Book of Abraham

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Was not Joseph Smith’s translation of the Egyptian papyri proven false when in the late 1960’s those original papyri documents were found and translated that they were only pagan funeral rituals? I read that the leading Egyptologist that went and verified the documents as being the actual ones Smith translated, after finding that the translations were false, left the Mormon Church. Should this not suggest and even prove that Smith was a false teacher? Did he not make the whole thing up?
 
Yes they were proven false, and the experts revealed that he had no knowledge of there ancient language and that was obvious from his translations.

What it did prove is that Joseph Smith had great imagination, with what he came up with.

Joseph Smith made it clear that he translated these “pagon funreal rituals”

Now to a Mormon this evidence is said to be anti mormon and that there is not enough evidence established to make the claim that it is false. They ask for more proof!

The Catholic Church once condemed Galieo even though the reasonable evidence was clear and later proven that Galieo was correct, the church struggled durring those years, as a church we lost the greek language by speaking and writting in Latin. After a few generations the greek language was lost and the new leaders did not understand these greek writtings, later this was re established and the church blossomed as we continue to explore both faith and reason.
 
I was fascinated with ancient Egypt as a child, and when I joined the LDS church as a teenager, one of the first things I said to the Bishop (and repeated in all my bishop’s interviews) that the plate that preceeds the book of Abraham should be removed from the Pearl of Great Price because the translation was wrong. I then proceeded to give the correct intrepretation of what was happening.

Plate with definitions as it appears in the Pearl of Great Price:
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v185/Amino-X/abraham.jpg
(see also xmission.com/~research/about/abraham.htm )
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Fig. 1. The Angel of the Lord
2. Abraham fastened upon an alter
3. The idolatrous priest of Elkenah attempting to offer up Abraham as a sacrifice
4. The alter for sacrifice by the idolatrous priests, standing before the gods of Elkenah, Libnah, Mahmackrah, Korash, and Pharaoh.
5. The idolatrous god of Elkenah
6. The idolatrous god of Libnah
7. The idolatrous god of Mahmackrah
8. The idolatrous god of Korash
9. The idolatrous god of Pharaoh
10. Abraham of Egypt.
11. Designed to represent the pillars of heaven, as understood by the Egyptians.
12. Raukeeyang, signifying expanse, or the firmament over our heads; but in this case, in relation to this subject, the Egyptians meant it to signify Shaumau, to be high, or the heavens, answering to the Hebrew word, Shaumahyeem.
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First, the head of the embalmer is missing. While it is properly labled “Priest”, that’s where the proper labels end.

The embalmer should be wearing the mask of the Jackel to represent the god Anubis. The priest who wore the Anubis mask would supervise the process while performing various religious rituals rather than actually doing the cutting himself. So the priest in the picture should look more like this or more appropriately, like this!

Undernieth the embalmers bench (labeled 10. Abraham of Egypt) you see the Canopic jars prepared to recieve the organs of the mummified.

While I’m not certain, but I believe the alligator-like creature numbered 9 in the image to be Am-Heh, the Devourer of Millions, a great beast of the underworld with the head of a hunting dog and an apetite for sacrifices (which, if this is a valid Egyptian papyrus and if Joseph Smith had any knowlege of ancient Egyptian gods, the apperance of Am-Heh could have lead him to falsely believe that this was a sacrifice scene)

The hawk, labeled #1 could be the representation of Kebeshsenuef, daughter of and assistant to Anubis, who takes the form of a Hawk, Ostrich or Serpent. Kebeshsenuef would assist Anubis by bringing him water to wash the entrails, quench his thirst, and quench the thirst of the spirit being mummified. This would make sense due to the fact that in the original papyrus image, the wing of the bird is touching the face of the person being embalmed, possibly symbolizing Kebeshsenuef bringing him water. As we can see by the bandages, the embalming is already well underway.

The hands being in front of the face and neck indicate that this person is already deceased. I seem to remember that if the hands are in front of the face that this indicates a position of some status or even royalty, but I may be mistaken on this point and cannot find a reference to it.

The text that accompanies this plate has been agreed upon by several professional Egyptoligists as being the breathing permit of Hor (See:lds-mormon.com/ferg.shtml )

I understand that there was limited knowlege in the day’s of Joesph Smith about the ancient hieroglyphs, so I don’t know if the translation is simply wrong through misunderstanding, or something that was changed to form a parable in the same manner as the Epic of Gilgamesh was used to become the parable of Noah and the Ark in the old testament.

The preceeding comments represent my personal views of the plate presented in the Pearl of Great Price and since I am not an Egyptoligist myself, should not be considered a definitive explaination of the above text, but rather an incintive to research the subject for yourself.

God Bless.
 
One more thing I failed to add before my edit mode timed out, is that in the original image there is no knife in the hand of Anubis (which is a correct representation of Anubis who is never shown weilding the knife).

Since there is a knife in the “facsimile”, this leads me to believe that the papyrus is genuine and not forged by Joseph Smith as some claim. (if he had forged them, at least part of the knife would be there).

Where he got it, I have no idea.

God Bless.
 
He got them where all good forgeries are found the yard sale.
Got myslef a Rolex.
 
Believe it or not, you may not be too far from the mark.

In the 1800’s the collection of Egyptian artifacts was as popular as “beanie babies” is today.

Artifacts were often smuggled out of Egypt with impunity and sold on the streets like apples. Mummies were frequently burned as fuel in steam engines.

God Bless.
 
I have some extremely “ancient” porcelain vases from China. My old boss had a room in the warehouse crammed with them for customer relation gifts. They all had “authentic” wax markings “proving” they were really Mings. Very lovely things. Fortunately they did not require me to found a new religion in order to have one in the living room.
 
Jo's_Dad:
Believe it or not, you may not be too far from the mark.

In the 1800’s the collection of Egyptian artifacts was as popular as “beanie babies” is today.

Artifacts were often smuggled out of Egypt with impunity and sold on the streets like apples. Mummies were frequently burned as fuel in steam engines.

God Bless.
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In the 1800’s archeology was just beginning to take off in Britain and elsewhere- people were flocking like crazy to the pyramids and everywhere else in Egpyt. We have all types of personal implements taken from tombs in our local museum that are authentic. At the same time, anyone can get antiqued Egyptian papyri from Cost Plus.
 
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stillsearching:
I have some extremely “ancient” porcelain vases from China. My old boss had a room in the warehouse crammed with them for customer relation gifts. They all had “authentic” wax markings “proving” they were really Mings. Very lovely things. Fortunately they did not require me to found a new religion in order to have one in the living room.
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True, but if you were going to start a new religion and recruit a lot of people who had no knowlege of the time period, would you not then use these vases? saying you had found scrolls inside, the scrolls are now missing but here are the vases they came in? Get a few experts to authenticate the vases and the wax seals and say “see! The vases are just as I said, the Seals are just as I said, then surely the scrolls are just as I said too”.

God Bless.
 
I am goign to take this and copy and paste it and post it on a thread where many mormons go to so they can see and I am curious to see hwo they will refute this. I couldnt word it better than you did.
 
Jo's_Dad:
True, but if you were going to start a new religion and recruit a lot of people who had no knowlege of the time period, would you not then use these vases? saying you had found scrolls inside, the scrolls are now missing but here are the vases they came in? Get a few experts to authenticate the vases and the wax seals and say “see! The vases are just as I said, the Seals are just as I said, then surely the scrolls are just as I said too”.

God Bless.
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But in the case of the Mormons, the experts did not authenticate the Egyptian works. The Egyptologists said his translations were garbled mumbo jumbo. And yet, people still fall for it. Look at what lengths these people will go to to avoid God. It is sad. But then they look to inherit a material world. So they use much material to back their claims. Plates, tablets, papyri, BOMS, symbols on clothing, handshakes, and so on. Entirely temporal, entirely material. The Mormons may be the most materialistic people I have ever met, simply because they seek to acheive materialism after death. Most of Christianity looks to inherit heaven instead.
 
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stillsearching:
But in the case of the Mormons, the experts did not authenticate the Egyptian works…
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Actually these were authenticated by Thomas Stuart Ferguson in 1972, who had actually spent the previous 10 years attempting to prove the archeology and anthropology of the BOM, but his research lead him to believe it was all just smoke and mirrors.

From
Book of Mormon though false by LDS member / archaelogist we read the following passage:

“Prof Klaus Baer of Univ. of Chicago, Prof Lutz of U.C. (Berkeley), Prof. Lesko (U.C. Berkeley) and Egyptologist Dee Jay Nelson, all agree that the original manuscript Egyptian text translates into the Breathing Permit of Hor (Egyptian God)…” All 4 agree with each other, and without having conferred or collaborated. (My UC men did not, and still do not, know that there is any relationship of the manuscript material to the Mormon Church, Joseph Smith, Book of Abraham-- or whatever…"

So the manuscript is an authentic Egyptian artifact but has nothing whatsoever to do with Abraham beyond what Jos. Smith ascribed to it.

As I said about the book “The DiVinci Code”, mix in enough truth to make the fiction seem plausable and you can sell ice cream in the north pole.

God Bless.
 
Jo's_Dad:
Actually these were authenticated by Thomas Stuart Ferguson in 1972, who had actually spent the previous 10 years attempting to prove the archeology and anthropology of the BOM, but his research lead him to believe it was all just smoke and mirrors.

From
Book of Mormon though false by LDS member / archaelogist we read the following passage:

“Prof Klaus Baer of Univ. of Chicago, Prof Lutz of U.C. (Berkeley), Prof. Lesko (U.C. Berkeley) and Egyptologist Dee Jay Nelson, all agree that the original manuscript Egyptian text translates into the Breathing Permit of Hor (Egyptian God)…” All 4 agree with each other, and without having conferred or collaborated. (My UC men did not, and still do not, know that there is any relationship of the manuscript material to the Mormon Church, Joseph Smith, Book of Abraham-- or whatever…"

So the manuscript is an authentic Egyptian artifact but has nothing whatsoever to do with Abraham beyond what Jos. Smith ascribed to it.

As I said about the book “The DiVinci Code”, mix in enough truth to make the fiction seem plausable and you can sell ice cream in the north pole.

God Bless.
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Actually, a friend of mine who just returned from the North Pole tells me Haagan Daas is the ice cream of choice.
 
Take a look at facsimile #3 in the PoGP if you really want to see a bogus “translation”. JS would have us believe that the female egyptian goddess Hathor represents God the Father. It is full of EASILY verifiable examples of his inability to understand egyptian.
 
I remember flipping through a Mormon book (BOM or PofGP, don’t remember right off hand) when I was about 16 and coming upon that “facsimile”. I knew it was merely a poor copy of an Egyptian “Book of the Dead” right when I glanced upon it.

I have nothing against our Mormon brothers and sisters, but honestly, this type of stuff is pure garbage. Could you imagine if a Pope from the Catholic Church would have taken an Egyptian papyri and tried to say that the translation into Latin from some secret form of Egyptian proved Papal infallibility, even though he just made everything up? Every protestant would be on us like no other-and deservedly so.

I remember gettting into a discussion about such things on another internet forum. When I tried to point out the obvious problems that come from the fact that not a single city or artifact uniquely attributable from the BOM has ever been found, the person I was discussing with turned the topic into “Explain the sins of Pope…and why their sins and wrongdoings don’t disprove the whole doctrine of the Catholic Church…”

Sorry, but I know this man was smarter than this, and what is sad is that he couldn’t resort to any reasoned arguement, but rather had to try to debunk Catholic doctrine through a faulty and irrelevant impeccability vs. infallibility arguement. 😦
 
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gbacon:
Was not Joseph Smith’s translation of the Egyptian papyri proven false when in the late 1960’s those original papyri documents were found and translated that they were only pagan funeral rituals? I read that the leading Egyptologist that went and verified the documents as being the actual ones Smith translated, after finding that the translations were false, left the Mormon Church. Should this not suggest and even prove that Smith was a false teacher? Did he not make the whole thing up?
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Yes, JS ‘translation’ was a figment of his terrific imagination - a pretty good article disproving the translation by a BYU scholar is at

lds-mormon.com/thompson_book_of_abraham.shtml

At the time of the release and subsequent debunking it was a great embarrassment to the LDS church and they turned to Hugh Nibley (who was THE apologist for the LDS church in the second half of the 20th century and whose scholarship was actually admired by many of his detractors UNTIL he began his defense of the translation of the Book of Abraham when, outside of LDS circles, anyway, his scholarship was sorely discredited) who attempted to come up with numerous theories but which amounted to hokum (one of my favorite words this month as I’ve read 40+ books about the Mormon faith).

Smith was very lucky that the golden plates from which the Book of Mormon were ‘translated’ were taken away from him - his translation skills were debunked in his own lifetime with the hoax of the ‘Kinderhook plates’.

xmission.com/~country/reason/kinder.htm

As I’ve concluded my LDS research for now I have come to the conclusion that the church has no connection to Christianity at all - although I do not doubt that many Mormons, ignorant of their faith, are indeed ‘Christians’. That may sound incongruous but I’ll attempt to make a case in another topic perhaps.

Ben
 
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ComradeAndrei:
I remember flipping through a Mormon book (BOM or PofGP, don’t remember right off hand) when I was about 16 and coming upon that “facsimile”. I knew it was merely a poor copy of an Egyptian “Book of the Dead” right when I glanced upon it.

I have nothing against our Mormon brothers and sisters, but honestly, this type of stuff is pure garbage. Could you imagine if a Pope from the Catholic Church would have taken an Egyptian papyri and tried to say that the translation into Latin from some secret form of Egyptian proved Papal infallibility, even though he just made everything up? Every protestant would be on us like no other-and deservedly so.

I remember gettting into a discussion about such things on another internet forum. When I tried to point out the obvious problems that come from the fact that not a single city or artifact uniquely attributable from the BOM has ever been found, the person I was discussing with turned the topic into “Explain the sins of Pope…and why their sins and wrongdoings don’t disprove the whole doctrine of the Catholic Church…”

Sorry, but I know this man was smarter than this, and what is sad is that he couldn’t resort to any reasoned arguement, but rather had to try to debunk Catholic doctrine through a faulty and irrelevant impeccability vs. infallibility arguement. 😦
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Maybe sounds a little bit like the Pope who decided Mary was assumed into heaven since he didn’t know where her body was after 100s of years. And since there were rumors and folk tales floating around, he as Pope had the power to make it official and since then all Catholics have believed this bit of folklore and made Mary the object of their devotion.
Sounds like hokus pokus and nothing in the Bible to back it up. Simply the imaginations of man and the Pope to make it official. That is just my view, of the devotion to Mary over Jesus Christ her Son. She was a virgin of great beauty and purity,and was chosen by God to be the Mother of His Son Jesus Christ, other than that the Bible does not elaborate on her life or her death. All other speculation is just that, Speculation.
BJ
 
BJ Colbert:
Maybe sounds a little bit like the Pope who decided Mary was assumed into heaven since he didn’t know where her body was after 100s of years. And since there were rumors and folk tales floating around, he as Pope had the power to make it official and since then all Catholics have believed this bit of folklore and made Mary the object of their devotion.
Sounds like hokus pokus and nothing in the Bible to back it up. Simply the imaginations of man and the Pope to make it official. That is just my view, of the devotion to Mary over Jesus Christ her Son. She was a virgin of great beauty and purity,and was chosen by God to be the Mother of His Son Jesus Christ, other than that the Bible does not elaborate on her life or her death. All other speculation is just that, Speculation.
BJ
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Well, since the issue before us is the Book of Abraham, do you have anything substantive to add to the discussion? After all, we are not talking about “folklore” from the distant past and “speculation.” We are asking questions about an event from the recent past: a prophet of God claimed to have translated an ancient text. Scholarship appears to have shown that the ‘translation’ was incorrect, and that Joseph Smith did not know of what he spoke.

I am not an Egyptologist. I was asking for information from Mormons about the *Book of Abraham * controversy. The explanation I linked to in my previous post seems a stretch. If you can enlighten me about developments in the research, please do.

I will not dwell on the anti-Catholic flavor of “hokus-pokus,” as you may not know the origin of the phrase.

Relevant comments, BJ? Or more sidestepping and tu quoques?
 
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