. Anyway let me add a little bit more about controversial doctrine,
contridictions, etc. First of all thank you for correcting my spelling and that the abyss is the outer darkness. The first thing I will say though is that I was always taught that paradise was fairly broad on who got in. It was actually one of the doctrines that appealed to me as it seemed to answer the proverbial quiestion "What happens to good Hindu's?" I believe the quote I remember reading is that the first judgement would be on the basis of the rules that one lived by. However, it wouldn't suprise me if this is a doctrine that more gets added to as you move in so if I'm in error thanks for the correction. It would be just like coming to acceptance of the three levels of Heaven only to find out that there is doctrine stating that there are multiple levels of the Celestial and therefore multiple levels of gods lol. You get the original doctrine in a believable state and then I guess in some way it does make it easier to swallow the next step, probably the point. I even remember hearing at one point that the true LDS doctrine stated that only the church hierchy made it to the top level, but I didn't post this because I don't have anything to back it up except heresay.
Oh, thanks for the description of the telestial kingdom. I new Smith had said it was wonderful but I had also heard it said that it was pretty close to Earth, just a much much better Earth and on almost infiinate levels. In fact I've stood in the spot that Smith apparently had the vision in which he was shown the three levels of heaven, it made quite an impression on me at the time. However in thinking about this it brings up an interesting contradiction. Doctrine states that when one dies they either go to paradise or spirit prison (thanks again for the clarification of terms, its been a while since I've done this). However, the origin story of Jospeh Smith very clearly states that Moroni came to him as an angel, even stated the fact that he was an angel I think. Being an angel would denote that one had been ressurected and placed in the Terrestrial level of heaven. So, how did Moroni become an angel? My answer would be that if one examines the Book of Mormon it never mentions most of the church doctrines that came into effect in later years including the three level of heaven, the progression, etc. So, Smith probably came up with the story never prediciting that it would later contradict doctrine. The official church reponse brings up even more questions. They state that Moroni because of his mission was allowed to progress. However they had to answer another question to. If Moroni was preordained to hide the plates and then come back to Smith as an Angel, was he not denied agency (free will) and the chance to progress? He would have basically been stopped at the Terrestrial Kingdom by this reasoning from the beginning of time. The Church answer to this is not to worry about Moroni, that he is still progressing. This of course brings up the question of whether or not people can improve their position within Heaven once they get there and even possibly move up to a higher tier over time.
I'm glad you mentioned the patriarchal blessing thats a very interestiing subject. I believe the practice came around after the translation of the Pearl of Great price when Smith decided that Abraham was an astrologer and that the practice had a divine nature. From that point on supposedly elders of the church with a certain gift could look at the position of the stars and in doing so thin the veil to determine a person's past as a spirit and their mission on Earth. However, funny enough I've heard a few of these blessings / fortunes and they tend to be strikingly similar. For men it seems to be something heoric in one's past like you fought valiantly in the war in heaven and then something to spur them on in their church life to serve a mission and stay faithful to the church. For women, it seems to be essentially an order to stay good, faithful, and have lots of mormon children. So yes probably at least part of the reason for keeping one's patriarchal blessing a secret is so that 100 people don't get together and figure out they have the same one.
Another similar process to this that occurs within the temple occurs when one first gains the full priesthood and has full access to the temple. By the way thanks for correcting me, I forgot to mention that members of the church in good standing that don't have the full priesthood can get further then the gift shop
lol. But anyway the first time one gets to completely enter the temple and go to the tellestial, terrestrial, and celestial
rooms they are given a name. I believe that this is supposed to be their previous name from when they were a spirit and they name they would be known
by in immortality. These names tend to be from the BOM or the Bible, only used in the temple, and is not to be shared. However what they forget to
mention is that they essentially have a name of the day for men and for women and everyone gets that name for that day. I guess it cuts down on the
paperwork but it must be quite a divine effort to make sure that only people of the same name enter the temple for the first time on any given day.Another controversial was polygamy. When it was introduced Smith used the precident of the kings of ancient Israel. Namely those that were chosen could have multiple wives because they were worthy. From reading and this is speculative, the policy cme around about the time that Oliver Cowdrey's wife became available (Cowdrey left the church and his wife didn't follow.) So basically in the beginning polygamy was only for certain members of the hierchy at the behest of Smith.
The church is fanatical about making sure that the prophocies of Smith and other prophets come true and they are master apologists when need be. For example there was one gentlemen that for one reason or another Smith told would never see death. Now this is a direct reference to Jesus in the book of mormon telling his 3 beloved (ones that were extremely faithful) nephites that they would not see death and would dwell on the Earth until the second coming. However, Smith seems to have gotten ahead of himself because the guy died a few years later lol. The church answer to this is that he died in his sleep there for he never realized what was happening and did not "see" his death when it occured. Another was Smith's prophecy as to where the church would end up. If I remember correctly this spot was to be in Missouri but they were driven out of the area and eventually it became Salt Lake City according to the record of a saint that was with Smith and then Brigham Young. However the church has bought a good bit of land in the area of Missouri in question and it is now where Zion will be located during the Millenium of peace. I know there are other examples and any that people want to add would be appreciated.
Another previous practice of the mormons that didn't last very long for obvious reasons was that of blood atonement. This was a short used practice in Utah where if someone supposedly committed a particuarly grievous sin they were told that the only way to attone for the sin was death. They would then under order of the church willingly be taken out and disemboweled in a process reminescent of the blood oaths that they took. Word got out about this and it ended rather fast, but I remember at least one case when the practice was used because a member of the church hierarchy had taken favor to a mans wife. The man was put to death to atone for some rather convienent sin and then as a good upstanding member of the church the elder in question took the grieving widow to be one of his wives so she would be taken care of.
Yet another interesting doctrine is the word of wisdom. The word of wisdom is basically a dietary guideline that members are supposed to follow and is actually a good thing. It precludes the use of alchohol, tobacco, tea or coffee presumably for caffeine, and encourages the consumption of fruits and veggies and moderate consumption of meat. However, after the words of wisdom had been given they were not followed by the prophet or those close to him. I remember being in Institute (LDS college indoctrination) and reading a passage where Smith and his friends went out and had a nice picnic including a bottle of wine. I was the only one that seemed to be troubled that the prophet wasn't exactly practicing what he preached.
Finally, I find it pretty fascininating that Smith's early history is pretty much sweeped under the rug because it explains a lot of later events. Smith as a young man was somewhat of a scam artist. He would take money from people claiming to lead them to the location of buried treasure. He was eventually arrested for this and his trial is a matter or public record. The fascinating thing is the process Smith used to divine the location of said tresure. He had a stone he had found and claimed it to be a seer stone. He would put the stone in his cap, peer in, and be shown the location of the treature. It must not have been much of a stone because he didn't have any satisfied customers. However it does bear a striking resemblence to Smith's description of the Ummim and Thummin (Ok I butchered the spelling again), the magical stones used to translate the Book of Mormon. Smith would evidently put the magical stone in his hat and be given the translated meaning of the reformed hieroglyphics on the golden tablet.
[edit on 28-11-2004 by jukyu]
