There is no contradiction here
“If the [Holy] Spirit guides me in a way that involves these multitude of documents,” he asked the bishop, “who am I to resist the enticing of the Spirit?”
The bishop replied, according to Dawson, “The Spirit is telling me to tell you not to use those documents.”
Let’s just assume that this is an accurate representation of what happened and let’s also sideline the politically charged topic that that “multitude of documents” was about. There is still no contradiction here. A contradiction only emergence if we see the truth of revelation as logically consistent, factual information rather than value-laden counsel that is adapted to the recipient’s stewardship.
Of course the whole point of the Protestant Reformation and the Scientific Revolution was an attempt to sideline the asymmetries of stewardship altogether by a focus on sola scriptura and the book of nature, respectively. But this is exactly why Mormons cannot fully embrace either of those movements. We do not believe in reformation or revolution but in the *restoration* of those same asymmetries of stewardship that the former were specifically meant to reform or revolt against.
It’s hard to explain to someone how a leader and a follower could both claim to be inspired by the Spirit in oppositional directions and both are still true, but it’s entirely possible.
I have come to find that the Lord often uses the struggle between differing perspectives and people to work His will. With patience, humility, and charity on the part of leader and follower, gradually the follower will change his beliefs and the leader will change his, until the best possible outcome in this circumstance according to the Lord occurs. (Which may not be PERFECTLY aligned with God’s will, but is nonetheless perfectly aligned with His will in that moment, in those circumstances.)
That possibility is revolting to our independently-minded, Hellenistic thinking. Yet, I’ve had much occasion recently to learn about submission to both God and man, and have found so much truth in it. God’s work and glory has no endpoint. It is therefore a process, not a subjective endpoint.
The work of God is only ever “finished” or “complete” in a staged sense. And the secret to grasping that is the secret of life.
Comment by SilverRain — May 6, 2015 @ 10:58 am
I agree with SR, it’s entirely possible.
Take something like public health, the general advice is to be vaccinated (for the greater good) but that might be terrible advice for your child specifically because we know some children will be greatly damaged by being vaccinated. Perhaps the spirit would intercede by advising against it.
Or a more LDS specific example; the 1st Presidency sends a letter asking for support for CA Prop. 8 but the spirit tells a specific member not to participate out of respect for their close relationship with a gay person.
A third example is the spirit teaches us based on our individual frame of references and as this advances taboo breaking becomes part of our lessons. In this case Oaks’ GA general advice might be contradicted for the specific spiritual training of an LDS member who is following the spirit as a disciple.
Comment by Howard — May 6, 2015 @ 11:13 am
That’s because it’s a load of illogical hogwash, SilverRain. You guys are just tying yourselves in knots here. The contradiction is obvious and real. I hesitate to make any comparisons for these sorts of mental gymnastics because it would get very Godwin’s law very fast. Humans are terrible at separating their emotions, pride, moral indignation, etc from *any* other source of information, including the divine, if that’s even involved here at all. There are no great secrets revealed by this incident, just human weaknesses.
Comment by Owen — May 6, 2015 @ 11:26 am
I think that SR and Howard bring up great points. I think Howard and I differ on the implications that such tensions might have for our public or online discipleship, but we both agree that private, personal revelation is under less obligation to align with that of authorities than we commonly assume.
Owen’s approach, on the other hand, demonstrates a remarkable lack of reflexivity in that he is totally unable to recognize the contingent nature of the enlightenment meanings and values that he is taking for granted when he so cavalierly tells us exactly who did and did not receive revelation outside of his own stewardship.
Comment by Jeff G — May 6, 2015 @ 11:58 am
I haven’t interacted with Owen as much as SR and Howard, so I can’t speak for him, but I think I share a certain amount of romanticism with both SR and Howard that is a little ambivalent to logical systematization and the naturalism (methodological or otherwise) that tends to come with it. To be sure, I take my counter-enlightenment values in a much more authoritarian direction than Howard, and SR (as always) is a kind of eclectic mix of moderation, but I think we all agree on that one point.
Comment by Jeff G — May 6, 2015 @ 12:02 pm
There is no logical contradiction here.
He feels guided in a way that involves the documents. The Bishop is being guided to tell him not use the documents.
Comment by Howard — May 6, 2015 @ 2:23 pm
“Humans are terrible at separating their emotions, pride, moral indignation, etc from *any* other source of information, including the divine, if that’s even involved here at all. There are no great secrets revealed by this incident, just human weaknesses.”
Ah, but that’s the secret, Owen. All of that is a feature, not a bug. Human weakness is the point, and emotions, pride, moral indignation are all part of working the divine.
For example, the fact that Jeff, Howard and I agree says there is likely something worth exploring there. ;) This just doesn’t happen in the natural world.
Jeff, I want that written on my tombstone: “She was an eclectic mix of moderation.” In Comic Sans, please.
Comment by SilverRain — May 6, 2015 @ 2:55 pm
Just a reader and not a usual comment author here. And I don’t mean it to be antagonistic, but can someone explain in layman’s terms how this not a contradiction? I don’t really understand it from the original post, and I’d like to.
It seems like a contradiction to me — spirit tells one person to do one thing; spirit tells bishop to tell that person to not do that thing. But phrases like “value-laden counsel that is adapted to the recipient’s stewardship” make me think there is something too simplistic about the way I’m looking at it.
Comment by Jay — May 6, 2015 @ 3:26 pm
SilverRain said, “I have come to find that the Lord often uses the struggle between differing perspectives and people to work His will. With patience, humility, and charity on the part of leader and follower, gradually the follower will change his beliefs and the leader will change his, until the best possible outcome in this circumstance according to the Lord occurs.”
Absolutely correct. And in fact, this is what happens in the top councils of the Church, particularly when the First Presidency and the Qof12 discuss and debate (yes, debate) difficult issues. Eventually, they get on the same page, which happens to correspond with the Lord’s page. It can take a long time, or it can be rather quick, but this is the process of how councils work and how the Lord works through councils.
Comment by Michael Towns — May 6, 2015 @ 3:45 pm
Jay, that is probably the least antagonistic comment I’ve ever seen. :)
The point I was trying to make is that many people have an idea of revelation that is based on scientific truth, a model that didn’t really come into existence until the 17th century. Within this mindset, revelation is divine information and truth is information that is logically consistent with itself. This scientific mindset suggests that logic and non-contradiction are natural features of the world rather than rules of interpretation that where invented by a few philosophers. This mindset also pretends that who is speaking, receiving or acting upon the information is totally irrelevant since that information is universally true across all contexts. Under this mindset, we have “one ought to use source X” and “one ought not to use source X” thus giving us a contradiction.
Like I said, however, this mindset did not become the prominent one until the 18th or even 19th century, so to project this mindset back onto most scripture would be a mistake.
Divine truth as it was taught prior to the scientific revolution, prior to the protestant reformation and, I suggest, within the context of the restored gospel is much closer to the oracle in The Matrix. It’s not about information that objectively corresponds to the world not matter who is looking. Instead of divine truth being like a true theory in physics, it is more like a good adaptation in biology: it depends upon the context and we can’t expect the same information to be equally divine across all contexts.
Thus, a person is qualified to receive revelation only for their own stewardship and nothing else. THis is the standard Mormon view that I can’t receive revelation for you, etc. Thus, the bishop received revelation for what he should do within his stewardship – give council, release callings, etc. – and the teacher receive his revelation to teach what he did. There is no abstract contradiction since there is no abstract person that both ought to and ought not to do something at the same time. Each person receives from God what is right for them within their own lives and stewardships. The idea that all of God’s council must be logically consistent with itself across all people and all times is a philosophy of men intended to keep priesthood leaders on their man-made, conceptual leashes.
The man is perfectly free to follow his promptings just as the bishop is. Why is it that they received these two different perspective regarding the same information? Who knows? Maybe the Lord wanted those kids to hear the message in the documents, but also wanted them to know that teachers should stick to the manual. There are a million reasons we could invent for why they got different messages – proof enough that there isn’t a contradiction – but the main point is that we do not know.
Comment by Jeff G — May 6, 2015 @ 4:04 pm
Jay,
Put differently, the scientific worldview rejects the idea of divine revelation being adapted to a stewardship. To do this they create a fact/value distinction where truths and morals are supposed to be two different things and while everybody has equal stewardship over the shared truth of facts, each person has equal stewardship over their subjective and private view of values. In this way, no person has any more stewardship than anybody else.
This view was specifically designed to dissolve, sideline or undermine priesthood stewardship. Within the scriptures, however, there is no fact/value distinction. Instead, there is a distinction between authorized and un-authorized. The man was authorized to receive revelation about what to teach. The bishop is authorized to receive revelation about who to release. It is entirely possible to believe that God wanted both of these things to happen, even though we have no idea why. Hence, faith.
Comment by Jeff G — May 6, 2015 @ 4:12 pm
It is sooo simplistic to believe there is only one truth (it isn’t the LDS checklist btw) and that the spirit is always consistent in revealing only that precise truth and never anything contradictory. The spirit refines us in a way that grows us toward truth. Why? Because our understanding is far too elementary to understand ultimate truth in one sitting, rather we must grow from paradigm (OT) to grater paradigm (NT) to grater paradigm (Joseph’s revelations) etc, etc to finally get there.
The 1949 First Presidency Statement (an abomination by today’s standards) has been soundly refuted by the current church. What do we make of this contradiction? The 1949 FP were fallen prophets? They had something to learn about human nature and accepting others? The 1949 FP was right and the current FP are fallen prophets? If they were wrong (they were) why did the spirit allow them to publish such trash?
Comment by Howard — May 6, 2015 @ 4:27 pm
Thanks for the response, and that does make sense.
I guess to view it as a non-contradiction, you have to view the two purported messages from the spirit as relating to different time periods and different conduct. That is, one message said, “right now, you should teach X.” Then, later, another message said, to a different person, “you should release this person so that he stops teaching X.” One related to one person at a particular moment, and the other to a different person’s decision about what to do with the future.
A true contradiction would arise only if one message said, “teach X right now, that is what God wants,” and then the later message said, “he was wrong to teach X when he did.” That does seem like a contradiction, but I might be wrong. Maybe there’s another way of looking at it.
And maybe that’s why I have a hard time with this scenario. If I look at what the parties have said, I assume that no one is giving us a direct quotation of what was said in that meeting with the bishop. And so, instead of looking at what they literally said (because I’m not sure I can know that), I’m assuming (projecting) what I think they meant. And what I think they most likely meant is something sort of like the scenario I described that seems to me like a contradiction — one party says that the spirit told him that teaching X was the right thing to do, and the other party says that the spirit told him that it was the wrong thing to do.
But like you said, I can’t know what anyone really thought or what messages they received. Unfortunately, we don’t have a transcript of those spiritual messages… If only, right?
Comment by Jay — May 6, 2015 @ 4:29 pm
Jay, That’s about where I’m at too.
Howard, while I still disagree with the direction you take in the second paragraph (you seem to assume access to an absolute paradigm that the 1949 presidency did not have access to, rather than a merely different paradigm against which other will almost always seem wrong), I think the appeal to paradigms is a good way of looking at it.
Comment by Jeff G — May 6, 2015 @ 4:41 pm
No not an absolute paradigm Jeff, the value of hind sight and today’s better access to information.
Comment by Howard — May 6, 2015 @ 5:08 pm
Hmmm…. I think that might be where you and I part ways.
You seem to embrace a much more accumulative idea of (revealed) truth than I do. To be sure, we both agree that from our perspective, the past message was wrong in some sense or another. You seem to think – in contrast to me – that we can generalize our perspective into the past such that the audience at the time ought to have rejected it as well. In other words, even though the audience did not know it at the time, that message was actually wrong and ought to have been ignored/rejected. I, on the other hand, do not think we can retroactively impose our hindsight upon such situations.
Would you say that’s right? (I’m guessing I got you a little bit wrong, I’m just not sure where.)
Comment by Jeff G — May 6, 2015 @ 6:04 pm
Try this logic the next time the cops pull you over for speeding. It’ll be a gas!
The simple answer is still that sometimes (often) people claim divine inspiration and are wrong. Including prophets, since, you know, the Mark of Cain was always total BS. Brigham and Company were just racists. It’s that simple.
And yes, I have the academic chops to talk the talk here, but I choose not to because, again, this is total cow crap.
Comment by Owen — May 6, 2015 @ 6:04 pm
Well assuming progressive paradigms are a path toward God’s knowledge (to the extent that the church is heading in the right direction) we can generally expect later paradigms to eclipse earlier paradigms.
Should the audience have rejected it? It’s a good question. At least one in the audience did and warned the FP that they were making a mistake, so it was certainly knowable at that time. See An Inconvenient Truth: Lowry Nelson was right; The First Presidency was wrong So were the 1949 FP speaking for God or for themselves (hubris)? Were the Willie and Martin handcart companies motivated to go (late) by God or by hubris?
Comment by Howard — May 6, 2015 @ 6:21 pm
We are in danger of repeating of the Lowry Nelson vs FP position currently regarding the place of women and LGBTs in the church. How can we know we aren’t? Only the spirit knows and he tells me we are!
Comment by Howard — May 6, 2015 @ 6:25 pm
Owen,
Again, simplicity is a historically variable feature of any mindset. Police force are very much the product of the modern mindset that I’m isolating and the naturalness or simplicity of the way they think and speak is simply a measure of how well we ourselves have been trained by schools and media to talk just like them. Your explanations that you so boldly pronounce without any justification other than intuitiveness are simply parroting the value claims of old philosophers.
Comment by Jeff G — May 6, 2015 @ 6:37 pm
So the problem we face is that God speaks through fallible filters we call prophets and leaders and worse not all prophets are Prophets. Clearly Joseph was stepping out of his learned frame of reference to bring us the restoration and unique doctrine but do our current “prophets”? Or are they more institutional administrators than prophets? And what happens when God speaks through members with less opaque filters than the prophets themselves (the Lowry Nelson’s in the audience) , shouldn’t that clearer communication be given voice and consideration to avoid the 1949 kind of debacle?
Comment by Howard — May 6, 2015 @ 7:29 pm
Jeff C.
This Carroll Quigley quote reminds me of you. You will probably see in it what is modern and therefore wrong. I see in it my Mormon upbringing before the church membership shifted and why you are moving away from mormonism at its best.
“it is clear that the West believes in diversity rather than in uniformity, in pluralism rather than in monism or dualism, in inclusion rather than exclusion, in liberty rather than in authority, in truth rather than in power, in conversion rather than in annihilation, in the individual rather than in the organization, in reconciliation rather than in triumph, in heterogeneity rather than in homogeneity, in relativisms rather than in absolutes, and in approximations rather than in final answers.”
Comment by Martin James — May 6, 2015 @ 8:30 pm
So Ed Feser uses the following example, following from Geach:
Over and over again your whole theory of truth seems to hinge on this idea that truth is located in a personal authoritarian relationship with God and/or his priesthood messengers on Earth. And the implementation of truth is inconsistent because it is based on changing, dynamic circumstances.
The question I have (and that I’ve asked before) is how any Mormon, from lowly lay person to Prophet, can claim that they all worship the same God, given that there can be so many inconsistencies not just on what God says or does but even in his core attributes?
How can the man above and his Bishop both be claiming to reference the same Holy Ghost?
You might respond by saying that there is some kind of experiential core understanding that is shared by both of these men in which we can reasonably expect that they’re both referencing the same Holy Ghost.
But I can’t for the life of me find some kind of coherent core of “God/the Holy Ghost/Jesus is X” that is common and unique to Mormonism. It’s certainly not a core of propositional knowledge – Mormons don’t have a consistent doctrine as to where God came from, whether He’s ultimately the source of laws or goodness or power, whether he is paired to a wife, whether his wife shares an equality of his glory, whether he birthed our spirits or just “found” them, etc. I’ve heard plenty of opinions on these but the LDS church seems to be in a long retreat on any statement of whether one or the other is correct. Likewise with the Holy Ghost: What relation does the HG have to God or us? Is he our brother or HF’s brother? Male or female? Is he a God or not a God or a god and how can He be any of those things without a physical body? How does he actually influence us or our physical bodies, and through what mechanism? Is he a plurality or singular? Do we even worship him? Etc.
Maybe you could say that the core that is shared between the man and his Bishop is an experiential one. Maybe they don’t have shared propositional knowledge about the Holy Ghost but they both experience him uniquely, in their own ways, to the degree that they both know it’s him.
But again, I don’t see a common shared experiential description of what the HG feels like to Mormons. Some describe him as a feeling, others as a sort of cognitive clarity, some as an emotion, some as a sensation, some even as an auditory or visual experience. Some describe him as extra-sensory. This seems rather impossible to distinguish between simply a bunch of people feeling a lot of different things that they’re all attributing to the HG. How can we tell the difference?
So without some core, shared propositional knowledge or experiential knowledge that ensures that we’re all talking about the same thing, how can we ever know? Even faithful members of the church?
Comment by Syphax — May 7, 2015 @ 9:33 am
(And also, Feser continues to make the point that there is still the obvious question of how much two people can differ on the same thing before it becomes clear that they’re not referencing the same thing. Which is an important question, but doesn’t really change the facts on the ground. Some flexibility may be permissible, but not ultimate flexibility with no grounding whatsoever.)
Comment by Syphax — May 7, 2015 @ 9:45 am
Finally (sorry, I’m just posting as these thoughts come to me), it you do concede that there is some shared core of either propositional or experiential knowledge that ensures we’re all talking about the same thing/person, doesn’t this completely undercut your ideas about truth being relative and interpersonally subjective?
Comment by Syphax — May 7, 2015 @ 9:50 am
Howard,
“assuming progressive paradigms are a path toward God’s knowledge”
This is where I disagree with you. I see no reason that revelation is aimed at giving us more of God’s information. Instead, it is aimed at getting us to God. To be sure there will be some overlap between the two, but they are not the same. I fully reject the idea that revelation is knowledge that a person possesses and can simply accumulate as if they were collecting information about the world. Instead, I see it as a revelation of strategies by which we interact with that part of the world that we interact with. So yes, I agree that paradigms eclipse each other, but not in any sense that allow later paradigms or priesthood leaders to speak more to a past context that the paradigms and priesthood leader of that past time were able to. Living prophets have no more authority to receive revelation for the dead than dead prophets are allowed to for the living and for the same reason: its out of their stewardship.
Of course the Lowry Nelson cases presupposes the very timeless standards that I am calling into question and as such establish nothing.
“And what happens when God speaks through members with less opaque filters than the prophets themselves (the Lowry Nelson’s in the audience)”
They he is speaking to them and them alone and they have no right to proclaim any such revelation as revelation. This is pretty basic Mormon doctrine. Of course, it does not appear that Nelson ever went public with his feelings, so I’m not taking him to task so much as those who publicize his private inspiration.
Comment by Jeff G — May 7, 2015 @ 12:04 pm
Martin,
That is a very interesting quote this the post-Enlightment West has produced two strands (each of which are meant to rebel against the ancien regime) that correspond to the two elements that Quigley speaks of. I call the monolithic and rationalistic element that is still very present within the natural sciences “naturalism” and the other, more heterogeneous and hermeneutic element “romanticism.” I think each of these elements have come things in common with Mormonism as I understand it. Most of my recent criticisms of intellectualism, however, are a methodological appropriation of the romantic tradition.
Syphax,
Your entire approach presupposes a propositional conception of belief in that belief are simply things that “pick out” parts of the world rather than engage them. But the word belief has no such meaning until quite recently, but instead meant loyalty or faithfulness to the object of one’s belief. In other words, the beliefs that we are taught to accept through revelation are rules for structuring our engagement with the world (I do not mean “world” in a limited naturalistic sense). Thus, what bring unity to the diverse beliefs and doctrines that have been taught and endorsed within the church are not like the case where people all have sufficiently similar maps of the same area – this would presuppose a propositional conception of belief. Rather, it is more like each person has varied directions to sufficiently similar destinations or end goals for their engagements with the world. Thus, there is a grounding, but it is not in the similarity of beliefs. Put another way, your question asks how much difference can there be in directions before the travelers are really going toward different destinations? The answer is: an awful lot.
Comment by Jeff G — May 7, 2015 @ 12:19 pm
What exactly does getting us to God mean to you Jeff?
Comment by Howard — May 7, 2015 @ 12:56 pm
That’s a good question and my answer is pretty generic.
It simply means following the path that He has laid for us to return to His presence. Eventually this will culminate in our becoming like Him, but there is not reason to conflate the path with the end result, or assume that the path just is the most “efficient” (in the modern, western sense) means to the end. Following His path means believing what he wants us to believe, when He wants us to believe it. To the extent that we think we can “look ahead” or “take obvious shortcuts” of our own making, we fall prey to prideful hubris. God’s paths might be very round about and indirect from out limited perspective, but that doesn’t make them any less His paths.
Comment by Jeff G — May 7, 2015 @ 1:01 pm
So you don’t believe we need to become more like him than we already are to enter into his “presence” (what ever that is)?
Comment by Howard — May 7, 2015 @ 1:43 pm
Of course I believe that. What I reject, however, is the idea that God is, above all else, a super-scientist and that it is by gaining propositional knowledge of the world and the plan of salvation that we become more like him. It’s sort of like when Mr. Miyagi teaches Daniel the exact opposite of what he thought he was supposed to learn. There is a master/apprentice relationship here that is very different from the American educational system (that Weber lamented so much) where teachers basically sell information and students, like good capitalists are suppose to accumulate as much educational capital as possible.
It is in this American context that pragmatism could make any intuitive sense in that objects of belief become tools that are supposed to be faithful to our individual interests rather than the original meaning in which belief was our being faithful to the object of belief. This radical inversion of sovereignty is a perfect illustration of how far the modern mindset regarding beliefs departs from a more sacerdotal mindset.
Comment by Jeff G — May 7, 2015 @ 1:59 pm
I have to confess I don’t see how both could be true. I don’t think values help here since of course we can then simply say there’s a fact that includes the value. (That is for any fact we can make a new fact that is the original fact plus it’s value)
I think the solution is more in hermeneutics. That is inspiration has to be interpreted. Further as we make not only our initial interpretation but subsequent ones we can drop parts of the original inspiration, make some parts more general than in the original and further we translate the inspiration into sentences that never fully capture the original.
To use the example you provided from BCC perhaps person 1 is asking a question about, “what is the answer to my question.” The person keeps asking and the spirit tells them where to find the answer. However there are dangers in getting the answer. Perhaps they are ill prepared for the answer. Perhaps their character is such that they may misinterpret the data. The Bishop is not asking the question of “where should person 1 get answer to his question.” The Bishop is instead asking, “will this answer help this person relative to problem B they have been discussing.”
So the problem is that the meaning of each inspiration is tied to the context out of which the questioning, prompting and directing is tied to. Likewise the “conflict” is tied to a single object (the documents) but of course very different propositions can have that object as a reference in them. “To know the answer to Q I must examine documents D.” “It is dangerous for person P’s spirituality to examine documents D.” Same object. Different propositions.
This sort of thing happens quite often. Further, much like Martin Harris’ continual requests to have the physical translation, we sometime ask and get answers for things that are not in our best interests. But even beyond that we always have to interpret them and to be frank we’re often bad at interpreting fairly clear spoken language between people. We should be humble in our interpretive abilities of the spirit. Yet it often seems like that humility is lacking and in place is an arrogance that we fully understand everything about the prompting.
Comment by Clark — May 7, 2015 @ 2:00 pm
Owen (3) I think you’re completely right that we’re rather bad about separating our emotions, hopes, desires and so forth from the events we’re interpreting. Even ignoring the issue of recognizing the spirit, just in day to day events we frequently read into them more than we ought. That said I don’t think there’s a necessary contradiction (although who knows maybe there is one due to misinterpretation) simply due to the role of context for the meaning of each sentence.
Jeff (4) while D&C 9:8 properly only applies to the translation by one individual and shouldn’t be overgeneralized, I think it still applies here. I think far too many just ask rather than really struggle with an answer to fully understand it. (Heck, I’ll be honest I’m often too superficial with my prayers and discernment) To really understand something is to struggle with it and think through the implications. Yet too many simply ask and take their initial understanding of the answer as the final answer. Even with translations it’s interesting see Joseph Smith go back over particular Bible verses and gain more and more information from them. I think that kind of struggle ought be a part of our own seeking and attempts to understand answers.
Jeff (10), I’m not sure most people take revelation like scientific truth. Rather I think they take it as if their initial understanding is complete and that there is no context to worry about. Even in science initial understandings are rarely right and scientists have to worry about context all the time to nuance their understandings. The arrival at simple stated laws is the result of a long process of understanding and correction. But even then most simple laws aren’t the laws you have to use. (Think of the difference between the ideal gas law taught to Freshman versus actually doing calculations with real gas mixtures in real conditions)
My sense is that people want inspiration to be the final answer without the work that goes into getting that final answer. More or less they want it to be easy and involve no struggle.
Howard (19) I’ve no idea what the future holds for women in the church of LGBTs. It seems to me that a lot of things happen in the time of the Lord and when he doesn’t give clear answers we have to struggle and figure things out as best we can. Often that means thinking in terms of the presuppositions our culture and background gives us.
I think the correct way to think about the Church is as a process not as a set of correct absolute statements. Even in the Articles of Faith we’re told there’s lots to be revealed. I just think that often those proclaiming the Church is wrong are themselves perhaps engaged in the same sort of thing. Perhaps they’re right, perhaps not. I can think of lots of places when I thought a leader was wrong. Sometimes it turned out they were wrong. Often it turned out I was wrong. I try not to get hung up in my own ability to figure it out. I have lots of opinions, but I try to keep them rather tentative and open to new information.
Syphax (23) “The question I have (and that I’ve asked before) is how any Mormon, from lowly lay person to Prophet, can claim that they all worship the same God, given that there can be so many inconsistencies not just on what God says or does but even in his core attributes?”
Could we not transform this slightly to illustrate the problem with this position? “How can any scientist from lowly college student to Nobel Prize winers claim they all study the same universe given that there can be so many inconsistencies not just on what the laws of the universe are but even its key features in the idea of a quantum gravity?”
Comment by Clark — May 7, 2015 @ 2:17 pm
Clark,
“we can then simply say there’s a fact that includes the value. (That is for any fact we can make a new fact that is the original fact plus it’s value)”
I think this is exactly backwards and is a claim that was designed to push truth closer to objective facts and away from empirically invisible values. By contrast, I think that facts are themselves contained within values rather than the other way around in which case values that are adapted to a different context or stewardship will almost certainly entail different facts.
“Further as we make not only our initial interpretation but subsequent ones we can drop parts of the original inspiration, make some parts more general than in the original and further we translate the inspiration into sentences that never fully capture the original.”
I fully agree with this so long as we acknowledge that the later interpretation should itself be inspiration that is adapted to the latter context and thus able to trump the earlier interpretation. But this does not in any way prevent the earlier interpretation from being equally inspired, even if it differs from the latter one.
“The Bishop is not asking the question of “where should person 1 get answer to his question.” The Bishop is instead asking, “will this answer help this person relative to problem B they have been discussing.””
I disagree (and I am taking the quote above as accurate since that is the only case I’m willing to take a stand on). The bishop is quite clearly claiming revelation as to what he should do: tell the teacher so and so. Like Howard, I fully allow the teacher to receive revelation that leads him in a different direction, but unlike Howard I don’t think this compromises the status of the bishop’s inspiration. I don’t see this contradiction as any deeper than God telling Abraham or Nephi to kill people in some cases, while saying ‘thou shalt not kill” in others. Some times the spirit leads us away from the authority figures, but this does not in any way compromise their authoritative status.
I think the only reason why we would even be tempted to “reword” the bishops question is because we have been trained to assume that truth must be a spatio-temporally uniform and logically consistent (at some level or another) picture of reality. (Think of Galileo’s appeals to the book of nature or the closed canon of scripture to the exclusion and even subversion of living authorities.) I think this is totally wrong.
Comment by Jeff G — May 7, 2015 @ 2:23 pm
“I think you’re completely right that we’re rather bad about separating our emotions, hopes, desires and so forth from the events we’re interpreting.”
I don’t know why we would assume that such things should be sidelined or that God wouldn’t anticipate such things in the way we interpret inspiration. Again, I think this is just a rhetorical trick by which the philosophically minded have attempted to retain their particular conception of truth to the exclusion of a more sacerdotal one. This strategy of appealing to a faulty interpretation of revelation in order to preserve the a scholarly kind of consistency was most popularized by Augustine and Galileo, both of which were aimed to forcing scripture to bow – by way of metaphorizing it – before their rather Platonic philosophy.
“To really understand something is to struggle with it and think through the implications.”
But why should we assume that understanding does or ought to play such a pivotal role? The scriptures that tell us not to hold God’s commands hostage to our own understanding are quite numerous.
“’m not sure most people take revelation like scientific truth.”
Just to clarify, I’m accusing people of taking a scientific conception of truth as being paradigmatic and that any other conception of truth is, to the point is deviates from such a conception, merely metaphorical in some sense. In this scientific view, truth is, once the proper contextual stamps are included, universally uniform and logically consistent. In other words, scientific truth is like a map that is the same no matter where we start or who holds the map rather than directions that differ according to starting points. I think this is completely wrong. I think truth is morally absolute within the sphere in which it has been placed, but not universally uniform like a platonist like Galileo would assume.
Comment by Jeff G — May 7, 2015 @ 2:38 pm
You seem to be implying that I am somehow caught up in what you call American pragmatism. You also seem pretty sure about what God isn’t.
So what is God maestro?
Comment by Howard — May 7, 2015 @ 2:44 pm
Jeff (34), I certainly don’t hold to a clear fact/value distinction. But of course it does seem clear that if one has a valueless fact (assuming such a thing were possible) that one could just have a new value laden fact that is the original fact plus some representation of value. So I think we have to be clear what we’re discussing. I think what you’re now getting at is more a dispute about what the nature of a fact is. I prefer instead to just talk about signs and avoid all the headache of unpacking what people mean by a fact.
To your second point ideally interpretation is an ongoing process that is inspired. But as a practical matter the degree of inspiration changes. Further every remembering of our memory of the original event changes that memory as the brain restores it. So all access to the original event is distorting. That’s one way where an original strong testimony event can become transfigured over time into something else. Testimonies always have to be recreated in a kind of originary re-experiencing of the original experience.
To the third point, the Bishop is claiming revelation about what the person should do relative to some set of concerns and potential events. That is I don’t think we should take it as applying to any context. (That’s not to say some universal inspiration couldn’t happen – just that there’s no indication that the inspiration is that broad) To your example of Nephi I agree although perhaps not quite the way you intend. I think the meaning of the sentence “thou shalt not kill” is itself tied to numerous contexts such that it wouldn’t even apply to Nephi in the legal tradition out of which Nephi was raised.
I’m not sure what you mean by “spatio-temporally uniform and logically consistent” so I won’t comment on that.
Comment by Clark — May 7, 2015 @ 2:48 pm
Jeff (35), I’m not entirely sure what you mean by scientific truth. Different philosophers obviously have very different views of what truth within science consists of.
As to God anticipating how we interpret his inspirations while giving them, I think he does. However I don’t think that means he’s going to work around such things and make it easy for us. I think his goal isn’t to give us a set of clear unambiguous messages but to teach us to develop a relation with him. The latter often is in conflict with the former.
Comment by Clark — May 7, 2015 @ 2:51 pm
Howard (36) not sure who you are replying to. I’ll fully admit I’m highly influenced by certain types of pragmatism (primarily Peirce – I’m not nearly as much a fan of James and don’t think much of the later neb-pragmatists like Rorty) As for what God isn’t, I fully confess I’m fallible there. I think there are some things about God I’m pretty confident in of course. But there’s lots I’m not. And I can be wrong even about things I’m confident about.
Comment by Clark — May 7, 2015 @ 2:52 pm
Howard,
I was afraid that I’d given that impression. If anything, I’m much more influenced by pragmatism than you are. I was simply using the emergence of pragmatism as an indicator of how far our modern conception of beliefs and truth had departed from the pre-modern conception that is to be found in scripture. I think my pragmatism helps me keep both models at arms length which, admittedly, is probably not what God wants from His children. This just goes to show that merely being a counter-enlightenment thinker does not entail a purifying return to any prior ideal.
Comment by Jeff G — May 7, 2015 @ 2:53 pm
Clark,
“I think what you’re now getting at is more a dispute about what the nature of a fact is.”
You’re right, to some extent. I think “fact” has basically defined in opposition to “value” within relatively recent times. It is for this reason that I so strongly reject any equation of facts with divine truths. Facts are information that we can use as we please. Truth are claims that we have a moral obligation to endorse and defend.
“Testimonies always have to be recreated in a kind of originary re-experiencing of the original experience.”
It’s not that I think this is wrong, I just think it’s too limited. I think that unless our remembering of a testimony is itself inspired, then it simply doesn’t carry the necessary legitimacy that it needs to. Furthermore, I would insist that an inspired recollection will often deviate from the original content of the remembered event. (1st vision accounts and JS’s new translation of the Bible come to mind.) In other words, the truth of our recollection of testimony depends more upon its relationship to God and what he currently requires of us than it does on its relationship to any event in the past. (I hope this is a stark enough rejection of the scientific mindset!)
“Bishop is claiming revelation about what the person should do relative to some set of concerns and potential events.”
If this is true, then it is not what he said. He specifically claimed revelation for what he himself should say to the teacher…. not what the teacher should say to anybody else. Of course there is a connection that cannot be totally sidelined, but we cannot simply assume that your translation of his statement actually follows from his statement.
By “spatio-temporally uniform” I mean something like a Platonic ideal that does not in any sense change according to spatio-temporal context. A Platonist like Galileo or Kepler would say that their theories (assuming they were true) were true at all times and for everybody no matter what their *social* context. While I would be willing to grant that their predictions would be accurate, I would not be willing to call any scientific theory of this type true. By saying this, I strongly play up the importance of continuing revelation in a way that would make any enlightenment figure very uncomfortable.
Comment by Jeff G — May 7, 2015 @ 3:10 pm
What? No, there were definitely realists in Ancient Greece who held that beliefs are rational connections with the objective world that we all have access to. I’m not sure what the historical epistemology thing is supposed to be doing for you – I’m broadly Aristotelian in thinking.
I’m wondering how this illustrates the problem with my position? I acknowledge that the same problem could be applied to the material or natural world.
Comment by Syphax — May 7, 2015 @ 3:14 pm
The pre-modern conception found in scripture is the way it is in part because the sophistication and accuracy of language and human experience was somewhat less than it has become. We have a much greater library of experiences and knowledge to draw from yet it still remains very inadequate for the job. It is undeniable that modern understanding skews the original meaning but returning to that time for understanding is also of little help and calling it impossible to understand is the least help of all. The Spirit interrupts scripture into useful current understanding, that is throwing out our frame of reference leaves us incapable of understanding much of anything so the Spirit starts with our American pragmatism (if that’s where we happen to be) and likens scripture unto that. And all of this learning is aimed at evolving and enlightening us in the direction of God.
Comment by Howard — May 7, 2015 @ 3:14 pm
Clark again,
“However I don’t think that means he’s going to work around such things and make it easy for us.”
There are a lot of assumptions here that I’m not too sure about. Why is His adapting his message to our current mindset, “making it easy” in any important sense? Why would such a thing require more (unjustified) work? If God wants us to know something, and we ask him to tell us something, why would we expect Him to give us an objective and unchanging stone rather than an organically adapted fish?
“I think his goal isn’t to give us a set of clear unambiguous messages but to teach us to develop a relation with him. ”
But isn’t this exactly what James 1:5 says that He does? Of course God wants us to establish a relationship with him, but I don’t see how this addresses the issue at hand. The point I’m pushing back against is that our desires and emotions are in any way and as such obstacles to inspired behavior. The idea of that fleeting emotions cloud truth is of Greek origin and has no place in the gospel.
To be sure, I acknowledge that appeals to interpretations, logically equivalent statements, emotions getting in the way, etc. can allow one to not feel threatened by difference in revelation. My point is that 1) it is not the only way and 2) it is not the best way. The idea that different statements in scripture, or in living authorities must be reconciled was only a threat to Biblical scribes whose only appearance of authority came from their expertise of and control over the texts of dead prophets. Once we have living prophet in our midst, we don’t have to rely upon what texts consistently tell us and thus feel no threat from conflicting messages. Such conflicts are resolved by an appeal to priesthood stewardship not through any disputation or contrived harmonization of such texts.
Comment by Jeff G — May 7, 2015 @ 3:23 pm
Howard,
“the sophistication and accuracy of language and human experience was somewhat less than it has become.”
Says who? This statements seems nothing more than a whiggish interpretation of history. At the very least, it suggests a historical accumulation of truth that is the very epitome of the progressive enlightenment vision. The scriptures, however, suggest the exact opposite in that the accumulation of knowledge in no sense entails an approximation toward truth.
Comment by Jeff G — May 7, 2015 @ 3:28 pm
Syphax,
To be sure that there were such realists in Ancient Greece. However, 1) it did not become the default understanding of the world until quite recently, and more importantly 2) it was not the mindset of any authorized prophet. This means that 3) such an interpretation of the scriptures is not binding upon us, and 4) such an interpretation of the scriptures will be misleading.
Comment by Jeff G — May 7, 2015 @ 3:31 pm
Please modern transportation and communication cross pollinates human experience at unprecedented rates!
Comment by Howard — May 7, 2015 @ 3:33 pm
But Howard, do you really think language is more accurate?
There’s more of it but does anyone really know any better what anyone else means?
I never feel like I really know what people have in mind when they use the word “God”. I’ve said before that i think i could devise a true, false test of 50 questions about what God means and no two mormons would answer the test the same way. How is that more accurate?
Comment by Martin James — May 7, 2015 @ 3:47 pm
Jeff: Many scholastics and Islamic thinkers were platonic and Aristotelian realists too! As well as certain schools of Hindu philosophy. I’m wondering if your simplified view of history might be coloring your rhetorical strategy of disparaging the modern.
In terms of authorized prophets or what not, don’t you think your views on truth could be influencing your judgment of who is an authorized prophet to begin with? Instead of the other way around?
Comment by Syphax — May 7, 2015 @ 3:47 pm
What’s a donkey? What’s a mouse? What’s a byte? What’s bandwidth? What’s a meson?
Comment by Howard — May 7, 2015 @ 3:50 pm
As I said earlier it still remains very inadequate for the job (of defining God for example) but we have many, many more examples and if one cares enough to check the definitions and use them correctly they do aid communication.
Comment by Howard — May 7, 2015 @ 3:56 pm
Syphax,
I’m well aware of those people.
1) Realism is not at issue. The issue is what the word “belief” means.
2) The point still stands that our modern, post-enlightenment conception of the word is by no means the natural, or default one.
3) The authors of the scriptures surely did not bring the same meaning to the words that we do.
Thus, by bringing our modern, post-enlightenment interpretation (that goes back to Greece rather than Israel) we systematically misinterpret them and hold them to unwarranted standards. This seems like a pretty safe argument that potentially has very large ramifications.
Comment by Jeff G — May 7, 2015 @ 4:57 pm
Jeff (52), I’m not sure the real issue is what belief means either. While we have disagreements over the range and meaning of belief I think there tends to be a common ground of application most agree with. (Since any philosophical use has to deal with common regular use of the term)
I do think the issue is more how we represent our understanding of the meaning. I think any short one or two sentence representation is always leaving a ton out. And that can make claiming contradiction difficult even if a strict meaning of the representation as presented is contradictory on the face of it. But I’ll not rehash that.
Jeff (44), adapting his message for our mindset is making it easy in terms of hermeneutics. i.e. it’s easier for the individual to get a correct interpretation. I’m not saying God should or shouldn’t do this. Nor am I saying work is bad or good. Although I do think a corollary of my comments is that often making things take more work is useful if God’s goal is our development. But I’d never say that’s always the case. I’ve had inspirations that were clear and unambiguous and many that were difficult and many that were confused with my own understandings and projections. I don’t think there is an univocal way God communicates.
As for James 1:5, I don’t see how you can read that as saying God communicates clearly especially given all the other scriptures like Matt 13 or the existence of the Book of Isaiah or the Book of Revelation. It seems undeniable that if the scriptures are inspired that most of it is hard to figure out.
To your final point, I’m not sure what you mean by “best way.” It seems to me that ultimately we have to engage with the problem of interpretation. Conflicting messages ought cause us to think because it raises question of our interpretations. Further there are complexities. For example consider the problem of evolution versus what some in authority have taught on it. I think authority provides a burden of proof issue in our hermeneutic processes but I don’t think it solves things like you do.
Comment by Clark — May 8, 2015 @ 11:37 am
Syphax (42) If you don’t see that as illustrating a problem then perhaps I’m simply not understanding what you mean your example to illustrate. I think it self-evident that scientists are all studying the same universe. Thus to me the problem with your position is conflating issues of description with issues of reference. It’s true we often use descriptions to reference, but I think it wrong to assume different descriptions entail different referents.
Comment by Clark — May 8, 2015 @ 11:39 am
Clark,
“adapting his message for our mindset is making it easy in terms of hermeneutics. i.e. it’s easier for the individual to get a correct interpretation”
I think this is where I get uncomfortable, although I’m having a hard time articulating why. I seems like you’re suggesting that not only are God’s messages encoded in some sense, but that our emotions and biases are exactly what prevent us from decoding some objective content.
All of this seems to suggest that God is trying to communicate divine facts to us and that if we follow all the instructions that scientists are urged to follow when performing experiments or interpreting data, then we will interpret his message in the least ambiguous way. I simply see no reason to accept any of this: which isn’t to say that you necessarily do. Perhaps I simply reject the language that your claim is being couched in since it seems (to me) to presuppose that how scientists (ideally) seek and sorts out truth, is the best or most paradigmatic way of so.
Comment by Jeff G — May 8, 2015 @ 2:27 pm
I don’t think I’m saying “emotions and biases are exactly what prevent us…” I’m saying they can. How much they affect us will depend upon the message at hand, the nature of our individual biases and emotions, and the overall context in which we make our interpretation. It’s far more complex and far less deterministic than I see you portraying it.
To your last point, I don’t see the connection to scientists. Science is great, but as you know there is no formal scientific method. In addition I certainly don’t advocate in the least adopting some form of scientism. I don’t think science is the only way to know things. Since I’ve not brought up science I’m not quite sure why you bring it up.
Comment by Clark — May 8, 2015 @ 8:05 pm
I know that you obviously aren’t as clear cut and extreme as I am portraying. My worry is more about how much of the vocabulary we are taught to use (and I detect some of it in your comments) strongly tend toward an (systematic) interpretation of Mormonism that has 1) been imported into zion from the world and 2) tends to lead people from zion out to the world – myself being a perfect example.
I know that you aren’t the bogeyman that I am painting. I am suggesting, however, that a lot of your claims seem like they were borrowed from the bogeymen and that makes me a little uncomfortable.
Comment by Jeff G — May 9, 2015 @ 12:04 pm
I guess I’m skeptical it is the vocabulary that leads people from zion rather than the content.
I’m also a little surprised you take this position given your expressed like for Rorty. It seems key to Rorty’s position in places like Mirrors of Nature that two different languages for explaining the same thing are fun. (i.e. one that just talks nerve impulses versus folk language of mind) This is the whole point of his eliminative materialism. It would seem relative to religion that a Rorty styled neo-pragmatist would end up saying there are two different languages to describe religion and no good reason to pick one above the other. i.e. the naturalist language versus the language of faith.
I’d love to hear you unpack your own position in terms of Rorty.
As for my claims being borrowed from boogey-men I guess I’m not sure what you mean.
My own view is that it’s frequently helpful to translate from one language scheme to an other so we can see if we actually understand things the same way. I’m fine with taking Pres. Benson’s recommendation of simply using scriptural language. However my experience is that when one does this frequently people use exactly the same language and can play the same language game successfully. Yet if one gets out of the context of that normal language game the common language obscures rather than helps. That is people use the same terms to mean radically incommensurate things. By translating to other languages we usually are able to see what we mean much better and discover where we disagree.
Comment by Clark — May 11, 2015 @ 2:00 pm
I do appreciate Rorty’s attack on “modernity” if we want to call it that, but I think we would all agree that his totally open-ended romanticism is incompatible with Mormonism. Basically, my overarching strategy has been:
1) I (wrongly) abandoned theism for scientific naturalism out of a rationalistic suspicion of unobservable entities and claims. – Think Dennett.
2) I (rightly) abandoned naturalism in favor of a sort of post-modern romanticism out of a suspicion of scientific naturalism’s pretenses to exclusivity. – Think Rorty.
3) Finally, I’m arguing against this post-modern romanticism by saying that a proper rejection of relativism and unconstrained pluralism is not to be found in the mathematical theories of natural science, but in a moral hierarchy structured by priesthood stewardship and revelation. Thus, from a Greek oriented perspective, I am clearly a relativist regarding truth and morals. My point is that this Greek perspective is itself wrong, and that absolute truth and morals are to be measured by a different standard altogether.
Comment by Jeff G — May 11, 2015 @ 2:28 pm
Jeff,
Even if you don’t think science and naturalism should get exclusive priority how do you decide what scope to give naturalism in your “being in the world” morally.
How do you distinguish “is” and “ought”. If you tell a child he “ought” not touch a hot stove because it “is” hot and the child says “to the devil with your exclusive naturalism” I will touch the stove. Do you argue for naturalism or just let nature have its say as a consequence?
I would feel more comfortable with your approach to dethroning science morally if I knew better what use you still make of nature and natural theories.
You may be a better mormon now but are you a better moralist? Do you understand is and ought any better and which is which?
Comment by Martin James — May 11, 2015 @ 5:14 pm
While my position is very much anti-Enlightenment, I wouldn’t necessary say it’s anti-science, per se. I think science comes up with very useful interpretations of the world that allow us to do some pretty incredible things. That said, nothing says that we are under a moral obligation to accept or teach any of those interpretations… and its not at all clear how naturalism could ever say that we do have any such obligation.
Thus, if my child wants to touch the hot stove after I’ve interpreted how that part of the world works, I wouldn’t necessarily call them immoral (although I would definitely want to take closer look at the lack of trust between us), but I would probably call her naive, ignorance, foolish, etc.
The boundaries for naturalism comes from above and have some flexibility and variety across varied stewardships. Some times and places they are more clear cut, or unforgiving than others. For instance, right now the boundaries that limit evolution seem to be pretty mild whereas before they were a bit more strict.
Comment by Jeff G — May 11, 2015 @ 5:39 pm
Jeff (61) That seems an odd way of putting it. If something is true with considerable evidence for it why would you say we don’t have a moral obligation to accept it? Or at least seek after it? (I don’t consider belief volitional so the details are more complex) Especially given D&C 93:24-25?
Now socially I certainly agree we shouldn’t force people to accept truth. But I’d think that personally we have an ethical duty to seek truth. (See also D&C 109:7 although that’s wisdom not truth)
Jeff (59) while I’d never deny a romantic element to Rorty, I think his larger point is that we talk with each other and attempt to persuade. While I think he’s has a bit too much naive faith in discussion, there is something to his approach.
While I’d not want to totally repress the romantic element (meaning broadly the backlash to Kant and Hegel) I think there’s an essential tension there and one can’t dominate.
I don’t think though, even in your presentation of authority, avoids relativism. Honestly I think it’s more Kierkegaardian than you might wish to admit, only with the ones we have faith in being picked for us. And in many ways Kierkegaard’s reaction to Kant is part of the romantic movement even if K was more formally ambivalent towards romanticism.
Interestingly I suspect one way to clarify your position against Rorty and Kierkegaard is to ask your position on irony. I suspect there you’re much more in Kierkegaard’s camp than Rorty’s.
(I’ll try and engage the posts you linked to in a formal response at my blog — thanks)
Comment by Clark — May 12, 2015 @ 2:07 pm
“If something is true with considerable evidence for it why would you say we don’t have a moral obligation to accept it? Or at least seek after it?”
For the same reason that Adam and Eve were told NOT to eat the fruit of the knowledge, or that God doesn’t simply reveal himself to the world. There is some information about the world that not only do we not have an obligation to believe it, but we might sometimes have an obligation to deny it.
“I don’t think though, even in your presentation of authority, avoids relativism.”
With respects to what is my account relativistic? Is respect to some things, it definitely is, but, I suggest, not with respect to anything that actually matters.
I am certainly influenced by Kierkegaard’s rejection of the ethical life, to be sure. Nevertheless, I reject his individualistic conception of the religious life. In other words, his religious life has two tiers: God and the individual. If, however, we build more mid-level tiers into the worldview by way of priesthood authority, then my view probably comes very close to Kierkegaard.
Comment by Jeff G — May 12, 2015 @ 3:53 pm
That’s a false analogy.
There’s a difference between my avoiding deceit versus my not telling you something. (Trust me, having had a security clearance where I was limited in what I could speak regarding my work it’s a distinction I’m quite familiar with) Also God’s command regarding the tree of knowledge is a bit more complex than being a type for all knowledge seeking. First off there was an unambiguous divine command. Second, there was a given reason. “Surely you will die.”
I’m all about balancing inquiry and ethics. I think we’d both agree that many science experiments in the 20th century were horribly unethical. But balancing two competing moral obligations seems quite different from what you were saying in (61).
As for relativism, what I fear is that you make authority the deciding factor for truth epistemologically which makes truth relative to the understanding of the person with authority rather than evidence or truth. So if an authority tells you something false, you are required to believe it in your system even if it is false. That by definition is relativism.
Comment by Clark — May 12, 2015 @ 9:41 pm
“But balancing two competing moral obligations seems quite different from what you were saying in (61).”
I am saying something very different indeed. I’m not talking about ethics vs belief, but rather the ethics OF belief. The gospel is absolutely full of the Lord prohibiting some kinds of knowledge and there are some examples of active misleading (Abraham comes to mind).
Mere information is not truth. Following Mattise, exactitude is not truth. The enlightenment idea that exact information about the world is truth was a secular transformation of the earlier belief (which was itself of Greek rather than Hebrew origins) that we have an obligation to seek out the divine meaning that is to be found in the natural world around us. This divine and typically moral meaning or purpose was what truth was. Galileo and his Protestant groupies transformed this obligation to find moral meaning in the natural world into a moral obligation to find the “natural laws” that govern the world. Its wasn’t until a century after Galileo that the natural laws of morality and science would be further severed.
Thus, to buy into the idea that we have a moral obligation to accept the well-supported findings of science is quite literally the philosophies of men mingled with scripture.
“I fear is that you make authority the deciding factor for truth epistemologically which makes truth relative to the understanding of the person with authority rather than evidence or truth.”
You’re getting really close, but notice how you couldn’t help but define truth in terms of evidence and truth, as if the latter two were practically one and the same? Furthermore, you speak as if evidence existed outside of the understanding of persons while tacitly assuming that each person’s understanding is, in principle, equal. But where did this idea of equality come from? Why should my understanding of evidence be placed on all fours with that of a priesthood leader when it comes to what the church does and teaches? The idea of evidence is very much influenced by Galileo’s attempt at subverting church authorities in that he allowed each person’s understanding of scripture to trump priesthood authorities, and each person’s understanding of natural evidence to trump their understanding of scripture. My basic point is the Mormonism is far closer to the Catholic church that it is to Galileo or Protestantism.
“So if an authority tells you something false, you are required to believe it in your system even if it is false. That by definition is relativism.”
Which is why I don’t accept that. Again, you’re assuming that truth and falsity exist independent of the persons who defend of critique them. What I am saying is that what a righteous priesthood authority says within his proper stewardship just IS truth. Think of Rorty’s substitution of solidarity for objectivity and then add in some priesthood stewardship.
Comment by Jeff G — May 14, 2015 @ 11:41 am
I suspect my view on belief as non-volitional has a lot to do with how I’d consider an ethics of belief. I’m fully behind an ethics of inquiry but am skeptical of an ethics of belief if we don’t pick our beliefs. Perhaps that gets us into the free will debate too much, as there are similar issues of accountability and desert. Of course we can talk about good beliefs and bad beliefs independent of whether a person is bad or good for having them. And maybe that’s what you mean. However even there I think things get tricky. (Often we’re actually talking about truth or justification and not belief as such)
In general I think our focus should be on inquiry.
With regards to your use of the term truth, I sense you’re wanting truth to be something more than correct propositions. You want Truth in the sense of being important and meaningful too. That’s fine, but let’s be clear what it is we’re talking about.
I don’t define truth in terms of evidence but rather in terms of stable beliefs at the end of a process of inquiry and being exposed to evidence. While evidence as such doesn’t exist independent of people the objects of evidence do. To give an example a fired pistol and gunpowder burns are objects of evidence. The presentation of these by a detective or forensic scientist is typically the evidence. However practically we loosely use these interchangeably.
The distinction is important though since in a process of inquiry I often return to the original objects and have new encounters with them thereby learning more. Within science this happens all the time.
I am definitely avoiding the idea that truth and falsity exist only dependent upon the particular individual making the judgment. By definitely that is relativism as I said. This is why many think Rorty falls into the relativism trap, BTW. Effectively there is no truth, only beliefs and discussion.
Your approach makes Rorty much worse though. At least Rorty attempts to bridge this problem by adopting the pragmatic notions of inquiry and discussion. So Rorty thinks that as we talk we change our beliefs. Discussion with all people is key for Rorty’s system. By denying that with your approach to authority you then make relativism into a kind of totalitarianism that Rorty explicitly opposes.
Comment by Clark — May 15, 2015 @ 11:49 am
“I’m fully behind an ethics of inquiry but am skeptical of an ethics of belief if we don’t pick our beliefs.”
That’s where I think we are talking past each other. Yes, I would agree about an ethic of inquiry, but that’s not what I am talking about. I am talking about an ethic of communication – an ethic of affirmation, criticism, questioning, answering and other such inter-subjective communications. I personally think that an ethic of utterly private belief is incoherent, if only because I’m not sure that any beliefs are fully private.
“I sense you’re wanting truth to be something more than correct propositions.”
Absolutely. The propositional bias is of very recent invention and has no business being projected onto our everyday or gospel notions of truth. It is fully built into the idea that thinking scientifically is the most mature or paradigmatic mode of thought – something which I quite obviously reject. I mean that truth is a morally justified, public guide to action. It can be an assertion or a person or even a feeling. The scriptures are full of non-propositional truths. The idea that truth is essentially propositional in nature is itself morally enforced in public interactions.
Here’s my post on the propositional bias.
“I am definitely avoiding the idea that truth and falsity exist only dependent upon the particular individual making the judgment.”
Well I don’t see how objects of any kind can exist independent of the categories that an observer brings to them. It is not at all clear to me that non-human creature would construe the world in terms of pistols and gunpowder. Yes, the world constrains our interpretation of it, but not to a unique point where inter-subjective interpretation can ever be put aside.
“This is why many think Rorty falls into the relativism trap, BTW. Effectively there is no truth, only beliefs and discussion.”
Yes, that is almost where Rorty goes but it is also where I disagree with him. If we think that truth is both propositional and absolute with respects to the world, then I guess I am a relativist. I, however, reject any such definition of truth. After all, what in the world is morally dangerous about relativism in that sense? Nothing of moral relevance seems to be at stake which is a strong reflection on how distant such a conception is from the context in which skepticism was seen as a dangerous moral threat rather than merely a limitation that we can comfortably live with.
“By denying that with your approach to authority you then make relativism into a kind of totalitarianism that Rorty explicitly opposes.”
Given my focus on publicly available discourse, my view most definitely incorporates Rorty’s view. What I deny from him is his egalitarianism since it is this egalitarianism that fuels his relativism. The presence of uniquely set apart authorities (not than the uninterpreted access to the objective world) is exactly what prevents any slide into relativism.
Comment by Jeff G — May 15, 2015 @ 2:04 pm
Honestly, probably one or the other is presuming the Spirit is guiding them one way or another rather than actually having received a manifestation of the Spirit. All kinds of people feel like they are guided to do all sorts of things. Actors, musicians, educators… so many examples of types of people I’ve heard say they have felt guided in their roles. For example, even evangelical ministers will most often say that God called them to the ministry (which we can’t hold to be correct). It would seem to be quite foolish to try to discuss the workings of the Spirit and deduce something about God in a situation in which the Spirit wasn’t accurately depicted.
The situation here is that one person is given guidance both to use the documents and to not use the documents in the same way at the same time. That’s a logical contradiction by definition.
If you are trying to argue that it’s not contradictory, more than likely you are actually trying to make a different argument! You are arguing that God’s revelation is not bound to the law of non-contradiction – a wholly different idea. The fact that the statement *is* contradictory doesn’t invalidate that argument. In other words, while the situation is a contradiction, that doesn’t mean the claims of spiritual guidance from either party are false, because the Spirit isn’t opposed to contradiction.
Is that the case? I think that you can make a good case for it (personally I doubt that’s the situation here though). While God commanded Adam and Eve not to eat the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, he wanted them to do it. That’s a contradiction since he would both want them to and not want them to eat the fruit in the same way at the same time. Given the foreknowledge and omnipotence of God, he knew the consequences of what would happen and had full power over the circumstances of the Garden (such as not issuing that command, not giving them access to the tree, etc.). Common sense alone should tell you that since he had power to *ensure* that they didn’t disobey, and went forward anyway, the inevitable outcome must have been his will all along.
Additionally, since God desires the progression of man – his very work is to bring about his immortality and eternal life – he wanted mankind to fall. A mortal probation was the plan God created for us before the world was even created. Surely, creating this plan and enacting it indicate that God wanted events to go according to plan. The fall was a necessary part of this plan, therefore God wanted Adam and Eve to eat the fruit. Finally, the book of Moses indicates that Satan sought to thwart god by tempting Adam and Eve to disobey God, for he “knew not the mind of God”. Satan was trying to get them to do something that he thought was contrary to God’s plan, however, by telling us in this context that he did not know the mind of God indicates that he was actually playing into God’s hand and doing exactly what God wanted him to do. This necessarily implies that God did want Adam and Eve to eat the fruit.
Therefore you can see that while God commanded Adam and Eve not to eat the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, he simultaneously wanted them to do it. Similarly, he commanded Abraham to offer Isaac as a sacrifice when he really didn’t want Isaac to be sacrificed. Please note this is not like how God commands not to kill, but later commands Nephi to kill Laban. This is not contradictory because one is a general commandment, the other is specific, meaning that these commandments are not meant in the same way at the same time.
Comment by Eso — May 20, 2015 @ 8:57 pm
How in the world could you possibly know that? I think it far more likely that you’re simply projecting ideology onto such people rather than observing some important difference between them.
The example that’s more pressing to me is when I was a missionary I had investigators receive answers to their prayers that the BoM and church were false. It is tempting to say that either me or my investigator must be misinterpreting our personal revelation, thus placing one of us closer to or more in touch with God than the other. I totally reject this line of reasoning.
This is the exact tension that I am trying to expose, since it might very well be the case that God called them. Since they have no authority to receive revelation for us, however, from our perspective there is no difference than if they had not been so called. Thus, since it makes no difference whether they were actually called or not, we are equally justified in affirming it as we are denying it.
I would say that deducing such things through human reasoning is (at best) risky regardless of the accuracy of the depiction. I would also resist the idea that accuracy and truth are as tightly connected as people tend to assume.
It’s only a contradiction if you assume inter-personal consistency, which just is to assume that stewardship plays no important role. This is an assumption that Mormon cannot endorse. There is no logical contradiction between God saying to one person “use x” and Him telling another person “tell the first person not to use x.” Yes, from the perspective of the first person, they receive different instructions, but this difference only amounts to a contradiction is the two sets of instructions are equally binding…. and they are not. Therefore, there is no contradiction. Most importantly, the difference in how binding each instruction is has absolutely nothing – nothing whatsoever! – to do with how clear the message that anybody receives is. At no point to assumptions need to be articulated and reevaluated in order to resolve any contradiction – the hierarchy of authority resolves all such conflicts and thus makes such appeals totally superfluous.
Again, how could you possibly know this? From what we understand, they would eventually need to eat the fruit, but at no point do we read that God wanted them to eat the fruit when they did. It would be perverse to think that God punished them for doing exactly as He wanted. It seems far more reasonable to me, to assume that just as God says “thou shalt not kill” at one time and then “slay him” at another, so too God would have later told them to eat and that Adam and Eve were punished for not heeding continuing revelation. It might be objected that my perspective is equally based in human reason, but this would be to miss the point. The point is that there are other interpretations open to us and that human reason is incapable of deciding the issue.
Comment by Jeff G — May 22, 2015 @ 11:35 am
“It’s only a contradiction if you assume inter-personal consistency, which just is to assume that stewardship plays no important role.”
Essentially what is happening here is that you are asking us to determine if something is a contradiction – which has a well defined meaning in the laws of logic – and then not being unfair with that definition (by essentially redefining it).
“In logic, it is a fundamental law- the law of non contradiction- that a statement and its denial cannot both be true at the same time.” (http://www.csus.edu/indiv/m/mayesgr/phl4/Handouts/phl4contradiction.htm)
So what are our statements?
1) He is directed by the Spirit to use the documents
2) He is directed by the Spirit to not use the documents
If the claim is that the scenario is both revelations are legitimate, then both statements would necessarily be true (in the sense of accuracy in logic), then there is a contradiction. The assumptions behind what qualifies having been given “direction” is not relevant. What’s relevant to non-contradiction is only whether or not the statements are meant “in the same way”. For example, they are to be “used” in the same way for the same purpose, rather than the first referring to research and the second referring to using the documents for kindling.
That’s why I say that it is a contradiction by definition. Does that imply that both parties did not receive legitimate revelation? Not necessarily; not if the Spirit isn’t bound to being non-contradictory. Of course my position is that it is more likely that one of these fallible parties is merely mistaken, same as your investigators. Did they receive a revelation that the Book of Mormon was not true, or is it more likely that they received nothing and perceived the lack thereof to mean it is false by default?
Alternatively, you seem to be arguing that the manner of direction is fundamentally not in the same way. In other words, revelation to a person is different than revelation through the priesthood to the same person. To me, that sounds like trying to argue that directions through the phone are inherently better than directions through email. So how are they different, which one supersedes the other, and how can you demonstrate God legitimately operates this way?
As far as the garden of eden, the best evidence is if you just study the implications of Moses 4 (particularly v1-6)
Comment by Eso — May 22, 2015 @ 9:18 pm
“which has a well defined meaning in the laws of logic”
1) I never said anything about logic.
2) Which logic?
3) “Contradiction” is a word that has many, many meanings across various fields and contexts.
Comment by Jeff G — May 23, 2015 @ 12:05 pm
There are of course logics where non-contradiction isn’t fundamental. The type of logic of Aristotle saw contradiction as a huge problem, although even there Aristotle’s aporias made for a bit more complexity than some realize. Once you move to modern logic things also get a tad trickier. Also if your logic has to deal with infinities noncontradiction can be a problem although there typically the flaw is with the law of the excluded middle.
Of course to be fair one could say it’s an axiom and as an axiom it just is required. The question then really becomes what logic are we using, how are we setting up premises, and are we applying it in a just fashion. i.e. soundness versus validity. You see this in classic examples of violating the law of contradition such as in quantum mechanics. Really what’s wrong are assumptions being made when applying logic.
Getting to Jeff, I think he’s really asking when we can apply traditional logic (whether 1st order deductive, induction, or more complex set theories). He’s not putting it like that, but it might be helpful if you do Jeff.
If I have Jeff right what he’s arguing is that there is no way to adjudicate disagreement using logic because what’s true for one isn’t true for the other. Effectively he’s redefined truth to something very individual and relativist. I don’t think this is helpful in the least. He attempts to avoid full relativism by allowing authority as a trump and to adjudicate interpersonal disagreements. But I don’t think authority can do the job he wishes.
Comment by Clark — May 23, 2015 @ 7:18 pm