I read Old Testament lesson 4 quite closely this week, but as fate would have it I won’t be teaching it today. Still, there is a lot wrong with the lesson, which covers the story of Adam and Eve in Genesis 3. Well, not exactly. The lesson covers Moses 4, which is a much different narrative than Genesis 3, which is the first problem, but I won’t dwell on that. Once upon a time, Moses and Abraham were taught at the end of the Doctrine and Covenants course, but now they have hopped over to the Old Testament and displaced the opening chapters of Genesis. Another step backwards for the LDS curriculum and for LDS scriptural understanding. So, trying hard not to sound whiny, here are some problems with this lesson, particularly for those who have to teach it.
1. Adam is actually a very minor figure in the Old Testament.
After the death of Adam at the ripe old age of 930 years (another problem I will not dwell on) in Genesis 5:5, Adam pretty much disappears from the Old Testament. It is only in Christian doctrine that Adam assumes a large role, first in Paul’s theology (“As in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive”) and most famously in Augustine’s account of original sin. Over the centuries, Adam’s original sin, somehow sexually transmitted to all his descendants, was the problem to which the growing edifice of doctrine and sacraments of the Catholic Church were the answer. So a lot of Christian theological ink was spilled on those first few chapters of Genesis, some interpreting the story literally, some allegorically or symbolically, or in recent years as a myth (in the positive sense of that term).
The Mormon story of Adam and Eve takes that Christian view of Adam as a key theological figure, expands it, and projects it back into the Old Testament narrative itself. That is the case in several D&C passages but most clearly in Joseph’s Smith’s rewriting of the Bible, the first few chapters of which, while never canonized in Joseph’s time, came down to us as the Book of Moses. It was not canonized until 1880, under John Taylor. The Joseph Smith Translation, as the full manuscript is known, was held in low regard by the LDS Church until roughly the 1970s, when the RLDS Church (now the Community of Christ) finally allowed LDS scholars access to the manuscript, and eventually it was included in the 1979 edition of the LDS Bible, as footnotes for short changes and in an appendix for long additions to various bible chapters.
So there is an evolution of Adam, in the Mormon view, from sinner to mere transgressor to a great and noble co-creator of the world to, under Brigham Young, Adam-God. Conceptually, Hero Adam is quite foreign to the actual Old Testament documents as we have them. It’s a uniquely Mormon thing, not a Bible thing or a Jewish thing or a Christian thing.
2. Transgression, schmansgreggion — Adam sinned and Eve sinned.
Along with rejecting Augustine’s doctrine of original sin and its transmission to all humans, the Mormon view seems to feel a need to absolve Adam of any sin at all. In the lesson, there are three paragraphs of an Elder Oaks talk from 1993 emphasizing that distinction, along with a short and irrelevant discussion of the difference between malum in se laws and malum prohibitum laws, as if somehow that strengthens the idea that Adam and Eve merely transgressed. If you appear in court with a ticket for doing 65 in a 55 or for having parked in a no parking zone, the judge doesn’t say “oh, that’s just a malum prohibitum offense, I’ll dismiss it.” Sorry, that’s an irrelevant distinction in court (as opposed to law school). And if there is a lesson to be drawn from it, that lesson is that a malum prohibitum offense is still an offense and that therefore a transgressory sin is still a sin.
In Genesis 2:17, God directly commands them to not eat the fruit of the tree. And we know that they understood, because in Genesis 3:3, Eve says, “God hath said, Ye shall not eat of it, neither shall ye touch it ….” Can’t get much clearer than that, and in the text it came straight from God’s mouth to Adam and Eve’s ears, and they understood it. Yet the Mormon view depicts this event of doing exactly the opposite of what God himself oh-so-clearly spelled out as .. not a sin? Try and come up with a more clear-cut example of direct disobedience to God, yet the implication here in the Mormon view (you can’t really get around it) is that sometimes disobedience is a good thing. Sometimes a commandment is a commandment, other times it’s no big deal. Then toward the end of the lesson, a bullet point teaches: “Why is it important to obey the Lord’s commandments even when we do not understand all the reasons for them?” So after a lesson extolling the virtues of Adam and Eve’s eyes-wide-open disobedience, they draw the lesson that blind obedience is the rule? Do they not even realize how inconsistent they are in this lesson and, more broadly, in LDS thinking on this topic?
3. God doesn’t give inconsistent commandments.
Part of the defense of Hero Adam is the idea that God gave Adam and Eve inconsistent commandments, first to multiply and replenish the earth (in Genesis 1) and also to not partake of the forbidden fruit (Genesis 2). Except that these were two entirely separate narratives, only stitched together when the Jewish Bible as canon was compiled after the Exile. To put it rather obliquely, the Adam and Eve of the narrative in Genesis 2 and 3 were unaware of the cosmic creation narrative in Genesis 1. In Genesis 3, asked to explain her actions, Eve replies, “The serpent beguiled me, and I did eat.” She did not say, “Hey, you told us to multiply and replenish the earth, and that was never going to happen unless I ate of the fruit of the tree. So it is wrong for you to punish me!” I think it is just dumb theology to try and defend Hero Adam and Hero Eve from the idea that they sinned by instead saying God screwed up by giving inconsistent commandments. It’s wrong within the text of Genesis 2, it’s wrong by source criticism, and it’s wrong theologically.
4. A willing suspension of disbelief only goes so far.
From the manual: “The Fall of Adam and Eve brought physical and spiritual death into the world.” This reflects the “no death before the fall” idea that was championed by Joseph Fielding Smith. FAIRMormon, a friendly source, gives a nice summary of the various LDS comments on this problem, suggesting that more recent statements by LDS leaders have walked this back a bit. So why don’t they change the stupid manual? Is anyone driving the bus? What are thirty Mormon adults sitting in an LDS Sunday School supposed to think in 2018 if a teacher reads that sentence from the manual?
I’ll tell you what ought to happen. Twenty-nine hands ought to go up. Fossils. Dinosaurs. Hundreds, thousands of remains of anatomically modern humans dating back tens of thousand of years. And yes, they are all dead. DNA ties us back millions, hundreds of millions of years to a variety of close ancestors and distant relatives in the evolutionary tree of life. All dead. Look, the manual is so bad that instead of carrying on with the willing suspension of disbelief, instead of just letting this and that questionable claim or assertion slip by without comment, at some point some people stop just playing along and realize that the manual has lost its credibility. That those who drafted, then edited, then approved the manual and its continuing publication and use simply don’t know what they are talking about. A statement in the manual that there was no death in the world before a historical Adam and Eve who lived 6000 years ago is likely to do that.
5. Don’t rule over women; preside over them.
Here’s my attempt to find something nice to say about the lesson. Not in the body of the lesson but in the back, under Additional Teaching Material, the manual quotes President Kimball saying he doesn’t like it when it says at Genesis 3:16 “he [thy husband] shall rule over thee.” He likes the word “preside” better and states: “A righteous husband presides over his wife and family.” I’ll take that as a veiled rejection of domestic violence and child abuse, and any use of Genesis 3:16 to justify that sort of thing. I endorse President Kimball’s counsel even if the textual reading of Genesis 3:16 does not support that reading.
To improve the conversation in the comments as far as manuals and their content goes, I’m going to suggest you go read a transcript posted here at Wheat and Tares of part of an interview with Daniel Peterson. He talks about his experience drafting lessons while serving on the LDS curriculum staff, his frustration with the editing process, and how he teaches. He teaches by ignoring the manual and simply referencing the scriptural texts to be covered and providing his own insights and commentary. That makes me think better of Daniel Peterson, but it doesn’t really solve the problems with the manual and the LDS curriculum, does it?
Wheat & Tares 
“3. God doesn’t give inconsistent commandments.”
Haven’t read much Mormonism eh?
So was Adam and Eve’s sin a venial sin or a mortal sin? 😉
Who is over Correlation? He should fix this! (I’m looking at you Dieter!)
I haven’t taken a close look at any LDS Church lesson manual in somet ime, but it seems the problem here is a common one in Sunday School. Requiring a literalist reading of differing texts necessitates wrenching one or all of them to maintain a single, historical narrative.
Last fall I did a close reading of the Book of Moses, and I enjoyed revisiting the text. But I wasn’t reading it as history, or attempting to harmonize it with the very different KJT version. I read it as mythology. Is there any room in today’s LDS Sunday School for openly referring to Genesis and the Pearl of Great Price as purely allegorical/mythological works?
Jake Christensen, I sure hope there is because that was the entire framing of my lesson today. While the church asserts there was a “historical Adam and Eve” I simply failed to mention that vexing (and ultimatley wholly unsupportable) point of theology and instead addressed the story as entirely symbolic. No one pushed back…we shall see if I am released before my next lesson .
I read DC 101:32-34 and said that we don’t know a lot of things about the origin of the world, how long Adam and Eve were in the garden of Eden what else was happening in Eden. So, rather than turn sunday school into a science class that none of us are expert in, we can talk about what we do know, Adam and Eve fell from the presence of God and we are effected by the fall but not responsible for it and because of Christ we can return to his presence, by him overcoming sin and death
The whole Adam and Eve thing speaks to what is wrong with Christianity and the little subgroup of that we call mormonsim. There is so much that has been disproved by science but leaders want to cling to literalism. I love the sermon on the mount because it is simple and if we stopped there and followed it, we would be a much better people.
One little tender mercy is when you get into a complex personal situation such that due to employment responsibilities and marital compromises , you can’t make it to Sunday school more than once a year for years at a stretch. I miss out on all these opportunities to be unkind to fellow orthodox ward members. I am too close to J. Golden Kimball and never got enough of the correlated shine to tolerate this brand of hog wash politely.
Honestly, does anyone take our teachings intellectually seriously? The premise of all this whining is unrealistic. Everyone knows the correlated LDS church slings around more bullshit than music. I see our thinking young people just roll their eyes, sort of like when I start talking about how nice life was before computers. Grow up! Oops- or rather go the other way.
I am amused by the part where it is suggested that 29 of 30 class members should be raising hands ….The problem with that expectation is that those 29 people never did it all at the same time, Individually they all got shut down in the past and walked out the door.
When I was a regular attender of Mormon Sunday school, I felt moved by the Spirit to implement the following survival tactics on myself:
-One week a month keep absolutely silent- others deserve a time to speak.
-One week a month keep comments to only one totally positive supportive remark.(This was the hardest one).
-One week a month restrict all comments to only one in the category of humor and gentle sarcasm.
-One week a month a critical thoughtful comment was allowed as long as it was one sentence or less.
I couldn’t live this “higher” law.
I think we confuse the purpose of a classroom, which is to educate or transmit knowledge, even teach thinking skills, and a Sunday school (sic) which is to indoctrinate, clamp down critical thinking, spin mythology and story telling. Stories don’t have to be consistent with reality, they are more powerful motivators and build fellowship. And when you realize you already have the world’s knowledge in the palm of your hand in the form of a digital device, the old style classroom becomes obsolete. If you don’t like the 6th grade level LDS lesson material, dial up some website and let the likes of Dave B. be your instructor. In a single blog thread you get a life-time worth of critical thoughts- as measured by my “higher” law.
If you want to survive correlated Mormon indoctrination, check your brain in at the door and just remember the motto Warren Jeffs taught his 70 young wives- Keep sweet!
Miguel: Be careful with the Sermon on the Mount. It is actually quite radical when taken literally and nearly impossible to live.
No offense but unless you have a Doctorate in Science, I am not listening to your science, this is Church not university. A University is, to borrow a phrase from an eminent Scientist “the ages of the rocks” Church and religion is for the rock of ages. My belief is God knows all geology, physics, etc so we should learn all we can but not at Church
I thought there was a chance I’d be substituting today, so I studied the lesson a little more than usual.
2. Transgression Schmansgression. 3. God doesn’t give inconsistent commandments.
I’ll admit I’ve struggled with this somewhat in the past. With the definition of sin being “doing anything against the will of God” then I feel like I can make the distinction between sin and transgression. Heavenly Father wanted the Fall, therefore partaking was not a sin. Things get a little murkier with supposedly inconsistent commandments. I had a church educator once imply that even the modern translation was rather rough in nature, and that Heavenly Father essentially said something along the lines of “Look, partaking of the fruit is a good thing, but you really, really need to understand, I cannot and will not control the consequences of the action.” I like that explanation, but feel like it potentially opens a can of worms when it comes to interpreting all other modern scripture. Another explanation I like is the idea that a perfect being would be incapable of directly commanding another being of doing something that would make them “less perfect,” especially with regards to mortality, so a setup of sorts had to be done to initiate the Fall. I realize neither of those explanations will satisfy everyone.
As far as the science goes (and this could apply to dozens of Gospel posts), as much as I love science, I have hard time putting faith in what science believes happened thousands of years ago when science currently can’t seem to agree on whether or not eggs are good for you. Even with history books, mankind seems to have a short-term memory with regards to its past. I’m not saying that what science says has no merit, value, or truth, nor that everything in the scriptures should be taken literally. I’m just not willing to write off the Adam and Eve story as quickly as others.
I also occasionally get frustrated with Sunday School, mainly for the simple nature of the lessons. I realized a few years ago, however, that as long as the Church is a missionary church, Sunday School will always be milk instead of meat. Obtaining meat–and even the occasional side dishes–is left for us to discover on our own and even encouraged in my experience, despite all criticisms of excessive correlation and lack of transparency.
Nice post and insights on many things…I am new to this blog, but it seems that you have some frustration, which is understandable.
1) Adam does play a large part in mormon theology, and has since the days of J.S. who taught that Adam is also Michael. I don’t see anything wrong with this.
2) I agree that a sin is a sin, which is why they were cast out, etc.
3) I agree about the two different accounts of genesis (800 BC and 400 BC or so), but if it is true that God commended them to 1) have children, and 2) not partake of the fruit, and if we believe 2 Nephi 2:23 and Moses 5:11, which says they wouldn’t/shouldn’t have children/seed, then is that not incongruent even if we take the accounts as independent? The only way they would not be is if God did not give them as a commandment to have children, or to stay together.
4) I agree with these comments also. I am a scientists and teach gospel doctrine. My next lesson is on the Noah’s ark and the flood. This will be an interesting lesson, perhaps similar to our discussion of evolution and how the official position allows for the compatibility of such.
Rule/ preside… tomato/potato. The clarification doesn’t sound like much of an upgrade. It feels like the obey/hearken “upgrade.” Softer sounding but makes me sad nonetheless.
I don’t even like that. The manual should just say that verse reflected the gender balances at the time, and that today fathers and mothers should be “equal partners” as stated in FamProc.
I don’t get to attend GD because of my current calling, but I can testify that our ward still has stalwart young-earth creationists (including a recent bishop). Teaching death before Adam & Eve doesn’t necessarily fly in all wards, even today.
Heres another version without the put down for the women.
http://www.cs.williams.edu/~lindsey/myths/myths_13.html
I arrived late, to a deafening silence and a desperate teacher.
Doesn’t this have equally baffling impact on our temple experience? And surely the question that arises there is – what IS literal, and what IS figurative? Or maybe the question’s there to put it all up for grabs from start to finish. Why else ask it if we’re supposed to take it all literally.
God, what is it all about?
My take home message is that we matter to God, and nobody gets this any more than me. Used to think they all did.
Whizzbang:
Listening is one thing, actually the only thing if you can’t READ!.
Can you read? Are you aware that about 95% of PhDs in theoretical physics (US and Europe) do not believe in God? Start with Carl Sagan, he is dated but quite entertaining. in fact, you can be really lazy and watch the movies. Cosmos series.
The problem with learning geology at church is that the geologists are not teaching the classes and the teachers are not teaching geology. At least not in y ward. And for some strange reason God doesn’t just plop a sound, clear textbook on Geology on my bed at night when I pray for geological answers.Same for Astronomy, Biology, etc.
You might consider a double barrel approach. Find PhDs who hold high callings in the church which presumes they have strong testimonies, maybe find ones who teach at BYU. You might check out what they are teaching in Biology 101 at BYU. Or maybe they have a class on Evolutionary Biology. Oh my, the very title is provocative. And you might check out what the active Mormon professors at the University of Utah, Utah State, Weber State, et. al. are teaching in basic college courses.
Actually I think you should ignore everything I wrote above and go for a hike in the woods and pray and you will feel much better.
Thanks for the comments, everyone.
Trousers, good catch. I thought about mortal versus venial sins when I wrote the paragraph on Elder Oaks’ legal analogy, but just didn’t have the time to go down that path.
Jake asks: ” Is there any room in today’s LDS Sunday School for openly referring to Genesis and the Pearl of Great Price as purely allegorical/mythological works?” Basically, no. There is hardly room to refer to Moses or the “primeval narrative” of Genesis 1-11 as partly allegory/myth. That’s why I wrote that these early OT lessons are tough “particularly for those who have to teach it.”
Mike, you throw a lot of disparate ideas into one comment. Let me pick out one I agree with: ” I see our thinking young people just roll their eyes ….” Yes, we really need to keep our bright and reflective young people, including young adults (like everyone under 60) engaged. PS: You can engage with other commenters, but please don’t insult them.
whizzbang, the glory of God is intelligence. The Church supports higher education for any and all who can afford it and obtain it. BYU provides undergraduate and graduate programs in all the areas you seem to have a problem with. All are welcome in the Church, regardless of their education or smarts or interest in engaging faith and science issues.
Eli, yes we do have to think about just how much doctrinal or historical meat to throw in the Sunday School curriculum. It certainly varies by ward demographic and by teacher what is appropriate for a given class, I think. But it sure would be nice if the manuals gave the average teacher a little more meat to work with. See the linked Daniel Peterson interview transcript for some interesting commentary on that issue.
Dave B, nice post. And some rather interesting comments. I think you (and some commenters) really put your finger on the tension that continues our church about different ways of reading. In fact, I think that’s a lot of what the ideological differences within Mormonism come down to: Whether to read something as literal or mythic/figurative. And, of course, it’s difficult to blend those theories of reading, so we end up with the bifurcation we have now. In the teaching context, esp. with lesson like this, ignoring the manual does help. But really, there is no solution. If one does take the Adam and Eve story literally, I don’t know how one can get around the fact that God stacked the deck against Adam and Eve. Further, the Adam and Eve story, it always seemed to me, teaches that it’s okay to disobey God’s commandments for a higher moral purpose, thus suggesting that there are higher moral purposes (obeying one’s conscience?)than obeying God’s commands, an understandably problematic idea for TBM’s and OT literalists. Further, most Mormons claim that Adam and Eve had enough “light” to be able to obey God’s commands, but there are clear implications that even if they had “enough” of a moral sense to make decisions, they didn’t really know, again suggesting that God is somehow stacking the deck (See Book 9 of Milton’s Paradise Lost for an interesting take on this idea). It’s too bad the almost pathological insistence on literalism forecloses the discussion of a lot of other, more likely, more rich and complex possibilities. And just a question, does the church still teach that the Garden of Eden was in America? That claim has always seemed so strange to me, esp. as the OT mentions the names of the rivers surrounding the garden, all of which are not located in North America. Just sort of wondering.
I think the hardest part of this lesson is that most members experience is not in the scriptures, but in the endowment ceremony. Being in the endowment, no one is willing to publicly talk about it, and it’s hard to untangle what you got from one source over another. I think it would really benefit the Church to declare that the only part that is sworn not to be disclosed are the names and signs, publish a full history of the entire ceremony, and put it forth as scripture that has been occasionally updated through the decades.
I think there is a message behind the conflicting commandments. It shows our total dependence on the Atonement. There is literally no way you can keep all the commandments. I think that is the whole point.
The older I become and the more I learn about the world, geological history, biology, the design and scope of the heavens etc. the less patience I have for the old (and IMHO very, very outdated maxim of “milk before meat”). When I happen upon a “lesson” of this nature – rather than simply sitting in the classroom – grinding my teeth, trying to be respectful and not offend anyone, that I quickly and quietly exit the room and leave. While these issues will continue to be debated until everyone is “blue in the face” – many, many of us are simply walking out the door. To treat us as naive and simplistic children is really rather insulting; despite the pretty pictures and well worn narrative that are placed within the pages of the coorelated doctrine. Love the discussion.
I won a case 4-2 in the Texas Supreme Court on the difference between things bad of themselves and bad because they are prohibited.
It can have huge differences.
Frank Pellet:
Yes, the endowment ceremony perpetuates the problem. But one of the most comical facts is that most of the scientists are too lazy to read a few more chapters into the Genesis. They get all hung up on the creation and never get past it, where the arguments are elaborate and complex. And since they drive our reactionary thinking, neither do most of us look beyond the first 2 chapters of Genesis.
But with a bit more patience, the morning dawn of light and knowledge breaks forth and we encounter Genesis 6-7 with Noah and the flood. “Every living substance was destroyed.” “All in whose nostrils was the breath of life.” Hence Noah was to collect mating pairs of animals of every variety to be preserved including birds. For half a year on a single ship he built. Image a zoo with less than 1% of 1% of 1%… of the known species on earth and how much food they eat and how much poop they produce. Not to exclude anything that lived on the land including creeping things. The waters covered the tops of all the highest mountains “under the whole heaven” (not just in the middle east) by 15 cubits. “Noah only remained alive” and his family. It wiped out all of the rest of the human race. Talk about a human bottleneck genetic event that has no DNA support whatsoever..
This is a much easier account to prove completely implausible and exaggerated with indisputable geological evidence on so many fronts that it is impossible to defend it. Floods leave geological evidence especially one of this magnitude. Many of the geological fascinations in Utah’s national parks and wilderness areas could not possibly survive beneath thousands of feet of water for 6 months. One can stand on Temple Square in Salt Lake and look at the Wasatch range and see that this never happened, without binoculars. There is even the Black Sea deluge with strong geological evidence that dates close to Biblical chronologies to Noah and probably provided the source for the original story.
The problem with Mormon doctrine is that we are pretty much saddled with a literal Garden of Eden/antediluvian world history localized to Missouri USA with specific history sites such as Independence and Adam-ondi-Ahman described in D&C 116. We also perpetuate a future expectation of Christ returning to a New Jerusalem we are eventually going to build there and prophecies of the great winding up scenes before the Millenium, tied to that location and tied to this antediluvian history that never happened in the first place. Other progressive churches can maybe tap-dance their way around some of these literal Biblical stories but we enjoy no such luxury.
Tell me again who is being “treated like naive and simplistic children” that “is really rather insulting” ? Anyone who has not given even meager consideration to a literal Noah’s flood is treating themselves and all under the sound of their voice and teachings that way. Quietly walking out the door gives them more honor than the deserve. Laughing and braying like the jackasses that they mimic would be more appropriate.
Lefthandloafer,
I realize your comment wasn’t necessarily directed at me but wanted to respond, although it could also apply to Mike’s more recent comment. As one who has never turned a blind eye to geological history, biology, and other sciences, I likewise have never tried to ignore some of the scientific anachronisms, anomalies, and other as of yet inexplicable phenomena that often gets swept under the rug and ignored by mainstream science. I don’t think there are a bunch of smoking men in a back room keeping these things from scrutiny, but there is a groupthink there that needs to be broken down. Refusal to look at some of these things strikes me as the rough equivalent of an active member refusing to acknowledge Joseph was a polygamist. I think the need for patience goes both ways.
At its best, I see science as an extremely useful tool in understanding how God does things. At worst, when one involves grant money, publication, and politics, among other things, science has almost become a form of priestcraft for secularism and atheism. There’s also an arrogance there that could certainly be toned down. Science takes its findings and says “This is what we KNOW to be true,” when it really is saying “This is what we KNOW to be true . . . until we learn differently.”
Catholicism made the mistake of taking its teachings and fusing them with the science of the time. Turns out the Earth isn’t the center of the universe after all! The science changed. I don’t think Catholicism completely recovered from that. I don’t see Mormonism making the same mistake.
Just as I feel a lot of issues in Church history have and will continue to resolve themselves with greater understanding, I think science will do the same to the Gospel’s benefit. Admittedly, the way we understand the Gospel will help as well (for example, when it comes to creation, I have an extremely loose interpretation of what a “day” is). In the end, I don’t think there will be conflict between understanding real science and actual Gospel truth.
As far as meat, I failed to mention that one of the best lessons I had on the creation was from a pre-med student. I don’t think either the more science-minded or young earthers were alienated in that lesson. Quite an accomplishment. I was referring to more Gospel meat in the classroom, like discussing whether Adam and Eve were created more “golem” style or through an actual birth process. I generally have to have those discussions at the dinner table or working beside an LDS colleague.
Eli, I agree to the extent that science continues to add to the stock of human knowledge, generally expanding or refining current theories and on occasion by displacing them. So it would be a mistake for the LDS Church (or any other church) to ties one’s doctrine and view of what might or might not have happened in history too tightly to the science of the day.
On the other hand, science as currently practiced is a self-correcting enterprise, in the long run. It has a pretty good track record as far as rejecting false theories and growing the stock of reliable knowledge. So I think it would also be a mistake to take the current set of LDS doctrines and match them up with current science, accepting science where it agrees with the LDS view and saying that sooner or later science will come around on those items where it differs with LDS views. I think the adjustment process tends to run in the other direction. Even Bruce R. McConkie didn’t think Lot’s wife was actually turned into a pillar of salt. No one outside a few BYU religion profs really thinks the earth was covered (submerged) with water during a global flood. Same for God changing skin color of an entire people or race as a sign of wickedness or righteousness. And so on and so forth.
And please note carefully, this is *not* a criticism of religion or LDS. I applaud the prudent adjustment of religious views to established scientific findings. That’s progress, not failure or surrender.
Thanks for your comments, Mike. Yes, I acknowledge that (sometimes I surprise even myself) with how far I’m willing to go…or how much nonsense I’m willing to swallow – just to “keep the peace” within our Ward, Neigborhood and Family.
Dave B.
Agreed. You managed to sum up much of what I was trying to say much more eloquently. In my heart though, I think science will come around to Gospel Truth more so than the reverse, but I had a hard time disagreeing with the essence of most of your specific examples.
Frankly, as an active Latter-Day Saint who really does value science in its purest form, watching how it currently is playing out and will continue to play out will always be a fascinating and exciting part of life for me.
Nah, Eli…haven’t you read the Word of Wisdom? We’re supposed to eat meat sparingly!
The test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposed ideas in mind at the same time and still retain the ability to function. -F. Scott Fitzgerald
Okay to simultaneously believe in Adam & Eve story, dinosaurs, evolution, etc. Ultimately all truths will be reconciled.
It’s hard to get some Mormons to see the difference between the Creation Story and Creationism.
Dave B.
I agree that scientists can be arrogant and close-mined. You know what they say, science progresses one funeral at a time.
But do you really think that geology is going to pivot and show there really was a worldwide flood? That the Egyptologists are going to pivot and say the Book of Abraham is a brilliant translation of the papyri? That Biblical scholars are going to conclude conclusively that polygamy really is recommended by the Word of God and was an admirable practice in 19th century Utah? That Nephite DNA is going to be found? That the city of Zarahemla is going to to verified by archeology? That astronomers are going to discover Kolob and switch to a cosmology consistent with what Joseph Smith taught? That psychologists are going to discover that gays really do just need to repent? That bishops interviewing young girls about their emerging sexuality is going to be demonstrated to be nearly always harmless and even highly beneficial to their development?
The list grows longer each decade. In too many cases all we are left with are shrinking plausibilities, which are a far cry from the the scientifically demonstrable. And on too many issues the case is closed. We lost.
Do we have to be soundly defeated on every front? Upon how many important issues must we be shown to be in error before we change our paradigm and blaze a new direction?
Mike, maybe you need to re-read my last comment. Particularly this part: “So I think it would also be a mistake to take the current set of LDS doctrines and match them up with current science, accepting science where it agrees with the LDS view and saying that sooner or later science will come around on those items where it differs with LDS views. I think the adjustment process tends to run in the other direction.”
So if I am arguing that religious views should adapt to established scientific thinking and you are disagreeing with me … well, I’m not sure what exactly you object to.
Dave B.
I owe you an apology. In a senior moment I confused your name with the comment made by Eli above it. Sorry about that. So rereading your 1/30 comment I think I agree with it. As for the second one on 1/31 admonishing me to re-read the first, I didn’t get it until I realize my response is addressed to the wrong person.
But maybe this might prove to be a new way to generate interesting ideas.
First address a reply to one of the more intelligent and thoughtful commenters. But respond to things someone else says or just to random things. The reply from the thoughtful commenter will most likely be further confusion. But maybe sometimes it might be novel and brilliant.
As an analogy, one of my relatives has been diagnosed with leukemia. (Chronic myeloid leukemia) and we have been reading about it. This disease is caused by a genetic translocation creating the Philadelphia chromosome. t(9,22) . A piece of chromosome 9 is attached to chromosome 22. The break point on both is through a gene that codes for a protein called a tyrosine kinase. T.K. enzymes act as on-and-off switches for other metabolic pathways especially ones that regulate cell growth. The t(9;22) mutation creates a super powerful sort of hybrid tyrosine kinase that is always turned on and revs up cellular division. In most cases it creates a less aggressive leukemia like the one my relative has. In some cases it really gets carried away and causes an extremely aggressive acute leukemia that can kill a person in a few weeks. Sometimes the chronic version transforms to the acute one and death is eminent. I suspect it is more complicated than this in the details.
Anyway, if blog ideas are like genes and enzymes, sometimes two sort of unrelated ideas put together could result in a really powerful new hybrid idea. So don’t mind me if my comments seem a bit irrelevant. I might just be moving from mild to moderate dementia or I might be trying to stir up new ideas.
One of my favorite classes was one that was required for all Physics majors at BYU. It was a class on science and religion. In it we discussed how “traditional” LDS interpretations and modern science could stand side by side. I have NEVER found a problem where I could not find a completely rational way for science and religion to complement and reinforce each other. The church ignores the problem, and young people, who think they much choose between science OR religion have trials of faith and leave the church. This problem could be so easily fixed by church leaders with a little education. I hope the problem will addressed soon!
I agree with Richard Bushman: Sunday School is a ritual, not a place of learning.