10-29-2005, 08:10 AM
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#31
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Veteran Member
Join Date: Oct 2004
Location: UK
Posts: 2,127
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It's the "Curse of Ham" (according to the fundies, though these days they try to fudge the issue). It's been used to justify slavery and inhumanity towards black people and so-called "degenerate" races such as the actions of the KKK and segregation for centuries.
Quote:
Theological foundation for racism in the LDS church:
According to sociologist Amand L. Mauss, a president of the Mormon History Association, the church's racist beliefs originated within protestant denominations from which many Mormons converted. He said in 1998: "Every major Protestant denomination in history has taught that blacks are descendants of Cain and Ham." 1
* Cain is described in the book of Genesis of the Hebrew Scriptures (a.k.a. Old Testament) as a son of Adam. Cain was jealous of his brother Abel, because God had rejected Cain's offering, while accepting Abel's. In Genesis 4:8, he is described as having "attacked his brother Abel, and killed him."
* Ham is described in Genesis 9 as a son of Noah who had seen his father naked. Ham himself was not punished. But Ham's son, Canaan, was cursed. Genesis 9:25-27 "Cursed be Canaan! The lowest of slaves will he be to his brothers. He also said, 'Blessed be the Lord, the God of Shem! May Canaan be the slave of Shem. May God extend the territory of Japheth; may Japeth live in the tents of Shem and may Canaan be his slave.' " This became known as the Curse of Ham.
Protestant denominations once interpreted the Bible as implying that the black race was formed from Cain and Abel's descendents. The Curse of Ham was used extensively prior to the Civil War to justify slavery as a biblically condoned, recognized and regulated practice. The abolition movement caused a great deal of distress among Christians because they had to reject slavery as profoundly immoral -- a practice which the bible accepted. Beliefs of the ancestry of blacks died a natural death among the leading denominations: Baptists, Methodists, Presbyterians, etc. But the LDS church was an exception. The Pearl of Great Price is one of four source texts that are accepted by Mormons as divinely inspired and authoritative scripture --the "Standard Works." The Pearl had specifically prohibited the ordination of anyone who was black or who had even one distant black ancestor. Its teachings could not be easily altered. Another inspired scripture is the Book of Mormon.
In 2 Nephi 5:21-23, it discusses the Lamanite race, and how they received dark skins and a degenerate status:
"And he had caused the cursing to come upon them, yea, even a sore cursing, because of their iniquity. For behold, they had hardened their hearts against him, that they had become like unto a flint; wherefore, as they were white, and exceedingly fair and delightsome, that they might not be enticing unto my people the Lord God did cause a skin of blackness to come upon them.
And thus saith the Lord God: I will cause that they shall be loathsome unto thy people, save they shall repent of their iniquities.
And cursed shall be the seed of him that mixeth with their seed; for they shall be cursed even with the same cursing. And the Lord spake it, and it was done.
And because of their cursing which was upon them they did become an idle people, full of mischief and subtlety, and did seek in the wilderness for beasts of prey.
In 2 Nephi 30:6, the original version of the Book of Mormon said that if Lamanites accepted the true gospel, "...their scales of darkness shall begin to fall from their eyes; and many generations shall not pass away among them, save they shall be a white and a delightsome people." After 1981, the term "white and delightsome" was changed to read "pure." 5
3 Nephi 2:15 reads: "And their curse was taken from them, and their skin became white like unto the Nephites." 5
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from:
http://www.religioustolerance.org/lds_race.htm
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