--- title: Improvement Era description: Monthly periodical of the Mormon church, 1897 onward. This library holds the issues of November 1897 to December 1930. authors: - Goddard, J. Percy collections: - periodicals tags: - magazine - improvement-era periodical: Improvement Era volume: 33 number: 9 published: 1930-07 publisher: Young Men’s Mutual Improvement Associations publisher_place: Salt Lake City language: en type: magazine reference: "J. Percy Goddard, “Abominable Creeds,” *Improvement Era* 33, no. 9 (July 1930): 599–600." source: url: https://archive.org/details/improvementera3309unse transcription: Transcribed from the Internet Archive scan of each issue (the item for each issue is named in the issue's own source); unnumbered advertising leaves are omitted, printed page numbers are kept as page markers. identifier: improvementera3309unse start_page: 599 end_page: 600 rights: status: public-domain basis: US publication 1930 or earlier (published 1930-07) source: https://archive.org/details/improvementera3309unse publication_year: 1930 note: The Internet Archive item metadata carries a blanket "© Copyright by Intellectual Reserve, Inc." notice. The library owner judged it inapplicable because this issue was published in 1930, before 1931; a scan-level notice does not restore copyright. --- # Abominable Creeds THE IMPROVEMENT ERA 3^2= Vol. 33-41 JULY, 1930 No. 9 Abominable Creeds By J. PERCY GODDARD Member of the Deseret Sunday School Union Board IN this centennial year of the Church of Jesus Christ of Lat- ter-day Saints it has been most interesting and enlightening to re- view the astonishing progress of the last one hundred years. We are living in a new and miraculous age of change and ad- vancement. Literally a flood of light and wisdom has come upon the world since the heavens were reopened to the Prophet of the latter-days. The purpose of this article is to call attention to the fact that dur- ing this century of most marvelous progress signal changes have oc- curred in the teachings of Christian ministers. Oversight of this fact has caused some among us to be somewhat puzzled to account for these words of the Lord to Joseph Smith in the spring of 1820: "All their creeds are an abomination in my sight." OUR young people hear or read the sermons of present day preachers and, on the whole, they are able to subscribe heartily to the things taught, and they wonder at the word of the Lord. How- ever, in large measure, a new Christianity is being taught today which is very different from that which was taught to our grand- parents and great-grandparents a century ago. We shall present an arraignment of some of the common teachings of Christian pulpits by one who was, himself, an eminent preacher and scholar. In 1877 Dr. F. W. Farrar, Dean of Canterbury, preached five sermons in Westminster Abbey, which, much to his surprise, stirred up a most heated controversy throughout Christendom. Dean Farrar is best known among us, as a people, as the author of a "Life of Christ" and a "Life of St. Paul." Due to incorrect versions of his stand as based upon niewspaper reports of his sermons, Dr. Farrar published the offending sermons in 1878 in a volume entitled "Eter- nal Hope." In this volume were included extended comments and notes in defense of the position taken in the sermons themselves. However, after this publication the controversy became even more heated and reached not only all parts of the British Isles and colo- nies but was taken up in America and in continental Europe. Due to the very widespread dis- cussion, and the numerous attacks upon Dr. Farrar's views, he was led in 1881 to publish another, and much more extended volume, undser the title of ("Mercy jand Judgment." This latter book is altogether a defense of the author's The Author position as set forth in his ser- mons, and is an answer to some of his innumerable critics. The two volumes, "Eternal Hope" and "Mercy and Judg- ment" were reprinted through sev- eral editions. Reference attached to quotations contained in this article are to the reprint editions of 1904. The chief points at issue be- tween Dean Farrar and his critics he summarizes under four head- ings, as follows: "1. That the fire of 'Hell' is material, and that its agonies are physical agonies. "2. That the doom of 'everlast- ing damnation' is incurred by the vast majority of mankind. "3. That this doom is passed irreversibly at death on all who die in a state of sin. "4. That the duration of these material torments is necessarily endless for all who incur them." — M. & J., p. 17. From chapter four of "Mercy and Judgment" I quote below just a few of the numerous descrip- tions cited by Dr. Farrar of the "hell" that had been preached for centuries. Calvin, d. 1564 — "For ever harassed by a dreadful tempest, they shall feel themselves torn asunder by an angry God, and broken by the weight of his hand, and transfixed and penetrated by mortal stings, terrified by the thunderbolt of God. So that to sink into any gulf would be more tolerable than to stand for a mo- ment in these terrors." — P. 99. St. Ignatius Loyola, d. 1548 — (Founder of Jesuit Order) "Let us fancy we see hell, and imagine what is worst to behold — a hor- rible cavern full of black flames. 600 The Improvement Era for July, 1930 Sulphur, devils, dragons, fire, swords, arrows, and innumerable damned who roar in despair. Im- agine the worst you can, and then say, 'All this is nothing compared to hell.' In that voracious sub- terranean cavern all the filth of the world is collected and enclosed, without exhalation or air, which must produce a most foetid pesti- lence. * * * The sight is tor- mented by frightful devils; a holy religious saw at death two so mon- strous and ugly devils, that he cried out that rather than see them again he would walk till the day of judgment on fire of sulphur and melted metal." — Spiritual Ex- ercises, Medit. XII. (This is one of the commonest books of Ro- man Catholic devotion.) Thomas Boston, d. 1732 — "God will hold sinners with one hand over the pit of hell, while he torments them with the other." — Fourfold State, p. 102. Jonathan Edwards (one of the most noted of all American preach- ers) d. 1758 — "Here all judges have a mixture of mercy, but the wrath of God will be poured out upon the wicked without mixture. Imagine yourself to be cast into a fiery oven * * * and imagine al- so that your body were to lie there for a quarter of an hour, full of fire, as full within and without as a bright coal fire, all the while full of quick sense: what horror would you feel at the entrance of such a furnace? Oh! then how would your heart sink if you knew that after millions and mil- lions of ages your torment would be no nearer to an end than ever it was. But your torment in hell will be immensely greater than this illustration represents." — Works, Vol. iii, 260, p. 102. "The pit is prepared, the fire is made ready, the furnace is now hot, ready to receive the wicked: the flames do now rage and glow. The God that holds you over the pit of hell, much in the same way as one holds a spider or some loathsome insect, abhors you and is dreadfully provoked. * * * He will trample them beneath his feet with inexpressible fierceness; he will crush their blood out, and will make it fly, so that it will sprinkle his garment and stain all his raiment." — Works, vii, 499. "You cannot stand before an infuriated tiger even; what then will you do when God rushes against you in all his wrath?" — /■ • PERCY GODDARD has al- ways been active in Church work. Indeed, activity is one of his chief characteristics. After filling a mis- sion to Germany, he became an instructor in the L. D. S. Business College, and subsequently taught in Weber College, Agricultural College and University of Utah. He is a graduate of the U. of U. and also of New York University. Since 1911 has been a practicing certified accountant. He was bishop of the 31st Ward in Liberty Stake for twelve years, is now in the High Council of that stake and also a member of the General Sunday School Union Board. Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God. Rev. C. H. Spurgeon (noted English Baptist preacher, contem- porary of Farrar) d. 1892 — "When thou diest thy soul will be tormented alone; that will be a hell for it; but at the day of judg- ment thy body will join thy soul, and then thou wilt have twin- ;hells, thy soul sweating drops of blood, and thy body suffused with agony. In fire exactly like that which we have on earth thy body will lie, asbestos-like for ever un- consumed, all thy veins roads for the feet of Pain to travel on, every nerve a string on which the Devil shall for ever play his diabolical tune of hell's unutterable lament." —P. 104. John Foster (English Baptist preacher and essayist) d. 1843 — "It is infinitely beyond the highest archangel's faculty to ap- prehend a thousandth part of the horror of the doom to eternal damnation." — P. 105. John Wesley (a founder of the Methodist religion) d. 1791 — "Consider that all these torments of body and soul are without in- termission. Be their suffering ever so extreme, be their pain ever so intense, there is no possibility of their fainting away, no, not for one moment. * * * They are all eye, all ear, all sense. Every in- stant of their duration it may be said of their whole frame that they are 'Trembling alive all o'er, And smart and agonise at every pore.' "And of this duration there is no end. * * * Neither the pain of body nor of soul is any nearer an end than it was millions of ages ago." — P. 107. Several passages are cited setting forth the thought that the view of the misery of the damned will increase the joy of the saints in heaven. By way of summary of the com- mon teachings regarding "hell," Dr. Farrar says: "But that souls are to be plunged into a material fire, miraculously created or kept aflame, and to be tormented with excruciating physical pangs during billions of ages for every second of sin, while saints and angels rejoice at their sufferings — these are the assertions which I wish to hear authoritatively repudiated, and which I myself repudiate with abhorrence. "It is not true that few only have propounded such teachings. Such passages may be adduced from thousands of writers of every class, both Romanist and Protestant, both Anglican and Noncomformist, and in every age from the third century to the nine- teenth."—Pp. 95-96. "To overthrow a belief in such horrors and such blasphemies is to overthrow a belief which is the worst enemy of the Faith, and which is the immediate parent of atheism, of wretchedness, and of despair."— P. 106. Dean Farrar continues: "It is but quite recently that Father Furniss has written and Messrs. Duffy have published, such ghastly tracts as 'The Spirit of Hell,' 'The Terrible Judgment and the Bad Child,' 'The Book of the Dying,' etc. * * I hardly like to copy, even by way of specimen, such re- volting horrors. " 'When a child commits a mortal sin its soul is not thrown into a den of lions, but it is thrown into a den of devils. These devils are a million times more cruel and frightful than lions and tigers, and serpents, and adders, and scorpions, and toads, and spiders, and all kinds of venomous and stinging creatures'." Pp.106, Is it any wonder the Lord de- clared "All their creeds are an abomination in my sight!"' In a following article will be shown the effect upon men of the doctrines herein described and fur- ther that the commonly accepted belief was that all but a compara- tive few of the human race will be subjected to endless sufferings hereafter with no hope of God's compassion or forgiveness beyond the grave.