Tuesday, September 16, 2014

Brief review of the Tanner/White debate, “Can Men Become Gods?”

In 2002, James R. White (Reformed Baptist) debated Latter-day Saint apologist, Martin Tanner on the topic, “Can Men Become Gods?” This debate focused on the Latter-day Saint doctrine of “eternal progression” (AKA Theosis; Apotheosis; Deification; Divinisation).

Being a convinced Latter-day Saint, I admit to being biased; however, I have to say that both sides were pretty awful. One can watch the two hour debate on youtube here:





Martin did a good job at presenting the key scholarly sources on the patristics vis-à-vis the doctrine of deification, and would recommend the sources he used to those wishing to delve into this doctrine (they present the non-LDS understanding of this doctrine better than any of White’s books or debates). However, one will notice that he did not give any meaningful discussion of the Latter-day Saint understanding of deification, let alone the theological presuppositions underlying the LDS understanding of deification (e.g. eternal pre-existence; creation ex materia as opposed to ex nihilo). This allowed White to score a few superficial points with the audience in his opening by presenting the LDS view and then claim his opponent is sidestepping his own faith’s distinctive teachings (a common tactic he has employed before [e.g. in his 2010 debate on Purgatory against Robert A. Sungenis]). Martin also should have zoned in White’s dancing around Christology—Jesus was exalted according to New Testament authors (e.g. Phil 2:5-11). If Jesus was exalted and given a name above every other name, and we will inherit all the things which Christ inherited from the Father, it stands to reason that we will share in that divine inheritance. White tried to relegate the importance of Rom 8:17 by saying that we will inherit all the things Christ inherited but such does not include any promise of exaltation (many Protestants would interpret this text as a promise of glorification, but not deification).

Additionally, while Calvin and Luther may have held to some form of deification, there would be a number of theological presuppositions underlying that doctrine that would be alien to LDS formulations thereof (e.g. the nature of justification and righteousness; the nature of mankind). This also brings us up to an important part of the debate—theologically, they were speaking past one another, as the presuppositions were different from the get-go. If LDS are to engage Reformed individuals in debate, one should be cognizant of their theology (e.g. forensic nature of the atonement and justification; total depravity of human beings). It is not just simply a matter of exegesis of Rom 8:17 and other texts.

And while not an important part of the debate, Martin’s claim that “Abba” means “daddy” was like nails on a chalk board for me (Abba is vocative not diminutive; "o father" would be the correct translation, contra Jeremias, The Prayers of Jesus and other commentators).

White was equally lousy. Indeed, this was one of the poorest showing from White, argument-wise, and is perhaps only matched by his poor showing against Robert Sungenis on the topic of Predestination. Furthermore, White made the same, time-worn and long-refuted arguments from his anti-Mormon books (e.g. Is the Mormon My Brother?), such as the Elohim in Psa 82:6 are human judges, not deities and that Isaiah 40-48 teaches strict monotheism. Furthermore, he equivocates when he cites biblical and patristic literature on “creation” (he labours under the mistaken assumption that “create” and “creation” mean creation ex nihilo. However, as Blake Ostler and Thomas Oord have shown, that is simply not the case, and is refuted by any scholarly study of the Hebrew and Greek terms denoting creation; White et al are guilty of equivocation). In addition, he is simply wrong in claiming that no one among the apostolic fathers held to deification. Origen is a key witness in his work, “Dialogue with Heraclides”:

Origen said: Since once an inquiry has begun it is proper to say something upon the subject of the inquiry, I will speak. The whole church is present and listening. It is not right that there should be any difference in knowledge between one church and another, for you are not the false church. I charge you, father Heraclides: God is the almighty, the uncreated, the supreme God who made all things. Do you hold this doctrine?

Heracl.: I do. That is what I also believe.

Orig.: Christ Jesus who was in the form of God, being other than the God in whose form he existed, was he God before he came into the body or not?

Heracl.: He was God before.

Orig.: Was he God before he came into the body or not?

Heracl.: Yes, he was.

Orig.: Was he God distinct from this God in whose form he existed?

Heracl.: Obviously he was distinct from another being and, since he was in the form of him who created all things, he was distinct from him.

Orig.: Is it true then that there was a God, the Son of God, the only begotten of God, the firstborn of all creation, and that we need have no fear of saying that in one sense there are two Gods, while in another there is one God?

Heracl.: What you say is evident. But we affirm that God is the almighty, God without beginning, without end, containing all things and not contained by anything; and that his Word is the Son of the living God, God and man, through whom all things were made, God according to the spirit, man inasmuch as he was born of Mary.

Orig.: You do not appear to have answered my question. Explain what you mean. For perhaps I failed to follow you. Is the Father God?

Heracl.: Assuredly.

Orig.: Is the Son distinct from the Father?

Heracl.: Of course. How can he be Son if he is also Father?

Orig.: While being distinct from the Father is the Son himself also God?

Heracl.: He himself is also God.

Orig.: And do two Gods become a unity?

Heracl.: Yes.

Orig.: Do we confess two Gods?

Heracl.: Yes. The power is one.

Orig.: But as our brethren take offence at the statement that there are two Gods, we must formulate the doctrine carefully, and show in what sense they are two and in what sense the two are one God. Also the holy Scriptures have taught that several things which are two are one. And not only things which are two, for they have also taught that in some instances more than two, or even a very much larger number of things, are one. Our present task is not to broach a problematic subject only to pass it by and deal cursorily with the matter, but for the sake of the simple folk to chew up, so to speak, the meat, and little by little to instill the doctrine in the ears of our hearers. . . . Accordingly, there are many things which are two that are said in the Scriptures to be one. What passages of Scripture? Adam is one person, his wife another. Adam is distinct from his wife, and his wife is distinct from her husband. Yet it is said in the story of the creation of the world that they two are one: "For the two shall be one flesh." Therefore, sometimes two beings can become one flesh. Notice, however, that in the case of Adam and Eve it is not said that the two shall become one spirit, nor that the two shall become one soul, but that they shall become one flesh. Again, the righteous man is distinct from Christ; but he is said by the apostle to be one with Christ: "For he that is joined to the Lord is one spirit." Is it not true that the one is of a subordinate nature or of a low and inferior nature, while Christ's nature is divine and glorious and blessed? Are they therefore no longer two? Yes, for the man and the woman are "no longer two but one flesh," and the righteous man and Christ are "one spirit." So in relation to the Father and God of the universe, our Saviour and Lord is not one flesh, nor one spirit, but something higher than flesh and spirit, namely, one God. The appropriate word when human beings are joined to one another is flesh. The appropriate word when a righteous man is joined to Christ is spirit. But the word when Christ is united to the Father is not flesh, nor spirit, but more honourable than these —God. That is why we understand in this sense "I and the Father are one." When we pray, because of the one party let us preserve the duality, because of the other party let us hold to the unity. In this way we avoid falling into the opinion of those who have been separated from the Church and turned to the illusory notion of monarchy, who abolish the Son as distinct from the Father and virtually abolish the Father also. Nor do we fall into the other blasphemous doctrine which denies the deity of Christ. What then do the divine Scriptures mean when they say: "Beside me there is no other God, and there shall be none after me," and "I am and there is no God but me"? In these utterances we are not to think that the unity applies to the God of the universe . . . in separation from Christ, and certainly not to Christ in separation from God. Let us rather say that the sense is the same as that of Jesus' saying, "I and my Father are one."

Compare the above to the longstanding Latter-day Saint understanding of the relationship of the Father and the Son, the “number of God,” and interpretation of John 17:22.

Furthermore, Tertullian, contra White, did teach deification—see his Against Hermogenes. As for his comment that Ignatius and Polycarp did not discuss deification, and this somehow deflates LDS claims, such is utterly inane given the brevity and highly limited scope of their epistles (also, White has to ignore that Polycarp’s most celebrated student, Irenaeus of Lyons, explicitly and repeatedly taught the doctrine). Further, it is not true that comments about deification language only appears in apologetic contexts—they appear in non-apologetic contexts in the writings of Clement of Alexandria; Cyprian and Origin, among others.

I did find it funny that White had to qualify his response to Martin’s question (if White considered Athanasius orthodox). Athanasius held to a number of doctrines White believes to be blasphemous (e.g. the perpetual virginity of Mary; infant baptism; baptismal regeneration; transformative justification; the personal sinlessness of Mary). And yet, White will quote Athanasius in his works as evidence, for instance, that the early Christian fathers held to Sola Scriptura (apparently, they held to formal sufficiency of the Protestant canon but held to a diametrically polar “gospel” than the one White proclaims [see his chapter, “Sola Scriptura in Early Christianity” in Sola Scriptura: The Protestant Position on the Bible]).

While much more could be said, on his use of Vajda’s MA thesis, ("'Partakers of the Divine Nature': A Comparative Analysis of Patristic and Modern Doctrine of Divinization") I will quote Errol Amey in a message he sent me about this debate from 2013:

He quotes from Vajda concerning differences between patristic and Mormon thought, but completely ignores the section that emphasises the similarities between them, and is conveniently silent concerning the fact that Vajda drew conclusions that are contrary to White’s own. Nor does he mention that after years of additional study, Vajda [who has been a Catholic priest] became a Latter-day Saint.


Overall, this debate could have been informative had a good LDS debater who knows LDS *and* Reformed theology (e.g. Blake Ostler) and a scholarly, non-LDS engaged in a debate. However, as it stands, this was a pretty poor debate.