In effort to adhere to tradition established with my other posts that typically start off with a personal story or analogy from other stories told, I similarly would like to start this post with a reference to part of a movie I’ve seen many times.
There was a newlywed couple. They were gifted a home freely through contributions from their parents. They weren’t expected to pay a dime for their needs. All their parents asked for in return was to keep the home in good order, essentially not cause mischief, and leave some of the fruit trees in the yard alone.
Naturally, when you are living a life of ease and luxury, you are bound to encounter people that will attempt to befriend you with bad intentions. So it was with this couple. At first, the friend tried to make it sound like he was being helpful. He basically said, “Everything your parents got for you is nice and all, but if you invest with me, I can increase your wealth and the return on your parents initial investment”. Of course the couple kind of shrugged it off, but the “friend” persisted. Eventually they caved to the pressure – maybe this investment would be worthwhile. As collateral for their investment, they harvested fruit from one of the trees in the yard that their parents told them not to mess with. The parents were apprised of these dealings with this particular friend and decided to pay a visit to the couple. The friend told the couple to hide, but the parents knew how to easily track their children down.
When the parents confronted the couple with their dealings, they didn’t seem pleased. Because the terms of the initial agreement were not adhered to, the parents kicked the couple out of the house, and told them they would need to go to work, and provide a living for themselves. Of course – the friend couldn’t provide any of the promised return on investment, because he was deceiving them.
The couple then went to work in hopes of making a decent life to live despite their mistakes and estrangement from their parents. They desired to achieve the success their parents had. They also wanted to get back in the good graces of their parents, because they loved them, and knew they wanted what was best for them, despite kicking them out of the house.
The friend would still come around often, trying to get the ear of the couple. When he learned the couple sought legitimate ways to get a return on their investment they now worked so hard for, the friend came back again stating he had plenty of ways to help them get a return on investment. The couple, knowing what had happened the last time, stood their ground, and sought legitimate ways to live a fulfilled life.
Perhaps by my summary of the movie, you already know which movie I’m referring to. If not, I’ll share some quotes of the movie to bring it home. While, this may seem like I’m referring to finances or money, and this movie does have references to such things, that is for another post.
Essentially to the point in the movie that I referred to, the couple say they are looking for “True Messengers”. Messengers that will truly guide and advise them in their spiritual journey. Their “friend” noted that he understood that they wanted someone to preach to them. Give them Religion. That many would be willing to preach to them the “philosophies of men, mingled with scripture” as if religion was the only adequate way to reconcile individuals to God.
There was a time in my life where I was able to make time to watch this particular movie weekly. When the local exclusive “venue” that presented the movie shut down for a few weeks for routine maintenance, I made an effort during those weeks to travel 2-3 hours to another venue that was offering a showing of the same movie. I was taught that this “movie” had special teachings, that if I were to repetitively watch it, I would gain greater understanding.
Week after week of watching the same movie, the line about religion would pry at me. This was Satan speaking after all. He’s pushing good people to religion saying it will bring them back to their parents. If religion was good, why would Satan be pushing people to it? Then in an effort to “doubt my doubts” as one prominent figure in religion once put it (Dieter F. Uchtdorf, Come Join with Us, October 2013 LDS General Conference), my mind attempted to say “nah, Satan is talking about other religions. You belong to the true one! What he says doesn’t apply to your religion”. This line of thinking is essentially “cognitive dissonance” which is defined as: “psychological conflict resulting from incongruous beliefs and attitudes held simultaneously”. We often naturally respond to cognitive dissonance through confirmation bias, where we seek answers from sources that validate our long held beliefs even though they may be conflicting with each other. It is akin to Bobby Hill listening to “music” thinking its good and valid music only for his wise father Hank to point out “it’s all toilet sounds… What that person on your tape has is a medical disorder”.
How many times have you been told your religion offers the truth? Or that its leaders are “True Messengers”, “True Prophets”, that following these people would guide you to eternal life?
In other posts I have addressed what Jesus Christ constitutes as true doctrine. If he was to send “true messengers” their message and teachings would align with his doctrine and teachings. Their teachings wouldn’t stray from what he said was his greatest commandments, to love God and to love your neighbor (Matthew 22:36-40) on which “hang all the law and prophets“ .
In words directly from LDS ritual, Religion is the “philosophies of men mingled with scripture”. Of course my phrase of choice for this would be to call such philosophies of men mingled with scripture a plurality of doctrines. While the concept of philosophy is questioning things in order to gain further understanding, man is also fallible or prone to fall in error in spiritual matters if they stray too far from Christ’s doctrine. Likewise, given man’s fallen state, a true messenger would be willing to admit their own errors and repent of their ways. In the modern world, the philosophies of men lead false teachers and prophets to loophole and play apologetics for their erroneous ways rather than repent and admit to their shortcomings.
Critics of the LDS church are quick to point at many errors in “doctrinal” teachings over the course of its history. Some of these doctrinal teachings that the church actually redirected course on have included: Blood Atonement, Adam-God Doctrine, Polygamy, and Priesthood Ordination restrictions based on race. The aforementioned disavowed doctrines were originated by Brigham Young, though the church has altered course on other teachings over its history under the guise or loophole of “continuing revelation” or “ongoing restoration” (Russell M. Nelson, The Temple and Your Spiritual Foundation, Oct. 2021 General Conference).
Additionally, Dallin H. Oaks, current first counselor in the First Presidency, and former practicer of the art of law, partitions God’s commandments into two separate categories. “Permanent” and “Temporary”. As many start to wake up to past and present questionable church practices he emphasized this new philosophy of his in the October 2024 general conference in his talk ironically titled “Following Christ”. To fully understand my point I encourage everyone to read this talk in its entirety.
I have emphasized Christ’s Doctrine and commandments in the present and prior posts. In fact, if you consider my points of view radical, Oaks is in agreement with my takes on the Doctrine of Christ as well as the two most important commandments Christ gave. He even classifies these as “permanent commandments”. So what gives? In lawyerly fashion, he offers a loophole for present and past church leader’s mistakes and false teachings through the term “temporary commandments”. If something was taught in the past, and we discarded it? Temporary Commandment. If Hinckley and Monson emphasized the use of the term “Mormon” in expensive marketing campaigns only for Nelson to take leadership reigns of the church and call using the term “Mormon” a “victory for satan” ? Temporary Commandment? No, actually. This was apparently a permanent commandment to discard the name “Mormon”, it only took us while to realize that we needed to take that seriously. He also strangely classifies “Tithing” as a permanent commandment. This resonates as ignorance or a misguided priority to classify tithing which benefits only the church financially as a permanent commandment when the potential to live the law of consecration which benefits all individuals participating (aka loving your neighbor) is there. It is also in contradiction the words of Joseph F. Smith:
“I want to say to you, we may not be able to reach it right away, but we expect to see the day when we will not have to ask you for one dollar of donation for any purpose, except that which you volunteer to give of your own accord, because we will have tithes sufficient in the storehouse of the Lord to pay everything that is needful for the advancement of the kingdom of God” (Joseph F. Smith, 1907 April General Conference).
In light of disclosures, practices, and financial penalties related to church finances in recent years, we can safely presume Joseph F. Smith would consider the present financial state of the LDS church a time when tithing is not required.
Loopholes in apologetic forms such as offering the “out” of “temporary commandments” leads to confusion and strays us from the straight and narrow path containing the word of God which leads us to eternal life. Joseph F. Smith was President of the church for 17 years and as such would be considered a prophet by LDS Standards. Why haven’t his aforementioned words been heeded by the church?
We turn back to the philosophies of men mingled with scripture for our answer. In General Conference Allen D. Haynie, a Seventy declared,
“Unlike vintage comic books and classic cars, prophetic teachings do not become more valuable with age. That is why we should not seek to use the words of past prophets to dismiss the teachings of living prophets.” (April 2023 General Conference, Allen D. Haynie, A Living Prophet for the Latter Days”)
This approach is a slippery slope. This gives the present corporate leader of the church all power just by his words. He has the words to invalidate any past prophet if he chooses. Nephi, Isaiah, Moroni, Joseph Smith. If anyone adheres to this type of counsel, they are heeding the philosophies of men to ignore any past error of the church or any of its leaders. They are circumventing or litigating the need of repentance, rather than being contrite. By this understanding, if this is your present state of mind, I acknowledge Haynie is just a seventy and not a mighty twelve or first presidency member. You must remember however, that the president of the church is always the last to speak at each general conference and by doing so validates any words spoken at general conference unless he explicitly states otherwise.
This philosophy of men mingled with scripture taught by Haynie is not an outlier or isolated teaching. Rather, he is reiterating a doctrine previously taught multiple times in general conference. In a talk at BYU, Ezra Taft Benson emphasized this exact teaching that I could dedicate a whole blog post to as a plurality of doctrines. It is problematic on every level and I recommend one read it to become aware of this ongoing damaging rhetoric within the church. To be concise, I will provide the highlight quote on BYU’s website:
“God’s revelations to Adam did not instruct Noah how to build the ark. Noah needed his own revelation. Therefore, the most important prophet, so far as you and I are concerned, is the one living in our day and age to whom the Lord is currently revealing His will for us.” (Ezra Taft Benson, Fourteen Fundamentals in Following the Prophet, BYU Devotional, February 26, 1980)
Sure in a literal sense, there may be logic in heeding Noah in his day. Noah by canon is a legitimate prophet. He did not invalidate Adam’s teachings. Certainly if we had a modern prophet in our day there would be importance in listening to them so long as they are a true messenger that does not depart from Christ’s doctrines or commandments. The problem is this type of logic is weaponized as a means to gaslight sincere individuals to ignore the ugly past, and give fealty to the present leader of the church with a promised prize of salvation. In this same talk given by Benson, he emphasized that the prophet will never lead us astray. Isn’t that counterintuitive to the point that the present prophet has all power to invalidate a previous prophet, if at a given time a prophet cannot lead one astray? May I state again, when we complicate things, and stray from true doctrine, shouldn’t this be a warning sign that something is off in the teachings of these preachers? This talk and its general points are often emphasized and has been a plague on the church for decades. Prior to Haynie’s damaging teachings, Benson’s talk was previously resurrected by Presidency of the Seventy member, Claudio R. M. Costa and Kevin R. Duncan, Seventy in October 2010 (Obedience to the Prophets, Claudia R. M. Costa & Our Very Survival, Kevin R. Duncan). Duncan emphasized Benson’s words which were “our salvation hangs on following the prophet”.
If you’re still present with me, I want to ask, what do the scriptures say in response to such teachings. While we addressed that present leaders of the church would have you discard any past prophets (which are the basis of canonized scripture in the lds church) that disagree with any present teachings by the “modern prophets” I would recommend using the scriptures as a validation method of what present preachers speak.
So what do they say on this topic? Isaiah whom has direct endorsement from our Savior, Jesus Christ stated:
“The voice said, Cry. And he said, What shall I cry? All flesh is grass, and all the goodliness thereof is as the flower of the field: The grass withereth, the flower fadeth: because the spirit of the Lord bloweth upon it: surely the people is grass. The grass withereth, the flower fadeth: but the word of our God shall stand for ever.” (Isaiah 40:6-8, KJV)
Jesus also had an interesting response to his church leaders on this subject:
“Then the Pharisees and scribes asked him, Why walk not thy disciples according to the tradition of the elders, but eat bread with unwashen hands? He answered and said unto them, Well hath Esaias prophesied of you hypocrites, as it is written, This people honoureth me with their lips, but their heart is far from me. Howbeit in vain do they worship me, teaching for doctrines the commandments of men. For laying aside the commandment of God, ye hold the tradition of men, as the washing of pots and cups: and many other such like things ye do. And he said unto them, Full well ye reject the commandment of God, that ye may keep your own tradition.” (Mark 7:5-9, KJV)
I get it, the Pharisees were leaders of a church in an apostate condition.. The LDS church on the other hand is Israel, Ephraim, you know, God’s chosen people, the true church that will never be apostate, with its prophetic leaders. We are so important that Isaiah talked about us! He says:
“Woe to the crown of pride, to the drunkards of Ephraim, whose glorious beauty is a fading flower, which are on the head of the fat valleys of them that are overcome with wine!
Behold, the Lord hath a mighty and strong one, which as a tempest of hail and a destroying storm, as a flood of mighty waters overflowing, shall cast down to the earth with the hand.
The crown of pride, the drunkards of Ephraim, shall be trodden under feet:
And the glorious beauty, which is on the head of the fat valley, shall be a fading flower, and as the hasty fruit before the summer; which when he that looketh upon it seeth, while it is yet in his hand he eateth it up.
In that day shall the Lord of hosts be for a crown of glory, and for a diadem of beauty, unto the residue of his people,
And for a spirit of judgment to him that sitteth in judgment, and for strength to them that turn the battle to the gate.
But they also have erred through wine, and through strong drink are out of the way; the priest and the prophet have erred through strong drink, they are swallowed up of wine, they are out of the way through strong drink; they err in vision, they stumble in judgment.
For all tables are full of vomit and filthiness, so that there is no place clean.
Whom shall he teach knowledge? and whom shall he make to understand doctrine? them that are weaned from the milk, and drawn from the breasts.
For precept must be upon precept, precept upon precept; line upon line, line upon line; here a little, and there a little:
For with stammering lips and another tongue will he speak to this people.
To whom he said, This is the rest wherewith ye may cause the weary to rest; and this is the refreshing: yet they would not hear.
But the word of the Lord was unto them precept upon precept, precept upon precept; line upon line, line upon line; here a little, and there a little; that they might go, and fall backward, and be broken, and snared, and taken.
Wherefore hear the word of the Lord, ye scornful men, that rule this people which is in Jerusalem.” (Isaiah 28: 1-14, KJV)
A pleasant site indeed it is for God’s “chosen people”. Vomit and filthiness.
How often in your life have you held to teachings, or felt it was your duty to explain and be apologetic of past unpleasant, or gross doctrines of your religion? Christ’s true doctrine does not need apology. It doesn’t need loopholes. It doesn’t need temporary commandments. It does not need confusion. It does not need the philosophies of men to uphold and support it. It is the preachers of the philosophies of men that need you. They need your allegiance and money for their power. The only thing they are offering in return is milk from their breasts tainted by their drunkenness of wine. Are you ready to be weaned and sober? Or continue the plague of drunkenness for further generations? Christ is not the head of Religion. If you want religion, you’ll find many that are willing to preach to you the philosophies of men, mingled with scripture.
Plurality of Doctrines 