A Rational Theology, as Taught by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day SaintsWidtsoe, John Andreas
Religion
A Rational Theology, as Taught by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints
Widtsoe, John Andreas
Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints -- Doctrines; Latter Day Saint churches -- Doctrines; Theology
In the Great Council then held, of which a dim and distant picture
only has been left, the great question was with respect to man's free
agency. The essence of the proposed plan was that the spirits,
forgetting temporarily their sojourn in their spirit home should be
given a body of grosser matter, and should be subject to this form of
universal matter, and even be brought into a temporal death. To bring
an eternal, free spirit under the bondage of matter and forgetfulness,
it was necessary for some one to begin the work by, figuratively
speaking, breaking a law, so that the race might be brought under the
subjection of death. This may be likened, roughly, to the deliberate
breaking, for purposes of repair or extension, of a wire carrying
power to light a city. Someone had to divert the current of eternal
existence, and thus temporarily bring man's earthly body under the
subjection of gross matter. Adam, the first man, was chosen to do
this work. By the deliberate breaking of a spiritual law, he placed
himself under the ban of earthly death and transmitted to all his
posterity the subjection to death. This was the so-called "sin of
Adam." To obtain or give greater joys, smaller pains may often have to
be endured.
**The Need of a Savior.** The purpose of the earth career was,
however, two-fold, to learn to understand gross matter, and to acquire
a body made of the essence of such matter. The bodies laid in the
grave must, therefore, be raised again. As the spirits, by their own
act had not brought upon themselves death, so by their own act they
should not conquer it. It was necessary, therefore, that someone, in
time, should reunite the broken wires and reestablish the flow of
eternal life, and thus to conquer death. For this work Jesus Christ
was chosen. Jesus actually came on earth, lived and taught the ancient
Gospel again to the children of men, and in time suffered death so
that the act of Adam might be atoned for. By this work, the purpose of
the earth-life was completed, and thus Jesus Christ became the central
figure in the plan of salvation.
Why death, so-called, should be necessary for us to achieve an
intimate knowledge of matter, and why Jesus should die to permit the
current of eternal life to flow freely between the earthly body and
the eternal spirit, are not fully known. Through Adam man was brought
on earth, subject to death; through Jesus, the Christ, he was lifted
out of death to continue an eternal life in association with the
earth-acquired body.
**Man's Part in the Great Plan.** In this great gathering in the
heavens many questions arose. By Adam man was to come on earth; by
Jesus he was to be resurrected. In both of these great acts, man had
no part, beyond permitting himself to be acted upon. In the plan, what
was to be man's part?
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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