In this video, LDS scholar Terryl Givens, a former professor of literature and religion at the University of Richmond and co-author (along with his wife Fiona Givens) of the co-author of The God Who Weeps: How Mormonism Makes Sense of Life and Crucible of Doubt: Reflections on the Quest for Faith, eloquently articulates his view that God is startlingly different from the God of classical theism. And whatever one may think of his views, he is certainly a powerful and persuasive speaker.
Not only does Givens reject the view that God is omniscient, omnipotent and omnipresent, but He also rejects the idea that God is incorporeal, impassible (unable to suffer), timeless, and able to create things ex nihilo. Indeed, he goes further, and defends the Mormon teaching that God the Father has a body like ours (complete with male genitals), that He has a female partner, that He feels our pain, and that there is a difference only in degree between Him and human beings: as Mormon theology phrases it, we are acorns, and He is the oak, which means that at some future stage, we will become gods. Moreover, Givens considers the persons of the Trinity to be distinct beings, each with their own center of consciousness. As he puts it, if they share a single consciousness, then how can the Father be impassible and the Son passible? But the greatest difference between LDS theology is that it makes God’s sovereignty or transcendence His defining attribute, rather than His love. From this, it follows that God’s standards of justice might be very different from our own – which is how Christians rebut the objection that the God of the Bible is unjust: He is unjust only when judged by human standards. If love is God’s primary attribute, on the other hand, then we may reasonably hope that all will be saved, as universalism teaches. Givens also touches on the Mormon teaching that human souls are pre-existent (a view also taught by the Church Father Origen) and that they are always capable of being redeemed (universalism). Before we can become gods, however, we must reach a stage in our moral development where we are completely free from sin. This, says Givens, is something we can achieve by our own efforts. Mormons espouse the Pelagian view that we can become good by trying. St. Augustine of Hippo is the villain in Givens’ reading of Christian history: it was he who discredited the enlightened teachings of Origen, affirmed the utter transcendence of God, insisted that we are totally reliant on God’s grace in order to avoid sin, and who taught the gloomy view that most of us are damned: God saves only those whom He wishes to redeem, for reasons known only to Himself.
So, is Givens’ view persuasive? On the positive side, I think a lot can be said for Given’s claim that the “triple omni” view of God as omniscient, omnipotent and omnipresent is unbiblical, that the God of the Bible is not an ex nihilo creator (a teaching that was not affirmed by Christians until 170 A.D.), and that God the Father was originally envisaged by the Jews as a corporeal, male entity who also had a wife (Asherah). On the other hand, at least the germ of the idea of divine transcendence and omnipresence seems to be found in Deutero-Isaiah (see Isaiah 55:8-9) and in the later Psalms (see Psalm 139:7-18), although the view being affirmed in these verses is not that God is incorporeal but that He occupies all of space, and maps out all of human history. Givens also appears to ignore an obvious theological objection to Mormonism: namely, that a corporeal being with a body like ours (as God the Father is claimed by Mormons to be) cannot serve as the ultimate explanation of everything, as a physical body can only exist within a larger milieu of space and time. Perhaps we should speak of God as super-corporeal: not above the physical, but more physical than we can possibly imagine. Finally, while I acknowledge the theological appeal of the doctrines of the pre-existence of souls and universalism, I would have to acknowledge that neither is found in the Bible.
Nevertheless, I think Mormonism deserves credit for making Christians question the classical theistic view of God and recognize that it is utterly unbiblical, and for raising the question of what sort of God we want to worship: one Who is primarily transcendent, or one Who is primarily our loving Father. Let me nail my theological flag to the mast and declare that I prefer the latter: a God Who knows us intimately, Who loves us all (both the righteous and the unrighteous) and Who grieves when we don’t love Him back. But if the classical theists are right, God is only our Father in a metaphorical sense: He does not feel our pleasures or our pains, or even think about us: the only thing He contemplates is Himself, and He is said to know us only insofar as we participate in His infinite Being.
That’s my two cents on Givens’ talk. Readers are invited to weigh in. What do you think?
vjtorley:
Unfortunately, only those who gain admittance to the highest of the three levels of heaven (the Celestial Kingdom) get to become gods. I’m screwed. 😡
vjtorley:
If that’s what classical theists believe, how do the ones who are Christians reconcile it with the idea that God sent his Son to redeem us? If God doesn’t think about us, why would it occur to him to try to save us?
I haven’t watched the video yet, but I dig that image behind them in the YouTube preview. Is that supposed to represent the Trinity? Four eyes, three Persons? Why does one of them have to share both eyes, while the other two only have to share one? I’ll bet it’s the Holy Spirit, because he always gets the short end of the stick. Third Fiddle to the Father and the Son.
On the other hand, there might be a fourth face facing backwards, in which case everyone has to share both eyes. It could be a Tetrad rather than a Trinity. Father, Son, Holy Ghost, and… Bob?
This must be your shortest post ever, VJ. Congratulations!
Would it kill you to watch the freaking video?
J-Mac:
No, it wouldn’t. Which is a relief, because I’m planning to watch it later and I don’t want to die.
Any other questions?
I have watched about half of the video so far, and found it surprisingly interesting. Its all the usual fiction, but Givens is an engaging speaker, a pleasure to watch.
So the Mormons think god is a ‘flesh and bone’ character, as distinct from the ethereal ghost of the rest of Christianity. This is a bit more than a mere detail, wouldnt you think ? So who is correct ? And how does god feel, watching us fighting over this nonsense when he could have been just a bit clearer.
I’m told by some people who live in Utah that most Mormons do not trouble themselves over theology and consider the church to be a social institution.
You are killing be, keiths. I’d thought you would criticize the title: “What is God?” Shouldn’t it be: “Who is God?”
Minor detail… 😉
J-Mac:
Both questions are legit, actually, and they have different answers. In response to the question “Who is God?”, a Christian could answer “Yahweh” and a Zoroastrian could answer “Ahura Mazda”. The question “What is God?” could be answered with “an all-powerful entity”, “the standard of objective morality”, and so on.
The video deals with the nature of God, so the question “What is God?” is appropriate.
Read the second verse of the Bible and try to think of God as corporeal there. Even the earth is not corporeal in that verse.
Classical theism has plenty of subtleties that do not come easily, so those who have arrived at it have thoroughly questioned it. Mormonism provides nothing that has not already been considered and rejected.
As does classical theism. Just by different people.
There’s no question religious creeds and practices are culturally based. How else could, picking an extreme example, Young Earth creationism survive except in a cultural bubble, where ignoring evidence of your own eyes is raised to an art form.
Mind you, just reading up on Joseph Smith and Brigham Young, it boggles my mind how Mormons made it through.
So, you are the only one here who is not misinformed?
You know what is funny but I always thought that you and someone else here knew what was going on…
Congratulations, keiths!
J-Mac:
I have no idea how you inferred that from anything I’ve written in this thread.
I have, pretty much from age 11, thought religion was a McGuffin.
We all get old…
Oolon Colluphid had the last word on this subject.
VJ
Thanks for the interesting post. I now have a better grasp of the differences between the Mormon faith and classic Christianity.
I agree with your point here as the evidence supports creation as evidence of the nature of our universe containing complex biology and complex atomic components that make up that biology.
Do you know how they came up with the idea of an embodied God? Is there anything more than Joseph Smiths claim. Just seeing God as he is able to appear in human form to Abraham does not mean he is constrained to the elements of our universe.
The bible as early as the Torah indicates God is spirit and not embodied as Arrons sons died in his presents from not being spiritually pure. The prophetic nature of the Bible also contradicts this assertion IMO.
Here is Groks analysis.
https://grok.com/share/bGVnYWN5_f018fed8-d0fd-4d2f-861f-71d77614f53e
Additionally from Grok regarding Arrons sons.
colewd:
Much of Mormon theology was pulled (or rather, expelled) directly from Joseph Smith’s ass, but there is considerable Biblical support for a corporeal God, and it goes way beyond Abraham’s encounter with God.
In Genesis, you have God audibly walking in the Garden, looking for Adam and Eve and being unable to find them. Later you have Moses being allowed to see God’s back but not his face. Then there’s Jacob actually, physically wrestling with God. Those are just the ones I remember — there are probably more.
Regarding the idea that God exists within the universe rather than having created it, Genesis 1 certainly seems to support it, because it talks about the earth being “without form, and void” before God begins his creative work. I know the scholarly consensus is that the biblical God didn’t create matter, he organized it, and that’s what Mormons believe. Creation out of nothing is a later idea that got tacked on to Christianity.
Here’s one thing I still don’t understand about Mormon theology: God lives near a star called Kolob, within our universe. Yet the act of creation was God’s reorganization of pre-existing matter. God presumably didn’t reorganize Kolob or his own body, so the reorganization must have been confined to a portion of the universe.
Also, since many of us are going to become gods ourselves, there must be some way of divvying up the universe and doling out pieces to the new gods. Do they then get to reorganize it themselves? And is the universe finite? Because then at some point we’ll run out of matter to dole out to the new gods. Maybe the final gods will have dominion over a single electron or quark, and then theogenesis will come to a halt. Or maybe Mormons believe that the universe is infinite. Even then, we might run out of matter. It depends on what the current theodensity of the universe is.
When I was a kid (and still a Lutheran), I’d argue theology with a Mormon friend of mine, but the topic of creation never came up. (He had a very feminine older sister who was legendary at our school for having beaten all the guys at arm wrestling. Maybe she had God on her side, and Mormonism is the true religion.)
As an aside, I kind of like the Mormon idea that Satan was Jesus’s brother. Fraternal conflict is a biblical theme: think Jacob and Esau and Cain and Abel. Might as well have a cosmic fraternal conflict.
vjtorley:
Here’s what I don’t get. Some of the pre-existent souls are God’s “spirit children”, but others aren’t. After all, there are many other gods who presumably have their own spirit children. Have the parent/child relationships been determined for all eternity, or is there an adoption process?
When a person ascends to godhood, does he get to choose his spirit children from the pool of unallocated souls? Does he have to recruit them? Are there Gods who can’t get anyone to sign up and just have to twiddle their thumbs for eternity in their empty kingdoms?
Is it easier to ascend to godhood in some kingdoms versus others? If so, I can imagine lots of souls clamoring to sign up as spirit children in those kingdoms versus other, more difficult ones.
Is the pool of souls infinite? If the universe has always existed, then there has been infinite time available for souls to ascend to godhood. If the pool of souls is finite, then all of them (or all of the eligible ones, anyway) should have become gods infinitely long ago. In that case, why is the process ongoing?
I don’t think Joseph Smith had a particularly mathematical mind.
Givens:
Yes, and there is something deeply flawed in the character of a God who refuses to save everyone. Which is the God that most Christians believe in.
Some theologies strike me as defining God as a psychopath, an entity lacking empathy. The phrase, “I feel your pain” leads me to suspect that the person saying it doesn’t feel other people’s pain.