Reasons for the Restoration: How Christianity Lost Its Jewish Roots

By the 2^ndand 3^rd centuries the followers of Christ had been consolidated into an orthodox Church and it had drifted away from its Jewish origins because of the influence of the Greek philosophies and pagan traditions the Gentile believers brought with them into the Church.The first misconception involves the Law of God, the Torah and the Greek word for law (nomos) which tended toward the negative and lacked the depth of the Jewish concept of Torah. To the Jews the main point of Torah is to teach God’s way and teach us how to walk the path he desires for us to walk in order that we arrive at the choice destination.To hit the mark in other words and the Greek word for sin meant to miss the mark.
The law of God or the law of sin or the law of Christ or the law of the Spirit of life are all subjects hit upon in the new testament and because of the problems with translating Hebrew language and ideas into the Greek language it is hard to discern which law is being spoken of.
The second misconception is that the law of God (Torah) is the opposite of Grace. Once the Torah is understood from the Jewish perspective, that it is the instructive teachings of God, the error becomes apparent. It stems from the pagan idea that Jews are saved by works and the Church is saved by Grace.These pagans saw the Jewish Old Testament God as a harsh legalistic one drastically different from the God of love in the New Testament.In the book of Daniel written some 600 years before Christ we see the Jewish idea of repentance and trust in God for mercy and grace without any works derived from the law.
The 3^rdmisconception is that we now have a better covenant than God’s law.The passage in Hebrews where this expression appears discusses only the sacrificial system whereby the symbolism of Jesus as the Lamb of God is preferable to an actual slaughtered lamb.The manifestation may have changed but the covenant of God to his people has not.
The 4^thmisconception is that a believer led by the Holy Ghost is not under the law of God.This comes from a misapplication of the words of Paul in his address to the Galatians, resulting in flawed reasoning.He reminds the Galatians that if they serve the Lord by the law of God and were led by the Spirit they would not be subject to the consequences of the law of sin. (Galatians 5:16-18).There are many scriptures referring to the law of sin throughout the writings of Paul which are often lifted out of context and applied to the law of God because of a failure to understand the Jewish context of Torah.
And in Romans 6:14 Paul say “For sin shall not be your master, because you are not under law, but under grace.” (NIV).The context displays the reference is to the law of sin not God.This wording is confusing to modern ears but upon reading the whole chapter you realize all Paul is saying is you are bound by the law you subscribe to, either the law of sin or of God.
These misconception show that a foreign concept of the law, unknown to Jesus, the Apostles and Paul with its Jewish perspective of Law and grace, snuck in.Jesus taught that the faithful should be guided by the Spirit into fulfillment of the Law through faith, love and study.Jesus fulfilled the Law ceremonially and sacrificially by dying on the cross and by undertaking the Atonement but the principles of the Torah like the Priesthood and the atonement still hold as true today as they were before or after Jesus.Scripture teaches they are eternal.
And these misconceptions led to other erroneous errors of reasoning and understanding of The scriptures especially when related to all things Jewish which after all is the very foundation of our Church and our scriptures as Jesus, Moses and all the Prophets of both the Old Testament and the Book of Mormon were Jewish.
Marcion lived during the 2^nd century A.D. and he rejected the Old Testament completely.He said the God of the Old Testament was a different God than the one of the New Testament.He was convinced that God’s grace opposed Gods law.Polycarp who was a student of John called him the Firstborn of Satan.The Church excommunicated him and he founded his own Church, one that was severely antagonistic towards the Jews.Later some of his ideas like grace opposing Torah were adopted by founding Church Fathers like Augustine and The Protestant Reformations hero John Wyclife who first translated the Bible into English were heavily influenced by this idea.
Some people assert that Paul said the “Letter of the Law kills.” ( 2 Corinthians 3:6). He did not mean that the Law was evil or kept people in bondage he in fact kept the Law as Jesus himself did and he also encouraged all to keep it (1 Corinthians 7:18).What he was saying was twofold, keeping theletter of the law to the point where it trumps the spirit of the law is deadly and also that the gentile believers without the proper training would be placed under a burden by keeping the law that they knew only a little about and were still learning.
And then there are the so-called reasons why Mormons aren’t true Christians or disciples of Christ.Which is a gross misunderstanding of the teachings of Jesus as well as a failure to understand the theology of the early 1^st century Church founded by Jesus himself, a church from which modern Christianity has departed as surely as it has departed from its Jewish roots.
For example:
Jesus said, “A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another.  All men will know that you are my disciples if you love one another” (John 13:34-35). He also said, “Anyone who has faith in me will do what I have been doing” (John 14:12), which included feeding the hungry, healing the sick and teaching the people. Jesus also said, “If you love me, you will obey as I command.” Knowing who Jesus considers to be his followers should help us understand who is and is not Christian shouldn’t it?
Jesus did a few things here: he gave us guidance on how to live properly in Gods view and he distilled the entire Old Testament into one phrase (John 13:34-35) and as the co-author of the bible he would know better than anyone what the true intention of the Hebrew Bible is.  And he distilled the entire work of the New Testament by saying “All men will know that you are my disciples if you have love one to another” as well as by saying “If you love me, you will obey as I command.” 
Now there are a few reasons people claim Mormons are not Christian, let me address them:
1)   The LDS view of the trinity is false; God, Jesus and the Holy Spirit are one being.Eusebius held this view at the council of Nicaea, that Jesus was ““of the essence” (of the Father) (and it) was indicative of the Son’s being indeed from the Father, yet without being as if a part of Him. And with this understanding we thought good to assent to the sense of such religious doctrine, teaching, as it did, that the Son was from the Father, not however a part of His essence. On this account we assented to the sense ourselves, without declining even the term “One in essence,” peace being the object which we set before us, and steadfastness in the orthodox view.’”  Athanasius ‘anathematized’ Christianity for eons by saying that Jesus was his own Father as well as being the Holy Spirit.
 “As Abra'm, Isaac, Jacob, too, babes, then men--to gods they grew. As man now is, our God once was; As now God is, so man may be,-- Which doth unfold man's destiny. . ."
Moroni 8:18 says " For I know that God is not a partial God, neither a changeable being; but he is ^aunchangeable from ^ball eternity to all eternity."  So for one that idea of God being literally an exalted man is completely refuted by LDS scripture.
For another it is a matter of deep theology that even Gordon B. Hinckley was at a loss to adequately characterize.  It is not brought up by most LDS to us God is the sole creator of the universe we believe him to be omnipotent, omniscient, and omnipresent and if you disagree I challenge you to find LDS doctrine or scripture that says we do not believe that about God because this Lorenzo Snow quote says a lot but nothing about those qualities of God, nice try though.  To say that we believe in a different God because of this is similar to saying we believe in a different Jesus because of our view of the Trinity which is to say a gross misrepresentation of the truth just as saying that the Athanasius view of the Trinity held by mainstream Christianity is some globular blob, neither characterization is fair or accurate. 
http://www.mormondoctrine.net/don’t_know_that_we_teach_it.htmdetails this further.
http://www.stevenroyedwards.com/monotheistic.htmldetails that Christians are not monotheistic according to Judaism or Islam. And I give you the entire text below.
“Most people don't seem to notice that Christianity is not a monotheistic religion. Christianity, really, worships three gods — "The Father," "The Son," and "The Holy Ghost." The Father is God proper. The Son is Jesus Christ. The Holy Ghost, (or "Holy Spirit,") is a component less-quantified. 
Naturally, Christians often condescend when "others" cannot understand a three-is-one theology. Be patient, a Christian might think — they're not from around here. Theology is the benevolent word for it — the educated word. If you really consider the arrangement from the outside, the Triune God — the Trinity — is more like superstition. It is, more to the point, superstition. 
This is not to suggest that a belief in God is obsolete. The perception of higher consciousness and power is a principal characteristic of humanity — it may be our proudest distinction. And, in fact, the possibility that there is "one god" is complicated by the suggestion of modern physics that the Universe is not a simultaneous phenomenon. (And, then, again — with typical slyness — the Universe implies that It may in fact be simultaneous.) 
But nature gives us nothing to suggest that there are three gods. And the Trinity is a group of three gods. You can try to explain it some other way, but there it is. Sure, they're one. We're all one. 
So maybe Christianity is an evolutionary phase on the progress toward the idea of one God. Not that others haven't gotten there already — notably the Jews and the Muslims.” This is a gross misunderstanding of the concept, Eusebius who did not hold this view still understood it and accepted it as orthodox.You have God, who is the one and only God, then you have his son who is exalted and only was able to make the world and so on because of his God given authority.And even Jews speak of the spirit of God over taking the prophets and inspiring them to write the words of God.That is the Holy Spirit!It’s not another God, again to say that is to fail to understand the concepts involved.And for people who call themselves “Biblical Christians” and who say that Mormons aren’t Christians and that we worship a different Jesus simply fail to understand our teachings because they would rather win the argument than have their facts straight.
But most of these misunderstanding arise because of a need to hold on to cherished beliefs whether they are correct or incorrect and when challenged with evidence they are wrong people usually attack and get defensive.  The departure from the Jewish roots of the original Church founded by Jesus was problematic and resulted in flawed and false doctrines still apparent in Modern Christianity. 
There are also the issues that arise from the consolidation of power during the 2^nd and 3^rd centuries A.D.The corruption of the Church like the selling of indulgences or the sneaking Nazi war criminals out of Europe and into Argentina where good Catholic girl Eva Perone hid them was a sin indicative of the corruptive power the Church has wielded since the 2^ndcentury.
These types of scandals were already arising in the 2^nd century A.D. because of the unbridled power being consolidated by the bishops of the Church and when Constantine converted the corruption reached a new zenith.And also, the departure from the original Jewish doctrines of Jesus, Moses and the Prophets resulted in an apostasy and thus the need for a restoration of the Gospel to the People once more.