Mormonism is theologically classified by different people in several different ways. One person will describe them as polytheists, another will describe them as henotheists, while another as monarchotheists, and yet another will describe them as panentheists. Metatheology is the study about theological systems which examines how theological claims are structured, categorized, justified, or conceptualized. So which theological system correctly describes Mormonism? I will argue that the answer to such a question depends on from which perspective one is addressing. In a nutshell, they are all correct to some degree, but perhaps incomplete by themselves.
The Panentheism of Mormonism
I first remember hearing the word, panentheism while living in northern California, and traveling to Mt. Shasta, where a serious number of New Agers reside. Panentheism means that God is in all things (pan (all) en (in) theism (God)), that God is developing along with the world, and the things in the world are essentially God’s body. This is not to be confused with pantheism, that God is all things.
“They scream” because they suffer an unknowable ontological dilemma.
A similar problem is found in Mormonism. Is man made out of building materials or are building materials made out of flesh? I’ll let you decide for yourself. But seriously, Doctrine and Covenants 93:33-35 says,
“For man is spirit. The elements are eternal, and spirit and element, inseparably connected, receive a fulness of joy; And when separated, man cannot receive a fulness of joy. The elements are the tabernacle of God; yea, Man is the tabernacle of God, even temples; and whatsoever temple is defiled, God shall destroy that temple.”
Several things should be considered here… First, that man is spirit, and that elements are eternal. Mormons do not believe in creation ex nihilo, that is, out of nothing. Rather, Heavenly Father (the Mormon endearing way to refer to “God”) is simply a rearranger of material or particles, and “creates” by simply organizing materials.[1] This is how they justify saying that they believe that Jesus is God, and that Jesus is Yahweh, but also that “Jesus was never created.” The problem is, the Mormon Jesus is a spirit child “created” by Heavenly Father, which is where Christianity differs. Jesus has personhood from eternity past, but in Mormonism, He doesn’t. I write more about this here.
Second, if we are to understand that “the tabernacle of God” in the above passage is the “place where God dwells” then not only is it the case in Mormonism that God is in the elements, but he is also in man, as well as in temples. God is in the elements… wouldn’t this be everything that exists? If “the elements are eternal” and, “spirit and element are inseparably connected” and, “the elements are the tabernacle of God,” then there is not much room, if any, left to describe anything else in existence. It is therefore safe to conclude that Mormonism in such perspective is panentheistic.
In Doctrine and Covenants 88:41, we see the panentheistic god as well. “He comprehendeth all things, and all things are before him, and all things are round about him; and he is above all things, and in all things, and is through all things, and is round about all things; and all things are by him, and of him, even God, forever and ever.” There are numerous further ideas that communicate such,[2] but these seem sufficient for our current purposes. Not all Mormons, but some will try to soften such passages. The problem is that the standard of their scripture seems to make it hard to maintain intellectual honesty in doing so.
On the contrary, the Bible shows us that panentheism is false. Luke was very purposefully revealing in the book of Acts that this is not how we can describe God’s nature, and records Stephen quoting Isaiah to do it:
“However, the Most High does not live in houses made by human hands. As the prophet says: “‘Heaven is my throne, and the earth is my footstool. What kind of house will you build for me? says the Lord. Or where will my resting place be? Has not my hand made all these things?’”[3]
God is separate from the material He created (otherwise He was also created, according to the principle of causality), and does not dwell in such material without the miraculous taking place. When, for instance God was in the burning bush, or when God opened the mouth of Balaam’s donkey, we are to consider such things miraculous, and outside of what is normal. There is no logical error with God being in the burning bush, but to assert that God is in everything material, as Mormonism does, errs biblically speaking. Both cannot be correct.
Similarly, in Acts 17 we find Luke recording the same idea from the words of Paul:
“For as I passed along and observed the objects of your worship, I found also an altar with this inscription: ‘To the unknown god.’ What therefore you worship as unknown, this I proclaim to you. The God who made the world and everything in it, being Lord of heaven and earth, does not live in temples made by man, nor is he served by human hands, as though he needed anything, since he himself gives to all mankind life and breath and everything.”[4]
God does not need anything, because if He did, what kind of God would He truly be? The phrase, “He does not live in temples made by man,” is in complete opposition to what Mormonism teaches. But instead, we find in 1 Corinthians 6:19 that the body is the temple for the Holy Spirit: “Do you not know that your bodies are temples of the Holy Spirit, who is in you, whom you have received from God?” God can logically exist in something that He made, but only does so through His divine, miraculous, intervention. There is an extreme difference between how Mormonism describes God versus how the Bible describes God.
The Polytheism of Mormonism
Mormonism is likely most often described as polytheistic, that Mormons believe in many gods. In some perspective, this is absolutely true. Mormons do not maintain the doctrine of the Trinity, but instead, they hold to tri-theism. That is, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost are three different gods. So, from this perspective, they worship three different gods, and in such are polytheistic. The problem is, when they speak of the tri-theistic godhead, when they say that “God is one” and quote Bible verses to prove such a belief, what they mean is that,
“From the Prophet’s account of the First Vision and from his other teachings, we know that the members of the Godhead are three separate beings. The Father and the Son have tangible bodies of flesh and bones, and the Holy Ghost is a personage of spirit.
Although the members of the Godhead are distinct beings with distinct roles, they are one in purpose and doctrine. They are perfectly united in bringing to pass Heavenly Father’s divine plan of salvation.”[5]
So, the Mormon “Godhead” exists in three beings, making the focus of their worship toward such, and because of this, they can be considered polytheistic. There are other arguments that would also give further strength to the fact that Mormons are polytheistic, such as a reading of Abraham 4-5 in the Pearl of Great Price, which refer to “the Gods” no small number of times, but I wanted to clearly focus here on the perspective from them to their objects of worship, which are the members of their “Godhead.”
The Bible on the other hand, teaches that there is one God, and that He exists in three persons. Deuteronomy 6:4 shows that God is one, but other verses such as Matthew 28:19, John 1:1-3, and Acts 5:1-4, show that God exists in three persons.
Consider also how Isaiah describes God as opposed to polytheism:
40:25, “To whom will you compare me? Or who is my equal?” says the Holy One.”
43:10, “Before me no god was formed, nor will there be one after me.”
44:6, “Thus says the Lord, the King of Israel and his Redeemer, the Lord of hosts: ‘I am the first and I am the last; besides me there is no god.’”
44:8, “Fear not, nor be afraid; have I not told you from of old and declared it? And you are my witnesses! Is there a God besides me? There is no Rock; I know not any.”
44:24, “Thus says the Lord, your Redeemer, who formed you from the womb: “I am the Lord, who made all things, who alone stretched out the heavens, who spread out the earth by myself…”
45:5, “I am the Lord, and there is no other, besides me there is no God; I equip you, though you do not know me…”
45:6, “That people may know, from the rising of the sun and from the west, that there is none besides me; I am the Lord, and there is no other.”
45:21, “Declare and present your case; let them take counsel together! Who told this long ago? Who declared it of old? Was it not I, the Lord? And there is no other god besides me, a righteous God and a Savior; there is none besides me.
45:22, “Turn to me and be saved, all the ends of the earth! For I am God, and there is no other.”
46:9, “Remember the former things of old; for I am God, and there is no other; I am God, and there is none like me…”
Probably one of the most significant things about this list is that it is not even remotely close to being exhaustive. God wants us to make no mistake in understanding that He alone is God, and there are no others.
The Monarchotheism of Mormonism
When we Look at Mormonism from the perspective of philosophy, we find within the pages of its doctrines that because a man can potentially become a God through what they refer to as the doctrine of exaltation,[6] and coupled with the teachings of Joseph Smith that God was once “as we are now,”[7] then it means that their god, “Heavenly Father,” also had a father who had a different god, implying that men potentially became gods for an infinite past. The implication I argue in my book is that there must be some kind of law that transcends all men (and therefore Heavenly Fathers) in order for them to become gods, and that this law could only have been written by some truly supreme being, which Mormons do not worship.
This being would, since he is not the object of their worship, be above all gods, and this would be a form of monarchotheism, which is the idea that there are many gods that fall under a supreme god. The monarchical god is normally the object of worship, but this is not so in the case of Mormonism. Since “Heavenly Father” was once a man, he is obviously not the supreme God, even though Mormons erroneously describe him as such. For considerably more on this, check out Mormonism: Impossible on Amazon.
Often, Mormons will argue that the Bible acknowledges that men can become gods, and that even Jesus poses a question suggesting such. Since this takes considerable unpacking and I have written on this before, I’ll refer you to this article. In a nutshell, their argument of such fails because they are ultimately equivocating the idea of “judges” with the idea of all-powerful beings.
In any event, Mormons are also from some perspective, monarchotheists, because their scriptures and prophets teach that they can potentially become gods, but there is no view beyond this on how such a process came into existence. Essentially, the law wrote itself, or perhaps readers of Mormon scripture are supposed to assume the truth of it and not ask questions.
As far as the Bible is concerned, please reread the above portion on what Isaiah says about God. That there are no other gods (greater or lesser), and that He alone is the one, true, supreme God. Not only is He the one true supreme God, but He is also described in the as all-knowing, all-powerful, all-present, and all-good (see Psalm 139, etc.). A person who was born as a man and became a “god” could never possibly be all-knowing, for he could never know any experience prior to his own birth (let alone, of his birth). He was not in the room moments before he was born and could not possibly observe himself coming out of the womb. Therefore, there are things that the Mormon god could never know.
The Henotheism of Mormonism
From the perspective of a Mormon, if they do not know what henotheism means and it is explained to them, I find from more than one occasion that they often come to appreciate the label. Henotheism is simply the idea that there are many gods, but there is only one object central to worship. Doctrine and Covenants 132:19-20 reads as follows:
“…and if ye abide in my covenant, and commit no murder whereby to shed innocent blood, it shall be done unto them in all things whatsoever my servant hath put upon them, in time, and through all eternity; and shall be of full force when they are out of the world; and they shall pass by the angels, and the gods, which are set there, to their exaltation and glory in all things, as hath been sealed upon their heads, which glory shall be a fulness and a continuation of the seeds forever and ever.
Then shall they be gods, because they have no end; therefore shall they be from everlasting to everlasting, because they continue; then shall they be above all, because all things are subject unto them. Then shall they be gods, because they have all power, and the angels are subject unto them.”
So, Mormons recognize that other gods exist (how could they not if every human male has the potential to become a god?), but the focus of their worship is directed only to one of them. As discussed, the Bible has much to say about such assertions.
Conclusion
Interestingly, the same Bible verses can be used to combat all these different metatheolgical facets of Mormon theology. So again, the Bible is replete with the idea that there is only one God, and not you, not me, not any human is, or ever will be like Him in such regard. Numbers 23:19 says, “God is not human, that he should lie, not a human being, that he should change his mind.” Consider at this point, Doctrine and Covenants 130:22 “The Father has a body of flesh and bones as tangible as man’s; the Son also; but the Holy Ghost has not a body of flesh and bones, but is a personage of Spirit.” In contrast, the phrase, “God is not human” in the Numbers passage above is another truth claim in direct opposition to what Mormonism teaches. Both cannot be correct.
Again, in Isaiah, we find God saying, “For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways,” declares the Lord. “As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.” There is an impassible distance between describing what God is from what a human being is. The Bible is clear on the nature of God, and Mormonism is clearly not.
When a person describes Mormonism as any of the above, they are correct to some degree. The issue is that one of these is not all Mormonism is, because it is all about the perspective from which Mormonism is being addressed. There may be further perspectives, but these are the ones that seem to be most prominent.
Written by Nace Howell through the grace of the Lord Jesus
© Nace Howell, 2025
[1] See the Pearl of Great Price, Abraham 3:24; 4:1, 12.
[2] See also Doctrine and Covenants 88:6-13.
[3] Acts 7:48.
[4] Acts 17:23-25.
[5] https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/manual/gospel-topics/godhead?lang=eng.
[6] See Doctrine and Covenants 132:19-20.
[7] “God Himself was once as we are now, and is an exalted man, and sits enthroned in yonder heavens!” https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/manual/teachings-joseph-smith/chapter-2?lang=eng.
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