The Unification movement affirms a doctrine of continuing revelation. But this is a difficult doctrine for any religious tradition to uphold.
The reason is simple. Revelation changes or at least upsets everything and almost everybody.
This is certainly the case for founders of religious traditions. The Hebrew prophets were stoned. Jesus was crucified. Mohammad was ridiculed and driven from the city of Mecca. Joseph Smith was assassinated. Sun Myung Moon endured torture and imprisonment.
In short, “Thus saith the Lord” is a life-threatening proclamation.
This is true not only for founders of religious traditions but also for their followers. Those claiming continuing revelation typically earn such titles as heretic, apostate, deceiver, witch, sorcerer, blasphemer, false prophet, liar, cult leader, and Antichrist.
In fighting off new claims, religious traditions generally follow two strategies.
This first is to close off revelation.
Christianity is a case-in-point. The early Church was a maelstrom of competing points of view, self-proclaimed prophets and founders of new sects. Christians agreed that Jesus had overcome death and in one way or another incarnated the living God. They disagreed about almost everything else: strategies of outreach, leadership, worship, church discipline, Jesus’ divine and human nature, and whether they should pray for or condemn Rome.
In this context, a plethora of individuals and groups arose who claimed continuing revelation. Some attracted broad followings. All were eventually branded heretics and many of their “revelations” claimed to supersede Jesus and his teachings. Among the more notorious were:
- Simon Magus, reputed to be the father of all heresies. He led a sect along with his consort, a reformed prostitute from Tyre. They claimed the Son was in Judea but the Father and Mother were in Samaria.
- Marcion, termed by his bishop “the first-born of Satan.” He taught that Yahweh was an inferior, evil god and proposed a “new” testament consisting of the Apostle Paul’s letters, the Gospel of Luke and his own writings.
- Lord Montanus, a former pagan priest. He proclaimed himself to be the Holy Spirit (Paraclete) whom Jesus promised to send and who “will guide you into all truth.”
Besides these, gnostic groups purveyed “secret” knowledge (“gnosis”) and scriptures teaching all matter is evil, that creation of the material world was a mistake or abortion, that Christ was not born and that he did not possess a physical body. Antinomian sects taught that saved Christians were “above the law” and everything was permitted, notably free love.
The Church responded to “false teachings” by closing off revelation. Reaching consensus took several centuries and wasn’t complete until the Council of Carthage (397). Church leaders set three criteria for writings to be included among the 27 books of the New Testament. They must be regularly used. They must teach sound doctrine. And they must be “apostolic,” that is, written during Christianity’s founding generation.
Nothing written after the apostles counted as revelation.
The Book of Revelation warns that anyone who “adds to” or “takes away” from its words (Rev. 22:18-19) will be subject to plagues, lose their part of the tree of life and the holy city. Christianity, in general, applied this warning to the New Testament as a whole. Judaism likewise closed the prophetic tradition after Malachi. Islam “sealed” it with Muhammad.
The second way religious traditions fight off new claims is by “managing” revelation.
Christianity adopted a two-fold approach.
First, it distinguishes between “public” and “private” revelations. Roman Catholicism, for example, teaches that public or “divine” revelation ended with the death of the last living disciple. However, “private” revelations continue. Thus, it accepts “apparitions” (visionary experiences) and “interior locutions” (inner voices) so long as they do not claim to “surpass, correct, improve, or complete public revelation.” Protestants are less comfortable with claims of private revelation and prefer to distinguish between Biblical revelation and later “inspiration.”
Second, the Church “manages” revelation by setting authorities over it. Early on, it entrusted bishops with the sacred deposit of faith. When they disagreed, councils of bishops gathered to refute heresy and set boundaries of Christian truth. Their collective wisdom, understood to be guided by the Holy Spirit, crystallized into creedal formulations. The papacy subsequently emerged as an “infallible” interpreter of divine revelation. Protestants reject this and regard Scripture alone as authoritative (“Sola Scripture”).
The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints (LDS), i.e., the Mormon Church, is a distinct case as it affirms continuing revelation but employs measures to control it.
LDS departs dramatically from mainstream Christianity in that it posits an “open” scriptural canon. At present, this includes the Holy Bible (King James Version), the Book of Mormon, the Doctrine and Covenants, and the Pearl of Great Price. Mormons regard apostolic revelation as “inspired” but not “infallible,” and later revelations take precedence over earlier ones as in the church’s repudiation of polygamy.
Although LDS upholds personal revelation, it understands that “divine” or “church-wide” revelation comes only through those called by God as prophets, i.e., the First Presidency and the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles. Mormons regard ongoing revelation to be essential in guiding them through changing conditions, keeping doctrine pure, revealing new doctrine and scripture in the time appointed by God, and in making policy or organizational changes as the church grows and evolves.
All this is by way of introduction to the issue of continuing revelation in Unification tradition.
Unification teaching appears unambiguous in affirming both continuing revelation and an “open” scriptural canon. Exposition of the Divine Principle (1996), the movement’s primary theological text, states:
It may be displeasing to religious believers, especially to Christians, to learn that a new expression of truth must appear. They believe that the scriptures they have are already perfect and flawless. Certainly, truth itself is unique, eternal, immutable and absolute. Scriptures, however, are not the truth itself, but are textbooks teaching the truth. They were given at various times in history as humankind developed both spiritually and intellectually. The depth and extent of teaching and the method of expressing the truth naturally varied according to each age. Consequently, we must never regard such textbooks as absolute in every detail.
At the same time, EDP describes the teaching of Sun Myung Moon to be the “ultimate life-giving truth.” Divine Principle (1973) refers to Rev. Moon’s teaching or “Principle” as the new, ultimate, and “final” truth.
Both texts acknowledge deeper, more profound portions of the truth will be revealed and published. However, it is difficult to imagine that the tradition will countenance continuing revelations that lie outside of or claim to supersede the Principle. The movement has already expelled “heretical” groups claiming that Rev. Moon failed or was a forerunner to their leader and teaching.
Within the movement, there is ambiguity over authoritative revelation.
An oral tradition, consisting of Rev. Moon’s sermons and speeches, exists alongside the Principle texts. In 1998, Rev. Moon announced that his words, collected in several hundred volumes, constituted the Completed Testament Age canon. By 2003, an authoritative set of his words, known as the Cheong Seong Geong or “Heavenly Scripture” was prepared. It consisted of 16 books or chapters on specific topics and ran to some 2,500 pages.
Rev. Moon subsequently directed that his “Messages of Peace” (Pyung Hwa Shin Gyeong), 17 public speeches delivered after 2003, be collected into an authoritative volume. Prior to his passing, he prepared his “last words for humankind” in the form of “Eight Great Textbooks.” These were:
- The Sermons of the Rev. Sun Myung Moon
- Exposition of the Divine Principle
- Cheon Seong Gyeong (“Heavenly Scripture”)
- The Family Pledge
- Pyeong Hwa Shin Gyeong (“Messages of Peace”)
- True Families — Gateway to Heaven
- Owner of Peace and Owner of Lineage, and,
- World Scripture
Video of True Mother’s address during the World [Unification] Leaders’ meeting at Cheon Jeong Gung Peace Palace, Oct. 27, 2014
After Rev. Moon’s passing, Mrs. Hak Ja Han Moon testified to her husband’s continuing presence and inspiration. She described his words as “precious gems” but made it a “top priority” to “polish” and put them “in order.” She assembled a “Compilation Committee” and less than a year later presided over the publication of a “revised” Cheon Seong Gyeong and a re-titled, re-worked Pyeong Hwa Gyeong (“Peace Messages”), which now includes a multitude of Rev. Moon’s speeches and some of her own.
This scandalized a dissident element within the movement calling themselves the “Blessed Families Committee for Protection of True Father-established Cheon Seong Gyeong and Pyeong Hwa Shin Gyeong” (BFC-PCP). They demonstrated outside church headquarters in Seoul, demanding that leadership “stop damaging the Eight Great Textbooks.”
Bottom line, they insisted no changes were valid if made after Rev. Moon’s passing.
BFC-PCP’s position appears to be a repudiation of the Unification movement’s doctrine of continuing revelation. It also is a direct challenge to Mrs. Moon as the movement’s co-founder (which Rev. Moon affirmed) and her husband’s co-equal.
From a comparative perspective, this recalls the “Filioque” controversy in early Christianity. The original Nicene Creed (325) professed belief in God the Father, the “only begotten” Son, and the Holy Spirit that “proceedeth” from the Father. In 447, the Western Church inserted a clause into the creed stating that the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father “and the Son” (i.e., filioque), effectively subordinating the Holy Spirit to the Father and the Son.
The filioque clause, repeated in Western liturgical churches to this day, has particular relevance for the Unification movement given its identification of the Holy Spirit with the feminine aspect of God.
Shortly after her husband’s passing, Mrs. Moon (“True Mother”) testified that Rev. Moon (“True Father”) was uniquely present to her and that they were carrying out a “joint ministry.” As she put it, “Father’s thinking is my thinking and my thinking is Father’s thinking.”
Later, she asserted her own unique origin as God’s “only-begotten daughter.” At a “Special Meeting for World [Unification] Leaders,” she said, “You cannot say that God’s only begotten son educated God’s only begotten daughter.” In effect, she maintained that she “proceeded” directly from God, thereby, standing the filioque’s 1,500 year legacy of Holy Spirit subordination on its head.
These issues are complex and highly charged. However, it seems inevitable that the Unification tradition will need to establish an authoritative canon as well as mechanisms for managing it.
The Cheon Il Guk Constitution, intended to provide for a Unification-inspired social order, states that its “basic scriptures” are Cheon Seong Gyeong, Cham Bumo Gyeong (“True Parents’ Scripture,” an as yet unpublished account of Rev. and Mrs. Moon’s life course), and Pyeong Hwa Gyeong. It says nothing about how they will be interpreted or who will have authority to interpret them.
The most likely future outcome is that Unification tradition will attribute unique significance to the revelation of God in Rev. and Mrs. Moon as “True Parents.” It’s also likely that Mrs. Moon will stand alongside her husband as the tradition’s co-founder, co-equal and co-revelator. How that will be expressed in holy texts, how those texts will be interpreted, whether the tradition will recognize ongoing revelations, and, if so, how continuing revelations will be authorized are as yet open questions.♦
Dr. Michael Mickler is Professor of Church History at UTS and Barrytown College. His books include: Footprints of True Parents’ Providence: The United States of America (2013) and 40 Years in America: An Intimate History of the Unification Movement, 1959-1999 (2000).
Applied Unificationism 
Very interesting and educational! I enjoyed reading the historical perspective and what other faiths have gone through, so far.
What can we learn from history? Maybe that nothing was and will ever be written in stone. Maybe that we are continuously evolving in our understanding, in our personal and collective wisdom and, most importantly, in our relationship to God.
What helps me to avoid the inevitable confusion and possible frustration all this brings, is to focus on my own relationship with the Divine that is within all of us and also to keep in mind that beliefs and realities may be changing, but love is the only one that is eternal and unchanging.
No matter what happens, with all those complex issues you write about, my hope is that we can stay in real love — as brothers and sisters in heart- — and not let any changes establish new barriers among all of us who have dedicated our life in “bringing down walls.”
A most important contextual and clarifying exposition. Thank you.
And a truer statement has not been made, to my memory and scope, at least: “Within the movement, there is ambiguity over authoritative revelation.”
Then again, how might “authoritative revelation” develop in such a day and age as ours?
This is a very important topic, and I think one’s level of maturity has a lot to do with how one handles continuing revelation. In the growth process, one learns the principles inherited from the society of the parents, and needs to learn how to judge where the principles work and where they need further explanation or revision as society evolves.
Our True Parents studied the knowledge that was available through life experience, the Bible, through other religions, and through principles of science and engineering. By sincerely praying for guidance, and through experimentation, True Father developed a new canon for his time — what he called a worldview for the post-World War II era. This required integrating science and religion, East and West, and tribal, national, and global level life. Traditional religions largely supported tribal-level societies and empires, none of them are adequate for our age.
For me, the important thing is to understand how TF set the foundation of this new level of religious thinking. We could compare it to the Copernican revolution in science. Lots of details need to be filled in, and lots of new books and additional words about the solar system could be written after Copernicus, but once new principles are discovered it is foolish to reject them. Such a rejection would be a sign of ignorance, foolishness, or political power agenda.
True Father brought together some core principles regarding the nature of human life and society in the Divine Principle that are universally applicable to people regardless of their former religious beliefs, like the principle of gravity applying to all. These principles might be challenging to religious leaders who have taught things based on personal supposition and fear of losing their flocks, but they should not be a challenge to people sincerely looking for truth.
I think it is important to keep Father’s original words and original speeches on video so that we can understand them in their full context. Picking and choosing his words, reassembling them by topic, etc., can be helpful as a study guide in some cases, but it also can distort his original intentions when his words are taken out of context. Any reassembly of True Father’s words is an effort at ongoing education by the person assembling them, and their motives may or may not be pure. Ultimately it is up to the reader to discern the value of such texts.
New revelations about the nature of God and human life will always continue, some will add to the collective knowledge of human civilization, and those that are false will fall away on their own. What is important to me is to understand how the Divine Principle establishes the foundation of core spiritual principles that can serve a global society.
Interesting that at the 1992 ICUS, True Parents were proclaimed as the Double Messiah and that the church was “the House of Unification….ushered in by the ‘mother.'” It was also at that event that True Mother was inaugurated as President of the Women’s Federation for World Peace.
In 2001, at the Cheongpyeong 21-day Registration workshop, a beautifully sensitive, artistically produced film on Hak Ja Han Moon’s mother (Dae Mo Nim) was shown. It situated Dae Mo Nim as the saintly mother of True Mother in a similar vein as the tradition of Mariology in the Catholic Church (I have not seen this film distributed beyond that workshop, by the way.) Yes, she is correct; she was guided by God and referred to God as her real or True Father long before she met SMM.
Actually, it was True Father himself who already gave the revelation that stood the church and “filioque’s 1,500 year legacy on its head.” In personal conversation with his early Korean disciple and UTS theologian, Dr. Young Oon Kim, and then again in his East Garden talk to leaders and members (2007), he revealed that “Adam and Eve were born as twins…like two peas in a pod….Each was the substantial body of God…both were equidistant from and the pillars of the Godhead…and of equal value to God…each perceived the truths and Divine Principles within the creation….”
It was TM’s course that she had to go the way of indemnity, but for the restoration of the world and fallen history. She fulfilled that restoration for the sake of the world and now stands with TF. At the Abel/UN WFWP small group HDH at the Peace Palace in July 2012, less than two months before Rev. Moon’s passing, he told us that “Even if the pillars of our church come down, I will be with our True Mother.” That was a prophetic statement. True Mother is reiterating what her True Husband already told us.
Dr. Mickler continues to publish topical and informative pieces of great value to both the current Unification community and the future generations as they attempt to sort this mess out. It has been revealed to me that every penny spent on his extensive education was worth every nickel. Keep up the good work, young man.
Dr. Mickler’s words are valuable. I appreciate the historical references to early Christianity, and think patristic scholars should be most interested in studying the Unification movement at this time as an opportunity to deepen their understanding of early church dynamics being lived out in the present time after the death of Rev. Moon. I hope this article will ignite a renewed interest in the most amazing religious story of our times.
A well-researched, articulate and informative essay. He dares ask, and answers, the very slippery question that is on numerous lips within the movement: Where do we go from here? And more importantly, perhaps, how do we get there? Excellent.
One asks “Where do we go from here?”
I would say that we should go in a God-centered direction which is parallel to God’s providence of restoration. We would be lost if we did not take with us the authoritative canon and God’s original blueprint for the ideal of creation which disappeared when Adam and Eve fell, and when Jesus was sacrificed. Father asked God for that plan, and God explained it to him. During his life time Father taught us that blueprint on every level.
If we are in the center of the providence then “here” is a place in which we would find the many tools that Heavenly Parent gave to us through the True Parents..
The God-centered direction mentioned in Father’s teaching materials is the direction toward the new beginning point, the central point where God and Humankind meet at a ninety degree angle. That would be the moment in time and space when and where the first successful True Parents appeared to set up the horizontal way for all of us to come together under the one umbrella of a True God-centered love, True God-centered Life, and True God-centered lineage. True Parents have given us the plan that we must follow and we can find it in their textbooks and teaching materials.
Most people believe that all we need is the Divine Principle and Unification Thought. But we also need True Parents textbooks and teaching materials in which we will discover the Word, The Eternal Truth, Logos, the Blueprint for the ideal of Creation. We have been taught that if we seek, we will find, and if we knock the door of knowledge will be opened to us and if we ask, it shall be given us. God is hoping to find a looker and a knocker and someone who sincerely asks Him for the Ultimate Truth.
Just as the Heavenly parent unraveled Himself when He began the Creation, and just as True Father unraveled the Words of Truth in the Bible, we too must unravel True Father’s Words of Truth. He has given us everything, we just need to know what we are seeking. We should be looking for the God-centered direction in which we must “go from here,” and the God-centered plan in order to unravel in the right direction.
Thank you so much for posting True Mother’s speech video. It added much value to the article. Hearing it all from the “horse’s mouth” was very powerful.
The questions raised in the article are very important ones. But in the realm of shimjeong, things take their proper places.
A very important article indeed. The survey of religious history and references to the torturous development of Christianity provided by Dr. Mickler is especially instructive. Believers of the Unification faith should reflect carefully about the many twists and turns that led to current Christian reality. I recall reading in an abridged version of Divine Principle in the 1970s that explained “Christians believe in the same God, same Christ and read the same Bible yet there are over 400 denominations”. Sun Myung Moon originally founded the Holy Spirit Association for the Unification of World Christianity to unite Christianity and eventually unite all world religions. His tremendous investment to promote inter-religious dialogue is but one example of his conviction. Given some of the recent developments in the Unification family one could easily speculate that divisions are not however limited to the first coming.
As Dr. Mickler mentions in his article, there has been some debate about the centrality of the eight textbooks Rev. Moon declared as his last will and testament and the Sacred Scriptures promoted by Mrs. Moon. On some Unification forums, there is debate as to whether the “revised” CSG is valid. A sober reading of all the texts will bring us to the conclusion that there really are only “three” scriptures that both Rev. and Mrs. Moon are emphasizing:
1. True Parents’ Words (including the Family Pledge authored by Rev. Moon) and both versions of CSG
2. Exposition of Divine Principle
3. World Scripture
True Parents’ words are found in a vast collection of sermons that include the original CSG, the recent “revised or updated” CSG and other texts including Rev. and Mrs. Moon’s words. The fact that World Scripture is considered a central text is a reminder that Rev. Moon’s purpose is beyond denominationalism.
The central issue, as Dr. Mickler hints, is interpretation. Who will be authorized to do so? What criteria will be established for interpretation? And how Unification praxis will be impacted through the agreed upon interpretation remains to be seen. Hopefully, such issues will be solved soon. The history of Christianity, as summarized by Dr. Mickler, provides important precedents that should not be repeated.
This is a vital topic to address in our faith community. It would have been helpful in the article to have clarified the meaning of the word “revelation,” as Dr. Young Oon Kim attempted to do in her book An Introduction to Theology (1983). I think this is important because unless we can agree on the meaning(s) of a given word, it is likely we will “not be having a conversation” even though we are talking. Words like “revelation” and “spiritual” are loaded with rich meaning and therefore require a fleshing out beforehand so all parties at the table can enter the discussion “on the same page,” so to speak.
Having been born and raised Mormon (LDS) and one that did not not reject the faith of my upbringing, I generally have more experience and understanding on this than many. That stated, this strikes me as getting “lost in the weeds.” What I take from the article is that people are placing their faith and sense of relationship with God in the “revealed” word (writings) from God.
I will cut to the quick of it. Jesus told the 12 disciples to go and pray about what he was telling them and ask the “Father” directly. Not only that, but that they should do it individually and in private. When Peter responded to Jesus’ question about who Peter understood Jesus to be, Jesus praised him as “No man has told you this” (paraphrased). After the resurrection there is a requiring question Jesus asks: “Will I find faith?”
The fundamental failure of John the Baptist was that he did not have faith in what God told him directly. John knew the Holy Scriptures as well as any up to that time. Also he was regarded and acknowledged to be a prophet, which means the very words he spoke were considered divine and inspired of God. Yet, “He who is least in the Kingdom of Heaven, is greater than John.”
Revelation and “scripture” have their place and value, but it will never be a substitute for faith. Without faith in God first, we are lost, no matter what else we may have. Please do not get lost in the weeds.
We are falling into a trap of our own making; or rather, already in it. It is the trap where the “spooky” is given more power and credence than the logical.
We bandy the word “revelation” around because we know a large number of people get goose bumps and tend to revere truth more when it is revealed in a spooky way rather than gleaned through research. But have we forgotten or just stopped caring that the Unification Movement was not founded on revelation, nor was it developed based on revelation.
I discount Jesus’s appearance to Father in his teenage years as many faithful Christians have met Jesus when deep in prayer and also, in that moment, Jesus did not “reveal” anything to Father other than what is already available in the pages of the New Testament and that is that his followers should continue his work and even “do greater things than he.”
No, when we talk about “revelation” we are pretty much talking about either specific and new information or specific directions that are passed, in a flash as it were, from beings in the spirit world (either directly from God or indirectly from God through angels or saints).
So, while it may give many people tingles and energize them to believe the words they receive from their pastor or lecturer came about via “revelation,” the fact is they did not. This is not our Unification Movement internal explanation at all. It is because we did not have faith in the value and power of Divine Principle based on the beauty and logic of the teaching alone and we did not trust the recipient of this teaching to appreciate it unless it was packaged in a spooky back story (or at least “reference”) as to how the teaching came about.
Members of the Unification Movement heard directly from True Father many times how he painstakingly investigated every aspect of God’s providence from his own biology and psychology and thought process and feelings to sociology and the individuals and community behavior around him to the Bible and other religious texts to science and history and every other thing that could possibly be connected to God and humankind, human history and humanity’s condition. Father studied all these things and thought them through and developed as a person and examined the workings of his own mind and heart and investigated the minds and hearts of others. He prayed deeply for years and where he was able, he just plain asked God for answers and I believe he prayed to Jesus and others in the afterlife and asked them.
Now, in this telling and re-telling by Father, he never once said that someone from the afterlife dumped answers in his lap. In fact, it was the opposite. He told us how spirits did their level best to muddy the waters and obscure the truth and even when he worked it out himself and took his findings directly to God in prayer that God, wanting him to be sure and not to have to rely on him accepting it based on revelation, God denied it was true even when He knew it was. Not once did God test Father like this but multiple times until Father had to be so sure of his findings that he had to just plain assert to God that there is no other explanation until God stopped denying it. Now, you might say that itself is a form of revelation but it’s not a revelation if Father already found the answer himself.
To be clear: I believe our movement and Father’s teaching is not based on revelation, but based on deep, prayerful, investigative research and testing that the living and perfect Messiah and True Parent, True Father did during his earthly, physical life.
Can anyone point out to chunks of Divine Principle or Father’s thousands of speeches where Father noted “and by the way, all that came in a revelation to me?”
Father spoke with the confidence of someone who worked the details out himself and who tested, re-tested and tested again until he was fully sure of them. The only way that our movement is based on revelation is that a living man with a physical body revealed them to us here on Earth. In that sense it is no more or less a revelation than the scientific discoveries that bless those of us living in the modern world.
Divine Principle is a treasure of treasures for sure, but it, and the further truths that came in Father’s speeches are not revelations in the spooky sense that people mean when they use the term “revelation.” So why are we suddenly pretending that our movement has been based on revelation all along? I believe it to be a slippery and very dangerous path.
Thank you, Dr. Mickler, for your outstanding research concerning “The Doctrine of Continuing Revelation.”
Let me respond to Peter Stephenson who asked above, “Can anyone point out chunks of Divine Principle or Father’s thousands of speeches where Father noted “and by the way, all that came in a revelation to me?”
This quote is worth considering:
“Early in my life God called me for a mission as His instrument. I was called to reveal His truth for Him, as His prophet. I committed myself unyielding in pursuit of truth, searching the hills and valleys of the spiritual world. The time suddenly came to me when heaven opened up, and I was privileged to communicate with Jesus Christ and the living God directly. Since then I have received many astonishing revelations. God Himself told me that the most basic and central truth of the universe is that God is the Father and we are His children. We are all created as children of God. And He said there is nothing closer, nothing deeper, nothing more ultimate than when father and son are one: One in love, one in life, and one in ideal.” (Sun Myung Moon, “God’s Hope for Man,” October 20, 1973, Washington, DC)
There are many more such “chunks.”