Book of Moses Evidence: Adam’s Premortal Existence

Adam as the First Man

The doctrine that all of God’s spirit children were created and existed prior to the creation of the earth is one of the distinctive teachings of the Book of Moses.

For I, the Lord God, created all things, of which I have spoken, spiritually, before they were naturally upon the face of the earth. … And I, the Lord God, had created all the children of men; and not yet a man to till the ground; for in heaven created I them; and there was not yet flesh upon the earth, neither in the water, neither in the air …. And I, the Lord God, formed man from the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul, the first flesh upon the earth, the first man also; nevertheless, all things were before created; but spiritually were they created and made according to my word. (Moses 3:5–7)

Other Restoration texts specifically assert that Adam—the “first man”—held an important leadership position under the direction of Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ and was known in his pre-earthly angelic role as Michael before the creation of the world.1 The Prophet Joseph Smith taught that “the Priesthood was first given to Adam: he obtained the first Presidency & held the keys of it” and that “he obtained it in the creation before the world was formed.”2

Ideas about Adam and the Creation in Early Judaism

Judaism was not a monolithic religious entity but consisted of a variety of competing and sometimes conflicting factions and groups which were often at religious and ideological odds with one another. Jarl Fossum in his seminal study The Name of God and the Angel of the Lord has explored evidence for early Jewish teachings about the premortal role of Adam in the creation and that this was an idea of some controversy in ancient rabbinic circles.3

One line of evidence comes from the Babylonian Talmud which declares, “Our rabbi’s taught: Adam was created [last of all beings] on the eve of Sabbath. Why so? Lest the minim [heretics] should say: The Holy One, blessed be He, had a partner in his work of creation.”4 Although this statement clearly affirms that Adam was not in existence before the Creation of the world, it also hints that there were some rabbinic Jews—labeled as heretics—who believed in such a doctrine.5 And, indeed, some early midrashic interpretations of the Bible convey ideas along these very lines.

One commentary, dating to the third century AD, states that “God took counsel with the souls of the righteous in creating the universe.”6 The Jewish proponent of this belief interpreted the passage in 1 Chronicles 4:23, which speaks of King Solomon and his workers, as an allusion to God and righteous premortal beings who helped him with the act of creation. Fossum states, “The midrash agrees with the rabbinic tradition that God in Gen. i.26 ‘took counsel’ with his agents. But it goes further … in that it explicitly calls God’s agents ‘makers’, ‘formers’, with reference to Genesis ii.7.”7 In a modern compilation known as The Legends of the Jews, which retells biblical and Jewish sacred history on the basis of a wide range of ancient and medieval Jewish sources, we read, “Before the world was created, there was none to praise God and know Him. He created the angels and the holy Hayyot, the heavens and their host, and Adam as well. They were all to praise and glorify their creator.”8

Fossum also finds evidence for this idea in subsequent gnostic Christian texts, leading him to conclude that “when the rabbis had to maintain that Adam was created on the eve of the Sabbath, they were contending against a doctrine of a heavenly man who was pre-existent or had been brought into being on the first day of creation.” Although found in later strains of Christian Gnosticism, Fossum contends that “this doctrine was of Jewish origin.”9

The First Man in the Book of Job

Additional evidence suggests that this idea of a premortal existence for the first man dates much earlier. In a study on conceptions of Adam in the ancient Near East and ancient Israel, Dexter Callender explains how these ideas stand behind some of the discourse in the book of Job.10 While the precise dating of this work remains unclear, many scholars believe it dates to the Persian period or possibly even the Babylonian period of Israelite history.11

In the story, Job’s friend Eliphaz responds to his complaints by asking, “Are you the firstborn of the human race? Were you brought forth before the hills? Have you listened in the council of God? And do you limit wisdom to yourself? What do you know that we do not know?” (Job 15:7–9 NRSV). The implication here is that Job, as a mere mortal, could not lay claim to such heavenly wisdom. Callender argues, however, that behind this question was an ancient assumption that, unlike Job, the first man (i.e., Adam) could indeed have laid claim to such heavenly wisdom.12 Callender makes several arguments which support this idea.

Brought Forth

First, he observes that in contrast to the Genesis account of the creation, the first man in Job is described in the text as having been “born” or “brought forth” rather than “created” (Genesis 1:27) or “formed” (Gen 2:7). Callender notes, “In these words of Eliphaz, we learn that the first human was thought to have been born before the hills. The verbal root here is hwl which means ‘to dance or writhe’. It is used in connection with birth imagery, denoting writhing in travail; and hence can render the meaning ‘to bear or bring forth.’” The meaning of the verb is clear in the parallelism here with yld, as in Isaiah 51:2. In other words, “The first human is described as having come into existence through natural means, that is through birth.”13 The usage of this terminology seemingly points to an origin for Adam’s creation which precedes his corporeal formation from the dust of the earth in Genesis 2:7.

Before the Hills

Second, the first man in Job 15:7 is said to have been born “before the hills,” a description which is also used for the personified figure of wisdom in Proverbs, where Wisdom is said to have been possessed by God at the beginning: “before the mountains were settled, before the hills was I brought forth” (Proverbs 8:25). In the Genesis account, Adam’s physical body was created at the culmination of the creation on the sixth day (Genesis 1:26, 31; 2:7). “It is significant,” Callender states, “that this birth is said to have taken place ‘before the hills,’” since “humankind is humankind is created after the waters had receded from the earth, allowing hills to appear.”14 However, the language could also be read as a reference to the premortal birth of Adam’s spirit, bringing it into existence before the creation of his physical body upon the earth, as recorded in Genesis 2.

A Listener in God’s Heavenly Council

Third, Eliphaz’s question, “Have you listened in the council of God?” is informed by a context which places the first man in God’s heavenly council where he had access to heavenly wisdom.15 “According to Eliphaz, the wisdom of the primordial human came as a result of his presence within the council of God, and the fact that he ‘listened.’”16 Callender also observes that the language in this passage may be “alluding to a particular divine council [cf. Gen. 1:26] in which the plan of creation was revealed” or alternatively may indicate continuing access, meaning “art thou wont to be a listener.”17

Was Present at the Creation of the World

Fourth, the Lord listed various things that Job in a mortal condition could not possibly have known, but which God knew by virtue of his wisdom as the Creator. These details were conveyed in a series of rhetorical questions: “Where wast thou when I laid the foundations of the earth? Declare if thou hast understanding. Who hath laid the measures thereof, if thou knowest? Or who hath stretched the line upon it? Whereupon are the foundations thereof fastened? Or who laid the corner stone thereof; When the morning stars sang together and all the sons of God shouted for joy” (Job 38:4–7).

According to Herbert May, “The motif of the First Man, created before the earth appears in Job 15:7, 8 and is also found in Job 38:4–7 …. In Job 38 the theme is wisdom and knowledge which Job, in contrast with God, does not have; he was not there (as First Man was there) when God laid the foundations of the earth and the members of God’s council (the morning stars, the sons of God) rejoiced.”18 In response to God’s questions, Job, as mortal would have to admit that he did not know the answers.

In contrast, Adam could have answered “yes,” since, as one associated with God in the premortal realms, he had access to divine wisdom about the creation of the earth. In fact, as Callender puts it, “The primal human … was present at the creation and by virtue of that fact possessed wisdom in its most intimate details. The divine speeches in [Job] chapters 38–41 make clear that the secrets of the universe lie within the primordium, the epoch of creation. As one who ‘was born then’, he knew the deepest and most esoteric of knowledge.”19 Thus, “in the world-view of the writer of Job and his audience the first human is an exalted being …. He is numbered among the sons of God.”20

Conclusion

In 1830, the notion of Adam existing before his birth as a premortal spirit, as well as the idea that he was given divine wisdom and helped in some way to create the earth, would have been significantly at odds with orthodox Christian sentiments in Joseph Smith’s environment. It is therefore significant that these ideas, found in the Book of Moses and other Restoration texts, can now be traced back very deeply into early Jewish thought—not only to rabbinic texts and commentaries but to passages in an early text within the Bible itself, namely the book of Job.