The Great Apostasy

"Periods of general apostasy have occurred throughout the history of the world. After times of righteousness, people have often turned to wickedness. One example is the Great Apostasy, which occurred after the Savior established His Church. After the deaths of the Savior and His Apostles, men corrupted the principles of the gospel and made unauthorized changes in Church organization and priesthood ordinances. Because of this widespread wickedness, the Lord withdrew the authority of the priesthood from the earth. During the Great Apostasy, people were without divine direction from living prophets. Many churches were established, but the did not have priesthood power to lead people to the true knowledge of God the Father and Jesus Christ. Parts of the holy scriptures were corrupted or lost, and no one had the authority to confer the gift of the Holy Ghost or perform other priesthood ordinances. This apostasy lasted until Heavenly Father and His Beloved Son appeared to Joseph Smith in 1820 and initiated the restoration of the fullness of the gospel." (True to the Faith "Apostasy" page 13)

In short: When the apostles died the authority that Jesus had given them was lost over all the earth until it was given again to Joseph Smith. What this means is that all the churches that have existed since then and until the day it was "restored" were, as according to Smith, an abomination. So what are we to say to this Great Apostasy?

The death of the last apostle would have happened in the end of the first century, around 90 AD. This would mean that the Great Apostasy happened after that date. This is important because in 70 AD the temple in Jerusalem was destroyed marking the beginning of the Diaspora. Jewish Christians would have been dispersed throughout the known world of that time: We have manuscripts of Christian books in the Syriac, Coptic and Latin languages. What this proves is there could have been no changes made to the original works because for such a change to occur all of the different manuscripts in different languages would need to have been changed in the same way at the same time. As for the Old Testament a discovery made in the 40s will cover that. The dead sea scrolls further disprove the apostasy of the Bible because all of the scrolls date before 100 BC and all the books of the OT are found with the exception of Esther.

With the knowledge the the Bible is Truthful and as it was when it was first written we can look at what is being used by LDS to say that the Apostasy happened. Lds.org gives several scriptures from the Bible to support the apostasy hypothesis, Isaiah 24:5; Amos 8:11–12; Matthew 24:4–14; Acts 20:28–30; 2 Timothy 3:1–5, 14–15; 4:3–4. The two Old Testament pericopes speak of an apostasy. However this apostasy is that of the people of Israel turning away from their God toward the gods of their own hands. Also, the restoration that the prophets speak of is the restoration of the coming Messiah . The New Testament verses are primarily warnings against false prophets and false teachings that will arise. Psalm 12:6-7 says, "The words of the Lord are pure words: as silver tried in a furnace of earth, purified seven times. Thou shalt keep them, O Lord, thou shalt preserve them from this generation for ever." The Bible does not speak of a Great Apostasy like the one described by Joseph Smith. All the prophets speak about the sinfulness of Israel, how God will punish them, and about a restoration or promise of a messiah. It seems silly to think something like this would happen again when we have our Messiah. Also, what need is there for a defense of the gospel, spoken of by Paul, when God was simply going to give us up to the world again?

Please remember that God is still alive and so is His word. Keep fighting the good fight my friends.