KEYS OF THE MYSTERIES, Part 2 of Chapter 2 of The Church and The Gospel 

 

Pages 19 to 25

Eternal Progression

We have the blessing of learning and progressing in knowledge not only in this life but also in the next-and for all eternity. Said Brigham Young:

Those persons who strive to gain eternal life, gain that which will produce the increase their hearts will be satisfied with. Nothing less than the privilege of increasing eternally, in every sense of the word, can satisfy the immortal spirits. (JD 1:350)

And again:

. . . if we are striving with all the powers and faculties God has given us to improve upon our talents, to prepare ourselves to dwell in eternal life, and the grave receives our bodies while we are thus engaged, with what disposition will our spirits enter their next state? They will be still striving to do the things of God, only in a much greater degree-learning, increasing, growing in grace and in the knowledge of the truth. (JD 7:333)

Furthermore, President Young taught that if we do not increase in knowledge, we are bound to retrogress:

. . . there is no such thing as principle, power, wisdom, knowledge, life, position, or anything that can be imagined, that remains stationary-they must increase or decrease. To me, life is increase; death is the opposite. (JD 1:350; also Contributor 5:22)

A few scholars have promoted the concept that it was possible for souls to reach a point where they knew everything and there would be an end to gaining knowledge. A dispute arose over this doctrine between Brigham Young and Orson Pratt in 1852.