THE
MORMON
CULT
by Ed Stevens
"Beloved, believe not every
spirit,
but try the spirits
whether they are of God..."
— I John 4:1.
During the nineteenth century
several new religious
movements
arose which today have millions of followers. They are Theosophy, Spiritualism, Christian
(?) Science, Russellism — now so-called "Jehovah's
Witnesses" of
the Watchtower Society, Seventh Day
Adventism, Pentecostalism, and Mormonism — designated as "The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day
Saints". The last four
mentioned all claim to have a
latter
day testimony
received from
heaven in visions
and
revelations, and that rejectors thereof will be
destroyed. If their testimony were of God all should be in perfect
harmony, but it is the opposite. Then where and how did this testimony arise?
The Bible tells us, "God is not
the author of confusion, but
of peace, and that "The Spirit speaketh
expressly
that some
shall depart from the faith, giving
heed to seducing spirits and doctrines of demons; speaking lies in hypocrisy;
having their conscience seared
with a hot iron (I Cor. 14:33; I Tim. 4:1, 2).
"He whom God hath sent speaketh
the words of God", we read in John 3:34.
FOUNDATIONS BEAR EXAMINATION
The acid test of stability and
truth is in the foundation. Let us
see how Mormonism was founded and under what circumstances. It began in the
visions of
a fifteen year old boy
named Joseph Smith.
(Seventh
Day Adventism had its real start with the visions of a
seventeen year old girl,
later known as Mrs. E. G.
White, whose writings her followers accept as
inspired of God.) The true Word of God came not by children,
but: "Holy men of God spake as they
were moved by the Holy Spirit" (II Pet.
1:21). Mormons accept the Book of Mormon, produced by Joseph Smith, to be
also the word of God. Let us examine this
man's background.
Schaff-Herzog's Encyclopedia of
Religious Knowledge reveals
that March 20, 1826 Joseph Smith was
found guilty in a court trial as being "a disorderly
person and an imposter",
upon the sworn testimony of five witnesses. The main
complaint was that Smith failed them in contracts to find hidden treasures,
etc.,
by his boasted ability in looking
through a certain
"magic stone" which he possessed.
In his book, "Heresies Exposed", W. C. Irvine states
that Smith's mother told fortunes and his
father sold blessings. Also, that the
late president of Michigan College, E. B. Fairfield, in 1850 had talked with three
men intimately acquainted with Joseph Smith,
who testified that he was "notorious
for his vulgar speech, his life of
unspeakable lewdness, and his being a notorious liar".
Isaac Hale so detested this suitor
of his daughter,
Emma, that
Smith must needs elope with her to marry
her, Jan. 18, 1827.
To such an one then, an "angel"
called Moroni,
was supposed to have come
from heaven when he was but fifteen years
old. According to Smith, Moroni showed
him where to find a buried book of gold plates
giving an account of the former inhabitants of North
America and containing "the fullness of the
everlasting gospel" as delivered to
these inhabitants by Christ. With the
plates were to be found two stones, "Urim
and Thumim", as magic spectacles
through which translation of the
hieroglyphics on the plates were to be
made. Smith further affirmed that having found the buried plates, the angel
forbade digging them up to translate
until four years later September 22, 1827,
meanwhile appearing to Smith nine times,
informing him of great judgments coming upon the earth and in what manner the
Lord's kingdom was to be conducted in the last days. Smith supposedly possessed
the plates two years and eight months.
When translation was completed he conveniently claimed the angel called
for them and carried them away (from
"Introduction" to the Book of Mormon).
WEIGHING THE EVIDENCE
It has been charged that Smith
used a certain unprinted
manuscript written by Solomon Spaulding of
Conneaut, Ohio, to produce the Book of Mormon. This
manuscript is now located in the library of Oberlin
College and it is affirmed there that there is not
enough
resemblance to sustain the
charge. However, Spaulding
evidently
wrote another manuscript in which he used
biblical phraseology. Through his reading from it to his
friends he came to be known by the young folks as,
"And-it-came-to-pass-Spaulding". It is believed that
this manuscript was found in the printing office of
Patterson and Lamdin of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, by
Sidney Rigdon through whom it came into the
possession of Joseph Smith who made
it the basis of the Book of Mormon.
This is corroborated by
Schaff-Herzog's Encyclopedia, Vol. III,
P. 1578 (published 1883), concerning
the Book of
Mormon, as follows:
"The usual belief is that most of
it was written by
one, Solomon Spaulding, a
Presbyterian clergyman. He had been accustomed
to maintain that the aborigines of America were the descendants of some of the tribes
of Israel; and in a time of ill health he
wrote a kind of romance supporting his
view. This he called the "Manuscript
Found" and tried to publish. In his work was much repetition of phrases common
in Scripture such as, 'and it came to
pass', and also the use of the names Lehi, Nephi, Moroni, Lamanites,
etc. There is substantial evidence of the above named facts. It is
supposed that this manuscript fell into the hands of
Joseph Smith, and that he, and perhaps Sidney
Rigdon and others introduced into it
and appended, in a style savoring
strongly of revivalism, the large portion found
in the Book of Mormon touching the Lord Jesus
Christ's descent in America soon after His
ascension from Judea, and His
organization of another apostolate
and establishment of another church".
The above quotation supports our
believing that
plagiarism and blasphemous
deception was perpetrated
by this
young fortune finder, Joseph Smith, as he supposedly dictated, from behind curtains, a translation
of the inscriptions on gold plates to two writers by
turns, Martin Harris and Oliver
Cowdery.
As to the Book of Mormon being a
true history of
the American
Indian, M. C. Sterling, chief of the
Smithsonian Institute at Washington, had this to say:
"There is no correspondence
whatever between
archeological sites and cultures as revealed by scientific
investigations and as recorded in the Book of Mormon.
The interpretations of
archeological and ethnographic
data,
moreover, are quite unlike the American prehistory which the Book of Mormon describes."
We can certainly prove by
examining the Book of
Mormon itself
that it is not of God. While it contains
whole pages word for word copied from the Bible and
scattered Bible truth differently written, it flatly
denies
two particular basic truths
taught in God's Word, which
Word
Smith must perforce profess to believe in order
to deceive the hearts of the simple (see Romans 16:17,
18 ) .
1. The Book of Mormon denies the completeness
of the Bible
and that addition thereto is condemned
in no uncertain terms.
Significantly, all claiming to receive revelations
subsequent to that of the apostle John in about A.D.
90, have brought forth false
doctrine in contradiction
to and denial
of Bible truth. Also, they make much
ado about
many mistranslations in the Bible. Actually,
there are few mistranslations and these can be located
and corrected by the Bible itself, simply by comparing Scripture
with Scripture.
As for this dispensation of the
Church which is
Christ's
body, when God is "taking out of the Gentiles
a people for His name" (Acts 15:14), we are completely instructed as to faith and worship by the
one
"apostle to the Gentiles", the
apostle Paul, "a teacher
of the Gentiles in faith and verity", or truth (Rom.
11:13; 15:16; I Tim. 2:7). He
wrote by inspiration
that it was
given him to fill full, or "fulfill the Word
of God" for the Church (Col. 1:24, 25). His statement
in II Tim. 3:16, 17 covers
the entire Bible:
"All
Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and
is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for
correction, for instruction in righteousness; that the man of God
may be perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all good
works."
When faced with adding to God's
Word and the
curse concerning this as
found in Rev. 22: 18, 19, Mormons blithely point to Deut. 4:2, saying, It is
written way back there: "Ye shall not add unto the
word which I command you", and
Look, they say,
how much was
added since that time. This is stupidly
crooked, for Moses, speaking to Israel, referred only
to "statutes and judgments" given to Israel (v. 5).
They are forbidden to add
to them; but they added
"traditions
of men" (Matt. 15: 1-5).
Proverbs 30:6 covers the entire
Bible in the words,
"Add thou not
unto His words,
lest He
reprove thee
and thou be found a liar".
Surely then, whatever is claimed
as additional
revelation will give
evidence as being not of God,
making
void His Word, the Bible. So it is with the
spurious Book
of Mormon wherein we find the following
ridicule and false assertion, denying the Bible's completion:
"Thou fool,
that shall say, A Bible, we have got a
Bible. Have ye obtained a Bible save as it were by
the Jews? Wherefore, because that ye have a Bible,
ye need not suppose that it contains all my words;
neither need ye suppose that I have not caused
more
to be written
(II Nephi 29:6, 10). Verse four shows
the speaker to be "the Lord God"! What a blasphemous falsehood!
Mormon teaching cunningly makes
the above
"Nephi" reference correspond
to Ezekiel 37:16-19
where
writings on "two sticks" are spoken of. These
sticks were merely an object lesson for Israel that
divided Israel would in the millennium become "one
nation in the land... neither shall they be divided into two kingdoms any more at all" (v. 20-28). Believe it or not, the Mormons
hold that one of these
sticks
represents the Bible and the other foretold the appearance of the Book of Mormon!
2. The Book of Mormon denies the
true way of
salvation.
It falsely teaches salvation by
works, that for remission of sins
and receiving the Holy Spirit one must
first be
water-baptized. We quote:
"By following your Lord and your
Savior down
into the
water, according to his word, behold, then
shall ye receive the Holy Ghost; and then can ye speak
with the tongues of angels... with new
tongues... unless a man shall endure to the end... he cannot be
saved.
For the gate by which ye should enter is repentance
and baptism in water... then are ye in this
straight and narrow path which leads to
eternal life" (II Nephi 3:13-18).
"The fulfilling of the
commandments bringeth remission
of sins". (Moroni 8:25).
FOOLISH DISCREPANCIES DISCLOSE FRAUD
According to Smith's Book of
Mormon, some descendents of
Joseph, the son of Jacob, left Jerusalem
600 B.C. to settle in America. They recorded their
activities on gold plates—in what language? Hebrew,
their native language? No! In "Reformed Egyptian"!
Ridiculous!
No man ever becomes an angel, but
Moroni, "the
last of the
prophets" became one! He buried the gold
plates and 400 years later appeared to Joseph Smith
near the same spot as an angel!
Again, during 600 years these
migrated Jews became "a great nation" in America, but about 400 years after
Christ had brought them "the everlasting gospel" and
"established His church", these Jews were
nearly annihilated in battles, becoming a mere remnant which Mormons hold are
the American Indians. Strange that the gospel had no power and
strange that Indian legend and tradition holds no trace whatever of migration
from Jerusalem and Christ's visit, or the
gospel!
BAPTISM FOR THE DEAD
The Mormon practice of the living
getting water
baptized for the dead to save them came not
from the Book of Mormon. They use I Cor.
15:29 to partly support it but it actually originated with their
fallacious claim that in 1836 the prophecy of Malachi 4:5, 6 was
fulfilled in that Elijah appeared to Joseph
Smith and "conferred authority to
baptize for the dead", thus "turning the hearts of the children to the
fathers"—the dead fathers (History of the
Church Vol. VI, P. 183, 184; "The Plan of Salvation", by Elder John Morgan,
P. 20, 21).
To prove this "vision" to be
also a farce or "giving heed to seducing spirits and doctrines of demons" we
need but
quote God's truth found in Psalm 49:8-10 and I Tim. 2:5
"None can by any means
redeem his brother, nor
give to God a ransom for him that he should still
live
forever and not see corruption.
For the redemption
of their soul
is precious, and it ceaseth forever", i.e.,
the
belief that humans can do anything to save humans.
"There is one mediator
between God and man, the
Man Christ
Jesus."
OTHER FALSE DOCTRINES IN MORMON LITERATURE
Quote: "Some preachers say that
faith is all that is
necessary to salvation. This is incorrect. Salvation is
obtainable upon four conditions: faith,
repentance,
water baptism, and laying on
of hands to receive the
Holy Spirit
of God. Then, according to their faithfulness and diligence in keeping the commands of God,
the various manifestations of the Spirit are poured out
upon men, such as the gift of speaking in
foreign tongues, of interpretation of
tongues, prophecy, dreams, visions,
the gift of healing and working of miracles,
discernment of spirits, etc. Baptism is a part
of the law of God . . . the remission of individual sins shall
be available to no man till he has been
baptized. No man is entitled to a
pardon for his sins until he obeys
that ordinance" ("Scrapbook of
Mormon Literature", by Ben. E. Rich,
pp. 42, 43, 46. Found also in "Doctrines and Covenants", by Joseph Smith).
"Christ's atonement was not
sufficient for personal
sins,
from which men can be redeemed only by obedience to Mormon ceremonies"
(Compendium).
"All are damned who do not avail
themselves of
these
ceremonies"
(Journal of
Discourses, Vol. I, p.
339).
"Redemption from personal sins can
only be obtained through
obedience to the requirements of the
gospel and a life of good works"
(Principles of the
Gospel, p. 19).
Concerning God, Brigham Young
taught: "Adam
is our God,
the only God with whom we have to do.
When our Father came into the garden of Eden He
came with a celestial body and brought Eve, one of
His wives with Him. Jesus Christ was the son of
Adam-God and Mary. Jesus was not begotten of the
Holy Spirit" (Journal of Discourses Vol. I, p. 50).
"The Holy Spirit is the most
refined and subtle of
substances,
like electricity, etc." (Key, p. 39).
God's Word plainly teaches that
the Holy Spirit
is a
Person and is received immediately upon believing
in Christ as one's Savior (John 7:39; 16:13; Gal. 3:3;
Eph. 1:13, 14; 4:30). Also, that speaking in tongues
was only a sign for unbelieving Israel during
the Acts period, ceasing thereafter when
Israel was set aside (Isa. 28:11, 12; I
Cor. 14:22; 13:8; Rom. 11:19-21).
Throughout God's entire Word we
find salvation
comes only by grace
(unearned favor) through faith
in
Christ, without works—Eph.
2:8-10;
Rom. 11:6;
4:1-5; Gal. 2:16, 21; John
1:12; 3:16, 36, 5:24; I
Cor. 15:1-5.
Hear Paul's warning: "But though
we or an angel from heaven preach any other gospel unto you than
that which we have preached unto you, let him be
accursed"!
Water baptism being a works
of the flesh, has no place in salvation. The thief on the cross was saved
without it, for Christ said to him, "Verily I say unto
thee today, thou shalt be with me in paradise". So
reads the Greek text of Luke
23:43. "Paradise" in the
Bible
designates always a place of beauty and bliss,
never Hades, as many teach. See Ezekiel 28:13; 31:8, 9; II Cor. 12:4.
PRE-EXISTENCE OF HUMAN SPIRITS TAUGHT
Mormons believe in the
pre-existence of human
spirits in
heaven
where they were born of
many Gods,
each having his own wife, or
wives. "As soon as each God has begotten many millions of male and female
spirits
and His heavenly inheritance becomes too small to accommodate comfortably
His great family, He in
connection
with His sons organizes a new world after
a similar order to the one which we now inhabit,
where He sends both male and female spirits to
inhabit
tabernacles of flesh and
bones" (Apostle Orson Pratt).
How utterly foreign this is to the
Bible! Our God tells us that man originated, spirit, soul and body in
God's forming'
man "of the dust of the ground and
breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man
became a living soul".
"And Adam called his wife's
name Eve; because she was the mother of all
living"
(Gen. 2:7;
3:20). "The first man is of the earth,
earthy;
the second Man is the Lord from heaven" (I
Cor. 15:47).
The Lord Jesus said, "I am from
above; ye are of
this
world"
(John 8:23).
ORIGIN OF THE MORMON "CHURCH"
Christ said of His Church,
"The gates of hell shall not prevail against it". Mormon teaching is that "All
had gone out of the way", so
God chose Joseph Smith
to "reorganize" and "establish His church and prepare
the way for the Redeemer's second coming" (Rays of
Light, C. W. Penrose, p. 4).
Schaff-Herzog's Encyclopedia gives
an account of
how the Mormon
church was organized:
"On 15, 1829, by command of an
angelic messenger
calling
himself John the Baptist, Smith baptized Cowdery, and then Cowdery baptized Smith. And, in process of time, it is claimed, Smith received the Melchizedek
priesthood at the hands of the apostles Peter.
James and John. Some of the prophet's family
and some of a family named Whitmer, in
Fayette, N. Y., became converts; and
on April 6, 1830, in Whitmer's house,
the Mormon church began its history. That day
it was organized with a membership of six."
We defer nauseating readers with
more elaboration
on Mormon
weird beliefs and ways, such as their
"Presidents" being 'the mouthpiece of God on earth",
continuously eligible to "revelations"; the "Aaronic"
and "Melchisedek" autocratic
priesthood originally
conferred by "angelic visitors"; "the twelve" and "the
seventy" officials; the secret oaths and mysteries,
with
degrees of
"exaltation" for the initiated; the superstitious marriage rites with absurd "endowments"; and
last of
all their credulous belief that when the Mormon
temple at Salt Lake City is finished (invisibly) then
Christ will return to set up His
kingdom!
SMITH'S LUSTFUL END
In the Book of Mormon polygamy is
forbidden. In
earlier "revelations" of
Joseph Smith it was distinctly
reprobated; but it was sanctioned in a "revelation"
Smith claimed to have received at Nauvoo, Ill., July
12, 1843. His death in jail by bullets from a mob can
be directly attributed to this
false "revelation" permitting polygamy, which suited
the lusts of Smith and his cronies. We
rightly say false revelation because nowhere
in the Bible is it stated that God "justified" any man in having plurality of
wives and concubines! We quote from
"History of the Mormon Church", Vol. V.
pp. 501,504, 506 as follows:
"Verily thus saith the Lord unto
my servant Joseph,
that inasmuch
as you have inquired of my hand to
know and understand wherein
I the Lord justified my servants
Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, as also Moses,
David and Solomon, my servants, as touching the
principle and doctrine of their having
many wives and concubines;
behold, I am the Lord thy God and
will answer thee as touching this
matter . . . . God commanded
Abraham, and Sarah gave Hagar to Abraham
wife. And why did she do it? Because this was the law
. . .
Abraham received concubines and they
bare him children and it was accounted unto him for righteousness,
because they were given
unto him and he abode in the law… If a man marry ten virgins he cannot commit adultery"
(italics ours).
Imagine twisting God's truth about
Abraham, who
was justified
by believing God, "and it (his faith) was
counted unto him for righteousness" (Rom 4:1-3)!
God gave no such "command"
to Abraham to take
Hagar to
wife. Sarah suggested it.
That God ever "justified" polygamy
is an unmitigated lie.
Solomon was denounced for having many
wives "which turned away his heart". The Lord Jesus,
as recorded in Matt. 5-8, taught that "in the
beginning
it was not
so",
that a man should have
another wife;
but that God had said a man
"shall cleave to his wife",
not wives, and that the two, not more, "shall be one flesh".
Likewise the apostle Paul always spoke of the married state of man as being "a
husband of one wife"
(I Tim 3:2; Tit. 1:6).
Up to the time of his death we see
Smith was still
an immoral
charlatan and deceiver!
From "Desert Saints", by Nels
Anderson, p. 38,
we learn that in the Mormon town
of Nauvoo some insurgent Mormons wanted to expose Smith and his aides, so they
bought a printing press and got out the first
and only copy of the "Nauvoo Expositor". In it they charged
these men with polygamy; that "whoredoms and all
manner of abominations are practiced
under the cloak of religion. Lo, the wolf is in the fold,
arrayed in sheep's clothing". Smith was
pictured among other things as an
egotist, a dictator, a cheat and a
perjurer. Smith asserted his dictatorship and destroyed
the press and its copies. For destroying property
Smith was arrested and jailed in Carthage,
where he and his brother, Hyrum were
shot by a mob.
"He that is of God heareth
God's Words" and will
not be
deceived by Satan's servants, made cunning in
mimicking and deceitfully handling God's Word to
gain religious power over souls as well as lustful
gain
(see John 8:47; Eph. 4:15; II Cor.
4:2). Please read also the entire chapter of II Cor. 11. Our Lord says
to all who believe on Him, "If ye continue in my
Word
then are ye my
disciples indeed, and ye shall know the
truth, and
the truth shall make you free"!
(John 8:31,
32 ) .
The solemn warning of II Thes.
2:10-12 applies
to all time,
that to all who "love not the truth" (refuse
to love the truth) will be sent "strong delusion
that
they should believe a lie"!
Reader, we pray you, Beware! Don't
give place
to wrath when
strong delusions are exposed as such;
but give place to Him who said, "Come unto me all
ye that are weary and heavy laden and I will
give you
rest"
(Matt. 11:28).
Write for free studies on other Cults, Salvation,
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true church of the Bible which
Christ alone is building
(Eph. 4:1-6).
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