The Mormon Apologetics Articles of Faith
Posted: Wed May 19, 2010 5:06 pm
1. We believe that it is self-explanatory that The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in its modern form is the same church that Joseph Smith started. It is therefore unnecessary to engage in any apologetic defense of why the Brighamite branch of Mormonism remained the true church, or why the Wilford Woodruff branch of Mormonism remained the true church.
2. Absence of proof is not proof of absence. This means that we can assume whatever we need to be true to be actually true or very probably true, and why critics of the Church cannot rely on the complete absence of any evidence whatsoever as a valid inference that something does not exist.
3. We believe in continuing revelation and inspiration given to prophets, seers, and revelators, insofar as it pertains only to administrative decisions like consolidating the three-hour block on Sundays or where to build a new temple, and in homilies about conforming to proper LDS behavior, like how many earrings a girl can have or what movies you can watch.
4. A prophet is only a prophet only when acting as such. If a member of the First Presidency or Quorum of the Twelve is giving a sermon to church members or speaking in general conference, he is not entitled to an automatic presumption that he is acting as a prophet. If a prophet or apostle has taught something that now seems embarrassing, is controverted by external evidence, and/or is inconsistent with an apologetic theory, he was a priori speculating and/or speaking only as a man.
5. We believe that the first principle of the restored gospel is a hyper-legalistic and largely self-serving definition of what constitutes "official church doctrine," such that we can freely disregard the teachings of prophets and apostles while claiming to be faithful members of the Church. Anyone who calls this hypocrisy or de facto apostasy is trying to impose standards of prophetic infallibility that we do not accept. We emphatically believe that prophets and apostles are playing a theological game of pinata, and we will be the judges of when they have managed to hit the pinata and made the candy come out.
6. We believe in The Book of Mormon, the Doctrine and Covenants, the Pearl of Great Price, and the Bible, insofar as they are interpreted correctly. The best test of whether the scriptures have been interpreted correctly is whether this interpretation can be made to fit an apologetic theory that makes the scriptures conform to the evidence. Thus, the prophets, seers, and revelators who are called by God to interpret scripture very frequently have no idea what they are talking about.
7. If you can create a chain of suppositions and assumptions in a way that might theoretically be somehow possible, the question has been conclusively answered.
8. People who point out flaws in apologetic theories are anti-Mormons and enemies of the Church. People who shred the teachings of Church leaders and/or completely ignore them to make the evidence fit the theory are defenders of the Church.
9. If you can find any parallel at all between an alleged group of ancient people and a real group of ancient people, no matter how distant or unrelated the parallel and the two groups, you can claim to have shown circumstantial evidence that the alleged ancient group of people really existed without needing to show any evidence that the alleged ancient group and the real ancient group ever actually interacted with each other.
10. We believe that The Book of Mormon was translated by the power of God. It was a word-for-word translation, and the "Hebraisms" in The Book of Mormon that Joseph Smith could not have known about are circumstantial evidence of its divine origin. It was a loose translation, and thus The Book of Mormon talking about things that did not not exist in the ancient Americas shows that Joseph Smith used lots of "loan words" (but see #2, supra), and the numerous grammatical and other mistakes in The Book of Mormon are also thus explained. We believe that Joseph Smith was an unlearned hillbilly who had only a rudimentary knowledge of the Bible and could not possibly have plagiarized much of The Book of Mormon from the Bible. We believe that Joseph Smith frequently recognized passages in The Book of Mormon that were similar to the Bible, and thus he used passages from the King James Bible to fill in those parts, which explains the parts of The Book of Mormon where errors in the King James Bible made their way in. And we believe all of these things at the same time.
11. We believe that the scribes and companions of Joseph Smith and other early church leaders are accurate sources of history, except for when they wrote things down wrong or put words in their mouths, depending on whatever is expedient for the argument we are currently making.
12. The plain, obvious meaning of the words someone said are not a reliable indication of what they meant.
13. "Ultimately, the truth of these things can only be known by the Spirit" is the Mormon apologetics version of, "And they lived happily ever after."
2. Absence of proof is not proof of absence. This means that we can assume whatever we need to be true to be actually true or very probably true, and why critics of the Church cannot rely on the complete absence of any evidence whatsoever as a valid inference that something does not exist.
3. We believe in continuing revelation and inspiration given to prophets, seers, and revelators, insofar as it pertains only to administrative decisions like consolidating the three-hour block on Sundays or where to build a new temple, and in homilies about conforming to proper LDS behavior, like how many earrings a girl can have or what movies you can watch.
4. A prophet is only a prophet only when acting as such. If a member of the First Presidency or Quorum of the Twelve is giving a sermon to church members or speaking in general conference, he is not entitled to an automatic presumption that he is acting as a prophet. If a prophet or apostle has taught something that now seems embarrassing, is controverted by external evidence, and/or is inconsistent with an apologetic theory, he was a priori speculating and/or speaking only as a man.
5. We believe that the first principle of the restored gospel is a hyper-legalistic and largely self-serving definition of what constitutes "official church doctrine," such that we can freely disregard the teachings of prophets and apostles while claiming to be faithful members of the Church. Anyone who calls this hypocrisy or de facto apostasy is trying to impose standards of prophetic infallibility that we do not accept. We emphatically believe that prophets and apostles are playing a theological game of pinata, and we will be the judges of when they have managed to hit the pinata and made the candy come out.
6. We believe in The Book of Mormon, the Doctrine and Covenants, the Pearl of Great Price, and the Bible, insofar as they are interpreted correctly. The best test of whether the scriptures have been interpreted correctly is whether this interpretation can be made to fit an apologetic theory that makes the scriptures conform to the evidence. Thus, the prophets, seers, and revelators who are called by God to interpret scripture very frequently have no idea what they are talking about.
7. If you can create a chain of suppositions and assumptions in a way that might theoretically be somehow possible, the question has been conclusively answered.
8. People who point out flaws in apologetic theories are anti-Mormons and enemies of the Church. People who shred the teachings of Church leaders and/or completely ignore them to make the evidence fit the theory are defenders of the Church.
9. If you can find any parallel at all between an alleged group of ancient people and a real group of ancient people, no matter how distant or unrelated the parallel and the two groups, you can claim to have shown circumstantial evidence that the alleged ancient group of people really existed without needing to show any evidence that the alleged ancient group and the real ancient group ever actually interacted with each other.
10. We believe that The Book of Mormon was translated by the power of God. It was a word-for-word translation, and the "Hebraisms" in The Book of Mormon that Joseph Smith could not have known about are circumstantial evidence of its divine origin. It was a loose translation, and thus The Book of Mormon talking about things that did not not exist in the ancient Americas shows that Joseph Smith used lots of "loan words" (but see #2, supra), and the numerous grammatical and other mistakes in The Book of Mormon are also thus explained. We believe that Joseph Smith was an unlearned hillbilly who had only a rudimentary knowledge of the Bible and could not possibly have plagiarized much of The Book of Mormon from the Bible. We believe that Joseph Smith frequently recognized passages in The Book of Mormon that were similar to the Bible, and thus he used passages from the King James Bible to fill in those parts, which explains the parts of The Book of Mormon where errors in the King James Bible made their way in. And we believe all of these things at the same time.
11. We believe that the scribes and companions of Joseph Smith and other early church leaders are accurate sources of history, except for when they wrote things down wrong or put words in their mouths, depending on whatever is expedient for the argument we are currently making.
12. The plain, obvious meaning of the words someone said are not a reliable indication of what they meant.
13. "Ultimately, the truth of these things can only be known by the Spirit" is the Mormon apologetics version of, "And they lived happily ever after."