170 years ago today - Jun 26, 1847

[Wilford Woodruff]
+ During our travels to day I walked most of the way with Professors Pratt, & Carrington And our conversation turned upon the subject of the original formation of God, Angels, men, & Devils the beget-ting of Spirits in the eternal world, & who by, the begetting of Children on the earth, the Death of men & children & the resurrection of All. Each one gave his views, opinions, & reasoning & many interesting remarks were truly made And Any person who should chance to read these lines I wish them to understand that the Ideas given upon these points were not given as doctrin but opinion untill sum thing better should present itself or be decided by revelation.

One of the most important Items If true was presented by Professor Pratt upon A Subject that Heretofore has been entirely out of the reach of All mankind from the days of Adam to the present time As far as is revealed to us. It was upon the subject of the original formation of the first God. We all admitted in the first place that which we believed to be an important truth ie the eternal formation of matter spirit, intelligence in some form or other. We also Agreed in the opinion that Neither God nor man Always had from all eternity the same formation that they now have but did exhist in some form for if we Admitted the fact that one being exhisted in the present form all might have exhisted in the same form as well as one.

Then the question arose how did God recieve his present formation? The Answer given by Professor Pratt was sumthing in the following language:

He sayes I throw out my Ideas not as doctrin but for you to look at. You know when A Chemist goes to work to Analize or try new experiments they often have to try many times before they put a thing perfect & take certain processes which are unnecessary and are afterward laid aside And pursue the most perfect Course that can be [pursu]ed. It may reasonably have been the case with the first being [form]ed which may be Called God. As eternity was filled as it were with particles of intelligence who had there Agency, two of these particles in process of time might have joined their interest together exchanged ideas found by persueing this course that they gained [double?] strength to what one particle of intelligence would have & afterwards were joined by other particles & continued untill they formed A combination or body though through a long process.

Yet they had power over other intelligences in consequence of their combination, organization & strength And in process of time this being body or God seeing the the Advantage of such an organization desires company or A companion And Having some experiance goes to work & organizes other beings by prevailing intelligences to come to gether & may form sumthing better than at the first. And After trials of this kind & the most perfect way sought ought it was found to be the most expeditious & best way to recieve there formations or bodies either spiritual or temporal through a womb.

[Source: Wilford Woodruff's Journal: 1833-1898 Typescript, Volumes 1-9, Edited by Scott G. Kenney, Signature Books 1993, http://amzn.to/newmormonstudies]

No comments:

Post a Comment