Eternal progression

[_harmony]

harmony,

How different would you say the doctrine of man/god is for LDS vs the (let's say) Baptist doctrine that man becomes immortal? Would you say that Baptists have an answer to one question regarding the eternal fate of man via salvation but lack the rest of the story? Does LDS doctrine simply answer both questions?

Does immortal equal being a God? That's a good question, Jersey. Especially in the light of Joseph's warning that all creeds were apostate and wrong. Yet what he proposes is the same thing?

[_bcspace]

Assuming a belief in God:

The doctrine of eternal progression, which Pres Hinckley said he's not sure we teach, is that man can become a god.

Emphasize. He was obviously trying to find the right words to fit within the milk before meat principle.

Yet the only examples we have of Gods are God and Christ, neither of which can be proven to have ever been a man before they were Gods.

Is there any other documentation of this idea, so that there would be some basis for Joseph to restore this? Or is this something Joseph dreamed up all by himself?

Biblical Theosis (among other things).....

John 10: 34-36 (Ps. 82: 1-8) We are divine gods already
Acts 17: 28-29 We are the same type of being as God.
Romans 8: 17 We will inherit everything God has.
2 Corinthians 3: 18 We will have the same image and glory as God.
Galatians 4: 7 We are heirs of God through Christ.
Philippians 2:5-6 We are to think that we can be equal with God.
Philippians 3:21 We will have the same kind of body as God.
1 John 3: 2 We will be just like God.
Revelation 3: 21 We will have the same power and authority as God.

"Men are Gods and Gods are men." Clement of Alexandria, The Instructor 3:1

"We have not been made Gods from the beginning, but at first merely men, then at length Gods..." Irenaeus, Against Heresies 4:38:4, in ANF 1:522

"...our Lord Jesus Christ, who did, through His transcendent love, became what we are, that He might bring us to be even what He is Himself." Irenaeus, Against Heresies 5: Preface, in ANF 1:526

All men are deemed worthy of becoming gods, and even of having power to become sons of the Highest. Justin Martyr, Dialogue with Trypho 124, in ANF 1:262

"we assert that not by their communion merely with Him, but by their unity and intermixture, they received the highest powers, and after participating in His divinity, were changed into God." Origen, Against Celsus 3:41

God "made man for that purpose, that from men they may become Gods." Jerome, The Homilies of Saint Jerome, vol. 1 (FC 48), translated by M.L. Ewald, 106

"For as Christ died and was exalted as man, so, as man, is He said to take what, as God, He ever had, that even such a grant of grace might reach to us. For the Word was not impaired in receiving a body, that He should seek to receive a grace, but rather He deified that which He put on, and more than that, gave it graciously to the race of man." Athanasius, Discourses Against the Arians 1:42, in NPNF Series 2, 4:330-331

Orthodox Christians "taught that the destiny of man was to become like God, and even to become deified" Prestige, God in Patristic Thought, 73

"One can think what one wants of this doctrine of progressive deification, but one thing is certain: with this anthropology Joseph Smith is closer to the view of man held by the Ancient Church than the precursors of the Augustinian doctrine of original sin were, who considered the thought of such a substantial connection between God and man as the heresy, par excellence." Benz, E.W., Imago Dei: Man in the Image of God, in Madsen, ed., Reflections on Mormonism, 215-216

[_harmony]

Assuming a belief in God:

The doctrine of eternal progression, which Pres Hinckley said he's not sure we teach, is that man can become a god.

Emphasize. He was obviously trying to find the right words to fit within the milk before meat principle.

Yet the only examples we have of Gods are God and Christ, neither of which can be proven to have ever been a man before they were Gods.

Is there any other documentation of this idea, so that there would be some basis for Joseph to restore this? Or is this something Joseph dreamed up all by himself?

Biblical Theosis (among other things).....

John 10: 34-36 (Ps. 82: 1-8) We are divine gods already
Acts 17: 28-29 We are the same type of being as God.
Romans 8: 17 We will inherit everything God has.
2 Corinthians 3: 18 We will have the same image and glory as God.
Galatians 4: 7 We are heirs of God through Christ.
Philippians 2:5-6 We are to think that we can be equal with God.
Philippians 3:21 We will have the same kind of body as God.
1 John 3: 2 We will be just like God.
Revelation 3: 21 We will have the same power and authority as God.

"Men are Gods and Gods are men." Clement of Alexandria, The Instructor 3:1

"We have not been made Gods from the beginning, but at first merely men, then at length Gods..." Irenaeus, Against Heresies 4:38:4, in ANF 1:522

"...our Lord Jesus Christ, who did, through His transcendent love, became what we are, that He might bring us to be even what He is Himself." Irenaeus, Against Heresies 5: Preface, in ANF 1:526

All men are deemed worthy of becoming gods, and even of having power to become sons of the Highest. Justin Martyr, Dialogue with Trypho 124, in ANF 1:262

"we assert that not by their communion merely with Him, but by their unity and intermixture, they received the highest powers, and after participating in His divinity, were changed into God." Origen, Against Celsus 3:41

God "made man for that purpose, that from men they may become Gods." Jerome, The Homilies of Saint Jerome, vol. 1 (FC 48), translated by M.L. Ewald, 106

"For as Christ died and was exalted as man, so, as man, is He said to take what, as God, He ever had, that even such a grant of grace might reach to us. For the Word was not impaired in receiving a body, that He should seek to receive a grace, but rather He deified that which He put on, and more than that, gave it graciously to the race of man." Athanasius, Discourses Against the Arians 1:42, in NPNF Series 2, 4:330-331

Orthodox Christians "taught that the destiny of man was to become like God, and even to become deified" Prestige, God in Patristic Thought, 73

"One can think what one wants of this doctrine of progressive deification, but one thing is certain: with this anthropology Joseph Smith is closer to the view of man held by the Ancient Church than the precursors of the Augustinian doctrine of original sin were, who considered the thought of such a substantial connection between God and man as the heresy, par excellence." Benz, E.W., Imago Dei: Man in the Image of God, in Madsen, ed., Reflections on Mormonism, 215-216

So if this isn't a new thought, and even the Baptists have a similiar idea in the idea of man's immortality, why is it considers so strange?

[_Jersey Girl]

harmony,

I don't know that it is so strange at all. Ev's will tell you (as I would have years ago) that it's blasphemy but when we argue it out, it's not much different than what Ev's believe.

[_Jersey Girl]

Let me continue on here...again, Ev's will tell you that it's blasphemy but when argued out, it's not much different than what Ev's believe. Ev's will tell you (again, as I would have years ago) that the Kingdom level's contained in Mormonism aren't Biblical and yet, when you ask them (gosh, I said them) if they believe they will be rewarded in "crowns" they will say yes. And when you ask them what a "crown' is they cannot tell you.

Stuff I learned in the trenches.

Hank Hanegraaff, for example, discusses "crowns" frequently in his radio broadcasts. He typically says that "what we do in this life, counts in the next".

And then he criticizes Mormonism regarding grace vs works and godhood.

I ask you, how different is it, to believe that one will be rewarded based on "worthiness/exaltation to godhood" vs "what we do in this life counts in the next and rewards in "crowns"?


To me, there is no difference.

How can any Ev rightly criticize the doctrine of exaltation to godhood in Mormonism (which attempts to answer the questions of eternal fate) when Ev's themselves cannot explain their own doctrine?

[_Trevor]

How can any Ev rightly criticize the doctrine of exaltation to godhood in Mormonism (which attempts to answer the questions of eternal fate) when Ev's themselves cannot explain their own doctrine?

Because the explication of the Mormon doctrine of deification comes from men whom they do not recognize as prophets and from scripture other than the Bible. While theosis certainly appears in the Bible, Mormons derive their concept of it primarily from these other sources.