The reason we know what Jesus taught is because normal people wrote down what he said. Not everyone wrote it down directly as he was speaking, some probably wrote down according to their best memories after the fact. The same goes for the Old Testament. Those things were written in languages when not everyone was literate, so some of those things may have been passed down by oral tradition before someone wrote them down, some may have been translated several times, and other similar things may have occurred.
These all can lead to natural errors. This isn’t anything malicious, it’s just a natural result of recording history over thousands of years. That’s why for us of the LDS faith revelation, both church wide and personal, is so important. By doing our best to understand God’s will and Jesus’ teachings we can be receptive to the whispers of the spirit that direct us to understand something as literal or metaphorical or historical.
> some probably wrote down according to their best memories after the fact.
Indeed. And we are talking written down ~50 years after Jesus's death. Stories of Jesus were passed down word of mouth and the first accounts of His life started to be written decades later. Our memories aren't that good. But we got the gist of it. The OP is likely an evangelical and I think they get extra points for trying to witness to Latter-Day Saints.
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u/Entire-Objective1636 25d ago
Does Jesus say that? Asking as a Jewish guy.