- Explanation of Adam-God Doctrine
- The Adam-God Doctrine and Scriptural Silence
- Helen Mar Kimball Whitney
- Orson Pratt’s Acceptance of the Adam–God Doctrine
- The Law of Witnesses: Affirmations of the Adam–God Doctrine in Early Latter-day Saint History
- Adam-God Doctrine: Historical Quotes
- Joseph Fielding Smith and the Limits of Apostolic Commentary
- President Spencer W. Kimball’s 1976 Denouncement of the Adam–God Theory
- Joseph F. Smith and the Quiet Reformation: Removing Adam–God from the Endowment
Quotes – Presidents of the Church
Quotes by LDS Church Presidents during their tenure.
Brigham Young, President (1847–1877)
“When our father Adam came into the garden of Eden, he came into it with a celestial body, and brought Eve, one of his wives, with him. He helped to make and organize this world. He is MICHAEL, the Archangel, the ANCIENT OF DAYS! about whom holy men have written and spoken—HE is our FATHER and our GOD, and the only God with whom WE have to do.”
Source: Journal of Discourses, Vol. 1, pp. 50-51, April 9, 1852.
Brigham Young, President
“How much unbelief exists in the minds of the Latter-day Saints in regard to one particular doctrine which I revealed to them, and which God revealed to me—namely that Adam is our father and God… Our Father Adam helped to make this earth, it was created expressly for him, and after it was made he and his companions came here.”
Source: Deseret News, Vol. 22, No. 308, June 8, 1873, Church History Library. Note: Not digitized; please assist with exact page or use Gemini.
Brigham Young, President
“Though we have it in history that our father Adam was made of the dust of this earth, and that he knew nothing about his God previous to being made here, yet it is not so; and when we learn the truth we shall see and understand that he helped to make this world, and was the chief manager in that operation.”
Source: Journal of Discourses, Vol. 3, pp. 319-320, April 20, 1856.
Brigham Young, President
“You believe Adam was made of the dust of this earth. This I do not believe, though it is supposed that it is so written in the Bible; but it is not to my understanding.”
Source: Journal of Discourses, Vol. 2, p. 6, October 23, 1853.
Brigham Young, President
“Here let me state to all philosophers of every class upon the earth, when you tell me that father Adam was made as we make adobes from the earth, you tell me what I deem an idle tale… Mankind are here because they are the offspring of parents who were first brought here from another planet.”
Source: Journal of Discourses, Vol. 7, pp. 285-290, October 9, 1859.
Brigham Young, President
“Some have grumbled because I believe our God to be so near to us as Father Adam. There are many who know that doctrine to be true.”
Source: Journal of Discourses, Vol. 5, pp. 331-332, October 7, 1857.
Brigham Young, President
“When Yahovah Michael had organized the world… Michael or Adam goes down to the new made world, and there he stays.”
Source: General Conference Report, Church Archives, October 8, 1854, Church History Library. Note: Not digitized; please assist or use Gemini.
Brigham Young, President
“It is one of the first principles of the doctrine of salvation to become acquainted with our Father and our God… Whether Adam is the personage that we should consider our heavenly Father, or not, is considerable of a mystery to a good many.”
Source: Journal of Discourses, Vol. 4, pp. 217-219, February 8, 1857.
Brigham Young, President
“If you have the privilege of commencing the work that Adam commenced on this earth, you will have all your children come and report to you of their sayings and acts.”
Source: Journal of Discourses, Vol. 4, p. 271, March 8, 1857.
Brigham Young, President
“Have they to go to that earth? Yes, an Adam will have to go there, and he cannot do without Eve… until this grosser matter is diffused sufficiently through their celestial bodies to enable them, according to the established laws, to produce mortal tabernacles for their spiritual children.”
Source: Journal of Discourses, Vol. 6, pp. 274-275, circa 1858.
Brigham Young, President
“Some may think what I have said concerning Adam strange, but the period will come when the people will be willing to adopt Joseph Smith as their Prophet, Seer, and Revelator and God! but not the Father of their spirits, for that was our Father Adam.”
Source: Journal History, p. 131, December 11, 1869, Church History Library. Note: Not digitized; please assist or use Gemini.
Brigham Young, President
“Our Father begot all the spirits that were before any tabernacle was made. When our Father came into the Garden He came with his Celestial body and brought one of his wives with him and ate of the fruit of the Garden until He could beget a Tabernacle.”
Brigham Young, President
“The blood he (Christ) spilled upon Mount Calvary he did not receive again into his veins… When this is dissolved, and we again obtain our bodies by the power of the resurrection, that which we now call the life of the body… will be supplanted by another element.”
Source: Journal of Discourses, Vol. 7, p. 163, June 5, 1859.
Brigham Young, President
“Before the gospel revealed the introduction of sin to this planet, it was a great marvel even to the most learned… The starting point they have not learned, that no intelligent being could be exalted with the Gods without being subjected to the temptation of sin.”
Source: Journal of Discourses, Vol. 6, p. 145, December 27, 1857.
Brigham Young, President
“With all the knowledge and wisdom that are combined in the person of brother Orson Pratt, still he does not yet know enough to keep his foot out of it, but drowns himself in his own philosophy.”
Source: Journal of Discourses, Vol. 4, pp. 266-267, March 8, 1857.
Brigham Young, President
“I will read a part of a short revelation, in order to exhibit some items of doctrine that are not generally understood… We must therefore receive a little here and a little there.”
Source: Journal of Discourses, Vol. 6, p. 286, August 15, 1852.
Brigham Young, President
“Michael was a resurrected Being and he left Eloheim and came to this earth & with an immortal body, & continued so till he partook of earthly food and begot children who were mortal (keep this to yourselves) then they died.”
Brigham Young, President
“I corrected O Pratt today. I did not say to him that God would increase to all eternity. But I said the moment that we say that God knows all things comprehends all things and has a fulness of all that he ever will attain, that moment eternity ceases.”
Brigham Young, President
“Your statements to night, You come out to night & place them as charges… It was Joseph’s doctrine that Adam was God &c.”
Source: Minutes of Meeting, Historian’s Office, April 4, 1860, Church History Library. Note: Not digitized; please assist or use Gemini.
Brigham Young, President
“This day I have seen the best spirit manifested… We are improving and I just know it, my path is like the noon day sun.”
Source: Brigham Young Journal, April 5, 1860, Church History Library. Note: Not digitized; please assist or use Gemini.
Wilford Woodruff, President (1889–1898)
“President Young said There never was any world created & Peopled Nor ever would be but what would be redeemed by the shedding of the blood of the Savior of the world… Adam made this world and Suffered himself to take a body and subject himself to sin.”
Source: Waiting For the World’s End, The Diaries of Wilford Woodruff, p. 290, post-1889.
Joseph Fielding Smith, President (1970–1972)
“The Lord did not give us the complete story of the creation of Adam and Eve because He knew the world would not accept it.”
Source: Journal of John A. Tvedtnes, June 30, 1961, Church History Library. Note: Not digitized; please assist or use Gemini for Tvedtnes’ journal.
Spencer W. Kimball, President
“All that Father Adam did upon this earth, from the time that he took up his abode in the Garden of Eden, was done for his posterity’s sake… A finer substance will give life to the body and will render it immortal.”
Source: The Ensign, p. 56; First Presidency Message, “Absolute Truth,” September 1978.
Quotes – Apostles of the Church
Quotes by apostles, including future presidents when they were apostles.
Wilford Woodruff, Apostle (1839–1889)
“At meeting of school of the prophets, President Young said Adam was Michael the Archangel and he was the father of Jesus Christ and was our God, and Joseph taught this principle.”
Wilford Woodruff, Apostle
“He [Brigham Young] said that our God was Father Adam. He was the Father of the Savior Jesus Christ—Our God was no more or less than Adam… Michael the Archangel.”
Wilford Woodruff, Apostle
“I wish to refer to the first doctrine preached that Adam was our Father and God… Who is this Michael the Archangel? It is Adam who was Michael in the creation of the world.”
Wilford Woodruff, Apostle
“Who begat the Son of God? Infidels say that Jesus was a bastard, but let me tell you the truth concerning that matter… Adam is Michael or God and all the God that we have anything to do with.”
Wilford Woodruff, Apostle
“Brother Cannon said there was a learned Doctor that wanted to be baptized… He is satisfied that the doctrine of the plurality of God and that Adam is our Father is a true doctrine revealed from God to Joseph and Brigham.”
Wilford Woodruff, Apostle
“Then the subject was brought up concerning Adam being made of the dust of the earth, and Elder Orson Pratt pursued a course of stubbornness and unbelief in what President Young said that will destroy him if he does not repent.”
Wilford Woodruff, Apostle
“I presented before the meeting the case of O[rson]. Pratt who did not believe in some of the teachings of President Young [Adam-God] and thought President Young reproved him unjustly.”
Wilford Woodruff, Apostle
“Brother G.A. Smith spoke in plainness his feelings concerning some principles of Elder O Pratt’s wherein he differed from President Young concerning the creation of Adam out of the dust of the Earth.”
Wilford Woodruff, Apostle
“Orson Pratt has differed from me in many things… You have accused me of worshipping a stalk or stone or a dead body without life or attributes.”
Wilford Woodruff, Apostle
“Brother Orson Pratt I wish to ask you one or two questions… You see that the spirit and doctrine which you possess is entirely in opposition to the First Presidency, the Quorum of the Twelve.”
Wilford Woodruff, Apostle
“Orson Pratt met with us, he did not dress, but said he wanted to be in the society of the Twelve. He seemed much more soft in his spirit than he had been.”
Wilford Woodruff, Apostle
“Orson Pratt was in the stand and quite unexpected to his Brethren he arose before his Brethren and made a very humble, full confession before the whole assembly for his opposition to President Young.”
Heber C. Kimball, Apostle (1832–1868)
“I have learned by experience that there is but one God that pertains to this people, and He is the God that pertains to this earth—the first man.”
Heber C. Kimball, Apostle
“Some have said that I was very presumptuous to say that Brother Brigham was my God and Savior. Brother Joseph was his God… Jesus Christ was his God and the God and Father of Jesus Christ was Adam.”
Heber C. Kimball, Apostle
“Now, brethren, you have got a spirit in you, and that spirit was created and organized—was born and begotten by our Father and our God before we ever took these bodies.”
Source: Journal of Discourses, Vol. 6, p. 31, November 8, 1857.
Heber C. Kimball, Apostle
“Are you ever going to be prepared to see God, Jesus Christ, His angels, or comprehend His servants, unless you take a faithful and prayerful course?… Do you know brother Brigham? No. Do you know brother Heber? No, you do not.”
Source: Journal of Discourses, Vol. 4, p. 248, March 1, 1857.
Heber C. Kimball, Apostle
“The Lord told me that Jesus Christ was the son of Adam.”
Source: Journal of Heber C. Kimball, 20:17; Deseret News, March 11, 1857, Church History Library. Note: Not digitized; please assist or use Gemini.
Heber C. Kimball, Apostle
“Brother Orson Pratt has withstood Joseph and he has withstood Brother Brigham many times and he has done it tonight and it made my blood chill.”
Heber C. Kimball, Apostle
“This brings to my mind the vision that Joseph Smith had, when he saw Adam open the gate of the Celestial City and admit the people one by one.”
Orson Pratt, Apostle (1835–1881)
“I have heard brother Brigham say that Adam is the Father of our spirits, and he came here with his resurrected body, to fall for his own children; and I said to him, it leads to an endless number of falls.”
Source: Minutes of the Meeting of the Council of the Twelve, April 5, 1860, Church History Library. Note: Not digitized; please assist or use Gemini.
Orson Pratt, Apostle
“Our first parents through transgressing the law of God, brought death into the world, but through the death of Jesus Christ, life and immortality were introduced.”
Source: Journal of Discourses, Vol. 3, p. 344, April 13, 1856.
Orson Pratt, Apostle
“At the time I expressed those views, I did most sincerely believe that they were in accordance with the word of God… I have since learned from my brethren, that some of the doctrines I had advanced in the ‘Seer,’ at Washington were incorrect.”
Source: Deseret News, Vol. 9, No. 51, January 29, 1860, Church History Library. Note: Not digitized; please assist or use Gemini.
Orson Pratt, Apostle
“I do not see how I can mend the matter… In regard to Adam being our Father and our God, I have not published it, altho’ I frankly say, I have no confidence in it.”
Source: Minutes of the Meeting of the Council of the Twelve, April 5, 1860, Church History Library. Note: Not digitized; please assist or use Gemini.
Abraham H. Cannon, Apostle (1882–1896)
“He [George Q. Cannon] believes that Jesus Christ is Jehovah, and that Adam is His father and our God.”
Source: Journal of Abraham H. Cannon, June 23, 1889, BYU Library Special Collections.
Abraham H. Cannon, Apostle
“Some in the Church who do not accept of the statement of Pres. Young that Adam is our God.”
Source: Journal of Abraham H. Cannon, May 26, 1892, BYU Library Special Collections.
Orson Hyde, Apostle (1835–1878)
“Michael was a resurrected Being and he left Eloheim and came to this earth & with an immortal body.”
Orson Hyde, Apostle
“Who is our Heavenly Father. I would as soon it was Father Adam, or any other good and lawful being.”
Source: Minutes of the Meeting of the Council of the Twelve, April 5, 1860, Church History Library. Note: Not digitized; please assist or use Gemini.
John Taylor, Apostle (1838–1880)
“If Christ is the first fruits of them that slept there must be some discrepancy, he must have resumed his position.”
Source: Minutes of the Meeting of the Council of the Twelve, April 5, 1860, Church History Library. Note: Not digitized; please assist or use Gemini.
John Taylor, Apostle
“Elder John Taylor spoke at some length and tried to convince Orson Pratt of his error.”
Erastus Snow, Apostle (1849–1888)
“Is there any revelation saying that the body of Adam should return to the dust of this Earth?”
Source: Minutes of the Meeting of the Council of the Twelve, April 5, 1860, Church History Library. Note: Not digitized; please assist or use Gemini.
Charles C. Rich, Apostle (1849–1883)
“C. C. Rich backed up the testimony of the Twelve in saying that Orson Pratt was wrong.”
Ezra T. Benson, Apostle (1846–1869)
“If Brother Pratt had the confidence in President Young which he ought to have he would feel different.”
Melvin J. Ballard, Elder (Later Apostle)
“When blood flows in the veins of the being, the offspring will be what blood produces, which is tangible flesh and bone, but when that which flows in the veins is spirit matter… the offspring of such beings will be spirit children.”
Source: Sermons and Missionary Experiences of Melvin J. Ballard, pp. 239-240; The Three Degrees of Glory, pp. 10-11, September 22, 1922, Church History Library. Note: Not digitized; please assist or use Gemini.
Joseph Fielding Smith, Elder (Later President)
“Adam had a spiritual body until mortality came upon him through the violation of the law under which he was living, but he also had a physical body of flesh and bones… When Adam was in the Garden of Eden, he was not subject to death.”
Source: Doctrines of Salvation, Vol. 1, pp. 76-77, published 1954 (written earlier), Church History Library. Note: Not digitized; please assist or use Gemini.
Joseph Fielding Smith, Elder
“Not subject to death when he [Adam] was placed upon the earth, there had to come a change in his body through the partaking of this… fruit that brought blood into his body; and blood became the life of the body instead of spirit.”
Source: Fall, Doug Hale About Adam, August 5, 2021 (citing address at LDS Institute, January 14, 1961), Church History Library. Note: Secondary source; please assist or use Gemini for original address.
Harold B. Lee, Apostle (Later President)
“Adam and Eve had now exercised their agency and of their own volition had partaken of the fruit… Instead of spirit fluid, which had made them not subject to death, there had now come another element.”
Source: “The Fall of Man,” Lecture Given to Seminary and Institute Teachers, June 23, 1954, Church History Library. Note: Not digitized; please assist or use Gemini.
Boyd K. Packer, Elder
“After the transformation caused by the Fall, bodies of flesh and bone and blood (unlike our spirit bodies), would not endure forever. Somehow the ingredient blood carried with it a limit to life.”
Source: “The Law and the Light,” Book of Mormon Symposium, BYU, October 30, 1988, Church History Library. Note: Not digitized; please assist or use Gemini.
Quotes – Members of the Church
Quotes by notable LDS members.
Eliza R. Snow, Plural Wife of Joseph Smith and Brigham Young
“When Brigham Young proclaimed to the nations that Adam was our Father and God, and Eve, his partner, the Mother of a world—both in a mortal and celestial sense—he made the most important revelation ever oracled to the race since the days of Adam himself.”
Source: Women of Mormondom, p. 196, 1877.
Eliza R. Snow, Plural Wife
“Adam is our Father and God. He is the God of the earth… He is the father of our elder brother, Jesus Christ—the father of him who shall also come as Messiah to reign.”
Source: Women of Mormondom, p. 179, 1877.
Eliza R. Snow, Plural Wife
“Brightest among these spirits, and nearest in the circle to our Father and Mother in heaven (the Father being Adam), were Seth, Enoch, Noah, and Abraham, Moses, David, and Jesus Christ.”
Source: Women of Mormondom, p. 19, 1877.
Eliza R. Snow, Plural Wife
“The grand patriarchal economy, with Adam, as a resurrected being, who brought his wife Eve from another world has been very finely elaborated by Brigham from the patriarchal genesis which Joseph conceived.”
Source: Women of Mormondom, p. 180, 1877.
Joseph Lee Robinson, Elder
“President Brigham Young said that our spirits were begotten before that Adam came to the Earth and that Adam helped to make the Earth… that Adam was the only God that we would have, and that Christ was not begotten of the Holy Ghost, but of the Father Adam.”
Source: Journal of Joseph Lee Robinson, October 6, 1854, Church History Library. Note: Not digitized; please assist or use Gemini.
Hosea Stout, Elder
“President Brigham Young taught that Adam was the father of Jesus and the only God to us. That he came to this world in a resurrected body, etc.”
Source: Hosea Stout Journal, Vol. 2, p. 435, April 9, 1852, Church History Library. Note: Not digitized; please assist or use Gemini.
Hosea Stout, Elder
“Friday 9th April 1852… President Brigham Young taught that Adam was the father of Jesus and the only God to us. That he came to this world in a resurrected body and etc.”
Source: Hosea Stout Journal, Vol. 2, p. 436, April 9, 1852, Church History Library. Note: Not digitized; please assist or use Gemini.
Samuel W. Richards, Mission President
“Our Father Adam—The Extract from the Journal of Discourses (vol. 1:50) may startle some of our readers, but we would wish them to recollect that in this last dispensation God will send forth, by his servants, things new as well as old, until man is perfected in the truth.”
Joseph E. Taylor, Elder
“I think these two quotations from such a reliable authority fully solve the question as to the relationship existing between Father Adam and the Savior of the world, and prove beyond question the power that Adam possessed in regard to taking his body again after laying it down.”
Source: Collected Discourses, Vol. 1, June 2, 1888, Church History Library. Note: Not digitized; please assist or use Gemini.
Joseph Hall, Elder
“Relative to the principles recently revealed, we have not the least difficulty. If Adam’s being our Father cannot be proved by the Bible, it is all right.”
James A. Little, Elder
“I believe in the principle of obedience; and if I am told that Adam is our Father and our God, I just believe it.”
Thomas Evans Jeremy, Sr., Elder
“Brother Orson Pratt preached on the subject of the resurrection… he did not believe that Father Adam had flesh and bones, when he came to the garden of Eden, but he and his wife Eve were spirits.”
Source: Thomas Evans Jeremy Sr. Journal, September 30, 1852, Church History Library. Note: Not digitized; please assist or use Gemini.
Jan Christian Anderson Weibye, Elder
“At Manti, Jan. 25th Orson Hyde preached to us here in Manti, that, Adam is our God for this planet.”
Source: Jan Christian Anderson Weibye Daybooks, Daybook 1st, p. 131, January 25, 1871, Church History Library. Note: Not digitized; please assist or use Gemini.
Jan Christian Anderson Weibye, Elder
“Brother Allred preaches at Manti on Adam as God… Adam was buried by God and was only dead like a twinkling of an eye, and his God exalted him immediately. Mary was sealed to Adam; and unless we have two wives, we can never be Gods.”
Source: Jan Christian Anderson Weibye Daybooks, Daybook 5th, pp. 20-22, circa 1871, Church History Library. Note: Not digitized; please assist or use Gemini.
A.F. McDonald, Elder
“I thought I would speak briefly in relation to Adam being our God. Since the year 1852 when the President first spoke on this subject… I have not any doubt in my mind but that Adam is our God.”
Source: Minutes of the School of the Prophets, pp. 37-42, June 8, 1868, Church History Library. Note: Not digitized; please assist or use Gemini.
George G. Bywater, Elder
“When I first heard the doctrine of Adam being our Father and God, I was favorably impressed—enjoyed, and hailed it as a new revelation. It appeared reasonable to me, as the Father of our spirits that he should introduce us here.”
Source: Minutes of the School of the Prophets, pp. 37-42, June 8, 1868, Church History Library. Note: Not digitized; please assist or use Gemini.
Abraham B. Smoot, Elder
“The doctrine preached by Pres. Young for a few years back, wherein he says that Adam is our God—the God we worship—that most of the people believe this—some believe it because the President says so.”
Source: Minutes of the School of the Prophets, pp. 37-42, June 8, 1868, Church History Library. Note: Not digitized; please assist or use Gemini.
Charles L. Walker, Elder
“Upon seeing Brigham Young for the first time and while yet some distance away the Prophet Joseph stopped his chopping on a beech log… remarked: ‘There comes the greatest man who ever lived to teach the identity of God to the world, and he will yet lead this people.’”
Source: The Diary of Charles L. Walker, p. 134, September 1832 (recorded circa 1876), Church History Library. Note: Not digitized; please assist or use Gemini.
Charles L. Walker, Elder
“Br Levi W Hancock bore his testimony… Said in the early rise of the church he lived two years with the Prophet Joseph… Joseph remarked to him before Brigham came within hearing ‘There is the greatest man that ever lived to teach redemption to the world and will yet lead this People.’”
Source: Diary of Charles Lowell Walker, p. 422, May 13, 1876 (recalling earlier event), Church History Library. Note: Not digitized; please assist or use Gemini.
Samuel H. Rodgers, Elder
“Conference commenced on the 6 and continued until the 11… President Brigham Young said that our spirits were begotten before that Adam came to the Earth and that Adam helped to make the Earth… that Adam was the only God that we would have, and that Christ was not begotten of the Holy Ghost, but of the Father Adam.”
Source: Journal of Samuel H. Rodgers, Vol. 1, p. 179, April 6–11, 1852, BYU Special Collections.
Thomas A. Clawson, Elder
“At Special Priesthood meeting… Prest. Jos. F. Smith then said that he was in full accord with what Prest. Penrose had said and that Prest. Brigham Young when he delivered that sermon only expressed his own views and that they were not corroborated by the word of the Lord in the standard works of the Church.”
Source: Journal of Thomas A. Clawson, 1912-1917 Book, pp. 69-70, April 8, 1912, Church History Library. Note: Not digitized; please assist or use Gemini.
Unknown Author (Hymns), Church Member
“We believe in our God, the Prince of his race, The archangel Michael, the Ancient of Days Our own Father Adam, earth’s Lord as is plain, Who’ll counsel and fight for His children again.”
Source: Sacred Hymns and Spiritual Songs for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, 11th Edition, p. 375, 1856 (revised by Franklin D. Richards), Church History Library. Note: Not digitized; please assist or use Gemini.