Journal of Discourses 21:201; “…not only all the children of men, of all generations, and of all ages, were created spiritually in heaven, but that fish and fowls, and beast, and all animated things, having life, were first made spiritual in heaven… … We are also told in this inspired translation, that these living trees which we behold—for God has given life unto all things—had their spiritual existence in heaven before their temporal existence; every herb and every tree, before it was planted out on the earth, that is, the spiritual part of it … that which gives power to the vegetable to bring forth fruit after its likeness—the spiritual part existed in heaven. …
…We read about the earth’s dying, and that it shall be quickened again. What is it that will make the earth die? It will be the withdrawing of the spiritual portion from it, that which gives it life— …
On the seventh day he began the temporal portion. There was not yet a man to till the ground, “and the gods formed man from the dust of the ground, and took his spirit—that is the man’s spirit—and put it into him and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and man became a living soul…” – Orson Pratt, Mount Pleasant, Utah, November 12, 1879
Genesis 1:1, 31; 2:2-3; “In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth. 31 And God saw every thing that he had made, and, behold, it was very good. And the evening and the morning were the sixth day. 2:2 And on the seventh day God ended his work which he had made; and he rested on the seventh day from all his work which he had made. 3 And God blessed the seventh day, and sanctified it: because that in it he had rested from all his work which God created and made.”
Yes, you read that correctly! Orson Pratt believed every living thing had a spirit. Hmmm…one has to wonder what the vegetable spirits must think as they’re baked, broiled, or fried up for dinner each night… Good grief!
Orson Pratt and Joe Smith should have read Proverbs 30:6 –
“Add thou not unto his words, lest he reprove thee, and thou be found a liar.”
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