Adventures in Mormonism

I use SiteMeter to track hits and traffic to this blog. One of the things SiteMeter lets me do is to see the search words and phrases that lead people here. I was looking at that just a few minutes ago and saw that someone had arrived at this blog by doing a Google search on the words “Mike Huckabee and the Mormon Anti-Christ” (this post, which I wrote some weeks back, was the second entry listed by Google). The phrase “the Mormon Anti-Christ” I interpreted to mean the person that the Latter-day Saints might consider to be “the” AntiChrist mentioned in the Epistles of John in the New Testament (and hinted at in Revelation, some Pauline epistles, the Gospels, and Daniel; see this entry in the Catholic Encyclopedia). In other words, I suspect the person was wondering if Mormons might think that Mike Huckabee could be the “AntiChrist.”

Simple answer: no. That’s because Mormons, unlike many Evangelicals, don’t really have much of a concept of there being a single, literal human (or demonic) “AntiChrist” prior to the Savior’s second coming. The concept (much less the actual phrase) does not show up at all in the various passages in LDS-specific scriptures that deal with events surrounding the Second Coming (e.g., relevant portions of the Book of Mormon, Doctrine & Covenants, and Pearl of Great Price). The term itself does appear twice (in a short span of verses) in the Book of Mormon, but it’s used as an adjective to describe a known individual (Korihor) in Book of Mormon times (~74 BC) who denied and preached against the idea of the Son of God coming to earth as an atoning Messiah.

Donald and Jay Parry, in Understanding the Signs of the Times (Deseret Book, 1999), spend a few pages (pp. 211-214) discussing the LDS concepts of “antichrist” and note “that there are many antichrists in every age”. They see the “man of sin, the son of perdition” spoke of by Paul as being Satan himself. They see the descriptions of the beasts in Revelation as being “in the likeness of the kingdoms of the earth” (citing the Joseph Smith revision of Revelation 13:1) and go on to conclude “both the beasts and the antichrist are individuals, nations, and philosophies.” That sounds about right, but I’m interested if other Latter-day Saints have run across different concepts regarding the AntiChrist within LDS literature, discourses and/or folk doctrine. ..bruce..

A brief postscript: I get the impression from what little research I’ve done that Catholics are much more skeptical about the idea of there being a literal, individual, powerful AntiChrist as a precursor to the Savior’s second coming — probably because, as the Catholic Encyclopedia entry cited above states, Protestants have been claiming for centuries that the Pope is the AntiChrist. What makes that so interesting is that in most horror movies about the rise of the AntiChrist — e.g., “The Omen” — it seems that it’s almost always the Catholics who are fighting against him. On the other hand, it seems like there’s often a group of renegade or corrupted Catholic priests and nuns who are supporting and protecting him. So for all us Mormons who complain about media bias, realize that it could be a lot worse — no one’s made a movie that shows the AntiChrist being born in Spanish Fork, attending BYU, and serving an LDS mission, before going to work for the Marriott Corporation, all the while being protected by a 21st century band of Danites. Yet. Hmm…maybe I’ll write a screenplay.

I even have a title for it: “Oh My Heck!”

Consider the following two quotes. Here’s the first one:

“…But you never asked me what my paper is about! I’m taking the text about growing up to the stature of Christ and working out an idea which I feel sure you’ll be interested in. I’m going to point out how people always forget that Jesus…was a comparatively young man when he died. He would have outgrown some of his earlier views, you know, if he’d lived. I’m going to ask my audience to consider what his mature views would have been. A profoundly interesting question. What a different Christianity we might have had if only the Founder had reached his full stature! I shall end up pointing out how this deepens the significance of the Crucifixion. One feels for the the first time what a disaster it was; what a tragic waste…so much promise cut short.”

I’m sure many of you recognize this quote; it’s from C. S. Lewis’s classic work The Great Divorce; in this particular passage (found in Chapter 5), a ‘Christian intellectual’ refuses to go to heaven so that (among other reasons) he can go back down to his ‘Theological Society’ in purgatory to read this paper.

And now here’s the second quote, in which former US President Jimmy Carter speculates on how better things might have been if Christ had accepted Satan’s temptation to rule over all the kingdoms of the earth and thus — one has to conclude logically — pass up His own crucifixion (from an article by Shawn Macomber at The American Spectator):

What a wonderful and benevolent government Jesus could have set up. How exemplary justice would have been. Maybe there would have been Habitat projects all over Israel for anyone who needed a home. And the proud, the rich, and the powerful could not have dominated their fellow citizens! As a twentieth-century governor and president I would have had a perfect pattern to follow. I could have pointed to the Bible and told other government leaders, “This is what Jesus did 2000 years ago in government. Why don’t we do the same?”

Anyone else see some eerie parallels here? Beyond that, I’m not sure Carter realizes why Satan’s offer was a temptation and why it was a good thing for Christ to refuse it. [UPDATE, based on personal communications from Shawn Macomber] Or maybe he does: Ed Morrisey over at Captain’s Quarters defends Carter and cites the subsequent paragraph from Carter’s book to indicate that the above paragraph has satiric overtones:

But the devil stipulated fatal provisos: an abandonment of God, and an acknowledgment of earthly things as dominant. … Anyone who accepts kingship based on serving the devil rather than God will end up a tyrant, not a benevolent leader.

On the third hand, Carter in this paragraph seems to still consider the idea a great one — he just rejects the “fatal provisos.” Macomber has his own doubts about Carter’s meaning and intent, as does Micah Tilman, a philosophy lecturer at Catholic University. Here’s a full, continuous extract from Carter’s book, so that you can make your own decision:

The devil’s third and final temptation was his offer to allow Jesus to replace Caesar and other leaders as ruler of the entire world. What a wonderful and benevolent government Jesus could have set up! How exemplary the justice would have been! Maybe there would have been Habitat projects all over Israel for anyone who needed a home. And the proud, the rich, and the powerful could not have dominated their fellow citizens.

It is easy to see the attractive nature of this offer. It would have not just exalted Jesus but also set an example for centuries of later rules. As a twentieth-century governor and president, I would have had a perfect patterns to follow. I could have pointed to the Bible and told other government leaders, “This is what Jesus did 2,000 years ago in government. Why don’t we do the same?”

But the devil stipulated fatal provisos: an abandonment of God, and an acknowledgment of earthly things as dominant. Jesus answered, “It is written, ‘Worship the Lord your God, and serve only him” (Matthew 4:10). Anyone who accepts kingship based on serving the devil rather than God will end up a tyrant, not a benevolent leader.

Hat tip to Jonah Goldberg at National Review Online for pointing me to the whole brouhaha. ..bruce..

Ben Huff over at Times and Seasons has an outstanding post drawing parallels between the LDS temple ceremony and the Catholic Mass (while also noting the key differences) in order to help those outside the LDS Church understand what goes on in the temple:

In a Catholic Mass, a congregation sits facing a priest, in a symbolic space, with an altar at the front, and participates in a standardized ceremony in which their spiritual relationships with one another and with God are symbolically represented and (re)affirmed. The priest leads the ceremony, with others assisting at various points. There are things the priest says, and responses by the congregation. The congregation stands and sits at various points, as part of this response, corresponding to whether they are praying or listening or reciting a creed or what have you. The Gospel is taught, and actively received. At the climax of the ceremony, each member of the congregation goes forward for a symbolic reunion with God, in this case represented by the priest and the Eucharist, in which God is said to be present.

The same basic format applies to the Mormon endowment. A congregation sits facing an officiator, in a symbolic space, with an altar at the front, and participates in a standardized ceremony in which their spiritual relationships with one another and with God are symbolically represented and (re)affirmed. The officiator leads the ceremony, with others assisting at various points. There are things the officiator says, and responses by the congregation. The congregation stands and sits at various points, as part of these responses. God’s plan of salvation is taught, and the teaching is actively received. At the climax of the ceremony, each member of the congregation goes forward for a symbolic reunion with God, in this case represented by entry into the Celestial Room, representing the presence of God.

Be sure to read not just the whole post, but also the comments, which are not only thoughtful but contain some links to additional analysis.

[UPDATED 01/25/08 - 1512 MST] You might also want to read this article (”Knocking Three Times on the Holy Door“) over at the excellent Temple Study blog. ..bruce..

Morehead’s Musings has an extended interview with Armand Mauss, an LDS sociologist who has done extensive research and writing on sociological aspects of the LDS Church. Mauss concisely states my core question about the Evangelical rejection of the LDS Church as ‘Christian’:

I recognize that there are some serious theological issues that make Mormons seem especially scary to many Evangelicals. In one way or another, most of those issues seem to shake down to doctrines of deity. Mormonism will never be able to accommodate the traditional Trinitarian theology, and that theology, in turn, seems to be the “litmus test” of “true” Christianity for Evangelicals. When Mormons, in all sincerity, claim to believe in the divinity of Jesus, and in His indispensible salvific role in human history, Evangelicals tend to dismiss such claims because they are not made within the context of Trinitarian theology. There is some irony in this Evangelical dismissal of the “Mormon Jesus,” since many surveys in recent decades have shown that many, if not most, of the modern clergy of the “Protestant mainline” do not believe in the literal divinity of Jesus or in His literal resurrection. Yet no one would claim that these denominations –- or even their clergy — are “not Christians.” Evangelicals also object to Mormon doctrines about the role of Jesus in the pre-existence, and/or the Mormon conception of God as once mortal – even though such ideas are strictly theoretical and play no part whatever in modern Mormon worship, or in the de facto Mormon focus exclusively on the God of Abraham as the only God ever encountered in Mormon scriptures and discourse. For some reason, these theoretical Mormon “embellishments” on doctrines about deity disqualify them from the “Christian” label, but Roman Catholics are not disqualified by the elaborate cult of Mary, or by such doctrines as the immaculate conception or transubstantiation, none of which are strictly biblical. It seems that for mainline Catholics and Protestants, all extra-biblical ideas are forgivable as long as they embrace a Trinitarian deity, but Mormons can’t be permitted their extra-biblical ideas and still be part of the Christian “family.”

I am no theologian, and I must confess that I find theological disputes generally tedious; as a social scientist, my main interest in theology is pretty much limited to its implications for behavior. I guess that’s why I find it difficult to understand why the “divide” has to be so “wide” between Mormons and Evangelicals.

Read the whole thing. ..bruce w..

OK, so I’m finishing my preparations this morning for teaching my Sunday School lesson (on the book of Revelation), and the thought strikes me: how many folks out there (and by “folks”, I mean evangelical Christians) believe, fear, or suspect that Mitt Romney may be the ‘Anti-Christ’ alluded to in Revelation by John?

Well, a very simple Google search (Mitt Romney AntiChrist) turns up about 26,000 hits. But, as it turns out, Romney is dead last on the list of major presidential contenders. Here are some searches for the other candidates as well as the current and immediate past Presidents and Vice-Presidents:

• Mike Huckabee: 156,000 hits
• Fred Thompson: 108,000 hits
• Bill Clinton: 84,900 hits
• Rudi Giuliani: 84,800 hits
• Ron Paul: 82,700 hits
• George W. Bush: 64,800 hits
• Hillary Clinton: 63,500 hits
• Al Gore: 62,500 hits
• John Edwards: 61,200 hits
• Dick Cheney: 40,800
• Barack Obama: 31,700 hits
• John McCain: 28,500 hits
• Mitt Romney: 26,000 hits

Admittedly, this is a crude and inaccurate measure — all I’m checking for is the presence of the word ‘AntiChrist’ along with the candidate’s first and last name. But the results certainly are counter-intuitive: not only is Mitt Romney the lowest on the list, but almost all the other major Republican candidates are ahead of all the major Democratic candidates, John McCain being the exception — but he’s still ahead of Romney.

I may do more refined searches later. ..bruce..