e46,
Question: What do you mean “as scripture”? As part of the B of M right, not the Christian Bible?
e46,
The supposed “proof” of what supposed scholars believe is a “mistranslation”, arises from two or more misconceptions:
**Has this papyrus been examined by experts in the field? Have you even seen this, or is it available for those wanting to examine it and test its validity?
- The belief that they are looking at the primary source of the translation. This is simply not true. There was another papyrus that Joseph Smith looked at when he translated the book of Abraham.
**
When Abraham lived among them, he taught them, not vice-versa.
- The belief that the Rosetta Stone is the be-all and the end-all for Egyptian translation from the beginning of the use of hieroglyphic writings for sacred beliefs of those people–as though beliefs and names would remain constant for 1000 years.
*
**
How do you know this? Is there historical data that supports this assertion?*
**
It can be easily found in history that Egyptian beliefs changed over a few centuries of time, let alone a thousand years.**
**
What is your basis for this statement?**
*Hieroglyphics are a symbolic religious language conveyance that communicates ideas, not individual words.
- The belief that there was a “word-for-word” translation process is a misconception.
*
**This statement is puzzling and confusing. What is your basis for this statement? Are you expert in this field? I thought Hieroglyphics was a system of writing of the Ancient egyptians.
**
Joseph Smith was able to capture the ideas through the Holy Spirit guiding his mind and heart, and thus he knew what Abraham conveyed through hieroglyphics–some of the same kinds of teachings conveyed and captured in the Bible about Abraham and the Abrahamic covenant, but with additional insight into the promises given by God to Abraham through his righteousness and his righteous desires for his posterity.
Was JS an expert or did he studied how to read hieroglyphics? And how do you know is the HS, and not a bad spirit that guided the mind of JS?
The posterity of Abraham is spread throughout the world, so we are seeing fulfillment today of promises given to Abraham so very long ago. We also saw a fulfillment of one of those promises through the birth of Christ, the Son of David and the King of Kings, over 2,000 years ago.
Hi,
JSday,
Nice use of an ad hominem to poison the well.
Are you saying this thread was clean from the beginning? I hope not; it was poisoned from the very beginning. Instead of the supportive side, it was from the negative side. What is the purpose of such a statement when it is so blatant incorrect? It was a response to an already poisoned topic? This kind of bickering has no place on a Catholic forum. We are better than that!Nice use of an ad hominem to poison the well.
Nope I’m saying Parker could have made his points without smearing people who have no part in this discussion and thus can not defend their scholarship.
Let’s just clean-up our own house before we go condemning the porch of another. Zaff, I apologize, but I find I have very little patience of late. I dislike the ticky-tacky word play that goes on. It is a very base form of one-up-manship that really does not have a place here. I see it most often in drive-by editors that drop in, unload their poor comments and then motor on to their next edit.
From you last statement, how can you tell it is the HG, and not just another spirit? Many other claim the same thing about the HS, so how can you tell yours is correct and other is not? And how come there is congruency in the claimed interpretations?Pablope,
**These Egyptian scholars…what is their translation or evaluation of this papyrus? And these Egyptian scholars…are their credentials impeccable ( not to be mean, I just want to make sure that they are real, not made up credentials) and well known and respected in their field of study? If they are well known, then you should be able to name them, right?
- Written descriptions of the papyrus scroll that was the basis of the Book of Abraham described a larger scroll than was found in the museum and has been examined by Egyptian scholars. That larger scroll was evidently burned in the “great Chicago fire of 1871”, but a smaller papyrus that was also examined by Joseph Smith was not burned in that fire and is what has been examined by Egyptian scholars.
**
**What I know about it, it was the key that unlocked the hieroglyphics, from which experts learned how to translate egyptian drawings, so to speak. **
- It is known that the Rosetta stone contains a translation at a single point in time.
If you want to know about Abram’s having spent time in Egypt and that he was respected by the Pharaoh during a famine, read Genesis 12:10-20. The idea that he taught Pharaoh and the Egyptians is found in the book of Abraham (2:15) , but is consistent with Genesis 12:10-20.
**Thanks…I am familiar with Abraham’s story from Genesis. Was it not Joseph who predicted the Egyptian period of plenty and famine and prepared Egypt for this?
If Abraham taught Pharaoh, then why did not the Egyptians become Jewish, or adopt the Jewish beliefs and God, and dispensed with their own religion?
**
I learned about Egyptian ancient religious history having read about it, including about changes in their “gods” and titles and in symbolism during the reigns of different Pharaohs. You can check any good historical source about that topic.
**You mean he did not study Egyptology? :
- Any good article about Egyptian hieroglyphics is going to explain that it was a form of religious writing, that it was “borrowed” from Mesopotamia and not originated by the Egyptians, and that it is made up of “ideograms” that are symbolic representations of ideas that convey thoughts or a flow of ideas or history to someone familiar with the ideograms.
- JS became knowledgeable about translating the hieroglyphs through inspiration.
Then how would you know that his translation is correct, that he did not make it up? I thought the “inspiration” of the biblical authors was to write the word of God, not translate it. Biblical scholars go through great lengths to translate the ancient manuscripts as accurately as possible for the our benefit, but they do not claim divine inspiration. JS, in this case, would be unique, isn’t it, in that he is the very first one to have been divinely inspired to translate. Another question: Has his translations been examined by others outside of Mormonism?
**
How I discern a source for inspired scripture as compared with false ideologies is through the confirming witness of the Holy Ghost, and through understanding that the Bible is going to be a confirming witness also and thus forms a basis of comparison. (“Bad spirits” would oppose the Bible and its direct truths also.)
But how is the OP blatantly incorrect?
Actually, the Rosetta Stone breakthrough (by Champolion) was to realize that hieroglyphs were no longer just ideograms (they probably were orginally primarily this) but phonetic. That is, they represent the sounds that make up the words.
The scripture you cite does not “prove” the Trinity. We use it as an example OF the Trinity, but it provides absolutely nothing about the Ousia or one Divine Being. In fact, Mormons use just this verse to make it “plain” that there is not one Essence or Being. The Bible can be made to say all manner of things.