In what can be called “Mormon Speak,” we typically talk about “getting” and then “having” what we call a “testimony.” None of this kind of talk can be found in our scriptures, which testify to us about faith and then tell us to testify about its contents and grounds—that is, to give an apologia (or defense).
We also speak of this “testimony” that we once got as somehow “growing” stronger and stronger, or being “challenged” or being “weakened.” What we are actually talking about is our faith—what we believe. So our talk about having a testimony is bunk. Why? There is not a single place in our scriptures in which anyone gets or has what we call a “testimony.”
There is, instead, much said about the necessity of our testifying to our faith or to what we believe by giving the reasons for our faith. And there is much in our scriptures about faith—understood as trust—in God. This trust in God is something we can have in the most dire of circumstances, such as when parents or children or friends go missing, or we or someone close faces a painful death, or we fail in the stock market, or when the wrong party gets elected in Wyoming, or when the Brethren disappoint us, and so forth.
As to really knowing, we all see through a glass darkly. We can, of course, nurture the seed of faith bit by bit and grow it little by little into the tree of life, and even eventually see it produce the fruit of the tree of life. Then, if and when we taste that fruit, we really know. We can then speak of our knowing. But until that day, we can only speak of knowing as something like it, already here and now, but not quite yet.
We have, for various reasons, somehow gotten into the habit of substituting the word testimony for the word faith. By doing so, we have created for ourselves a bit of a problem. I can recall going through some confusion about this just as I got started at the university. “Testimony” has become something one gets and hence has, somewhat like the “born again” experience of evangelicals. In addition, we thereby make everything rest on how we feel at the moment. We can then talk about “having had a testimony” and then “not having one” right now, even though we still have faith in God and are striving to keep the commandments. But if we think of “testimony” as something we do when we give reasons for our faith, then we focus on something more than the emotions of the moment, even the very best or worst of which eventually come and go. But the reasons can and do stay in our minds and hearts, if we genuinely hearken, read, listen, ponder, serve as good servants of their Master should, if they are to find favor in his sight.
In addition, when we force bearing our testimonies, or testifying, into an exercise of describing how we came to know, we face the problem of not exactly knowing how or what we know, but still having faith or things we believe, and still being able to remember God and his mighty works, and the covenants we made to serve him, come what may, whether we feel like it or not. And if we are not sure about knowing, then we somehow begin to feel like we are out on the ocean without a rudder or a sail.
I would, if I could, forbid Latter-day Saints from saying that they “have a testimony.” Instead, I want to hear something about their faith—about its object and grounds. I want to hear or read an apologia. Should we not, following a famous passage in our scriptures, be ready to give the reasons for the hope that is in us? These reasons will provide a kind of window into our souls—what makes us tick. I sort of miss hearing someone tell how reading the Book of Mormon turned them from being a beer drinker (or whatever) into a Saint (or aspiring Holy One, which is what that word means).
“Testimony” has become something one gets and hence has, somewhat like the “born again” experience of evangelicals. In addition, we thereby make everything rest on how we feel at the moment. We can then talk about “having had a testimony” and then “not having one” right now, even though we still have faith in God and are striving to keep the commandments.
I like the way you put that, Bro. Midgley.
How often have all had opportunity to chuckle at the small child stretching to reach the microphone once we hear him or her utter those timeless words: “I’d like to bury my testimony …” Perhaps, if I understand you correctly, that child is closer to the truth than we may have previously considered.
Thank you for this post; it has made me think about my spirituality differently, in a good way. But I do have a few comments.
A testimony is, perhaps, more accurately described as the declaration of the product, result, blessing, witness, or confirmation of faith & faithfulness granted by the Spirit. It is not a profession of blind faith or trust, but a declaration of KNOWLEDGE of that which is often, but not always, unseen, yet true. The phrase “I want to bear my testimony” may not be in the scriptures, but the words “I know” or “witness” are, denoting the role of REVELATION in gaining that which is, at least to the individual, a proof. Our latter-day vernacular has labelled this as a testimony.
We can, whether it is blatantly present in the scriptures or not, turn to & rely on how latter-day prophets use the term “testimony”, as it is accurate to our time, language & circumstances.
I believe that it would be accurate to say “I wish to bear my testimony”, which would be equally accurate if one said, “I testify”. I was past 50 when I was baptized a member of the Church, consequently several sayings in the Church struck me as odd.One such was of the type when a person says, “I have a testimony of the Gospel of Jesus Christ”. I wanted to say, “Then please share it with me! What is your testimony?” But that was indeed the testimony. One of my sons claims a testimony of the Book of Mormon, that it is false. He claims that he prayed about it and “the spirit” told him it was false. That is another problem. We talk about receiving a testimony from the spirit. Of course we are supposed to assume that it was a “true spirit” and that the testimony was a “truthful testimony that whatever is discussed is true”. But we are often left only to assume.
I agree for the most part with the post.
“And this is not all. Do ye not suppose that I know of these things myself? Behold, I testify unto you that I do know that these things whereof I have spoken are true. And how do ye suppose that I know of their surety? Behold, I say unto you they are made known unto me by the Holy Spirit of God. Behold, I have fasted and prayed many days that I might know these things of myself. And now I do know of myself that they are true; for the Lord God hath made them manifest unto me by his Holy Spirit; and this is the spirit of revelation which is in me.” (Alma 5:45-46)
If you “know,” it is because the spirit of God has testified to you, and you know you had the experience. You *believe* that the spirit of God made it known unto you in that experience, and you *trust* what the spirit has told you, because, as Enos, you know that God cannot lie. So long as you are obedient, that spirit can work in you and you can maintain that faith and confidence. And therefore, it is the manifestation of the spirit that works on you, and you can know that your experience means that something is true. But you do not have first hand knowledge of it, you only have the evidence of your experience. The problem is when you stop believing, and your unbelief in your experience leads you to deny in your mind, and doubt the reality of it, because you give into the fear that it isn’t true, and you yield to the temptation to explain it away.
Louis, I respectfully disagree that talk about “getting” and then “having” what we call a “testimony” is not found in our scriptures. Jacob had a testimony and so did Alma.
We are commanded to “testify” of what we know, and when we do, what we have said and what we know is “a testimony.” I have a testimony that God lives and that Jesus is the Christ. I do not comprehend why that kind of language offends you.
The word “have” can be understood in two ways. And the word “witness” and the word “testimony” generally are synonymous in scripture. Understanding these two facts helps to put into perspective what this post is trying to say. And understanding these two facts seems to show that this post perhaps is not quite right in stating that “having” what we call a “testimony” cannot be “found in our scriptures.” It can be found in our scriptures.
As to the word “have,” a little background: All who “have” a Bible or a Book of Mormon “have” the testimony or witness of the prophets and apostles. To “have” a testimony or witness of Christ in this sense is simply to have read or heard (or had made available to us to read or hear) the testimony or witness of prophets and apostles witnessing of Christ. For example, as second counselor in the First Presidency under President Wilford Woodruff, President Joseph F. Smith, in his talk “I Know that My Redeemer Lives” (Weber Stake Conference, Ogden, Sunday, October 18, 1896, in Brian Stuy, Collected Discourses, vol. 5, p. 229.) stated: “we have the testimony of the Prophets and Apostles of this present age, who have seen and heard for themselves, and who have received ordination under the hands of messengers sent from God.” Note his use of the word “have” in the sense of “to possess.” This is simple to understand. And of course this phrase can be interpreted in solely a physical sense, as in simply to possess or have available the printed pages on which that witness or testimony is written or to have in one’s mind the present experience of hearing (or a memory of having heard) the words spoken by the prophets and apostles.
But the concept of “having” a testimony or witness of Christ goes beyond that (and should go beyond that) and the concept of “having” a testimony or witness in a further, deeper sense indeed finds root in our latter-day prophetic tradition and indeed is consistent with and not at all absent from the scriptures. Here is a description of the deeper sense (followed in my next paragraph below by a description of how it is consistent with and derives from our scriptures). In the very next sentence in his discourse, President Smith states: “And better than all this, you have the testimony of the Holy Ghost himself, and that cannot make any mistake.” To “have” a testimony in this sense is, again, “to possess” or at least to have “received” such a testimony. But used in this way, the word “have” does not suggest merely a physical sense (as in possession of a written text or possession of a memory of a spoken witness); rather, it suggests a spiritual sense, where the Holy Ghost speaks and witnesses and testifies — and we receive (not just hear) that witness. And this is precisely what may be meant by the use of the word “have” (or “hath”) in 1 John 5:10, where in a general epistle to all the world, the writer (apparently the apostle John, author of the Gospel of John and witness of Christ’s resurrection) stated: “He that believeth on the Son of God hath the witness in himself.” (1 John 5:10.)
There, in the phrase “hath the witness,” the word “hath” derives from the Greek εχει (“echei”) meaning simply “to have” or “to hold.” And the word “witness” derives from the Greek μαρτυρίαν (“marturian”) meaning “record,” or “testimony,” or “witness.” The word “witness” is used also in verse 9: “If we receive the witness of men, the witness of God is greater: for this is the witness of God which he hath testified of his Son.” (1 John 5:9.) The Greek word μαρτυρίαν (“marturian”), translated in vv. 9 and 10 as “witness,” appears in various other passages in the New Testament and there is translated either by the King James translators or by others as “testimony.” See, e.g., John 5:34 (“But I receive not testimony from man”); John 5:36 (“But I have greater witness than that of John,” translated in the World English Bible as “but the testimony which I have is greater than that of John”); Acts 22:18 (“for they will not receive thy testimony concerning me”); and Revelation 12:17 (“which keep the commandments of God, and have the testimony of Jesus Christ”).
So there we see our scriptures using phrases like “I have a greater witness” (Jesus speaking); “hath the witness” (John speaking); “receive thy testimony” (Paul speaking); and “have the testimony of Jesus Christ” (John the Revelator speaking). The post states that it is “Mormon Speak” for us to “typically talk about ‘getting’ and then ‘having’ what we call a ‘testimony'” and argues that “none of this kind of talk can be found in our scriptures.” I wonder if, rather, “Mormon talk” is not also “John talk,” “Jesus talk,” and “Paul talk.”
Stephen Kent Ehat
It seems that Blair Hodges and Gerald Fuller have grasped the point of my screed, which seems to have gotten the attention of a few others. I quite like and even appreciate much of what Stephen Kent Ehat has written as he tried to help me sort out what he thinks I was trying to convey. Put bluntly, I agree with what Ehat has written, above. Theodore Brandley has quoted some language from our scriptures that supports my own opinion that testimony is what we do when we yield to workings of the Holy Spirit as we repent (understood as turning or returning to Jesus Christ), accept the testimonies given in our scriptures and by the Lord’s sometimes and even often deeply flawed servants, and respond in faith to what we have received as a gift or treasure from none other than God.
As Ehat somewhat pedantically points out, the Greek word marturia, which is often translated as “to testify,” or, in intensified forms, spimartureo, marturomai, diamarturomai, and so forth, where it becomes “to bear (or summon to) witness,” or “protest solemnly,” and also to the words mariturion and marturia, which are commonly translated as “testimony,” or “witness,” or sometimes “record,” as in “right on the heart.” In virtually every instance, these words are employed, as Ehat indicates, to identify faith centered on Jesus Christ. As he points out, one can accept, receive, believe, or have and hold such a witness from another one or from what is found in various texts, including especially our scriptures. All of this, I now testify, is the work of the Holy Spirit, which convicts me and you, if we will welcome it, as it can hopefully confict other hearers or readers, and thereby draw all of us into a community of genuine Saints. This can and does happen when we are led make covenants that popefully transform us into Saints–that is, Holy Ones. When we teach, preach, instruct, blog, lecture, opine on boards, lists, gab in Sunday School, gossip at meals, we should also be placing our offering on the altar, as we, as well as we can, testify of our faith in Jesus Christ, and set out also as well as we can what we know about divine and human things. We should not just be constantly affirming that we have a testimony, but we should be activiely testifying. When we ourselves so testify, we do so in the name of Jesus Christ, presumably as if he is speaking. So just repeating a formula that we have learned is now what we should be doing.
The Saints generally have come to talk about how they came to faith by telling how they “got their testimonies,” or telling how they lost them, and so forth. When we talk this way, we have moved away from the idea of testifying or witnessing to our faith in Jesus Christ, or to what we know (or think we know) or believe about divine things, set out in a solemn declaration spoken or written explicitly or implicitly in the name of the one to whom we are a witness. In this way we trivialize genuinely important.
I have, as all of you have, seen the evidence that a very high percentage of returned LDS missionaries, those who once spent two years testifying or witnessing for Jesus Christ, never again testify to their faith in Jesus Christ to one not of our faith. When they get “home,” they simply cease being missionaries, and more on to other things, and even look back, John Dehlin style, to those silly days. However, in my experience, if you ask these same former LDS missionaries, if they have a “testimony,” most or at least many of them will say that they do. And they will also volunteer how they somehow came to “get” their faith (or “testimony”) and they will manifest signs that they strive to remain faithful. Their stories, will often, ironically repott some details about what happened to then while serving as missionaries testifying for and about Jesus Christ.
Ironically, those who go missing will also “testify” about how they were once duped into believing and doing or not doing this and that, and they will also report how they once were believers, but now have been indarkened by this or that currently fashionable ideology, bit of historical detail they were not taught in Primary, or some now popular sin, or whatever. The odd thing is that the popular “exit stories” of those who go missing are a form of witness or testimonial.
These observations are part of what is behind my remark about “getting a testimony” being a kind of LDS equivalent of the evangelical “born-again experience.” And the testimonials gathered by apostates are also a kind of secular testimony bearing, though not in the name of Jesus Christ.
One final note. One can hear in General Conference those who address the Saints mention “getting” and “having” testimonies, and also we can hear their powerful messages to which the speakers testify in the name of our Lord. I see this as merely a habit that is a bit like our once fashionable and not even now abolished obsession with the expression “free agency,” which somewhere along the line we borrowed from gentile sources. The first instance of the expression “free agency” that I am aware of is in the writings of William Channing, the founder of Unitarianism in the USA. Of course, agency or moral agency is language found in our scriptures. Within that horizon, that language carries a far different meaning than what was often conveyed by the expression “free agency.”
So my preference is to hold tightly to the language of our scriptures. We should, I testify, feast upon the Word, and especially the Book of Mormon.
One might venture to disagree with the notion that General Conference speakers — who mention “getting” and “having” testimonies — do so as the result of “merely a habit” that Latter-day Saints may have “borrowed from gentile sources.” One might even reject such a notion. (That seems to be, however, precisely what is stated in the second-to-last paragraph of the post immediately above.)
The April 2 response (further above), quoting from 1 John and Revelation, did not refer to the verb “to testify” but, rather, to the synonymous nouns “testimony” and “witness.” The April 2 response did so both because 1 John 5:10 uses the noun, not the verb (“He that believeth on the Son of God hath the witness in himself”) and because Revelation 12:17 uses the noun, not the verb (“have the testimony of Jesus Christ”). The scriptures clearly do speak of “having a testimony.”
It is for the reader to decide whether it is considered “pedantic” — definition: overly concerned with formal rules and trivial points of learning — to simply look at the plain-English language used 1 John 5:10 and Revelation 12:17 and see that those two passages, in essence, use the very straighforward phrase “have a testimony.” Those two passages of scripture clearly seem to support the notion that it is not merely some sort of “Mormon Speak” to “talk about ‘getting’ and then ‘having’ what we call a ‘testimony.” And those two passages seem also to support the notion that it might not be accurate to assert that “none of this kind of talk can be found in our scriptures.”
It might be suggested that the first paragraph of the first April 1 post be amended to read as follows: “We typically talk about ‘getting’ and then ‘having’ what we call a ‘testimony.’ While the Apostle John, Jesus, and Paul all speak of receiving and having a testimony and a witness, the scriptures and the prophets go beyond that and tell us also, more importantly, to actively testify to others, to actively witness to others about the contents and grounds of our faith — that is, to give an apologia (or defense).”
In other words, the message Louis Midgley conveys (or perhaps should convey) is that it is one thing to “have” a testimony and quite another thing actively to declare it to others. That is wholly acceptable and sound. But in making the latter point one need not contend the former point is not based in scripture.
Athanasios Paul Thompson writes: The site, Ancienttruthmedia.com is planning to publish an article on Mormonism. It is the first in a series of articles on companion American religions that hold to a Christianized orientation. It will not be a blanket endorsement of each but an evenhanded attempt for honest recognition of the good discovered in other churches. Although not orthodox and outside of the normal catagories of heterodoxy, the Latter Day Saint theology and practice is maturing. Their own inhouse debates about a popular LDS concept called, “Having a testimony” is an example of the clear and open thinking that enables the advancement of truth. The ancient apostolic faith tradition embodied in Eastern and Oriental Orthodoxy and expressed in Roman Catholicism must accept the challenge to fairly evaluate other churches. Mormonism rightly acknowledges that there is both a subjective as well as objective revelation to be realized by believers. It is no longer appropriate to simply label non Orthodox Catholics as heretics. Both greek expressions apprehend a necessary accuracy when apologetics are done but modern thought often distorts the intentional meaning behind the words. To call someone heretical today is to insult the righteouly inclined with what they deem to be a decisively offensive tone. At its apostolic heart the ancient church testifies to objective longheld dogmatic standards of belief. The Nicene and Apostles Creeds are at their best, carefully worded statements of belief. Within those statements the reality of the Holy Spirit is exemplified. The Philosopher Plato once remarked, “The beginning of truth is to wonder at things.” Creedal statements in their unique exactitude are important to the Orthodox self understanding and Christian world view. But the words describing others who do not conform to them – namely the heterodox (some truth or partly true) and heretical (false and absent of truth) were never intended to be used as a heavy sledgehammer to offend and insult other brothers in the general faith of God and Christ. The Holy Spirit leads and guides into truth and also moves in mysterious ways as defined in various biblical accounts in the Gospel of St.John and the Book of Acts.
Christians should have a testimony. We all need a personal account as to how and when we came to understand who God is and what He has done in and through Jesus Christ, Pantocrator! There is the declarative testimony of the Word of God in history and also the living Word incarnate in the soul of a believing Christian through personal conviction about objective truth. Our LDS friends must not abandon good language which may more than adequatly describe a potentially holy and life changing experience in order to better understand objective truth. Both are needed.
Press on dear Mormon friend into the fullness of God’s revelation and confirm your calling as secure in Christ, Savior of mankind!
I was a bit bored with the what has been posted on this blog, especially since some of what has been posted has been an attempt, not to understand what I had in mind, but to explain to me what I should have written, if I had been thinking clearly the way my critic obviously does. But this last item posted has been interesting. I have been trying to find out something about Fr. Athanasios Paul Thompson.
I have discovered that he has identified himself a “Jesus Freak revert.” From what seems to have been an early involvement in counterculture music and also religion, he has morphed from one form of Christinity to another. At some point he seems to have become an Orthodox Catholic Priest, hence his name, I assume. I also conclude that this means he linked to one of the family of Orthodox churches, but not to the Roman Catholic Church. But, at least by 2004, he started to endorese the Seventh-day Adventist movement, and has been associated with the SDA ministry of Jim Reinking. This has led to a number of speaking engagements through Reinking’s SDA Life Discovery Ministry. In a comment he posted on some website called Mormon Matters, which seems to me to be a Dehlin type former Latter-day Saint undertaking, Fr. Athanasios Paul Thompson has described himself as follows:
Fr. Athanasios Paul Thompson encourages “death to this world” and knows what he speaks of. He gleans an accumulative perspective from more than forty years of fulltime Christian ministry, half of that immersed in the great traditions of the Orthodox Catholic heritage. Athanasios Paul is the founder/speaker of Ancienttruthmedia.com and Sevenholystones.net – He has recently endorsed the mission of the Adventist church as it expresses concepts of holiness in the way it reaches out to proclaim the Gospel of Grace. Both SDAs and LDS members beleive they have prohpets [sic] whose writings serve as guides along with the sacred scripture. Athanasios Paul is a friend of the LDS church and just a few years ago had the unique opportunity to meet with the late President of the church, Gordon B. Hinkley [sic]. Although he acknowledges the important differences in belief between Latter Day Saints and other Christians, it is his conviction that an uncompromised love is a foundational principle for all who presume to speak for God.
See http://mormonmatters.org/2009/11/18/death-to-the-world/
Part of what I intended to set our in my original post, and then clarify with a subsequent caveat (understood as an explanation intended to avoid misunderstanding) is that Latter-day Saints, without even realizing it, have a tendency to substitute “having a testimony” for faith. So it is not uncommon to hear one ask whether someone else “has a testimony” rather than faith. And “having a testimony” also silently replaces faithfulness. Someone who I do not know has complained about my having made this point. They have insisted that the scriptures talk about “having a testimony.” Well, this is sort of true, but not in a way that brushes aside faith.
What I consider a quibble, was supported not by a single passage from the Book of Mormon, but by two proof-texts from the New Testament: 1 John 5:10; and Revelation 12:17.
1 John 5:10 (NASB) reads as follows: “The one who believes in the son of God has the witness in himself; the one who does not believe God has made him a liar, because he has not believed in the witness that God has borne concerning the Son.” This passage clearly stresses faith, and also links faith to believing the witness (or testimony in other translations–see the NIV, NAB, or NRSV, for example) that has been borne to him by the Apostles and through the Holy Spirit. I really like this way of putting it. Faith is the focus, and the witness from another is the medium or vehicle providing the content of faith.
Revelation 12:17 (NASB) reads as follows: “And the dragon was enraged with the woman, and went off to make war with the rest of her offspring, who keep the commandments of God and hold to the testimony of Jesus.” Some translations have “hold to the testimony of Jesus” (NIV, NRSV), while others have “bear witness to Jesus” (NAB). If one assumes that faith must yield faithfulness, and that being faithful entails keeping the commandments, then one witnesses to Jesus that one holds, or has accepted, believed, received the gospel by one’s deeds, in addition to mere words. I rather like this way of reading this proof-text.
One can find above some quibbles about one aspect of what I have posted. These, it seems to me, amount to mere caviling about words. I see this carping as merely raising trivial or frivolous objections. Perhaps these remarks were not exactly bickering. They did not raise to the level of petulant quarreling. Instead, what I see above is someone who I do not know at all offering to serve as my pedagogue. I choose this word intentionally. Originally the word paidogagos identified the slave who led his master’s young boy to school, and it has become a sort of negative way of referring to a teacher or professor. The word profess makes me think of confess. To “confess” is, among other things, to own, acknowledge, declare, avow, and also to admit something. Hence we speak of a confession of faith. Or a profession of faith? Or bearing testimony, or testifying? I suspect that the word “confess,” which I think we get from Latin. First think of confiteri, meaning “to confess,” and then ask about the word fari, which I think may mean “to speak” and hence also in a remote way “to testify.” About what? About one’s credo (or creed)–that is, what one believes. Now one ought to be able to tell a story, given evidence, set out reasons about what one believes or about one’s faith. It would be odd to say that one has a creed, or faith, and yet be unable to explain how one came to believe, or what it is one believes.
So I very much like the idea of testifying, in word as well as deed, and hence of bearing a testimony. And especially about one that rests on the witness of the Holy Spirit. I have now sketched an argument supplementing a portion of what I had sort of set out in that initial post, about which there has been some carping.
I also wonder why we have not heard from Athanasios Paul Thompson. I am a bit intrigued by him.
I should also have explained that the word pedant, as I use it, it not an insult, unless I add “sort of” or “a bit” or some other qualifying language. Why? The word pedant, I believe, is a shorted and perhaps slang version of the Italian pedagogo, which I think means teacher. But, since teachers (or professors?) tend to have a low reputation, sometimes and even perhaps often for good reasons, the word pendant has taken on the meaning attributed to it by Stephen Kent Ehat, my somewhat pedantic critic.
I really liked the OP, and I liked Ehat’s response, which seems to me complimentary for the most part with what Midgley was trying to originally point out. Namely:
Latter-day Saints, without even realizing it, have a tendency to substitute “having a testimony” for faith. So it is not uncommon to hear one ask whether someone else “has a testimony” rather than faith. And “having a testimony” also silently replaces faithfulness.
I like such examinations of common phrases and so forth in the church. I liked Ehat’s points for that reason as well. I am reminded of a prayer written by Rowan Williams, Archbishop of Canterbury:
“Jesus,
Help us not to hide in our churchy words;
when we worship, let us know and feel that there is
always something new,
something fresh to see of you.
Do not let us forget that you will always have
more to give us,
more than we could ever guess.
Amen.”
(from Robert L. Millet’s Modern Mormonism: Myths and Realities, forthcoming from Kofford Books)
Latter-day scriptures, too, convey the concept of “having a testimony.” See, e.g., Alma 7:13—“Now the Spirit knoweth all things; nevertheless the Son of God suffereth according to the flesh that he might take upon him the sins of his people, that he might blot out their transgressions according to the power of his deliverance; and now behold, this is the testimony which is in me.” If Alma tells the people of Gideon that a certain testimony is “in” him, it probably can be said that he “has” that testmony.
Although in setting their hand to Revelation 12:17, the NASB and NIV editors may have changed the word “have” to the nearly synonymous phrase “hold to”—an essentially equally valid English translation of εχει (“echei”)—and although the NAB editors change the underlying verb of the Greek text from “to have” or “to hold,” rendering it as “bear witness,” it should be noted that the Prophet Joseph also set his hand to the text of that New Testament passage (see JST Rev. 12:17), leaving it with the word “have”—“Therefore, the dragon was wroth with the woman, and went to make war with the remnant of her seed, which keep the commandments of God, and have the testimony of Jesus Christ.” Perhaps it is wise to adhere to what JS gives us rather than what NASB editors give us.
Through the Prophet Joseph Smith, the Lord declared: “Put upon thy servants the testimony of the covenant, that when they go out and proclaim thy word they may seal up the law, and prepare the hearts of thy saints for all those judgments thou art about to send, in thy wrath, upon the inhabitants of the earth, because of their transgressions, that thy people may not faint in the day of trouble.” (D&C 109:38.) If that testimony is “upon” us, perhaps we “have” it.
Last week, our current Prophet and President of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints admonished: “If you have not read the Book of Mormon, read it. I will not ask for a show of hands. If you do so prayerfully and with a sincere desire to know the truth, the Holy Ghost will manifest its truth to you. If it is true—and it is—then Joseph Smith was a prophet who saw God the Father and His Son, Jesus Christ. The Church is true. If you do not already have a testimony of these things, do that which is necessary to obtain one. It is essential for you to have your own testimony. . . .” (President Thomas S. Monson, “Priesthood Power,” April 2011 General Conference, Priesthood Session.)
In plain terms, Elder Dallin H. Oaks of the Council of the Twelve earlier stated: “Those who have a testimony of the restored gospel also have a duty to share it.” (Elder Dallin H. Oaks, “Testimony,” April 2008, General Conference, Saturday Afternoon Session.)
Whether the scriptures do or do not speak of having a testimony is for the reader to decide. Whether it is “pedantic” or a “quibble” or a “cavil” or “trivial” or “frivolous” or a form of “pedagoguery” simply to quote the scriptures to see whether they do speak or do not speak of having a testimony is for the reader to decide. Above is it stated both that “in General Conference those who address the Saints mention ‘getting’ and ‘having’ testimonies” and that such mention of having testimonies is “merely a habit that is a bit like our once fashionable and not even now abolished obsession with the expression ‘free agency,’ which somewhere along the line we borrowed from gentile sources.” The reader can decide whether President Monson and Elder Oaks, using the same language spoken by Jesus, Paul, and John—and enunciating the same concept conveyed by Alma and Joseph Smith—are borrowing from “gentile sources.”
The only point being made here is that one might rightly take pause when a posting first states in a benign way that it may be called “Mormon Speak” to “typically talk about ‘getting’ and then ‘having’ what we call a ‘testimony'” and then shockingly adds that “[n]one of this kind of talk can be found in our scriptures.” The simple point here is, regardless of what else rightly is said about testifying of truth, the scriptures themselves say that one indeed may (and indeed should) “have a testimony.” To shockingly state otherwise seems, perhaps, misplaced.
Blair Hodges wrote:
As Alma pointed out in his great discourse a testimony comes through faith, but can grow beyond faith into pure knowledge.
In order to testify of something one must have knowledge of it. When most people in the Church testify to the basic truths of the Gospel it is a true testimony because they truly “know.” As Alma pointed out, it takes great faith to obtain the knowledge, and then because they “know” their faith on that point is dormant. Having a “testimony” is having knowledge that came by faith. Having a testimony normally silently increases faithfulness. It is because of their faith that they received their testimonies and it is because of their testimonies that the faithful Saints are faithful.
Perhaps a more succinct statement of the relationship between faith and testimony would be: By faith comes revelation, by revelation comes knowledge, and knowledge is testimony.
Seems like I have a different concept of what a
testimony is. I consider it a result of
revelation and revelation a result of faith
exercised. This testimony is part of my being.
It didn’t grow and was never challenged.
I am a bishop in Denmark, and the 3 first questions in a temple interview asks if the person has faith in and a testimony of…. And some members claim that they have faith but really dont know what to answer on the testimony bit, especially some of the youth. To them I quote from D&C 46.
13 To some it is given by the Holy Ghost to know that Jesus Christ is the Son of God, and that he was crucified for the sins of the world.
14 To others it is given to believe on their words, that they also might have eternal life if they continue faithful.
So where ever we are between faith and testimony we all have the promise of eternal life. Personaly I feel that I live more by faith than by testimony.
I am not an intellectual. I am a very simple man who has lived some sixty-seven years and still go to church on sunday and partake of the sacrament. I see my home teaching families every month and try to minister and see to their needs. I ask for priesthood blessings in time of need.
I go my knees morning and evening and pray with the expectation that my prayers are heard and answered according to Heavenly Father’s wisdom and my needs. I have always taught my children and now I teach my grandchildren that they can trust in the power of prayer.
When I see all the words tossed back and forth about faith and testimony – well I can’t compete. I just know what is welded inside me and what I can always rely on. I know I can take it to my spiritual bank and deposit it for safe keeping and that when I need to make a withdrawal it will be there. Always has been. Always will be.
Call it faith. Call it testimony. I just know what Ifeel when I read the Book of Mormon (even after all these years and at this season of my life). It is a sweet feeling when tears fall from my eyes and onto my shirt and that warm feeling of assurance passes through me. Is it a testimony? Is it faith? Whatever it is – I thank God for it.