As Latter-day Saints we believe that all creation existed spiritually
before the physical organism was brought into existence; "And every
plant of the field before it was in the earth, and every herb of the
field before it grew." (Gen. ii:5.)
"And God said, Let the earth bring forth the living creature after
his kind, cattle, and creeping thing. And beast of the earth after
his kind; and it was so." (Gen. i:24.) Therefore each kind, whether
beast, bird or fish, as well as man, existed before it came to occupy
a physical being, otherwise how could each have been created after its
own kind? The spirit and the body must be the soul, as enunciated by
the Lord in a revelation to the prophet Joseph Smith. (Doctrine and
Covenants, sec. 88, verse 15.) "And the spirit and the body is the
soul of man." Otherwise there might be an eternal fullness when the
spirit and the body are separated. When Jesus was crucified He went, as
stated by Peter, to preach to the spirits in prison, and did not enter
into the fullness of His Father's glory until He ascended after His
resurrection. This was the pattern to all men.
Without the union of the spirit and the body there is not a fullness
of glory. As the spirit exists between death and the resurrection, so
the spirit existed before the birth of the mortal body. God is the God
and Father of the spirits of all flesh, as stated by Moses: "O God, the
God of the spirits of all flesh, shall one man sin, and wilt Thou be
wroth with all the congregation?" (Num. xvi:22.) "Let the Lord, the God
of the spirits of all flesh, set a man over the congregation." (Num.
xxvii:16.) This declaration is corroborated by the apostle Paul in
writing to the Hebrews: "Furthermore, we have had fathers of our flesh,
which corrected us, and we gave them reverence; shall we not much
rather be in subjection to the Father of spirits and live?"
We associate in this life with our natural fathers; we see them as they
are. They teach, guide and direct us by virtue of their fatherhood and
their advanced experience, which qualify them to teach us and direct
our footsteps in the way we should walk. So in our pre-existence did
we mingle with our heavenly Father and His children, our brother and
sister spirits. We knew God and partook of His influence and power. We
were agents to ourselves, and when propositions affecting man's eternal
welfare were placed before us, we were left to choose for ourselves
and be responsible for our own course. Thus Lucifer rebelled, and
drew one-third part of the heavenly host away. They were cast out,
and denied a body. So keenly have they felt this curse that they seek
to possess the bodies of the human family. When Jesus cast the evil
spirits from the men coming out of the tombs, so eager were they to
possess some physical tabernacle, that they besought Him that they
might enter the herd of swine. The request was granted, and the swine,
possessed of evil spirits, ran down violently into the sea.
Not only the fact of man's pre-existence, but also his power to do good
and ill, seemed to be understood by the ancient apostles when they
said, "Master, who did sin, this man or his parents, that he was born
blind? Neither hath this man sinned, nor his parents." (John ix:2, 3.)
Jesus did not deny the possibility of sinning before birth. Why should
not the spirit be just as capable of intelligent action before the
birth into this world, as it is during its existence between death and
the resurrection? As to that time, Jesus taught that all that were in
their graves should hear His voice. (St. John v:25, 29.) When Job was
in the depth of his affliction the Lord said unto him, "Gird up now thy
loins like a man; for I will demand of thee, and answer thou me. Where
wast thou when I laid the foundations of the earth? * * * When the
morning stars sang together, and all the sons of God shouted for joy?"
(Job xxxviii:3, 4, 7.) Doubtless Job was somewhere in existence or the
Almighty would never have propounded such a question. The sons of God
shouted for joy, and without doubt Job was among that honored number.
Solomon also gives us to understand that the spirit once dwelt in the
presence of the Lord. He says: "And the spirit shall return unto God
who gave it."
The subject of pre-existence is made very plain in the first chapter,
5th verse of Jeremiah: "Before I formed thee in the belly I knew thee:
and before thou camest forth out of the womb I sanctified thee and I
ordained thee a prophet unto the nations." Thus in his pre-existent
state did Jeremiah receive his ordination to be a prophet of the Lord
to the nations of the earth. If such were the case with Jeremiah,
why not with thousands of the sons of God? Indeed it is evident from
Paul's writings that the time of man's coming to this world is not
mere chance, neither is it regulated by the arrangements of human
philosophy in this world: "God that made the world * * * hath made
of one blood all nations of men for to dwell on all the face of the
earth: and hath determined the times before appointed and the bounds
of their habitations." (Acts xvii:24, 26.) In other words, the Father
of our spirits determined when we should come and those portions of
the earth where should be set the bounds of our habitation. It was
no chance-work, then, that Abraham, Moses, Isaiah, Ezekiel, Daniel,
the Savior, Joseph Smith, and the founders of liberty in this and
other lands came to the earth in their respective times and to those
countries where they played their great parts in the purposes of God
and the drama of life. "I came forth from the Father, and am come
into the world; again I leave the world and go to the Father." (St.
John xvi:28.) "And now, O Father, glorify Thou me with thine own self
with the glory which I had with Thee before the world was." (St. John
xvii:5.) Jesus dwelt with the Father before He came here, so did we.
Entering our temples of mortality we forget all that has passed before
in our spiritual existence. This mortal state is a veil which hides
the eternal past, from our recollection, and shuts off the visions of
the eternal future, only as from time to time the revelations of the
Holy Ghost bring "things past to our remembrance and shows us things to
come."
It is probable, from some references in the Scriptures, that if our
spirits were sent here unembodied, the remembrance of the past would
come with us. At least, this was doubtless the case with Lucifer
and his rebel host. When he tried to tempt the Savior, as recorded
in Matthew, fourth chapter, he knew Him undoubtedly from their
acquaintance in a pre-existent state. When the man with evil spirits
met the Savior in the synagogue, the spirits cried out, "saying, let us
alone. What have we to do with Thee, thou Jesus of Nazareth? Art thou
come to destroy us? I know Thee who thou art, the Holy One of God."
(Luke iv:34.) A similar testimony was borne by evil spirits possessing
the men coming out of the tombs, as recorded in Matthew, viii:29. "And
behold they cried out, saying, What have we to do with Thee? Jesus,
thou Son of God? art Thou come hither to torment us before the time?"
"And unclean spirits, when they saw Him, fell down before Him and cried
saying, Thou art the Son of God." (Mark iii:11) In Luke, viii:28,
we have the testimony of the historian that the devils possessing a
certain man cried out, "and with a loud voice" said, "Jesus, Thou Son
of God." It is not probable that these evil spirits knew Jesus because
of a testimony from above, while all Judea failed to recognize in Him
the Messiah, the Savior of the world. Many likely knew Him because they
had been associated and acquainted with Him before the world was.
John the Revelator in Revelations, twelfth chapter, describes the war
in heaven, which took place between Satan and his followers on the
one hand and Michael and his angels on the other. This description
refers to their spiritual existence, as do the foregoing quotations
from Holy Writ. These show us clearly that man did not begin with this
world, nor does he end with this earthly life. Man is eternal, and
will have no end. He lived and reigned with God in the heavens. His
course there largely affects his condition here, as our conduct in this
life will have all to do with the glory we attain to in the world to
come. Man will live on forever. He dies as to the body, lives in the
spirit world, and will again take up his body, a resurrected, glorified
being, prepared on certain conditions to dwell with God throughout the
countless ages of eternity, to become like unto Him. Possessing all
things, even as Jesus, being in the image of His Father, "thought it
not robbery to be made equal with him." "What is man, that Thou art
mindful of him? and the Son of Man, that Thou visitest him? For Thou
hast made him a little lower than the angels, and hast crowned him with
glory and honor. Thou madest him to have dominion over the works of Thy
hands; thou hast put all things under his feet." (Psalms viii:4-6.)