Hands up, elbows in. Sweat beads down my forehead as I hit the rubber rings, they stretch back then shoot me out like a slingshot. I'm the rock, baby. And I'm back in the ring with my comparative religions project after a much-needed three day respite from heavy lambasts to the side and three-too-few fist blows to the head. Seriously, my ear was bleeding. Little drops of red speckled the mat. But my head's patched up, and I can see about 30/20 (an improvement from rolling around on the floor in total theological despair).
Let's talk about Mormonism, shall we?
First off, I need to say that Mormon theology is brilliantly well-contained. Joseph Smith, whether or not he was a prophet, a dude with some cool rocks and plates he found while playing in the sand pit, a literary master of the Orwellian calibre (please get my reference), or the best liar / actor since Odysseus, he was a systematic genius. The theological system of Mormonism has an internal cogency that rivals that of the eastern Buddhist religions and Henry James novels. Thisisn't to say it's necessarily true, just fantastically well self- and Biblically-explanitory and meticulously rational within purely biblical confines.
Smith was a master of definitions, which I, the Gordon Ramsey of definitions, can respect. Smith's ability to concretely identify biblical words' correct definitions (like the difference between faith and trust. And yes, tanto, there's a difference) and use them in their correct context is nearly perfect. Except a few minor instances (such as the development of the definition of soul throughout the book and the gross misrepresentation of the concept of love) Smith manages to use his words pretty much with their accurate and, most of the time, accurate New Testament definitions. This is unlike many Protestant theologians who when asked to define the face of god think of WASP America's Will Riker Jesus face with a clean-trim beard and hard-cut jaw.
Let's talk about Mormonism, shall we?
First off, I need to say that Mormon theology is brilliantly well-contained. Joseph Smith, whether or not he was a prophet, a dude with some cool rocks and plates he found while playing in the sand pit, a literary master of the Orwellian calibre (please get my reference), or the best liar / actor since Odysseus, he was a systematic genius. The theological system of Mormonism has an internal cogency that rivals that of the eastern Buddhist religions and Henry James novels. Thisisn't to say it's necessarily true, just fantastically well self- and Biblically-explanitory and meticulously rational within purely biblical confines.
Smith was a master of definitions, which I, the Gordon Ramsey of definitions, can respect. Smith's ability to concretely identify biblical words' correct definitions (like the difference between faith and trust. And yes, tanto, there's a difference) and use them in their correct context is nearly perfect. Except a few minor instances (such as the development of the definition of soul throughout the book and the gross misrepresentation of the concept of love) Smith manages to use his words pretty much with their accurate and, most of the time, accurate New Testament definitions. This is unlike many Protestant theologians who when asked to define the face of god think of WASP America's Will Riker Jesus face with a clean-trim beard and hard-cut jaw.
For example, as aforementioned, I've been studying of late the difference between the concepts of faith and trust. Both refer to the greek root word 'pistis' but are used in disparate contexts. Faith is one's belief in God's ability to do somethingwithout experiential evidence to back it up. Thus, a nonbeliever must have some level of faith in order to begin a walk with Christ because he hasn't been saved yet. When learning to ride a bicycle, you have to suspend disbelief that the bike won't spontaneously combust and char your hiney in order to get on and try to balance and press the petal. You don't know the bike won't pull a Michael Bay and go boom boom, but your parents tell you it wont so you have faith in their judgement.
Trust, however, is a belief in God's ability to do something based on past personal or communal experiences of similar nature. Thus David trusted God when enemies attacked him because, well, David had more beef with surrounding nations than Germany at the end of WW2. He had plenty of experiences to found his trust on, plus a pseudo-history of his forefathers passed down in the Law of the Lord. A nonbeliever can't have trust. They have to make a small faith jump and hope that trust will be developed as a result of God's reaction to the faith decision. Faith is the steps onto the rickety bridge, trust is looking back half way and feeling comfortable to walk the second. Smith resists to using them interchangeably as many people do and uses them in accurate context most if not all of the time.
Second thing I'll mention, Smith's system unifies the Old and New Testament in a way no Prodestant theologian subscribing to sola scriptura or sola fide could ever hope to. His union of God's justice and God's grace and God's mercy (again, there's a difference between all of these concepts) into a cogent system takes into consideration nearly all necessary Biblical concepts, unless you're a hypercalvinist. If you're Armenian, you should go be Mormon. Seriously. Mormonism is the logical outcome of Armenian theology and they have way cooler underpants.
However, like with Islam, to achieve such theological unity it was necessary for Smith to publish new Scriptures and engage in redationary theologizing of the old. Who ever heard of Enoch running around preaching about the imminent coming of Jesus Christ? Or Abraham? Or Jacob? Because in the Book of Mormon all of them do. In fact, the entirety of the Old Testament patriarchy was saved by conscious profession of and faith in the fytyre coming Christ and the keeping of the Old Testament covenant until it could be fulfilled in Jesus' appearance. In order for Smith's system to work, simply put, the patriarchs had to preach Christ. There's no other way around it. The Old Testament and the New Testament simplydon't work together without theology to carve them up and stick them together.Like cutting puzzle pieces to make them fit. And that's exactly what Smith did. Go back and rewrite the history. Or he had the real history revealed to him. One of the two.
Either way, the patriarchs who we read about in our scriptures, who biblically are flaming, no-pork-eatin', Law-abiden', temple-prayen', goat-n-cow-sacrificen' Jews, were actually Zealots for Jesus in the Book of Mormon.
There are all sorts of problems and anachronism, beginning with the name 'Jesus' which wasn't actually Jesus' name, even in the time of Jesus. It was 'Yehshua' or Joshua in modern transliteration, or Jasha-baby in contemporary Ebonics. Jesus is a transliteration from an long-ago-disproved translation and a bad one at that.
I'd mention many of the other problems, but I haven't the time. Issues aside (which, mind you, don't disprove Mormonism one bit, just certain facets. And orthodoxy has plenty of its own) Smith's system is incredibly complex and logically well-grounded. It's one of Mormonism's greatest boons, in my opinion, but also one of its greatest pitfalls. But I won't go into that.
Tomorrow I'll talk about the good-old concept of salvation in Mormonism, which I meant to touch on tonight but I also want to go home and pet my beard. No, it can't be done anywhere. There are lotions.
Trust, however, is a belief in God's ability to do something based on past personal or communal experiences of similar nature. Thus David trusted God when enemies attacked him because, well, David had more beef with surrounding nations than Germany at the end of WW2. He had plenty of experiences to found his trust on, plus a pseudo-history of his forefathers passed down in the Law of the Lord. A nonbeliever can't have trust. They have to make a small faith jump and hope that trust will be developed as a result of God's reaction to the faith decision. Faith is the steps onto the rickety bridge, trust is looking back half way and feeling comfortable to walk the second. Smith resists to using them interchangeably as many people do and uses them in accurate context most if not all of the time.
Second thing I'll mention, Smith's system unifies the Old and New Testament in a way no Prodestant theologian subscribing to sola scriptura or sola fide could ever hope to. His union of God's justice and God's grace and God's mercy (again, there's a difference between all of these concepts) into a cogent system takes into consideration nearly all necessary Biblical concepts, unless you're a hypercalvinist. If you're Armenian, you should go be Mormon. Seriously. Mormonism is the logical outcome of Armenian theology and they have way cooler underpants.
However, like with Islam, to achieve such theological unity it was necessary for Smith to publish new Scriptures and engage in redationary theologizing of the old. Who ever heard of Enoch running around preaching about the imminent coming of Jesus Christ? Or Abraham? Or Jacob? Because in the Book of Mormon all of them do. In fact, the entirety of the Old Testament patriarchy was saved by conscious profession of and faith in the fytyre coming Christ and the keeping of the Old Testament covenant until it could be fulfilled in Jesus' appearance. In order for Smith's system to work, simply put, the patriarchs had to preach Christ. There's no other way around it. The Old Testament and the New Testament simplydon't work together without theology to carve them up and stick them together.Like cutting puzzle pieces to make them fit. And that's exactly what Smith did. Go back and rewrite the history. Or he had the real history revealed to him. One of the two.
Either way, the patriarchs who we read about in our scriptures, who biblically are flaming, no-pork-eatin', Law-abiden', temple-prayen', goat-n-cow-sacrificen' Jews, were actually Zealots for Jesus in the Book of Mormon.
There are all sorts of problems and anachronism, beginning with the name 'Jesus' which wasn't actually Jesus' name, even in the time of Jesus. It was 'Yehshua' or Joshua in modern transliteration, or Jasha-baby in contemporary Ebonics. Jesus is a transliteration from an long-ago-disproved translation and a bad one at that.
I'd mention many of the other problems, but I haven't the time. Issues aside (which, mind you, don't disprove Mormonism one bit, just certain facets. And orthodoxy has plenty of its own) Smith's system is incredibly complex and logically well-grounded. It's one of Mormonism's greatest boons, in my opinion, but also one of its greatest pitfalls. But I won't go into that.
Tomorrow I'll talk about the good-old concept of salvation in Mormonism, which I meant to touch on tonight but I also want to go home and pet my beard. No, it can't be done anywhere. There are lotions.