# Glory

Explore the concept of Glory through the lens of Mormon Transhumanism—where theology and technology converge to illuminate humanity’s divine potential.

[Image: When the tabernacle was completed, “a cloud covered the tent of the congregation, and the glory of the Lord filled the tabernacle,” so Moses “was not able to enter” (Exodus 40:34-35).]

In the ancient Near Eastern worldview, glory constitutes the tangible, ontological weight of a divine presence. The Hebrew term *kabod* preserves this physical mass in its root, *kabad*, meaning “to be heavy.” When Genesis describes Abram as “very rich,” the Hebrew literally renders him as “very heavy.” Consequently, the *kabod* of the Lord is the overwhelming heaviness of His proximate nearness. The Greek *doxa* arrived at this sacred utility by a more circuitous route. Stemming from *dokeō* (“to seem”), it functioned in classical Greek primarily to denote opinion or reputation, until the Jewish translators of the Septuagint brilliantly adopted it for *kabod*, thereby infusing a word for mortal reputation with the searing weight of the divine presence.

## **The Cloud That Filled the Tabernacle**

In the books of Moses, the glory of the Lord is consistently portrayed as a tangible presence that occupies sacred space—a hallmark of ancient temple theology. When the children of Israel completed the tabernacle, “a cloud covered the tent of the congregation, and the glory of the Lord filled the tabernacle,” rendering the space so intensely sacred that Moses “was not able to enter” (Exodus 40:34-35). This same cloud that had descended upon Sinai ultimately settled on the portable sanctuary and, later, the Holy of Holies in Solomon’s temple. Later Jewish tradition beautifully termed this indwelling presence the *Shekhinah* (“dwelling”), a word sharing its linguistic root with *mishkan*, the tabernacle. Yet, as the Book of Moses reveals, the prophet who initially could not enter the tent eventually stands within the very glory of the heavenly veil itself.

## Transfigured Before Him

> You have the words of eternal life in your possession. What next? Take your own philosophy; if I am organized and capacitated to receive this glory and this exaltation, I must be the friend of Him who has brought me forth and instituted this exaltation for me; I must not be His enemy at any time. Again, you say, ‘we are organized to become Gods, even sons of God; to act independently.

Restoration scripture provides a profound record of this glory resting upon a mortal, an experience the Apostle Paul later extended to the entire covenant community. The grand vision opening the Book of Moses is best understood as a classic heavenly ascent—an apocalypse in which a prophet is brought into the divine council, transfigured, and commissioned. Moses is able to endure God’s presence only because the glory of God is physically upon him as a temporary endowment. When this presence withdrew, Moses was “left unto himself” and collapsed; confronting Satan, Moses testified that he “could not look upon God, except his glory should come upon me, and I were transfigured before him” (Moses 1:9, 14).

Paul invokes the shining face of Moses to promise this same metamorphosis to all disciples: “But we all, with open face beholding as in a glass the glory of the Lord, are changed into the same image from glory to glory” (2 Corinthians 3:18). The Greek verb here, *metamorphoō*, is the exact term the Synoptic Gospels use for the Transfiguration of Jesus. Contemporary Mormon transhumanists draw their motif of “transfigurism” from this very principle of bodily transformation through divine encounter, anticipating that righteous applications of medicine and technology might participate in this redemptive work.

## **Intelligence, or Light and Truth**

An 1833 revelation directly equates the glory of God with intelligence, expanding the definition in the very same breath: “The glory of God is intelligence, or, in other words, light and truth” (D&C 93:36). While Latter-day Saints rightly interpret this as a divine mandate to seek learning, the text carries a stark warning: light and truth can be forsaken through disobedience. By this measure, intelligence that is stripped of light and truth has lost its *kabod*—the very element that makes it glorious. This profound theological metric applies equally to the artificial intelligences humanity now seeks to build.

## **My Work and My Glory**

God’s own definition of His glory is radically outwardly focused, an orientation that formed the central crux of the premortal divine council. “For behold, this is my work and my glory—to bring to pass the immortality and eternal life of man” (Moses 1:39). Divine glory is measured entirely by the exaltation of God’s children. In the heavenly council, Satan sought to monopolize this weight, offering a guaranteed salvation for a steep price: “Wherefore give me thine honor” (Moses 4:1). The Beloved Son, conversely, deflected all glory back to the Father, maintaining the eternal ecosystem of grace.

The Son who refused to hoard glory subsequently gave it away: “And the glory which thou gavest me I have given them; that they may be one, even as we are one” (John 17:22). As thinkers like Lincoln Cannon have observed, this ancient council narrative is deeply relevant to our technological age. Centralized, coercive power—whether spiritual or artificial—mimics Satan’s primeval offer: a frictionless salvation orchestrated from a single throne, purchased with human agency. Distributed power, wherein individuals raise one another “from glory to glory,” aligns with the work of Christ. Ultimately, whether in the ancient tabernacle or the digital age, true glory is measured by what God’s children are empowered to become.

*See also*: [Celestial](/topical-guide/celestial), [Celestial Kingdom](/topical-guide/celestial-kingdom), [Degrees of Glory](/topical-guide/degrees-of-glory), [Exaltation](/topical-guide/exaltation), [Heaven](/topical-guide/heaven), [Inherit](/topical-guide/inherit), [Redemption](/topical-guide/redemption), [Resurrection](/topical-guide/resurrection), [Salvation](/topical-guide/salvation), [Telestial Kingdom](/topical-guide/telestial-kingdom), [Terrestrial Kingdom](/topical-guide/terrestrial-kingdom), [Theosis](/topical-guide/theosis), [Transhuman](/topical-guide/transhuman)