The Know

One of the most profound truths restored through the Prophet Joseph Smith was regarding the eternal origin and destiny of humankind. In addition to the understanding he received in Doctrine and Covenants 76, an all-encompassing vision of the three degrees of glory and the potential each mortal child of God has to become like Him in the future, Joseph Smith also learned by revelation that all human lives began before mortal birth.1

The first time this truth was hinted at came when the Prophet was translating the Book of Mormon. Alma taught that Melchizedek Priesthood holders were “called and prepared from the foundation of the world . . . , on account of their exceeding faith and good works” (Alma 13:3). More information on this would be revealed when Joseph Smith translated the Book of Abraham, a record that taught that God had organized the spirits of humankind before they were born. Among those spirits “were many of the noble and great ones; and God saw these souls that they were good, and he stood in the midst of them, and he said: These I will make my rulers; for he stood among those that were spirits, and he saw that they were good; and he said unto me: Abraham, thou art one of them; thou wast chosen before thou wast born” (Abraham 3:22–23). Others, too, were foreordained to certain callings in that premortal council.2

Indeed, the premortal life figured also in Joseph Smith’s inspired translation of the Bible, in which God the Father states: “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” (Moses 3:5). This would later be reiterated on May 6, 1833, in a revelation detailing how the righteous can grow from grace to grace as the Savior did and eventually return to God’s presence. The Lord declared, “Man was also in the beginning with God. Intelligence, or the light of truth, was not created or made, neither indeed can be” (Doctrine and Covenants 93:29). Furthermore, it was during that premortal existence that Satan rebelled and became the devil for refusing to follow God’s plan of salvation.3

This doctrine concerning the premortal origins of all human beings is a critical aspect of the Father’s plan of salvation: humankind, being literal spirit children of God, came to earth in order to further progress so that they might become like God. This doctrine also has ancient roots, which can be found in the Bible. For example, when the Lord called Jeremiah to be a prophet, He declared, “Before I formed thee in the belly I knew thee; and before thou camest forth out of the womb I sanctified thee, and I ordained thee a prophet unto the nations” (Jeremiah 1:5).4 Echoing this doctrine, the Apostle Paul similarly stated, “God . . . separated [appointed] me from my mother’s womb, and called me by his grace.”5 While some have attempted to argue that Jeremiah’s calling simply represents God’s foreknowledge, Terryl L. Givens has noted that “sanctifying and ordaining require an entity to be sanctified and ordained.”6 Additionally, a highly regarded Jewish biblical scholar, Mitchell Dahood (1922–1982), observed that “an impressive number of [Old Testament] texts take for granted that man originated and pre-existed in the nether world.”7

Moreover, an episode during Jesus’s mortal ministry highlights this doctrine. As Jesus walked with his disciples, “he saw a man which was blind from his birth. And his disciples asked him, saying, Master, who did sin, this man, or his parents, that he was born blind? Jesus answered, Neither hath this man sinned, nor his parents,” and afterward proceeded to heal the man (John 9:1–3). As S. Kent Brown has noted, “The concept of a premortal life, in which an individual is able to make choices, lies at the base of the question” those disciples asked Jesus.8 Furthermore, Jesus did not challenge the disciples on the reality of a premortal life but explained that the man had not committed a sin justifying his lifelong blindness.9 Elsewhere, Paul would also teach about the preexistent state of the Church.10 The repeated references to the pre-existence led one biblical scholar to conclude, “The idea of pre-existence . . . is deeply embedded in the Biblical traditions.”11

This doctrine was also expressed among early Jewish and Christian writers. For instance, the community at Qumran that wrote the Dead Sea Scrolls around the time of Jesus said in a hymn of thanksgiving that the righteous are those whom God “founded before the centuries . . . together with the host of your spirits and the assembly of your holy ones, with your holy vault and all its hosts.”12 Similarly, in the book of 2 Enoch, an angel declared, “For all the souls are prepared for eternity, before the composition of the earth.”13 An early Christian hymn found among a collection known as the Odes of Solomon likewise declares, “He who created me when yet I was not knew what I would do when I came into being,” and the odist similarly says in the voice of the Savior, “Before they had existed, I recognized them; and imprinted a seal on their faces.”14 Another text, titled the Wisdom of Solomon, likewise teaches, “As a child I was naturally gifted, and a good soul fell to my lot, or rather, being good, I entered an undefiled body.”15 Regarding this text, biblical scholar David Winston noted, “This verse is as clear a statement of the concept of preexistent souls as one could wish, and there is no need to explain it away as many commentators have done.”16

This doctrine is also key in a Christian text known as the Clementine Recognitions, which purports to be the recollections of Clement of Rome during the Apostolic Father’s conversion to Christianity. According to the Recognitions, two of the greatest questions on Clement’s mind before meeting the Apostle Peter were “whether there be for me any life after death” and “whether I did not exist before I was born.” When Clement and Peter met, Peter first instructed him regarding the creation of the world. When detailing the creation of Adam and Eve, Peter taught, “But after all these things [God] made man, on whose account he had prepared all things, whose internal species is older, and for whose sake all things that are were made, given up to his service, and assigned to the uses of his habitation.”17

Similar sentiments are also found among the writings of many of the Church Fathers, including Clement of Alexandria and Origen.18 John Gee has also observed that this doctrine was especially prominent in the forty-day literature.19 It was also typical among various Gnostic groups, and various Gnostic texts found at Nag Hammadi maintain the pre-existence of the human soul.20

As the Christian church entered the third and fourth centuries AD, more and more voices sought to put down many of the heresies that Gnosticism introduced. Unfortunately, in the effort to stamp out those heresies, some authentic doctrines and practices of the New Testament church were likewise targeted solely because they were more prominently taught or practiced by these Gnostic Christians.21 By the sixth century AD, this authentic and once-beloved Jewish and Christian doctrine was declared a heresy. At the Second Council of Constantinople, Origen was even posthumously condemned and excommunicated in part for his multiple references to this doctrine.22 Because of this decision, most Christian churches today likewise reject this doctrine. But this important doctrine has been revealed and restored through the Prophet Joseph Smith, clearly demonstrating the divine origins and potential of humankind.

The Why

As revealed through the Prophet Joseph Smith, our lives did not begin at birth, neither will they end with death. The Lord’s plan of salvation extends well before the earth itself was created. Because God desires His spirit children to be able to progress and become like Him, He instituted this plan to help each of us grow through a mortal experience and learn how to make and keep sacred covenants with Him.

This doctrine is ancient, and it was taught in the Old and New Testaments. However, as truths were slowly corrupted through the Great Apostasy, this doctrine was likewise manipulated, in ways becoming unlike what the apostles had taught the early Church. Because there were not any prophets or apostles to correct the church, once-beloved doctrines were lost and forgotten, perhaps even in the Lord’s interest to both protect such a sacred truth and prevent its corruption from further condemning His children. This same principle was once described by the prophet Alma, who taught:

It is given unto many to know the mysteries of God; nevertheless they are laid under a strict command that they shall not impart only according to the portion of his word which he doth grant unto the children of men, according to the heed and diligence which they give unto him. And therefore, he that will harden his heart, the same receiveth the lesser portion of the word; and he that will not harden his heart, to him is given the greater portion of the word, until it is given unto him to know the mysteries of God until he know them in full. (Alma 12:9–10)

However, as part of the restoration of all things, God once again revealed this doctrine to His children, allowing them to rejoice fully in His great plan of happiness.