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Thank you for this very thoughtful and well written article on the need for knowledge “according to the flesh”. I have loved that phrase in these verses. I once felt similarly to how you described the atonement at the start of your article about thinking of Jesus looking down upon us judgmentally for our struggling so much with life, and a few years ago I began to realize that your later understanding of his loving and encouraging us is a more accurate perception of how he views us.
I have recently been considering just how uniquely able Christ is to help us through mortality. I’ll share the following entry from my scripture journal as a note to Alma 7:12 about Christ’s ability to “know according to the flesh how to succor his people”:
“There’s a great deal of authenticity that comes from personal experience when you want to help another person. We thrive on relating to other people through our shared experiences. Even if we haven’t experienced the exact same circumstances as another, being able to relate through a similar experience brings a sense of connection and understanding that draws us closer together, and through that closeness we feel comfort, healing, and a sense of rest from our burdens, because we realize we are not alone in our experience. However, that connection is only partial because it feels impossible for us to fully reveal ourselves in a way sufficient to allow compete connectedness with another person. How could they fully and truly understand what we alone have lived! But we are not alone in that experience. There is one who has lived it too. The Savior has miraculously taken upon himself the burden of all mankind because he wants to offer us the complete healing we desperately need. He is the only One with whom we can find that perfect unity we desire and the healing, peace and comfort that come through complete self disclosure received in perfect love and perfect understanding. Through that perfect understanding he can receive our experience and lovingly show us the path we can take to more perfect living and loving.”
Christ truly is the only name under heaven whereby we can be saved, not only from our sins, but from the burdens of mortal life that Satan would attempt to use to drag us down.
Thank you again for your beautiful article!
Amen! Thank you for your beautifully written comment, which is really a testimony.
Alma 7:11–13 and your excellent article make a strong case that, in order for Christ to succor his people, it was required that he know, experientially. If that is true, then the contra must also be true. Without knowing experientially, he could not succor his people. So, then, those who lived before Christ’s mortal existence and atonement, could not have been succored–including Alma. When you said “For thousands of years prior to Bethlehem, humans worshipped Christ as the premortal Jehovah,” I was hoping you might tackle this. How could a premortal Jehovah succor his people?
This is an intelligent and significant question and I thank you for it. First, let me say that, of course, the pre-mortal Messiah, as Jehovah, was able to, and did, succor his people. To suggest that he could only succor them after he had experienced, for himself, similar physical, psychological, and spiritual pains and infirmities would run against everything we know. It would counter common sense, doctrine, and temple experience.
There are two ways to answer your difficult question. First, the question assumes a linear perspective. Tad Callister has explained that the Atonement was applicable to all times (and in all worlds he created). In a way we cannot understand, his mortal experiences, including the Atonement, specifically covered infirmities, sins, and suffering of all humanity, not just for the people at the meridian of time. This included sins not yet committed and infirmities not yet suffered as well as sins and infirmities prior to his mortal experience. Those before the Atonement was completed received the blessing it brings as if he had already come (Mosiah 3:13: “Whosoever should believe that Christ should come, the same might receive remission of their sins, and rejoice with exceedingly great joy, even as though he had already come among them.” The Atonement had to be completed and He had to taste the sins and pains of all humanity to be able to free us from death and hell, and to bring us into the presence of the Father, but the joy of the remissions of sins and the hope of eternal life was available to all based on the Atonement, regardless of when it took place.
Second, the question may reflect modern, zero-sum, and black and white, thinking. All around us are voices declaring that we are ‘sexist or not sexist,” “racist or not racist,” “homophobic or not homophobic.” But those extreme positions describe exactly …nobody. They are mere shallow talking points to score a political or cultural advantage in some online argument. People do not exist in such extreme dichotomies. The natural man always falls somewhere upon a very wide spectrum or continuum –never in the absolute extremes of any position. Similarly, to imagine that Christ could succor his people after his mortality but not before his mortality is to view the issue too narrowly. Jehovah did not need full experiential knowledge to understand pain, sadness, illness, fear, and so on in order to succor his people to an incredible and entirely satisfactory way. We can read that, as Jehovah, he succored many Old Testament heroes (see also Isaiah 50:4). The point of Alma 7, at least to me, is that Jehovah/Jesus needed to complement or supplement or augment his incomprehensible cognitive knowledge with his own felt and complete experiential knowledge in order to understand in an even more profound way. Christ took on mortal flesh for many reasons, only one of which was to learn to succor his people at a greater depth. In answer to your deep question, to assume that he could not succor his people as Jehovah prior to his experience in mortality is simply not correct logically or scripturally. Hope that helps.
Thank you so much for this article. Articles like this are why I subscribe to and donate to the Interpreter Foundation. I started listening to the audio recording earlier in the week and was hooked when I realized the need for experiential learning was about Christ. I am speaking in sacrament tomorrow (Easter) and was facing a writer’s block until this jogged me loose. I read more of it while at the Mesa temple grounds Thursday evening waiting for the Easter pageant to start. The pageant was updated this year after a 3-year hiatus waiting for the Mesa temple remodeling to complete. The updated scene in Gethsemane and the crucifixion took on new meaning after having read the article. I had to turn away as I thought of the sheer intensity of what and how He suffered. Thank you for helping me know Him a little better.
Your note and experience is much appreciated. I approached this topic with trepidation and much prayer.
I didn’t make that mistake because I didn’t mean that we mortals have to experience ALL things as the Savior did. I did mean that the rest of mortals are put into a fallen world not only to make choices but also to gain experience such that we may have more empathy and concern, more love, more ability to help others, and less inclination to sin and less inclination to being indifferent.
I like your answer about how babies will gain experience: we don’t know. I fully agree that we don’t have the answer. I asked the question because I thought that you might know some doctrinal statement that I was not aware of. Having such questions does NOT make me doubt. Such questions will easily be answered in the next life. For example, I have a personal opinion about whether Jesus had a wife during His mortality, but I’m aware that there’s no official church statement on that. We do know that at some point Jesus was married because – as you quoted in your article – Jesus said, “Be perfect even AS I…” Jesus could NOT have described Himself as “perfect” and could NOT be an exalted resurrected being (which He was after His resurrection) if He did NOT have a wife. When Jesus became married, we don’t know.
There are many unanswered questions, but none of them should raise doubts. As the Gospel makes very clear, we simply need to follow the Savior. Both God the Father and Jesus have better things to do than to constantly answer merely curious questions.
So true! There is much that we do not know but that need never be an impediment to all we do know and need never lesson faith.
I enjoyed the article very much. It made me appreciate even more the Savior’s glorious atonement. As I pondered the article, a question occurred to me. How do babies who die (and thus go to the celestial kingdom) gain Experiential Knowledge as the Savior did, and as the rest of us mortals must do?
Hello Lanny – I’m so glad that my “thinking out loud” in this article had value for you, as it did for me. And your follow-up question of how babies who die before the age of accountability gain experiential knowledge is an outstanding one. I will now give you the correct response:
I have no idea!
Nobody does.
You noted that “babies who die [will] go to the Celestial Kingdom.” True. We know that from D&C 137:10 (as well as the King Follett Discourse and other sources). But will they first have some time in the Spirit World before resurrection where they can gain some kind of experiential knowledge? Again, I do not know. Elder McConkie made it clear that they will NOT be tested in the Spirit World, but does that preclude gaining any experiential knowledge? Only two years ago, President Dallin H. Oaks spoke strongly and clearly about exactly how much we do not know. He also cautioned us against undue speculation. I highly recommend reading, “Trust in the Lord” (www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/general-conference/2019/10/17oaks). However, we do have some clues. Below are some references that have bearing on your excellent question. Rather than excerpting sections to reproduce here, which would require another lengthy article, I recommend that you look at these in their entirety. There is some redundancy across the various references, but all are worth reading.
• Bruce R. McConkie — http://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/ensign/1977/04/the-salvation-of-little-children
• http://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/manual/teachings-joseph-f-smith/chapter-15
• http://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/ensign/1981/06/i-have-a-question/will-those-who-died-as-little-children-have-to-receive-baptism-at-some-future-time
• http://www.ldsliving.com/why-do-some-children-die-and-what-will-happen-to-them-in-the-resurrection-comforting-answers-for-loved-ones/s/88699
• https://latterdaysaintmag.com/the-salvation-of-little-children-who-die/
I might mention, too, that your question has a larger context. In asking about babies, you wrote that “the rest of us mortals must [gain experiential knowledge ‘as the Savior did’]” That part is not quite correct. Yes, we obviously must have SOME experiences, but they are idiosyncratic and individually-tailored for each one of us. Keep in mind that nobody other than our Savior needed to gain ALL experiential knowledge or even all CATEGORIES of experiential knowledge. The gospel is crystal clear that we are given unique and specific challenges and trials that are for our own individual growth and learning needs. I certainly don’t wish to have all experiences or categories of experiences. The Savior needed that to complete the atonement and succor each one of us. Thankfully and because of his glorious sacrifice, I don’t need the same. I have enough challenge with the trials and experiences that are assigned to me on my own path. Happily, and thanks to Jesus Christ, I don’t need everyone else’s experiences. Apparently, babies who die before accountability don’t need ANY trials or adversity. Joseph Smith stated that such children “…were too pure, too lovely, to live on earth; therefore, if rightly considered, instead of mourning we have reason to rejoice as they are delivered from evil… (see http://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/liahona/2008/08/what-joseph-taught-comfort-at-the-time-of-death). We who have remained on this earth to work out our own salvation have our own experiences to deal with, but we do not have all categories of experience to endure as did the Savior. That gives us yet another reason to worship and adore him!