THE GLORY OF GOD IS INTELLIGENCE

Knowledge Is Power in Heaven as on Earth

IN a revelation to Abraham the Lord made known the existence of spirits appointed to take bodies upon the earth. These spirits were designated as "the intelligences that were organized before the world was"; and elsewhere in the same record spirits are called intelligences. See Pearl of Great Price, pp. 65, 66.

This usage of the term has gained a place in modern English, as lexicographers agree. The Standard Dictionary gives us the following as one of the specific definitions of intelligence: "An intelligent being, especially a spirit not embodied; as the intelligences of the unseen world; the Supreme Intelligence."

The word is current as connoting (1) the mental capacity to know and understand; (2) knowledge itself, or the thing that is known and understood; and (3) the person who knows and understands. Beside these there are other minor usages.

In the revelation above cited the Lord impressed upon His ancient prophet and seer the fact that some of the spirits were more intelligent than others; and then proclaimed His own Divine supremacy by the declaration: "I am the Lord thy God, I am more intelligent than they all. . . . I rule in the heavens above, and in the earth beneath, in all wisdom and prudence, over all the intelligences thine eyes have seen from the beginning. I came down in the beginning in the midst of all the intelligences thou hast seen."

In such wise did God make known anciently the power by virtue of which He is supreme over all the intelligences that exist—the fact that He is more intelligent than any and all others. In the heavens as upon the earth the aphorism holds good that Knowledge is Power, providing that by "knowledge" we mean application, and not merely mental possession, of truth. In a revelation through Joseph Smith the prophet given in 1833, the character of Divine authority and power is thus sublimely summarized: "The Glory of God is Intelligence." (D&C 93:36.)

The context of the passage shows that the intelligence therein referred to as an attribute of Deity is spiritual light and truth; and that man may attain to a measure of this exalting light and truth is thus made certain: "He that keepeth His commandments receiveth truth and light, until he is glorified in truth and knoweth all things. . . . Intelligence, or the light of truth, was not created or made, neither indeed can be. All truth is independent in that sphere in which God has placed it, to act for itself, as all intelligence also."

The antithesis of light and truth is darkness and falsehood; the former is summarized as righteousness, the latter as evil. Reverting to the figure of mortality as a school for embodied spirits, we must admit that every pupil who ignores or rejects the truth as presented to him through the revealed word and his own experience is culpably responsible for his ignorance.

Not all knowledge is of equal worth. The knowledge that constitutes the wisdom of the heavens is all embraced in the Gospel as taught by Jesus Christ; and wilful ignorance of this, the highest type of knowledge, will relegate its victim to the inferior order of intelligences. Another latter-day Scripture may be cited as an inspired generalization embodying an eternal truth relating to our subject: "It is impossible for a man to be saved in ignorance." (D&C 131:6.)

Can it be otherwise? If a man be ignorant of the terms on which salvation is predicated he is unable to comply therewith, and consequently fails to attain what otherwise might have been his eternal gain. The ignorance that thus condemns is responsible ignorance, involving wilful and sinful neglect. Lack of the saving knowledge that one has had no opportunity to acquire is but a temporary deficiency; for Eternal Justice provides means of education beyond the grave. Every one of us will be judged according to the measure of light and truth we have had opportunity to acquire. Even the untutored heathen who has lived up to his highest conceptions of right shall find means of progression. Part of the blessing to follow the second advent of Christ is thus stated: "And then shall the heathen nations be redeemed, and they that knew no law shall have part in the first resurrection; and it shall be tolerable for them." (45:54.)

The intelligence that saves comprises knowing and doing what is required by the Gospel of Christ; and such intelligence will endure beyond death. "Whatever principle of intelligence we attain unto in this life, it will rise with us in the resurrection. And if a person gains more knowledge and intelligence in this life through his diligence and obedience than another, he will have so much the advantage in the world to come." (130:18, 19.)

Intelligence as to Godly things, which are summarized in the Gospel of Jesus Christ, leads to an ever increasing understanding and comprehension of God Himself, and this is knowledge supreme; for as the praying Christ affirmed: "This is life eternal, that they might know thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast sent." (John 17:3.)