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nibbler wrote:
For me, once it comes under the microscope it all starts to come out in the wash.
Everything looks way different under a microscope.
On one hand there is the question, does a vision carry less weight than a visitation? On the other hand a vision seems like a more accessible spiritual experience for the average member/person, and if that’s on par with Joseph’s experience, I think that’s pretty powerful. Everyone knows what a visitation is, but what is not discussed very much at church is what a vision actually is. Is it something between a daydream and a visitation? Do you go unconscious? Have some of us had visions but just never thought to call them such?
Unknown wrote:On one hand there is the question, does a vision carry less weight than a visitation? On the other hand a vision seems like a more accessible spiritual experience for the average member/person, and if that’s on par with Joseph’s experience, I think that’s pretty powerful.
Everyone knows what a visitation is, but what is not discussed very much at church is what a vision actually is. Is it something between a daydream and a visitation? Do you go unconscious? Have some of us had visions but just never thought to call them such?
From my point of view a vision is not any less weighty than an actual visitation. I understand that might not be true for everyone. That’s why I’m perfectly fine with the FV being just that – to me it’s the same as if God and Jesus were actually there. You might wonder then, why do I ask and does it really matter. I do believe in truth, and truth is Joseph never presented it as anything other than a vision, and I think we should not be teaching otherwise. On the other hand, it doesn’t matter to my eternal salvation and in some ways I really don’t care.
nibbler wrote:I’d like to get back to the question: What difference does it make whether some event was a visitation or a vision? Does one carry more weight than another? How do people’s interpretations of the FV change when looking at it as a visitation? A vision?
The church has put great emphasis on this not being a vision but an actual phisical event. From the things learned about the coporeal of God by his appearance in the FV, to the necessity of recieving priesthood by the laying on of hands (what if I have a vision or a vivid dream that gives me priesthood authority – is that valid?), to the importance of literal golden plates and a historical B of M. The list goes on and on.
If JS recieved a vision – (similar to the visions of some others that lived before, during, and after he did) what basis do we have to claim that our religion is different, better, more effective and God sanctioned than the religions of others that are similarly based?
Roy wrote:If JS recieved a vision – (similar to the visions of some others that lived before, during, and after he did) what basis do we have to claim that our religion is different, better, more effective and God sanctioned than the religions of others that are similarly based?
THAT…is a pretty dang good point!!And…one that makes me wonder if that his how the different versions of the 1st Vision came about…out of what the church needed it to be.
I agree that the church does certainly emphasize that some of the visitations were of necessity physical, like the priesthood ordination (although Joseph retrieved the plates, urim & thummim, etc., himself, Moroni was just “there”). Again, I’m still fine with the priesthood stuff being a vision, it’s just as real to me but that doesn’t mean others can’t question it or that it’s as real to you. That’s actually why I left the original question just at the FV and Moroni – there was no need for physical contact. I do see the point of view of those who need it all to be physical – I just don’t see the evidence. I wouldn’t mind seeing an essay on the priesthood thing. It’s always sort of bothered me that we have such detailed information about the AP, even to the words spoken, but for the supposedly more important MP, it just happened. There has been some recent new understanding of the AP restoration as well – historians have told us that it did not actually happen “on the banks” of the Susquehanna, rather it was in a wooded area up a hill a bit. (The Susquehanna was apparently in a flood stage at the time.)
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