TEMPLES and temple work
I have a real hard time with the temple because the sole purpose of temples is to do the work for the dead who didn't have the opportunity to do it in this life. To me this says that everyone who has ever lived, or will ever live, will have to accept Mormonism and the plan of salvation, or else they will not go live with God again, no matter what you've done with your life. What about all those great people who attend a church of their choosing, never sin, and always do good in the world? They won't have a shot at the celestial kingdom if they don't accept the Mormon way? That makes no sense to me. I guess I can understand doing those covenants and stuff for yourself, but I disagree when it comes to doing it for random people you don't even know. They get to choose to accept it or not, I know this. I was taught this as well. What if they choose not to accept it? They go to hell? This seems way off in my opinion.
The Mormonthink website says... “The LDS temple ceremony has many parallels to Masonic rites, and for good reason: Joseph Smith introduced the rites into the LDS temple about two months after becoming a Freemason himself, and fourteen years after his brother Hyrum and (possibly 34 years) after his father both became Freemasons. The rituals taken from Masonry cannot have come from Solomon's time (as many LDS believe) as Masonry did not originate until the Middle Ages. Although claimed to be sacred, the rites within the temple are secret because of their cult-like trappings and because of the blood oaths initiates were required to make (although these oaths have now been removed from the ceremony itself, anyone going through the endowment ceremony before 1990 remembers them well). Many members feel that requiring an entrance fee (in the form of tithing) to get to God's greatest reward is not in keeping with Christ's atoning sacrifice being a free gift to all.”
THAT is a good way to sum up how I feel about the Temple. I feel that the temple is only for the “privileged” or “the most righteous”, the ones that pay the most tithing.
More quotes from Mormonthink: “Heber C. Kimball, a Mason himself said, "We have the true Masonry. The Masonry of today is received from the apostasy which took place in the days of Solomon, and David. They have now and then a thing that is correct, but we have the real thing." (Manuscript History of Brigham Young, 13 November, 1858, 1085, LDS archives; see also Stanley B. Kimball, "Heber C. Kimball and Family, The Nauvoo Years, Brigham Young University Studies 15 (Summer 1975): 458. See also David John Buerger, The Mysteries of Godliness: A History of Mormon Temple Worship, Smith Research Associates, San Francisco, 1994, 56.)
To anyone who has knowledge of both the LDS Temple Ceremony (especially the pre-1990 temple ceremony) and Mason Rites it is very apparent that they have many similarities. Many things are exactly the same. Even knowledgeable Mormons admit that the endowment ceremony (especially in its earlier versions) contains many details that are similar to the Masonic initiation rites of Joseph Smith's day. The symbols, oaths, handclasps, and terminology resemble the Masonic ritual in hundreds of ways.
The clearest evidence of Masonic influence on the Nauvoo temple ceremony is a comparison of texts. Three elements of the Nauvoo endowment and its contemporary Masonic ritual resemble each other so closely that they are sometimes identical. These are the tokens, signs, and penalties. (David Buerger, Mysteries of Godliness: A History of Mormon Temple Worship, Chapter 3: Joseph Smith's Ritual)”
“The Mormon Temple endowment ceremony is without a doubt taken from the Masonic ceremonies Joseph Smith participated in just weeks before he introduced the temple endowment. The grips, tokens, covenants, secret words, keys, etc. were word for word the same when first introduced. Members who were Masons previous to Joseph joining the fraternal order unashamedly referred to the Mormon endowment as "celestial masonry."Fawn Brodie, No Man Knows My History, pp. 279-283”
“Perhaps in the 1800s the secrecy of the temple was so outsiders (as well as the bulk of the LDS membership) would not find out about the practice of plural marriage. However, why is it secret now? God may have commanded it to be secret of course, or maybe there are more practical, earthly answers.
The temple ceremony can seem very strange to many people. We've heard even many faithful members refer to the experience as not at all what they expected and even bizarre. It definitely is very different than the worship services in the LDS chapels every Sunday.
Simply put, people outside the Church wouldn't understand it. How many people would join the church if the temple ceremony was explained to them in detail by the missionaries?
However, making it a 'sin' to discuss the temple ceremony outside the temple causes people to simply accept the strangeness of the ceremony. If it wasn't for this, members would likely talk amongst themselves about the ceremony and probably not in flattering ways. Perhaps with open discussion, members would come to the conclusion that the ceremony isn't something they comfortably believe in.
Generally when people or organizations have secrets, it is usually for nefarious reasons. Even the Book of Mormon condemns 'secret combinations'. You would think that God's true church would be the most open and honest of any organization, but this is far from true. If God commanded it to be this way then that's fine, but if it is done by man, then the reasons are suspect.”
From Mormonthink... “The original temple ceremony practiced by the saints included an oath of vengeance against the United States government for the death of Joseph Smith. The change was added by Brigham Young after Joseph was killed by the mob. This was removed in early 1927. Imagine if Mitt Romney was running for president after taking an oath against the United States government.
The oath in part was:
You and each of you do covenant and promise that you will pray, and never cease to pray, Almighty God to avenge the blood of the prophets upon this nation, and that you will teach the same to your children and your children's children unto the third and fourth generations.”
The Full Oaths read...
“The significant changes made in 1990 include:
I thought this sums up nicely how I feel about eternal marriages and the possible problems with how the church presents them.
1) Unworthy spouse: It isn't enough for people to get into the Celestial Kingdom to have an eternal family. One must make it into the top 1/3 of the Celestial Kingdom. The odds are pretty low that the average church member would make it to the top 1/3 of the Celestial Kingdom. My stake president estimated that maybe only 1 in 10 church members would (he gave that in a talk chastising the stake members for not being better people). So how many families would have one spouse worthy of the top 1/3 of the CK, but the other spouse only makes it to the middle 1/3 or even to another kingdom? Those people would have to then be separated, regardless of the devotion of the one that made it to the top.
2) Less Worthy children: In a typical LDS family of say 4-5 children, what are the chances that both spouses and all the children (and their spouses) will be of the same worthiness level? We know of very few members that even have all active immediate family members, let alone Celestial Kingdom-bound members.
3) Grandparents and grandchildren: What defines an eternal family? To us, we of course think of our parents on one end and our children on the other so we have grandparents, us and our children. But what about our parents? Since they are children themselves, their version of the eternal family is their parents and us. So what about their parents? Well, our grandparents would want their children for their eternal family, and their parents (our great grandparents). Our great grandparents would want them (our grandparents) for their eternal family, etc. The never-ending chain doesn't really make sense to break it into families because one family is part of another. And of course, many of these people wouldn't make it to the top 1/3 of the CK anyway.
4) Homosexuals: What about gay people? Well of course they can't make it to the top of the CK without a spouse of the opposite sex, so I guess they are out of luck - and their families will just have an empty chair in the CK. Also, is their sexual orientation all of a sudden going to change in the next life - basically a huge part of their identity and personality will just be 100% reversed? It is really so unrealistic to expect a gay person to live the "Celestial Law' all their lives, alone and celibate because of the way they were born.
5) Polygamy: What about the husband that gets sealed to another woman after his first wife dies (such as in the case of apostles Nelson and Oaks)? Now what if the first wife doesn't like this arrangement in the next life? Can she boot the second wife out of her husband's eternal marriage to her? Then what does she do - just get another man assigned to her because they are all interchangeable? We don't really think that everyone will just accept polygamy in the next life, despite some member's claims.
6) Divorce: When marriages dissolve that causes many potential problems in the eternal family concept. What happens to the children of divorced couples? Do they go to the mom or dad? Which one does not get their children in their own eternal family? With the divorce rate so very high, this would effect a huge number of potential eternal families.
7) Sealings of first marriage not cancelled: If Ann & John are married in the temple and they don't have any children and end up getting divorced, but never get their sealing cancelled (which happens for several reasons such as one spouse dies, one spouse refuses to cancel the sealing or the church simply won't allow it, etc). Then Ann marries Paul. They aren't allowed to be sealed unless Ann has her first sealing cancelled, which she can't do. So all of the children that Ann & Paul have are actually sealed to Ann & John, even though they are Paul's children. I know people that this has happened to and her first husband doesn't even know that his ex-wife had children that are now sealed to him. It makes little sense.
8) In-laws: How many people would even want to live with their parents, their children, their in-laws, their children's spouses, etc.? The simple fact is that many "good" people don't really want to be that close with their in-laws and non-blood relatives in this life, let alone the next one.”
Here's another good quote by a prophet…
“Those who receive the fullness will be privileged to view the face of our Father. There will not be such an overwhelming number of the Latter-day Saints who will get there. President Francis M. Lyman many times has declared, and he had reason to declare, I believe, that if we save one-half of the Latter-day Saints, that is, with an exaltation in the celestial kingdom of God, we will be doing well. Not that the Lord is partial, not that he will draw the line as some will say, to keep people out. He would have every one of us go in if we would; but there are laws and ordinances that we must keep; if we do not observe the law we cannot enter. Many come into the Church, like fish that are gathered into the net, that have to be sorted and thrown out again or put into piles where they belong. And so it will be with us
Joseph Fielding Smith, from Vol. 2 (page 15) of his collected writings known as “Doctrines of Salvation”.
Here's another quote… “If performing baptisms and temple endowments is commanded by God, then the saints are performing a much needed and heaven-sanctioned service regardless of whether nonmembers approve or not. If however, this practice turns out to be merely something instituted by the church without that direct instruction from Deity, then it's the height of arrogance to assume that every nonmember (or 99.8% of the living population) is unable to enter heaven without the assistance of the LDS Church and its temples.
Legally (so we've been told) it's been ruled that a dead person cannot be harmed by performing such rituals so they will be continued to be practiced (at least in the USA ) regardless of whether nonmembers want them to be performed or not. (Note: we have not been able to confirm that this is indeed the law.)
Whether it's true or not, many people believe that anyone not wishing this service performed for them should have their request honored. If it turns out that it is indeed necessary, then those that requested the service not be performed can take it up with God. Actually since most nonmembers have no idea that this is going on, perhaps the church should obtain permission from the people while they are living or from their closest relatives.”
Another great one… "WHAT IF ALL THE CHURCHES DID THIS? The Catholic Church rejects Mormon baptisms as valid. But do you see the Catholic Church 'baptizing' Mormons and others they consider to not have valid baptisms into the Catholic Church when they die? It would be ridiculous if all the other churches felt the need to perform ordinances after people die so they can be saved.”
MY CONCLUSIONS… I have a hard time wanting to go back to the temple. To me, it was weird and uncomfortable from the first time I attended. And it has been uncomfortable and weird every time thereafter. I feel that it is very cult-like, and all the rituals I feel are not needed to get to heaven. What if someone never gets to go to the temple? They don’t get to learn the signs and tokens necessary to pass through the veil into God’s presence? What if we do it for a dead person… only after one time, do THEY have all the signs and tokens necessary to pass through the veil into God’s presence? Do you think I or anybody who hasn’t desensitized themselves to the rituals will remember everything necessary to get into God’s presence?
I’m not sure it’s going to work that way. I feel that the more you go the less weird it is. To me, that is just desensitization, just like medicine works. The more you hit a receptor in the body, the less it responds to the stimulus, therefore the less reaction. I feel this is why long time members don’t have any problem with the temple, because they’ve gone so many times, that they see it as normal. It’s weird and uncomfortable to me.
ANOTHER THOUGHT: Misogynistic views of women in the temple. This is a topic that I had never realized until I studied up on temple rituals. All throughout the temple, the man covenants to obey Father in Heaven, while the woman covenants to obey her HUSBAND! Also, when God is speaking during the endowment ceremony, the women have to veil their faces. To me, this is a blatant statement that the woman is not worthy to speak with God, and her role is to covenant to serve her husband. The women are not allowed to be in the presence of God. They have to cover up! So God speaks to the man, and the woman has no say in the matter. So crazy.
CLICK HERE for a comparison of pre/post 1990 temple endowment ceremonies and changes that have been made. It's interesting to compare.
CLICK HERE to see full temple endowment session online
The Mormonthink website says... “The LDS temple ceremony has many parallels to Masonic rites, and for good reason: Joseph Smith introduced the rites into the LDS temple about two months after becoming a Freemason himself, and fourteen years after his brother Hyrum and (possibly 34 years) after his father both became Freemasons. The rituals taken from Masonry cannot have come from Solomon's time (as many LDS believe) as Masonry did not originate until the Middle Ages. Although claimed to be sacred, the rites within the temple are secret because of their cult-like trappings and because of the blood oaths initiates were required to make (although these oaths have now been removed from the ceremony itself, anyone going through the endowment ceremony before 1990 remembers them well). Many members feel that requiring an entrance fee (in the form of tithing) to get to God's greatest reward is not in keeping with Christ's atoning sacrifice being a free gift to all.”
THAT is a good way to sum up how I feel about the Temple. I feel that the temple is only for the “privileged” or “the most righteous”, the ones that pay the most tithing.
More quotes from Mormonthink: “Heber C. Kimball, a Mason himself said, "We have the true Masonry. The Masonry of today is received from the apostasy which took place in the days of Solomon, and David. They have now and then a thing that is correct, but we have the real thing." (Manuscript History of Brigham Young, 13 November, 1858, 1085, LDS archives; see also Stanley B. Kimball, "Heber C. Kimball and Family, The Nauvoo Years, Brigham Young University Studies 15 (Summer 1975): 458. See also David John Buerger, The Mysteries of Godliness: A History of Mormon Temple Worship, Smith Research Associates, San Francisco, 1994, 56.)
To anyone who has knowledge of both the LDS Temple Ceremony (especially the pre-1990 temple ceremony) and Mason Rites it is very apparent that they have many similarities. Many things are exactly the same. Even knowledgeable Mormons admit that the endowment ceremony (especially in its earlier versions) contains many details that are similar to the Masonic initiation rites of Joseph Smith's day. The symbols, oaths, handclasps, and terminology resemble the Masonic ritual in hundreds of ways.
The clearest evidence of Masonic influence on the Nauvoo temple ceremony is a comparison of texts. Three elements of the Nauvoo endowment and its contemporary Masonic ritual resemble each other so closely that they are sometimes identical. These are the tokens, signs, and penalties. (David Buerger, Mysteries of Godliness: A History of Mormon Temple Worship, Chapter 3: Joseph Smith's Ritual)”
“The Mormon Temple endowment ceremony is without a doubt taken from the Masonic ceremonies Joseph Smith participated in just weeks before he introduced the temple endowment. The grips, tokens, covenants, secret words, keys, etc. were word for word the same when first introduced. Members who were Masons previous to Joseph joining the fraternal order unashamedly referred to the Mormon endowment as "celestial masonry."Fawn Brodie, No Man Knows My History, pp. 279-283”
“Perhaps in the 1800s the secrecy of the temple was so outsiders (as well as the bulk of the LDS membership) would not find out about the practice of plural marriage. However, why is it secret now? God may have commanded it to be secret of course, or maybe there are more practical, earthly answers.
The temple ceremony can seem very strange to many people. We've heard even many faithful members refer to the experience as not at all what they expected and even bizarre. It definitely is very different than the worship services in the LDS chapels every Sunday.
Simply put, people outside the Church wouldn't understand it. How many people would join the church if the temple ceremony was explained to them in detail by the missionaries?
However, making it a 'sin' to discuss the temple ceremony outside the temple causes people to simply accept the strangeness of the ceremony. If it wasn't for this, members would likely talk amongst themselves about the ceremony and probably not in flattering ways. Perhaps with open discussion, members would come to the conclusion that the ceremony isn't something they comfortably believe in.
Generally when people or organizations have secrets, it is usually for nefarious reasons. Even the Book of Mormon condemns 'secret combinations'. You would think that God's true church would be the most open and honest of any organization, but this is far from true. If God commanded it to be this way then that's fine, but if it is done by man, then the reasons are suspect.”
From Mormonthink... “The original temple ceremony practiced by the saints included an oath of vengeance against the United States government for the death of Joseph Smith. The change was added by Brigham Young after Joseph was killed by the mob. This was removed in early 1927. Imagine if Mitt Romney was running for president after taking an oath against the United States government.
The oath in part was:
You and each of you do covenant and promise that you will pray, and never cease to pray, Almighty God to avenge the blood of the prophets upon this nation, and that you will teach the same to your children and your children's children unto the third and fourth generations.”
The Full Oaths read...
- "Should you reveal the first token of the Aaronic priesthood, you agree that your throat be cut from ear to ear, and your tongue torn out by its roots."
- "Should you reveal the second token of the Aaronic priesthood, you agree that your breasts be torn open, your heart and vitals torn out and given to the birds of the air and the beasts of the field."
- "Should you reveal the first token of the Melchizedek priesthood, you agree that your body be cut asunder and all your bowels gush out."
- "You do covenant and promise that you will pray and never cease to pray to Almighty God to avenge the blood of the prophets upon this nation, and that you will teach the same to your children and to your children's children unto the third and fourth generation."
“The significant changes made in 1990 include:
- Elimination of the penalties associated with the signs and tokens. After 1990, patrons were no longer required to pantomime their own deaths by slashing their throats or disemboweling themselves by slicing a knife across their stomachs.
- The protestant ministers were no longer referred to as agents of Satan.
- Changing of words from the Adamic Language to English.
- The elimination of the Five Points of Fellowship.
- The five points of fellowship is so strange, we're sure many LDS must have wondered why it was ever in the temple ceremony to begin with (other than the fact that it was in the Mason's ceremony). Many women expressed their discomfort in the touching that went on with a total stranger of the opposite sex. At the veil, the temple attendee had to engage in the following ritual with whoever was the temple officiator at the veil at the time:
- inside of right foot by the side of right foot,
- knee to knee,
- breast to breast,
- hand to back, and
- mouth to ear.
Not many women were comfortable touching their breasts and legs to other men's chests and legs. Men didn't like doing it with other men either. It's one thing to do that with your spouse and quite different with a stranger or worse, someone from your ward that you didn't particularly care for. Perhaps complaints from members also helped the leadership of the Church decide that this part of the ceremony was no longer required for exaltation. We again must wonder why it was required as part of the ceremony for 150 years but all of a sudden changed with no explanation.
- The five points of fellowship is so strange, we're sure many LDS must have wondered why it was ever in the temple ceremony to begin with (other than the fact that it was in the Mason's ceremony). Many women expressed their discomfort in the touching that went on with a total stranger of the opposite sex. At the veil, the temple attendee had to engage in the following ritual with whoever was the temple officiator at the veil at the time:
I thought this sums up nicely how I feel about eternal marriages and the possible problems with how the church presents them.
1) Unworthy spouse: It isn't enough for people to get into the Celestial Kingdom to have an eternal family. One must make it into the top 1/3 of the Celestial Kingdom. The odds are pretty low that the average church member would make it to the top 1/3 of the Celestial Kingdom. My stake president estimated that maybe only 1 in 10 church members would (he gave that in a talk chastising the stake members for not being better people). So how many families would have one spouse worthy of the top 1/3 of the CK, but the other spouse only makes it to the middle 1/3 or even to another kingdom? Those people would have to then be separated, regardless of the devotion of the one that made it to the top.
2) Less Worthy children: In a typical LDS family of say 4-5 children, what are the chances that both spouses and all the children (and their spouses) will be of the same worthiness level? We know of very few members that even have all active immediate family members, let alone Celestial Kingdom-bound members.
3) Grandparents and grandchildren: What defines an eternal family? To us, we of course think of our parents on one end and our children on the other so we have grandparents, us and our children. But what about our parents? Since they are children themselves, their version of the eternal family is their parents and us. So what about their parents? Well, our grandparents would want their children for their eternal family, and their parents (our great grandparents). Our great grandparents would want them (our grandparents) for their eternal family, etc. The never-ending chain doesn't really make sense to break it into families because one family is part of another. And of course, many of these people wouldn't make it to the top 1/3 of the CK anyway.
4) Homosexuals: What about gay people? Well of course they can't make it to the top of the CK without a spouse of the opposite sex, so I guess they are out of luck - and their families will just have an empty chair in the CK. Also, is their sexual orientation all of a sudden going to change in the next life - basically a huge part of their identity and personality will just be 100% reversed? It is really so unrealistic to expect a gay person to live the "Celestial Law' all their lives, alone and celibate because of the way they were born.
5) Polygamy: What about the husband that gets sealed to another woman after his first wife dies (such as in the case of apostles Nelson and Oaks)? Now what if the first wife doesn't like this arrangement in the next life? Can she boot the second wife out of her husband's eternal marriage to her? Then what does she do - just get another man assigned to her because they are all interchangeable? We don't really think that everyone will just accept polygamy in the next life, despite some member's claims.
6) Divorce: When marriages dissolve that causes many potential problems in the eternal family concept. What happens to the children of divorced couples? Do they go to the mom or dad? Which one does not get their children in their own eternal family? With the divorce rate so very high, this would effect a huge number of potential eternal families.
7) Sealings of first marriage not cancelled: If Ann & John are married in the temple and they don't have any children and end up getting divorced, but never get their sealing cancelled (which happens for several reasons such as one spouse dies, one spouse refuses to cancel the sealing or the church simply won't allow it, etc). Then Ann marries Paul. They aren't allowed to be sealed unless Ann has her first sealing cancelled, which she can't do. So all of the children that Ann & Paul have are actually sealed to Ann & John, even though they are Paul's children. I know people that this has happened to and her first husband doesn't even know that his ex-wife had children that are now sealed to him. It makes little sense.
8) In-laws: How many people would even want to live with their parents, their children, their in-laws, their children's spouses, etc.? The simple fact is that many "good" people don't really want to be that close with their in-laws and non-blood relatives in this life, let alone the next one.”
Here's another good quote by a prophet…
“Those who receive the fullness will be privileged to view the face of our Father. There will not be such an overwhelming number of the Latter-day Saints who will get there. President Francis M. Lyman many times has declared, and he had reason to declare, I believe, that if we save one-half of the Latter-day Saints, that is, with an exaltation in the celestial kingdom of God, we will be doing well. Not that the Lord is partial, not that he will draw the line as some will say, to keep people out. He would have every one of us go in if we would; but there are laws and ordinances that we must keep; if we do not observe the law we cannot enter. Many come into the Church, like fish that are gathered into the net, that have to be sorted and thrown out again or put into piles where they belong. And so it will be with us
Joseph Fielding Smith, from Vol. 2 (page 15) of his collected writings known as “Doctrines of Salvation”.
Here's another quote… “If performing baptisms and temple endowments is commanded by God, then the saints are performing a much needed and heaven-sanctioned service regardless of whether nonmembers approve or not. If however, this practice turns out to be merely something instituted by the church without that direct instruction from Deity, then it's the height of arrogance to assume that every nonmember (or 99.8% of the living population) is unable to enter heaven without the assistance of the LDS Church and its temples.
Legally (so we've been told) it's been ruled that a dead person cannot be harmed by performing such rituals so they will be continued to be practiced (at least in the USA ) regardless of whether nonmembers want them to be performed or not. (Note: we have not been able to confirm that this is indeed the law.)
Whether it's true or not, many people believe that anyone not wishing this service performed for them should have their request honored. If it turns out that it is indeed necessary, then those that requested the service not be performed can take it up with God. Actually since most nonmembers have no idea that this is going on, perhaps the church should obtain permission from the people while they are living or from their closest relatives.”
Another great one… "WHAT IF ALL THE CHURCHES DID THIS? The Catholic Church rejects Mormon baptisms as valid. But do you see the Catholic Church 'baptizing' Mormons and others they consider to not have valid baptisms into the Catholic Church when they die? It would be ridiculous if all the other churches felt the need to perform ordinances after people die so they can be saved.”
MY CONCLUSIONS… I have a hard time wanting to go back to the temple. To me, it was weird and uncomfortable from the first time I attended. And it has been uncomfortable and weird every time thereafter. I feel that it is very cult-like, and all the rituals I feel are not needed to get to heaven. What if someone never gets to go to the temple? They don’t get to learn the signs and tokens necessary to pass through the veil into God’s presence? What if we do it for a dead person… only after one time, do THEY have all the signs and tokens necessary to pass through the veil into God’s presence? Do you think I or anybody who hasn’t desensitized themselves to the rituals will remember everything necessary to get into God’s presence?
I’m not sure it’s going to work that way. I feel that the more you go the less weird it is. To me, that is just desensitization, just like medicine works. The more you hit a receptor in the body, the less it responds to the stimulus, therefore the less reaction. I feel this is why long time members don’t have any problem with the temple, because they’ve gone so many times, that they see it as normal. It’s weird and uncomfortable to me.
ANOTHER THOUGHT: Misogynistic views of women in the temple. This is a topic that I had never realized until I studied up on temple rituals. All throughout the temple, the man covenants to obey Father in Heaven, while the woman covenants to obey her HUSBAND! Also, when God is speaking during the endowment ceremony, the women have to veil their faces. To me, this is a blatant statement that the woman is not worthy to speak with God, and her role is to covenant to serve her husband. The women are not allowed to be in the presence of God. They have to cover up! So God speaks to the man, and the woman has no say in the matter. So crazy.
- "Prior to 1990, the LDS church endowment ceremony both taught that Eve's punishment was, "In sorrow shalt thou bring forth children; nevertheless, thou mayest be preserved in childbearing. Thy desire shall be to thy husband, and he shall rule over thee in righteousness." It taught that Adam was punished because he "hearkened unto the voice of thy wife" and partake of the fruit. And women were literally put "under covenant to obey the law of their husbands."
- Post 1990, the first two references were removed, and women are now told to "hearken to the counsel of her husband, as her husband hearkens unto the counsel of the Father". Okay, but "hearken" means to "listen and obey" in the LDS church. So they're saying the same thing, but in a way that won't offend the younger crowd.
- Gender roles in the church
CLICK HERE for a comparison of pre/post 1990 temple endowment ceremonies and changes that have been made. It's interesting to compare.
CLICK HERE to see full temple endowment session online
REFERENCES
- http://www.mormonthink.com/temple.htm
- Fawn Brodie, No Man Knows My History, pp. 279-283
- David Buerger, Mysteries of Godliness: A History of Mormon Temple Worship, Chapter 3: Joseph Smith's Ritual
- Manuscript History of Brigham Young, 13 November, 1858, 1085, LDS archives
- http://sacred-texts.com/mas/dun/index.htm
- http://www.mormonthink.com/essays-peace-and-violence.htm
- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5VrsFEiTpsQ
- https://www.reddit.com/r/exmormon/comments/3om9md/more_misogyny_provided_by_the_temple_endowment/
- http://www.ldsendowment.org/parallelgarden.html
- http://www.i4m.com/think/lists/mormon_gender.htm