THE UNITY AND THE DISTINCTIVENESS OF THE PERSONAGES OF THE GODHEAD.

ANALYSIS.

REFERENCES.

I. The Oneness of the Trinity: its Nature.

Mormon Doctrine of Deity, ch. IV; Seventy's Year Book No. III, lessons xxxiii, xxxiv and xxxv; and all the Scriptures cited in the body of the Discussion.

II. Distinctiveness of the Father as a Personage.

III. The Distinctiveness of the Son--Divinity of the Son.

SPECIAL TEXT: "The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God, and the communion of the Holy Ghost be with you all. Amen." (II Cor. xiii:14.)

DISCUSSION.

1. The Unity of Father, Son and Holy Ghost: While conceiving these three Divine Personages, as constituting an organized unit, a body or Divine Council, it should be remembered that their oneness consist in moral unity, not physical unity, or identity of substance or essence. In other words, they are distinct and separate personages, in the sense of being three separate and distinct individuals, a unity only in agreement of purpose, and unity of will for the accomplishment of certain definite ends,[A] to bring to pass the immortality and eternal progress of man.[B]

[Footnote A: The Three Personagess. "Everlasting covenants was made between three personages before the organization of this earth, and relates to their dispensation of things to men on the earth: these personages, according to Abraham's record, are called God the first, the Creator; God the second, the Redeemer; and God the third, the Witness or Testator."—Little & Richards' Compendium—Gems from the Prophet's Teachings—p. 289.]

[Footnote B: Doc. & Cov., Sec. xciii:26-35. Book of Moses, Pearl of Great Price, ch. iii., II Nephi ch. ii; also New Witnesses for God, Vol III, ch xl. where the matter is discussed at great length.]

Jesus himself taught that he and his Father were one,[A] that whosoever had seen him had seen the Father also;[B] that it was part of his mission to reveal God, the Father, through his own personality; for as was the Son, so too was the Father;[C] hence Jesus was God manifested in the flesh, a revelation of God to the world;[D] a revelation not only of the being of God, but of the kind of being God is.

[Footnote A: John x:30; xvii:11-22.]

[Footnote B: John xiv:9.]