The Mormon Illusion: What the Bible Says About the Latter-Day Saints [Paperback]

Floyd McElveen (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: January 9, 1997

(Revised and expanded edition) This classic work on Mormonism has more than 135,000 copies in print.

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Floyd C. McElveen is a graduate of Western Conservative Baptist Seminary in Portland, Oregon. He has served as a missionary evangelist, a church planter and pastor, and the national evangelist for the Conservative Baptist Home Mission Society.

Product Details

• Paperback: 224 pages
• Publisher: Kregel Publications; Rev Exp edition (January 9, 1997)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0825431921
• ISBN-13: 978-0825431920
• Product Dimensions: 7.8 x 5.2 x 0.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 7.2 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (14 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,095,298 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

8 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars This book has merit despite its shortcomings., August 13, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: The Mormon Illusion: What the Bible Says About the Latter-Day Saints (Paperback)

This is an example of the very abundant badly written literature on religion that most of us seekers have to endure. The need to get the message across seems to justify any kind of crimes against order and scholarly rigour. Mixing sources like newspaper accounts and scriptures with no sense of hierarchy made this reading quite unpleasant. In any case, the doctrines here presented are clear enough to make sense despite the confusion in presenting them. I think the book fills a very necessary niche since mormons seem very reluctant to talk "theology" and seem to rely very heavily in pure feeling in all matters religious where -they say- the "thinking" has been already done. Mr. McElveen does some thinking here (some feelings get mixed in there too) and exposes many of the obvious conflicts between the Book of Mormon and the Bible some of which were apparent to me before and some of which weren't so clear. I've read other books actually published by the mormon church and -regardless of the lavish presentation and the good grammar- they have totally failed to bring any sense into the business of the golden tablets and the church's doctrine or they have avoided the hard questions alltogether. This book doesn't do that at least. In conclusion, this books merits spring from the merits of the doctrine presented, not from the author's ability to expose (preach?) it. But I guess that was the intention in the first place. As for the merits of the doctrine , this is not the subject of an unbiased (s that possible?) book review. You'll have to read it yourself if interested.

24 of 35 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Skilled rhetoric; horrible analysis, December 2, 1998

By A Customer

This review is from: The Mormon Illusion: What the Bible Says About the Latter-Day Saints (Paperback)

McElveen seems to think that if he hurls charges against Mormonism as fast as he can, and mixes them with a lot of snickering, sarcastic rhetoric, he can convince the reader of his point, which apparently is that Mormonism is not a form of Christianity. He only partially succeeds, chiefly because he ignores basic principles of logic and textual analysis. Maybe he has tightened up some of his analytical failings in the new edition, but this older edition has numerous flaws. Among them are:

(1) he implies the "burning in the bosom" is Satanically influenced, yet says that he experienced "sweet feelings" himself as a manifestation of truth (see also Luke 24:42);

(2) he never can decide whether we're saved through invocation of Christ's name, or by faith;

(3) the apostle Paul gave different accounts of his vision, just like Joseph Smith;

(4) the Lord is also called an angel (Ex. 3:1-3);

(5) if the B of M has been "corrected" why does he still claim it has bad grammar;

(6) Floyd uses anti-Mormon, rather than neutral sources throughout the book (Moody, Tanner, etc.);

(7) Christ's blood doesn't cleanse us from all sin--and Jesus Himself said so (Mat 12:32);

(8) paradise is not heaven (John 20:17, 1 Pet 3:18-19);

(9) Jesus is our Brother (Rev 3:14, Heb 8:29);

(10) man CAN see God (Ex 24:10), and if you argue otherwise, then you must honestly question the divine nature of Jesus, who was seen throughout His life;

(11) Jesus was conceived of God, not the Holy Spirit (John 5:18);

(12) Floyd says the priesthood has ended, yet also says all believers are priests;

(13) "called" and "consecrated" are not the same (Ex. 28:1, 4);

(14) besides Jesus, Melchezidick held the priesthood of Melchezidick, obviously;

(15) if genealogies are so bad, why is Jesus' given--twice (Mat 1; Luke 3);

(16) justification comes through DOING as well as believing (Rom 2:13);

(17) the thief on the cross did not go to Heaven (John 20:16-17);

(18) it's not the Mormons' job to prove three heavens from the Bible;

(19) we existed before we were born (Prov 8:27-31, Jer 1:5);

(20) you CAN fall from grace (Gal 6:7);

(21) a complete apostasy occurred (Amos 8:11-13);

(22) the primitive Christian church had more than 12 apostles (Act 1:24-26);

(23) Judas Iscariot could not be a foundation of the celestial city (Luke 22:3);

(24) the bible DOES give qualifications for apostle (Acts 1:22);

(25) an interpretation of any scripture before Revelations calling the bible complete is contradictory;

(26) no unity among Christian sects exists as Floyd would have us believe;

(27) request for revelation through prayer is a biblical principle (James 1:5);

(28) if all angelic visitations are from Satan, then John the Beloved was tricked by one too (Rev 1:1);

(29) Mormons don't claim that their works alone will get them into heaven;

(30) someone can be eternal and also created (Prov. 8:22-24);

(31) murder is not forgiven (Acts 2:34, 1John 3:15).

And this is just an abbreviated list.

5 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Readable but defective, April 23, 2005

By 

Hinkle Goldfarb (R.R. 1 Highway 162, Butte City, California) - See all my reviews

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This review is from: The Mormon Illusion: What the Bible Says About the Latter-Day Saints (Paperback)

Overall, Floyd McElveen has written one of the few anti-Mormon ("A-M") books that even occasionally entertains. However, the book is defective on a number of levels. Let's take a look at a few of them

CONSISTENT LOGIC. Poor. Any book should be internally consistent, and a polemical and ostensibly factual work *must* be consistent with outside documents as well. Here are just a few of dozens of the book's logical lapses:

1. Floyd can't claim he confessed to believe in Jesus at age twelve (p 14), then turn around and claim that he wasn't saved (p 19) while still preaching that all you need to do to be saved is "call upon the name of the Lord" (pp 87, 164). So which is it? Either calling upon Jesus works or it doesn't. Once you start attaching strings to it, you've basically made the Mormons' case for them, since they argue -- appropriately IMHO -- that the string attached to *true* faith is works.

2. Floyd falls for the classic A-M logic error regarding the priesthood, stating "When Jesus died...the need for priests was done away with" and then on the *same page* stating "every Christian is now declared to be a priest" (p 99). He couldn't even let a page go by before contradicting himself.

3. Floyd also falls for the logic error of asserting that the Melchizedek priesthood held by Jesus is "untransferable" and once again on the same page contradicting himself by saying that Melchizedek also held the priesthood (p 97). Folks, if the Melchizedek priesthood is untransferable, that means either Jesus held the priesthood, or Melchizedek, but not both. This isn't rocket science. Also, note that Jesus was a priest after the "order" of Melchizedek. Ps. 110:4. Who ever heard of a priesthood "order" with only one person? The Aaronic priesthood was also an "order" (Heb. 7:11) and had at least tens of thousands of priests.

4. As a dog returns to its vomit, so does Floyd to his folly, proclaiming that there can be only twelve apostles but once again on the same page saying that all believers are apostles (p 123). Besides, should Judas Iscariot, whom Jesus called "a devil" (John 6:70), really be the foundation to the Celestial City like Floyd claims (p 123)?

5. There's no substitute for knowing your bible if you're writing a book heavily referencing it. Floyd says the bible gives no qualifications for apostle (p 124). I suggest Floyd pick up his bible, blow the dust off it, and turn to Acts 1:21-22.

6. Floyd states "the whole of 1 Corinthians 15 gives God's beautiful picture of...our own resurrection" (p 111) but then twists 1 Cor. 15:46 ("not first which is spiritual, but that which is natural; and afterward that which is spiritual") around like a pretzel to claim that the verse is comparing our pre-mortal vs. mortal state (p 86), rather than the contextually obvious comparison of our mortal state to our resurrected state. Floyd needs more than a course in logic. He needs a heavy-duty course in biblical exegesis.

7. Floyd also engages in subtler manipulation and contradiction. He claims that praying for confirmation of the truthfulness of the BoM is a "satanic trap" (p 131), since sincere people will feel psychologically pressured to believe the BoM or else worry they are not asking with a "sincere heart" in accordance with Moroni 10:4. Fair enough. But then he states "[t]rue Christians do get a deep and abiding peace beyond anything else they have ever known" when they understand Jesus has saved them (p 141). Is Floyd not engaging in the same psychological pressure he just criticized the Mormons for? Isn't he implying that if you *don't* have a deep peace beyond anything you've ever known, you're not a Christian? Floyd, which are you: scribe, Pharisee or hypocrite?

EDITING. Better than the 1980 edition, but still poor. He gives a mea culpa for being fooled by Dee Jay Nelson in this edition (p 56), which is good. But other poor editing abounds. He tells us that Marvin Cowan is "a Baptist missionary to the Mormons he loves and for whom his heart aches" on page 104, then ten pages later tells us that Marvin Cowan "serves as a missionary to the Mormons." Telling us once would have been enough. The verse stating "for I am God, and not man" is Hosea 11:9, not Hosea 1:9 (p 92). Likewise, there is no Rev. 1:46 (p 211). These are not confidence builders in Floyd's book!

AS APOLOGY. Not good. The book has virtually no rebuttal for some of Mormonism's strongest scriptures, such as John 17:20-23, Luke 2:52 and Mat. 3:16-17 (re the Godhead), Mat. 27:9 and Zech 11:12 (re errancy of the bible), Acts 2:38 (re baptism), Rev. 3:14 (re Jesus as elder brother), Rev. 3:21 (re becoming gods). The books "Mormons Answered Verse By Verse" and "Reasoning from the Scriptures With Mormons" at least take a stab at responding to several Mormon-friendly scriptures. Floyd makes little such attempt.

AS HISTORICAL RECORD. Poor. To bolster his case, Floyd throws the kitchen sink at the Mormons, using scriptures, pamphlets, newspaper articles and even affidavits. A lot of these sources are of suspect quality and/or are rehashes of other A-M literature. In fact, there is not a single primary source referenced in this book, other than Floyd's febrile conversations with various Mormons, and occasional chats with other A-Ms.

AS A POLEMIC. Good. The book has its sneering and sarcasm down cold. When Floyd has a supposed LDS member saying he belongs to "the Latter-day Saints Church" (p 14), you know what you're in for. You can't say you weren't warned. His mock sympathy for Mormons ("We sympathize with their heartbreak over what the following facts will reveal") (p 28) is truly hilarious for someone with a twisted sense of humor like me.

IN SUMMARY. Overall, this book does a lot of the low-level dirty work of A-M literature, hurling everything it can at Mormons, like Alma 7:10 (p 37), angels of light (pp 32, 133), inhabitants on the moon (p 37), Adam-God (p 77), false prophets (p 187), "god of this world" (p 176), etc. But I suppose someone has to do the dirty work, and that's Floyd's shtick. For the interested reader however, I think in terms of consistency and intellectual heft, "Reasoning from the Scriptures With Mormons," although itself flawed, is a better value.