During the period from the 1890s
through the first two decades of the twentieth century, church leaders and
scholars spent considerable time considering the church’s theology. Among those
involved in addition to Widtsoe were James E. Talmage, a PhD in geology and chemistry
and president of the University of Utah; Frederick J. Pack, PhD and a University
of Utah geology professor; B. H. Roberts, who held an undergraduate degree from
the University of Deseret but was largely self-educated; and J. C. Homans, a
non-Mormon writing at times under the pseudonym of Robert C. Webb, PhD. Homas
did not have a PhD, and his writings created problems for the Church.
In 1909, the year following the publication
of Widtsoe’s Joseph Smith as Scientist, the First Presidency issued a statement
titled “The Origin of Man.” Orson F. Whitney wrote the first draft of the
statement, but Widtsoe, Talmage, and BYU President George H. Brimhall reviewed
the edited draft. Like Widtsoe, they considered the biblical account
allegorical, and viewed Adam as the first man. The statement uses the term “class”
and “order,” as Widtsoe had done, but it is not clear that they meant them scientifically,
as Widtsoe did.
. . .
Widtsoe also worked to facilitate one
of his goals: promoting his belief that religion and science were compatible
and could reinforce one another. Unfortunately, although his proposal to link
the concept of the luminiferous ether with the Holy Spirit may have seemed
plausible at the time, in the long run it had to give way to quantum mechanics.
More important was his work backed by his personal prestige in the introduction
of a modified version of natural selection and progressive evolution into the discussion
of LDS Church doctrine. Perhaps equally important, he contradicted the
untenable position that the earth was only 6,000 years old, a doctrine that had
become increasingly indefensible as scientists made significant discoveries in
fields such as anthropology, astronomy, biology, and other disciplines. (Thomas
G. Alexander, John A. Widtsoe: Scientist and Theologian, 1872-1952 [Salt
Lake City: Signature Books, 2023], 69-70, 71)
In a subsequent essay, Widtsoe
considered “Pre-Adamites.” He agreed that sufficient evidence existed that we
could not deny that such beings as Neanderthals, Cro-Magnons, and “other
supposed races of manlike creatures are much the same as of many other forms of
life that have lived on earth, but have long since disappeared—as for example,
the dinosaurs. . . . The discoveries are here. They cannot be denied: but the
inferences from them are subject to constant revision.” He cites committed evolutionists
who insist that such beings demonstrate that humans evolved from pre-Adamic
beings. Again he points out, “Nevertheless, it must also be admitted that no
one can safely deny that such manlike beings did at one time roam over the earth.
The Lord, not man, made the earth. At his pleasure he did many things not
understood by us.” He considered the relationship between pre-Adamites and
current human beings “speculation.” “Latter-day Saints,” he concluded, “are
content to know that much is yet to be learned; they wait, therefore patiently,
for the larger day of knowledge, without disturbing the equanimity of their lives.”
(Widtsoe, Evidences and Reconciliations, 3:140-43)
In other words, Widtsoe believed that
we had sufficient evidence to recognize the existence of pre-Adamic beings.
Nevertheless, we should accept that God created all of them, including
pre-Adamites and modern human beings, but that “how all of this was
accomplished is not known. The mystery of the ‘creation’ of Adam and Eve has
not yet been revealed.” (Widtsoe, Evidences and Reconciliations, 3:142) (Ibid.,
146)