Confused Missionary?

[JIME]

Hi! I have been looking into the Mormon Faith, and decided to meet with some missionaries to ask some questions about doctrine and some doubts I was having.

One of these doubts i was had to do with the Brigham Young statement about people living on the moon and the sun: "I will tell you who the real fanatics are: they are they who adopt false principles and ideas as facts, and try to establish a superstructure upon a false foundation. They are the fanatics; and however ardent and zealous they may be, they may reason or argue on false premises till doomsday, and the result will be false. If our religion is of this character we want to know it; we would like to find a philosopher who can prove it to us. We are called ignorant; so we are: but what of it? Are not all ignorant? I rather think so. Who can tell us of the inhabitants of this little planet that shines of an evening, called the moon? When we view its face we may see what is termed "the man in the moon," and what some philosophers declare are the shadows of mountains. But these sayings are very vague, and amount to nothing; and when you inquire about the inhabitants of that sphere you find that the most learned are as ignorant in regard to them as the most ignorant of their fellows. So it is with regard to the inhabitants of the sun. Do you think it is inhabited? I rather think it is. Do you think there is any life there? No question of it; it was not made in vain. It was made to give light to those who dwell upon it, and to other planets; and so will this earth when it is celestialized. Every planet in its first rude, organic state receives not the glory of God upon it, but is opaque; but when celestialized, every planet that God brings into existence is a body of light, but not till then. Christ is the light of this planet. God gives light to our eyes. Did you ever think who gave you the power of seeing who organized these little globules in our heads, and formed the nerves running to the brain, and gave us the power of distinguishing a circle from a square, an upright from a level, large from small, white from black, brown from gray, and so on? Did you acquire this faculty by your own power? Did any of you impart this power to me or I to you? Not at all. Then where did we get it from? From a superior Being. When I think of these few little things with regard to the organization of the earth and the people of the earth, how curious and how singular it is! And yet how harmonious and beautiful are Nature's laws! And the work of God goes forward, and who can hinder it, or who can stay His hand now that He has commenced His kingdom?"

When i asked about this, they said that Young came back the next day and asked the congregation if they believed him, and some of the people said no. They told me he then asked why, they replied and said they prayed and felt it was wrong.

I looked for the part when he came back and asked if the congregation believed what he had said, and i had no luck finding it. I was wondering if these missionaries are confused, or if they are lying to me. If you can find the part i was unable to find to this sermon by Brigham young please link. Or if you can give another explanation that would be helpful as well. Thanks :)

[Nappaljarri]

Hi Jime, what part of the sermons quote are you wanting to question? There is alot there :)

Generally, though, in our church there is straight church doctrine and then there is speculation. Even apostles and prophets can say things that are pure speculation, even educated speculation. This is in the clasification of speculation, even though spoken by the prophet.

Another good question to ask ones self when sifting through lots of information is.. "does this have anythign to do with my salvation?" The answer this time is definately no. Whether there is inhabitants on celetial bodies in our universe doesn't matter to the choices and promise we need to make to come close and become like God (according to the teachings of The Church Of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints).

I hope this may help

[JIME]

I was more wondering if i was lied to or not. Did Young really come back the next day and say he was testing the church? Because that is what i was told by two missionaries last week, and i cannot find it anywhere!

[HiJolly]

I was more wondering if i was lied to or not. Did Young really come back the next day and say he was testing the church? Because that is what i was told by two missionaries last week, and i cannot find it anywhere!

I have no idea. But I did find this:

The Nature of Prophets and Prophecy

Finally, we consider a statement attributed to Joseph Smith that may prove to be the one most frequently cited by modern critics. An article in The Young Woman's Journal 3 (1892), 263-264, indicates that Joseph Smith, as early as 1837, had declared that there six-foot people living on the moon, who dressed like Quakers and lived nearly a thousand years. Because of its absurdity, some critics have included the article in their list of Joseph Smith's "false prophecies," though it is by no means prophetic in nature and despite the fact that the article does not attribute the belief to divine revelation. (Joseph may have been joking.) The statement regarding people on the moon is both second-hand and very late, and there are no known statements from Joseph Smith himself. The source is the Oliver B. Huntington Journal, Book 14, and is from a journal entry dated 1881, nearly forty years after Joseph Smith's death! It is hardly a reliable source.

Nevertheless, Joseph Smith may have believed, as did Brigham Young (Journal of Discourses 13:217), that the moon is inhabited. After all, it had been reported in the press in 1835 that Sir John Herschel, the most prominent astronomer of the day, had seen creatures on the moon who were human in form with bat-wings and wearing no clothing. During the century before, others had reported seeing moon people who were half-human and half-dog. Amazingly, a few astronomers even reported seeing people living on the sun! As it turned out, the Herschel story was a journalistic hoax, designed to increase circulation.14 But large numbers of people believed it, and it continues to appear occasionally in twentieth-century publications. Could we really fault Joseph for accepting as fact (if he did so) something that he thought prominent scientists of his day accepted? After all, he did not claim to have any divine source for this information.

HiJolly

[Nappaljarri]

Back to the question if Missionaries lie, I'm sure there are some that do (they are imperfect creatures), but on the whole I don't believe that missionaries would purposefully lie to someone. They may have a firm belief in what they have told you, although they cannot back it up, but have been told the story themselves (you know chinese whispers).

[JIME]

Thanks for the input!

I was actually aware that non-LDS people back then believed the moon was inhabited, but i found it odd that prophetic people of the church were claiming this, and that they were on the sun!

Anyway, thanks. The missionaries were probably misinformed, although... I cant see why anyone would tell them that if there is no proof! :/

[mnn727]

Did Young really come back the next day and say he was testing the church? !

WHo knows? Who cares? What could his speculation about this possibly have to do with anything? Did he ever say he was speaking Prophetically? It was very common for people to believe the moon was inhabited back then, newspapers even reported it.

Does everything that comes out of a Prophets mouth have to be of God? Where does ANY scripture say that?

I am pretty sure that most Biblical prophets thought the earth was flat as everyone did back then, does that make them any less of a Prophet?

The Bible talks of; the 4 corners of the Earth, cockatrices and dragons, does that make the Bible false?

Why do you try to attach infallibility to Prophets when not one of them has ever claimed it (modern or Biblical) and in fact many have preached against it?

As far as missionaries lying to you, there are many well meaning people that try to explain things, perhaps one of their Sunday School teachers told them that and they never checked it out, perhap Brigham did say it -- not everything B.Y. ever said made it onto the internet, lots of people kept jounals back then and many times they have been passed down through the generations and only those people with access to it would know about it. Perhaps they did lie to you, I don't know, but not finding something on the internet does not mean it does not exist.

Once again we never claimed infallibility of everything a Prophet says. There is a reason Prophets have 2 counselors and 12 Apostles and all 15 must agree for any doctrinal matter to be binding on the Church.

Edited September 5, 2008 by mnn727

[HiJolly]

WHo knows? Who cares?

If I were an investigator, I would most certainly care.

HiJolly

[candyprpl]

I was more wondering if i was lied to or not. Did Young really come back the next day and say he was testing the church? Because that is what i was told by two missionaries last week, and i cannot find it anywhere!

You must remember that these missionaries are young and they may have told you that because that was the answer they were given and never researched it to see if it was true. So no, they didn't lie to you.

But I agree with the poster that said to ask, what does this have to do with salvation?

That's what the missionaries are taught to teach you -- the plan of salvation. They don't have all the answers to the teachings of all the prophets.

[mnn727]

If I were an investigator, I would most certainly care.

HiJolly

I mean no offense to this, but why? Once they understand that Prophets have never claimed infallibilty, this type of question ends.

[HiJolly]

I mean no offense to this, but why? Once they understand that Prophets have never claimed infallibilty, this type of question ends.

My comment went back to the OP about whether or not the Elders were lying.

I don't think they were, but IF they were I'd sure want to know it. I know I made a factual mistake or two on my mission, but I never intentionally lied to anyone.

HiJolly

[Maureen]

I mean no offense to this, but why? Once they understand that Prophets have never claimed infallibilty, this type of question ends.

But, a person needs to ask questions first and receive answers before they can come to any conclusions regarding the situation; even Prophet infallibility.

[Islander]

Thanks for the input!

I was actually aware that non-LDS people back then believed the moon was inhabited, but i found it odd that prophetic people of the church were claiming this, and that they were on the sun!

Anyway, thanks. The missionaries were probably misinformed, although... I cant see why anyone would tell them that if there is no proof! :/

JIME:

God does not always reveals to His prophets everything, especially those things that are not really relevant to the building of the kingdom. B. Young was free to speculate on just about every subject just like the next fellow, and they often did on non-church/doctrinal issues.

By the way, I wonder where you found that story?

[NeuroTypical]

I was wondering if these missionaries are confused, or if they are lying to me.

I doubt they were lying. I haven't thoroughly researched the issue, but from what I can remember, BY was engaging in very common 1800's frontier America speculation, never claimed it was revelation, and was wrong - case closed. It wouldn't surprise me in the least that someone dreamed up the comforting falsehood that he came back the next day and claimed he was joking or testing or whatever. It also wouldn't surprise me in the least that this falsehood spread like wildfire as an urban myth, and spread to one or both of these missionaries.

Missionaries are most certainly NOT trained to lie.

LM

[JIME]

I never said this had to do with salvation. Sorry if you got that impression.

How did i find this? I Actually was randomly reading sermons of the journal of discourses and saw this, believe it or not.

Why would you say this doesn't matter?...

I think i will stop posting in these forums now because I seem to be offending you.

Bye!

[bytor2112]

Our faith really hinges on whether or not the Book of Mormon is what it claims to be.......and whether Joseph Smith did indeed see Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ. The Journal of Discourses, while very interesting to read, is not considered official church doctrine or scriptural canon. I wonder what we might think if we could hear some of Moses's or Abraham's sermons or private speculative conversations or even Paul's?

[tubaloth]

Lets see…

I dare to bet the Missionaries probably haven’t read this talk by Brigham Young. Up until now I had heard this teaching by Brigham Young, but never sat down to read it.

Two cases probably happen.

1. The Missionaries (or probably one of them) had heard of it before and had heard of this “answer” before. Sense that answer fixed the question, there was probably no reason to go any father. Plus missionaries don’t really have access to journal of Discourses. So they told you the answer they had heard, it was good enough for them, so they assumed it was good enough for you.

2. Probably some ward member told them this answer, that ward member either got it mixed up, or the missionaries didn’t understand what the member was trying to tell them.

Either way, the missionaries where not TRYING to lie to you! They were trying to answer the question to the best of there knowledge (which was incomplete).

Now after I read the quote and what I had always thought about this such quote is this:

A couple of things about LDS doctrine. The first being is that we believe after we die we go to what is called a spirit world. Really this is a waiting place for spirits until the resurrection. I think I recall Brigham Young teaching that the spirit world was right here on this world! That isn’t really to far fetched of an idea, many people believe that spirits can still be around us so to speak.

Second doctrine of the LDS church, is we believe in Three Kingdoms of Glory, meaning Celestial, Terrestrial, and Telestial. Paul taught about these three degrees of the resurrection, and even compared the resurrection to Sun (as the Celestial Glory), the Moon (as Terrestrial glory) , and Stars (as Telestial Glory).

So the way I see Brigham Young’s quote, is more saying everything God created has a purpose (or reason for its creation). Who is to say that the moon or the sun don’t have people on them, (that’s where he tries to pull in the idea of the man in the moon). “So it is with regard to the inhabitants of the sun. Do you think it is inhabited? I rather think it is. Do you think there is any life there? No question of it” I don’t think Brigham Young was talking about people actually walking around, I think he was thinking more of it in a spirtual sense. That we are actually seeing kingdoms of glory, really I kind of think he is just taking Paul’s idea one step farther (See 1 Corinthians 15) That the kingdoms of glory are not some far reaches of the universe, but that are just out side our window.

I’m not saying Brigham Young was 100% correct in this idea! What I am saying, he really wasn’t that far off with what LDS doctrine is! That Heaven (maybe where God and Christ are) which would be in the Celestial Kingdom (which is like the sun) is already there, watching over us, giving us light!

[evangelical]

Hi Jime, what part of the sermons quote are you wanting to question? There is alot there :)

Generally, though, in our church there is straight church doctrine and then there is speculation. Even apostles and prophets can say things that are pure speculation, even educated speculation. This is in the clasification of speculation, even though spoken by the prophet.

Another good question to ask ones self when sifting through lots of information is.. "does this have anythign to do with my salvation?" The answer this time is definately no. Whether there is inhabitants on celetial bodies in our universe doesn't matter to the choices and promise we need to make to come close and become like God (according to the teachings of The Church Of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints).

I hope this may help

Hold on. The people in the congregation, according to the account, were able to pray and feel it was false. Why couldn't Brigham Young, no mere congregant but the prophet himself, have similarly prayed about it to find out if it was only speculation or not. This shows the problem, in my opinion, with the whole personal testimony idea. What if men really were discovered on the moon? The people would still have had a feeling, after prayer, that those people did not exist. I simply cannot understand how the entire Mormon church came to believe what you believe after praying then recieving a feeling. This is very dangerous in my opinion.

[bytor2112]

Hold on. The people in the congregation, according to the account, were able to pray and feel it was false. Why couldn't Brigham Young, no mere congregant but the prophet himself, have similarly prayed about it to find out if it was only speculation or not. This shows the problem, in my opinion, with the whole personal testimony idea. What if men really were discovered on the moon? The people would still have had a feeling, after prayer, that those people did not exist. I simply cannot understand how the entire Mormon church came to believe what you believe after praying then recieving a feeling. This is very dangerous in my opinion.

Yet, I assure you that if you had this "feeling" you would understand.

[RachelleDrew]

I never said this had to do with salvation. Sorry if you got that impression.

How did i find this? I Actually was randomly reading sermons of the journal of discourses and saw this, believe it or not.

Why would you say this doesn't matter?...

I think i will stop posting in these forums now because I seem to be offending you.

Bye!

If it matters to you, then it DOES matter.

I'm getting awfully sick of the "it has nothing to do with your salvation, it doesn't matter" approach. If an investigator is asking a question about the church, no matter what it is, it should be answered with something better than "it doesn't matter so don't ask" nonsense. From an outsider's view, it could be construed as hiding information about the church to say things like that. At least, I know that's how I perceived the "it doesn't matter" answers when I was investigating.

For the record JIME, missionaries aren't taught to lie or anything, but i'm sure like all humans a few do. Chances are though, they were simply mis-informed. I wouldn't know personally, I don't know anything about the story you posted so I couldn't tell you if it were true or not.

[BenRaines]

Were the people in the time of Columbus lying? They believed the Earth to be flat. The missionaries may have been told by someone else that this is what happened. I don't believe that they fabricated a lie to answer your question.

Type in Mormon Urban Legends in your search engine. Urban legends work too. Lots of lies told as truth.

Ben Raines