Plurality of gods
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The plurality of gods usually refers to a unique concept taught by Joseph Smith and several other leaders of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. It is believed to be based on interpretations of the Bible, the Book of Abraham, the teachings of Joseph Smith, Jr. and successor prophets and by Latter Day Saints.
Latter-day Saints believe in an eternal cycle where God creates children in the purpose that they may grow to be joint-heirs of Jesus Christ and thus become one with God or like God. This is commonly called exaltation with the LDS church. However, Gordon B. Hinckley, former prophet and president of the church, stated that we do not currently possess a clear understanding of what it means to be joint-heirs with Christ.
Conversely, previous prophets or leaders of the church have made statements about their personal beliefs about exaltation. Joseph Smith taught, and the Bible also states, that we are the sons of God. Joseph further stated in a single funeral talk that God was the son of a Father, and that the cycle continues for eternity. This teaching is also implied in a single LDS hymn "If You Could Hie to Kolob" (written by William W. Phelps), which says,
-
- "Do you think that you could ever, through all eternity,
- Find out the generation where Gods began to be? ...
- Or view the last creation, where Gods and matter end?"
LDS also believe there is evidence for this teaching in the Bible:
- Revelations 1:6 - "And hath made us kings and priests unto God and his Father; to him be glory and dominion for ever and ever. Amen"[1] Joseph Smith interpreted this to mean that individuals were made kings and priests unto God, referring here to Jesus Christ, and to his Father.[1]
[edit] The Godhead as three Gods
The two largest Latter Day Saint denominations disagree as to the nature of the Godhead. The largest and most well-known, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, accepts Smith's teachings that the Godhead is composed of three individual beings that make one God as stated in the Book of Mormon. In the Book of Abraham, which Latter-day Saints believe Smith translated from ancient Egyptian papyri, the creation story refers to "the Gods" instead of "God": "And then the Lord said: Let us go down. And they went down at the beginning, and they, that is the Gods, organized and formed the heavens and the earth.[2]
Smith taught that God the Father, Jesus Christ, and the Holy Spirit were three Gods, and quoted the Apostle Paul in the New Testament, who said, "there are gods many and lords many" to justify it. [1] Smith ridiculed the traditional Trinitarian view of the Godhead:
"Many men say there is one God; the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost are only one God! I say that is a strange God anyhow—-three in one, and one in three! It is a curious organization. "Father, I pray not for the world, but I pray for them which thou hast given me." "Holy Father, keep through Thine own name those whom thou hast given me, that they may be one as we are." All are to be crammed into one God, according to sectarianism. It would make the biggest God in all the world. He would be a wonderfully big God—-he would be a giant or a monster. I want to read the text to you myself—"I am agreed with the Father and the Father is agreed with me, and we are agreed as one." The Greek shows that it should be agreed. "Father, I pray for them which Thou hast given me out of the world, and not for those alone, but for them also which shall believe on me through their word, that they all may be agreed, as Thou, Father, art with me, and I with Thee, that they also may be agreed with us," and all come to dwell in unity, and in all the glory and everlasting burnings of the Gods; and then we shall see as we are seen, and be as our God and He as His Father. I want to reason a little on this subject. I learned it by translating the papyrus which is now in my house. I learned a testimony concerning Abraham, and he reasoned concerning the God of heaven. "In order to do that," said he, "suppose we have two facts: that supposes another fact may exist—two men on the earth, one wiser than the other, would logically show that another who is wiser than the wisest may exist. Intelligences exist one above another, so that there is no end to them."[1]
[edit] Man as gods
One way in which multiple gods are seen in Mormonism is that men are, in a sense, gods. In the King Follett Discourse, a sermon given by Joseph Smith a few months before his death, Smith taught the following:
- Humankind has no beginning, and "chaotic matter" had existed before God made the world from such matter.
- "I take my ring from my finger and liken it unto the mind of man ... because it has no beginning"
- "The pure principles of element, are principles that can never be destroyed." (Times and Seasons, 5:615)
- One should know what God is like and how to interact with Him.
- "It is the first principle of the Gospel to know for a certainty the Character of God, and to know that we may converse with him as one man converses with another." (TPJS, p. 345)
- "If the veil were rent today, and ... God ... (were) to make himself visible ... if you were to see him today, you would see him like a man in form -- like yourselves in all the person, image, and the very form as a man." (TPJS, p. 345)
- People have a potential to become Gods themselves.
- Smith discussed the potential of mankind by referencing Romans 8:17[[2]], then stating that men may go: "...from one small degree to another, and from a small capacity to a great one; from grace to grace, from exaltation to exaltation ... until (they) arrive at the station of a God." (TPJS, p. 346-47)
Smith taught, "You have got to learn to become Gods yourselves, the same as all Gods before you have done."
[edit] References
- ^ a b c "Sermon by the Prophet—The Christian Godhead—Plurality of Gods", History of the Church, Vol. 6, p. 473-479
- ^ Abraham 4:1, Pearl of Great Price (Salt Lake City: Corporation of the President of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, 1985).
