Posted by:
Jim Huston
(
)
Date: September 18, 2011 11:30AM
Heavenly Mother
Gordon B. Hinckley, Teachings of Gordon B. Hinckley, p. 257
Logic and reason would certainly suggest that f we have a Father in Heaven, we have a Mother in Heaven. That doctrine rests well with me.
Bruce R. McConkie, Mormon Doctrine, 2nd ed., p. 516
Implicit in the Christian verity that all men are the spirit children of an Eternal Father is the usually unspoken truth that they are also the offspring of an Eternal Mother. An exalted and glorified Man of Holiness (Moses 6:57) could not be a Father unless a Woman of like glory, perfection, and holiness was associated with him as a Mother. The begetting of children makes a man a father and a woman a mother whether we are dealing with man in his mortal or immortal state.
We become like unto our Eternal Father and our Eternal Mother
James E. Talmage, General Conference, April 1915
"The doctrine of the relationship between God and men, as made plain through the word of revelation, is today as it was of old, though in the light of later scripture we are enabled to read the meaning more clearly. It is provided that we, the sons and daughters of God, may advance until we become like unto our Eternal Father and our Eternal Mother, in that we may become perfect in our spheres as they are in theirs. That grand truth, taught by the Prophet Joseph and ridiculed for the time, has now gripped the minds of the thinkers and philosophers of the age... It was crystallized into what we may call an aphorism, by President Lorenzo Snow: 'As man is God once was; as God is man may be'."
Don’t worship Mother
Orson Pratt The Seer p 159
"But if we have a heavenly Mother as well as a heavenly Father, is it not right that we should worship the Mother of our spirits as well as the Father? No; for the Father of our spirits is at the head of His household, and his wives and children are required to yield the most perfect obedience to their great Head. It is lawful for the children to worship the King of Heaven, but not the 'Queen of heaven.'... we are nowhere taught that Jesus prayed to His heavenly Mother..."
Power of Spiritual Reproduction
Brigham Young Journal of Discourses V6 p 275, 1852
Neither is it taught that Jesus had a heavenly mother or that we existed as spirits before we were conceived on earth, or that we become gods. You cannot appeal to the Bible with these other doctrines of Mormonism, the whole system is divorced from the Bible.“After men ...have BECOME GODS, ...they have the power then of propagating [reproducing] their species in spirit” Thus, as man is exalted to be a god of his own world he continues to have spirit offspring to repeat the process.
Orson Pratt The Seer, pp. 134-135, 1853
“Each succeeding generation of Gods follow the example of the preceding ones: each generation have their wives, who raise up from the fruit of their loins immortal spirits: when their families become numerous, they organize new worlds for them.... [T]hey place their families upon the same....”
Bruce McConkie Mormon Doctrine p 516 1979
“This doctrine that there is a Mother in Heaven was affirmed in plainness by the First Presidency of the Church... they said that 'man, as a spirit, was begotten and born of heavenly parents, and reared to maturity in the eternal mansions of the Father,' that man is the offspring of celestial parentage,' and that 'all men and women are in the similitude of the universal Father and Mother, and are literally the sons and daughters of Deity.'"
Created in the image of Mother in Heaven
Joseph Fielding Smith Answers to Gospel Questions v3 p 142, 144
"The fact that there is no reference to a mother in heaven either in the Bible, Book of Mormon or Doctrine and Covenants, is not sufficient proof that no such thing as a mother did exist there. . .Is it not feasible to believe that female spirits were created in the image of a 'Mother in Heaven'?"
Mother and Father in Heaven
Mormon Hymnal – Oh My Father
"In the heavens are parents single? No, the thought makes reason stare! Truth is reason, truth eternal Tells me I’ve a mother there... Father, Mother, may I meet you In your royal courts on high?"
God was a polygamist
Orson Pratt The Seer p 172
“... it will be seen that the great Messiah who was the founder of the Christian religion was a polygamist... the Messiah chose... by marrying many honorable wives himself, to show to all future generations that he approbated the plurality of wives under the Christian dispensation in which His polygamist ancestors lived.
“We have clearly show that God the Father had a plurality of wives, one or more being in eternity, by whom He begat our spirits as well as the spirit of Jesus His First Born, and another being upon the earth by whom He begat the tabernacle of Jesus, as his only begotten in this world. We have also proved most clearly that the Son followed the example of his Father, and became the great Bridegroom to whom Kings’ daughters and many honorable wives were to be married. We have also proved that both God the Father and our Lord Jesus Christ inherit their wives in eternity as well as in time... And then it would be so shocking to the modesty of the very pious ladies of Christendom to see Abraham and his wives, Jacob and his wives, Jesus and his honorable wives, all eating occasionally at the same table, and visiting one another, and conversing about their numerous children and their kingdoms. Oh, ye delicate ladies of Christendom, how can you endure such a scene as this?... If you do not want your morals corrupted, and your delicate ears shocked, and your pious modesty put to the blush by the society of Polygamists and their wives, do not venture near the New Earth; for polygamists will be honored there, and will be among the chief rules in that Kingdom.”
Erastus Snow, Journal of Discourses, vol. 23, p. 300
To this I reply, that neither Christ nor his Apostles ever uttered one word in condemnation of that system of marriage that was in vogue in their days, and that had been recognized and acknowledged in the house of Israel from the days of Abraham until Christ. In fact Christ Himself was the fruit of polygamy, so far as the flesh was concerned. And nowhere is there to be found one word in condemnation of this system, or anything intimating that he intended to change the then existing relations of the sexes; but while he, as well as his Apostles and the ancient Prophets and Patriarchs denounced adultery and fornication they recognized and sustained honorable marriage whether single or plural; and every form of illicit intercourse with the sexes was condemned by the primitive Christians, as well as by the Prophets and Patriarchs of old.
Gods without end
Orson Pratt The Seer, March 1853, pp. 37-39
“In the Heaven where our spirits were born there are many Gods, each one of whom has his own wife or wives, raises up a numerous family of sons and daughters... each father and mother will be in a condition to multiply forever and ever. As soon as each God has begotten many millions of male and female spirits, and his Heavenly inheritance becomes too small, to comfortably accommodate his great family, he, in connection with his sons, organizes a new world, after a similar order to the one which we now inhabit, where he sends both the male and female spirits to inhabit tabernacles of flesh and bones.... The number of the sons and daughters of God, born in Heaven before this earth was formed, is not known by us. They must have been exceedingly numerous.. The amount of population now on the globe, is estimated in round numbers at one thousand million. If we take this estimation for the average number per century, during the seven thousand years of its temporal existence it will amount to seventy thousand millions [i.e., 70 billion].... It will be seen, from this estimation, that about seventy thousand million sons and daughters were born in Heaven, and kept their first estate... If we admit that one personage was the Father of all this great family, and that they were all born of the same Mother, the period of time intervening between the birth of the oldest and the youngest spirit must have been immense. If we suppose, as an average, that only one year intervened between each birth then it would have required, over one hundred thousand millions of years for the same Mother to have given birth to this vast family.... Should the period between each birth, be one hundred times shorter than what is required in this world, (which is very improbable,) it would still require over one thousand million of years to raise up such a numerous progeny.... But... it is altogether probable that the period required for the formation of the infant spirit, is of the same length as that required in this world... If the Father of these spirits, prior to his redemption, had secured to himself, through the everlasting covenant of marriage, many wives... the period required to people a world would be shorter... if it required one hundred thousand million of years to people a world like this... it is evident that, with a hundred wives, this period would be reduced to only one thousand million years"
God and Mary
God and Mary had a physical relationship
Joseph Fielding Smith, Doctrines of Salvation, vol. 1, p.18
I believe firmly that Jesus Christ is the Only Begotten Son of God in the flesh. He taught this doctrine to his disciples. He did not teach them that he was the Son of the Holy Ghost, but the Son of the Father. Truly, all things are done by the power of the Holy Ghost. It was through this power that Jesus was brought into this world, but not as the Son of the Holy Ghost, but the Son of God. Jesus is greater than the Holy Spirit, which is subject unto him, but his Father is greater than he! He has said it. Christ was begotten of God. He was not born without the aid of Man, and that Man was God!
Mary had two husbands
Brigham Young, Journal of Discourses, vol. 11, p. 268
The man Joseph, the husband of Mary, did not, that we know of, have more than one wife, but Mary the wife of Joseph had another husband. On this account infidels have called the Savior a bastard. This is merely a human opinion upon one of the inscrutable doings of the Almighty. That very babe that was cradled in the manger, was begotten, not by Joseph, the husband of Mary, but by another Being. Do you inquire by whom? He was begotten by God our heavenly Father.
God was literal father of Jesus
Bruce R. McConkie, Mormon Doctrine, 2nd ed., p. 742
God the Father is a perfected, glorified, holy Man, an immortal Personage. And Christ was born into the world as the literal Son of this Holy Being; he was born in the same personal, real, and literal sense that any mortal son is born to a mortal father. There is nothing figurative about his paternity; he was begotten, conceived and born in the normal and natural course of events, for he is the Son of God, and that designation means what it says.
Brigham Young, Journal of Discourses, vol. 8, p. 115
While brother Joseph was referring to the providences of God, I was led to reflect that there is no act, no principle, no power belonging to the Deity that is not purely philosophical. The birth of the Saviour was as natural as are the births of our children; it was the result of natural action. He partook of flesh and blood-was begotten of his Father, as we were of our fathers.
Elohim Conceived Christ
Bruce R. McConkie, The Mortal Messiah: From Bethlehem to Calvary, vol. 1, p. 330
As far as this life is concerned, he was born of Mary and of Elohim; he came here as the offspring of that Holy Man who is literally our Father in heaven. He was born in mortality in the literal and full sense as the Son of God. He is the Son of his Father in the same sense that all mortals are the sons and daughters of their fathers.
Mary one of God’s wives
B. H. Roberts, Defense of the Faith and the Saints, vol. 2, p. 270
If none but Gods will be permitted to multiply immortal children, it follows that each God must have one or more wives. God, the father of our spirits, became the father of our Lord Jesus Christ according to the flesh. The fleshy body of Jesus required a mother as well as a father. Therefore, the father and mother of Jesus according to the flesh must have been associated together in the capacity of husband and wife; hence the Virgin Mary must have been for the time being, the lawful wife of God the Father.