Mormonism is a cult...
DeLuca22
Sorry to say but all Mormons are going to hell. Joseph Smith was no
different than David Karesh...except for the fact that people are not as
easily fooled now as they were then.
In Revelations, God said that if anyone changes or _adds to_ the bible,
they will be hit with all the plagues on Earth.
Reply if you want to delu...@aol.com
Craig Anderson
DeLuca22 <delu...@aol.com> wrote in article
<19961216100...@ladder01.news.aol.com>...
> Sorry to say but all Mormons are going to hell. Joseph Smith was no
> different than David Karesh...except for the fact that people are not as
> easily fooled now as they were then.
Hey, I feel a song coming on! Ahem ... me me me me .... la la ... ahem:
Everybody sing (to the tune of Rawhide):
Trolling, trolling, trolling,
Keep them posts a'trolling,
Keep them posts a'trolling, all niiiiiighttttt
Spread lies and distortion,
Mistate their position,
Just say that you're a Christian,
It's alriiiiight.
Craig
marzioli
> Why? Is Red bonkers?
:) :) :)
> I didn't think so. Now, you are free to read the Book of Mormon -- a New
> Testament
> of Jesus Christ.
But Red!! You forgot to mention that the Books of the Bible only deal with
truth.. So now how are we going to accept a book like the BOM or the Mormon
religion if it's not based on reality and truth? Hmmm... Methinks some
thing is wrong here. We are free to read any book, but if we want to
dedicate our lives to a god, it SHOULD be THE God, right? Or are you all
happy with a lie, and at best, a watered down version of the original word
of God? Now hold on here Red, you might say "Hey he's sort of rude". This
is a reduced version of what I have been writing for months on this news
group. Basicaly, what is Mormon truth, and how can they accept personal
revelation as the only truth when it is not objective? I will quote a
popular phrase from the man Charles Hodge
"Revelation is the communication of truth to the mind"
Do you agree with that? If you do GOOD! If you do not, then why do you
believe in the BOM? Well first off that phrase points out the usefull
nature of objective truth. If revelation is the communication of truth to
the mind, then the revelation has to be truth. If it is not truth, then it
is not a revelation of God. If it's not a revelation of God, then why
would we listen to it? So we find that if our "revelation" does not have
any basis in truth, then it is truly not from God. So about the BOM, where
is the evidence FOR it? I have been shown many "Hey it's possible that
there exists evidence somewhere!!!" and "This could have, should have,
maybe" arguments, but NO SOLID EVIDENCE for the BOM and anything the BOM
says. I have also noticed that all the verses that have ANY spiritual
value are verses stolen from the KJV Bible. What do I mean by stolen?
Context of verse, or meaning, phrases, and even close to word for word
snatching! Now tickle me pink! For instance should I consider this book
truth? Should you? I hope not, but I'm sure you wont' listen to me
because I told you so. Remember not to ignore the message because of the
messanger... God bless you all :)
Samuel
Marzioli
Truth Seekers Inc.
marz...@tdl.com
come see our web page at
http://www.tdl.com/~marzioli/
2 Corinthians 13:8 "For we can do nothing against the truth, but only for
the truth"
Acts 26:25 "... I am not out of my mind, most excellent Festus, but I utter
words of sober truth"
I always thought faith was the belief in things unseen, not in the things
that do not exist...
"Revelation is the communication of truth to the mind"
Charles Hodge
Red Davis <j...@microsoft.com> wrote in article
<01bbeb8a$c3102510$4f5e5ba5@sysadmin>...
The Baron Von SQUIDhofen
Whilst blissfully cavorting naked thru a local Republican convention,
mst...@exis.net (Matt Steen) graciously stopped to yodel the following words of
wisdom in our general direction:
> In article <01bbeb3b$0f8c4770$4cea2399@orion>, j...@mental.health.ca.us
> says...
> >
> >DeLuca22 <delu...@aol.com> wrote in article
> ><19961216100...@ladder01.news.aol.com>...
> >| Sorry to say but all Mormons are going to hell. Joseph Smith was no
> >| different than David Karesh...except for the fact that people are not
> as
> >| easily fooled now as they were then.
> >|
> >| In Revelations, God said that if anyone changes or _adds to_ the bible,
> >| they will be hit with all the plagues on Earth.
> >|
> >| Reply if you want to delu...@aol.com
> >
> >Hey Deluca, are you for real?
> >
> Naw, he's a troll. Looking for someone to argue with him.
Well, I suppose if he aspires to become a plague then perhaps it becomes his
duty to start "hittin", now don't it?
Slap away, Ebola Man! Don't let them talk you outta yur fun! There's nothin
quite like playin' the Angel'a Death!! If them mahrmans is cursed then us
Born-Again-crisscrosstians must be the plague! So kill kill kill in the name of
Jesus! Thank Jesus we're saved cause now everthang is permitted!! Yeeehaw!!
-- Dr. Squid >o< >o< (drs...@ix.netcom.com) drsquid = biup27b
qLzdn!q = p!nbsJP
* Proud of my near-madness, as if I had attained a goal *
* -- Peter Handke (The Weight of the World) *
Rev. Psycho
Matt Steen
Naw, he's a troll. Looking for someone to argue with him.
Skydmore
From: delu...@aol.com (DeLuca22)wrote>
>Sorry to say but all Mormons are going to hell. Joseph Smith was no
>different than David Karesh...except for the fact that people are not as
>easily fooled now as they were then.
>In Revelations, God said that if anyone changes or _adds to_ the bible,
>they will be hit with all the plagues on Earth.
>Reply if you want to delu...@aol.com
It refers to the Book of Revelation, not the entire Bible.
I guess you must be God if you can pass judgement
like that.
Skyd
Diana Newman
Rev. Psycho wrote:
>
> DeLuca22 <delu...@aol.com> wrote in article
> <19961216100...@ladder01.news.aol.com>...
> | different than David Karesh...except for the fact that people are not as
> | easily fooled now as they were then.
> |
> | In Revelations, God said that if anyone changes or _adds to_ the bible,
> | they will be hit with all the plagues on Earth.
> |
> | Reply if you want to delu...@aol.com
>
Yes, unfortunately, he probably is. There really ARE people who don't
know their bible enough to realize that the verse quoted applies only to
Revelations.....and would, if taken to apply to everything written after
Revelations, preclude a few of the books in the Bible itself. Ah,
well.....
Diana
Robert Craig Harman
DeLuca22 wrote:
>
> Sorry to say but all Mormons are going to hell. Joseph Smith was no
> different than David Karesh...except for the fact that people are not
> as easily fooled now as they were then.
>
> In Revelations, God said that if anyone changes or _adds to_ the
> bible, they will be hit with all the plagues on Earth.
Actually, it says no such thing...
...Craig's collection of anti-Mormon misreadings #5...
--
Robert Craig Harman En France, appelez 01 39 76 68 84 pour
BYU Chemical Engineering recevoir un Livre de Mormon gratuit...
Master's Candidate
LDS France Paris Mission http://www.et.byu.edu/~harmanr/mission.html
Best Sellers
delu...@aol.com (DeLuca22) thought hard about this before
writing:
>Sorry to say but all Mormons are going to hell. Joseph Smith was no
>different than David Karesh...except for the fact that people are not as
>easily fooled now as they were then.
>In Revelations, God said that if anyone changes or _adds to_ the bible,
>they will be hit with all the plagues on Earth.
>Reply if you want to delu...@aol.com
Ho, sheesh! Here we go again. It is obvious that Deluca
hasn't a clue. And it's Christmas, so I can't even lend him
a quarter.
Lehi
Please visit the Separation of School and State Alliance web
site at www.sepschool.org.
______
If the state monopolizes the philosophy of its citizens, it is
not significant that it does so in the classroom rather than
in the chapel.
(1996) Moi
To compel a man to furnish contributions of money for the propagation of
opinions which he disbelieves and abhors is sinful and tyrannical.
(1777) Thomas Jefferson
Whenever is found what is called a paternal government, there is found
state education. It has been discovered that the best way to insure
implicit obedience is to commence tyranny in the nursery.
(1874) Benjamin Disraeli
Gene Humbert
On Mon, 16 Dec 1996 08:38:47 -0700, Diana Newman <di...@sunrem.com>
wrote:
>Rev. Psycho wrote:
>>
>> DeLuca22 <delu...@aol.com> wrote in article
>> <19961216100...@ladder01.news.aol.com>...
>> | Sorry to say but all Mormons are going to hell. Joseph Smith was no
>> | different than David Karesh...except for the fact that people are not as
>> | easily fooled now as they were then.
>> |
>> | In Revelations, God said that if anyone changes or _adds to_ the bible,
>> | they will be hit with all the plagues on Earth.
>> |
>> | Reply if you want to delu...@aol.com
>>
>> Hey Deluca, are you for real?
>
>Yes, unfortunately, he probably is. There really ARE people who don't
>know their bible enough to realize that the verse quoted applies only to
>Revelations.....and would, if taken to apply to everything written after
>Revelations, preclude a few of the books in the Bible itself. Ah,
>well.....
>
>Diana
Not only that, but if they are going to insist on believe that
Revelations applies to the whole Bible, they had better start reading
Deuteronomy, and deal with it. If they believe one, they'll have to
believe the other, and throw out everything after it.
Gene....
Jade012
Gene wrote:
>Not only that, but if they are going to insist on believe that
Revelations applies to >the whole Bible, they had better start reading
Deuteronomy, and deal with it. If >they believe one, they'll have to
believe the other, and throw out everything after >it.
That is so true. I suppose all of the apostles are going to be in trouble
when Judgement Day arrives. After all, Mathew, Mark, Luke, John...they
are all written after Deuteronomy. I guess Mormons won't be all alone
when they are condemned for adding something after the book of Revelations
(which according to this can't be considered true anyway)
Jessica Fields.
Jason C. Scott
This is a ridiculous argument, peripheral to the problem. Mormons have
the wrong god. Right god, go to heaven. Wrong god, go to ...
Jason C. Scott
Let's see, now. The Bible has over 50,000 archaeological evidences to
support it. The Book of Mormon has none. The Bible has original
manuscripts dating back within 65 years of the apostles, and over 20,000
early manuscripts. The Book of Mormon has no golden plates.
Score: Bible 70,000 Book of Mormon 0.
The plan of salvation of the Book of Mormon is different from the Bible,
attempting to change it to a gospel of works like the Old Testament.
Where would a prudent person put his or her faith?
Jade012
If not for personal revelation that causes us to have faith, how can any
of us have faith in the Bible itself? If I can gain witnesses about one,
I can gain witnesses about the other.
Jessica
Best Sellers
"Jason C. Scott" <jcs...@pop3.concentric.net> thought hard
about this before writing:
>Let's see, now. The Bible has over 50,000 archaeological evidences to
In the Holy Ghost and His witness.
Certainly not in archeology, especially since it's not
perfectly aligned with Biblical historicity anyway.
Lehi
Please visit the Separation of School and State Alliance web
satie at www.sepschool.org.
Raymond Bingham
I uncovered clues pointing to Best Sellers (sel...@psyber.com) having written:
>>Let's see, now. The Bible has over 50,000 archaeological evidences to
>>support it. The Book of Mormon has none. The Bible has original
>>manuscripts dating back within 65 years of the apostles, and over 20,000
>>early manuscripts. The Book of Mormon has no golden plates.
>>Score: Bible 70,000 Book of Mormon 0.
>>The plan of salvation of the Book of Mormon is different from the Bible,
>>attempting to change it to a gospel of works like the Old Testament.
>>Where would a prudent person put his or her faith?
>In the Holy Ghost and His witness.
>Certainly not in archeology, especially since it's not
>perfectly aligned with Biblical historicity anyway.
And where exactly is the archeaological evidence that Christ turned
water into wine, or that Moses divided the red sea, or that God commanded
Abraham to go up and sacrifice Isaac, or Jonah was swallowed by a whale,
or Job was cursed many curses, or Mary was a virgin, or Paul had a vision
of the ressurrected Christ, or Peter healed the blindman, or Christ
brought Lazarus back from the dead.
Anyone can construct a story with archaelogical base. I could tell a story
about a boy who lived in Livermore California, who played in a creek behind
the LDS church on Mocho street. It could be completely fabricated, though
all those places exist.
If your faith in the Bible is based on Archeaological proof you have a
serious problem with your faith. I know that mine is not. Mine is based
off of the Spirit of God, but then my faith in the Book of Mormon is based
off the very same thing. Therefore the Bible and the Book of Mormon are
equally valid scripture in my heart.
If you deny the Book of Mormon you are only denying yourself of enormous
spiritual blessings. It is your own choice, when it all comes down to it
because the Book of Mormon was intended to be verified by the Holy Spirit
and through the excercising of faith. If you choose not to try it out,
then such is your own condemnation...
Best regards,
--
*****************************************************************
* Raymond Bingham * Fort Collins System Lab - Hewlett Packard *
* (aka. wReam...) * ra...@shofixti.fc.hp.com - 100% MY opinion *
*****************************************************************
* The internet needs a lobotomy to recover from its lobotomy. *
*****************************************************************
Jade012
Jason,
Have you talked to God lately, or are you just making this call on what
YOU believe?
Jessica Fields
Jade012
Jason,
There are many archeological evidences of the Book of Mormon. If you list
some of your archeological evidences of the Bible, I will be happy to list
some of my archeological evidences of the Book of Mormon. (Doesn't that
sound like..I'll show you mine if you show me yours?) Also, if you have
anything specific that you can't find proof for in the Book of Mormon, I
will be happy to answer your questions to the best of my ability.
Jessica Fields
Jason C. Scott
Since the Book of Mormon contradicts the Doctrine and Covenants and the Bible, you must have your
hands full trying to figure out what the real gospel is.
w.braun
Jason C. Scott <jcs...@pop3.concentric.net> wrote in article
<59tk4h$g...@herald.concentric.net>...
> Since the Book of Mormon contradicts the Doctrine and Covenants and the
Bible, you must have your
> hands full trying to figure out what the real gospel is.
>
If you want to give an example, I'm sure someone wll be happy to explain it
to you.
Jason Roberts
In article <19961225043...@ladder01.news.aol.com>, jad...@aol.com
(Jade012) wrote:
Yikes! I sure hope Jessica has more than a few poorly written books from
Deseret.....
Reminds me of the home teacher I had who presented a lesson on how "it came
to pass" was of Mayan origin, as evidenced by a Mayan hieroglyph denoting
the passage of time. All this from some booklet put out by Deseret.
Jessica, I think before you do anything silly, we should introduce you to
Kerry. Kerry, Jessica. Jessica, Kerry.
Show her the ropes Kerry, won't you? You could use an intern I imagine....
Oh, yeah, I am a different Jason from the one addressed in the above post.
A simple shorthand for keeping the Jasons straight follows:
Name Known for Abreviation
Jason Hardy "The Guide" JH
Jason C. Scott "con-Mormon Jason" JCS
Jason Roberts "mistaken for the above two" JR
--
Jason Roberts
I hit hard for the glory of God.
-Reggie White, "In the Trenches"
ehu...@uswest.com
In article <59ofoo$r...@herald.concentric.net>,
"Jason C. Scott" <jcs...@pop3.concentric.net> wrote:
>
> Let's see, now. The Bible has over 50,000 archaeological evidences to
> support it. The Book of Mormon has none. The Bible has original
> manuscripts dating back within 65 years of the apostles, and over 20,000
> early manuscripts. The Book of Mormon has no golden plates.
>
> Score: Bible 70,000 Book of Mormon 0.
>
> The plan of salvation of the Book of Mormon is different from the Bible,
> attempting to change it to a gospel of works like the Old Testament.
>
> Where would a prudent person put his or her faith?
How about in God, where it belongs?
-------------------==== Posted via Deja News ====-----------------------
http://www.dejanews.com/ Search, Read, Post to Usenet
ehu...@uswest.com
In article <59tk4h$g...@herald.concentric.net>,
you must have your
> hands full trying to figure out what the real gospel is.
Jason, Jason, Jason...
The only contradiction exists in YOUR mind. Relax and let it go..
Don't try to excite yourself... it's beyond your ability to comprehend.
Gene...
Kerry Shirts
In article <8516735...@dejanews.com>, ehu...@uswest.com says:
>
>In article <59ofoo$r...@herald.concentric.net>,
>> support it. The Book of Mormon has none. The Bible has original
>> manuscripts dating back within 65 years of the apostles, and over 20,000
>> early manuscripts. The Book of Mormon has no golden plates.
>>
>> Score: Bible 70,000 Book of Mormon 0.
>>
>> The plan of salvation of the Book of Mormon is different from the Bible,
>> attempting to change it to a gospel of works like the Old Testament.
>>
>> Where would a prudent person put his or her faith?
>
>How about in God, where it belongs?
Yes..... very good! I also would be interested in seeing ALL 70,000
proofs for the Bible. Not that I am disparaging the Bible, but I under-
stand the evangelistic tendenz to OVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV
<encoded_portion_removed>
VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVerexaggerate also!
Kerry A. Shirts
Jade012
Gene,
With most of these people it is a simple case of "Don't confuse me with
facts, my mind is made up"
Jessica (sure she is going to get hate mail for that one)
Jason C. Scott
ehu...@uswest.com wrote:
>In article <59ofoo$r...@herald.concentric.net>,
> "Jason C. Scott" <jcs...@pop3.concentric.net> wrote:
>>
>> Let's see, now. The Bible has over 50,000 archaeological evidences to
>> support it. The Book of Mormon has none. The Bible has original
>> manuscripts dating back within 65 years of the apostles, and over 20,000
>> early manuscripts. The Book of Mormon has no golden plates.
>>
>> Score: Bible 70,000 Book of Mormon 0.
>>
>> The plan of salvation of the Book of Mormon is different from the Bible,
>> attempting to change it to a gospel of works like the Old Testament.
>>
>> Where would a prudent person put his or her faith?
>
>How about in God, where it belongs?
I'm for that. How about testing a few of your doctrines, like God said to do?
"Beloved, believe not every spirit, but try the spirits whether they are of God: because many
false prophets are gone out into the world." I John 4:1
"they received the word with all readiness of mind, and searched the scriptures daily, whether
those things were so." Acts 17:11
Jason C. Scott
ehu...@uswest.com wrote:
>In article <59tk4h$g...@herald.concentric.net>,
>you must have your
>> hands full trying to figure out what the real gospel is.
>
>Jason, Jason, Jason...
>
>The only contradiction exists in YOUR mind. Relax and let it go..
>
>Don't try to excite yourself... it's beyond your ability to comprehend.
>
>Gene...
I cannot comprehend how:
God can exist in a man's heart according to the Book of Mormon (Alma 34:36)and the Bible, and then
he cannot exist in a man's heart (it's an old sectarian notion) according to D&C 130:3. I just
cannot comprehend that. Can you explain that to me? Please, I want to know. Use your scriptures.
I cannot comprehend how:
Death seals a man's fate (heaven, hell, etc) (Mosiah 2:36-39, Alma 34:32-35) and that baptism does
no good for the dead without the law (Moroni 8:22-23) and yet baptism for the dead gives man a
choice to change his fate after death (Joseph F. Smith vision, v.58). Can you change your fate
after death or not? I cannot comprehend. Please explain that to me with your scriptures.
Jesse Paakkari
Kerry Shirts <shir...@srv.net> wrote:
: >> Let's see, now. The Bible has over 50,000 archaeological evidences to
: >> support it. The Book of Mormon has none. The Bible has original
: >> manuscripts dating back within 65 years of the apostles, and over 20,000
: >> early manuscripts. The Book of Mormon has no golden plates.
: >> Score: Bible 70,000 Book of Mormon 0.
: >> The plan of salvation of the Book of Mormon is different from the Bible,
: >> attempting to change it to a gospel of works like the Old Testament.
: >> Where would a prudent person put his or her faith?
: >How about in God, where it belongs?
: proofs for the Bible. Not that I am disparaging the Bible, but I under-
: stand the evangelistic tendenz to OVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV
: VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVerexaggerate also!
I almost thought about asking that too. But I think that this is how
that 70,000 came to be....:
So ie. Dead sea scrolls is in (what? - how many I don't know, just
demonstating a point... ) 20,000 little pieces. Then we have all the old
pieces of the pottery etc. those amount 40.000 (just think how many
pieces one can break an ordinary vase ... if you try this at home,
you'll see, but don't blame me if your mama gets mad...). And so on and
on.
If I am wrong, I surely liked to see the list, there must be one,
otherwise no one in their right mind would claim such? (or would they..).
: Kerry A. Shirts
--
Jesse Paakkari Jesse.P...@cc.helsinki.fi jpaa...@cc.helsinki.fi
Jason C. Scott
There are no archaeological proofs for the Book of Mormon. Even a former
archaeologist who worked for BYU in 1953-54 said: "The first myth we need
to eliminate is that Book of Mormon archaeology exists." Dee Green Asst
Prof of Anthropology at Weber State College, former Asst Editor of the
BYU Univ Arch Soc Newsletter, Editor in 58-61.
SRLowther
Jason Robers (JR) wrote:
<<Yikes! I sure hope Jessica has more than a few poorly written books from
Deseret.....
Reminds me of the home teacher I had who presented a lesson on how "it
came
to pass" was of Mayan origin, as evidenced by a Mayan hieroglyph denoting
the passage of time. All this from some booklet put out by Deseret. >>
Jason, are you a Deseret bigot or just a publications snob? Superficially
the hieroglyph thing actually has a certain plausibility to it. Care to
expound?
Steve Lowther
Andrew Archer
Jason C. Scott <jcs...@pop3.concentric.net> wrote in article
<59tk4h$g...@herald.concentric.net>...
> Since the Book of Mormon contradicts the Doctrine and Covenants and the
Bible, you must have your
> hands full trying to figure out what the real gospel is.
>
>
Sorry Jason, if your religion is so grand, then why spend so much time
trying to tear down another. It seems rather sad. You can't make your
house look bigger by destroying those around you.
Andrew Archer
ROBF761
How sad that all the prophets of old are headed for hell...and to think
they are so much ahead of you...where does that leave you?! Good luck,
sorry you are so unhappy.
I. Wonder
In article <01bbf52c$8d469580$64489cce@aarcher005>, "Andrew Archer"
<aarch...@csra.net> wrote:
Trying to help others see the light is not tearing it down. Aclassic
mormon whine when their beleifs are confronted"you just anti-mormon". If
this is tearing your church down why do you send out missionaries? Do they
not tell people they are wrong if they don't believe little joe's stories?
JFFDEA
Would some of the mormon "scholars" and archeological experts please
postsome of the "evidence" for the book of mormon. After reading the
previous posts I called an archeology professor from the University at
Albany who specializes in South American culture and asked him about
evidence for the BOM. The short answer is that there is absolutely no
evidence, that any respected scholar accepts, for the existence of the
civilizations described in the BOM. In fact the evidence against the
Nephites and Lamanites living on this continent is overwhelming. North
and South American "Indians" predate the supposed arrival of the BOM
peoples in the Americas by several thousand years, and there is no mention
of any group coming from across the sea and setting up a large thriving
civilization, such as the one spoken about in the BOM. Professional
archeologists, who are often maligned on ARM, do not claim to have all of
the answers...ever. But, with all they have learned and are learning,
there is no evidence of Jews coming to this continent or any of the
islands around it and setting up a civilization...none... absolutely no
evidence. If you have any please post it. I believe that it will be hard
to put on lenses colored enough to change the Mayans or Aztecs or
Cherokees (etc. etc. etc.) into Nephites or Lamanites. This is not to
malign to CoJCoLDS, I find it to be at least as useful as many other
religions in the world today; however, the mormon claim that they are the
only true religion is insulting to billions of people. The reason that
mormons have to "prove" they are right, is that the claim to be the only
true religion is the lynch-pin of the faith. If there is another true
religion, then mormonism is false. Live and let live. Perhaps there is
more than one road to nirvana? Not if you believe in mormonism. Again,
if you have any real archeological proof--PLEASE POST IT, or e-mail me
with it. I will run it by the archeology dept. at SUNY Albany and see
what the verdict is. Faith is one thing, scientific proof is another.
JM
Arden Eby
srlo...@aol.com (SRLowther) wrote:
Besides, this "It came to pass stuff" does not come from a book
published by Deseret. It is from an "off-press" called SA
Publications.
Arden
***********************************************************************************
Arden Eby
Internet: ar...@teleport.com
Packet Radio: KI...@KA7AGH.OR.USA.NA
Homepage (Eby's Cyberscroll) http://www.teleport.com/~arden/
***********************************************************************************
Dan Lommel
I just want to observe concerning the request for archaeological proof of
the Book of Mormon that it is not likely to be found as long as most LDS
people want to find proof that fits their preconceived views of what
Nephite/Lamanite culture was like. Please recall that the Book of Mormon
makes no claims as to the size or etent of its culture (the idea that the
"land northward/land southward" bits refer to North/South America or areas
above and below the Isthmus of Tehuantapec are mere conjectures). We also
have no idea how extensive the culture described was or if other people
were around who simply weren't considered important enough to be mentioned
in the context of the book. The Book of Mormon is above all a sacred
history and includes very little cultural/political history all things
considered. If the lack of evidence to confirm one idea of what these
people *must* have been like is a problem then assume that maybe the
evidence doesn't fit that view but may fit something else.
Incidentally I want to add that the common Mormon belief that the Maya are
the people referred to in the Book of Mormon is something that serious
*LDS* scholars of the Mayan languages are very uncomfortable with.
Linguistically a Uto-Aztecan hypothesis is much more plausible but this
pushes the geography and archaeology off the board for what most people
accept.
My answer is that archaeoloical *proof* of the Book of Mormon is not going
to be found unless a stelae shows up with a map and inscriptions saying
this is Cumorah, etc. In any event this shouldn't bother you. There are
still places referred to in early European texts that can't be located and
the very existence of the Indo-Europeans can't be archaeologiacally
proved. Archaeology is not going to prove or disprove the existence of
Lamanites/Nephites. Ultimately linguistic evidence is what is needed and
we don't know enough to say what form that would take.
I also want to say that every time a new "proof" based on archaeology that
the Book of Mormon can't be true has been thrown out it has usually fallen
flat within a few years (e.g. the 'there was no warfare in the New World'
or 'there was no cement' arguments). In the end the amount that the
archaeoloists don't know is immense as is the amount that LDS Book of
Mormon scholars don't know.
Arle Lommel
Jason Roberts
In article <32c7e377....@news.teleport.com>, ar...@teleport.com
(Arden Eby) wrote:
> srlo...@aol.com (SRLowther) wrote:
> >Jason Robers (JR) wrote:
> ><<Yikes! I sure hope Jessica has more than a few poorly written books from
> > Deseret.....
> > Reminds me of the home teacher I had who presented a lesson on how "it
> >came
> > to pass" was of Mayan origin, as evidenced by a Mayan hieroglyph denoting
> > the passage of time. All this from some booklet put out by Deseret. >>
> >Jason, are you a Deseret bigot or just a publications snob? Superficially
> >the hieroglyph thing actually has a certain plausibility to it. Care to
> >expound?
> Besides, this "It came to pass stuff" does not come from a book
> published by Deseret. It is from an "off-press" called SA
> Publications.
The booklet my home teacher had was from Deseret. I asked him who it was
published by, and he handed it to me, and I looked at it myself. This was
all within the last few weeks. I have forgotten the title, but will ask my
HT to bring it to Church Sunday.
When I looked at the author's qualifications given in the book, it
included "in a stake presidency, Gospel Doctrine instuctor" and the like.
While I am no expert in Mayan Glyphs, I have done research in the area
enough to know that the claim is utter bunk. I am working on a more
thorough responce so srlowther explaining way. Stay tuned.
> Arden
--
--
Jason "wondering at the Mormon/Mayan fascination" Roberts
Currently reading: Statistics in Language Studies
-Woods, Fletcher, Hughes
Gene Humbert
Since he asks, I'll give him an answer. That doesn't mean he will
accept the answer, nor that he will listen.
At least I've tried, and I've not invaded HIS space to give it to him.
He's the one on the attack, after all.
Gene...
Gene Humbert
On 28 Dec 1996 01:49:07 GMT, "Jason C. Scott"
<jcs...@pop3.concentric.net> wrote:
>
>I cannot comprehend how:
>
>God can exist in a man's heart according to the Book of Mormon (Alma 34:36)and the Bible, and then
>he cannot exist in a man's heart (it's an old sectarian notion) according to D&C 130:3. I just
>cannot comprehend that. Can you explain that to me? Please, I want to know. Use your scriptures.
Alma 34:
36 And this I know, because the Lord hath said he dwelleth not in
unholy temples, but in the hearts of the righteous doth he dwell; yea,
and he has also said that the righteous shall sit down in his kingdom,
to go no more out; but their garments should be made white through the
blood of the Lamb.
John 14
23 Jesus answered and said unto him, If a man love me, he will keep
my words: and my Father will love him, and we will come unto him, and
make our abode with him.
D&C 130
3 John 14:23--The appearing of the Father and the Son, in that verse,
is a personal appearance; and the idea that the Father and the Son
dwell in a man's heart is an old sectarian notion, and is false.
I would have to agree with Joseph Smith, and the revelation given him
by God the Father.
The idea of Jesus Christ and Heavenly Father physically dwelling in
each man's heart IS a sectarian notion, and false. The scriptures are
not clear on this, as is evidenced by the fact that so many falsely
claim that the lord physically dwells in each heart. What they are
speaking of, IMHO, is the idea that if a man loves the Lord, he will
keep His image in his heart, and try to emulate him constantly.
>
>I cannot comprehend how:
>
>Death seals a man's fate (heaven, hell, etc) (Mosiah 2:36-39, Alma 34:32-35) and that baptism does
>no good for the dead without the law (Moroni 8:22-23) and yet baptism for the dead gives man a
>choice to change his fate after death (Joseph F. Smith vision, v.58). Can you change your fate
>after death or not? I cannot comprehend. Please explain that to me with your scriptures.
>
>
Since we believe that no man will make a choice after death that he
would not have made in mortality, your point is moot, if non-existant.
YOU cannot change your fate after death. God CAN decide your fate
based upon what you would have done had you been given sufficient
information. Again you misunderstand, whether intentionally or not,
what the LDS position is.
Now... are you going to admit your mistakes, or are you going to go
back into denial and bring this up again at a later date with some
other unsuspecting soul?
Gene...
mor...@mormons.org
In article <19961230201...@ladder01.news.aol.com>,
jff...@aol.com (JFFDEA) wrote:
>
> JM,
I suggest you search the internet for proof. I know of a number of sites
devoted to collecting evidence supporting the Book of Mormon. Our site
has links to several of them. When you say there is NO PROOF whatsoever,
that's a rather far reaching
statement.
It's also not an accurate description of the avalable evidence. Most
non-LDS scholars do not believe the evidence as a whole supports the Book
of Mormon. Why? If they did, they would convert, right? Therefore,
only LDS scholars believe the Book of Mormon is
true.
But most non-LDS scholars say that some of the evidence supports the Book
of Mormon. But in their opinion, the majority of the evidence taken as a
whole does not support the Book of
Mormon.
That's rather different saying there is no evidence whatsoever supporting
the Book of
Mormon.
Good Luck in your search!
John Walsh
All About Mormons
http://www.mormons.org
James E. Adams
> >you must have your
> >> hands full trying to figure out what the real gospel is.
> >
> >
> >The only contradiction exists in YOUR mind. Relax and let it go..
> >
> >Don't try to excite yourself... it's beyond your ability to comprehend.
> >
> >Gene...
>
>
> God can exist in a man's heart according to the Book of Mormon (Alma 34:36)and the Bible, and then
> he cannot exist in a man's heart (it's an old sectarian notion) according to D&C 130:3. I just
> cannot comprehend that. Can you explain that to me? Please, I want to know. Use your scriptures.
>
>
> Death seals a man's fate (heaven, hell, etc) (Mosiah 2:36-39, Alma 34:32-35) and that baptism does
> no good for the dead without the law (Moroni 8:22-23) and yet baptism for the dead gives man a
> choice to change his fate after death (Joseph F. Smith vision, v.58). Can you change your fate
> after death or not? I cannot comprehend. Please explain that to me with your scriptures.
Hello,
I believe that I can help you with your lack of understanding; however, I would also strongly suggest
that you rely on YOUR OWN research, rather than that done by anti-Mormon authors such as Farkas,
Decker, Tanner, Reed, MeKeever, Martin, Cares, et al (I've read their work and their words show
strongly in your posts).
There are no contradictions between LDS scriptures - unless you view/interpret them through the lens
of traditional Christianity. Would you be confident of critical inspection by a Budhist or Muslim or
Hindu of your own books of scripture? I doubt you would be very concerned with their interpretation.
In cases where there may appear to be unclear meaning, we Mormons (like traditional Christians) often
turn to commentaries (just as a Protestant would rely on the Matthew Henry Commentary of the Bible)
and other church works. However, often these are unnecessary as "... by the power of the Holy Ghost
we may know the truth of all things." (Moroni 10:5).
Alma 34:36 was clipped and misunderstood by your source. Mormons know that the Father and Son exist
in our hearts through the presence and mediation of the Holy Ghost. There is no contradiction.
In Mosiah, Chap. 2, King Benjamin is addressing HIS PEOPLE - not non-believers. Unlike certain
Evangelical Christians, Mormons do not hold to the "once saved always saved" falacy. And, it's true,
(as King Benjamin states in verses 36 - 39) that if our Brethren turn from the Spirit of the Lord in
Apostasy "...and repenteth not, and remaineth and dieth an enemy to God..." then the death OF THAT
BROTHER seals his fate. [BTW: if you read your Bible (depending on which canon and translation you
have chosen to use) you will see this absolutely confirmed in Hebrews 10: 26-31.] In Alma 34:32-35,
once again we see an Anti-Mormon examining LDS Scripture through the lens of traditional
Christianity. You see, we Mormons believe that those who have not heard the fulness of the gospel
will have that opportunity after death. However, we also understand that procrastination is the
thief of eternal life and if a person puts off repentance until later, he will learn that the power
to change becomes less and less with the passage of time (v.33) due to acquired habits. These
habits of our nature (sin vs. self-conttrol; the ability to believe vs. the inability to believe,
etc.) will not change easily after death because there is no way to work/labor/exercise toward new
ways of thinking and behaving. Therefore, THIS IS THE TIME to labor and improve ourselves (LDS and
non-LDS) and if we fail to prepare properly by not focusing on the things that matter most, we will
end up unprepared to come face to face with death after which no labor can be performed to improve
our natures. Once again, there is no contradiction.
Jason, it is only fair that you reveal your own denomination and/or belief system. To do less would
be dishonest. Then we can proceed to point out areas of your own scriptures and/or faith which will,
no doubt, hold far more contradictions and inconsistencies than those you PERCEIVE in the LDS Faith.
Peace on Earth and Good Will Toward All...
Jim Adams
Sean A. McKitrick
Again,
>if you have any real archeological proof--PLEASE POST IT, or e-mail me
>with it. I will run it by the archeology dept. at SUNY Albany and see
>what the verdict is. Faith is one thing, scientific proof is another.
>
>
>JM
Uh...what made SUNY Albany--especially the opinion of one
professor--the definitive answer on anything?
If you are an archeologist/social scientist you no very well that you
are relying on a sample size of one (n=1). You should also know that,
the higher up the echelons of archeology/anthropology you go, the
higher the degree of disagreement about the very issue you discuss
regarding civilizations in the western hemisphere prior to Columbus.
Previous discussions regarding bibilical archeology address this issue
quite well--the "facts" behind the lives of Abraham, Moses, Adam and
Eve, etc. are contradicted by much archeological evidence. Does this
"prove" the Bible wrong, too?
One problem with archeology is that, especially re: ancient
civilizations, there is very little replicable original data. This
means that we cannot go to the source of the information and find
answers that are difinitive. This also means that archeologists will
forever have to deal with the assertion that their field is in reality
unscientific--without claims to verifiable and identifiable data, the
results of any archeological study will always be placed in doubt.
Anyway, this is a matter of faith. As someone who busies himself with
social science (I am engrossed in my dissertation project now), I know
that some things can never be falsified or confirmed. Religion, the
"creation" aspect of evolution, and even ancient civilizations are
unscientific because the pursuit of truth cannot be dependent on a
reliable source of data--only interpretation. This is not a criticism,
for I also feel that the best thing we can do is espouse our own
positions and help others understand the way we do.
As far as religion is concerned, we should always do as we are
taught--study, ponder, pray and learn until we receive a perfect
knowledge. It may be "unscientific", but without this process we could
never obtain the faith that brings us closer to God.
Happy New Year!
Sean McKitrick
Sean A. McKitrick
>Trying to help others see the light is not tearing it down. Aclassic
>mormon whine when their beleifs are confronted"you just anti-mormon".
If
>this is tearing your church down why do you send out missionaries? Do
they
>not tell people they are wrong if they don't believe little joe's
stories?
This is a very insensitive and intolerant way of looking at
things...there is a BIG difference, since Mormon missionaries do not
make it a practice of mockingother people's beliefs (i,e--the "little
joe" comment).
You try to tear down our faith by using derogatory terms such as
this--of course, to you it is simple "sarcasm"...perhaps a look at the
bibilical references suggesting that you treat others with respect
would be a good start on the way toward understanding what I mean....
Sean McKitrick
Arden Eby
jason....@mail.admin.wisc.edu (Jason Roberts) wrote:
>The booklet my home teacher had was from Deseret. I asked him who it was
>published by, and he handed it to me, and I looked at it myself. This was
>all within the last few weeks. I have forgotten the title, but will ask my
>HT to bring it to Church Sunday.
Huh...I certainly haven't seen that one. It has been around for a
couple of years though via SA publishers.
>When I looked at the author's qualifications given in the book, it
>included "in a stake presidency, Gospel Doctrine instructor" and the like.
But it was originated by James Allen, Ph.D.
>While I am no expert in Mayan Glyphs, I have done research in the area
>enough to know that the claim is utter bunk.
Well neither am I really (I've read a dozen books or so and attended a
couple of conferences) but unless someone is lying it seems plausible
to me. We may be referring to different arguments though since I'm
not familiar with the source you've read.
Arden Eby
jff...@aol.com (JFFDEA) wrote:
>Would some of the mormon "scholars" and archeological experts please
>postsome of the "evidence" for the book of mormon. After reading the
>previous posts I called an archeology professor from the University at
>Albany who specializes in South American culture and asked him about
>evidence for the BOM. The short answer is that there is absolutely no
>evidence, that any respected scholar accepts, for the existence of the
>civilizations described in the BOM.
Here are some examples of bona fide Mormon scholars who accept the
Book of Mormon
Sorenson, John L. Ph.D. Mesoamerican Archaeology, UCLA
Griggs, C. Wilfred Near Eastern Archaeology, UC Berkley
Hugh Nibley, Ph.D. Ancient Studies, UC Berkley
Matheny, Ray T. Ph.D. Mesoamerican Archaeology, U of U
BTW, it's a little cruel to put Mormon "scholars" in quotes when they
are fully qualified and credentialed in the same way as the scholar
you contacted.
Especially see:
AUTHOR 1) Sorenson, John L.
TITLE An ancient American setting for the Book of Mormon / John L.
Sorenson ; foreword by Leonard J. Arrington, Truman G. Madsen, and
John W. Welch.
IMPRINT Salt Lake City, Utah : Deseret Book Co. ; Provo, Utah
: FARMS, c1985.
Additionally, you may visist the The F.A.R.M.S. Homepage. FARMS is
the Foundation for Ancient Research and Mormon Studies. at
http://kolmogorov.che.psu.edu:2222/farms/farms.html
Anyway here is the article on archaeology from the _Encyclopedia of
Mormonism_:
Archaeology
Archaeology is the study and interpretation of past human cultures
based on known material remains. Biblical and Mesoamerican
archaeological research is of special interest to Latter-day Saints.
Several types of indirect archaeological evidence, however, have been
used in support of the Book of Mormon. For example, John L. Sorenson
and M. Wells Jakeman tentatively identified the Olmec (2000-600 B.C.)
and Late Pre-Classic Maya (300 B.C.-A.D. 250) cultures in Central
America with the jaredite and nephite cultures, based on
correspondences between periods of cultural development in these areas
and the pattern of cultural change in the Book of Mormon.
Likewise, parallels between cultural traits of the ancient Near East
and Mesoamerica perhaps indicate transoceanic contacts between the two
regions. Among these are such minor secondary traits as horned incense
burners, models of house types, wheel-made pottery, cement, the true
arch, and the use of stone boxes. All of these may, however, represent
independent inventions. Stronger evidence for contacts may be found in
the tree of life motif, a common religious theme, on Stela 5 from
Izapa in Chiapas, Mexico. Jakeman, in 1959, studied Stela 5 in detail
and concluded that it represented the sons of a legendary ancestral
couple absorbing and perhaps recording their knowledge of a munificent
Tree of Life. This can be compared favorably to the account of Lehi's
vision in the Book of Mormon (1 Ne. 8).
The presence of a bearded white deity, Quetzalcoatl or Kukulcan, in
the pantheon of the Aztec, Toltec, and Maya has also been advanced as
indirect evidence of Christ's visit to the New World. The deity is
represented as a feathered serpent, and elements of his worship may
have similarities to those associated with Christ's Atonement.
Recent work by LDS professional archaeologists such as Ray Matheny at
El Mirador and by the New World Archaeological Foundation in Chiapas
has been directed toward an understanding of the factors that led to
the development of complex societies in Mesoamerica in general. Under
C. Wilfred Griggs, a team of Brigham Young University scholars has
sponsored excavations in Egypt, and other LDS archaeologists have been
involved in projects in Israel and Jordan.
Another area of archaeological investigation is in LDS history. Dale
Berge's excavations at Nauvoo; the Whitmer farm in New York; the early
Mormon settlement of Goshen (Utah); the Utah mining town of Mercur;
and, most recently, Camp Floyd, the headquarters of Johnston's army in
Utah, have provided information about the economic and social
interactions between early Mormon and non-Mormon communities.
Illustration: An Egytian gold-covered mummy, excavated in Egypt by
Brigham Young University archaeologists in 1988. Courtesy C. Wilfred
Griggs.
Bibliography
Griggs, C. Wilfred. Excavations at Seila, Egypt. Provo, Utah, 1988.
Jakeman, M. Wells. "The Main Challenge of the Book of Mormon to
Archaeology; and a Summary of Archaeological Research to Date Giving a
Preliminary Test of Book-of-Mormon Claims." In Progress in
Archaeology, An Anthology, ed. R. Christensen, pp. 99-103. Provo,
Utah, 1963.
Jakeman, M. Wells. "Stela 5, Izapa, as `The Lehi Tree-of-Life Stone."'
In The Tree of Life in Ancient America, ed. R. Christensen. Provo,
Utah, 1968.
Matheny, Ray T. "An Early Maya Metropolis Uncovered, Elmirador."
National Geographic 172, no. 3 (1987):316-39.
Smithsonian Institution. "Statement Regarding the Book of Mormon."
Department of Anthropology, National Museum of Natural History,
SIL-76, 1982.
Sorenson, John L. "An Evaluation of the Smithsonian Institution's
'Statement' Regarding the Book of Mormon" F.A.R.M.S. Paper. Provo,
Utah, 1982.
Sorenson, John L. An Ancient American Setting for the Book of Mormon.
Salt Lake City, 1985.
[End Encyclopedia article]
Here are a couple of random pieces of Mormon Archaeological commentary
(seriously, I just lifted the first couple of articles I saw from the
_Journals of Book of Mormon Studies_)
Maya Harvest Festivals and the Book of Mormon (Allen J. Christenson)
Annual F.A.R.M.S. Lecture
27 February 1991
Allen J. Christenson
Introduction
Throughout the history of the Maya, who dominated southern
Mesoamerica, the most important public festival of the year was timed
to coincide with the main corn harvest in mid-November. For the most
part, this also served as the New Year's day of the solar calendar,
when kingship was renewed. The celebration of this harvest festival
has remained remarkably consistent through the centuries due to the
extreme conservatism of the Maya people. As a result, study of the
festival over time reveals a great deal about the Maya view of the
importance of New Year's Day and perhaps hints at concepts which may
appear in Book of Mormon events, since most Book of Mormon scholars
believe that Nephite and Lamanite history took place in the general
area of Mesoamerica.1
The Harvest Festival and the San Martín Cult
Since the arrival of the Spanish conquerors in the early sixteenth
century, the Maya have progressively integrated components of European
Catholicism into their own indigenous world view. A notable example
of this religious syncretism is the observance of the harvest festival
of San Martín by the Tzutujil Maya Indians of Santiago Atitlán, a
small village in the Guatemalan highlands.
The harvest festival is observed on November 11, the traditional day
of the Catholic calendar dedicated to Saint Martin of Tours, a fourth
century Roman soldier who suffered imprisonment for becoming a
Christian. As a monk, and later as a bishop, Martin was believed to
have worked many miracles, including raising the dead.
In Santiago Atitlán, the day of San Martín on November 11 is
considered the most important ritual day of the year, even more
powerful than Easter or the festival of the village's patron saint.
San Martín is considered "King San Martín,"2 the ruler of the world,
more ancient than any other god or saint, and father to them all3.
Although the name of San Martín is venerated by the Indians on this
day, the festival bears little resemblance to traditional Christian
liturgy and is in fact merely a continuation of ancient Maya ritual.
The cult figure worshiped under the name San Martín is a red cloth
bundle measuring 24" x 12" which is normally kept in a wooden case to
the left of the altar in the shrine of the village's patron saint, San
Juan. Despite their importance, the most sacred elements of the San
Martín ritual are not performed as a public ceremony. Non-priests
know little about them, and for the most part they take place in the
dead of night behind closed doors.
On the evening prior to November 11, the San Martín bundle is removed
from its case and laid on an altar. The Dance of San Martín is then
conducted before it. Two young men wearing jaguar costumes repeatedly
paw the backs of two others wearing deer costumes, one of whom is the
chief priest of the San Martín cult. The priest wearing the deer
costume is finally "killed" by a jaguar and carried back to the altar
as a sacrificial offering.
At midnight, the doors and windows are shut and the chosen priest who
had been killed as a deer opens the San Martín bundle. It is believed
that only at midnight can the bundle be safely opened, otherwise winds
would rush out and devastate the world.4 From the bundle he first
removes a beige garment with a flamelike design on it. While he puts
on this garment, candles are distributed to those present. With the
garment on, the priest dances to the four corners of the room in a
crucifixionlike pose, with his knees flexed and his arms held out with
palms straight and facing inwards. One Indian specifically associated
this portion of the dance with the crucifixion of Jesus Christ.5 The
priest then returns the first garment, crosses himself to the four
directions, takes out a second garment, and the process is repeated.
A third garment is considered the most powerful and is never removed.6
Although not specifically mentioned, it may be assumed that the priest
represents the god rising from the dead, while dancing with the
garments of San Martín. The priest who opens the bundle holds great
power in Santiago Atitlán and is believed to hold the power to rise
from death. The deceased priests are often referred to as San Martíns
and are believed to maintain their power after death.7
Standing in opposition to San Martín's power over life and fertility
is another idol at Santiago Atitlán called the Mam ("ancient one"; cf.
fig. 1). This idol consists of a flat piece of wood with two legs and
a head attached to the main trunk. A carved wooden mask is tied
around the head to serve as its face, and a cigar is inserted in its
mouth. When seen in public, the idol is dressed with several layers
of fine clothes. For example, in 1936 this consisted of six shirts,
six pairs of pants, numerous sashes, twelve scarves, and two Stetson
hats, one worn on top of the other.8 There are rumors that the core
of the idol contains a smaller, very ancient image.9 Due to the
zealous guardianship of the idol by the Indians, however, this has
never been confirmed. The Mam represents death and the the
destructive power of the underworld.10 The jaguars, which
symbolically
Figure 1
"kill" the deer during the Dance of San Martín, do so under his
authority. His appearance always calls for normal business and
activity to cease. But since he is believed to usurp the place of the
village's political leaders as well, these cannot function when he is
placed on display.
On the day of the San Martín festival, the Mam is publicly brought out
to stand on the north end of the village square to oppose the renewal
of life and fertility by the saint. The placement of the shrine to
the north is significant. In the cycle of legends regarding the
creation of the Mam "at the beginning of time," the tree from which
the Mam idol was made was found on the "north edge of the village."11
To the Maya, the north is associated with death, cold winds, the color
black, and other expressions of the destructive elements of the
universe.
Following the symbolic "resurrection" from death of the priest of San
Martín, the Mam idol is taken away and dismantled to "render it
harmless."12 Although the mask is packed away right side up, the head
itself is turned backward so as to "leave him without power of
speech."13 In most other highland Maya areas the figure is torn apart
and scattered on the ground. I saw one particularly evil-looking Mam
on the outskirts of Sololá thrown onto the highway so that cars would
run over it.
The Harvest Festival and the Highland Maya prior to the Conquest
The festival of San Martín is apparently a continuation of ancient
harvest rituals observed by the highland Maya of Guatemala before the
arrival of the Spanish conquerors. At the time of the Conquest, the
Guatemalan Highlands were dominated by the Quiché-Maya. Their supreme
god was called Tojil, a god associated with the sun, life-giving rain,
and sacrifice.14 The Maya believed that gods periodically underwent
auto-sacrifice, offering themselves as a blood atonement so as to
preserve world order in times of crisis. At appropriate times, sacred
animals were ritually sacrificed and their skins were worn by priests
in imitation of the slain god. The token of the god Tojil was the
bloody skin of a deer, slain in his name.15 The sacred deer skin,
wrapped in a bundle and kept hidden in a wooden chest, was called "Our
Lord of the Stags" and was venerated as the symbol of power of the
Quiché royal family.16 Sacred bundles of the type worshiped by the
Quichés under the name of Tojil were well known by Mesoamerican
Indians prior to the Spanish Conquest and directly relate to the
bundle of San Martín at Santiago Atitlán.
The temple of Tojil stood at the symbolic center of the Quiché capital
of Utatlán, facing east toward the rising sun (cf. fig. 2). Ximénez
wrote that certain days were dedicated to the
Figure 2
festival of Tojil in which special sacrifices were offered in his
name.17 During this festival, people from throughout the region
gathered at Utatlán, living in temporary shelters near the temple.18
Sacred deer were sacrificed by priests mimicking jaguars, and their
blood was offered to the four cardinal directions and then finally to
the "heart of earth" at the center.19 As the representative of Tojil
on earth, the priest-king of the Quichés reenacted the symbolic death
and descent of the god into the underworld, where he was confronted by
the lords of death.20
The crisis of witnessing the ritual descent of their legitimate rulers
into the underworld must have been extremely frightening. It was
believed that death was then given permission to afflict mankind.21
Ximénez wrote that because of the ritual passage of these kings
through the underworld, the days of the festival were considered
"closed" days, when there were no legitimate rulers.22 In the days of
the Quiché king Quik'ab, a revolt was staged during the festival of
Tojil, in which the king's enemies tried to kill him during the dance
of the deer sacrifice, the point at which the king's supernatural
powers would be considered weakest.23
While the king was symbolically in the underworld, carved idols were
prepared in the image of underworld gods and ceremonially wrapped in
richly decorated mantles and covered with much gold. These images
were brought forward and honored as temporary kings, taking the place
of the legitimate leaders of the community. As such they were carried
through the streets to the accompaniment of music and were given
offerings.24 As usurpers of political authority, the images
represented the reversal of the customary order of society and
therefore functioned much as the Mam does in modern highland Maya
villages.
Ultimately, the priest-kings ceremonially returned from the underworld
in triumph, having defeated the lords of death. The idols of
underworld lords were taken away or destroyed, while the victorious
kings were confirmed in their reign as representatives of Tojil and
danced publicly before the people. A sign was given to the people to
assure them that the "great god was in his proper place."25 The
rulers were then carried through the streets as saviors of the world
and providers of new life.
According to the Título de Totonicapán, the Great Dance of Tojil took
place in the month of Tziquin K'ij, just prior to the harvest in
November.26 The Festival of Tojil also originally marked an ancient
New Year's celebration. The Totonicapán document says that the
conclusion of the Tojil festival represented the close of the 360-day
solar year, and that at that time "lordship" changed, as with the
symbolic renewal of rule or the actual accession of a new king.27
When worshipped as the sun, Tojil has been identified as the
manifestation of another Quiché Maya god, Jun Junajpu.28 The cycle of
legends surrounding Jun Junajpu is found in the Popol Vuh and
indicates that this god journeyed north along a black road toward the
underworld. There he was confronted by a wooden image of the death
god. After a number of trials, Jun Junajpu was eventually overcome
and sacrificed by the lords of the underworld. The head of Jun
Junajpu was then hung in a dead calabash tree, which miraculously bore
fruit resembling the head of Jun Junajpu.29 Eventually, the twin sons
of Jun Junajpu also journeyed to the underworld where they defeated
and sacrificed the lords of death, rescued the head of their father,
and raised it to the sky where it became the sun.30
The mythological components of this legend were applied in a very
practical way to the political life of the kings of highland
Guatemala. The ancient Quiché ruling dynasty traced their descent
from these gods, as did many other highland Maya groups.31 It is
known that deceased rulers were equated with Tojil and Jun Junajpu and
their bodies were revered in special sepulchres.32 Living rulers were
correspondingly identified with the sons of Jun Junajpu.
The Origin of the San Martín Cult following the Spanish Conquest
The question arises, how did the festival of Tojil become associated
with that of San Martín? The supremacy of the festival of San Martín
cannot be explained by Christian tradition alone, since its observance
was rather minor in sixteenth-century Spain. Its significance must
therefore be due either to some importance attached to the tradition
of the saint by early Maya converts to Christianity, or to coincidence
that the day of the saint's festival happened to fall on a day of
importance in the ancient Maya calendar. As will be seen, both of
these possibilities may be true in the case of the San Martín cult.
Bunzel wrote that San Martín was arbitrarily selected as the patron of
the earth's fertility by the first Christian missionaries, thereby
replacing the name of an earlier Maya god.33 I think it unlikely that
this association was arbitrary. It is known that the Festival of
Tojil, from which the San Martín cult derived, was celebrated in
mid-November, at the same time of year as the day of San Martín on
November 11. It was therefore easy for the priests at Santiago
Atitlán to continue to venerate the old god at the appropriate time of
year by transferring his festival to the day of a Christian saint.
The characteristics of San Martín also made this association logical
in the eyes of early Maya converts. With the Spanish Conquest, images
of native gods were forcibly replaced by those of Christian saints.
These adopted, in the eyes of the Indians, the powers and status of
the older Mayan deities. Thomas Gage, who visited Guatemala in the
1630s, wrote that the saints' images were worshiped like ancient
idols:
They yield unto [Roman Catholicism], especially to the worshipping of
saints' images, because they look upon them as much like unto their
forefathers' idols; and secondly, because they see some of them
painted with beasts . . . and think verily that those beasts were
their familiar spirits. . . . The churches are full of them. . . .
Upon such saints' days, the owner of the saint maketh a great feast in
the town.34
Over time the cult of the animals came to take precedence over the
saint himself. This may explain the curious identification of the god
Tojil and his deer-skin bundle with San Martín. San Martín was
universally depicted in Christian iconography riding a horse and
dividing his cloak to clothe a naked beggar. The Maya have
consistently confused horses with deer. When the Spaniards arrived,
they mistook the horses they rode as giant deer and therefore named
them quej, the same word for deer. Even today both animals bear the
same name in Maya languages.
Despite the imposition of Christianity on the populace, the Indians
felt that at least the form of their ancient traditions had to be
maintained so as to effect the regeneration of the earth. The
highland Maya quickly adapted the most important aspects of their
harvest festival of resurrection into a new Christian context, in this
case the cult of San Martín.
Jesus Christ as the supreme God of the conquering Spaniards soon was
equated with the ancient gods also. The early Quichés identified
Christ with both Tojil and Jun Junajpu.35 This process of religious
syncretism almost triggered a revolt in Guatemala:
It happened in this kingdom shortly after being conquered that, upon
hearing the [life] of Christ which the friars taught them, that there
arose a Mexican Indian, a pseudo-prophet. He taught them that Huhapu
(Junajpu) was God and that Hununapu (Jun Junajpu) was the son of God;
. . . For this cause, there was such a commotion among the Indians
that the work was nearly lost, for they came to imagine that our Holy
Gospel told them nothing new.36
Jesus Christ was undoubtedly equated with Jun Junajpu because both
were sacrificed by their enemies and hung in a cruciform tree before
rising from death. This association did not end with the defeat of
the Mexican pseudo-prophet. Because of its ancient association with
rain, and the resurrection of their god, the cross was adopted as the
symbol of the pre-Columbian tree of life.37 Early Christian
conquerors and missionaries habitually set up crosses in places of
pagan worship to symbolize the victory of the cross over heathenism.
Indians apparently attributed the virtues of the defeated gods to the
cross itself and gave offerings to it. This explains why modern Maya
Indians often paint crosses green or decorate them with foliage. It
should be remembered that the San Martín dance also is equated with
the crucifixion of Jesus Christ.
Among the Maya, the resurrection of Christ following his crucifixion
is often equated with the rising of the sun, similar to the apotheosis
of Jun Junajpu as the sun. At Santiago Atitlán, the cross and other
Christian images are returned to the church with the rising of the sun
on the day following the defeat of the Mam. Many refer to Christ as
"Our Father Sun,"38 or "Lord Sun."39 The church monstrances carried
during the procession at Santiago Atitlán bear the image of Christ on
a cross surrounded by a sunburst pattern.
To the Maya, this curious blending of seemingly disparate beliefs does
not seem unnatural. Periodic attempts by the Catholic clergy to
suppress pagan elements has been met with great resistance and even
violence. On at least two occasions, in 1914 and 1950, Catholic
priests conducting Easter Mass at Santiago Atitlán attempted to
destroy the Mam image. On both occasions, the priests were driven
forcibly out of the village.40 For the most part, village priests
today tend to wink at "irregularities" in Christian ceremonies as
practiced by the Indians, so long as they maintain their central
emphasis on Christ and the other Christian saints. This tolerance has
resulted in the survival of a surprisingly rich array of beliefs and
practices which can be traced to pre-Columbian antecedents.
The Harvest Festival and the Yucatec Maya
The most important chronicler of Yucatec Maya tradition was Father
Diego de Landa, a Franciscan who labored in Yucatán immediately after
the Conquest and was therefore an eyewitness to Indian rites which
were for the most part still untainted by Western influences. His
chief native informant was Nachi Cocom, whose bones he later had dug
up and cast into the fields on the suspicion that he had practiced
pagan rituals after he had been baptized a Christian.41
In an expanded description of the Uayeb, or New Year's rites, Landa
described the image of a demon which he called "the evil one" created
during the final "unlucky days" of the year. This idol was carried to
the house of the ruler of the village, where he usurps his political
authority. The same demon appears often in Yucatec sources as a
jaguar deity who is responsible for famine and the death of rulers.42
The Uayeb New Year's rites are known to have been celebrated in
Yucatán long before the Spanish Conquest, as demonstrated by the
surviving pre-Columbian Maya hieroglyphic codices (cf. fig. 3). Pages
34-37 of the Madrid Codex
Figure 3
illustrate the Uayeb New Year's rites. Centered within the lower
registers are cinerary urns set on the coils of serpents, representing
the idea that "the years are closed, or dead, and . . . the ashes of
the years rest within them."43 The prefix for the Uayeb glyph may
represent the idea of evil, and its presiding deity was the Mam.44 To
the left of the urn on page 21b is a jaguar, the representative of the
underworld lords and harbinger of human sacrifice.
Father Pío Pérez wrote that the Indians of Yucatán referred to the
festival at the end of the calendar year as the feast of the god Mam,
the same name used for the evil idol at Santiago Atitlán, and said
that the days of his reign carried danger of sudden deaths, plagues,
and other misfortunes.45 López de Cogolludo, who lived in Yucatán
during the Seventeenth Century, described the Mam which presided over
the Uayeb, or New Year's rites: "They had a wooden (idol) which they
. . . placed on a bench over a mat, and [he] was offered things to
eat, and other gifts in a festival called Uayeyab, and at the end of
the festival, they undressed him and threw the pieces on the ground
without giving him any more reverence."46
According to Landa's account, while the image of the evil demon sat at
the house of the village ruler, the image of the god of life was taken
down from its usual place and kept hidden from view. An arch of
leaves and branches was set up in connection with this ceremony,
associated with the tree of life, or Yaxche.47 Landa wrote that the
Indians believed that the Yaxche was a tree growing in the underworld
beneath which the dead rest. The lord of this underworld realm was
called "Hunhau," the lowland Maya form of the Quiché god Junajpu.48
The defeat and descent of Hun Ahau is connected with political
kingship, each ruler having descended from this god. According to
Kelley, Hun Ahau is in fact equivalent to the patron deity of the Maya
kings and a manifestation of the supreme lowland Maya god of life and
resurrection, the feathered serpent god Itzamna.49 This is confirmed
by the Yucatec Maya codices. On page 34b of the Madrid Codex, the
disembodied head of Itzamna as god of life rests among the leaves of a
tree growing from the central urn of New Year's day. The god of
death, seated on a sign for the 360-day year, reaches out to seize the
head while the god of sacrifice presides on the other side. The
implication is that during the Uayeb days the god of life is
sacrificed and his severed head is placed in a tree, just as in the
Jun Junajpu myth. The tree of life is also a prominent motif on page
33c of the Dresden Codex, which depicts Itzamna seated within its
trunk.
In the Chilam Balam of Maní, the standard of Itzamna was the tree of
life in the form of a cross:
The Itza (people of Yucatan) will see . . . the sign of the one God,
the erect tree which will be shown so that the world will be
enlightened. Lords, console yourselves, discord and confusion will be
finished, when the bearer of the cross comes to us. In the future,
priests everywhere will be enlightened. Mighty Itzamna, your master
will come . . . to arrange the day of resurrection.50
The cross as a symbol of the tree of life is a major component of the
name glyph of Itzamna himself. In the glyphs placed within the
horizontal strip of each of the pages dealing with the Uayeb rite in
the Madrid Codex, the cross glyph is prominently displayed,
representing wind, breath, and life itself.51
Landa concludes his description of the New Year's rites saying that
"once the ceremonies were ended and the evil spirit was chased away,
according to their mistaken views, they considered the year as a good
one."52
The Uayeb New Year's Festival is connected with the month of Xul,
which fell in the latter part of October and continued through much of
November, when the principal harvest season was observed.53 Xul
carried the meaning of "end" in Yucatec Maya, further hinting at an
original designation as the end of the calendar year. Xul is also
used to represent the sun in the underworld. Deer sacrifices were
observed at that time, the deer representing the death of the sun.54
The following month is Yaxkin, meaning "new sun," or "new day," as at
dawn when the sun reemerges from the underworld.55
Classic Maya Architectural Evidences of a November Festival
In tracing the festival of regeneration into the Maya Classic period,
from A.D. 300-900, it must be recognized that no codices or eyewitness
descriptions of religious ceremonies exist from that period.
Nevertheless, the iconography of Classic Maya architecture indicates
that virtually the same pantheon of gods was worshiped as at the time
of the Spanish Conquest. In the final days of the year, ritual
conflict between the lords of the underworld and the king, as
representative of the god of life and resurrection, was the
predominant motif in the art and architecture of Palenque.
The impressive Temple of Inscriptions at Palenque was built as a
funerary monument for Lord Pacal, the ruler of the site from A.D.
615-684.56 The elaborately carved lid of the king's sarcophagus
depicts the deceased lord lying atop the sun at the critical moment
when both sink into the open jaws of the underworld. From the body of
Pacal grows a huge cross-shaped tree decorated with foliage, and
draped with the body of the two-headed feathered serpent god, Itzamna.
His role as a god of resurrection, associated with the underworld tree
of life, has already been mentioned. Pacal's association with this
god indicates that the ruler is recapitulating his descent into the
underworld to be confronted by the lords of death and sacrifice. The
stucco images of these evil lords decorate the walls of the tomb
chamber.
A complex of three temples on the southeastern periphery of the site
continues this ritual passage of Pacal through the underworld as the
personification of Itzamna. On the western side of the complex is the
Temple of the Sun, dedicated to the lord of the underworld,57 and the
setting of the sun. The carved panel within the shrine commemorates
the underworld's jaguar patron, as well as sacrifice, warfare, and
death. The dead and rigid body of Itzamna rests beneath the night
sun, held by lords of the underworld.
The largest of the three temples is the Temple of the Cross, located
on the northern edge of the complex. This temple is dedicated to the
passage of the sun beneath the earth, with the resultant death of the
world and loss of fertility.58 The Temple of the Cross was
constructed in such a way that only during the months of November to
January does the light of the setting sun strike its interior and
illuminate the carved panel within (cf. fig. 4). On the left or
western side of the panel, Pacal is depicted holding the head of the
sun before him. On the right, or eastern side, stands Pacal's son and
successor, Chan Bahlum. Between them is the partly skeletized head of
the setting sun. A large barren cross-shaped tree grows from this
head, and is draped with the partially skeletized body of Itzamna,
symbolic of the god hanging on the underworld tree of life.
The piers flanking the entrance to the shrine are also intricately
carved. The right pier depicts the principal lord of the underworld
as an aged, toothless deity wearing a jaguar pelt cape and a belt
buckle shaped into a mat symbol, indicating his authority and
lordship.59 The iconography of this figure is remarkably similar to
the Mam image at Santiago Atitlán, with whom he is identified. His
headdress is heavily laden with tobacco leaves and he is smoking a
very large cigar.60 It is significant that his image appears most
prominently in this temple, as it occupies the north end of the
complex, the symbolic location of the entrance into the underworld.
Figure 4
To the east, the direction of rebirth and the rising sun, is the
Temple of the Foliated Cross. This temple is dedicated to the
manifestation of Itzamna as patron of the various ruling Maya
dynasties.61 The inscribed birth date of this god at the beginning of
time is Hun Ahau, which also appears as a name for the god in Maya
texts.62 The shrine of this temple commemorates the rebirth of the
sun and maize from the underworld. It also recognizes the renewal of
earthly rule among the living in the guise of Pacal's son, Chan
Bahlum. The central panel of the shrine is again dominated by a
cross-shaped tree, however it is now laden with disembodied heads
nestled in corn leaf clusters with life signs emanating from their
mouths. The rejuvenated sun appears above it. The tree itself is
heavy with abundant foliage. The head of Itzamna, from which the tree
grows, now is surrounded by corn elements and bears a prominent Kan
cross on his forehead, the glyphic symbol of rain and new life.63 The
Kan cross is interchangeable with the glyph Yax, indicating completion
or newness.64 It also signifies the end of one temporal cycle and the
beginning of a new one.65 The celebration of the renewal of kingship
at Palenque therefore must have taken place at New Year's. Cohodas
believes that the shrine served as the center of a harvest festival
about the time of the autumnal equinox.66
The November Festival and Classic Maya Ceramics
The conflict between underworld lords and the god of life is a common
motif on Maya funerary vessels buried with important personages,
particularly kings. Inscriptions found on these ceramics are believed
to have been taken from a long hymn which was sung over the bodies of
dead or dying lords, describing the descent of the sons of Jun Junajpu
into the underworld.67 This hymn was meant to prepare the dead for
his passage into the underworld where he, like the sons of Jun Junajpu
before him, might overcome death and rise again.
A very early depiction of this conflict may be seen on the Early
Classic "Box of God K and L Smoking" from the northern Peten (cf. fig.
5).68 The left-hand panel on the front of this box depicts the god of
life holding a cross-shaped glyph with foliage growing from it. This
god is being threatened by the lord of the underworld in the
right-hand panel. The iconography of this god is remarkably similar
to that seen at Palenque. He is depicted as an aged, hump-backed man
smoking a large cigar.
Figure 5
The Mayan vessel known as Grolier 49 also depicts the underworld god
on a jaguar throne, wearing a jaguar cloak, and smoking a large
cigar.69
The vessel known as the "Carved Vase Chocola Style and God L Seated"70
depicts a seated underworld god, smoking his cigar and holding in his
right hand the severed head of the life god, who has apparently been
recently sacrificed.
The finest series of ceramic vessels are those painted in "Codex
Style." It is believed that these were decorated by the same priests
or scribes who painted the hieroglyphic codices, none of which has
survived from the Classic period. All of these Codex Style vessels
come from Calakmul in southern Campeche, or sites which were under its
control.71 Calakmul was located furthest north of the important
Classic Maya sites, occupying the traditional location of the entrance
to the underworld. Its ceramic art therefore placed particular
emphasis on underworld themes and the power of its lords.
Perhaps the finest of the vases produced at Calakmul is Grolier 42.72
It depicts the lord of the underworld seated on his jaguar throne.
Three of the women surrounding him are preparing his wine, probably
the powerfully intoxicating balche drink. Facing the jaguar throne, a
bound god identified as Jun Junajpu is being beheaded.73
A "World Tree," or tree of life, grows from the decapitated head of
the serpentine life god in Princeton 16,74 a motif remarkably similar
to the depictions of Itzamna on the cross panels at Palenque. The
head bears the glyph representing the sun. He also wears the
quadripartite headdress indicative of Maya royalty. A serpent winds
down the branches of the tree in a manner reminiscent of the
directional trees in the Dresden Codex which are associated with the
New Year's rites. A jaguar deity, apparently the sacrificer, is seen
above and to the right of the tree, with the severed head of the life
god on his back.
The Vase of the Falling Lord75 depicts the skeletal god of death
leading a procession through the underworld carrying a decapitated
human head with serpentine features in his right hand. A jaguar
follows the death god, presumably the sacrificer. Behind the jaguar
is a composite serpent with deer antlers and a head emanating from its
mouth and tail, identifiable as Itzamna.76 The glyphic sequence
concludes with the Xul Emblem Glyph.77 The presence of the Xul glyph
may indicate that the scene takes place in the month of Xul,
corresponding to the month of November and the end of the calendar
year.78
Princeton 3 depicts a similar scene with a jaguar of sacrifice
grasping the head of Itzamna which has a deer antler growing from
it.79 Itzamna is often depicted with both deer and serpentine
features.
As in the Popol Vuh, the defeat and decapitation of the life god at
the hands of the lords of the underworld does not go unavenged. Maya
ceramic vessels frequently depict the descent of the two youthful sons
of Jun Junajpu into the underworld, where their father's head is hung
within a tree, and where they ultimately defeat the lords of death.80
Grolier 20, a polychrome vase from the Guatemalan highlands, depicts
these youthful gods along with two underworld gods around a tree which
grows from a disembodied head.81
The victory of the sons of Jun Junajpu over the underworld lords is
dramatically represented on Princeton 10. On this vessel, one of the
young gods drags God N from his underworld shell while hiding a knife
behind his back ready to sacrifice him.82
The November Festival and Izapan Art
Izapa is an important site situated near the Guatemalan border in the
extreme southwestern corner of Mexico in the modern state of Chiapas.
Its main period of occupation took place prior to the birth of Christ,
in the Late Preclassic period. Despite its early date, its artistic
iconography displays a number of elements common to the harvest
festivals described in later periods and which seem to have dominated
a widespread area of southern Mesoamerica. Fagan writes concerning
the period:
We believe that the spread of [Izapan Art] at the beginning of the
Late Preclassic period in approximately 500-300 B.C. signals the
period during which a common religious system and ideology began to
unify large areas of Mesoamerica. A powerful priesthood congregated
in spectacular ceremonial centers, commemorating potent and widely
recognized deities.83
The arrangement of Izapan carved monuments follows a pattern
reminiscent of the ancient Mesoamerican ritual calendar, with each
stela aligned with topographic features, horizon-line solstice,
equinox, and other celestial markers.84 The site apparently served as
a complex ritual center for the observance of various calendric and
agricultural cycles. Lowe believes that the main focus of these
rituals was related to the timing of planting and harvesting.85
Altar 60, located on the northern margin of Group A at Izapa, is
believed to represent the critical endpoint of the calendric cycle.86
The altar depicts a deity with a jaguar mask who may be identified
with the malignant god of the underworld.87
Stela 25 stands in association with this altar (cf. fig. 6). It
depicts a sacrificed reptilian beast from whose body grows a tree of
life. The body of a double-headed serpent winds around the sacrificed
beast as well as a stylized cross held aloft by a human figure
standing on the right. The presence of a conch in close approximation
with both figures indicates that the scene takes place in the
underworld. The double-headed serpent, as well as
Figure 6
the common motif of a tree sprouting from the body of a sacrificed
reptilian beast, identifies the subject of this stela as the life god
Itzamna,88 or Jun Junajpu,89 both gods of life and resurrection.
Similar depictions of a tree of life sprouting from the head of the
god of resurrection are also seen in Izapa Stelae 5, 10, and 27. The
trunk of the tree of life depicted on Stela 27 is marked by a
prominent Kan cross enclosing the figure of a life deity.90 The tree
itself has four branches, another cross motif.
In the case of Stela 2, this tree is identifiable as a calabash tree91
and is flanked by two figures floating above the ground. Both Norman
and Lowe associate this scene with the calabash tree of Jun Junajpu in
Xibalba, the two raised figures being the "sons" of the tree.92
A large fruit-laden tree of life is the dominant element of Stela 5,
the richest of the Izapan monuments in iconographic detail. Lowe
believes that this stela was oriented to commemorate the first day of
the agricultural or solar year.93 Itzamna as a double-headed earth
serpent frames the tree, one head dominating each side of the
monument. Beneath this head is a seated figure with a royal parasol
held over his head by an attendant, indicating his status as a king,
who rules in the name of the life god.94 In front of this figure is a
book or table in the shape of an Ik profile, the cross-shaped life
symbol of Itzamna.95 Preclassic Izapa was a well-developed chiefdom
and regional center.96 As such, much of the ritual iconography of its
art served as a basis not only for agricultural ceremonies but also as
a renewal of kingship by the earthly representatives of the gods. A
royal personage may be seen on Stela 4, wearing a headdress bearing
the image of Itzamna on his belt.
The defeat and sacrifice of the underworld lord may be seen in Stela
12, in which a sacrificed jaguar is suspended from the heads of the
two-headed serpent god. The sons of Jun Junajpu may be seen below the
sacrifice tending a fire.
Book of Mormon Evidences of a November Festival
It has been shown that throughout the history of the Maya, the most
important festival of the calendar year consistently took place in
mid-November when the sacrifice and resurrection of their life god was
ceremonially reenacted. This festival was apparently tied to the main
harvest period as well as New Year's Day and its attendant renewal of
kingship power. The question remains, would this season of the year
have held any significance for Book of Mormon peoples? The Nephites
(Alma 30:3) and many Lamanites (Alma 25:15) kept the law of Moses and
were therefore familiar with its required festivals. It is
significant in this regard that the Israelite harvest festival, or
Feast of Ingathering, is among the most important festivals** of the
Israelite calendar year. All Israel was enjoined to gather at
Jerusalem for its celebration. Zechariah said that it would be during
this festival that the Messiah would come and be declared king
(Zechariah 14:16). This Israelite festival complex (which also
included Rosh ha-Shanah and Yom Kippur) traditionally served as the
time when sacrifices were made in similitude of the atoning sacrifice
of God, when the New Year was celebrated, and when kings officially
took office.
The period from 300-50 B.C., when the Izapan Art style reached its
peak of influence, was an exceptionally important one among Book of
Mormon cultures. It was precisely at this time, around 200 B.C., that
a large group of Nephites under Mosiah became united with the
Mulekites at Zarahemla, thus introducing Nephite religious concepts to
a new area. It is reasonable that Lehi and his family would continue
to observe the Festival of Ingathering and would time it with the
period of the harvest.
The key elements of the Festival of Ingathering appear in the account
of King Benjamin's address to the combined population of his realm
gathered at Zarahemla about 124 B.C. (cf. fig. 7).97 The premise of
Benjamin's call to the people to assemble was the transfer of kingship
to his son, the second Mosiah. Anciently, the inauguration of a new
king was the central focus of the New Year's rite, and this appears to
have been true in this case. The timing of such an act was critically
important. Notice that Benjamin had his son assemble the people on a
specific day (Mosiah 1:10, 18; 2:9, 28). As John Welch has pointed
out, he was not on his deathbed-this
Figure 7
King Benjamin's Farewell Address, by Minerva Teichert
Courtesy of Museum of Fine Arts, Brigham Young University
©All rights reserved
gathering having preceded his death by three years-and therefore he
must have chosen that day for its ritual importance.98
Benjamin's address closely parallels the ancient Mesoamerican pattern
of harvest festivals in which the life god, or his earthly
representative, descends into the underworld and is overcome by evil
powers of death and sacrifice. Benjamin begins by declaring to the
people that he intends to unfold "the mysteries of God . . . to
[their] view" (Mosiah 2:9). He announces his imminent death and
"descent" into the grave (Mosiah 2:26-30). In his absence, he warns
the people to beware of the "evil spirit," "the enemy of all
righteousness," the "enemy to God" who brings destruction upon mankind
(Mosiah 2:32-33, 37-38). It is precisely the descent of the king into
the underworld in the Mesoamerican festival at the end of the calendar
year which permits the forces of death and evil to reign upon the
earth. Although this is usually only a temporary ritual death on the
part of the king, the prospect of his actual death was cause for great
concern.
Benjamin's announcement of his own impending death and the coming of
the "evil spirit" must have had a similar effect on his people. It is
at this point that Benjamin shifts the focus from himself as a mortal
king to the God of Life, whom he calls their "heavenly king" (Mosiah
2:19). He prophesies that this God would soon "come down from heaven"
to experience the trials of temptations, pain, hunger, thirst, fatigue
and the shedding of blood for their sakes (Mosiah 3:5-7). At the
culmination of these trials, the God of Life was then to die and be
crucified (Mosiah 3:9).
The death of the god of life and his placement on a cross, or
cross-shaped tree of life, were powerful motifs within Mesoamerican
society. The association of the cross with the tree of life was
explicit in the Book of Mormon. Both Lehi and Nephi, the founders of
the Nephite royal dynasty, were shown a vision of the tree of life.
When Nephi asked the meaning of this tree, he was told that it
represented the love of God (1 Nephi 11:25). The attendant vision
given to Nephi to explain the tree of life motif was a prophecy of the
"condescension of God," whereby the sacrificial "Lamb of God"
descended from heaven to be slain on a cross for the sins of the world
(1 Nephi 11:26-34). Immediately after his death, Nephi beheld the
combined forces of evil brought together to fight against the people
of God (1 Nephi 11:34-36).
As in Mesoamerican theology, the death of Jesus Christ as the god of
life was associated elsewhere in Book of Mormon prophecy with the sun.
Samuel the Lamanite foretold that the birth of Christ would be
accompanied by three days of light, as if the sun had not set (Helaman
14:3-4; 3 Nephi 1:15, 19). Samuel then went on to confirm the
prophecy of Zenos and Nephi that the crucifixion of Christ would be
accompanied by the darkening of the sun (1 Nephi 19:10-11), which
would "refuse to give his light" (Helaman 14:20). Great death and
destruction occurred as a result (Helaman 14:20-27; 3 Nephi 8:3,
19-23).
Benjamin continued his prophecy by declaring that the death of Jesus
Christ was only temporary and that he would rise again after three
days (Mosiah 3:10) to bring salvation to his people. The evil spirit
would thus be expelled. Benjamin stressed that during his life Jesus
Christ would have great power to "cast out devils, or the evil spirits
which dwell in the hearts of the children of men" (Mosiah 3:6) and
that his atoning blood was the only means of salvation (Mosiah 3:27).
King Benjamin seems particularly to stress God's power over life
(Mosiah 2:20-23; 4:6, 22; 5:15). It is interesting that Benjamin
should stress that it is Jesus Christ who gives them "breath" (Mosiah
2:20-21). It has been seen that the cross-shaped glyph, meaning
breath or wind, was prominently associated with both the tree of life
as well as its patron deity Itzamna.
The prophet Nephi, who seems to have set the pattern for many of the
religious motifs in the Book of Mormon, identified Christ with the
serpent raised upon a staff by Moses (2 Nephi 25:20). This is similar
to the recurrent Mesoamerican symbol of the serpentine god Itzamna
lifted up into the branches of a cross-shaped tree of life. The
persistence of this symbol may be seen in a prophecy given 600 years
later by Nephi, the son of Helaman. It was delivered from a tower to
a large multitude of people at Zarahemla. In this prophecy, Jesus
Christ is again compared to a serpent who will be "lifted up." He
further declares that "as many as should look upon that serpent should
live, . . . even unto that life which is eternal" (Helaman 8:15). The
recurrence of this theme before large congregations of people may
imply a formal ritual or reference to such.
There is evidence that the Lamanites also recognized the importance of
the New Year in the renewal of kingship. To the Lamanites, the
Nephites in the land to the north would have been considered evil
adversaries, ripe for destruction. Divinely sanctioned wars were a
prominent part of Mayan theology and were often tied to astronomical
events or appropriate dates on the ancient calendar.99
In this paper it has been shown that as part of their New Year's
rites, ancient Maya kings engaged in ritual combat with evil lords who
resided in the north. Their legitimacy and the continued survival of
their kingdoms depended on the successful defeat of these powerful
adversaries. It is therefore no accident that the Lamanite king
Amalickiah chose New Year's to engage the Nephites in battle (Alma
51:32-52:1). The Nephite general Teancum took advantage of the
situation by slaying Amalickiah on New Year's Eve, precisely when the
underworld lords would have been believed to be their strongest. When
the Lamanites awoke the following morning, expecting a divinely
sanctioned victory, they found instead their king and protector dead.
It is no wonder, then, that they fled in terror.100
Ammoron, the brother of Amalickiah, was chosen to succeed as king of
the Lamanites. Undoubtedly the new king was determined to assert his
legitimacy and therefore again chose the end of the calendar year to
confront the Nephites in the north. Teancum in response again
successfully slew the Lamanite king in his sleep. The demoralized
Lamanites were thus slaughtered the following day and driven from the
land (Alma 62:36-39).
The rivalry between the underworld lords of death and sacrifice, and
the god of life, has been traced continuously in time to at least the
Late Preclassic period, well into Book of Mormon times. This
comprises an important, if not the dominant, theme of contemporary
Maya rituals, early Maya literature and codices, the Yucatec New
Year's rites, Classic Maya architectural and ceramic art, and Izapan
monumental stelae. The conflict was dramatized in New Year's
festivals, held in November, whose aim was to celebrate the sacrifice
and resurrection of life deities, as well as to legitimize**legitimate
the earthly authority of Maya rulers.
At a recent seminar on warfare in the Book of Mormon, John Sorenson
concluded that military campaigns between the Nephites and Lamanites
in the first century B.C. were conducted on a consistent basis in the
months immediately preceding and following their New Year's day.101
He further concluded from an exhaustive review of the sources that
these campaigns were fought soon after an important annual harvest
when provisions would be most plentiful and the people would be less
involved with agricultural labors. If the Nephites were subject to
the same environment as the native people of Mesoamerica, the Book of
Mormon New Year's Day, like that of the Maya, must fall at or slightly
after the primary maize harvest in November or December. I therefore
propose that the harvest season corresponding to our month of
November, so important throughout Mesoamerican history as a New Year
marker, also served as such in the Book of Mormon.
According to most scholars, Book of Mormon history took place during
the Preclassic period of southern Mesoamerica, a time of widespread
cultural interaction throughout the area generally believed to have
been the Nephite/Lamanite center of power. Numerous passages in the
Book of Mormon point to concepts which would have been familiar to the
inhabitants of contemporary Mesoamerica, such as the tree of life, the
placement of the life god on a cross, or cross-shaped tree, the
association of the death and resurrection of the life god with the
movements of the sun, and the renewal of kingship as part of a harvest
season New Year's ceremony.
That Nephite and Mesoamerican rulers were familiar with shared
religious symbols broadens our understanding of New World scriptural
concepts of kingship and resurrection. Many of these motifs, indeed,
may have originated in the teachings of Nephite and Lamanite prophets
who centered their teachings on Christ as the only true God of life
and resurrection. In this light it is appropriate that the ancient
Maya of Santiago Atitlán readily adopted Christ as their life God,
whose history had long been familiar to their ancient predecessors.
[End]
Moses' Brazen Serpent as It Relates to Serpent Worship in Mesoamerica
Wallace E. Hunt, Jr.
121
Abstract: This paper shows that the account of Moses' brazen serpent
as taught by the Nephite leaders presents parallels to the symbol and
name of the Mesoamerican god, "Quetzalcoatl." It further shows that
the term flying, used in the Nephite but not in the biblical account
of the fiery serpent, has parallels in the Old and New Worlds.
Archaeologists and scholars agree there are countless documented
instances of serpent worship in varying forms throughout human
history. Yet, despite the innumerable varieties of serpent worship,
only in Mesoamerica do we find a preponderance of "feathered" serpent
worship. Carrasco emphatically states that "there is no doubt that
serpent symbolism and more specifically feathered serpent symbolism is
spread throughout the architecture of ceremonial centers in
Mesoamerica."1 The God who was represented by statues and pictorial
representations of feathered serpents was known as "Quetzalcoatl."
Although the ancient peoples of Mesoamerica worshiped many different
gods, the beauty of an indigenous bird so captured their interest that
they not only borrowed its name, but used its form as well to
represent their principal and most revered God, called "Quetzalcoatl"
by the Toltecs and Aztecs, and "Kukulcan" and "Gucumatz" by the Maya.2
Native to the highlands of Chiapas, Mexico, and Guatemala, the quetzal
is a strikingly beautiful creature with a three-foot long iridescent
green tail, crimson breast, and a myriad of other bright colors on its
coat.3
Although Quetzalcoatl's origin is clouded in obscurity, the legends,
the few pre-Columbian writings extant today, and the early
post-Conquest writings contain an abundance of material on this
ancient and revered god. These accounts are contradictory and vary
widely both on the god's attributes and the details of how he was
worshiped,4 undoubtedly due to a millennium of digressions from the
original concept from the end of the Book of Mormon to the time of the
Conquest. However, through all this maze, we find that the
Mesoamericans consistently endow Quetzalcoatl with many Christlike
attributes, some of which are listed below:
--Quetzalcoatl was the creator of life.5
--Quetzalcoatl taught virtue.6
--Quetzalcoatl was the greatest Lord of all.7
--Quetzalcoatl had a "long beard and the features of a white man."8
--The Mesoamericans believed Quetzalcoatl would return.9
Although at first glance the meaning of the name "Quetzalcoatl" might
strike one as a far cry from the concept of the Christian deity, it is
quite possible that this depiction could have originated from an
experience of the Israelite nation on their journey from Egypt as
related in both the Old Testament and the brass plates of Laban. After
traveling for approximately thirty-eight years in the desert, the
Israelites received the last miracle of their exodus, one that carried
with it a most important lesson and symbol. As before, the people
rebelled and complained.
And the people spake against God, and against Moses, Wherefore have ye
brought us up out of Egypt to die in the wilderness? for there is no
bread, neither is there any water; and our soul loatheth this light
bread.
And the Lord sent fiery serpents among the people, and they bit the
people; and much people of Israel died.
Therefore the people came to Moses, and said, We have sinned, for we
have spoken against the Lord, and against thee; pray unto the Lord,
that he take away the serpents from us. And Moses prayed for the
people.
And the Lord said unto Moses, Make thee a fiery serpent, and set it
upon a pole: and it shall come to pass, that everyone that is bitten,
when he looketh upon it, shall live.
And Moses made a serpent of brass, and put it upon a pole, and it came
to pass, that if a serpent had bitten any man, when he beheld the
serpent of brass, he lived. (Numbers 21: 5-9; emphasis added)
But why did God use the word fiery in his command, "Make thee a fiery
serpent?" Although most Bible scholars concede that the serpents in
this area were very colorful, even of a "glowing fiery red color,"10
there is some disagreement among them as to whether the original
Hebrew word for "fiery" referred to the snake's color or its venomous
bite. This paper suggests that it referred to both attributes.
Although it would be presumptuous to speculate on the Lord's actual
reason for using the word fiery, we can assume he wanted the serpent
to be bold, bright, and colorful in order to draw attention to this
powerful symbol. Although the Lord did not specify which material to
use, Moses constructed the serpent of brass. Even though it would have
been easier and faster to use cloth or wood, brass may have seemed the
best choice for portraying a "fiery" aspect.11 One can imagine the
dramatic impact the gleaming brass serpent had on the suffering
Israelites as Moses carried it aloft, high above his head, the serpent
flashing a myriad of piercing fiery colors when the sun shone upon its
numerous angles and crevices. Such a spectacle would surely serve to
remind the people of the fiery intensity of their snake bites while
simultaneously displaying God's omnipotence, since, as they looked
upon it, they were healed.
Interestingly, the brazen serpent was kept by the Israelites for some
500 years, during which time the sacred symbol was devalued into "an
object of popular worship in Judah,"12 until Hezekiah, a righteous
King, "brake in pieces the brazen serpent that Moses had made: for
unto those days the children of Israel did burn incense to it" (2
Kings 18:4). Even though the Israelites were the Lord's chosen people,
they, having lost sight of its meaning and spiritual symbolism, had
degenerated into worshiping the serpent as an idol.
Actually, the five verses above from the book of Numbers comprise only
a very brief summary of this important event, which eventually led to
this idolatrous serpent worship. The passages contain surprisingly
little detail and absolutely no indication of its true significance. A
glimpse of its importance is revealed in the third chapter of John,
when Jesus tells Nicodemus:
And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the
Son of man be lifted up: That whosoever believeth in him should not
perish, but have eternal life. (John 3: 14-15)
Paul also refers briefly to the incident: "Neither let us tempt
Christ, as some of them also tempted, and were destroyed of serpents"
(1 Corinthians 10:9).
Because there are so few references in the Bible, to fully understand
the Lord's lesson, we must turn to the Book of Mormon and the people
of Mesoamerica. The written records of the Nephites, which were
essential in maintaining their adherence to the Lord's commandments,
consisted of the brass plates of Laban (specified as scripture) as
well as their own written histories, some of which were also
considered scripture (Alma 18:38). The importance of these written
records became apparent when the Mulekites merged with the Nephites.
The Mulekites had no written records, their language had become
corrupt, and they had even denied their God. The Mulekites "did
rejoice exceed ingly" (Omni 1:14) because the Nephites had the brass
plates. Though the Mulekites apparently outnumbered the Nephites,13
the Nephite king became the leader when the groups merged, for the
Nephites, because of their reliance on records and record keeping,
were strongly united and stable (Omni 1:14-19). In fact, there appears
to be a fascination with historical records throughout the entire
history of the Nephites. The best example of this is when King Limhi's
people and the followers of Alma returned to Zarahemla and were
reunited with the main Nephite group. Their first act, filled with
emotion, was the reading of each group's records (Mosiah 25:5-9).
With this love for their ancestors and their writings, one can easily
understand that in calling the Nephites to repentance, their leaders
would often urge them to remember what the Lord had done for their
fathers.14 In the Book of Mormon, the various writers refer to the
Lord's dealings with their fathers some seventy-nine times.15 Thus, it
appears that the Nephite leaders were continually reminding their
people what had happened to their fathers. As a result, it is natural
that the Nephite leaders used and adapted events from the lives of
their forefathers for their everyday teachings, including the story of
Moses and his brazen serpent, thus keeping the story alive and active
among the people. Further, it was common practice to distribute copies
of the scriptures among all the Nephites (Alma 63:12; Jacob 7:23; and
Alma 14:1), who were continually encouraged by their leaders to read
them.16
Although the brazen serpent event is described five separate times in
the Book of Mormon (2 Nephi 25:20; Alma 33:19-22; 37:46; Helaman
8:14-15),17 the most significant account is where Nephi refers to the
event in admonishing his brothers. Note Nephi's use of the word flying
in his description of the serpent:
And he did straiten them in the wilderness with his rod; for they
hardened their hearts, even as ye have; and the Lord straitened them
because of their iniquity. He sent fiery flying serpents among them;
and after they were bitten he prepared a way that they might be
healed; and the labor which they had to perform was to look; and
because of the simpleness of the way, or the easiness of it, there
were many who perished. (1 Nephi 17:41)
In contrast to the Old Testament, the Book of Mormon clearly defines
the Lord's lesson, which, as McConkie states, was to "typify Christ
and point attention to the salvation which would come because he would
be lifted up on the cross."18
When one compares the biblical and the Book of Mormon accounts of the
brazen serpent, one can assume, because of the greater detail
contained in the Book of Mormon, that the Book of Mormon source, the
brass plates of Laban, which had not undergone the ravages of editing
and translations, contained a more accurate account of the brazen
serpent event than is set forth in the Bible.19 As a result, in
interpreting the event and its significance, it seems prudent to rely
more heavily upon the Book of Mormon account.
It now becomes imperative to explore why the biblical account refers
only to "fiery serpents," whereas the Book of Mormon refers to "fiery
flying serpents," for the use of the word flying is important in
understanding what took place in Mesoamerica. If Joseph Smith had
personally authored the Book of Mormon instead of merely translating
it, he would have been foolish to interject the term flying into the
description of Moses' serpent, since the term flying is not used in
the biblical account of this event. This term does, however, appear
later in the Old Testament. In two of his prophecies unrelated to the
brazen ser pent account, Isaiah uses the phrase "fiery flying serpent"
(Isaiah 14:29; 30:6; cf. 2 Nephi 24:29). Since Nephi describes the
serpent as not only "fiery," but also "flying," we can theorize the
Bible originally depicted a "fiery flying serpent," but somewhere
along the way, the term flying was changed or omitted as various
scribes and editors translated and retranslated the Bible over the
centuries.20
This usage of the term flying in association with Moses' brazen
serpent is indirectly supported by numerous works of modern scholars.
For example, Karen Joines notes in her exhaustive study of this
subject that to the Hebrew word for serpent used in Numbers "may be
attributed wings."21 Joines further states that neither "the Revised
Standard Version nor the Septuagint translations of the Hebrew Bible
has been at great care to make consistent translations of the Hebrew
words for serpents."22 Henry also suggests that the serpents "flew in
their faces and poisoned them."23
In addition, there are isolated accounts of winged serpents in this
area of the desert. Joines quotes Herodotus as believing "this desert
to be a haven for flying serpents."24 Bush, while he does not give the
concept credence, does agree that "the popular idea has for some cause
invested these serpents with wings . . . [and] it is supposed that the
epithet flying was given from their power of leaping to a considerable
distance in passing from tree to tree."25 Perhaps most significant,
however, is the analysis by Auerbach: the serpent "was not simply
placed upon a pole; this would be sufficiently designated by makkel or
simply 'es. Rather, it was connected with the 'flagstaff.' "26 In this
manner, the serpent would appear as a flag, as though it were
flying.27 If Moses did indeed attach his brass serpent outstretched
and perpendicular to his pole, it would comply fully with the
description "fiery flying serpent."
Thus, the connection can be made that Nephi's use of the term flying
(and very likely its usage by other Book of Mormon leaders as well)
could have been carried over into the later religious beliefs of the
Mesoamericans, since we do find in Mesoamerica the application of the
term flying in association with serpent representations of their God.
For example, Carrasco refers to a Mixtec prose source containing
stories in which Quetzalcoatl was referred to as "9 Ehecatl" (a
calendric name) or "a flying serpent."28 Nicholson reports that the
Otomis (contemporaries of the Aztecs, the Otomi language being second
in importance only to Nahuatl), in one of their annual veintena
ceremonies honoring Quetzalcoatl, attributed the word antazhoni,
meaning "Great Flying," to Quetzalcoatl.29 In his extensive work on
native antiquities, Frey Bernardino de Sahagun, one of the early
fathers to come to New Spain, in the context of a description of a
serpent named after Quetzalcoatl, stated, "And when it flies or
descends, a great wind blows. Wherever it goes, it flies."30 Thomkins
also quotes Sejourne's description that "Teotihaucan was the place
where the serpent learned miraculously to fly."31 Another example of a
flying serpent can be found in The Maya, in which Coe displays a gold
disc found at the Sacred Cenote at Chichén Itzá. On the disc is a
serpent surrounded by clouds, thus implying a flying serpent.32
In this connection, it is important to focus upon why the word quetzal
was selected as the first element in their God's name, Quetzalcoatl.
Since the quetzal bird was revered for its magnificent color, beauty,
and elusiveness, it inspired awe and reverence and was capable of
evoking the image of a "fiery flying serpent" in the minds of its
beholders. This perception applied not only to the quetzal's overall
appearance, but also to the bird's individual attributes. For example,
since feathers are the source of a bird's ability to fly, and since
birds are, in fact, distinguished from other creatures by their
flying, the "feathered" (or "quetzal") portion of the name could have
easily and naturally emanated originally from the word "flying" as
used by Nephi in the phrase "fiery flying serpents." Feathers connote
flying!
Also, since the term fiery was illustrated by Moses' usage of a
material which imparted vivid color, the Mesoamerican usage of the
quetzal bird's name was a natural choice, since the bird was so
brightly colored. With the blazing equatorial sun shining on its
crimson breast and its iridescent green three-foot long tail rippling
in the wind, the quetzal itself could seem to appear as some type of
formidable "fiery flying serpent."33
Conclusion
Naming their God after the venerable quetzal bird was certainly a
natural and instinctive choice for the Mesoamericans. Further, since
they also used the word coatl, or serpent, their vision of their deity
must have embodied attributes symbolized both by this vividly colored
flying bird and by serpents. Could it be that this embodiment was
actually rooted in a version of Nephi's "fiery flying serpent" that
was corrupted over time?
As archaeologists and scholars continue exploring Mesoamerica, it is
entirely possible that further facts and analogies may surface in
support of this theory. In that case, the innumerable remnants of
ancient feathered serpent statues and renderings could, ironically, be
viewed as yet one more testament to the Book of Mormon and to Joseph
Smith's faithful translation of the Nephite records.
Charles
On 26 Dec 1996 10:30:41 GMT, "Jason C. Scott"
<jcs...@pop3.concentric.net> wrote:
>Since the Book of Mormon contradicts the Doctrine and Covenants and the Bible, you must have your
>hands full trying to figure out what the real gospel is.
>
Since the Bible Contradicts itself does that mean it is wrong? Where
are the lot books of the Bible anyway? Where are the profecies of
Enoch referred to in Jude 1:14, where is the Wisdom of Solomon?
The Book of the Wars of the Lord?
>
>There is a reference i.e. "It is Written" statement by Mathew that
>it was prophesied that Christ would be a Nazarene where is this
> prophecy?etc.etc.etc.
>Try putting together a list of everytime the Scriptures are quoted in
>the Scriptures themselves and you will be surprised. Even Jesus
>quoted the Scriptures.
>Charles
Strawmann
>Sorry to say but all Mormons are going to hell. Joseph Smith was no
'Scuse me, but when did God give you the powers to foresee who is going to
hell?
>In Revelations, God said that if anyone changes or _adds to_ the bible,
>they will be hit with all the plagues on Earth.
If that were true, then the Bible would never have come to be....because
for anyone to add books/scripture to the Book of Revealation, would
constitute "adding" onto the Book of Revealation, which according to you
God says can't happen.
Regards....Lou R. (a.k.a., Strawmann)
I. Wonder
In article <19970107092...@ladder01.news.aol.com>,
stra...@aol.com (Strawmann) wrote:
>>Sorry to say but all Mormons are going to hell. Joseph Smith was no
>
>'Scuse me, but when did God give you the powers to foresee who is going to
>hell?
Probably right before he visited little joe smith, God is a busy entity
isn't he?
Gene Humbert
On Wed, 08 Jan 1997 00:06:15 -0500, Ja...@worldnet.att.net (I. Wonder)
wrote:
>In article <19970107092...@ladder01.news.aol.com>,
>stra...@aol.com (Strawmann) wrote:
>
>>>Sorry to say but all Mormons are going to hell. Joseph Smith was no
>>
>>'Scuse me, but when did God give you the powers to foresee who is going to
>>hell?
>
>Probably right before he visited little joe smith, God is a busy entity
>isn't he?
>
>
>
Congratulations. You get today's rudeness prize. (Mainly because
most of the other clowns were quiet today...
Gene...
Best Sellers
Jason C. Scott thought hard about this before writing:
>I cannot comprehend how:
>God can exist in a man's heart according to the Book of Mormon (Alma 34:36)
>and the Bible, and then he cannot exist in a man's heart (it's an old
>sectarian notion) according to D&C 130:3. I just cannot comprehend
>that. Can you explain that to me? Please, I want to know. Use your
>scriptures.
Well, since there are three Gods (the Father, the Son and
the holy Ghost), it's not a problem. The Holy Ghost (a
personnage of spirit) can dwell in our hearts, but the
Father and the Son (personnages of flesh and bone) cannot.
But since you were reading the 130th section, you should
already know that, shouldn't you?
D&C 130:22 The Father has a body of flesh and bones as
tangible as man's; the Son also; but the Holy Ghost has not
a body of flesh and bones, but is a personage of Spirit.
Were it not so, the Holy Ghost could not dwell in us.
>I cannot comprehend how:
>Death seals a man's fate (heaven, hell, etc) (Mosiah 2:36-39, Alma 34:32-35)
>and that baptism does no good for the dead without the law (Moroni 8:22-23)
>and yet baptism for the dead gives man a choice to change his fate after
>death (Joseph F. Smith vision, v.58). Can you change your fate after death
>or not? I cannot comprehend. Please explain that to me with your scriptures.
The Moroni pasage speaks of children as being without the
law, since they are unable to repent and cannot sin by
virtue of their being unable to understand. So your
quotation is vain.
King Benjamin (Mosiah 2) was speaking to people who had
already been baptised, so this passage does not apply to
baptism for the dead, either.
Amulek (Alma 34) was speaking to those who could hear the
Gospel, and could repent based on their hearing it. Baptism
for the dead is for those who have no occasion to hear and
understand the Gospel of Jesus Christ, and thus cannot
repent in this life.
Jason, you take passages out of context, twist their
meanings and create strawmen of the remains. You are not
worthy of debate. You are devious, crafty and conniving. I
have a message for you: repent.
Lehi
He probably went to a government school where they taught
him that everything is relative. His parents surely
wouldn't have trained him this way. See www.sepschool.org
______
If the state monopolizes the philosophy of its citizens, it is
not significant that it does so in the classroom rather than
in the chapel.
(1996) Moi
To compel a man to furnish contributions of money for the propagation of
opinions which he disbelieves and abhors is sinful and tyrannical.
(1777) Thomas Jefferson
Whenever is found what is called a paternal government, there is found
state education. It has been discovered that the best way to insure
implicit obedience is to commence tyranny in the nursery.
(1874) Benjamin Disraeli