Adam as God: From revealed doctrine to “false doctrine”
While serving as President of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Brigham Young publicly identified Adam as “our Father and our God.” He later called the proposition doctrine and said God had revealed it to him. Church President Spencer W. Kimball denounced Adam–God as a theory and false doctrine, and Apostle Mark E. Petersen explicitly taught that Adam was not God.
The short answer
Did Brigham Young teach that Adam was our God?
Yes. Published sermons identify Adam as humanity’s Father and God. In a separate 1873 newspaper report, Young called the teaching doctrine and attributed it to revelation while serving as Church president.
The defining contrast
Doctrine proclaimed. Theory denounced.
The contrast concerns both Adam’s identity and the status assigned to the teaching. A Church president presented the earlier claim in a doctrinal sermon; a later Church president warned members not to disseminate it.
“When our father Adam came into the garden of Eden, he came into it with a celestial body, and brought Eve, one of his wives, with him. He helped to make and organize this world.”“He is our Father and our God, and the only God with whom we have to do.”
“Such, for instance, is the Adam-God theory. We denounce that theory and hope that everyone will be cautioned against this and other kinds of false doctrine.”A warning to Church teachers and priesthood holders against disseminating the teaching.
“Now, let all who may hear these doctrines, pause before they make light of them, or treat them with indifference, for they will prove their salvation or damnation.”Journal of Discourses, volume 1, page 51
Scope of the warningThe warning closes the sermon’s doctrinal section on Adam and on the begetting of Jesus. Adam–God is among the “doctrines” Young said hearers should not treat with indifference.
The repeated record
Not confined to one 1852 transcript
The later newspaper record matters because it repeats the central claim more than twenty years later and supplies Young’s own description of its authority.
- Special conference sermon
Adam identified as Father and God
“He is our Father and our God, and the only God with whom we have to do.”
View the scanned page at BYU ↗The discourse was reported by George D. Watt and later printed in the first volume of the Journal of Discourses, pages 46–53. The defining passage appears on pages 50–51.
- Public reaffirmation
“Which God revealed to me”
“How much unbelief exists in the minds of the Latter-day Saints in regard to one particular doctrine which I revealed to them, and which God revealed to me—namely that Adam is our father and our God.”
Deseret News, June 18, 1873, p. 308, col. 4 ↗Young continued by saying that Adam helped make the earth and “stands at the gate and holds the keys of everlasting life and salvation” for his children. The printed report therefore does more than repeat the identity claim: it calls it doctrine and attributes it to revelation from God.
Publication detailsThe 1873 discourse was delivered in the New Tabernacle on Sunday afternoon, June 8; reported by David W. Evans; and published in the Deseret News on June 18, volume 22, number 20, issue page 4 (numbered page 308), column 4.
The later doctrinal position
Rejection, denial, and current teaching
Kimball changed the category of the teaching. Petersen denied its principal claim. McConkie called belief in it a heresy. Current Church teaching distinguishes Heavenly Father, Jesus Christ, and Adam.
Kimball denounced the theory
President Spencer W. Kimball asked those teaching “on the campuses or in our chapels” to teach orthodox truth. He warned against doctrines “alleged to have been taught by some of the General Authorities of past generations,” named the Adam–God theory, and grouped it with false doctrine.
Kimball described Adam–God as a doctrine “alleged to have been taught by some of the General Authorities of past generations.” The teaching was not merely alleged: a Church president preached it, the Church’s British periodical printed it, and the Deseret News reported Young attributing it to revelation. Kimball named no speaker.
Petersen directly denied the claim
Elder Mark E. Petersen identified Adam as Michael, the archangel, and as a servant of God and Christ. His conclusion was explicit: “Adam was not our God, nor was he our Savior. But he was the humble servant of both in his status as an angel.”
In Petersen’s account, Adam is exalted and authoritative but remains subordinate to Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ.
McConkie called it a heresy kept alive by the devil
In “The Seven Deadly Heresies,” Bruce R. McConkie listed belief that “Adam is our father and our god” as a heresy:
“The devil keeps this heresy alive as a means of obtaining converts to cultism.”
Young warned that these doctrines would “prove their salvation or damnation.” McConkie said those who believe the teaching “reject the living prophet.” Loyalty to the prophet was invoked for opposite answers to the same question.
Three distinct identities
The 2023 edition of Preach My Gospel teaches that God is the Father of human spirits, that Adam and Eve were the first of Heavenly Father’s spirit children to come to earth, and that Jesus Christ is Heavenly Father’s firstborn Son and the chosen Redeemer.
The Church’s Bible Dictionary identifies Adam as Michael, the archangel and patriarch of the human family. These sources assign Adam exceptional authority without identifying him as God the Father.
The current materials establish what the Church teaches members now. They do not present a new canonized revelation narrating when or why Young’s earlier claim was reversed.
Adam is currently taught as a spirit child and servant of God—not as “our Father and our God.”The institutional explanation
Not every statement is binding doctrine
The Church distinguishes a leader’s statements from binding doctrine. In April 2012, Apostle D. Todd Christofferson taught: “Not every statement made by a Church leader, past or present, necessarily constitutes doctrine.” A statement by one leader on one occasion may represent personal opinion rather than an official or binding position.
Adam–God was not added to the standard works or adopted in a united declaration of the First Presidency and Quorum of the Twelve. Its nineteenth-century reception was not uniform; Apostle Orson Pratt opposed Young’s position, and the surviving record shows disagreement even among senior leaders.
Young was the Church president, repeated the proposition across more than two decades, publicly called it doctrine, and in 1873 said God had revealed it to him. That record differs materially from a single stray sentence whose speaker presented it only as personal speculation.
What changed
Identity, category, and authority
The record supports a narrower and more concrete finding than a general claim about whether prophets can ever err.
Identity
Young identified Adam as humanity’s Father and God. Petersen identified him as an angel serving God and Christ.
Category
Young used “doctrine” and claimed revelation. Kimball used “theory” and grouped it with false doctrine.
Institutional status
The teaching was publicly repeated but never canonized or adopted through the Church’s present standard for binding doctrine.
Remaining question
The current framework settles what members should teach now; the sources do not supply an institutional account of the earlier revelation claim.
Biblical context
The Father, Christ, and the first Adam
The New Testament gives Adam a foundational place in human history while distinguishing him from the Father and from Jesus Christ. Quotations below use the English Standard Version.
1 Corinthians 8:4–6
One God, the Father
“For us there is one God, the Father … and one Lord, Jesus Christ.”
Paul is discussing food offered to idols. Against the many beings called gods and lords, he names the Father as the source of all things and Jesus Christ as the one through whom all things exist. Adam is not placed in either identity.
Read 1 Corinthians 8:4–6 (ESV) ↗1 Corinthians 15:45–49
The first man was “a man of dust”
“The first man was from the earth, a man of dust; the second man is from heaven.”
Paul’s resurrection argument contrasts the first Adam, from whom humanity bears an earthly image, with Christ, the “last Adam,” through whom believers bear a heavenly image. Following Genesis 2:7, where God forms the man “of dust from the ground,” Paul places Adam’s origin in the earth. Young taught that Adam “came into” Eden “with a celestial body” as humanity’s God.
Read 1 Corinthians 15:45–49 (ESV) ↗Hebrews 1:5–6, 13–14
The Son and the angels
The Son receives a status the writer says God did not grant to angels; the angels worship and serve.
Hebrews is arguing for the Son’s superiority to angels. Because current Latter-day Saint teaching identifies Adam as Michael the archangel, this passage supports a distinction between Adam’s exalted angelic office and the identity of the Son.
Read Hebrews 1:5–6, 13–14 (ESV) ↗The Bible presents Adam as a created man formed from dust and names one God: “I am the first and I am the last; besides me there is no god” (Isaiah 44:6, ESV). Young’s teaching made a created man “the only God with whom we have to do.” Later Church leaders also rejected that claim, but the Latter-day Saint framework that made it possible—exalted men becoming gods—remains part of current teaching.
Finding
A documented reversal in doctrinal status
The records establish that Young publicly identified Adam as “our Father and our God,” later called the proposition doctrine, and said God revealed it to him. They also establish that Kimball denounced Adam–God as a theory and false doctrine, Petersen taught that Adam was not God, and current Church materials distinguish Adam from Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ.
The institutional qualification is also documented: Adam–God was not canonized or formally adopted under the Church’s present standard for binding doctrine. That limitation narrows the claim this case can make; it does not erase Young’s repeated public attribution of the teaching to divine revelation.
Sources and limitations
Read the record
The central comparison uses the nineteenth-century publications and the Church’s official archive. Scholarly context is used to document disputed reception, not as a substitute for the primary texts.
The 1852 text is a stenographic publication, not an audio recording or canonized text. The Church’s current source note says Journal of Discourses transcriptions were sometimes inaccurate, was not an official Church publication, and is not by itself authoritative for doctrine. It also records that Young supported the publication plan and that the First Presidency encouraged its purchase. The central extract also appeared in the British Mission’s Millennial Star on November 26, 1853, before the first Journal of Discourses volume was published in 1854. This audit did not establish a publicly accessible scan of Watt’s original shorthand for this particular discourse. The separate 1873 newspaper report substantially reduces dependence on one wording or one occasion. A reported 1981 private letter from Bruce R. McConkie was excluded because this case does not need it and no authenticated archival scan was established in this audit.