Heavenly Father
Mormonism has a unique understanding of God the Father, or in their own terms, Heavenly Father. Their doctrine of Heavenly Father affects many other doctrines as will be clear below.
Contents |
[edit] An exalted being
[edit] A human with a body of flesh and bones
An official and historical doctrine of the Mormon church is that God the Father has a body of flesh and bones.
- "The Father has a body of flesh and bones as tangible as man’s; the Son also; but the Holy Ghost has not a body of flesh and bones, but is a personage of Spirit. Were it not so, the Holy Ghost could not dwell in us." -D&C 130:22 [2]
The early Mormon church held to this belief, with it's very origination being found on the lips of their founder, Joseph Smith,
- "...the earliest latter-day discussion of divine embodiment is best understood as a rejection of traditional doctrine concerning God and the metaphysics that makes that doctrine possible and perhaps even necessary. Joseph Smith's most clear statement of God's embodiment comes as part of a denail of Nicean trinitarianism: 'That which is without body, parts, and passions is nothing. There is no other God in heaven but that God who has flesh and bones.'" (James E. Faulconer, Element: the Journal of the Society for Mormon Philosophy and Theology, vol. 1, issue 1, spring 2005, p. 4).
[edit] The literal father of our spirits
In an official publication put out by the Mormon church, it states "You are a literal child of God, spiritually begotten in the premortal life," (True to the Faith, p. 74). The result of this belief is that God literally is our father in heaven, having conceived us all through physical relations with our Mother in heaven. She is rarely spoke of today, and quotes are surprisingly scarce in Mormon history although the belief of her existence is essential for this belief and others.
[edit] God was once a man...
Historic Mormonism and much of contemporary Mormonism teaches that the Father was once not as he is, and needed to progress to become a God. It is held that he was once a man like us, and many unequicovally affirm that he sinned and need his own savior and his own wife(s). God has thus not always been God, and because he was once a man, he now has a body of flesh and bones.
[edit] Further progression
Some in historic Mormonism have also taught that God the Father is still progressing in some form of knowledge or power. However, some Mormons find this belief heretical.
- "[If] a person accepts the false heresy that GOd is progressing or increasing in any of these attributes, that is, does not now possess them in their fulness and perfection, he places a bar across the path leading to a full measure of faith," (Mormon Doctrine, p. 263-264).
Lastly, the Father is viewed as the primary monarch of this world, the only one in the Triad (Father, Son, and Holy Ghost) to which we should pray and give worship.
[edit] Father and Mother
"Our heavenly parents provided us with a celestial home more glorious and beautiful than any place on earth." Gospel Principles
[edit] Notes
[edit] See also
[edit] External links
[edit] Non-Mormon
[edit] Mormon
- God, our Heavenly Father (Mormon.org)
- Teachings About God the Father
