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I’ll take it one step further. The power of the story is in working the story for meaning. Although it may not seem intuitive in our culture, place our self in the role of Lucifer. Even when we believe we are in contact with the divine, with God, what part of our own personal revelation is the “philosophies of man” mingled with our own scripture (revelation)? I pointed the finger at our esteemed brothers who take up the flag of public prophecy, but I personally doubt we are free from it either. What a powerful and humbling perspective to ponder how we can be wrong. How do we also not know the mind of God? Probably in a lot of ways. The confidence of the illusion that we
know, I think that hinders our progress. Comfort in knowing is a form of pride that prevents us from letting go of cherished and comfortable viewpoints that are rife with the corruption of our “worldly” expectations and assumptions. Hi Wayfarer, thanks for the exchange, I have been looking on your bloganacle and I see we worship a different God, I worship the one who you think is dead, so future dialouge would not be appropriate, I wish you well on your journey Jeff Walsh Jeff Walsh, I would COMPLETELY disagree. Your post sounds more like hurt feelings.
Mike from Milton.
jeffwalshgen wrote:Hi Wayfarer, thanks for the exchange, I have been looking on your bloganacle and I see we worship a different God, I worship the one who you think is dead, so future dialouge would not be appropriate, I wish you well on your journey Jeff Walsh
(chuckle) – dead? last i checked, very much alive… you obviously didn’t read very well. my point is this: i am an active, practicing LDS, who desires to remain such, and with good conscience holds a TR. how, then, do we worship a different god? i think if you can set aside your bias…there is a more excellent Way.peace!
I’ve tried to follow along on this thread but I can’t get past my belief that there wasn’t an Eden and that Adam and Eve weren’t real people operating in a real place in time. It seems that when these discussions take place it’s in terms of the temple ceremony and accounts in Genesis and the PoGP. So, if it’s all allegorical as I believe, then where does the allegory come from and what is the point of discussing it? GBSmith wrote:I’ve tried to follow along on this thread but I can’t get past my belief that there wasn’t an Eden and that Adam and Eve weren’t real people operating in a real place in time. It seems that when these discussions take place it’s in terms of the temple ceremony and accounts in Genesis and the PoGP. So, if it’s all allegorical as I believe, then where does the allegory come from and what is the point of discussing it?
Yeah. I just don’t have faith in Adam and Eve and the Garden of Eden in any type of literal sense. It makes no sense to me at all.
I know it will come across as heretical to say so in the Mormon world, but I just don’t see any reason really that one must believe in a literal Adam and Eve and Garden of Eden.
Does that mean I worship a different god than the faithful mormons do, kind of like what I heard about Wayfarer’s god? I don’t think so…but if it makes the mormons feel better to tell me that we worship a different god, just because we don’t agree on the nature of said god and I have a different “faith” about the gods than my LDS friends…nothing I can do about that – only, live and let live. And I’m not talking about nonmembers. I think we can do that with our own members – within the walls of our own church as well.
When the endowment itself used to say that the account of the creation of Adam and Eve was figurative, the door is wide-freaking-open to take that to mean there was no factual, historical Garden of Eden. I understand totally that many people take it literally (and get great meaning out of such a view). I have NO problem with them doing so. It just isn’t “the one true way” to view it, just as believing Noah’s flood was localized and used as a grand morality tale doesn’t lessen the power of it one bit for me. I go back to my baseline statement:
When the Articles of Faith themselves say “as far as it is translated correctly”, any impediment to differing viewpoints being legitimate is annihilated right from the start – and we are left to be “agents unto ourselves”, with advice, counsel and direction from inspired but fallible leaders who are neither scientists nor historians in the strictest sense of the words.
Of course, that’s how I want it, so it’s easy for me to say that.
Whether or not the scriptures are “translated correctly” and whether or not they are to be interpreted literally are entirely different topics, aren’t they? Not really, Doug. Every time we read something we attempt to “translate” it into something that makes sense to us. We read what we think it means. That means, if the original author wasn’t crystal clear about whether or not something should be taken literally or figuratively or allegorically or in some other way, it is up to the readers to “translate” what is written into something that makes sense to them. In the case of scriptures, especially ones written LONG after the time of the story, everything is compounded when the viewpoint of the original writers isn’t shared by the later readers. The “translation” process gets short-circuited, in a very real way, when the readers simply don’t understand how the original writers and readers viewed the stories – and I personally am convinced those writers and readers didn’t take the Garden of Eden story literally. Hence, those who take it literally, imo, aren’t “translating it correctly” – on top of any other translation inaccuracies that are in the record due to classic translation issues over time.
Hi again Wayfarer, When I read on your blog that you wrote under “Thoughts on redefining the God of my understanding” where you said “When the god of our religeous upbringing dies, there is a hole in the support network……….” If I misunderstood this I wholeheartedly apologise, I assumed that you had a LDS upbringing and that you had departed from the teachings of the Church. Just to make it clear the God that I worship is the Father of my spirit, Jesus Christ is my Saviour and elder brother, if this is your belief then we do have the same God. Wonderful. Please would you define for me the bias that you imply that I have.
If it is because I believe that the placing of Adam and Eve in the garden, the fall and the process whereby mankind came into being to populate this world, then I would ask you to explain how mankind did come into being. I ask Ray, Cwald GB Smith and others the same question
Mike could you explain what it is you disagree with? Jeff Walsh
jeffwalshgen wrote:If it is because I believe that the placing of Adam and Eve in the garden, the fall and the process whereby mankind came into being to populate this world, then I would ask you to explain how mankind did come into being. I ask Ray, Cwald GB Smith and others the same question
By a process of evolution with the origin in what became Africa.
Hi GBsmith, Are you then saying evoulution is proven fact and creation is a faith belief? I really would like to debate this with you, I believe you need more faith to accept evolution as the vehicle mankinds exststence than you do to believe in God. For instance the coming together by chance of the myriad submicroscopic parts that formed the first spec of life is so infinitly small it is impossible. You may think that science has all the answers but all they have is theory and another meaning of the word is guess. You have only to look at the Piltdown man hoax which scientist hearlded for 40 years as the missing link which proved evoultion, only to find out that the jawbone had been stained with biocromate of potash and teeth atrificially pared down and did not even belong to the skull, this seems like desperate hopefullnes to me. I believe that the apostle Peter in 2pet3:3-4 was referring to these scientist/phillosophers as scoffers walking after thair own lusts. jeff walsh
Old-Timer wrote:Not really, Doug. Every time we read something we attempt to “translate” it into something that makes sense to us. We read what we think it means. That means, if the original author wasn’t crystal clear about whether or not something should be taken literally or figuratively or allegorically or in some other way, it is up to the readers to “translate” what is written into something that makes sense to them.
In the case of scriptures, especially ones written LONG after the time of the story, everything is compounded when the viewpoint of the original writers isn’t shared by the later readers. The “translation” process gets short-circuited, in a very real way, when the readers simply don’t understand how the original writers and readers viewed the stories – and I personally am convinced those writers and readers didn’t take the Garden of Eden story literally. Hence, those who take it literally, imo, aren’t “translating it correctly” – on top of any other translation inaccuracies that are in the record due to classic translation issues over time.
Let me phrase that differently. Whether or not the scriptures are “translated correctly” and whether or not they are to be taken literally are entirely different topics. I believe you are conflating the process of translation and the process of personal interpretation. A document might theoretically be “translated”
verbatim, i.e. word for word (though subtle differences in language make it unlikely that it is ever 100% successful) and yet still be open to widely varying personalinterpretations, either because the author was vague or imprecise, intentionally or otherwise, because the social millieu of the reader varies significantly from that of the writer, or for any of a number of other reasons. Translation is getting the words on paper as they were originally intended. Interpretation is finding a personal meaning in those words. True, there may be instances where subleties in language that might suggest a figurative/literal intent might get lost in the process of translation, but I don’t think that’s what most people are talking about when they reference the articles of fatih. jeffwalshgen wrote:I believe that the apostle Peter in 2pet3:3-4 was referring to these scientist/phillosophers as scoffers walking after thair own lusts.
In your argument, does it matter that the “Peter” who wrote 2 Peter was almost certainly not the Peter who was a disciple of Jesus? I am genuinely curious, not that the particular verse that you quoted is necessarily pertinent to the larger question, but because it would seem that how we interpret and give weight to certain scriptures based on who we think might have written them is or can be.
Whether or not we believe in a literal evolution of the kind put forward by modern science (which I do), or whether we believe in a literal garden of eden story (which I don’t), the fact is that we all believe that at some point something miraculous happened. It really is “turtles all the way down” as someone else recently pointed out.
doug wrote:Whether or not the scriptures are “translated correctly” and whether or not they are to be iterpreted literally are entirely different topics, aren’t they?
indeed. jesus teaching in parables does not require a literal interpretation of the parable to accept it as “the word of god”. in fact, a literal interpretation of the parable would be to misconstrue the intent of the parable, and therefore would not be the word of god.this is the fundamental problem with literalism–losing the point of scripture, of the spiritual principles behind them.
i find it hilarious how we LDS interpret the “Search the Scriptures” verse as commandment:
John 6:39 wrote:Search the scriptures; for in them ye think ye have eternal life: and they are they which testify of me.
LDS lift this verse right out of context to say that we are commanded to “Search the Scriptures”, yet this is a clear mistranslation and misinterpretation of the verse. it means nearly the opposite. you might say How? without going into a koine greek lesson, the verb “Search” here is not imperative, but second person plural: “ye search” is how it should be translated in jacobian english, meaning that Jesus is observing that the jewish audience searches the scriptures thoroughly, and have entirely missed the point: “for (not ‘and’) they are they which testify of me”.so the verse is mistranslated, and too bad that it is, because it demonstrates that literalism is NOT the right approach for scripture. why do i say that? because the “scriptures” to which he was referring, the “old testament”, said almost nothing
literalabout Jesus Christ. The only way Jesus could make that claim is if “literal” interpretation is set aside in favor of a figurative, symbolic, or spiritual understanding of the Tanakh (a hebrew acronym for the old testament). LDS doctrinal history is full of speculative statements on the nature of the cosmos. King Follett goes beyond the pale, and BY speculate about how God/Adam, and Christ came from other planets, and what takes the cake is the physical act of Elohim having sex with Mary. Leaders speculated about how blacks were less valiant in the premortal existence, thus the priesthood ban and curse of blackness. Saying that Jesus and Lucifer are brothers, while symbolically a wobderful teaching, becomes caricature when taken literally. Saying God the Father was once man, while, again, very powerful symbolically, poses signifant logical challenges when taken literally: infinite regress as well as the challenge of reconciling the teaching with an unchangeable god from eternity to eternity.
one can spend 40 years searching the scriptures literally, and studying every doctrine ever taught by any LDS prophet, seer, and revelator over the 181+ years and will entirely miss the point. that is exactly what Christ is saying in John 6:39.
be still and know that I am god.
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