It’s been a while since I read Joseph Smith’s Polygamy: Volume 3 by Brian Hales. I read volume 3 first because (1) it was the shortest (a mere 281 pages compared to the other volumes), and (2) Brian Hales recommended we read it first since it was the first time anyone had tried to tackle the theological reasons behind polygamy. I intended to write my review sooner, but knew it would take some time, and put it off for far too long. As I reviewed my notes, I realized that I could probably do a post on the topic of spirit babies. Mormons have long believed that if we are sealed in the temple and live worthily, we are able to have unnumbered offspring forever. This has led many to believe that some women will be eternally pregnant, and also why more women are needed for eternal gestation. Some women have remarked that they don’t want to be pregnant forever.
It turns out that might be a folk doctrine that Brian Hales attacks in this book.
Now there is a good reason to believe in spirit birth. Hales remarks on page 113
Joseph Smith taught of another benefit granted to exalted men and women: “a continuation of the seeds” (D&C 132:19). Unfortunately, nowhere in the revelation are these benefits specifically explained. The most popular interpretation among Latter-day Saints today states that “the phrases ‘an increase’ and ‘a continuation of the seeds forever and ever’ mean that those who abide in the covenant are exalted in the highest degree of the celestial kingdom will have spirit children in the eternities.”32 In other words: “You are a literal child of God, spiritually begotten in the premortal life.”33
Now here’s where it gets interesting.
Another contrasting view to this interpretation is based upon a strict reading of Joseph Smith’s teachings that, “the Spirit of Man is not a created being; it existed from Eternity & will exist to eternity. Anything created cannot be Eternal.”34 And, “God never did have the power to create the spirit of man at all.”35 The Book of Abraham seems to agree: “If there be two spirits, and one shall be more intelligent than the other, have no beginning; they existed before, they shall have no end, they shall exist after, for they are gnolaum, or eternal” (Abr. 3:18).36
This interpretation, however, dismissed any form of eternal progression that involves an eternally extending genealogy through generations of spiritual procreation by exalted couples (a process sometimes referred to as “spirit birth”).37 Instead, it promotes an endless population of uncreated spirits who are not literally the offspring of God but are mentored by Him to pregress to divinity as His “children.” In this view, the order of heaven is not strictly familial. Instead, priesthood sealings of mortal parents and children (on an earth such as this one) form a chain that, as they are exalted, established their divine positions in the celestial kingdom. Jonathan Stapley embraces this view, affirming that the “vivaparous spirit birth is a wildly popular folk belief.”38 In other words, a “continuation of seeds,’ I think Joseph Smith is talking about retaining kinship, as opposed to being separate and single.”39 In other words, a “continuation of seeds” is the ability for mortal parents to continue to relate to and preside over their earthly children in eternity. Those who are unworthy live isngly without any family structure in the next life.
Similarly, in his impressive volume, In Heaven as It is on Earth: Joseph Smith and the Early Mormon Conquest of Death, Samuel Brown dismissed the possibility that “a continuation of seeds” represents the birth of spirit offspring by exalted couples: If Christ had pre-existence, so did humans. Through Christ, humans experience a birth that obliterated all births–they had no beginning.”
Hales continues along this line, and asks “Spirit Birth and D&C 132?” on page 120.
Another verse refers to God’s promise that Abraham would have “innumerable” seed: “Abraham received promises concerning his seed, and of the fruit of his loins–from whose loins ye are, namely, my servant Joseph–which were to continue so long as they were in the world; and as touching Abraham and his seed, out of the world they should continue; both in the world and out of the world should they continue as innumerable as the starts, or if ye were to count the sand upon the seashore ye could not number them” (D&C 132:30).
A question arises whether Abraham’s “seed” could become “innumerable” without spirit birth. The verse states that his seed are to be “of the fruit of his loins.” “Loins” refers to “the lateral portions of the lumbar region”64 but has been used euphemistically for reproductive anatomy that is covered with a “loincloth.” For example, Genesis 35:11 reads: “God said unto him [Jacob], I am God Almighty; be fruitful and multiply; a nation and a company of nations shall be of thee, and kings shall come out of they loins.” Lehi referred to his son Joseph saying, “thou are the fruit of my loins” (2 Ne. 3:4). Accordingly, the “fruit” of a person’s “loins” would seem to be literal offspring.
Joseph Smith also taught that through adoption ordinances on this earth, those not of Abraham’s literal seed can become his offspring.65 So could the number of Abraham’s “seed” through biological and adopted progeny on earth fulfill the prophecy to become “innumerable?”
Have you ever heard that spirit birth was a folk doctrine? Women, does that make you happy or sad you wan’t have to be eternally pregnant?
Wheat & Tares 
I am against the idea of eternal pregnancy (how would that even work? Pregnancy is by definition physical change, so how dudes that happen with a. A non physical child and b. A perfected body? The body does sine amazing things during and after pregnancy, but that is not the healthy and whole resurrection I’ve been promised). The possibility of no spirit birth reminds me again how cautious we ought to be in assuming we know things about the hereafter. Might lack of spirit birth mean that same sex couples exist on par with heterosexual couples since it’s all non biological adoption? It does seem to me that the folk doctrine of spirit birth is frequently trotted out to justify homophobia and policies like the November exclusions, and would be glad to see it refuted (regardless of what that means we do and don’t know about gender, sexuality, and coupledom post earth).
I have long seen the notion of vivaparous spirit birth as part of Momon folklore. It is not taught in the scriptures and was not taught by the Prophet Joseph Smith. I acknowledge it as part of the tapestry of Mormon thought but do not sustain it as doctrine. However, as the folklore of heavenly mothers turns more into doctrine, so does the folklore of past and future vivaparous spirit births.
@elizabeth
Regarding homosexuality in heaven (ignore the inflammatory title):
http://religionnews.com/2016/02/05/no-gays-in-heaven-avoiding-new-mormon-folk-doctrine/
Regarding marriage in heaven. According to the Bible, marriage as we understand it on Earth will not exist in Heaven. There will be no physical sex (and no need for it). I suppose this allows for marriage partners of the same sex to have families, as you suggest. I hope that’s the case.
http://www.gotquestions.org/marriage-heaven.html
If there’s no marriage in heaven, and no need for physical sex, then it’s safe to assume no pregnancy. So “spirit babies” would, one assumes, not be carried by the mother as they are on Earth.
It isn’t clear to me how families, as we experience them, would exist. If I understand the OP correctly, mommies and daddies in heaven would not have infinitely growing families due to eternal pregnancy.
I am not clear how rank and file TBMs envision the afterlife in this regard.
@ji
Agree. I am not even sure viviparous (live) birth makes any sense for spiritual beings–they aren’t “living”.
The word “intelligences”(plural) occurs frequently in LDS literature, having reference to the period of the premortal existence of mankind. The term has received two interpretations by writers within the Church: as the literal spirit children of Heavenly Parents and as individual entities existing prior to their spirit birth. Because latter-day revelation has not clarified the meaning of the term, a more precise interpretation is not possible at present.
Encyclopedia of Mormonism (1992)
@howard
With the footnote that BoA also uses “intelligent”, “more intelligent”, “weaker intelligence”, etc. in the sense of mental capacity (as explained in the link you provided).
Why would spirit birth imply eternal pregnancy? For that matter, how is spirit birth even compatible with eternal pregnancy? Unless one posits something like staggered gestation periods, I don’t know how that would even work. Here in mortality, once you give birth, you’re no longer pregnant.
While I know that our readers aren’t necessarily orthodox, it’s funny to me that everyone has been on board with Brian Hales reasoning. It’s not what I’ve heard at church.
So if there is no pregnancy, that means no sex in the Celestial kingdom, right? Sexual relations in LDS doctrine are inseparably tied to procreation, so without the necessity of procreation, sex has no legitimacy. But at least we’ll have resurrected physical bodies, so we can hold hands with our eternal companions.
Spirit birth is thought to imply eternal pregnancy, since if you are going to have an infinite number of children, you will be pregnant an infinite time. However, it does not necessarily mean that you are constantly pregnant. If you have infinite time, you have infinite time to do other things too. Just like there are infinitely integer numbers, there are more real numbers.
Personally, I have been sceptical about spirit birth for some time. Mainly, because we really don’t have anything revealed about it and because it seems to be just an extrapolation of this earthly experience. Lord works in mysterious ways, and extrapolating from this life to life in eternities can go amiss.
At least when I was teenager I found motivating the idea of that only those who are exalted are able to have sex.
Nate, that may have been the view in the 70s, and earlier, but I thought we’d moved on a bit from there, given the more relaxed stance on birth control etc.
@nate
“hold hands”
As I understand it, there will be no marriage in heaven as it exists on Earth (Matt 22:30), so sex would not be permitted, as that would be fornication. It seems we will still recognize our partners, but no longer be married to them in the earthly sense. This makes arrangement supports the OP’s assertion of “no spirit babies”. Presumably we’ll have evolved a new kind of loving relationship with our partners in heaven that precludes sex and procreation as we now understand it.
Howard — that is a great quote.
MH — it is interesting that while Joseph Smith turns out to have an almost vanishingly small number of DNA descendants involved in the LDS Church, if you track the matrilineal (sons of daughters and husbands of daughters) descendants of those he was sealed to (though did not have DNA children with), they comprise a huge part of the LDS Church leadership.
It makes one think, in this context.
In the church we make 2 grand mistakes:
1. We assume we know more than we a actually do about the plan of salvation and the mysteries of godliness
2. We limit the nature and abilities of God as the all powerful being.
These mistakes are heavily present in every post so far.
“Spiritually pregnant”. Why would the God of eternity be forced to procreate spirit children in their image… Especially when frogs and horses don’t seem to have that requirement and we know they have spirits as well?
“No sex in heaven”… Why not? We certainly accept sex as a sacred practice. Some outside-Christianity view sex as a spiritual practice (the beginnings guide to sex in the afterlife is an interesting read) King follet discourse states that God and Christ both have spiritual bodies of flesh and bone. If Christ can eat food so can God, demonstrating that earthly physical processes things are possible.
My personal opinion: I believe that there is a distinct nuance in the BOA regarding the difference between “intelligence” and “spirit”, with intelligence being the spark that animates the spirit. I believe that God can create life out of intelligence and as creator is the Father, and this is different from procreation.
I refuse to limit God and their relationship. In the scriptures, Christ is named the only begotten. No one else is called this. This is a title has a procreative nature to it, IMO. So… My crazy personal doctrinal spin is that Christ is the only procreated child of God. We are created in a different process. The Energy and end result is the same, but it’s manifestation occurs differently.
There is no reason to limit sex in heaven, and no reason to limit the creative powers of God to an early birthing cycle. Why not give God his accolade, and assume that both is possible?
MH, re: your second question.
The thought of spirit pregnancy/birth is so very bizarre to me and is laced with such speculation I prefer not to think of it much. And since the concept of spirit pregnancy supports the idea of eternal polygamy, I have even less motivation to consider it a possibility for my hereafter.
I’ll stick with the happy thought that God loves me and doesn’t want me to have a miserable future. If that means I’m eternally pregnant, (hopefully without cankles?) and sending my beloved husband on late night trips for eternally aged sharp cheddar and iceberg lettuce from the local Kolob Market, then so be it. I’ll be ok with that so long as there aren’t any sister wives in the picture. There are other scenarios that would work, but again, there are many that are very painful to consider, so I just prefer not to think on anything too specifically.
Also sprit pregnancy/spirit contractions/spirit delivery of placenta? Just……weird.
For a more mathematical view on this question, see my current post at mormonomics.blogspot.com. For me, the sheer numbers make spirit birth a highly dubious doctrine.
The “eternally pregnant” idea illustrates the paradoxes inherent in resurrection in general. The whole idea of procreation on earth is tied into mortality. Procreation is a kind of resurrection itself, a way for life to continue beyond the death of the procreator. In a universe with no death, the very utility of procreation itself is questionable. If eternal things are multiplying, with no mechanism for recycling (through death), you also have the problem of creation ex nihilo. We clearly live in a universe whose eternal scale consists in the life, death, and rebirth of stars and galaxies on the grandest scale possible. Even the universe is understood as having a cycle. The idealism of resurrection is extremely foreign to these natural cycles, and there is nothing in the universe that remotely seems to follow that kind of steady state pattern. The resurrection seems to be more related to the longings of human nature than anything we can possibly imagine happening in the physical world. Where these longings come from is a good question, and whether they point to some kind of real dimension where eternal pregnancy would have some sort of utility or meaning.
I think Joe Schmoe is on to something. The fact is, we have almost no knowledge about what happens after we die. We essentially believe 3 things: 1. We’ll continue existing after death, 2. There’s a possibility we’ll be with our heavenly parents and 3. We’ll be with our families. The last two of these conditions are predicated on personal choices and relative righteousness.
That’s it. That’s all we have. Which does make a lot of our speculation seem ridiculous, I guess. Also, however, it makes clear that we really could use a deeper sense of things, a theology, a place where one can really map some of this stuff out. Unfortunately, however, this church, which can’t even define the difference among revelation, doctrine and policy, certainly isn’t likely to be motivated to create a broad and deep intellectual and spiritual framework for the posing and answering of such questions mentioned in this post. Which is why websites like this one exist, I suppose, but which also demonstrates that one goal (among some fairly noble ones) of the church is to keep things simple, to discourage questions and to stigmatize doubt.
It would be a fascinating exercise to explore how people imagine heaven. How do they imagine “Be with their families?” The first thing that pops in my mind is a picture of a husband, wife, and some number of children. Possibly some pets. I’ve heard the idea floated that everybody will somehow be healed of earthly infirmities. For example, if you died of bone cancer at 95, you’d be restored to age 30 in the pink of health. But, presumably, all of your children would mature, become parents themselves, and then die of old age. So, in order to “Be with their families” they’d need one copy of each child as a young child, and one copy of each child as a mature adult acting as parent of the succeeding generation… and so on. Or maybe “Be with their families” means they’ll all be together as adults (all defaulted back to age 30). Sort of like an eternal Christmas dinner. Oh goody!
Anon #19 — I imagine “being with my family” the way I imagine Christ being with His Father. I don’t think the average Mormon envisions his or her family gathered around a Thanksgiving table carving a turkey. We understand our children are actually our brothers and sisters, so that though there may be a lineal descent to familial relationships, we’ll actually be collateral in light of being brothers and sisters. And yes, we also understand we technically married our spirit brother or sister. That’s just the way things are.
“average Mormon envisions”
So, I searched “Mormon family in heaven” and found a number of explanations and images indicating that Mormons do seem to picture several generations of family, dressed in white clothes or robes, in a green paradise. God and Jesus are shown talking to them or sitting on thrones. I didn’t notice Heavenly Mother, but I assume she’s there as well. I think this is how the “average Mormon” visualizes “being with their family” in heaven.
https://www.lds.org/manual/introduction-to-family-history-student-manual/chapter-1?lang=eng
Y’all anons need to pick a “new name” if I can borrow a phrase…
Let’s throw a wrench in this, maybe Mormon Heretic can help out:
is God currently still making spirit progeny — either creatively or procreatively? If so, how do those individuals have true agency to accept “the plan” and Christ, when the results of lucifers disobedience is a historical eternal fact for them? When dear Ol Lucy wanted things his way, there had never been rebellion before…
How do we understand CHILDREN in heaven? Little snotty crying mini-me’s crawling around the legs of the thrown of power, or glowing floating orbs that need a tether so they don’t float away on the clouds of the universe?
Remember those halfway reported Joseph Smith statements about deceased children being resurrected as children? Do we REALLY believe there is no physical change after resurrection? I don’t see evidence for that on the scriptures… And wouldn’t a stable physical state be a limit on the power of God, when we know that he has no limits and posses a spiritual body of flesh and bone?
If gender is a social construct, but masculine/feminine sex traits are designed by God (evidenced by Adam and Eve) what is the gender construct of a celestial society, where creative expansion and addition of glory is the purpose?
@joe
“children in heaven”
Precisely. One image I posted showed a couple of generations: grandparents, parents, children. But the explanation says that upon resurrection one receives a new eternally healthy *physical* body for the spirit to inhabit. If that’s the case, why are grandma and grandpa imagined as old? What about the great grandparents (not shown)? The picture also shows young children. Are they eternally that way? Presumably they weren’t young when they died on earth. And how can they be eternal children in heaven and still, presumably, give rise to all subsequent generations? Is there a mature version of each child in heaven as well?
In case it’s of interest, I broached these topics from a believer’s perspective in an essay for BYU Studies a while back: https://byustudies.byu.edu/content/believing-adoption
Note that one can still imagine eternally generative parental relationships without requiring the incredibly detailed biological accounts that some have called “spirit birth.”
The key point of doctrine is that our spirit bodies are begotten spirit sons and daughters of heavenly parents, and that gender is part of our premortal, mortal, and eternal purpose. It is difficult to imagine purposeful eternal gender without linking it to functional reproduction. As pointed out we do not know much about how resurrected bodies differ from mortal ones. But that does not mean we must throw out the concept of spirit birth. It is also possible that the reproduction of resurrected beings is much less ‘messy’ than in mortality.
Additionally any time taken for reproduction will be less than the time available. so there will certainly be eternal time available for anything else.
Larger numbers of spirits is also not a show stopper since we are talking about eternal pasts and futures.
You’d think cornerstone concepts like sealing, eternal families, spirit babies, etc. would be the most clearly understood. I get the impression heaven will be full of Mormons demanding a refund. And God saying “You should’ve read the fine print.”
One of my 20 something year old children came out recently and claims she is species confused. She is a rabbit trapped in a human body. She craves carrots and likes to wiggle her nose and her tail, or what passes for a tail in a human body. And hop around once in a while.
So maybe this really complicates things in the pre-mortal life. Do our pets and farm animals have spirits co-eternal with God? I think a few of the pioneers were sealed to their oxen in the temple. What about the billions of insects and nematodes and sea creatures? And viruses, bacteria and parasites? What if one of them did get mixed up and sent to the earth to inhabit a body of the wrong species?
This species confused daughter claims the condition is not that uncommon. She knows of quite a number of her mostly male peers who are species confused. They think and act like they are jackasses.
See species dysphoria https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Species_dysphoria
My brother in-law thinks he’s a chicken. He runs around the yard clucking and flapping his elbows. We should take him to a shrink for treatment….but we need the eggs.
Abr 3:22 “Now the Lord had shown unto me, Abraham, the intelligences that were organized before the world was…”
“Organized intelligences” and subsequent spirit bodies does not sound like pregnancy, gestation and birth. It doesn’t sound like one by one our spirits were born and we all waited around until all the birthing was done…and then…had a big meeting to discuss the plan why all that birthing was needed and the next estate.
Abraham’s promise for innumerable seed is more likely a figurative way to talk about lots and lots of descendants throughout the earthly generations, not literally innumerable, not literally as many as sands on the seashore, not in heaven…but “a lot” was the point being made, and was something important to Abraham…his eternal legacy on earth.
It doesn’t make sense to me for pregnancy in the eternities, or the need for food or sleep or other temporal necessities.
What I do find fascinating is the point that #26 makes…that for something so critical to our church focus … the temple and eternal sealing of families…how little we know about why that is necessary or what that is like.
We focus on temples as so hugely important to everything we do at church, even at the cost of dividing earthly families when marriage is done in the temple where some are excluded, or out of the temple where some are disappointed. And yet…we don’t know why it matters. We just have faith it does. For some reason…it really matters as some of the most important things we can do in this one shot mortal experience we get.
Puzzling.
At some point…I think we realize we see through the glass darkly…and really know so little…and therefore…love reigns supreme and choosing wisely to live in the present is of most importance. The rest will work itself out.
But I can’t imagine it works out where women have to put up with that for eternity what they only deal with in a few years of in this short life experience.
I sometimes enjoy the speculative discussion, though. I often wonder what nonmormons think of us and our thoughts on speculations of God and heaven.
I agree with those who feel we know very little about what goes on in the eternities. I would not like to be eternally pregnant either.
But in my various speculations over the years I’ve wondered about the resurrection and the promise that not a hair of the head will be lost, that all will be restored and perfected. What then becomes of ovaries and testes and uteruses (uteri???) and other related parts of the body? Will they not be included in the resurrection?–no hair will be lost but reproductive organs are no more? Or do they exist but are dormant forevermore?
Are spirit bodies born of spirit bodies? Did I bear spirt children of God before I came to earth? Did pre-mortal Adam and Eve begin that process for all, and two by two many were born? Or came forth? Even if this were so, and then on earth Adam and Eve also began the mortal birthing process, how then would resurrected, perfected physical bodies have the seeds to procreate anything but the same type of bodies?? Are celestial beings parents of more celestial beings that don’t need the first two estates? Do they have a family to raise and then take a break for a little season, and then have another family, and so on and so on? Do they help organize intelligences to be incorporated as part of a birthing process of spirit children for another little season?–help create an earth for them to gain physical bodies? Could they bear celestial children to raise in perfection, but also help guide the creation process of various estates we’ve already passed through? Are there wonders of creation beyond our capacity to imagine and comprehend???
It’s all a wondrous mystery that often sparks my curiosity.
It worries me that the Mormon concept of heaven seems to be that God is white, Jesus is white, and “made in His image” means that God’s lineage is all white people. The artwork that Mormons are exposed to supports this overwhelmingly. Most images show a few token people of other races, and even that is relatively recent. It’s not just the artwork: people dress up their families in white suits as if they imagine Mormon heaven that way… a sort of dress rehearsal.
The concept is reinforced by teaching as well. Here’s a quote from an lds.org website about Mormon families and heaven:
“When we understand the doctrine of premortal life, then things fit together and make sense. We then know that little boys and little girls are not monkeys, nor are their parents, nor were theirs, to the very beginning generation…. We are the children of God, created in his image…. Our child-parent relationship to God is clear.” -Boyd Packer
It’s one thing to speculate on a blog and say “Mormon heaven is mysterious and we don’t understand it.” What worries me is what the Mormon church is selling to members and potential new converts. People buy into superficial images and don’t bother thInking whether the concepts even make sense or, worse, are sexist and racist. It’s a classic example of “sell the sizzle, not the steak.”
It would be awesome if it turns out God and Jesus are black guys, heaven is 99% black, it’s men who bear spirit babies, not women, and Heavenly Mother is black and runs the whole show.
I agree with heber13 that Abraham gives insight into this matter that is different from birth as we know it. That’s been my understanding for quite a while now.
Im always hesitant to frame celestial physicality in terms of earthly biological processes or identity politics such as birth, ethnicity or gender-roles. I disbelieve that exalted beings are black or white, especially since we know that skin color is an evolutionary byproduct in relation to earths equator. Likewise, careful reading reveals that “god” is a title given to the creative union of male and female and while we know aspects of male and female exist in the next life, we have zero evidence of any type of gender related roles or attributes. Race and gender role attributes are earthly constructions, and our understanding of biology is as well.
We frame our understanding of diety and eternal progression in terms which we are familiar with; family, father, children, birth, and death. We often forget that our understanding is limited by culture and context, and shaped by the theophany of a single individual who gathers social traction.
One of the cultural falsehoods that we perpetuate is that the restored gospel has all of the answers. Joseph taught the opposite and simply stated that we had the necessary keys for salvation. Even our beloved authoritarian leaders Brigham young and Bruce mcConkie admitted we only knew a portion of eternal truth.
It’s also pretty obvious that no one in this blog has witnessed the grandeur of heaven or the sociality that exists there. Has anyone had a legitimate conversation with anyone who has?
Anon wrote: “It worries me that the Mormon concept of heaven seems to be that God is white, Jesus is white, and “made in His image” means that God’s lineage is all white people.
Amen and Amen.
Out of the bogus science of phrenology (the idea that the shape of your skull predicted personality and criminality) grew the real science of differentiating race (African, European, Asian) based on skeletal features alone. Modern experts in human osteology can do this with probably about 95% accuracy. The Smithsonian institute alone has a collection of tens of thousands of complete human skeletons of known racial origin. The extensive collaborative study of these various collections over decades form the foundation of this essentially physical science. When an unidentified human skeleton is found in the mountains or desert, forensic anthropologists using these same principles can make accurate estimates of gender, race, and height. *(See below)
Applying the same principles to human skeletons dating back into prehistory, it is apparent that the white race emerged later (probably about 40,000 years ago) and the black race is at least 5 and possibly 10 times as old. Even the prehuman skulls (such as Homo erectus which go back 2 million years) ) exhibit strong African racial features. Therefore, at least the first 80 or 90% of human history was lived by black people in the absence of white people. If an anthropomorphic God literally created man in his own image, down to specific racial features, then this creator God has to be similar in racial features to the oldest race of man on earth. That would be the African race.
The development of agriculture is dated to about 10,000 years (in multiple places and occurring over thousands of years). The Bible describes Adam as a farmer (or gardener). In the recent past primitive pre-agricultural cultures were thought of as being somehow sub-human (maybe not descended from Adam?) or degenerated back towards animals like the Lamanites described in the Book of Mormon which justified exploitation and slavery, etc. In this framework we only became fully human and children of God when we began to till the soil. A white Adam living late might be twisted to make sense in this context. The better awareness of deep human racial history demotes the centrality of the white race in the story of mankind and by extension makes a racially white universal God untenable.
I am not sure how to interpret the historic LDS denial of the Priesthood, the power to act in God’s name, exclusively to the oldest race of people who probably most closely resemble in physical features our Heavenly Father. How does a black God enthroned in heaven look down on the likes of Bruce R. McKonkie thundering from the pulpit (personal experience) that the Negro will never receive the Priesthood in this life? **And to be stubborn about it for nearly half a century after this scientific information was well established. And for some of us to continue to make excuses and justification for it right up until a few years ago. After this boondoggle, I don’t think anything this generation of Mormons might have to share in this area has much credibility outside our own myopic echo chamber.
When you pray, try to image just once, that God is black. It might change the way you view black people. And maybe we need to read more books like ‘The Shack’ by William Young wherein God the Father is imaged to be a sassy black woman, Christ a gentle middle eastern carpenter, and the HG a female Asian mystic..
*Footnotes:
Bass, William M. 1995. Human Osteology: A Laboratory and Field Manual. Columbia: Missouri Archaeological Society, Inc.
Eckert, William G. 1997. Introduction to Forensic Science. United States of America: CRC Press, Inc.
Gill, George W. 1998. “Craniofacial Criteria in the Skeletal Attribution of Race. ” In Forensic Osteology: Advances in the Identification of Human Remains. (2nd edition) Reichs, Kathleen l(ed.), pp. 293–315.
Krogman, Wilton Marion and Mehmet Yascar Iscan 1986. The Human Skeleton in Forensic Medicine. Springfield: Charles C.Thomas.
** I image Elder Mckonkie after he died, being greeted at the pearly gates by our Heavenly Father who in physical appearance more closely resembles LeBron James than Charlton Heston. And by our Heavenly Mother who looks more like Whoopi Goldberg than Elizabeth Taylor. And them saying with love and forgiveness, well done thou good and faithful son…mostly..
***The beards God wears in Mormon art can go. The authentic native African has very little facial hair..The thick beards we see on many African-Americans are a marker and legacy of their white ancestors (and too often from coercion/rape during slavery).
anon and old geezer, you are conveniently forgetting some very obvious facts. Read the scriptures, such as in Revelations. John clearly describes the Great Jehovah, now resurrected as white, whiter than the pure snow. Hebrews: “For our God is a consuming fire”. All your ‘black’ hypothesizing is absolutely useless. Secondly, prophets have seen them. I’m sure Moses, Abraham, would have said something if Jehovah and His angels were black. Homo Erectus was not a child of God, or a descendants of Adam. Yuval Noah Harari describes that when homo sapiens arrived on the scene, they obliterated and completely decimated all other species of humans. They were no match whatsoever for thinking god-like homo sapiens who were created in the very image and likeness of God. Homo neanderthalus, denisisovans and erectus had intelligences similar to other primates.
As far as all the speculation regarding spirit babies. Some of you are totally discounting all the revelation since J. Smith. Conference talks, and other statements have shed a lot more light on The Restoration, which is ongoing, since Smiths day. Further, do you recall how the resurrected Lord walked though walls? His perfected, glorified body isn’t just physical again, it is a Spirit Body and a Physical Body in perfect completeness. It is BOTH Spirit and Physical. So having spirit offspring… a continuation of the seeds forever… ETERNAL LIVES! is not only possible, but it is the plan… Our resurrected, perfected bodies will be fully capable of sex. To a Spirit being, spirit element is as tangible as the physical world is to us now. So having spirit children wouldn’t feel like having gas. But it also doesn’t have the drawbacks of earthly birth since Eve’s and Her daughters labor was greatly multiplied in sorrow, pain, etc… And why wouldn’t there be sex? Sex is the divinely appointed means for bringing the Family of God into the physical world. Why would He cast sex aside as something below gods if He appointed it?, It seems like we need to discard the warn out secular tripe’s that ‘Sex is Dirty, and Bad’. Nothing could be further from the truth. It is in marital sex that we enter a godly realm and cooperate with God in providing bodies for His children, and we get to ascend to the title that God chooses that we refer to Him as FATHER, and it’s Co-Divine Partner… MOTHER. Out of all the titles the Great Elohim could have us use, He prefers that we call Him FATHER/MOTHER. (Elohim is plural and refers to our Heavenly Parents jointly. Think about that! Also, What happens when an immortal Father begets a Son with a mortal mother? = The Only Begotten Son, who was capable of both life (living forever) and death. Jesus was not the Offspring of the Holy Ghost. The scriptures cannot be more clear! Begotten IS BEGOTTEN in the full spiritual and physical sense! D&C 132:41.. Clearly vs. 41 is referring to women, and makes the exception being one who has received a holy anointing. The Holy Anointing has reference to Mary, the Mother of the Son of God. Just read the scriptures. There is so much there, we just don’t take the time to think and pray for answers.
Liberty, your blanket statements sufgest your comments can’t be taken seriously. Do you really belive all that tripe about Democrats? I mean, come on. Can you not see that you’re repeating tropes of our own? Did you not read the OP? Do you not know that the church has backtracked several times on references to skim color in the scriptures and now says that such references are not clearly referencing skin color?
People have used the verses you references for an excuse for racism for a very long time. Ignore that if you wish, but hey, facts.
Also, that you resurrect an old thread to make statements about race and ‘leftists’probably reveals more about your heart in commenting than anything else. Thanks for playing though. Quite revealing.