A Response Part I: My Motive

A couple of months ago, I was in the sort of discussion that inspired me to the previous posts in this blog, where I complain and rail about inter-denominational arguments.  Now it's worth mentioning that the person in this discussion seems like he's probably a pretty decent person whom I'd lend my car to if he ever asked.  Even so, he is also, unfortunately, one of those folks who doesn't seem to have a problem casually trashing people's beliefs where they differ from his.  

So he once asked me to comment on a blog post he created in which he goes through his anti-LDS arguments.  He mentions me in the opening.  (I'm the 'devout Mormon' he references.)  I didn't really have anything to say at the time because it's not like I was being asked for collaboration.  It did stay in the back of my mind, though, and I have decided to write my impressions here in order to present another point of view.  For reference, the blog post I'm talking about is right here.

This is a multi-part response because his blog post was pretty long and I'd rather approach it in bite-sized pieces.

Since he displays a username of GethN7 I'll go ahead and use that to refer to him.

So after a preamble about 4 paragraphs long that gives a clear insight and motive behind this post, we get into the meat of it.

Section 1.  GethN7 provides a link to a website as his source.  The title page of that source is "7 Reasons Why Mormonism and Christianity Are Not the Same"

So... we're not expecting objectivity from a source like that.  I'll also clarify here: If there is just one version of Christianity that is correct, I assert that it is taught by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints.  I'm not gatekeeping here, though.  If someone tells me they're a Protestant Christian or a Catholic and therefore a Christian... fine.  Go ahead and use the term if you like.  It isn't my place to tell you what you may call your beliefs.  I will say, however, that I reject the notion that these other churches should somehow be considered the default and that it's the job of the LDS Church to meet the standards set by those churches.  That's just silly. 

In section A, GethN7 goes on to say this:

"Mormon doctrine essentially repudiates everything after the death of the original apostles of Christ as illegitimate."

I wouldn't put it that way.  We know that it didn't take long for the Early Church to begin to splinter and start messing with doctrine.  Lots of factions started popping up that were mostly defined by their differences in the doctrines they taught.  It was a gradual process that went on for centuries.  

This shouldn't be a point of disagreement.  The whole point of the Council of Nicaea in 325 was to address these problems.  

The LDS argument is that the early church lost its way, over the course of centuries, to the point where it was eventually in complete apostasy. 

 

"Mormon doctrine essentially claims until Joseph Smith came along, humanity was stumbling in the wilderness with a flawed, perverted version of the actual beliefs in God until Joseph Smith and his successors had the perfected version restored.

Frankly, this is not a new argument. Islam also claims to be the perfected version of the revelations of God, given by the Prophet Muhammad, and that Jews and Christians had an imperfect version of the actual truth."

It was also the argument of the originators of the Protestant movement.  Folks like Martin Luther, Huldrych Zwingli, John Wesley, etc., all began their movements to form the various Protestant branches for precisely the reason that they believed existing Christian traditions were flawed and in need of reform.  So yes, GethN7 is correct in saying that argument isn't new, but it's also very common among Christian churches.  By the logic of his argument here, no Christian church is legitimate other than the Catholic Church.  

So Section 1A isn't making a particularly strong argument.  Let's look at Section B:

"The Mormon view of the Bible is that is it not inerrant nor complete. Again, this is an argument many like Muslims and many splinter cults from the early church like Montantism made to "retcon" the Bible and add newer content down the line without the messy problem of repudiating the old."

To clarify, the exact LDS position, as stated in the Articles of Faith, is that "We believe the Bible to be the word of God as far as it is translated correctly; we also believe the Book of Mormon to be the word of God."  

The question of the reliability of the translation of the Bible seems to be pretty common, given there are dozens of different translations out there to choose from.  We Latter-Day Saints generally stick with the King James Version, but just walk into any bookstore where Bibles are sold and you'll have a plethora of options.  Don't forget also that the Catholic Bible contains several books that non-Catholics refer to as the Apocrypha, which do not appear in any Protestant Bible that I'm aware of.  I haven't seen this used to disqualify any other traditions as being Christian.  It seems to be another "It's only bad when the Mormons do it" argument.

So again, this argument really doesn't do much to support the notion that Latter-Day Saints aren't Christians.  So far, this article is doing a better job of calling into question the validity of pretty much any Christian tradition that isn't Catholic or Orthodox.

To continue GethN7 makes an argument based on one of the flawed premises already mentioned in this work.  Namely, the idea that we believe the Apostasy happened all at once in a short period of time.

"However, this presents the first logical problem. If Christianity was a flawed, perverted shell of itself after the original apostles of Christ died, and the first canonization of the scriptures which even [Latter-Day Saints] largely accept was done by the Council of Nicaea ... then how can they accept the current Bible as considered canonical by most Protestant denominations ... a remotely accurate basis for their deuterocanon?"

One wonders if he's ever tried just asking one of us this question.  

We do believe the Bible to be the Word of God.  We also acknowledge that centuries of imperfect human scribes and political agendas may have had some effect on the veracity of at least some of the text.  This isn't a dig at the Bible.  It's an acknowledgement of the realities of what happens when you have copies of copies of copies throughout the Dark Ages and through the Renaissance.  None of that makes the Bible false.  It just means you need to study it very deliberately and seek to understand the message by accompanying that study with prayer, with the intent of asking God, through the Holy Spirit, to help us understand the meaning of what we're reading.

This is also why we have the Book of Mormon, which complements the Bible.  It has not undergone nearly as many such translations and copies.

I would also remind GethN7 that the Bible that came out of the Council of Nicaea contained the books of the Apocrypha, which are not used by Protestants either.  So that leads me to ask a counter question:  If Protestants believe in 'sola scriptura' (the belief that the Bible alone is the source of Christian truth and that it is inerrant) and if they believe the Council of Nicaea was a reliable source of Christian doctrine, then why have they also rejected the version of the Bible produced there?  

I'm not saying that to attack Protestantism.  I'm only pointing out that there's a double standard being used to attack LDS here.

Watch this, I'll take the quote above and change just TWO words, and let's imagine it's an article attacking Protestant traditions:

"However, this presents the first logical problem. If Catholicism was a flawed, perverted shell of itself after the original apostles of Christ died, and the first canonization of the scriptures which even [Protestants] largely accept was done by the Council of Nicaea ... then how can they accept the current Bible as considered canonical by most Protestant denominations ... a remotely accurate basis for their deuterocanon?"

See what I mean?  This argument can be aimed at Protestants just as easily.  So... maybe things aren't quite so simple?

"If they suspect anything after the original apostles died, and the canonization of scripture was not done by anyone they considered proper Christians, then their core premise that the Bible is not inerrant nor complete means one of two things. Either they need it to be true because it's the only way their retcons can be justified, or they are being inconsistent and giving the canonization of the Bible some degree of legitimacy, which undermines the core of their argument they cannot trust anything after the death of the original apostles. I respectfully contend their arguments don't wash."

I had a chuckle that he suggests LDS doctrines are 'retcons' but then uses the word 'respectfully' at the end.  Can't have it both ways, my friend.

This would be a better argument if all of LDS theology originated from the Bible.  It doesn't.  We all know that.

So this argument fails.  It's based on a standard that Protestantism doesn't meet either.  Again, only the Catholics seem to pass his test.

To sum up where we're at so far:  GethN7's arguments suggest that to be counted as a true Christian tradition, a church must:

• Accept that the history of Christianity is one of consistency and doctrinal accuracy going all the way back to the time of the Apostles, such that no reform or correction is needed.
• Agree that the only canonically accurate version of the Bible must be the one produced by the Council of Nicaea.

So the Catholics reading this are probably feeling pretty validated right now.  I certainly wouldn't blame them.  I'm not defending Catholicism here, and my intent isn't to attack Protestants.  I'm only pointing out that the arguments made so far are arbitrary and not carefully thought out.  It's almost like GethN7 is randomly picking elements of LDS theology and saying they're bad without even realizing that his own traditions have some very similar things in common.

Matthew 7:1-5

To be continued...