It has been said before that no one can understand nor appreciate the Infinite Atonement of Jesus Christ and the Fall of Adam without understanding the preexistence. That being said, this article by this distinguished professor is interesting.

http://www.mormontimes.com/around_church/worldwide_church/?linkTrack=dailyEmail&id=6526

Here is an excerpt:

...The LDS faith is the only significant Christian denomination teaching this doctrine today," Givens said of the belief in a pre-existence. "But it turns out, literally dozens -- perhaps hundreds -- of poets, mystics, philosophers, theologians and pastors have taught this same principle across the centuries."

Givens said the writings of St. Augustine, Immaneul Kant and even psychotherapist Sigmund Freud lend themselves to a belief in the eternal nature of the soul, and these perspectives should be embraced, not resisted. Givens referenced the Prophet Joseph Smith, who sought specific truths from different sources, then wove them into a coherent message, an approach Givens referred to a syncretism.

"We too often think that Joseph (Smith) started with a clean slate, repudiating the entire Christian past and starting out fresh, only teaching that which came to him direct from the Heavens; but he emphatically resisted any such expression," Givens said. "His was a generous mind, unafraid to embrace truth wherever he found it and bring it home to Zion."
...

[This message has been edited by diamond4 (edited 3/1/2009 9:13a).]

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Givens said the writings of St. Augustine

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Please quote Augustine on this if you are going to reference him and not just name drop him.

[This message has been edited by Seamaster (edited 3/1/2009 9:16a).]

I am a pretty good googler. I google "Premortal Existence" + "Augustine" and I get only LDS articles claiming that Augustine believed in their premortal existence. I click on the top 10 links. Not one actually cites Augustine or quotes the work they are extracting their notion from....

Typical.

You aked for one reference but I will give you two.

One of the earliest post-New Testament references to the doctrine of a premortal life is found in the "Recognition's of Clement", which was probably written in the latter part of the second century or the early part of the third century. The author, speaking as though he were Peter, discoursed on the creation, and then commented: "But after all these things (the creation of the earth) He made man, on whose account He had prepared all things, whose internal species is older, and for whose sake all things were made." The translator, referring to the phrase "whose internal species is older," added this enlightening footnote: "That is, his soul, according to the doctrine of the preexistence of souls".

Origen acknowledged that the doctrine of the premortal existence had become obscure by the beginning of the third century: "what existed before this world, or what will exist after it, has not become certainly known to the many, for there is no clear statement regarding it in the teaching of the Church." Nonetheless, Origen believed there was a premortal realm, not only for Christ, but for all mortals. He understood that each of us brings to mortality those traits we developed in that premortal sphere. He suspected the reason that some people were more receptive to good and other to evil had to do with events "older than the bodily birth of the individual." He cited as the basis for his belief in a premortal existence the leaping of John the Baptist in his mother's womb at the salutation of Mary, and the Lord's pronouncement that he knew Jeremiah and ordained him a prophet before he was born. Origen then gave the following opinion as to why people were born with certain dispositions:

"It appears to me, to give no other answer, so as to show that no shadow of injustice rests upon the divine government, than by holding that there were certain causes of prior existence, in consequence of which the souls, before their birth in the body, contracted a certain amount of guilt in their sensitive nature, or in their movements, on account of which they have been judged worthy by Divine Providence of being placed in this condition. For a soul is always in possession of free-will, s well when it is in the body as when it is without it; and freedom of will is always directed either to good or evil ... And it is probable that these movements furnish grounds for merit even before they do anything in the world; so that on account of these merits or grounds they are, immediately on their birth, and even before it, so to speak, asserted by Divine Providence for the endurance of good or evil."

Then he added: "We must suppose that there sometimes existed certain causes anterior to bodily birth."

Seamaster - you pointed out sometime ago that this was one of the heresies that was repudiated by the Catholic church about 500 years after they had been taught for centuries beinning with the time of Christ. Did you ever wonder why the Lord would wait so long to correct a false teaching that had been taught and thus would deceive man as to who they were, where they came from and why they are here in mortality under the circumstances they find themselves in?

Origen must have felt strongly about the reality of a premortal existence for man, because he further wrote, "He (God) created all whom He made equal and alike," Certainly Origen was not referring to the physical creation, because all mortals are not equal or alike at birth.) Origen further explained that God sent various vessels (or souls) to the earth - some were like gold or silver, to be honored, others were like wood or clay, to be dishonored, based on their actions in the premortal life. As a result, Origen concluded that God is just because everyone is born "according to his merits; nor will the happiness or unhappiness of each one's birth, or whatever the condition that falls to his lot, be deemed accidental." Why? Because his status in this life will in part be a reflection of his premortal choices. With the foregoing understanding, Origen reasoned that Jacob was honored above Esau due "to the deserts of his previous life."

[This message has been edited by diamond4 (edited 3/1/2009 1:00p).]

I forgot to give you where these are exactly found.

Clement's statements are found in the Ante-Nicene Fathers, 8:85.

Origen's statements are found in the Ante-Nicene Fathers 4:240-241 & 4:336-37.

Your Church banned this doctrine of the Premortal existence in the mid 6th Century by a church edict known as anathemas against Origen. This was a council of approximately 165 bishops, who were the very men that were entrusted to preach the gospel of Christ, but who denounced the very doctrine that was one of the cornerstones of the gospel plan!

[This message has been edited by diamond4 (edited 3/1/2009 12:59p).]

ibmagg, what you claim is untrue. But let's go with it.

Assume that the all powerful church knew of the doctrine of the supposed pre-existence. Please explain their precise motivation for not only ignoring that doctrine, but taking miraculous steps to erase it from scripture and from history? What was the precise motivation?

I notice that diamond completely ignored Seamaster's request for any actual links to any writngs by St. Augustine concerning this topic. Are you going to pretend that the questioned wasn't asked Diamond?

Petro - You have really got to learn how to read. I posted this before you wanted to challenge the source of the quotes, so here it is again:

Clement's statements are found in the Ante-Nicene Fathers, 8:85.

Origen's statements are found in the Ante-Nicene Fathers 4:240-241 & 4:336-37.

Fightin TX Aggie - Sorry to take so long but my wife and I just finished watching the Women's Basketball game for the second time. It was Blair's first victory in Manhatten in 25 years of coaching!

I understand that you don't believe it, but of course you will have to ignore the scriptures as well as the early Christian writers. That being said, you ask a valid question concerning the motivation behind the decision. The real answer is that the clergy of the Catholic church had slipped into the Dark Ages of apostasy! They no longer had the spirit of Christ nor enjoyed the principle of revelation!

But, Scholar Barry Robert Bickmor suggested several more reasons for this phenomena. First, the doctrine was promulgated by the Gnostics and, therefore may have been in disfavor with mainline Christians; second, the doctrine may have been part of the secret traditions of the Christians (meaning it was sacred and therefore, not publicly taught, but rather only privately discussed among the spiritually seasoned); and third, in a Hellenistic-driven world, it may have fallen prey to the Platonic doctrine that the spirit was uncreated. But, the bottom line is that whatever argument advanced, falsehood took the stage from truth.

I can assure you that Satan must have been exultant at the outcome. It was a dissolution of one more divine doctrine that I have given examples of in earlier posts. Additional pieces of the gospel puzzle thus having been discarded, the result of which made it more difficult for the common man to understand God's plan - where man came from, why he is here, and where he is going.

Petro Says:

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I notice that diamond completely ignored Seamaster's request for any actual links to any writngs by St. Augustine concerning this topic. Are you going to pretend that the questioned wasn't asked Diamond?

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Diamond4 Responds:

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Petro - You have really got to learn how to read. I posted this before you wanted to challenge the source of the quotes, so here it is again:

Clement's statements are found in the Ante-Nicene Fathers, 8:85.

Origen's statements are found in the Ante-Nicene Fathers 4:240-241 & 4:336-37.

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Seamaster says...

Diamond4, this may surprise you but Augustine is not Clement. And, you are quoting a compilation of the works of some fathers and not the works themselves.

Further the work you cite is a 'psuedo-Clementine' 4th century piece. Psuedo means fake. So, just to make sure you understand...this was not written by Clement of Rome.

The origin of that piece is from the Ebionite sect in the 4th century...a sect which among other things denied that Paul was an apostle!

So...ONE MORE TIME The LDS are making a living on this matter by saying that Augustine held this view. Please quote Augustine...I'll be waiting.

Well, if egyptian papyri translated means the book of abraham, then Clement means Augustine, or maybe I cant read either

[This message has been edited by fahraint (edited 3/1/2009 8:19p).]

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Your Church banned this doctrine of the Premortal existence in the mid 6th Century by a church edict known as anathemas against Origen

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The council did not debate ecclesiastical discipline nor did it issue disciplinary canons. Our edition does not include the text of the anathemas against Origen since recent studies have shown that these anathemas cannot be attributed to this council. (Norman P. Tanner, S.J., Decrees of the Ecumenical Councils, vol. 1 pp. 105, 106.)

AND

It is most certainly improbable that the fifth Ecumenical Council drew up fifteen anathematisms against Origen, since the celebrated Origenist, Theodore Ascidas, was not only present at this Council, but was of the greatest influence there, and in fact, was the real originator of it. (Charles Joseph Hefele, A History of the Councils of The Church. Vol. IV, p 224.)

Still waiting on those Augustine passages Diamond4.

He has to find a mormontimes to back up his assertions...he doesnt have original thoughts.

Sorry about focusing on Origen who lived much closer to the time of Christ and the Apostles and should have more credibility than Augustine. I have only read of Origen being quoted by LDS authors. I should have been paying closer attention. What happens when watching great basketball.

The passage attributed to Clement is disputed among the scholars. Some giving its credit to Clement of Rome while others say the writer is unknown. The passage that is unquestionably Clement's as found in The Apostolic Fathers, p. 25 in his epistle to the Corinthians which clarifies the confusion that angels of heaven, as referred to in the scriptures, are different from the children of God who are sent to earth. Clement makes clear they are one and the same: "When the most high divided the nations, when He dispersed the sons of Adam, He fixed the boundaries of the nations according to the number of the angels of God. (meaning the people who would constitute the nations of the earth). Moses made it clear that the phrase "angels of God" (as referred to by Clement above) meant those mortals who would become the house of Israel, equating the angels of heaven with certain premortal spirits. He stated that God "set the bounds of the people according to the number of the Children of Israel" (Deut. 32:8) As to those premortal spirits who would inhabit the earth, Paul taught that God "hath determined the times before appointed, and the bounds of their habitation" (acts 17:26). In other words, God knows both the date and the place of our mortal birth, predicated in large measure upon our life in the premortal existence.

[This message has been edited by diamond4 (edited 3/1/2009 10:26p).]

Clement /= Augustine

hieroglyphs /= book of abraham

The problem you have, bob, is you made a claim about Augustine, and you have not backed it up, as usual. No amount of hand waving, smoke screen, or hysterics can solve your dilemma.

[This message has been edited by fahraint (edited 3/1/2009 10:30p).]

Diamond4.

Google "Augustine" + "Premortal Existence."

You will find dozens of statements from Mormon sources that Augustine taught premortal existence but not one of them actually cites Augustine to prove that assertion. Why would that be?

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The passage attributed to Clement is disputed among the scholars. Some giving its credit to Clement of Rome while others say the writer is unknown

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Actually, everybody knows that the Clement passage is a 4th century product and a 'pseudo' work. Everybody. I am not aware of a single scholar who believes that Clement who lived in the first century wrote that.

Origen, in case you are not aware, was a gifted student of Clement of Alexandria. His approximate date of birth was 185 AD to 255 AD. He became a famous teacher at the school of Alexandria as he had a keen mind and was the most prolific of the early Christian writers. It is estimated that he wrote approximately 2,000 works. He is known as the father of Christian theology. He endured tortures and became a martyr for the Christian cause during the Decian persecution.

^
more obfuscation

Please, bob, solve the dilemma

Diamond...I dont see how this relates to Augustine? Please clarify.

Dont hold your breath......He would die and go to his grave before he would ever admit he was wrong

Origen was certainly gifted intellectually, and in how much he knew. He wrote some good pieces, but he mixed too much personal opinionated philosophy into others, such that it set out a pattern to interpet his Christian theology.

On pre-existence, I think the following describes it well:

http://energeticprocession.wordpress.com/category/origen/

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Two key aspects to the Origenist Problem
February 5, 2005

Some of the problems with Origen’s doctrine of say the pre-existence of souls or necessary creation are precisely two key principle problems in his doctrine elsewhere, however, we shall see he was very consistent. The first is a divine problem. For Origen, God’s essence has no mulitplicity or distinctions. Existence, Will, and Activity are wholly indistinguishable and identical. Since God’s activity is wholly indistinguishable we can say that he is an ‘ever-productive’ agent. To be ever-productive, the divine essence must create, since it has no distinction of being, essence, will and activity. The essence has but one object of willing to choose–it has but one good thing to do. We can therefore say, for God’s essence, true freedom is actually freedom from free choice. Thus, for Origen God was by definition Creator and Almighty:

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Accordingly, to prove that God is almighty we must assume the existence of the universe. For if anyone would have it that certain ages, or periods of time, or whatever he cares to call them, elapsed during which the present creation did not exist, he would undoubtedly prove that in those ages or periods God was not almighty, but that he afterwards became almighty from the time when he began to have creatures over whom he could exercise power. Thus God will apparently have experienced a kind of progress, for there can be no doubt that it is better for him to be almighty than not to be so. Now how is it anything but absurd that God should at first not possess something that is appropriate to him and then should come to possess it? But if there was not time when he was not almighty, there must always have existed the things in virtue of which he is almighty; and there must always have existed things under his sway, which own him as their ruler.

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(On First Principles, Bk.I C.2,10, trans. G.W. Butterworth)

Origen’s definition of simplicity is therefore accompanied by a dialectic of opposition: If God is simple, he must create; if God is simple, creation is composite. Because of God’s simplicity, creation stands over and against God, for the very purpose that God can be Creator. In other words, “he imagined an endless flow of ages which had to be filled…Any sequence in the divine predicates appeared to him under the form of real temporal change; and therefore, having excluded change, he was inclined to deny any sequence at all to, or interdependence among, those predicates taken as a whole; he asserted more than the mere “co-eternity” of the world with God; he asserted the necessity of the divine self-disclosure ad extra, the necessity of the eternal realization of the fulness and of all the potentialities of Divine power.” (Florovsky, Creation and Redemption, Vol. III, The Collected Works of George Florovsky, p.53) For Origen, “the world was impossible without God, and God was impossible without the world.” (Ibid., pp.55-56). Therefore, for Origen, God cannot choose not create, since such a choice is entagled with a dialectic, which would involve mulitplicity, and given God’s utter perfection, such would by definition be evil and impossible.

The second problem is bound up in the creature. Since, we have just shown that for Origen, God’s freedom is really a freedom from free choice, creation, being composite, must therefore involve choice. This choice, however must precisely be between objects of differing moral value. The creature in its diversity must always have free volition, mutibility, and motion:

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the will’s freedom always moves in the direction either of good or evil, nor can the rational sense, that is the mind or soul, ever exist without some movement either good or evil.

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(Loc. cit. III, 3,5)

We see in this passage that Origen logically ties personhood to free-choice and motion, but because he cannot disentagle motion and plurality from his definition of free-will as objects dialectically conditioned, this has terrible consequences for the redeemed in the eschaton. With God being absolutely simple, how many objects willing can their be? But one, and Origen has ruled out all diversity or motion in the eschaton for creatures–absorption into the One. However, Origen is not one to give up on the problem. We saw that motion, free-will, and personhood are tied together in his doctrine of free-choice. The redeemed have but one single good object to will, the other option by definition must be evil, which brings us to the second problem: cycles of falls and redemptions:

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the soul is immortal and eternal, it is possible that in the many and endless periods throughout diverse and immeasurable ages it may either descend from the Highest Good to the lowest evil or to be restored from the lowest evil to the Highest Good.

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(Ibid., III, 1,23)

This is why Origen logically believes in the pre-existence of souls.

My thinking and ideas here were borrowed from Joseph P. Farrell–Free Choice in Saint Maximus the Confessor, Saint Tikhon’s Seminary Press, 1989.

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Sorry fahraint, I thought I admitted I was in error in who I was quoting. I have never personally quoted Augustine.

Cyprian -The bottome line the doctrine of the pre-mortal existence was taught for centuries from the time of Christ. The scriptures teach it and the Catholic church, which claims that that revelation no longer existed or was required, in the mid-sixth century banned the doctrine. On what basis?

We don't base our teachings on what any of the apostolic fathers or early Christian writers had to say. It is nice to have their confirming support for that is additional evidence. Remember, Joseph had access to none of them. But, because of "revelation' Joseph could more completely connect the scriptures together to restore original Church doctrines and ordinances.

[This message has been edited by diamond4 (edited 3/2/2009 9:28a).]

Diamond, I apologize for missing that!

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The bottome line the doctrine of the pre-mortal existence was taught for centuries from the time of Christ

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Not true, and not supportable.

Origen apparently may have proposed such a preexistence based on his interpretation of scripture, but there is no evidence that it was EVER part of scripture.

Your church claims that "plain and precious truths" were removed from the scriptures, but there is no evidence of this. In fact, the Dead Sea Scrolls, many of which even predate Christ, show that our Bibles are accurate.

You are deceived.

Well, I wish LDS news sources like Mormon Times would stop saying that Augustine taught the pre-mortal existence because that is quite simply a huge lie.

In one work he contemplated the creation of souls and said that one idea is an eternal existence but he then said that the Church had not spoken on the matter and went onto say that his opinion was that souls were created with the body. In fact, this is also where Nancy Pelosi was confused because in the same work (which is really just him questioning this matter) he talked about the possibility that souls were introduced in the fetus during their time in the womb and not from the beginning.

Why is the LDS so desperate to find traces of their doctrines in the patristic post Nicene Creed Fathers? Its crazy.

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Why is the LDS so desperate to find traces of their doctrines in the patristic post Nicene Creed Fathers? Its crazy.

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This is really quite simple.

In order to validate themselves as a religious group, they need to fall in line with the early church. This way they can completely contradict the modern church and claim that their "prophet" was sent to realign their group.

Otherwise he is just a guy with sick fantasies who wanted to be relevant in this world.

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Petro - You have really got to learn how to read. I posted this before you wanted to challenge the source of the quotes, so here it is again:

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Diamond: It isn't I who has misread the comments and question. I and others asked for the writings from St. Augustine that supposedly back up your claims and you have yet to provide them.

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Sorry fahraint, I thought I admitted I was in error in who I was quoting. I have never personally quoted Augustine.

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No. It wasn't a matter of you being in error of who you were quoting. It was a matter of you cutting and pasting statements from pro-Mormon web sites without actually investigating the claims that they were making. The site mentioned writings from St. Augustine and so you happily passed that mention on to us without actually having any real clue whether such a statement was correct or not.

Seamaster has apparently done a bit of searching and determined that none of the pro-mormon websites actually mention these supposed St. Augustine quotes. Are you therefore willing to admit that your source websites might be biased and/or factually incorrect?

Sorry Petro -There was no cut and pasting on this thread, they were all hand typed. I just wish this information was available to cut and paste.

Regardless of Seamaster's research it still does not over come the fact that the doctrine of pre-mortal existence did not originate with Joseph Smith. It was taught in the Church for over five hundred years. Origen, taught it and he is considered the "father of Christian theology". But even he did not understand that the spirits of men and women were begotten sons and daughters of God. It was too long after the apostasy was in full swing and so many gospel truths were lost and perverted.

Your original post which makes reference to Augustine is an "excerpt" from the article.

How is that not cut and paste?

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It was taught in the Church for over five hundred years.

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Again, this isn't true no matter how many times you repeat it.

There is no evidence of this in scripture and no evidence of a cover-up to remove it from scripture and, moreover, no possible justification to remove it from scripture had it ever been there to begin with.

This is pure fantasy on your part.

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It was taught in the Church for over five hundred years. Origen, taught it and he is considered the "father of Christian theology".

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It was not taught for 500 years.

Its not even worth trying to respond guys.

The interesting thing is that the LDS are completely opposite to almost every measure of orthodoxy that WAS taught for the first 500 years, so its disingenuous to claim some sort of superiority because they *think* that Origen was a patristic Mormon. He wasn't but Diamond4 does not really care about facts so what’s the use?

Origen never taught the pre-mortal existence of souls. A group of people who called themselves "Origenites" were under this error for a while but no evidence exists that Origen himself taught this. And, as I already mentioned, most scholars believe that the "Anathemas Against Origen" are fraudulent in the first place.

Amateur Hour at Mormon Times...

Matt - that was a cut and paste and I made that clear from the way I posted it, for that was from the article that I included the link to. My responses on the other hand were all hand typed.

[This message has been edited by diamond4 (edited 3/2/2009 4:48p).]

Diamond: Obviously that was a cut and paste (Even though you previously stated "There was no cut and pasting on this thread, they were all hand typed.). And yet you are still unable or unwilling to provide a SINGLE quote from St. Augustine backing up the claims that you cut and pasted.

Under those circumstances, are you willing to admit that the story you quoted from might be wrong? Or, like all the other threads, is your ego too big to ever admit that you might and/or your Mormon sources might be incorrect? Will you just pretend that you never talked about St. Augustine instead?


[This message has been edited by PetroAg87 (edited 3/2/2009 4:57p).]

Petro...

I don't think Diamond4 knows how to cut/paste...literally.

So, when he says that he hand typed something he isn't saying that it is an original thought, he is saying that he literally just copied it like he would if he were using a typewriter.

Diamond4. Just so you know how to copy/paste:

Use your mouse to highlight the text you want to copy. Click the top of the text and while holding down the button highlight the entire text that you want to copy. Then, on your keyboard, type 'ctrl + c' at the same time. Then go into TexAgs where you type thread and on the keyboard type, 'ctrl + v.' Viola...the copied text should appear in the box.