Time can be a friend or an enemy and more often than not it
is an enemy that changes humanity. The writings of early men handed down
throughout the ages entrusted for our keeping either become distorted, or lost
in shelves of libraries. The standards for the test of Orthodoxy become
replaced with new and different doctrines that are not judged on their content
according to the earlier writings. The canon of the Bible is complete and there
is no reason to add any other authority than what the Bible contains. The Holy
Scriptures were received but not by all and have led to declarations that are
subject to interpretations and there are as many interpretations as there are
men. These different interpretations have led to schisms that do not follow
that which was believed everywhere, always, and by all men.[1]
History attests to the fact that often men and women fell for a man’s teaching
and set a higher store on the profane than to remain true to the religion
handed down from the apostles. It is this period that I am addressing, from the
Reformation and into the time of the Second Great Awakening, a time whereby people
were introduced by the appearance of new doctrines. In place of the heavenly
doctrine received from the apostles and in their place human doctrines,
superstitions are inaugurated and the institutions of our forefathers of the
Church were and are now being destroyed, even going so far as to rescind the
decrees and decisions of those men who walked and talked with Jesus Christ and
those who held fast to what those apostles taught. Deception of truth and the
lust of the wicked and novel inquisitiveness does not confine itself and
spreads like wildfire among those who are easily led by new doctrine. The
ancient faith being polluted with a new kind of faithfulness, or a faith, must
return to the ancient sanity from this new madness and become once again the
true light of the world. Some men were led astray into this new madness, men of
importance and this was and is not right that they support false and
inconsistent notions of anyone, man or woman who teaches another gospel. These
new doctrines found people ready to accept them due to the falling away from
the true religion handed down throughout the ages for if they stayed true and
be devoted to the true religion the more ready he is to oppose innovations.
Looking back to the apostles of Jesus Christ it can be seen that they always
defended the integrity of the religion they received from Jesus Christ. An
early church father, Cyprian (210 A.D.-258 A.D.) stated: “If they come to you
from any heresy, let nothing be renewed except what has been handed down….[2]
Heresy is defined as a religious opinion at variance with the orthodox or
accepted doctrine.[3]The early
church fathers noted and observed the new innovations for the religion of
Christianity and admonished that those new innovations not be handed down but
to preserve what was received from the apostles. Those who desire to retain the
teachings received from antiquity have a filial duty to do so to protect the
faith for themselves, their posterity the world at large. It is a fraud for a
person to plot out heresy under a name not its own, that is, to try to change or
adulterate the works of some ancient worthy writing by teaching some vagueness
according to their own doctrine which they attempt to advance for they have no
fear to set before others this poisoned cup of heresy. Tue and Authentic
Christians ought to fear, to have great fear, to dread the sin of altered and
polluted faith. The apostle Paul writing to the Galatian church: “I marvel that
ye are so soon removed from Him that called you into the grace of Christ unto
another gospel: which is not another; but there be some that trouble you, and
would pervert the gospel of Christ.”[4]
What was written by the writers of the Bible were not just written to those to
whom the letter was addressed rather it was for all to read and to adhere as
this example well illustrates: “If we live in the Spirit, let us also walk in
the Spirit. Let us not be desirous of vainglory, provoking one another, envying
one another.”[5] It would be
absurd to say that the Ten Commandments and other commandments by God, by Jesus
Christ apply equally to everyone and to say that those injunctions that relate
to man and to their conduct do not apply equally to all in every age or time
then to say the Ten Commandments apply in equal fashion so then do the
injunctions written for our conduct as both relate to conduct, then it is true
that all that was written by men the ancient Bible writers are to be enforce
equally to all. With this in mind then I, we, must press on to examine the new
innovations that began during the early time of the United States. A new
innovation of Christianity is Mormonism, or The Latter Day Saints of Christ,
along with other new innovations and doctrines that were not from the beginning
of Christianity accepted and faced such error as with the Gnostic, and the
Judaizers, and others, Marcion, Manicheans, Nestorians, and others. Today one
of the new innovations is Mormonism and this I will begin to address.
The afore synopsis of history that caused men and
women to come to this new land now called the United States I shall attempt the
task to write with fidelity as a recorder not with any presumption of an
author. I will observe with all care to write the essential points and to be as
simple and clear with close attention to what has been recorded by men of the
times, and by those who have written a biography, or some other historical
information to led to the truth of the subject. Furthermore, there must be an evaluation
of the times and both the evils and the messages that would form a person’s
character leading to a person exercise of that character. The time in which
Joseph Smith Jr. lived was a time of political instability and a migrant
civilization that were migrating to the new frontier. The migration caused a
breakdown within the culture that had been the culture of those immigrants from
Europe and a time when authority was lax and almost non-existent it was natural
for men and women to seek for some sort of security and safety from the evils
that surrounded them to leave behind much of the old religiosity to find a
new religion that would be acceptable. The bible was not discarded: rather it
was lost to those leaving behind the old ways to secure new ways. The problem
was that they left behind those men who were schooled in Scripture and of the
commentaries that men wrote to aid them in their Christian life. Men not
schooled in theology, or even in Christian history began to teach new
interpretations of Scripture and exegetical preaching turned to a method of
religious experience that would ease the seeking person who was troubled about
what they did not know in Scripture. In some cases, these early settlers seeking a new way to worship God was a major force in their search especially in the “burned out
district” of New York. The Antebellum Period camp meetings, and revivals
were growing tiresome although they had a huge impact upon people leading to
feel as though they had found something lost or new and they wanted this new
teaching. New cults, new denominations, new thought about God formed out of all
this confusing time and this was the time that Joseph Smith Jr. found himself
and developed his character leading to a new thinking and a new religion called
the Mormons, or Latter Day Saints of Jesus Christ. Therefore, Joseph Smith
being the founder of this new religion I must investigate him and how he came
to not follow the older theological teaching.
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