Did The Soul Preexist Anterior To Creation?

And do not fear those who kill the body

But cannot kill the soul. But rather

Fear Him who is able to destroy

Both soul and body in hell.

Are not two sparrows sold for

A copper coin? And not one of them

Falls to the ground apart from your

Father’s will. But the very hairs

Of your head are all numbered.

Do not fear therefore; you are of

More value than many sparrows.

Matthew 10:28–30

            In the previous blog I began this investigation into the origin of the soul and then in future blogs will continue the doctrine of Original Sin and how Scriptures approaches this subject and gives the Father’s word revealing the true doctrine of Original Sin. I must show how this doctrine of preexistence, one of the three theories presented to people is being taught in certain religious circles: i.e., Mormons is one of such who teach preexistence:

Consistent with the idea that all spirits (or souls) existed prior to their mortal life, LDS doctrine holds that all vegetable and animal life was created spiritually before the physical creation (Moses 3:5; cf. Gen. 2:5). In this sense, every living thing (plant, animal, human) is spoken of as having a soul (Moses 3:9, 19).

The human soul is innately endowed with an agency that should be honored and guarded as sacred and eternal (D&C 134:4). The soul (spirit), being eternal, cannot be fully destroyed but can suffer a type of destruction or spiritual death through sins that result in total and ultimate estrangement from God (1 Ne. 14:3; Alma 12:16-18, 36;30:47;42:9, 16). Scripture teaches that all human souls are children of God and are of infinite worth (Matt. 16:26; Alma 39:17; D&C 18:10-16). God has great joy in a repentant soul, and there is no more important work than the saving of souls and bringing them to God (D&C 18:10-16;15:6;16:6). RICHARD N. WILLIAMS[1]

            When there is a teaching that holds to preexistence of the soul there can be found other teachings that are not orthodox, rather they hold to a god that is not as the Bible portrays and reveals God:

The traditional Mormon view of God is summed up by the famous Lorenzo Snow couplet, "As man is God once was, as God is man may be." The historic understanding of this strongly implies that God the Father was once a sinner, and that we ourselves may model our mortal experience unto godhood after the mortal experience he once participated in. In his famous "King Follett Discourse" Joseph Smith taught,

"God himself was once as we are now, and is an exalted man, and sits enthroned in yonder heavens. That is the great secret... [Y]ou have got to learn how to be Gods yourselves, and to be kings and priests to God, the same as all Gods have done before you..."[2]

In the book; A Compilation containing the Lectures on Faith; by Orson Pratt ( a Mormon) as given at Kirtland Ohio even goes so far as to say that God needed faith to create:

15. By this we understand that the principle of power which existed in the bosom of God, by which the worlds were framed, was faith; and that it is by reason of this principle of power existing in the Deity, that all created things exist; so that all things in heaven, on earth, or under the earth exist by reason of faith as it existed in Him.[3]

            According to Mormon doctrine and teachings the soul existed, that is was anterior to creation of the physical body, and that God by means of His faith, which in some way He needed, and this would be counted true if God was as a man which the Mormons teach, to create. There is no Scripture that indicates these facts as proposed by the Mormons.

            In the next blog I will attempt to bring light on the teaching of Origen an early Church father that had a great impact on Christianity today, who taught a preexistence albeit no the Platonic doctrine of the ideal world. Should we hold to this teaching? Read the next blog and make this decision for yourself.

A good man obtains favor

            From the LORD,

But a man of wick intentions

            He will condemn.

                        Proverbs 12:2

Take Time Today: Read God’s Word

Richard L. Crumb

---

[1] Retrieved from: http://eom.byu.edu/index.php/Soul: April 3, 2013

[2] Retrieved from: http://www.mrm.org/god-of-mormonism: April 3, 2013

[3] Pratt, Orson; A Compilation containing the Lectures on Faith as delivered at the School of the Prophets at Kirtland, Ohio, Bookcraft, Inc. Salt Lake City, Utah; p. 8

The Origin Of The Soul: In Regards To Original Sin

I long for Your salvation, O LORD,

And Your law is my delight.

Let my soul live, and it shall

Praise You; and let Your

Judgments help me.

I have gone astray like a lost sheep,

Seek Your servant.

For I do not forget

Your commandments.

Psalm 119:174–176

            When investigating Original Sin  we are led to a perplexing question for many and for many years has been a huge debate among theologians. This debate is conjoined to the question of Original Sin and is a major portion of this debate; in fact, it is the foundational question that needs to be answered. The question? The origin of the soul. What is it? Where and when did man become a soul, a living soul? The answer to this question aids us to understand how Original Sin has come into the lives of people for all these centuries and will continue to plague mankind until Jesus Christ returns and this world is destroyed and renewed and the children of God become immortal to live with Jesus Christ for eternity. David in the above Scripture cures out to have his soul live; is he speaking of life, or the soul which is a separate entity within him? One thing we do learn from those Scriptures is to be a seeker and allow the judgments of God to help us and to not forget His commandments. Yet, there is this question of the soul, its origin. There are and have been for all these centuries three theories that have been advanced as to the origin of the soul. 1) There is a Preexistence of the soul; 2) Traduction, or the doctrine that the soul of the child is derived form the soul of the parent; 3) That of immediate Creation, or the doctrine that the soul is not derived as the body is, but owes its existence to the creative power of God. Where do you stand in regards to these there theories? As to why this understanding is important will become clear as we study the origin of the soul and then see how there has come to be Original Sin.

            First, let us examine the theory of preexistence of the soul for it has been presented in two forms. I wrote previously in regards to Plato and his dualism for he held that ideas are eternal in the mind of the eternal One. These ideas are not just mere thoughts, but are living entities. These ideas or living entities constitute the essence and life of all external things and that the universe and all that the universe contains are these ideas that are realized, that is clothed in matter, and in history are developed. A simple explanation given before is that the chair you may be sitting on are only ideas that have their reality in the mind of the eternal One are His ideas clothed in materiality. Plato expounded on this subject by saying that an ideal, or the intelligent world is one that is anterior to the world that we are existing in, in time. Plato called these ideals, but Aristotle called them forms. Aristotle denied that the ideal was anterior to the actual. Aristotle called all matter eternal and that all things consist of matter and form; and this form according to Aristotle meant that which gives character, or that which determines the nature of individual things. With this both Plato and Aristotle influenced Christianity with this Aristo–Platonic philosophy. The schoolmen, especially during Medieval times came close to these philosophies, especially this philosophy in regards to the soul being preexistent as to its origin, not only to the soul but also the all things in this ideal world. An ancient theologian, St. Bernard who is held in high esteem especially in the Roman Catholic Church, opposed nominalism (Nominalism is a philosophy that denies that general or abstract words stand for objective existing entities and that universals are only names assigned to them), causing St. Bernard to adopt Platonic doctrine of ideas, and he identified those ideas with genera and species. In other words, these ideas, as he taught, were eternal although posterior to God, as can be seen with the order of nature after its cause. Providence according to this theologian applies the idea of matter, which then becomes animated and takes form. Others, i.e., Franz Delitzsch (Leipzig, February 23, 1813 – Leipzig, March 4, 1890) was a German Lutheran theologian and Hebraist, stated: “There is according to the Scriptures, an ideal preexistence of man; a preexistence in virtue of which man and humanity are contemplated by the divine omniscience not merely as objects lying far of in the future, but as present in the mirror of his wisdom. Not only  philosophy and the so called Gnosis, but also the Scriptures recognized and avow a divine ideal world to which the actual world stands related as the historical development of an eternal conception” (Italics mine, taken from Biblische Paychologie, p.23). It may be said that Delitzsch meant nothing more than by this than that the omniscience fo God embraces from eternity the knowledge of all things possible, and that God’s purpose having been determined fro eternity the future for all actual events, that all of this existed in the mind of God and then these ideals were then realized in the external world, and in the history of the world. This is somewhat different form the Platonic or Realistic theory of preexistence.

            Don’t become weary, stay with this for we are examining a very important element of the Christian faith, and its doctrine in regards to sin, especially the doctrine of Original sin. Our understanding become illuminated will aid is to see how these philosophies that led to theologies as to whether or not they are Scriptural and how the have and are in this present age influencing many so–called Christian Churches. In the next blogs I will discuss Origen’s doctrine in regards to preexistence for Origen is a an early church father who was read and followed by many Christians of his day and for others who came into churches that taught some of Origen’s doctrines. The answer we find will aid us not only for our understanding but as to how we might answer this question on the doctrine of Original Sin for those seeking truth or just have so smug dislike for Christianity due to the doctrine of sin.

Brethren, if anyone among you

            Wanders from the truth,

And someone turns him back,

            Let him know that he who

Turns a sinner from the error of h

            His way will save a soul

From death and cover a multitude

            Of sin.

                                    James 5:19–20

Pray today and communicate with God

Richard L. Crumb

Living As A Child Of God

But God, who is rich in mercy, because of His great love

with which He loved us, even when we were dead

In trespasses, made us alive together with Christ

(by grace you have been saved),

and raised us up together, and made us sit together in the

heavenly places in Christ Jesus, that in the ages to come He

might show the exceeding riches of His grace in His kindness

toward us in Christ Jesus. For by grace you have been

Saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God,

Not of works, lest anyone should boast.

Ephesians 2:4–9

           

            Paul was reminding the Ephesians of God and Jesus Christ who being in the same substance, the very essence of one another had great and rich mercy due to the love of God and by the death of His Son Jesus Christ all who believe in Jesus Christ would be saved and this by grace. Man is dead in their trespasses and this can only be true if man is a sinner and by his sin has forfeited the right to receive God’s grace. So some would preach, as did Pelagius who I quoted in the last blog, and the man Jacobus Arminius who has influenced many people who are Christian but believe that man has just enough of goodness to save themselves. This is a form of Gnosticism whereby man may through some assimilation of knowledge could be found good enough to be saved and inherit a place in the kingdom of God. But, and this is a big “but,” man cannot save himself for man does not have life, life was forfeited by the sin of Adam and by Adam’s sin all men have inherited this sin. This sin made all men dead in their trespasses for man can not do anything aside from trespassing, trespassing the law of God for there are and are dead. Only by Christ can man be saved and brought to life. It isn’t the acquiring of knowledge that saves a man, it is not be some eloquent preaching that saves man, it is not by any works of man that saves, man, for it is only by the Grace of God that man is saved and that Grace which supplies to all of God’s children a faith which is a gift from God and no man can boast of their philanthropy, their giving to charities, to working in soup lines, to going to Church regularly, to being a Sunday School teacher, etc. for to say that these are means by which a man can be saved in contrary to Scripture. Man cannot save himself for if he could then all he did was some good work, some good choice and this by his own efforts but God says, NO! It is not by any works of man that saves man, salvation is by and through God by means of the propitiation work of the Son of God, the Son of Man, Jesus Christ, His death, resurrection and ascension into heaven that the debt man owes to God but cannot be paid by man is paid by Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ then sits at the right hand of the Father and makes eternal intercession for all of God’s children, to all that were given to Jesus Christ by the Father. You know that you are one of God’s children, one to whom God has given mercy and grace, the faith to believe in and upon His Son Jesus Christ if you are putting on the image of His Son and then by this grace and faith, this change for whom you live you do many good works but this is only to be doing what God requires, it is not something special, it is a requirement of God for all His children.

            Pelagius brought upon Christianity much harm with his profane fiction that Adam’s sin was to Adam’s hurt only and that Adams’ sin did not hurt his posterity and only by means of Satan who tried to deceptively hide the fact that this sin is incurable. Man could by Pelagianism cure himself. What blasphemy! Cavil all a person desires against this fact that man cannot save himself, that all the preaching in the world will not save the world, but will bring to God’s children the truth of God, His Son, and a change in their hearts, lives, and actions by means of the truth revealed in God’s word that we go as commanded and preach the good news of Jesus Christ. Man from the womb is sin, his soul does not desire God for it is ungodly infected by inherited sin and has inherited wickedness. Look around the world and see if this is not true. The corruption of man is innate as proclaimed by King David under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit and written down for all to read and know; “Behold, I was brought froth in iniquity, and in sin my mother conceived me” (Psalm 51:5). Is the Bible saying that the wife of Jesses, David’s father, was a prostitute, or a woman of ill repute, or any other reason why she would be sinful do some action of hers, or is the Bible pointing out the fact that man within the womb is sinful? It is clear from all Scriptures on this subject that man is sinful in the womb, and is sinful out of the womb and is in need of a Savior. David was not throwing blame on his parents, rather he was commending the goodness of God towards him. All of come into this world as descendants of Adam and are inheritors of the sin of Adam, we are descendants of impure seed, we are tainted with this world’s sin, and are in contagion due to this sin and we cannot bring a clean thing out of an unclean thing (Job 14:4).

            Do not be dismayed! God can bring cleanness to an unclean thing, an unclean person and this He does by His Grace, freely offered to all of His children, not by works, you cannot boast, “look at me and what I am doing” for all you are doing is only what you should be doing and if you are one of God’s children then you are doing what you do out of your love for God and the desire of faith in His Son to become in the image of Jesus Christ that we have as our object of affection and enjoyment. We do not out of fear, not for any reason within other than our desire to do the will of the Father as did Jesus: “Again, a second time, he went away and prayed, saying, ‘O My Father, if this cup cannot pass away from Me unless I drink it, You will be done” (Matthew 26:42). May you and I be found doing His will.

But Jesus answered him, saying,

            “It is written, “man shall

not live by bread alone, but by

            every word of God.’”

                                    Luke 4:4

Live Today For Jesus Christ: Be His Image

Richard L. Crumb