Bear One Another's Burdens

Bear one another's burdens

That they may be light.

Mourn with those that mourn.

Comfort those that stand in need of comfort.

In the tradition of Mormon poets like William W. Phelps and Orson F. Whitney I have made my paraphrasing of Mosiah 18: 8-9 into a kind of mantra. It's very important doctrine because it's part of my covenant with God from my baptism. What I really love about this is the special kind of intimacy and deep friendship that comes from sharing burdens, mourning together. This is one of the most Christ-like, God-like things I can imagine.

Real friendship is proven in hard times. Friends have fun together, play together and laugh together. But they should also cry together and struggle together. And the blessing is imbedded right there in the counsel: bear one another's burdens that they may be light. Just sharing the burden helps.

There are a lot of burdens to be shared and made light. In the words of Jeffy R. Holland: “We have neighbors to bless, children to protect, the poor to lift up, and the truth to defend. We have wrongs to make right, truths to share, and good to do. In short, we have a life of devoted discipleship to give in demonstrating our love of the Lord. We can’t quit and we can’t go back." [1]

So I repeat the mantra from Mosiah 18:8-9 regularly to keep my mind and heart right with God. This is what we need to do.

References

1. http://www.lds.org/general-conference/2012/10/the-first-great-commandment?lang=eng

Radical Nonviolence in the Book of Mormon

The Book of Mormon can be read as a story of two brothers—Nephi and Laman.  It begins with the family of Lehi, which is constantly divided between the influences of these two sons.  The brothers ended their lives as enemies, separated from one another and the rest of the history of this family was a constant struggle between these two groups, the Nephites and the Lamanites.  After hundreds of years this bad blood and intense hatred boils over into destruction of epic scale.

The Book of Mormon is written from the perspective of the Nephites and their perspective of the Lamanites is often less than flattering.  Historian Richard Bushman has speculated what the history would have looked like if Lamanites had written it. [1] The two groups had many prejudices toward each other, which they had carried down from their parents. 

The Lamanites taught their children that Nephi had cheated Laman of his inheritance and sought to rule over his people and had stolen all of their records.  The Lamanites also taught their children “that they should hate them, and that they should murder them, and that they should rob and plunder them, and do all they could to destroy them; therefore they [had] an eternal hatred towards the children of Nephi.” [2]

For their part, the Nephites didn’t have a very high opinion of the Lamanites either.  When the four sons of the King, Mosiah, intended to go to the land of the Lamanites they were mocked by their fellow Nephites.  They said of the Lamanites that their “hearts delight[ed] in the shedding of blood.”  Some even suggested violence as the only solution: “Let us take up arms against them; that we destroy them and their iniquity out of the land, lest they overrun us and destroy us.” [3]

But the four sons of Mosiah did go the land of the Lamanites and their first experiences among them did much to confirm the prejudices of the Nephites.  They were treated very harshly.  Ammon was bound and taken before the local leader.  Luckily, he was able to win over the king, Lamoni.  His brothers were not as lucky, and they were beaten and thrown into prison.  But eventually, relations started to ease and many of the Lamanites began to change.  They had been murderous and bloodthirsty, but when they learned of the Gospel they began to see the error of their violence.

Some of the Lamanites began to change in ways so radical that we might even think unwise.  They still lived amid the danger of invasion and attack but their hearts were so transformed that they had no more desire to fight.

Their king said to his people: “Now, my beloved brethren, since God hath taken away our stains, and our swords have become bright, then let us stain our swords no more with the blood of our brethren… Oh, how merciful is our God! And now behold, since it has been as much as we could do to get our stains taken away from us, and our swords are made bright, let us hide them away that they may be kept bright, as a testimony to our God at the last day, or at the day that we shall be brought to stand before him to be judged, that we have not stained our swords in the blood of our brethren since he imparted his word unto us and has made us clean thereby.  And now, my brethren, if our brethren seek to destroy us, behold, we will hide away our swords, yea, even we will bury them deep in the earth, that they may be kept bright, as a testimony that we have never used them, at the last day; and if our brethren destroy us, behold, we shall go to our God and shall be saved.” [4]

So they buried their weapons, promising never to raise them again.  They were indeed attacked and began to suffer a mass slaughter.  And they just gave up their lives, because “they buried the weapons of war, for peace.” [5] As the other Lamanites were killing them they saw that they didn’t fight back.  “Now when the Lamanites saw this they did forbear from slaying them; and there were many whose hearts had swollen in them for those of their brethren who had fallen under the sword, for they repented of the things which they had done.  And it came to pass that they threw down their weapons of war, and they would not take them again, for they were stung for the murders which they had committed; and they came down even as their brethren, relying upon the mercies of those whose arms were lifted to slay them.  And it came to pass that the people of God were joined that day by more than the number who had been slain.” [6] This radical nonviolence by the Lamanites was more disarming than retaliation.  But many died in the process.  It was a heavy cost but the result was a dramatic transformation of an entire people.

In modern times nonviolence has been extremely effective in bringing about dramatic change. Mohandas Gandhi used nonviolence to end the occupation of India from British rule.  Martin Luther King, influenced by Gandhi, used nonviolent protest in his struggle for civil rights for African Americans.  But these men have been criticized by some who believed that nonviolence was weak and ineffective.   George Jackson, a member of the Black Panthers, said, “the concept of nonviolence is a false ideal. It presupposes the existence of compassion and a sense of justice on the part of one's adversary. When this adversary has everything to lose and nothing to gain by exercising justice and compassion, his reaction can only be negative.” [7]

But the enduring impact of Martin Luther King and Gandhi seems to vindicate and validate their nonviolent practices.  For one thing, the former oppressors have for the most part admitted their wrongdoing much as the murderous Lamanites recognized their own sin.  Had Martin Luther King encouraged violence, civil rights for Africans Americans might not have the widespread acceptance it has today.

The practice of nonviolence is not only effective to win people’s rights and freedoms.  It also brings people together.  The dream of Martin Luther King was not only that black Americans would enjoy the freedoms of white Americans.  Rather it was that “all of God's children, black men and white men, Jews and Gentiles, Protestants and Catholics, will be able to join hands and sing…” And who could argue with that?  Why would we not all want that?  At its heart, nonviolence appeals to the desire of every man and every woman for peace and love, that’s why it touches us all.  To quote the Book of Mormon one more time: "the preaching of the word had a great tendency to lead the people to do that which was just—yea, it had had more powerful effect upon the minds of the people than the sword, or anything else." [8]

Notes

[1] Bushman’s essay is titled The Lamanite View of Book of Mormon History.  It can be read in his book Believing History: Latter-Day Saint Essays.

[2] Mosiah 10:17

[3] Alma 26:24-25

[4] Alma 24:12,15-16

[5] Alma 24:19

[6] Alma 24:24-26

[7] Jackson, George. Soledad Brother: The Prison Letters of George Jackson. Lawrence Hill Books, 1994

[8] Alma 31:5

Atonement Theory, Part 1: A History

It might be surprising to find out that something as foundational as the doctrine of the Atonement has been interpreted very differently throughout history.  Here I would like to review the history of Atonement theory in Christianity.  It would be interesting to extend this back into the history of Judaism but that is another topic on it’s own.  In Reform Theology and in most LDS discussion the dominant theory of Atonement is that of Penal Substitution.  However, this theory was not developed until the Reformation.  There had been several other theories before this one.   I’ll go through some of these theories here as well as one more modern theory.  Later on, I will discuss my own understanding of the Atonement.

The Ransom Theory

According to the Ransom Theory, Christ’s Atonement was a ransom payment made to the devil to deliver our souls from Hell.  Satan was tricked into thinking that he could keep the soul of Christ captive after this transaction.  But since Christ is divine Satan was unable to hold him captive.  Scriptural basis for the theory comes from a few sources.  In Mark, “For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many” (Mark 10:45).  From Paul, “For there is one God and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus, who gave himself as a ransom for all men—the testimony given in its proper time” (1 Timothy 2:5-6).  This theory was promoted by Origen (185-254) as well as Irenaeus (d. 202) and Tertullian (160-220).

The Satisfaction Theory

According to the Satisfaction Theory, Christ suffered to satisfy the demands of God’s honor and merit.  This theory is best understood in terms of the feudal society in which it developed.  This theory was put forward by Anselm of Canterbury (1033-1109).  Anselm compared God to a feudal lord who had been wronged by his surfs and needed to maintain his honor.  No mere mortal, or surf, could satisfy the injury to the honor of a lord.  Only a lord, or God, could satisfy God’s honor.  This theory emphasizes God’s justice, which must always be satisfied.  It’s emphasis on justice makes it very similar to the Penal Substitution Theory.

The Governmental Theory

This theory is very similar to the Satisfaction Theory and the Penal Substitution Theory.  The Governmental Theory says that God is the great lawgiver and that he must uphold the law.  Whenever a law is broken there must be a punishment to sustain order in the universe.  Christ thus suffers the penalty for the broken law.  This Theory was developed by Hugo Grotius (1583-1645) who was, incidentally, a jurist.

The Moral Theory

In this theory, Christ’s sacrifice is not so much intended to affect God the Father at is intended to affect us.  The Atonement of Christ demonstrates the supreme love of God for us and thus moves us to repentance and love for God.  This theory was developed by Peter Abelard (1079-1142).  A similar idea was promoted by Faustus (1539-1604) and Laelius Socinius (1525-1562).  They saw the Atonement was the most beautiful demonstration of God’s love.  It also an example of supreme love for God, inspiring us to love God to the same degree.  “To this you were called, because Christ suffered for you, leaving you an example, that you should follow in his footsteps” (1 Peter 2:21).

Penal Substitution Theory

This is the dominant view in the Reform Tradition and probably the most common explanation of Atonement given today.  According to Wayne Grudem’s Systematic Theology, penal substitution is “the view that Christ in his death bore the just penalty of God for our sins as a substitute for us” (p. 1251).  “This view is sometimes called the theory of vicarious atonement.  A ‘vicar’ is someone who stands in the place of another or who represents another.  Christ’s death was therefore ‘vicarious’ because he stood in our place and represented us.  As our representative, he took the penalty that we deserve” (ibid. 579).  This theory was largely developed by John Calvin (1509-1564).

These are the major theories of Atonement throughout the history of Christianity.  However, there is one more theory I would like to mention since it is my favorite and the closest to my own view.  It is called the Compassion Theory, developed by Mormon theologian and philosopher Blake Ostler in the second volume of his series Exploring Mormon Thought: The Problems of Theism and the Love of God.

Ostler defended his theory in another paper titled Atonement in Mormon Thought (see link below).  In this paper he listed five questions he felt that any theory of Atonement should address:

1. How are Christ’s life, death and resurrection either necessary or uniquely beneficial to expiate or eradicate the effects of sin in our lives so that we are reconciled to God here and now?

2. Why can’t we just be forgiven without someone suffering?

3. Why does Christ’s suffering and experience atone for our sins in a way that the Father and the Holy Ghost do not?

4. How could Christ “bear our sins” or “take our sins upon him” that we commit in the here and now in a way that caused him to suffer?

5. How do the ordinances of sacrament and baptism (among others) signify what occurs in atonement?

He also proposes that any theory of Atonement should meet Abelard’s Constraint, that is to say it be “neither unintelligible, arbitrary, illogical, nor immoral.”

Compassion Theory

The Compassion Theory takes advantage of the meaning of the word “com-passion” which etymologically means “feel in union with”.  In The Problems of Theism and the Love of God, Ostler says: “The purpose of Atonement is to overcome our alienation by creating compassion, a life shared in union where we are moved by our love for each other.  ‘The Passion’ also refers to Christ’s suffering—and thus com-passion is to share in Christ’s suffering and he in ours, that we might share also in the unsurpassable joy of each others’ lives… The purpose of the atonement in LDS scripture is to ‘bring about the bowels of mercy’ so that God is moved with compassion for us and we are moved with gratitude to trust him by opening our hearts to him.  The result of the Atonement is that we are free to choose to turn back to God, and he is free to accept us into a relationship of shared life.  Atonement removes, casts out, and releases the guilt that alienates us; and it also brings us together into shared life.  When we let go of our past and release the painful energy of alienation, Christ experiences that release and receives into himself the pain that we have experienced to be transformed by the light of his love.  If we refuse to let go of our past histories and the pain that arises from our sins, we will continue to experience pain.  If we let go of that pain; however, then Christ experiences the very pain that we release, but we no longer have to.  In his Passion we find compassion.  He literally feels our and pains is thereby filled with compassion for us.  In this sense, Christ suffers for our sins and bears our iniquities” (235-236).

So there is a brief review of the major theories of this most important doctrine.  Later, I will talk about my own understanding of the Atonement in response to scripture and in response to personal experience.

Reference:

Blake Ostler’s Atonement in Mormon Thought

http://blakeostler.com/docs/AtonementInMormonThought.pdf

Faith And/Or Works

When I was in college I liked to pass through the main mall going by the food court and library.  Sometimes I would take the long route just to see what was going on.  There were usually a handful of demonstrators and preachers and it was always an interesting diversion.  I remember one time I heard a preacher yell out: “for all you people who think you’re gonna get to Heaven by being nice people and doing good I’ll tell you the only way to be saved is through Christ.”  The college kids weren’t responding very well.  It might have been because his friend had another poster detailing why every group and subgroup on campus was going to Hell.  But regardless of what people may think, college kids are pretty morally conscious, sometimes hyper-morally conscious.  College kids are always getting involved in efforts to help alleviate poverty and protect the environment out of altruistic, idealistic motives.  And here was a guy telling them that all these good works were a waste of time and that they should instead be focusing on Jesus.

It’s great to testify of Jesus, but why downplay the importance of good works and good character?  Are good works and faith in Christ mutually exclusive?  The question is often framed “are we saved by works or by grace?”  This has been a big theological debate for hundreds of years.  Augustine was probably the most prominent theologian to discuss it in early Christianity.  During the Reformation Martin Luther brought this question to the forefront and it was continued by John Calvin.  But I think this whole discussion is presenting a false dichotomy and actually distorts the meaning of faith.  We don’t have a choice of either faith or works.  If you have faith in Christ you have faith and works.

This whole debate seems like a distraction to me.  Why worry so much about this?  Doing good is never bad.  It sounds silly to even say such a thing but it sometimes seems necessary.  Good works, genuinely good works are never bad and they are never condemned in scripture.  Scriptures only condemn pride, doing good things for glory and honor.  Jesus never said not to help the poor.  He just said to go and do it in private rather than make a big scene for the appearance of piety (Matthew 6:1-4).  Even Paul never condemned good works.  Paul just stressed that despite our efforts to do good work, we fail; but we can still be accepted by God through his grace (Romans 7:19-25; Romans 8).  Paul also warned about pride: “For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is a gift of God: Not of works, lest any man should boast” (Ephesians 2:8-9).

There is a certain nuance in the scriptures, especially in Paul.  We sometimes have a difficult time with nuance.  But the tension is this—we are saved by grace and not by our works, but good works are still essential.  We can’t just say “I’m saved” and then live a life of sin.  “What shall we say then?  Shall we continue in sin, that grace may abound?  God forbid.  How shall we, that are dead to sin, live any longer in therein?” (Romans 6:1-2)  This is nuance taught in the seminaries and is well understood by the educated clergy.  But unfortunately the message sometimes get’s lost on the rest of us.  It’s easier to avoid the tension and break things down into black and white—faith or works, take your pick.

Theologian J.I. Packer said: “Faith cannot be defined in subjective terms, as a confident and optimistic mind-set, or in passive terms, as acquiescent orthodoxy or confidence in God without commitment to God.  Faith is an object-oriented response, shaped by that which is trusted, namely God himself, God’s promises, and Jesus Christ, all as set forth in the Scriptures.  And faith is a whole-souled response, involving mind, heart, will and affections.

Reformed theologians actually had a very developed understanding of faith.  They broke down faith into three parts: notitia, assensus, and fiducia.

Notitia is the knowledge of the content of the gospel.

Assensus is the agreement, recognition that the gospel is true.  We usually focus primarily on this aspect of faith. 

Fiducia is trust and reliance in God.  It is trusting that although we sin and fail at times, we can trust in the grace of God and in the Atonement of Christ.  This is the element of commitment and dedication.

The idea that we don’t need God or God’s grace is the heresy of legalism.  The people the get all worked up and condemn the idea of salvation by works are very wary of the doctrine of legalism.  The danger of legalism is that it can be very damaging to our individual esteem.  If we think we have to be perfect we are apt to compare ourselves to others and feel we are not good enough.  Or we might get an inflated ego and feel like we are better than everyone else.  Both attitudes are alienating God.

The opposite end of legalism is antinomianism.  Antinomianism (literally “against+law”) is the idea that after we declare our faith in Christ we no longer need to abide by any rules.  The dangers of this doctrine should be obvious.  My big question to antinomianism is—what’s the point?  So God saves a bunch of vile, wretched people who stay that way forever.  That doesn’t even seem like salvation at all.  There is no progress.  It is eternal degeneracy.  I find it hard to admire a religion that doesn’t uplift and ennoble people’s lives or somehow make the world a better place.

Going back to J.I. Packer he says: “But if ‘good works’ (activities of serving God and others) do not follow from our profession of faith, we are as yet believing only from the head, not from the heart, in other words, justifying faith (fiducia) is not yet ours.  The truth is that, though we are justified by faith alone, the faith that justifies is never alone.”  A good way to get a deeper understanding of faith is to observe the different comments by Paul and James.  James famously said, “faith, if it hath not works, is dead, being alone” (James 2:17).  So does James contradict Paul?  Well, it’s possible that the two themselves got into arguments over this; we don’t know for sure.  But even if they did, they didn’t have to.  J.I. Packer said: “When James says that faith without works is dead (i.e., a corpse), he is using the word faith in the limited sense of notitia plus assensus, which is how those he addresses were using it.  When he says that one is justified by what one does, not by faith alone, he means by ‘justified’ ‘proved genuine; vindicated from the suspicion of being a hypocrite and a fraud.’  James is making the point that barren orthodoxy saves no one (James 2:14-26).  Paul would have agreed, and James’s whole letter shows him agreeing with Paul that faith must change one’s life.  Paul denounces the idea of salvation by dead works; James rejects salvation by dead faith.”

This leads into another key concept in Christian theology—sanctification.  Sanctification is “an ongoing transformation within a maintained consecration, and it engenders real righteousness within the frame of relational holiness” (Packer).  The “born-again” experience is regeneration.  But regeneration is just the beginning.  Sanctification is the continuing process that follows.  As Packer says: “Regeneration is birth; sanctification is growth.”  If you stop your spiritual progress right after you’re born again you remain a spiritual infant.

So maybe someday I’ll run out to the University and start preaching “All you people out there trying to live good lives and do good works, keep it up.  And don’t be discouraged when you make mistakes, God loves you anyway and wants to help you.  Trust God and follow Christ and you can have a great life.”  Or something like that.  We don’t need to have these extreme distinctions, choosing either a life of faith or a life of good works.  It’s not faith or works; it’s faith and works.

Referenced

Packer, J.I. Concise Theology: A Guide to Historic Christian Beliefs.

Exegesis in the Book of Mormon

On November 28, 1841 Joseph Smith met in the council with the Twelve Apostles and afterword wrote the following: “I told the brethren that the Book of Mormon was the most correct of any book on earth, and the keystone of our religion, and a man would get nearer to God by abiding by its precepts, than by any other book.” (DHC 4:461)  This quote is now found in the introduction of latest edition of the Book of Mormon, a reminder of the book’s importance to our faith.

One of the most detailed scholarly works on the Book of Mormon is written by Terryl Givens, titled By the Hand of Mormon: The American Scripture that Launched a New World Religion.  Givens’ book follows the history of the Book of Mormon’s importance in the church and its impact on the religious world.  One theme Givens repeats throughout is that the presence of the book itself has often been more important to believers than the actual content of the book.  He proposed that “the book’s primary claim to the reader’s attention will be as a pointer to meaning, rather than an embodiment of meaning.”

“This fact is made clear in the rhetoric of conversion as expressed by virtually every convert to Mormonism.  The typical conversion account would seldom include a statement such as, ‘I studied the Book of Mormon and found the doctrinal exposition of the atonement as recorded in Alma 42 especially compelling.’  The near-universal formula would read more like Mormon luminary Parley P. Pratt’s: ‘As I read, the spirit of the Lord was upon me, and I knew and comprehended that the book was true.’” [1]

Reading Givens’ book made me to consider how the practice of exegesis is applied or can be applied to the Book of Mormon the way it is done using the Bible.  Exegesis, defined broadly, is the explanation or interpretation of a text.  There is a rich history of exegesis applied to Biblical texts and his been responsible for most major developments in Christian theology.  Biblical exegesis can be said to have had a tremendous impact on Mormon theology in particular as well considering that many of the sections in the Doctrine and Covenants were revelatory responses to Joseph Smith’s new translation of the Bible.

I will borrow an idea from Terryl Givens here, hopefully in a way he would approve, and say that Book of Mormon exegesis falls into two categories:

1.  Examination of the text of the book to understand its meaning

2.  Using the text as a means to receive revelation from God

Granted, both of these methods can and have been used in Biblical exegesis but I think the first has been used more especially.  The strength of the Book of Mormon exegesis has usually been of the second kind.  It is not bad that the Bible and Book of Mormon have been used in these ways, but there is also opportunity to develop spirituality further by trying both exegetical approaches to both works of scripture.  For example, the Bible can be read in a way to feel the power of God.  Readers can pray about the Bible to know by the power of the Holy Ghost if its words are true (Moroni 10:4-5).  Historically, this has been seen in the practice of lectio divina.  The Book of Mormon can also be read to develop a deeper understanding of atonement, agency, grace, the godhead, and the first principles of the Gospel.

These two approaches are by no means mutually exclusive and can in fact be mutually fulfilling.  The Book of Mormon has been and remains the most powerful tool for conversion experience in the Mormon faith.  There is a power in it that turns its readers to Christ.  The Book of Mormon also contains some of the most profound lessons of any work of scripture.  These lessons can be explicit in the form of sermons and doctrinal explanations.  The lessons can also be woven into the stories of the lives of these ancient people, from which the deeper meaning must be deciphered.  Undertaking this work of theological, literary exploration is a challenging but ultimately rewarding effort that further deepens the revelatory encounter with God just as in the first instance of conversion.

1.  Givens, Terryl. By the Hand of Mormon: The American Scripture that Launched a New World Religion. Oxford. 2002. p. 235