universe, he also says: "And again, verily I say unto you, that
which is governed by law is also preserved by law, and perfected and
sanctified by the same. That which breaketh a law, and abideth not by
law, but seeketh to become a law unto itself, and willeth to abide
in sin, and altogether abideth in sin, cannot be sanctified by law,
neither by mercy, justice nor judgment. Therefore they must remain
filthy still." And again he said: "There is a law irrevocably decreed
in heaven before the foundations of this world upon which all blessings
are predicated; and when we obtain any blessing from God it is by
obedience to that law upon which it is predicated."[A] The Prophet
of the New Dispensation, then, the gospel of that dispensation, its
Theology, stand committed to the sublime doctrine that the universe
in every way is under the reign of law; and hence, in some way, the
Atonement, by and through which man is redeemed; the necessity,--the
absolute necessity--for it; the reason why that means, and that means
alone, could bring redemption and put man in the way of salvation--all
this must be by reason of the existence of some law by which the facts
in the case are governed. These laws and an understanding of them are
the object of our research.
[Footnote A: Doc. & Cov., Sec. 130:21,22.]
LESSON XV.
(Scripture Reading Exercise.)
THE EXORABLENESS[A] OF LAW.
ANALYSIS.
I. The Effective Quality in Law--Inexorableness.
II. Reign of Law vs. Government by "Arbitrary Will."
III. Mercy and Special Providence in a Reign of Law.
IV. Law and Destructive and Constructive Forces.
V. God No Respector of Persons; Mercy and Special Providence Under
Dominion of Law.
REFERENCES.
Doc. & Cov., Sec. 88: also Sec. 130.
Drummond's Natural Law in the Spiritual World--Introduction.
Fiske's Studies in Religion, pp. 337-340; and the works and passages
quoted in the body of this lesson.
_SPECIAL TEXTS: "Verily I say unto thee, Thou shalt by no means come
out thence [from prison] till thou hast paid the uttermost farthing."
(The Christ: Matt, v.26.)_
_"Think not I am come to destroy the law I a. not come to destroy,
but to fulfill. For verily I say unto you, Till heaven and earth pass
one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the law, till all be
fulfilled." (Matt, v.17, 18.)_
[Footnote A: "Inexorable"--literally not to be moved or changed by
petition or prayer. Immovable, relentless. See Cent. Dict.]
DISCUSSION.
_1. The Essence of Law:_ Inexorableness is of the essence of law.
There can be no force in law only as it is inexorable. What effect is
to cause, in the physical world, that penalty must be to violation of
law in the moral and spiritual kingdom. This is what is meant by the
inexorableness of law.
The inexorableness of law is at once both its majesty and glory;
without it neither majesty nor glory could exist; neither respect nor
sense of security, nor safety, nor rational faith. If the idea of the
"reign of law" be set aside and there be substituted for it the reign
of God by his sovereign will, independent of law, even then we must
postulate such conception of the attributes of God that regularity will
result from his personal government, not capriciousness, today one
thing, tomorrow another. Hence one of old viewing God's government from
the side of its being a direct, personal reign of God rather than a
reign of God through law, wrote his message from God as follows:
"I am the Lord, I change not; therefore ye sons of Jacob are not
consumed."[A]
[Footnote A: Malachi iii:6. For the notion expressed in the text that
Malachi viewed God's government from the side of a personal reign, see
the preceding verses of the chapter cited.]
And another occupying the same point of view, said:
"Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and cometh down
from the Father of light--"
And then he adds immediately, "With whom is no variableness, neither
shadow of turning."[A]
[Footnote A: James i:17.]
_2. The Quality of Regularity of Law--How Secured:_ View the
matter, then, from which standpoint you may, government of the world by
the personal, sovereign will of God, or the government of God through
the reign of law, the quality of regularity, that can only come of
inexorableness--arising either from the quality of God's attributes,
or the inherent nature of law--is necessary to a sense of security,
to right mental attitude, to rational thinking and right conduct. All
this becomes apparent if the matter is thought upon conversely. If a
reign of law is supposed to exist and the law is not inexorable, but
may be set aside, suspended, abridged, enlarged, or its penalties
annulled; and these changes affected not by the operation of any fixed
principle, or by some controlling higher law, but capriciously, through
the interposition of some sovereign will, call it special providence
or what not, then, of course, you have no reign of law at all; but the
reign of a sovereign will that operates independent of law. Under such
government--if, indeed, it could be called government--all would be
confusion, uncertainty, perplexity, doubt, despair. Happily no such
conditions exist; but instead there exists a divine government in the
world, operating through a reign of law; and the virtue and value of
that government arises from the inexorableness of law.
_3. Where, Then, is Mercy?_ If, however, the exorableness of
law is to be insisted upon up to this degree of emphasis, where then
does mercy, which is supposed to mitigate somewhat the severity and
inexorableness of law; and, furthermore, is supposed in some way to
represent the direct and gracious act of God when mitigating the law's
severity--where does Mercy appear? At what point does she enter into
the moral and spiritual economy? A large question, this, and one not to
be considered just yet, except to say that the entrance of Mercy into
the economy of the moral and spiritual kingdom, is not in violation of
law, but in harmony with it. In fact, as we shall see somewhat later,
Mercy takes her part in the economy of the moral and spiritual kingdoms
because of the existence of a reign of law, rather than in derogation
of it.
_4. Destructive Forces Under the Dominion of Law:_ When a reign
of law is conceived as governing in the physical world, then the
conception must include the destructive, or disintegrating forces as
operating under law as well as the constructive or integrating forces,
else your reign of law is not universal.
Moses stood with God and beheld the multitude of his creations: "And
the Lord God said unto Moses, For mine own purpose have I made these
things; * * * and by the word of my power, have I created them. * * *
And worlds without number have I created; and I have created them for
mine own purpose. * * * Behold there are many worlds that have passed
away by the word of my power. And there are many that now stand, and
innumerable are they with man. * * * And as one earth shall pass away,
and the heavens thereof, even so shall another come, and there is no
end to my works, neither to my words."[A]
[Footnote A: Book of Moses (P. of G. P.) i:31-38.]
This passage implies constant movement in the universe. The statement,
"As one earth shall pass away and the heavens thereof, even so shall
another come," corresponds somewhat to the modern scientist's notion
of "evolution and devolution;"[A] but the thing to be noted here is
that not only is God represented as having created these worlds and
world-systems "by the word of his power;" but also that "there are many
worlds that have passed away by the word of his power." By which we
are to understand that destructive as well as creating forces in the
physical world operate under law. So also should we understand that in
the moral and spiritual world, where there appears to be a modification
of the inexorableness of law, such as comes in a manifestation of Mercy
in the modification, or suspension, or the obliteration of the penalty
of a law by the forgiveness of sin--for "sin is the transgression of
the law"[B]--all this must not be thought upon as capriciousness, the
arbitrary act of Deity in the interests of special favorites. No; the
manifestation of mercy which seems to set aside the severity of the
law, which seems to soften its inexorableness by allowing an escape
from its penalty, by forgiveness of sins--this is the result of the
operation of law, as much so as when the law proceeds to the utmost of
its severity, to the extreme manifestation of its inexorableness in the
exaction of the utmost farthing of its penalty. It is not by special
and personal favor that men shall have forgiveness of sins, and find
shelter under the wings of Mercy. That must be obtained, if obtained at
all, under the operation of law governing the application of Mercy in
the economy of the moral and spiritual world; by law that operates upon
all alike. Forgiveness of sins, like other blessings, is predicated
upon the obedience to law, and is not based upon personal favor. "There
is a law irrevocably decreed in heaven before the foundation of the
world, upon which all blessings are predicated; and when we obtain
any blessing from God it is by obedience to that law upon which it
is predicated"[C]--forgiveness of sins with the rest. It is because
we live under this reign of law that the scriptures teach that God
is no respector of persons. God "regardeth not persons, nor taketh
reward."[D] "Neither doth God respect any person; yet doth he devise
means, that his banished be not expelled from him."[E] "Peace to every
man that worketh good, to the Jew first, and also to the Gentile; for
there is no respect of persons with God."[F] "Call on the Father, who
without respect of persons judgeth according to every man's work."[G]
[Footnote A: "While new cosmic bodies arise and develop out of rotating
masses of nebula in some parts of the universe, in other parts old,
extinct, frigid suns come into collision, and are once more reduced
by the heat generated to the condition of nebulae. * * * While minute
and then larger bodies are being formed by this pyknotic [condensing]
process in one part of space, and the intermediate ether increases
its strain, the opposite process--the destruction of cosmic bodies by
collision--is taking place in another quarter. The immense quantity of
heat which is generated in this mechanical process of the collision
of swiftly moving bodies represents the new kinetic energy which
effects the movement of the resultant nebulae and the construction of
new rotating bodies. The eternal drama begins afresh. Even our mother
earth, which was formed of part of the gyrating solar system millions
of ages ago, will grow cold and lifeless after the lapse of further
millions, and, gradually narrowing its orbit, will fall eventually into
the sun." (Ernest Haeckel: "Riddle of the Universe"--1900,--pp. 240,
243).]
[Footnote B: I John iii:4.]
[Footnote C: Doc. & Cov., Sec. 130.]
[Footnote D: Deut. xiv:17.]
[Footnote E: II Sam. xiv:14.]
[Footnote F: Rom. ii:10, 11.]
[Footnote G: I Peter i:17.]
"The collision of suns may have produced nebulae and these nebulae
in turn may gradually develop themselves into suns again. It seems
reasonably certain that nebulae are the stuff from which the stars are
made" ("Science-History of the Universe," Vol. I; "Astronomy," p. 318).]
_5. Sense of Security Under a Reign of Law:_ So here men stand
under the reign of Law, before God. No one may hope to escape the
penalty due to violation of law through favor; no one will fall under
the condemnation of the law-through lack of favor with God, by reason
of capriciousness in him, much less through vindictiveness, which is
unthinkable in God. God will make no infraction of the law, in the
interests of supposed favorites; such "blessings," whether in the
providing of permanent opportunities for individuals, families, or
races, as may reach through the apparent complexity of things to men;
or occasional blessings such as seem to come to some individuals as
special acts of providence; all will come in accordance with the laws
upon which such blessings were predicated before the foundations of the
world were laid; and this notwithstanding inequalities and diversity
of fortunes and misfortunes that exist among individuals, families,
nations, races of men. Underneath all the diversities and equalities
that exist, so difficult to account for in some of their aspects, there
law is operating despite all seeming incongruities; and out of all
these diversities and complexities of experiences, at the last will
come justice--God's justice; and men will be satisfied that it is so.
Meanwhile this reign of law, with all its inexorableness--nay, rather
because of it--present and operating as well in disintegrating as in
integrating processes; present in the manifestations of mercy and
"special acts of providence," as in manifestations of severity in the
moral and spiritual world; how splendid it all is! How satisfying!
What assurance, what confidence it gives! No wonder that John Fiske,
remarking upon the idea of the reign of law, said: "So beautiful is
all this orderly coherence, so satisfying to some of our intellectual
needs, that many minds are inclined to doubt if anything more can be
said of the universe than that it is a 'Reign of Law,' an endless
aggregate of coexistences and sequences."
But the deeper and truer view of things will be, not to accept this
"reign of law" as God; nor mistake it for Deity--for mistake it would
be if confounded with God. Let the reign of law be conceived rather
as the means through which God is working to the achievement of his
high purposes--God in the world, and working through law;[A] God, the
administrative Power in the reign of law.
[Footnote A: It is only just to John Fiske to say that such is his
conception of the matter; for, commenting upon the effect upon the
thinker who has this conception of the reign of law in the world, he
says: "The thinker in whose mind divine action is thus identified
with orderly action and reign of law, and to whom a really irregular
phenomenon would seem like a manifestation of sheer diabolism, foresees
in every possible extension of knowledge a fresh confirmation of
his faith in God. From his point of view there can be no antagonism
between our duty as inquirers and our duty as worshipers. To him
no part of the universe is godless. In the swaying to and fro of
molecules and ceaseless pulsations of ether, in the secular shifting
of planetary orbits, in the busy work of frost and raindrop, in the
mysterious sprouting of the seed, in the everlasting tale of death and
life renewed, in the dawning of babe's intelligence, in the varied
deeds of men from age to age, he finds that which awakens the soul to
reverential awe: and each act of scientific explanation but reveals
an opening through which shines the glory of the Eternal Majesty"
("Studies in Religion," pp. 167-8).]
It is this quality of exorableness in law, excellent and essential as
it is, that made the Atonement of the Christ necessary to the salvation
of man.
LESSON XVI.
(Scripture Reading Exercise.)
THE APPLICATION OF PRINCIPLES--(A) ARBITRARY ACTION EXCLUDED IN MAN'S
REDEMPTION.
ANALYSIS.
I. Recapitulation of Principles.
II. The Commandment Given--Violated--Effects
III. The Commandment Given as to an Immortal Person--The Penalty
Eternal.
IV. The Problem Propounded--
1. What can man do?
2. What can God do?
V. Redemption by the Sovereign Act of God--Arbitrary Action Under Reign
of Law, Inadmissable.
REFERENCES.
Doc. & Cov., Sec. 29; Gen. ii and iii.
Hebrews ix and x.
Alma xxxiv and the works and passages cited in the body of this lesson.
_SPECIAL TEXT: "And thus we see that all mankind were fallen, and they
were in the grasp of justice yea the justice of God, which consigned
them forever to be cut off from his presence." (Book of Alma xlii:14.)_
DISCUSSION.
_1. Recapitulation:_ Let us now begin the application of our
principles to the Atonement. But first a brief recapitulation of them.
We have seen in preceding lessons--
That Intelligences, though differing in degree of intelligence are all
eternal; and are begotten spirits in a heavenly kingdom; and God is
their Father;
That the purpose of God with reference to his spirit-offspring is to
bring to pass their eternal life and progress and joy;
That to bring to pass possible progress and happiness to the spirits
of men, union of the spirits with earth elements is necessary, hence
earth-birth and earth-life are provided for man;
That to get an environment bringing man in contact with sin and
suffering and death, all which shall give him the experience
essential to his progress--the harmony in the "reign of law" must be
broken--there must be violation of law, there must be a fall of man;
That the fall of man did not surprise the purposes of God, but
furthered them;
That violations of law, however ignorantly done or designedly planned,
and that even for right ends, involves destruction nevertheless of the
harmony of things, and relations, and also involves the transgressor
in the penalties inseparably connected with law, and without which law
would be of no force at all;
That the attributes of God, each complete and perfect, must exist in
harmony with each other, no one supplanting another or intruding upon
its domain;
That a reign of law subsists throughout the universe as well in the
moral and spiritual kingdom as in the physical world;
That any manifestations of mercy, or special providence prompted by
love must not violate the harmony subsisting in the attributes of God,
or be contrary to the conception of the universal reign of law;
That Love and Mercy, however, must enter into the economy of the
earth-order of things; they must get themselves in some way worthily
expressed; no divine economy can exist without them, and without such
expression; even justice crys aloud for their presence.
To get Love and Mercy adequately expressed in the earth-order of
things, and in harmony with law, is the burden and mission of the
Christ through the Atonement.
This is the point to which our previous lessons have led us; and now to
the working out of the application of our principles.
_2. The Commandment Given and Violated.--Effects:_ The commandment
is given, saying: "O. every tree of the garden thou mayest freely eat;
but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat
of it; for in the day thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die."[A]
[Footnote A: Gen. ii:16, 17.]
We need not speculate upon the nature of the thing forbidden. It is
enough to know here that partaking of the thing forbidden by the
commandment led to the knowledge of evil, as well as of good--to
knowledge that comes of experience; and though, as I have before
argued, the transgression so far from surprising the purposes of God
was essential to them, yet when law is transgressed, in the nature of
things, penalties must follow, else laws are but a mockery and the
reign of law a myth.
Adam transgressed the law, as already detailed;[A] the penalties
followed. The nature of those penalties must be found in the events
following the "fall" as consequences as well as in the penalty
pronounced--"In the day thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die."
The harmony of things was broken: innocence fled; union with God was
severed; God banished man from his presence--spiritual death;[B]
physical death also followed; for as to his body, dust man is, and unto
dust shall he return, was the decree of God,[C] and all the woes that
make up the sum of evil in man's earth life followed.
[Footnote A: Lessons VII and VIII.]
[Footnote B: "The task we have set ourselves is to investigate the
essential nature of Spiritual Death. And we have found it to consist of
a want of communion with God" (Drummond's "Natural Law in the Spiritual
World," p. 158). So that spiritual life consists in a union with God;
destroy that union--and sinning against God destroys it--and spiritual
death ensues. For this doctrine we have the warrant of revelation:
"Adam * * * partook of the forbidden fruit and transgressed the
commandment; * * * whereupon I, the Lord God, caused that he should
be cast out from the Garden of Eden, from my presence, because of
his transgression, wherein he became spiritually dead, which is the
first death, even that same death which is the last death, which is
spiritual, which shall be pronounced upon the wicked when I shall say,
'Depart ye cursed'" (Doc. & Cov., Sec. xxix:40, 41). "The fall had
brought upon all mankind a spiritual death as well as a temporal; that
is, they were cut off from the presence of the Lord" (Alma xlii:9).]
[Footnote C: Gen. iii:19. The several sentences of this chapter
pronounced upon man and woman should be included as penalties affixed
to the commandment, "Thou shalt not eat of it," as well as "Thou shalt
surely die."]
_3. The Commandment is Given as to An Immortal Being:_ This is now
the situation: The law is broken. The penalty is incurred. The law is
inexorable. The law was addressed to one provisionally immortal--had
not man sinned his life would have been eternal. The law was not
temporal, but eternal. "Not at any time," said the Lord to Joseph
Smith and six elders, in Fayette, September, 1830--"not at any time
have I given unto you a law which was temporal; neither Adam your
father whom I created. Behold, I gave unto him that he should be an
agent unto himself; and I gave unto him commandment, but no temporal
commandment gave I unto him, for my commandments are spiritual; they
are not natural, nor temporal, neither carnal nor sensual."[A] The
Prophet Joseph also said: "All things whatsoever God in his infinite
wisdom has seen fit and proper to reveal to us, while we are dwelling
in mortality, in regard to our mortal bodies, are revealed to us in the
abstract, and independent of affinity with this mortal tabernacle; but
are revealed to our spirits precisely as though we had no bodies at
all; and those revelations which will save our spirits will save our
bodies. God reveals them to us in view of no eternal dissolution of the
body, or tabernacle."[B]
[Footnote A: Doc. & Cov., Sec. xxix:34, 35.]
[Footnote B: Sermon of April Conference, 1844--the "King Follett
Sermon," "Improvement Era" for January, 1909; published also in
"History of the Church," Vol. VI, with notes by the Editor.]
_4. The Problem:_ What, Then, Can Man or God Do? The commandment,
then, is given to Adam as to an eternal being, and by violating the
law, and doubtless an eternal law, he and the race he shall beget is
under an eternal penalty.[A] Under these circumstances what shall man
do? Nay, rather, what can he do? What shall God do? Nay, what can he
do? Forgive man his transgression out of hand as becomes the true
sovereign of the universe? An ancient and, I might say, a time-honored
suggestion. Origen the theologian of the third Christian century, and
held to be "the greatest Christian mind of the ante-nicene age," at
least held forth the possibility of such procedure. For in his views
"the remission of sin is made to depend upon arbitrary will, without
reference to retributive justice, as is evidenced by his assertion that
God might have chosen milder means to save man than he did; e. g.,
that he might by a sovereign act of his will have made the sacrifices
of the Old Testament to suffice for man's sin."[B] "But logic," as
Shedd subsequently remarked, "could not stop at this point;" for
if the provision for ratifying the broken law is resolved into an
optional act on the part of God, it follows that an Atonement might be
dispensed with altogether. "For the tribitrary and almighty will that
was competent to declare the claims of justice to be satisfied by the
finite sacrifice of bulls and goats would be competent also to declare
that those claims should receive no satisfaction at all."