page a like. We also have an Outer Brightness group on Facebook where you can join and interact with us and others as we discuss the podcast, past episodes, and suggestions for future episodes, etc. You can also send us an email at outerbrightness at gmail.com.
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You can also subscribe to our YouTube channel and hit that notification bell. Music for Outer Brightness is graciously provided by the talented Brianna Flournoy and Adams Road. You can learn more about Adams Road by visiting their ministry page at adamsroadministry.com. In the past, I believed in my own righteousness and hoped that I was worthy of the blood that Jesus shed. But now I know that all the works I did were meaningless compared with Jesus' lonely death on the cross where he bore sin.
And now I have the righteousness that is by faith in Jesus' name. I consider everything a loss compared to knowing Jesus. For whose sake I have lost all things because of the cross. On the cross, Jesus took away the written code, the law of words that stood opposed, and nailed it there for me.
And through the cross, he put to death hostility, and did his body reconcile us to God and brought us peace. And I am crucified with Christ, and I no longer live, but he lives in me. I consider everything a loss compared to knowing Jesus.
For whose sake I have lost all things. But when I gained Jesus, it was worth the cost. All my righteousness I count as a loss because of the cross. Some demand a sign and some seek to be wise, but we preach Christ crucified.
A stumbling blood for some, the foolishness of God. But wiser than the wisest man, the power of the cross. May I never boast except in the cross of our Lord, through which the world has been crucified to me. And I to the world, so I take up my cross and follow where Jesus leads. Oh, I consider everything a loss compared to knowing Jesus. For whose sake I have lost all things. But when I gained Jesus, it was worth the cost. All my righteousness I count as a loss because of the cross. Because of the cross. Because of the cross.
Whisper: medium.en / 2023-09-02 22:18:04 / 2023-09-02 22:43:14 / 25
