I was not raised in the Church. I came into the Church not knowing much at all about Mormonism. Why did I join? Because Mormons did not smoke or drink. I was raised in a home of chain-smokers/alcoholics. I am highly allergic to nicotine, and my home growing up was filled with cigarette smoke and the smell of alcohol, and constant unending fighting and screaming. Also, I thought Mormons were all honest and moral, because the Reader's Digest "articles" (actually they were paid-for Advertisements) portrayed Mormons as all honest and moral people.

I remember sitting in one of my first Sunday Schools, and an old Mormon man was talking about the atonement, that Jesus had to die for us because Adam and Eve ate a fig given to them by a talking snake. Well, at the time, I had not read the Book of Mormon, save a few chapters. So, I still believed in evolution, and I believed that the Adam and Eve story was a parable not a literal story (Brigham Young also believed that, by the way).

Anyway, the old Mormon Sunday School teacher had a "poster board" that showed Adam and Eve, hand in hand, as a white Anglo-Saxon man and woman. Not Italian. Not Russian. Not Greek. Not Turkish. But Anglo-Saxon. Anyway, I asked the old Mormon man:

"How do we know they were white people?"

The others in the Sunday School laughed. The old man laughed and said: "Because they were made in the image of God".

I did NOT KNOW at the time, that Mormonism taught that God the Father was an exalted, resurrected, Anglo-Saxon looking White man with red hair and blue eyes (i.e. the exact "twin" of the Mormon Jesus-- red hair and blue eyes).

So, I said: "Well, how do we know that Adam was white?"

The old man said: "Because he was a MAN".

I said: "Most MEN are not white."

Old lady behind me said: "Adam was a MAN".

I said: "Most MEN are not white."

The old teacher said: "Adam was a MAN, and he looked like a MAN"

In other words, the old Mormons there believed that God the Father was an Anglo-Saxon looking White Man. NOT a Jewish looking white man. Not an Arab looking white man. Not an Italian or Sicilian looking white man. Not a Greek looking white man. Not an Armenian looking white man, but an ANGLO SAXON and we KNOW that because Adam was a "man" and that is what "men" look like.

For Mormons, Jesus did NOT look like a Jew, he looks like an Anglo-Saxon!

Again, I joined the LDS Church without knowing ANY of the following:

*God the Father an Anglo-Saxon looking white man.
*Jesus, God the Father, and Adam all looked like each other.
*Cain was an Anglo-Saxon looking white man too, until he killed Abel, then God changed him into the first "Negro".
*Cain married his white Anglo-Saxon looking sister, and then God changed her into the second "Negro" ___OR__ God didn't change her, but she had full "Negro" children.
*All the "Negroes" (Cainites) died in the flood except for Egyptus, Ham's wife, and they had "full Negro" children even though Ham was an Anglo-Saxon looking white man like his father Noah.
*American Indians were originally Anglo-Saxon looking Jews, whom the Lord "cursed" with a "skin of blackness" (even though they don't have a skin of blackness), and gave them straight hair, and other "Mongolian" features, because they were "filthy and idol" and he didn't want the Anglo-Saxon looking Jewish Nephites to intermarry with them.

I didn't know "any" of that. Had I know all this, I would have never joined the LDS Church.
*

"Adam and Eve story was a parable not a literal story (Brigham Young also believed that, by the way)"

Brigham Young did not believe it was a parable. He's the one who taught Adam-God his entire reign. Adam-God requires a literal storyline.

Can you provide your sources for BY teaching Eden as a parable?

Dear Muser,

Brigham Young said "Adam was not made like we make adobes" and that the story of the snake "was a children's rhyme". He also once said in meeting with the Apostles (recorded by Wilford Woodruff) that Eve was Adam's daughter "which explains the dark saying of Eve being made from one of her father's ribs". He also said that we were not to take the story literally, no more than we were to believe our mothers when they told us when we were children that babies came from Toad Stools (mushrooms).

Joseph Fielding Smith and Bruce R. McConkie knowingly, deliberately LIED when they wrote that the Church "has always taught" that the story of Adam and Eve was literal and not figurative. They KNEW better! They deliberately ___LIED___.

I could pull up all those quotes for you, but I would prefer that YOU did the research yourself. It's easy to do. Just Google:

"Brigham Young" and Adam and abobes

"Brigham Young" and "Eve was the daughter of Adam"

"Brigham Young" and "toad stools"

"Brigham Young" and "the story of Adam and Eve"

Good hunting.


Anonymous Muser Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> "Adam and Eve story was a parable not a literal
> story (Brigham Young also believed that, by the
> way)"
>
> Brigham Young did not believe it was a parable.
> He's the one who taught Adam-God his entire reign.
> Adam-God requires a literal storyline.
>
> Can you provide your sources for BY teaching Eden
> as a parable?

You're confusing parables with symbolism. A parable is "a usually short fictitious story that illustrates a moral attitude or a religious principle."

https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/parable

Symbolism is "the art or practice of using symbols especially by investing things with a symbolic meaning or by expressing the invisible or intangible by means of visible or sensuous representations."

https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/symbolism


Let’s take your sources in order.

1. The adobe quote doesn't say what you think it says. BY wasn't teaching that the creation story was fictitious, but that Adam was an ET, not native to earth. Adam was still a real person to BY.

Brigham Young, October 9, 1859, JOD 7:285-86
"Here let me state to all philosophers of every class upon the earth, When you tell me that father Adam was made as we make adobies from the earth, you tell me what I deem an idle tale. When you tell me that the beasts of the field were produced in that manner, you are speaking idle worlds devoid of meaning. There is no such thing in all the eternities where the Gods dwell. Mankind are here because they are the offspring of parents who were first brought here from another planet, and power was given them to propagate their species, and they were commanded to multiply and replenish the earth."

Brigham Young, October 23, 1853, JOD 2:6-7
"Supposing that Adam was formed actually out of clay, out of the same kind of material from which bricks are formed; that with this matter God made the pattern of a man, and breathed into it the breath of life, and left it there, in that state of supposed perfection, he would have been an adobie to this day. He would not have known anything… You believe Adam was made of the dust of this earth. This I do not believe, though it is supposed that it is so written in the Bible; but it is not, to my understanding… But suppose Adam was made and fashioned the same as we make adobies; if he had never drunk of the bitter cup, the Lord might have talked to him to this day, and he would have continued as he was to all eternity, never advancing one particle in the school of intelligence."

He was still teaching a literal Adam, but not literally made from "the dust of the earth." That’s the difference.


2. As for "Mother Eve was the daughter of Adam" (from the Wilford Woodruff Journals), that ties into Adam-God; in any event, BY is referring to them as actual historical individuals, not as fictitious parables. Once again, your source doesn't support your assertion.


3. Now for "Toad Stools." I admit, that one was new to me, and it took me a while to find it. Too bad for you that it doesn't support your claim either.

Unpublished Brigham Young Discourse – General Conference, October 8, 1854
"Now about the rib. As for the Lord taking a rib out of Adam's side to make a woman of, he took one out of my side just as much. 'But,' brother Brigham, 'would you make it appear that Moses did not tell the truth?' No, not a particle more than I would that your mother did not tell the truth, when she told you that little Billy came from a hollow toad stool."

Get it now? As far as BY was concerned, the rib was one symbolic element within an overall historical narrative. That's not the same thing as the story itself being thought of as a fictional account. BY viewed Adam & Eve as actual people, and Eden as an actual place. Not fictitious at all to BY, thus not a parable.


My turn. I'm going to give you a bunch of BY quotes showing he believed in a literal, historical Adam & Eve and actual Garden of Eden. Tell you what, I won't even demand that you look for them. I'll spoon-feed them to you.

Brigham Young, April 9, 1852, JOD 1:50-51
"Now hear it, O inhabitants of the earth, Jew and Gentile, Saint and sinner! When our father Adam came into the garden of Eden, he came into it with a celestial body, and brought Eve, one of his wives, with him. He helped to make and organize this world. He is MICHAEL, the Archangel, the ANCIENT OF DAYS! about whom holy men have written and spoken – HE is our FATHER and our GOD, and the only God with whom WE have to do."

Brigham Young, August 8, 1852, JOD 3:88-89
"According to the reading of the Bible, the sayings of Jesus Christ, of all the ancient Prophets, and of the Apostles, every soul, every son and daughter of Adam and Eve, that have lived from the day of transgression to this time; and that will live from this time henceforth, so long as any of the posterity of Adam and Eve shall continue upon the earth, unless they know Jesus Christ, and his Father, and receive the Holy Ghost, and be prepared to dwell with the Father and the Son; become acquainted with them, and converse with them, they will all be damned; every soul of them will be sent to hell."

Brigham Young, August 8, 1852, JOD 3:90
"There is only one Gospel sermon, recollect, brethren and sisters, and the time that is required to preach it is from the day of the fall, or from the day when Adam and his wife Eve came here upon this planet, and from that time until Jesus Christ has subdued the last enemy, which is death, and put all things under his feet, and wound up all things pertaining to this earth."

Brigham Young, February 8, 1857, JOD 4:217
"Thus you may continue and trace the human family back to Adam and Eve, and ask, 'are we of the same species with Adam and Eve?' Yes, every person acknowledges this; this comes within the scope of our understanding."

Brigham Young, July 8, 1863, JOD 10:230-31
"We believe in God the Father and in Jesus Christ our elder brother. We believe that God is a person of tabernacle, possessing in an infinitely higher degree all the perfections and qualifications of his mortal children. We believe that he made Adam after his own image and likeness, as Moses testifies…"

Brigham Young, July 11, 1869, JOD 13:144-45
"We also understand the earth, and the nature of the earth, and why God permitted Mother Eve to partake of the forbidden fruit. We should not have been here to-day if she had not; we could never have possessed wisdom and intelligence if she had not done it. It was all in the economy of heaven, and we need not talk about it; it is all right. We should never blame Mother Eve, not the least."

Brigham Young, April 17, 1870, JOD 13:313-14
"I know that there are a great many in the world who are so wise in their own eyes that they are not disposed to believe the account contained in the bible of the Creation, of Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden, the antediluvian world and other things, but we profess to believe, and we do or should believe these things."

Brigham Young, May 7, 1871, JOD 14:111-12
"Do you not all know that you are the sons and daughters of the Almighty? If you do not I will inform you this morning that there is not a man or woman on the earth that is not a son or daughter of Adam and Eve. We all belong to the races which have sprung from father Adam and mother Eve; and every son and daughter of Adam and Eve is a son and daughter of that God we serve, who organized this earth and millions of others, and who holds them in existence by law."

Brigham Young, August 24, 1872, JOD 15:138-39
"And we will have revelations to know our forefathers clear back to Father Adam and Mother Eve, and we will enter into the temples of God and officiate for them. Then man will be sealed to man until the chain is made perfect back to Adam, so that there will be a perfect chain of priesthood from Adam to the winding-up scene."

Discourses of Brigham Young, pp. 157-58
"Some may regret that our first parents sinned. This is nonsense. If we had been there, and they had not sinned, we would have sinned. I will not blame Adam or Eve. Why? Because it was necessary that sin should enter into the world; no man could ever understand the principle of exaltation without its opposite; no one could ever receive an exaltation without being acquainted with its opposite. How did Adam and Eve sin? Did they come out in direct opposition to God and to his government? No. But they transgressed a command of the Lord, and through that transgression sin came into the world. The Lord knew they would do this, and he had designed that they should. Then came the curse upon the fruit, upon the vegetables, and upon our mother earth; and it came upon the creeping things, upon the grain in the field, the fish in the sea, and upon all things pertaining to this earth, through man's transgression."


There you go. Your turn.

Well, duh. Josephs Myth saw God and Jesus and they were very white. I've seen them in the movies. So they sent White Peter, James and John down to make man in their image, which means white like God.

I know, where was my brain?

I thought they ate an unnamed fruit and then wore a fig leaf. I am probably confused. I only templed a couple of times and the death oaths and baker's hats were distracting.

Fun stuff to debate about as long as you recognize that JS, BY and the rest of them were making it up as they went along.