Are Mormonism and Human Evolution Compatible?

[_Sethbag]

Arg. I accidentally put two replies to this thread in the other thread about Larry "I'm not gay" Craig.

I'm moving them over here.

Go back and re-read the Evolution thread, and especially my most recent post. I predict that you'll come back with some variation of "the Bible Dictionary doesn't really reflect LDS doctrine, because the Bible Dictionary was never voted on unanimously in General Conference" or some such crap.

So it's crap if the intro to the BD itself says it's not doctrinal?

Of course. This is pure and simple trying to have it both ways. The church teaches something, but then disclaims it as "not doctrinal"? If it's not LDS doctrine, then take it out of the Bible Dictionary the LDS print in their editions of the Bible. I use the Bible Dictionary entry just because it's the most accessible to me and I remember that it's in there. You and I both know that the doctrine of nothing having died on Earth until Adam fell has definitely been taught a lot in the LDS church. So, when you latch onto the BD's disclaimer, which part do you think is not doctrinal? What about the line near the end of the entry where it says that these things being literally true are confirmed through modern revelation? Are you saying that the claim that these things are verified through modern revelation is one of the statements that might be wrong?

Ok, so the Bible Dictionary printed in every copy of the LDS edition of the Bible, under the direction of the Lord's Anointed, for the past multiple decades, cannot be trusted to accurately reflect LDS beliefs, but some guy calling himself BCSpace on the Internet has it all figured out. And you're telling me that I'm the delusional one?

You are. You seem to be afflicted with the same delusion that haunts many older generation LDS who inccorectly assumed that the statement of any Apostle (contrary to D&C 107) is doctrine.

Ah, you mean, things taught by the Prophets, Seers, and Revelators? But I'm not even saying that any little word ever uttered by a given apostle must be church doctrine. I'm talking about widely taught, and widely accepted doctrines, and the "no death before the Fall" doctrine falls into that category. You can't now just disclaim this as one of Bruce R. McConkie's delusions; this doctrine precedes him by many decades in the church.

What haunts the younger generation then? The wishywashiness that comes with seeking to create a pseudo-theology through a process of exclusion, as Runtu recently said, and simply refusing to take a stand on anything at all?

BCSpace, you are a perfect example of exactly what I'm talking about when I say there are members, and there are some on this board, who wish to believe in their own, personalized form of Mormonism. You don't believe the same things that our grandparents and parents in the church believed. You've chosen to jettison, as you should, the false teachings of our past prophets as you've seen them become no longer viable, but you are missing the whole point, which is that this religion was, is, and always will be manmade in the first place!

You still want to believe that the church is somehow "true", but you don't want to deal with having to believe the kinds of things that the church has traditionally believed. And you don't want to deal with the fact that LDS prophets have a long history of making statements of fact that turn out to be false, and have thereby shot their credibility all to hell. Somehow the church can be true, at the same time as the words of the prophets are meaningless, and when the teachings of the church can be disclaimed at will.

[_Sethbag]

Aaronic priesthood lesson on the Fall of Adam
"Explain that physical death, known also as temporal death, was introduced into the world as a consequence of the Fall. As a result of the Fall, all people and all forms of life upon the earth must suffer a physical death, a separation of spirit and body."

Here's a statement from Russel M. Nelson's talk here

"The Fall of Adam (and Eve) constituted the mortal creation and brought about the required changes in their bodies, including the circulation of blood and other modifications as well. 8 They were now able to have children. They and their posterity also became subject to injury, disease, and death. And a loving Creator blessed them with healing power by which the life and function of precious physical bodies could be preserved. For example, bones, if broken, could become solid again. Lacerations of the flesh could heal themselves. And miraculously, leaks in the circulation could be sealed off by components activated from the very blood being lost"

You're trying to say that the creation process itself might have been a typical, conventional mortal experience, that works with evolution, and then Adam and Eve had the blood removed from their bodies, their reproductive capacity disappeared, and they were put into a situation where if they made the right decision...... they would get their blood and their reproductive capacity back? You see how ridiculous this is from an LDS doctrinal point of view?

Here's another one from Russel M. Nelson here.

"Adam and Eve were first created with bodies of flesh and spirit, without blood, and were unable to die or beget children. Thus, we might describe this as a paradisiacal creation, one that initially equipped Adam and Eve to live in the Garden of Eden, which was in a state of everlasting paradise. (See Moses 4:28–29.)

Adam and Eve’s subsequent fall effected a change upon their bodies. While I don’t understand completely the chemistry of that change, somehow it permitted blood to circulate in their veins. It provided for processes of aging and death to come upon their tabernacles of flesh. And in a marvelous manner, it allowed the blessing of procreation, so that myriads of awaiting spirits could be born and thus obtain mortal bodies."

What part of "Adam and Eve were first created with bodies of flesh and spirit, without blood, and were unable to die or beget children" do you believe to be compatible with evolution?

Seriously, these are three references I found in just a few minutes on lds.org. There are a lot more teachings that make it clear that LDS doctrine is that Adam and Eve came about in a world in which there was no death, no blood in bodies, no ability to beget children, etc., and that is entirely incompatible with evolution. You can try to poke and prod and find more loopholes, but the bottom line is that the teachings of the LDS church with respect to the creation of Adam and Eve are simply not compatible with evolution. They only are compatible with evolution in the Gospel of BCSpace, Nephi, and Nehor.

[_The Nehor]

Yes, you are. And someday you may figure this out. It'll help if you stop making excuses for the LDS church and finding your own, "personal" ways to continue believing in it.

And your dating life is your business, obviously, but let's look at this realistically for a moment. Do you honestly think LDS women dig a guy who tells them he's seen God, angels, and the Devil? Who feels bliss every time he takes the sacrament? Who believes the church is true, but doesn't believe what the church teaches about so many things?

And seriously, the history that you're a part of doesn't begin until Adam? Just what in the hell does that even mean? You're a white boy, who speaks English, so you're part of the story of the development of the Indo-European language family, thought to have moved into Europe something like 9000 years ago (3000 or so years before the Biblical Adam timeframe). You're a descendant of ancient Europeans, who go back tens of thousands of years. You know that dude they found frozen in Austria in the ice a few years ago? He was part of the ancient history of the people you descend from.

Not your history? You're cutting off your nose to spite your face, or, less clichely, you're willing to cut yourself off from the history of humanity to which you belong, all before 6000 years or so ago, and divorce yourself from your roots, in order that your stone-age, goatherder mythologies can remain somewhat plausible to you?

Or else just what do you mean by this? How is this ancient world not your world? How is its history not your history? How do your statements about this make any sense whatsoever, apart from the value they have to you in helping you maintain some semblance of plausibility in your belief system?

It is literally true that your belief system is bronze-age mythology, personally reinterpreted as necessary to get around certain contradicting facts now recognized through modern research. How does that satisfy you? Oh, I think I know the answer to this. It's the religious euphoria into which you have trained yourself to fall through your meditation practices.

But dude, seriously, chicks don't dig guys who claim to see God, Angels, and the Devil. That's just too far out for even most Molly Mormons to stomach, much less your garden variety, less Molly Mormon girl.

So don't believe what I've experienced because it might interfere with my dating life? No, I'll pass. I refer to my dating life in a self-deprecating way for a cheap laugh. I'm not worried over it.

Poor me with my bronze-age mythology. How could something that came from more than 20 years ago possibly be right? Oh wait, my mythology even claims to predate the bronze age and the Earth itself. I guess I can live with that accusation.

[_Dakotah]

If you read your scriptures you will get a partial answer. The 'sons of Adam' married who? Where did these marriage partners come from?

Talmage and B. H. Roberts among others believed in pre-Adamic people here on the earth. The teachings of the current leaders only say that 'Adam was the father of our race' on this earth. Nothing in the scriptures says there were never any others.

[_The Nehor]

If you read your scriptures you will get a partial answer. The 'sons of Adam' married who? Where did these marriage partners come from?

Talmage and B. H. Roberts among others believed in pre-Adamic people here on the earth. The teachings of the current leaders only say that 'Adam was the father of our race' on this earth. Nothing in the scriptures says there were never any others.

Yeah, counting Dakotah and both of the Apostles to me that makes 4 in my anomalous teaching club that stands firm against all Church Doctrine...and 2 of them were apostles ;)

[_Jason Bourne]

Evolution includes very long periods of things living and dying. Mormon doctrine is that nothing died on Earth until Adam's Fall. Evolution is clearly not compatible with this LDS doctrine, and the only way around it is to soft-pedal the doctrine and reinterpret and redefine it as much as is required to avoid problems like this. Basically you have to give up traditional Mormon doctrines in order for evolution and other modern scientific principles to be compatible with Mormon doctrine. Isn't that ironic?

Certainly the creative time periods could have included things living and dying and then when the earth was ready it would have been put into a perfect state. I am really not all the hung up on this. I am not aware of the statements you refer to. But certianly there is wiggle room I think at least as far as the creation of the earth and life on it goes accept for the first man and woman and you point out those problems below.

There's quite simply too much redefinition going on. Mormon doctrine is clear on the subject. God created the earth, and he created the plants and animals, but man was not found on the earth, so God created Adam. This only works with actual Earth history if all the "pre-Adamites" are redefined as "not man", and then you have this tremendous problem of what to call all the homo sapiens who had already invented written language, and the wheel, and the agricultural revolution, and had already founded the first proto-civilizations, and were already speaking proto-Indo European languages and other ancestral languages, at the time Adam came along and was the "first man".

Yes I have noted it is an issue. Then are Adam and Eve mythical? If yes does that destroy the need for Jesus and does the whole premise of Christianity fall apart?

Surely you see the problem. This reality is simply not compatible with LDS doctrine without eviscerating and utterly redefining away LDS doctrine until it can be somewhat plausible.

I see the problem sure. But I see that perhaps your problem is rigidity. I think that there is room for understanding things differently. You don't. Thus you jettisonned your belief and I modify and roll with it realizing I live by faith and not be perfect knowledge and am ok with that.

Why bother? What is it about Mormonism to you that it needs to remain "true" enough that you're willing to redefine all your beliefs and basically give up so much of what Mormons believe and have believed, just so that it can remain true, or at least plausible, to you? What kind of hold does Mormonism have on you that you are driven to hold onto it in this way, when it is obviously not true? What is it about the hold the ideas of Mormonism has on your mind that you, an obviously intelligent man, are willing to twist and turn so much so that these cherished beliefs can still be true?

As noted a number of times elsewhere here I hold to my faith because of the utility it brings in my life. the joy and meaning and so on. I think you rather overstate what I twist and turn and what is and is not true to me. I often wonder how one can be so certian about things that are essentially unkowable. You do not know that evlution is like it claims. Sure there are evidences and theories but these change and shift often based on new discoveries. Are you so certain that you cannot let a bit of the mystical and metaphysical benefits that come through faith and religion come into your life. You were a strong believer once. How is it that you are so certain a non believer now, as certain a non believer as perhaps you were a TBM before. So many of you have traded one dogma for another.

Me I am just happy to still have faith and doubts at the same time and understand there is a hell of a lot I just do not know.

[_The Dude]

If you read your scriptures you will get a partial answer. The 'sons of Adam' married who? Where did these marriage partners come from?

Talmage and B. H. Roberts among others believed in pre-Adamic people here on the earth. The teachings of the current leaders only say that 'Adam was the father of our race' on this earth. Nothing in the scriptures says there were never any others.

Oh, so is this kind of like the need for "others" in America even though they were never mentioned in the Book of Mormon? Archaeology and DNA evidence demand their unmentioned existence for the Book of Mormon, as they do for the Bible in this instance. Why does this keep happening? Is it a pattern for failed teachings?

Even if we allow for this, you have to convert a lot of words from normal usage into a spiritual jargon. That's the only way to make Adam the father of our race, or the first man, or the head of a lineage. You have to dump the normal understanding of words like "father", "man" and "lineage" because in normal terms those words crash into the reality that Adam could only have been one individual among hundreds of thousands of contemporary humans who were related only through distant ancestors. In this picture, if Adam had been trampled by a mammoth before finding and marrying Eve, God could have named some other insignificant man to be "the father of our race" and we wouldn't know the difference.

[_Jason Bourne]

I think what BCSpace and I are alluding to is that most LDS do NOT believe in the literal fall of Adam and Eve. We see it symbolically.

Nephi are you wacky??? Sorry but most LDS if not almost ALL active LDS believe Adam and Eve are literal and the fall is literal. No question on this one.

[_Yoda]

I think what BCSpace and I are alluding to is that most LDS do NOT believe in the literal fall of Adam and Eve. We see it symbolically.

Nephi are you wacky??? Sorry but most LDS if not almost ALL active LDS believe Adam and Eve are literal and the fall is literal. No question on this one.

Agreed. I actually didn't even begin to think about the possibility of the fall of Adam and Eve being symbolic until I read a couple of religious studies books for a class I was auditing.

[_ozemc]

But dude, seriously, chicks don't dig guys who claim to see God, Angels, and the Devil. That's just too far out for even most Molly Mormons to stomach, much less your garden variety, less Molly Mormon girl.

Is that all you care about? "Chicks who don't dig guys who claim...."?

Take all the bimbos you want. What really motivates you?

Been married for 16+ years, Ray, and faithful ever since. I know there's the temptation to think it's "all about me", but in this case at least, it isn't, and I was addressing Nehor and his oft-mentioned trouble finding a good LDS woman to marry. My own personal opinion is that Nehor's "spirituality" and visitations and whatnot are too creepy for Mormon women, and that's really a big part of the failure to get married. Maybe he'll find a fringe Molly who wants a guy who falls into ecstasy with every prayer, is moved beyond words at each taking of the sacrament, but who doesn't need the Prophets, Seers, and Revelators telling him what to believe and do, because he's got God himself appearing to him to tell him his own personal version of the truth.

Just as an aside ... Aren't there breakaway sects of the "official" Mormon church in which the leader does just that? They have their own prophets?