The Mormon Temple Part 4

You hear a knock on the door and open it to find two friendly representatives from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, otherwise known as the Mormon Church.

So what will you say? Will you send them away without a Christian witness, or will you engage them in a meaningful and Christ-honoring conversation? If you desire the latter, may we suggest the book, Answering Mormon's Questions, by Mormonism Research Ministries Bill McKeever and Eric Johnson. Answering Mormon's Questions is available wherever you find quality Christian books. Viewpoint on Mormonism, the program that examines the teachings of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints from a biblical perspective. Viewpoint on Mormonism is sponsored by Mormonism Research Ministry. Since 1979, Mormonism Research Ministry has been dedicated to equipping the body of Christ with answers regarding the Christian faith in a manner that expresses gentleness and respect. And now, your host for today's Viewpoint on Mormonism. Is what goes on in a Mormon temple sacred or secret? Welcome to this edition of Viewpoint on Mormonism. I'm your host, Bill McKeever, founder and director of Mormonism Research Ministry, and with me today is Eric Johnson, my colleague at MRM. This week we've been looking at the Mormon temple ceremony, the ordinances that are a part of the ceremony, and the origination of the temple ceremony. If you were to bring this subject up with, let's say, a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, don't be surprised if there is a reluctance to talk to you about the temple ceremony. Oftentimes, you will hear the Latter-day Saints say something like, well, we don't discuss the ceremony because it's so sacred. But what did Mormon historian Richard L. Bushman say about that, Eric? And this is found in an article that was in the Deseret News back on March 6, 2008.

The title of the article was Seek Understanding, Not Converts. Bushman Urges Mormons. He said while some members will claim that Mormon temples are sacred, not secret, Bushman said that temples are secret, plain and simple, noting that even members don't speak to each other about it. So if a Latter-day Saint is reluctant to even discuss the ceremony with another like-minded Latter-day Saint, couldn't you say, as Bushman is alluding to here, that there is an element of secrecy that involves this ceremony? We have a website, and it's called sacred or secret.com.

We like to take the signs for that website out to temple open houses and stand on the street as cars pass by. I cannot tell you how many times I've been approached by Latter-day Saints, and they oftentimes will say, smugly, it's sacred. And then I said, oh, okay, can you tell me what's inside?

What the different ordinances are? Well, no. Well, that's the definition of secret. So yes, as Bushman has said, we agree, they're sacred. But they're also secret because they're promising when they go into the temple not to tell anybody about what goes on inside. And the question that you asked, a Latter-day Saint shouldn't have a problem at least giving you an outline of what goes on in the temple because in yesterday's show, we did exactly that. And we were citing from the Encyclopedia of Mormonism that listed the various ordinances that take place in a Mormon temple.

We've already discussed washing and anointings. Today, we want to look at the endowment, but there's also marriages for eternity and sealings of family members for eternity, as well as doing works on behalf of the dead, such as baptism for the dead. This is clearly spelled out in Volume 4, page 1444 in the Encyclopedia of Mormonism.

So that is not really a secret at all, though don't be surprised that you might come across a Latter-day Saint that doesn't even want to divulge that much information as to what goes on in the ceremony. Well, let's talk about the endowment ceremony today. There is a definition of what this endowment is, and you can find it on the official website of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints under the title of endowment.

What does it say on that page? In a general sense, a gift of power from God. Worthy members of the church can receive a gift of power through ordinances in the temple that gives them the instruction and covenants of the holy priesthood that they need in order to attain exaltation. The endowment includes instructions about the plan of salvation.

Now again, I want to go back to one of the main themes of this series. As we've been saying, members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints firmly believe, because this is what they are told by their leaders, that what they believe and what they practice is what was believed and practiced by the first century church. Hence, it is referred to as a restoration. They have a restored gospel that they believe Joseph Smith brought back to light that had been hidden for centuries. They also believe that they are a part of a restored church. This, the endowment, is a part of that restoration. But in that definition that you gave, Eric, I'm trying to imagine, did the first century church really believe and practice this?

Worthy members of the church can receive the gift of power through ordinances in the temple that gives them the instruction and covenants of the holy priesthood that they need in order to attain exaltation. Was that really done in the temple in Jerusalem? No, of course not. We brought that out on Monday that the Jewish leaders would not have allowed the Christians to have come into the temple because they wanted to do this work for themselves and for the dead. It just doesn't make any sense that that would have happened. We have no evidence historically that it happened.

Well, you know, there's a saying that it's not a conspiracy theory if you quote them saying it. And so we're going to quote for you two LDS leaders, the first being a Mormon apostle by the name of John Witso. He's going to explain where Joseph Smith received this temple endowment. And as you listen to this definition, ask yourself, is that really then something that could have possibly been restored? Is that something that we find in biblical days? Remember, this is supposed to be patterned after what was done in biblical days. But how did it come forth? Obviously not from any type of scripture, that's for sure.

What did John Witso say about this? Joseph Smith received the temple endowment and its ritual as all else that he promulgated by revelation from God. By revelation from God. Well, that tells us that obviously it's probably not written down anywhere. It's certainly not in the Old Testament. It's certainly not in the New.

And Eric, let me ask you this. Is the ritual that was performed in the Jerusalem temple a huge secret? There's books that have been written about what went on in the temple in Jerusalem.

Alfred Edersheim probably wrote the classic on that in a book titled The Temple, where he goes in great detail to explain specifically not only what the priests wore, but what the priests did, and the function of the temple at large. There is nothing hidden about the temple, and so if this is really something that was done anciently, why is it when we compare what the Mormons are doing to, let's say, a book written by a scholar like Alfred Edersheim, do we not see a similarity there? They are very different in what they are promulgating, to use a word from Apostle John Witso, but we also have Mormon apostle Bruce R. McConkie. What did he say on page 779 of his book Mormon Doctrine? They were given in modern times to the prophet Joseph Smith by revelation, many things connected with them being translated by the prophet from the papyrus on which the book of Abraham was recorded. So he agrees basically that a lot of this came by revelation to Joseph Smith, but then he adds, many things connected with them being translated by the prophet from the papyrus on which the book of Abraham was recorded. Well if the book of Abraham is a fraud, and we firmly believe it is, then what does that say about the temple ceremony if there is any connection between it and the book of Abraham?

Certainly that would raise a whole lot of suspicions regarding its authenticity. Bill, there was temple sacrifice in the Jerusalem temple, and we know all about that because the Bible specifically talks about how these animals were slaughtered on behalf of the sins of the people. And certainly the book of Hebrews explains how Jesus was sacrificed in lieu of the animals. But we have other things such as psalms that were sung in the temple. We get this from Jewish records. The Mishnah says that there were seven psalms sung by the Levites at the daily sacrifices in the temple. So one psalm every day of the week, Psalm 24 on the first day, Psalm 48 on the second, 82 on the third, Psalm 94 on the fourth, Psalm 81 on the fifth, Psalm 93 on the sixth, and Psalm 92 on the Shabbat, or the Sabbath. And I ask the question, how many psalms have ever been recited in an LDS temple? But that's what they were doing back in the days of the temple in the Old and New Testament. And it's not that a Mormon can say, well, I remember we recited a psalm one day because there is a chapel in the temple. But did they do it on a regular basis like the priest did in ancient Israel?

No, of course not. So there's no similarity there as well. What's also fascinating to me is Joseph Smith's involvement with Freemasonry. According to the History of the Church, volume 4, page 550 to 551, under the date of March 15, 1842, Joseph Smith said, I officiated as Grand Chaplain at the installation of the Nauvoo Lodge of Freemasons at the grove near the temple. And then on May 4, 1842, not long after he becomes a mason himself, he introduces the Nauvoo Endowment Ceremony, which surprisingly contains a lot of elements very similar to that which is found in the Masonic Ceremony. Do we find anything Masonic in the way the original Jerusalem Temple was conducted?

No, of course not. So again, you cannot say that this is a restoration. One thing about this Nauvoo Ceremony, there was no temple in Nauvoo. Joseph Smith died before the temple was finished.

So where did they do all this? Well, at that time, because there was not a temple for them to use, they used to perform this ceremony on the second floor of Joseph Smith's red brick store. I might mention that it was at the red brick store that Joseph Smith tried to put the moves on a very young daughter of Sidney Rigdon, a young girl by the name of Nancy Rigdon. So here we find holy things supposedly being done in the red brick store and unholy things being done in the red brick store. So they didn't even need a temple at that particular time. The point that we're bringing out, and I don't think it can be stressed strong enough, there is no similarity between what Latter-day Saints do in their temple with first century Christians. As we brought out earlier in this week, temple worship was not of significant importance to the early Christians. You might say, as it's been said in modern times, Jesus is our recommend, he is our temple. We don't need a building to go to, and we don't need to perform certain rituals in order to gain God's approval or ultimately be exalted, as Latter-day Saints are told. There is no similarity between what happened in the first century and what Mormons are doing in their temples today. We hope you will join us again as we look at another viewpoint on Mormonism.