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I never realised that those Christian churches which follow the Trinitarian view believe that God (as in God the Father) is neither male or female. Thinking about it, it makes sense given that they believe God is spirit without physical form.
What I want to ask you guys is where does the LDS get the belief that God (as in God the Father) has a physical form and is male?
Hi Faith, long time no chat! Correct. You'll also find many that believe the Spirit is genderless (but always should be referred to in male pronouns) and that we become genderless upon resurrection. Male: He's the Father. Father=male. That's all over scripture. Body: D&C 130: 22 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.
As a convert to LDS theology, I remember the many misconceptions that I had to work through (and am still working through), some of which were simply caused by insufficiently specific descriptions of the missionaries I first talked with. Though the young missionaries message was one of restoration of ancient Christian beliefs, they were not historians of ancient Christian literature.
The three base points to Jane.Does’ point is that the Father is anthropomorphic, he has a glorified body, and it is “tangible” (i.e. a material body) . This is consistent with Early Judeo-Christian assumptions described in their literature of belief.
A) God possessed Anthropomorphic (manlike form) characteristics.
B) God was glorified.
C) He was "tangible", that is he was a material being in a material universe. He did not consist of "nothing”. (Matter was an assumed worldview in ancient Judeo-Christian literature..)
I don’t want to appear to give you any more difficulties, but I think that the specific and simple four words “
of flesh and bone”, as a “stand alone” description, will simply bring to mind the earthly body made of earthly material, which is a distortion of the actual doctrine. While the words may be correct, the resulting conception may not be correct because the words are insufficiently descriptive to form the larger context of early Judeo-Christian belief.
“A BODY” VERSUS “A GLORIFIED BODY” – these are very different things
For example, though early Judao-Christians believed in an anthropomorphic Lord God and would have viewed the Lord Gods body as being “material”, most of the early textual descriptions are made firmly inside the context of
glorified anthropomorphisms. For example, when, in the early Jewish Haggadic literature, angels temporarily mistake adam, (with his beautiful and glorious newly formed body) for the Lord God (since one was in the image of the other), it was Adam in his original
glorified body that the angels saw and NOT Adams fallen and
mortal body.
Jewish Haggadah records that “
When Adam opened his eyes for the first time…” and beheld the worlds’ magnificence, “
his admiration for the world surrounding him did not exceed the admiration all creatures conceived for Adam. They took him to be their creator…” (Haggadah) The text is not describing “fallen Adam” with a mortal Body, but a glorified Adam with a Glorified Body. “
and when the angels saw Adam’s glorious appearance they were greatly moved by the beauty thereof. For they saw the image of his face burning with glorious splendor like the orb of the sun, and the light of his eyes was like the light of the sun, and the image of his body was like unto the sparkling of crystal…”.
Though THIS Adam, in his Glorified and immortal body may have possessed “
flesh and bones”, the simple description of “
flesh and bones” without constructing the necessary context of wonderful and indescribable and profound glorification, will not be conceived of correctly as it was by the early judeo-christians as it relates to either resurrected beings with glorified bodies or to Glorified Adams’ body nor to Gods Glorified body.
After Adams fall, the angels would not, could not, have mistaken this fallen Adams’ body for the Lord God body.
Did the early Judao-Christians believe that God the Father had hands and a face and a mouth and walked and talked and moved about with a body? Yes, they did.
But that body was, in their texts, always a glorified body. Flesh? Yes.
But it did not seem to be a flesh like that which we experience and conceive of when we say “flesh”.
ANTHROPOMORPHIC (literally “Man-formed” or “In the form of man”)
IF we can agree that
the definition of anthropomorphism means “having human characteristics”, (though literally
μορφη -morphe refers to a specific "Shape" God has or chooses to have) then when the early Judeo-christians describe their belief in an anthropomorphic God, they are describing their belief in a God that had specific "human characteristics" (i.e. the appearance and action of God).
AN ANTHROPOMORPHIC GOD WAS ASSUMED IN ANCIENT JUDEO-CHRISTIAN LITERATURE
The early literature is full of anthropomorphisms where the form of God is assumed to be like man. For examples, when the prophet Enoch describes The God of the Universe “
march[ing] upon Mount Sinai” or creating adam “with his own two hands … in a facsimile of his own face” and when Gabriel sets the prophet Enoch down “in front of the face of the lord .." (2nd enoch) or when Enoch tells us “
even I saw the face of the Lord." Though the Prophet Enoch is talking about a God who IS marching upon legs, who HAS two hands to form Adam and who has a FACE to model Adams face after, still, these are all relative terms since Enoch is speaking of a Glorified being.
These are all quite anthropomorphic and obvious and not mystical or symbolic descriptions, yet they are in the context of a
Glorified Body. “
But the face of the lord is not to be talked about, it is so very marvelous and supremely awesome and supremely frightening....
When the Lord tells Enoch to “
Be brave”, he says that “
the Lord, with his own mouth, said to me, “Be brave Enoch! Don’t be frightened!” Stand up, and stand in front of my face…” 2nd enoch, these descriptions are not symbolic, but they come from a glorified being. Anthropomorphic in the extreme to be sure, but still, glorified.
I think it is a bit difficult for a modern Christian worldview that adopted more transcendency than ancient Christianity theology (or the LDS restoration of ancient theological models), to understand the ancient Judeo-Christians texts meant exactly what they say. “
All this the Lord said to me, as a man talks to his neighbor.” 2nd Enoch 36:3.
When I grew up in non LDS theology, my native Christianity took such things much more metaphorically. It
had to take them metaphorically because it had abandoned the historical assumptions. Plus, I had no concept that the early Judeo-christians had described in their own texts, their own beliefs, or that those beliefs would have been so different than my own.
OTHER EXAMPLES EXIST THROUGHOUT THE ANCIENT JUDEO-CHRISTIAN LITERATURE
For examples :
“…the original man, formed by the holy hands of God,…”(Sibylline Oracles book 8 vs 259-262
“… Moses wept for forty days and spoke with God mouth to mouth,... The Questions of Ezra (Recension A) vs 39;
“…
Who made Adam, the protoplast, the first one?” And God said, “My immaculate hands..." The Greek Apocalypse of Ezra 2:1, 10-17;
“…
he said, “I want to speak to God face to face, but I am not able, Lord, to ascend into the heavens.” The Apocalypse of Sedrach 2:3-5;
“
…And he finished talking with him and the LORD ascended from Abraham.” Jubilees (the book of division) 15:18-21;
“… the Lord turned and said to Adam, ‘From now on I will not allow you to be in Paradise. “Life of Adam and Eve (apocalypse) 28:1-4;
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