More Unbiblical Lies By Joseph Smith and the LDS.

President John Taylor, the third President of the Church, explained: "Moses, Elijah, Elias and many other leading characters mentioned in the Scriptures, who had operated in the various dispensations, came and conferred upon Joseph the various keys, powers, rights, privileges and [permissions] which they enjoyed in their times.... Whatever of knowledge, of intelligence, of Priesthood, of powers, of revelations were conferred upon those men in the different ages, were again restored to the earth by the ministration and through the medium of those who held the holy Priesthood of God in the different dispensations in which they lived."

President Taylor also declared: "If you were to ask Joseph what sort of a looking man Adam was, he would tell you at once; he would tell you his size and appearance and all about him. You might have asked him what sort of men Peter, James and John were, and he would have told you. Why? Because he had seen them."

Teachings of Presidents of the Church: Joseph Smith, pg.103

Problems:

First: Elijah and Elias are the same person; Elias is the N.T. Greek version of his name. Of course the LDS has a really stretched explanation claiming there was another Elias who visited Smith. Smith was probably thinking of Elisha.

Second: These people noted had no “keys, powers, rights, privileges and [permissions] which they enjoyed in their time” to confer upon Smith. I challenge Mormons to demonstrate any of this from the Bible. These men had no power of the priesthood (the priesthood wasn’t given until the time of Moses and it was given to Aaron and his sons). Elijah was just a prophet.

Third: Smith could not have seen Adam, Peter, James or John; these men were dead and God gave only certain men the ability to visit earth and that was to Jesus only. Smith just plain lied.

Joseph Smith Was NOT a Martyr

In February 1847, nearly three years after the Prophet Joseph Smith was martyred, he appeared to President Brigham Young and gave him this message:

Teachings of Presidents of the Church: Joseph Smith, pg.98

Two things wrong with this statement:

First, Joseph Smith was not a martyr — he shot back. And he wasn’t imprisoned or killed for his faith. He was charge with inciting a riot destroying the Nauvoo Expositor. Other charges were fornication and polygamy. Additionally, he was charged with treason against the state of Illinois for calling out the Nauvoo militia to prevent his arrest. It was this last charge that got him jailed.

Second, The dead do not appear to living people to speak to them, especially if they are people who are condemned to everlasting destruction in Hell, such as Smith

Joseph Smith's False Teachings About John the Baptist

John [the Baptist], at that time, was the only legal administrator in the affairs of the kingdom there was then on the earth, and holding the keys of power. The Jews had to obey his instructions or be damned, by their own law; and Christ Himself fulfilled all righteousness in becoming obedient to the law which He had given to Moses on the mount, and thereby magnified it and made it honorable, instead of destroying it. The son of Zacharias wrested the keys, the kingdom, the power, the glory from the Jews, by the holy anointing and decree of heaven, and these three reasons constitute him the greatest prophet born of a woman. ...

The Lord promised Zacharias that he should have a son who was a descendent of Aaron, the Lord having promised that the priesthood should continue with Aaron and his seed throughout their generations. Let no man take this honor upon himself, except he be called of God, as was Aaron, and Aaron received his call by revelation. ...

The people need not wait for the days of Pentecost to find the kingdom of God, for John had it with him, and he came forth from the wilderness crying out, "Repent ye, for the kingdom of heaven is night at hand," as much as to say, "Out here I have got the kingdom of God and I am coming after you; I have got the kingdom of God, and you can get it, and I am coming after you; and if you don't receive it, you will be damned;" ...

There was a legal administrator, and those that were baptized were subjects for a king; and also the laws and oracles of God were there; therefore the kingdom of God was there; for no man could have better authority to administer than John; and our Savior submitted to that authority Himself, by being baptized by John; therefore the kingdom of God was set up on the earth, even in the days of John...

Whenever men can find out the will of God and find an administrator legally authorized from God, there is the kingdom of God; but where these are not, the kingdom of God is not. All the ordinances, systems, and administrations on the earth are of no use to the children of men, unless they are ordained and authorized of God; for nothing will save a man but a legal administrator; for none others will be acknowledged either by God or angels. ...

John held the Aaronic Priesthood, and was a legal administrator, and the forerunner of Christ, and came to prepare the way before him....John was a priest after the order of Aaron before Christ....

The keys of the Aaronic Priesthood were committed unto him....

The Savior said unto John, "I must be baptized by you. Why so? To answer my decrees"....Jesus had no legal administrator [except] John.

There is no salvation between the two lids of the Bible without a legal administrator.

Teachings of Presidents of the Church: Joseph Smith, pg.81-85

WOW! What a lot of unbiblical nonsense! Let’s look at the errors/lies in this teaching:

1) There was no such thing biblically as someone who was a “legal administrator” of anything so John the Baptist didn’t hold such and office, nor did he have any “keys” to the Kingdom of 

God, nor was he even suggesting that "Out here I have got the kingdom of God and I am coming after you; I have got the kingdom of God, and you can get it, and I am coming after you; and if you don't receive it, you will be damned;" …. This is nothing but an unbiblical invention by Joseph Smith.

2) John didn’t “wrest” anything from the Jews and he had no “decree from heaven,” nor were Jews required to “obey his instructions or be damned.” None of this will be found in the Bible.

3) Jesus did not give Moses the Law; God wrote—inscribed—the Law on the tablets (Exodus 31:18).

4) Where in the Bible does it say that a priest was called by revelation from God? Where in the Bible does it say John was a priest? Just being a descendent of Levi (the tribe which had the priests) doesn’t make one a priest, and nothing in the Bible hints at John being a priest.

The real teachings of the New Testament regarding priests is that Christians have no priests, that Christians are a priesthood of believers with Jesus as our great high priest.  (1 Peter 2:4-5)

There is absolutely no biblical warrant for any priesthood among Christians.

Oh, Contradictions!

Looking back into my early posts about contractions in LDS publications, I seem to have missed one important one.  It was brought to my attention by an article on the Life After Ministry blog, which I highly recommend for anyone questioning the teachings of Mormonism.

So, Mormons, how do you explain the following contradictory commands of God?

D&C 49:16:  Wherefore it is lawful that he [man] should have one wife, and they twain shall be one flesh, and all this that the earth might answer the end of its creation.

This actually agrees with the Bible and the Book of Mormon teaching on marriage.

However, D&C 132 permits multiple wives and claims that God commanded Abraham to take Hagar for a second wife and that David’s wives and concubines were given to him by God.  Beginning at vs.51 it discusses how God gave other wives to Joseph Smith and if his wife Emma didn’t accept it she would be destroyed! The interesting thing is that throughout the remainder of D&C132 “God” says these men shall take “virgins” for their wives and yet Smith took other men’s wives!  Brigham Young agreed with and taught (and practiced) the doctrine of polygamy.

This contradiction came about because Joseph Smith was trying to cover up his serial adultery and his apostles, being likewise desirous of sex with many women, continued to teach it. 

I’ve written a few articles about God’s view of polygamy and problems which arise from such immorality:

God’s View of Polygamy.

Mormon Women Fear Eternal Polygamy.

Loveless Mormon Marriages.

Sexual Abuse in the Mormon Church.

The Mormon God vs the Christian God

 God himself was once as we are now, and is an exalted man, and sits enthroned in yonder heavens. That is the great secret. If the veil were rent today, and the great God who holds this world in its orbit, and who upholds all worlds and all things by His power, was to make Himself visible,--I say, if you were to see Him today, you would see Him like a man in form--like yourselves in all the person, image, and very form as a man; for Adam was created in the very fashion, image and likeness of God, and received instruction from, and walked, talked and conversed with Him, as one man talks and communes with another...

Cited in Teachings of Presidents of the Church: Joseph Smith, pg 40. Originally in History of the Church Vol.6

The Bible tells REAL Christians that God is spirit, not man. But Smith taught that God was once a man who worked his way to exaltation and now lives near the star Kolob (some say it’s a planet but I’ll address that in a later post). The real God lives outside His creation but is always acting within His creation.

Adam was not "in the very fashion, image, and likeness of God” because God is not now nor ever was a man. One can walk and talk with God in prayer, and some patriarchs actually heard God’s voice. And, if you note, Genesis 1:26 says Let us make man in our image, after our likeness…” (KJV, emphasis added).

 

John MacArthur’s commentary explains the true meaning of “likeness” and “image” of God in Genesis 1:26:

1:26: Us…Our. This is the first clear indication of the triunity of God (cf. 3:22; 11:7). The very name of God, Elohim (1:1) is a plural form of El. The plural pronouns introduce  plurality of relationships in the Godhead. They suggest both communion and consultation among members of the Trinity. They also signify perfect agreement and clear purpose. man. The crowning point of creation, a living human, was made in God’s image to rule creation. Our image…likeness. This speaks of the creation of Adam in terms that are uniquely personal. It establishes a personal relationship between God and man that does not exist with any other aspect of creation. It is the very thing that makes humanity different from every other created animal. It explains why the Bible places so much stress on God’s hands-on creation of Adam. He fashioned this creature in a special way—to bear the stamp of His own likeness. It suggests that God was, in essence, the pattern for the personhood of man. The image of God is personhood [MY emphasis], and personhood can function only in the context of relationships. Man’s capacity for intimate, personal relationships needed fulfillment. Most important, man was designed to have a personal relationship with God. … In his rational life, he was like God in that he could reason and had intellect will, and emotion.  In the moral sense, he was like God because he was good and sinless. However, it did not bestow deity upon man.

As MacArthur—and multitudes of Christian commentators—notes, God was never a man so His image/likeness in man had to do with his spirituality, his personhood, his ability to have relationships, etc. Mormon theology gives all mankind the ability to work themselves to godhood. Christian (and Jewish) theology, as taught in the Bible, has ONE eternal and spiritual God and none of mankind will ever be a god.