Note: The concept that the Bible has been corrupted by its 'scribes' is not solely conveyed by Mormon doctrine which states the Bible, being a second, third, fourth, fifth, etc. hand compilation 'is only true as far as it has been translated correctly.' The most often corrected reditions of Jeremiah 8:8 of the various Bible versions who test the translations of the scriptures, states that the scribes did falsify many things in the Bible record through their handling of it. The LDS position is no more or less than spoken in Jeremiah 8:8. The point of the LDS position is that there is a need of a second confirming record to be made one with the Bible, to the end of drawing the straight line of truth between the two records of two separte nations on such matters as have been corrupted.

Now if one believes they can legally become the sons and daughters of Christ and be raised by such an authorized legal and binding ordinance of the priesthood of God to such a relationship with Christ unto heaven, then how can one deny that the ancient Mosaic Law, The Law of God of adoptive marriage and raising up seed to the dead? And that it did raise up legal and rightful heirs to the dead man's house and all rights of heir-ship as belonging to that house as well as membership in that house are not sanctioned by the powers of heaven? Are ye not Christ's children?

Vicarious ordinances and performaces are very much a part of the gospel plan. If it were not so, the very atonement of Jesus Christ would not have any basis upon which to stand. Thus perhaps it is well that we under stand that he who supports us in our adoptive process of becoming his sons and daughters has himself been so adopted as being the rightful heir of the house of Joseph and Ephraim. And if Christ can legally become heir to the house of Ephraim by such an adoptive process, so then it is possible that we can become his sons and daughters by the adoptive process of us becoming sons and daughters of Christ though he never did bear us in the more traditional sense as was questioned by Nicodemus.

It is only by the right of our adoption in Christ that we can become the sons and daughters of Him, and enter back into the Kingdom of God and obtain an inheritance in heaven. Without that process, there would be no rightful inheritance of mortal man in the priesthood or in heaven. The rights and powers of the priesthood covenants demand it to be so. Vicarious ordinances and performances are common place in the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

In fact the greatest vicarious performance of them all was done by Christ for us. In the garden he took upon himself the sins of the world, that all who would believe on his name and become his sons and daughters in the gospel and repent of their sins might have their sins removed by the means of his vicarious performance for us. If one believes in the atonemnt, then one must needs believe in the performance of vicarious ordinances.

Today it has become quite common place for worthy members of the Church to perform any number of vicarious ordinances for the dead. As stated we commonly baptise for the dead so that they too may come under the reaches of the atonement of Christ and become his sons and daughters, His rightful heirs in the Kingdom of God. We perform the priesthood endowment work for the dead, we perform celestial marriages for the dead, and we perform family sealings for the dead that families may be tied together by the sealing power of heaven.

Consider that if we accept all the vicarious work performed in our Church today, if we accept Christ's vicarious work of performing the atonement for us, then why does it seem not totally logical and consistent to accept Boaz's vicarious performance for the dead Mahlon in raising up seed to the house of Mahlon? Then ask, 'Was not Obed of the house the the Ephrathites Mahlon and Elimelech?' How else by right did Christ inherit the rights of coming under the Covenant of Abraham that persisted through the promises unto Isaac, Jacob and Jacob's son of the covenant birthright Joseph and his son Ephraim? And how else was Christ legally within the scope of the promises of the fathers as fulfilled by Joseph the worthy son of Jacob, rather than by Judah the unworthy son of Jacob?

Certainly Christ held his own right to the powers of heaven. After all it was and is his own priesthood powere bestowed upon him by our Heavenly Father before the foundation of the world. But that was in heaven, according to the laws of heaven. There is the order according to the laws of the Fathers pertainly unto this earth and even Christ did all according to the letter of the Law of Moses and of the baptism of John the Baptist.

Would not Christ also conform to meet the Patriarcahl law of the father concerning the rightfule decent and bestowal of the priesthood covenant of the firstborn on earth as well as in heaven. He states he came to fulfill the covenants of the Law, the Covenants of Joseph to Abraham, from Abraham to Noah, and from Noah to Adam included. He would have been therefore rightfully descended from the legal and rightful house of the Covenant and the rightful heir of being Messiah ben Joseph.

In all things He did conform to the Law. He was blessed and circumcised in the temple. He was baptised by John to fulfill all righteousness and lived obedient to and in compliance to the law. He did not begin his lawful ministry until the Jewish lawful age. In all things in did comply and fulfill all righteousness. Why then would one think that he would not be legally of the rightful inheriting house of the Covenant of the fathers, the Covenant of Abraham, which was bestowed upoon the head of Joseph and his son Ephraim by the hand of Jacob called Israel?

When Jacob stated upon the head of Joseph, 'fron thence is the shepherd the stone of Israel', Jacob was stating that the Messiah would rightfully be of Joseph's house, and by birth or the birth of legal adoption it is the same. Yes the blood of Judah was in the Christ, what little there was of it. God the Father was the father, Ruth the Moabite of the linage of Lot was as much of the bloodline as was Boaz. But the real telling part was not whose bloodline the child had, it was whose legal and rightful seed was he. Through Mary and even the adoptive parentage of Joseph the carpenter, he was of the house of David.

And David's house was of the house of Jesse, and Jesse's house was that of his father Obed, and Obed's legal and rightful house of heirship was that of Mahlon to whom Boaz performed the vicarous performance of marriage and raising up seed to the dead. And Mahlon and his father Elimelech where Ephrathites, taken to mean of the tribe of Ephraim and thereby comes the legal, lawful, and proper linage of the covenant promises of the fathers made by God to Adam, Enoch, Noah, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Joseph and Ephraim.

The legality of 'adoption' in the eyes of God is that once adopted a person becomes as the same as a natural born child of God. It is considered in the LDS Church that if one who does not have the 'blood of Israel' in their veins is baptised, by virtue of that baptism the become and are changed to then have that blood of Israel in their viens and have become the same as any other son or daughter of Israel. (See * Furhter Note at bottom of this item).

[Note: This would apply to Obed as well, having been raised up as the 'seed of the dead' son of Mahlon by the vicarious performing Boaz. In the eyes of God, whose law of adoption that was, Obed as well as Jesse and David were of the seed of Ephraim and Joseph by what of that governing 'Law of God'.]

Further consider, God the Father to whom we seek to return to the presence of IS NOT of this world. None of us except Jesus Christ the 'only begotten of the father in the flesh' are of the Father's bloodline as to the flesh. In fact we are further told that blood does not flow in the Celestial Glorified Body but that which is 'spirit' does and therein lies the Eternal Life. Blood is only of this temporal mortality. And 'bloodlines' are in this sense only significant unto this world. Therefore, an adoption unto God is just as significant and binding as is bloodline birth. And the only why by which we become heirs of the Kingdom of God is not by mortal temporal birth and the bloodlines therefore, but only by that adoptive process of being born of water and spirit as so stated to Nichodemus in John chapter 3.

" ... Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God" ~ John 3:5

This being born of authorized and authoritative baptism of what and the receiving of the Holy Ghost and its sanctification is that adoptive birth by which we of this mortality become members of the Kingdom of God and are enabled to return to the presence of God. And this is that adoptive birth which our bloodline birth of this mortality has nothing to do with. Irrespective of that mortal birth, only in and by this adoptive birth are be born unto God into the Celestial realm. And it is this type of ordinance and covenant relationship which is the most significant in respect to Jesus Christ. It is NOT significant as to his bloodline birth unto the linage of Judah, but it is his adoptive Law of God redemptive birth unto the house of Mahlon and Elimelech by which he is heir of the covenants and blessings of the fathers in respect to his mortality. He is in this adoptive Law of God Levirate marriage of Boaz to Ruth and Boaz's surrogate parentage of Obed by the Law of God as the Seed of the Dead Mahlon that makes the linage of Christ that of the Covenant line of the Fathers, from Adam, Enoch and Noah, from Abraham, Issac and Jacob, and on through Joseph and Ephraim even down through Elimelech, Mahlon, Obed, Jesse, David and so on to Jesus Christ. This is the covenant of God linage and it is by the aboption process according to that law of God of Levirate Marriage. And this adoptive process is greater, more binding and more significant than that of bloodline. And in this Israel, as the kingdom of Ephraim did have a greater claim in David than did the Jews and Judah, despite their bloodline birth relationship.

* Further note: The fundament Gospel belief that any are a pure blooded descendant of Abraham is of some question over the centuries as discussed in a related article by Daniel H. Ludlow that supports that Gentiles are in fact adopted as the seed of Abraham. Yet the fact may be that a pure blooded Gentile, not having any of the blood of Israel in them, and may actually become a 'purer blooded Israelite' of Abraham even than are most of Abraham's children is noted by a statement of the Prophet Joseph Smith:

“This first Comforter or Holy Ghost has no other effect than pure intelligence. It is more powerful in expanding the mind, enlightening the understanding, and storing the intellect with present knowledge, of a man who is of the literal seed of Abraham, than one that is a Gentile, though it may not have half as much visible effect upon the body; for as the Holy Ghost falls upon one of the literal seed of Abraham, it is calm and serene; and his whole soul and body are only exercised by the pure spirit of intelligence; while the effect of the Holy Ghost upon a Gentile, is to purge out the old blood, and make him actually of the seed of Abraham. That man that has none of the blood of Abraham (naturally) must have a new creation by the Holy Ghost. In such a case, there may be more of a powerful effect upon the body, and visible to the eye, than upon an Israelite, while the Israelite at first might be far before the Gentile in pure intelligence” (Smith, Teachings, 149–50).

Now what is the difference in the blood of the covenant children and that of a pure Gentile may not even be pertaining to any matter of the DNA of the physical man of such a type A, B, AB, or O. But rather it is that which does pertain unto the spiritual man and his connection to the birthright covenant of the Firstborn of God. Complying to the Gospel of Jesus Christ and the accompanying holy ordiances of God is what changes a man into being a son of the covenant and an heir of the priesthood of God and of heaven.

Final note: Why was the priesthood not necessary of all to begin the restoration? Since the restoration was to the fulfilling of Abraham's covenant through the birthright of the firstborn, it would be logical to take the restoration to those nations and peoples in whom the blood of the covenant birthritht, Joseph, Ephraim and Manasseh primarily first until such point that the foundation of the restoration was laid in the hands of 'he' who was the responsible servants of God for the fulfillment of that covannat obligation of right to the rest of the earth. Many people and nations were intially left out, many still are by their own national laws, traditions and denial of wanting to receive it. Only in the Millennium will all, even back to the victims of the great flood, really have the opportunity that has been first reserved to the Lord's servants of the covenant, Joseph and his sons. It may really be just that simple.