heaven, and the opposite as hell, without giving warrant, however,
for the belief that but two places or kingdoms are provided, to one
or the other of which every soul is to be consigned according to the
balance-sheet of his life's account, and perhaps on a very small margin
of merit or guilt. Equally unscriptural is the inference that the state
of the soul at death determines that soul's place and environment
throughout eternity, forever deprived of opportunity of progression.
When left to his imagination, without the guidance of revelation, man
conjures up a heaven and a hell to suit his fancy. Thus, to the mind
of the savage, heaven is a hunting-ground with game a-plenty; to the
carnal, heaven promises perpetual gratification of senses and passions;
to the lover of truth and the devotee of righteousness, heaven is the
assurance of limitless advancement in wisdom and achievement. And to
each of these, hell is the eternal realization of deprivation, loss,
disappointment and consequent anguish.
Divine revelation is the only source of sure knowledge as to what
awaits man beyond the grave, and from this we learn that at death
the spirits of all men pass to an intermediate state, in which they
associate with their kind, the good with the good, the wicked with the
wicked, and so shall endure in happiness or awful suspense until the
time appointed for their resurrection. Paradise is the dwelling place
of relatively righteous spirits awaiting the glorious dawn of the
resurrection. The final judgment, at which all men shall appear before
the bar of God, is to follow their resurrection from the dead. We shall
stand in our resurrected bodies of flesh and bones to receive from
Jesus Christ, who shall judge the world, the sentence we individually
merit, whether it be "Come ye blessed of my Father" or "Depart from me
ye cursed." (See Matt. 25:31-46.)
In His solemn discourse to the Apostles immediately prior to the
betrayal our Lord sought to cheer their saddened hearts with the
assurance, "In my Father's house are many mansions: if it were not so,
I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you. And if I go
and prepare a place for you, I will come again, and receive you unto
myself; that where I am, there ye may be also." (John 14:2, 3.)
Here is conclusive proof of varied conditions in the world beyond;
and the teachings of Paul are incisive as to the state of resurrected
souls: "There are also celestial bodies, and bodies terrestrial; but
the glory of the celestial is one, and the glory of the terrestrial is
another. There is one glory of the sun, and another glory of the moon,
and another glory of the stars: for one star differeth from another
star in glory. So also is the resurrection of the dead." (1 Cor.
15:40-42.)
Latter-day revelation avers even more explicitly the fact of numerous
and graded states provided for the souls of men. There is a Celestial
Kingdom, into which shall enter all who have won not alone Salvation,
but Exaltation. And who are these blessed ones?
"They are they who received the testimony of Jesus, and believed on his
name and were baptized after the manner of his burial, being buried in
the water in his name, and this according to the commandment which he
has given; that by keeping the commandments they might be washed and
cleansed from all their sins, and receive the Holy Spirit." (D&C, 76).
Next in order is the Terrestrial Kingdom, in which shall be saved those
who, though honorable according to the codes of men, have failed in
valiant and aggressive service in the cause of God, and also those who
have died in ignorance of the prescribed "laws and ordinances of the
Gospel."
"Behold, these are they who died without law, and also they who are
the spirits of men kept in prison, whom the Son visited, and preached
the gospel unto them, that they might be judged according to men in
the flesh; who received not the testimony of Jesus in the flesh, but
afterwards received it. These are they who are honorable men of the
earth, who were blinded by the craftiness of men."
Yet lower is the Telestial Kingdom, and of its inhabitants we read:
"These are they who received not the gospel of Christ, neither the
testimony of Jesus. These are they who deny not the Holy Spirit. These
are they who are thrust down to hell. These are they who shall not be
redeemed from the devil, until the last resurrection, until the Lord,
even Christ the Lamb shall have finished his work. . . . But behold,
and lo, we saw the glory and the inhabitants of the telestial world,
that they were as innumerable as the stars in the firmament of heaven,
or as the sand upon the sea shore."
Far below the lowest of these kingdoms of glory is the fate or state
decreed for the souls who have sinned in the full light of knowledge
and with conscious guilt, those who having received the testimony
of Christ have ruthlessly and wantonly denied it in the interest
of temporary gain or gratification, who have fallen so far in
transgression as to be known by the awful name "sons of perdition," for
whom no forgiveness is promised. (See D&C, 76:32-38).
Thus is it provided that every soul shall inherit according to his
deserts under the inviolable laws of God. Salvation is relative.
He who attains the Telestial state is saved from the fate of utter
Perdition; he who wins a place in the Terrestrial is raised above the
lesser glory; and those who merit exaltation in the Celestial kingdom
are supremely blessed, for they shall dwell and serve with God and His
Christ eternally.
-- 17 --
IN THE REALM OF THE DEAD
Paradise--What of the Spirits in Prison?
"WE believe that through the Atonement of Christ all mankind may be
saved, by obedience to the laws and ordinances of the Gospel."
No limitation is here expressed with respect to the living or the dead.
Who are the living but the few just now tabernacled in mortal bodies
destined sooner or later to die? Who are the dead but the uncounted
myriads who once lived in the flesh and have already passed to the
world of the disembodied? If the Atonement accomplished by the Lord
Jesus Christ be a means of salvation to the few only who constituted
the living during some specific period, or even to all who have heard
and accepted the Gospel while in the body, the sacrifice made by the
Son of God becomes of limited and small effect. The sure word of
Scripture declares otherwise.
Christ affirmed that His mission as the Redeemer and Savior of the race
extended beyond the grave. Consider the profound significance of His
words: "Verily, verily, I say unto you, The hour is coming, and now is,
when the dead shall hear the voice of the Son of God: and they that
hear shall live. . . . Marvel not at this: for the hour is coming, in
the which all that are in the graves shall hear His voice, And shall
come forth; they that have done good, unto the resurrection of life;
and they that have done evil, unto the resurrection of damnation."
(John 5:25-29).
Jesus Christ died upon the cross in the literal sense in which all
men die. While the corpse lay in the rock-hewn sepulchre the immortal
Christ existed as a disembodied Spirit. Where was He, and what were
His activities in the interval between His death on Calvary and His
emergence from the tomb with spirit and body reunited--a resurrected
Soul? The most natural assumption is that He went where the spirits
of the dead ordinarily go; and that in the sense in which He had
been while in the flesh a Man among men, He was during the period of
disembodiment a Spirit among spirits. The Scriptures confirm this
conception as true.
While in the bodiless state our Lord ministered among the departed,
both in Paradise and in the prison realm where dwelt in a state of
durance the spirits of the disobedient. To this effect testified Peter:
"For Christ also hath once suffered for sins, the just for the unjust,
that He might bring us to God, being put to death in the flesh, but
quickened by the Spirit: By which also He went and preached unto the
spirits in prison." (1 Peter 3:18, 19).
And further: "For, for this cause was the gospel preached also to them
that are dead, that they might be judged according to men in the flesh,
but live according to God in the spirit." (1 Peter 4:6).
One of the two condemned malefactors crucified by our Lord's side
reviled Him; the other, who was penitent, supplicated the dying Christ
saying: "Lord, remember me when thou comest into thy kingdom"; and to
this appeal the Lord replied with the blessed assurance: "Verily I say
unto thee, Today shalt thou be with me in paradise." (Luke 23:42, 43).
The spirit of Jesus and that of the repentant sinner left their
crucified bodies and went to the same place in the spirit world. But
neither of them at that time went to Heaven, the abode of the Eternal
Father; for, on the third day following, Jesus, then a resurrected
Being, positively stated to the weeping Magdalene: "I am not yet
ascended to my Father," and added as to an event then future, "but go
to my brethren, and say unto them, I ascend unto my Father, and your
Father; and to my God, and your God." (John 20:17).
Christ and the contrite thief went to Paradise; but Paradise is not the
distinctive abode of God. To infer that the crucified transgressor was
saved by his dying confession, and was granted a special passport to
Heaven with sins unexpiated and without his compliance with "the laws
and ordinances of the Gospel" is to disregard both letter and spirit of
Scripture, and to ignore both reason and the sense of justice. We find
here no warrant for belief in the efficacy of death-bed confession as
a means of grace. Only through individual faith, repentance, and works
can remission of sins be obtained. The dying malefactor who won from
the Christ the comforting promise of a place in Paradise had manifested
both faith and repentance. The blessing promised him was to the effect
that he should that day hear the Gospel preached in Paradise. In the
acceptance or rejection of the message of salvation he would be left
an agent unto himself. The requirement of obedience to "the laws and
ordinances of the Gospel" was not waived, suspended, or superseded in
his case, nor shall it be for any soul.
For the dead who have lived and died in ignorance of the requirements
of salvation, as, in another sense, for the disobedient who later
come to repentance, the plan of God provides for the vicarious
administration of the essential ordinances to the living posterity
in behalf of their dead progenitors. Of this saving labor Malachi
prophesied in solemn plainness (Malachi 4:5, 6); and the glorious
fulfilment has been witnessed in this modern age. The great Temples
reared by the Latter-day Saints are maintained in large part for the
service of the living in behalf of the dead.
-- 18 --
WHY ARE THEY BAPTIZED FOR THE DEAD?
Elijah the Prophet on the American Continent
IN one of his letters to the Corinthians, Paul the Apostle discusses
the resurrection of the dead, which was a subject of contention at the
time of his writing. Having shown that through the Atonement of Jesus
Christ all mankind shall be eventually redeemed from bodily death, the
scholarly Apostle asks: "Else what shall they do which are baptized for
the dead, if the dead rise not at all? Why are they then baptized for
the dead?" (1 Cor. 15:29). As the question is put by way of finality
and climax to the preceding argument and is without explanatory
comment, we must conclude that the subject involved no new or strange
doctrine; but to the contrary that the people both understood and
practised the ordinance of vicarious baptism by the living in behalf of
the dead.
To Nicodemus our Lord declared in such plainness as to preclude
dispute: "Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot
enter into the kingdom of God." (John 3:5). That this new birth
comprises water baptism by immersion, as was at that time being
administered by John the Baptist, and the higher baptism of the Spirit,
which Christ Himself came to give, is evident from the scriptural
context. Note the incisiveness of our Lord's affirmation that without
baptism man cannot enter the kingdom of God. No distinction is made, no
exceptions are implied. The indispensable condition is applicable to
all men whether living or dead.
Nicodemus, though a scholar and a master in Israel, failed to
understand the full import of our Lord's words, and in seeming
bewilderment asked: "How can a man be born when he is old? Can he enter
the second time into his mother's womb, and be born?" (Verse 4).
With at least equal pertinency it may now be asked: How can a man
who has died without baptism be baptized? Can he enter the second
time into his body of flesh and be immersed in water? The answer is
that the living may be baptized for the dead. No one who accepts as
a reality the Atonement of Jesus Christ in behalf of all humankind
can consistently deny the efficacy of vicarious service, in which one
person officiates in behalf of another, provided of course that the
labor be done by Divine appointment.
In the last chapter of the Old Testament the prophet Malachi describes
a condition of the last days immediately precedent to the second
advent of the Christ: "For, behold, the day cometh, that shall burn as
an oven; and all the proud, yea, and all that do wickedly, shall be
stubble: and the day that cometh shall burn them up, saith the Lord of
hosts, that it shall leave them neither root nor branch." (Malachi 4:1).
This fateful prediction is followed by the blessed promise, expressed
in the words of Jehovah: "Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet
before the coming of the great and dreadful day of the Lord: And he
shall turn the heart of the fathers to the children, and the heart of
the children to their fathers, lest I come and smite the earth with a
curse." (Verses 5, 6).
Joseph Smith the modern prophet solemnly affirms that in 1836 Elijah
the prophet of ancient Israel appeared in the Temple that had been
erected by the Latter-day Saints at Kirtland, Ohio, and effected the
fulfilment of Malachi's prediction by this declaration: "Behold, the
time has fully come, which was spoken of by the mouth of Malachi,
testifying that he (Elijah) should be sent before the great and
dreadful day of the Lord come, to turn the hearts of the fathers to
the children, and the children to the fathers, lest the whole earth be
smitten with a curse." (D&C, 110:14-15).
This union of the interests of the departed fathers with those of their
yet living descendants is a necessary preparation for the coming of the
Lord, as affirmed by Joseph Smith: "The earth will be smitten with a
curse, unless there is a welding link of some kind or other, between
the fathers and the children, upon some subject or other, and behold
what is that subject? It is the baptism for the dead. For we without
them cannot be made perfect; neither can they without us be made
perfect." (D. C. 128:18).
The Latter-day Saints are distinguished as a Temple-building people.
Through direct revelation the Lord has made plain that baptism and
associated ordinances for the dead, as also certain endowments of the
living, are acceptable only when administered in structures specially
reared and consecrated for this sacred service.
In the spirit realm, as in our material world of mortals, the Gospel
of Jesus Christ is being preached; and among both dead and living the
authoritative proclamation is made: Repent for the Kingdom of Heaven is
at hand. To be competent to officiate for his dead, a man must first
comply with the laws and ordinances of the Gospel in his own behalf.
There is an element of particular fitness in the fact that the
appointed minister, through whom the vicarious service of the living in
behalf of the dead has been inaugurated in the current dispensation,
is none other than Elijah, who was taken from earth without passing
through the change we call death, and who therefore held a peculiar and
special relationship to both the living and the dead.
True to the commission conferred through Elijah's modern ministry, the
Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints rears Temples to the name
and service of the living God, and in those sacred structures carries
forward the appointed service for the salvation of the uncounted dead
who have passed away in ignorance as to the necessity of compliance
with the laws and ordinances of the Gospel, without which compliance no
man can have place in the Kingdom of God.
-- 19 --
OBEDIENCE IS HEAVEN'S FIRST LAW
Conditions of Citizenship in the Kingdom of God
WE believe that through the Atonement of Christ all mankind may be
saved, by obedience to the laws and ordinances of the Gospel. (Articles
of Faith, 3).
Pope's famous line, "Order is Heaven's first law," has often been
misapplied. Order is a result of compliance with established
requirements; of necessity, therefore, it cannot be first. It is an
effect, not the primary cause. A more thoughtful generalization leads
to the conclusion that obedience is the basal law of Heaven, and that
this law is equally valid and as truly operative in things pertaining
to mortality.
Jesus Christ, through whom the plan of salvation has been made
available to mankind, has prescribed the conditions under which we may
become its beneficiaries--the terms by which citizenship in the Kingdom
of God may be secured.
Among these specified conditions is baptism by immersion for the
remission of sins. The gross materialist, who wilfully refuses to see
or to acknowledge anything beyond the affairs of earth, may ask: How
can water wash away sin? In answer be it said, water cannot remove
the stain of guilt; nevertheless, obedience to the law of baptism as
required by Jesus Christ is truly a means of securing forgiveness.
Obedience, not water, is the cleansing unction.
Have you never read of Naaman, captain of the Syrian hosts, who sought
relief from his leprosy through the ministration of Elisha, the man of
God? Read 2 Kings, chap. 5. The prophet commanded the leper to wash
himself seven times in Jordan, and promised that through obedience
the man would be cleansed. But the haughty Syrian was offended at
the simplicity of the requirement. He had expected some ceremonial
spectacle of power, a display of miracle. But by the counsel of his
servant he went "and dipped himself seven times in Jordan, according
to the saying of the man of God: and his flesh came again like unto
the flesh of a little child, and he was clean." The waters of Jordan
had no special virtues of healing, but obedience effected a cure from
the leprous affliction, which was rightly regarded as at once a bodily
disease and a curse.
And what of the widow, whose sons were to be sold into bondage because
she could not pay her late husband's debt? Read 2 Kings 4:1-7. She came
to Elisha in agony of soul; and the prophet told her to take the one
little pot of oil in her house, and pour from it into as many vessels
as she could borrow. With scrupulous care she complied with every
detail of the instructions given her by the man of God, and the vessels
were filled from the single cruse. Then she came and told the man of
God. And he said, "Go, sell the cil, and pay thy debt, and live thou
and thy children of the rest."
Obedience is a source of power, even as is prayer. When the Jews
marveled at the wisdom of Christ, He told them of a very simple yet
effective way of obtaining, each for himself, knowledge of supreme
worth. "My doctrine is not mine," said He, "but his that sent me. If
any man will do his will, he shall know of the doctrine, whether it be
of God, or whether I speak of myself." (John 7:16, 17).
In every-day affairs we comply without question with the requirements
essential to the results we desire. Electricity lights our homes,
propels our vehicles, drives our machinery, transmits our messages,
but only on condition that we obey to the minutest detail the laws by
which that mystic force operates. We may cause the sunlight to record
indelibly the beauties of the landscape, or the features of a friend,
but only through obedience to the laws of light and the numerous
mechanical adjustments incident to the use of the camera. And as we
fully and unreservedly obey, the result is sure.
Why then should it be a thing strange in our eyes that through
obedience to established and eternal law the higher or spiritual
powers should be invoked to our service? The effect is equally sure.
The Christ has given us solemn assurance: "He that believeth and is
baptized shall be saved." (Mark 16:16).
In the present age, the unalterable necessity of obedience as a means
of blessing has been reaffirmed through the prophet Joseph Smith:
"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." (D&C 130:20, 21).
And further: "I, the Lord, am bound when ye do what I say, but when ye
do not what I say, ye have no promise." (82:10).
There is no element of uncertainty in the plan of salvation, far
less of inconsistency or caprice in the judgment to be rendered on
individual lives, for that would imply injustice. The plan is simple.
Man is in a fallen condition, beset with weaknesses and sin. Means are
provided whereby he may rise, and, through the corridors of death and
the portals of the resurrection, reach the way of eternal progression.
These means are all comprised in obedience to the laws and ordinances
of the Gospel. It is only by compliance with the laws of our community
and nation that we have title to personal liberty and to a share in
the blessings and privileges provided by the government under which
we live. Shall the terms of citizenship in the Kingdom of God be less
definite than in the nations officered by men?
Divine authority for the naturalization of mankind in that eternal
Kingdom has been restored to earth in the current age. The Church of
Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints calls upon all peoples, irrespective
of race or nationality, to cultivate an abiding faith in God, to
turn from sin in contrite and genuine repentance, to be baptized by
the authority of the Holy Priesthood, and to receive the assured
companionship of the Holy Ghost through the laying on of hands.
On the high authority of the Holy Scriptures, the direct word of God to
man, be it said: There is no other road to Salvation.
-- 20 --
THE DEVILS BELIEVE AND TREMBLE
Faith Not Mere Belief
WE believe that the first principles and ordinances of the Gospel are:
(1) Faith in the Lord Jesus Christ; (2) Repentance; (3) Baptism by
immersion for the remission of sins; (4) Laying on of hands for the
gift of the Holy Ghost. (Articles of Faith, 4).
Faith in God is the first, the fundamental, the basal principle of the
Gospel; as, indeed, faith, in the more general usage of the term, is
the impelling cause to activity even in ordinary affairs. Faith and
belief are not infrequently confused, and the words are too commonly
regarded as synonymous. An approach to identity of meaning appears in
early English, in consequence of which fact belief is sometimes given
the more definite signification of faith in our versions of the Holy
Scriptures. Belief may be nothing more than a mental assent to any
proposition, principle, or alleged fact; whereas faith implies such
confidence and conviction as shall inspire to action. Belief is by
comparison passive, a mere agreement or tacit acceptance only; faith is
active and positive, and is accompanied by works. Faith is vivified,
vitalized, living belief.
Even the devils believe that Jesus is the Christ, and so fully that
they tremble at the prospect of the fate foreshadowed by that belief
(see James 2:19). Their belief may amount even to certain knowledge,
but they remain devils nevertheless. Consider the man possessed by a
demon in the country of the Gadarenes. When he beheld Jesus afar off
he ran to the Master, and worshiped Him, while the evil spirit by whom
the man was controlled acknowledged the Lord, calling Him "Jesus, thou
Son of the Most High God." (Mark 5; for analogous instances see Mark
1:23-27, and 3:8-11).