Alma 13 and the Coming of Christ

In a page entitled, "Book of Mormon Questions," Al Case, a former member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, under the section, "Book of Mormon Style and Inconsistencies," posed the following criticism:

Why did Alma not know when Christ was coming (Alma 13:21-26) even though he possessed plates and Lehi and Nephi had written precisely when he would arrive?

The pericope reads as follows (emphasis added):

And now it came to pass that when Alma had said these words unto them, he stretched forth his hand unto them and cried with a mighty voice saying, Now is the time to repent for the day of salvation draweth nigh; yea, and the voice of the Lord, by the mouth of angels, doth declare it unto all nations; yea, doth declare it, that they may have glad tidings of great joy; yea, and he doth sound these glad tidings among all his people, yea, even to them that are scattered abroad upon the face of the earth; wherefore they have come unto us. And they are made known unto us in plain terms, that we may understand, that we cannot err; and  this because of our being wanderers in a strange land; therefore we are thus highly favoured, for we have these glad tidings declared unto us in all parts of our vineyard. For behold, angels are declaring it unto many at this time in our land, and this is for the purpose of preparing the hearts of the children of men to receive his word at the time of his coming in his glory. And now we only want to hear the joyful news declared unto us by the mouth of angels of his coming for the time cometh, we know not how soon. Would to God that it might be in my days; but let it be sooner or later, in it I will rejoice.

Alma is speaking of Jesus’ “coming in glory,” that is, the “Second Coming” or parousia; not his birth. The Book of Mormon, when referencing the Second Advent of Christ speaks of it, not his birth, as His coming in glory:

And behold, according to the words of the prophets , the Messiah will set himself again the second time to recover them; wherefore, he will manifest himself unto them in power and great glory unto the destruction of their enemies , when that day cometh when they shall believe in him, and none will he destroy that believe in him. (2 Nephi 6:14)

And now many days hence the Son of God will come in his glory, and his glory shall be the glory of the Only Begotten of the Father, full of grace, equity, and truth, all of patience, mercy, and long suffering full of grace, equity, and truth, full of patience, mercy, and long-suffering, quick to hear the cries of his people and to answer their prayers. (Alma 9:26)

And many of the people did inquire concerning the place where the son of God should come, and they were taught that he would appear unto them after his resurrection; and this the people did hear with great joy and gladness. (Alma 16:20)

And he did expound all things even from the beginning until the time that he should come in his glory—yea, even all things which should come upon the face of the earth, even until the elements should melt with fervent heat, and the earth should be wept together as a scroll, and the heavens and the earth should pass away. (3 Nephi 26:3)

Therefore, more blessed are ye, for ye shall never taste of death; but ye shall live to behold all the doings of the Father unto the children of men, even until all things shall be fulfilled according to the will of the Father, when I shall come in my glory with the powers of heaven. (3 Nephi 28:7)

Would may object that Alma’s use of the phrase, “would to God that it might be in my days” as evidence Alma expected the event to happen in his lifetime. However, as John Tvedtnes has noted:

[T]he opposite is true. There are two Hebrew expressions that the King James translators rendered "would [to] God that" or "would that."[24] In all but one case that I found in the Bible (Genesis 30:34),[25] the situation being described is clearly one that is impossible of fulfillment. Note the following:

"Would to God we had died" (Exodus 16:3); "would God that we had died" (Numbers 14:2 [twice]; 20:3); "would God I had died for thee" (2 Samuel 18:33); the speakers obviously hadn't died.

"Would to God that all the Lord's people were prophets" (Numbers 11:29); unfortunately, they were not.

"Would to God we had been content, and dwelt on the other side Jordan" (Joshua 7:7); they had, however, crossed the river.

"Would to God this people were under my hand! then would I remove Abimelech" (Judges 9:29); the speaker did not govern the people.

"I would there were a sword in mine hand" (Numbers 22:29); there wasn't.

In addition to Alma 13:25, the Book of Mormon uses the expression "would to God" in two other passages, both of which reflect an impossibility of fulfillment:

"Would to God that we could persuade all men not to rebel against God" (Jacob 1:8); they couldn't.

"I would to God that ye had not been guilty of so great a crime" (Alma 39:7); the crime had already been committed.

Notes for the Above:

24. Neither Hebrew idiom mentions God. The King James translators similarly added the divine title in another Hebrew expression, changing "may the king live" to "God save the king," to correspond to the formula used in the British coronation ceremony (1 Samuel 10:24; 2 Samuel 16:16; 2 Kings 11:12; 2 Chronicles 23:11).

25. Even this may have been intended by Laban as an expression of impossibility.

Marianne Meye Thompson on "seeing God"

If God cannot be seen, it is not because God is invisible, but because God hides himself or because “no one can see God and live.” The possibility of seeing God always remains; but it is qualified in numerous ways, due, perhaps, to the character and nature of God, to the virtue or status of the particular individual, or to the variety of ways in which “seeing” can be understood.

Marianne Meye Thompson, “Jesus: ‘The one Who Sees God’,” in Israel’s God and Rebecca’s Children: Christology and Community in Early Judaism and Christianity: Essays in Honour of Larry W. Hurtado and Alan F. Segal, eds. David B. Capes, April D. DeConick, Helen K. Bond, and Troy A. Miller (Waco: Baylor University Press, 2007), 215-26, here, p. 221.

Notes on John 4:24 and Divine Embodiment

"God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth" (John 4:24 [NRSV])

John 4:24 is one of the most common proof-texts used against the Latter-day Saint belief that God the Father is embodied. However, from the get-go, one must note the irony that most critics who raise this verse are Trinitarians. Why? In this verse, there is a differentiation, not just between the persons of Jesus and the Father, but between Jesus and God (θεος)! Notwithstanding, there are some elements on this verse that are often overlooked by critics.

Firstly, the Greek of this verse is:

πνεῦμα ὁ θεός, καὶ τοὺς προσκυνοῦντας αὐτὸν ἐν πνεύματι καὶ ἀληθείᾳ δεῖ προσκυνεῖν

The phrase, often translated, “God is spirit” is in bold. In Greek grammar, this is a qualitative predicate nominative, which deals with, not composition, but one's qualities. Furthermore, from the context, this refers to man’s worship of God, not the composition of deity. Jesus is addressing a Samaritan, whose theology privileged Mount Gezirim, while the Jews privileged Jerusalem, one of the many disputes between them. Jesus, instead, echoing the universalism of the New Covenant, states that proper worship of God will not be localised in one place. In other words, this verse does not address God's physiological nature--only the means by which men communicate with God. Such must be done spiritually (i.e., spirit to spirit), and must develop a spiritual nature.

Furthermore, taking the absolutist view of this verse to its "logical" conclusion, one would have to state that it is a requirement that men are to shed their physical bodies in order to worship God--if God is only spirit and this passage requires men to worship God "in spirit," then men must worship God only in spirit. Thus, to cite John 4:24 against the teachings of Mormon theology is to claim that men cannot worship God as mortal beings, which is ludicrous. It would also akin to absolutising 1 Cor 15:45, and stating that Christ currently exists in an unembodied spirit, notwithstanding Christ's corporeal ascension (Acts 1:11) and His being depicted as embodied in post-ascension visions of Jesus (e.g., Acts 7:55-56).

A related criticism that has been raised by some opponents (e.g., Craig Blomberg in How Wide the Divide?) is that if God were to possess a physical body, this would make divine omnipresence impossible as God would be rendered "limited" or "finite" by that body. Therefore, God, in LDS theology, could not be omnipresent, something required by this verse. However, Latter-day Saints affirm only that the Father has a body, not that his body has him. The Father is corporeal and infinitely more, and if a spirit can be omnipresent without being physically present, then so can a God who possess a body and a spirit.

Indeed, the Bible affirms that, though the Father has a body (e.g., Heb 1:3), His glory, influence, and power fills the universe (Jer 23:34). He is continually aware of everything in the universe and can communicate with, and travel to, any spot instantaneously (Psa 139:7-12).

Furthermore, a question that is begged is that “spirit” is immaterial. However, many early Christians believed that “spirit” was material (e.g., Origen, On First Principles, Preface 9 and Tertullian, Against Praxaes, 7), something consistent with LDS theology (D&C 131:7).

Another related verse is Luke 24:39. However, as with John 4:24, this is another example of eisegesis. What Evangelical critics fail to note is that the converse of the statement is not true. A living physical body most definitely does have a spirit. In fact, it is physically dead without one (James 2:26). A spirit alone does not have a physical body. But if God has a physical body, he also has a spirit. Therefore, even though God is corporeal, it is appropriate to say that God "is spirit" (as in John 4:24), for spirit is the central part of His nature as a corporeal being.

Moreover, it would not be appropriate to say that God is only a spirit based on this verse--here, Christ clearly has a spirit and a physical body. His spirit had just been recombined with His perfected and glorified physical body in the resurrection, a point He took great pains to demonstrate (Luke 24:41-43). He was not, however, "a spirit" in the sense of being only a spirit.

Finally, in unique LDS Scripture, we find something similar to John 4:24 echoed in D&C 93:33-35:

For man is spirit, The elements are eternal, and spirit and element, inseparably connected, receive a fullness of joy. And when separated man cannot receive a fullness of joy. The elements are the tabernacle of God; yea, man is the tabernacle of God, even temples; and whatsoever temple is defiled, God shall destroy that temple.

In this pericope, man is said to be “spirit,” though such does not preclude embodiment.

Volcanism in Book of Mormon Lands and Mesoamerica

In 3 Nephi 8, there is a description of a great catastrophe in the Book of Mormon lands, one that matches volcanic activity (e.g., mists of darkness; terrible storms; whirlwinds; lightning and thunder; cities being destroyed by burning, being sunk into the ocean, or being covered with either earth or rising waters, etc).

Interestingly, there is strong evidence of such volcanic activity in Mesoamerica, the area most Book of Mormon scholars believe to be the lands of the Book of Mormon (on this, see, for e.g., John L. Sorenson, Mormon's Codex: An Ancient American Books [2013]) and in the right time (about 30 C.E.).

An important article on this issue would be: Benjamin R. Jordan, "Volcanic Destruction in the Book of Mormon: Possible Evidence from Ice Cores," in the Journal of Book of Mormon Studies 12/1 (2003): 78-87, 118-19, online here.

The abstract of the article reads:

Third Nephi 8 preserves a written account of a natural disaster at the time of Christ’s death that many assume to have been caused by volcanic activity. In a modernday science quest, the author examines research done on glacial ice cores from Greenland and Antarctica. Ice-core records can reveal volcanic gases and ashes that are carried throughout the world—the gases are detected by measuring the acidity of the ice at various layers. Many factors influence the findings and the proposed datings of the volcanic events. The ice-core records offer some evidence, though not conclusive, of a volcanic eruption around the time of Christ’s death

LDS apologist, Jeff Lindsay, offers a good summary this evidence provides for Book of Mormon historicity:

If the Book of Mormon is true, then we should expect to find evidence of significant volcanic activity (according to the description of events in 3 Nephi) around 33 A.D., and that activity should be in Mesoamerica (based on the best understanding of Book of Mormon geography, independent of any considerations of volcanism). So we have a simple test that cannot be obscured by the tragedy of destroyed written records or the complexities of archeological interpretation of a fragmentary and complex record. We can simply ask: was there volcanic activity in Mesoamerica around 33 A.D.? This is something that ought to be hard to miss if it occurred. And the answer is clear and irrefutable: yes, there was impressive volcanic activity in Mesoamerica dating to that time, activity of the kind that would fit the Book of Mormon account remarkably well. There is even a city that was partially buried by the huge lava flow from that event. Please look at the detailed evidence on this issue and ask how Joseph Smith, who knew nothing about volcanoes, could accurately describe the results of volcanic activity, and manage to have the date of the event later be confirmed by scientists in a land that corresponds with Book of Mormon lands? It will take a LOT of faith to ascribe this issue to luck.

Resources on Roman Catholicism

When Pope Francis was elected pope in 2013, I witnessed a lot of fellow Latter-day Saints praising the new pope and wishing God’s blessings upon his and his pontificate on facebook and other venues (even if his first act as pope was idolatrous [a prayer to Mary]); furthermore, in light of the recent meetings between LDS and Catholic leaders addressing moral issues, I have no doubt that many within the Church will hope for theological, not just moral, ecumenism in the near future. For those of us who have studied Rome’s history and theology, however, this is polar opposite of what any Latter-day Saint should hope for—what Rome teaches as dogma about issues such as the papacy, Mary, the Mass, veneration of images, etc., falls under the anathema of Gal 1:6-9. This stance may make me unpopular, but so be it.

For those wishing to study the real issues about Roman Catholicism, I would recommend the following (broken down into [1] sources and [2] works refuting, biblically and/or historically, Catholic dogmas on central issues—Mary, the Papacy, the Mass, and the early Councils); at the end, I have included some Catholic apologetic and scholarly works on various issues, too:

Heinrich Denzinger, The Sources of Catholic Dogma

Ludwig Ott, The Fundamentals of Catholic Dogma

Jacques Dupuis, The Christian Faith

Catechism of the Council of Trent (AKA The Roman Catechism)

1994 Catechism of the Catholic Church

1983 Code of Canon Law

Documents of Vatican II (1962-1965)

Karl Josef von Hefele, A History of the Councils of the Church (5 vols.)

Richard P. McBrien, Catholicism

The Harper-Collins Encyclopedia of  Catholicism, ed. Richard P. McBrien

Philip Schaff, History of the Christian Church (8 vols.)

Idem. Creeds of Christendom (3 vols.)

Eric Svendsen, Who is My Mother? The Role and Status of the Mother of Jesus in the New Testament and Roman Catholicism

Stephen J. Shoemaker, The Ancient Traditions of the Virgin Mary's Dormition and Assumption

J.E. Merdinger, Rome and the African Church in the Time of Augustine

William Webster, The Matthew 16 Controversy: Peter and the Rock

Edward Denny, Papalism

Michael Whelton, The Two Paths

Michael Tierney, The Origins of Papal Infallibility, 1150-1350: A Study on the Concepts of Infallibility, Sovereignty, and Tradition in the Middle Ages

George Salmon, Infallibility and the Church

Ignatius Von Döllinger, The Pope and the Council

J.N.D. Kelly, The Oxford Dictionary of Popes

Laurent A. Cleenewerck, His Broken Body: Understanding and Healing the Schism between the Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox Churches

John F. Bigane, III, Faith, Christ or Peter: Matthew 16:18 in Sixteenth Century Roman Catholic Exegesis

Henri de Lubac, Corpus Mysticum: The Eucharist in the Church in the Middle Ages

Edward J. Kilmartin, The Eucharist in the West: History and Theology

John Philip Jenkins, Jesus Wars

Jacques Le Goff, The Birth of Purgatory

Ramsay MacMullen, Voting about God in Early Church Councils


Pro-Catholic Apologetic Works


Robert A. Sungenis, Not by Faith Alone: The Biblical Evidence for the Catholic Doctrine of Justification

Idem. Not By Bread Alone: The Biblical and Historical Evidence for the Eucharistic Sacrifice

Not by Scripture Alone: A Catholic Critique of the Protestant Doctrine of Sola Scriptura ed. Robert A. Sungenis

B.C. Butler, The Church and Infallibility

Scott Butler et al. Jesus, Peter, and the Keys

Steve Ray, Upon This Rock

Idem. Crossing the Tiber

Karl Keating, Catholicism and Fundamentalism

Patrick Madrid, Pope Fiction

Idem. Any Friend of God is a Friend of Mine

Scott Hahn, Kinship by Covenant

James T. O'Connor, The Hidden Manna

Dave Armstrong, A Biblical Defense of Catholicism

Idem. The Catholic Verses

Idem. Pillars of Sola Scriptura

John Henry Newman, An Essay on the Development of Christian Doctrine

Idem. Lectures on Justification

Yves Congar, Tradition and Traditions

George Agius, Tradition and the Church


Tim Staples, Behold your Mother

John McHugh, The Mother of Jesus in the New Testament

Martin Sheehan, Apologetics and Catholic Doctrine

Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica

Mark Shea, By What Authority?

Trent Horn, The Case for Catholicism: Answers to Classic and Contemporary Protestant Objections

Comments on the Holy Spirit, Genesis 1:26, and Adoption

I've been fighting an illness over the past few days, so did not have much time for blogging. However, to make up for it, I am reproducing a few interesting comments I encountered in my readings that may be of some interest:

Within the Judaism of the time, the possession of the holy Spirit, the Spirit of God, was regarded as the mark of prophecy: therefore, Jesus’ inspiration and equipping for ministry by the Spirit of God signifies that he was (and probably regarded himself as) a prophet. His claim to possess the Spirit is quite explicit if “the blasphemy against the Holy Spirit” (Mark 3:29) is rightly interpreted as the denial of the divine source of the spirit power with which Jesus casts out demons.

David Hill, New Testament Prophecy (Atlanta: John Knox, 1979), as cited by Stevan Davies, Spirit Possession and the Origins of Christianity (Dublin: Bardic Press, 2014), 79.

Turning to the rest of the verse [Gen 1:26], we note two points of emphasis concerning the status and role of human beings in the created world: 1) status—humanity is to be made in the image of God, and 2) role—humanity is to exercise a dominant role in the governance of the earth. Concerning the first category, we note that humanity occupies a unique status in contrast with all of the other created beings on the earth: being made in the image and according to the likeness of God. The basic likeness is in physical appearance, as study of the etymology and usage of both terms show: selem and demut. These terms are used in cognate languages of statue representing gods and humans in contemporary inscriptions, and certainly the intention is to say that God and man share a common physical appearance. If or when God makes himself visible to human beings, they will recognise their own features and vice versa. The image is the same, and the basic features are comparable. While God is not human, and humans are not divine, they share a common appearance, or physique. Whenever God is described in the Hebrew Bible, he has features that human beings also have (cf. Ezekiel 1:26-28). The correspondence is by no means limited to body parts, but extends to the whole makeup of God and humans, including mind and spirit, thoughts and words. We must not press the resemblances too far, as there are constant admonitions that God is different in profound respects (cf. Isaiah 55:6-11), but these would hardly be necessary is not for the basic similarities. Only human beings, of all earthly creatures, share image and likeness with the deity.

David Noel Freedman, “The Status and Role of Humanity in the Cosmos According to the Hebrew Bible,” in On Human Nature: The Jerusalem Center Symposium, eds. Truman G. Madsen, David Noel Freedman, and Pam Fox Kuhlken (Ann Arbor, Mich.: Pryor Pettengill Publishers, Inc: 2004), 9-25, here, pp. 16-17 (square bracket my own)

Today, when one speaks of adoption, he refers to the legal process whereby a stranger becomes a member of the family. In Paul’s time, however, adoptions referred to that legal process whereby a parent placed his own child in the legal position of an adult son, with all the privileges of inheritance. Someone may question why adoption was required when the child was already a son by birth. It must be remembered that in pagan Rome, a citizen often had many wives and many children. Some of the wives may have been concubines and slaves. The citizen may not have wanted the offspring of his slave wives to receive his titles, position in society, and inheritance. The legal procedure of adoption, therefore, provided a means whereby the citizen could designate those children which he wished to be considered his legal sons and heirs. Through receiving newness of life, believers become children of God. Through adoption, the children of God are declared to be His sons, who have all the privileges and inheritance of sonship.

Alva G. Huffer, Systematic Theology (Oregon, Illin.: The Restitution Herald, 1960), 390.

The Book of Mormon and New Testament Textual Criticism

It has often been asserted that Mark 16:9-20 (the so-called “Longer Ending”) and Luke 22:43-44 are textual interpolations to the New Testament. As a result, some have questioned the historicity of the Book of Mormon, as well as the Doctrine and Covenants, where similar concepts are expressed (e.g., Mosiah 3:7; Mormon 9:22-24; D&C 19:18). However, two recent studies have challenged (successfully, IMO) the scholarly consensus on these texts.

On the longer ending of Mark, Nicholas P. Lunn, The Original Ending of Mark: A New Case for the Authenticity of Mark 16:9-20 (Pickwick Publications, 2014) offers a cogent challenge to the claim that vv.9-20 of Mark chapter 16 are not original to the gospel; instead, the author shows that the longer ending was known to Luke and Matthew, as well as the authors of early texts such as 1 Clement and the Shepherd of Hermas, as well as refuting all the claims against this text based on word-usages.

On Luke 22:43-44, LDS scholar, Lincoln Blumell has a published article in TC: A Journal of Biblical Textual Criticism (online here) that argues that the original text of Luke had the "blood-sweat" text, but it was omitted by Christian scribes beginning in the 2nd/3rd centuries.