LDS How Many Apostles?

Paul of Eugene OR

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Doesn’t the LDS Church have 15 Apostles? The Quorum of the 12 and the 1st Presidency? I read that there has been as many as 21 Apostles in the LDS Church at one time. Why not 12 like the early Church? Why the difference if they are the restored Church?
Look, its their religion, let them have whatever they want in terms of their own apostles.
 
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mmksparbud

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Look, its their religion, let them have whatever they want in terms of their own apostles.


Well for crying out loud!!----Who said it isn't their religion?---They can have however many apostles they want--and do. That is hardly the point! This is a debating forum about religions--or hadn't you heard?? As a non-Christian religion, on this site, Christians do have the right to ask questions of them as to what and why the believe as they do. If you look around, there is usually 1 thread that will be dissecting my faith--I do not take offense. I just try and correct any false statements. Can't debate what is the same--only what is different.
 
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Solomon Smith

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Look, its their religion, let them have whatever they want in terms of their own apostles.

No I don’t have to condone their fake Apostles. Apostles don’t exist anymore. An Apostle is one who has been specifically sent by Jesus Christ.
 
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Peter1000

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Jesus can appear to whomsoever He will. It's just that there was no further additions of apostles after Paul mentioned in the bible, so wondering why you feel to add more. After the apostles, they were designated bishops, elders, deacons.
I do not put a cap on the Lord. I do put a cap on what man does outside of the bible. And it is not so that you think your God is all powerful, for you do not feel that God created everything out of nothing, only from what was already there.
The apostles were the foundation of the first century church along with Jesus Christ (see Ephesians 2:19-20). You can see that bishops are not part of the foundation. Bishops did not recieve the keys to the kingdom of heaven, only apostles had those keys (see Matthew 16:18-19).

So as the apostles went around the world, they called bishops of local areas and gave them some of the keys that they had, but just for their local area, and when this bishop died, so did his keys. And a new bishop was called by the apostles for that area. This is how the Lord Jesus Christ, maintained order in the church.

The bishop had the power to call and ordain elders and deacons etc. to keep order in the church in his area.

All went along quite well (read Ephesians 4:11-14) because the apostles were doing their job. Those with the keys had the right to receive revelation from Jesus Christ. The apostles had the right to receive revelation for the entire church, the bishops had the right to receive revelation for their particular area, but not for other areas.

Eventually, because of the wickedness of the world, the Lord allowed all of the apostles to be murdered and in doing so, he allowed for the keys to be lost from the earth. This is called the Great Apostacy.

Because of the Great Apostacy, there was a need to restore the apostles back to the earth so that the foundation of the church could be established again, so that the Lord could give revelations to the apostles again to move the church forward.
 
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mmksparbud

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The apostles were the foundation of the first century church along with Jesus Christ (see Ephesians 2:19-20). You can see that bishops are not part of the foundation. Bishops did not recieve the keys to the kingdom of heaven, only apostles had those keys (see Matthew 16:18-19).

So as the apostles went around the world, they called bishops of local areas and gave them some of the keys that they had, but just for their local area, and when this bishop died, so did his keys. And a new bishop was called by the apostles for that area. This is how the Lord Jesus Christ, maintained order in the church.

The bishop had the power to call and ordain elders and deacons etc. to keep order in the church in his area.

All went along quite well (read Ephesians 4:11-14) because the apostles were doing their job. Those with the keys had the right to receive revelation from Jesus Christ. The apostles had the right to receive revelation for the entire church, the bishops had the right to receive revelation for their particular area, but not for other areas.

Eventually, because of the wickedness of the world, the Lord allowed all of the apostles to be murdered and in doing so, he allowed for the keys to be lost from the earth. This is called the Great Apostacy.

Because of the Great Apostacy, there was a need to restore the apostles back to the earth so that the foundation of the church could be established again, so that the Lord could give revelations to the apostles again to move the church forward.

Not all were murdered. John died a natural death--only one. There is not one thing stated about any apostles passing on any keys. There is no such apostasy. There was a falling away of the truth--when Catholicism had reign over the world and they did not allow anyone to read His word except for their priests. Things were lost by most--but not the bible itself, It has been preserved and always will be. There was always a remnant that God kept and they kept the bible going until the reformation. The dead sea scrolls proved that nothing in the bible was lost.
 
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Ironhold

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The dead sea scrolls proved that nothing in the bible was lost.

That's a common misconception.

Dead Sea Scrolls - Wikipedia

They don't include the New Testament Texts, and lack the book of Esther.

What they do have, however, are a number of works that are now considered deuterocanonical, plus several previously-unknown works possibly exclusive to whatever sect created and preserved them.
 
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mmksparbud

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That's a common misconception.

Dead Sea Scrolls - Wikipedia

They don't include the New Testament Texts, and lack the book of Esther.

What they do have, however, are a number of works that are now considered deuterocanonical, plus several previously-unknown works possibly exclusive to whatever sect created and preserved them.


It is not a misconception.
I know they don't include the NT--and as for Esther--they did find a passage from it not too long ago. They contain every book of the OT--and it is the OT that Jesus, all the disciples and every new Christian had. It is the OT that Jesus said spoke of Him. The OT that converted the Jews to Christianity. The NT was just letters going around to the churches at first.
 
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Peter1000

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It is not a misconception.
I know they don't include the NT--and as for Esther--they did find a passage from it not too long ago. They contain every book of the OT--and it is the OT that Jesus, all the disciples and every new Christian had. It is the OT that Jesus said spoke of Him. The OT that converted the Jews to Christianity. The NT was just letters going around to the churches at first.
You are correct about the NT, but the dead see scrolls are another thing entirely. Do you realize that even though almost every book of the OT is present in the DSS, only fragments of the books of the OT are found in the DDS. Therefore if I had to put a % of the entire OT that is represented in the DDS, it would be 20%.

Not enough to support a statement like, the DDS proves that none of the words of the OT have ever been lost or changed. The general meaning is proven, but some specific words and some specific scriptures have been lost or changed, and I as I remember it could be many hundreds or thousands, which is some cases may change the meaning of the text.
 
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dzheremi

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Peter, you are aware that there is such a thing as scriptural canon(s), right? Your post presupposes the Mormon view of things being 'lost', because that gives your religion conceptual and intellectual grounds to claim to be 'restoring' what was 'lost'. But we actually already have Christian churches (in the form of the Orthodox Tewahedo churches of Ethiopia and Eritrea) whose canons contain many more OT (and NT) books than in the standard canon familiar to people outside of those particular churches, and the way they got to be like was not through some kind of reintroduction or reestablishment of books that had been 'lost', but by preserving what they had received in their own language (which at the time was Ge'ez/"classical Ethiopic"). Whatever was not preserved is not therefore 'lost' so much as it did not make the cut for whatever reasons, was not found in Ge'ez or translated into it, etc.

The Jews are actually very similar in this regard, in that they do not all share the same canon with each other beyond the basics common to all (cf. the Christian NT -- all have at least the 27 expounded in the canon as set by HH St. Athanasius the Apostolic, but some do have more), so it depends on which tradition you look at.

You are looking at things in an anachronistic way, my friend. There was never one canon that was huge and then chipped away from (in an 'apostasy' or in any other circumstance). The Bible, both OT and NT, was received at particular places by particular peoples, and was later canonized according to what became the agreed upon basic set of 27 NT books and however many OT books (again, it varies, so you can't put an exact number on it), but as the Ethiopian link shows, these lists can vary a lot. That has to do with the actual history of the reception of the scriptures in the real world in which we all live -- not an alternate pseudo-history designed to put non-scriptural Mormon writings or ongoing revelations on par with what has been established in Christian history since the 4th century. (Really since the second century, if you want to count the development of the Christian canon as beginning with the troubles started by the heretic Marcion, who was kicked out the Church at Rome in the 140s for mutilating the canon of scripture as it was then by removing the OT basically entirely. That shows the Church had some form of canon established at that time, but the drive to create a distinctly Christian canon -- which would later be codified by HH St. Athanasius the Apostolic and others at their respective synods -- began in reaction to him.)
 
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mmksparbud

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You are correct about the NT, but the dead see scrolls are another thing entirely. Do you realize that even though almost every book of the OT is present in the DSS, only fragments of the books of the OT are found in the DDS. Therefore if I had to put a % of the entire OT that is represented in the DDS, it would be 20%.

Not enough to support a statement like, the DDS proves that none of the words of the OT have ever been lost or changed. The general meaning is proven, but some specific words and some specific scriptures have been lost or changed, and I as I remember it could be many hundreds or thousands, which is some cases may change the meaning of the text.

While some of the Qumran biblical manuscripts are nearly identical to the Masoretic, or traditional, Hebrew text of the Old Testament, some manuscripts of the books of Exodus and Samuel found in Cave Four exhibit dramatic differences in both language and content. In their astonishing range of textual variants, the Qumran biblical discoveries have prompted scholars to reconsider the once-accepted theories of the development of the modern biblical text from only three manuscript families: of the Masoretic text, of the Hebrew original of the Septuagint, and of the Samaritan Pentateuch. It is now becoming increasingly clear that the Old Testament scripture was extremely fluid until its canonization around A.D. 100.[128]


In conclusion, we should accord to the Masoretes the highest praise for their meticulous care in preserving so sedulously the consonantal text of the Sopherim which had been entrusted to them. They, together with the Sopherim themselves, gave the most diligent attention to the accurate preservation of the Hebrew Scriptures that has ever been devoted to any ancient literature, secular or religious, in the history of human civilization...

Because of their faithfulness, we have today a form of the Hebrew text which in all essentials duplicates the recension which was considered authoritative in the days of Christ and the apostles, if not a century earlier. And this in turn, judging from Qumran evidence, goes back to an authoritative revision of the Old Testament text which was drawn up on the basis of the most reliable manuscripts available for collation from previous centuries. These bring us very close in all essentials to the original autographs themselves, and furnish us with an authentic record of God's revelation. As W. F. Albright has said, "We may rest assured that the consonantal text of the Hebrew Bible, though not infallible has been preserved with an accuracy perhaps unparalleled in any other Near Eastern literature."[129]
Number
Book
found
Psalms 39
Deuteronomy 33
1 Enoch 25
Genesis 24
Isaiah 22
Jubilees 21
Exodus 18
Leviticus 17
Numbers 11
Minor Prophets 10[notes 1]
Daniel 8
Jeremiah 6
Ezekiel 6
Job 6
Tobit 5[136]
1 & 2 Kings 4
1 & 2 Samuel 4
Judges 4[137]
Song of Songs (Canticles) 4
Ruth 4
Lamentations 4
Sirach 3
Ecclesiastes 2
Joshua 2


Number of BOM ancient scripts found for verification of authenticity: NONE
 
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Peter1000

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Not all were murdered. John died a natural death--only one. There is not one thing stated about any apostles passing on any keys. There is no such apostasy. There was a falling away of the truth--when Catholicism had reign over the world and they did not allow anyone to read His word except for their priests. Things were lost by most--but not the bible itself, It has been preserved and always will be. There was always a remnant that God kept and they kept the bible going until the reformation. The dead sea scrolls proved that nothing in the bible was lost.
There is not one thing stated about any apostles passing on any keys. That is exactly why there was an apostacy.

The keys that Peter and the apostles held, remember, is the power that what you do on earth, is accepted in heaven. Therefore, if no keys were passed, then no real power to bind and loose, which was a hallmark of the apostles.

What you are left with is an earthly kind of power given to men, by men. This power looked spactacular and was very celebrated among the strong leaders, but lacked the true heavenly power to bind and loose. Without that power, no true church. That is why it did not take long for the 1 church to start splitting up into factions with no clear leader, that never came together again, even unto this day.
 
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Peter1000

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While some of the Qumran biblical manuscripts are nearly identical to the Masoretic, or traditional, Hebrew text of the Old Testament, some manuscripts of the books of Exodus and Samuel found in Cave Four exhibit dramatic differences in both language and content. In their astonishing range of textual variants, the Qumran biblical discoveries have prompted scholars to reconsider the once-accepted theories of the development of the modern biblical text from only three manuscript families: of the Masoretic text, of the Hebrew original of the Septuagint, and of the Samaritan Pentateuch. It is now becoming increasingly clear that the Old Testament scripture was extremely fluid until its canonization around A.D. 100.[128]


In conclusion, we should accord to the Masoretes the highest praise for their meticulous care in preserving so sedulously the consonantal text of the Sopherim which had been entrusted to them. They, together with the Sopherim themselves, gave the most diligent attention to the accurate preservation of the Hebrew Scriptures that has ever been devoted to any ancient literature, secular or religious, in the history of human civilization...

Because of their faithfulness, we have today a form of the Hebrew text which in all essentials duplicates the recension which was considered authoritative in the days of Christ and the apostles, if not a century earlier. And this in turn, judging from Qumran evidence, goes back to an authoritative revision of the Old Testament text which was drawn up on the basis of the most reliable manuscripts available for collation from previous centuries. These bring us very close in all essentials to the original autographs themselves, and furnish us with an authentic record of God's revelation. As W. F. Albright has said, "We may rest assured that the consonantal text of the Hebrew Bible, though not infallible has been preserved with an accuracy perhaps unparalleled in any other Near Eastern literature."[129]
Number
Book
found
Psalms 39
Deuteronomy 33
1 Enoch 25
Genesis 24
Isaiah 22
Jubilees 21
Exodus 18
Leviticus 17
Numbers 11
Minor Prophets 10[notes 1]
Daniel 8
Jeremiah 6
Ezekiel 6
Job 6
Tobit 5[136]
1 & 2 Kings 4
1 & 2 Samuel 4
Judges 4[137]
Song of Songs (Canticles) 4
Ruth 4
Lamentations 4
Sirach 3
Ecclesiastes 2
Joshua 2


Number of BOM ancient scripts found for verification of authenticity: NONE
We were talking about the DSS. You said the DSS prove that the OT was not changed very much from the originals.

I said that we only have about 20% of the entire OT represented by fragments of papyrus. Some fragments only consist of several verses from 1 book. The book of Isaiah is almost compete, none of other books, and only mere fragments of the rest. So altogether, I would guess that we have around 20% of the original.

My point is, you cannot with 20%, say that the DSS proves anything, except for Isaiah, and if I studied that book, Masoretic vs DDS, I would find hundreds of changes. Has anyone done this work?
 
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mmksparbud

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We were talking about the DSS. You said the DSS prove that the OT was not changed very much from the originals.

I said that we only have about 20% of the entire OT represented by fragments of papyrus. Some fragments only consist of several verses from 1 book. The book of Isaiah is almost compete, none of other books, and only mere fragments of the rest. So altogether, I would guess that we have around 20% of the original.

My point is, you cannot with 20%, say that the DSS proves anything, except for Isaiah, and if I studied that book, Masoretic vs DDS, I would find hundreds of changes. Has anyone done this work?

And I am saying that with 0% of any corroborating evidence for the BOM---you can not say that the BOM proves anything at all. What the DSS has shown SO FAR is that what they have all verifies the OT as we have it. Everything new that they are uncovering has been just as the OT says. They still are uncovering more.

Isa_55:11 So shall my word be that goeth forth out of my mouth: it shall not return unto me void, but it shall accomplish that which I please, and it shall prosper in the thing whereto I sent it.
 
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mmksparbud

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Isa_22:22 And the key of the house of David will I lay upon his shoulder; so he shall open, and none shall shut; and he shall shut, and none shall open.
Rev_3:7 And to the angel of the church in Philadelphia write; These things saith he that is holy, he that is true, he that hath the key of David, he that openeth, and no man shutteth; and shutteth, and no man openeth;
Rev_9:1 And the fifth angel sounded, and I saw a star fall from heaven unto the earth: and to him was given the key of the bottomless pit.
Rev_20:1 And I saw an angel come down from heaven, having the key of the bottomless pit and a great chain in his hand.
Rev_1:18 I am he that liveth, and was dead; and, behold, I am alive for evermore, Amen; and have the keys of hell and of death.

JS never had the keys to anything.
 
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Solomon Smith

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Define "specifically sent"?

An Apostle is someone who has seen Jesus face to face and witnessed the resurrection and has been sent by him personally. There are no more Apostles. The Apostolic age ended. What more definition is needed?
 
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Ironhold

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An Apostle is someone who has seen Jesus face to face and witnessed the resurrection and has been sent by him personally. There are no more Apostles. The Apostolic age ended. What more definition is needed?

Don't know about anyone else here, but I find it horrific to think that the heavens are closed and God is done speaking.
 
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