Church Without a Prophet, A

DESCRIPTION: "A church without a prophet is not the church for me; It has no head to lead it, in it I would not be. But I've a church not built by man...." "The God that others worship is not the God for me." "A church without apostles is not the church...."
AUTHOR: unknown
EARLIEST DATE: 1877 (Sacred Hymns and Spiritual Songs, according to Hubbard-BalladsAndSongsFromUtah; Lingenfelter/Dwyer/Cohen-SongsOfAmericanWest dates this book to 1871)
KEYWORDS: religious nonballad patriotic discrimination
FOUND IN: US(Ro)
REFERENCES (4 citations):
Hubbard-BalladsAndSongsFromUtah, #205, "A Church Without a Prophet" (1 text)
Cheney-MormonSongs, p. 144, "A Church without a Prophet" (1 text)
Greenway-FolkloreOfTheGreatWest, p. 249, "A Church Without Apostles Is Not the Church for Me" (1 text)
Lingenfelter/Dwyer/Cohen-SongsOfAmericanWest, pp. 190-191, "A Church Without a Prophet" (1 text, 1 tune)
Roud #10865
CROSS-REFERENCES:
cf. "The Rose That All Are Praising" (tune, according to Greenway-FolkloreOfTheGreatWest)
NOTES [161 words]: Jewish tradition held that prophecy ended with the prophet Malachi, some time around 350 B.C.E. (although later authors such as Daniel continued to portray their works as prophecy; they just pretended it was written pre-Malachi). Certainly there were no Jewish prophets after c. 100 B.C.E. Christianity believed that prophecy revived with the coming of Jesus (the New Testament contains multiple references to prophecy, and Paul encourages it). But that sort of prophecy too died out and was discouraged. In recent centuries, many denominations, such as Pentecostals, have encouraged behaviors such as speaking in tongues that are linked to prophecy. But, as far as I know, only the Mormons make Prophet an official church status. Of course, the Mormons were the first denomination of the second millennium to conclude that they had more scriptures than just the Hebrew and Greek Testaments, and to produce scriptures not written in the vernacular of the time. - RBW
Last updated in version 6.6
File: Hubb205

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