Why Baptize for the Dead?
Moroni 10:26; “And wo unto them who shall do these things away and die, for they die in their sins, and they cannot be saved in the kingdom of God; and I speak it according to the words of Christ; and I lie not.”
1 Cor. 15:29; “Else what shall they do which are baptized for the dead, if the dead rise not at all? Why are they then baptized for the dead?”
Moroni 10:26 says there is no salvation for those who die in their sins so why are the Mormons being baptized for the dead?
Isn’t this “Holy Scripture” counter-intuitive to all the genealogical work they do for baptisms and endowment work for dead relatives?
What would Mormons do with their spare time?
The Apostle Paul was asking the new Corinthian church why some in their congregations were baptizing their dead friends and relatives if they weren’t convinced of Jesus’ resurrection. Somehow this group of people had decided this was a necessary step needed for the deceased to get a second chance of going to heaven before they had heard about the gospel. Their inconsistencies in theology weren’t making a lot of sense so Paul set the record straight when he heard of this practice.
From information gleaned by scholars and historians they’ve been able to show how members of the church at Corinth were incorporating their past pagan temple practices into their new found discovery of Jesus’ gospel.
Writings from Chyrsostom, an early church father, mentioned the pagan practice briefly by describing how a living person would lie underneath the body of the deceased person. Someone would approach the deceased to ask if they’d like to be baptized and the living person would answer affirmatively for the dead one. The living person would then be baptized for the deceased. So how does all that fit in with what we see in the Moroni passage above?
When will the Mormon people be encouraged by their leaders to look at the history of the Bible and why things were said. There’s no context to the majority of Joseph Smith’s teachings.
You won’t find why the Nephites or Lamanites were told to do something. You won’t find any historical background as to why they were given specific directives and you won’t find any mention of the in-depth covenants God made with man to help put these things into a simple understanding.
Then what is your answer for those who died not knowing the Gospel? Do they burn in hell for all of eternity? According to you, they died in their sin, so that is the only logical result.