No it does not. I am not arguing that the council and the original position are the exact same things, instead I am arguing that they are similar forms of philosophical justification. I partially address your point in #12 (as well as 13, 14, and 15. However, knowing that they had a religious calling does not mean that they knew they “would be rich or poor, powerful or oppressed…” Additionally, there is no way to know (I do not think so, at least) whether said foreordination took place before or after the council. I am also assuming (and we will likely part ways) that the concept of the council and these verses about foreordination are very much symbolic.

How does this work with the idea of foreordination? I copied this from the True to the Faith manual:
Jesus Christ was foreordained to carry out the Atonement, becoming “the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world,” (Revelation 13:8; see also 1 Peter 1:19–21). The scriptures tell of others who were foreordained. The prophet Abraham learned about his foreordination when he received a vision in which he saw “many of the noble and great ones” among the spirits in the premortal spirit world. He said: “God saw these souls that they were good, and he stood in the midst of them, and he said: These I will make my rulers; for he stood among those that were spirits, and he saw that they were good; and he said unto me: Abraham, thou art one of them; thou wast chosen before thou wast born” (Abraham 3:22–23). The Lord told Jeremiah, “Before I formed thee in the belly I knew thee; and before thou camest forth out of the womb I sanctified thee, and I ordained thee a prophet unto the nations” (Jeremiah 1:5). John the Baptist was foreordained to prepare the people for the Savior’s mortal ministry (see Isaiah 40:3; Luke 1:13–17; 1 Nephi 10:7–10).

The doctrine of foreordination applies to all members of the Church, not just to the Savior and His prophets. Before the creation of the earth, faithful women were given certain responsibilities and faithful men were foreordained to certain priesthood duties. As people prove themselves worthy, they will be given opportunities to fulfill the assignments they then received.

Doesn’t that argue against the point you were making?

“Yet, the construct is used as a form of moral justification.”

I think one of the powerful things about the preexistence is how it functions as theodicy. I remember on my mission a guy said “How can God hold me responsible; I didn’t ask to be born.” Which then prompted a discussion of the preexistence. There is something about the idea of participating in the plannng and purposes of earth life that make the whole program more palatable and justifiable. It seems Rawls was tapping into that same need for preexistent choice and planning as a way of envision a more just society. It beats the secular and traditional Christian notion of having been created at birth and thrust into a mess with no choice or concept regarding what we were getting into.

This is important and I am glad you brought it up (not bad for an English major). I am assuming that the participants in the council in heaven may have known about the condition of earth existence. However, I do not think at the time of the council that they knew where they would place in those conditions. They chose agency without knowing whether they would be rich or poor, powerful or oppressed, or even when they would come to earth. They may have known about these hardships but I do not think they would known exactly what particular hardship they themselves would face. This is similar to the veil of ignorance in the original position in that the participants are not completely ignorant; instead they are ignorant of their own particular station in life. The veil, as we call it, that keeps us from recalling the preexistence is not a big part of my argument, though it might connect LDS thinking to early forms of social contract thinking (Hobbes, Locke, Rousseau) whereby an actual contract is entered into by citizens long ago which we have no record or knowledge of actually happening. That will have to wait for a future day.

It is fun to get this out. I have been thinking about this stuff forever. Sheldon, and everyone else, please ask follow up questions or clarification questions. I am also up for advice on ways to better articulate some of these LDS themes.

I am not denying that they have major differences. However, in form, they have similarities. In addition, Mormons think of the council, and rhetorically use it, in a way very similar to the way that Rawlsians use the Original Position.

Let me see if I can cover all of your points. Thanks for bringing them up. I will brake this up into multiple comments for organization purposes.

“I’m curious to know what you will do with the concepts of foreordination and merit based placement on earth.”

I am not completely sure about foreordination. I tend to view the idea of the noble and greats one found in Abraham as referring to those who have become knows as the noble and great one in our earthly narrative and do not think that they must be viewed as somehow more noble and great in the pre-existence. This is not to say that we did not come here for a purpose, but I also think that is largely a shared purpose.

Beyond the idea of “people existing before the world,” I’m straining to see similarities. It seems Rawls hypothetical OP people and our preexistent spirits are up to completely different things in that state. Furthermore, the states of ignorance that the veil is veiling are exactly opposite. Rawls has the veil drawn across the future, and for us the veil refers to our ignorance of the preexistence. In fact, we believe we knew a lot more in the preexistence about our future earth life than we currently know about the preexistence. The ignorance is definitely retrospective, not forward looking.

I think there’s a lot of cool stuff for this project, I’m just curious to see where Chris take is from here.