Book: Did God have a Wife?–Mormon commentary

I previously reviewed Did God have a Wife?  by William Dever.  I finished with the statement that I would add some commentary specific to an LDS perspective, so here goes:

The concept of God having a wife:
Devers writes with a sense that revealing that God had a wife is an enormous blow to traditional Christianity (and perhaps accurately so if that means the definition of God set forth by the Creeds).  Of course the proposition that God has a wife is not at all threatening to a Mormon.  If you told a Mormon about this “new finding” the response would be something akin to “oh yeah–I already knew that.”

This understanding comes from statements made by the Prophet Joseph Smith to Eliza R. Snow who later penned the lines to the LDS hymn “O My Father” which includes the line “In heav’n are parents single? No, the thoughts makes reason stare!  Truth is reason; truth eternal Tells me I’ve a Mother there.”  (Side comment:  I recall a lecture of Truman Madsen in which he stated that the Mormon Tabernacle Choir received more requests for the lyrics of that particular song than for any other type of inquiry.)  Scripturally the Mormons point to the accounts of the Garden story in which they “the gods” or Elohim (plural in Hebrew) counseled and created the earth and phrases like “calling their name Adam, male and female” illustrating that just as the name “Adam” in that usage encompassed both Adam and Eve that the fullest understanding of the name “God” would parrellel that pattern of reference.  It is also an extrapolation from the Mormon understanding of exaltation being as couples, husbands and wives sealed eternally as one.

The Mormon reading has been considered absolute heresy to the traditional monotheistic religions from the very beginning when Joseph Smith first started talking about it.  Perhaps traditional Christianity will have to modify their official doctrines in light of the research of Dever and others.

Archeological Prevalence and Truth
In the same breath as the paragraph above in which Mormons would not be surprised by the findings of Dever, I think a typical Mormon would view all the archaeological remains highlighted by Dever as evidence of a true doctrine becoming corrupted and mis-incorporated into worship.  The sheer presence of figurines, even widespread prevalence of such female figurines, does not indicate that this is evidence of the “true” and “pure” form of worship of Elohim and Jehovah.   All of the sacred writings of the Mormons:  Old Testament, New Testament, Book of Mormon, Book of Moses, Book of Enoch, and Book of Abraham, tell a similar tale of tragedy–a rejection of the prophets, wickedness, false worship, and sadly on a population wide scale.  So the widespread archeological evidence of worship of a female diety is not evidence to a Mormon that such worship was endorsed by God.  A Mormon sees a true doctrine (the reality of a Heavenly Mother alongside a Father in Heaven) but with misguided worship (Mormons view the doctrine as sacred territory and usually do not speak about it following the pattern of Christ and the prophets and apostles)

Women in LDS temples
This unique understanding also comes from interpretation of LDS temple ceremonies in which the woman is the great heroine of the Garden story and the women participants engage equally in all the ordinances of the Priesthood.  When outside observers cry foul at the Mormons for not being “progressive” in having female pastors or official offices in the Priesthood, I think Mormons struggle to respond because their doctrine and history has such an absolutely exalted view of women, they don’t even know where to begin, because the accusations are so far from the reality of how women are viewed within our community.

The also hesitate to respond because a lot of this understanding comes from the teachings in the temple and Mormons are quite unsure about what is appropriate or how to talk about the temple to those who have no reference point.  More often then not attempts to explain are twisted and thrown back at them in hostility so that the Mormons tend to view talking about things in the temple as “not casting their pearls before swine” so to say.

Summary:

I think Mormons out there would be interested in reading the book to see all the findings and parallels but would take it primarily as, ‘looks like Joseph Smith was right again.’  Time vindicates the prophets.