Pre-script: My apologies to any non-Mormons who might read this post -- as it will probably make no sense and I'm not going to attempt to explain. My apologies to everyone else -- as it will probably be pretty long. I suggest you skip it.
I've got an ongoing email discussion going on with a couple of my friends. In an email I sent yesterday I said that I did not believe in the Book of Abraham or the JST, though I still believe Joseph Smith was inspired. I received the following comment from my friend today:
"I...do not believe that you can truly accept Joseph Smith as a prophet and look at the JST and the Pearl of Great Price as works of fiction."
I would like to explain why I don't believe in the Book of Abraham...My purpose is not to convince. Only to inform.
The everyday Mormon's understanding of the BoA is that it was translated by Joseph Smith from a series of papyri containing the writings of Abraham. When Joseph first published the BoA in Times and Seasons, the Rosetta Stone had not been discovered and Egyptian was indiscernible. However by 1912 there were a number of institutions and persons who had that capability. In 1912 a Utah Episcopalian Bishop decided to send the BoA facsimiles to a number of respected institutions. These all recognized the facsimiles as coming from the Egyptian Book of Breathings -- a religious text often buried with mummies to direct their souls to heaven. Only, in the Book of Breathings, the scene doesn't show the "idolatrous priest of Elkenah attempting to offer up Abraham as a sacrifice"...it shows the Egyptian god Anubis preparing a body for burial. Furthermore, although a lot of the Egyptian hieroglyphics were copied correctly, there were others which were nonsensical or copied backwards, etc.
Mormon scholars at that time defended the Church, in a nutshell, by saying: "Joseph Smith translated the BoA from another papyrus." (According to Mormon belief at the time, the Joseph Smith papyri had burned up in the Great Chicago Fire at the Chicago Museum.)
But then, in 1966, a U of U professor discovered the Joseph Smith papyri in a vault at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, NY. The papyri were accompanied by a letter of authenticity from Emma Smith, with a map of Kirtland, OH, glued to the back. These papyri were sent back to Church headquarters. The Church didn't release the papyri at first. They hired a professor to study them. Unfortunately, he found that the portions of the papyrus which critics had earlier said were bogus were, on the Joseph Smith papyrus, missing.
He noticed that the torn and missing portions of the papyrus matched up just perfectly with the portions of the BoA facsimile which were nonsensical. His conclusion: Joseph Smith was a fraud. The professor left the Church.
Since then, a number of Mormon apologists, including Hugh Nibley, have tried to come up with alternative explanations for the discrepancy:
1) The NY Met didn't have Joseph Smith's actual papyri and they did - in fact - burn up.
2) The BoA is the Book of Breathings but it contains esoteric information encoded, which Joseph Smith was able to extract.
3) Joseph Smith was using the papyri merely to give him inspiration and the BoA, like the Book of Moses, was done through pure revelation -- not translation.
Personally, I think it's too coincidental that the papyri came with a letter of authenticity and a map of Kirtland. I also think it's coincidental that the portions that Egyptologists thought were made up matched up perfectly with the torn papyri. And yet Joseph obviously thought he was translating from the papyri: (from the title page of the BoA)
A translation of some ancient records, that have fallen into our hands from the catacombs of Egypt. The writings of Abraham while he was in Egypt, called the Book of Abraham, written by his own hand upon papyrus.
There are, of course, counter-arguments to this from modern Mormon apologists. One is Kerry Shirts and another is Jeff Lindsey. (As for "anti-Mormon" arguments, there are multiple: some being more fair than others). I for one feel that Joseph Smith was a prophet but that he was wrong in regards to the BoA. (Note: Joseph also made a Hebrew primer that is pretty erroneous.)
So, can a prophet be wrong and still be a prophet? Sure. There are plenty of examples of prophets in the Bible who grievously sinned and yet we still recognize their prophecies (David and Solomon, for instance).
16 comments:
I am curious. . . what exactly do you mean when you say you don't believe in the BoA? Are you saying that because what it has been marketed as (a translation of Egyptian papyri) and what it seems to likely be (a fictional story created by Smith regarding Abraham in Egypt) renders the text in your opinion of no personal or spiritual value?
Perhaps, if you think differently from what i've posited, you could clarify then what part(s) you could or do believe about the BoA.
A second thing I cannot help but comment on. . .Not to belittle what your friend said about the impossibility of accepting Smith as a prophet and thinking he authored fiction, but that kind of thinking is quite dangerous, especially when it comes from the pulpit at general conference (which is probably where your friend got the notion). Why do i call statements like this dangerous? It is well understood that no document is free of human error. Yet, when one establishes as a foundation the infallibility (or perhaps historically accuracy) of a text, then when such a text could or is demonstrated to be error-ful what happens. . .all of a sudden the church can't be 'true' and Smith can't be a prophet, and the walls of belief come a tumblin' down, and the person is left alone amid the rubble of what was once thought to be a tower of faith. So let us be careful about building too much upon the shaky foundation of human fallibility.
I got some ideas for you on this. I sent one to you via email, but for anyone else who stumbles across this and is interested -- I sought the help of someone who is a scholar in the field of religion and particularly mormon studies. His name's Terryl Givens. He's incredibly intelligent, well-educated, respected in his field, often interviewed by organizations outside the church, etc. He just published a book called "By the Hand of Mormon", available through Oxford press.
So, he recommended the following when I asked him his thoughts on this topic: "read the first parts of Hugh Nibley's Message of the Joseph Smith Papyri book, recently re-issued." He said it's pretty pricey, though -- so you might have to find it in a library. I just barely got the advice, so I haven't looked into it yet, but I will, and I'll be happy to report back if anyone's interested.
I'm also reading a book called, "Getting at the Truth" by Robert L. Millet, which addresses (briefly) this issue. It has some explanations on it, which may very well be true -- however, the explanation is so brief that it fails to be completely satisfying.
I'll talk with you more about this later -- but for the record, in case anyone wanted to research a bit - I thought I'd toss those into the mix.
I believe with you that the BoA is "true," but is not what Jospeh purported it to be, i.e., a translation of the Egyptian papyri. I believe that Joseph's study of this ancient document catalyzed revelation. So I love the BoA, but do not see it as a translation. There are clear links to Joseph's study of Hebrew in 1834-35, such as "gnolam" in Abr. 3:18, which is the Sephardic pronounciation (the way Joseph's teacher would have said it) of the Hebrew word "olam," or "eternal." I think the JST is the same thing; Joseph's study of the Bible catalyzed revelation (and part of it was his own ideas, I imagine, since it is often hard to distinguish the two.
I for one do not find this threatening. It all has to do with the nature of God and revelation.
i wonder where i fit in all this. i could agree that in many ways, joseph smith was a prophet, and that he did all sorts of "divinely inspired things." i could even believe that, inspirationally speaking, the BoA is full of truth. however, it does not mean i that the LDS church as a whole. what keeps us on opposite sides of the divide, i wonder?
"A second thing I cannot help but comment on. . .Not to belittle what your friend said about the impossibility of accepting Smith as a prophet and thinking he authored fiction, but that kind of thinking is quite dangerous, especially when it comes from the pulpit at general conference (which is probably where your friend got the notion). Why do i call statements like this dangerous? It is well understood that no document is free of human error. Yet, when one establishes as a foundation the infallibility (or perhaps historically accuracy) of a text, then when such a text could or is demonstrated to be error-ful what happens. . .all of a sudden the church can't be 'true' and Smith can't be a prophet, and the walls of belief come a tumblin' down, and the person is left alone amid the rubble of what was once thought to be a tower of faith. So let us be careful about building too much upon the shaky foundation of human fallibility."
although it does not establish its infallibility, the church DOES establish it's own direct authority from god--quite a declaration.... when a prophet who founds such a church claims to translate what is later discovered to have very little if anything to do with translation, it most certainly leads me to question the authority of an institution founded on his revealations (more by young than smith, anyway, but it's an ever evolving institution...) so perhaps emma (as an enemy of the church) planted a distorted copy of the BoA in the museum as a stumbling block (like the lost book of lehi) to disbelievers? maybe, anything's possible, but i doubt it. the comedian bill hicks put it well when he was talking about the way some fundamentalist christians consider dinosaur bones to be stumbling blocks to imperfect faith, planted by god. he says "i really find it disturbing to think of god as some trickster up there, tryin to fuck with our heads.." i'm with hicks. i am as sincere as i know how to be in my search for truth, and i don't like to play those games...they're all about ego and hopes and fears for/of being on the winning/losing teams, and have very little to do with truly trying to understand the nature and benefit of virtues themselves. it's too concerned with author for me, and too little with the SUBSTANCE of this story we call life.
This topic has sparked my interest. I did a little research and asked around. Of all the questions about the truthfulness of the Church, never have I been asked about the book of Abraham. I know it is scripture, and if you ask God, you can know it is true too. The same princples always apply, "If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God. . ." In our search for truth, are we relying and trusting in our Heavenly Father, or in our own wisdom? The truth is out there, we just have to work for it and ask God if our beliefs are true.
Also, in my searches, I came across a wonderfully written Q&A about the book of Abraham and it addresses just about every question posed by Phee. I hope you will give it a look. http://www.fairlds.org/pubs/LBOA.pdf
I checked out all three of these apology sites and I'm still unconvinced.
Critics say that the papyri discovered in NY are, indeed, what Joseph translated as the Book of Abraham. Mormon scholars say tha they aren't. Why? Because if they were then we would have to admit that they truly don't say in Egyptian what Joseph said in the BoA. They are a funerary text for a priest who died and was to be resurrected. Rather than try and confront that argument, the next best thing is to remove yourself from the argument by saying the text isn't the same text...that the real papyrus burned up and this was just another one from the collection.
Critics counter by pointing out that a manuscript of the original BoA translation contains hieroglyphics in the margin - in order - from the NY papyri. (Which it does: http://www.irr.org/mit/boamss1.html)
So then the apologists contend that the characters were penned in later on by someone other than Joseph Smith. To which I ask: someone who just decided to make hieroglyphics (from a DIFFERENT scroll) on the BoA manuscript? Too coincidental.
I agree that the papyri discovered in the Met weren't ALL of the papyri Joseph Smith owned. He said he had much more and that some of them had a different form. But that doesn't prove that what we have WASN'T part of the BoA. We don't have the other two facsimiles but we DO have the Abraham sacrifice facsimile and it was connected to a funerary papyrus detailing a priest's funeral. So all you have done by mentioning there were other papyri is evade the problem.
The Church is very evasive here. You have to admit that. Like other problematic points of doctrine (polygamy, for example), the Church is very evasive on this issue. Or, as is the case here, silent.
The Student Manual for the Pearl of Great Price says the following:
How Did the Prophet Translate the Ancient Writings?
The Prophet Joseph Smith never communicated his method of translating these records. As with all other scriptures, a testimony of the truthfulness of these writings is primarily a matter of faith. The greatest evidence of the truthfulness of the book of Abraham is not found in an analysis of physical evidence nor historical background, but in prayerful consideration of its content and power.
...Now, if you didn't know anything about the controversy, you'd skip right over that paragraph. But knowing what's been said by scholars about the BoA, you'll see that the Church side-steps the entire issue, the same way that Chad (no offense) does: "The same princples always apply, "If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God. . ." In our search for truth, are we relying and trusting in our Heavenly Father, or in our own wisdom?"
I understand that religion is founded on faith. But when "faith" becomes your fall-back answer it is no longer a foundation: it is a band-aid, a blindfold ... and leads to apathy.
Hypothetically, you could take the most ridiculous concept, make it doctrine, and say you have to have faith.
Example one: (Christian) I believe that Moses spread his arms and the Red Sea parted. I've never seen anything like this. But I have faith that it happened.
Example two: (Mayan) I believe that the first man was made out of corn and that the underworld can be found by going to a crossroads and invoking a prayer. I've never seen anything like this. But I have faith that it happened.
Example three: (Heaven's Gate-ian) I believe that if I commit suicide while the Haley-Bopp Comet is passing the earth that I will be taken up on the alien spacecraft that is flying in its tail and will be taken to alien paradise. I've never seen anything like this. But I have faith that it happened.
I'm not saying that either argument is fool-proof (i.e. about the BoA). But I know that if I were in a courtroom I'd probably believe the critics over the apologists.
A couple of thoughts:
*You said that in a courtroom, none of this would hold up. I couldn’t prove the existence of God in a courtroom, either. Does that make him any less real…any less of a God…any less important for me to know him?
*Joseph Smith purposefully didn’t share everything – he was not only obscure about the translation of the BofA, but also translating the Book of Mormon, about his vision of God and the Savior, and about other visits (and teaching) he may have received from other heavenly messengers. There is so much information about his life about which we know little or nothing. It has never been different for any prophet – including the Savior. There is so much unanswered, unrevealed, unrecorded, untold. How often does the Lord (or his prophets) explain their reasons and methods by saying (just as Joseph Smith did): "For a wise purpose in God" and "by the power of God"? It may be evasive, but its the way God seems to work. We just think it ought to be different with Joseph Smith because he was closer to our day.
*Satan uses partial truths to his advantage (perhaps even more than lies). Be careful about making a spiritual judgement based on partial physical evidence whose conclusion may be subject to fallacies based on incomplete evidence, misrepresentation due to rumor (whether unintentional or deliberate), and of course, the fact that we simply were not there...
My final comment is that when we all die, we can clear it up with God himself. I have always been a believer in the spirit of the law, and not the letter. Everyone is entitled to their own opinion and in the end I think all that matters is what kind of life we have lead. Were we kind to others, helpful? That is what I believe it is all about. So, did Joseph translate it from this or that source, does it really matter in the end? Did it make you any better of a person?
My thoughts....
firstly no amount of mental gymnastics are going to transform the boa into anything more then what they are...Egyptian Funeral scripts.
What you need to consider as believers of Joseph Smith is he flawed thus capable of a suggestable translation of the papyri? Certainly many of g-ds chosen were flawed in the Hebrew scriptures. I dont even think that J.S can come close to David and his foibles. If you think about it in those terms it is quite possible that he translated incorrectly, but this does not in of itself disprove b.o.m.
My question is...how does this compare to the nt? Again as a non believer I see far more connections btw the bom and the hebrew scriptures than with the new testament.
Any thoughts on that? Should the teachings/history of the BOM reflect more of the NT? Or is it because part of it was set before Christ?
Bazza
Kris, your thoughts are great. Your discussion of logic and faith and knowing God made a lot of sence. Thanks for your thoughts. I hope others got something out of your post, I sure did.
Boyd K. Packer, "Atonement, Agency, Accountability," Ensign, May 1988, 69
"How well I know that among learned men are those who look down at animals and stones to find the origin of man. They do not look inside themselves to find the spirit there. They train themselves to measure things by time, by thousands and by millions, and say these animals called men all came by chance. And this they are free to do, for agency is theirs.
But agency is ours as well. We look up, and in the universe we see the handiwork of God and measure things by epochs, by eons, by dispensations, by eternities. The many things we do not know we take on faith.
But this we know! It was all planned before the world was. Events from the Creation to the final, winding-up scene are not based on chance; they are based on choice! It was planned that way."
The interesting thing about that quote is that I usually find it is scientists who talk about things in unfathomable spans of time like billions of years, while folks of a more religious bent try to sell the idea of an earth that is only several thousand years old. Indeed, when I try to discuss eternity with religious people, the subject is usually laughed away as incomprehensible.
Although I did have a very interesting, insightful conversation about eternity with someone recently.
What an enigmatic comment, Dan. My curiosity is piqued.
Too many comments to reply to here. I'll have to post.
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