Some critics of the Book of Mormon claim that Mosiah 15:1-4 and Ether
3:14 teach Modalism. This has been refuted by myself and other LDS scholars,
including:
Blake T. Ostler, Re-vision-ing the Mormon
Concept of Deity
Ari D. Bruening and David L. Paulsen, The
Development of the Mormon Understanding of God: Early Mormon Modalism and Other
Myths
Robert
Boylan, Does
the Book of Mormon Teach Modalism, Responding
to Jared Cook on Mosiah 15: Part 1, Responding
to Jared Cook on Mosiah 15: Part 2 (cf. The
1832 First Vision Account versus Modalism and Psalm
110:1 and the two Lords in the 1832 First Vision Account)
Notwithstanding,
many critics of the Book of Mormon who read these and other texts as teaching
that God is a single person is reflective
of true theology (i.e., reflects the theology the authors hold to). This is the
case with the Tanners, showing that they are ignorant of Trinitarianism and are
Modalists (to be fair, probably out of theological ignorance than conviction).
As they
write in a chapter entitled “The Godhead”:
The Book of Mormon also teaches that Christ
was God himself manifest in the flesh. In Mosiah 15:1, 2 and 5 we read the
following:
And now Abinadi said unto them: I would that
ye should understand that God himself shall
come down among the children of men, and shall redeem his people. And because
he dwelleth in flesh he shall be called the Son of God, and having subjected
the flesh to the will of the Father, being
the Father and the Son--. . . . And thus the flesh becoming subject to the Spirit, or the Son, to the Father,
being one God . . .
This
is in harmony with the Bible, for in 2 Corinthians 5:19 we read as follows: “To wit, that God was in Christ, reconciling the
world unto himself, . . . “ (Jerald and Sandra Tanner, Mormonism: Shadow or Reality? [5th ed.; Salt Lake City:
Utah Lighthouse Ministry, 1987, 2008], 163, emphasis in bold in original,
emphasis in highlighter added)
That the
Tanners believed (errantly) that Mosiah 15 teaches that the Father and Son are
one and the same person is seen in
comments they make in their chapter on the First Vision:
The Book of Mormon, which was first published
in 1830, taught that there was but one God:
And now Abinadi said unto them: I would that
ye should understand that God himself shall come down among the children of
men, and shall redeem his people. And because he dwelleth in flesh he shall be
called the Son of God, and having subjected the flesh to the will of the
Father, being the Father and the Son-- . . . And thus the flesh becoming
subject to the Spirit, or the Son to the Father, being one God, . . . (Book of Mormon, Mosiah 15:1, 2, 5)
The Book of Mormon tells of a visitation of
the Father and the Son to the “brother of Jared.” The Father and the Son mentioned, however, are not two separate personages. Only one personage appears, and this
personage says:
Behold, I am he who was prepared from the
foundation of the world to redeem my people. Behold I am Jesus Christ. I am the
Father and the Son. In me shall all mankind have light, . . . (Ether 3:14)
(Ibid., 163, emphasis in bold in original, emphasis in highlighter added)
If anything,
apart from poor exegetical skills (both of the Bible and the Book of Mormon),
the Tanners, in their magnum opus,
where ignorant of the Trinitarianism their Protestant theology teaches, and
were, functionally, heretical, even according to Trinitarian theology.
