Heavenly Father |
Has God always been God?
There is not a clear teaching about the nature of God when it comes to the official web site of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (www.lds.org).
Some believe that Heavenly Father has always been God, while others believe that He once used to be a mortal man who progressed into a God. This may be an attempt of the LDS Church in modern times to focus on similarities rather than differences with other Christian groups.
You may even receive different answers from Mormon missionaries you question.
Let's examine some teachings:
The Mormon Heavenly Father progressed from a man into becoming a God.
Former LDS President Gordon B. Hinckley seemed to dodge and dissemble in an August 4, 1997 Time
cover story when veteran religion writer Richard N. Ostling asked him about the distinctive Mormon teaching that humans can become gods, and that God the Father
was once a man (p. 56).
Question: ... about that, God the Father was once a man as we were. This is something
that Christian writers are always addressing. Is this the teaching of the church
today, that God the Father was once a man like we are?
Answer: I don’t know that we teach it. I don’t know that we emphasize it. I haven’t heard it discussed for a long time in public discourse. I don’t know. I don’t know all the circumstances under which that statement was made. I understand the philosophical background behind it. But I don’t know a lot about it and I don’t know that others know a lot about it.
The truth of the matter is that the LDS Church does teach this, despite the
statement of Mr. Hinckley that he does not know the first principle of the
gospel of Joseph Smith.
"God Himself is an exalted man, perfected, enthroned, and supreme"
(Doctrines of the Gospel Student Manual - Religion 430-431, chapter 7, page 17).
"Through a continual course of progression, our Heavenly Father has received exaltation and glory; and He points us out the same path ... we shall eventually come in possession ... of everything that heart can desire" (Lorenzo Snow, The Teachings of Lorenzo Snow, 3-4). See also "Doctrines of the Gospel Student Manual - Religion 430-431, page 92.
“When you climb up a ladder, you must begin at the bottom, and ascend step by step, until you arrive at the top; and so it is with the principles of the Gospel—you must begin with the first, and go on until you learn all the principles of exaltation. But it will be a great while after you have passed through the veil [died] before you will have learned them. It is not all to be comprehended in this world; it will be a great work to learn our salvation and exaltation even beyond the grave. This is the way our Heavenly Father became God. It is the first principle of the Gospel to know for a certainty the character of God. … He was once a man like us; … God himself, the Father of us all, dwelt on an earth, the same as Jesus Christ himself did” (Teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith, pp. 345–346, 348; Gospel Principles, chapter 47, p. 305)
"If we passed our tests, we would receive the fulness of joy that our heavenly parents have received" (Gospel Principles, page 14). The LDS version of Heavenly Father and Mother received their fulness of joy (exaltation, eternal life - 3 Nephi 28:10; Doctrine and Covenants 76:59; 84:38) through their heavenly parents; Jesus' grandfather and grandmother for lack of better terms.
Subsequent Mormon leaders have been just as clear, like General Authority Milton R.
Hunter, who wrote:
"Mormon prophets have continuously taught the sublime truth that God the Eternal
Father was once a mortal man who passed through a school of earth life similar that
through which we are now passing" (The Gospel Through the Ages, 1945, p 104).
"God himself was once as we are now, and is an exalted man ... God himself, the Father of us all, dwelt on an earth, the same as Jesus Christ himself did ... He is the one who was once as we are now" (Doctrines of the Gospel Student Manual, chapter 3, page 8).
"The progression of our Father in heaven to godhood, or exaltation, was strictly in accordance with eternal
principles" (Achieving a Celestial Marriage Student Manual, p. 129).
God - Eternal and Everlasting or not?.
At one point in his life, Joseph Smith wrote, "By these things we know that there
is a God in heaven, who is infinite and eternal, from everlasting to everlasting the same
unchangeable God, the framer of heaven and earth, and all things which are in them"
(Doctrine and Covenants 20:17). The Book of Mormon teaches something similar: "For
I know that God is not a partial God, neither a changeable being; but he is unchangeable
from all eternity to all eternity" (Moroni 8:18).
At another point in his life, he taught that Heavenly Father changed from some type of being into a God:
"I will go back to the beginning before the world was, to show what kind of
being God is. What sort of a being was God in the beginning? Open you ears and hear, all
ye ends of the earth, for I am going to prove it to you by the Bible, and to tell you the
designs of God in relation to the human race, and why He interferes with the affairs of
man. God himself was once as we are now, and is an exalted man, and sits enthroned in
yonder heavens!" (Teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith, 2002, page 357).
"We have imagined and supposed that God was God from all eternity. I will
refute that idea, and take away the veil, so that you may see" (ibid, page 358).
These last two quotes are also found on pages 345-346 of the 1938 version compiled by
Joseph Fielding Smith.
What is your definition of "Eternal" or "Everlasting" God?
The Mormon Heavenly Father is a resurrected personnage of flesh and bones.
"The Father has a body of flesh and bones as tangible as man’s"
(Doctrine and Covenants 130:22). See also "Teachings of Presidents of the
Church, Joseph F. Smith," Chapter 40, page 356.
The Mormon Heavenly Father is not omnipresent.
"Each occupies space and is and can be in but one place at one time, but each has
power and influence that is everywhere present" (Doctrines of the Gospel Student
Manual - Religion 430-431, page 8).
The Mormon Heavenly Father is married to at least one Goddess wife in heaven.
“All men and women are … literally the sons and daughters of Deity.
Man, as a spirit, was begotten and born of heavenly parents, and reared to maturity in the
eternal mansions of the Father, prior to coming upon the earth in a temporal [physical]
body” (Gospel Principles, page 11).
"These spirit beings [referring to those on planet Earth], the offspring of exalted parents, were men and women, appearing in all respects as mortal persons do, excepting only that their spirit bodies were made of a more pure and refined substance" (Doctrines of the Gospel Student Manual, chapter 6, page 14).
Heavenly Father, like Heavenly Mother, was a person who needed to get exalted. It is unclear from Mormon theology whether some other 'Jesus' atoned for the sins of Heavenly Father on his earth or whether Heavenly Father atoned for the sins of Heavenly Mother when she was a mortal.
The following writing by Joseph Smith reveals that Heavenly Father is a polygamous husband:
"Verily, thus saith the Lord unto you my servant Joseph, that inasmuch as you have inquired of my hand to know and understand wherein I, the Lord, justified my servants Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, as also Moses, David and Solomon, my servants, as touching the principle and doctrine of their having many wives and concubines - Behold, and lo, I am the Lord thy God, and will answer thee as touching this matter."
"Abraham received all things, whatsoever he received, by revelation and commandment, by my word, saith the Lord, and hath entered into his exaltation and sitteth upon his throne. Abraham received promises concerning his seed, and of the fruit of his loins—from whose loins ye are, namely, my servant Joseph - which were to continue so long as they were in the world; and as touching Abraham and his seed, out of the world they should continue; both in the world and out of the world should they continue as innumerable as the stars; or, if ye were to count the sand upon the seashore ye could not number them. This promise is yours also, because ye are of Abraham, and the promise was made unto Abraham; and by this law is the continuation of the works of my Father, wherein he glorifieth himself" (Doctrine and Covenants 132:1-2,29-31).
The Mormon Heavenly Father glorified himself in the same law. A polygamous marriage is a requirement for exaltation as
pertaining to the law of the LDS priesthood: “They [the virgins] are given unto him to multiply and replenish the
earth, according to my commandment, and to fulfill the promise which was given by my Father before the foundation
of the world, and for their exaltation in the eternal worlds, that they may bear the souls of men; for herein is the
work of my Father continued, that he may be glorified” (vv. 61, 63).
Polygamy was suspended by the Mormon Church back in 1890. It is believed by some
that polygamy will be resumed again in the future.