The Great Apostasy-Did It Really Occur

Volume Four—Chapter Five THE GREAT APOSTASY—DID IT REALLY OCCUR? In a previous chapter we spoke of the Christian church during the Medieval Period and how it devolved, doctrinally, organizationally, and procedurally following the loss of apostolic leadership.1 We refer to this devolution or deterioration as the “Great Apostasy.” I am including this chapter in our section on “The Nature of God” because the Great Apostasy brought with it important changes bearing on the doctrine of the Father and the Son including views on the virgin birth of Jesus and whether or not we LDS worship “a different Jesus” than that worshipped by the so-called “orthodox

Christians.”

#The Great Apostasy

Evangelical view. Blomberg questions the LDS position regarding the great apostasy. He notes the simple, logical, and comprehensive solutions LDS theology offers to all of the dilemmas facing orthodox Christians today. He asks why, if the ancient Christians had the same beliefs as the Latter-day Saints, would they “ever have exchanged such a neat and orderly system for one that leaves the unanswered

questions that remain in the Bible and early Christianity?” (HWD, 108).

An implied second criticism here is that LDS doctrine provides a solution for virtually all spiritual issues, problems, and dilemmas. Hence, our doctrine seems too neat, too pat, too simplistic, and too fabricated by man.

LDS view. We do see the critical alterations of the organization, doctrines, and ordinances of the Lord’s early Church as a part of a complete (“Great”) apostasy. The alteration of the doctrine of the nature of God is a prime example. Why or how did this alteration take place?

Roger D. Cook explains why Christians exchanged Greek philosophy for the simple doctrines of Christ’s early church:

To understand why Christians would have left the simple and persuasive doctrines of the early church, one must understand the near seductive nature of philosophy and, more specifically, why the mysticism and logical appeal of Greek Middle Platonism captured the minds and imaginations of the intelligentsia of the Roman world.

Greek philosophy was seen as the “rocket science” of the ancient world, able to answer sophisticated questions on subjects ranging from ethics to the nature of the universe. A number of Greek philosophical schools existed in the Roman Empire at the time of Christ, including Aristotelian, Stoic, and the most influential, Middle Platonic. The appeal of philosophy was widespread, with numbers of educated citizens declaring themselves aligned with one or another of the popular philosophies. Such cities as Athens, Alexandria, Antioch, and Tarsus developed deep philosophical traditions; debates between the different schools of thought became the popular pastime among the educated elite. In fact, philosophy actually became part of regular education in the Roman Empire; sophisticated ideas of the Greek philosophers trickled into the consciousness of cultured citizens throughout the empire. Philosophy gave direction on how to rightly live one’s life in the often difficult environment of the empire, methods by which one might reach or dimly comprehend infinite reality, and a hope for a better life for the soul in the transcendent world to come.

In the second century, as the church began to attract members from among the educated elite of the Roman Empire, philosophy retained its premier position. For example, the early church father Clement regarded philosophy as indispensable to understanding Christian theology and even developed his own Christian brand of Middle Platonism in the Hellenized Egyptian city of Alexandria. . . .

In like manner the fifth-century church father Augustine declared Plato’s philosophy to be the most pure and clear, and the first Christian apologist Justin Martyr contends that the Greek philosophers “spoke well in proportion to the share he had of the spermatic [seminal, original, influencing the development of future events] word” and “whatever things were rightly said among all men, are the property of us Christians” (Justin Martyr, Apology 2.13, ANF, 1:193). With this universal admiration it is no wonder that Christians quickly succumbed to the metaphysical speculations of Greek philosophy (FRB, 267-69).

A. H. Armstrong suggests that the church fathers used philosophy to explore and understand their own doctrine and to make these beliefs attractive to the Greek and Roman educated elite (A. H. Armstrong, An Introduction to Ancient Philosophy, 157-58; compare 141-56).

#The Virgin Birth

Evangelical view. Evangelicals reject the literal, biological interpretation of biblical language of the sonship of Jesus Christ or his virgin birth. They reject the idea that God actually “begat” Jesus. Evangelicals maintain that the phrase “only begotten” in the KJV is an incorrect translation of the Greek adjective monogenes, based on the KJV translators’ mistaken assumption that the word was derived from the Greek verb gennao (“to be born”) plus the adjective monos (“only”). They claim that if “only begotten” were the correct translation of monogenes, it would have to contain three n’s (monogennes). Instead, they maintain, monogenes (with two n’s) comes from monos plus a form of the verb ginomai meaning “to be” (or “to become”)—hence monogenes means “only,” “only existing” or “one and only.” Therefore they deny that the Bible contains any evidence that the Father created or “begat” Jesus.

LDS view. Brother Robinson responds:

Professor Blomberg’s interpretation of monogenes seems to be a bit overstated. However, the point is moot since there are other passages of scripture that do refer to Jesus as “begotten”, and from gennao rather than ginomai. In fact, the Nicene Creed itself declares that Jesus is “begotten.” Such prominent Evangelical scholars as F. F. Bruce (The Epistles of John, 126) and I. H. Marshall (The Epistles of John, New International Commentary on the New Testament, 252, n. 37) have held that “the One begotten by God” (1 John 5:18) is Jesus. R. E. Brown lists no fewer than twenty-three other modern scholars plus the NEB and RSV as subscribing to the same view (“The Epistles of John,” Anchor Bible, 620). So it isn’t just the Mormon standing alone here!

In Matthew 1:16, the final verse of the “begats” (Abraham begat

Isaac, etc.), Mary is referred to as she “out of whom was begotten Jesus.” In this verse the passive form of gennao appears as the last in a string of forty consecutive occurrences of that verb, all unmistakably having the sense of paternal “begetting.” As Abraham begat Isaac, so Jesus “was begotten” of Mary. That God “begot” Jesus was also important to the author of Hebrews, as his begotten status set Jesus apart from and made him higher than the angels (Hebrews 1:5; 5:5). It is true that the root of monogenes is ginomai rather than gennao. However, monogenes is still used in the New Testament to refer to “sole progeny” at Luke 7:12, 8:42, and 9:38, and at Hebrews 11:17, and is twice used in the same sense by Josephus (Antiquities 1.222; 5.264, italics mine) (HWD, 138-39).

There are several biblical passages suggesting that God is the Father of Jesus and Jesus is the Son of God. At the Mount of Transfiguration, Matthew reports, “While he yet spake, behold, a bright cloud overshadowed them: and behold a voice out of the cloud, which said, This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased; hear ye him” (Matthew 17:5). In Luke’s account of the baptism of Jesus, we read, “And the Holy Ghost descended in a bodily shape like a dove upon him, and a voice came from heaven, which said, Thou art my beloved Son; in thee I am well pleased” (Luke 3:22). After healing a man at the pool Bethesda, Jesus said, “Verily, verily, I say unto you, The Son can do nothing of himself, but what he seeth the Father do: for what things soever he doeth, these also doeth the Son likewise” (John 5:19). Just before his crucifixion, Jesus said to his disciples, “Ye have heard how I said unto you, I go away, and come again unto you. If ye loved me, ye would rejoice, because I said, I go unto the Father: for my Father is greater than I” (John 14:28).

Robinson writes:

If Jesus was truly a human being, then he had forty-six chromosomes, a double strand of twenty-three. If he was truly human, he got one strand of twenty-three chromosomes from his mother. Where did the other strand come from if not from his Father? I am not talking about a sexual conception, only a divine conception and a divine sonship.” Surely the Evangelicals do not believe that Joseph or somebody else was Jesus’s father! Do they really believe that the Father was not the Father of Jesus?! . . .

There can be no doubt that Mary was pregnant and that God caused her pregnancy (Matthew 1:18; Luke 1:34-35). Latter-day Saints believe that this makes the mortal Jesus the “begotten” Son of God. For me it means God was the immediate cause of the conception of Jesus in the flesh, that is, as a physical, mortal, and biological being. Exactly how God caused Mary to become pregnant is unknown . . . but that God did indeed cause her to become pregnant is in my view a fundamental belief of historic Christianity. If Evangelicals do not believe that God was the Father of the mortal Jesus, the cause of his coming into biological existence, then the Latter-day Saints would have misgivings about Evangelicals being truly Christian! (HWD, 139).

Robinson adds:

Regarding the virgin birth, Latter-day Saints believe everything that the Bible has to say on the subject. However, the Bible has less to say on this subject than many seem to wish it did. Certainly the gynecological expositions of the medieval church are as extra-biblical as they are tasteless and indelicate. Unfortunately, popular speculations on the LDS side have sometimes also been tasteless and indelicate. Still, on this subject official Mormonism makes four assertions:

1. Mary was a pure virgin (Alma 7:10; 1 Nephi 11:13-20).

2. Mary was in some unspecified manner made pregnant by God the Father, through the power of the Holy Ghost (Luke 1:32-35), “not in violation of natural law but in accordance with a higher manifestation thereof” (James E. Talmage, Jesus the Christ, 81). Hence, Jesus is not a metaphorical Son, but a literal begotten Son.

3. Jesus of Nazareth, the offspring of that divine conception, is in his biological being the son of a mortal mother, Mary, and a divine Father, God. Jesus is not the son of the Holy Ghost, but of the Father through the Holy Ghost. Jesus’s divine paternity was necessary in order for him to have power over death and therefore to accomplish his saving mission (John 5:26; 10:17-18) and perform his atoning sacrifice. Only one with the power to live could truly die voluntarily.

4. The exact details of how Jesus’s conception was accomplished have not been revealed, either in the Bible or in modern revelation.

While it is true that certain LDS leaders (mostly in the nineteenth century) have offered their opinions on the conception of Jesus, those opinions were never included among the official doctrines of the Church and have not appeared in official church publications—lest they be taken as the view of the Church. It is not the position of the Church that the conception of Jesus was accomplished by a sexual act. Yet those who would misrepresent the LDS Church (and also a vocal minority of its own eccentrics) continue to insist on the unofficial speculations of the nineteenth-century members rather than on the official views of the Church then or now.

Latter-day Saints also insist on the preexistence of Jesus Christ and on his identity in his preexistent state as God (John 1:1-14). Thus, it was not only Jesus’s incarnation that made him God the Son, but his designation by the Father to be the Son “in the beginning” (HWD, 135-36).

It may also be noted that Evangelicals maintain that Mormons misunderstand the word “firstborn” (Colossians 1:15—“the firstborn of every creature”). While Paul’s reference seems clear, Evangelicals maintain that the term more likely means “first in rank, prominence, or hierarchy.” We contend that in the premortal sphere, Jesus was, temporally speaking, the literal firstborn of all of the Father’s spirit offspring.

#Do We LDS Worship a “Different Jesus”?

Evangelical view. Evangelicals have created a standard of orthodoxy for Jesus and the Godhead. Since we differ with their standard, we are said to worship a “different Jesus.” Blomberg writes that it was the Council of Chalcedon that “defined what would remain the standard of orthodoxy” (HWD, 112).

LDS view. We worship the Jesus Christ described in the New Testament. It is true that we say some things about him that are not part of Evangelical orthodoxy. For example, we claim that Jesus was Jehovah, the God of the Old Testament. He is a separate and distinct being from the Father to whom Jesus is subordinate. Once resurrected, he will never again lay down his body. He will return to the earth a second time clothed with that same body and will reign on the earth personally for a thousand years. Does this mean that we worship a “different Jesus”?

Robinson responds to the Evangelicals:

I would point out that John thought Jesus was crucified the afternoon before Passover (John 19:14; 18:28), so that the Last Supper was not the Passover meal, while Matthew, Mark, and Luke say Jesus ate the Passover with the disciples and was crucified the morning after (Mark 14:12; Matthew 26:17-19; Luke 22:13-15). Is John (or the Synoptics) writing about “a different Jesus,” or do they simply disagree on the details concerning one Jesus? If some Christians think Jesus had siblings and other Christians think that he did not, or if some think he stayed in Egypt for years while others think it was merely for weeks or months, do they worship different beings? . . . Some Evangelicals, like the Mormons, do not accept the Nicene and Chalcedonian definitions, I am told, but limit their Christology to the New Testament data. Do these people also worship “a different Jesus” than other more creedal Evangelicals, and are they therefore not Christian?

This charge, that people worship “a different Jesus” if they disagree over any detail of his character or history, is simply a rhetorical device, a trick of language. Unfortunately, some Latter-day Saint authors have also resorted to this rhetorical device in describing “the false Jesus of the apostate sectarians” and the like. Latter-day Saints worship that divine Son of God of whom the apostles and prophets of the Old and New Testaments bear record, and we believe all that they have to say about him. There is no biblical information about the Son of God that the Latterday Saints do not affirm. If Evangelicals truly worship “a different Jesus” than this, I shall be greatly disappointed (HWD, 136-37).

Fundamentally, we are troubled by Evangelicals’ reliance on the formulae of councils and creeds for their “standard of orthodoxy.” Their definition of God is not easily reconciled with the text of the New Testament. What gives any group of scholars the authority to amend God’s New Testament revelations? Should their definition of God be the standard for orthodoxy? Does this not render orthodox a rather arbitrary label?

We LDS are refused the title of “orthodox Christians.” We freely admit we are not, by Evangelical standards, “orthodox” Christians. We do not accept the authority of the councils and their creeds. One might well ask just who it is that God considers to be an “orthodox Christian”?

See “Medieval Catholic Church” in chapter 1, Evangelicals and the Restored Gospel.