Firstly let me say - I am agnostic - but I am very fascinated by stories such as Joseph Smith and thousands of others who say angels visited them or they were given divine tasks.. I don't think they would make it all up... (perhaps some... but if I want to be realistic... not that many people would make it all up) but I don't believe most of the Mormon teachings either (although the book of Mormon is beautiful). Something happened to him... but what was it? There is a man in my town who claims he was visited by angels - I have known him for maybe 10 years (before he claimed that)... and this guy was legit... no chance he would lie.. something happened to him... but I don't know what to think about it... What are your thoughts (please give plausible explanations that are respectful... I really want to know but I dint want any hate or mainstream Christian fuss please!) - the way I see it - there are 3 routes
1)They are crazy or on drugs
2)They lied
3)They are telling the truth
4)Or Something else happened but what?
I am looking for something in category 4 (or maybe somewhat 3). What do you think?
to Chris... i said no hate or mainstream fuss
to be hives4u... i didn't mean to offend in any way - I am just on another spiritual path - I am hap pi that you have found yours and I wish you well on it
Mormonism is not Christian. Mormonism is a cult that rejects the free gift of salvation in Jesus, so Mormonism leads to eternal torment in the lake of fire. Mormonism also rejects the TRUTH that JESUS IS GOD, so Mormonism has a different and fake "god" that cannot save, and a different and fake "Jesus" that is not the TRUE JESUS. Mormonism is idolatry.
And also the truth is that only the BIBLE is the Word of God. The "book of Mormon" is not from God.
The TRUE JESUS loves Mormon people so very much, and wants them ALL saved! So Mormon people need to get away from Mormonism, and instead, believe in the TRUE JESUS for His free gift of salvation! Getting into heaven is truly only by believing in Jesus for His free gift of salvation, without adding ANY of your own works.
JESUS TRULY paid for all our sins with His death on the cross! And then Jesus rose from the dead! Nothing else pays for any of your sins, not works, not good deeds, nothing.
So believe in Jesus for His free gift of salvation RIGHT NOW!
The truth is that JESUS is God, and Jesus loves you so very much! And the Trinity is true!
The truth about Jesus is that the only way to be saved and to get into heaven and avoid being sent to hell, is by believing in JESUS for His free gift of eternal life in heaven, believing in faith alone that Jesus, who is God, died on the cross for all our sins as FULL PAYMENT for all our sins, and then Jesus rose from the dead (1 Corinthians 15:1-4). Believe in Jesus for His free gift of salvation, and you will be in heaven, no matter what!
Salvation is a FREE GIFT that happens in a split second when you believe in JESUS for His free gift of salvation! It is impossible to lose or "leave" salvation (John 6:39-40, John 10:28, 1 John 5:13).
Please pray now: "Jesus, I believe that You died on the cross to pay for my sins and that You rose from the dead, and I thank You for eternal life!" You will be in heaven with Him forever when you die!
Joseph smith is for real and if you think the book of Mormon is beautiful what is so wrong with the Mormon the church it is actually called the church of Jesus Christ of latter day saints we actually be liver in visions we call them personal revaluations i be live they are telling the truth
The mind is a strange and wonderful thing, capable of having vivid hallucinations. People who are gullible or susceptible and do not understand what has happened to them can easily be led to believe it was some sort of divine intervention.
What happened to moses when he saw God? There was a vast majority that did not believe him. If God is the same yesterday, today and forever, then why cant he come visit someone in these days? And I don't want to hear the biblical passages of how he has stopped, because as far as I'm concerned, your "bibles" have been changed as many times as my opinion toward ABM. The whole religious issue would end if everyone realized that when you pray for guidance, and listen to the holy spirit, God will tell you the truth. James 1:5. This isn't a question of what really happened, because nobody can prove it. It is a question of spiritual guidance by God himself through the holy spirit.
It's possible that Joseph Smith and others were deceived and became false prophets.
1 John 4:1 Dear friends, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God, because many false prophets have gone out into the world.
2 Corinthians 11:14 Satan himself masquerades as an angel of light.
The test of a prophet is 100% accuracy in predicting the future. This is the test to all prophets. In Old Testament times, false prophets would have been put to death, so it's an important test.
Deuteronomy 18:21-22 You may say to yourselves, "How can we know when a message has not been spoken by the LORD?" (22) If what a prophet proclaims in the name of the LORD does not take place or come true, that is a message the LORD has not spoken. That prophet has spoken presumptuously. Do not be afraid of him.
From your answer choices, you apparently think that both lying as well as truth-telling and being crazy are mutually exclusive, but they are not.
Most people who invent a new religion, whether they would pass a lie-detector test or not, are motivated by an urge to control others with their words, to lead by their ideas. What can reinforce this is the feeling that a power stronger than oneself is actually the source of the "wisdom". So, the actual faith can result FROM the principal selfish motivation. Material gain and power usually goes along with this, but for most charismatics, that is secondary. It takes a great deal of ego to sit down and write hundreds of pages of mythology and go about convincing everyone that it's true.
And it also takes the assistance of other people who may be similarly motivated, by the gains they can make by latching onto your work. The Mormon religion was a great way for men to control people, access to women especially, which seems to be the main point. They re-asserted that males were the foundation of the family, which is a tricky proposition give the importance of motherhood in the pioneer era.
I think part of the success of the Book of Mormon was the scarcity of texts back then. It would be a lot harder to create a word-based cult of lasting power in the days of the Internet. There is just too much competing text.
Joseph Smith was a con man. He made up stories and pushed others to either think that they saw things or say that they saw things to improve the credibility of his lies.
As for others, people see what they expect to see. People will look at patterned wallpaper or curtains and they will see faces, or angels, or different things. Those things are not there. The pattern is no different at that point. It is just the bits of our brain that is trying to force the shapes of what we see into something it can recognize.
This man in your town may think he was visited by angels, but that does not mean that he was. He may have been dreaming, he may have had a hallucination, he may have seen something that he interpreted as being an angel, he may even be making it up.
This is similar to the people who see ghosts. Look at the form of the classic 'sheet' ghost. Round head with big eyes, arms that taper to a point, a body that tapers to a point. White. Now look at a barn owl form the front. A rounded head with big eyes, wings that taper to points and a tail that is fairly pointed. Very pale brown. Owls can fly practically silently and are often seen in graveyards hunting for mice etc. How many people do you think have been startled by seeing an owl flying though a graveyard and immediately jumped to the conclusion that it is a ghost? So when they run home and say that they saw a ghost they are not lying, they really think that they did see one. But they are definitely mistaken.
He could have had any one of a bunch of neurological or personality disorders that would have made him think he was really seeing things like angels and hidden secrets or that made him lie compulsively to inflate his own sense of self-worth. People do it every day--unhappy with their lives, they make up stories and fantasies that put them in the center of some grand conspiracy or design on the part of higher powers like God or the Illuminati.
Another example of this type of illusion is Pierre Plantard, the man whose lies largely inspired the novel The Da Vinci Code. He claimed to be a member of or heir to countless secret societies, none of which has ever been pr oven.
Chris; have you read the book of Mormon? if you ha vent you cant say anything and we are the only church who
do sent be live in drinking, doing drugs, sex before marriage, cussing, being modest, marriage is sacred and we are the only church who has the priesthood. and we be live in everything to be peaceful so during church we do not have a band and we do not scream or shout we pray always that's how we let god know that we be live in him and we feel his spirit and we love god
IMHO - JS @least was telling the truth. if one can accept the possibility of God - then there is no reason to believe that He would not communicate with us.
you said "I don't believe most of the Mormon teachings either (although the book of Mormon is beautiful)." so I'm gonna' bet that what you've heard of our beliefs may be incorrect. there is a lot of misinformation on the LDS out in the world. I would answer any questions.
I will also star this so that my LDS contacts can see it and talk with you as well if you wish.
One theory is that he was pious when he started, and well meaning. He just wanted to get people to think about religion. Then as he grew in power and collected members, he started believing his own hype. I think that is called the pious fraud theory.
http://www.lds-mormon.com/vogel.shtml
Another is that he had Narcissistic Personality Disorder.
Another is that he was a con man before the church and a con man during it. It was a great job and provided work for his entire extended family.
There is occasional discussion of drugs, which were freely available in the form of mushrooms. I don't think too many people take that seriously.
http://www.i4m.com/think/history/holy-ghost.htm
One theory is that the Book of Mormon was written by a couple other people and he started out as the front man because he was charismatic. He quickly took over. It ties back to the pious fraud thing. That's a part of the Spaulding Manuscript theory.
There is something beautiful about divine manifestations found in all faiths. This is one reason I love reading about Catholic saints who claim similar divine manifestations as well. Even if you don't believe in the sect's faith beliefs or doctrine.
Your 1-4 is pretty apt, you either have to believe one of the following you've mentioned. I believe that Joseph Smith is telling the truth, course that is why I am Mormon. I too have experienced a lot of divine manifestations in my life. I've had dreams/visions in my life as for a scientific, analytical explanation, I can't explain them. I've had them, I can't deny them. I do believe that a lot of religious people have had dreams and visions in their lives as well, but don't talk about them or even let other people know about them for the sake that people either believe as you mentioned:
1)They are crazy or on drugs
2)They lied
3)They are telling the truth
4)Or Something else happened but what?
So unless you feel driven as Joseph Smith did in telling people, these visions and dreams go by unnoticed or dismissed by others as the following you've mentioned. Some people pass of these dreams and visions as being demonic but those are by people who discredit the vision because they don't believe in the content to begin with so the opinion is biased. It is is up to the discretion of your 1-4 as a possibility in the end.
There are several shared visions too - visions seen by multiple people at the same time. On the day that Joseph Smith received the Book of Mormon, Brigham Young and Heber C. Kimball were standing in their yards with their families watching armies march across the sky. They lived miles apart - I don't believe they even knew each other. They saw the uniforms and heard the clink of their weapons. They stood amazed and watched for hours as this army marched to the horizon, whereupon they heard a huge battle take place. Both of them later joined the LDS church when they heard about the Book of Mormon.
Joseph Smith and three men, known as the three witnesses, also shared a vision in which they saw the angel Moroni, the Book of Mormon, and heard the voice of God declare the book to be true.
Usually a vision is like a dream, with no tangible result except the increased faith of the witness. The Book of Mormon is a special case, because it is the tangible result of a vision. It can be studied and tested, and compared with other ancient texts. The University of California at Berkeley invented a program to test unknown works for authorship. When the Book of Mormon was tested, they discovered that it had at least two authors, neither of which was Joseph Smith or any known contemporary. Also discovered were ancient literary devices like chasms and tops lists. The coronation of King Mosiah is typical of a coronation ceremony from the time of the Old Testament. Over a hundred geographic references were shown to be completely consist ant with each other and totally plausible according to known geography. Ancient figures of speech can be found throughout the Book of Mormon, not the least of which is the much ridiculed "it came to pass", a common word/character in both Hebrew and Mayan. Perhaps the most astounding thing is the complete lack of those elements associated only with Jewish thought(tribe of Judah), while containing all of those elements that we now know are distinctly Israelite(tribes of Ephraim & Manassah), as the book itself claims. The Book of Mormon was even instrumental in finding the place called Nahom, in the exact spot described in the Book of Mormon. Ancient pillars that were excavated on the spot still showed inscriptions bearing the ancient name. The Book of Mormon is perhaps the greatest stumbling block to atheism extant today. Non-Mormon Christians aren't too thrilled with it either.
did you know J's was persecuted since he was 14? by many different church leaders and others long before he even started the Mormon church ?
some of his own words
was an bobs cure boy, only between fourteen and fifteen years of age, and my circumstances in life such as to make a boy of no consequence in the world, yet men of high standing would take notice sufficient to excite the public mind against me, and create a bitter persecution; and this was common among all the sects?all united to persecute me.
23 It caused me serious reflection then, and often has since, how very strange it was that an obscure Boy, of a little over fourteen years of age, and one, too, who was doomed to the necessity of obtaining a scanty maintenance by his daily belabor, should be thought a character of sufficient importance to attract the attention of the great ones of the most popular sects of the day, and in a manner to create in them a spirit of the most bitter persecution and deviling. But strange or not, so it was, and it was often the cause of great sorrow to myself.
why does the world think to make me deny what I have actually seen? For I had seen a vision; I knew it, and I knew that God knew it, and I could not Eden it, neither dared I do it; at least I knew that by so doing I would offend God, and come under condemnation.
he was persecuted his whole life and killed by a mob.
if this man claimed to be a prophet he sure did get persecuted and killed just the same as prophets and the apostles in the old days.
there must have been something special about him could he have been a prophet in our time that people didn't believe? few people believed Christ was the Christ and killed him and the same with many prophets long ago
I would have to suspect that 2) figures in this more than you would give credit for. If you are in the Rochester NY area and tell a tall tale, to this day, you will find people saying "that is a good a one as young Joe ever told". That is an allusion to the lying ability of Joseph Smith Jr.
Joseph Smith spirit guide/showed up in a brilliant light and then appeared to Him saying he or they were also God and Jesus.
demons can appear to be angels, I had an angel visit me once and angels are real as well, its just that demons pretend to be spirit guides and show up as angels of light, the angel that I saw that astral projected me to the other side of the milky way did not have any light behind him, leaving me to wonder...was it a real angel or was it a demon??? I do know my spirit guide did finally show up one day in a glow of brilliant light and led me at ray after that by talking to me. I was very psychic from birth and I was also a Mormon. I am sure Mahammad meant well when he followed his spirit Guide and wrote the Koran, but we are currently as war with his people now, because of his spirit guide/demon. I hear of people on hear all the time being led astray by their spirit guides off the path that God wants them on and so it goes.....
Angels do sometimes minister to people, but often incognito, according to the New Testament. Many sincere people have experiences they do not understand, and attribute them to angels. Some people really do receive the ministrations of glorious, resurrected angels or ministering spirits.
You need not think that there is no way to know. Answers to prayer and the burning witness of truth from the Holy Ghost are available to all of God's children.
If it can't be vindicated at some future point, it isn't faith.
Like someone else mentioned. Joseph Smith was only 14 years old when the first vision happened.
There was a great awakening in the area he lived in and there were lots of different churches. He didn't know which one to join. The bible said if you lack wisdom then ask God, so that's what he did. He probably expected to get a prompting from the Holy Ghost that would tell him which church to join. Instead he saw God AND Jesus Christ (what a shock that must have been to see them as two separate beings), and he was told to join none of the churches.
When Joseph Smith told about his experience to religious leaders they persecuted him, but he saw what he saw and he could not deny it. Joseph Smith's family also believed Joseph, they knew him better than anyone. His family also had to endure the persecution. Joseph's brother even died with him in jail, and they took comfort in the words of The Book of Mormon.
You might be interested in this you tube video http://www.youtube.com/user/MormonMessages#p/u/49/CkKblIMfmjI
ADD:
I think the Book of Mormon itself proves that Joseph Smith was "for real". It, as you say, beautiful. It's so amazing and speaks truth. There are also a lot of complex things in it. Joseph Smith had a 3rd grade education and would not have known about many of the things found in the Book of Mormon. Now add that on top of how quickly it was done, it took him from about 60-90 days to translate the Book of Mormon. Do you think that someone with a 3rd grade education could write all that in such a short amount of time?
Yes, Joseph was telling the truth - but let's back up for a moment. What is an 'angel'? LDS [aka Mormons] assert that angels are not some alien species, but rather the spirits of men [or the resurrected person] who have lived on earth and are carrying messages from God. There are also spirits which follow Satan [Lucifer] and can appear seeking to draw men away from God. Although dealings with the 'supernatural' are not always explicable - that does not mean they are incomprehensible. Heavenly beings live in a realm of greater glory than we mortals and we often struggle to find the words to express these experiences.
1) It wasn't drugs, in fact when Joseph was a boy he had an infection in one of his legs. An operation was done to try to save the leg and in those days the only thing available to deaden the pain was liquor. Joseph refused to take the liquor and said that if he could have his father hold him in his arms he would bear the pain. Doesn't sound like someone prone to taking drugs to me. It wasn't mental illness either, because Joseph's behavior wasn't erratic like that of someone who is mentally ill.
2) He didn't lie. His family background and how he lived his life don't bear up to the accusations that he was a con man. He didn't fit the profile of a con man.
3) I'm certain he was telling the truth. The reason I believe this is because when I studied it for myself I felt the spirit testify that it was true. I know that is difficult for people to comprehend, but I'm sure all of us have had the experience at one time or other that we felt our own spirits touched by something. When I read the Joseph Smith story I feel that. I believe in God and I believe that he didn't put us here on earth as a whim, but that he has a specific purpose for us, and the gospel restored through Joseph Smith has all of the answers. http://scriptures.lds.org/en/js_h/1
4) I don't think it was something else. What else could it be and why? If it was the Devil as so many people claim, why would the teachings revealed to Joseph Smith place the life and teachings of Jesus Christ as the focus of the Church? It doesn't make sense.
People say the teachings of the LDS church are odd, but I suspect they either rely on sources like South Park or anti-Mormon web sites, accept what other people say, or haven't taken the time to research official resources to find out what actually is taught.
Is Joseph Smith for Real?
And the Trinity is true!
