The Signs of the Times

Hoping to confound the Savior by asking him to perform an impossible miracle for a mere man, the Pharisees and the Sadducees of his day asked that “he would shew them a sign from heaven.” His answer was profound—for them and for us—especially when we consider that we live at a time in history that is equally pivotal to the days of Christ’s ministry. Hence, modern Christians, and especially Mormons, who have been given much more knowledge than the rest of the world, would do well to pay special heed to his reply to those early Jews.

He answered and said unto them, When it is evening, ye say, It will be fair weather: for the sky is red.

And in the morning, It will be foul weather today: for the sky is red and lowring. O ye hypocrites, ye can discern the face of the sky; but can ye not discern the signs of the times? (Matthew 16: 2, 3.)

In other words, in the Savior’s mind it should have been as easy to discern the signs of the times as it was to predict the weather. Since predicting the weather has been a popular pastime of the human race since Adam, and continues to preoccupy us even today, the Savior’s recrimination is particularly stinging.

Implied in the Savior’s response was the accusation that the very sign of the times they asked for had already been given; it stood before them in his own person, since he was the promised Messiah they awaited. In effect, he was saying that the answer was as plain as the nose on their face.

Meteorology has come a very long way since the Savior uttered those words approximately 2,000 years ago. We have dramatically improved our ability to prognosticate the weather, thanks to remarkable technological advances. Yet, sadly, the confusion and controversy that seems to abound among modern Christians, and Saints in particular, regarding the signs of our times, betrays a woeful ignorance that may equal that of the contemptible Pharisees and Sadducees.

The implication of the Savior’s reply for us is that we should be able to foresee his second coming as easily as one predicts the weather—that the answer is as plain as the nose on our face.

Yet, the Saints seem to struggle with this issue. More lamentable is the fact that most Saints seem to have adopted popular views on the interpretation of prophecy held by most Christians—like those of Hal Lindsay, for example—which are most surely misguided because they lack the inspiration of latter-day prophets from Joseph Smith to the present.

When Latter-day Saints ponder the clues to the Savior’s second advent, they would do well to note that we should be more discerning of his coming than the Jews were, else we risk making a fatal error similar to theirs. We should look to the words of modern prophets for guidance in this matter, not to contemporary Christianity.

Joseph Smith gave us the clue needed to answer the question, but we have systematically ignored it because it seemed extravagant in that it flew in the face of accepted scientific dogma. During a sermon given by the Prophet in the General Conference “convened on the floor of the (Nauvoo) Temple” of April 6th, 1843, he read from Revelation and Hosea, prophecies of the last days. He then said, “The coming of the Son of Man never will be—never can be—till the judgments spoken of for this hour are poured out.” (History of the Church, Vol. 5, p. 336.) That makes clear the subject of this sermon: the second coming; it also sets forth the order of events: first the judgments or natural disasters, then the Savior appears—the same order noted in the Book of Mormon for his coming to the Nephites, which may turn out to be a prophetic model for events yet to occur in our time.

Joseph went on to quote Paul, “Ye are the children of the light, and not of the darkness, that that day should overtake you as a thief in the night,” meaning that the Saints should be far more aware of and prepared for the Savior’s coming than the rest of the world. Put in the Savior’s terms, we Saints should be able to discern the signs of the times as readily as we can predict the weather.

The Prophet then went on to explain himself more precisely in an unequivocal statement as to what the signs of the second coming will be so there might be no room for confusion on the part of the Saints.

It is not the design of the Almighty to come upon the earth and crush it and grind it to powder, but he will reveal it to His servants the prophets.

Judah must return, Jerusalem must be rebuilt, and the temple, and water come out from under the temple, and the waters of the Dead Sea be healed. It will take some time to rebuild the walls of the city and the temple, &c.; and all this must be done before the Son of Man will make His appearance. There will be wars and rumors of wars, signs in the heavens above and on the earth beneath, the sun turned into darkness and the moon to blood, earthquakes in divers places, the seas heaving beyond their bounds; then will appear one grand sign of the Son of Man in heaven. But what will the world do? They will say it is a planet, a comet, &c. But the Son of Man will come as the sign of the coming of the Son of Man, which will be as the light of the morning cometh out of the east. (History of the Church, Vol. 5, pp. 336-7; italics added.)

This statement is highly informative as to what we might expect to see occur prior to the second coming. Most of it is self-explanatory. However, part of it deserves further commentary.

Joseph’s reference to the “grand sign” as a planet or comet is often misconstrued to mean that the sign is not a comet or a planet. However, a careful reading of the text says otherwise. Indeed, the Prophet meant that the world’s assessment would be a correct one, that the sign would, indeed, be “a comet, a planet,” but that the Saints should see it as a “grand sign”—perhaps the same sign referred to in a revelation from the Lord that says, “And immediately there shall appear a great sign in heaven, and all people shall see it together.” (Doctrine & Covenants 88:93.) Joseph’s addendum that the sign would come out of the east “as the light of the morning” reinforces the idea that it will be all three: a planet that looks and behaves as a comet, yet is also a sign from the Creator.

Connected to both the Savior’s statement and that of Joseph Smith is one made by Elder LeGrand Richards in a 1951 General Conference address on the subject of the last days. “The newspapers might announce some great phenomenon in the heavens, misplacement of planets, that have caused consternation, and scientists will have their explanation to make of it, and unless they have faith in the living God, unless as Jesus said, they can read the signs of the time, they may not know anything about what is (actually) going on in the world.” (Conference Report, April, 1951, pp. 40-1; italics added.)

This statement puts a lock on it. Elder Richards specifically refers to the Savior’s statement and alludes to that made by Joseph Smith on the subject of the grand sign, then brings them together in a modern context. Though such pronouncements are admittedly rare, the latter-day prophets are on the record with unmistakably lucid statements as to what the signs of the last days, prior to the second coming, will be. It appears, from the above statements, that a planet-sized body that will look and behave like a comet will threaten us—that is, it will be brilliant, have a great tail and move on an elliptical path that will bring it dangerously close.

These declarations are particularly noteworthy given the recent scientific revelations that cometary impacts, such as that which destroyed the dinosaurs, can cause all the natural disasters listed by Joseph Smith—who directly connects them, and accurately so, to the appearance of the comet/planet/sign—earthquakes all over the world at once (“earthquakes in divers places”), a dust or soot filled atmosphere causing darkness nearly worldwide (“the sun turned into darkness”), tsunamis of epic proportions that will inundate and destroy thousands of miles of coastlines where there are large population concentrations (“the seas heaving beyond their bounds”), a spectacularly illuminated moon (“the moon to blood”) and numerous other catastrophic manifestations in the heavens and here on the earth (“signs in the heavens above and on the earth beneath”). We can surmise that the effects exerted by a planet passing close by the Earth would be even more pronounced than those of a mere comet. Of course, the distance and size of the body would be the determining factors.

Once again, the inspiration and vision of latter-day prophets of God have anticipated scientific discoveries while revealing remarkable truth. Latter-day Saints should no longer be in doubt about this subject nor should they fall victim to the misleading interpretations of prophecy offered by our Christian cousins. We have our own, inspired view, given by revelation, which should allow us to predict the events of the second coming with considerable accuracy—as easily as we predict the weather.

© Anthony E. Larson, 2002

Revelation: Understanding John's Apocalypse

LDS scholars and church members alike fail to notice vital elements of John’s New Testament book, Revelation. They see it solely as a eschatological writing—a revelation of future tribulations to befall the world in a period of physical and political upheaval immediately preceding the second coming of Christ.

While it is certainly all that, there is much more to discover. With the aid of a new perspective, the mystery of that book vanishes. Revelation becomes a pivotal document, a virtual 'Rosetta Stone’ of the cultural traditions common to 1st century Mediterranean and Middle Eastern peoples.

Let’s look at a summary of the situation that led to John’s vision. Christianity's early leaders, most notably the Apostle Paul, had expanded their missionary efforts far beyond Palestine and its roots in Judaism. Thanks to a revelation given to Peter, they initiated a campaign to win converts from non-Jewish or 'gentile' cultural groups, including Romans, Greeks, Egyptians and Babylonians.

This put the fledgling church on the horns of a dilemma. Gentile religious and cultural traditions were very different from those of Judaism and Christianity. For example, the gentiles believed in a multiplicity of gods while Christianity taught of only one God. This and many other fundamental differences made proselytism difficult for the newly born religion. Yet, if the new church were to survive and flourish, it had to win converts.

What was needed was a strategy to find connections, common ground with the religious traditions of their 'pagan' neighbors to make Christianity more palatable.

John's Revelation was part of that strategy. His vision was an attempt to reconcile the cultural and religious traditions of the Gentiles with that of the Jews, melding them into a new, common tradition for the Christian church that would allow it to appeal to both communities.

Evidence for this is found in several examples of Revelation imagery, which are also found in ancient sources that predate John's writing, demonstrating the 'borrowing' nature of his account.
In Revelation, chapter 13, we read of a rather remarkable beast. "And I stood upon the sand of the sea, and saw a beast rise up out of the sea, having seven heads and ten horns, and upon his horns ten crowns, and upon his heads the name of blasphemy.

"And the beast which I saw was like unto a leopard, and his feet were as the feet of a bear, and his mouth as the mouth of a lion: and the dragon gave him his power, and his seat, and great authority.

"And I saw one of his heads as it were wounded to death; and his deadly wound was healed; and all the world wondered after the beast." (Revelation 13:1-3.)

When we consult sources outside the Bible and Israelite tradition, we find that this story is a rhetorical rendition of a Babylonian tradition. It depicts the epic myth of the celestial battle between the beast, Tiamat and the thunderbolt god, Marduk, as depicted in Babylonian fine art.

To assure the reader that this illustration and John’s depiction stem from the same, identical tradition, note the specific features of the beast: looks like a leopard, feet of a bear and a lion’s head or mouth. The wings on both Tiamat and Marduk represent their power to move about in the heavens as do the winged birds.

Astoundingly, we also see this beast — wounded head and all — depicted in Mesopotamian cylinder seal art hundreds of years before John described seeing it in vision.

This Babylonian ostracon clearly shows the multi-headed leopard form (note the spots) of the beast, as John described it - including the slash mark of Marduk’s sword across one of the heads.

After comparing these two examples of Babylonian art to the Revelation narrative, there can be little doubt that they both stem from the same mythical tradition of the battle between Marduk and Tiamat. This discovery allows for only one of two conclusions: Either this is a rather remarkable coincidence, or it is an instance of borrowing from older, pagan tradition by John. As we shall see from the next example, it was most likely a borrowing.

In his epic vision, John also reported seeing four other beasts in heaven. "And the first beast was like a lion, and the second beast like a calf, and the third beast had a face as a man, and the fourth beast was like a flying eagle." (Revelation 4:7.)

These four are also seen everywhere in the Egyptian tradition that long predates John. Named after Canopus, an area in the Nile delta region, these jars were funerary furniture used to house various organs of the deceased during internment rites. The four creatures depicted on lids of these Canopic jars were said to be the sons of Horus. They are also found in the Joseph Smith papyri.

The Egyptians employed the heads of a baboon and a jackal rather than the Israelite designation of a calf (ox) and lion. This variation is typical from culture to culture and across time, just as the names of the same gods varied. But there is no mistaking that the four creatures seen in prophetic vision also adorned the burial art of Egyptians for many centuries before John penned his Apocalypse.

These two examples amply demonstrate John’s borrowing of pagan tradition and imagery for his own vision. As it turns out, almost all the imagery in Revelation can be traced to common religious traditions of that day and time.

This is a remarkable discovery.

John created an admixture of ancient cultural motifs and Christian beliefs that would give the ring of familiarity to doctrines of the early Christian church among any of his ‘gentile’ contemporaries—a calculated attempt to give Christianity the proper traditional underpinnings necessary to validate any religion, thus making it more acceptable to a much wider audience.

Given this alternative view, we can now see John’s vision with new eyes. Here is the answer to the riddle that is Revelation: The multitude of pagan gods became mythic characters and images in John’s vision—the strange beasts, creatures, kings, women and other icons—in a revised series of sacred dramas, each one calculated to show Christ’s place in those traditions.

© Anthony E. Larson, 2006

Children of the Light?

Latter-day Saints' opinion on the subject of potential planetary near impacts, past and present, differs little from that of the general public. Sadly, most Mormons seem as indifferent to this concept as their secular and sectarian contemporaries. Yet, it probably should not be so.

Joseph Smith clearly held a catastrophist view of history and prophecy that included disasters originating in the heavens, which would have had devastating effects here on Earth. Speaking of the Second Coming, he said, "It is not the design of the Almighty to come upon the Earth and crush it and grind it to powder . . . ." (History of the Church, 5:337.) These words are not those of a gradualist or uniformitarian. They bespeak a catastrophist point of view. It is well established by this author that Joseph Smith's teachings on past and future events are patently catastrophist. (See The Prophecy Trilogy, Vol. 3, Ch. 1.) Given that fact, why are so many Latter-day Saints loath to accept this interpretation of history and prophecy? For the answer to that question, we will have to examine history.

Abandoning our roots

The restoration of the gospel began at the same time as a revolution in geology and biology. Popular opinion in Joseph Smith's day held that the Creation and Noah's Flood had largely shaped the world. Today they would be called creationists. Geologists like Hutton and Lyell disputed that view, noting that a rational interpretation of the geologic record argued for a very old planet altered only by slow processes over eons of time. They were gradualists.

In Joseph Smith's day, the gradualists were a minority, but by the latter half of the 19th century, the scientific and academic communities had spurned creationism and catastrophism to embrace gradualism completely. The general public was somewhat slower to shift opinion. Still, by the turn of the century, gradualism dominated the thought of the general public since it was, by that time, the only way the subject was taught in almost all academic settings.

Mormons in flux

This ideological shift presented a problem to Mormons who were in the process of trying to integrate with the larger American culture. Historically, the church and the government had been at odds, as any student of early church history knows. The Saints' exodus to the Great Salt Lake Valley originally put them outside the confines of the United States. However, they eventually found themselves once again within its boarders due to the westward expansion of the nation. This left the Saints with a difficult decision: move yet again, just as they had left Jackson County and then Nauvoo, leaving behind another city and temple erected from raw land, or accommodate the laws and cultural standards of the United States so they could keep their new desert home. The decision to remain and conform prevailed, and the Saints undertook the daunting task—-as history records that painful adversarial process—-of qualifying for statehood and citizenship.

To diminish tension and facilitate the process, Mormons sought to emphasize cultural similarities with the rest of America and suppress dissimilarities in hopes of reducing the antagonism of earlier days. This, they trusted, would help avoid further confrontations—-like the Johnston's Army incident, for example—-and ease tensions so that the church could finally put down permanent roots and better carry out its revealed mandate to preach the gospel.

Like the larger American population, the Mormons eventually embraced gradualism and for much the same reasons. Even though the position of the Prophet and early church members had been catastrophist, Mormons eventually found the idea of gradualism irresistible.

As a result, a new generation of Mormons did not entirely share their forefathers’ worldview because of the pressures from the greater society around them to conform to the common precepts taught by almost all educational institutions, including gradualism.

This ideological reversal on the Saints' part produced the desired effect. It opened doors to Mormons in American society that had formerly been closed, allowing them to pursue careers in politics, science and education; some eventually even attained tenure in prestigious institutions. There was now one less difference between Mormons and their American contemporaries.

A split personality

Yet, all this progress came at a price. The Saints' ideological shift to gradualism created an intellectual dichotomy in the 20th century. Their scriptures—-especially those new revelations that came with the restoration—-tell of a catastrophic Earth history. They also proclaim, emphatically and dramatically, a catastrophic future. Yet, the cultural beliefs Mormons had adopted to "fit in" with the rest of the Americans precluded such notions, categorically denying any such possibility.
This produced an intellectual dichotomy in the Saints’ worldview, creating a spiritual and academic scotoma that has only grown larger in the many years since.

This resulted in church members shifting ideological gears on a consistent basis. In a religious setting, they read and mouthed an ideology with catastrophist underpinnings; in a secular setting, such as the public and private educational system, they espoused the opposite ideology of gradualism. This has endured, strangely, to the present. It has become institutionalized, resulting in a sort of intellectual and religious schizophrenia.

In addition, there may have been one other, even more profound loss: Mormons no longer understood their scriptures as they were meant to be understood. While Joseph Smith's interpretation of prophecy and history may not seem essential to our salvation, it performs a vital function in our interpretation of revealed knowledge. Revelation regarding past or future events comes from a perspective that acknowledges the role of planetary catastrophes in Earth's past, present and future. The language of the prophets is steeped in it. So, if our paradigm does not include this perspective, we have no frame of reference with which to completely understand the revelation.

This is what the Apostle Peter meant when he wrote, "Knowing this first, that no prophecy of the scripture is of any private interpretation. For the prophecy came not in old time by the will of man: but holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost." (2 Peter 1:20,21.) If the parties involved in any exchange do not share a common understanding—if one is a gradualist and the other a catastrophist—there will be a fundamental misunderstanding in the exchange of information. They do not share a common view, background or experience. Therefore, they do not interpret the data, information or truths, in the same way. Hence, there can be no "private interpretation" of the scriptures or prophecy. Both parties must have the same frame of reference. The fallible "will of man," or opinion of man, will only lead to misunderstanding.

To correctly understand the scriptures, prophecy or revelation itself, one must have the same frame of reference as the text itself, which is catastrophist. Thus, it may be that this paradigm shift in the last century left Mormons incapable of properly interpreting what had been given them by revelation regarding historic and prophetic events.

A systematic method of interpretation

The systematic method for interpreting historic and prophetic events, given us by Joseph Smith, is based on symbolism. (See The Prophecy Trilogy, Vol. 1, Ch. 3, for a list of such metaphors and their origins.) This puts the prophet squarely in the center of ancient prophetic tradition. In both the revelations he communicated to us and in the sermons he gave, Joseph used these symbols correctly and consistently.

For example, history speaks of water turning to blood, of stars falling from the heavens, of migrating seas and oceans. Knowing what has occurred in the past to give birth to such descriptive metaphorical phrases, one can determine what is meant by the same metaphor in another context—-prophecy, for example. That knowledge allows a consistent system of interpretation, rather than the extravagant guesswork and speculation engaged in by most scriptural exegetes. It also acknowledges a celestial origin for most religious iconography, ritual and metaphor.

The two faces of symbolism

Such symbolism has two aspects or facets: one literal, the other metaphorical. The literal aspect in the water-turned-to-blood example refers to a time in the past when Earth's waters were polluted by exogenous, ferriferous dust. Its use in prophecy refers to a repeat of this phenomenon. Its metaphorical aspect is simply a rhetorical, poetic representation of a physical event or phenomenon. The water does not turn into anything, much less blood. Such is the nature of all metaphor.

This aspect is also a reflection of the ancient mind that turned to dramatic imagery in order to describe the inexplicable. This does not imply that the ancients were somehow less intelligent, that they could not discern the reality in what they saw. Indeed, some—-Plato, for example, or Mormon—-clearly grasped the true nature of catastrophic events and so described them. (See Helaman 12: 8-17.) However, the extraordinary nature of the events ensured that most of the time they would be characterized in symbolic terms, as opposed to analytical terms. The colorful nature of metaphor is always more dramatic and appealing than cold, dispassionate analysis. In any case, the imagery of past catastrophes captured the imagination of the masses, leading to its widespread adoption and use.

The past is the key

It is vital that one have a firm grasp of the events and conditions in antiquity that produced gospel symbolism. The Lord alluded to that fact when he revealed that ". . . truth is knowledge of things as they are, and as they were, and as they are to come." (Doctrine & Covenants 93:24.) The intimate relationship between past, present and future events implied here must be recognized in order to correctly understand the truth when it is presented. This tripartite concept (past = present = future) is often repeated in the scriptures, especially in prophecy.

Undoubtedly, one of the functions of the School of the Prophets, if not the primary function, was educating the brethren in the many prophetic metaphors and symbols employed anciently, their variations, elaborations, their proper application and interpretation. By teaching the systematic interpretation of scriptural metaphors, religious rituals and iconography, the prophet ensured that the priesthood brethren understood their proper use and interpretation. They could interpret this symbolism wherever they came across it and not be misled by doctrinal distortions.

Equipped with this knowledge, any Latter-day Saint can also see that temple and religious iconography is the physical counterpart to rhetorical metaphor. That is to say, the metaphor reflects the meaning of the icon and the icon reflects the meaning of the metaphor. Those things depicted in religious art, architecture, rite and ritual, can also be found in religious rhetoric.

Knowledge: a key to discernment

Indeed, this is one of the keys used to discern a false prophet in a day and age when the meaning of these symbols and metaphors is largely unknown. Because a false prophet is not schooled in the knowledge of these things, he or she lacks the ability to properly use and interpret such symbolism and metaphor. Thus, the pretender's "revelations" and teachings lack these elements. They fail to properly employ the time-honored literary devices known to all true prophets because they are ignorant of the iconography of antiquity. Hence, they interpret prophecy no differently than any run-of-the-mill evangelical exegete.

For much the same reason, the apostate who has turned against the true religion can be a threat. Once intimately schooled in this knowledge of symbolism, the perpetrator has the power to do tremendous damage because he or she can deceive even the "elect," or those who know these symbols and their proper use.

This, too, is an excellent test for a true prophet: He will employ this symbolism properly and in a manner consistent with ancient tradition. While only the whisperings of the Spirit can completely confirm a prophet's claim to revelation, this is additional, intellectual confirmation, if you will. A true prophet will easily and correctly employ traditional, scriptural symbolism in his teachings, and that symbolism will certainly be present in all revelation he passes along to the Saints. In this respect, as in every other, Joseph Smith passed the test successfully.

Left to their own devices

Once the Saints had abandoned Joseph Smith's symbolism-based interpretation of scripture and prophecy, a vacuum appeared in their theology. They no longer had a yardstick or touchstone for interpreting most gospel symbolism. Since nature abhors a vacuum, a ready replacement was soon found in the eschatological thinking of sectarian Christianity. Mormonism, therefore, has largely adopted the prophetic interpretation of sectarian Evangelism, epitomized today by the writings of Hal Lindsay in his book, The Late, Great Planet Earth, or the teachings of Herbert W. Armstrong, a popular millennialist and radio evangelist of the 1950s, in his radio program, "The World Tomorrow." One can see evidence of this when comparing the views of the aforementioned evangelists with those of recent Mormon writers Cleon Skousen and Dwane Crowther. As one aphorism has it, "There ain't a dimes bit of difference between 'em."

Hence, we find Mormons generally interpreting prophetic utterances, ancient and modern, in remarkably similar ways to their evangelical, Christian cousins: metaphor is made literal and symbol is made modern. This leads to gross distortions in the interpretation of prophecy. For example, consider the unfounded interpretation of the year 2000 as the date for the second coming or the obsession with the number 666. It also leads to the creation of fictitious characters such as the Antichrist and fictitious events such as the Rapture. It seems apparent to this author that we may have allowed harmful sectarian notions to find their way into our catechism, just as Elder McConkie repeatedly warned before his death.

Time to reevaluate

Given all the recent discoveries coming out of the sciences regarding impacts and the prophetic warnings that repeatedly forewarn us of spectacular celestial events before the Second Coming, would it not be prudent for Latter-day Saints to reexamine our views? Would it not be wise for us to acknowledge, as modern science already has, that such things may happen? Should we not want to return to our roots in catastrophism, given us by Joseph Smith? If it was once our desire to conform to a trend that led us to abandon our catastrophist base, then why not conform to the newest trend of science, neocatastrophism, in order to return to our former beliefs?

Signs, ancient and modern, in the heavens

When we consider the magnitude and import of seeing the Shoemaker/Levi comet impact giant Jupiter in our own time, one wonders if this astronomical visual aid might not have been God's way of making a point. Was it done merely to amaze or amuse us? Was it done to keep the astronomers, scientists and scholars busy? Or was it, indeed, a sign, meant to awaken us from our apathetic complacency about the times we live in and the planet we live on? Should not Latter-day Saints be the first to recognize this?

The Nephites were given a sign of the Savior's birth. “. . . for behold, at the going down of the sun there was no darkness; . . . . And it came to pass that there was no darkness in all that night, but it was as light as though it was mid-day. And it came to pass that the sun did rise in the morning again, according to its proper order; and they knew that it was the day that the Lord should be born, because of the sign which had been given. . . .

“And it came to pass also that a new star did appear, according to the word.” (3 Nephi 1:15, 19,21.)

Thus, we see that God used the heavens, a celestial canvas, upon which to paint the sign of his Son's advent.

Recent history has given us a rather remarkable sign of our own. “On July 16, 1994, the first fragment of Comet Shoemaker-Levy 9 entered Jupiter's stratosphere traveling at the speed of 60 kilometers per second—-that's about 134,000 miles per hour. Seconds later it exploded. A plume of shock-heated cometary material mixed with hot gases from Jupiter's atmosphere soared more than two thousand miles above the tops of Jupiter's clouds. As material from the plume fell back into the stratosphere of Jupiter, it left a large, crescent-shaped dark spot partly surrounding a smaller intense dark cloud that formed along the entry path of the comet.

“Two days later, Fragment G hit Jupiter with such force that its plume was, in some wavelengths of observation, fifty times brighter than the entire planet. By the end of impact week, Jupiter was bruised with the markings of 21 impacts, dark scars larger than Earth. Not in the 400-year history of the telescope has any planet displayed such dramatic new features. Nine months after the impact ended, Jupiter's southern hemisphere was graced with a belt of dark material, still easily visible through small telescopes.

“We are only now beginning to grasp the magnitude of what has happened.” (Cosmic Collisions, pp. 6, 7, from the foreword by David H. Levy and Carolyn & Eugene Shoemaker.)

Was the impact of a comet with Jupiter in our time any less of a sign than that given to the Nephites? The intent of that sign was to verify that, as Samuel the Lamanite had prophesied, the Son of God had been born. Could it be that the Shoemaker/Levi event was a demonstration to a disbelieving world—-Mormons in particular—-that such things can happen—-indeed, will happen—-to us?

Certainly, it was a verification of assertions by this author, the scriptures, the prophets and a multitude of modern catastrophists that such things do happen; that we live in an uncertain solar system that has seen numerous cosmic disasters in historic times; that old assumptions about a steady-state Earth wherein ". . . all things continue as they were from the beginning of the creation . . ." (2 Peter 3:5.) are flawed; that we have been "willingly ignorant" in this enlightened, modern age, of the truths that the ancients sought to preserve in ritual and stone; that ". . . the world that then was, being overflowed with water, perished: But the heavens and the Earth, which are now . . . are kept in store, reserved unto fire against the day of judgment . . . ." (Ibid. 3:5, 6.)

As Latter-day Saints who have been given the restored gospel, we have a greater obligation to recognize and receive these things than does the rest of the world. Are we not designated as the “children of the light?”

© Anthony E. Larson, 2003

Out of the Past

Joseph Smith lived his life with one foot in the present, the other in the past. That is, in order to effect a ‘restoration,’ he had to know what from the past had been lost in order to restore it.

It’s evident from the abundance of information he bequeath the church that he had a profound understanding of the past. In fact, his entire journey as a modern prophet began because he sought for the original, primitive church. The gold plates entrusted to him contained the ancient history of at least two migrations to the New World long before Columbus. The Egyptian papyri, which he explained with self-assured confidence and considerable accuracy at a time when scholars knew little or nothing about their meaning, dealt with an ancient culture with a rich heritage that scholars are still trying to fully fathom.

One could go on for pages, listing his research into and exposure to the past.

So, ancient history played a huge role in the prophet’s life and career. Given that fact, it would be natural to expect that if anything closely approximating what this author affirms about dramatic changes in the heavens and the earth occasioned by past planetary catastrophes, Joseph would have had something to say about it.

In fact, this was the question that prompted one of the early searches this author initiated into ancient history: Did Joseph Smith describe a world in the past that was in any way notably different from the one we know today? The search yielded a wealth of evidence, some of it direct, some of it anecdotal, that, indeed, Joseph knew of and taught about a very different heaven and earth than the one we see today.

For example, speaking of the Tower of Babel story, Apostle Orson F. Whitney said, “… the object of the people who built the Tower of Babel (was) to reach heaven, to attain one of the starry planets, one of the heavenly bodies.

“… I cannot conceive how … a race of people … could cherish the idea that they could actually reach the sun, moon, or one of the stars simply by piling brick upon brick and stone upon stone.

“But the Prophet Joseph Smith, whose job it was to shed light upon the darkness of this generation, is said to have declared that it was not their intention to reach heaven, but to reach Zion, which was then suspended in mid-air between heaven and earth, or at such a height as to render the project feasible. This certainly is more reasonable.”

Orson Pratt, another Apostle, amplified on this idea, saying, “About the time of Abraham, the Tower of Babel was built. … They thought that the City of Enoch was caught up a little ways from the earth, and that the city was within the first sphere above the earth; and that if they could get a tower high enough they might get to heaven where the City of Enoch and the inhabitants thereof were located.”



Of course, we have the Philo Dibble illustration, presented to him by Joseph Smith, which gives us a virtual picture of Earth in a tandem arrangement with other planets that makes the above statements meaningful. This was Joseph’s vision of what the ancient heavens looked like, what Orson Hyde called “one grand constellation of worlds,” a concept that he undoubtedly learned from Joseph.

This picture of the ancient Earth with its companion planets explains the following statement by Apostle Orson Pratt: “The Prophet Joseph once in my hearing advanced his opinion that the Ten Tribes were separated from the Earth or a portion of the Earth was, by a miracle, broken off and that the Ten Tribes were taken away with it, and that in the latter days it would be restored to the Earth or be let down in the polar regions.”

Fast forward to the present, and we find that most Mormons today know nothing of such accounts because they seem extravagant, far-fetched and implausible in light of the modern, scientific model of our solar system. They simply have not taken the time or made the effort to learn all that Joseph Smith taught. And LDS scholars have simply avoided quoting such observations because they don’t fit the “scientific” or “logical” worldview we embrace and are therefore an embarrassment or an enigma to them. So, they avoid them entirely.

Yet, as it turns out, the very information that mainstream, LDS scholars have an aversion to is actually what the Prophet believed.

Unlike our founder, it can correctly be said that we Saints today live with both intellectual feet firmly planted in the present. Our motto seems to be, “Forget the past,” a position diametrically opposed to our founding prophet’s perspective.

Even when studying the scriptures, we mostly restrict ourselves to an analysis of their content for a spiritual message. We rarely strive for a contextual, temporal picture of the ancients’ world in order to more fully understand the perspective offered in their writings. Instead, we tend to spiritualize what we don’t understand, substituting metaphysical or supernatural explanations to fill the gaps in our understanding. Hence, the entire study of the gospel has become an exercise designed to give everything a spiritual meaning, entirely ignoring the temporal side of all the scriptural accounts.

Try suggesting to most modern Latter-day Saints that a thorough study of antiquity is necessary to understand the restored gospel, and you will note how their eyes glaze over, their brain switches to the ‘off’ mode and they start looking for the exit sign.

Given the unbounded interest of their church’s founder in the past, one must ask, “What’s wrong with this picture?”

© Anthony E. Larson, 2006