Joseph Smith Religion

One of the largest struggles for members in the church is animosity of non-members. On one hand, many express their dislike of the LDS church without even knowing what Sacrament Meeting is or the full the title of the “Mormon church” (The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints). On the other hand, there are a number supposed experts about Mormon doctrine. Some have belonged to the Church themselves at one point, leaving after finding unresolved dissonance between their beliefs and the Gospel. Others are often learned scholars, criticizing the Mormon doctrine to prove their own views. The following paper involves the latter of the two in an analysis of Ezekiel 37:15-17, a Biblical scripture that the LDS Church believes to refer to The Book of Mormon.

A homegrown religion originating in the late 1820s, Mormonism arose as a rejection of the existing Christian sects and a return to what the Mormons considered to be pure Christianity. Similarly, the members believed their desire for a new kind of government stemmed from their disillusionment with what they believed was a corrupt government and a desire for the reestablishment of true American values and the original intent of the founding fathers. This sentiment is epitomized by Joseph Smith’s presidential platform, which states “No honest man can doubt for a moment, the glory of American liberty is on the wane; and that calamity and confusion will sooner or later destroy the

The prophets are difficult to interpret mainly due to misunderstandings about their function and form (Fee/Stuart p182). Most dictionaries define the word “prophecy”as ‘foretelling or prediction of what is to come. Using the prophets in this way is highly discerning, for less than 2% of OT prophecy is messianic; less than 5% describes the new covenant age and less than 1% concerns future events (Fee/Stuart p182). The prophets usually announced the immediate future of Judah, Israel and the surrounding nations, rather than our future. Those events were forthcoming for them but past for us (Fee/Stuart p182). The primary function of prophets as a spokesperson was to speak for God to their own contemporaries. Of the hundreds of prophets in

There are thousands of stories in the Bible, but one stands out in particular; the story of Joseph. The Hebrew meaning of the name Joseph is “may Jehovah add, give increase.”1 Through the life of Joseph we see God add meaning and purpose to his life, just as God adds meaning and purpose to all our lives. “For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the Lord, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.”2 Joseph obediently followed God’s plans through trials and tribulations whereas many other figures in the Old Testament faltered in their faith. Joseph, son of Jacob, is the single most important human being in the Old Testament because of his impeccable faith to the one true God and his story of forgiveness that set the stage for God’s chosen people.

They then told him that he would be the prophet of the new church (Smith, n.d.). Joseph Smith’s own account of that day says,

First, what must be looked at is who is a prophet and what is a prophet’s message. A prophet is an Israelite called on by God to express in poetic form the vision of God, His kingdom, the messianic age of peace, the work of the Holy Spirit, a new community of people, and the transformation of creation and humanity (VanGemeren 16). One example of a prophet is Amos, where the feeling of prophetic sense of an inner compulsion, “Surly the Lord God does nothing unless He reveals His secret counsel to His servants the prophets. A lion has roared! Who will not fear? The Lord God has spoken! Who can but prophesy?” (Amos 3:7-8).

The role of the prophet changes with the society in which he lives. In modern society, a prophet is a visionary, telling people what they can become; in Biblical times, a prophet was the voice of God, telling his people what they had to become to fulfill their covenant with God.  In William Golding's Lord of the Flies, the prophet is a peaceful lad, Simon.  He alone saw that the jungle, which represented freedom and the lack of civilization, was not to be feared but to be understood; he alone knew that the mythical Beast of the island, feared by all the boys, was, in fact, their own inherent savagery. Through these truths Simon represents a Christ figure paralleling Christ's

To fully understand the meaning behind his sermons and predictions we must first look at what a prophet is and what he holds true.

Prophets had a gift from god to be founders and leaders of the church, so it is rational to accept the word governing the church came through them. The prophets were promised the spirit of truth who would bring to their memory what Christ had said and guide them into all truth. After the rise of Christ prophets received supernatural powers to enable the work and confirm their message through god. Miracles were an act of god to prove the message from God to the people of God. If the credential of a prophet was questioned it could be settled by divine authorization. There were true prophets as well as false ones so, it was necessary to have divine confirmation of the true ones as well. Did it tell the truth? If there were any contradicting stories then it was not considered as God’s

In the textbook's introductory material (Ch. 1 - 4), Hays presents the central focus of the prophets being the covenant and social justice. The covenant is presented within a three-part formula: "I will be your God; You will be my people; I will dwell in your midst" (p. 35). Hays elaborates on the justice aspect on p. 71: "The Prophets and Social Justice Today".

The prophets are some of the most studied individuals in the bible, but often many people overlook the primary mission of the prophets. According to Bratcher “the prophets’ primary task was to call the people

With this week’s reading, I found that Joseph Smith’s life had parallels and similarities not only from the analogy Joseph draws between himself and Paul, who was also persecuted for his witness of the living God, but also with prophets and disciples from nearly every dispensation. I found that there were connections between the conversion of Alma the younger and deliverance of Joseph Smith from the adversary, as Alma describes being racked with

In the last section of the Bible there are two parts. The two parts are the Major and Minor Prophets. The Major prophets are in the books of Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, and Daniel. The minor Prophets are in the books of Hosea, Joel, Amos, Obadiah, Jonah, Micah, Nahum, Habakkuk, Zephaniah, Haggai, Zechariah, and Malachi, these books form that last segment of the Old Testament cannon. The authors of these books were the Hebrew prophets, which makes sense because a Hebrew prophet is a spokesperson for God. The twofold aspect of the prophet's ministry included declaring God's message for people of their day and foretelling God's actions in the future (Hindson). Thus, the prophet was also called a "seer" because he could see future events before

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saint’s official sacred scripture is the Book of Mormon. To the Latter-day Saints, the Book of Mormon is considered a partner to the Bible; however, there is more emphasis on the Book of Mormon. The leadership of the church has changed over time, but the founder, Smith, is believed to be the first prophet since the old church fell. The title of prophet symbolizes the original structure of the old church where Jesus Christ established the first church with his biblical prophets. For the Latter-day Saints, the prophet is the current president of the church and is the

The cult Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day was founded informally in 1829 and the formally on the 6th April 1830 in New York In the United States. The cult was founded by Joseph Smith. As A young boy Joseph was confused as to which church he should join and regularly looked guidance from god through prayer, One day god the almighty father and his son Jesus Christ appeared to joseph through a vision and explained to him that he should not join any other churches “for they were all wrong; … that all their creeds were an abomination in his sight; … that: ‘they draw near to me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me, they teach for doctrines the commandments of men, having a form of godliness, but they deny the power thereof.’” (JS-H 1:19) People heard of Josephs encounter but few chose to believe him, Fours years passed before Joseph was visited by a heavenly messenger by the name of Moroni who said god has special work for joseph to do and that deposited in a nearby hill were some gold plates which had the everlasting gospel in scripted onto it and that it was josephs job to translate the words and restore the gospel of the lord. When joseph tried removing the plates from the nearby hill joseph was told