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Contrary to the nature of (God)
The phrase contrary to nature is used in the New Testament, once, in Romans 11:24: ”graffed contrary to nature into a good olive tree.”
The Book of Mormon (Alma 41:11–12) has contrary to the nature of happiness and contrary to the nature of God in the context of restoration or judgement of the soul:
And now, my son, all men that are in a state of nature, or I would say, in a carnal state, are in the gall of bitterness and in the bonds of iniquity; they are without God in the world, and they have gone contrary to the nature of God; therefore, they are in a state contrary to the nature of happiness.
And now behold, is the meaning of the word restoration to take a thing of a natural state and place it in an unnatural state, or to place it in a state opposite to its nature?
Similar (or exact) versions of this phrase are used in various places the Universalist community, including an 1811 preface in a hymn book edited by Abel Morgan Sarjent:
- … that all enmity is of the devil and contrary to the nature of God.”
Sarjent also writes:
- That misery and death, present or future, being contrary to the nature of divine love and friendship. … did not … proceed from God.”
Another Universalist use of this phrase is shown in an anti-Universalist screed: Universalism Confounds and Destroys Itself: or Letters to a Friend, in Four Parts, by Josiah Spaulding, 1805, Northampton, Massachusetts, p.34 which quotes Dr. Huntington, a Universalist:
< Back to Index“The hearts of good people,” [Dr. H.] adds “do not reject the absolute predestination and decrees of God, nor ever did, simply considered, or justly considered. What our hearts revolt at, is the attributing such decrees to God, as are contrary to his nature. GOD IS LOVE. Attribute no decrees to God but those of infinite love, and they will set easy on our minds.” The Doctor is here trying to prove the future happines of all men from the nature of God. “As the nature of God is love, he will bring us all, every human soul in due time, to see and approve of his infinite wisdom and love, in all his works.” The boundless love of God, he thinks, forms an argument that makes the salvation of all men certain.