Mormonism

As you probably already know, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints (aka the Mormons) claim that the Book of Mormon is a divinely-inspired book, on equal footing with the Bible. Why? Because of this verse, which they claim proves that will be other “testaments” of Jesus Christ, of which the Book of Mormon is apparently the singular example.

John 10:16, “And other sheep I have, which are not of this fold: them also I must bring, and they shall hear my voice; and there shall be one fold, and one shepherd.”

However, when you look at the New Testament as a whole, what you find is that there are 2 basic types of people, Jews and Gentiles. Jesus came to minister to the Jews, not the Gentiles. At one point in his ministry, he is harsh toward a Gentile lady needing help:

Matthew 15:22-28, “And, behold, a woman of Canaan came out of the same coasts, and cried unto him, saying, Have mercy on me, O Lord, thou Son of David; my daughter is grievously vexed with a devil. But he answered her not a word. And his disciples came and besought him, saying, Send her away; for she crieth after us. But he answered and said, I am not sent but unto the lost sheep of the house of Israel. Then came she and worshipped him, saying, Lord, help me. But he answered and said, It is not meet to take the children’s bread, and to cast it to dogs. And she said, Truth, Lord: yet the dogs eat of the crumbs which fall from their masters’ table. Then Jesus answered and said unto her, O woman, great is thy faith: be it unto thee even as thou wilt. And her daughter was made whole from that very hour.”

But He gives in because of her faith. Instead, Paul the Apostle, was given the Gentile ministry.

Romans 11:13, “For I speak to you Gentiles, inasmuch as I am the apostle of the Gentiles, I magnify mine office: If by any means I may provoke to emulation them which are my flesh, and might save some of them.”

In fact, Paul spends a lot of time on distinguishing the two peoples in the book of Romans, and underscoring the point that although they had been on “opposite sides of the track,” the sacrifice of Jesus has made salvation – previously available only to the Jews – now open to the Gentiles as well.

1 Corinthians 12:13, “For by one Spirit are we all baptized into one body, whether we be Jews or Gentiles, whether we be bond or free; and have been all made to drink into one Spirit.”

And so it is that Jesus did have “other sheep” that were “not of this fold.” And they have “heard His voice,” and are now one “flock.” In fact the very process of opening up salvation to the Gentile is actually part of the plan for Israel’s redemption.

Romans 11:14, “If by any means I may provoke to emulation them which are my flesh, and might save some of them.”

So we see that Jesus’ comment here about “other sheep,” when read along with the rest of the New Testament, is almost expected. It’s simply a statement of how things are now and how they will be in the future. It’s a little glimpse into what will happen with Paul’s ministry.

However, if, for the sake of argument, we dismiss this explanation for Jesus’ words, and accept the Mormon idea that He is prophesying of another “bible” of sorts, then let us compare these two works. But let us not, at least at first, focus on spiritual matters. Rather let us review their historical credibility.

For, you see, the Bible is most investigated literary work on the planet. No book has received as much critical, literary, historical, archeological, or spiritual study. Many people reject the Bible because they do not trust that it was translated correctly. (I have written more on this site than about any other subject, and I think you can trust that the original meanings have not been lost.) But even laying aside all deeper meanings, the people, places, and things that the Bible describes are all readily traceable to their historical context. When the Bible talks about the kings that ruled Israel and Samaria, other records from other peoples corroborate these facts. When the Bible talks about dates, say for the exile of the Jews in Babylon, these dates can be verified by other sources that have no vested interest in proving the Bible as accurate.

It really is very simple. When the Bible talks about a city, for the most part, we know where it stood in that day because we know where it stands today. We know exactly where the cities of Jerusalem, Jericho, Babylon, Nazareth, and others are. We can go visit them today. We can excavate the ground underneath them and prove that their inhabitants lived like the Bible says they did. Every time someone uncovers more about the history of the middle east, it underscores the Bible’s reliability as a historically accurate record.

Why is this important? Because Truth can only come from truth. Here – in the Bible – we have a book that makes some statements about what has happened in the past. They can be proven to have happened. That establishes it as truth. Then we note that the book makes predictions about things that should happen within the time frame that it covers. What we find is that these predictions have come true, showing that not only is the book accurate, but also it has been inspired by a force more powerful than mankind. That indicates that it is Truth as well. Further, we note that the Bible also makes predictions about what will happen in our future, as well as making statements about how we ought to live. After showing that the Bible is truth and Truth, we ought to take heed about the things it says to us for today.

The Book of Mormon claims to be the history of an offshoot of the Jewish people who traveled across the Atlantic ocean in an ark to the Americas around 800 BC, settled and civilized the land, building great cities and temples, and who finally wiped themselves out in a great battle around present day New York around 400 AD. Is this true? The Mormons will ask that you simply pray about the Book of Mormon and ask God if it’s true. They say that a person will feel a “sign” that the book is true that they describe as a “burning in the bosom.” The problem I have with such an approach is that the Bible itself delcares how to measure its Truthfulness, and this isn’t the way.

2 Timothy 2:15, “Study to shew thyself approved unto God, a workman that needeth not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth.”

See, the Bible doesn’t ask you to pray about it to see if it is Truth, it asks you to study it to see if it is Truth. Remember what Paul is really telling Timothy. Jesus had come and said that He was the fulfillment of the prophesies concerning the Christ. Were we to take that on blind faith? No. Were we to simply pray and ask God if it were true? No. Jesus and Paul both spent a lot of time showing how the man, Jesus, fit all the prophesies concerning his first coming. That’s what Paul was advising Timothy to do. Study the scriptures and see if what you’re being told is Truth.

And so what does a study of the facts of the Book of Mormon reveal? Well, let me ask this leading question. How many of us, in our schooling, learned of a Jewish-type people that lived on this continent for the 1200 years from 800 BC to 400 AD? None of us. How can a people that – according to the Book of Mormon – numbered in the millions – who built fortified cities and temples – whose history stretched another 4 centuries later than anything recorded in the Bible – have left no mark on our historical and archeological records? I have had some limited discussions with Mormons about this, and their answer is always dismissive (which was why the discussions were limited). They claim that the central Americans and native north Americans are the descendants of these people, and that their records have been lost and their ruins built over.

Compare this to archeological evidence that supports the Bible. Jericho has not just been excavated, but the Jericho of Joshua’s time was seven layers under the present-day ruins. Each layer can be identified and dated, even though the middle eastern lands were in a continual flux of wars and peoples, and even though the ruins have been flattened by these wars and the elements, each time to provide a foundation for the next building. Jericho is not unique. Many, many such digs have gone on around Israel. The cities, having been destroyed and rebuilt so many times, actually stand higher than the rest of the land. This does not make it hard to verify the remains archeologically. Rather, it preserves the important facts for later discovery. And each one underscores the veracity of the Bible.

On the other hand, the archeological evidence for the book of Mormon is almost non-existent. Though several books on Mormon archeology have been written, they are all, of course, written by Mormons. One of the most frequently-cited works on the subject, Kon Tiki by Thor Heyerdahl, only claims to prove that a white-skinned race lived on this continent during the time under investigation. It does not concern itself with finding any of the places or fixing any of the times referenced in the Book of Mormon. The bottom line is that Mormons themselves are at a loss to locate even one of the scores of cities mentioned in their own book.

In fact, the situation is so bad, some Mormons have put forth the idea that the lands of the Book of Mormon (an hourglass-shaped land mass with oceans on both sides), instead of referring to the entire Americas (as most people have assumed), might actually refer to one small section of central America. However, this theory introduces another problem. See, the last survivor of the last battle that wiped out the Mormon people, Moroni, allegedly buried the original, huge golden tablets from which the Book of Mormon was “translated” in a little hill just a short way from the battleground. Since Joseph Smith says he dug up and translated the plates around New York, it would mean either that the hordes of people who fought the last great war had to have traveled the thousands of miles to present-day New York from Central America just to do so, or Moroni carried the hundreds (if not thousands) of pounds of plates all those thousands of miles to bury them there.

Mormons have a history tour here in America, which retraces the path of Joseph Smith from his start in New York to his establishment in Utah. One of the big places of interest along the way is a city in Illinois where one of the first (maybe it’s the first, I’m not sure) Mormon temples was built. A friend of mine went there. Took pictures. Was very proud of the experience. And I can understand this. If I could walk the paths of, say, the Apostle Peter, or especially the Apostle Paul, I would love to do that.

Oh. Wait. I can.

There are a million tours to take of the Holy Land in Israel. Most of the cities of the Bible are located right where they were 2,000 years ago. Many of the cities reference in the Old Testament have been located. You can walk around all of this history. We know the paths that the Apostles took as they started their churches. Why? Because it’s all there. Why in the world can’t we have a tour of the “Mormon Holy Lands?” Why don’t they have a thriving tourism office in Salt Lake providing guided tours of the cities referenced in the Book of Mormon? This would be an enormous boon to the faith, and an incredible blessing to its adherents. But it doesn’t exist. It’s more than a little curious, isn’t it?

Why would God ask us to believe in a book that can’t even be shown to be historically accurate? Most of the entire world, with the obvious exceptions, understands that the Bible – even if they don’t agree with its spiritual viewpoints – it is still a verifiable historical record. Mormons will brush this question aside and tell you that if you would open your heart and ask God sincerely, He would show you that it’s true. But should a person pray about the Book of Mormon? In contrast to the Bible, it just doesn’t seem to bear that much attention. Asking if it is Truth before establishing its credibility as truth is backwards. After all, how can it possibly be Truth if it can’t even be shown to be true?

After having examined the “natural” argument as to the veracity of the Book of Mormon, I want to turn my attention to the “spiritual.” The Mormons frequently refer to a passage in Deuteronomy for proof of Joseph Smith’s divine calling as a prophet, and I want to include it here for my purposes as well. This is central to the Mormon belief system because when you elevate someone to the status of a prophet, it implies that they speak for God.

Deuteronomy 18:20-22, “But the prophet, which shall presume to speak a word in my name, which I have not commanded him to speak, or that shall speak in the name of other gods, even that prophet shall die. And if thou say in thine heart, How shall we know the word which the LORD hath not spoken? When a prophet speaketh in the name of the LORD, if the thing follow not, nor come to pass, that is the thing which the LORD hath not spoken, but the prophet hath spoken it presumptuously: thou shalt not be afraid of him.”

To get into a discussion about Joseph Smith’s standing as a prophet here would be to deal with such a huge topic so shallowly (and ignorantly) that I can’t begin to go into it. There are hundreds of books and web sites about such things. I’ll just stick to the Book of Mormon, what it does or doesn’t teach, and leave it at that.

Importantly, there is more to this subject of prophets to be found in the Bible, and any study of a subject in the Bible must be done in light of all the scripture that speaks on that subject.

Deuteronomy 13:1-5, “If there arise among you a prophet, or a dreamer of dreams, and giveth thee a sign or a wonder, And the sign or the wonder come to pass, whereof he spake unto thee, saying, Let us go after other gods, which thou hast not known, and let us serve them; Thou shalt not hearken unto the words of that prophet, or that dreamer of dreams: for the LORD your God proveth you, to know whether ye love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul. Ye shall walk after the LORD your God, and fear him, and keep his commandments, and obey his voice, and ye shall serve him, and cleave unto him. And that prophet, or that dreamer of dreams, shall be put to death; because he hath spoken to turn you away from the LORD your God, which brought you out of the land of Egypt, and redeemed you out of the house of bondage, to thrust thee out of the way which the LORD thy God commanded thee to walk in. So shalt thou put the evil away from the midst of thee.”

This one is even more damning. This passage says that even though a prophet offer “a sign or a wonder,” if he doesn’t speak in line with what we already know as Truth, he is not a prophet of the Lord, regardless if that “sign or wonder” comes to pass. The New Testament backs this up.

Galatians 1:6-9, “I marvel that ye are so soon removed from him that called you into the grace of Christ unto another gospel: Which is not another; but there be some that trouble you, and would pervert the gospel of Christ. But though we, or an angel from heaven, preach any other gospel unto you than that which we have preached unto you, let him be accursed. As we said before, so say I now again, If any man preach any other gospel unto you than that ye have received, let him be accursed.”

So, in light of all the testifying as to how Joseph Smith is a prophet with a divine calling to restore the “true” gospel of Jesus Christ, I would like to ask why the Mormon church is not teaching what the Apostles taught. The Mormons like to establish their authority by claiming that Jesus laid hands on the apostles who laid hands on others who laid hands on others who eventually laid hands on Joseph Smith who laid hands on… You get the idea. And yet, they don’t focus on the Apostles’ teachings.

What was the very first Apostolic sermon about? Repentance, baptism in the name of Jesus, and being filled with the Holy Ghost (as evidenced by speaking in tongues).

Acts 2:38-39, “Then Peter said unto them, Repent, and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins, and ye shall receive the gift of the Holy Ghost. For the promise is unto you, and to your children, and to all that are afar off, even as many as the Lord our God shall call.”

Notice that it says right there that the promise is for everyone for all time. That means it still happens today the way it happened then. Also, the Apostles understood that the Lord our God is One LORD.

Deuteronomy 6:4-5, “Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God is one LORD: And thou shalt love the LORD thy God with all thine heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy might.”

But the Mormon church teaches that God is a “trinity.” In fact, the “revelation” that Mr. Smith allegedly experiences concerning the Book of Mormon shows all three “people” of the “trinity” standing side by side by side. The attentive reader will notice that this never happens in the Bible, because it can’t.

Unfortunately, it doesn’t stop there. Unbelievably, in his later teachings to his followers, he describes how God Himself was actually conceived sexually, was a human being – like us – who achieved godhood, and is one of many, many gods that make up the spiritual realm. Further, later church leaders taught that Adam was actually the incarnation of God that populated the earth. I can’t even begin to go into the specifics of quoted references and refutations here. There is so much controversy about who said what that it becomes tedious. The bottom line is that — despite the back pedaling today — people heard the church leaders teaching these things, or these controversies wouldn’t exist. Again, there are hundreds of pages about that on the internet. Suffice to say that the Bible is very explicit in many places that there one and only one all-powerful God who is from everlasting to everlasting.

Don’t get me wrong, the Mormon church stands for a lot of good, wholesome, and moral things. Family is of utmost importance. Baptism in the name of Jesus is necessary and the right way to perform baptism at all. But then they also teach that saved Mormons will all have their own worlds to populate – one for each wife – and rule over in the afterlife, and there’s just simply nothing, at all, that you can even misconstrue in the Bible that would lead to such thinking.

And so it is that the Mormon church isn’t teaching what the Apostles taught about salvation, nor are they teaching correct doctrine about the nature of God. According to Deut 13:1-5, no matter how good a person is or what signs and wonders they might work, if they aren’t teaching proper doctrine – if they are leading people away from the Truth that’s already been established by the Bible – then they are in the wrong, and there shouldn’t be any more question about their status as a prophet or the status of their works as Truth.