Is Mormonism Biblical?
- Jason Pluebell
- Jun 19
- 20 min read
Today, we are looking at a "sect of Christianity", as skeptics would call it, that originated in the early 19th century in the United States of America. This article is part of a series where we examine the many Christian cults that exist. The common definition of a cult (as the layman understands it, as worshipping a person) will leave you wondering, "huh, I guess we are all part of a cult in some sort of way", but this definition falls short. When we speak of Christian cults, we are talking about something a little different. An actual cult is a group that is led by a person who demands unorthodox doctrines and absolute loyalty, often characterized by tactics that isolate and deceive their followers to have a sort of "paranoia" towards outsiders. Christian cults alter, add, or remove core salvific doctrines of the Christian faith, to the degree of falling from true salvation and belief in Jesus Christ. The group we will be looking at is Mormonism, or more formally, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
Before We Begin...
Before we start, this message goes out to Mormons specifically. If you are reading this article and believe, or maybe thinking about Mormonism, know that all the information presented is historically accurate and true. I aim to present an honest display and sobering conclusion of if Mormonism is a valid belief that conforms to reality. If any wording or data offends you, I am truly sorry for the conviction and discomfort, but I cannot allow emotions to barricade my standard for truth, and out of the love for all people to hold beliefs that respond successfully to reality, I present the truth. If you end up remaining unconvinced, that is okay; all that I request is your patience, rationality, critical thinking skills, and attention. Thank you for reading, and always ask questions!
What is Mormonism?
A quick Google search of “what is Mormonism” gives us
“Mormonism is the religious beliefs and practices of members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, also known as Mormons. The term describes the doctrines of the church, which were restored to Earth by the Prophet Joseph Smith in 1830.”
Joseph Smith Junior claimed to be a prophet from God, and like Muhammad, claimed that he was prophesied in scripture. The Mormon Church consists of about 16 million people, and its demographic is in the United States. Are Mormons Christian? What does Mormonism teach? Who is Joseph Smith?
How it Started
In the early 1800s, a man named Joseph made some bold claims about the current standing of the Church. In 1830, Joseph Smith Jr. claimed that 10 years prior, in 1820, he went out to the woods and asked God what to believe in. The response he received was that the denominations of the Church are abominations and that the original gospel has been lost. Hold up. We already have an issue, because Mormons today claim to be truly Christian. Why is this? Well, until about the last 30 years, Mormons attacked traditional Christianity. But in these "tolerant" times, they now try to exist peacefully among Christ, what a shame that most Mormons are ignorant of the constant changing of their beliefs to avoid legal and social quarrels.
Joseph claimed that he went to a hill in New York and dug a hole. He found some golden plates with some inscriptions on them, and then claimed to have faithfully translated them into the Book of Mormon from a lost language he called "reformed egyptian", before the Rosetta Stone was deciphered... Now, why was this? Well, in the day of Joseph, early Americans were curious about the natives. How did they live? What food did they eat? What did they believe? Has God worked in their life, and the Book of Mormon aims to answer these exact questions.
The Book of Mormon
Below is a very simplified and comprehensive summary of the Book of Mormon.
The book's narrative begins in about 600 B.C. when some Jews traveled across the seas to the Americas and populated them. The Jews split into 2 Nations, a good and holy nation, and a bad and unholy one. The unholy nation had their skin slowly darken due to their evil (this is because Joseph Smith was racist, and included it in his religion). Over time, the unholy nation wiped out the good ones, leaving the native Americans that the settlers found. Centuries passed, and when Jesus was resurrected and during his 40 days before His ascension, He visited the natives and gave them the gospel. That is a summary of what the Book of Mormon contains.
Now, what is wrong here? Many things. I’ll start with the idea that skin darkens due to evil. This is bad for the Mormons, your prophet was a racist and held views of people that God didn’t approve of (Galations 3:28). Another thing is the Jews crossing an entire ocean, which doesn’t make much sense considering Israel was not an ocean-bearing Nation, nor is it in a desirable location for crossing either ocean to get to the new world. So the Israelites crossing the sea to the Americas makes no historical sense. There is no historical mention of any voyages to the Americas by Israel anywhere.
This is a claim that is 1. Baseless with no evidence, and 2. Does not make any historical sense.
It is also said that on May 15, 1829, the heavens were so excited from Joe's translating that John the Baptist came from Heaven to anoint Joe. (https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/manual/doctrine-and-covenants-stories/chapter-6-joseph-and-oliver-are-given-the-priesthood-may-1829?lang=eng). An event also lacking external historical records outside of Mormon claims.
What Governs Mormon Belief?
Now in this list, not every Mormon believes or knows about every one thing. Just like Islam, Mormon teachers keep their followers ignorant of the Church and its beliefs until later indoctrination, so the stakes of leaving are higher (more on this later).
Mormons have 4 authorities that drive their belief, these include: the Book of Mormon, Doctrines and Covenants, Pearl of Great Price, and very loosely the Bible. Mormons only believe the Bible when it is translated in favor of Mormon Theology, so they cherry-pick the Bible. This is ultimately a result of human nature to suppress God’s truth (Romans 1:18) and embrace our arbitrary desires.
“We believe the Bible to be the word of God as far as it is translated correctly; we also believe the Book of Mormon to be the word of God.” (Articles of Faith 1:8).
So they even admit on the LDS website that they don’t even honestly approach the Bible, only use it when it's convenient. This is ultimately trusting man's word over God's Word; those are some deep waters they’re in!
In the sections below are listed some Christian doctrines that Mormonism changes, adds, or removes that lead to heresy:
Mormon God
Mormonism teaches that God used to be a human and lived on another planet named Kolob. He lived a very righteous and good life and even worshipped his own god (pantheism). Through his good works, he was exalted to become a god himself and received his own planet, named Earth. He then, with his many wives, populated heaven with spirit babies and sent them down through the "veil" to live human lives. All humans have existed in an eternal past with god before being sent down. This doesn't make sense because we know the universe had a beginning, space, time, and energy all started. So why are we talking about eternity when all of this godhood stuff happens in the already existing matter/energy cosmos, wouldn’t humans start existing at their birth from god? It doesn’t logically make sense to say that a finite being existed infinitely in a finite universe. That is the same as saying it is possible to have a square circle: there is a huge category mistake driving this contradiction. Finite things and Infinite things are two separate categories of being.
They believe that God has a physical body, and stands at about 10 feet tall, and he had a firstborn child, named Jesus.
Mormon Jesus
Mormons believe that Jesus is a created being, the firstborn of God, and the older brother of satan. They believe that Jesus was sent down to live a righteous life, not for man's sin, but to become his own god. This Jesus was married, which seems to have come from a gnostic influence or from other texts that claim false authorship and authority that were written centuries after the Gospels. None of this is consistent with the historical or biblical Jesus. Now in the Bible, when Jesus is called the “firstborn”. We aren’t saying Jesus had a beginning, that he was the first creation. The term firstborn, in Judaism, does not apply to the firstborn child; it is given to the offspring that will inherit authority or rank. That is why Jesus is called the firstborn of God, because He has equal Authority with the Father, both being God, and He is to inherit the future Kingdom, and He has the rank to forgive all sins. The fact that Jesus is said to be sitting "at the right hand" of the Father, which is an ancient term that meant a person was seated on the same throne as the King. This meant that Jesus was equal to the Father.
Mormon Trinity
“The Father has a body of flesh and bones as tangible as man’s; the Son also; but the Holy Ghost has not a body of flesh and bones, but is a personage of Spirit. Were it not so, the Holy Ghost could not dwell in us. (D&C 130:22).
Mormons believe that Jesus is the literally birthed son of God and creator of Earth (what does this even mean, considering how Earth was given to god, before Jesus). The uniting of the father and son is not like Christian theology; they are united only in love for us, not in being. They believe that they have distinct personages and both have physical bodies. This contradicts the bible when it says God is spirit, that he is not limited to the confines of space and time, being the creator of it. They believe that the trinity consists of 3 different gods and not one. The Holy Spirit is thought to be the 3rd god, but is stranger than the first 2. The Holy Spirit isn’t a body, but like our feelings themselves. I don’t understand it, and I don't expect you to either.
The trinity in Mormonism makes 0 sense. God is tri-personal, and scripture makes this clear, one being, 3 persons. This is how God can be love because he has love within the persons of Himself, in contrast, Allah of Islam, who must create to experience love.
Mormon Salvation
Mormon salvation is not guaranteed; they must work for it like many others. Mormons also do not have the same meaning to salvation that we do; our salvation is the forgiveness of our sins, saving from damnation through faith in Jesus' death and resurrection, and the dwelling of the Holy Spirit within us to change us righteously. Mormons are progressing to godhood. If they are good enough, they will become a god, receive their planet, and have babies. “For we labor diligently to write, to persuade our children, and also our brethren, to believe in Christ, and to be reconciled to God; for we know that it is by grace that we are saved, after all we can do. (2 Nephi 25:23)” Not only does this contradict the definition of grace, it straight up tries to pull a parody on Ephesians 2:8-9. This entire doctrine, that we become gods, is the same lie that was told to Eve in the garden (Genesis 3:4-6).
Mormon Grace
What does grace get you in Mormonism? It only gets you resurrection. Yep, Jesus’ sacrifice was only so you can be resurrected, nothing else. Even after being risen, a person can still be damned because there are more places to go, and in those places, we continue to work to be righteous for godhood. This is another tool satan uses; he wants you to be too busy to recognize the true value of Jesus’ sacrifice. This work system creates an authority complex, as more work means more salvation. This is why it is very difficult to have a fruitful argument with a Mormon; they are so full of prejudice because they are “better” than non-Mormons by their works. But the grace of Jesus Christ is free, and out of the acceptance of this free gift do we love others, out of love for Jesus, not for a reward but because Jesus lives, and He saves lives.
Mormon Heaven
What is heaven, then, to a Mormon, considering the Bible says that heaven is fellowship with God, a fixed communion between man and God? Many people fall into Mormonism because they constantly send a message of "uniting with family in heaven", and the people who fall for this most likely have unsaved loved one who has passed, but due to their decent behaviours get into Mormon heaven (or one of the heavens, more on this ahead). Another cult tactic that plays and relies on a person's trauma and emotions to manipulate them into committed belief. Heaven is a little different in Mormonism. If a Mormon lives a good life, when they die, they are set on an eternal progression to become a god (still makes no sense, how can you reach the destination if the process is infinite, since God is infinite). They slowly become a full-on god, and when they do, they go to heaven. What is heaven? It’s the place where you have spirit babies with your wives, then you can send them to live human lives. I am geting some deja vu, this sounds familiar. Oh Yeah! Mohammed said something similar to this for heaven. He said heaven was a paradise, with rivers of wine. You can drink from them and have as much sex as you want with your 72 fine maidens.
What is up with these false prophets, and their “heaven” being just a bunch of sexual immorality?
Eternity to a Mormon
There are 4 different places one could go after they die. Jesus’ death brought resurrection to all people, Mormon or not, but not actual salvation.
The first place you could go is the Celestial Kingdom, this is where you become a god, and it has 3 levels. Level 3 is if you were baptized, Level 2 is if you also passed temple acceptance, and Level 1 is if you did these and got married in a temple.
The second place is the Terrestrial Kingdom, this place is similar to Earth and seems similar to purgatory, or a place to work for salvation after death. The Father never visits, only Jesus pops in once in a while to catch up. This is where honorable and good people go.
The third is the Telestial Kingdom (Telestial is not an english word), this is where just plain bad people go, there is no visitation from the Mormon trinity apart from the Holy Spirit. And the fourth place is called the Outer Darkness, which is the place for people who commit apostasy and speak out against the Mormon church.
Where did this theology come from? 2 Corinthians 12:2, where Paul mentions a man being caught in the third heaven (possibly speaking about a NDE), but the Mormon church created an entire theology off a misunderstood verse. What does Paul mean here? There are heavens mentioned in scripture, but they seem to be always talking about 1 of 3 different heavens. The first heaven is the sky that we can see outside, the Earth's Atmosphere. The sky was often referred to as the lowest heaven. The second heaven speaks of celestial bodies, stars, space, and the universe. The third heaven is where God resides. Now since God is spaceless, he cannot exist literally inside a spatial heaven. The third heaven is used to name where outside of space, time, and energy is.
The Restoration of the Gospel
Supposedly, Mormons are resurfacing old and original doctrine that has been hidden and corrupted by the church. Mormons then test the Gospels with the Book of Mormon. This is a very dishonest approach considering the sheer vast amount of supporting evidence there is for the Gospels being reliable. Thus the Restoration of the Gospel is not motivated by an objective truth or historical fact that can be shown.
Scripture is very clear that we test new doctrine with old, “To the teaching and to the testimony! If they do not speak according to this word, it is because they have no dawn. (Isaiah 8:20).” You are commanded to test prophets based on what God has already revealed, which makes sense. “If a prophet or a dreamer of dreams arises among you and gives you a sign or a wonder, and the sign or wonder that he tells you come to pass, and if he says, ‘Let us go after other gods,’ which you have not known, ‘and let us serve them,’ you shall not listen to the words of that prophet or that dreamer of dreams. For the Lord your God is testing you, to know whether you love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul. (Deuteronomy 13:1-3)” It is such a shame that ex-Christian Mormons have left the truth they were called.
What are the requirements to receive the grace of this Mormon gospel? Well, there's a host of things you must do. Here’s a short list:
You MUST obey ALL commands of God, which, by human nature, every Mormon has failed to fulfill.
You MUST be baptized in a specific way.
You MUST become a Latter-day Saints church member by committing a portion of your income to the church.
You MUST become a Melchizedekian Priest, which is not mentioned in the bible. Women are excluded from this, and up until 1978, African Americans were too.
You MUST be approved in the temple by some endowments.
You MUST be married in a Mormon temple and nowhere else.
Then you have received the Restored Gospel.
Mormon Testimony
To a Christian, your testimony is the recalling of the events that led to your accepting Jesus. These stories can vary by person, but there is always an invitation to God that causes a crisis of belief, and the person to think through it. Now, obviously, not every testimony is going to have a person thinking long and hard; some people accept Jesus more easily, but the point is that you had a real reason to accept Christ. To a Mormon, a testimony is not a recalling of events, but the moment when you feel like the Mormon Church is true. This “testimony” is boiled down to a mere feeling, but satan can give you feelings. After all, doesn’t sin feel good? The Heart of man is deceiving, and that’s why we need Jesus.
The Mormon testimony consists of some core must-have things: You must admit God is alive and loves us; That Jesus is the son of God, savior, and redeemer (which has 0 real meaning here); Joseph Smith is a prophet of God and he restored the Gospel; The Church of Latter-day Saints is God’s only Church; The President of the church is a prophet of God that receives revelation. Every first sunday of the month, Mormons get together and share testimony. You must repeat these things over and over again until they are committed to memory and most likely brainwashed you into belief, and you are to do this even when you find things about Mormonism that are odd. This action is supposed to “grow” your faith and testimony.
Testimony is a recalling of the events that led to you logically accepting Christ, not a feeling that you get when you repeat lies over and over again. So much so that you form a mental bond to the good feeling of believing Mormonism is true, and the ideas recited, regardless of their truth value. This is not an environment for a person to think critically about the value of truth and sets them up to operate like a preset machine, rather than an intelligence with the ability to choose. This is a literal cult tactic that removes any clear sight of other decisions about something, making the control of a person easier, since they can’t understand other options, only what they have heard repeated.
The Book of Abraham
In 1835, Joseph Smith Jr. bought some ancient Egyptian papyri and claimed to have translated it. This was before the Rosetta Stone was deciphered, so at this time, not one person could read Egyptian Hyroglyphs. Joseph said that the Papyri belonged to none other than the Patriarch Abraham.
Joseph said that the Papyri showed Abraham about to be sacrificed by an Egyptian priest. The fun fact here is that Joseph wasn’t entirely honest. Part of the image was lost, the priest's upper body was gone, and Joseph just used his imagination to draw a priest with a knife. The Image of Facsimile 1 is not even close to what the actual papyrus was; there is not even a priest in it. When this papyrus was discovered, Joseph’s drawing was deemed a fraud. The actual image was the god Anubis resurrecting Osiris (see images of faked parts and original papyri).
The Egyptian text says nothing about Abraham, and the Mormon Church even admits this! What a total and utter shame that they admitted this. My heart goes out deeply to those of the Mormon church; you are a victim of the con artist Joseph Smith. This means that the Authenticity of the Book of Abraham is nonexistent; no early Jew, Egyptian, or Christian ever mentioned a Book of Abraham.
The Witnesses of the Gold Plates
Some 11 witnesses claimed to have seen the golden plates and the angel Moroni. Giving them the benefit, that even if this did happen, it says nothing about whether these plates contained the truth. The issue isn’t whether they were there or not, it is the contents of their testimonies that's odd. The accounts are vague, undetailed, and lack personal elements. There were no descriptions of Moroni or what they were feeling in the moment. Compare this to the disciples, who didn’t have a quick and convenient encounter for “trust me, bro” claims. They ate, slept, talked, touched, slept next to him, and heard teaching from him over his 40 days until his ascension. Did Joseph get to smell Jesus? No, but the disciples did. The disciples had concrete experiences that spanned over time. If Joseph faked the entire Book of Abraham, then why should we trust him with the plates? Which have never been seen.
Joseph Smith Himself
In 1830, Smith claimed he was sent by God to restore the lost Gospel. He used the same tactic Muhammad used and claimed that the scriptures prophesied him. Where is he mentioned, you might ask? Joseph says that Genesis 50:33 mentions him... Now I wish this weren’t real, but Genesis 50 stops at verse 26, and there is no extension found in any manuscripts of Genesis. So, where did he get this from? Well, he got this from his own perversion of the Bible, in which he forged multiple passages such as this one. There is no verse past 26 in Hebrew, or any manuscripts, so Joseph’s Trustworthiness as a prophet is based on nothing.
The only evidence is a “trust me, beo” scenario. To believe in Smith, you must believe this was a lost verse; but to believe in the lost verse, you must trust Smith. This is a really good example of circular logic. What is the point of a prophecy, if God is going to hide it until the person prophesied about arrives? Prophets of the OT used verifiable actions to prove they were trustworthy and from God, or told of future events in detail. Smith wrote himself into prophethood, a title that does not manifest outside of his ego. Not only this, but Joseph has failed to prophesy, which is a clear-cut sign that they are not from God.
“For verily this generation shall not all pass away until a house shall be built unto the Lord, and a cloud shall rest upon it, which cloud shall be even the glory of the Lord, which shall fill the house. (D&C 84:5)” In the verses before this, the specific plot of land is given. In September of 1832, Smith declared that a temple would be built in Independence, Missouri. This would be the future New Jerusalem and would be built within a generation's time of his saying it. For 100 years, the Mormon church leaders kept expecting their temple, but after 100 or so years, they gave up on it. False prophecy is an indication that the person is not a prophet at all. Not only was Smith not a prophet, but he also had a questionable reputation.
Joseph Smith Junior was not the best man. He was a scam artist who did fortune-telling and such. Joseph held his monotheism very loosely as well. Later in his life, he started sounding more polytheistic, considering he believed there is an infinite number of gods. Joseph had some character issues as well. He had some 40 wives who were married to him behind his original wife’s back. Joseph would often hire maids or servants and then marry them and sleep with them as they worked with him. There is a record of his wife finding him and a maid in a barn having some fun. 11 of these 40 women were already married, and one wife was 14 years old. Uh oh, Mormons, don’t let Joseph near the school playground.
Joseph Smith Jr. was like Muhammad; he gained power as a result of his claims. Drunk with this power, he then changed and morphed Mormonism to feed his sinful desires.
The Follett Sermon
The Follet Sermon is a sermon Joseph gave at a funeral on April 7th, 1844. 20,000 people were present, and he claimed he was inspired by God when he said this. So, genuine Mormons, you have to believe this.
“I will go back to the beginning before the world was, to show what kind of a being God is. What sort of a being was God in the beginning? Open your ears and hear, all ye ends of the earth... God himself was once as we are now, and is an exalted man, and sits enthroned in yonder heavens! That is the great secret.... ... - 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.....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 ideas are incomprehensible 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 himself, the Father of us all, dwelt on an earth, the same as Jesus Christ Himself did… ..The scriptures inform us that Jesus said, as the Father hath power in himself, even so hath the Son power to do what? Why, what the Father did. The answer is obvious- in a manner to lay down his body and take it up again. Jesus, what are you going to do? To lay down my life as my Father did, and take it up again. Do you believe it? If you do not believe it you do not believe the Bible. The scriptures say it, and I defy all the learning and wisdom and all the combined powers of earth and hell together to refute it.”
"Here, then, is eternal life-to know the only wise and true God; and you have got to learn how to be gods yourselves, and to 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 to the resurrection of the dead, and are able to dwell in everlasting burnings, and to sit in glory, as do those who sit enthroned in everlasting power.”
Notice how he says that if you do not believe him, then you do not believe the Bible. Muhammad used this tactic too by telling Muslims that if they read and believed the Gospels, they would go to hell.
[Why do we call Mormonism a Cult?]
The word cult has many uses in today's culture. In a theological context, cult refers to those who claim to be Christian but do not display anything Christian. Anything that perverts core doctrine is classified as a cult to the Church (not speaking of the Mormon Church, but the body of Christ). Early Mormonism said all Christians were abominations and cults, which were nothing but empty insults, and they were not friendly with them at all. You must repeat very obviously false teachings until you memorize them. You must go on mission trips, where mission support (paid by the Mormon church) offers to house the missionaries. These people then continue to indoctrinate the missionaries, “clearing” any confusion from encountering knowledgeable people. What am I saying? The younger you are in the church of Latter-day Saints, the less the church will tell you about weird and irrational Mormonism; they may even teach you traditional Christianity at first. The Church waits until there is a cost of leaving to reveal the wacky and false teachings of Joseph Smith. But no worries, you can find all of this and more on their website!
Conclusion
Mormonism is a false Gospel. It teaches principles and doctrines that contradict the very words of Jesus. Joseph Smith was a crafty devil who created the scam called Mormonism. To be a Mormon, you must: Accept what you are told, no question; Recite the lies of the Mormon Doctrine; and believe in baseless, valueless, untrue claims about God. I pray that this post can open your eyes to the dangers of dabbling in False Gospels. It pains me very much to crap on Mormons like this, but in the pursuit of truth, nothing Satan builds will stand against the real, personal, historical, and living Jesus Christ. May the Holy Spirit draw you to the true Christ. The one who pierced a hole through eternity lived the life we cannot, and took all the punishment and wrath that we deserve. All to rise again and triumph over death and sin. Will you take the next step in knowing Jesus? Are you ready for the best story of your life? In the historical Jesus' name, Amen.
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