Episode 185: D&C 84 – Section 107 Part 2
The priesthood is The Force, the church teaches you how to use that priesthood authority to do All The Things. After that we get the lineage/genealogy of priesthood authority. To sum up, be biologically male, don’t be slothful, middle management is the best, don’t be born unto the Levitical line of Judaism.
Names with their LDS.org links, kinda not a genealogy!
Seth
Enos, son of Seth
Mahalaleel, father of Jared
Jared, I couldn’t find a link for him on LDS.org!
Enoch, 7th son of Adam
Jeremy Runnell’s excommunication on YouTube
and a link to his Mormon Stories interview
Patron Bonus: Marie went to an entire 3 hour church service
Read along with us at CompareDandC.com
My Book of Mormon 
December 2, 2017 at 6:55 pm
Hi Marie and Bryce!
It’s been a while since I’ve enjoyed the dawn on Saturday morning with my ‘hot drink’, trying not to wake my wife as I try to talk back to you via my iPod!
OK, let’s start–
Those names are not Joseph’s creations, they are pure Bible KJV. This is an expansion upon the genealogy from Adam to Noah in Genesis 5. As the Bible began to be read literally in the 17th century, people tried to calculate the age of the Earth by working backward through dates in various Biblical books. The most famous of these chronologies was that of Archbishop James Ussher, who determined that Creation began in 4004 BC, on October 23 (a Sunday) in the morning. 😀 This is still the basis of most timelines used by Creationists to this day.
Wikipedia article here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ussher_chronology
Joseph (or more likely, in my opinion, Sidney) adds to the bevy of birthdates and dates where the pre-flood Patriarchs begat sons by adding priesthood ordination dates! As a side note, I still have a printout of my priesthood lineage, showing who I received the priesthood from (my father), who he received it from, on back to Joseph Smith, who received the Melchizedek Priesthood from Peter, James, and John, who received it from Jesus himself. (See how well-connected I am?) 😉
According to the chronology, Adam lived long enough to ordain his great-great-great-great-great-great-grandson Lamech (Noah’s father). And therefore, if my math is correct, the gathering of Adam’s posterity at Adam-Ondi-Ahman occurred in 3977 BC (sorry, I don’t have the exact day, but we can probably assume it was on a Sunday afternoon following three hours of church meetings…)
There is a long tradition of pseudepigraphical works called ‘expansions’ going back as far as the Bible itself, where authors ‘filled in’ details and stories that were ‘missing’ or only mentioned in passing. Enoch is a prime example of this. Enoch himself garners only three verses in Genesis, and is mentioned in passing in Jude. However, there are no less than three complete, different Books of Enoch (Hebrew, Ethiopic, Slavonic) in existence!
It is interesting that Joseph mentions the Book of Enoch in verse 57, as the first English translation of (Ethiopic) Enoch had only been published in 1821. I’ll have to do some digging to see if it was available to him directly. In my estimation, more likely is that he is ‘expanding’ upon the Book of Jasher, which is itself a collection of Hebrew Midrash stories (also expansions!), which Joseph (or his ghost authors) quotes and makes reference to in the History of the Church.
And in the Midrash stories is a tradition that Noah was a Miracle Baby/Wunderkind and was “holy from birth,” hence why he was chosen to preserve mankind. His father Lamech had fallen into unrighteousness and Noah was sent to live with and learn from his great-great-great-great-great-great-grandfather, Seth. Based on this, the ordination of Noah to the priesthood at age 10 is no longer far-fetched…
So back to Adam-Ondi-Ahman. This name is pure Joseph. In some early manuscripts and diaries, you can see it spelled “Adam-on-Diahman”, or even “Adam-on-Diamond.” (Really, Joseph? *facepalm*) I’ve even seen one early map where the townsite is labeled simply “Diamond.” (SHINE-hah, anyone?). Regardless, this location is identified only with Missouri (as is the Garden of Eden, just over the hill.) But then if those places are in North America, how did people get to the Middle East? Noah and The Ark, of course! (duh!) He built it in North America (South Carolina, to be specific) and it drifted to Ararat during the Flood. Simple.
The mental gymnastics that your poor tour guide was performing was an attempt to reconcile the view that the Book of Mormon events occurred in upstate New York with John Sorenson’s Mesoamerican hypothesis, which places all the events of the Book of Mormon in Mexico and Guatemala. So the latest apologetic argument is that there are TWO of each location; one in Central America and named in the Book of Mormon, and one in upstate New York, named after the first ones by ‘survivors’ who moved north to escape the Lamanites (which is no where mentioned in the BoM itself, but hey, that’s why ‘expansions’ were created in the first place, right?) And all this means then that Moroni buried the plates in the Hill Cumorah somewhere in Chiapas, and then some time later, dug them up, carried them the 2000 or so miles to New York, and reburied them in a glacial mound three miles from where Joseph Smith’s family would move to in about 1400 years or so. Simple.
And finally, important characters in this theology have both an earthly name and a heavenly name (whether this is the same as the “New Name” received in the temple is never made clear). Hence Elohim/God the Father creates the world with Jehovah/Jesus, and they send Michael/Adam down to become the first man. Incidentally, Gabriel = Noah, who then not only is born holy and saves the world via the ark, but then later comes back as an angel to announce to the Virgin Mary that she is to be the mother of Emmanuel… wait, what? Jesus (Greek) = Y’shua (Hebrew) = Joshua (English), but Jehovah is derived by inserting vowels into the Tetragrammaton [YHWH] = Yahweh who is the god of the Midianites and their priest Jethro/Reuel/Raguel, which Moses and the Exodus brought with them to Canaan and… oh bloody hell.
Well, now that I’m completely in the weeds, I’ll call it quits for now. Thanks as always for the work you two do to keep us entertained and informed. 🙂
December 2, 2017 at 7:11 pm
My wife just added “Shine-hah, you crazy Diamond.” 😀 😀 😀
December 5, 2017 at 12:51 am
Ach! I just realized that Noah wasn’t sent to live with Seth – Seth had already died when Noah was born – he was sent to live with his grandfather Methuselah. My mistake! :O
(Gee, if only I’d had some kind of chart…) 😛
Since then, I discovered this delightful tidbit in the Jewish Encyclopedia online:
“Apocryphal legend represents Noah at his birth as having a body white like snow, hair white as wool, and eyes like sunbeams. As soon as he opened his eyes, with the light of which the whole house was illumined, he stood upright between the midwife’s hands and addressed a prayer to God. His father, Lamech, frightened at this sight, went to consult Methuselah, telling him that his grandchild resembled an angel more than a child. Lamech further informed his father that he foresaw some accident would befall the earth during the lifetime of his son; he therefore asked Methuselah to consult Enoch, who was then among the angels, and who consequently would know what was to happen. Methuselah, accordingly, went to the ends of the earth to confer with Enoch, who announced to him that a flood would destroy the world, that only the new-born son and his future sons, three in number, would survive.”
http://www.jewishencyclopedia.com/articles/11571-noah
But how did the midwife react? 😉
December 2, 2017 at 9:12 pm
I’m afraid I have to correct you guys on an important point. You seem to have misread this section as saying that descendants of Aaron can’t receive the Melchizedek Priesthood. That’s not what it says at all. It just says that an Aaronic Priesthood holder cannot hold the keys of the Aaronic Priesthood, and officiate as a bishop, unless he is a descendant of Aaron. A Melchizedek Priesthood holder, however, can be a bishop without being a descendant of Aaron.
I’m still baffled that Joseph Smith wasted so much ink discussing this point, since as far as I know it has never been an issue, and no mere Aaronic Priesthood holder has ever been made a bishop. Even on the off chance a church member of Jewish heritage could prove he was a descendent of Aaron, in practice he’d already have been ordained to the Melchizedek Priesthood long before being considered for the bishop’s position, anyway.
But keep in mind that in Joseph Smith’s day, Aaronic Priesthood holders were generally adults, not just teenagers, so the idea of calling an Aaronic Priesthood holder to an important job would not be ludicrous. The current LDS practice of ordaining 12-year-old boys to the Aaronic Priesthood and making them Deacons, then Teachers at 14, and Priests at 16, is not laid out in the D&C anywhere at all, and it’s not considered a matter of inviolable doctrine. The Mormon scriptural canon says nothing about the appropriate age for any ordinance, except baptism at age 8. Sometimes, back then, young teens were even called as elders, like Hyrum Smith’s son, Joseph F. Smith, who was sent off on a mission to Hawaii (the “Sandwich Islands”) at age 15 in the 1850s. (Some think Brigham Young just wanted to get rid of a potential rival until his own power was fully consolidated, but I wouldn’t know.)
So the mere “fact” of Noah getting the Priesthood at age 10 doesn’t invalidate the entire premise of Mormonism, sorry guys. Besides, there’s plenty of lower hanging fruit you could go for if that’s the aim.
Marie, if you get another chance to talk to your apostle friend in the Community of Christ, you should ask about their take on Aaronic Priesthood and Melchizedek Priesthood. As I understand it (and I hope to be corrected, if I’m wrong), the two are basically considered separate career tracks. If you feel called to serve the congregation in a temporal capacity, you go into the Aaronic Priesthood, and if you feel called to serve in a spiritual or pastoral capacity, you go into the Melchizedek. So in their system, there would be no shame in being an adult who had never progressed beyond the office of Deacon.
As for the LDS church, I think they decided long ago that temporal needs (“temporal” referring to the mundane needs of this world, and of time instead of eternity, like making sure people have enough to eat, unnecessary crap like that) are less important than spiritual needs, and eventually considered the Aaronic Priesthood useful only as a set of training wheels for teenagers to prepare them for receiving the Melchizedek Priesthood later. I’m not sure when and how the current system came about, though, so don’t take this as anything more than my speculation.
December 2, 2017 at 10:30 pm
I’ll also mention that the church technically still has deacons quorums of up to twelve members with a President called from within the quorum, teachers quorums of up to 24 with their own President, and priests quorums of up to 48 members presided over by the Bishop, who choses a “First Assistant” from the group of priests to be in charge of them. Those presidents and first assistants do have authority to make assignments, but the duties given to those quorums are so limited that their authority is pretty meaningless. Really the de facto leader of each of these groups is the “quorum advisor”, an adult who teaches the lessons each Sunday, and usually makes all the arrangements for any quorum activities.
December 2, 2017 at 10:39 pm
For anyone out there who hasn’t had the pleasure of perusing the church magazine, The Ensign (and that’s pronounced “EN-sign”, not “EN-sən”, since the magazine is not a junior naval officer), did you know that the semi-annual General Conference issues have a very special… CENTERFOLD? Prepare to feast your eyes on Misters October 2017:
https://www.lds.org/bc/content/ldsorg/church/news/2017/10/27/2017-11-39-general-authorities-and-general-officers-of-the-church-of-jesus-christ-of-latter-day-saints-eng.pdf?lang=eng
Mmmm, so white, so delightsome…
Anyway, you’ll see the seven presidents listed there, the “Presidency of the Seventy”. The president of those seven presidents is L. Whitney Clayton, perhaps best known to the ex-mo community for his leading role in the church’s Proposition 8 efforts, or for directing John Dehlin’s stake president to excommunicate him, even though church HQ insists church discipline is always left to local leaders’ discretion.
Shown below the Presidency of the Seventy are the General Authority Seventies, who belong to the First and Second Quorums of the Seventy. It seems to be a recent development that the two quorums are being lumped together on this chart, probably because no one was taking the Second Quorum as seriously as the First Quorum? Gotta love hierarchy.
Members of the Third through Eighth Quorums of the Seventy are not General Authorities of the church, but have limited authority over stakes in specific areas of the world, so they’re referred to as “Area Seventies”.
Actually, the current structure of the Seventies is very recent, with changes perhaps still ongoing. Until 1975, the only seventies who were General Authorities were the seven presidents, who were called the “First Council of the Seventy”. Back then, every stake of the church had its own quorum of seventies, who were basically just in charge of stake missionary functions, and were below the high priests in authority. My own dad was a “seventy” for a time under this old system before the local seventies quorums were phased out.
December 2, 2017 at 11:14 pm
Oh yeah, although I’ve had too much to say today, I haven’t even addressed your question about whether all those Biblical figures were alive in the time of Adam. Yes, whoever wrote this section did their homework beforehand, that is, they read Genesis 5, and according to that genealogy, Adam lived 930 years, and could have been around to meet the entire chain of his descendants down to Lamech, including our good friend Mahalaleel.
Here’s a depiction of that gathering in Adam-ondi-Ahman, where the Lord appeared to them (looks like Missouri to me):
Notably, Lamech would have been 53 years old at the time of this last blessing, but his name isn’t listed in the roll call. Had he apostatized by then, I wonder?
My thoughts turned to a story in Genesis 4 where Lamech is boasting about killing some dude, but it’s apparently not the same Lamech; he was a descendant of Cain, not Seth. “Hear my voice; ye wives of Lamech,” he said. “Hearken unto my speech: for I have slain a man to my wounding, and a young man to my hurt. If Cain shall be avenged seven-fold, truly Lamech seventy and sevenfold!” Yeah, he’s kind of a weirdo.
December 3, 2017 at 2:04 pm
Gottfried and Duke, blowing up the comments. I AM SO HAPPY RIGHT NOW.