LDS: What is "doctrine"?

[Watchmen]

Another thread got me thinking: what is LDS "doctrine"???

Is it teachings specific to the Plan of Salvation or is it something more? For example, one person in the other thread mentioned he didn't know anything about Kolob until he had one foot out the door. My first reaction was, is "Kolob" doctrine??? I don't think so. I guess I believe "doctrine" refers to teachings specific to the Plan of Salvation. There are other "teachings" that are truths about God that aren't necessary to know to receive salvation or exaltation. Then, there are "opinions" - often found in the various journals or McConkie books. Finally, there's "folklore" and "philosophy" - those things that may not be true, but which members speculate about.

 

[Anti-Constantine]

Another thread got me thinking: what is LDS "doctrine"???

Is it teachings specific to the Plan of Salvation or is it something more? For example, one person in the other thread mentioned he didn't know anything about Kolob until he had one foot out the door. My first reaction was, is "Kolob" doctrine??? I don't think so. I guess I believe "doctrine" refers to teachings specific to the Plan of Salvation. There are other "teachings" that are truths about God that aren't necessary to know to receive salvation or exaltation. Then, there are "opinions" - often found in the various journals or McConkie books. Finally, there's "folklore" and "philosophy" - those things that may not be true, but which members speculate about.

The doctrine of the LDS Church is found in our standard works: The Bible, The Book of Mormon, The Doctrine & Covenants and The Pearl of Great Price. Other texts and statements are aids and current practice of the Church oftentimes, but not doctrine.

Kolob is mentioned in the following verses:

1. Abr. 3: 3-4, 9, 16 (Pearl of Great Price)
   3 And the Lord said unto me: These are the governing ones; and the name of the great one is Kolob, because it is near unto me, for I am the Lord thy God: I have set this one to govern all those which belong to the same order as that upon which thou standest.
   
   4 And the Lord said unto me, by the Urim and Thummim, that Kolob was after the manner of the Lord, according to its times and seasons in the revolutions thereof; that one revolution was a day unto the Lord, after his manner of reckoning, it being one thousand years according to the time appointed unto that whereon thou standest. This is the reckoning of the Lord’s time, according to the reckoning of Kolob.
   
   • • •
   9 And thus there shall be the reckoning of the time of one planet above another, until thou come nigh unto Kolob, which Kolob is after the reckoning of the Lord’s time; which Kolob is set nigh unto the throne of God, to govern all those planets which belong to the same order as that upon which thou standest.
   
   • • •
   16 If two things exist, and there be one above the other, there shall be greater things above them; therefore Kolob is the greatest of all the Kokaubeam that thou hast seen, because it is nearest unto me.
   
2. Abr. 5: 13 (Pearl of Great Price)
   13 But of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it; for in the time that thou eatest thereof, thou shalt surely die. Now I, Abraham, saw that it was after the Lord’s time, which was after the time of Kolob; for as yet the Gods had not appointed unto Adam his reckoning.
   

All members of the Church are encouraged to read the standard works frequently and each of the standard works is also given 1 year of devoted study in our Sunday worship meetings every four years as follows:

• Old Testament/Pearl of Great Price
• New Testament
• Book of Mormon
• Doctrine and Covenants/Church History

These are then repeated every four years. If your friend had done the studying the Church encourages, he would have been fully aware of what Kolob is in LDS doctrine.

It is also worth noting the following:

Religions of the World: A Latter-day Saint View
There is often an enormous gap between the thought of the official religious scriptures and the popular beliefs and traditions at large.

This holds true in most religions, LDS are not immune.

 

[Katzpur]

Another thread got me thinking: what is LDS "doctrine"???

Is it teachings specific to the Plan of Salvation or is it something more? For example, one person in the other thread mentioned he didn't know anything about Kolob until he had one foot out the door. My first reaction was, is "Kolob" doctrine??? I don't think so. I guess I believe "doctrine" refers to teachings specific to the Plan of Salvation. There are other "teachings" that are truths about God that aren't necessary to know to receive salvation or exaltation. Then, there are "opinions" - often found in the various journals or McConkie books. Finally, there's "folklore" and "philosophy" - those things that may not be true, but which members speculate about.

According to Joseph Fielding McConkie (who is obviously not "the" McConkie you're referring to, and who does not speak on behalf of the Church in any official capacity), there are several characteristics common to all Church doctrine:

1. Good doctrine will always sustain the idea that the living prophet, not scripture or any other document, is the constitution of the Church.

2. All true doctrine will have revelation as its source.

3. Pure doctrine will always come through the channels the Lord has ordained.

4. It is not for us to either add to or take from the system of salvation as revealed by the Lord.

5. True doctrine will always edify.

6. The standard works are the measuring rod for all doctrine.

7. No true doctrine can stand independent of the testimony that Jesus Christ is the Son of God and that salvation is in and through him and none other.

I believe all of these statements to be valid. Numbers six and seven are, however, in my opinion, the most important ones. If we rely solely on the scriptures as our source of doctrine and look to the General Authorities to help us understand them, we'll have a foundation of truth we can count on.

 

[Scott C.]

Another thread got me thinking: what is LDS "doctrine"???

I think of LDS doctrine as being the official teachings and beliefs of the church. I consider the standard works and official church publications to be reliable sources on the teachings of the church or doctrine. If we leave out the official publications, the scriptures are open to false interpretations. The teachings of the living prophets, as found in the church publications, are critical to understanding official doctrine. The role of an Apostle is to keep us "from being tossed to and fro by every wind of doctrine." If the scriptures were sufficient for doctrine, we would not need living Apostles to keep us from being deceived by every wind of doctrine.

 

[Worshipper]

I think official Church doctrine consists of the standard works, official statements of the First Presidency, and official statements of the Quorum of the Twelve. As Anti-Constantine points out, that includes stuff about Kolob and a whole lot of other things that may or may not be part of the Plan of Salvation (after all, who am I to say that Kolob has nothing to do with the Plan of Salvation?).

But doctrine just means teaching, so anything that gets taught in church or by church members is, in a way, church doctrine. When my friend in high school got taught in Young Women's that she would have to accept her husband's polygyny in the afterlife if she wanted exaltation, that was church doctrine. When I was told in Sunday school that husbands should read all the mail that comes into the household before deciding whether his wife and children should have access to it, that was church doctrine. When one of my BYU professors told us that we spent too much time as a church trying to get close to Heavenly Father and we should really spend more time getting close to Heavenly Mother since we all love our mothers more than our fathers anyway, that too was church doctrine.

None of this was official church doctrine, and all of it seems to me to be contrary to official church doctrine, but it was still part of the religious instruction of people in the church, it still represented actual religious beliefs of real members of the Church, and it was still accepted as good doctrine in each of those three cases by at least one student in each setting.

And this kind of doctrine (though not necessarily these three specific doctrines) often has as much or more relevance in church members' actual worship than the official doctrine.

It's pretty easy to limit official Church doctrine to a fairly small canon. But when we talk about LDS doctrine generally, how can we justify excluding anything that constitutes a real part of some Latter-day Saints' religious experience?

 

[Orontes]

Another thread got me thinking: what is LDS "doctrine"???

Is it teachings specific to the Plan of Salvation or is it something more? For example, one person in the other thread mentioned he didn't know anything about Kolob until he had one foot out the door. My first reaction was, is "Kolob" doctrine??? I don't think so. I guess I believe "doctrine" refers to teachings specific to the Plan of Salvation. There are other "teachings" that are truths about God that aren't necessary to know to receive salvation or exaltation. Then, there are "opinions" - often found in the various journals or McConkie books. Finally, there's "folklore" and "philosophy" - those things that may not be true, but which members speculate about.

Hello,

Doctrine would refer to official teachings or stances of the Church. The most obvious example being the canon. Noting that alone however does not take account of interpretation. The way one understands a text can be legion. The base doctrine one must affirm is found in the baptism interview. The base doctrine one must abide to be in "good standing" is found in the temple recommend interview.

 

[Watchmen]

Hello,

Doctrine would refer to official teachings or stances of the Church. The most obvious example being the canon. Noting that alone however does not take account of interpretation. The way one understands a text can be legion. The base doctrine one must affirm is found in the baptism interview. The base doctrine one must abide to be in "good standing" is found in the temple recommend interview.

So - is "Kolob" doctrine? It's in the canon, but it's not in either interviews mentioned.

Also, wouldn't the endowment be doctrine? That's not in the canon for some reason (presumably to keep it from being slung through the mud).

 

[Orontes]

So - is "Kolob" doctrine? It's in the canon, but it's not in either interviews mentioned.

The word Kolob certainly is in the canon, just as Olea and kokaubeem are. How one understands it is another matter: simply a star, a cosmological power, a celestial time referant etc. This is why I mentioned interpretation as something over and above the text. One issue to consider is Mormonism doesn't recongize any inerrantist positioning. Therefore the weight assigned to scriptural content may vary. For example, consider John 1:1

"In the beginning was the Logos, and the Logos was with God, and the Logos was God."

Logos is translated as Word in the KJV. For an educated Greek speaker in Antiquity this statement would read as pure Stoicism. Logos is a word that had a well established metaphysical baggage before the rise of Christian Thought. That such a word would be chosen and used as an identity statement with God in an assumed Christian text is telling on a number of levels. The point is logos, like Kolob is a word coming from another linguistic-cultural tradition far removed from our own.

Also, wouldn't the endowment be doctrine? That's not in the canon for some reason (presumably to keep it from being slung through the mud).

Maybe, I would qualify the Endowment as ceremony/ritual. One might say ceremony is doctrine, but then one would need to consider: is it the rite per its form (actons), or is it the content of the rite that is doctrinal? Rites include something more than simple idea. If one does consider temple rites as doctrine, then it is a different order of doctrine given the esoteric nature: something akin to Clement of Alexandria's stromata (which in Greek means patchwork and referred to the highest order of Christian teaching: reserved for the elect) that had a subjective character. For the early Christians doctrine seems to have referred more to the teachings presented to the public arena.

 

[Watchmen]

Thanks for the answers, O.

 

[Orontes]

It's a good question you raised.

 

[zippythepinhead]

The word Kolob certainly is in the canon, just as Olea and kokaubeem are. How one understands it is another matter: simply a star, a cosmological power, a celestial time referant etc. This is why I mentioned interpretation as something over and above the text. One issue to consider is Mormonism doesn't recongize any inerrantist positioning. Therefore the weight assigned to scriptural content may vary. For example, consider John 1:1

"In the beginning was the Logos, and the Logos was with God, and the Logos was God."

Logos is translated as Word in the KJV. For an educated Greek speaker in Antiquity this statement would read as pure Stoicism. Logos is a word that had a well established metaphysical baggage before the rise of Christian Thought. That such a word would be chosen and used as an identity statement with God in an assumed Christian text is telling on a number of levels. The point is logos, like Kolob is a word coming from another linguistic-cultural tradition far removed from our own.


Maybe, I would qualify the Endowment as ceremony/ritual. One might say ceremony is doctrine, but then one would need to consider: is it the rite per its form (actons), or is it the content of the rite that is doctrinal? Rites include something more than simple idea. If one does consider temple rites as doctrine, then it is a different order of doctrine given the esoteric nature: something akin to Clement of Alexandria's stromata (which in Greek means patchwork and referred to the highest order of Christian teaching: reserved for the elect) that had a subjective character. For the early Christians doctrine seems to have referred more to the teachings presented to the public arena.

Post 1,000!