Speaking of Lorenzo Snow’s doctrine of “theosis,” one biographer wrote:
Shortly after his arrival in Nauvoo, Lorenzo received one of the most spiritual manifestations of his entire life, and he had many of them. He was at the home of Elder H.G. Sherwood and while in conversation with him, Brother Sherwood entered into an explanation of the meaning of “the laborers in the vineyard,” in which the Savior drew a graphic picture of the husbandman calling servants into the vineyard at different hours of the day. Attentively listening to the explanation, Elder Snow experienced a rich outpouring of the spirit of the Lord. His spiritual eyes were opened and he “saw as clear as the sun at noonday, with wonder and astonishment, the pathway of God and man.” The revelation which came to him he later expressed in the form of a couplet:
As man is God once was;
As God is, man may be.
As God is, man may be.
Elder Snow was startled by this revelation and amazed at the magnitude of the doctrine involved. Until then he had never heard the Prophet or others high in the councils of the Church advance such a doctrine, yet when he began to reason on the matter, it seemed perfectly logical and in his innermost soul he felt it was true. He reasoned that if God is the literal Father of the spirit of man, it is within the realm of probability that man in the process of time may ultimately achieve Godhood. And in the same line of reasoning, formed in the image of God and endowed with God-like attributes, can ascend to the plane of Deity, God should have ascended the scale in a similar manner.
This manifestation explained the meaning of the “dark saying” made to Lorenzo by the father of the Prophet Joseph Smith in the Kirtland Temple at a “blessing meeting” before Brother Snow’s baptism. Father Smith predicted that Lorenzo would soon be convinced of the truth of the gospel as taught by the Latter-day Saints and that he would be baptized. Continuing, the Patriarch said: “You will become as great as you can possibly wish—even as great as God, and you cannot wish to be greater.”
This truth expressed in the couplet Elder Snow revealed to none save his sister, Eliza, until he arrived in England when he made it known to Brigham Young. When Lorenzo related his experience to President Brigham Young, President Young replied:
“Brother Snow, that is a new doctrine; if true, it has been revealed to you for your own private information, and will be taught in due time by the Prophet of the Church; till then I advise you to lay it upon the shelf and say no more about it.”
Elder Snow heeded the counsel given him and after returning to America, President Young came to him and told Lorenzo that what had been revealed to him was true for the Prophet had just been teaching it to the people. Some time later while in conversation with the Prophet Joseph Smith, Elder Snow related his experience at Brother Sherwood’s three years before, and was pleased to have the Prophet say, “Brother Snow, that is true gospel doctrine, and it is a revelation from God to you.” (Thomas Cottam Romney, The Life of Lorenzo Snow: Fifth President of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints [Salt Lake City: Sugarhouse Press, 1955], 34-35)
Notwithstanding the “high anthropology,” Snow did not believe that man, even in a glorified, exalted state, would be “independent” of the Father and the Son. In the dedicatory prayer to the Manti Temple, dated May 21, 1888, Lorenzo Snow closed with the following words:
And now, Holy Father, we dedicate ourselves with all we possess—our time and our talents, our substance—unto thee, praying thee to fit and qualify us or thy service that is required at hour hands, and asking thee to watch over us through the various scenes through which we are called to pass, and that when we have finished our course here below, we may be prepared to dwell with thee and receive a fullness of celestial glory, and we will ascribe all praise, honor and dominion to God and the Lamb, for ever and ever, Amen. (Ibid., 318, emphasis added)
Such is consistent with other texts, including those from uniquely LDS Scripture, that affirms we will always be under eternal subjection to God the Father (e.g., D&C 76:21, 62, 92-93, 108, 110, 119).
Further Reading
Blake T. Ostler, Exploring Mormon Thought, volume 3: Of God and Gods
In my Email exchange with a Confused Calvinist on LDS Theology and Christology, I discussed Lorenzo Snow’s famous couplet its grounding in Christology
