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Intelligences

 

"Man was also in the beginning with God. Intelligence, or the light of truth, was not created or made, neither indeed can be. All truth is independent in that sphere in which God has placed it, to act for itself, as all intelligence also; otherwise there is no existence."—Doctrine & Covenants 93:29-30.

"Mormonism has definite and unique beliefs about the nature of human beings—they are uncreated intelligences with free agency; all humans are children of God created in his image; earth life is purposeful; salvation is a process rather than a far-off goal."—Lowell Bennion, "A Mormon View of Life," Dialogue: A Journal of Mormon Thought 24/3 (1991): 68, on New Mormon Studies CD-ROM.

"Our personal intelligence is everlasting and divine."—Russell M. Nelson, "Where is Wisdom?," Ensign, November 1992, on Church Magazines CD-ROM.

"In our own primeval births, the eternal intelligence part of us was 'organized' and provided opportunity to become part of God's plan of salvation—with the potential to become like him. This doctrine is ennobling and intriguing—a subject that we hope will be among the many great and important things about which God will yet reveal more."—Donald Q. Cannon, Larry E. Dahl, and John W. Welch, "The Restoration of Major Doctrines through Joseph Smith: The Godhead, Mankind, and the Creation," Ensign, January 1989, on CMCD.

"…according to the express word of God "intelligences" are not created, neither indeed can they be."—B. H. Roberts, The Seventy's Course in Theology (Salt Lake City: Deseret, 1907), 10, on Infobases Gospel Library CD-ROM.

"…intelligent entities perceive the truth, are conscious of the truth, they know that which is, hence 'the light of truth,' 'intelligence.'"—B. H. Roberts, The Seventy's Course in Theology (Salt Lake City: Deseret, 1907), 8, on IGLCD.

"There is something that is not created or made. The Scriptures called it 'intelligence,' which at a certain stage in the pre-existence was organized into a 'spirit.' After that spirit had grown to a certain stature it then was given the opportunity by an all-wise Father to come into another stage for its development. It was added upon, and after having lived its span and having attained to its purpose in mortality, another change took place. We go, not into another life in fact, but into another stage of the same life. There something which was not created or made, and something which does not die, and that something shall live on forever."—Teachings of the Presidents of the Church: Harold B. Lee (Salt Lake City: The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, 2000), 9.

"A spirit…was an organized intelligence. This is the first beginning we have in our understanding of what a spirit is. It is an organized intelligence that lived as a spirit before this world was."—Teachings of the Presidents of the Church: Harold B. Lee (Salt Lake City: The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, 2000), 11.

"Now that is the first truth that we learn that there was an organized intelligence that was called…a spirit.…The fact that you and I are here on this earth with a physical body is an evidence that we were among those who kept our first estate; we passed the test and were permitted to come here. If we hadn't passed the test we wouldn't be here; we would be down with Satan trying to tempt the ones who had a body…"—Teachings of the Presidents of the Church: Harold B. Lee (Salt Lake City: The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, 2000), 11-12.

"The earth was created and organized as the dwelling place of heaven-born spirits in mortal bodies to 'prove them herewith, to see if they will do all things whatsoever the Lord their God shall command them.'"—Teachings of the Presidents of the Church: Harold B. Lee (Salt Lake City: The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, 2000), 225.

"The mind or the intelligence which man possesses is co-equal with God himself."—Teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith, compiled by Joseph Fielding Smith (Salt Lake City: Deseret, 1976), 353.

"Intelligence is eternal and exists upon a self-existent principle. It is a spirit from age to age, and there is no creation about it. All the minds and spirits that God ever sent into the world are susceptible of enlargement."—Teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith, compiled by Joseph Fielding Smith (Salt Lake City: Deseret, 1976), 354.

"God is thus the organizer of eternal intelligences, which can neither be created nor destroyed (see D&C 93:29)."—Neal A. Maxwell, "The Richness of the Restoration," Ensign, March 1998, on CMCD.

"Now then, to make a summary of what I have just read, may I ask each of you again the question, 'Who are you?' You are all the sons and daughters of God. Your spirits were created and lived as organized intelligences before the world was. You have been blessed to have a physical body because of your obedience to certain commandments in that premortal state. You are now born into a family to which you have come, into the nations through which you have come, as a reward for the kind of lives you lived before you came here and at a time in the world’s history, as the apostle Paul taught the men of Athens and as the Lord revealed to Moses, determined by the faithfulness of each of those who lived before this world was created."—Harold B. Lee, "Understanding Who We Are Brings Self-Respect," Ensign, January 1974, on CMCD.

"The prophet Abraham found favor in the sight of the Lord. He was given the assurance that he was a great and noble intelligence before coming to this earth. He learned that the earth was created as a place for the intelligences to dwell after their birth as mortal beings. Here they would be tested and tried to see if they would do all things that the Lord God would command them to do. Earth life would thus become a testing ground."—Henry D. Taylor, "A Time of Testing," Ensign, December 1971, on CMCD.

"In the process of time each of our intelligences was clothed with a spiritual body by heavenly parents, and we became personages of spirit with bodies of eyes and ears and hands and feet. All of us on this earth had the same Father of our spiritual bodies, and because he lives in heaven, we have been rightfully taught to refer to him as 'our Father in heaven.'"—Daniel H. Ludlow, "Moral Free Agency," New Era, November 1976, on CMCD.

"The intelligence of spirits had no beginning, neither will it have an end. That is good logic. That which has a beginning may have an end. There never was a time when there were not spirits; for they are co-equal [co-eternal] with our Father in heaven."—Teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith, compiled by Joseph Fielding Smith (Salt Lake City: Deseret, 1976), 353.

"And the Creator is under no necessity to annihilate the soul for want of power to support its faculties, for want of objects on which to exercise them, or for want of space to contain the innumerable intelligences that are incessantly emerging into existence: for the range of immensity is the theatre of his Omnipotence, and that powerful Energy, which has already brought millions of systems into existence, can as easily replenish the universe with ten thousand millions more…So that in every point of view in which we can contemplate the soul of man and the perfections of its Creator, it appears not only improbable, but even absurd in the highest degree, to suppose that the spark of intelligence in man will ever be extinguished."—Latter-day Saints' Messenger and Advocate, Kirtland, Ohio, December 1836, Vol. III, No. 3, Whole No. 27., on NMSCD.

"It is not difficult, with this large vision of the universe and its innumerable Intelligences before us as set forth in previous chapters—it is not difficult, I say, to understand how that in the creation of our little earth in the universe, a plurality of Divine Personages were united in directing its organization, and decreeing the lines of its development, and these Intelligences were the incarnation of all that is known as Deity, each one of them;15 and doubtless were the Intelligences known as the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit."—The Truth, The Way, The Life, An Elementary Treatise on Theology: The Masterworks of B. H. Roberts, Stan Larson, ed. (San Francisco: Smith Research Associates, 1994), on NMSCD.

"God has taken these intelligences, given to them spirit bodies, and given them instructions and training. Then he proceeded to create a world for them and sent them as spirits to obtain a mortal body, for which he made preparation. And when they were upon the earth, he gave them instructions on how to go about developing and conducting their lives to make them perfect, so they could return to their Father in heaven after their transitions. Then came the periods of time when souls were to be placed upon the earth and born to parents who were permitted to furnish the bodies. But no parent has ever yet on this earth been the parent of a spirit, because we are so far yet from perfection. Remember what was said a while ago, that “As man is, God once was; and as God is, man may become.”They came with the definite understanding that they could return to become like God and go forward in their great development and progress."—Spencer W. Kimball, "Our Great Potential," Ensign, May 1977, on CMCD.

"These intelligences (speaking of those who were spirits) were the noble and great ones, those who were potential kings and queens of heaven."—"The Pearl of Great Price: A Unique Scripture," Ensign, December 1972, on CMCD.