Does the Book of Mormon contradict the Bible?

Same way he does everything else. Quietly, without leaving any fingerprints, like a thief in the night. You'd just reach into your pocket, and find a twenty. Amazingly. And if you asked the scientists about it, they would say "Yeah, these things happen."He gave you your pancreas as a free gift didn't he? And you didn't have to go through any rote actions or mental gymnastics to get that one, at all.Edited by Iblis, : deceased statesmen

Hi, ICANT. Cut the crap, ICANT.----- The part where it's required before you get the gift. No, I didn't ignore the definitions: my post showed that your belief also fails to meet the definition of "gift" that you required.My version: "In order to be saved, you must do good works."Your version: "In order to be saved, you must believe in me."Both versions: "In order to be saved, you must X."The only difference is our opinions about what X is, not about whether or not salvation is a gift. A gift, by your definition, has no prerequirements or contingencies, not even belief.----- How does asking him walk to the front differ in principle from asking him to help an old lady cross the street? Or from asking him to preach the word? Or from asking him to be baptized? Or from asking him to read a certain book? Or from asking him to sing Billy Joel on karaoke night? Or from asking him to pay your salary.It doesn't matter what you ask him to do: if you ask him to do something, anything, and will only give him his "gift" if he does what you ask, you are making his gift contingent on his works.That's the principle on which the doctrine of salvation by works is based. And you taught that principle over your pulpit, whether you intended to or not.You also think man has to do something before he can receive salvation from God. You just think you can say you don't because you don't call it "works."

---

-Bluejay (a.k.a. Mantis, Thylacosmilus)Darwin loves you.

Hi Bluejay, I did not ask him to do anything.I made an announcement that anyone who would come get the $20 could have it.God says anyone can have eternal life.All anyone has to do is to accept the offer.Now explain how you or anyone can accept the offer if you do not believe in God, or you do not believe He will give you eternal life.Now according to the definition of gift I would have had to received compensation of some kind for the $20 not to be a gift. His walking to the front only benefited him not me. He was $20 richer, and I was $20 poorer. Had he not come got the $20 I would have been better off. It doesn't make any difference what I think, or believe.It is not my game and I don't make the rules.God said through the Apostle John: That is a declarative statement of a completed action.There is no place in that statement that says you have to do anything. You are free to do anything you want to do as well as believe anything you want to believe. It is totally up to you.Do you know how a pardon works?In 1829 George Wilson was convicted and sentenced to hang. President Andrew Jackson offered him a pardon which he refused. The supreme court ruled they could not force him to accept the pardon so the sentence was carried out.God has offered just such a pardon to everyone a full free pardon all anyone has to do is accept it. But there is no one that can force someone to accept the pardon. Neither will God force anyone.Now you can shovel out another load of your shinola or explain how someone believing God has benefited God anything causing eternal life not to be a gift.God Bless,

---

"John 5:39 (KJS) Search the scriptures; for in them ye think ye have eternal life: and they are they which testify of me."

quote:

---

All anyone has to do is to accept the offer.

---

Come on, that smacks of a patronising attitude, a means tested hand-out. People have dignity, and don't need charity, thank you. We will get what we want and deserve without any help.

Hi ochaye, Patronizing or not that is the way it is.People have pride, but you call it dignity. Are you sure you want what you deserve? I sure don't.Do it your way. God Bless,

---

"John 5:39 (KJS) Search the scriptures; for in them ye think ye have eternal life: and they are they which testify of me."

Do you have an up to date Bible? I don't get all these funny words.

ICANT, there is actually a difference between a gift and a reward, but I'm not sure you're seeing that... On the contrary: If no one had stood up and walked over to you, no one would have received the "gift" and nothing would have been "given away." If instead you had walked over to one of the people listening to you and put the $20 into that person's hand, for no other reason than deciding on your own to do so, that would have been a gift. Do you see the difference?What you did was to provide a reward for the performance of a requested action -- even though the action you requested seemed trivial and insignificant. The distinction speaks directly to the nature of "salvation": it isn't a "gift" -- it's a transaction.I know how easy it is to get the terms confused, what with our various media being swamped with ads that offer "free gifts" that are actually incentives to perform particular actions, such as going into a store, responding to a "survey", providing contact information, or accepting a service that involves monthly payments by the "gift recipient" (though of course "you can cancel at any time, even before making the first payment" -- I always "cancel" such services during the initial presentation, without accepting the "gift").Edited by Otto Tellick, : clarified who I was talking to in opening sentence

---

autotelic adj. (of an entity or event) having within itself the purpose of its existence or happening.

Hi, ICANT. So, according to the definition of gift, God would have had to receive compensation of some kind for our salvation not to be a gift.So, what compensation do Mormons believe God gets for our salvation?

---

-Bluejay (a.k.a. Mantis, Thylacosmilus)Darwin loves you.

I always figured that it's more a matter of what compensation the church gets (i.e. the community of participants, and/or the organizational hierarchy) from the individual being saved -- that's the important thing. What God gets from the transaction is immaterial. (pun intended) But seriously... I am having a little trouble following your rhetorical device here. You are a Mormon, and you are asking non-Mormons to tell you what Mormons believe. So this implies the answer should be self-evident or somehow obvious, but I'm sorry to admit that it leaves me stumped.Is there some compensation (to God or to anyone/anything else) to be provided by the person receiving salvation? Is there any substantive purpose for having salvation, apart from the pure self-interest of desiring eternal life with various pleasant attributes?Speaking as someone with a purely non-theistic basis for moral action, I'm perfectly content with the notion that I should do good works because this yields an overall benefit to me, my family, my friends, the people with whom I share my neighborhood, my city, my country and this planet. The wider I can expand (both geographically and temporally) the scope of beneficiaries of my good deeds, the better -- bearing in mind that I have personal and material limitations on my ability to expand this scope.From this perspective, the Christian pursuit of "salvation" has tended to sound (to my ears, at least) pretty self-centered, and it would be refreshing to hear that there's some benefit of a broader and more practical nature involved.I realize my train of thought here is somewhat orthogonal to the thread topic, and I apologize. In hopes of making up for that, I'd like to say (as an outsider to the debate) that some of Bluejay's comments about the status of alternate interpretations of scripture have been very enlightening for me. I especially like the point in Message 173 about how the Bible actually seems to go both ways on the matter of whether "works" are needed for salvation. I was also impressed by this point from Message 189: Finally, this point, from Message 247, is honestly inspiring, and gives me great hope:

---

autotelic adj. (of an entity or event) having within itself the purpose of its existence or happening.

Hi, Otto. That's clever.I like that.----- The best way to debate somebody who is making a stupid point is to force them to do the thinking.The interaction went like this:ICANT: "Salvation is a gift. You don't have to do anything for it."Bluejay: "But, you just said that there is a contingency on receipt of the gift."ICANT: "But, the contingency that I believe in isn't a form of compensation."Bluejay: "And the contingency that I believe in is?"See? Isn't that the best possible response?----- I'm perfectly content calling this a worthy motivation, and not standing in your way or demanding that you change.However, it's a completely pointless thing to debate in a forum such as this, because it always just ends up a duel of talking points; and middle-of-the-roaders like me are too scared to comment on anything because we will inevitably get sucked in by pointed retorts from either side focusing entirely on the bits of our neutrality that make us sound like the enemy of the side in question.Also, it strays a bit too far from the topic here.

---

-Bluejay (a.k.a. Mantis, Thylacosmilus)Darwin loves you.

You can't force morons to answer.

Hi Bluejay, What difference does it make what Mormons believe or do not believe?What difference does it make what I believe or do not believe?The only thing that matters is what God says as that is what we will be judged by when we stand in the day of judgment.God says: That is what God has to say about the matter. We can accept it or reject it.God said it and that settles it.God Bless,

---

"John 5:39 (KJS) Search the scriptures; for in them ye think ye have eternal life: and they are they which testify of me."

We can take a look at the case of the disciples in a minute, but we should not skip past the lesson issued to the rich young ruler - which lends a context to Jesus' dealing with the disciples.Remembering also, the spirit in which my original case was made:

quote:

---

Here are the verses concerned. Can we take a look at them with a view to Jesus teaching as I'm arguing he/Paul et al teach?: God sets man an impossible task in order that man sees the task as impossible? Because the story of the Rich Young Ruler is an excellent example of same.

---

Are we agreed that the man is looking to see how he can achieve eternal life for himself by what he does? And that the means whereby he is examined has to do with 'adherance to God's law' - initially against the classic, Mosaic sense of the law? And that Jesus confounds (intentionally, one must conclude) the mans attempt to achieve eternal life so by asking him to follow the law of God as further expounded on by Jesus (golden rules) - but which is Gods law nonetheless?If the text stopped at that point, I believe we could conclude that the premise suggested by me is well supported by this passage.-Having another look at your contention: This analysis takes no account of the information that went before. We have a particular lesson to apply here and it has something to do with Jesus' confounding of one who seeks to work for eternal life. I doubt you'd suppose Jesus accidently happening to finger 'giving up wealth' in the case of a rich young ruler. We should suppose he was intending to cause this man to stumble and fall on the issue of self-earning of eternal life.Assuming you agree with the lesson Jesus was teaching this rich young ruler, my insertion of 'self' is, I think, an acceptable emphasis to place on his conclusion below. A conclusion which states the impossibility of earning eternal life oneself.

quote:

---

23Then Jesus said to his disciples, "I tell you the truth, it is hard for a rich man to (self)enter the kingdom of heaven. 24Again I tell you, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to (self)enter the kingdom of God."

---

-And so to your contention: The rich young ruler came looking for eternal life by own effort - and he left stumped. That is: with man impossible.There is no indication that the disciples followership was sourced in such self-reliant motivation. Indeed, we know that Jesus turned up and simply called them and they followed. We know also that when asked by him would they leave him that they acknowledge that they couldn't: he had the words of eternal life.There is a contrast to be drawn here:Rich young ruler > what must I do/work at > Impossible with man
Disciples > we cannot do, we rely on Jesus > Possible with God- I feel I've given a step by step breakdown of happenings, with reasonable in-context conclusions attaching to those steps - over the whole passage. Would you like to pose an alternative, step-by-step viewpoint along those lines?- Deceptive? Jesus is speaking but frankly. This rich young ruler asked a straight question and Jesus gave him a straight answer.Q: "What work must I do..? What standard must I reach ... if I want to earn eternal life?"A: "This is the work must you do... this is the standard you must reach - if you want to earn eternal life for yourself"It's worth noting the complete absence, anywhere in scripture, of Jesus saying or implying himself as saying that a persons trying their best to follow the law will suffice for a self-earned salvation? He is remorselessly insistant that it be all of the law, all of the time: Jesus isn't at all deceptive, Bluejay. He speaks in parable often, and in riddles that have his own disciples wondering. He very often doesn't answer the question asked sometimes and at other times, such as this time, does so with laser precision. There can be little doubt about his message here when it comes to a man achieving eternal life through own effort, which comes through adherance to Gods law.With man it's impossibleSeeing that that's all a man needs to be convinced of in order to gain eternal life (according the the gospel of grace), what better message should Jesus concern himself with delivering if not:With man it's impossible.- Gotcha. It's a little like salvation by grace. Works are important in terms of heavenly reward (or degrees of glory if you like). It's just that they don't earn you eternal life/heaven in the first place.What is the basis for the few exceptions not gaining heaven btw?Edited by iano, : No reason given.Edited by iano, : No reason given.Edited by iano, : No reason given.

The rest of the world gazes in awe, speechless, at the folly of the USA. But possibly the most eye-wiping characteristic of Americans is their ability to stoutly resist the doctrine of justification by faith, while doing so in such a manner as to demonstrate that they have not the smallest hope of being justified by personal works.

Hi, ICANT. Perhaps none, unless it happens to be the topic of the thread.Oh, look...----- Yes, God very clearly states that a man's salvation is contingent on something that that man does. Our disagreement is about what a man has to do to satisfy that contingency, and nothing more.Until you are willing to acknowledge that any contingency on receipt of the "gift" (be it works, belief, following, ordinances, or whatever) renders an argument from principle invalid, I see no point in continuing to discuss this with you.

---

-Bluejay (a.k.a. Mantis, Thylacosmilus)Darwin loves you.