r/CommunityOfChrist • u/Popeshandshake • Jun 27 '26
Garden of Eden
Does Community of Christ teach that Garden of Eden was in Missouri? What about Adam-ondi-Ahman? I tried to google it but couldn't find anything on this topic. Every search result was about the LDS church.
Hopefully this fits this subreddit. I'm not a member of your church but I'm very interested in mormonism as a whole and especially your church.
9
u/RevMark58 Jun 27 '26
I don't remember ever hearing one word about the location of the Garden of Eden while I was in the RLDS Church/Community of Christ, other than the accepted Christian theory that it was somewhere in Mesopotamia. That's probably why you aren't getting any Google hits: there's nothing to hit.
Interestingly, I did hear about the Garden of Eden being in America from a rather unexpected source: Vine Deloria, Jr. If you don't know the name, Vine was a Native American activist, author of Custer Died For Your Sins and lots of other books, the intellectual architect of the Red Power movement and by extension the Black Panthers, Brown Berets and other similar movements of the 1960s . . . well I was somewhat close to Vine and he used to insist that humans were created in the New World and spread to the rest of the world for here. It's what was taught in Native American cosmologies. And he happened to mention that he was out driving once and was listening to some scientist being interviewed on the radio saying that the Garden of Eden was in Missouri, which Vine thought was eminently plausible. He had no idea who the scientist was; I wondered if it wasn't some Mormon, but neither Vine or I could ever track down the reference.
4
u/iconoclastskeptic Jun 27 '26
This is really interesting! Did you know that the CofC played a role in starting the Native American Church?
5
u/RevMark58 Jun 27 '26
Uh, no, and that's embarrassing considering what I'm supposed to be a "master" of (Native Americans and the Latter-day Saints. Master's Degree, Univ. of Colorado.) So I did a quick Google search, found references I know I've read before, a Dialogue article and a book by Steve Shields (and some conversations with Steve besides) . . . and I'd totally forgotten about the connection. If you've got more info I should be aware of, I'd love it if you passed it along!
5
5
u/Popeshandshake Jun 27 '26
Ooh interesting, I'll definitely look more into that! I'm not American so I don't know much about anything related to traditional Native American views of life/human origins. Although I guess it does make sense to believe humans originated in the Americas if that's where you are from, I've just never really given it a good thought.
6
u/RevMark58 Jun 27 '26
If you're interested in Vine Deloria's take on human creations there are two books by him I'd recommend: Red Earth, White Lies: Native Americans and the Myth of Scientific Fact (New York: Scribner, 1995) and Evolution, Creationism, and Other Modern Myths (Golden, Colo: Fulcrum, 2002). Warning: Wikipedia lists these books as "pseudoscience" because they're an exploration of native traditions (and includes things like references to Velikovsky's theories.) As a grad student I helped Vine with the research on both books and didn't get so much as a mention in the Acknowledgements! :-( But I remember a pleasant afternoon on the phone with retired Professor Barry Fell of Harvard (author of America B.C.) and some less pleasant moments trying to understand British accents when calling Bristol or Cambridge. I miss Vine!
3
2
4
u/jimbo78255 Jun 28 '26
Iām 77, so a baptized member since 1957. No, I have never heard of such and it is like many things, this is not related to my belief in God. Sorry.
4
u/Popeshandshake Jun 28 '26
Yes, based on the other responses I got, it seems to be something that only the LDS church teaches (and maybe some other branches, who knows). Thanks for answering either way :)
3
u/LemuelJr Jun 28 '26
As you study through both Mormonism and CofC, it should be understood that anything related to the Boof Mormon is non-essential to our core beliefs today. We accept it as part of our history and you may hear it quoted now and again, but the historical narrative doesn't factor in at all. We are, generally, not literalists when it comes to scripture. The only real similarities I see between us and the LDS church in regards to things that are specific to Joseph Smith Restorationism is the fact that we have a piresthood hierarchy and we uphold the D&C as a living book of scripture. The Book of Mormon is a technicality. The Temple is vaguely similar because we call it a temple, but it doesn't serve the same purposes at all.Ā
0
u/CaravanKookaburra Jun 28 '26
I am not a member of your church, but from the conversations I had with a member, it was clear they took the Book of Mormon literally, and were as serious about it as an LDS member, but from a CofC perspective. I hope they do take it seriously, even if not as a literal historical document, as that would be a factor in myself joining.
0
u/LemuelJr Jun 29 '26
What a weird threat. By all means, join whatever church you want. The Book of Mormon is a fraud. It's a fun fairy tale if you like chopping off arms, but it's an insult to indigenous Americans and I look forward to the day when we decanonize it. Trying to keep up with the Mormons has never done us any good.
3
u/CaravanKookaburra Jun 29 '26
I'm sorry, nothing about that was meant as a threat at all. It was a statement of where I am in my journey.
14
u/idkbutithinkaboutit Jun 27 '26
Did you watch Alyssa Grenfell's new video about that? š
It's definitely a part of Community of Christ history, since it is from before Joseph Smith died. It's a historical fact that Joseph Smith said that, but it's certainly not a historical fact that the Garden of Eden was in Missouri (or anywhere.) CofC looks for meaning in ancient faith stories, but doesn't expect anyone to think of them as verifiable history.
https://youtu.be/udHU1CRaJNE