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Hello. (Excuse me for my bad english)

I heard that there are several different degrees of heaven and glory in each.

And very few people were going to hell.

This is reassuring, because many religions promise hell to non-believers, which is highly discouraging to the converted. (if they are unable to convince their whole family)

What are the levels within the celestial paradise, terrestrial and telestial ?

Is it true that the highest degree of the celestial exaltation is to become a "god" dealing with another world and to guide its inhabitants ?

Simply being a married Mormon for that ? (priesthood aaron / Melchizedek is needed? or priests do not have a higher degree after death than other Mormon s?)

Is it true that Mormons of celestial kingdom can visit their friends and members of us family in the telestial or terrestial kingdom ?

Thank you.

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Hello. (Excuse me for my bad english)

I heard that there are several different degrees of heaven and glory in each.

And very few people were going to hell.

This is reassuring, because many religions promise hell to non-believers, which is highly discouraging to the converted. (if they are unable to convince their whole family)

What are the levels within the celestial paradise, terrestrial and telestial ?

Hi Drojizad -

It's true; Mormonism is remarkably universalistic about who actually winds up "saved".

Regarding the celestial, terrestrial, and telestial kingdoms, the best source for you to look at on this question would be Doctrine and Covenants, Section 76 (link to the French version).

Is it true that the highest degree of the celestial exaltation is to become a "god" dealing with another world and to guide its inhabitants ?

I believe, that, yes. It doesn't mean that we will become greater than God Himself. But it does mean that, through the atonement of Christ, God offers us the opportunity to do the exact same thing that He does.

Simply being a married Mormon for that ? (priesthood aaron / Melchizedek is needed? or priests do not have a higher degree after death than other Mormon s?)

Mormonism teaches that to attain the highest "degree of glory", it is necessary to for a husband and a wife to be married and to have that marriage solemnized by a special type of ceremony called a "sealing". These are done inside LDS temples. As part of the process of preparation for the temple rituals, Mormon males are ordained to an order of priesthood called the "Melchizedek Priesthood" (the "Aaronic Priesthood" is a lower order of priesthood that a male receives as he is being prepared to receive the Melchizedek Priesthood). Mormon females are not required to receive a priesthood ordination before receiving the temple rituals.

Is it true that Mormons of celestial kingdom can visit their friends and members of us family in the telestial or terrestial kingdom ?

Most Mormons view the "levels of heaven" as actual, physical places but acknowledge that people who go to the celestial kingdom can also visit "lower" realms.

Personally, I view the "levels of heaven" primarily as states of being, not physical places; and I think association between the "kingdoms" is a lot less problematic than some Mormons seem to think it will be. But that's just my opinion, not official LDS teaching. ;)

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One thing to understand is that there is a spirit world where the dead go before final judgement.

After death we go to Spirit Paradise or Spirit Prison. This is most like traditional heaven and hell. But it is temporary and a per-judgement before the final judgement. There those in prison will be taught the gospel and can, if they accept Christ, enter into paradise.

After judgement and the resurrection, our bodies are glorified in degrees. See 1 Corinthians 15.

Will we become "gods?" Well it depends on how you want to define it, but the LDS Topical Guide, points to the following Bible verses in the topic "Man, Potential to Become like Heavenly Father"

let them have dominion: Gen. 1:26 . ( Moses 2:26 . )

man is become as one of us: Gen. 3:22 . ( Moses 4:28 . )

be holy: for I … am holy: Lev. 19:2 . ( 1 Pet. 1:16 . )

thou hast made him a little lower than the angels: Ps. 8:5 .

madest him to have dominion over the works of thy hands: Ps. 8:6 .

Ye are gods; and all of you are children of the most High: Ps. 82:6 .

Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father: Matt. 5:48 . ( 3 Ne. 12:48 . )

spirit hath not flesh and bones, as ye see me have: Luke 24:39 .

Is it not written in your law … Ye are gods: John 10:34 . ( Ps. 82 ; D&C 76:58 . )

we are the offspring of God: Acts 17:29 .

heirs of God, and joint-heirs with Christ: Rom. 8:17 .

changed into the same image from glory to glory: 2 Cor. 3:18 .

if a son, then an heir of God through Christ: Gal. 4:7 .

Till we all come … unto a perfect man: Eph. 4:13 .

be in subjection unto the Father of spirits, and live: Heb. 12:9 .

when he shall appear, we shall be like him: 1 Jn. 3:2 .

him that overcometh will … sit with me in my throne: Rev. 3:21 .

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Mormonism teaches that to attain the highest "degree of glory", it is necessary to for a husband and a wife to be married and to have that marriage solemnized by a special type of ceremony called a "sealing". These are done inside LDS temples. As part of the process of preparation for the temple rituals, Mormon males are ordained to an order of priesthood called the "Melchizedek Priesthood" (the "Aaronic Priesthood" is a lower order of priesthood that a male receives as he is being prepared to receive the Melchizedek Priesthood). Mormon females are not required to receive a priesthood ordination before receiving the temple rituals.

Afro-americans can not attain the highest degree of gloty ?!? (They can not become priests, I believe ?)

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This is perhaps the coolest afterdeath i've heard in my entire life ! (As perhaps also some forms of hinduism/tantrims where true liberation is to become its own supreme deity, especially left-handed paths)

The classic paradise does not make much sense I think. (As life on earth but better ... but really more sense than to have fun forever, without goals, always TAXABLE at the limited nature of man, which seeks to create in his imagination , its ideas, its buildings but without success, His condition allowing him to shape some vague imitations infinement below creations of his mind, creator in his nature but unable to accomplish)

But there is no risk of hubris if the man knows that he can become like his creator ? or at least a risk of becoming arrogant ?

But perhaps mormonism combines respect for the creator and glory of man. (a centered way, while catholicism respects the creator but make the man in a slave drugged by a divine ecstasy without goals.)

Edited by Drojizad
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But there is no risk of hubris if the man knows that he can become like his creator ? or at least a risk of becoming arrogant ?

Not if one remembers where their dependencies lie, that exaltation is not something one boot-straps themselves to through their own pluck and general exceptional nature. Even if there is a risk, and there is if one fails to remember the above, that doesn't influence the reality of it from the LDS perspective. At it's heart the belief is that we have the potential to become like our Father, the inseparable gulf between creator and created that is such a feature of a lot of the Abrahamic religions is either thinner or non-existent (depending on your point of view) in LDS theology.

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Well, scripturally the phrase is "Priests and kings" and not "gods"

D&C 76:

52 That by keeping the commandments they might be washed and cleansed from all their sins, and receive the Holy Spirit by the laying on of the hands of him who is ordained and sealed unto this power;

53 And who overcome by faith, and are sealed by the Holy Spirit of promise, which the Father sheds forth upon all those who are just and true.

54 They are they who are the church of the Firstborn.

55 They are they into whose hands the Father has given all things—

56 They are they who are priests and kings, who have received of his fulness, and of his glory;

Revelation 1

6 And hath made us kings and priests unto God and his Father; to him be glory and dominion for ever and ever. Amen.

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Well, scripturally the phrase is "Priests and kings" and not "gods"

While I'm more inclined to go with priests and kings, if for no other reason than the kind of miscommunication that can happen with saying we can become gods there is scriptural support for the phrasing (though it is important to keep in mind just what is being meant by it):

20 Then shall they be gods, because they have no end; therefore shall they be from everlasting to everlasting, because they continue; then shall they be above all, because all things are subject unto them. Then shall they be gods, because they have all power, and the angels are subject unto them.

Link: Doctrine and Covenants 132:20

Edited by Dravin
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There are differences between humans become gods and god of the Mormons ?

It is not the creator of the entire universe for you ? he is a former mortal himself ?

In short, we believe that God and man are of the same species, not of a different substance. We are his children in a real, not metaphorical sense.

Jesus Christ (as God/Jehovah) created the world under the direction of God the Father (also God), so the persons that make up the Godhead (or more traditionally the Trinity) have distinct roles and abilities in our universe.

There is a distinction between us becoming gods, and God the Father. The definition of "god" in Mormonism isn't the supreme being capable of creating worlds.

From the previous verse: "Then shall they be gods, because they have no end; therefore shall they be from everlasting to everlasting, because they continue;"

In that sense these verses become more clear:

Psalms 82:6

6 I have said, Ye are gods; and all of you are children of the most High.

John 10:34

34 Jesus answered them, Is it not written in your law, I said, Ye are gods?

You are a god right now. Not because you have power or dominion (although you have a bit of both), but because you are progressing. You are moving forward.

Similarly, damnation is defined as an end to progression. We continue on growing, progressing, procreating forever, or we are damned.

At some point, we will be judged, and God will find us worthy of ALL that He has, and we become one with Him. We inherit His throne and become forever gods.

But God the Father is still our father, Jesus Christ still our savior. So, just as we have fathers on Earth who will always be higher than us, so will our Heavenly Father.

So now, think of the word God, not as a person. But as a state of being. We are all God until we are damned.

Edited by bytebear
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"fathers on Earth who will always be higher than us" ? maried mormons are not equals ?

The big difference between God the Father and us is that he is the father of all but we ourselves have children? (God created the universe and Jesus, Jesus create us and Jesus, we become equal to Jesus is our savior.)

And the fact that it generates only and has not been created, while the children create in pairs (marriage as absolute condition) and were generated ?

The afterlife is not the end of evolution, then ?

It's a bit like Gnosticism ?, the pro-father who only create the universe and the aeons that exist in pairs (male and female principle, while pro-father is both at once)

Except for the Gnostics, the Earth is an error create by the pride of a aeon, Sophia who wanted to create without her companion.

She has created a distorted aeon* (it evokes the myth of Juno generating the hideous Haphaestos) that create the physical universe. (he has never seen the pro-father to mold a parody of the universe with a lower sense of the world and the darkness of the void)

For them, the companion of Sophia is Jesus, and Sophia is Maria.

She wants to repent to Jesus to help save men in their insuflant a divine shard, because they were just animals before.

The God of Genesis is the devil, the snake is Jesus.

*Often compared to the God of the Old Testament, Gnostics justified it by the fact that Jesus told the Jews that are the sons of the devil, among others things.

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Not an evolution. God the Father does not gain powers or knowledge or substance. He gains by his childrens' gain. His dominion grows because our dominion grows.

We cannot ever be equal to Jesus Christ because he was the redeemer. We receive redemption through him, but will never have to sacrifice and die for our own sins or the sins of others. In that Christ is unique. but we do not see him as God the Father, since he is also subject to the Father. We are brothers and sisters with Christ under the Father, but Christ is the father of our salvation.

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The big difference between God the Father and us is that he is the father of all but we ourselves have children? (God created the universe and Jesus, Jesus create us and Jesus, we become equal to Jesus is our savior.) . . .

It's a bit like Gnosticism ?, the pro-father who only create the universe and the aeons that exist in pairs (male and female principle, while pro-father is both at once).

I'm not very well versed in Gnosticism; but no. Mormonism teaches that God is married, and that He created our spirits (before the creation of our bodies) with the assistance of our Heavenly Mother. Mormonism doesn't say much more about Her; but we do believe that She exists.

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Why humans of earth are losts (and must be redemeet) and not the inhabitants of futur worlds ruled by futurs divinised humans ?

They do need to be redeemed. The question--and modern Mormonism doesn't answer this definitely--is whether the atonement of Jesus Christ covers those other, future worlds; or whether each world will need its own "savior" to do the same thing for that world that Jesus does for ours.

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Do I wonder whether Joseph Smith knew the Gnosticism ? Which were its knowledge nun besides?

or if the gnostic ones had similar revelations? (The Gnosticism was the doctrines of the majority of the early Christians, but it is the branch minor of the paulinism which was essential thanks to the political support while destroying the majority of texts (some Apocryphs looks like mormons books) and inventing the persecution and extermination of the “heretics”)

Considering the Mormons say being like the early Christians, I wonder whether these “early Christians” were the gnostic ones…

Many similarities, i think.

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I don't think there's really a "bad" motivation for accepting the teachings of Momonism.

But ultimately, of course, it's all about Jesus Christ (who makes it all possible); and I think the highest motivation for anything we do in life would be our love and gratitude for Him.

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Like the idea of apotheosis as a god-like, is regarded as a good motivation to become Mormon or not ?

Fundamentally the good motivation to become a Mormon is you believe our teachings are true and that God wants you to be a member of this Church. However, liking a particular doctrine either in thinking it is interesting or in believing it to be true is an excellent reason to investigate the Church. One thing you may or may not be aware of is that prior to baptism people who are looking into the Church receive lessons by missionaries about fundamental doctrines and beliefs, these beliefs can kind of be thought of as a fundamental level of knowledge and commitment required to understand what membership entails.

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Do I wonder whether Joseph Smith knew the Gnosticism ? Which were its knowledge nun besides?

or if the gnostic ones had similar revelations? (The Gnosticism was the doctrines of the majority of the early Christians, but it is the branch minor of the paulinism which was essential thanks to the political support while destroying the majority of texts (some Apocryphs looks like mormons books) and inventing the persecution and extermination of the “heretics”)

Considering the Mormons say being like the early Christians, I wonder whether these “early Christians” were the gnostic ones…

Many similarities, i think.

I would recommend reading Joseph Smith History and how he describes how he was called as a prophet. It might give you insight in how we believe Joseph Smith learned and discovered doctrines.

Joseph Smith—History 1 

Also, we believe that at the time of the New Testament Apostles, they had the same knowledge we have now, but it was lost in the centuries that followed. Gnostics were a branch of Christians who had part of the truth, but because they didn't have prophets and apostles, were left to their own interpretations and came up with ideas that filled in the holes.

We believe we have more complete knowledge, but even we don't have all the answers of the afterlife. We have the tools (in terns of ordinances) needed to redeem mankind, including our ancestors, and that is all we require at this time.

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