sock puppet wrote:So was the FP stupid or uninspired when the pronounced 8/17/1949 that the ban against blacks getting the priesthood was a direct commandment from the Lord, and doctrine?
I suppose that indirectly you are referring to the latest pronouncement:
...church leaders and members advanced many theories to explain the priesthood and temple restrictions. None of these explanations is accepted today as the official doctrine of the Church.
and how that fits with the 1949 statement:
August 17, 1949
The attitude of the Church with reference to Negroes remains as it has always stood. It is not a matter of the declaration of a policy but of direct commandment from the Lord, on which is founded the doctrine of the Church from the days of its organization, to the effect that Negroes may become members of the Church but that they are not entitled to the priesthood at the present time. The prophets of the Lord have made several statements as to the operation of the principle. President Brigham Young said: "Why are so many of the inhabitants of the earth cursed with a skin of blackness? It comes in consequence of their fathers rejecting the power of the holy priesthood, and the law of God. They will go down to death. And when all the rest of the children have received their blessings in the holy priesthood, then that curse will be removed from the seed of Cain, and they will then come up and possess the priesthood, and receive all the blessings which we now are entitled to."
President Wilford Woodruff made the following statement: "The day will come when all that race will be redeemed and possess all the blessings which we now have."
The position of the Church regarding the Negro may be understood when another doctrine of the Church is kept in mind, namely, that the conduct of spirits in the premortal existence has some determining effect upon the conditions and circumstances under which these spirits take on mortality and that while the details of this principle have not been made known, the mortality is a privilege that is given to those who maintain their first estate; and that the worth of the privilege is so great that spirits are willing to come to earth and take on bodies no matter what the handicap may be as to the kind of bodies they are to secure; and that among the handicaps, failure of the right to enjoy in mortality the blessings of the priesthood is a handicap which spirits are willing to assume in order that they might come to earth. Under this principle there is no injustice whatsoever involved in this deprivation as to the holding of the priesthood by the Negroes.
The First Presidency [1]
Was the FP in 1949 stupid as a collective body? Well, they were apparently wrong...and if they were wrong they were either uninspired or as BRM later said...they were speaking according to the light and knowledge that they had. It gets rather messy when we start talking about how revelation occurs within the mind/heart and collective will of a group living within the confines of their own doctrinal upbringing and understanding. Just how much would/should God try to step in and say..."You're wrong!"...rather than gently nudging each generation along until you have the David O. McKay types that come along and FOR THEMSELVES 'see the light', so to speak. I would
like to think that in the general course of things that God can 'make' people see the light...but I think it may get a bit more messy and complicated than that...even with prophets. The process seems to be line upon line. The Old Testament seems to demonstrate at times that this is the case.
Now, can a FP statement come somewhere along the line of gradual perception and/or understanding of people...in accordance with natural evolution of thought/mind/heart...and that this becomes the 'word of the Lord' at a particular time? Just how much of a collaborative effort is the result of revelation...and its product?
Regards,
MG