Mormon Quotes

Plurality of gods

Brigham Young
Joseph Smith holds the keys of this last dispensation, and is now engaged behind the vail in the great work of the last days. I can tell our beloved brother Christians who have slain the Prophets and butchered and otherwise caused the death of thousands of Latter‑day Saints, the priests who have thanked God in their prayers and thanksgiving from the pulpit that we have been plundered, driven, and slain, and the deacons under the pulpit, and their brethren and sisters in their closets, who have thanked God, thinking that the Latter‑day Saints were wasted away, something that no doubt will mortify them ‑ something that, to say the least, is a matter of deep regret to them ‑ namely, that no man or woman in this dispensation will ever enter into the celestial kingdom of God without the consent of Joseph Smith. From the day that the Priesthood was taken from the earth to the winding‑up scene of all things, every man and woman must have the certificate of Joseph Smith, junior, as a passport to their entrance into the mansion where God and Christ are ‑ I with you and you with me. I cannot go there without his consent. He holds the keys of that kingdom for the last dispensation ‑ the keys to rule in the spirit‑world; and he rules there triumphantly, for he gained full power and a glorious victory over the power of Satan while he was yet in the flesh, and was a martyr to his religion and to the name of Christ, which gives him a most perfect victory in the spirit‑world. He reigns there as supreme a being in his sphere, capacity, and calling, as God does in heaven. Many will exclaim ‑ "Oh, that is very disagreeable! It is preposterous! We cannot bear the thought!" But it is true.
Brigham Young, Journal of Discourses 7:289
Brigham Young
Angels are those beings who have been on an earth like this, and have passed through the same ordeals that we are now passing through. They have kept their first estate far enough to preserve themselves in the Priesthood. They did not so violate the law of the Priesthood and condemn themselves to the sin against the Holy Ghost as to be finally lost. They are not crowned with the celestial ones. They are persons who have lived upon an earth, but did not magnify the Priesthood in that high degree that many others have done who have become Gods, even the sons of God.
Brigham Young, Journal of Discourses 9:103
Joseph Smith
The heads of the Gods appointed one God for us; and when you take that view of the subject, it sets one free to see all the beauty, holiness and perfection of the Gods.
Joseph Smith, DHC 6:476
Joseph Smith
Many men say there is one God; the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost are only one God. I say that is a strange God anyhow -- three in one, and one in three! It is a curious organization. 'Father, I pray not for the world, but I pray for them which thou hast given me.' 'Holy Father, keep through Thine own name those whom thou hast given me, that they may be one as we are.' All are to be crammed into one God, according to sectarianism. It would make the biggest God in all the world. He would be a wonderfully big God -- he would be a giant or a monster. I want to read the text to you myself -- 'I am agreed with the Father and the Father is agreed with me, and we are agreed as one.' The Greek shows that it should be agreed. 'Father, I pray for them which Thou hast given me out of the world, and not for those alone, but for them also which shall believe on me through their word, that they all may be agreed, as Thou, Father, are with me, and I with Thee, that they also may be agreed with us,' and all come to dwell in unity, and in all the glory and everlasting burnings of the Gods; and then we shall see as we are seen, and be as our God and He as His Father. I want to reason a little on this subject. I learned it by translating the papyrus which is now in my house.
Joseph Smith, History of the Church 6:476
Joseph Smith
I want to ask this congregation, every man, woman and child, to answer the question in their own heart, what kind of a being God is? ... Does any man or woman know? Have any of you seen him, heard him, or communed with him? . . . God himself was once as we are now, and is an exalted man, and sits enthroned in yonder heavens! That is the great secret. If the veil were rent today, and the great God who holds this world in its orbit, and who upholds all worlds and all things by his power, was to make Himself visible, I say -- if you were to see Him today, you would see Him like a man in form -- like yourselves in all the person, image, and very form as a man; for Adam was created in the very fashion, image and likeness of God, and received instruction from, and walked, talked and conversed with Him, as one man talks and communes with another.... It is the first principle of the Gospel to know for a certainty the Character of God, and to know that we may converse with him as one man converses with another, and that He was once a man like us; yea, that God Himself, the Father of us all, dwelt on an earth, the same as Jesus Christ himself did; and I will show it from the Bible.
Joseph Smith, History of the Church, 6:303-304
Joseph Smith
We have imagined and supposed that God was God from all eternity. I will refute that idea, and take away the veil, so that you may see. These are incomprehensible ideas to some, but they are simple. It is the first principle of the Gospel to know for a certainty the Character of God, and to know that we may converse with him as one man converses with another, and that he was once a man like us; yea, that God the Father of us all, dwelt on an earth, the same as Jesus Christ himself did, and I will show it from the Bible.
Joseph Smith, Teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith, pp.345‑346
Joseph Smith
You have to learn how to be Gods yourselves, and be kings and priests to God, the same as all Gods have done before you, namely by going from one small degree to another, and from a small capacity to a great one: from grace to grace from exaltation to exaltation until you attain the resurrection of the dead.
Joseph Smith, History of the Church; Vol. 6 Pg. 306
Joseph Smith
The doctrine of a plurality of Gods is as prominent in the Bible as any other doctrine.... I will show from the Hebrew Bible that I am correct, and the first word shows a plurality of Gods; and I want the apostates and learned men to come here and prove to the contrary, if they can. An unlearned boy must give you a little Hebrew. Berosheit baurau Eloheim ait aushamayeen vehau auraits, rendered by King James' translators, 'In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.' I want to analyze the word Berosheit. Rosh, the head; Sheit, a grammatical termination; the Baith was not originally put there when the inspired man wrote it, but it has been since added by an old Jew. Baurau signifies to bring forth; Eloheim is from the word Eloi, God, in the singular number; and by adding the word heim, it renders it Gods. It read first, 'In the beginning the head of the Gods brought forth the Gods,' or, as others have translated it, 'The head of the Gods called the Gods together.' I want to show a little learning as well as other fools.... The head God organized the heavens and the earth. I defy all the world to refute me. In the beginning the heads of the Gods organized the heavens and the earth. Now the learned priests and the people rage, and the heathen imagine a vain thing. If we pursue the Hebrew text further, it reads, 'The head one of the Gods said, Let us make a man in our own image.' I once asked a learned Jew, 'If the Hebrew language compels us to render all words ending in heim in the plural, why not render the first Eloheim plural?' He replied, 'That is the rule with few exceptions; but in this case it would ruin the Bible.' He acknowledged I was right.... In the very beginning the Bible shows there is a plurality of Gods beyond the power of refutation. It is a great subject I am dwelling on. The word Eloheim ought to be in the plural all the way through -- 'Gods'. The heads of the Gods appointed one God for us; and when you take [that] view of the subject, its
Joseph Smith, History of the Church 6:474-476
Wilford Woodruff
I feel thankful for the privilege of speaking a few words to this school. I wish to refer to the first doctrine preached that Adam was our Father and God in the revelation called the olive leaf it says that 'the devil gathered together the hosts of hell and Michael the ark angel gathered together the hosts of heaven and he overcame the devil and his angel and this is the battle of the great God' who is this Michael the ark angel it is Adam who was Michael in the creation of the world...
Wilford Woodruff, Minutes of the School of Prophets, Jan. 24, 1868
Wilford Woodruff
Brother Cannon said there was a learned Doctor that wanted to be baptized.... He [the doctor] is satisfied that the doctrine of the plurality of God and that Adam is our Father is a true doctrine revealed from God to Joseph and Brigham. For this same doctrine is taught in some of the old Jewish records which have never been in print and I know Joseph Smtih nor Brigham Young have had access to, and the Lord has revealed this doctrine unto them or they could not have taught it. President Young said if all that God had revealed was in fine print it would more than fill this room but very little is written or printed which the Lord has revealed.
Wilford Woodruff, Journal of Wilford Woodruff, Sept. 4, 1860
Wilford Woodruff
At meeting of School of Prophets: President Young said Adam was Michael the Archangel, and he was the Father of Jesus Christ and was our God and that Joseph taught this principle.
Wilford Woodruff, Journal of Wilford Woodruff, Dec. 16, 1867
Hosea Stout
Another meeting this evening. President B. Young taught that Adam was the father of Jesus and the only God to us. That he came to this world in a resurrected body, etc. More hereafter.
Hosea Stout, Hosea Stout Journal, v. 2, p. 435, Friday, April 9, 1852
B. H. Roberts
What are angels? They are intelligences of the human species. Many of them are offsprings of Adam and Eve. That is they are men, who have, like Enoch or Elijah, been translated; or, like Jesus Christ, been raised from the dead; consequently they possess a material body of flesh and bones, can eat, drink, walk, converse, reason, love, fight, wrestle, sing, or play on musical instruments. They can go or come on foreign missions, in heaven, earth, or hell; and they can travel space, and visit the different worlds, with all the ease and alacrity with which God and Christ do the same, being possessed of similar organizations, powers and attributes in a degree.
B. H. Roberts, B.H. Roberts, LDS Church Historian, Mormon Doctrine of Deity, p. 256
Jens Christian Andersen Weibye
Brother Allred preaches at Manti on Adam as God, with the following remarks in part: 'Adam was buried by God and was only dead like a twinkling of a eye, and his God exalted him immediately. Mary was sealed to Adam; and unless we have two wives, we can never be Gods. Adam will worship his god and we will worship Adam, and our children will worship us.'
Jens Christian Andersen Weibye, Jan Christian Anderson Weibye Daybooks, Daybook 5th, pp. 20‑22
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