Strongest Evidences for Restoration of Primitive Church?


Jason_J
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The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints proclaims to be a Restoration of the original Church established by Jesus Christ anciently. It is believed that there is not only a restoration of priesthood authority from God, but also a restoration of ancient beliefs and practices that were either lost and/or changed.

What do you believe are the strongest evidences for that Restoration of true doctrines and practices (excluding witness from the Holy Ghost of course ;)).

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I think the obvious answer is the Book of Mormon, as a single item of evidence.

But really, its the whole story of the restoration. Even non-LDS scholars look at Joseph Smith's insight into doctrinal issues as genius. He retold the story of Christianity in a way that is foreign to today's churches, but fits incredibly well with the Biblical and historical record. Was he a genius, incredibly insightful, or was he simply explained it all through translation and angelic tutelage?

Lastly, I would point to prophecies that have been and are continuing to be fulfilled.

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What do you believe are the strongest evidences for that Restoration of true doctrines and practices (excluding witness from the Holy Ghost of course ).

I can't exclude it as it solely is the bedrock of my testimony. Without it all other evidences are meaningless.

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I'm not sure if this is what you're getting at, but the strongest proof for me was every time I thought the missionaries were making things up, they were able to point to passages in the Bible. In essence, they were able to go back to the source - not a council, not a learned essay, but back to the Bible. So, some examples for me are the Melchizedek priesthood (I thought for sure this was something the LDS had made up) and Christ's activities after the crucifixion.

bts - I was just thinking of you the other day, Jason_J. Glad to see you again. I hope all is well with you.

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Thanks, yes, this is the sort of thing I'm looking for.

What I'm interested in are historical/physical/etc evidences for a restoration of ancient beliefs and practices, things that separate us from other Christian churches, and that show that these unique beliefs and practices really are restored and not just invented by Joseph Smith. My list would include things like:

-pre-mortal existence

-baptism for the dead

-creation from pre-existing matter

-continuing revelation being needed in the true Church

-exaltation/deification

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Jason_J - From my point of view there are two distinct indications that a restoration has taken place. In essence I would call these two indications a spiritual indication and the second I would call an empirical indication.

First - New Scripture and Prophets: The spiritual indication has been referenced in part in the coming forth of the Book of Mormon. But this is just a tip of an iceberg. Even to the casual religious student of Judaism, Christianity or Islam it is obvious that there was once a time of divine revelation through prophets chosen by G-d to direct and inspire true believers. Without G-d selecting his spokesmen directly there would be no ancient truths to be restored. This pattern existed for thousands of years of human history and is the basis of all our scripture in traditional religion - weather it be Jewish (Old Testament), Christian, (New Testament) or Islam (Quran). The one common thread among all these is that there was of time of Prophets guiding the people from Adam to Moses G-d spoke to man and guided them in the creation of scriptures spoken by prophets.

Without question when there are no prophets there would be no scripture and whenever there were prophets there was a historical record of their deeds in scripture. Anciently this was known a covenant and the prophet was the proctor of the covenant. Throughout the ancient scriptures when people followed the proctor prophets they spiritually progressed, prospered and flourished. When they rejected their proctor prophets or tried to continue without them - they will fall into regressive conditions. We see this cycle of renewal and decay throughout human history and especially scripture. Even when there were prophets we see this renewal and decay taking place among those the follow the prophets and those that reject the prophets for another path in life.

Second the Empirical evidence of Apostasy and restoration: History is a very strong indication that human society have fallen into a long era of decay. So pronounced was this decaying that it was called - The Dark Ages. Again even a casual student of history realizes that human enlightenment took more than a hiatus but a serious and devastating decline. According to LDS theology (and scripture) near what is called the “end of times” there would be a “Marvelous Work and a Wonder”. This would begin as a reversal of decline as a preparation for a restoration. Anciently it was spoken of as someone to come before to prepare a way - A restoration of all things. The classic indication of a grand change is an era called Renaissance - that corresponds to exploration and discovery of the New Americas (prophesied in the Book of Mormon). At the end of this era came the divine restoration of prophets which corresponds to the age of enlightenment.

This age of enlightenment was brought about by the restoration of prophets and divine covenants again among the people. Since the restoration there has been an explosion of understanding and knowledge covering the world. We are currently in an era of unprecedented growth and advances in all aspects of human endeavor. To say that something more dramatic than our time has existed at any other era of human history is rhetorically flawed. Even the advent of Christ was not so empirically dramatic. Obviously something has changed and is having an empirical effect that cannot be matched by any other time in human history. If there is a G-d (and there is) his hand in the affairs of man are more pronounced today than at any time in human history. To reject the idea of a restoration is to reject G-d. And yet many well meaning traditionalists do such a thing in front of overwhelming evidence of G-d’s hand. It is akin to the Jews rejecting the Christ - which is why traditional Christians do not flow unto the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints any more than the Jews under the traditional Jews led by the Scribes and Pharisees accepted Jesus.

The Traveler

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Thanks, yes, this is the sort of thing I'm looking for.

What I'm interested in are historical/physical/etc evidences for a restoration of ancient beliefs and practices, things that separate us from other Christian churches, and that show that these unique beliefs and practices really are restored and not just invented by Joseph Smith. My list would include things like:

-pre-mortal existence

-baptism for the dead

-creation from pre-existing matter

-continuing revelation being needed in the true Church

-exaltation/deification

I've been here since 2006. We've discussed many doctrinal differences. This list is an excellent one, highlighting key unique LDS beliefs. I'm told that two common sites that have explanations and defenses of these teachings are FAIRLDS and Jeff Lindsey's site.

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Second the Empirical evidence of Apostasy and restoration: History is a very strong indication that human society have fallen into a long era of decay. So pronounced was this decaying that it was called - The Dark Ages. Again even a casual student of history realizes that human enlightenment took more than a hiatus but a serious and devastating decline.

A very western European centred view of that particular period of history, the dark ages wasn't a world wide event and to say it was is giving the rest of the world at that time a pretty bad rap. The dark ages is a distinct period of time in western European history, outside of western Europe in places such as the Byzantine Empire and the Islamic world there was no decay at all. Whilst in western Europe the ancient knowledge found in the books of the Greek, Roman and Indians was being burned as heresy this was not the case in places like Constantinople, Baghdad, or Cordoba where learning and knowledge was seen as a great virtue and a gift from God.

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In answering that question, it's important to remember that there's a difference in these times to how it has been in other periods. So while it's a restoration of all things, there are those things revealed that were not revealed in other dispensations (To individuals, maybe, but not to the church or the world as a whole).

"Whereas previous prophets were sometimes left to surmise—as Moroni supposed the Jews also had a record of the Creation from Adam on down (see Ether 1:3)—ours, instead, is a time of fulness, including “things which never have been revealed from the foundation of the world” (D&C 128:18)." - Neal A. Maxwell ("God Will Yet Reveal")

Not that that is the case with the specific examples you gave, but it's a nice thought :)

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Second the Empirical evidence of Apostasy and restoration: History is a very strong indication that human society have fallen into a long era of decay. So pronounced was this decaying that it was called - The Dark Ages. Again even a casual student of history realizes that human enlightenment took more than a hiatus but a serious and devastating decline.

A very western European centred view of that particular period of history, the dark ages wasn't a world wide event and to say it was is giving the rest of the world at that time a pretty bad rap. The dark ages is a distinct period of time in western European history, outside of western Europe in places such as the Byzantine Empire and the Islamic world there was no decay at all. Whilst in western Europe the ancient knowledge found in the books of the Greek, Roman and Indians was being burned as heresy this was not the case in places like Constantinople, Baghdad, or Cordoba where learning and knowledge was seen as a great virtue and a gift from God.

In general it is understood that the destruction of the Library of Alexander (about 292 BC.) was the beginning of the Dark Ages. But we also find within 150 years the loss of the library of Zoroaster (major Library) in Persia, Buddhist hiding both New Testament and Buddhists documents from attempts to destroy all such documents in Dunhuang China and of course the Nephite’s in the Americas. Granted Algebra and base 60 numbers (astrological and navigational calculations including time) is credited to Islam but there are indications that the Ancient Chinese, Egyptians and Phoenicians had superior mathematics (including trigonometry) over 1000 years before even the Greeks making the arguments of empirical advances tentative at best. In fact it was not until the development of partial differentiation equations in the 19th century that modern mathematics surpassed the capability of the highest advanced mathematics before Christ. I am unaware of any advances in the world to advance human understanding since the destruction of the library of Alexander that did not already exist somewhere anciently.

Since the restoration (beginning with the renaissance) - I know of no previous era of enlightenment and understanding - leaving any religious thinker to wonder what G-d has changed in our time.

The Traveler

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The Dark Ages is historically the middle ages period of European history dating from the fall of the western Roman empire to the beginning of the Italian renaissance (roughly 6th century AD to end 13th century AD).

The library of Alexandria is generally held to have been created under the reign of either Ptolemy Lagides or his son Ptolemy II who reigned between 323 BC and 246 BC, as for the date for the destruction of the library its generally held to have been closed/destroyed by the edict of the then Roman Emperor Theodosius in approx 391 AD.

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The Dark Ages is historically the middle ages period of European history dating from the fall of the western Roman empire to the beginning of the Italian renaissance (roughly 6th century AD to end 13th century AD).

The library of Alexandria is generally held to have been created under the reign of either Ptolemy Lagides or his son Ptolemy II who reigned between 323 BC and 246 BC, as for the date for the destruction of the library its generally held to have been closed/destroyed by the edict of the then Roman Emperor Theodosius in approx 391 AD.

Outside of historical rumors concerning Prestor John and the so called Nestorian Christians in the Far East I do not know of any enduring Christian societies besides what you have already referred to as part of Western Civilization. It should be obvious to the causal student of history that Christianity evolved significantly during what is classically referred to as The Dark Ages; leaving in its wake a preponderance of empirical evidence of significant philosophical changes to the entire structure Christian societies. For example: The Toleration Act of 1649 - the first time a Christian society used the force of law to prevent the plunder of property or life of someone believing in the Trinity but not beholdin to popular Christian notions of the day - specifically that Protestant Christians cannot target for plunder and killing; Catholics just because they are Catholics.

The Traveler

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Apart from the Orthodox/Coptic Churches in what is now the middle east and turkey who have used the same litany/rituals since the days they were founded in the early 1st century AD with the spread of the Church outwards from Jerusalem under the guidance of the first Apostles and their followers.

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