Saturday, December 2, 2023

Brigham Young Differentiating between Adam and the God and Father of Jesus (April 26, 1846)

  

I said, “The Spirit of the Lord and keys of the priesthood hold power over all animated beings. When father Adam transgressed the law he did not fall at once from the presence of the Lord but spake face to face with him a long time afterwards. Men continued to sin and degenerate from generation to generation until they had got so far from the Lord that a veil of darkness sprang up between them so that men could no longer speak with the Lord, save it were through a Prophet. During this time the earth and all creation groaned in sin, and enmity increased, and the lives of men and beasts decreased. For this cause the Son of God descended below all things that he might reach every man and that he might return to the Father and have power over all things.

 

“In this dispensation, the keys that were committed to father Adam will be restored, and we are to return into the favor and presence of the Lord. If we cease hostility, with the serpents and lay aside all enmity and treat all animals kindly, being humble and faithful with long suffering and forbearance no man need ever have a horse or a cow bitten by a snake. The serpents would soon become perfectly harmless, so that they could be handled without danger, children could play with them without receiving harm.” (Brigham Young, April 26, 1846, in Manuscript History of Brigham Young, 1846-1847, comp. Elden J. Watson [Salt Lake City: Elden J. Watson, 1971], 142-43)