The Mormon Temple Part 10

Mormonism 101 for teens is a valuable resource for anyone wanting a simplified view of the Mormon religion from a Christian perspective. 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. As we've mentioned, there are a number of temple ordinances that are very important to members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. We've talked about the initiatory rites, washings, and anointings, the endowment ceremony.

Very quickly, we're going to cover the subject of marriages and sealings of families for time and eternity. This is what Joseph Fielding Smith, the 10th president of the LDS Church, said in his book, Doctrines of Salvation, volume 2, pages 43-44. Now, lest I sound redundant, this whole series, I've been trying to bring out the fact that even though LDS leaders have insisted that what they do in their temple is patterned after biblical days, you will not find any evidence to support these claims. Here is another one that cannot be verified from history or even the New Testament, and that is this notion that a husband and wife can be sealed for time and eternity in the New Testament. Marriages in the temple was unheard of in the temple in Jerusalem.

There never was any such ordinance performed in that building. But the most common ordinance performed in temple ceremonies has to do with baptism for the dead. In fact, listen to this statement that Joseph Smith made in Doctrine and Covenants, section 128, verse 6. Listen to this statement that Joseph Smith made in Doctrine and Covenants, section 128, verse 17. This most glorious of all subjects belonging to the everlasting gospel, namely, the baptism for the dead. It's the most glorious of all subjects belonging to the everlasting gospel, yet we see nothing about this topic in the Book of Mormon. So if, as I said before, Nephites really existed, and the Book of Mormon gives us an idea of what they believed in practice, there's no mention of baptisms for the dead in the Book of Mormon. And really, the best verse that Latter-day Saints have in the Bible is 1 Corinthians 15, 29.

We've talked about that verse many times. It certainly has been taken out of context to be able to support the idea of the importance of baptism for the dead for early Christians. And Joseph Smith also went on to say that those saints who neglected, speaking of baptism for the dead, on behalf of their deceased relatives, do it at the peril of their own salvation.

What does that look like, Eric? Let's say a Latter-day Saint just doesn't want to go and be baptized on behalf of their ancestors. Do they end up in the terrestrial kingdom? And I just mentioned 1 Corinthians 15, 29. If this was that important to the early Christians, why wasn't there more of an emphasis by Peter and Paul and others to go get baptized on behalf of their dead relatives? Now Gordon B. Hinckley, the 16th president of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, wrote this in the book Be Thou an Example.

We find this on page 131. Through living proxies who stand in behalf of the dead, the same ordinances are available to those who have passed from mortality. In the spirit world, they are then free to accept or reject those earthly ordinances performed for them, including baptism, marriage, and the sealing of family relationships.

There must be no compulsion in the work of the Lord, but there must be opportunity. So what Gordon B. Hinckley is telling us is even though a faithful Latter-day Saint goes to a temple and is baptized on behalf of a deceased loved one, they have no guarantee at all that that deceased loved one are going to embrace the work that has been done on their behalf. So there is no assurance for the Latter-day Saint, knowing that their families are going to be together for eternity.

They do not have such an assurance. How many Latter-day Saints though who do this work think that their relatives are not going to receive that? I think they all would say that, and yet there's agency even in the next life.

Well, let me bring this subject up. This is Joseph Fielding Smith, the 10th president of the church, in his book, Doctrines of Salvation, volume 2, page 183. And I think what Smith says here is probably going to rock the boat of many Latter-day Saints who have had a false idea of what baptism for the dead is all about. And what I mean by that is many Latter-day Saints are led to believe that they can go and be baptized on behalf of any deceased loved ones when they embrace it in the spirit world, that they're going to automatically be with them in the celestial kingdom.

Listen to what Joseph Fielding Smith, the 10th president, has to say about this. He says, second chance leads to terrestrial kingdom. He goes on, Terrestrial glory, not the celestial glory. If you're a Latter-day Saint and you're talking to your spouse, and they're rejecting that message, and they do not want to become a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, they refuse it during their mortality, then just as it was in ancient times, as Joseph Fielding Smith is saying here, they would not have the opportunity to go to the celestial kingdom. Yes, they could embrace the vicarious baptism done on their behalf, but as far as their eternal destiny is concerned, it'll be no higher than the terrestrial kingdom.

If you end up in the terrestrial kingdom, the second level, you're not with your family forever. So you see a lot of Latter-day Saints have a huge misunderstanding regarding the efficacy of baptism for the dead. What are Latter-day Saints baptized in when they are baptized for the dead? Now this is important because there's a special font made just for baptisms for the dead, but Joseph Fielding Smith, again, had something to say about this in his book, Answers to Gospel Questions, Volume 5, pages 12 to 13. When the Temple of Solomon was built, we read of a molten sea, ten cubics, and that actually should be ten cubits, from one brim to the other. It stood on the back of twelve carved oxen. This font, or brazen sea, was not used for baptisms for the dead, for there were no baptisms for the dead until the resurrection of the Lord. If that's the case, why is it, if everything they're doing in the temple is patterned after Biblical times, why do they baptize for their dead in a font that looks very similar to the brazen sea?

Now the brazen sea was quite large, and it had the twelve oxen underneath. The way it was designed in the Old Testament was three of the oxen were facing north, three east, three south, and three west. Even in that pattern, that's rare in an LDS temple. Most of the time, when you look at the brazen sea as it is designed in the temples, they show them in a circular pattern, rather than three going in each direction.

I'm not saying that's the way it is in all of them, but in most of them. I think we pointed out earlier this week, Bill, that the early Christians did not make it a regular part of their worship to go to the temple and do these ordinances, including baptism for the dead. According to Joseph Fielding Smith, there was no baptisms for the dead until the resurrection of the Lord. Well, if that's 30 or 33 AD, and the temple is destroyed in 70, there's less than four decades to be able to do this. No indication that the Jews were accepting Christians to come on in and participate in our brazen sea.

Yeah, and I want to make a very firm statement here. I think Joseph Fielding Smith is really grasping at straws and taking a huge leap of faith to think for a minute that this brazen sea was ever used at all for any type of baptisms, because that's just not true. 2 Chronicles 4, 4 and 6 tells us specifically what the Bronze Sea was actually used for. Verse 4, the sea stood on twelve bulls, three facing north, three facing west, three facing south, and three facing east.

The sea rested on top of them, and their hindquarters were toward the center. Verse 6, he then made ten basins for washing, and placed five on the south side and five on the north. In them the things to be used for the burnt offerings were rinsed, but the sea was to be used by the priests for washing. The sea was to be used for priests for washing. See, it was used only by those who ministered in the temple, the priests. It wasn't a baptismal font that just about anybody could go and be baptized on behalf of their dead. Furthermore, if Joseph Fielding Smith wants to insist that there were no baptisms for the dead until after the resurrection of Jesus Christ, they most certainly could not have baptized on behalf of any of their dead in a font similar to the brazen sea. The Bible tells us in 2 Kings 25-7 that Nebu-Zaradon, the captain of the guard, carried away captive the rest of the people who remained in the city. This would be Jerusalem. And it goes on in verse 13 to say, The bronze pillars that were in the house of the Lord, and the carts and the bronze sea that were in the house of the Lord, the Chaldeans broke in pieces and carried their bronze to Babylon.

There was no such font in the temple during the first century. But I'm not going to take away from what they believe. They do feel that these temples are very sacred edifices, but it's not biblical. It's just not biblical. And because it's not biblical, it cannot possibly be a restoration. Yet that's the word that is often used when Mormons try to explain what they believe and what they practice. Remember, they believe that their church is a restoration of how things were done anciently by the first century church. Only because of this complete apostasy did those practices and beliefs cease to exist, making it necessary for God to restore the gospel and to restore the church as they believe it was originally.

History does not bear that out. The vicarious baptisms that have been performed in Mormon temples have included a lot of celebrities, a lot of famous people. We have, for instance, Christopher Columbus has been baptized by proxy. You have a Methodist preacher, John Wesley. William Shakespeare, every deceased United States president has been baptized vicariously.

Scientists such as Albert Einstein, a number of Holocaust victims, including Anne Frank. I mean, I'm sure they're doing this out of the goodness of their heart. I'm not trying to take away from the Latter-day Saints desire to want to do something they think is a benefit for others. The point is, it's just not biblical. Bill, I think if there's anything we've learned, and you just got done talking about this, the Bible doesn't teach the things that happen in the LDS temple. So if a Latter-day Saint wonders why we as Christians don't consider the things that they do as being very important to do for salvation, it's because we don't have any evidence that this ever took place in the temple in Jerusalem. Thank you for listening. If you would like more information regarding Mormonism Research Ministry, we encourage you to visit our website at www.mrm.org, where you can request our free newsletter, Mormonism Researched. We hope you will join us again as we look at another viewpoint on Mormonism.