I’m going to skip question 2 for a moment;
3,If God didn't take sin upon himself, isn't this just sadistic cruelty to one of his sons? As sin is something that brings distance between us and God, why would it be forgiven through the torture of a separate entity from the Father?
As I said God the Father of spirits choose Yahweh/Jesus because of his eternal righteousness, he anointed him God and gave him the power to create.
As the creator of the earth He is God and Father of it.
4, Without a Trinity, how does Atonement occur ….
Don’t need the Trinity, Yahweh is the God and Father of this earth.
Alma 34:14
14 And behold, this is the whole meaning of the law, every whit pointing to that great and last sacrifice; and that great and last sacrifice will be the Son of God, yea, infinite and eternal.
I’m going to use Alma 42 to explain how we view the atonement.
“But there is a law given, and a punishment affixed…justice claimeth the creature and executeth the law, and the law inflicteth the punishment; if not so, the works of justice would be destroyed,”
For every sin committed there is a punishment attached, this is an eternal law. There is also
“….a repentance granted; which repentance, mercy claimeth….
“For behold, justice exerciseth all his demands, and also mercy claimeth all which is her own; and thus, none but the truly penitent are saved.
What, do ye suppose that mercy can rob justice? I say unto you, Nay; not one whit. If so, God would cease to be God.”
So we are in this dug of war between mercy and justice, as much as God wanted to save us he will not break his own laws of justice.
14 And thus we see that all mankind were fallen, and they were in the grasp of justice; yea, the justice of God, which consigned them forever to be cut off from his presence.
15 And now, the plan of mercy could not be brought about except an atonement should be made; therefore God himself atoneth for the sins of the world, to bring about the plan of mercy, to appease the demands of justice, that God might be a perfect, just God, and a merciful God also.
5, Why does Mormonism hold that the Garden of Gethsemane is the important part of the Passion narrative? Does this not conflict with their stated idea of the Crucifixion as a sin offering?
Starting at the point of entering the Garden until he gave up the Ghost and his blood fell to the ground Jesus Christ was suffering various aspects of the atonement.
Ps 51:17
“ For thou desirest not sacrifice; else would I give it: thou delightest not in burnt offering. The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit: a broken and a contrite heart…”
2 Cor 7: 10 For godly sorrow worketh repentance to salvation not to be repented of: but the sorrow of the world worketh death.
As Jesus entered the Garden it says “ 33 And he taketh with him Peter and James and John, and began to be sore amazed, and to be very heavy;
And saith unto them, My soul is exceeding sorrowful unto death: Mark 14
In Isa 53 it says
“ He is despised and rejected of men; a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief ….Surely he hath borne our griefs, and carried our sorrows:… because he hath poured out his soul unto death”
In three different phases Jesus experiences this pouring “out of his soul unto death”.
Luke 22:44
44 And being in an agony he prayed more earnestly: and his sweat was as it were great drops of blood falling down to the ground.
In our D&C 19 the Lord explains;
15 Therefore I command you to repent—repent, lest I smite you by the rod of my mouth, and by my wrath, and by my anger, and your sufferings be sore—how sore you know not, how exquisite you know not, yea, how hard to bear you know not.
16 For behold, I, God, have suffered these things for all, that they might not suffer if they would repent;
17 But if they would not repent they must suffer even as I;
18 Which suffering caused myself, even God, the greatest of all, to tremble because of pain, and to bleed at every pore, and to suffer both body and spirit—and would that I might not drink the bitter cup, and shrink—
19 Nevertheless, glory be to the Father, and I partook and finished my preparations unto the children of men.
This is a sermon given by Elder Bruce R. McConkie
“..Two thousand years ago, outside Jerusalem’s walls, there was a pleasant garden spot, Gethsemane by name,….We do not know, we cannot tell, no mortal mind can conceive the full import of what Christ did in Gethsemane.
We know He sweat great gouts of blood from every pore as He drained the dregs of that bitter cup His Father had given Him.
We know He suffered, both body and spirit, more than it is possible for man to suffer, except it be unto death.
We know that in some way, incomprehensible to us, His suffering satisfied the demands of justice, ransomed penitent souls from the pains and penalties of sin, and made mercy available to those who believe in His holy name.
We know that He lay prostrate upon the ground as the pains and agonies of an infinite burden caused Him to tremble and would that He might not drink the bitter cup.
We know that an angel came from the courts of glory to strengthen Him in His ordeal, and we suppose it was mighty Michael, who foremost fell that mortal man might be.
As near as we can judge, these infinite agonies—this suffering beyond compare—continued for some three or four hours.”
Only a God could suffer as he suffered in the Garden.
After this Jesus went though a series of events which symbolize the different kinds of suffering we each go though; he was sold for thirty pieces of silver, betrayed, spit on, unjustly accused, imprisoned, whipped, mocked and then placed on the cross. His friends ran away from him and denied him, he had to watch his own mother suffer as she watched her son hang on the cross. All of this was done so that we could turn to him in our times of suffering.
Lot’s of men died on crosses but none were without sin as he was, as he hung on the cross he had this moment where he said;
"And about the ninth hour Jesus cried with a loud voice, saying, Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani? that is to say, My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?" Matt 27
All of his life He had the influence of the Father with him but He had to suffer those last few moments alone on the cross to complete his infinite sacrifice.
I once heard that when the soldiers pierced his side “blood and water” spilled upon the ground is a sign of a major heart attack. His heart was literally broken;
“The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit: a broken and a contrite heart…"
