Posted by:
cludgie
(
)
Date: June 02, 2011 04:19AM
(Also, I may be mis-reading, but I hope you're not blaming bona dea for what was my comment.)
When I went to BYU in the 1960s, I had a class by the infamous and nutty Cleon Skousen. In that class he explained the whole Blacks-not-getting-the-priesthood schtick. He claimed (and this is Skousen speaking), that the black-skinned prohibition pertained only to "Negroes," and by "Negroes," the church meant West and Central and some southern Africans, chiefly the Bantu peoples. Okay, then... Uh, who again? How do we know? Who exactly decides this?
He specifically said that East Africans (Somalis, Eritreans, Ethiopians and the like, could, in fact, hold the priesthood, as could black-skinned Indians, New Guineans, Papuan Indonesians, and Australian aboriginals. (Try floating that one past your bishop when it comes time to be ordained.)
When I was learning about the origins of Indonesians, I learned that they are part of the three great migrations from Taiwan and China that produced the Malay, Indonesians, Philippine, Madagascar, Micronesian, and Polynesian peoples. (Helluva big area, you know, from Madagascar clear over to Easter Island.) But it said something like, "excluding the Papuan peoples and native Australians," but offered no more information. I had to google the Papuan origins, and it explains how they were part of a migration of African people that came across on the land bridge that extended across parts of the Indian Ocean 40,000 years ago. I just found it interesting that for years the Australians and New Guineans could have apparently have the priesthood (according to Skousen) when they were 100% African origin. Meanwhile, any white with "one drop of African blood" ("Negroes," you know) could not hold the priesthood.
Weird religion.
Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 06/02/2011 04:19AM by cludgie.