posted
BB: I have no idea why you're drawing the pig example. So far, I've never said anything about persecution aside from agreeing to the fact that not all Christians persecute Jews.
(As an aside addressing that: *shrug* If the government of the France started deporting Muslims wholesale, in contradiction with their equivalent of the Constitution would we really draw the fine distinction that while *French people* persecuted Muslims, *France* did not? I do not think so.
I'm not sure why you're attempting to draw a different distinction between Islam and Muslims and furthermore how that relates to my line of inquiry)
In any case, so if Christians as a group were in apostasy starting in 100AD, when did they stop?
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Rakeesh: I believe that what you quoted is *in fact* a question.
katharina: IIRC, That is no good for Christians *as a group*. That works for Mormons and any other Restorationists as subgroups of Christians, but not Christians as a whole. Specifically, it is my understanding that Catholics and the other groups that in fact form the majority of Christianity that they do not generally in fact accept as truth what you call the restoration. Is that not correct?
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I'm not 100% sure I follow the "when did you stop beating your wife" reference.
However, if I understand you correctly (and feel free to correct me), what you're saying is that Mormons believe that other Christians *still* are in apostasy, that is not really following the teachings of Christ. (I'm going to use Mormons as a synonym for Restorationalists for brevity in the next paragraph)
So in a very real sense, it seems that while OSC or Mitt Romney are trying to gain mainstream acceptance for Mormons *as* Christians, Mormons believe that Mormons are the *only real* Christians around and in fact believe that the rest of Christians are not really Christian.
To shorten that, in response to the accusation "You're not really Christian" the response is "No. You're wrong. I am Christian. You're not really Christian!"
Is that really true? That seems bizarre to me.
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posted
The definition of "apostasy" is what is important here.
BB cites 100 AD; I'm not sure why he's picked that date, though a lot of Mormons will argue that "apostasy" was complete upon the death of the original twelve apostles, generally assumed to be around then. Other Mormons will cite the Council of Nicea, piggybacking on the traditional rhetoric of the Reformers.
These two dates indicate two general arguments Mormons make about the "apostasy." The first date has to do with a loss of priesthood authority to perform salvific ordinances. The second date has to do with a more general loss of correct doctrine - closer to the argument Mucus cites.
I would, though, take issue with a particular point of Mucus's argument - neither of these models of apostasy are directly relevant to "following the teachings of Christ," in the sense of generally worshipping God, engaging in ethical behavior, and so forth, all of which Mormons today are quick to acknowledge exists in all religions. Indeed, that's generally how Mormons define "Christian," which is why the accusation of not being Christian tends to chap Mormon hides.
By the way, I personally am not entirely satisfied with either of those 'apostasy' arguments, but find the one about correct authority more tenable. Interestingly, it's also the one more frequently cited by Mormons today. I think that's because it's somewhat more public relations friendly.
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posted
Point of order: Mormons don't believe all 12 apostles actually died, so that couldn't really be the triggering event of the apostasy. Also, I think Paul may be considered a true apostle. But when you look at Pauls writings, he was dealing with an ongoing apostasy all the time.
I heard an interesting point the other day, that the trinity was not invented at Nicea, but was an existing interpretation that existed in dynamic tension with unity theology but gained institutional credence with Nicea.
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True, pooka on John, but that's a phrase I still hear tossed around a lot.
The problem with Paul is that the office of "apostle" as the LDS church describes it today is not the way it's used in the New Testament or in Joseph Smith's church.
Also, I think it's more accurate to describe the Pauline church as multiple Christianities; there was really no orthodox Christianity in the first few centuries, but a diversity of theological claims that even the leaders of the nascent church disagreed on. Acts and Galatians document this, as do Paul's other letters.
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quote:Also, I think it's more accurate to describe the Pauline church as multiple Christianities; there was really no orthodox Christianity in the first few centuries, but a diversity of theological claims that even the leaders of the nascent church disagreed on
This raises the very interesting issue of what, exactly, Christianity is, and what the role of orthodoxy should be. It's said religion should be the steering wheel and not the spare tire. (I think the guy who founded Boy's Town said that). So what are the four tires that are in contact with the ground?
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quote:Originally posted by MattB: The definition of "apostasy" is what is important here. ... I would, though, take issue with a particular point of Mucus's argument - neither of these models of apostasy are directly relevant to "following the teachings of Christ," in the sense of generally worshipping God, engaging in ethical behavior, and so forth, all of which Mormons today are quick to acknowledge exists in all religions. Indeed, that's generally how Mormons define "Christian," ...
(All "Abrahamic" religions actually)
You're probably right.
The term apostasy is definitely confusing to me since thats the term many other faiths use when someone leaves their faith outright. Normally, the term "apostasy" is used when you leave a faith and the term "heresy" when you change it in unapproved ways, but still essentially stay within the faith. It seems like "Great Heresy" would be preferable to "Great Apostasy"
Rakeesh: What IS my meaning?
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Man, I'm sorry if this is offensive to other Mormons, but I have a real problem with some of BB's comments in this thread. I think if you're going to get touchy about other Christians saying you're not Christian, than you can't just offhandedly exclude your religion from responsibility when someone says "Christians have a history of. . ." because your branch of Christianity didn't exist during that time frame. Either we're all Christians and it's our shared history and we differ on a few important details, or we're not. You can't have it both ways.
And I'm aware that you believe that other Christians are fundamentally wrong, but you still come from the same shared history. God didn't reveal the golden plates to a Buddist in Thailand, who would have had to do a whole heck of a lot more background work than just adding the Book of Mormon to people who already believed in the Bible. Joseph Smith was able to build on the foundation of people who already believed in the same God he was preaching about. My branch of Christianity wasn't around during the Crusades, either, but that doesn't mean I get to say that wasn't my religion that's responsible for them.
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posted
I'm fine with everything you just said, ElJay. I think you're right.
My problem with Lisa's comments of "your people did [blank]" is that I don't believe in holding people responsible for what strangers did hundreds of years ago.
People act like crap all the time. Even people who claim to be followers of good do evil. Even people who WANT to be followers of good sometimes do evil. That doesn't mean that good is actually evil, but that people do evil things.
Dismissing people for what other people did hundreds of years ago is unfair and irrevelant. Condemning Christians now for behavior of other Christians during the middle ages is as much nonsense as condemning Jews now for "killing Christ." The analogy is chosen deliberately. Returning evil for evil doesn't make it good. (In this example evil 1 = blaming all Jews for Christ's death; evil 2 = blaming all Christians for blaming all Jews for Christ's death.)
Rather than saying "Hey, those weren't my people," my response would be "Why on earth are you perpetuating a stupid, fruitless habit of blame of centuries old sins?"
Though all things foul should wear the brow of grace, yet grace must still look so. --MacBeth 4:3
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posted
Actually, I had missed the starkness with which BB disassociated Mormonism from the rest of Christianity at the end of the last page; I don't think that's characteristic of the Mormon leadership nor of Mormon thought in general, on either the popular or elite levels.
Despite some incendiary rhetoric about Protestants, Joseph Smith, BH Roberts, and other early Mormon leaders had surprisingly positive things to say about Catholicism. More recently, there been a burgeoning (if somewhat simplistic) cult of the Reformation on the popular level, celebrating Tyndale and Luther and the rest for "laying the groundwork for the Restoration."
On a more sophisticated level, Mormonism lifts a great deal from Protestantism. The Book of Mormon quotes or paraphrases the King James Bible on over a thousand occasions, or a little less than twice a page, on average (preemptive cite: Mark Thomas, Digging in Cumorah. Salt Lake, 1999, page 17). The Mormon Sunday meeting is a close image of Congregational meetings of the seventeenth through nineteenth century; we even administer the Eucharist in the same way the Puritans did. The common Mormon notion of the atonement is lifted directly from John Calvin's penal substitution theory; the phrase "burning in the bosom" Mormons still use today entered the language of Christian experience via the fourteenth century mystic Richard Rolle; and the Mormon notion of 'callings' (even the word itself) also derives directly from the Reformation thinkers. Mormons owe much, much more than they generally are aware to the broader Christian tradition.
Finally, though it seems I drag this out every few months, I would note that in February 1978 the First Presidency issued a proclamation stating that religious leaders from Muhammad to the Reformers to Buddha "received a portion of God's light."
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quote:Originally posted by ElJay: Either we're all Christians and it's our shared history and we differ on a few important details, or we're not. You can't have it both ways.
QFT.
I think this gets at the root at whats been prickling at my subconscious for the last page or so.
Either you're a Christian and you buy into the shared history or you're not. If you tell people you're Christian when it suits you (to gain votes or whatnot) but then swing around and tell people that you're not Christian when it doesn't suit you, then thats kind of like cherry-picking.
(... and the persecution issue seems to be a red herring to me. You can simply say "Yeah, I'm a Christian and we did some stuff we're not proud of. We're better now. Sorry")
Personally, I could care less whether you want to be called Christian or not* but consistency is key.
* with the caveat that from an academic POV, I greatly prefer monophyletic ( link ) groups rather than polyphyletic groups, which is what you would get if you had a "Christianity" group that arbitrarily excludes Mormonism
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posted
*sigh* I seem to be bugging alot more people than usual.
Far be it from me to say that Protestants and Catholics are evil or that their churches are intent on committing evil. As a Christian I do believe that God has workings within both churches and uses their adherents as tools. I also believe that Buddha, Mohammed, Luther, Zwingli, etc all had portions of God's truth instilled in their minds. But I do not believe that many of the things done in the name of Christianity have a basis in Christianity either logically or spiritually. The crusades had no basis in scripture, or in revelation. The Spanish Inquisition belongs to that category as well. The Tai Ping Rebellion, The Salem Witch Trials, etc are all examples of people stating that Christianity was guiding them in their works, but upon careful analysis those claims become laughable at best, utterly ridiculous at worst.
What I object to is the idea that every Christian is a party to those events because we are descended from men and women who perpetrated them, or because those ancestors acted under the stated banner of Christianity and therefore it is de facto Christianity that spurred them on.
I reject those people's claim to fealty to Christ. I also deny that they had any legitimate argument that Christ sanctioned those actions. They are the people who will exclaim to God that they did many mighty works in His name and God's reply will be, "I never knew thee."
I do not believe that anti antisemitism has any claim on Christianity at all.
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I also don't believe that Christ sanctioned any of those actions, but the fact remains that the majority of the people who took them believed with all their heart and souls that they were serving Christ. So I don't think that it's valid for those of us that now claim the title of Christian to say it wasn't my religion that did that. Well, yes, it was. It was extremely misguided people who did that, but they did it as Christians as what they feverently believed Christ wanted them to do.
So, we can say those people made mistakes, and I believe that they were wrong and weren't guided by God. And I don't believe that we carry their guilt, as you and kat have both said, we're different people. But we still have to acknowledge that it was done under the banner of our religion. To disavow it like you are is a total cop-out. You don't get to make judgement on their fealty to Christ any more than I get to make judgement on yours.
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I agree with what you said, but not really for the reasons you outlined. 'Christian' is a word that correctly defines a lot of people. If someone doesn't try to lay claim to the good done under the general banner of Christianity (but not their specific banner, such as Roman Catholic, Mormon, Lutheran, etc.), then I think it's alright for a person to disavow evil done in the name of a different brand of Christianity's banner, too.
Of course in practice, from what I have seen, many Christians are pretty liberal about laying claim to the good, and pretty quick to point out that it was some other Christians who did the bad, so there you go.
Now as for your point about a shared history specifically with regards to where Mormonism began, I agree with you. Even though our specific brand of Christianity (which of course we believe is the correct one) wasn't around when things like the Crusades happened, our forefathers who first converted to our religion did belong to such sects.
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quote:Either you're a Christian and you buy into the shared history or you're not. If you tell people you're Christian when it suits you (to gain votes or whatnot) but then swing around and tell people that you're not Christian when it doesn't suit you, then thats kind of like cherry-picking.
I disagree strongly with this. I hardly think that which larger group you self-identify with for historical blame-game purposes is what makes one a Christian or not.
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Blackblade,
quote:I reject those people's claim to fealty to Christ.
Insofar as 'fealty' means loyalty and devotion (which are two of the more common definitions of that uncommon word), I disagree strongly with you. To reject those people's claims of correct interpretation is one thing, to reject their loyalty and devotion is quite another.
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quote:Insofar as 'fealty' means loyalty and devotion (which are two of the more common definitions of that uncommon word), I disagree strongly with you. To reject those people's claims of correct interpretation is one thing, to reject their loyalty and devotion is quite another.
I agree, I am saying those who slew Jews and excused themselves in the name of Christ had no fealty to Him.
I can accept that many Christians relied on their leaders to explain to them what the scriptures said and where therefore deceived. But those who were at the top and making decisions have no claim to the religion I belong to.
I'm not saying who falls under that category, only that those people existed. I do not believe in a crusade where everyone meant well.
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I'm not prepared to go that far, seeing as how so many of the people who did those things were so poorly taught what it meant to be a Christian. Hell, for most of history most Christians were illiterate. To them, 'Christian' often effectively meant 'what my local authority says'.
I say that they were loyal to Christ, but were very, very badly wrong about what Christ wanted. This is not to say they get a pass, though, because ultimately we all bear responsibility for our actions, and even if you're taught to do something evil, if you do that evil thing, you're still doing evil.
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quote:Originally posted by Rakeesh: I disagree strongly with this. I hardly think that which larger group you self-identify with for historical blame-game purposes is what makes one a Christian or not.
I think that which larger group you self-identify with, for *whatever* purposes, is what makes one a Christian or not. Period.
If you find yourself requiring to choose a different self-identification for when dealing with different people, then thats a big sign of a problem.
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quote:I think that which larger group you self-identify with, for *whatever* purposes, is what makes one a Christian or not. Period.
*puzzled* You think that following the teachings of and believing in Jesus Christ is a factor of which larger group you self-identify with? That's just baffling to me.
The belief and following come before the self-identification with the larger group, Mucus, not the other way around. I didn't become a Christian because I started self-identifying with a bunch of other Christians, I started self-identifying with a bunch of other Christians because I became a Christian.
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posted
I don't think we're using the phrase "self-identify" in the same way.
See this example, as the first example I found on Google.
quote:How may employees identify themselves? The preferred method of employee identification is voluntary, self-identification. Employees may self-identify by using the MIT SAP Employee Self Service application.
i.e. when I use the word "self-identify", what I mean is that I generally accept the word (self-identification) of the person telling me whatever they are, Christian or not, until proven otherwise
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quote:I reject those people's claim to fealty to Christ.
I prefer to argue against the atrocities being laid upon Christianity rather than saying those people are outside of Christianity. I don't really think the violent Jihad going on today is really inherent to Islam. It's about power and land and money, and Religion is something sociopaths have found they can use to get other people to do their dirty work for them.
I wouldn't lay it on the crusaders being christian any more than I'd lay it on their being white or male or any of the other categories we tend to assume crusaders fall into.
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