Posted on 05/05/2008 9:24:59 PM PDT by sevenbak
Elder Jeffrey R. Holland
Of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles
We invite all to inquire into the wonder of what God has said since biblical times and is saying even now.
President Monson, may I claim a moment of personal privilege?
As the first of the Brethren invited to speak following your singular message to the Church this morning, may I say something on behalf of all your Brethren of the General Authorities and indeed on behalf of all the Church.
Of the many privileges we have had in this historic conference, including participation in a solemn assembly in which we were able to stand and sustain you as prophet, seer, and revelator, I cannot help but feel that the most important privilege we have all had has been to witness personally the settling of the sacred, prophetic mantle upon your shoulders, almost as it were by the very hands of angels themselves. Those in attendance at last night’s general priesthood meeting and all who were present in the worldwide broadcast of this morning’s session have been eyewitness to this event. For all the participants, I express our gratitude for such a moment. I say that with love to President Monson and especially love to our Father in Heaven for the wonderful opportunity it has been to be “eyewitnesses of his majesty” (2 Peter 1:16), as the Apostle Peter once said.
In general conference last October, I said there were two principal reasons The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is accused, erroneously, of not being Christian. At that time I addressed one of those doctrinal issues—our scripturally based view of the Godhead. Today I would like to address the other major doctrine which characterizes our faith but which causes concern to some, namely the bold assertion that God continues to speak His word and reveal His truth, revelations which mandate an open canon of scripture.
Some Christians, in large measure because of their genuine love for the Bible, have declared that there can be no more authorized scripture beyond the Bible. In thus pronouncing the canon of revelation closed, our friends in some other faiths shut the door on divine expression that we in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints hold dear: the Book of Mormon, the Doctrine and Covenants, the Pearl of Great Price, and the ongoing guidance received by God’s anointed prophets and apostles. Imputing no ill will to those who take such a position, nevertheless we respectfully but resolutely reject such an unscriptural characterization of true Christianity.
One of the arguments often used in any defense of a closed canon is the New Testament passage recorded in Revelation 22:18: “For I testify unto every man that heareth the words of . . . this book, If any man shall add unto these things, God shall add unto him the plagues that are written in this book.” However, there is now overwhelming consensus among virtually all biblical scholars that this verse applies only to the book of Revelation, not the whole Bible. Those scholars of our day acknowledge a number of New Testament “books” that were almost certainly written after John’s revelation on the Isle of Patmos was received. Included in this category are at least the books of Jude, the three Epistles of John, and probably the entire Gospel of John itself.1 Perhaps there are even more than these.
But there is a simpler answer as to why that passage in the final book of the current New Testament cannot apply to the whole Bible. That is because the whole Bible as we know it—one collection of texts bound in a single volume—did not exist when that verse was written. For centuries after John produced his writing, the individual books of the New Testament were in circulation singly or perhaps in combinations with a few other texts but almost never as a complete collection. Of the entire corpus of 5,366 known Greek New Testament manuscripts, only 35 contain the whole New Testament as we now know it, and 34 of those were compiled after A.D. 1000.2
The fact of the matter is that virtually every prophet of the Old and New Testament has added scripture to that received by his predecessors. If the Old Testament words of Moses were sufficient, as some could have mistakenly thought them to be,3 then why, for example, the subsequent prophecies of Isaiah or of Jeremiah, who follows him? To say nothing of Ezekiel and Daniel, of Joel, Amos, and all the rest. If one revelation to one prophet in one moment of time is sufficient for all time, what justifies these many others? What justifies them was made clear by Jehovah Himself when He said to Moses, “My works are without end, and . . . my words . . . never cease.”4
One Protestant scholar has inquired tellingly into the erroneous doctrine of a closed canon. He writes: “On what biblical or historical grounds has the inspiration of God been limited to the written documents that the church now calls its Bible? . . . If the Spirit inspired only the written documents of the first century, does that mean that the same Spirit does not speak today in the church about matters that are of significant concern?”5 We humbly ask those same questions.
Continuing revelation does not demean or discredit existing revelation. The Old Testament does not lose its value in our eyes when we are introduced to the New Testament, and the New Testament is only enhanced when we read the Book of Mormon: Another Testament of Jesus Christ. In considering the additional scripture accepted by Latter-day Saints, we might ask: Were those early Christians who for decades had access only to the primitive Gospel of Mark (generally considered the first of the New Testament Gospels to be written)—were they offended to receive the more detailed accounts set forth later by Matthew and Luke, to say nothing of the unprecedented passages and revelatory emphasis offered later yet by John? Surely they must have rejoiced that ever more convincing evidence of the divinity of Christ kept coming. And so do we rejoice.
Please do not misunderstand. We love and revere the Bible, as Elder M. Russell Ballard taught so clearly from this pulpit just one year ago.6 The Bible is the word of God. It is always identified first in our canon, our “standard works.” Indeed, it was a divinely ordained encounter with the fifth verse of the first chapter of the book of James that led Joseph Smith to his vision of the Father and the Son, which gave birth to the Restoration of the gospel of Jesus Christ in our time. But even then, Joseph knew the Bible alone could not be the answer to all the religious questions he and others like him had. As he said in his own words, the ministers of his community were contending—sometimes angrily—over their doctrines. “Priest [was] contending against priest, and convert [was contending] against convert . . . in a strife of words and a contest about opinions,” he said. About the only thing these contending religions had in common was, ironically, a belief in the Bible, but, as Joseph wrote, “the teachers of religion of the different sects understood the same passages of scripture so differently as to destroy all confidence in settling the question [regarding which church was true] by an appeal to the Bible.”7 Clearly the Bible, so frequently described at that time as “common ground,” was nothing of the kind—unfortunately it was a battleground.
Thus one of the great purposes of continuing revelation through living prophets is to declare to the world through additional witnesses that the Bible is true. “This is written,” an ancient prophet said, speaking of the Book of Mormon, “for the intent that ye may believe that,” speaking of the Bible.8 In one of the earliest revelations received by Joseph Smith, the Lord said, “Behold, I do not bring [the Book of Mormon forth] to destroy [the Bible] but to build it up.”9
One other point needs to be made. Since it is clear that there were Christians long before there was a New Testament or even an accumulation of the sayings of Jesus, it cannot therefore be maintained that the Bible is what makes one a Christian. In the words of esteemed New Testament scholar N. T. Wright, “The risen Jesus, at the end of Matthew’s Gospel, does not say, ‘All authority in heaven and on earth is given to the books you are all going to write,’ but [rather] ‘All authority in heaven and on earth is given to me.’ “10 In other words, “Scripture itself points . . . away from itself and to the fact that final and true authority belongs to God himself.”11 So the scriptures are not the ultimate source of knowledge for Latter-day Saints. They are manifestations of the ultimate source. The ultimate source of knowledge and authority for a Latter-day Saint is the living God. The communication of those gifts comes from God as living, vibrant, divine revelation.12
This doctrine lies at the very heart of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and of our message to the world. It dramatizes the significance of a solemn assembly yesterday, in which we sustained Thomas S. Monson as a prophet, a seer, and a revelator. We believe in a God who is engaged in our lives, who is not silent, not absent, nor, as Elijah said of the god of the priests of Baal, is He “[on] a journey, or peradventure he sleepeth, and must be [awakened].”13 In this Church, even our young Primary children recite, “We believe all that God has revealed, all that He does now reveal, and we believe that He will yet reveal many great and important things pertaining to the Kingdom of God.”14
In declaring new scripture and continuing revelation, we pray we will never be arrogant or insensitive. But after a sacred vision in a now sacred grove answered in the affirmative the question “Does God exist?” what Joseph Smith and The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints force us to face is the next interrogative, which necessarily follows: “Does He speak?” We bring the good news that He does and that He has. With a love and affection born of our Christianity, we invite all to inquire into the wonder of what God has said since biblical times and is saying even now.
In a sense Joseph Smith and his prophetic successors in this Church answer the challenge Ralph Waldo Emerson put to the students of the Harvard Divinity School 170 years ago this coming summer. To that group of the Protestant best and brightest, the great sage of Concord pled that they teach “that God is, not was; that He speaketh, not spake.”15
I testify that the heavens are open. I testify that Joseph Smith was and is a prophet of God, that the Book of Mormon is truly another testament of Jesus Christ. I testify that Thomas S. Monson is God’s prophet, a modern apostle with the keys of the kingdom in his hands, a man upon whom I personally have seen the mantle fall. I testify that the presence of such authorized, prophetic voices and ongoing canonized revelations have been at the heart of the Christian message whenever the authorized ministry of Christ has been on the earth. I testify that such a ministry is on the earth again, and it is found in this, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
In our heartfelt devotion to Jesus of Nazareth as the very Son of God, the Savior of the world, we invite all to examine what we have received of Him, to join with us, drinking deeply at the “well of water springing up into everlasting life,”16 these constantly flowing reminders that God lives, that He loves us, and that He speaks. I express the deepest personal thanks that His works never end and His “words . . . never cease.” I bear witness of such divine loving attention and the recording of it, in the sacred name of Jesus Christ, amen.
NOTES
1. See Stephen E. Robinson, Are Mormons Christians? (1991), 46. The issue of canon is discussed on pages 45–56. Canon is defined as “an authoritative list of books accepted as Holy Scripture” (Merriam Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary, 11th ed. [2003], “canon”).
2. See Bruce M. Metzger, Manuscripts of the Greek Bible: An Introduction to Greek Paleography (1981), 54–55; see also Are Mormons Christians? 46.
3. See Deuteronomy 4:2, for example.
4. Moses 1:4.
5. Lee M. McDonald, The Formation of the Christian Biblical Canon, rev. ed. (1995), 255–56.
6. See “The Miracle of the Holy Bible,” Liahona and Ensign, May 2007, 80–82.
7. Joseph Smith—History 1:6, 12.
8. Mormon 7:9; emphasis added.
9. D&C 10:52; see also D&C 20:11.
10. N. T. Wright, The Last Word: Beyond the Bible Wars to a New Understanding of the Authority of Scripture (2005), xi.
11. Wright, The Last Word, 24.
12. For a full essay on this subject, see Dallin H. Oaks, “Scripture Reading and Revelation,” Ensign, Jan. 1995, 6–9.
13. 1 Kings 18:27.
14. Articles of Faith 1:9.
15. “An Address,” The Complete Writings of Ralph Waldo Emerson (1929), 45.
16. John 4:14.
That you don't see the similarities is equally frustrating. I freely acknowledge some similarities in the Latin, but you didn't even look at the dozens of characters from hieratic that are close.
Also, did you know where Latin originated from? Latin can trace it's roots all the way back to ancient Phoenician, which was an ancient derivative of Egyptian.
Here's the one I was looking for originally. I dont' expect you to see any similarities given your frame of reference, but WOW, they are sure there, and they are 1000 years removed, both time and place from what Moroni wrote.
FYI, these are ancient Egyptian grave texts.
Now, that all said, none of this really matters. My faith is based on an answer from God to me. I cannot deny the sweetness of His spirit to my soul, nor should I. I also cannot deny the miracles I have witnessed, the lives changed, souls cankered in sin and sorrow brought to the grace of Christ, where their guilt was swept away and they had a completely different life, including my own.
Nor can I deny the wonderful things I have witnessed. These things are sacred to me, but I share them with you in this forum a bit trepidatiously. I have seen the overwhelmingly gravity and physics defying results of angelic protection in behalf of a servant of the Lord. My own life was spared due to the whisperings of the spirit to my mind, warning me to move immediately. There are many others, which I won't go into.
Know this, that I cannot deny what I have been given, it is a gift, and I hold it sacred. I'm sorry that you feel you continually need to belittle my faith, that is your right, but I will continue to do what I do for the reasons I've listed.
Have a great day.
Sevenbak.
Mormon smoke and mirrors. The chart is illustrative of EXACT duplication of the Latin Shorthand which Smith claimed were ‘reformed Egyptian’. Your effort to infer from similarities but not exact duplication is duly noted ... deceit is not a pretty exhibition, seven. [BTW, have you found any Jewish RELIGIOUS documents written in Egyptian alphabet? Hard, isn’t it!]
Hard? Hardly. I guess you missed this thread.
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/religion/2012873/posts
It would appear you mormonism apologists depend upon uninformed people being confused and then led into Mormonism via mischaracterizations, vague assertions, and unbiblical claims which are conveniently misunderstood by those not verse in the Bible and thus easily led into mormonism at the first stirrings of spiritual awakening.
You claim to pray for my heart to be softened ... you would be more to the point if you would pray to your mormon god to dowse the fire I get when I see the lies and heresies of mormonism promoted as if they are 'the truth'. You insult and anger Christians (and me in particular) when you claim Christianity lost Holy Spirit direction for individual saved people until the adulterous peepstone divination false prophet came on the scene with his great scam. You religion's efforts to be baptoised for the dead is blatant affirmation that you believe mormonism is the 'ONLY' way into God's Presence.
Unbelievable.
Have a good day MHGinTN.
Nice try to mischaracterize what I posted in #42, and as you reread the bracketed sentence below, note that I did not assert there were none rather that finding any was hard ... and you linked to a paganized verse as your proof source!
[BTW, have you found any Jewish RELIGIOUS documents written in Egyptian alphabet? Hard, isn’t it!] last sentence in post #42
BTW, 7, the moderator pulled my posting of the chart on that thread AND told a postert that if he was not a Mormon to leave the thread! Am I supposed to be reading mormon propaganda now in order to be ‘educated’ to mormonism without opportunity to object? LOL!
Isaiah 29:13 Wherefore the Lord said, Forasmuch as this people draw near me with their mouth, and with their lips do honour me, but have removed their heart far from me, and their fear toward me is taught by the precept of men
Quit wasting your time fighting on here. We Mormons as well as yourself need to be spending less idle time on here bickering over discrepancies in faith and focus on the commons bonds we share. Namely service, prayer, faith in Jesus Christ who will surely come again. Let’s leave it up to Him to decide who did their part in following His example.
When satan is failing to woo a soul he resorts to warning against using the Word against him. You might want to take the verse you posted to me and read it again, in light of the perversions to Bible Truth which your prophet, Smith, has made and you swallow as 'restored gospel'.
Read the KJV of Luke 10:22, then read Joseph Smith’s ‘Translation’ version of the King James Bible where Smith changes the wording to reflect his acceptance of ‘Sebelianism’ at that time in his evolving theology. In 1830, Smith embraced 2nd Century Sebelianism (modalism), proposing God the Father came into the flesh as Jesus and after the crucifixion ascends as God the Spirit. [ Your own B of M refutes this!. See Mosiah 15:1-2&5; Ether 3:14; even Alma 18:22 teaches God is a Spirit; even testimony of the three witnesses accompanying modern printings of the B of M acknowledge the trinity!]
By 1835, Smith moves from Sibelianism and is embracing a binitarian concept of God, and the Holy Spirit as ‘the mind of God’, perhaps because he started studying Hebrew in 1835 and found the word ‘Elohim‘.
The reality is that the Book of Mormon, published in 1830, teaches a very different concept of God from what the supposed ‘first vision’ as propounded by the LDS Church teaches!
In Smith’s handwritten version (1832) of his supposed vision, he mentions seeing only one being. Only later was this supposed vision changed to incorporate God the Father in flesh and bones, and God the Son in His body of flesh and bones. The Book of Mormon actually refutes the official First Vision account, as does Joseph’s own hand-penned version dated to 1832!
So, what could be done with this contradictory status? … In 1837, the LDS hierarchy changed the Book of Mormon to fit better with Joseph‘s changing theology! [ For one or two of many changes, see 1st Nephi 11: 18, 1830 edition: Mary went from Mother of God, to Mother of the Son of God. And following ’The Lamb of God, even the eternal Father‘, was changed to read, ’the Lamb of God, the Son of the Eternal Father.’ ]
In 1842 the first PUBLISHED account of the supposed first vision says Joseph saw two personages. In 1843 he dictated the D&C section 130 in which he teaches God and Jesus each have a body of flesh and bones. In 1844, Joseph began giving sermons on how there is a multiplicity of Gods, a council of Gods, and human progression to deity.
Isaiah 29:16 Your perversion! as clay is the potter esteemed? That the work saith of its maker, ‘He hath not made me?’ And the framed thing said of its framer, ‘He did not understand?’
Adding your works ('after all that you can do') to His crucifixion is perversion. Preaching progression by works to godhood is perversion. It is not a loving thing to let you rush into perversion without warning you.
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