tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-76573305825937998102024-03-14T09:25:32.117-07:00I began to reflectReflections on Joseph Smith and the Holy Scriptures: The Holy Bible, The Book of Mormon: Another Testament of Jesus Christ, The Doctrine and Covenants, The Pearl of Great Price, and Related ThemesI began to reflecthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11853353050355842605noreply@blogger.comBlogger197125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7657330582593799810.post-89152992854204165702023-05-28T13:00:00.012-07:002024-01-28T19:40:22.388-08:00Another Comforter and Second Comforter: Reflections on President Henry B. Eyring, General Conference, April 2023<p>ROUGH DRAFT ONLY--need to get back to work on it. . . </p><p>In the <i>Teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith</i>, edited by Joseph Fielding Smith, we read of the First and the Second Comforter (149-151). The Prophet describes the Second Comforter as Jesus Christ. Most Latter-day Saints have learned about the doctrine of the First and Second Comforter.</p><p>My intent is not to speak to doctrine or to delve into any mystery. The Prophet Joseph invites us to read the Scriptures with new understanding. Everytime we read of the Comforter or of Another Comforter in the Holy Scriptures or in the teachings of the Prophet Joseph, or other modern prophets and apostles, we</p><p>It is, however, a priceless discovery to learn that the Prophet Joseph never actually spoke of a Second Comforter. On JosephSmithPapers.org the reader will find the original source of the Prophet's teaching about the Comforter, as given in Commerce, Illinois, in late June or early July 1839, and recorded later on by Willard Richards ("Discourse, between circa 26 June and circa 2 July 1839, as Reported by Willard Richards").</p><p>Here we read not of the Second Comforter but of "Another Comforter," thus conforming to the language of John 14. The wording "Second" Comforter represents, then, an editorial choice, after the Prophet's death.</p><p>Of course, "Another" does often imply "Second." For example, in Swedish "<i>andra</i>" or "another" (depending on the context) is the word for "second," <i>forsta, andra, tredje</i>. . . </p><p>The historical note found on JosephSmithPapers.org., while helpful in giving historical context, does not effectively clarify the doctrine relative to "another Comforter"; rather it confuses the matter yet more by claiming that the 1839 discourse represents clarification and even correction of what was previously revealed in 1832 and recorded as Section 88 of the Doctrine and Covenants. While the Prophet did add, under inspiration, to doctrines set forth earlier in his ministry, Did he really correct direct revelations? I intend no offense, since we all would agree that history is a discipline concerned with interpretation of sources and events, rather than a theological study. The claim, and it's quite a claim for historians to make since historians do not ordinarily define (or worse, decide or declare) doctrine, is not sound. While hoping neither to misunderstand or to give any offense, I like the idea that the Joseph Smith Papers, and accompanying annotations, are open for response. </p><p>Let's start here: The notes, recorded some years later while Willard Richards was in England, of a discourse or discourses given in 1839 in Illinois do not "correct" scripture recorded in the Doctrine and Covenants. Such notes, discourses, teachings provide additional doctrine insights in harmony with, not in contradiction of, scripture. It may not always be simple or easy to find the harmony but it's simplistic to point to "contradiction," "correction," seven years later in need of correction, etc. I say this because John 14, Doctrine and Covenants 88, and the Joseph Smith Discourse of 1839 do require some comparative study and reflection, but such study should rest on the foundation stone of all three constituting correct and clearly stated doctrine. It is up to us, in every case, to read and read again until understanding comes. A moment's thought will show how ready we are to dismiss scripture or to assume it requires revision. There is no instance of Joseph Smith giving a discourse to correct insufficiencies, or hopeless obscurities, in the revelations of the Doctrine and Covenants. The editors of the Joseph Smith papers duly note the usage of "another Comforter," "other Comforter," though they do not detail how a later 19th century editor or editors changed the wording to "Second Comforter" (as published first in the Deseret News) or how such a change may matter. </p><p>Yet what interests me most particularly is how an editorial change removes us, however unintentioned, from the immediacy of Scripture. Joseph Smith had that immediate tie to the language, expression, feeling of Scripture. When Latter-day Saints hear or read the words "Second Comforter," they tend to think of "deep doctrine," "mystery," the all-but-unattainable. The edited words take on their own connotations and leave the Greek and the Wyclifian English far behind.</p><p>We will better understand what Joseph Smith intended to teach us about John 14 if we went back to his original words: "Another Comforter." Setting aside momentarily what the Prophet taught us about Prophets, Apostles, and Saints and the visitations of the Lord Jesus Christ, I am also powerfully impressed about what President Henry B. Eyring teaches us today, that is to say, what he invites us all to do today, this very moment.</p><p>Perhaps we should say, given that John 14 is a discourse on love, that there ultimately are no deep doctrines in the Kingdom of God, only a deep, deep love.</p><p><br /></p><p>Quoting from President Eyring's latest conference talk, April 2023, we read: </p><p>"The Holy Ghost will come and abide with us. The Lord says that as we continue to be faithful, the Holy Ghost will dwell in us. That is the promise in the sacramental prayer [note the context of the Last Supper] that the Spriti will be our companion and that we will feel, in our hearts and minds, His comfort." Again: "The Savior promises that as we keep our covenants, we can feel the love of the Father and the Son for each other and for us. We can feel Their closeness in our mortal lives, just as we will when we are blessed to be with Them forever."<br /><br /></p><p>Think of it: We <i>can </i>feel Their closeness in our mortal lives, <i>just as we will</i> when we are blessed to be with Them forever.</p><p>We can start today and receive today. We can love and come to know Divine Love. Our present and our future blessings are not limited nor curtailed, nothwithstanding our weakness. </p><p>The Prophets and Apostles in our days are providing counsel according to who we are and what we, today, are able to bear. They wish to make things as simple and as clear as possible for all of us, no matter our circumstances, so we can take hold of the principles of the Gospel with confidence, and thereby allow the Lord to make our lives easier. He teaches in a manner that all can understand, all can follow today, all can receive. We are not asked to be today, or to become tomorrow, as Ezekiel, John on the Isle of Patmos, or Joseph Smith, in order to receive the promises of John 14 (see<i> Teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith</i>, 149-151). And yet we can walk the same path of covenantal love.</p><p>We can begin, as we are, and no matter where we are on the covenant path, to receive all the blessings promised by the Savior in John 14-17. Any disciple can ponder the love of the Father and the Son for each other and for themselves. By thus doing, any can feel Their closeness, beginning today, just as they will when they are blessed to be with Them forever. By so doing, all of us, no matter our spiritual preparation are already enjoying blessings associated with the "Other Comforter," or "Second Comforter," even while we as yet are not able to bear the presence of angels or see the face of God (Doctrine and Covenants 88). </p><p>We can already understand, without reaching beyond our capacities, what Joseph Smith taught: "There are two Comforters spoken of" in the Scripture. We can receive the Holy Ghost. We can be filled by the Comforter "with hope and perfect love," as Mormon taught. We can feel the closeness of our Father and of our Redeemer. That understanding will help all Saints to stay on the Covenant Path, avoid looking beyond the mark, avoid fainting by the way, and even avoid supposing that everyone, today and everyday, must reach the spiritual attainments of Biblical prophets. No. We can be ourselves, live our lives, and yet receive all that our Father hath, if only we will deepen our love for God and His Son.</p><p>Additional insight available to all, and of great worth in our spiritual walk, has to do with the very idea of a Comforter. In Liddell and Scott the Greek word<i> ho parakletos</i>, or Paraclete (an English word borrowed from Greek and found in any English dictionary) is defined as <i>Helper, Comforter</i>. I note that Wyclif was the first to use <i>Comforter</i> to translate Paraclete. His sense of the word differed in some ways from our own: <i>con </i>and <i>fort</i>, combines an intensive with the idea of <i>strengthening</i> so well as <i>comforting</i>: the Strengthener (see "Paraclete. A Gospel Word Study," <i>The Expository Time</i>s, 10:4). Tyndale followed Wyclif's choice of words. (Compare Luther's Bible, the <i>Troester.</i>) The most recent, and up-to-date, lexicon, one that carefully weighs the linguist usages found in Greek papyri is <i>The Concise Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament</i> (Frederick William Danker). I'm continuing to explore this lexicon, On pages 267-268, we find definitions associated with the verb and the noun in question: <i>parakaleo</i>: "call to be at one's side"; invite with connotations of urgency or firmness; entreat, impore, for securing help/assistance; 'hearten in time of trouble,' comfort, console; 'encourage performance,' urge, exhort, encourage; say something friendly. </p><p><i>Paraklesis</i>: 'emboldening for facing or carrying out a responsibility or task,' exhoration, encouragement; 'heartening in time of trouble,' through word or demeanor,' consolation, comfort.</p><p>Ho Parakletos: 'one who is called on to provide guidance or encouragement,' counselor, encourager; of Jesus offering encouragement to a sinner. . . <b>.more to come from this lexican; page under construction. . . </b></p><p>Thus we have:</p><p>Strengthener</p><p>Encourager</p><p>Cheerer</p><p>Sustainer</p><p>One who pleads your cause (Advocate, see 1 John 1:2, and again look to Jerome, Wyclif, Tyndale.</p><p><br /></p><p>(More to Come in just a moment)</p>I began to reflecthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11853353050355842605noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7657330582593799810.post-23688329611046729852022-04-02T17:53:00.002-07:002023-11-30T16:40:16.329-08:00Drunk with Wine in The Reign of Zedekiah<p> In 1 Nephi 4 we learn that Laban "had been out by night" "with the elders of the Jews."</p><p>He returned "drunk with wine."</p><p>And it was by night; [and] I, Nephi, crept into the city and went forth towards the house of Laban.</p><p>And I was led by the Spirit, not knowing beforehand the things which I should do.</p><p>Nevertheless I went forth, and as I came near unto the house of Laban I beheld a man, and he had fallen to the earth before me, for he was drunken with wine.</p><p>And when I came to him I found that it was Laban. </p><p><br /></p><p>So what had Laban and the "brethren" or "elders", "out by night," been drinking? </p><p>Nothing less than "wine infused with vanilla!" </p><p>Yes, "vanilla-infused wine was widely consumed by Jerusalem's wealthy during the reign of King Zedekiah," the king whom Laban served. "One of the excavated buildings [in which wine jars with vanilla traces were found] was an impressive two-story structure, which may have served as a bureau for senior royal officials," including a large wine cellar.</p><p>To some such place Laban had repaired by night to meet the elders of the Jews.</p><p><br /></p><p>Notes</p><p>Consider the following: Steinmeyer, Nathan, "Biblical Kings Drank Vanilla-Flavored Wine," 1 April 2022, <i>Biblical Archaeology</i>. </p><p>https://www.biblicalarchaeology.org/daily/biblical-sites-places/jerusalem/biblical-kings-drank-vanilla-flavored-wine/?mqsc=E4143000&dk=ZE2140ZF0&utm_source=WhatCountsEmail&utm_medium=BHDA%20Daily%20Newsletter&utm_campaign=4_1_22_Biblical_Kings_Drank_Vanilla_Flavored_Win</p><p>Bibliography: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0266085</p><p>https://paleojudaica.blogspot.com/2022/03/vanilla-flavored-wine-in-ancient.html</p><p><br /></p>I began to reflecthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11853353050355842605noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7657330582593799810.post-23027049028481856722020-06-06T15:29:00.001-07:002020-06-06T15:30:30.026-07:00Shulem<div class="post-body entry-content" id="post-body-2360621922733490325" itemprop="description articleBody" style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px; line-height: 1.4; position: relative; width: 578px;">
Damaged Copy of 2010 original. I'm repairing the gaps by consulting a hard copy.<br />
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The Prophet Joseph Smith's Explanation of Book of Abraham Facsimile 3 introduces "Shulem, one of the King's principal waiters." Contrary to expectation, a principal waiter holds a high post at court in the Ancient Near East: "Facsimile 3 may well be a copy on papyrus of the funeral stele of one Shulem who memorialized an occasion when he was introduced to an illustrious fellow Canaanite in the place. A 'principal waiter' (<i>wdpw</i>) could be a very high official indeed, something like an Intendant of the Palace" (Hugh Nibley, <i>Abraham in Egypt</i>, 451).<br />
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Joseph the Seer, in explaining Facsimile 3, thus saw beyond the fragmentary Book of Breathings to grasp what appeared on the original stele from which the Breathings vignette was taken. Where we see "Osiris Hor, the justified forever," Joseph Smith saw "Shulem." And Latter-day Saints will hardly apologize for Joseph Smith having seen a genuine Eblaite name and a genuine Egyptian title of office from a record now lost to knowledge and surviving only in a re-purposed copy used by a Ptolemaic priest. Even though memorial stele memorializing the presentation of Standard Bearer, Queen's Chief Cook, Fan Bearer, etc., are common, as Hugh Nibley further observes, Joseph Smith brings us Shulem at Court out of the blue--we encounter this character nowhere else in the literature. (For a translation of the vignette, see Michael D. Rhodes, <i>The Hor Book of Breathings: A Translation and Commentary</i>, 23-25.)<br />
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Any leads? The Prophet gives us both Ether's Mount <em>Shelem</em> and Pharaoh's <em>Shulem, </em>at one vowel difference, and leaves us to sort out the nuances. And while it's the root that holds the meaning, it's the vowel that carries the nuance. Ether 3:1 introduces the mystified latter-day reader to "the mount, which they called the mount Shelem, because of its exceeding height." <i>Height, </i>much less <i>exceeding height</i>, throws the everyday reader for whom <i>Sh-l-m</i> speaks to <i>peace</i>. Yet as long ago as his <em>World of the Jaredites</em>, Hugh Nibley had this to say about exceedingly high Mount <em>Shelem</em>: "The original meaning of the best known of Semitic roots, SALAM, may be 'a high place' (Arabic <em>sullam</em>, ladder, stairway, elevation) with the idea of safety, and hence peace, as a secondary derivation," 242. And from an offhand cough or "mutterance" made from the lectern years ago, I took it that Brother Nibley thought <em>Shulem</em> might well signify <em>Ladder</em>. A "good Syrian and Canaanite" name is how he characterizes it in <em>Abraham in Egypt, </em>451.<br />
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And he is right.<br />
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In Mitchell Dahood's "Hebrew Hapax Legomena in Eblaite," <em>Archives of Ebla: An Empire Inscribed in Clay </em>(Giovanni C. Pettinato, ed.), 443, we find the following:<br />
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"Eblaite PN <em>sulum/sullum</em> "Ladder"<br />
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<i>Ladder </i>is just the beginning of possibilities. A good Canaanite name Shulem may be; still, the vocalic nuance remains uncertain--a rung or two away from reach. As far as the Book of Abraham is concerned, there's no particular <i>symbolic</i> meaning intended anyhow; Shulem's just a good Northwest Semitic name--a genuine touch.<br />
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Professor Dahood, changing his mind, elsewhere matches the same personal name, now transcribed <i>Zulum</i>, with Hebrew <i>tselem</i> (<i>Image).</i> (The second vowel in Zulum is not the original, but alters in harmony with the first.) The latest list of Ebla names yields Zulum(u) or Sullum and gives the meaning as <i>Reconciled</i>, which returns us to the familiar root <i>s-l-m/sh-l-m</i> (see<i> Cybernetica Mesopotamica. </i>Morphemics:<i> </i>Ebla PN's, numbers Coogan</div>
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Note to Reader: About two lines with references were erased from the original essay; I'm searching for the hard copy or cloud copy to restore them. </div>
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Meanwhile:</div>
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<span style="font-size: 15.84px;">While doubling of the middle consonant--Zulum or Sullum?--would perforce also change the nuance, we don't know whether we have the full writing or not. Slight vocalic shifts in the Semitic root also modify mood and state--all of which can complicate the translation of names. Translation is tricky and nuanced anyhow: </span><i style="font-size: 15.84px;">Reconciled</i><span style="font-size: 15.84px;"> may also be understood as </span><i style="font-size: 15.84px;">Pacified</i><span style="font-size: 15.84px;"> or </span><i style="font-size: 15.84px;">Appeased, </i><span style="font-size: 15.84px;">that is, </span><i style="font-size: 15.84px;">put at peace, put (back) in(to) a state of well-being (</i><span style="font-size: 15.84px;">or</span><i style="font-size: 15.84px;"> health </i><span style="font-size: 15.84px;">or</span><i style="font-size: 15.84px;"> safety), put out of reach of danger. </i><span style="font-size: 15.84px;">We have not forgotten Mount Shelem, so Sullum, at least as place name, also may well evoke a </span><i style="font-size: 15.84px;">high ground</i><span style="font-size: 15.84px;">.</span><br />
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<span style="font-size: 15.84px;">Now, Shulem's just a name, a common name likely built from the most common of all verbal roots--let's not be silly. I have never attributed any symbolic meaning to Shulem in respect of Facsimile 3. There is no hidden reference to </span><i style="font-size: 15.84px;">ascension, </i><span style="font-size: 15.84px;">for instance. Still, Abraham looks safe and snug up there on Pharaoh's throne. But in an earlier scene, we see the great patriarch bound on Egypt's sacrificial altar. In a moment of </span><i style="font-size: 15.84px;">Retribution</i><span style="font-size: 15.84px;"> (cf. the modified root of </span><i style="font-size: 15.84px;">shlm:</i><span style="font-size: 15.84px;"> </span><i style="font-size: 15.84px;">shillem, shillum</i><span style="font-size: 15.84px;">), the sacrificing priest of Pharaoh met his doom; now in a moment of </span><i style="font-size: 15.84px;">Reconcilation</i><span style="font-size: 15.84px;">, Abraham meets Egypt. Shulem simply </span><i style="font-size: 15.84px;">had</i><span style="font-size: 15.84px;"> to be there. His name is just his name, I suppose; yet his dramatic appearance on the scene, by name, at once suggests the long-due moment of Appeasement and Reconciliation, "by the politeness of the king."</span><br />
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<span style="font-size: 15.84px;">Shulem, a fellow Canaanite, appears as if Abraham's brother, even his twin or double--a spitting image (</span><i style="font-size: 15.84px;">tzelem</i><span style="font-size: 15.84px;">?). If Abraham sits where the king ought to be, then Shulem, who is being presented at court, stands where visiting Abraham, by all rights, ought to be standing (cf. Hugh Nibley, </span><i style="font-size: 15.84px;">Abraham in Egypt</i><span style="font-size: 15.84px;">, 450). Abraham on the throne finds balance in Shulem at presentation. All is balanced, all Reconciled, all at "happiness and peace and rest" at the moment of Shulem's presentation (see Abraham 1:2). No wonder the Prince of Egypt, who leads Shulem to the throne, comes to us in the form of Ma'at, the goddess of universal order and harmony. The goddess who makes all things right takes the man of peace and reconciliation by the hand, and brings him to Abraham, who has long sought to be "a prince of peace" (Abraham 1:2). The Egyptian court becomes a great hall of mirrors: King and Prince, Abraham and King, Shulem and Abraham. Olimlah, the Prince's slave (perhaps another mirroring: prince and slave), alone stands out. Why? The Egyptian artist valued a "broken symmetry"; by breaking the symmetry, we can get a sense of difference, even of immediacy. "I'll teach you differences," says the Earl of Kent: Facsimile 3 is royal, not commonplace or stereotyped, material.</span><br />
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<span style="font-size: 15.84px;">At once, "each of the five figures in our Facsimile 3 represents a different social stratum, from divinity to slave, though (and this is important) all belong to the same universe of discourse--it is all the same family" (452). This combined theme of social status and of "participating in the king"(!) belongs, says Nibley, to the rites of coronation and panegyris, to which "all the world was summoned." Here, in simple formula, Egypt conveys what Persian artisans took walls to cover at Persepolis: all peoples, all classes, all professions gathering in homage. Hieroglyphs at the bottom of the facsimile duly yield the blessing of prosperity (</span><i style="font-size: 15.84px;">sw3D</i><span style="font-size: 15.84px;">) pronounced by "the gods of the south, north, west, and east"--mirroring not only the acclamation of the entire world at the new rule, but also the four cardinal figures, the four sons--or doubled twins--of Horus, as found on Facsimiles 1 and 2 (see Michael D. Rhodes, </span><i style="font-size: 15.84px;">The Hor Book of Breathings: A Translation and Commentary, </i><span style="font-size: 15.84px;">25. The four figures beneath the altar, at the moment of death, now become the vehicle of prosperity and health. They witness everywhere, for they have at each stage certified, that the king has obtained the victory over his enemies (</span><i style="font-size: 15.84px;">m3'-xrw r xft.jw</i><span style="font-size: 15.84px;">). New rule? Yes. That's why Hathor and Ma'at represent the transfer of legitimate rule to the new power on the throne. It is only through Hathor and Ma'at that we can symbolically "participate in the king."</span><br />
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<span style="font-size: 15.84px;">Shulem as twin of Abraham? After all, Shulem also figures in the name Ahe-Shulim (without the vowel harmony seen in Sulum), which Albert Tobias Clay, writing in 1912, translates </span><i style="font-size: 15.84px;">My brother is kept safe</i><span style="font-size: 15.84px;">, or </span><i style="font-size: 15.84px;">preserved</i><span style="font-size: 15.84px;"> (see "List of Elements," in Albert Tobias Clay, </span><i style="font-size: 15.84px;">Personal Names from Cuneiform Inscriptions of the Cassite Period). </i><span style="font-size: 15.84px;">Abraham's Shulem, a principal waiter for the king, though far from home, is kept safe and sound in Pharaoh's court. And thanks to the seeric insight of Brother Joseph, the name of this special Shulem is, for all time, </span><i style="font-size: 15.84px;">Preserved</i><span style="font-size: 15.84px;">.</span><br />
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<span style="font-size: 15.84px;">Professor Clay translates correctly but we can add a touch of local mythology. "My divine brother is Shulim" reflects the Canaanite myth of the birth of the divine twins, Shahar and Shalem or Shalim (Shulim), who name the Morning and the Evening Star. We hear in the Cassite period name, however vocalized, the words of Shahar, the Son of the Morning: My twin is Shulim, the Evening Star. Shalim, the Requiter, or Reconciler, is thus now come full cycle in his setting as Shulim, the Reconciled (See the Ugaritic evidence at KTU 1.23, "the Gracious and Beautiful Gods". See also Nicolas Wyatt, "The Religious Role of the King in Ugarit," in </span><i style="font-size: 15.84px;">Ugarit at Seventy-Five</i><span style="font-size: 15.84px;">). Here we also might mention Egyptian Stela Aberdeen 1578 in which a certain Ahmose evokes the Canaanite deity Reshef-Shulman or -Salmanu, which perhaps signifies Resheph (the </span><i style="font-size: 15.84px;">flaming one</i><span style="font-size: 15.84px;">), </span><i style="font-size: 15.84px;">bringer of retribution,</i><span style="font-size: 15.84px;"> or, though less likely for the fiery, armor-clad deity, </span><i style="font-size: 15.84px;">bringer of welfare and well-being</i><span style="font-size: 15.84px;"> (see I. Cornelius, </span><i style="font-size: 15.84px;">The Iconography of the Canaanite Gods Reshef and Ba'al</i><span style="font-size: 15.84px;">, 36; Maciej M. Muennic, </span><i style="font-size: 15.84px;">The God Resheph in the Ancient Near East</i><span style="font-size: 15.84px;">, 89-90). Whether one star (Venus) or as twins, both Morning and Evening Star must come to </span><i style="font-size: 15.84px;">completion</i><span style="font-size: 15.84px;"> or</span><i style="font-size: 15.84px;"> fullness</i><span style="font-size: 15.84px;">. Altar to Throne, Shahar and Shalem, Morning and Evening Star--Facsimile 3 grants us a glimpse of the never-ending cycle: but only a name and just a glimpse. The Ancient Egyptian verb, by the way, that best evokes fiery, retributive Shalim </span><i style="font-size: 15.84px;">in his</i><span style="font-size: 15.84px;"> </span><i style="font-size: 15.84px;">setting</i><span style="font-size: 15.84px;"> is </span><i style="font-size: 15.84px;">hotep</i><span style="font-size: 15.84px;"> (</span><i style="font-size: 15.84px;">to set</i><span style="font-size: 15.84px;">, of the sun or stars; </span><i style="font-size: 15.84px;">to rest</i><span style="font-size: 15.84px;"> or </span><i style="font-size: 15.84px;">to be at peace</i><span style="font-size: 15.84px;">; </span><i style="font-size: 15.84px;">to be appeased, satisfied; to be content</i><span style="font-size: 15.84px;">). The flame burns itself out; all nature rests.</span><br />
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<span style="font-size: 15.84px;">Our Shulem, despite the shared verbal root, stands at a safe remove from the mythology of Shahar and Shalem; Shulem's just a good Canaanite name. Here's another: at Tell Beydar (ancient Nabada) in Syria we find the previously unknown name, Lushalem (</span><i style="font-size: 15.84px;">May [lu] he [the newborn son] be healthy, safe, sound</i><span style="font-size: 15.84px;">). Though the tablets predate the Patriarchal Age, Tell Beydar comes close to our story; for here we also find the name borne by Abraham's own son: Ishmail, or Ishmael. The name had not previously been attested in ancient times outside the Hebrew Bible. Newly discovered Tell Beydar names further include the gates or districts of Malum and--Sulum (</span><i style="font-size: 15.84px;">fullness--and completeness?</i><span style="font-size: 15.84px;">). Tell Beydar, we are assured, lay on a route Abraham himself would once have traveled and "is of potentially great importance" in understanding his story (David Key, "Discovering the Missing Link," </span><i style="font-size: 15.84px;">The Independent</i><span style="font-size: 15.84px;">, 23 November 1993). The book of Abraham describes such places, beginning with the all-important hill of Olishem. (For Tell Beydar, see http://www.beydar.org/ ).</span></div>
I began to reflecthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11853353050355842605noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7657330582593799810.post-78216150992074506202020-04-19T14:58:00.003-07:002020-05-18T11:26:46.535-07:00Worldwide Fast for Healing during the CoronavirusOn Saturday, April 3, 2020, President Russell M. Nelson, the Lord's Prophet to the world, invited members and friends of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints to participate in a worldwide fast:<br />
<br />
"So tonight, my dear brothers and sisters, in the spirit of the sons of Mosiah, who gave themselves to much fasting and prayer, and as part of our April 2020 general conference, I am calling for another worldwide fast.<br />
<br />
For all whose health may permit, let us fast, pray, and unite our faith once again. Let us prayerfully plead for relief from this global pandemic. I invite <i>all, </i>including those not of our faith, to fast and pray on Good Friday, April 10, that the present pandemic may be controlled, caregivers protected, the economy strengthen, and life normalized."<br />
<br />
Did the fasting have any effect? Were blessings laid up in store? Latter-day Saints know the power of fasting and prayer. We've proved Him many times.<br />
<br />
<br />
Consider the following item--and the reader may add hope and possibilities of his or her own--which I noticed on the very day following the fast--on Holy Saturday. The item comes in the form of a tweet, a "small and simple thing," and was posted by a well-known UK medical doctor, Professor Karol Sikora, a man of great optimism and kindness. Dr. Sikora is the CMO of Rutherford Health plc and Founding Dean and Professor of Medicine at the University of Buckingham Medical School. The entire Sikora family blesses all of our lives: Mrs. Sikora, a nurse, has come out of retirement as the battle rages on.<br />
<br />
Here is the tweet from Saturday, April 11:<br />
<br />
"Extremely encouraging report in The Times this morning.<br />
<br />
Professor Sarah Gilbert is '80% confident' the Coronavirus vaccine she is developing at Oxford will work and if all goes perfectly, it could be ready by the Autumn.<br />
<br />
80% is a very positive number indeed."<br />
<br />
I've seen additional good news about the Oxford vaccine, so let's see what continues to develop.<br />
<br />
Alma speaks to fools like me:<br />
<br />
<div class="verse" data-aid="128352854" id="p6" style="--height: 82.1px; background-color: white; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #0d0f10; font-family: Palatino, "Palatino Linotype", Palatino-Roman, Pahoran, "Pahoran ldsLat", "Noto Sans Myanmar", NotoSansMyanmar, SaysetthaldsLao, serif; font-size: 18px; font-stretch: inherit; font-variant-east-asian: inherit; font-variant-numeric: inherit; line-height: inherit; padding: 0px 0px 0.65em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span class="verse-number" style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: "palatino" , "palatino linotype" , "palatino bold" , , "pahoran" , "pahoran ldslat" , "noto sans myanmar" , "notosansmyanmar" , "saysetthaldslao" , serif; font-size: 0.9em; font-stretch: normal; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: 700; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">37:6 </span>Now ye may suppose that this is foolishness in me; but behold I say unto you, that by small and simple things are great things brought to pass; and small means in many instances doth confound the wise.</div>
<div class="verse" data-aid="128352855" id="p7" style="--height: 82.1px; background-color: white; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #0d0f10; font-family: Palatino, "Palatino Linotype", Palatino-Roman, Pahoran, "Pahoran ldsLat", "Noto Sans Myanmar", NotoSansMyanmar, SaysetthaldsLao, serif; font-size: 18px; font-stretch: inherit; font-variant-east-asian: inherit; font-variant-numeric: inherit; line-height: inherit; padding: 0px 0px 0.65em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span class="verse-number" style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: "palatino" , "palatino linotype" , "palatino bold" , , "pahoran" , "pahoran ldslat" , "noto sans myanmar" , "notosansmyanmar" , "saysetthaldslao" , serif; font-size: 0.9em; font-stretch: normal; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: 700; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">7 </span>And the Lord God doth work by means to bring about his great and eternal purposes; and by very small means the Lord doth confound the wise and bringeth about the salvation of many souls.</div>
<br />
Again:<br />
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Ether 3:4 "And I know, O Lord, that thou hast all power, and can do whatsoever thou wilt for the benefit of man; therefore <b>touch these stones</b> [or <b>elements</b>], O Lord, with thy finger, and prepare them that they may shine forth in darkness; and they shall shine forth unto us in the vessels which we have prepared, that we may have light while we shall cross the sea.</div>
<span style="background-color: white; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #0d0f10; font-family: "palatino" , "palatino linotype" , "palatino bold" , , "pahoran" , "pahoran ldslat" , "noto sans myanmar" , "notosansmyanmar" , "saysetthaldslao" , serif; font-size: 0.9em; font-stretch: normal; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: 700; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">5 </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #0d0f10; font-size: 18px;">Behold, O Lord, thou canst do this. We know that thou art able to show forth great power, which looks small unto the understanding of men."</span><br />
<br />
Despite it being "the worst of times," we live in a season of hope, "the best of times," and fasting and prayer intersect with every hope and righteous endeavor at all times.<br />
<br />
Each reader, following our fasting for Italy and the two worldwide fasts led by our Prophet--the Prophet to the world--may see budding "signs of Spring." In fact, Dr. Karol Sikora himself, through his candid but encouraging tweets awakens hope in many a reader. Grateful comments accompany his every post.<br />
<br />
The Lord tells us in a revelation given to the Prophet Joseph Smith, that "fasting and prayer" really amounts to "rejoicing and prayer." And our current Prophet teaches how "Saints can be happy under every circumstance. We can feel joy even while having a bad day, a bad week, or even a bad year!<br />
<br />
My dear brothers and sisters, the joy we feel has little to do with the circumstances of our lives and everything to do with the focus of our lives" ("Joy and Spiritual Survival," General Conference, October 2016).<br />
<br />
That focus returns us to Easter morning. And it returns us to the joy of this special bicentennial year in which we commemorate the appearance of the Father and His resurrected Son, "early in the Spring of 1820," to the boy prophet, Joseph Smith.<br />
<br />
Let's see what continues to develop from the vital work at Oxford.<br />
<br />
And elsewhere:<br />
<br />
<a href="https://chicago.suntimes.com/coronavirus/2020/4/25/21236187/coronavirus-uchicago-medicine-cannulas-ventilator-alternative-hospital-covid-19">https://chicago.suntimes.com/coronavirus/2020/4/25/21236187/coronavirus-uchicago-medicine-cannulas-ventilator-alternative-hospital-covid-19</a><br />
<br />
<a href="https://www.foxnews.com/science/uk-coronavirus-vaccine-trial-could-deliver-30-million-doses-september-government-says">https://www.foxnews.com/science/uk-coronavirus-vaccine-trial-could-deliver-30-million-doses-september-government-says</a><br />
<span style="background-color: #f5f8fa; color: #14171a; font-family: , , "blinkmacsystemfont" , "segoe ui" , "roboto" , "ubuntu" , "helvetica neue" , sans-serif; font-size: 15px; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span>
<span style="background-color: #f5f8fa; color: #14171a; font-family: , , "blinkmacsystemfont" , "segoe ui" , "roboto" , "ubuntu" , "helvetica neue" , sans-serif; font-size: 15px; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="color: black; font-size: small; white-space: normal;"><br /></span></span>I began to reflecthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11853353050355842605noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7657330582593799810.post-38307456692210746332020-03-03T01:34:00.004-08:002020-04-24T14:42:09.654-07:00Thoughts on the Novel Coronavirus, Ether 3, and the Come, Follow Me Book of Mormon Manual<div class="gs" style="background-color: white; color: #222222; margin: 0px; padding: 0px 0px 20px; width: 578.182px;">
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<span style="font-size: 18px;">Thoughts on the Novel Coronavirus and Ether 3</span></div>
<div id="m_-7686469015439378028gmail-p4" style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #0d0f10; font-stretch: inherit; font-variant-east-asian: inherit; font-variant-numeric: inherit; line-height: inherit; padding: 0px 0px 0.65em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="font-family: "palatino" , "palatino linotype" , , "pahoran" , "pahoran ldslat" , "noto sans myanmar" , "notosansmyanmar" , "saysetthaldslao" , serif; font-size: 18px;">As we now navigate what the head of the World Health Organization today calls the "uncharted territory" of the novel coronavirus--including what for many Latter-day Saints is already a limited access to public worship--it surely will be things "which [look] small unto the understanding of men" (and are sometimes even despised) that may fire souls with joy, encircle hearts with peace, sustain all in comfort. </span></div>
<div id="m_-7686469015439378028gmail-p4" style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #0d0f10; font-stretch: inherit; font-variant-east-asian: inherit; font-variant-numeric: inherit; line-height: inherit; padding: 0px 0px 0.65em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="font-family: "palatino" , "palatino linotype" , , "pahoran" , "pahoran ldslat" , "noto sans myanmar" , "notosansmyanmar" , "saysetthaldslao" , serif; font-size: 18px;">Consider the 2020 <i>Come, Follow Me</i> Book of Mormon Ma</span><span style="font-size: 18px;">nual, as prepared for both Sunday School and home study. There may be a few for whom such a vade mecum to unlocking the Holy Scriptures looks small indeed (and it <i>is</i> unusually sparse), utterly lacking in any and all learned profundity or sophistication. Yet if touched by the Lord with His finger, the verses of Ether, Helaman, Mosiah, and the associated questions and comments found in a simple manual, "shall shine forth" unto us as if an inexaustible fountain of light--shining stones--an everflowing source of bright joy. </span></div>
<div id="m_-7686469015439378028gmail-p4" style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #0d0f10; font-stretch: inherit; font-variant-east-asian: inherit; font-variant-numeric: inherit; line-height: inherit; padding: 0px 0px 0.65em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="font-family: "palatino" , "palatino linotype" , , "pahoran" , "pahoran ldslat" , "noto sans myanmar" , "notosansmyanmar" , "saysetthaldslao" , serif; font-size: 18px;">It is yet Bicentennial 2020, and we can still respond to the invitation of a living Prophet, President Russell M. Nelson, to celebrate, to immerse ourselves in the glorious light of the Restoration. By doing so, we yet observe the prophetic counsel of Elder Neal A. Maxwell about not mistaking instances of "local cloud cover," however glum today, for "general darkness" (from a talk given at BYU in 1999).</span></div>
<div id="m_-7686469015439378028gmail-p4" style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #0d0f10; font-stretch: inherit; font-variant-east-asian: inherit; font-variant-numeric: inherit; line-height: inherit; padding: 0px 0px 0.65em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="font-family: "palatino" , "palatino linotype" , , "pahoran" , "pahoran ldslat" , "noto sans myanmar" , "notosansmyanmar" , "saysetthaldslao" , serif; font-size: 18px;">And let's remember one thing which we've probably considered only a curio of the past, a remainder of the premature apocalyptic worldview shared by our millennially minded ancestors, and that is: One cannot read the first volume of the History of the Church, without noting how the outpour of revelation after revelation runs alongside the contemporary outpour of a cholera pandemic of startling measure. The outbreaks, as recorded and tallied in the Prophet's History, hit with a fury beyond anything we can imagine today. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "palatino" , "palatino linotype" , , "pahoran" , "pahoran ldslat" , "noto sans myanmar" , "notosansmyanmar" , "saysetthaldslao" , serif; font-size: 18px;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "palatino" , "palatino linotype" , , "pahoran" , "pahoran ldslat" , "noto sans myanmar" , "notosansmyanmar" , "saysetthaldslao" , serif; font-size: 18px;">We skip over those tales of the past. And what of the Saxton Letter? 4 January 1833: Does that ring any bells? Latter-day readers of the Prophet's earnest letter to editor Saxton find in the Prophet's poignant sentences about plague and pestilence simple, even simplistic, reflections of a millennial imminency that today's student, in fulsome 21st century sophistication, can scarcely tolerate. Even the helpful and thoroughgoing commentary in the Joseph Smith Papers Online pauses to nuance for the latter-day student how Joseph Smith "saw these events, on which Saxton had reported in several issues of his newspaper, through a millenarian lens." </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "palatino" , "palatino linotype" , , "pahoran" , "pahoran ldslat" , "noto sans myanmar" , "notosansmyanmar" , "saysetthaldslao" , serif; font-size: 18px;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "palatino" , "palatino linotype" , , "pahoran" , "pahoran ldslat" , "noto sans myanmar" , "notosansmyanmar" , "saysetthaldslao" , serif; font-size: 18px;">No, Brother Joseph, child of your times--mumbles the reader--you shot your bolt too soon. No. This alarm bell you sound concerns a typical 19th century pandemic, no Millennium in sight; wait a century or two--or even three or four. Maybe even wait until the end of the world. Yet on his second visit to the boy Prophet, Moroni "informed me" of the coming pestilences. </span><span style="font-family: "palatino" , "palatino linotype" , , "pahoran" , "pahoran ldslat" , "noto sans myanmar" , "notosansmyanmar" , "saysetthaldslao" , serif; font-size: 18px;">It is Moroni's voice, a voice and mantle now assumed by his young Yankee apprentice, that we so urgently hear in the Saxton Letter.</span></div>
<div id="m_-7686469015439378028gmail-p4" style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #0d0f10; font-stretch: inherit; font-variant-east-asian: inherit; font-variant-numeric: inherit; line-height: inherit; padding: 0px 0px 0.65em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="font-family: "palatino" , "palatino linotype" , , "pahoran" , "pahoran ldslat" , "noto sans myanmar" , "notosansmyanmar" , "saysetthaldslao" , serif; font-size: 18px;">There was nothing pertaining to the unfolding of the Kingdom for which the young Joseph Smith was not carefully prepared. </span><span style="font-family: "palatino" , "palatino linotype" , , "pahoran" , "pahoran ldslat" , "noto sans myanmar" , "notosansmyanmar" , "saysetthaldslao" , serif; font-size: 18px;">And the same tutoring--daily study of the Book of Mormon--is available to each of us in all our varied circumstances, and throughout the prosperous years to come, the years of Gospel prosperity and continuing Gospel restoration. And some of those years will surely be joyfully spent, under Brother Joseph's continuing dispensational direction, in perfoming temple ordinances for those very souls who once perished of disease in the first decades of the 19th century.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "palatino" , "palatino linotype" , , "pahoran" , "pahoran ldslat" , "noto sans myanmar" , "notosansmyanmar" , "saysetthaldslao" , serif; font-size: 18px;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: "palatino" , "palatino linotype" , , "pahoran" , "pahoran ldslat" , "noto sans myanmar" , "notosansmyanmar" , "saysetthaldslao" , serif; font-size: 18px;">The only "millenarian lens" through which Brother Joseph gazed, unlike every other man of his times, was the Urim and Thummim, the same that was given to the Brother of Jared on the Mount (see Doctrine and Covenants 17). And who knows but what our own personal Urim and Thummim might be the 2020 <i>Come, Follow Me</i> vade mecum? </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "palatino" , "palatino linotype" , , "pahoran" , "pahoran ldslat" , "noto sans myanmar" , "notosansmyanmar" , "saysetthaldslao" , serif; font-size: 18px;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "palatino" , "palatino linotype" , , "pahoran" , "pahoran ldslat" , "noto sans myanmar" , "notosansmyanmar" , "saysetthaldslao" , serif; font-size: 18px;">And now Ether, and the prayer of Jared's brother on Mount Shelem, a location most of us would place in eastern China:</span></div>
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3:4 And I know, O Lord, that thou hast all power, and can do whatsoever thou wilt for the benefit of man; therefore <b>touch these stones</b> [or <b>verses</b>], O Lord, with thy finger, and prepare them that they may shine forth in darkness; and they shall shine forth unto us in the vessels which we have prepared, that we may have light while we shall cross the sea.</div>
<div id="m_-7686469015439378028gmail-p5" style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #0d0f10; font-family: Palatino, "Palatino Linotype", Palatino-Roman, Pahoran, "Pahoran ldsLat", "Noto Sans Myanmar", NotoSansMyanmar, SaysetthaldsLao, serif; font-size: 18px; font-stretch: inherit; font-variant-east-asian: inherit; font-variant-numeric: inherit; line-height: inherit; padding: 0px 0px 0.65em; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: "palatino" , "palatino linotype" , "palatino bold" , , "pahoran" , "pahoran ldslat" , "noto sans myanmar" , "notosansmyanmar" , "saysetthaldslao" , serif; font-size: 0.9em; font-stretch: normal; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: 700; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">5 </span>Behold, O Lord, thou canst do this. We know that thou art able to show forth great power, which looks small unto the understanding of men.</div>
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The Book of Mormon and the 2020 study manuals, however small these may look unto the understanding of men--and I'm afraid that they often are made out to look very small indeed--can be touched by the Lord with an ever brighter, and forever inexaustible, light, a light which is the preparation of the Gospel of Peace.</div>
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I began to reflecthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11853353050355842605noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7657330582593799810.post-38186468104430674862019-01-06T21:03:00.003-08:002019-02-04T20:32:35.574-08:00Simeon McIntier and Isabel Nicol Pioneer Family<div class="note" style="color: #787069; padding-top: 10px;">
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<span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">I can speak for at least three generations. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">No one during the last three generations has any clear idea why Isabel Nicol, after her abandonment by Simeon McIntier (with no mention of divorce) was married to the same man that her sister Agnes had married (William Austin); neither do we understand why within two years after Isabel's death on the pioneer trail, William, thirty years the senior, would marry her own daughter, Agnes McIntier. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Yet, while puzzled, we have known that pioneer marriages, and later sealings, often had as purpose the safety and welfare of a widow or lone woman. Isabel Nicol had been, as a letter from her brother stated, "deserted" by her husband, somewhere in Iowa. The reason for the desertion is not known, but we acknowledge the stress of poverty and an uncertain future. Did Simeon leave in desperate hopes of bettering the family's economic circumstances? A census record indicates a possible stay in the gold mines of California--but that could be another lost soul of a Simon McIntyre. He apparently left in the company of one or more young sons. Perhaps he had left home more than once over the long thirty years of marriage.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">As daughter Agnes tells us, the rural family from the cold but fertile borderline of Canada and New York "had worked their way to the eastern part of Illinois," over tiring years. They had to work along the way: there had been a quiver full of children already at journey's beginning; one, a little girl now lay buried in Nauvoo, Illinois, where she had died in 1843. Shortly thereafter, the family temporarily left Nauvoo looking for work again--and so the pattern unfolded--each step leading inexorably to a greater uncharted loneliness.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Given the circumstances of poverty and exile in a wilderness, a wilderness which would soon claim Isabel's life, we understand that a marriage served the same purpose as welfare services would serve today, that is, the protection and preservation of life. Exiles in the American wilderness had no access to social workers, Medicare, Medicaid, Food Stamps, and the like. There was, however, a responsible person, who was willing to provide for his wife's sister, Isabel--and later, however baffling to us, for both wife's niece and wife's daughter in marriage: William Austin. William's later marriage with Isabel's own daughter, now bereft of both father and mother, becomes the unanswerable question, but we lose sight of family bonds, of family welfare, of family loyalty, a loyalty forged in refugee trials we scarcely comprehend. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Why William and Agnes decided to seal in marriage Agnes's husband with her own mother in the Endowment House, some twenty years after Isabel's death, is also mysterious beyond measure, even to minds and hearts fully nurtured on multiple family histories abounding in plurality of wives. Yet the doctrine of sealing was only in part understood at that time, and may be best understood by us as an acknowledgment that family belongs together--always. As William Austin had served in place of husband, caretaker of Isabel's temporal welfare after Isabel had been abandoned by her own husband, so in the next world, William Austin would also preside over her spiritual welfare. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Such a network of plural marriages--sisters, and then aunt and niece, mother and daughter--would have been rare (and perhaps exceptional) even in those days of plural marriages and plurality of sealings, but we must recall the plural difficulties, too, of what the younger Agnes later called "the long trek to Utah," a trek that had begun in 1838, from New York, and thence on-and-on, over 15 years. But one thing is for sure. We should not delete the record of marriage--"No marriage"--for William and Isabel, </span><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">as a well-meaning contributor on FamilySearch, either in bafflement or denial, recently did </span><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">(and we cannot delete the record of sealing), solely because marriage in the days of the pioneer cannot signify the same thing that it signifies to us today. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Records indicate that Simeon McIntier himself eventually showed up in Utah Territory and, clearly in good favor and standing in the Church, received at journey's end his own pilgrimage promises, blessings, and endowments in the Endowment House. He later died at the home of his son, near Ogden, Utah. Letters between family members show the great concern and love of the Austin household for Simeon McIntier. Had Simeon, lost in dreams or work--and work is also a dream--expected to reunite with his wife in Utah? If so, he was too late. Isabel had died of "mountain fever" in the once great Pioneer Encampment, long lost to view and presumably located a few hundred yards to the Northeast of Cache Cave, just over the border from Wyoming. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Filled with rumors, I went to the Cave on the one day it opens during the year, the first of Spring, seeking traces of autumnal pioneer burials. I found none; for there are none to find. The sheep rancher, who owns the property, drove me a little ways northward from the famous cave, and pointed to the Northeast: "The Camp must have been there," he said. It is there still, in the mystery of an untroubled stillness.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">I went on exploring that day--on to Echo Canyon, where the only reverberations one hears today are the tremulous voices of history.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Little, if anything, in letters the children exchanged about their father's death, expresses blame, resentment--or even sorrow. Remember: These were Latter-day Saints and Pioneers. Daughter Agnes McIntier Austin left on record a single, parsimonious, sentence about Bentonsport and Winter Quarters: "We suffered hardships along with the rest of the Saints." </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">When the grandchildren of Simeon McIntier and Isabel Nicol went to the Logan Temple for the purpose of sealing in eternal marriage this long-separated couple, they did so without any sense of blame, resentment, or even full understanding of two victims, perhaps flawed martyrs, of the American Frontier. They did well.</span><br />
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<fs-change-summary hide-see-all-changes="" style="display: block;"></fs-change-summary><span style="color: #4f4f4c; font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif; letter-spacing: -0.1px; white-space: pre-line;">Sketch of the Life of AGNES McINTIER AUSTIN, written by herself.</span><br />
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<span style="color: #4f4f4c; font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif; letter-spacing: -0.1px; white-space: pre-line;">I was born in Hammond, St. Lawrence Co., New York, October 11, 1830. My parents, Simeon and Isabell Nicol McIntier, joined the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints when I was about seven years old. I was eight years old when my parents left New York and started west. They worked their way into the eastern part of Illinois. While we were living in Illinois, two Mormon Elders came to our house and made it their home for quite some time while they traveled around and preached the gospel to the people in the neighborhood. </span><br />
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<span style="color: #4f4f4c; font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif; letter-spacing: -0.1px; white-space: pre-line;">We moved into Nauvoo, Ill. sometime during the year 1841. I have seen the Prophet Joseph Smith and his brother Hyrum and heard them preach the gospel of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, quite a few times. I was present at the conference of the Church which was held in Nauvoo, Ill. on the 6th of October, 1843, and heard the Prophet say concerning Sidney Rigdon: "I have thrown him off my shoulders and you have again put him on me. You may carry him but I will not."</span><br />
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<span style="color: #4f4f4c; font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif; letter-spacing: -0.1px; white-space: pre-line;">I was baptized in the Mississippi river; I think it was in May, 1844. I was baptized by Elder Augustus Stafford. On May 5th, 1844, my parents moved from Nauvoo for the summer, thinking they might get more work, but they returned to Nauvoo in September 1844, and remained there until the Saints left for the migration westward. </span><br />
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<span style="color: #4f4f4c; font-family: "helvetica neue" , "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif; letter-spacing: -0.1px; white-space: pre-line;">We crossed the river in April and worked our way westward. We came to Bentensport [Bentonsport, Iowa] in the spring of 1846, and in the fall of 1847 we arrived at Winter Quarters, Nebraska. We suffered hardships along with the rest of the Saints. In 1852 we commenced the long trek to Utah. My mother, Isabell Nicol McIntier, took sick at Green River, with mountain fever. She died, and we buried her in Echo Canyon, Utah, just a little east of Cache Cave. We arrived in Salt Lake City, Utah, on October 8th, 1852.</span><br />
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I began to reflecthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11853353050355842605noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7657330582593799810.post-18298187695957783922018-06-15T23:40:00.006-07:002022-11-29T15:35:28.862-08:00Is The Book of Abraham "All Wrong"? <br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.84px;">While Latter-day Saints may find critical reviews of the Pearl of Great Price variously illuminating, the academic world ultimately seeks so much more of all of us: we are now to yield up <i>all </i>our Scriptures, <i>all</i> our claims to prophetic dispensation, and <i>all</i> this nonsense about freedom to express belief at will.</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.84px;"><br /></span><span style="color: #424242;"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 15.84px;">Multiple voices proclaim the downfall of the book of Abraham. And i</span></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-size: 15.84px;">t's just a wee book: 12 pages, one for each of the tribes of Israel. Let it go. But is the wee book a flimsy book?</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.84px;"><b><br /></b></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.84px;"><b>I Reviewing The Gospel Topics Essay: "Translation and Historicity of the Book of Abraham"</b></span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.84px;"><br /></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.84px;"><br /></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.84px;">A decade ago, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, in the interests of sustaining the scriptural claims of the book of Abraham, published a Gospel Topics essay on her official Webpage. The now dated "Translation and Historicity of the Book of Abraham" received wide coverage, and summaries of the essay have become part of the curriculum for Youth, but any reader, young or old, must now also take into account the prompt response crafted by the late Professor Rob</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">ert K. Ritner, professor of Egyptology at the University of Chicago. To begin with, all Latter-day Saints should be very grateful that Professor Ritner, in the form of several articles and one book, has joined in the debate over Abraham. That's what Saints love to see, and it shouldn't bother anyone in the least when his take on matters does not match that of Joseph Smith. The Scriptures were written for "the benefit of the world" and "to draw all men" to One, who "commandeth none that they shall not partake" (2 Nephi 26:24). Church members do not own the Scriptures they enfold to their hearts; all that the Saints possess in this ephemeral world are gift boxes which they are to share, gift boxes containing the invitation a loving Savior sends to all humankind (see Alma 5). Abraham invites readers, and it's the open discussion that counts, the kind of discussion that never dismisses any participant, argument, or evidence, with a wave of the hand. </span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"><br /></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">The various Gospel Topics Essays have surprised, even dismayed, many a reader, Saint or none. That mistakes would be made, misunderstandings abound, essays updated as needed, more questions swirl, was made clear by Church leaders from the start. We learn together and questions swirl: Has the Church herself now renounced or downgraded the book of Abraham? or any other part of her vast Scriptural, historical, or doctrinal heritage? </span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"><br /></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Learning requires a measure of vulnerability, and new learners and essays alike need a space for reflection and review, but the newspapers wouldn't let either the essays or the learners alone. Starter essays drew attention from the <i>Salt Lake Tribune</i> and <i>New York Times</i> alike, and misinterpretation immediately sprang up in that nutrient sparse, low-depth soil. "Church officially admits Joseph Smith practiced polygamy! Lifelong Members Stunned!" </span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"><br /></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">How can anyone argue with that kind of ignorance? Church authorities, who saw the essays (mostly) as updated summaries themselves were stunned at the reports. I remember a round rebuke from a member of the Quorum of the Twelve at a stake holiday event: Go back, and "read every word." </span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"><br /></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Readers, in the delicate moment, found no refuge for independent thought.</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"><br /></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">And what of the rough-and-tumble "Translation and Historicity of the Book of Abraham"? </span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Professor Ritner opens with a volley meant to stun: "Translation and Historicity" "represents new reflection on a document whose authenticity as </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">verifiable history </i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">is now officially acknowledged to be in serious dispute." The volley falls short of the mark. The very title speaks to historicity: the essay makes claims based on historicity and backs them with evidence from expansive bibliography the reader is free to study. Ritner may disagree with the evidence so presented, and he may misread the intent of the Church in sponsoring the piece, well and good; but the claim of "official acknowledgment" and "[the Church's] discomfort with its own conclusions and reasoning" rings false. </span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"><br /></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">And what of this "serious dispute" over the book of Abraham as "verifiable history"? Has there yet been any Jewish or Christian scholar, or any other believer for that matter, who puts forth the claim that the history of Abraham's life, as recorded in Genesis, is "<i>verifiable</i> history" in the same way that historical figures appearing in a multiplicity of ancient or modern records meet some standard or other of verification? No. That the life of Abraham appears only in Scripture has never been a matter of "serious" nor any other kind of "dispute". So exactly how does the Church's Gospel Topics essay "<i>now</i> officially acknowled[ge]" denial of such a commonplace recognition of the lack of extra-Biblical evidence for the Patriarchal narratives in the Bible? Was there, then, an earlier opposing position officially argued by Church authorities? If so, where published? Or does the appearance of the essay's lengthy bibliography supporting the historical claims of the book of Abraham--sustaining not verifying--the first such <i>ever </i>"officially" published, reflect a surging "serious dispute" over "verifiable history"?</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"><br /></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Besides, what are the rules, or whose rules, for verifying any historical narrative or interpretation thereof? Let's all eschew a facile historiographical scientism. And just how novel is it for leaders of any religious community to invite adherents to seek answers about Scripture, which are <i>ever</i> also answers touching on historicity in prayer? St. Paul, a Witness, and all Christians else, hold the Resurrection of Jesus Christ as <i>the</i> Event in history. </span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"><br /></span><span style="color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif;"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 15.84px;"><br /></span></span><span style="color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif;"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 15.84px;">So who gets to define epistemology, the philosophical study of knowledge?</span></span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"><br /></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">While the essay does say--and the wording is awkward and unclear--matters of "veracity and value" "cannot be <i>settled</i> by scholarly debate [alone]," the same sentiment has always (not "newly") been made about the Book of Mormon: Another Testament of Jesus Christ--including its historical geography--the book of Moses, and even about the latter-day visions, doctrines, and ordinances pertaining to the Restored Church in history--and still unfolding. "Translation and Historicity," despite clumsy, even painful, syntax, diction, and linking--and several unforced errors--does not partake of a rhetoric consistent with a document of surrender. No. It tackles the questions swirling about the book of Abraham head on. Acknowledging the difficult, it proposes, in places of eloquence, a reason for faith, never surrender.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Ritner's response--really a must for any reader of the essays--brings together everything he finds objectionable, including so much that Hugh Nibley tried to answer in 1968-1970, 1975, 1980, and 2013. Let's consider a few objectionable matters: 1) Joseph Smith's attempts, at publication some seven years after purchase, to deal with either flaking papyrus or lacunae in the facsimiles, here unjustly and obnoxiously labeled "forgeries"; 2) the question of anachronisms--though Joseph Smith thoughtfully translates into established Biblical and Classical idiom, thus "Pharaoh" or "Chaldeans," and "Egyptus," the last for what he originally translated "Zeptah"; 3) the bizarre names (Kolob, Enish-go-on-dosh (<i>ins-q3-'n-dshr</i>?), for which I would refer the reader to the Egyptian name for Mars, Hor-Dosh (Horus the Red), and suggest the underlying phrase to be <i>'n-dosh</i>, "beautiful in [her] redness," of Hathor as Female Sun, which corresponds to the Prophet's explanation of the Hathor cow on Facsimile 2). </span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"><br /></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Throughout both his response and an earlier book, <i>The Joseph Smith Papyri: A Complete Edition,</i> Ritner appeals to his discipline. Nibley he censors for butchering a few sacred cows: Petrie, Breasted, Mercer. But that's not the whole story: "In his personal dealings with Mercer, Nibley found him to be kind and unfailingly courteous. Dealing with him was a pleasure. In 1968, a year before Mercer died, Nibley wished him well." </span><a href="https://burtonkjanes.com/2017/01/11/selling-the-professors-library/">https://burtonkjanes.com/2017/01/11/selling-the-professors-library/</a> .<br />
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<span style="color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif;"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 15.84px;">The family man and beloved teacher was never the monster Ritner describes. His collegiality drew many from the discipline to Provo: there were letters, calls, visits. His <i>An Egyptian Endowment: The</i> <i>Message of the Joseph Smith Papyri </i>received a favorable review. Yet other reports in Ritner's pages, too painful to repeat, call to mind words of Joseph Smith: "The deceased ought never to have had an enemy. But so it was, wherever light shone, it stirred up darkness" (A. Ehat, ed., <i>Words of Joseph Smith</i>, 9 October 1843).</span></span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">And let it be understood that to invoke abstract ideas such as </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">scholarship</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"> or </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Egyptology</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"> v. <i>apologetics</i> hardly contests the dozens of well-expressed insights, evidences, arguments, and pointed questions about both Abraham and the Egyptians generously put forth by Hugh Nibley, Michael Rhodes (and others) over many decades. Read the "Conclusion" to Nibley's </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Abraham in Egypt. </i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Here we find over fifty points of evidence for the antiquity of the book of Abraham. Does Professor Ritner address a single one? No. Neither does he think it necessary to do so. </span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">I want to see dialogue based on what books say rather than a rhetorical <i>declaratio</i> made on the authority of capital </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">E</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"> "<b>E</b>gyptology" and "<b>E</b>gyptologists." Speaking <b><i>E</i></b><i>x cathedra</i> stuns the hapless layman, yet just how often would like noble appeals to the authority of Egyptology command space in the journals, monographs, and books published within the discipline? Never. The discipline requires a full engagement with argument on all sides of any question. Yet Latter-day Saints also bear some fault for the fray. Dr. Ritner complains often, and justly, about his own articles and books not receiving due notice, or even proper footnoting, in discussions about the book of Abraham. From this point forward, may we all be willing, without neglect, prejudging, abuse, bullying, or ad hominem reference, and without reference to the Church one belongs to, to the university at which one may teach, or not teach, or the books or articles one may have read or not read, to consider with quiet heart the arguments made by every student. </span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">The book of Abraham belongs as much to Samuel Mercer and Robert Ritner as it does to anybody else--it is certainly not the special province of the educated or of the apologist. A duly credentialed Hugh Nibley, by the way, never called himself an "apologist." So why use that overworked, stunningly misunderstood, and even abstract <i>label</i>, which properly belongs to other Christian traditions to dismiss him? As Richard Lloyd Anderson also once told me, careful student of the New Testament that he was: Apologetics is the wrong word--which is to say, it doesn't fit the story of our community (For a glimpse at the meaning and purposes of apologetics throughout Christian History, I recommend the entry on "Apologetics" in Mircea Eliade [ed.], <i>The Encyclopedia of Religion</i>. Hint: More BYU's current Maxwell Institute and the Joseph Smith Papers Project than the extracurricular FAIR).</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"><b><br /></b></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"><b><br /></b></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"><b>II The Facsimiles</b></span> <span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"><br /></span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Professor Ritner is quite correct in challenging the claim made for decades in the so-called "apologetic" publications that a Roman period Egyptian magical papyrus sustains what Joseph Smith says about Abraham and the lion couch in Facsimile 1. </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">The Demotic Magical Papyrus of London and Leiden</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"> features a lion couch in connection with a love charm, and </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Abraham</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"> is one of the various magical names written under the couch. But what of that? The vignettes don't look anything alike! </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Abraham</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">, in the middle of another elaborated chain of invoked names, also appears next to </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Pupil of the Wedjat-Eye.</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"> Does that side-by-side occurrence, or link, automatically spell </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">hypocephalus</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"> and thus</span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;"> Abraham Facsimile 2</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">"? No. If so, how? and exactly how? Latter-day Saint students, a quarter-of-a-century since, wondered about a link between the magic and the facsimiles--well and good to wonder--but what is the substance of the claim? In other words, What should a perplexed but grateful reader do with such a claim? Teach it to friends?</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">And why does the Gospel Topics essay disguise the magic manual by calling it a text from an "Egyptian temple library?" Placing </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">temple</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"> and </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Abraham</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"> in a single sentence enchants the Latter-day Saint reader, but it's nothing more than sleight-of-hand. If you wish to enjoy potions concocted of pulverized shrewmouse or to revel in jumbled chains of Egyptian, Greek, Hebrew names invoked for the greater cause of love or power, </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">The</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"> </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Demotic Magical Papyrus of London and Leiden</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"> is your book. </span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Let us spare our fellow Saints, who know magic when they see it, from having to murmur charms and lisp spells to all challengers, while also choking back laughter: "CHA CHA CHA CHA CHA CHA CHA. Then clap thrcc timcs, TAK TAK TAK, go 'pop, pop, pop' for a long timc; hiss a grcat hiss, that is, one of some length." Lay readership? Even the least among us can see how the scholarly translator (Hans Dieter Betz) turned the very idea of translation into something of a joke wrapped in an enigma: "<i>a great hiss, that is, one of some length</i>." And how exactly should any of us explain the following command from the Demotic Magical Papyrus: "Come to me, Kanab"!? perhaps in terms of Kanab, Utah, Gateway to Zion and Kolob Canyon? </span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"><br /></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Laughter wonderfully stirs the honest student to assess whatever parades today as Scriptural scholarship in our Restored Gospel community, to test whether so much of what editors deem worthy of publication, amounts to little more than "Come to me, Kanab!" the apologetic dance of "pop, pop, pop," or even a chill "cha, cha, cha." As we trek toward the heart of the 21st Century, may loyal students of the Scriptures take up the challenge to write more thoughtfully, and with increasing simplicity and clarity, as befits a reverence for the Restored Word of God.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Even worse, because the magical book, or collection, postdates the Patriarchal Age by eons, the Gospel Topics essay, to make it relevant to the book of Abraham, resorts to claiming it shares a date with the Joseph Smith papyri. Yet hundreds of years also separate the magical archive from the papyri, so how does the claim stand at all? much less lend weight to a principal idea also expressed in the essay that the Joseph Smith Papyri, at the time of its purchase, included what was merely a copy, or copy of a copy, of a very ancient book of Abraham?</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Ritner therefore rightly contests any attempt to link these magical texts with the Abraham facsimiles, though what he says mostly repeats what Ed Ashment convincingly set forth decades ago. Let's drop the matter, appreciate the work of these brethren in the vineyard of scholarship, and go on our way rejoicing.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Professor Ritner also challenges the essay's citation of a medieval Coptic tale of Persian King Shapur and Abraham as sound evidence for the book of Abraham. (<i>Coptic</i> names both the Egyptian Christian Church and the last stage of the Egyptian language, an idiom written mostly in Greek letters.) The tale is Persian. While the late and derivative retelling in Coptic may show correspondences with other stories about Abraham circulating in antiquity, and while these last may in turn recall in places our own book of Scripture, its appearance in "Translation and Historicity" is an unforced error. The document is certainly not "a later <i>Egyptian</i> text," as too cleverly claimed, "that tells how the Pharaoh tried to sacrifice Abraham." Again, how could any Latter-day Saint reader in discussion with friends use the Coptic tale to sustain the the book of Abraham? None of us can be expected just to throw out smoke: <i>Coptic</i> signifies <i>Egyptian</i>, therefore <i>Coptic text mentioning Abraham</i> points to our <i>book of Abraham</i><i>.</i></span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Ritner further objects, with <i>some</i> justification, to the essay's referencing the ritual slaughter found indisputably in various Middle Kingdom sources to support the story of <i>Abraham's</i> sacrifice. And the matter may require a clearer explanation and added argument before the reader can arrive at a full assessment. No one knows, after all, when Abraham lived--and it's reckless to set tight limits. Whenever ideas and evidence are contested, however strong the evidence may appear, the opportunity becomes ours to engage fruitfully, argue with clarity and force--and also to dig deeper. Bridges to scriptural understanding via the historical record require both careful footings and also awareness of audience, lest, having the best of intentions, students either construct a "bridge to nowhere" or require of faithful and alert, but new, readers the holding of a "bridge too far." God never requires a "bridge too far for faith."</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">In the grand tournaments, therefore, of </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Abraham v. the Demotic Magical Papyrus</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">, we all must call points as we see them, as do watchful and mature umpires, on the chair or the line, and never as partisans in a religious contest. Besides, the games and the sets play themselves out so very often as a contest of personalities and academics, each opponent vying for the mastery. The sets once lost, the tournament ended, a continuing challenge on the same questions of evidence can only be characterized as quixotic. What we rightly seek, says Hugh Nibley, may be characterized as </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">the specific and the peculiar</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">, the kind of evidence that approaches demonstration. The deep faith undergirding the Holy Scriptures, in their inspiration, in their writing, transmission, and preservation, in their restoration, reception, and in their reading, as we strive to receive into our spiritual bloodstream the nutrients vital to eternal life, cannot flow from a tilting at windmills, from sets lost, or from trying to hold a bridge far, far, behind the line.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"><br /></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Here's something else that the Chicago Professor likely gets right: the vignette we call Facsimile 1 has thematic correspondence to Hor's Breathing Document; it's there at the beginning of the document because it captures the moment of Osirian renewal and resurrection which that ritual document affords. The Gospel Topics essay renews Nibley's old observation about vignettes often being placed at some remove from passages describing them--thus "out-of-place" to our eyes. The observation holds true in many cases, but Ritner correctly refuses to disassociate the vignette from the Breathings Document. I came to the same conclusion based on what the text alongside the vignette says of the priestly office of Hor, with whom the document was buried. Among other offices, the accompanying text identifies Hor as "the Prophet of Min who massacres His enemies." </span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Latter-day Saint students, running in the track of Professor Marc Coenen's clarifying publications about the ancient owners and dating of the Joseph Smith Book of Breathings, all take note that the lot in the priesthood devolving on Hor includes a rare office associated with the (combined) deity Resheph-Min: "Prophet of Min who massacres his enemies." Does the office somehow correspond to the action depicted on Facsimile 1, or to other ideas therewith associated? Resheph, who dwells in the house of Montu [Manti], a Canaanite god of war inducted into the Egyptian pantheon, shares an identity in Min, who, in turn, shares a role with Horus as avenger of his father, Osiris.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Since our Theban priest also bears the name Hor (that is "Horus", to cite the Greek form of the admittedly common name), why not also take on Horus' avenging role, the very same role belonging to Min and to Resheph? </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Any other likenesses? That the Book of Abraham's violent "god of El-Kenah" bears comparison with Canaan's Resheph, whose name (</span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">r-sh-p</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">) bespeaks the vivid lightning and flames of fire, must be clear to the attentive reader of the Book of Abraham! Abraham survives lightning, flame, and earthquake, all of which figure in Abraham Chapter One, and all of which belong to the vengeance of Min, or Min-Resheph. Besides, one of Abraham's own descendants, through Ephraim, bears--and here's ritual reversal and the sign of escape--the name Resheph, surely now to be understood as descriptive of the God of Israel: "I cause the wind and the </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">fire</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"> to be </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">my chariot</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">," Jehovah tells rescued Abraham (Abraham 2:7; see 1 Chronicles 7:25; for Resheph in a chariot see Professor Muennich's, </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">The God Resheph in the Ancient Near East</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">, 112f.).</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Though Professor Coenen sees in Facsimile 1 not a scene of sacrifice but of Osirian resurrection <i>and</i> the conception of Horus (for Osiris not only escapes death, he lives on to found a dynasty), the figure on the vignette that Joseph Smith names the priest of Elkenah, or the priest of Pharaoh (who is thus the priest of the living Horus, the living king), does something recall a surviving bronze figure of "Min who massacres the enemy": "dressed in a short kilt, held up by two bands that cross over the breast and back" (p. 1113). Osiris' violent death (and its vengeance), resurrection, and an endless posterity all form a single constellation that Facsimile 1, <i>Osiris stirring on the lion couch</i>, delicately manages to call forth. Joseph Smith sees in the same--"in this [particular] case," he says--Abraham's arrested sacrifice at the hands of a priestly enemy, "dressed in a short kilt, held up by two bands that cross over the breast and back," with his rising from the altar as earth and sky shake and flare.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: xx-small;">I'm drawing on an earlier post entitled, "The Book of Abraham: Case Closed (or Sarah to the Rescue," posted Dec. 2011. See Marc Coenen, "The dating of the Papyri Joseph Smith I, X and XI and Min who massacres his enemies," in Willy Clarysse, <i>Egyptian Religion: </i>1103-14. A detailed review of the Hor Book of Breathings and the nature and historical setting of the priestly offices of Hor and Osoroeris, including examples of symbolic slaughter and burning showing correspondences to Facsimile 1, as described by Joseph Smith, is John Gee, "Some Puzzles of the Joseph Smith Papyri," <i>FARMS Review</i> 20:1 (2008), 113-157. </span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: xx-small;"><br /></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"><br /></span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">The Egyptian record attests a symbolic, ceremonial killing of foreigners, as depicted at centers like Philae, Edfu, and Karnak, with special maces, swords, and clubs, including "a particular kind of [bladed] mace much resembling in shape the </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Dd</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">-pillar, the symbol of Osiris' enduring life and dynasty," as also resurrection (Val H. Sederholm, </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Papyrus British Museum 10808 and Its Cultural and Religious Setting</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">, Leiden: Brill, 2006, 114). How strange that the bladed mace symbolically used to kill foreign victims in royal ceremony also symbolizes the perpetuity of the Osirian dynasty. But the Egyptians are not finished: "The king, playing Horus-Min, cuts off the heads of his father's enemies at the stroke of a pole-axe [or bladed mace, both sword and club]. [And] the special word for </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">killing</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"> at Edfu [<i>Ddj</i>--and Edfu is also </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Ddj</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">!] alludes to Osiris and the stability of his dynastic line" (Sederholm, </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Papyrus 10808</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">, 117). Both name, action, and instrument of sacrifice thus confirm the dynastic line. No sacrifice; no posterity. That's also the paradox of Abraham and Isaac. It's an Osirian paradox, an Osirian unfolding.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">At Karnak we see paired depictions of Resheph <i>and</i> "the pharaoh stabbing two prisoners kneeling in a metal kettle [for burning] with their arms tied behind their backs in front of [a representation of] 'Min who [massacres] his enemies' " (Coenen, 1113). Why the duality</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">? Does it hint at the king working in concert with his priestly representative? Pharaoh, twinned with a Canaanite god, here acts in the office of Min who massacres his enemies. And as Pharaoh, so Abraham's "priest of Pharaoh," who is of course, also the priest of the Canaanite god of Elkenah, in the very same mirroring of roles and priesthoods, Egyptian and Canaanite, as depicted at Karnak. All these things come together on one postcard-size papyrus in Joseph Smith's keeping: Hor's priestly title of "Min who massacres his enemies" <i>and</i>, should we follow the Prophet's lead, the "Priest of Elkenah, who is also the Priest of Pharaoh, king of Egypt." Add to that Abraham Chapter One's focus on the priestly line of Abraham that compares thematically--does it not?--to the text about the lineage and inherited priestly offices of Hor, alongside the vignette, and we certainly do have the makings of a serious discussion about priesthood in the ancient world. Critics, as they delight to tell us, base their entire case against Joseph Smith on the lack of any connection whatsoever between the vignette and Abraham Chapter One. . . or between the hypocephalus and Abraham Chapter Two. . . Forget the critics, when the Gospel Topics essay all too soon insists that the Joseph Smith Papyri currently in our possession (including copies of text) do not have anything at all to say about Abraham that's <i>an unforced error</i>. Hugh Nibley shows how even the title of the Breathings document: "written by Isis for her brother Osiris so <i>that his soul may live</i>" mirrors not only the actors but the curious wording of the Abraham and Sarah story--the passage into Egypt has all the dangers and the triumphs of an initiatory ritual. </span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">We continue with Coenen's description of the ritual sacrifice at which Pharaoh and his divine Canaanite counterpart officiate: Behind Min "stands a tree on a hill surrounded by a wall" (which may register a specific place-name), a setting that recalls "the hill called Potiphar's Hill, at the head of the plain of Olishem." The tree (or, Heliopolitan pillar) likewise recalls the sacrifice of the "three virgins" who "would not bow down to worship gods of </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">wood</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"> or of </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">stone</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">" (Abraham 1:10-11; Coenen, 1113; for ceremonial hills marked with standing </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">stones</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"> see Nibley and Rhodes, </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">One Eternal Round</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">, 170-3; for another royal massacre and burning of enemies, 179). And let's not forget that a standing stone, an engraved stelae, found in Syria long after the book of Abraham's emergence, depicts great Ramesses adoring a Canaanite deity bearing the name--if I read it correctly--"Elkenah." (If not "Elkenah", then how should we read the near-matching name?)</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: xx-small;">(See: "The god of Elkenah in Hieroglyphs and in the Book of Abraham":</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: xx-small;">http://valsederholm.blogspot.com/2014/02/the-god-of-elkenah-in-hieroglyphs-and.html.)</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">By killing the enemies of Osiris, Pharaoh and his designated priestly double reverse the inimical act of killing Osiris himself, and thus ensure both Osiris' resurrection and Horus' (that is, Pharaoh's) dynastic claims. It bears repeating: As the priest of Min who massacres his enemies, Hor himself becomes Pharaoh's (Horus') stand-in, a role recalling the sacrifice-mad "priest of Pharaoh" in Abraham's account. The role, however essential, is not without its risks. And here's a genuine touch, even a moment of dramatic literary genius that only an ancient reader might fully grasp: "And the Lord. . .smote the priest that </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">he</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"> died; and there was great mourning in Chaldea, and also in the court of Pharaoh" (Abraham 1:20). "Great mourning" in Pharaoh's court? for a distant priest? Why would he matter? By smiting the Pharaoh's ceremonial agent, God has smitten the Pharaoh himself and has also smitten his dynastic line (cf. the slaying of the firstborn in Exodus and the subsequent swallowing up of Pharaoh in the Red Sea). It is the priest's office, as agent, that matters, and the mourning over his death must then match in intensity and cloud of disaster that which prevails at the actual death of a king. One can picture the choking dust storm at Ur sweeping down to Egypt. A panicked herald runs with the news.</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"><br /></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">The priest of Pharaoh dies a substitute for the king himself, whether we consider that king the Pharaoh in Egypt, or even Abraham, a man now wrapped in power and dread, priest and king. As Nibley notes, the priest "is slain in [Abraham's] place" </span><span style="color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">(</span><i style="color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Abraham in Egypt, </i><span style="color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">26). Is it any surprise, then, that Pharaoh and Abraham--or even Osiris and Abraham--should later also exchange places on the throne, as Joseph Smith describes the scene on Facsimile 3? </span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"><br style="font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif;" /><span style="font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif;">Yet every ceremonial preparation of a mummy evokes both the violent death as well as the resurrection of Osiris: a sacrifice "after the manner of the Egyptians"--the Osirian manner. To </span><i style="font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif;">wrap</i><span style="font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif;"> (</span><i style="font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif;">wt</i><span style="font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif;">) is itself both to kill and also to resurrect; for, without wrapping, there can be no subsequent rising (</span><i style="font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif;">wt</i><span style="font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif;"> resonates with </span><i style="font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif;">mwt</i><span style="font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif;">, </span><i style="font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif;">die</i><span style="font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif;">). The Ancient Egyptian Netherworld Books likely date, some of them at least, from the Middle Kingdom and flourish in the New, a span of time that also brackets the Patriarchal Age. Here's something from the little known Book of the Night: Addressing "the Asiatic, Libyan, Medjay, and Nubian threat at Egypt's four borders" (matching in exact cardinal order--east, west, north, south--the regional gods of Elkenah, Libnah, Mahmackrah, Korash, as carefully listed and depicted in the book of Abraham), the priest intones: </span></span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"><span style="font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif;"><br /></span></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"><span style="font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif;">"You are the rebels that 'made a wrapping,' 'made a wrapping' Father Osiris. Accordingly, Father Osiris commanded that I, in the form of Mekhenty-Irty [~ Horus], should smite this your enemy" (New Kingdom Netherworld Book of the Night II, 87-8 = Sederholm, </span><i style="font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif;">Pap</i><i style="font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif;">yrus 10808</i><span style="font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif;">, 126). </span></span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"><span style="font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif;"><br /></span></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"><span style="font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif;">Wrapping and killing collapse into one: to wrap the Osirian mummy, the action of Anubis, is thus also to kill the god with a knife, or similar instrument. The surprising phraseology found in "You <i>are the rebels</i></span></span><span style="color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">"; "made a <i>wrapping</i>"; "Smite </span><i style="color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">this your enemy</i><span style="color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">" (which replace "you the priest"; "killed"; and "smite </span><i style="color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">you</i><span style="color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">") is euphemistic, ironic, delicate: the notion of substitutes runs very deep in the Egyptian sacrificial night. </span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"><br /></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Anubis, that is, the masked priest of Anubis, who prepares the mummy, symbolically both slays and wraps. Yet, given the taboo surrounding Osiris' death, he does not "smite you," rather "this your enemy"; he doesn't kill, he wraps. The priest of Anubis thus slays the Enemy of Osiris and wraps Osiris in one succinct act. We may reject the seeric view of Facsimile 1 as the attempt by a priest of Pharaoh to sacrifice <i>Abraham</i>, but we're still stuck with a vignette depicting the sacrificial resurrection of <i>Osiris, </i>for the <span style="font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif;">act of sacrifice meets the idea of resurrection; each notionally requires the other. Well-known is that paradox of Osirian ceremony in which the sharp-clawed jackal Anubis, troubler of desert burials, first cuts into the body, then wraps it, preparatory to resurrection. </span></span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"><span style="font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif;"><br /></span></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"><span style="font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif;">Facsimile 1, at once, both illustrates Osiris' resurrection as described in the Book of Breathings </span><i style="font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif;">and </i><span style="font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif;">the arrested sacrifice and escape (also in token of resurrection) of any Osiris, including the special case of </span><i style="font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif;">Abraham</i><span style="font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif;">. As Nibley points out, Abraham becomes as Osiris, for the Egyptians found in Abraham's heralded escape from sacrificial death a living token or surety of Osirian promise. All this makes of Abraham, to Egyptian eyes, a king, Osiris redivivus. No wonder, "by [jittery] politeness of the king," Abraham, as Osiris was allowed broad scope to substitute on the throne, as depicted on Facsimile 3, wear Osiris' Atef Crown, and then teach about the cosmic powers (Abraham Facsimile 2), which pertained to the mystery of kingship, as Professor Jan Assmann sets forth in his many books.</span></span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"><br /></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">That is the world of Facsimile 1. </span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"><br /></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"><br /></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">But what of Facsimile 3? It's the very same thing. The Theban priesthood, following a hoary tradition, diligently searched out and put to use earlier vignettes and writings with which to interlace their own glory, a glory of royal aura. And as Nibley points out, the symbolic journey in the facsimiles from altar to throne, becomes the journey, the promise, the blessing of Abraham. Ritner, who loftily refuses to tackle any of the deeper themes of the Book of Abraham, including the momentous theme of ritual journey and inheritance, simply points to the names and titles now appearing on the vignettes and declares that "no amount of special pleading" can save Joseph Smith's labeling the figures as king, Abraham, prince, principal waiter, slave, mixing the figures of women for men, or assigning them whimsical names, such as Shulem or Olimlah. </span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"><br /></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"><br /></span><br />
<span style="color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif;"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 15.84px;">By saying that there is no way out now for Joseph Smith, except by recourse to a logically fallacious special pleading, is gentle mockery. But the joke about special pleading is also a telling reminder about what constitutes professorial authority. The professor decides what will count as a piece of egyptological evidence and, with a wave of the hand, what will not. Well, how about it, this matter of special pleading? None is necessary. Nibley always answers with evidence and logic. And if the evidence verifies the names the Prophet gives us as specific and peculiar to the world of Abraham, then logic dictates that he was also working with more than one document, whether an extant physical document or one revealed in seeric vision, not the Roman Period vignette of Facsimile 3 alone. </span></span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Shulem and Olimlah? The names (shades of Elkenah and Pharaoh) reflect the two worlds of Abraham: Syro-Palestine and Egypt. Professor Ritner never notes the possibility of such a bull's-eye, but we cannot fault an </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">egyptologist </i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">for not knowing the <i>latest </i>archaeological discoveries from </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Syria</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"> (Nabada) that yield both Shulem (also attested at Ebla) and Ishmael (matching the name of Abraham's son). Olimlah follows an Egyptian pattern: <i>Ol </i>or<i> Oli (wri)--im (imn)--lah (ra)</i>: Great is Amun-Ra (Nibley, <i>Abraham in Egypt</i>). And we now know enough of Ancient Egyptian phonology to prefer "lah" over "ra" for the name of the sun god. Hugh Nibley naturally isn't trying to prove that Olimlah must signify "Great is Amun-Ra," but he does establish how the name fits a common pattern. Nearly four decades on, no one has challenged, much less effectively challenged, what Nibley so effortlessly here points out. This is not "apologetics"; it would simply be irresponsible for a student of Egyptian not to point out such an obvious--though no less astonishing--correspondence. </span></span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">As for the next logical step in explaining how Joseph Smith translated, or interpreted, as he did, we must conclude that the Seer saw deeper than the reuse of the vignettes by the late Theban priests--he looked beyond the names pertaining to Ptolemaic Thebes--and instead gave us the </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Urtext</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">, the original text accompanying the original representations on either papyrus or stela, and their original intent. </span><span style="color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">And w</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">hy else possess the seeric gift, if not to see deeper than scholarship can? It's true that no scholar, however gifted, could unpack all the meaning that the Prophet Joseph could unpack. Therefore? Though a study of Egyptian language and texts can certainly throw light on some of Joseph Smith's statements and conclusions, no modern egyptologist has the gift to recover the world of Abraham from the vignettes alone. The papyrus scroll bearing the text of Abraham's record would be another matter--but we are left with the vignettes. Never taking any credit to himself, Hugh Nibley would always say: What a marvelous production Joseph Smith gives us in the book of Abraham!</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"><br /></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Again, Brother Joseph invited the entire learned world to "find out" and to translate all they could--and to share it posthaste. He wasn't working in a corner, hiding from the latest breakthroughs, or anything remotely like that. Special pleading was not his style. Neither is it ours.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Thus, when that same learned world makes and shares its findings, welcome or blistering, we need not gloss over anything. We may even answer.</span><br />
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<b style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;"><i><br /></i></b><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"></span><b style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;"><br /></b><br />
<b style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">III <i> All</i> Wrong</b><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">From the beginning the Latter-day Saints have savored intellectual challenge for the opportunities it provides to share the Scriptures of the Restoration. And here's something to welcome with rejoicing: </span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"><br /></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">"All of Smith’s published 'explanations' are incorrect, including the lone example defended by the new web posting: the water in which a crocodile is swimming (Fig. 12 of Fascimile 1), supposedly a representation of 'the firmament over our heads … but in this case, in relation to this subject, the Egyptians meant it to be to signify Shaumau, to be high, or the heavens.' Although Egyptians might place heavenly boats in the sky, that is not relevant 'in this case' where the water is placed below the figures and represents the Nile, not the sky. The selective defense of these explanations by the church is telling, and all other explanations are simply indefensible except by distorting Egyptian evidence."</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Although Ritner quite correctly notes a jumbled use, or "selected defense," rather than a proper thematic interweaving of what evidence a more considered essay might have brought together, the only distortion here is the typical critic's distortion of </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">method. </i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">As all students of Egypt know, representations in Egyptian art may signify </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">more than one thing</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">, and interpretation remains perforce delicate. To Western minds </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">a</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"> cannot be the equivalent of not </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">a </i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">(that is,</span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;"> -a</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">)</span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">; </i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">for the Egyptians </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">x</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"> may be both </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">a</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"> and </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">-a</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">. Through the decades, egyptologists have described such a </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">many-valued logic</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"> in tones of astonishment.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Now consider what Joseph Smith says in his Explanation of Facsimile 1: elsewhere such-and-such a figure or configuration signifies </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">x</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">, "but in this case, in relation to this subject, the Egyptians meant it to to signify" </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">y. </i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">In other words, figure <i>x, </i>here, signifies both <i>a</i> and <i>-a</i>.</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"> Nibley, who calls the "folly of giving just </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">one</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"> interpretation" "the pit into which Joseph Smith's critics have always fallen," quotes E. Otto: "the </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">greatest possible </i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">number of meanings in the briefest possible formulation"; "a mysterious plurality of meaning"; and H. Frankfort: "unbridled chains of associations and conclusions"; "we must attempt to hear the resonance of this polyphony of meaning." ("Many-valued logic": Erik Hornung, </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Conceptions of God in Ancient Egypt; </i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Hugh Nibley,</span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;"> Abraham in Egypt, </i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">116-17, 124).</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Ritner, therefore, is not "wrong" in identifying these zigzags with the Nile; nor is he "wrong" when he speaks of the crocodile as collecting the members of Osiris preparatory to his resurrection; nor, again, is he "wrong" when he elsewhere </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">also</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"> wonders whether the zigzags may <i>alternatively</i> represent the Lake of Khonsu. Yet which Nile? which of the several roles of the crocodile? For </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">in writings of ritual significance </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Nile</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"> may refer either to the terrestrial or to the celestial Nile, or to both at once. As for the mysterious Lake of Khonsu, the place of passage and transition in the burial rites, the whereabouts of its otherworldly location (or counterpart?) is anybody's guess. Facsimile 3 conveys, in text and in iconography, all three levels of the cosmos: the starry heavens, the terrestrial court, and the netherworld--and the events depicted thereon may unfold in any one, or </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">all</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">, of those realms (</span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Abraham in Egypt</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">, 123). And does not the same thing hold true for Facsimile 1? It does. Again: "</span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">All</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"> of Smith's published 'explanations' are incorrect." Here is special pleading; for Ritner elsewhere confirms the idea of the croc as "god of Pharaoh": "Horus-Sobek was a god of Pharaoh, so one out of five [explanations] is correct" (Robert K. Ritner, ed., </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">The Joseph Smith Egyptian Papyri</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">, 118). That being so, you would hope that "Translation and Historicity" would parade, rather than neglect as it does, such a direct hit.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Egyptian Religion is not a monolith, a fact to keep in mind when we interpret the representations found on temple walls and in papyrus rolls. Every region, city, mesa, or kiva, as throughout Classical Greece, as at Hopi, unfurls its own religious and symbolic universe. In the Faiyum, or "the inland sea" region (</span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">pa-ym--</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">a Semitic word), crocodile is king. The Book of the Faiyum equates that inland sea with the </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Mehet-Weret</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">, the Great Flood Waters of the Celestial Cow in which the crocodile with pharaonic crown swims in one eternal round (Horst Beinlich, </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Das Buch vom Fayum</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"> and this essay: http://archiv.ub.uni-heidelberg.de/propylaeumdok/2891/1/Beinlich_Faiyum_2013.pdf ,</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">While the cosmos of the Faiyum might not match Facsimile 1 in every particular, local interpretations still resonate with the larger abstraction we call </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Ancient Egyptian Religion</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">. In light of the evidence from the Pyramid Texts, Utterance 317 (R. Faulkner, </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">The Ancient Egyptian Pyramid Texts</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">, 99 and n.6), according to which Sobek swims in "the flood of the Great Inundation"-- that is to say, "The sky according to [Professor] Sethe"--and also in light of the Book of the Faiyum, we can unpack what Joseph Smith sets forth, as follows:</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">The zigzags do not here, as in most (or many) cases, represent Mehet-Weret (Flood-Great), the Great Cosmic Flood, or the Celestial Expanse, but in this case, in relation to this [particular] subject, they represent the very heights of heaven in which the crocodile as king and sun god reigns crowned and supreme. As Horus the Elder spreads his wings over all below, so the crocodile, as god of Pharaoh, swims round his domain, master of all he "surveys."</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Does Pharaoh rightfully attain such reach? might his realm extend even to Syria? Yes, says Brother Joseph, for the priest of Syrian Elkenah is the priest of Pharaoh, his representative in whose name and with whose delegated power he acts. Thus, when the priest is smitten, the "court of Pharaoh" mourns. The play of identities, even of substitute death, or sacrifice--again, a favorite theme of Hugh Nibley's--fits the ancient world like a glove.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">As in other Near Eastern and Mediterranean texts, the king (or his representative) is about to sacrifice a victim on a mountain top, when struck down by lightning. Thus: "Shamau to be high or the heavens," refers the ritual height of sacrifice, and, at once, to the watery depths below. </span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Am I open to other interpretations of these symbols? Of course. And Ritner's (often multiple) explanations are of deepest import. That's how the discipline works. Otherwise, we're left with the sort of simplistic arrangements parading as definitive science that everywhere propagate on the Internet, that glorious domain of the frosh. Who hasn't seen a chart comparing Joseph Smith's interpretations of the facsimiles with those of the freshman's confused assortment of egyptologists, including a few consigned to oblivion: in the left column, Joseph Smith; in the right, "E</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">gyptology"? Students of Egypt never reduce themselves to such a simplistic view of the ancient evidence: </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">x</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"> is only </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">x</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"> and</span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;"> y</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"> is </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">y</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">, except when distorting method to snap at an unwelcome reading. Neither do they indiscriminately pick egyptologists out of the air. E.A.Wallis Budge, anyone? </span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">There is never any good reason to box oneself in like that--unless there's a need to box ears: "all other explanations are simply indefensible"; "all" Smith's "'explanations'" are incorrect"--not even worth terming explanations, rather "explanations."</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">We all face amateur hour, and some, perhaps justifiably, learn to snap off "answers." Packaged books arrive in the mail; an early morning call awakes. The voice on the other end assures us that Ancient Egyptian is really Finnish. I've always been curious about Finland, so, dazed, I listen. The person on the other end of the lines says he has just had a wonderful exchange with Professor Erik Hornung--or was he just about to call him?</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">How to deal with such unwelcome packages and morning calls? How to deal with the Kemeticists, Saycians, Rosicrucians, and Latter-day Saints? Latter-day Saints should never get flustered, or throw up hands in surrender, just because an egyptologist or assyriologist gets testy or declines to discuss a particular position or point of evidence.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Even so, Oxford Professor John Baines warns against such testy response to ideas originating outside the discipline (John Baines,"Restricted Knowledge, Hierarchy, and Decorum," </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">JARCE</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"> 27, 1-23). We might miss an insight, he says, by throwing up walls. Baines laments his take-no-prisoners discipline, riddled with cliques, in which every other egyptologist must always be wrong for "us" to be right. Trenches zigzag the field--how startling, how devastating, what one egyptologist will say about another!--and we should always forgive our colleagues, for whom reputation is ever at stake, for failing to lay down the weapons of the discipline when addressing the hapless layman who blithely stumbles into no man's land. </span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"><br /></span><span style="color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif;"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 15.84px;">Yet while showing full charity to critics of the Book of Abraham, and even acknowledging that any or all of them make their own assessments in good faith, let's also remember to lend a little kindness to Joseph Smith, who worked </span></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">after the hieroglyphs had been cracked but before the discipline was well launched. Lacking access to those few then working in the field, he still had the good faith to share his ideas with the world--his book appeared in the pages of the most prominent newspaper in New York City so well as in Nauvoo. Does the Prophet ever claim that his interpretations are the only possible ones? No. He asks: If the world can find out these numbers (numbered figures), please do let us know (Explanation, Facsimile 2). </span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"><br /></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Coming to grips with the mind of the ancients takes decades--not a tap on the screen. Because of the powerful changes in our understanding of Egyptian religion, especially since the 1980's, it's unfair to judge Brother Joseph's work by holding to the conclusions of egyptologists working in the discipline's genesis, then to pronounce (as does Ritner): Joseph Smith--Wrong for a century-and-a-half! Some of the best work came early on, it is true, but the differences in understanding are revolutionary. Nibley finds powerful correspondences between Joseph Smith's Explanation of Facsimile 2 and those of 19th Century students of the hypocephalus; in the 21st Century the astonishment, as publications abound, only grows the greater. Who is reading? Who has taken even a first look at the new material?</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"><br /></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif;"><span style="font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Again, Professor Robert Ritner hears in the Prophet's Explanation voluble ravings in the manner of pre-egyptologist Athanasius Kircher (Ritner, "Translation and Historicity of the Book of Abraham--A Response"). Here's how Kircher translates an obeliskful of hieroglyphs: </span><br style="font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif;" /><br style="font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif;" /><span style="font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif;"></span><span style="font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif;">Hemphta the supreme spirit and archetype infuses its virtue and gifts in the soul of the sidereal world, that is the solar spirit subject to it whence comes the vital motion in the material or elemental world, and an abundance of all things and variety of species arises. From the fruitfulness of the Osirian bowl, in which, drawn by some marvelous sympathy, it flows ceaselessly. . . (quote from Ritner, "Review")</span><br style="font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif;" /><br style="font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif;" /><br style="font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif;" /><span style="font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">The "ceaselessly flowing" interpretations of Kircher by which Professor Ritner illustrates what he considers Joseph Smith's own absurd interpretations lacks the specificity, balance, concision, and coherence one finds throughout the thematically compact book of Abraham--and it lacks a little mystery besides. Kircher elaborates on but a single, spent, idea.</span><br style="font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif;" /><br style="font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif;" /><span style="font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Joseph Smith's Abraham, including the Explanation of Facsimile 2, merits a second look. Even should the reader disagree with him to the point of laughter, Joseph's take on the matter merits a jot of charity. Remember what he records of the persecution he suffered at the hands of neighbors: "being of very tender years, and persecuted by those who ought to have been my friends and to have treated me kindly, and if they supposed me to be deluded to have endeavored in a proper and affectionate manner to have reclaimed me" (Joseph Smith--History 1: 1:28). Where was kindness, propriety, affection?</span><br style="font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif;" /><br style="font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif;" /><span style="font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Even should we not believe a jot of it, we can all take a charitable look at Joseph Smith's explanation of Kolob (the central figure, the transcendent Amun-Ra in the form of the archaic Ram of Mendes) as being: "The First Creation . . First in government, last pertaining to the measurement of time. The measurement according to celestial time." The Prophet's focus on revolutions, temporal cycles and measurement, "grand governing" and thus hierarchically descending cosmic powers; on stars, earth, and sun, and transmission of light; or on altars and sacrifices and thrones, hardly deserves to be pilloried by either supremely gifted and educated scholars (who really must smile at amateurs); or by the countless eager sophisticates in train, who, though professing an advanced and and up-to-millennial understanding of all things past, present, and on Wikipedia, have never given a moment's thought to the symbolic representations found both on and in works of great antiquity. They've simply "reddit."</span></span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"><span style="font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif;"><br /></span></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif;"><span style="font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Nibley and Rhodes (2013: ps. 240-241) helpfully sum up Joseph Smith's "brief explanation" with the following headings for "words used":</span><br style="font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif;" /><br style="font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif;" /><span style="font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif;">1) cosmology: <i>earth, planets, firmament, Sun, stars, moon, revolution</i></span><br style="font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif;" /><span style="font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif;">2) measurement and number: <i>measurements of time</i>, <i>celestial time, day, cubit, years, one thousand, quarters, revolution</i></span><br style="font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif;" /><span style="font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif;">3) transmission of power or energy: <i>receiving light, borrows its light, governs planets or stars, receives its power, governing power</i></span><br style="font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif;" /><span style="font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif;">4) hierarchy or dominion (intelligence and purpose): <i>creation, residence, government, key, power, God, throne, authority, crown, light, the governing power</i></span><br style="font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif;" /><span style="font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif;">5) ordinances and procedures (relating the above to humanity): <i>sacrifice, altar, Temple</i></span><br style="font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif;" /><span style="font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif;">6) Joseph Smith's use of "special idiom or notation to convey the above," that is, the idea of representation, overlapping of symbolism, iconography conveying more than one meaning:<i>represent, signify, pertaining to, answering to, "but in this case, in relation to this subject, the Egyptians meant it to signify" x and not just y.</i></span></span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Whether these last themes point decisively to Kircher, or, perchance, to what contemporary egyptologists say about the hypocephali or the various books of the netherworld, is a matter for the diligent reader to discover. A careful study of both Scripture and egyptology is all Hugh Nibley ever asked of his readers. </span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"><br /></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"><br /></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Another complaint, rhetorically crafted and targeted for a particular, and blithely uninformed, lay audience (the target audience of the critics): "Smith confuses human and animal heads and males with females." But as </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">all</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"> <i>students</i> know, Ancient Egyptian Religion unfolds to the Western view as a parade of shifting crowns, heads, bodies marching across temple walls and down papyrus rolls. As for the particular confusion of male with female, please note that the Ma'at figure in Facsimile 3 wears a sheath dress that leaves the bosom uncovered. Even on the rough Hedlock woodcut, from which the facsimile was printed, the nipple can be seen; on the original papyrus, the nipple would have been indisputably clear; the same must be said for the Isis figure behind the throne. Just look at any other representations of Ma'at on papyrus, including elsewhere on the Joseph Smith Papyri. Given such artistic attention to the feminine, unmistakable to either prophet or disciple or wife or mother or visitor by the hundreds, why on earth would Joseph Smith, on purpose, in plain sight, make the same kind of illogical and improbable associations, </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">x</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"> equals both </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">a</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"> and</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"> </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">-a</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">, that the Egyptians themselves make in every place? (For more on the symbolic multiplicity of the Egyptians, as well as the Prophet's symbolic reading of Facsimile 3, see Hugh Nibley, "All the Court's a Stage," in </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Abraham in Egyp</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">t, a book published some </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">40 years ago</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">.)</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Latter-day Saints will not have our minds "stolen away" into believing that Joseph Smith could not tell the women from the men or the animals from the people on the vignette. He could, but that was only the beginning of interpretation. What's the point of having a Seer, unless he can scan semiotic horizons unfamiliar to the minds and logic of moderns? And what's the point of having a gifted scholar like Hugh Nibley, if we're not even going to read his words or ponder his sources, including the quoted works of hundreds of egyptologists? Neither neglect nor prejudice is any excuse at all. Remember, critics not only mock our appeals to testimony, they also do all they can to prevent our reading the words of our own scholars or delving into their footnotes. In doing so, are they not diminishing us as a culture and as a people? Have we so little confidence in our own honor and ability as a university-building Church, that we must shrink before every wind of ridicule? before every waving of diploma?</span><br />
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<b>IV</b> <b>Come and See</b><br />
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Recently I visited the Church History Library in Salt Lake City, Utah, and saw once more the vignette from which book of Abraham Facsimile 1 is taken. I looked at it several times, and thought deeply. What a joy to see the papyrus itself, not a facsimile, not a photograph nor a digitized copy, but the very ink, the very hieroglyphs, the vignette itself in all its design and character!</div>
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To understand the vignette in its fullness, we must turn to the pages of the book of Abraham in the Pearl of Great Price and read the explanations of a latter-day Seer. Otherwise, we risk seeing only a part of the meaning, that part which reflects darkly in the mirror of modern scholarship, a scholarship at a dusty multi-millennial distance from the lost past.</div>
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I do not fault today's scholars for not seeing what Joseph Smith saw: Who can be expected to possess the high gift of the seer to see things as they really are, and as they really once were?</div>
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Yet I do detect a mote in the scholarly eye, when students of an ancient civilization pretend to a preeminent knowledge of that past. We learn to read an ancient script, yes, and master our tentative lexical lists--but to boast? "Yea, how quick to boast" (Helaman 12:5).</div>
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What do we know? What can we know? Professor Westendorf would tell his students that no living person can know Ancient Egypt as it once was; the best we might do is to build theoretical models by which to approximate that past. We may come, thereby, if not to understanding, at least to a common ground for observation and discussion. We all recall those ridiculously disproportionate models fashioned by scientists to teach the public something of the swirling atom, to grant students a brush with a molecule, and the like. Without the model, there can be no<i> logos</i>, that is to say, no -<i>ology</i>. We would all drift toward incoherence, then into stillness.<br />
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Such limitations, however, do not apply to seers, because "things shall be made known by them which otherwise could not be known" (Mosiah 8:17). Such gifted revelators something call to mind the transcendence of translated beings, like Enoch or John the Beloved, being themselves<i> translating beings</i> capable of putting disparate peoples and cultures in touch with each other, as though they themselves transcend both space and time and differences in language and culture.<br />
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As I consider the tone of scholarship everywhere today, I wonder how well any of us are doing at building models that invite dialogue--open, demanding, cheerful dialogue--about the forgotten past.</div>
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For instance, as Professor Robert Ritner, in <i>The Joseph Smith Papyri: A Complete Edition</i>, winds up his argument against the Prophet Joseph's explanation of Facsimile 1, an argument consisting of merest <i>ex cathedra</i> declaration after declaration of Folly and Error, he bangs down the gavel:</div>
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"Except for those willfully blind, the case is closed."<br />
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The words of Scripture best suited to set alongside such a declaration are those of King Limhi in Mosiah 8: </div>
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"And now, when Ammon had made an end of speaking these words [about the interpreters and the high gift of seers] the king rejoiced exceedingly, and gave thanks to God, saying: Doubtless a great mystery is contained within these plates, and these interpreters were doubtless prepared for the purpose of unfolding all such mysteries to the children of men."</div>
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I say the same of Facsimile 1, or of any of the Abraham facsimiles: a great mystery is contained within that vignette, rich as it is with representation and symbolism. And, as I see it, Joseph the Seer has unfolded a portion of its ancient "mysteries to the children of men" in latter-days, with more unfolding to come for those who seek it. Neither is the door shut to those who seek either to understand or add to the Prophet's Explanation of Facsimile 1 by the study of Near Eastern languages and cultures. I attest to just how very open that door lies. Enter and seek--and find. It doesn't make a jot of difference whether anybody attempts to stop up that avenue of pursuit: seek and you will find abundance "of treasures hid in the sand." "And [you] shall find wisdom and great treasures of knowledge, even hidden treasures." Yes, you shall find even the Pearl of Great Price (Deuteronomy 33; Doctrine and Covenants 89).</div>
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As I reflect on Professor Ritner's pronouncement of blindness, even willful blindness, I am compassionately startled at what many apparently cannot see or do not even care to look for. "Look to God and live" (Alma 37). Like Limhi I feel to exclaim:</div>
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"O how marvelous are the works of the Lord, and how long doth he suffer with his people; yea, and how blind and impenetrable are the understandings of the children of men; for they will not seek wisdom, neither do they desire that she should rule over them!"<br />
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<b>V A Word to the Wise: Any Fool Can See</b><br />
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Wisdom! You may rule over me! Like Emerson, "I am weary of the surfaces, and die of inanition." If Hokhmah, Ma'at, Sofia, the Wisdom of the Ages, not sophistication nor prating invective, desires to rule my mind, a mind that now hopes to see, She may.<br />
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Let's take a look at her judicious works.<br />
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Journalist Doug Gibson, reprising on Twitter a frankly objective review of Professor Ritner's edition of the Joseph Smith Papyri, a review originally published in the <i>Ogden Standard Examiner,</i> observes:<br />
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"To Ritner, the 'case is closed.' What Smith claimed, and the LDS Church claims today, is simply false, he says.<br />
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"Ironically, that certainty of Ritner's may be the weakest point of his arguments. One can make a case that to draw any conclusion that science is settled can be called unscientific.<br />
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"With ancient Egyptian-era digs going on in the world, it's an audacious claim to say that part of a book that millions regard as scripture is forever concluded to be a hoax"<br />
(<i>Mormon History and Culture</i>: "The Mummy's Curse and the Book of Abraham").<br />
http://www.standard.net/stories/2012/04/29/scholar-challenges-joseph-smith-translation<br />
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While there is little original about the case Ritner presents against the book of Abraham, he presents it with a blare of trumpets. And, as we have already seen, few blasts sound so sharply as his ridicule of the Prophet's explanations of certain goddesses appearing on Facsimile 3. How is it that the Prophet confuses goddesses with mortal males?<br />
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Yet addressing the very same embarrassment in 1956--when Professor Ritner was barely three--Hugh Nibley had the following to say (in the form of an imaginary dialogue):<br />
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"'It <i>is</i> rather quaint,' Professor F. commented. '<i>Any fool can see</i>, for example, that the figures called Pharaoh and his son are women.'<br />
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"Yes,' Mr. Blank answered, 'a myopic moron could <i>see</i> that, and that is why it so remarkable. It is plainly intentional.'"<br />
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Mr. Blank, in search of the patiently recovered remarkable rather than the surface visible, goes on to cite arcane works of egyptology in hopes of revealing why Joseph Smith discerns a trace of Pharaoh or Prince in the outward form of a goddess (<i>Lehi in the Desert. The World of the Jaredites. There Were Jaredites</i>, 336-337).<br />
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To read anything of the Egyptian past, the student must drop all preconceived notions, including the norms of Western logic, and, well, venture. . .<br />
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As a serious reader of Professor Ritner's <i>Joseph Smith Egyptian Papyri: A Complete Edition</i>, I note both strengths and weaknesses; I note sound transcription, sound translation--and the unsound (and I've tallied a list). But what surprises this reader is the professor's singular lack of intellectual curiosity about the documents he assays to translate. Everything translates into the matter-of-fact, if not the outright dull--these documents bore the professor. Such dull, technical work, hardly conveys the original intent: shall we even call these translations? Neither does Ritner await anyone else's sheaf-laden return from the library. Even as we, brim with joy, rejoice in discovery and ready our report, he interrupts by slamming the classroom door in our faces. And Ritner makes it abundantly clear that he is not the first to do so. Student after student, he notes, has slammed the door on the book of Abraham since, say, 1861. Yet as Nibley asks: Will the latch hold?<br />
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A year after declaring the "case closed" "for all but the willfully blind," in his <i>Complete Edition</i>, the busy professor returns to the subject with the same fervid rhetoric in his review of the Gospel Topics essay.<br />
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The latch never holds.<br />
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Intellectual Curiosity? We wonder whether documents such as the Book of Breathings or the hypocephalus have anything profound to tell us about the Egyptian mind? Do they yield a chapter in the intellectual history of the race? Might they have something--anything--to say to religious seekers? Or are they, as the Chicago Professor dryly puts it: "amulets" of "common" funerary hopes? Contrast Nibley's own translation of one of these "amulets," the <i>rare</i> Breathings text (and keep in mind that Nibley dismissed the results as being both tentative and technical)--and it's a joy to read, mistakes or none. There's a sweep that captures the Egyptian usage and idiom and makes exchange in poetic coin.<br />
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Ritner's "complete" transcriptions and translations, fleeting in comment, carry a cold and hurried air. We don't come to understanding. The book evinces a single-minded purposefulness in an impatient and aggrieved tone. Ritner not only declares: All Joseph Smith says is false! He also insists of the supposedly ubiquitous, thus "common," "amulets": Nothing to see here, move along.<br />
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The tone runs counter to that of Professor Ritner's other famous book, <i>The Mechanics of Ancient Egyptian Magical Practice, </i>which the reader can hardly put down. And Ritner's terse museum-label comments about these particular Egyptian texts also stand at odds with the trend of egyptological writing since 1980. Go to any library and select books written by Jan Assmann, Erik Hornung, Alexandra von Lieven, Dimitri Meeks, Sylvie Cauville, John Baines, and so on, and see whether these ever fail to stir the soul with the wonders of the Egyptian mind, see whether these don't seek to draw the universal treasuries into the expanding picture.<br />
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Hugh Nibley also draws together documents of like thematic and cultural bearing, treasures he believes ought to read in light of the Joseph Smith Papyri and vice-versa. He invites the reader to study these, ponder the larger <i>Kulturkreis</i>, and then to decide whether such productions of the Egyptian mind as the hypocephalus, the Breathings document, or the vignettes, are worthy of our attention, whether we also read Abraham's record or not (see <i>The Message of the Joseph Smith Papyri</i> (1975) and <i>One Eternal Round</i> (2010). Amulets? Shall we brush these collections aside in our knowing simplicity? or shall we take a second look?</div>
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<b style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;"><b style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;"><span style="font-weight: 400;">The test has to do with curiosity--and with attentiveness to matters of both intellectual history and of eternal concern. Ever reading, ever studying, ever discovering, we wait on the Lord for the fullness of truth.</span></b></b><br />
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<b style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">VI The <i>Rise</i> of the Book of Abraham</b><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Professor Ritner closes his review of "Translation and Historicity of the Book of Abraham" by asking the Authorities of the Church of Jesus Christ to discard the book of Abraham as canonical Scripture and instead consider it Joseph Smith's "perhaps[!] well-meaning" but flawed attempt to sound lost cultural values beyond his depth. The confident, caustic tone cries Checkmate: "With the Book of Abraham now confirmed as a perhaps well-meaning, but erroneous invention by Joseph Smith, the LDS church may well devote some reflection to the status of the text."</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">The Apostles made no response. Demands come and go. And it comes as no surprise when men and women "cast many things away which are written and esteem them as things of naught" (2 Nephi 33:2). The living Abraham continues upon his throne, in his exalted state, and forever holds the keys of his book (Doctrine and Covenants 132).</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">I do have a response to Professor Ritner's request, however.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">It's high time for one realization to dawn on critics of Abraham's restored writings: Joseph Smith gave us more than one book of Abraham. The Joseph Smith Translation of Genesis yields as many surprises about Abraham's world as does the Pearl of Great Price. Revelations in the Doctrine and Covenants and many verses in the Book of Mormon give us yet a Third Book of Abraham. 1st, 2nd, 3rd, and 4th Nephi find a worthy match in Abraham.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Dismiss any one of these books, and we'll hand you yet another. Discard Potiphar's Hill, and see Mount Hanabal rise lofty among the Mountains of Moab. Reject Shulem, and find blessed Esaias (Doctrine and Covenants 84). Each of these various "books" of Abraham, besides ringing with antiquity, also contain new words of divine revelation received in his dispensation and now offered to us--words about covenants made long ago by the Father of the Faithful.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">And Latter-day Saints, by unanimous vote, stand in eternal covenant relation to the book of Abraham--to every last word and explanation. Its place, including its genuine nature, stands as one of unquestioned permanence--no matter how the translation was effected or what opinions about the ineffable method of seeric learning and reading we may choose to hold.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">There is no end to the revelatory world of Joseph Smith. In like manner, our covenantal link to the World of Abraham continues. The book of Abraham belongs to what we call a Pearl of Great Price. We will never sell the pearl or give it away. Neither can the covenantal link all members have with the book--affirmed by unanimous vote in General Conference--ever be broken. As we hold true to that covenant, other books will yet come forth from the dust. There is more of parchment and of papyri than we can now imagine.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">One thing we can take from the Gospel Topics Essay: The living Prophets and The Councils of the Church will never set the various books of Abraham aside--not now, not any of them, not a jot or a tittle of them, no never. Neither will the seeric Explanations of the three facsimiles ever disappear from the hundreds of thousands of copies of Scripture, copiously pouring from the presses day by day. Will living prophets claiming direct revelation (available to all) about the genuine nature of the Book of Abraham--and isn't that what the essay says?--ever stop the presses from rolling? You might as well stretch out your hand to stop the mighty Missouri River in its course, or turn it upstream.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Attacks will make no difference whatsoever to any claim carrying the revelatory imprimatur of the founding Prophet. Answers to attacks, new and old, scriptural and linguistic and historical, will continue to be shared to all willing to study them. And, in the simplest expression of which I am capable, the linguistic evidence sustaining the name and description of Kolob will never cease to hold the interest both of Latter-day Saints and of many, many others. Such telling witnesses to truth will yet fill the whole earth, as the waters fill the great deep.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.84px;">Earlier Draft</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.84px;">While Latter-day Saints may find critical reviews of the Pearl of Great Price variously illuminating, the academic world ultimately seeks so much more of all of us: we are now to yield up <i>all </i>our Scriptures, <i>all</i> our claims to prophetic dispensation, and <i>all</i> this nonsense about freedom to express belief at will.</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.84px;"><br /></span><span style="color: #424242;"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 15.84px;">Multiple voices proclaim the downfall of the book of Abraham. And i</span></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-size: 15.84px;">t's just a wee book: 12 pages, one for each of the tribes of Israel. Let it go. But is the wee book a flimsy book?</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.84px;"><b>I Reviewing The Gospel Topics Essay: "Translation and Historicity of the Book of Abraham"</b></span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15.84px;">The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, in the interests of sustaining the scriptural claims of the book of Abraham published a Gospel Topics essay on her official Webpage. "Translation and Historicity of the Book of Abraham," got wide coverage and summaries of it have become part of the curriculum for youth and young adults, but any reader, young or old, must now also take into account the prompt response crafted by Professor Rob</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">ert K. Ritner, professor of Egyptology at the University of Chicago. To begin with, all Latter-day Saints should be very grateful that Professor Ritner, in the form of several articles and one book, has joined in the debate over Abraham. That's what Saints love to see, and it shouldn't bother anyone in the least when his take on matters does not match that of Joseph Smith. The Scriptures were written for "the benefit of the world" and "to draw all men" to One, who "commandeth none that they shall not partake" (2 Nephi 26:24). Church members do not own the Scriptures they enfold to their hearts; all that the Saints possess in this ephemeral world are gift boxes containing the invitation a loving Savior sends to all men (see Alma 5). Abraham invites readers, and it's the open discussion that counts--so long as that discussion never dismisses any participant, argument, or evidence, with a wave of the hand. </span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">The various Gospel Topics Essays have surprised, even dismayed, many a reader, Saint or none. That mistakes would be made, misunderstandings abound, essays updated as needed, more questions swirl, was made clear by Church leaders from the start. We learn together and questions swirl: Has the Church herself now renounced or downgraded the book of Abraham? or any other part of her vast Scriptural, historical, or doctrinal heritage? </span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Learning requires a measure of vulnerability, and new learners and essays alike require a space for reflection and review, but the newspapers wouldn't let either the essays or the learners alone. Starter essays drew attention from the <i>Salt Lake Tribune</i> and <i>New York Times</i> alike, and misinterpretation immediately sprang up in that nutrient sparse, low-depth soil. "Church officially admits Joseph Smith practiced polygamy! Lifelong Members Stunned!" </span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">How can anyone argue with that kind of ignorance? Church authorities, who saw the essays (mostly) as updated summaries themselves were stunned at the reports. I remember a round rebuke from one of the Twelve at a stake event: Go back, and "read every word." </span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Readers, in the delicate moment, found no refuge for independent thought.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">And what of the rough-and-tumble "Translation and Historicity of the Book of Abraham"? </span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Professor Ritner opens with a volley meant to stun: "Translation and Historicity" "represents new reflection on a document whose authenticity as </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">verifiable history </i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">is now officially acknowledged to be in serious dispute." The volley falls short of the mark. The very title speaks to historicity: the essay makes claims based on historicity and backs them with evidence from expansive bibliography the reader is free to study. Ritner may disagree with the evidence so presented, and he may misread the intent of the Church in sponsoring the piece, well and good; but the claim of "official acknowledgment" and "[the Church's] discomfort with its own conclusions and reasoning" rings false. </span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">And what of this "serious dispute" over the book of Abraham as "verifiable history"? Has there yet been any Jewish or Christian scholar, or any other believer for that matter, who puts forth the claim that the history of Abraham's life, as recorded in Genesis, is "<i>verifiable</i> history" in the same way that historical figures appearing in a multiplicity of ancient or modern records meet some standard or other of verification? No. That the life of Abraham appears only in Scripture has never been a matter of "serious" nor any other kind of "dispute". So exactly how does the Church's Gospel Topics essay "<i>now</i> officially acknowled[ge]" denial of such a commonplace recognition of the lack of extra-Biblical evidence for the Patriarchal narratives in the Bible? Was there, then, an earlier opposing position officially argued by Church authorities? If so, where published? Or does the appearance of the essay's lengthy bibliography supporting the historical claims of the book of Abraham--sustaining not verifying--the first such <i>ever </i>"officially" published, reflect a surging "serious dispute" over "verifiable history"?</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Besides, what are the rules, or whose rules, for verifying any historical narrative whatsoever or establishing any one of the multiple interpretations to which historians subject all narrative? Let's all eschew a facile historiographical scientism. And just how novel is it for leaders of any religious community to invite adherents to seek answers about Scripture, which are <i>ever</i> also answers touching on historicity in prayer? St. Paul, a Witness, and all Christians else, hold the Resurrection of Jesus Christ as <i>the</i> Event in history. </span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">While the essay does say--and the wording is awkward and unclear--matters of "veracity and value" "cannot be <i>settled</i> by scholarly debate [alone]," the same sentiment has always (not "newly") been made about the Book of Mormon: Another Testament of Jesus Christ--including its historical geography--the book of Moses, and even about the latter-day visions, doctrines, and ordinances pertaining to the Restored Church in history--and still unfolding. "Translation and Historicity," despite clumsy, even painful, syntax, diction, and linking--and several unforced errors--does not partake of a rhetoric consistent with a document of surrender. No. It tackles the questions swirling about the book of Abraham head on. Acknowledging the difficult, it proposes, in places of eloquence, a reason for faith, never surrender.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Ritner's response--really a must for all readers of the Gospel Topics essay--brings together everything he finds objectionable about the book of Abraham and the essay, including so many things that Hugh Nibley, without flinching, addressed and answered as thoroughly as he was able in 1968-1970, 1975, 1980, and 2013, a half-century of articles and hefty tomes. I can't summarize all Ritner's objections in a review (Joseph Smith's attempts, at publication seven years after purchase, to deal with flaking papyrus or lacunae in the facsimiles--here, unjustly and obnoxiously labeled "forgeries"; the question of anachronisms; the bizarre names). But let it be understood that to invoke abstract ideas such as </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">scholarship</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"> or </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Egyptology</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"> as opposed to <i>apologetics</i> is no reasoned way to escape the many dozens of well-expressed insights, evidences, arguments, and pointed questions about both Abraham and the Egyptians generously put forth by Hugh Nibley, Michael Rhodes (and others) over many decades. Read the "Conclusion" to Nibley's </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Abraham in Egypt. </i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Here we find over fifty points of evidence for the antiquity of the book of Abraham. Does Professor Ritner address a single one? No. Neither does he think it necessary to do so. </span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">I want to see dialogue based on what books say rather than a rhetorical <i>declaratio</i> made on the authority of capital </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">E</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"> "<b>E</b>gyptology" and "<b>E</b>gyptologists." Speaking <b><i>E</i></b><i>x cathedra</i> stuns the hapless layman, yet just how often would like noble appeals to the authority of Egyptology command space in the journals, monographs, and books published within the discipline? Never. The discipline requires a full engagement with argument on all sides of any question. Yet Latter-day Saints also bear some fault for the fray. Dr. Ritner complains often, and justly, about his own articles and books not receiving due notice, or proper footnoting, in discussions about the book of Abraham. From this point forward, may we all be willing, without neglect, prejudging, abuse, bullying, or ad hominem reference, and without reference to the Church one belongs to, to the university at which one may teach, or not teach, or the books or articles one may have read or not read, to consider with quiet heart the arguments made by every student. </span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">The book of Abraham belongs as much to Robert Ritner as it does to anybody else--it is certainly not the special province of the "educated" or of the "apologist." A duly credentialed Hugh Nibley, by the way, never called himself an "apologist." Not once. So why use that overworked, stunningly misunderstood, and even abstract <i>label</i>, which properly belongs to other Christian traditions to dismiss him? As Richard Lloyd Anderson also once told me, careful student of the New Testament that he was: It's the wrong word--which is to say, it doesn't fit our story or our community (For a glimpse at the meaning and purposes of apologetics throughout Christian History, I recommend the entry "Apologetics" in Mircea Eliade [ed.], <i>The Encyclopedia of Religion</i>. Hint: A little more BYU's current Maxwell Institute and JSPP than the extracurricular FAIR.)</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"><b>II The Facsimiles</b></span>
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Now Professor Ritner is quite correct in challenging the claim made for decades in the so-called "apologetic" publications that a Roman period Egyptian magical papyrus sustains what Joseph Smith says about Abraham and the lion couch in Facsimile 1. </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">The Demotic Magical Papyrus of London and Leiden</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"> features a lion couch in connection with a love charm, and </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Abraham</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"> is one of the various magical names written under the couch. But what of that? The vignettes don't look anything alike! </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Abraham</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">, in the middle of another elaborated chain of invoked names, also appears next to </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Pupil of the Wedjat-Eye.</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"> Does that side-by-side occurrence, or link, automatically spell </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">hypocephalus</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"> and thus</span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;"> Abraham Facsimile 2</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">"? No. If so, how? and exactly how? Latter-day Saint students, a quarter-of-a-century since, wondered about a link between the magic and the facsimiles--well and good to wonder--but what is the substance of the claim? In other words, What should a perplexed but grateful reader do with such a claim? Teach it to friends?</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">And why does the Gospel Topics essay disguise the magic manual by calling it a text belonging to an "Egyptian temple library?" Placing </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">temple</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"> and </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Abraham</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"> in a single sentence may enchant the Latter-day Saint reader, but it's nothing more than sleight-of-hand. If the reader wishes to enjoy potions concocted of pulverized shrewmouse or to revel in jumbled chains of Egyptian, Greek, Hebrew names invoked for the greater cause of love or power, </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">The</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"> </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Demotic Magical Papyrus of London and Leiden</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"> is your book. </span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Let us spare our fellow Saints, who know magic when they see it, from having to murmur charms and lisp spells to all challengers, while also choking back laughter: "CHA CHA CHA CHA CHA CHA CHA. Then clap thrcc timcs, TAK TAK TAK, go 'pop, pop, pop' for a long timc; hiss a grcat hiss, that is, one of some length." Lay readership? Even the least among us can see how the scholarly translator (Hans Dieter Betz) turned the very idea of translation into something of a joke wrapped in an enigma: "<i>a great hiss, that is, one of some length</i>." And how exactly should any of us explain the following command from the Demotic Magical Papyrus: "Come to me, Kanab"!? perhaps in terms of Kanab, Utah, Gateway to Zion and Kolob Canyon? </span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"><br /></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Laughter wonderfully stirs the honest student to assess whatever parades today as Scriptural scholarship in our Restored Gospel community, to test whether so much of what editors deem worthy of publication, amounts to little more than "Come to me, Kanab!" the apologetic dance of "pop, pop, pop," or even a chill "cha, cha, cha." As we trek toward the heart of the 21st Century, may loyal students of the Scriptures take up the challenge to write more thoughtfully, and with increasing simplicity and clarity, as befits an enhanced reverence for the Restored Word of God.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Even worse, because the magical book, or collection, postdates the Patriarchal Age by eons, the Gospel Topics essay, to make it relevant to the book of Abraham, resorts to claiming it shares a date with the Joseph Smith papyri. Yet hundreds of years also separate the magical archive from the papyri, so how does the claim stand at all, much less lend weight to a principal idea also expressed in the essay that the Joseph Smith Papyri, at the time of its purchase, included what was merely a copy, or copy of a copy, of a very ancient book of Abraham?</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Ritner therefore rightly contests any attempt to link these magical texts with the Abraham facsimiles, though what he says mostly repeats what Ed Ashment convincingly set forth decades ago. Let's drop the matter, appreciate the work of these brethren in the vineyard of scholarship, and go on our way rejoicing.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Professor Ritner also challenges the essay's citation of a medieval Coptic text about Persian King Shapur and his dealings with Abraham as sound evidence for the book of Abraham. (<i>Coptic</i> names both the Egyptian Christian Church and the last stage of the Egyptian language, an idiom written mostly in Greek letters.) The text points to Persia, it derives from Persia. While the late and derivative Coptic story may show correspondences with other stories about Abraham circulating in antiquity, and while these last may in turn recall in places our own book of Scripture, its prominent appearance in "Translation and Historicity" is an unforced error. The document is certainly not "a later <i>Egyptian</i> text," as claimed, with sleight-of-hand, "that tells how the Pharaoh tried to sacrifice Abraham." Again, how could any Latter-day Saint reader in discussion with friends use the Coptic tale to sustain the the book of Abraham? None of us can be expected just to throw out smoke: <i>Coptic</i> signifies <i>Egyptian</i>, therefore <i>Coptic text mentioning Abraham</i> points to our <i>book of Abraham</i><i>.</i></span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Ritner further objects, with <i>some</i> justification, to the essay's references to ritual slaughter, found in various Middle Kingdom sources, to support the story of Abraham's sacrifice, and the matter, promising as it may be, does require a clearer explanation and added argument before the reader can arrive at a full assessment. When ideas and evidence are contested, however strong the evidence may seem to be, the opportunity now becomes ours to engage productively--and also to dig deeper. Bridges to scriptural understanding via the historical record require both careful footings and also awareness of audience, lest, having the best of intentions, students either construct a "bridge to nowhere" or require of faithful and alert, but new, readers the holding of a "bridge too far." God never requires a "bridge too far for faith."</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">In the grand tournaments, therefore, of </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Abraham v. the Demotic Magical Papyrus</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">, we all must call points as we see them, as do watchful and mature umpires, on the chair or the line, and never as partisans in a religious contest. Besides, the games and the sets play themselves out so very often as a contest of personalities and academics, each opponent vying for the mastery. The sets once lost, the tournament ended, a continuing challenge on the same questions of evidence can only be characterized as quixotic. What we rightly seek, says Hugh Nibley, may be characterized as </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">the specific and the peculiar</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">, the kind of evidence that approaches demonstration. The deep faith undergirding the Holy Scriptures, in their inspiration, in their writing, transmission, and preservation, in their restoration, reception, and in their reading, as we strive to receive into our spiritual bloodstream the nutrients vital to eternal life, cannot flow from a tilting at windmills, from sets lost, or from trying to hold a bridge far, far, behind the line.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Here's something else that the Chicago Professor likely gets right: the vignette we call Facsimile 1 has thematic correspondence to Hor's Breathing Document; it's there at the beginning of the document for a reason. It captures the moment of Osirian renewal and resurrection which that ritual document afford. The Gospel Topics essay had renewed Nibley's old observation about vignettes often being placed at some remove from passages describing them--thus "out-of-place" to our eyes. The observation holds true in many cases, but Ritner correctly refuses to disassociate the vignette from the Breathings Document. I had already reached the same conclusion based on what the text alongside the vignette says of the priestly office of Hor, with whom the document was buried. Among other offices, the accompanying text identifies Hor as "the Prophet of Min who massacres His enemies." </span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Latter-day Saint students, running in the track of Professor Marc Coenen's clarifying publications about the ancient owners and dating of the Joseph Smith Book of Breathings, all take note that the lot in the priesthood devolving on Hor includes a rare office associated with the (combined) deity Resheph-Min: "Prophet of Min who massacres his enemies." Does the office somehow correspond to the action depicted on Facsimile 1, or to other ideas therewith associated? Resheph, who dwells in the house of Montu [Manti], a Canaanite god of war inducted into the Egyptian pantheon, shares an identity in Min, who, in turn, shares a role with Horus as avenger of his father, Osiris.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Since our Theban priest also bears the name Hor (that is "Horus", to cite the Greek form of the admittedly common name), why not also take on Horus' avenging role, the very same role belonging to Min and to Resheph? </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Any other likenesses? That the Book of Abraham's violent "god of El-Kenah" bears comparison with Canaan's Resheph, whose name (</span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">r-sh-p</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">) bespeaks the vivid lightning and flames of fire, must be clear to the attentive reader of the Book of Abraham! Abraham survives lightning, flame, and earthquake, all of which figure in Abraham Chapter One, and all of which belong to the vengeance of Min, or Min-Resheph. Besides, one of Abraham's own descendants, through Ephraim, bears--and here's ritual reversal and the sign of escape--the name Resheph, surely now to be understood as descriptive of the God of Israel: "I cause the wind and the </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">fire</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"> to be </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">my chariot</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">," Jehovah tells rescued Abraham (Abraham 2:7; see 1 Chronicles 7:25; for Resheph in a chariot see Professor Muennich's, </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">The God Resheph in the Ancient Near East</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">, 112f.).</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Though Professor Coenen sees in Facsimile 1 not a scene of sacrifice but of Osirian resurrection <i>and</i> the conception of Horus (for Osiris not only escapes death, he lives on to found a dynasty), the figure on the vignette that Joseph Smith names the priest of Elkenah, or the priest of Pharaoh (who is thus the priest of the living Horus, the living king), does something recall a surviving bronze figure of "Min who massacres the enemy": "dressed in a short kilt, held up by two bands that cross over the breast and back" (p. 1113). Osiris' violent death (and its vengeance), resurrection, and an endless posterity all form a single constellation that Facsimile 1, <i>Osiris stirring on the lion couch</i>, delicately manages to call forth. Joseph Smith sees in the same--"in this [particular] case," he says--Abraham's arrested sacrifice at the hands of a priestly enemy, "dressed in a short kilt, held up by two bands that cross over the breast and back," his rising from the altar as earth and sky shake and flare, and his promise of an endless posterity.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: xx-small;">I'm drawing on an earlier post entitled, "The Book of Abraham: Case Closed (or Sarah to the Rescue," posted Dec. 2011. See Marc Coenen, "The dating of the Papyri Joseph Smith I, X and XI and Min who massacres his enemies," in Willy Clarysse, <i>Egyptian Religion: </i>1103-14. A detailed review of the Hor Book of Breathings and the nature and historical setting of the priestly offices of Hor and Osoroeris, including examples of symbolic slaughter and burning showing correspondences to Facsimile 1, as described by Joseph Smith, is John Gee, "Some Puzzles of the Joseph Smith Papyri," <i>FARMS Review</i> 20:1 (2008), 113-157. </span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">The Egyptian record attests a symbolic killing of foreigners, a ceremonial act or depiction only, at centers like Philae, Edfu, and Karnak, with special maces, swords, and clubs, including "a particular kind of [bladed] mace much resembling in shape the </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Dd</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">-pillar, the symbol of Osiris' enduring life and dynasty," as also resurrection (Val H. Sederholm, </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Papyrus British Museum 10808 and Its Cultural and Religious Setting</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">, Leiden: Brill, 2006, 114). How strange that the bladed mace symbolically used to kill foreign victims in royal ceremony also symbolizes the perpetuity of the Osirian dynasty. But the Egyptians are not finished: "The king, playing Horus-Min, cuts off the heads of his father's enemies at the stroke of a pole-axe [or bladed mace, both sword and club]. The special word for </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">killing</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"> at Edfu [Edfu is also </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Ddj</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">!] alludes to Osiris and the stability of his dynastic line" (Sederholm, </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Papyrus 10808</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">, 117). Both name, action, and instrument of sacrifice thus confirm the dynastic line. No sacrifice; no posterity. That's also the paradox of Abraham and Isaac. It's an Osirian paradox, an Osirian unfolding.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">At Karnak we see paired depictions of Resheph <i>and</i> "the pharaoh stabbing two prisoners kneeling in a metal kettle [for burning] with their arms tied behind their backs in front of [a representation of] 'Min who [massacres] his enemies' " (Coenen, 1113). Why the duality</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">? Does the depiction show Pharaoh as both priest and king? He is both, after all. Or does it hint at the king working in concert with his priestly representative? Pharaoh, twinned with a Canaanite god, here acts in the office of Min who massacres his enemies. And as Pharaoh, so Abraham's "priest of Pharaoh," who is also the priest of the Canaanite god of Elkenah. And as Elkenah, or as Resheph-Min, so also Ptolemaic priest Hor, the owner of our Breathings document. We continue with Coenen's description of the ritual sacrifice of Pharaoh and his divine Canaanite counterpart: Behind Min "stands a tree on a hill surrounded by a wall" (which may register a specific place-name), a setting that recalls "the hill called Potiphar's Hill, at the head of the plain of Olishem." The tree (or, Heliopolitan pillar) likewise recalls the sacrifice of the "three virgins" who "would not bow down to worship gods of </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">wood</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"> or of </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">stone</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">" (Abraham 1:10-11; Coenen, 1113; for ceremonial hills marked with standing </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">stones</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"> see Nibley and Rhodes, </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">One Eternal Round</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">, 170-3; for another royal massacre and burning of enemies, 179).</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">By killing the enemies of Osiris, Pharaoh and his designated priest, or double, reverse the inimical act of killing Osiris himself, and thus ensure both Osiris' resurrection and Horus' (that is, Pharaoh's) dynastic claims. It bears repeating: As the priest of Min who massacres his enemies, Hor himself becomes Pharaoh's (Horus') stand-in, a role recalling the sacrifice-mad "priest of Pharaoh" in Abraham's account. The role, however essential, is not without its risks. And here's a genuine touch, even a moment of dramatic literary genius that only an ancient reader might fully grasp: "And the Lord. . .smote the priest that </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">he</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"> died; and there was great mourning in Chaldea, and also in the court of Pharaoh" (Abraham 1:20). "Great mourning" in Pharaoh's court? for a distant priest? By smiting the Pharaoh's ceremonial agent, God has smitten the Pharaoh himself and has also smitten his dynastic line (cf. the slaying of the firstborn in Exodus and the subsequent swallowing up of Pharaoh in the Red Sea). It is the priest's office, as agent, that matters, and the mourning over his death must then match in intensity and cloud of disaster that which prevails at the actual death of a king. One can picture the choking dust storm at Ur sweeping down to Egypt. A panicked herald runs with the news.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">The priest of Pharaoh dies a substitute for the king himself, whether we consider that king the Pharaoh in Egypt, or even Abraham, a man now wrapped in power and dread, priest and king. As Nibley notes, the priest "is slain in [Abraham's] place" </span><span style="color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">(</span><i style="color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Abraham in Egypt, </i><span style="color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">26).</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"><br style="font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif;" /><span style="font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif;">Yet every ceremonial preparation of a mummy evokes both the violent death as well as the resurrection of Osiris: a sacrifice "after the manner of the Egyptians"--the Osirian manner. To </span><i style="font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif;">wrap</i><span style="font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif;"> (</span><i style="font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif;">wt</i><span style="font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif;">) is itself both to kill and also to resurrect; for, without wrapping, there can be no subsequent rising (</span><i style="font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif;">wt</i><span style="font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif;"> resonates with </span><i style="font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif;">mwt</i><span style="font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif;">, </span><i style="font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif;">die</i><span style="font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif;">). The Ancient Egyptian Netherworld Books likely date, some of them at least, from the Middle Kingdom and flourish in the New, a span of time that also brackets the Patriarchal Age. Here's something from the little known Book of the Night: Addressing "the Asiatic, Libyan, Medjay, and Nubian threat at Egypt's four borders" (matching in exact cardinal order--east, west, north, south--the regional gods of Elkenah, Libnah, Mahmackrah, Korash, as carefully listed and depicted in the book of Abraham), the priest intones: </span></span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"><span style="font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif;">"You are the rebels that 'made a wrapping,' 'made a wrapping' Father Osiris. Accordingly, Father Osiris commanded that I, in the form of Mekhenty-Irty [~ Horus], should smite this your enemy" (New Kingdom Netherworld Book of the Night II, 87-8 = Sederholm, </span><i style="font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif;">Pap</i><i style="font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif;">yrus 10808</i><span style="font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif;">, 126). </span></span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"><span style="font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"><span style="font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif;">Wrapping and killing collapse into one: to wrap the Osirian mummy, the action of Anubis, is thus also to kill the god with a knife, or similar instrument. The surprising phraseology found in "You <i>are the rebels</i></span></span><span style="color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">"; "made a <i>wrapping</i>"; "Smite </span><i style="color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">this your enemy</i><span style="color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">" (which replace "you the priest"; "killed"; and "smite </span><i style="color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">you</i><span style="color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">") is euphemistic, ironic, delicate: the notion of substitutes runs very deep in the Egyptian sacrificial night. </span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"><br /></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Anubis, that is, the masked priest of Anubis, who prepares the mummy, symbolically both slays and wraps. Yet, given the taboo surrounding Osiris' death, he does not "smite you," rather "this your enemy"; he doesn't kill, he wraps. The priest of Anubis thus slays the Enemy of Osiris and wraps Osiris in one succinct act. We may reject the seeric view of Facsimile 1 as the attempt by a priest of Pharaoh to sacrifice <i>Abraham</i>, but we're still stuck with a vignette depicting the sacrificial resurrection of <i>Osiris, </i>for the <span style="font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif;">act of sacrifice meets the idea of resurrection; each notionally requires the other. Well-known is that paradox of Osirian ceremony in which the sharp-clawed jackal Anubis, troubler of desert burials, first cuts into the body, then wraps it, preparatory to resurrection. </span></span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"><span style="font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"><span style="font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif;">Facsimile 1, at once, both illustrates Osiris' resurrection as described in the Book of Breathings </span><i style="font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif;">and </i><span style="font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif;">the arrested sacrifice and escape (also in token of resurrection) of any Osiris, including the special case of </span><i style="font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif;">Abraham</i><span style="font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif;">. As Nibley points out, Abraham becomes as Osiris, for the Egyptians found in Abraham's heralded escape from sacrificial death a living token or surety of Osirian promise. All this makes of Abraham, to Egyptian eyes, a king, Osiris redivivus. No wonder, "by [jittery] politeness of the king," Abraham, as Osiris was allowed broad scope to substitute on the throne, as depicted on Facsimile 3, wear Osiris' Atef Crown, and then teach about the cosmic powers (Abraham Facsimile 2), which pertained to the mystery of kingship, a theme appearing over and again in the books of Professor Jan Assmann.</span></span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">That is the world of Facsimile 1. </span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">But what of Facsimile 3? It's the very same thing. The Theban priesthood, following a hoary tradition, diligently searched out and put to use earlier vignettes and writings with which to interlace their own glory, a glory of royal aura. And as Nibley points out, the symbolic journey in the facsimiles from altar to throne, becomes the journey, the promise, the blessing of Abraham. Ritner, who loftily refuses to tackle any of the deeper themes of the Book of Abraham, including the momentous theme of ritual journey and inheritance, simply points to the names and titles now appearing on the vignettes and declares that "no amount of special pleading" can save Joseph Smith's labeling the figures as king, Abraham, prince, principal waiter, slave, mixing the figures of women for men, or assigning them whimsical names, such as Shulem or Olimlah. </span><br />
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<span style="color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif;"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 15.84px;">By saying that there is no way out now for Joseph Smith, except by recourse to a logically fallacious special pleading is gentle mockery. But the joke about special pleading is also a telling reminder about what constitutes professorial authority. The professor decides what will count as a piece of egyptological evidence and what will be disqualified with a wave of the hand. Well, how about it, this matter of special pleading? None is necessary. Nibley always answers with evidence and logic. And if the evidence verifies the names the Prophet gives us as specific and peculiar to the world of Abraham, then logic dictates that he was also working with more than one document, whether an extant physical document or one revealed in seeric vision, not the Roman Period vignette of Facsimile 3 alone. </span></span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Shulem and Olimlah? The annoying names reflect the two worlds of Abraham: Syro-Palestine and Egypt. Professor Ritner never notes the possibility of such a bull's-eye, but we cannot fault an </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">egyptologist </i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">for not knowing the <i>latest </i>archaeological discoveries from </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Syria</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"> (Nabada) that yield both Shulem (also attested at Ebla) and Ishmael (the name of Abraham's son). Olimlah follows an Egyptian pattern: <i>Ol </i>or<i> Oli (wri)--im (imn)--lah (ra)</i>: Great is Amun-Ra (Nibley, <i>Abraham in Egypt</i>). And we now know that "lah" rather than "ra" best describes the ancient phonological evidence for the name of the sun god. Hugh Nibley naturally isn't trying to prove that Olimlah must signify "Great is Amun-Ra," but he does establish how the name fits a common pattern. Nearly four decades on, no one has challenged, much less effectively challenged, what Nibley so effortlessly here points out. This is not "apologetics"; it would simply be irresponsible for a student of Egyptian not to point out such an obvious--though no less astonishing--correspondence. And it would simply be out-of-character for a professor not to wave his hand, for authority serves as argument enough.</span></span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">As for the next logical step in explaining how Joseph Smith translated, or interpreted, as he did, we must conclude that the Seer saw deeper than the reuse of the vignettes by the late Theban priests--he looked beyond the names pertaining to Ptolemaic Thebes--and instead gave us the </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Urtext</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">, the original text accompanying the original representations on either papyrus or stela, and their original intent. What's wrong with that? </span><i style="color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Urtext</i><span style="color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"> is the obsession of modern philology. And w</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">hy else possess the seeric gift, if not to see deeper than scholarship can? It's true that no scholar, however gifted, could unpack all the meaning that the Prophet Joseph could unpack. Therefore? Though a study of Egyptian language and texts can certainly throw light on some of Joseph Smith's statements and conclusions, no modern egyptologist has the gift to recover the world of Abraham from the vignettes alone. The papyrus scroll bearing the text of Abraham's record would be another matter--but we are left with the vignettes. Never taking any credit to himself, Hugh Nibley would always say: What a marvelous production Joseph Smith gives us in the book of Abraham!</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Again, Brother Joseph invited the entire learned world to "find," that is, to translate all they could--and to share it posthaste. He wasn't working in a corner, hiding from the latest breakthroughs, or anything remotely like that. Special pleading was not his style. Neither is it ours.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Thus, when that same learned world makes and shares its findings, welcome or blistering, we need not gloss over anything. We may even answer.</span><br />
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<b style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;"><i><br /></i></b><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"></span><b style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;"><br /></b><br />
<b style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">III <i> All</i> Wrong</b><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">From the beginning the Latter-day Saints have savored intellectual challenge for the opportunities it provides to share the Scriptures of the Restoration. And here's something to welcome with rejoicing: </span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">"All of Smith’s published 'explanations' are incorrect, including the lone example defended by the new web posting: the water in which a crocodile is swimming (Fig. 12 of Fascimile 1), supposedly a representation of 'the firmament over our heads … but in this case, in relation to this subject, the Egyptians meant it to be to signify Shaumau, to be high, or the heavens.' Although Egyptians might place heavenly boats in the sky, that is not relevant 'in this case' where the water is placed below the figures and represents the Nile, not the sky. The selective defense of these explanations by the church is telling, and all other explanations are simply indefensible except by distorting Egyptian evidence."</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Although Ritner quite correctly notes a jumbled use--or "selected defense"--rather than a proper thematic interweaving of what evidence a more considered essay might have composed, the only distortion here is the typical critic's distortion of </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">method. </i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">As all students of Egypt know, representations may signify </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">more than one thing</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">, and interpretation remains perforce delicate. To Western minds </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">a</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"> cannot be the equivalent of not </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">a </i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">(that is,</span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;"> -a</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">)</span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">; </i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">for the Egyptians </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">x</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"> may be both </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">a</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"> and </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">-a</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">. Through the decades, egyptologists have described such a </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">many-valued logic</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"> in tones of astonishment.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Now consider what Joseph Smith says in his Explanation of Facsimile 1: elsewhere such-and-such a figure or configuration signifies </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">x</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">, "but in this case, in relation to this subject, the Egyptians meant it to to signify" </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">y. </i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">In other words, figure <i>x, </i>here, signifies both <i>a</i> and <i>-a</i>.</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"> Nibley, who calls the "folly of giving just </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">one</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"> interpretation" "the pit into which Joseph Smith's critics have always fallen," quotes E. Otto: "the </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">greatest possible </i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">number of meanings in the briefest possible formulation"; "a mysterious plurality of meaning"; and H. Frankfort: "unbridled chains of associations and conclusions"; "we must attempt to hear the resonance of this polyphony of meaning." ("Many-valued logic": Erik Hornung, </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Conceptions of God in Ancient Egypt; </i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Hugh Nibley,</span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;"> Abraham in Egypt, </i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">116-17, 124).</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Ritner, therefore, is not "wrong" in identifying these zigzags with the Nile; nor is he "wrong" when he speaks of the crocodile as collecting the members of Osiris preparatory to his resurrection; nor, again, is he "wrong" when he elsewhere </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">also</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"> wonders whether the zigzags may <i>alternatively</i> represent the Lake of Khonsu. Yet which Nile? which of the several roles of the crocodile? For </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">in writings of ritual significance </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Nile</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"> may refer either to the terrestrial or to the celestial Nile, or to both at once. As for the mysterious Lake of Khonsu, the place of passage and transition in the burial rites, the whereabouts of its otherworldly location (or counterpart?) is anybody's guess. Facsimile 3 conveys, in text and in iconography, all three levels of the cosmos: the starry heavens, the terrestrial court, and the netherworld--and the events depicted thereon may unfold in any one, or </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">all</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">, of those realms (</span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Abraham in Egypt</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">, 123). And does not the same thing hold true for Facsimile 1? It does. Again: "</span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">All</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"> of Smith's published 'explanations' are incorrect." Here is special pleading; for Ritner elsewhere confirms the idea of the croc as "god of Pharaoh": "Horus-Sobek was a god of Pharaoh, so one out of five [explanations] is correct" (Robert K. Ritner, ed., </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">The Joseph Smith Egyptian Papyri</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">, 118). That being so, you would hope that "Translation and Historicity" would parade, rather than neglect, such a direct hit.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Egyptian Religion is not a monolith, a fact we must keep in mind when we interpret the representations found on temple walls and in papyrus rolls. Every region, city, mesa, or kiva, as throughout Classical Greece, as at Hopi, unfurls its own religious and symbolic universe. In the Faiyum, or "the inland sea" region (</span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">pa-ym--</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">a Semitic word), crocodile is king. The Book of the Faiyum equates that inland sea with the </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Mehet-Weret</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">, the Great Flood Waters of the Celestial Cow in which the crocodile with pharaonic crown swims in one eternal round (Horst Beinlich, </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Das Buch vom Fayum</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"> and this essay: http://archiv.ub.uni-heidelberg.de/propylaeumdok/2891/1/Beinlich_Faiyum_2013.pdf ,</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">While the cosmos of the Faiyum might not match Facsimile 1 in every particular, local interpretations still resonate with the larger abstraction we call </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Ancient Egyptian Religion</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">. In light of the evidence from the Pyramid Texts, Utterance 317 (R. Faulkner, </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">The Ancient Egyptian Pyramid Texts</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">, 99 and n.6), according to which Sobek swims in "the flood of the Great Inundation"-- that is to say, "The sky according to [Professor] Sethe"--and also in light of the Book of the Faiyum, we can unpack what Joseph Smith sets forth, as follows:</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">The zigzags do not here, as in most (or many) cases, represent Mehet-Weret (Flood-Great), the Great Cosmic Flood, or the Celestial Expanse, but in this case, in relation to this [particular] subject, they represent the very heights of heaven in which the crocodile as king and sun god reigns crowned and supreme. As Horus the Elder spreads his wings over all below, so the crocodile, as god of Pharaoh, swims round his domain, master of all he "surveys."</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Does Pharaoh rightfully attain such reach? does his realm extend even to Syria? Yes, says Brother Joseph, for the priest of Syrian Elkenah is the priest of Pharaoh, his representative in whose name and with whose delegated power he acts. Thus, when the priest is smitten, the "court of Pharaoh" mourns. The play of identities, even of substitute death, or sacrifice--a favorite theme of Hugh Nibley's--fits the ancient world like a glove.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">As in other Near Eastern and Mediterranean texts, the king (or his representative) is about to sacrifice a victim on a mountain top, when struck down by lightning. Thus: "Shamau to be high or the heavens," refers to both the ritual height of sacrifice, and, at once, to the beetling look at the watery depths below. Is there any like trace of these things in the archaeological record? A stele representing Ramesses the Great worshipping a Canaanite god is known from Syria. The name of that god can yet be worked out by the student: Elkenah.</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: xx-small;">(See: "The god of Elkenah in Hieroglyphs and in the Book of Abraham":</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: xx-small;">http://valsederholm.blogspot.com/2014/02/the-god-of-elkenah-in-hieroglyphs-and.html.)</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Am I open to other interpretations of these symbols? Of course. And Ritner's (often multiple) explanations are of deepest import. That's how the discipline works. Otherwise, we're left with the sort of simplistic arrangements parading as definitive science that everywhere propagate on the Internet, that glorious domain of the frosh. Who hasn't seen a chart comparing Joseph Smith's interpretations of the facsimiles with those of a freshman's confused assortment of egyptologists, including a few consigned to oblivion: in the left column, Joseph Smith; in the right, "</span><b style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">E</b><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">gyptology"? Students of Egypt never reduce themselves to such a simplistic view of the ancient evidence: </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">x</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"> is only </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">x</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"> and</span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;"> y</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"> is </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">y</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">, except when distorting method to snap at an unwelcome reading. Neither do they indiscriminately pick egyptologists out of the air.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">There is never any good reason to box oneself in like that--unless there's a need to box ears: "all other explanations are simply indefensible"; "all" Smith's "'explanations'" are incorrect"--not even worth terming explanations, rather "explanations."</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">We all must face amateur hour, and some, perhaps justifiably, learn to snap off "answers." Packaged books arrive in the mail; an early morning call awakes. The voice on the other end assures us that Ancient Egyptian is really Finnish. I've always been curious about Finland, so, dazed, I listen. The person on the other end of the lines says he has just had a wonderful exchange with Professor Erik Hornung--or was he just about to call him?</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">How to deal with such unwelcome packages and morning calls? How to deal with the Kemeticists, Saycians, Rosicrucians, or even those Latter-day Saints? Latter-day Saints should never get flustered, or throw up hands in surrender, just because an egyptologist or assyriologist gets testy or declines to discuss a particular position or point of evidence.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Oxford Professor John Baines warns against such testy response to ideas originating outside the discipline (John Baines,"Restricted Knowledge, Hierarchy, and Decorum," </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">JARCE</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"> 27, 1-23). We might miss an insight, he says, by throwing up the walls. Baines laments his take-no-prisoners discipline, riddled with cliques, in which every other egyptologist must always be wrong for "us" to be right. Trenches zigzag the field--how startling, how devastating, what one egyptologist will say about another!--and we should always forgive our colleagues, for whom reputation is ever at stake, for failing to lay down the weapons of the discipline when addressing the hapless lay man who blithely stumbles into no man's land. </span><br />
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<span style="color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif;"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 15.84px;">Yet while showing full charity to all critiques of the Book of Abraham, and even acknowledging that any or all of them make their own assessments in good faith, let's also remember to lend a little kindness to Joseph Smith, who worked </span></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">after the hieroglyphs had been cracked but before the discipline was well launched. Lacking access to those few then working in the field, he still had the good faith to share his ideas with the world--his book appeared in the pages of the most prominent newspaper in New York City so well as in Nauvoo. Does the Prophet ever claim that his interpretations are the only possible ones? No. He asks: If the world can find out these numbers (numbered figures), please do let us know (Explanation, Facsimile 2). </span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Coming to grips with the mind of the ancients takes decades--not a tap on the screen. Because of the powerful changes in our understanding of Egyptian religion, especially since the 1980's, it's unfair to judge Brother Joseph's work by holding to the conclusions of egyptologists working in the discipline's genesis, then to pronounce (as does Ritner): Joseph Smith--Wrong for a century-and-a-half! Some of the best work came early on, it is true, but the differences in understanding are revolutionary. Nibley finds powerful correspondences between Joseph Smith's Explanation of Facsimile 2 and those of 19th Century students of the hypocephalus; in the 21st Century the astonishment, as publications abound, only grows the greater. Who is reading? Who has taken even a first look at the new material?</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif;"><span style="font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Again, Professor Robert Ritner hears in the Prophet's Explanation voluble ravings in the manner of pre-egyptologist Athanasius Kircher (Ritner, "Translation and Historicity of the Book of Abraham--A Response"). Here's how Kircher translates an obeliskful of hieroglyphs: </span><br style="font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif;" /><br style="font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif;" /><span style="font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif;"></span><span style="font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif;">Hemphta the supreme spirit and archetype infuses its virtue and gifts in the soul of the sidereal world, that is the solar spirit subject to it whence comes the vital motion in the material or elemental world, and an abundance of all things and variety of species arises. From the fruitfulness of the Osirian bowl, in which, drawn by some marvelous sympathy, it flows ceaselessly. . . (quote from Ritner, "Review")</span><br style="font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif;" /><br style="font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif;" /><br style="font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif;" /><span style="font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Is Ritner correct? The "ceaselessly flowing" example from Kircher by which the professor illustrates what he considers Joseph Smith's own absurd interpretations lacks the specificity, balance, concision, and coherence one finds throughout the thematically compact book of Abraham--and it lacks a little mystery besides. Kircher elaborates on but a single, spent, idea.</span><br style="font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif;" /><br style="font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif;" /><span style="font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Joseph Smith's Abraham, including the Explanation of facsimile 2, merits a second look. Even should the reader disagree with him to the point of laughter, Joseph's take on the matter merits a jot of charity. Remember what he sadly records of the persecution he continuously suffered at the hands of even neighbors: "being of very tender years, and persecuted by those who ought to have been my friends and to have treated me kindly, and if they supposed me to be deluded to have endeavored in a proper and affectionate manner to have reclaimed me" (Joseph Smith--History 1: 1:28). Where was kindness, propriety, affection?</span><br style="font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif;" /><br style="font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif;" /><span style="font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Whether we believe even a jot of it, we can all take a charitable look at Joseph Smith's explanation of Kolob (the central figure, the transcendent Amun-Ra in the form of the archaic Ram of Mendes) as being: "The First Creation . . First in government, last pertaining to the measurement of time. The measurement according to celestial time." The Prophet's focus on revolutions, temporal cycles and measurement, "grand governing" and thus hierarchically descending cosmic powers; on stars, earth, and sun, and transmission of light; or on altars and sacrifices and thrones, hardly deserves to be pilloried by either supremely gifted and educated scholars (who really must smile at amateurs); or by the countless eager sophisticates in train, who, though professing an advanced and and up-to-millennial understanding of all things past, present, and on Wikipedia, have never given a moment's thought to the symbolic representations found both on and in works of great antiquity. They've simply "reddit."</span></span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif;"><span style="font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Nibley and Rhodes (2013: ps. 240-241) helpfully sum up Joseph Smith's "brief explanation" with the following headings over "words used":</span><br style="font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif;" /><br style="font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif;" /><span style="font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif;">1) cosmology: <i>earth, planets, firmament, Sun, stars, moon, revolution</i></span><br style="font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif;" /><span style="font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif;">2) measurement and number: <i>measurements of time</i>, <i>celestial time, day, cubit, years, one thousand, quarters, revolution</i></span><br style="font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif;" /><span style="font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif;">3) transmission of power or energy: <i>receiving light, borrows its light, governs planets or stars, receives its power, governing power</i></span><br style="font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif;" /><span style="font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif;">4) hierarchy or dominion (intelligence and purpose): <i>creation, residence, government, key, power, God, throne, authority, crown, light, the governing power</i></span><br style="font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif;" /><span style="font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif;">5) ordinances and procedures (relating the above to humanity): <i>sacrifice, altar, Temple</i></span><br style="font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif;" /><span style="font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif;">6) Joseph Smith's use of "special idiom or notation to convey the above," that is, the idea of representation, overlapping of symbolism, iconography conveying more than one meaning:<i>represent, signify, pertaining to, answering to, "but in this case, in relation to this subject, the Egyptians meant it to signify" x and not just y.</i></span></span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Whether these last themes point decisively to Kircher, or to what contemporary egyptologists say about the hypocephali or the various books of the netherworld is a matter for the diligent reader to discover. A careful study of both Scripture and of contemporary egyptology is all Hugh Nibley ever asked of his readers. </span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Another complaint, rhetorically crafted and targeted for a particular, and thankfully blithely uninformed, lay audience alone (the target audience of the critics): "Smith confuses human and animal heads and males with females." But as </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">all</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"> students know, so do the Ancient Egyptians, and with astonishing and bewildering frequency. As for the particular confusion of male with female, please note that the Ma'at figure in Facsimile 3 wears a sheath dress that leaves the bosom uncovered. Even on the rough Hedlock woodcut, from which the facsimile was printed, the nipple can be seen; on the original papyrus, the nipple would have been indisputably visible to any observer; the same must be said for the Isis figure behind the throne. Just look at any other representations of Ma'at on papyrus--including elsewhere on the Joseph Smith Papyri. Given such artistic attention to the feminine, unmistakable to either prophet or disciple or wife or mother or visitor by the hundreds, why on earth would Joseph Smith, on purpose, make the same kind of illogical and improbable associations, </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">x</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"> equals </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">a</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">; </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">x</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"> equals </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">-a</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">, that the Egyptians themselves make in almost every depiction or writing? (For more on the symbolic multiplicity of the Egyptians, as well as the Prophet's symbolic reading of Facsimile 3, see Hugh Nibley, "All the Court's a Stage," in </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Abraham in Egyp</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">t, a book published some </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">40 years ago</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">.)</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Latter-day Saints will not have our minds "stolen away" into believing that Joseph Smith could not tell the women from the men on the vignette. He could, but that was only the beginning of interpretation. What's the point of having a Seer, unless he can scan semiotic horizons not familiar to the minds and logic of moderns? And what's the point of having a gifted scholar like Hugh Nibley, if we're not even going to read his words or ponder his sources, including the quoted works of hundreds of egyptologists? Neither neglect nor prejudice is any excuse at all. Remember, critics not only mock our appeals to testimony, they also do all they can to prevent our reading the words of our own scholars or delving into their footnotes. In doing so, are they not diminishing us as a culture and as a people? Have we so little confidence in our own honor and ability as a university-building Church, that we must shrink before every wind of ridicule? before every waving of diploma?</span><br />
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V <i>Come and See</i><br />
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Recently I visited the Church History Library in Salt Lake City, Utah, and looked once more at the vignette from which book of Abraham Facsimile 1 is taken. I looked at it several times, and thought deeply. What a joy to see the papyrus itself, not a facsimile, not a photograph nor a digitized copy, but the very ink, the very hieroglyphs, the vignette itself in all its design and character!</div>
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To understand the vignette in its fullness, we must turn to the pages of the book of Abraham in the Pearl of Great Price and read the explanations of a latter-day Seer. Otherwise, we risk seeing only a part of the meaning, that part that reflects darkly in the mirror of modern scholarship, a scholarship at a dusty multi-millennial distance from the lost past.</div>
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I do not fault today's scholars for not seeing what Joseph Smith saw: Who can be expected to possess the high gift of the seer to see things as they really are, and as they really once were?</div>
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Yet I do detect a mote in the scholarly eye, when students of an ancient civilization pretend to a preeminent knowledge of that past. We learn to read an ancient script, yes, and master our tentative lexical lists--but to boast? "Yea, how quick to boast" (Helaman 12:5).</div>
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What do we know? What can we know? Professor Westendorf would tell his students that no living person can know Ancient Egypt as it once was; the best we might do is to build theoretical models by which to approximate that past. We may come thereby, if not to understanding, at least to a common ground for observation and discussion. We all recall those ridiculously disproportionate models fashioned by scientists to teach the public something of the swirling atom, to grant students a brush with a molecule, and the like. Without the model, there can be no<i> logos</i>, that is to say, no -<i>ology</i>. We would all drift toward incoherence, then into stillness.<br />
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Such limitations, however, do not apply to seers, because "things shall be made known by them which otherwise could not be known" (Mosiah 8:17). Such gifted revelators something call to mind the transcendence of translated beings, like Enoch or John the Beloved, being themselves<i> translating beings</i> capable of putting disparate peoples and cultures in touch with each other, as though they themselves transcended space and time and differences in language and culture.<br />
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As I consider the tone of scholarship everywhere today, I wonder how well any of us are doing at building models that invite dialogue--open, demanding, cheerful dialogue--about the forgotten past.</div>
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For instance, as Professor Robert Ritner, in <i>The Joseph Smith Papyri: A Complete Edition</i>, winds up his argument against the Prophet Joseph's explanation of Facsimile 1, an argument consisting of merest <i>ex cathedra</i> declaration after declaration of Folly and Error, he pronounces:</div>
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"Except for those willfully blind, the case is closed."<br />
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The words of Scripture best suited to set alongside such a declaration are those of King Limhi (Mosiah 8): </div>
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"And now, when Ammon had made an end of speaking these words [about the interpreters and the high gift of seers] the king rejoiced exceedingly, and gave thanks to God, saying: Doubtless a great mystery is contained within these plates, and these interpreters were doubtless prepared for the purpose of unfolding all such mysteries to the children of men."</div>
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I say the same of Facsimile 1, or of any of the Abraham facsimiles: a great mystery is contained within that vignette, rich as it is with representation and symbolism. And, as I see it, Joseph the Seer has unfolded a portion of its ancient "mysteries to the children of men" in latter-days, with more unfolding to come for those who seek. Neither is the door shut to those who seek either to understand or add to the Prophet's Explanation of Facsimile 1 by the study of Near Eastern languages and cultures. I attest to just how very open that door lies. Enter and seek--and find. It doesn't make a jot of difference whether anybody attempts to stop up that avenue of pursuit: seek and you will find abundance "of treasures hid in the sand." "And [you] shall find wisdom and great treasures of knowledge, even hidden treasures." Yes, you shall find even the Pearl of Great Price (Deuteronomy 33; Doctrine and Covenants 89).</div>
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As I reflect on Professor Ritner's pronouncement of blindness, even willful blindness, I am compassionately startled at what many apparently cannot see or do not even care to look for. "Look to God and live" (Alma 37). Like Limhi I feel to exclaim:</div>
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"O how marvelous are the works of the Lord, and how long doth he suffer with his people; yea, and how blind and impenetrable are the understandings of the children of men; for they will not seek wisdom, neither do they desire that she should rule over them!"<br />
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V <i>A Word to the Wise</i><br />
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Wisdom! You may rule over me! Like Emerson, "I am weary of the surfaces, and die of inanition." If Hokhmah, Ma'at, Sofia, the Wisdom of the Ages, not sophistication nor prating invective, desires to rule my mind, a mind that now hopes to see, She may.<br />
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Let's take a look at her judicious works.<br />
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Journalist Doug Gibson, reprising via Twitter a frankly objective review of Professor Ritner's study of the Joseph Smith Papyri, a review originally published in the <i>Ogden Standard Examiner,</i> observes:<br />
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"To Ritner, the 'case is closed.' What Smith claimed, and the LDS Church claims today, is simply false, he says.<br />
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"Ironically, that certainty of Ritner's may be the weakest point of his arguments. One can make a case that to draw any conclusion that science is settled can be called unscientific.<br />
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"With ancient Egyptian-era digs going on in the world, it's an audacious claim to say that part of a book that millions regard as scripture is forever concluded to be a hoax" (Mormon History and Culture: "The Mummy's Curse and the Book of Abraham").<br />
http://www.standard.net/stories/2012/04/29/scholar-challenges-joseph-smith-translation<br />
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While there is little original about the case Ritner presents against the book of Abraham, he presents it with a blare of trumpets. And few blasts are so sharp as his ridicule of the Prophet's explanations of certain goddesses appearing on Facsimile 3. How is it that the Prophet confuses goddesses with mortal males?<br />
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Yet addressing the very same embarrassment in 1956, before Professor Ritner was even born, Hugh Nibley had the following to say (in the form of an imaginary dialogue):<br />
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"'It <i>is</i> rather quaint,' Professor F. commented. '<i>Any fool can see</i>, for example, that the figures called Pharaoh and his son are women.'<br />
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"Yes,' Mr. Blank answered, 'a myopic moron could <i>see</i> that, and that is why it so remarkable. It is plainly intentional.'"<br />
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Mr. Blank, in search of the patiently recovered remarkable rather than the surface visible--that is, what scholars do--goes on to cite arcane works of Egyptology in hopes of discovering why Joseph Smith might so discern a trace of the Pharaoh or the Prince in the outward form of a goddess (<i>Lehi in the Desert. The World of the Jaredites. There Were Jaredites</i>, 336-337).<br />
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To read anything of the Egyptian past, the student must drop all preconceived notions, including the norms of Western logic, and, well, venture. . .<br />
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As a serious reader of Professor Ritner's <i>Joseph Smith Egyptian Papyri: A Complete Edition</i> (though not the only published edition!), I also note strengths and weaknesses; I note sound transcription, sound translation--and the unsound. The book may have its errors, and I've tallied a telling list, but the surprising, and I think the significant, thing to note is the singular lack of intellectual curiosity about the documents Professor Ritner assays to translate. Everything translates into the matter-of-fact, if not the outright dull. Another weakness is that Ritner does not await anyone else's sheaf-laden return from the library. Even as we, brim with joy, rejoice in discovery and ready our report, he interrupts by slamming the classroom door in our faces. Ritner makes it abundantly clear, however, that he is, by no means, the first to do so. Student after student, he notes, has slammed the door on the book of Abraham since 1861 or so. Yet as Nibley asks: Will the latch hold?<br />
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The latch simply never holds.<br />
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Intellectual Curiosity? We wonder whether documents such as the Book of Breathings or the hypocephalus have anything profound to tell us about the Egyptian mind? Do they yield a chapter in the intellectual history of the race? Might they have something--anything--to say to religious seekers? Or are they, as the Chicago Professor dryly puts it: "amulets" of "common" funerary hopes?<br />
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Ritner's "complete" transcriptions and translations, fleeting in comment, carry a cold and hurried air. We don't come to understanding. The book evinces a single-minded purposefulness in an impatient and aggrieved tone. Ritner not only declares: All Joseph Smith says is false! He also insists of the supposedly ubiquitous, thus "common" "amulets": Nothing to see here, move along.<br />
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If it is so, such a neglect seems to be very much at odds with Professor Ritner's other famous book, <i>The Mechanics of Ancient Egyptian Magical Practice, </i>which the reader can hardly put down. If it is so, then Ritner's terse museum-label comments about these Egyptian texts also stand at odds with the trend of Egyptological writing since 1980. Go to any library and select books written by Jan Assmann, Erik Hornung, Alexandra von Lieven, Dimitri Meeks, Sylvie Cauville, John Baines, and so on, and see whether these ever fail to stir the soul with the wonders of the Egyptian mind, see whether these don't seek to draw the universal treasuries into the expanding picture.<br />
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Professor Ritner possesses uncommon gifts in prose style. Yet had Ritner's contracting book on the Joseph Smith Papyri undergone standard egyptological peer-review or the requisite editing for printing at a standard publishing house (one not given to religious controversy), how many counts of sarcasm, what tally of personal barbs, might have vanished from the final cut? So declawed, the book, written for a specific lay audience, would have lost its crowd appeal.<br />
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Hugh Nibley also draws together documents of like thematic and cultural bearing, treasures he believes ought to read in light of the Joseph Smith Papyri and vice-versa. He invites the reader to study these, ponder the larger <i>Kulturkreis</i>, and then to decide whether such productions of the Egyptian mind as the hypocephalus, the Breathings document, or the vignettes, are worthy of our attention, whether we also read Abraham's record or not (see <i>The Message of the Joseph Smith Papyri</i> (1975) and <i>One Eternal Round</i> (2010). Shall we brush these collections aside in our knowing simplicity? or shall we take a second look?<br />
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The test has to do with curiosity--and with attentiveness to matters of eternal concern. Ever reading, ever studying, ever discovering, we wait on the Lord for the fullness of truth.</div>
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<b style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman", times, freeserif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;">VI The <i>Rise</i> of the Book of Abraham</b><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Professor Ritner closes his review of "Translation and Historicity of the Book of Abraham" by asking the Authorities of the Church of Jesus Christ to discard the book of Abraham as canonical Scripture and instead consider it Joseph Smith's "perhaps[!] well-meaning" but flawed attempt to sound lost cultural values beyond his depth. The confident, caustic tone cries Checkmate: "With the Book of Abraham now confirmed as a perhaps well-meaning, but erroneous invention by Joseph Smith, the LDS church may well devote some reflection to the status of the text."</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">The presiding quorums made no response. Demands come and go. And it comes as no surprise when men and women "cast many things away which are written and esteem them as things of naught" (2 Nephi 33:2). The living Abraham continues upon his throne, in his exalted state, and forever holds the keys of his book (Doctrine and Covenants 132).</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">I do have a response to Professor Ritner's request, however.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">It's high time for one realization to dawn on critics of Abraham's restored writings: Joseph Smith gave us more than one book of Abraham. The Joseph Smith Translation of Genesis yields as many surprises about Abraham's world as does the Pearl of Great Price. Revelations in the Doctrine and Covenants and many verses in the Book of Mormon give us yet a Third Book of Abraham. 1st, 2nd, 3rd, and 4th Nephi find a worthy match in Abraham.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Dismiss any one of these books, and we'll hand you yet another. Discard Potiphar's Hill, and see Mount Hanabal rise lofty among the Mountains of Moab. Reject Shulem, and find blessed Esaias (Doctrine and Covenants 84). Each of these various "books" of Abraham, besides ringing with antiquity, also contain new words of divine revelation received in his dispensation and now offered to us--words about covenants made long ago by the Father of the Faithful.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">And Latter-day Saints, by unanimous vote, stand in eternal covenant relation to the book of Abraham--to every last word and explanation. Its place, including its genuine nature, stands as one of unquestioned permanence--no matter how the translation was effected or what opinions about the ineffable method of seeric learning and reading we may choose to hold.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">There is no end to the revelatory world of Joseph Smith. In like manner, our covenantal link to the World of Abraham continues. The book of Abraham belongs to what we call a Pearl of Great Price. We will never sell the pearl or give it away. Neither can the covenantal link all members have with the book--affirmed by unanimous vote in General Conference--ever be broken. As we hold true to that covenant, other books will yet come forth from the dust. There is more of parchment and of papyri than we can now imagine.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">One thing we can take from the Gospel Topics Essay: The living Prophets and The Councils of the Church will never set the various books of Abraham aside--not now, not any of them, not a jot or a tittle of them, no never. Neither will the seeric Explanations of the three facsimiles ever disappear from the hundreds of thousands of copies of Scripture, copiously pouring from the presses day by day. Will living prophets claiming direct revelation (available to all) about the genuine nature of the Book of Abraham--and isn't that what the essay says?--ever stop the presses from rolling? You might as well stretch out your hand to stop the mighty Missouri River in its course, or turn it upstream.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Attacks will make no difference whatsoever to any claim carrying the revelatory imprimatur of the founding Prophet. Answers to attacks, new and old, scriptural and linguistic and historical, will continue to be shared to all willing to study them. And, in the simplest expression of which I am capable, the linguistic evidence sustaining the name and description of Kolob will never cease to hold the interest both of Latter-day Saints and of many, many others. Such telling witnesses to truth will yet fill the whole earth, as the waters fill the great deep.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;">Further translations by egyptologists from the text of Facsimile 2 of the Book of Abraham: </span><br />
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<a href="https://valsederholm.blogspot.com/2016/05/figures-19-21-book-of-abraham-facsimile.html">https://valsederholm.blogspot.com/2016/05/figures-19-21-book-of-abraham-facsimile.html</a><br />
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<a href="https://valsederholm.blogspot.com/2013/03/reading-erased-right-panels-on.html">https://valsederholm.blogspot.com/2013/03/reading-erased-right-panels-on.html</a><br />
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<a href="https://valsederholm.blogspot.com/2013/06/reading-rim-new-readings-for-facsimile.html">https://valsederholm.blogspot.com/2013/06/reading-rim-new-readings-for-facsimile.html</a><br />
<br />I began to reflecthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11853353050355842605noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7657330582593799810.post-5107948974925911592018-02-13T12:53:00.001-08:002018-02-22T13:30:31.390-08:00At Home with Laban and LehiWhat was the cost, when Laman and Lemuel left home to take up a wandering life?<br />
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https://www.biblicalarchaeology.org/daily/biblical-sites-places/jerusalem/first-temple-period-palatial-estate-ein-hanniya-jerusalem/<br />
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And. . . from the excavations near the Temple, "out of the dust," what appears to be the seal of "Isaiah the prophet" (see Isaiah 29):<br />
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https://members.bib-arch.org/biblical-archaeology-review/44/2/7 .<br />
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Candida Moss: https://www.thedailybeast.com/did-archaeologists-just-prove-the-existence-of-prophet-isaiah?ref=scrollI began to reflecthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11853353050355842605noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7657330582593799810.post-27582122477011815372018-02-04T16:21:00.001-08:002019-10-18T00:03:27.566-07:00"Period of Time" in the Book of Mormon FIRST DRAFT (Under Construction at this PERIOD OF TIME)<br />
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"I can no longer be your king." These are the words of an aged King Benjamin before a Grand Assembly of his people:<br />
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"I say unto you that I have caused that ye should assemble yourselves together that I might rid my garments of your blood, <i>at this period of time when</i> I am about to go <i>down</i> to my grave, that I might go <i>down</i> in peace, and my immortal spirit may join the choirs <i>above </i>in singing the praises of a just God.<br />
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And moreover, I say unto you that I have caused that ye should assemble yourselves together, that I might declare unto you that I can no longer be your teacher, nor your king" (Mosiah 2: 28-29).<br />
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What catches the attention for the student of ancient languages is the aptness of the phrase <i>period of time</i>, which otherwise makes for a rather cloying, long phrase in English. Wouldn't it be better just to say: <i>at this time</i>?<br />
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Let's consider again what follows the phrase: "at this period of time when I am about to go down to my grave, that I might go down in peace, and my immortal spirit may join the choirs above."<br />
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Here is the idea of the <i>tequfah</i>, a Hebrew word signifying the turn or cycle of time, the march of the seasons, and the mark of the end of a cycle, the end of a year. For instance, the great year of Kolob in Facsimile 2 belongs under the heading of <i>tekufah</i>.<br />
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"At this <i>revolution</i> of time." </div>
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"That I might rid my garments of your blood, at this <i>tekufah</i> when I am about to go down" (down cycle: death).<br />
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This time of ending, or of a period shortly before or marking the beginning of a new season (as in the newly deciphered Qumranic calendar)--thus both beginning and ending.<br />
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Of course the English expression "period of time" refers to the same thing. Consider the Greek word <i>periodos</i>.<i> Periodos</i> signifies I "a going round, the making a circuit round II a way round: a circuit compass III a book of travels. . . map IV a going round in a circle, a cycle of time, a period of time 3. the orbit of a heavenly body V a well-rounded sentence, period" (Liddel and Scott, <i>Greek-English Lexicon</i>).<br />
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But where the Nephites are concerned, it's the idea of the <i>tequfah</i> (or<i> tekufah</i>): the end of an era; a break in the action (as in Helaman's epistle to Moroni); a space between, as at Qumran, according to the recently translated cryptic calendar.<br />
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"one eternal round" Facsimile 2 as a map and periodos, and as tekufah. Describes tekufot and is itself a tekufah, or representation of a tekufah--thus a calendar so well as map, a mapping out of both space and time.<br />
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Here is also the meaning of "the season," tekufah, and "the end," the qetz (also qayits, as in the pun in Jeremiah 1). To lay up fruit against the season" thus signifies to lay up fruit against the turning of the season, that is, into the season beyond the harvest. The qetz and the tekufah appear together in the words of Zenos: that's a bullseye for the Hebraic nature of his allegory.<br />
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Compare 2 Nephi 9 body and spirit<br />
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I began to reflecthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11853353050355842605noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7657330582593799810.post-8636071800297532482017-12-29T20:31:00.002-08:002020-08-06T09:10:27.184-07:00What is a Hypocephalus? What is the Aztec Calendar Stone? What of the Aztec Mosaic Shields?<i>The Aztec Calendar Stone and the Aztec Mosaic Shields in Light of Book of Abraham Facsimile 2</i><br />
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I <i>Too Close To Be Ignored</i><br />
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In one of the many startling moments of <i>One Eternal Round</i>, a study of Book of Abraham facsimile 2 (the hypocephalus), Hugh Nibley and Michael Rhodes describe the Aztec Calendar Stone as "too closely resembling the Joseph Smith hypocephalus to be ignored" (197; see pages 197-200).<br />
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The reader holds his breath--a vast distance obtains between Egypt and Mesoamerica--as the authors quote the long forgotten but striking words of Zelia Nuttall:<br />
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The Calendar Stone is "an image of the nocturnal heavens as it is of a vast terrestrial state which. . . had been established as a reproduction upon earth of the harmonious order and fixed laws which apparently governed the heavens." It is also, note Nibley and Rhodes, "a calendar with stars as indicators, marking time and space together," even--so Nuttall--"a complete count. . . expressive of a great era of time." "Like the hypocephalus, the Calendar Stone is conspicuously divided into two parts," worlds above and below (Zelia Nuttall, <i>The Fundamental Principles of Old and New World Civilizations</i>: <i>a comparative research based on a study of the Ancient Mexican religious, sociological and calendrical systems</i>, Cambridge, MA)<i>.</i><br />
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Referencing Nuttall, Nibley and Rhodes continue: "Around the center are placed 'symbols of the four elements, the union of which was believed by the native philosophers to be essential for the production and maintenance of life.'" Nibley here recalls the four sons of Horus standing just below the central quadrifrons, or four-faced, creator and sun god, though on the lower, upside-down side of the hypocephalus. The Egyptians associated these sons of Horus with the funerary canopic jars, which hold the vital organs taken from the deceased and sealed up for the mummy's promised day of resurrection. The Calendar Stone's "central luminary," in Nuttall's words, who provides "the motive power," even "the divine power who ruled heaven and earth from a changeless and fixed centre in the heaven," is likewise quadrifrons, gazing out toward the four directions: "the quadruple lord, 'He who looks in four directions." The Calendar, at once, depicts the fourfold former world eras, "ages that have collapsed--Jaguar, Wind, Fire, and Rain" (David Carrasco, <i>Daily Life of the Aztecs</i>, 174). The "Four Movement" name of the present, fifth, age is Earthquake.<br />
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While the sons of Horus (or surely also of Geb, god of earth, whose four "sons" travel back-and-forth in the four quarters of the earth), certainly keep the elements of life in their manifestation as the canopic jars, there is more to consider; for the quadruple heads of the central ram-headed figure, according to Egyptian texts, also represent the four ba's, or the four spirits, powers, colors, cardinal points, or elements, so well as the four dynasts ruling over their respective patriarchal spheres and ages, these last being primeval eras in which semi-mythical rulers held sway long before Egypt's Pyramid Age (see David Klotz, <i>Adoration of the Ram: Five Hymns to Amun-Re from Hibis Temple, </i>99, 168).<br />
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As element or mineral, we accordingly find the successive generations, ages, or reigns, of Re (fire), Shu (air), Geb (earth), and Osiris (water). The quadrifrons Ram of Mendes, ancient and enduring image of fruitfulness and potency, at the center of the hypocephalus, is thus the forefather of every king, beginning with Re, Shu, Geb, Osiris, who "happen to be the male progenitors of the Heliopolitan cosmogony (Re-Atum begat Shu, Shu begat Geb, Geb begat Osiris)" (Klotz, 99). Osiris' son Horus succeeds him, the pattern for each successive historical king, or Horus, of Egypt, a fifth age. If such concerns stand revealed in the iconography of the hypocephalus, how telling that the first chapter of the book of Abraham, from verse one forward, comments on the patriarchal order that held sway in earlier eras, sets forth the origins of Egyptian kingship, and further introduces the cosmogonic and cosmological themes that make up the balance of the book.<br />
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Many have wondered why Joseph Smith so blithely termed the hypocephalus "Facsimile 2 of the book of Abraham." Did he not know that the object was nothing more than an ordinary funerary amulet? Everyone on the Internet knows that.<br />
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The correspondence of color and mineral to the fourfold Mendesian Ram also evokes Nibley's rare quest to trace links between the hypocephalus idea and green gemstones, a theme to which he and Rhodes devote an entire--and deeply beautiful--chapter. And why not? For as David Carrasco points out of the Aztec Calendar: Tonatiuh, the sun god, "wears a headband studded with three jewels of precious greenstone. . . and circular ear spools with [descending] greenstone jewel signs" (Carrasco, 173). In fact, the entire Stone glistens with representations of precious jewels, including, says David Stuart, the green <i>xiuhhuitzolli</i> diadem.<br />
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The round hypocephalus, placed "under the head" of the mummy is, significantly, also a "headband."<br />
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Diadem? In another chapter, Nibley and Rhodes treat the all-important idea of the cosmocrator, the conquering emperor who aspires to rule the whole cosmic demesne. Nibley notes how the name of the owner of the hypocephalus, Sheshonq, is associated with a whole line of Egyptian cosmocrators--including Pharaoh Sheshonq himself. Whether Nibley's identification of a royal Sheshonq, in this particular case, is correct or not, another significant name, Heliopolis, or Pillar City, occurs more than once on the hypocephalus rim--and Nibley hastens to note the significance of the place as the center of royal and priestly rule and the setting of the unfolding of the solar cosmogony. At once, Heliopolis is both an earthly temple complex and a heavenly solar city, a pillar or axis of the Egyptian cosmos.<br />
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Mayanist David Stuart, in a paper appearing just this month, "<i>El emperador y el cosmos</i>," notes how glyphs suggesting the names of Moteuczoma II (the same Moctezuma or Moteczoma who welcomed Cortez), the Warrior god Huitzilopochtli, so well as glyphs representing the precious green jade and the word<i> central</i> <i>plaza</i> or <i>market</i>, all occur on the Aztec Calendar. To Stuart, these glyphs signal the (solar) deification of the warrior king, or in other words, a solar identity for Moteuctzoma II as cosmic emperor, what we might even call a "solarization" of his face. Remember that the very name of the Aztec ruler, <i>Frowning in severity like a lord</i>, reflects the angry heat of the sun at its apex (Gordon Whittaker, Mexicolore.co.uk). And now consider Dimitri Meeks's explanation of the hypocephalus as "solarized" head of the deceased, who now finds identity with Re, or rather Amun-Re, and participates in his ever-encircling procession. In this sense, the hypocephalus becomes a mask, as replacement and substitute for Amun-Re's invisible head. (Amun signifies "hidden"; "not visible.") (Dimitri Meeks, "<i>Dieu masque, Dieu sans tete</i>," <i>Archeo-Nil</i>, 1991).<br />
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The Solar stone, Professor Stuart postulates, was "carefully designed to link the above-mentioned energized and animated cosmic spaces and spheres to the specific identities of Moteuczoma II and the heroic deity of the Mexica, Huitzilopochtli, both represented as if one sole being in the center of the cosmos" (Stuart, "<i>El emperador y el cosmos: nueva mirada a la piedra del sol</i>"," <i>Arqueologia Mexica</i>, No. 24, 2018; for a draft of the same in English, see also: https://decipherment.wordpress.com/tag/piedra-del-sol/ ).<br />
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And exactly who is the Transcendent Cosmic Amun-Re (Hidden Supreme god-and-Sun), as Professor Klotz "names" the central figure on the hypocephalus? There is no Western "exactly" to keep in mind--and certainly no pretentiously "precise" reading. For is this central power not also, so Klotz, the Cosmic Amun-Shu (Hidden-Supreme god-and-brilliant solar atmosphere)? the Unified and Resurrected Re-Osiris (sun-and-deified deceased king)? as also the four-faced Ram of Mendes: Re-Atum, Shu, Geb, Osiris? or even the Transcendent Amun--Ta-Tanen (Hidden Supreme god-and-emergent god of Earth)? Does it not also represent the resurrected Osiris Sheshonq? or even the royal Osiris Sheshonq? The accompanying text refers to him simply, though most Abrahamically, as the "great" and "noble" god of the "First Time," ruler of the five regions of cosmic space.<br />
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Again, How does the cosmology of the Calendar Stone tie-in to ritual? For the Mexica, the sun must "draw its power from the sacrifices carried out by gods and humans" (Carrasco, 173), a rejuvenating power. We recall how the Prophet Joseph Smith explains Facsimile 2 in light of "revelation" "<i>from </i>God <i>to</i> Abraham, as he offered <i>sacrifice</i> upon an <i>altar</i>." (His own community also attempted to offer Abraham himself upon an altar--but God delivered him.) David Stuart notes that the Aztec Calendar is essentially the uppermost level of a fourfold altar, an altar positioned in the capital's main plaza to represent the enthroned center and thus the axis of the universe. As such, the Stone also becomes a mirror image, reflecting both day and night, sun and stars, and especially the Pleiades that signal the cosmic center and govern the time of the all-important New Fire Ceremony, the re-igniting of sun and hearth fire, a new and ever-repeating cosmogony, cycling round every 52 years (Stuart, "<i>El emperador y el cosmos"</i>).<br />
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The seven stars of the Pleiades cross the zenith of the night sky to signal the regeneration and re-transmission of the solar flame. When Professor Stuart further notes how the Pleiades and the Sun, standing at the separate poles of the cosmos--night and day--become each the reflection of the other, and that here we find the true significance of the Calendar Stone, we come close indeed to the idea of the Transcendent Cosmic Amun-Re, the hidden Re, or power beyond the sun. For the Egyptians the sun is a star, for the stars are all Re's, or suns (<i>r'.w</i>). Re thus stands lord of Re's (<i>nb r'.w</i>). Joseph Smith sees on the hypocephalus a celestial hierarchy, including hints at multiple "suns." Does the idea of Enish-go-on-dosh being both "one of the governing planets" so well as sun, though found in the upside-down region, or of Kolob as both superstar and supersun, stray far off the mark?<br />
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<span class="a" style="background-color: #f1f1f1; border: none; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: "ff14" , "times new roman" , "times" , serif; font-size: 37px; height: 1px; left: 3747px; letter-spacing: 1px; line-height: 1; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; position: absolute; top: 2388px; white-space: nowrap; word-spacing: 2px;"><br /></span>And does not Joseph Smith inform us that the sun, according to the Egyptians, "receives its power through the medium" of other celestial powers, an idea which signals the necessity of a continuing solar replenishment? Everything about this replenishment and renewal is timed by complementary celestial revolutions, according to his Explanation anyhow. The hypocephalus, like the Calendar Stone, is thus programmed by "the measurement of time," including, "the measurement of this earth." Ritual procedure thus accords with cosmically timed measurement to ensure the continuing downward flow of divine power. That's the Egyptian view and the Egyptian practice--and that's also what Brother Joseph is telling us.<br />
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The timing, which also depends on the convergence of the various earthly, lunar, solar, and planetary or stellar, cycles or revolutions, requires the precision of a priestly class of observers.<br />
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David Carrasco, detailing the standard reading of the iconography, speaks of "a narrow band of the twenty day-signs circling the central core of the stone," which again describes the coordinated revolutions of earthly and celestial time (Carrasco, 174). Another ring--of turquoise, the precious greenstone--runs round the symbolic "day count," and is pierced by the four solar rays at the four quarters of the cosmic scheme (see Khristaan Villela, http://www.mexicolore.co.uk/aztecs/calendar/calendar-stone; and K.<br />
Villela and M. E. Miller, eds,. <i>The Aztec Calendar Stone</i>).<br />
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Stuffed between the rays are a profusion of feather symbols, which recalls the double ostrich feather crown, a symbol of intense and translucent atmospheric radiance, sported by the standing solar figure in the upper half of the hypocephalus disk. His tall feather crown pierces, at apex, or zenith, the rim of facsimile 2 (here see <i>One Eternal Round</i>, 267)<i>. </i>Along with the feathers are what Villela tells us are likely droplets of blood, the sacrificial blood that empowers the whole. Might they also represent droplets of atmospheric water, shot through with light--the vivifying rains? The outermost circle, the rim, represents "the blue sky vault," which recalls the text on the hypocephalus rim that speaks to the ever-encircling course of the sun and his retinue through the sky with its bright Heliopolitan gates or shrines. (Hugh Nibley notes how the outer rim of Achilles' Shield displays the earth-encircling Okeanos.)<br />
(For new translations of facsimile 2 rim, see http://bit.ly/1bthZpQ .)<br />
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II <i>Test Results</i><br />
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"Too closely resembling the Joseph Smith hypocephalus to be ignored?" Note how, in this last sentence, "<i>Joseph Smith</i> hypocephalus" signals both the standard Egyptian hypocephalus <i>and</i>, at once, the Prophet's <i>Explanation</i> of the particular example in his possession. In other words, not only might we compare the round Calendar to the round Egyptian object per se, we can go so far as to compare what Mesoamericanists say of the one to what Joseph Smith says of the other.<br />
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So let's hold the explanations of both Joseph Smith and the Egyptologists regarding hypocephali studiously in mind, as we examine the principal themes that Professor Stuart, writing this very year, descries in the Aztec Solar Stone:<br />
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">1) temporal and solar dynamism</span><br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">2) the vertical axis, earth to celestial zenith</span><br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">3) the idea of the cosmic center (both in heaven and on earth)</span><br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">4) cyclical movement</span><br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">5) the cosmic rule of the divinized earthly ruler, as warrior, in the likeness of the sun</span><br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">6) the divinized earthly ruler as the "embodiment of time"</span><br />
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Nibley and Rhodes (2013: ps. 240-241) helpfully sum up Joseph Smith's "brief explanation" with the following headings over "words used":<br />
<br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">1) cosmology: <i>earth, planets, firmament, Sun, stars, moon, revolution</i></span><br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">2) measurement and number: <i>measurements of time</i>, <i>celestial time, day, cubit, years, one thousand, quarters, revolution</i></span><br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">3) transmission of power or energy: <i>receiving light, borrows its light, governs planets or stars, receives its power, governing power</i></span><br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">4) hierarchy or dominion (intelligence and purpose): <i>creation, residence, government, key, power, God, throne, authority, crown, light, the governing power</i></span><br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">5) ordinances and procedures (relating the above to humanity): <i>sacrifice, altar, Temple</i></span><br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">6) Joseph Smith's use of "special idiom or notation to convey the above," that is, the idea of representation, overlapping of symbolism, iconography conveying more than one meaning:<i> represent, signify, pertaining to, answering to, "but in this case, in relation to this subject, the Egyptians meant it to signify" x and not just y.</i></span><br />
<br />
<br />
We don't yet know how Professor Stuart's peers will receive his new interpretations of the Stone, but that's not our present concern. We speak of a Prophet; and his most vocal, and even mocking and shaming, critics to the contrary, Joseph Smith's spare and orderly Explanation shows, should we compare it to what others say about like circular cosmic drawings, a thoughtful and ordered thematic reading. Professor Robert Ritner hears in the Prophet's Explanation voluble ravings in the manner of pre-Egyptologist Athanasius Kircher (Ritner, "Translation and Historicity of the Book of Abraham--A Response"). Here's how Kircher translates a handful of hieroglyphs:<br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-size: x-small;">Hemphta the supreme spirit and archetype infuses its virtue and gifts in the soul of the sidereal world, that is the solar spirit subject to it whence comes the vital motion in the material or elemental world, and an abundance of all things and variety of species arises. From the fruitfulness of the Osirian bowl, in which, drawn by some marvelous sympathy, it flows ceaselessly. . . </span><br />
<br />
<br />
Is Ritner correct? The "ceaselessly flowing" example from Kircher by which Ritner illustrates what he considers Joseph Smith's own absurd interpretations lacks the specificity, balance, concision, and coherence one finds throughout the thematically compact book of Abraham--and a little mystery besides. Kircher elaborates on but a single, spent, idea.<br />
<br />
Joseph Smith's Abraham, including the Explanation of facsimile 2, merits a second look. Even should one disagree with him to the point of laughter, Joseph's take on the matter merits a jot of charity. Remember what he sadly records of the persecution he continuously suffered at the hands of even neighbors: "being of very tender years, and persecuted by those who ought to have been my friends and to have treated me kindly, and if they supposed me to be deluded to have endeavored in a proper and affectionate manner to have reclaimed me" (Joseph Smith--History 1: 1:28). Where was kindness, propriety, affection?<br />
<br />
Whether we believe even a jot of it, we can all take a charitable look at Joseph Smith's explanation of Kolob (the central solar figure) as being: "The First Creation . . First in government, last pertaining to the measurement of time. The measurement according to celestial time." The Prophet's focus on revolutions, temporal cycles and measurement, "grand governing" and thus hierarchically descending cosmic powers; on stars, earth, and sun, and transmission of light; or on altars and sacrifices and thrones, hardly deserves to be pilloried by either supremely gifted and educated scholars (who really must smile at amateurs); or by the countless following eager sophisticates who, though professing an advanced and and up-to-millennial understanding of all things past, present, and on Wikipedia, have never given a moment's thought to the symbolic representations found on works of great antiquity.<br />
<br />
<br />
III <i>Case Two: The Turquoise Mosaic Shields </i><br />
<br />
Though products of vastly differing cultures, such nevertheless breathtaking points of <i>thematic </i>comparison between the hypocephalus and the Calendar Stone, which certainly date from chapter drafts of <i>One Eternal Round </i>made by Hugh Nibley in the mid-Eighties (the book was posthumously published in 2013), also serve to introduce my own new comparative findings about another Mexica artifact depicting the cosmos: the mosaic Aztec shields. These rare mosaic shields also merit a page or two in any consideration of the hypocephalus.<br />
<br />
"The mosaic design on the shield now in the British Museum. . . portrays the principal division of the Aztec universe. The small circular shape of the shield corresponds to the surface of the earth. At its center is a circle of mosaic with four rays. . . this is a solar disc. The four rays emanating from the solar disc divide the earth into four quarters. In each quarter stands a sky-bearer" (Colin McEwan, et al., <i>Turquoise Mosaics from Mexico</i>, 62). As the reader will recall, the sons of Horus may also take the role of sky-bearers at the corners of the earth. The Prophet Joseph Smith explained these last figures, as follows: "Represents this earth in its four quarters."<br />
<br />
Of a recent finding we further read "The position of the mosaic disc discovered at the bottom of Offering 99 [at <i>Templo Mayor</i>--the pyramidal center of the universe--to which compare Nibley and Rhodes, 100] links it with the night-time journey of the stars through the earth's interior during the recreation of the Mesoamerican underworld--one of the very important functions of this journey was the underworld's fertilization."<br />
<br />
A similar theme obtains on the lower, nightly, half of the hypocephalus, which depicts the upside-down netherworld dominated by the mother cow and replete with symbolism of her impregnation, for she will bear the brilliant central power which, in the form of the four-faced Ram of Mendes, we can call the Transcendent Cosmic Amun-Re (see discussion in <i>One Eternal Round</i>). For the Egyptians, the mother cow, represents Hathor, a goddess who is not only the mother of the sun, but herself the Female Sun, Solar Disk of Solar Disks, at Dendara, the Female Heliopolis, or Sun City. Joseph Smith expresses the idea thus: "and [the cow] is said by the Egyptians to be the Sun." Even so, Rait, nearly a textual "unknown," hardly contests Re's glorious one act play.<br />
<br />
The name Joseph claims the Egyptians gave her: Enish-go-on-dosh is right on the mark for the Lady of Dendara. Should on-dosh reflect<i> 'n-ds(r)</i>, beautiful in (her) solar redness (as the Eye of the sun); then Enish-go might well answer to<i> ins-q3</i>, both "exalted in scarlet" and also "exalted as the scarlet solar eye." I see the name as referring to the Female Sun, the exalted (go) and beautiful (on) Red (enish, dosh) Solar Eye (Enish and Dosh), in an elaborated word play typical of such Hathorian names and, at once, powerful recalling the name attached to one of Horus' sons in his manifestation as fie<span style="font-family: inherit;">ry red star--one of the seven Akhu--that is, as a sun himself: <span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; line-height: 20px;"><i>Dosh-iati-imi-hawt-ins</i> (the One whose two eyes are red [</span><i style="background-color: white; color: #333333; line-height: 20px;">dSr.(ty) j3t.ty</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; line-height: 20px;">], who dwells in the House of Scarlet [<i>Hw.t jnsw.t]</i>, i.e., in the Horizon, sometimes also called the House of Dosh [<i>Hw.t </i></span><i style="background-color: white; color: #333333; line-height: 20px;">dSr.wt]</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; line-height: 20px;">). </span></span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">The surprising Egyptian view of a female sun in a feminine ne</span>therworld, the womb of creation, at opposite pole from the solar powers on the upper half of the disk, leads us on to Professor Stuart's conclusion about the Stone: "We might with justification argue that the upward-facing solar image was but a reflection and was thus, in a concrete and physical sense, materially 'in the earth,' while, at once, uniting the earthly and netherworldly sphere with the solar zenith." (translating, "<i>Puede verse que la imagen solar acostada fue un reflejo y estuvo, materialmente, 'en la tierra,' uniendo la esfera del suelo con el cenit solar</i>").<br />
<br />
<br />
IV <i>A Many-Valued Logic and an Openness to Surprise</i><br />
<br />
Eduard Seler, losing patience with the array of re-interpreters of the Aztec "Sunstone" ("Earthstone?"), famously decreed of the central figure: "It is the sun--no more and no less." David Stuart takes a more nuanced view. When Professor Stuart asks us to accept that a particular representation on the Calendar or elsewhere need not refer to a sole god or a single concept but to multiple interpretations, we wonder whether he has, after all, read Erik Hornung on the many-valued logic of the Egyptian mind (Hornung, <i>The One and the Many; </i>compare the magnificent Burr Cartwright Brundage, <i>The Fifth Sun: Aztec Gods, Aztec World</i>, 1979).<br />
<br />
We all resist facile comparisons between Egypt and Ancient America, an often exceptionally cloying and boring game. And we may consider how even brilliant students, like Nuttall, Brundage, or Florescano have themselves shot beyond the mark in targeting cross-cultural comparisons; yet try as we might to push the poles back to their places, try as we must to understand separate cultures on their own terms, and on their own soil--authochthons all--we may still take up Stuart and Carrasco one day, Klotz and Meeks the next. And should we chose to marvel, what of it?<br />
<br />
If Hugh Nibley chooses to compare the Homeric Shield of Achilles to the Round Egyptian hypocephalus--Why not? The abounding parallelism delights the reader. When critics simplistically carp at "parallelomania," not only are they often blind to crystalline influence, they also fail to discern a rich and buoyant poetics, a "loud and bold" new look from "a peak in Darien."<br />
<br />
Or shall we, like Calvin at Geneva, careful, prosaic, special, clerical, scientific, and so very deeply and puritanically disturbed, avert our eyes from Keats's teeming Pacific?<br />
<br />
Did any idea ever bridge that deep? The Mexica themselves famously do say their own ancestors made that sea-crossing, carrying with them an ancient "book of knowledge" (Sahugun, <i>Codice Matritense de la Real Academia</i>; see esp. Alfredo Lopez Austin, <i>Tamoanchan, Tlalocan: Places of Mist</i>; I'm translating from Miguel Leon-Portilla, <span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif;"> </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "Times New Roman", Times, FreeSerif, serif;">Los antiguos mexicanos </i><i style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "Times New Roman", Times, FreeSerif, serif; text-align: justify;">a través de sus crónicas y cantares </i><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; text-align: justify;">(1961):</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif; font-size: 15.84px;"> .</span><br />
<br style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "Times New Roman", Times, FreeSerif, serif; font-size: 15.84px;" />
<span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif;"><br /></span></span>
<br />
<div>
<span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif;">They arrived, they came. . .</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "Times New Roman", Times, FreeSerif, serif;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "Times New Roman", Times, FreeSerif, serif;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif;">Over the water in their ships they came,</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "Times New Roman", Times, FreeSerif, serif;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "Times New Roman", Times, FreeSerif, serif;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif;">in many groups.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "Times New Roman", Times, FreeSerif, serif;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "Times New Roman", Times, FreeSerif, serif;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif;">And it was there they arrived, at water's edge,</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "Times New Roman", Times, FreeSerif, serif;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "Times New Roman", Times, FreeSerif, serif;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif;">on the north coast.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "Times New Roman", Times, FreeSerif, serif;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "Times New Roman", Times, FreeSerif, serif;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif;">And that very place where they beached their ships</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "Times New Roman", Times, FreeSerif, serif;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "Times New Roman", Times, FreeSerif, serif;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif;">is Panutla,</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "Times New Roman", Times, FreeSerif, serif;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif;"><br /></span></span><br />
<div>
<span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif;">which means: the place where one goes over the waters,</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "Times New Roman", Times, FreeSerif, serif;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif;"><br /></span></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #424242; font-family: "times new roman" , "times" , "freeserif" , serif;">and we still call it Panutla today.</span></span><br />
<br />
<br />
We must point out," says Lopez Austin, "that the data [about Panutla, their migrations to Tamoanchan near the snow-capped volcanoes, the loss of their "original books" and creation of new ones] is so strange and enigmatic that it has led to many interpretations"--but that's the joy of it (Lopez Austin, <i>Tamoanchan</i>, 79; 55; for a map and diagram showing the ships and migrations, fig. 3, 57). "The document is a history of the Mexica, told by themselves" (Lopez Austin, 56), that is to say, the <i>emic</i> view, that which touches as close to the reality of the Mexica origins as we can possibly come.<br />
<br />
It is left to us, outsiders, to take up the <i>etic</i> view of things, to make models that approximate, but never reach, the cultural, religious, and historical truth. Such models must be shaped with rigor and with care, in a word: scholarship; yet curious students keep on the lookout for all kinds of surprises. My own work in Egyptian and Hebrew won't permit me, for instance, to look favorably on the conclusions of others who have tried to see in these languages a dual-origin for Uto-Aztecan--a startling enterprise. All I can see, despite the formidable work spread before me, are the telling multiple misses about Egyptian and Hebrew semantics and phonology. And once you start to tally the misses, it's easy to whittle down the cognate count to next to nothing: consider the case of Japanese and Korean. But at least I give things a considered examination.<br />
<br />
<br />
Of the extant hypocephali, the Calendar Stone, or the Mosaic Shields: What thematic correspondence, what shared semiotic, may we, with eagle eyes, descry on these? Our keen informants again tell us that the latter "commemorates the descent of the stars into the interior of the earth," a cosmic dance of seven all-encircling "warlike star deities" in which Descent and Ascent make up One Eternal Round, a continual renewal of the powers of life. (See <i>Turquoise Mosaics</i>, notes on Image 94 by Adrian Velazquez and Maria Eugenia Marin).<br />
<br />
Indeed, some curious students today discern the symbolism of the caterpillar and the butterfly, images associated with the warrior cult, both coursing the rim and unfolding at center of the Aztec Calendar itself:<br />
<br />
"The outer image is the body of some kind of animal or insect that has fire symbols in boxes along its body. . . The body of the animal or insect curves down to the bottom, and the heads face each other as gaping serpent jaws. . . The traditional view is that these huge images are 'fire serpents,' as indicated by the huge serpent heads and the images of fire that cover their bodies. . . But a more recent interpretation, offered by Karl Taube, suggests that these images are not serpents at all, but giant caterpillars representing the transformation and rebirth of the warrior as the sun, emerging in the center of the image in the shape of a great butterfly" (Carrasco, <i>Daily Life</i>, 174; Karl Taube, "The Turquoise Hearth: Fire, Self Sacrifice, and the Central Mexican Cult of War," in <i>Mesoamerica's Classical Heritage</i>, 2000; also, Taube, "The Symbolism of Turquoise in Ancient Mesoamerica").<br />
<br />
For Professor Taube, the imagery of jaguar, serpent, and butterfly (or caterpillar) all overlap. Vanishes forever, in the light of multiple approaches, the prohibitive Western voicing: "no more and no less." Whether they know it or not, and whether it speaks, at all, to influence, diffusion, or the like--and that's impossible to unscramble--today's Mesoamericanists not only discern in the Mayan glyphs the same system of mixing logographic and syllabic writing that obtains in the hieroglyphs of Egypt, they likewise find in Ancient American composition, both text and iconography--to us, richly chaotic--an "illogical" many-valued logic perfectly at home in Ancient Egypt.<br />
<br />
And the noses of these serpent-caterpillars converging at the nadir of the Calendar Stone? These, says Professor Villela, are indeed bespangled with star symbols. According to Taube, their proper "supernatural caterpillar" home is the fifth level of the heavens, whence dart falling stars. One wonders whether falling stars, in appearance of fiery serpents or caterpillars, might have been thought to fertilize the ground? (See Karl Taube, "Symbolism of Turquoise"). The New Fire Ceremony likewise draws the flaming energy from the Pleiades to this lower earth: "Go and Catch a falling star."<br />
<br />
Do not all these things also recall the two serpents appearing at either side the ram-faced figure of the hypocephalus, a manifestation of powerful solar energies? (lightening bolts? comets? meteors?) or even the fledgling falcon, with tiny, hopeful, outstretched wings (labeled <i>imty</i> or <i>Infant </i>on certain <span style="background-color: white;">disks</span> dramatically appearing in the upper left panel as symbol of solar rejuvenation, in the cycle of time, manifest in the heavenly firmament (see Explanation of Facsimile 2, fig. 4)?<br />
<br />
<br />
These serpents, says Tamas Mekis, in a new dissertation considering all extant hypocephali, both "protect" the central solar god and also "ensure" for him a continuation of "light and energy, at day or at night" ("Hypocephli," Budapest, 2013). All of which recalls what Joseph Smith explained about the figure of four-faced ram, an emblem for the Ancient Egyptians of both unceasing creative and procreative abundance: the central figure receives his power through the medium of other powers. As for the fledgling solar falcon, Mekis tells us, citing the hieroglyphic label, that it embodies in mysterious and transcendent form, as Amun-Re's Ba of Ba's, that is, at once both hidden and radiant, all four of the Ba's, or powers, aspects, and cosmic extension, of the four-faced ram. Now glimpse the Calendar Stone's unfurling butterfly bursting from its chrysalis with four manifest wings--"strange sights"--each bearing the epochal record and pattern of a Sun.<br />
<br />
"Tell me where all past years are."<br />
<br />
<br />
V <i>Cultural Diffusion or Independent Invention?</i><br />
<br />
Yet how could all these themes and motifs from Ancient Egyptian iconography also appear in 16th century Mexico? Obviously, given the intervening millennia separating the two, core ideas and attitudes from Ancient Egypt were as likely to circle the globe several times over as was the royal Egyptian bloodline. Do not the mathematical models of genealogy show us how every living person today must descend from the royal line that built the pyramids?<br />
<br />
<br />
"When you walk through an exhibit of Ancient Egyptian art from the time of the pyramids, everything there was very likely created by one of your ancestors--every statue, every hieroglyph, every gold necklace.<br />
<br />
"If there is a mummy lying in the center of the room, that person was almost certainly your ancestor, too.<br />
<br />
"It means when Muslims, Jews or Christians claim to be children of Abraham, they are all bound to be right" ("Statisticians: Common Ancestor of All Humans Lived 5,000 Years Ago," AP, 5 July 2006).<br />
<br />
<br />
Nibley and Rhodes, while insisting on the arcane and rarefied nature of the hypocephalus idea, an idea that can be summarized in a few telling points, also take us far afield: the Ascension Literature (the Apocalypses of Abraham, Enoch, and so on, the Shield of Achilles, the Hermetic Tradition, a word or two about the Chinese jade disks--even a page about the Aztec Calendar. Nothing is said about the Book of Mormon or of Jaredites, Mulekites, Southeast Asians, or any others who might have borne the freight of the cosmic circle. However telltale the cross-cultural signs of recognition, however clear the trace of the pollen, Nibley leaves the matter in the air.<br />
<br />
<br />
Diffusion of knowledge from clime to clime is a delicate thing, as delicate as the lift of a butterfly.<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
Notes: Essay updated in January 2018.<br />
<br /></div>
</div>
I began to reflecthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11853353050355842605noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7657330582593799810.post-62008205931999618872017-12-12T17:57:00.001-08:002020-08-16T22:39:36.322-07:00Reading Facsimile 1 of the Book of Abraham with Wisdom at Our Side<div>
I <i>Come and See</i><br />
<br />
Today I visited the Church History Library in Salt Lake City, Utah, and looked once more at the vignette from which book of Abraham Facsimile 1 is taken. I looked at it several times, and thought deeply. What a joy to see the papyrus itself, not a facsimile, not a photograph nor a digitized copy, but the very ink, the very hieroglyphs, the vignette itself in all its design and character!</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
To understand the vignette in its fullness, we must turn to the pages of the book of Abraham in the Pearl of Great Price and read the explanations of a latter-day Seer. Otherwise, we risk seeing only a part of the meaning, that part that reflects darkly in the mirror of modern scholarship, a scholarship at a dusty multi-millennial distance from the lost past.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
I do not fault today's scholars for not seeing what Joseph Smith saw: Who can be expected to possess the high gift of the seer to see things as they really are, and as they really once were?</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Yet I do detect a mote in the scholarly eye, when students of an ancient civilization pretend to a preeminent knowledge of that past. We learn to read an ancient script, yes, and master our tentative lexical lists--but to boast? "Yea, how quick to boast" (Helaman 12:5).</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
What do we know? What can we know? Professor Westendorf would tell his students that no living person can know Ancient Egypt as it once was; the best we might do is to build theoretical models by which to approximate that past. We may come thereby, if not to understanding, at least to a common ground for observation and discussion. We all recall those ridiculously disproportionate models fashioned by scientists to teach the public something of the swirling atom, to grant students a brush with molecular structure, and the like. Without the model, there can be no<i> logos</i>, that is to say, no -<i>ology</i>. We would all drift into incoherence, then into stillness.<br />
<br />
Such limitations, however, do not apply to seers, because "things shall be made known by them which otherwise could not be known" (Mosiah 8:17). Such gifted revelators something call to mind the transcendence of translated beings, like Enoch or John the Beloved, being themselves<i> translating beings</i> capable of putting disparate peoples and cultures in touch with each other, as though they themselves transcended space and time and differences in language and culture.<br />
<br />
As I consider the tone of scholarship everywhere today, I wonder how well any of us are doing at building models that invite dialogue--open, demanding, cheerful dialogue--about the forgotten past.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
For instance, as Professor Robert Ritner, in <i>The Joseph Smith Papyri: A Complete Edition</i>, winds up his argument against the Prophet Joseph's explanation of Facsimile 1, an argument consisting of merest <i>ex cathedra</i> declaration after declaration of Folly and Error, he pronounces:</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
"Except for those willfully blind, the case is closed."<br />
<br />
<br />
The words of Scripture best suited to set alongside such an eager, un-nuanced, and incompletely argued pronouncement are those of King Limhi (Mosiah 8): </div>
<div>
<br />
"And now, when Ammon had made an end of speaking these words [about the interpreters and the high gift of seers] the king rejoiced exceedingly, and gave thanks to God, saying: Doubtless a great mystery is contained within these plates, and these interpreters were doubtless prepared for the purpose of unfolding all such mysteries to the children of men."</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
I say the same of Facsimile 1: a great mystery is contained within that vignette, rich as it is with representation and symbolism. And, as I see it, Joseph the Seer has unfolded a portion of its ancient "mysteries to the children of men" in latter-days, with more unfolding to come for those who seek. Neither is the door shut to those who seek either to understand or add to the Prophet's Explanation of Facsimile 1 by the study of Near Eastern languages and cultures. I attest to just how very open that door lies. Enter and seek--and find. It doesn't make a jot of difference whether anybody attempts to stop up that avenue of pursuit: seek and you will find abundance "of treasures hid in the sand." "And [you] shall find wisdom and great treasures of knowledge, even hidden treasures." Yes, you shall find even the Pearl of Great Price (Deuteronomy 33; Doctrine and Covenants 89).</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
As I reflect on Professor Ritner's pronouncement of blindness, even willful blindness, I am compassionately startled at what many apparently cannot see or do not even care to look for. "Look to God and live" (Alma 37). Like Limhi I feel to exclaim:</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
"O how marvelous are the works of the Lord, and how long doth he suffer with his people; yea, and how blind and impenetrable are the understandings of the children of men; for they will not seek wisdom, neither do they desire that she should rule over them!"<br />
<br />
<br />
II <i>A Word to the Wise</i><br />
<br />
Wisdom! You may rule over me! Like Emerson, "I am weary of the surfaces, and die of inanition." If Hokhmah, Ma'at, Sofia, the Wisdom of the Ages, not sophistication nor prating invective, desires to rule my mind, a mind that now hopes to see, She may.<br />
<br />
Let's take a look at her judicious works.<br />
<br />
Journalist Doug Gibson, reprising via Twitter a frankly objective review of Professor Ritner's study of the Joseph Smith Papyri, a review originally appearing in the <i>Ogden Standard Examiner,</i> observes:<br />
<br />
<br />
"To Ritner, the 'case is closed.' What Smith claimed, and the LDS Church claims today, is simply false, he says.<br />
<br />
"Ironically, that certainty of Ritner's may be the weakest point of his arguments. One can make a case that to draw any conclusion that science is settled can be called unscientific.<br />
<br />
"With ancient Egyptian-era digs going on in the world, it's an audacious claim to say that part of a book that millions regard as scripture is forever concluded to be a hoax" (Mormon History and Culture: "The Mummy's Curse and the Book of Abraham").<br />
http://www.standard.net/stories/2012/04/29/scholar-challenges-joseph-smith-translation<br />
<br />
While there is little original about the case Ritner presents against the book of Abraham, he presents it with a blare of trumpets. And few blasts are so sharp as his ridicule of the Prophet's explanations of certain goddesses appearing on Facsimile 3. How is it that the Prophet confuses goddesses with mortal males?<br />
<br />
Yet addressing the very same embarrassment in 1956, before Professor Ritner was even born, Hugh Nibley had the following to say (in the form of an imaginary dialogue):<br />
<br />
"'It <i>is</i> rather quaint,' Professor F. commented. '<i>Any fool can see</i>, for example, that the figures called Pharaoh and his son are women.'<br />
<br />
"Yes,' Mr. Blank answered, 'a myopic moron could <i>see</i> that, and that is why it so remarkable. It is plainly intentional.'"<br />
<br />
Mr. Blank, in search of the patiently recovered remarkable rather than the surface visible--that is, what scholars do--goes on to cite arcane works of Egyptology in hopes of discovering why Joseph Smith might so discern a trace of the Pharaoh or the Prince in the outward form of a goddess (<i>Lehi in the Desert. The World of the Jaredites. There Were Jaredites</i>, 336-337).<br />
<br />
To read anything of the Egyptian past, the student must drop all preconceived notions, including the norms of Western logic, and, well, venture. . .<br />
<br />
<br />
As a serious reader of Professor Ritner's <i>Joseph Smith Egyptian Papyri: A Complete Edition</i> (though not the only published edition!), I also note strengths and weaknesses; I note sound transcription, sound translation--and the unsound. The book may have its errors, and I've tallied a telling list, but the surprising, and I think the significant, thing to note is the singular lack of intellectual curiosity about the documents Professor Ritner assays to translate. Everything translates into the matter-of-fact, if not the outright dull. Another weakness is that Ritner does not await anyone else's sheaf-laden return from the library. Even as we, brim with joy, rejoice in discovery and ready our report, he interrupts by slamming the classroom door in our faces. Ritner makes it abundantly clear, however, that he is, by no means, the first to do so. Student after student, he notes, has slammed the door on the book of Abraham since 1861 or so. Yet as Nibley asks: Will the latch hold?<br />
<br />
The latch simply never holds.<br />
<br />
<br />
Intellectual Curiosity? We wonder whether documents such as the Book of Breathings or the hypocephalus have anything profound to tell us about the Egyptian mind? Do they yield a chapter in the intellectual history of the race? Might they have something--anything--to say to religious seekers? Or are they, as the Chicago Professor dryly puts it: "amulets" of "common" funerary hopes?<br />
<br />
Ritner's "complete" transcriptions and translations, fleeting in comment, carry a cold and hurried air. We don't come to understanding. The book evinces a single-minded purposefulness in an impatient and aggrieved tone. Ritner not only declares: All Joseph Smith says is false! He also insists of the supposedly ubiquitous, thus "common" "amulets": Nothing to see here, move along.<br />
<br />
If it is so, such a neglect seems to be very much at odds with Professor Ritner's other famous book, <i>The Mechanics of Ancient Egyptian Magical Practice, </i>which the reader can hardly put down. If it is so, then Ritner's terse museum-label comments about these Egyptian texts also stand at odds with the trend of Egyptological writing since 1980. Go to any library and select books written by Jan Assmann, Erik Hornung, Alexandra von Lieven, Dimitri Meeks, Sylvie Cauville, John Baines, and so on, and see whether these ever fail to stir the soul with the wonders of the Egyptian mind, see whether these don't seek to draw the universal treasuries into the expanding picture.<br />
<br />
Professor Ritner is always worth reading. Yet had Ritner's contracting book on the Joseph Smith Papyri undergone standard Egyptological peer-review or the requisite editing for printing at a standard publishing house (one not given to Mormon controversy), how many counts of sarcasm, what tally of the personal barbs, might have vanished from the final cut? So declawed, the book, written for a specific lay audience, would have lost its crowd appeal.<br />
<br />
Hugh Nibley, by way of contrast, at least tried to gather documents having a similar thematic and cultural bearing, all of which he believes ought to read in light of the Joseph Smith Papyri and vice-versa. He invites the reader to study these, ponder the larger <i>Kulturkreis</i>, and then to decide whether such productions of the Egyptian mind as the hypocephalus, the Breathings document, or the vignettes, are worthy of our attention (see <i>The Message of the Joseph Smith Papyri</i> (1975) and <i>One Eternal Round</i> (2010). Shall we brush these collections aside in our knowing simplicity? or shall we take a second look?<br />
<br />
The test has to do with curiosity--and with attentiveness to matters of eternal concern. Ever reading, ever studying, ever discovering, we wait on the Lord for the fullness of truth.<br />
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I began to reflecthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11853353050355842605noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7657330582593799810.post-76074519707101709822017-12-02T13:13:00.002-08:002022-06-19T18:50:47.549-07:00Alma 37:12: One Eternal Round: Thoughts on Egyptian Cosmology and Intellectual HistoryIn Alma 37:12 we read:<br />
<br />
[God] doth counsel in <i>wisdom</i> over all his works,<br />
<br />
and his paths are straight,<br />
<br />
and his course is one eternal round.<br />
<br />
<br />
Here we discover yet another place in the Book of Mormon that calls to mind the delightful Egyptian and Hebrew expressions about Lady Wisdom, both Ma'at and Hokhmah.<br />
<br />
Note how <i>Wisdom (or Ma'at) </i>governs all his works; how "his paths are straight (<i>m3'</i>)." Since the Egyptian verb <i>m3'</i> marks <i>movement along a straight line, </i>the co-incidence of Wisdom (Ma'at) and her "straight" (<i>m3'</i>) paths makes for a typically Egyptian play on words. But there's more. The Wisdom governing all His works includes both God's paths <i>and</i> His course, a duality of expression that both brings together and comprehends, in the compass in two brief phrases, all His works and all His ways, the works and the ways of salvation.<br />
<br />
<br />
Alma's poetic recitations to his son Helaman reflect the anaphoric expressions of his (again, poetic) discourse to the Saints at Gideon:<br />
<br />
For I <i>perceive</i> that ye are in the paths of righteousness [cf. Eg. <i>m3'.t, or Ma'at; straight paths];</i><br />
<br />
I <i>perceive</i> that ye are in the path which leads to the kingdom of God;<br />
<br />
<i>yea, I perceive</i> that ye are making his paths <i>straight</i>.<br />
<br />
I <i>perceive</i> that it has been made known unto you, by the testimony of his word, that he cannot walk in<i> crooked</i> [Eg. <i>isf.t; the opposite of Ma'at</i>] paths; neither doth he <i>vary </i>from that which he hath said; neither hath he a <i>shadow</i> <i>of turning</i> from the right to the left, or from that which is right to that which is wrong;<br />
<br />
therefore, his <i>course</i> is <i>one eternal round</i> (Alma 7:19-20).<br />
<br />
<br />
Because some may yet wonder whether God's laws of morality and chastity are subject to change, Alma, anticipating the matter, immediately adds: "And he doth not dwell in unholy temples; neither can filthiness or anything which is unclean be received into the kingdom of God." Purity thus exemplifies God's unvarying ways.<br />
<br />
<br />
The Doctrine and Covenants (3:2) also cites the ancient formula:<br />
<br />
For God doth not walk in crooked paths, neither doth he turn to the right hand nor to the left, neither doth he vary from that which he hath said,<br />
<br />
therefore his paths are straight,<br />
<br />
and his course is one eternal round.<br />
<br />
The idea of "a shadow of turning from the right to the left," or from the right hand to the left, glossed by Alma as a reference to "right" and to "wrong," clearly shows astronomical reference: the sun at ascension or meridian, the limiting of solar shadow, the right hand (<i>imn</i>) as the West (<i>imn</i>) in Egyptian (Hebrew has the right hand as the South), the left hand as the East, the idea of solar turning, the solstices, etc. The Path and Course of God reflects the path of the sun.<br />
<br />
<br />
And wording in Alma 37 not only suggest the Hebrew idea of the <i>tequfah</i>, what the Greeks would term a <i>periodos</i> (a <i>period,</i> or <i>complete cycle</i>), they also recall a poetic Egyptian theologoumenon from a New Kingdom text we name the Solar Litany (Solar Litany 152) that "summarizes, perhaps harmonizes, conflicting notions about the movement of the sun":<br />
<br />
<i>phr jtn.f</i><br />
<i>m3' b3.f</i><br />
<br />
May his <i>jtn</i> (manifestation as solar globe) revolve (or wind) back-and-forth--<br />
but his <i>b3</i> (spiritual manifestation, radiance) follow a straight course.<br />
<br />
Or:<br />
<br />
His <i>jtn</i> shall wander in revolution;<br />
His <i>b3</i> shall proceed in a straight line.<br />
<br />
The verb <i>m3' </i>gives the punchline to the couplet, for "when written with the <i>cartouche</i>," as here, the verb "paradoxically describes a regular circuit along a straight line," or a "going round in a straight line." The goddess Maat, whose name derives from the very same verbal root, thus personifies Egyptian notions of right, rightness, correctness, truth, justice, and candid honesty.<br />
<br />
(Val Sederholm, <i>Papyrus British Museum 10808</i>, Brill, Leiden and Boston, 112).<br />
<br />
<br />
The Egyptian couplet forcefully recalls another in the Hebrew Bible, though I doubt the specific textual comparison has ever been made, given how little read the obscure Solar Litany remains. We speak of Psalm 17, a cosmic psalm, to which Egyptian influence has famously been attributed. The peculiar manner in which the Hebrew Psalm unpacks the duality of solar movement, as both straight line of ascent <i>and</i> revolution, reveals the Egyptian influence as much as any other feature of the cosmic psalm already identified by scholars:<br />
<br />
<i>Miqtzeh hashamayim motza'o</i><br />
<i>utqufato al-qetzotam</i><br />
<br />
From the extreme bounds of the heavens is his going out (or his ascension, cf. Eg. <i>prj</i>),<br />
and his circuit (cf. Eg. <i>phr</i>) reaches to its extremest bounds, [and thus making One Eternal Round].<br />
(Psalm 17:8).<br />
<br />
If rendered into Egyptian, the couplet would feature a telling play on words, a fairly common correspondence in solar texts, between <i>prj </i>(to <i>go forth</i> or to <i>ascend</i>, often used of heavenly bodies) and <i>phr </i>(to<i> describe a circle, make a circuit</i>).<br />
<br />
For the sun, ascension culminates as a full revolution, from noontide to noontide, and the motion described is therefore but one whole consisting of two complementary parts or paths. Yet, even so, the image of the <i>motza'</i>, the linear "going forth," contradicts that of the <i>tequfah</i>, the "circuit." So we're left wondering whether the sensible, run-of-the-mill translations positing a simple <i>circuit</i>--a commonplace, really, in Bible translation--satisfy original intent. The solar course described in Psalm 17:8 involves something more than meets the eye--the sun moves far from our perception into the "extremest bounds."<br />
<br />
<br />
Nor is such a contradictory (or complementary!) model to be found in the Egyptian <i>texts</i> alone; the <i>wall murals</i> of the contemporaneous New Kingdom tombs paint the solar course both as fixed line and as a winding, even serpentine, movement, which reflects the <i>phr</i>-model of solar movement. The Egyptians held to both symbolic and realistic visions of cosmic movement, the ideal and the observed. The sun to the watchful observer is indeed all over the place, at every hour and at every season (see descriptions in Joshua Aaron Roberson, <i>The Ancient Egyptian Books of the Earth, </i>2012).<br />
<br />
"The juxtaposition of <i>phr</i> and <i>m3'</i>, as descriptive of the sun's movement (or any travel for that matter), speaks both to the principle of complementary pairs [as found throughout Egyptian literature] and to a fundamental contradiction. Both <i>jtn</i> and<i> b3</i> describe the sun, yet the words suggest distinct [or alternating] visions of what that body is [or what it may be]; for each takes a distinct [though complementary] verb (or requires a distinct model) of solar movement. The notion of <i>m3'</i>, countering the planetary drift inherent in <i>phr,</i> provides the corrective element; one may say, the adjustment of the cosmos. The two modalities, movement along a straight line and turnings, keep things in balance; what the verbal pair reflects is only the true nature of any road" (Sederholm, 113).<br />
<br />
"The complementary pair (<i>m3', phr</i>) occurs again in <i>Urk</i>. VI, 11, 22-13, 1 [another obscure text]:<br />
<br />
<i>Wpj-W3w.t hr m3' n.f</i><br />
<i>phry jb nj phry jm.f</i><br />
<br />
Wepwawet [the swift jackal, Opener of Paths] straightens the road for him,<br />
and thus soothes, lit. encircles or rounds, the heart of him<br />
who makes his rounds therein (113 n 64).<br />
<br />
The Opener of the Paths prepares a straight path before the traveler,<br />
and thus calms (or encircles) the traveler of encircling roads<br />
<br />
or: calms the wanderer in wandering roads.<br />
<br />
"The hints of a cosmological reflection in the couplet lend it deep interest and suggest that the Egyptians held two, contradictory, models of celestial mechanics. Mortality is swept along by the same contrary winds. After all, the fundamental rule of life is "Follow Maat" [while also understanding that] "Life is a <i>phr.t</i> (<i>phr.t pw 'nx</i>)--either finished cycle or back-forth spin. Nevertheless, whereas life's cycle. . . mimes <i>Fortuna</i>, the centerpiece of Egyptian values remains the attainment of <i>Maat</i> [Order, Justice]" (Sederholm, 113).<br />
<br />
The reader will recall the Wepwawet-standard (the Opener of the paths standard), in the hand of the standing figure at the apex of the round hypocephalus, who also stands directly above the seated figure of the Transcendent Amun-Re-Shu at the heart (qrb, or Kolob) of the circle. Movement from the heart to the apex of the circle marks ascension and manifest glory (the ba of Shu), which, at once, signifies culmination of the solar circuit. As Hugh Nibley would have it, the hypocephalus (which he also describes as "one eternal round"), is rather globe or sphere than circle. Ascension is thus as much circuit as line. That the circle of the hypocephalus also signifies the divine aureola encircling and thus protecting the deceased comes now as no surprise, "thus encircling, he calms the traveler of the encircling solar highways," a traveler who, as the text of the hypocephalus rim informs us, has joined the solar retinue and will soon enter into rest with the heavenly host in the tabernacle of the Elder One, in the heavenly Pillar City (or Heliopolis) at the apex of the circle.<br />
<br />
<br />
Here is the wanderer's rest, Abraham's longed-for city: "for he looked for a city which hath foundations, whose builder and maker is God"; "but now they desire a better country, a heavenly"; "he hath prepared for them a city" (Hebrews 11:10, 16). Abraham, the strict follower of Ma'at, or of <i>righteousness</i> (see Abraham 1:1), also knew that the eternal quest for eternal life was a <i>phr.t</i>, a <i>circuit</i> or <i>progress</i>, from altar to altar, and back home to God. (Hugh Nibley, some forty years ago, wrote of Abraham's circuit, or progress, from altar to altar, a prominent theme in the Book of Abraham.) <i>Phr.t </i>also wraps the heart of the traveler in calm and quietness, no matter how exposed to the perils of the road: "[we] came forth in the way to the land of Canaan, and dwelt in tents as we came on our way. Therefore eternity was our covering and our rock and our salvation, as we journeyed from Haran by the way of Jershon, to come to the land of Canaan" (Abraham 2:15-16).<br />
<br />
<br />
So what does the standard manual on Egyptian Religion, a textbook still used three decades after publication, have to say about the contradictory nature of solar movement?<br />
<br />
"Clearly the earth was not thought to revolve around the sun,<br />
but neither was the sun thought to revolve around the earth"<br />
<br />
Leonard H. Lesko, "Ancient Egyptian Cosmogonies and Cosmology," in<i> Religion in Ancient Egypt</i>, 117-118.<br />
<br />
<i><br /></i>
<i>"Neither was the sun thought to revolve around the earth."</i><br />
<br />
<br />
That's a startling statement! Did the Egyptians not hold to a geocentric universe, to the plain and the simple--and predictable? Surely Professor Lesko faced immediate dismissal from Yale University for making such an unhistorical and unscientific claim about the cosmology of the ancients, a claim overturning the fixed knowledge of every ten-year-old on the planet! Cornell University nevertheless published the textbook in 1991, and it has been standard college fare on both sides of the Atlantic ever since.<br />
<br />
While "The universe was 'all that the sun encircles,' [yet] if this phrase implies that the sun was thought to have gone around the world on a single circular course, then apparently the phrase reflected a cosmology different from that in the religious texts discussed here."<br />
<br />
Again: "Obviously the ancient Egyptians viewed and described the world around them in a variety of ways [a various semiotic]. The personifications and metaphors of the myths and stories were imaginative, poetic, very complex, and often humorous, but they certainly did not represent the sum total of the Egyptians' cosmological or scientific thinking on the subject" (Lesko, 117).<br />
<br />
In other words, let's not mistake metaphor, image, and icon about sun and stars for the sum total of cosmological speculation.<br />
<br />
Other questions spring to mind: Was the Egyptian heaven a flat roof? or was it rounded or "bent"? Both representations appear in the sources. Did the sun move? or was it moved by outside agencies? Again, both ideas appear.<br />
<br />
<br />
In 2008 I published a few speculative paragraphs about the possible rotation of the Akhet, a "place" or "moment" usually associated with the "Horizon" (and Akhet is usually translated as <i>Horizon</i>):<br />
<br />
"The iconography of the Akhet shows the rounded sun. . . half manifest, half hidden, between the twin hills that, properly speaking, stand for the east <i>and </i>west horizons, although pictured as but one horizon. Entry into the Akhet thus answers [with immediacy] to egress on the eastern skyline."<br />
<br />
<br />
So do the writings and iconography describe the sun as circling about a static earth? or do they rather describe a sort of continual flip-flop in the horizon in which Entry and Egress occur at the same point yet mark different moments in time, dusk and dawn? Somehow, as Professor Derchain has suggested, "the perpetual cycling of the sun" (the eternal round) must "rely upon the equation of east and west, thus linking the solar death/descent with rebirth/ascent" (Robeson, 26 n 82). Again, the flow of the iconography that marks the path from descent to ascent can take either a horizontal or a vertical model (Robeson, 43). There was nothing static about the Egyptian presentation of the solar cycle.<br />
<br />
Some iconographic labels, in purposeful mistaking, bizarrely describe dusk at the east horizon, dawn at the west, a hint at <i>the mysterious reversibility of the system. </i>But this pert reversal of space and time is so typically Egyptian: "today we're saying that the sun rises in the West and sets in the East." Note the Western bafflement at encountering, and attempting to right, yet another transgression of logic: "Coming out of the Eastern (sic) Mountain, resting in the Western (sic) Mountain, every day." Note that this is "Every Day"--the continual workings of the cosmic gears. What other culture says this sort of thing? plays like games with space and time? Yet examples of such mismatch are clearly not error nor are they, after all, reflective of a pert playfulness. No. They are (we hope) "possibly intentional textual interchange of west and east, as an expression of the perpetual motion of the sun" (Roberson, 153 n 178, referencing Derchain and Piankoff). Still, we note that what moves perpetual are the cardinal points themselves, the directional markers of the earth; the <i>in-volved</i> sun itself "has nothing to do"--not even "roll around heaven all day."<br />
<br />
If the earth rotates eastward on her axis, does not west mountain come round to merge with east mountain--one single point on the eternal horizon? Isn't the place of solar ingress and egress essentially, then, the same for a sun standing still? That's what the egyptologists have long been mulling over, though it remains a delicate point. The ancient record continuously teases the reader, teasing out divergent threads and imagery, that is, until he yearns for some--any--logical, Western, formula to tie the threads together into Text, into semiotic Encyclopaedia, and tell us once-for-all how the Egyptians ordered their universe. And that yearning sums up the entire egyptological enterprise--how to weave nonsense and contradiction into explanatory models. There's a bit of cosmic speculation, here, to say the least, on the part of the solar priests who composed the netherworld books for the tombs of the royal high priest of the sun, and even though we are not yet able to build a model of the Egyptian universe out of it all, the matter does deserve something better than the notation (<i>sic</i>!). The sometime fluidity of the cardinal points at the Akhet-horizon deserves its own chapter in the intellectual history of the human family. A chapter in intellectual history? Here is a culture that conceived, like many others, of fixed cardinal points as the bedrock of cosmology--and then happily, at will, shifted east and west and dawn and dusk and line and circle. Is there something worth pondering, balancing, there?<br />
<br />
Or shall we just rest content believing that the Egyptians, like all primitives everywhere, held the Ptolemaic view? Shall we posit that they were neither philosophers nor scientists, that they didn't know about such things as, say, the circulation of blood? (In Egypt, they did!) A placid contentment would require less thought as we page through the primitive, but even so, we're going to have to revive the already archaic signature of <i>sic </i>for use on nearly every translated page of obscure Egyptian writings. I await the book entitled <i>Ancient Egyptian Cosmological Thought (sic!).</i><br />
<br />
While we await the tidy answers, the speculation rolls wildly on: Might the Egyptians have understood the Akhet as a rotating axis?<br />
<br />
Certainly the round Duat, or Netherworld, which is somehow <i>involved</i> in the Akhet, takes shape as a temporal-spatial moment of turning. The hieroglyph that writes the logogram for Duat is a star, some say the sun, enclosed in a circle, an encircling that turns in One Eternal Round.<br />
<br />
<br />
Again: "The inversion and righting of the sun raises questions about the Egyptian model of celestial mechanics. These states [inversion, flip-flop, righting] are merely perceptual, being symbolic of the journey through the Netherworld.<br />
<br />
<br />
"One explanation for the inversion and [simultaneous?] righting of the sun centers round the rotation of the Akhet [itself]. If it is the Akhet that daily turns 180 degrees, and not the sun, the movement of the sun is merest illusion. Indeed the cryptographic hieroglyphs that paint the setting of the sun with the image of a man plunging headlong with outstretched arms and its rising with a man arms uplifted [Papyrus Salt 825] hint at a celestial mechanics in which the Akhet serves as the axis of revolving sky and Netherworld. The Akhet is a place of turning and the <i>dynamis</i> of [the complementary temporal modalities] <i>nhh-</i>and <i>d.t</i>-time, the axis of the workings of renewal in respect of which all other celestial bodies move.<br />
<br />
"Where the Akhet lies is unknown, even unknowable; like our horizon it marks a boundary or hollow between the visible and invisible worlds. Indeed the revolution of the Akhet parallels and even motivates that of the invisible world. Osiris, who personifies, surrounds, and controls the Duat, receives the disk [or globe] at dusk and uplifts the same at dawn in <i>perpetuum mobile</i>. As the Akhet revolves so turns the Duat with its night sky from darkness into daylight. Gears of baffling complexity work the thing; for the movement is really a complete shift <i>back </i>into daylight, West to East and East to West--erasing the dark hours, and still dawning Eastward all the same.<br />
<br />
"The Akhet and Duat together make up a temporal-spatial continuum, the Akhet as the place that holds the sun and keeps its flame; the Daut, a mostly temporal feature, a space composed of hours. Osiris [the mummified corpse in the Duat, the dead king], in his name of 'Yesterday' and acted upon by the force and wheel of time, uplifts the ponderous sun at dawn with no perceptible motion of his part. Yet it is his uplifted arms that serve as the sign of rejuvenation. Both Osiris and the sun are righted by the turning of the Akhet in the unresting hours and, as consequence, together stand upright--with arms outstretched--as symbols of towering strength and power. Here is the cosmically sized Re-Osiris standing 'with extended arm at the eastern horizon' [as one resurrected solar power].<br />
<br />
The union and resurrection of the cosmic Re-Osiris realizes the greatest mystery of Egyptian religion.<br />
<br />
"Egyptian <i>theoria</i> but subserves the theology of solar renewal for which the movements of the heavenly bodies provide the hoped-for signs. If the Akhet does turn, the axis of turning still centers in Re because he provides the motivation [the force or the focus] for that turning. The same holds true of Re's relation to the <i>p.t</i> [or sky] and its shape and roadways, as the iconography shows. At times the Egyptians envision the <i>p.t</i> as a 'bow-shaped' roof or vault (<i>pd.t, </i>bow), the so-called 'bent' sky. The notion of<i> bending,</i> when applied to the static, flat rooftop, implies a potential, even motive, force. The imagery of the <i>bent heavens</i> reflects (cf. Lat. <i>reflectere</i>, to bend backwards, like a bow) both the observable re-turn of the sun to the day sky and the nature of the road it travels. The aquatic solar roadway inclines, winds, and bends, as lead the channeled waters" [the winding <i>phr</i>-cycle again] (paragraphs taken from Sederholm, <i>Papyrus British Museum 10808</i>, 110-111).<br />
<br />
<br />
These few and premature thoughts only hint at the baffling complexity of the gears that work the thing--the very universe in its cosmic revolutions. Then perhaps the texts, no matter our pains, will never yield anything more than hints.<br />
<br />
But when did the Ancient Egyptian books ever promise the reader definitions, certainty, answers? Whether they yet deliver enlargement of mind, an enlarged horizon of cosmological speculation for the curious seeker, certainly depends on our response, for deep answers to deep. We can at least read the ancients afresh--letting labels go, foregoing models.<br />
<br />
<br />
The Book of Mormon, with which we began, is at pains to show us that the Lord's ancient covenant people understood the workings of the cosmos (Helaman 12:15): "for surely it is the earth that moveth and not the sun!"<br />
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As for the book of Abraham, the father of the faithful makes abundantly clear that what he terms the "set time of the earth," or "the reckoning of the time of the earth," has to do with the measurement of its axial rotation in comparison with which the moon "moveth in order more slow." In other words, both the earth and the moon spin, but because the moon spins much slower, "therefore the reckoning of its time is not so many [as the earth] as to its number of days, and of months, and of years." Do we understand what Abraham plainly though poetically sets forth? (And most readers down the decades do understand.) The numbering of day and night, month after month and year after year, comes as consequence of the earth spinning on her axis--thus "surely it is the earth that moveth and not the sun!" (See Abraham 3). In Abraham's Egypt, then, to borrow a line from the standard undergraduate textbook on Egyptian religion and cosmology, the sun clearly "was not thought to revolve around the earth."<br />
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Should we thence wish to hie to Kolob, we'll need something more than the basic manual, but the deeper dive into Egyptology, the nearer our reach.<br />
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<br />I began to reflecthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11853353050355842605noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7657330582593799810.post-46748749952419434892017-11-25T16:34:00.001-08:002017-12-07T21:09:18.566-08:00Missouri: A Mighty Shout of JoyROUGH DRAFT ONLY: PAGES STILL TO BE ADDED Around 1991 I drafted for my own "profit and learning" a number of exploratory essays about the Prophet Joseph Smith. Truman G. Madsen and Hugh Nibley both indulged me in reading what follows, a fragmentary but imaginative thematic and symbolic recapturing of the Missouri persecutions, so I now make what Brother Madsen was wont to call "a few cosmetic changes" and invite the indulgence of any who might choose to reflect on<br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-size: large;">Missouri: A Mighty Shout of Joy</span><br />
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For the Latter-day Saints in Missouri, the last week of October 1838 was a plunge into the vortex of darkness. Parley P. Pratt records the impatient burnings of the hours just preceding the Battle of Crooked River:<br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-size: x-small;">The night was dark, the distant plains far and wide were illuminated by blazing fires, immense columns of smoke were seen rising in awful majesty, as the world was on fire. The thousand meteors, blazing in the distance like the camp-fires of some war host, threw a fitful gleam of light upon the distant sky, which many might have mistaken for the Aurora Borealis. this scene, added to the silence of midnight, the rumbling sound of the tramping steeds over the hard and dried surface of the plain, the clanking of swords in their scabbards, the occasional gleam of bright armor in the flickering firelight, the gloom of surrounding darkness, and the unknown destiny of the expedition, or even of the [abducted] people who sent it forth; all combined to impress the mind with deep and solemn thoughts </span><span style="font-size: x-small;">(<i>Autobiography</i>, 178).</span><br />
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It is a picture of elemental chaos--Missouri unreal: "The banks of Shoal creek on either side teemed with children sporting and playing. . . The weather was very pleasant, the sun shone clear, all was tranquil." On this bright afternoon of the 30th of October descended the harvest sun of Haun's Mill, with its buzzing, angry mob. Children and mothers scattered to the woods, while "the bullets cut down the bushes on all sides of us," remembered Amanda Smith. "One girl was wounded by my side, and fell over a log, and her clothes hung across the log; and they shot at them expecting they were hitting her; and our people afterwards cut out of that log twenty bullets (Amanda Smith, HC III, 323-325). Three "little boys crept under the bellows in the shop" to escape death. Upon discovery, one was killed instantly. Another, shot three times, lived for a month, while the third, eight-year old Adam Smith, wounded severely "feigned himself dead, and lay perfectly still, till he heard his mother call him after dark (III, 187). Joseph Young secreted himself "in a thicket of bushes, where I lay till eight o'clock in the evening, at which time I heard a female voice calling my name" (III, 185). The survivors clung together throughout "the painful night in deep and awful reflections" (III, 185). Thereafter, the dead "were thrown into a dry well and covered with dirt" (III, 324).<br />
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The thunderheads hit Far West a day later. Mosiah Hancock, four-and-a-half, witnessed the slaughter of an infant wrested from its mother and the multiple violations of an unconscious sixteen-year-old girl. He himself was beaten to death: "I could look upon my body, and I was far above them and was glad; for behold, I saw a personage draped in perfect white who said to me, 'Mosiah, you have got to go back to the earth, for you have a work to do'" (<i>The Life Story of Mosiah Lyman Hancock</i>). In one place, women and children, separated from the men, huddled in prayer in the face of a threatened attack at dawn, and looked to the heavens.<br />
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It is the faith of the mothers of Missouri that transcends the tale of persecution with a show of power:<br />
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">Brother Joseph Holbrook was literally hacked to pieces [at Crooked River], and he was brought to our home about the first of April. My mother nursed him for about three months. He had to remain in the hay loft all this time until he was able to get out of the state. One evening, old Sam Bogart [the mob-king] and two other men came hunting him. He was hid in the hay loft covered with flax. . . I cannot attempt to describe my feelings as I stood on the floor in front of the fire while those three dark figures stood outside our door. I felt sure my mother would get one of them even if they killed my father. I shudder to think of these dark times</span> (Mosiah Hancock).<br />
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*The mothers of Zion shielded "Brother Joseph," whether Joseph Smith or Joseph Holbrook, with their very lives.<br />
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The stories eerily repeat themselves: thickets and lofts, fires, the quietly calling voices of women stirring to life men feigning death, the dark figures of men and horses engulfed in the broad Missouri night. And horrible was the passage "within" that night:<br />
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">When my guard conducted me to the door of this miserable cell it grated on its huge hinges and opened like the pit yawning to receive me; a volume of thick smoke issued forth and seemed to forbid my entrance; but urged in my rear by bayonets and loaded pistols in the hands of savage beings, I endeavored to enter, but war forced to retreat again outside of the door to breathe for a moment the free air. At this instant several pistols were cocked and presented at my head and breast, with terrible threats and oaths of instant death if I did not go in again. I told them to fire as soon as they pleased, for I must breathe a moment or die in the attempt. After standing a few moments, I again entered the prison and threw myself down, my face to the floor, to avoid the smoke. Here I remained for some time, partly in a state of insensibility; my heart sickened within me, and a deathlike feeling came over me, from which I did not wholly recover for several days</span> (<i>Autobiography</i>, 233-234).<br />
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In Far West Joseph Smith was betrayed and taken prisoner, with several of his friends, on October 31, and sold to the justice of a mad carnival. Men daubed with red paint masqueraded savagely, and the prisoners on the road to their "mock court" were exhibited like dethroned authorities to the gaping inhabitants of Vanity Fair. The prisoners were placed in a covered wagon bound for trial and execution at Independence. Lucy Smith came to kiss her sons goodbye:<br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">The man who led us through the crowd spoke to Hyrum, who was sitting in front, and, telling him that his mother had come to see him, requested that he should reach his hand to me. He did so, but I was not allowed to see him; the cover was of strong cloth, and nailed down so close that he could hardly get his hand through</span> (HC III, 195).<br />
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Hyrum Smith later spoke of men, women, and children bound to trees, whipped, and left to hunger, and, then, "to gnaw the bark from the trees" (III, 404-424). Joseph and his associates, chained together in a dungeon were offered human flesh, while poison was administered to them in tea. "I escaped unhurt," said Alexander McRae, "while all who did [drink] were sorely afflicted, some being blind two or three days" (III, 258). Hyrum, who was poisoned several times, remembered the prisoners lying "two or three days in a torpid, stupid state, not even caring or wishing for life." Of the prison into which another Joseph was placed: "Ramban explains it as an underground dungeon with an overhead opening through which they lowered the prisoners and through which the prisoners had light." The word for "dungeon" was explained by Ramban as having reference to "the faint light that percolated into the dungeon."<br />
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Liberty Jail had its opening though which they lowered the prisoners. Old photographs of the jail show it to be a solid box of pain.<br />
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Another victim of the hospitality of Egypt was the hero of the Hymn of the Pearl, who was detected as a foreigner and fed "a mixture of cunning and treachery." The prince "sank into deep sleep under the heaviness of their food." "Deep sleep" is a a fair description of the long bondage during the Missouri winter of 1838-1839. Indeed, the descent into Missouri is reminiscent of much else: the widespread patterns of initiatory rites in which cabins, caves, forests, and dungeons are symbolic of death. According to Mircea Eliade, "Such ritual represents a return to the womb of earth, to the embryonic state." It is a return to the Guph--the inchoate atmosphere of the Chamber of Creation in Jewish thought--and to the preexisting night. To enter Missouri is to confront the cataclysm and to be ground inexorably to a fine dust.<br />
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Joseph, in the midst of that long Winter, calls upon the Master of the elements, the Lord of the Apocalypse: "O Lord God Almighty, Maker of heaven, earth, and seas (see Rev. 14:7). . . who controllest and subjectest the devil, and the dark and benighted dominion of Sheol." Joseph has descended through the elemental storms into Sheol, the silent house of death.<br />
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In that stillness "the voice of inspiration steals along and whispers:<br />
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and if thou shouldest be cast into the pit, or into the hands of murderers, and the sentence of death passed upon thee; if thou be cast into the deep; if the billowing surge conspire against thee; if fierce winds become thine enemy; if the heavens gather blackness; and all the elements combine to hedge up the way; and above all; if the very jaws of hell shall gape open the mouth wide after thee, know thou my son, that all these things shall give thee experience, and shall be for thy good. The Son of Man hath descended below them all. Art thou greater than He?<br />
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The whisper of the Spirit increases to a violent pitch with the anaphoric <i>if</i>, then leads to a most surprising conclusion: the gentle rebuke of the Lord. God responds to Joseph in the Stormwind exactly as He answers Job, by showing him a picture of the natural world as an hierarchy of harsh realities. At the bottom lurks Leviathan, or "Old Pharaoh, King Devil of Mobocrats," as Joseph Smith calls this aquatic monster (WPJS 122; Book of Abraham, Facsimile 1, Figure 9). In this atmosphere of upheaval, attended by thunderings, lightnings, tempest, fire, smoke, vapor of darkness, and the opening of the earth, even the very "God of nature suffers" (1 Nephi 19:11-12).<br />
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The King of Nature, who has descended below all, challenges His disciples with an incisive question: "Are ye able to be baptized with the baptism that I am baptized with" (see Matthew 20:22)? The challenge resonates with the Christian imagery of baptism as tomb <i>and </i>womb: as both ritual extinguishment and the recovery of prenatal innocence (see Hugo Rahner, <i>Greek Myths and Christian Mystery</i>--the whole book). The sullen tomb into which Joseph had fallen was such a sign in <i>imitatio Christi</i>.<br />
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Entrance into a baptism of this type invites the revelation of sacred teachings, especially the key to the hearts of the fathers. In his Letter from Liberty Jail, Joseph laments that the "plan of the devil" has robbed him heretofore of the "opportunity to give [the saints] the plan that God has revealed to me." Nevertheless, "trials will only give us the knowledge necessary to understand the minds of the ancients. For my part, I think I never could have felt as I now do, if I had not suffered the wrongs that I have suffered." In order to obtain the knowledge of the fathers, and to understand their minds, there must be first a sum pathos--all must experience the same cup (again Matthew 20:22).<br />
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Of John Lathrop, Joseph's first American progenitor, and like Joseph, the pastor of a persecuted band, we read: "On April 29, 1632, the meetings were raided by a band of ruffians representing the Church of England, and he was imprisoned in the Old Clink Prison in Newgate, where he was held until 1634, when according to the record, he somehow escaped from Newgate prison" (E.B. Huntington; Newgate recalls the trial of Jeremiah at the Temple). From Newgate Lathrop fled to Massachusetts. We also recall John Bunyan's twelve years in prison, anguishing over the nurture of his blind daughter, his dreams of drowning, his passage to Paradise (see Jack Lindsay, John Bunyan: Maker of Myths).<br />
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Joseph clung to the consolation "that the ancients will not have whereof to boast over us in the day of judgment, as being called to pass through heavier afflictions; they we may hold an even weight in the balance with them." And in a letter to his wife, he writes, "I feel like Joseph in Egypt." (see Elder Neal A. Maxwell). Like ancient Joseph, the Prophet is strengthened by a constant flow of revelation as the dungeon is converted into "a nourishing womb in which he is engendered anew. The symbols of initiatory death and rebirth are complementary" (Mircea Eliade, <i>Birth and Rebirth</i>, 37).<br />
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The imagery of his dreams reveals that the experiences of Liberty clustered about Joseph to the last night of his life (HC VI, 393-394). Those dreams were informed with both horror and enlightenment:<br />
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">I dreamed last night that I was swimming in a river of pure water, clear as crystal, over a shoal of fish of the largest size I ever saw. They were directly under my belly. I was astonished, and felt afraid that they might drown me or do me injury (HC V, 306).</span><br />
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Another nightmare presents his enemies as snakes wrapped in battle, as he rides past unharmed toward the prairie, an open and forbidding landscape:<br />
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">On arriving at the prairie, I was overtaken and seized by William and Wilson Law and others, saying, 'Ah! ah! we have got you at last! We will secure you and put you in a safe place!' and, without any ceremony dragged me out of my carriage, tied my hands behind me, and threw me into a deep, dry pit. (William Law had been Joseph's Counselor in the First Presidency).</span><br />
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After a horrible scene of his enemies being devoured by "ferocious wild beasts" (a neat reversal of the story of Joseph, who is represented by his brothers as having been slain by a lion), Joseph is visited by his guide or guardian angel. "Joseph, Joseph," he calls, "What are you doing there? I replied, 'My enemies fell upon me, bound me and threw me in.' He then took me by the hand, and drew me out of the pit, set me free, and we went away rejoicing" (HC VI, 461-462).<br />
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The dream recalls the visitation of Adam by his angelic guide in an old Mandaean text:<br />
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">I have come and will instruct thee, Adam, and release thee out of this world. Hearken and hear and be instructed, and rise up victorious to the place of light *Mircea Eliade, <i>Myth and Reality</i>, 130).</span><br />
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This visitation reminds one forcibly of a vision about David Patten, who was slain at Crooked River, Missouri. In the dream Elder Patten descends as an apostle of light to preach baptism and deliverance from death to the faithful ministers of Christendom and their families, men like Lathrop and Bunyan (Ann Booth, Wilford Woodruff Journals, July 2, 1840).<br />
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The idea of the rescuing message or messenger also recalls the prince in the Hymn of the Pearl, who is sent down to Egypt to recover "the one pearl, which resides there near the ravenous dragon," or serpent. Once in Egypt, he forgets his purpose until he receives an encouraging letter from home which inspires him to finish his mission.<br />
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Joseph Smith identified the pearl of great price with "the inheritance prepared for the saints" or the "place of Zion" in Missouri.<br />
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The pearl is the <i>even shetiyah</i>, the foundation stone of the "place of Zion," which in Jewish though is the first creation "from which the rest of the earth sprang forth." Joseph, too, represents a sure foundation, a pure stone, tested in the rivers of fire.<br />
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From jail he writes a letter to the homeless saints, whose makeshift dwellings of the Mississippi reflect a painful reversal of the festival of Succoth. This letter takes up the theme of the chaos of the elements. It speaks of the devastation of "mountain torrents" which strew the streams with filth, and which are a representation of a hell of "ignorance" and "bigotry" pouring "forth its rage like the burning lava of mount Vesuvius."<br />
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By way of contrast and of fulfillment is the mighty Missouri, which in its eternally self-purifying roll is as God Himself "moving in His majesty and power," and is an awesome reflection of the the wisdom and glory of "the Maker of Heaven, Earth, Seas, and the Fountains of Water." The Missouri moving with state in "its decreed course" represents the rule and order of God amidst the play of nature. Joseph compares its majestic flow with the "knowledge from heaven" which pours down upon the heads of the Saints from the throne of God and the Lamb. This current of revelation involves knowledge about the heavens to inform the Saints of the "bounds set to the heavens or to the seas, or to the dry land, or to the sun, moon, or stars--all the times of their revolutions, all the appointed days, months, and years, and all their glories, laws, and set times." The passage through the deep involves a new creation of heaven and earth, as the initiate, like a pearl sheltered from the violence of cosmic disaster, is recovered from death into light.<br />
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The Letter from Liberty Jail with its picture of "burning mountains," winter torrents, avid lightnings, and "fierce tigers" is balanced by a sense of an everlasting and on-going order. To be swept by the maelstrom into "the lowest consideration of the darkest abyss," is vital for the revelation of the root of the matter, upon which the mind may work to "considerations of eternal expanse," as in the case of Job. Nevertheless, a recurring theme in Joseph's letters from Liberty Jail is that the watery expanse must be traversed with steadiness. In this imagery one senses a longing for the buoyancy and the freedom of the sail The last stage of Joseph's flight into freedom, cloaked in disguise, was the ferry over the Mississippi.<br />
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"Who can tell what high rank should be given to man? He crosses the sea, he penetrates the heavens with his thought and understands the movement of the stars" (Nemesius; This is the "baptismal voyage," Hugo Rahner, 343). The crossing is equated with the revelation of the hierarchies of the heavenly kingdoms and the eternal possibilities of man.<br />
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Joseph Smith is Everyman and has his likeness in every nation and culture, even as he binds them into one heart and family. In India, for instance, the "fathers" celebrated the <i>rajasuya</i>, the enthronement ceremony which involved "the future sovereign's reversion to the embryonic state, his gestation for a year, and his mystical rebirth as Cosmoscrator, identified with Prajapati (the All God) and the Cosmos. When he is anointed he stands on the throne, arms lifted; his incarnating the cosmic axis fixed in the navel of the eartth (that is, the throne, the Center of the World) and touching the heavens. The aspersion is connected with the water that come down from the heavens. . . to fertilize the earth." So, too, the Jews, in their keen study of the trials of the Patriarchs of the race, have sketched out a path to glory. The Jewish exegetes, commenting on the semantic resemblance between "trial" nisayon and "banner" nes, have observed of the Fathers.<br />
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Joseph's Letter from Liberty contains "only hints of things which existed in the prophet's mind, [things] which are not written concerning eternal glory (see WPJS, 205. Yet the Letter packs the fullness of Nauvoo within its pages: "We are called to hold the keys of the mysteries of those things that have been kept hid from the foundation of the world until now."<br />
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The Zohar reveals Joseph in Egypt as the berith shalom, "the Covenant of Peace" and as "the Righteous Foundation," the yosid. Given this identification, the prophecy of Isaiah 54 has at its heart a direct referecne to the preparations of Joseph in the crucible of Missouri:<br />
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For the mountains shall depart, and<br />
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The Church of Jesus Christ, in its infancy, passed through two seasons of persecution in Missouri, but all this was only a preparation for the blessings of two temples<br />
So, too, the Missouri persecutions are a dark echo of response to the brilliance of<br />
the seal of its witness. God reveals Himself to imprisoned Joseph in the storm, and as God of Battles. This, we feel, is as essential a revelation and a witness as that of the First Vision. Indeed, the passage through Missouri deepens the contemplations of the nature of God and man, as first manifest in the Revelation of the Father and the Son. The baptism of Missouri is a mighty shout of joy:<br />
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">Bathing himself, in the mysterious depths he shouts mightily for joy, for water is his nourishment. He remains one and the same, yet he comes forth strengthened out of the depths, a new sun, and shines his light upon men, having been cleansed in the water (Melito of Sardis).</span>I began to reflecthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11853353050355842605noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7657330582593799810.post-50847860426920693502017-10-21T13:50:00.001-07:002020-07-12T00:06:52.081-07:00Castalian Waters and Pierian Spring<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: 16px;">Readers just want to learn something. Tired of the mystifying Castalian waters, Latter-day Saints readers, like Joseph Smith, just "want to show a little learning as well as other fools"; they know they must "Drink deep, or taste not the Pierian spring." </span>I began to reflecthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11853353050355842605noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7657330582593799810.post-2830896085228108362017-10-16T13:10:00.000-07:002017-11-25T16:31:23.143-08:00Discovery in the Book of Mormon<div class="MsoNormal">
ROUGH DRAFT--SEVERAL PAGES LACKING<br />
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">Immersed in Robert Alter's books, which explore literary themes in the Hebrew Bible, I wrote the following little essay in 1992, the 500th anniversary of Columbus's discovery of America. I reproduce the sea-battered draft here, with some cosmetic changes. A
second version(s), boasting new sails, and perhaps bettered, will appear in other posts.</span><o:p></o:p></div>
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Discovery and devastation march through the pages of the
Book of Mormon. The graphic descriptions of the annihilation of entire cultures
in the book remind the reader that for the Nephites, America, “the land of
promise, choice above all other lands,” ever remained a mystery and a terror.
To enter America was to be swallowed up in a labyrinth where, wanderers, “our
lives passed away like as it were unto us a dream, we being a lonesome and a
solemn people, wanderers, cast out from Jerusalem, born in tribulation, in a
wilderness, in a strange land.” To discover America is to be separated, as it
were in dream, from one’s own proper identity, lost, and, horribly enough,
eventually forgotten, as in the case of the people of Zarahemla (or Mulekites),
“whose language had become corrupted” and culture shivered and forgotten. In
this state approaching disintegration, the Mulekites were ”discovered” by an
isolated band of Nephites, themselves lost in the breadth and the sweep of the
continent, fleeing the destruction of their own homes in the land southward.
The secret of America lay to the north; northward coursed the dawn of
discovery.<o:p></o:p></div>
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Amaleki, the Nephite record keeper, recounts how Mosiah,
fleeing north with his refugee group “<i><b>discovered</b> </i>a people who were
called the people of Zarahemla. Now, there was great rejoicing among the people
of Zarahemla; and also Zarahemla did rejoice exceedingly, because the Lord had
sent the people of Mosiah with the plates of brass which contained the record
of the Jews. <o:p></o:p></div>
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As we continue to read, Mosiah further “<i>discovered</i> that the people of
Zarahemla came out from Jerusalem at the time that Zedekiah, king of Judah, was
carried away captive into Babylon."</div>
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"At the time that Mosiah <i>discovered</i> them, they had
become exceedingly numerous. Nevertheless, they had had many wars and serious
contentions, and had fallen by the sword from time to time; and their language had become corrupted; and they had brought no records with them; and they denied the being of their Creator; and Mosiah, nor the people of Mosiah, could understand them.<br />
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And it came to pass in the days of Mosiah, there was a large stone brought unto him with engravings on it; and he did interpret the engravings by the gift and power of God. And they gave an account of one Coriantumr, and the slain of his people. And Coriantumr was <i>discovered </i>by the people of Zarahemla; and he dwelt with them for the space of nine moons. . .<br />
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And his first parents came out from the tower, at the time the Lord confounded the language of the people; and the severity of the Lord fell upon them according to his judgments, which are just; and their bones lay scattered in the land northward."</div>
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In <i>the Amaleki </i>certain key terms, motifs, and themes appear, which also resurface later in the artfully constructed narratives of Mosiah, Alma, and Mormon. Martin Buber defines a key-word (<i>Leitwort</i>) as:</div>
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"A word or word-root that recurs significantly in a text, in a continuum of texts, or in a configuration of texts: by following these repetitions, one is able to decipher or grasp a meaning of the text, or at any rate, the meaning will be revealed more strikingly. The repetition, as we have said, need not be merely of the word itself but also of the word-root in fact, the very difference of words can often intensify the dynamic action of the repetition."<br />
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The Book of Mormon narrative is also rich in motif. Robert Alter describes a motif as:<br />
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"A concrete image, sensory quality, action, or object" that "recurs through a particular narrative," but "has no meaning in itself without the defining context of the narrative; it may be incipiently symbolic or instead primarily a means of giving formal coherence to a narrtive."<br />
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Motifs help to bind disparate, even unrelated, events in the narrative to a common theme. Amaleki emphasizes plates, records, swords, bones--all these, hard, cold, ringing, lifeless objects which survive man's own brief flowering, symbolized by the nine moons which terminate the existence of an entire culture. Plates, stones, towers; all reflect coldly, moonlike, lurid. The sun, itself extinguished, hides his faces from "a lost and a fallen people" caught in the chill void on the dark side of the earth.<br />
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The key words of language and discovery, then, inform Amaleki's concise historical narrative, and indeed are strengthened by the use of two important verbs, to interpret and to confound language. Interpretation of ancient records, like that found upon the "large stone," provides additional waves of discovery to shock and to terrify the Nephite explorers, being the "account of one Coriantumr and the slain of his people." "One Coriantumr"--only<i> one</i>, a certain strange fellow named Coriantumr, king no longer, kingdom defunct.<br />
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The theme of discovery plays itself out to envelop the picture as follows: The sense of joy and brotherhood shared by Nephites and the people of Zarahemla accompanies a recital of sorrows, for the people discovered by Mosiah is an illiterate people, atheistic, corrupt, and decimated by internecine war. Mosiah recovers this lost people through a program of education, focusing on written language and the study of ancient records.<br />
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Now another discovery is made. An ancient record that nobody can read is brought to the king, who learns that it too speaks of a confounding of languages, a journey to America, and to another people caught in the American labyrinth and ground to powder. The very appearance of the stone reveals that much. Yet Mosiah. . .<br />
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<b>[temporary gap--draft only--Standing water, proceed with caution. . . </b><br />
<br />
according to Amaleki's pattern of crediting discovery by a descending rule of ethnocentricity, was discovered by the people of Zarahemla. This discovery of a single man represents the final moment of a people never to be recovered--beyond discovery--by a genius like Mosiah; an ultimate gestation period that bears only bones, ashes, and stones.<br />
<br />
"One Coriantumr," to be sure, has fathers and first parents, but no progeny, for as Amaleki explains, "the severity of the Lord fell upon them, according to his judgments which are just." And then, a final statement which reveals the deepest level of discovery, one of wrenching sorrow: "and their bones lay scattered in the land northward."<br />
<br />
Coriantumr knows nine silent months with a people fresh to a brave new world--one that had wonderful people in it, but now "their bones lay scattered," and that is all. <i>The Amaleki</i> calls to mind Psalm 53: "The is none that doeth good, no not one." "There were they in great fear." "God hath scattered the bones." "God hath despised them."<br />
<br />
In the story of Mosiah discovery spells desolation. Desolation, in fact, is the name given in the Book of Mormon to the land far to the north of Zarahemla, "the land which had been peopled and been destroyed, of whose bones we have spoken [a grim phrase], which was discovered by the people of Zarahemla, it being the place of their first landing [they got out quick]. Far from being a pristine and a virgin country in 600 B.C., the newcomers found the scene so terrifying that they plunged quickly southward--southward into cultural annihilation. Southward, away from stones, plates, records, and the still warm bones. (The narrative recalls the Viking discovery of a shipwreck, even as they were in the act of "discovering" America.)<br />
<br />
Amaleki completes the record of the small plates of Nephi, (which represents the end of an epoch in Nephite history--a wipeout), by speaking of an expedition sent from Zarahemla to recover, or rediscover, the lost Nephite homeland in Lehi-Nephi in the deep southward:<br />
<br />
"Wherefore, they went up into the wilderness. And their leader being a strong and might man, and a stiffnecked man [like "one Coriantumr"?], wherefore he caused a contention among them; and they were <i>all slain, save fifty, </i>in the wilderness [the labyrinth], and they returned again to the land of Zarahemla. And it came to pass that they also took others to a considerable number, and took their journey again[!] into the wilderness. And I, Amaleki, had a brother, who also went with them; and I have not since known concerning them. And I am about to lie down in my grave."<br />
<br />
As this mini-episode indicates, the first 400 years of Nephite history terminates on a sad note. Fifty bloodstained men struggling back to Zarahema, brother separated from brother, lost from knowledge, simply dropping out of exitence, as far as the record is concerned, in the terror of the Americas.<br />
<br />
Three generations have passed and brother yearns for brother. Both the Nephites at Zarahemla and the Nephites at Lehi-Nephi, separated by an uncharted distance, have sent out small expeditions 'not a map-making people, have sent out small expeditions each intent on finding the other. small-half-hearted. The narrative of the Book of Mosiah (the grandson of the great discoverer of Zarahemla), abridged, edited, and shaped by Mormon centuries later, begins with the expedition sent to Zarahemla under the direction of one Ammon and his three brothers. The four men upon arrival in the land of Nephi are surrounded, taken, bound, and thrust into prison by order of the king, Limhi. After two days, the four brothers stand before Limhi, who commands them to reveal their mysterious identity under penalty of death. Ammon, as spokesman, announces his name, genealogy, origin, and the purpose of the expedition, whereupon Limhi and all his people rejoice, for they dwell on the verge of extinction and are about to slip back into the leveling and eliminating forces of the continent.<br />
<br />
This whole episode may be called a type-scene for it clearly recalls another Ammon, son of Mosiah himself, who after venturing forth to the same country with his three brothers some years later, is taken, bound, and granted audience before the Lamanite king. In this latter instance, however, Ammon does not reveal his true identity, a point that bears upon the denouement of the recital. Limhi caused Ammon to read the history of his own people and explains to him the present exigency:<br />
<br />
Now, as soon as Ammon had read the record, the king inquired of him to know if he could interpret languages, and Ammon told him that he could not.<br />
<br />
And the king said unto him: Being grieved for the afflictions of my people I caused that forty and three of my people should take a journey into the wilderness [reversal of first doomed journey: repentance], that thereby they might <i>find</i> the land of Zarahemla, that we might appeal unto our brethren to deliver us out of bondage.<br />
<br />
And they were <i>lost</i> in the wilderness for the space of many days, yet they were diligent, and <i>found </i>not the land of Zarahemla but returned to this land, having traveled in a land among many waters, having <i>discovered</i> a land which was covered with bones of men, and of beasts, and was also <i>covered</i> with ruins of buildings of every kind, having<i> discovered</i> a land which had been peopled with a people who were as numerous as the hosts of Israel.<br />
<br />
And for a testimony that the things that they had said are true they have brought twenty-four plates which are filled with engravings, and they are of pure gold. And behold, also they have brought breastplates, which are large, and they are of [cold, resounding] brass and of copper, and are perfectly sound. And again, they have brought swords, the hints thereof have perished, and the blades thereof were cankered with rust; and there is no on in the land that is able to interpret the language or the engravings that are on the plates.<br />
<br />
Therefore I said unto thee: Canst thou translate?"<br />
<br />
For: "I am desirous to know the cause of their destruction."<br />
<br />
The venture into the wilderness was a dismal one, and the harbinger of fear. The group does not find Zarahemla, but rather loses itself in both space and in time, for the "space" of many days. Mormon, the narrator, perhaps for reasons of thematic emphasis retells the story in a later section of Mosiah, and in so doing plays again upon the language and irony of finding and losing in the dreadful game of discovery. The grand terror of the story is not indeed in the revelation of a land covered with bones and the skeletal remains of buildings, but in the mistaking of this desolation for the blithely abandoned sister-city Zarahemla, an error attributable to an obvious paranoia, not to mention a besetting loss of cultural memory--no one remember Coriantumr or marvelous translation or the testimony of the stone.<br />
<br />
Now king Limhi had send, previous to the coming of Ammon, a small number of men to search for the land of Zarahemla, but they could not find it, and they were lost in the wilderness. Nevertheless, they did find a land which had been people yea, a land which was covered with dry bones; yea, a land which had been destroyed and they, having supposed it to be the land of Zarahemla, returned to the land of Nephi, having arrived in the borders of the land not many days before the coming of Ammon, And they brought a record with them, even a record of the people whose bones they had found; and it was engraven on plates of ore. And now Limhi was again filled with joy [type=scene: a king brought records in an unknown language] on learning form the mouth of Ammon that king Mosiah had a gift from God, whereby he could interpret such engraving such engravings. yea, and Ammon also did rejoice [the rejoicing Ammon]<br />
<br />
The expedition returns to Lehi-Nephi bearing both the 24 plates and the sad tale of the devastation of Zarahemla. (The found 24 plates calls to mind the lost 24 daughters of the Lamanites in the previous chapter; and the 43 searchers for Zarahemla.) Although, not long afterward Ammon arrives to announce that Zarahemla yet survives in the middle of America, surrounded by a world of pain, a dread question remains; Who were the victims of the land northward? What was the cause of their destruction. It is the anxiousness and fear of a small and time-worn race on the border of the wilderness that impels the asking of such a question. God himself provides the answer and it is a dire one. (See Alma 37; be careful what you ask, but also ask the right question).<br />
<br />
And now, I will speak unto you concerning those twenty-four plates, that ye keep them, that the mysteries and the works of darkness, and their secret works, or the secret works of those people who have been destroyed, may be made manifest unto this people; yea, all their murders, and robbings, and their plunderings, and all their wickedness and abominations, may be made manifest unto this people; yea, and that ye preserve these interpreters.<br />
<br />
For behold, the Lord saw that his people began to work in darkness, yea, work secret murders and abominations; therefore the Lord said, if they did not repent they should be destroyed from off the face of the earth.<br />
<br />
And the Lord said: I will prepare unto my servant Gazelem, a stone, which shall shine forth in darkness unto light, that I may <i>discover </i>unto my people who serve me, that I may <i>discover </i>unto them the works of their brethren, yea, their secret works, their works of darkness, and their wickedness and abominations.<br />
<br />
And now, my son, these interpreters were prepared that the word of God might be fulfilled, which he spake, saying: I will bring forth out of darkness unto light all their secret works and their secret works and their abominations; and except they repent I will destroy them from off the face of the earth; and I will bring to light all their secrets and abominations, unto every nation that shall hereafter possess the land.<br />
<br />
And now, my son, we see that they did not repent; therefore they have been destroyed, and thus far the word of God has been fulfilled; yea, their secret abominations have been brought out of darkness and made known unto us.<br />
<div class="verse" data-aid="128352872" id="p24" style="background: 0px 0px rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.01); border: 0px; color: #333333; font-family: Palatino, "Palatino Linotype", Pahoran, Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 18px; line-height: 25.2px; margin-bottom: 26px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
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<div class="verse" data-aid="128352872" id="p24" style="background: 0px 0px rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.01); border: 0px; color: #333333; font-family: Palatino, "Palatino Linotype", Pahoran, Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 18px; line-height: 25.2px; margin-bottom: 26px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
<span style="background-color: transparent;">. . . . (Draft Only)</span></div>
<br />
.......but the cessation of history and the wreckage of an entire society on the dark side of the earth: America. Through Mosiah all readers become wonderful seers and discoverers of hidden knowledge Yet as the narrator points out repeatedly whole cultures have been demolished leaving only stones, bones, and plates, hard lifeless testimonies of dashed hopes and bon vivre. These alone are preserved that all people should learn a tale of iniquity, abomination, and total loss.<br />
<br />
The glorious discovery of America is ever a record of genocide. And genocide is ever a record of the severity of the judgments in in other words the decisions of the Lord, which are just. To discover America is to be translated instantaneously as it were to the day of judgment, Every stage of Nephite history unravels another chapter in the judgment day of the Lord.<br />
<br />
Another example of this discovers itself in the history of Ammonihah, built far from the main center of Zarahemla, by the borders of the land, in order to foster a sense of independence of thought, pride, and self-security. Ammonihah was lost in a single moment of pain, when<br />
<br />
"every living soul of the Ammonihahites was destroyed, and also their great city, which they said God could not destroy, because of its greatness. But behold, in one day it was left desolate; and the carcasses were mangled by dogs and wild beasts of the wilderness. Nevertheless, after many days their dead bodies were heaped up upon the face of the earth, and they were covered with a shallow <i>covering</i>, And now so great was the scent thereof that the people did not go in to possess the land of Ammonihah for many years. And it was called Desolation."<br />
<br />
Ammonihah represents a mini-Desolation, a reminder in miniature that widespread destruction of the people in the north, is a constant in the American experience.<br />
<br />
EPISODE<br />
<br />
Moroni takes his Jaredite account from "the twenty and four plates which were <i>found </i>by the people of Limhi, which is called the book of Ether," Coriantumr enters the scene, scion of ancient warrior kings,
“having studied himself in all the arts of war,” “for there were many who rose
up, who were mighty men, and sought to destroy Coriantumr by their secret plans
of wickedness.” The sun trembles at the horizon, and sets in blood.<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And so great and lasting had been the war, and so long had
been the scene of bloodshed and carnage, that the whole face of the land was <i>covered</i>
with the bodies of the dead. And so swift and speedy was the war that there was
none left to bury the dead, but they did march forth from the shedding of blood
to the shedding of blood, leaving the bodies of both men, women, and children
strewed upon the face of the land, to be a prey to the worms of the flesh. And
the scent thereof went forth upon the face of the land, even upon all the face
of the land; wherefore the people became troubled by day and by night, because
of the scent thereof.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Was the war great and lasting or was it swift and speedy? It
was as deep and as great as the very foundations of culture; it was swift to
cut down even the most tender plants.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Troubled by day and by night, there came, finally, nights
wherein men “were drunken with anger, even as a man is drunken with wine.” Then
a dawn, by which “all had fallen by the sword,” except Corintumr and the
Heraclean Shiz. But<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Shiz had fainted with the loss of blood. And it came to pass
that when Coriantumr had leaned upon his sword, that he rested a little [the
nine moon rest would come later], he smote off the head of Shiz. And it came to
pass that after he had smitten off the head of Shiz. . . that Coriantumr fell
to the earth, and became as if he had no life.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Silver, gold, iron, copper, and the luminous bones glittered
in the dawn, as the heaps of earth fell back in shadow. The whole face of the
land was covered with a shroud.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Discovery bespeaks a search for that which is lost or
hidden. The Book of Mormon employs
various words and expressions to clarify the message of discovery: to discover,
to find, to search, to bring to light, to reveal. The greatest explorers of the
Book of Mormon are the men of light, the seers, for the most significant
findings in Nephite history are those of ancient records like the twenty-four
gold places and the Jaredite stele. The discovery of a physical object or land
is but prelude to the great act of decipherment., the interpretation of the
discovery of the ancient record. To interpret a record by the power of God is
to discover deeply a people, to reveal them and to come to know them heart to
heart. It is to rejoice and to drink of dark sorry. Seers, in this world, see
what they would not, yet in sight there is joy. The records of lost cultures
proved an indispensable man and a guide for the Nephites by which they could
negotiate the new world in which they found themselves.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The finding of the record of the Jaredites comes at the most
crucial point in Nephite history—they are split—then split again—even lost.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The reoot of the verb discover is cover. A cover is a
barrier to knowledge, and a closing of a door, the end of history. Has covered
the eyes of the seers. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The narratives speak of many coverings<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And who thus have no lasting cover for their sin, and whose
bones lay scattered on the open face of the land. That face wears a cruel and
lonesome countenance, as if it were the reflection of the moon..<o:p></o:p></div>
<br />
DRAFT ONLY--MORE PAGES TOMORROW</div>
I began to reflecthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11853353050355842605noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7657330582593799810.post-54921985422618754812017-10-14T21:06:00.000-07:002019-10-05T21:26:18.653-07:00Joseph Smith and the Book of Abraham Papyrus Roll in His Own Words<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">The guiding principle underlying all I write about the book of Abraham may be expressed as follows: </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span>
<b><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">Joseph Smith was a Prophet of God and he knew what he was doing. </span></b><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">While he may not have fully grasped, at the moment, all the implications of the many revelations he received, as Elder Neal A. Maxwell suggested in his final public discourse, he surely understood his calling and the nature of prophecy and seership: "Though the grandness of this doctrine is beyond our comprehension, it is not beyond our attention and exploration. We are, in fact, in the position of having been given revelations that were then far beyond the Prophet Joseph Smith, bright as he was. Yet he was their enunciator and their declarer" ("Free to Choose," BYU devotional, 16 March 2004). And Joseph Smith was also the appointed keeper of the various sacred records that he both treasured and translated. How did he translate? In the words of associate W.W. Phelps: "He translated sacredly" (LDS Hymnal: "Now we sing with one accord")</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">It was for Joseph Smith, as it was with King Mosiah: "King Mosiah, had a gift from God, whereby he could interpret such engravings," as appeared on records "of ancient date," whether plates of ore, large stones, or papyrus rolls (Mosiah 21:28; Mosiah 8:11). And note how the "gift from God" precedes the instrumentality by which the gift is exercised; the "gift" is given, then "interpreters" provided "whereby he could interpret." For Brother Joseph, the gift to interpret ever remained, even when the instrumentality, or Urim and Thummim, "whereby he could interpret," varied from ancient interpreters to seer stones, then to the experienced seeric vision of spiritually endowed eyes. The gift also remained, whether he was to interpret engravings on plates of ore or hieratic on papyrus. Yet Latter-day Saints sometimes find it easier to exercise faith to see Brother Joseph visited by an angel and translating from plates hid from worldly eyes, rather than translating from papyri originating in "the catacombs of Egypt" and brought to him, as if by accident, by an ordinary man named Michael Chandler.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">Yet documentary evidence abounds for the Prophet translating from a papyrus roll. Whether translation from papyri by the gift and power of God and an open flow of revelation combined to produce what we have of the book of Abraham is, naturally, an open question. As Hugh Nibley explains, the Prophet Joseph, in translating Scripture, would both translate and interpret ancient writings, while also allowing further revelation to cause his mind to "take flight" to skies of clarity and splendor (Hugh Nibley, <i>An Approach to the Book of Abraham</i>, 4). Like Abraham, Joseph Smith sought not only to be one "who possessed great knowledge" but "to possess a greater knowledge" (Abraham 1:1). We here recall the telling words of Elder Bruce R. McConkie who yearned for yet more knowledge about "the dispensation of the gospel of Abraham": "Would that the Prophet had gone on his translation or revelation, as the case may be" ("The Doctrinal Restoration," in <i>The Joseph Smith Translation: The Restoration of Plain and Precious Truths</i>, ed. M.S. Nyman, R.L. Millet, 1985, 1-22).</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">We speak of Lehi's dream of the Tree of Life, but he also calls it a vision. Interpretation, translation, insight, dream, or vision--all belong to seers and revelators. Scripture works to the salvation of the human family, which calls for nothing less than all the divine communication the Prophet is capable of receiving. We need not question, in any degree, the work of a seer because<i> he is the one </i>who has been <i>set apart</i> or <i>consecrated</i> to be the Gazelem, or spiritual interpreter, of this generation. Gazelem derives from Semitic <i>g-z-r = </i>Egyptian <i>Dj-z-r</i>, "set apart," "make sacred or consecrate," with<i> -m</i> as mimation, and occurs as a personal name in both Levantine and Egyptian sources.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">Still, clear evidence that the Prophet Joseph interpreted from a papyrus roll comes from his own official record.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">We would do well to start with the Prophet's final public discourse, his ultimate and far-reaching public testimony, delivered just eleven days before his martyrdom. On Sunday, June 16, 1844, Joseph Smith taught powerful doctrine about the nature of God and of eternal advancement from intelligence to intelligence. He took a portion of his text from Abraham Chapter 3, published two years earlier, and told his hearers that he had learned this powerful doctrine "while translating," which is a marvel. The act of translating papyri, by the gift of God, led to the receipt of revelation about the nature of God, one medium of gift and light flowing into the other! We recall the Lord's invitation to Oliver Cowdery a year before the publication of the Book of Mormon itself: "Ask that you may know the mysteries of God, and <i>that you may translate and receive knowledge</i> from all those ancient records which have been hid up, that are sacred" (Doctrine and Covenants 8:11). "<i>Translate and receive knowledge</i>": so runs the Divine invitation. The verse thus also succinctly describes Joseph Smith's learning the mysteries of God by translating a papyri, a "sacred record" once "hid up," and now "in [his] house." How did it all happen: Chandler and papyri and Abraham? Brother Joseph must have been asking in faith for more "ancient records" to come forth in his day. Such faith drew Abraham's record to Kirtland--and to a Prophet's home.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">"I learned it by translating the papyrus now in my house." What a definitive statement! And it is very important to note the name of the Prophet's personal secretary who took down his last sermon: it was the gifted Englishman Thomas Bullock, the most accurate secretary the Prophet ever had.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">As Joseph Smith delivered his powerful sermon, did he know what he was saying? did he know what he had been doing? or was the latter-day Gazelem, one who brings hidden things from darkness into light, himself in the dark? Some students now say that Joseph Smith only thought he was translating from papyrus, that in his ordinariness and weakness he might not always have been able to distinguish between an act of translation from a document and a revelation prompted because of a document. (Of course, seeric translation is revelatory at essence--and Orson Pratt insisted on combining these words to describe how seers translate.) These students insist that Latter-day Saints must today fashion new narratives about the book of Abraham because the old ones have failed, failed, they say, because Joseph Smith could not have divinely translated from an Egyptian papyrus, and this despite his work with the Egyptian engravings on the gold plates. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">Yet would anyone say the same of King Mosiah and the large stone "filled with engravings" brought to <i>him</i> for interpretation, itself a sort of historical accident reminiscent of Chandler's papyri? Did Mosiah translate the stone by the "gift and power of God" or was the stone only a heavy prompt? Amaleki says "he did interpret the engravings by the gift and power of God," but what did Amaleki know? Or, would Ammon perchance have suggested to King Limhi that while Mosiah's grandson, now king himself, could interpret languages, that even so, owing to weakness and simplicity, he might not know exactly what was going on when he translated, even with the engravings in front of him? Did "direct" revelation, then, though unrecognized as such by the weak king, hold him steady as he faltered in his noble and seeric but doomed efforts to interpret?</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">Consider the pattern the Books of Omni and Mosiah, and Doctrine and Covenants Section 9, give us for seeric translation. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">Amaleki knew; Mosiah knew; Benjamin knew; the second King Mosiah knew; Aminadi knew: Joseph knew. These were all seers of God and they knew what they were doing. <b>The question is not one of frailty and weakness in a prophet or king or seer</b>, <b>but whether each and every one was a moron</b>. So let's not ask questions about Joseph Smith, that we couldn't also in good faith ask of Aminadi, Gazelem, or of either Mosiah. "Limhi was again filled with joy on learning from the mouth of Ammon that king Mosiah had a gift from God, whereby he could interpret such engravings; yea, and Ammon also did rejoice" (Mosiah 21:28).</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">What is <i>our </i>response?</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">Do we rejoice? Or do we, at times, let our reasoning "interrupt [our] rejoicings?"</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">Oliver, in the revelation received through Joseph, was further invited to "ask in faith, with an honest heart, believing that you shall receive a knowledge concerning the engravings of old records, which are ancient, which contain those parts of my scripture of which has been spoken" (8:2). This special promise somehow seems to embrace all the "old records," and the consequent code-cracking, which have emerged in Egypt, Palestine, Mesopotamia, Asia, and the Americas since 1829--and the coming forth of the Book of Mormon leads them all.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">One record alone joins the Book of Mormon in the lead, as earnest of that which is yet to come, "the revelation" of "a translated version of the record [of portions of the last chapter of the Gospel of John] made on parchment by John and hidden up by himself" (Doctrine and Covenants 7). As Hugh Nibley noted in 1975, there seems to be no limit as to the manner in which the "old records" come to light: some are penned on parchment, others engraved on metal or stone, some are perceived and translated by vision, others with the old record preserved and present. "The engravings of old records, which are ancient," certainly has the ring of metal to it, but may also include such things as the records of Enoch and Noah recovered through the inspired translation of the Holy Bible.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">Needless to say, the brethren, in light of this revelation, expected to recover more engraved plates in the fashion of the gold plates of Mormon, or the like, and that's why the papyri, once identified as purporting to be Abraham's writings, had to purchased and kept safe at home. Joseph Smith would not have raised $2400 to purchase papyri unless he had already read on one of the rolls that it purported to be "the writings of Abraham." Just because someone, somewhere, says that the Prophet subsequently only thought that he was translating from a specific roll of papyrus, when he was really receiving the book of Abraham by revelation, without need of papyri, doesn't make it so. Not to fuss--evidence will point the way.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">On Sunday, December 20, 1835, Brother Joseph wrote in his journal, <i>in his own hand</i>: "I showed them [guests] the sacred record." Here we find unequivocal evidence that the Prophet himself, not solely his scribes and associates, considered at least some part of the papyri in his possession to be Scripture, or "Sacred Record." So was Joseph Smith nine years in confusion about translating from a concrete sacred record, while "really" receiving inspiration that had nothing to do with what lay before his eyes or what he was exhibiting to visitors?</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">To say that the hieroglyphs have nothing to do with the translated book of Abraham, and that any previous claim to the contrary was in error, because Joseph wrote the book of Abraham by "inspiration" or by "pure inspiration," is not only to neglect the evidence found in the historical record, it is to promote the concoction of history by mind-reading. (And that's the very method Fawn Brodie evoked in her biography of Joseph Smith.) The claim can also be challenged on the grounds of logic.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">If someone tells me that Joseph Smith "translated," or wrote, by inspiration, without hieroglyphs, couldn't I query whether the same inspiration would not work so well to translate papyri <i>with hieroglyphic or hieratic script</i>? If he was a seer working by inspiration, then what did he see in this case? Or what if I choose to bring up those Egyptian hieroglyphs on the gold plates? I could say: "Does not the 14-page book of Abraham translation undeniably follow the pattern previously stated to have been used to translate 421 pages?" Were the following response forthcoming: "Joseph Smith also translated those 421 pages by inspiration!?" "Well," I'd say, "didn't the plates sit beside him? didn't he see hieroglyphs appear before him? Or weren't there hieroglyphs and the translation thereof? Can the English translation of the Book of Mormon stand apart from a hieroglyphic original? And what were you telling me about the book of Abraham again? Is not <i>Inspiration</i> a word often veering from the concrete, one reflecting hesitation over using stronger words like<i> revelation, vision, Spirit, </i>words more befitting the dispensation of the fulness of times? Why not say instead '</span><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">He translated sacredly?'"</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">We sing of "an angel" that "Brought the Priesthood back again": "Even Joseph he inspired/Yea, his heart he truly fired/With the light that he desired/For the work of righteousness." Shall we, then, simply say it was all by "inspiration?" We could so say--and yet be doctrinal--but we'd then be leaving out so very, very much of the significance of seers and so very much of the realities of the Restoration. Inspired Joseph saw Elijah; inspired, he felt his hands on his head; under inspiration he "sacredly" pondered and expounded Elijah's expansive doctrines; and worked, fired in mind and heart, to build the Holy Temple. Did Joseph Smith build the Temple by "pure inspiration," then? He did. Nevertheless, as Brigham Young would be at pains to remind us, the Seer and the Saints used stone and mortar and brass all the same. And he used papyri and hieroglyphs all the same. The visionary mind of the Seer <i>read</i> <i>iconography</i> on the three facsimiles of the book of Abraham, iconography that must also be termed "hieroglyphic." So how is it that a Seer could not <i>read</i> <i>words</i> penned in hieroglyphic script? or words engraved on plates in a reformed hieroglyphic script?</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: rgba(255 , 255 , 255 , 0.01); color: #333333; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; text-indent: -10px;">Again in 1835, the Prophet appended a few words about the Egyptian artifacts, again written in his own hand, to a letter sent by W.W. Phelps to his wife Sally Phelps. In what he wrote, the Prophet, with his astonishing knowledge of Scripture ever likening verses, phrases, and prophecies, unto his own circumstances, tied the purchase and ownership of the papyri, or parts thereof, to the ancient prophecies of Moses--the papyri, arriving by seeming accident, nevertheless also came as prophecy fulfilled. The Prophet thus wrote to Sally of "hidden things of old time" and of "treasures hid in the sand" ("treasures": Deuteronomy 33:19). If the "treasures hid in the sand," in the very case of which Brother Joseph was then speaking, were mere prompts to revelation, then how could these rolls take on the substance and character of treasures? </span><br />
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<span style="background-color: rgba(255 , 255 , 255 , 0.01); color: #333333; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; text-indent: -10px;">We move to an even more specific point of evidence.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">"A TRANSLATION of some ancient records that have fallen into our hands, from the Catacombs of Egypt, purporting to be the writings of Abraham, while he was in Egypt, called the BOOK OF ABRAHAM, written by his own hand, upon papyrus." There next follows the shortened title, "The Book of Abraham". <i>Times and Seasons,</i> March 1, 1842. The lines introducing the book of Abraham, at the time of its publication in 1842, also convey the same line of evidence.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">These records, says Joseph knowingly--and with wonder--"have fallen into our hands." Here is a frank acknowledgment of the accidental, or the <i>seeming</i> accidental, the utter strangeness of the event. The whole circumstance of Chandler's visit to Kirtland and the subsequent purchase of the papyri all unfolded as surprise, a double accident. The word accident, we recall, comes from <i>ad cadere</i> to fall to, into; the records "have fallen (<i>cadere</i>) into our hands" by accident or coincidence, etc. "Fallen into our hands" tells us much about the attitude of Joseph Smith toward the papyri. "Have Fallen into our hands. . . purporting to be": Brother Joseph is speaking to an audience and telling them that the recovery of Abraham's writings apparently was not effected through supernatural means, but by accident and surprise. Yet the Lord had commanded Joseph and Oliver quite specifically to ask for more "old records" to come to light.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">By small and simple means, Alma tells his son, Helaman, are the writings of the ancients preserved (Alma 37).</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">Why were the several papyrus rolls valued and purchased? (And why were the mummies purchased under some duress and not valued at all?) Because one of the sheets of papyri "purported" (<i>pro-portare</i>, carry forth, bear forth) that it held a treasure from the sands of Egypt. What treasure and how? Clearly the papyrus itself carried a message. Who says so? Joseph Smith. And why did he say so? Because he claimed to have "a gift from God to interpret such engravings or ancient scripts. There can be no doubt as to the implications of the peculiar wording of the introduction to the book of Abraham. Joseph Smith is saying he examined the papyri and that on one roll he saw words conveying, or purporting to say: Here are the "writings of Abraham while in Egypt." And what were the specific words he first read? Would it not logically be the title, a purporting statement indeed, which in its full and typically Egyptian form reads (as Hugh Nibley noted half-a-century ago): "<i>The Book of Abraham Written by His Own Hand upon Papyrus</i>" (Hugh Nibley, <i>An Approach to the Book of Abraham</i>, 7-8)? There is no other way to read the introduction--and to wriggle out of it by writing "Joseph Smith, or perhaps one of his associates, wrote the introduction" misses the point (see the extremely hard-to-follow Gospel Topics Essay, "Translation and Historicity of the Book of Abraham." Joseph Smith tells us the plain truth as he saw it: The papyrus purported to bear the title Book of Abraham. Only Joseph Smith, among the brethren, claimed to have the gift of God to "translate all records that are of ancient date" (Mosiah 8:11).</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">We go now to Spring 1844. On May 15, two easterners, Josiah Quincy and Charles Francis Adams, visited Joseph Smith and spent the day with him. On the next day, Josiah Quincy wrote to his wife and stated the following:</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">"He preached for us, prophesied for us, and interpreted hieroglyphics for us."</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">According to Adams's own diary, the Prophet took papyrus up in his hand and read the English translation directly from it. Whether a portion of the book of Abraham or no, we see the Seer in act of translation by the gift and power of God. He preached by the gift of the Holy Ghost, prophesied by that gift, and even interpreted hieroglyphics by that gift. Here was not the man Joseph Smith, but the Prophet with the prophetic mantle--and the Seer with the papyrus in hand.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">Again, we recall the words spoken before thousands on 16 June 1844: "I learned it [the mysteries of God] by translating the papyrus now in my house."</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">Not all the evidence for Brother Joseph translating directly and knowingly from papyrus comes from his own mouth and record. Some comes from our own ability to "interpret hieroglyphics." Indeed, abundant evidence linking Brother Joseph, the book of Abraham, and the papyri and vignettes, comes directly from Facsimile 2 of the book of Abraham, the Egyptian hypocephalus. Words and phrases on this particular hypocephalus parallel most remarkably themes and episodes in each of the first three chapters of the book of Abraham.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">The "noble" and "great" god described on the hypocephalus matches the "noble and great ones" spoken of in Abraham Chapter 3. This "noble" and "great" god is described on the hypocephalus (as noted by Nibley, and as the recently restored hieroglyphs confirm) as "descending" to help and to rescue one who calls upon him for rescue--just as in Abraham 1--and just as God comes down in the beginning to instruct the great and noble spirits in Abraham 3. The great god of the hypocephalus, after all, dwells in "the beginning," or <i>zp tpy</i>, as everyone has noted. Yet more parallels could be drawn between the hieroglyphs found on the hypocephalus and the book of Abraham, but the question is How did Joseph Smith know? Joseph Smith is a Prophet of God and he knew what he was doing.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">I would ask the question of Abraham: "Is anything too hard for the Lord?" By seership, says Ammon, man can "work mighty miracles." Is it too great a "mighty miracle," to imagine the book of Abraham in hieratic on an actual sheet or roll of papyrus? We shrink from that while accepting a Book of Mormon written on plates of gold.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">Yet nearly all the recovered literature of antiquity and certainly all the code-cracking strikes me as wonderful. Consider the story of the cracking of the Maya script, as recounted by Michael Coe. Or consider George Smith.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">George Smith was the 19th century student that first identified tablets from Iraq, tablets hidden away in the basement of the British Museum for twenty years, as the ancient Babylonian Flood Narrative: Utnapishtum and all that. He started to translate the text, filled with wonder. But a part of the text was missing, lost in millennia. What did George Smith do? He led a projected six-month expedition to Nineveh to recover the missing section of text--an unlikely outcome that took one week. Was anything too hard for these men?</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">"Now it must be understood that he was looking for some dirty bits of clay almost indistinguishable from thousands and thousands of other bits scattered across the ruins, which measured eight miles in circumference. Smith might just as well as shuffled through the woods in autumn looking for half-a-dozen specific leaves, yet he picked up the pieces in a week. Considering the amount of rubble, how did he do it? Nobody knows. You couldn't get away with this in a novel or a movie because the odds against such a thing happening are outrageous." "On the 14th of May," Smith writes, "I sat down to examine the store of fragments of cuneiform inscriptions from the day's digging. . .On cleaning one of them, I found to my surprise and gratification that it contained the greater portion of seventeen lines, . .fitting into the only place where there was a serious blank in the story,'" Evan S. Connell, <i>The White Lantern</i>, 158-9.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">We further read in the<i> Smithsonian Magazine </i>of the "rather slender hope that he might be able to find a missing piece of the Flood tablet, some three inches on a side, which he felt should still be lurking among the tons of accumulated rubble at the site. Yet he had to know that this would be like looking for a needle in a haystack. The clay fragment would be almost indistinguishable from the debris around it, assuming it hadn't been pulverized in antiquity or tossed out by Rassam's men during their excavations 22 years earlier" (David Damrosch, "Epic Hero, <i>Smithsonian Magazine</i>, May 2007). Yet not only was the missing piece promptly found, but a mere three days into the dig Smith had also found the Epic of Atrahasis! (Vybarr Cregan-Reid, "The Sad Tale of George Smith and Gilgamesh," <i>The Telegraph, </i>21 September 2013.he Telegraph, 21 September 2013).</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">But the story gets even chancier: "As it happened, the fragment Smith so rapidly found was not from <i>Gilgamesh </i>at all but was from what scholars now know to be the opening of an even older version of the Flood story, dating from perhaps 1800 b.c. [Abraham's dispensation],"<i> (Smithsonian Magazine).</i></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">Here was "a self-taught laborer who had never been to high school, much less college" who was working not with "a window of opportunity, but a mousehole of opportunity" "chancing upon the flood story," and then happening upon an even older record, of ancient date, within a week of starting a dig in Nineveh. Accident, luck, serendipity? Let's move on and actually study these gifts, gifts undreamed of before 1829, before 1830 and Cumorah and the Book of Mormon <i>(Smithsonian Magazine)</i>.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">And consider the following gift of God to a humble George Smith, whereby he, too, could read such engravings: "His accomplishment is all the more impressive given that he built some of his interpretations on guesses about words that no one had ever deciphered, in lines that often were only fragments of their full selves. Smith's writings are full of discoveries that have stood the test of time, often involving intuitive leaps beyond literal surfaces" (<i>Smithsonian Magazine</i>).</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">We need to accept the role of accident and coincidence and of "falling into our hands," of surprise and irony as "mighty miracles". We accept angels; let's be open to surprises of every sort. Joseph Smith was the first to acknowledge the accidental element, the surprise in all this sudden appearance of papyri. Yet he quickly raised 2400 dollars for the purchase. That's a lot of money for a chimera, for someone who doesn't really know whether he was translating actual text in front of him by the "gift and power of God" or not. The mighty miracle of preservation and copying stands at equal weight with the mighty miracle of ship and wagon on to little Kirtland. Why was it so? Who knows. The Book of Mormon explains it all: the large stone, the twenty-four plates, in each case these object are brought to the kingly seer--though epochs and hundreds, if not thousands of miles, separate seer from record.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">Abraham, another possessor of the Urim and Thummim, likewise explains with some wonder how certain ancient records of the fathers about Creation, Astronomy, and Priesthood, "came into my hands" preserved "until the present day." That's a hint for us, and he tells us all about it--how it happens. That should reassure us and build our faith. Abraham, says Doctrine and Covenants Section 132, "hath entered into his exaltation and sitteth upon his throne"--following his resurrection in 33 BC. He can, under the direction of the God of the Living and not the dead, the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, oversee the destiny of his record, this sign, this earnest of the resurrection of the dead. We may have to adjust our thinking about what the Lord can do when He says I am able to do mine own work. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">We might ponder again the question put to Abraham and Sarah:<b> Is anything too hard for the Lord?</b></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><b>Joseph Smith was and is a prophet, and he knew what he was saying and what he was doing.</b></span><br />
<br />I began to reflecthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11853353050355842605noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7657330582593799810.post-16032796494201605472017-08-03T01:02:00.001-07:002020-03-26T17:44:14.366-07:00With One Accord (1 Nephi 10:13)<b>Draft Only</b><br />
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Swept along in the poetic crescendo, I but catch at the meaning of Scripture: "Wherefore, he said it must needs be that we should be led <i>with one accord</i> into the land of promise, unto the fulfilling of the word of the Lord, that we should be scattered upon all the face of the earth" (1 Nephi 10:13).<br />
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Might "with one accord," I wonder, signify led with full intent; with an overriding purpose; by the Lord's guiding hand and purpose, "unto the fulfilling of [His] word"?<br />
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"<i>Led</i>. . . unto the fulfilling of the word of the Lord": the accent falls on the verb of <i>leading</i> and on the Lord as the Agent, the Leader, the One who acts, without hindrance whatsoever, to fulfill His purposes. After all, with Back-to-Jerusalem-or-Bust Laman and Lemuel on the ship and on the sands, there was precious little accord among the little band.<br />
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A moment's thought gives us the literal meaning: Lehi addresses the phrase to his family in the hopes that from this moment forward they might be "led with one accord," that is, "with one heart and one mind." Lehi urges them to rise above the passivity of being "acted upon" and instead begin to act with one hope, one dream, as yoke-fellows in the Lord's forward-looking purposes. Yet even should they not come to terms--and they don't--the phrasal punch seems to sweep them along to fulfillment of God's will in history.<br />
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A very strange copy of the Book of Mormon buckles the shelves of the Translation Department of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, a copy that cross-references every single phrase which makes the King James Version of the Holy Bible and the Book of Mormon: Another Testament of Jesus Christ truly "one in thine hands." A VERY STRANGE BOOK--think Parley P. Pratt, here. I held the tome once, plunged in amazement: it references <i>Everything</i>. It is the master edition for the conceptually and scripturally uniform translation of the Book of Mormon into every language on earth. The Holy Bible in every tongue, the King James Version leading the way, becomes the sacred instrument, the Directors or Interpreters, "one in thine hand," for reading the Book of Mormon throughout the world, "with one accord."<br />
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Keeping that cross-referenced copy well in mind, along with the "small and simple means" of a powerful Scriptural search engine on lds.org, I turn to the French translation of 1 Nephi:<br />
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<span class="verse-number verse" style="background: 0px 0px rgba(255 , 255 , 255 , 0.01); border: 0px; color: #333333; font-family: "palatino" , "palatino linotype" , "pahoran" , "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: 18px; font-weight: 700; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">13 </span><span style="background-color: rgba(255 , 255 , 255 , 0.01); color: #333333; font-family: "palatino" , "palatino linotype" , "pahoran" , "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: 18px;">C’est pourquoi il fallait, dit-il, que nous fussions conduits d’un commun accord à la terre de promission </span><span style="background-color: rgba(255 , 255 , 255 , 0.01); color: #333333; font-family: "palatino" , "palatino linotype" , "pahoran" , "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: 18px;">pour accomplir la parole du Seigneur que nous serions dispersés sur toute la surface de la terre.</span><br />
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"<i>D'un commun accord</i>": it's clear that the marked-up master copy, which points unerringly to a phrase appearing a stunning 10 times in the Acts of the Apostles, governs the reading--even while the bracing quality of the sentence as it appears in English falls to the side (at least to these ears). Lehi exhorts his family, and in particular his strong-willed sons--to be possessed "<i>d'un commun accord</i>." Is that the correct and one-and-only reading of "with one accord" in 1 Nephi 10:13? Of course it is, though on certain days of the week I may still grasp at other possibilities.<br />
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">How well the French accords with the English--its the very same word. Tyndale first conjured up "with one accord" to translate Greek <i>homothumadon</i> (<i>homothumos</i>). <i>Accord</i> is, of course, the Latin <i>ad corda</i>, <i>at heart, to the heart</i>, altered in French, then brought into English. </span><br />
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The Spanish is even more true to the original Greek and Hebrew antecedents:<br />
<span class="verse-number verse" style="background: 0px 0px rgba(255 , 255 , 255 , 0.01); border: 0px; color: #333333; font-family: "palatino" , "palatino linotype" , "pahoran" , "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: 18px; font-weight: 700; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><br /></span>
<span class="verse-number verse" style="background: 0px 0px rgba(255 , 255 , 255 , 0.01); border: 0px; color: #333333; font-family: "palatino" , "palatino linotype" , "pahoran" , "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: 18px; font-weight: 700; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">13 </span><span style="background-color: rgba(255 , 255 , 255 , 0.01); color: #333333; font-family: "palatino" , "palatino linotype" , "pahoran" , "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: 18px;">Por tanto, dijo que era necesario que fuéramos conducidos unánimemente a la tierra de promision</span><span style="background-color: rgba(255 , 255 , 255 , 0.01); color: #333333; font-family: "palatino" , "palatino linotype" , "pahoran" , "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: 18px;">, para que se cumpliese la palabra del Señor de que seríamos dispersados sobre toda la faz de la tierra.</span><br />
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English knows <i>unanimous</i> and <i>unanimity</i>, which signifies "everybody's in favor," but the Spanish <i>unanimemente</i> still carries the old sense "with one spirit, energy, mind, one <i>animo</i>." How does<i> Liddel and Scott</i> translate <i>homothumos</i> (<i>homou, thumos</i>): <i>of one mind, </i><i>unanimous. </i>Here, the <i>thumos</i>, the <i>soul</i>, the<i> life</i>, the <i>breath</i>, speaks to <i>mind, will, purpose</i> (while also suggesting <i>spirit, courage</i>). Lehi's sons are to have the same mind and purpose. United in a common cause, they will be led in Zion-like unity, of one heart and one mind, to the promised land, even to Zion.<br />
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These clarifying Book of Mormon translations exist in many a tongue for the words of Lehi all thanks to the ten appearances of <i>with one accord</i> (<i>homothumadon</i>) in the Acts of the Apostles. Mostly, it's the "band of Christians" who meet and pray and word "with one accord," but, often, the phrase describes the attacking populace: mobs attack "with one accord." The Greek phrase (or the English rendering) in Acts conveys the single purpose of many agents, not the Act or Agency of God, though one could also say that He leads us "with one accord," that is, "without variance or distraction." I like that reading, too.<br />
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<br />
There is another place in the King James Bible where we find "with one accord," and that is Joshua 9:2: "That they gathered themselves together, to fight with Joshua and with Israel, with one accord." The enemies of Israel, like the mob in Acts, attack Joshua and Israel <i>peh echad</i> ("mouth single" = "with one mouth"). The Hebrew wording places emphasis on the phrase: <i>vayyitqabbetsu yachdav lehillahem im-Yehoshua veim-Yisrael-</i>-<b>peh echad</b> ("and they gathered <i>in one</i> to battle Joshua and Israel, with one mouth, or as the Orthodox Jewish Bible renders: "with one <i>peh</i>" [accord]). (The various translations may be found on BibleHub.)<br />
<br />
Wycliffe's Bible has a curious reading: "with one will, and with the same accord," in which "with one will" and "with the same accord" translate, in fine duplicate, both the phrase <i>and</i> its emphatic placing. It's clear that Tyndale's "with one accord" nicely sums the matter up. He must have had Wycliffe's Old Testament translations very much in mind, even memorized, while translating the New Testament. Whether that's so or not, Tyndale transcends Wycliffe. Had he translated <i>peh echad</i> in Joshua 9:2,<i> </i>we would have seen "with one accord."<br />
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Adverbial <i>peh echad</i>, or <i>peh-echad</i>, also occurs in 2 Chronicles 18:12. A royal messenger warns hapless Michaiah that 400 prophets have agreed on a prophecy of "good news" for Ahab: "Lo! the words of all the prophets tell with one mouth good things to the king" (Wycliffe's Bible).<br />
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"There is not <i>ish echad</i>" (one man) of the 400 who casts a dissenting vote (Orthodox Jewish Bible). Michaiah, #401--and the narrative anticipation runs high--will be that <i>ish echad</i>. Goodbye forever <i>peh echad</i>, for the one who sticks out like a sore thumb, as Nibley would say of Lehi, becomes the man of <i>thumos</i>, the spirited soul, who can speak for God. Overriding his entire cabinet, Lincoln was wont to say: "the <i>ayes </i>have it." The Lord's overriding purpose moves swiftly "with one accord," "in unanimity," "the unanimity of One with one," God with prophet, to fulfill His Word. Ahab falls.<br />
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And now to Lehi: "It must needs be that we are led--<i>peh echad</i>--into the land of promise."<br />
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A land of promise is a land of prophecy, of new beginnings. Lehi becomes a new Jacob, his sons, the heads of new branches of Joseph. And as every reader notes, the theme of what will befall Lehi's posterity in the latter-days persists throughout the books of Nephi. Besides being apocalyptic prophets themselves, Lehi and his sons Nephi and Jacob quote such far-seeing prophets as Joseph, Isaiah, Zenos, Zenock, and Neum. As for Laman and Lemuel, they are continually hearing and discussing all these prophecies, all these readings, and peppering Nephi with questions. The Book of Mormon opens as the Bible ends, as a grand Apocalypse, all tailored to Lehi's posterity, and to us: "that which shall befall you in the last days."<br />
<br />
It should come as no surprise, then, that Lehi's prophecies and promises find striking correspondences with a midrash (found in two versions), and associated rabbinic commentary, on Genesis 49. In Midrash Tanchuma Chapter 8, Jacob, after hesitating, speaks to his sons about the latter days. (Well, I'm surprised!) 2 Nephi 3 shows how Lehi himself both quoted and expounded Genesis 49 in setting forth the blessings and promises on his son Joseph. We keep in mind that Lehi's copy of Genesis 49, found on the brass plates, was much longer than the version in our Bibles.<br />
<br />
According to the commentary on Midrash Tanchuma Vayechi, when Jacob wished to speak to his 12 sons about the latter days, he felt, Nephi-like, constrained not to do so, because he sensed one or more of his sons was in Esau-like or Ishmael-like rebellion (Laman-like and Lemuel-like--and sons of Ismael-like), and thus incapable to holding to the covenant and of receiving the promised latter-day blessings. Jacob mourned in his heart. Yet at the last minute all 12 sons responded to his wishes <i>peh echad</i>, "with one mouth": <i>D'accord</i>. Jacob could then deliver the apocalyptic message with his last blessing. All Bible readers who encounter the first chapters of 2 Nephi immediately think of Genesis 49. Such readers need no compendious volume to tell them What's what.<br />
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Did such a story about Jacob's prophetic hesitation in speaking to his sons appear on the Plates of Brass? Jacob foresaw the apostasy of so many of his seed, and his heart, like Lehi's, like Nephi's, almost failed him. The same prophecy of covenantal failure, finally overcome by the covenantal faithful, appears in Moroni's narrative of Jacob and the remnant of the coat of Joseph.<br />
<br />
A close study of Lehi's discourses and blessings to his sons so indicates.<br />
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<b>DRAFT ONLY</b><br />
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Genesis 49 bears the story out most succinctly: He seeks to bless his sons and tell them about the latter-days. They gather (<i>q-b-ts</i>, as the enemies gather in Joshua 9:2), whereupon we twice read that they are prepared to "listen" (<i>shema'</i>) to their father, Jacob. The repetition shows assertion and implies a moment of doubt: Yes, we will indeed listen! We will certainly hear about our latter-days! (Hearing such a prophetic forecasting could be a troubling prospect for anyone, much less for 12 potential rivals.) As the midrash says, they finally spoke with <i>peh echad</i>. How telling that this midrash should light on this phrase; how fitting that Lehi should use it as well. It's the mot juste in either case. Such a peculiar detail shines so bright as a constellation of chiasmus or a discovery of a lush Bountiful by blue Arabian shores. It speaks to the specific and the peculiar, as Hugh Nibley would say.<br />
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Lehi somehow discerned both all this filial tension and rebellion <i>and</i> all the possibilities of a final coming to unity--though not until the last day. He apparently found the very story of which the midrash witnesses engraved on the plates of brass. Captain Moroni, after all, gives a wonderfully expansive story about Jacob and his sons (Alma 46). These are "the words of Jacob" about the preserved coat of Joseph and what that signified for the latter-day remnant of Joseph's own seed. Recall that the Brass Plates places the accent on Joseph's seed, Lehi's genealogical line, as if another Stick of Joseph, and so forth. 2 Nephi 3 also shows a much longer Genesis 49 than we know. The chapter went on and on--it was a prophecy of the latter days.<br />
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Jacob mourned, believing that he could not reveal the events of the latter-days to his 12 sons. Suddenly they spoke <i>peh achad</i>--then he blessed them.<br />
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Happy coincidence or not, the occurence of <i>peh echad</i> in the midrash harmonizes beautifully with Lehi's admonition to his own recalcitrant sons to forge ahead "with one accord."<br />
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Lehi clearly is a New Jacob, the leader "of the people of Jacob." In Laman and Lemuel he discerns, perhaps, Reuben and Levi; in Nephi and Sam, there is Joseph and Judah; in Jacob and Joseph; there is Joseph and Benjamin, and so forth.<br />
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The midrash showing Jacob's sons speaking <i>peh echad</i>--that's what Lehi is all about here: "'<i>amru kulan b'peh echad</i>"--They all spoke with one accord.<br />
Nephites, Lamanites, all with one accord--the Latter-day unity.<br />
DRAFT<br />
I'll be adding my on the midrash here, in a few days.......................<br />
My Source : Musings on Midrash: Vayechi--Shema Yisrael (RPT) http://musingsonmidrash.blogspot.com/2012/01/vayechi-shema-yisrael.html<br />
the midrash of Jacob's sons speaking peh echad--that's what Lehi is all about here. "'<i>amru kulan b'peh echad</i>"<br />
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"And I pray for the day when we can follow the example of our ancestors, Ya'akov's twelve sons, by truly saying <i>b'peh echad--Shema Yisrael, HaShem Elokeinu HaShem Echad</i>."<br />
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<b><br /></b><br />
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<b>UNSORTED NOTES ONLY</b><br />
<br />
But was it reasonable for Lehi to suppose that his sons could be of one mind? They were not--and he knew it--but he never gave up hope until the day he died. His final blessing included the first blessing for Laman and Lemuel--the blessing of favor--it came with one condition, but without restriction. If they would only take it. They wanted more than anything else that first blessing; yet they also wholly refused it.<br />
<br />
Laman (and Lemuel) was, contrary to a surface view very much inclined to repentance, The account shows anything but a one-dimensional Laman; the man was repenting all the time. even kneeling and throwing himself into the dust. What, then, did Laman (and Lemuel and the sons of Ismael) lack? He lacked knowledge--he read and discussed the Scripture, he pondered his father's visions and dreams--but he lacked both full intent and desire <i>and</i> a comprehensive knowledge--the big picture--the overriding purpose "with one accord"--what Paul would call the <i>mystery, </i>the dealings of that God who made them. He lacked humility. Above all, he lacked endurance. I speak not of enduring to the end, but even of enduring through the next trial or the next.<br />
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This leads to the matter of tribal or clan loyalties. To make it through the wasteland, the clan must have a single mind and determination. Nothing must weaken the resolve to come through--the pioneering "we came through"--to survive. To rebel, to murmur, to threaten to return--go backwards--these were threats to the survival of all. The real miracle is that with such dissonance, born of a lack of resolve, the entire clan didn't perish at every contretemps. The essence of desert survival is to survive, endure, the next difficulty--to do so require some vision of the journey as a whole, as a cycle.<br />
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Laman epitomizes another type of the <i>ish echad</i>, the one out-of-step with the aims and purposes of the struggling tribe--and his ignorance and his pride led him not to care about the consequences. He should have died a thousand deaths along the arduous road, along with those foolish enough to attend to his words. Yet he even thought that his father was a "foolish man." Foolish imaginations Lehi might have had--if you follow Laman's way of looking at things--but Lehi in the Desert was anything but a fool.<br />
<br />
Laman played the fool.<br />
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So how could anything have been accomplished, much less "with one accord."<br />
The answer is simple, and it's the necessary answer of survival--Laman had to be forced to comply. Force hardly seems to answer to our view of Agency, yet Force was what was applied, a force that reduced Laman, like Esau, like Pharaoh, to one "acted upon" to the fulfillment of the Lord's overarching purposes. Half the characters in the Bible seem to be so "acted upon." It's not a matter of predestination; these biblical transgressors souls each exercised moral choice, but even so, the divine plan and program could not be thwarted. They knew not the dealings, or the purposes, and yet were swept up, then even swept away, by them. See Also: http://afterthemannerofchemish.blogspot.com/2016/01/with-one-accord.htmlI began to reflecthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11853353050355842605noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7657330582593799810.post-81635932577167030302017-07-29T01:57:00.000-07:002020-01-25T17:12:15.369-08:00An Egyptologist Looks at Gospel Topics Essay "Translation and Historicity of the Book of Abraham"Is the book of Abraham true? Yes, but it is not complete; it stops almost midair. Would that the Prophet had gone on in his translation or revelation, as the case may be--Elder Bruce R. McConkie of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles<br />
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For he promised unto them that he would <i>preserve</i> <i>these things</i> for a wise purpose in him, that he might show forth his power unto <i>future generations</i>--Alma 37:18 <br />
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But the records of the fathers. . . the Lord my God <i>preserved</i> in mine own hands. . . and I shall endeavor to write some of <i>these things</i> upon this record, for the benefit of my <i>posterity</i>--Abraham 1:31<br />
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<i>Lech Lecha! (Genesis 12)</i><br />
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<b>The Gospel Topics Essays: Why Weigh in?</b><br />
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The several Gospel Topics essays show themselves a labor of love. Yet each must pass the same test: the test of time. Will evidence, expression, and claim continue to hold up after a quarter of a century or half a century have passed? Will the rising generation cling to what is asserted or will it seek improvements? At what point would it be fair to weigh in on the work so thoughtfully prepared under assignment? Might the several essays need some room to breathe before pencils get sharpened?<br />
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They never had that chance. The giants of the press, moving apace, told us all what to think about each and every essay, told us what snippets to focus on. "<i>Mormon Church Admits Joseph Smith Married Wives</i>"--as if Mormon children, for at least a century, didn't roam the halls every Sunday with a copy of the revelation on marriage in their tiny hands. General Authorities expressed disappointment at how the press sensationalized and thus also trivialized essays of beauty, worth, and completeness. I heard one of the Twelve counsel: Read every word of that essay [on plural marriage]. <i>Church Admits that Book of Abraham May Not Be A Literal Translation!</i> I recalled what Elder Bruce R. McConkie taught so eloquently <i>three decades ago</i>: "Is the book of Abraham true? Yes, but it is not complete; it stops almost midair. Would that the Prophet had gone on in his translation or revelation, as the case may be" (https://rsc.byu.edu/archived/joseph-smith-translation-restoration-plain-and-precious-things/1-doctrinal-restoration).<br />
<br />
The Gospel Topics Essays will do their best work if we all remember one of the first principles of Mormonism. The doctrines of salvation aside, in the light of the Gospel Latter-day Saints favor relaxed opinion over creed and wresting, the open rather than the defined (see Alma 40:15; and also 40:5, 8, 17, 20, 21).<br />
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"Translation and Historicity of the Book of Abraham" now enters its fourth year, and I hope it is doing the work it was designed to do. Could a better essay have done better work? We have what we have. I chose not to weigh in. Having a doctorate in egyptology doesn't qualify me to steady the ark.<br />
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Without naming the piece, I did write on how unexplained ideas about the Egyptian relics serving as a "catalyst" for the translation did not match the evidence. The essay didn't stop with the relics: "The Bible seems to have been a frequent catalyst" for the Prophet's revelations. Why the qualifying "<i>seems</i> to have been"? Because the idea of Bible or mummies or papyri as "catalyst" is hokum, and those who prepared the essay sensed it. The records, says Joseph Smith, "have <i>fallen</i> into our hands"---accident or miracle--and astonishingly "purport to be the writings of Abraham, while in Egypt." "Purport" clarifies the relation of a papyrus to Abraham: something penned on papyrus, and read and understood from the first by the Prophet, is making a claim. Purchase followed.<span style="font-family: "calibri" , sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-size: x-small;">(See "Examining the Catalyst Theory and the Book of Abraham"; "Two Bridges: A Cautionary Note about Gospel Scholarship":</span><br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">http://valsederholm.blogspot.com/2016/04/the-catalyst-theory-of-book-of-abraham.html).</span><br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">http://valsederholm.blogspot.com/2016/08/two-bridges-cautionary-note-in-book-of.html</span><br />
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"There is a time to keep silence, and a time to speak." Jacques Barzun wrote of the duty of teachers to correct. A proud father told Barzun: "I've prepared my son from childhood to become a teacher because of your example." Barzun shared with us his response: "I feel sorry for your son." Teachers must tell students what the self-protective hope not to hear. The worldly response is to reject intellect and learning as elitist.<br />
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Teachers also face the temptation to correct with pluck. Pardon the reviewer whose burden is no less light for all his plucky puckishness. We may not know much, any of us, but we have an obligation to share what we know of method, discipline, and beauty. Although standards remain non-negotiable, scholarship is a cheerful, joyous enterprise and colloquium, an on-going effort in which (a very few) errors prove not fatal but instructive, and much collegiality and openness to the findings of others must thrive. The Egyptian Wisdom Literature contrasts the <i>kebob</i>, or cool scribe (controlled, efficient, mannerly) with the hot-headed scribbler (pushy, self-willed, angry). A jar overflowing with pure, cool water becomes the hieroglyphic signature of the cool scribe; the hothead explodes "like fire in hay."<br />
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A keen reading is no fire. It's a favor. I'm just inviting any curious parties to read along for a spell.<br />
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I'm "going out to clean the pasture spring." "You come too."<br />
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<b><br /></b>
<b>Part One: Review of "Translation and Historicity of the Book of Abraham"</b><br />
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<b>I Proving that the Holy Scriptures are True</b><br />
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What do I think of "Translation and Historicity of the Book of Abraham"? I will speak first as a reader of English; afterward, as an egyptologist. The opening paragraph and the later doctrinal discussion flow well and partake of beauty. These paragraphs make me think of President Henry B. Eyring. The conclusion, which speaks to study, prayer, and spiritual witness, as the "ultimate" way to learn the "truth" about Abraham's book is lovely, too--though it's also likely that many have first been convinced of the truth of the book by the proofs given in other Scriptures or by the evidences of history and language.<br />
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The response to proofs and evidences depends on each individual--some being more promptly convinced by what they learn from Scripture or from "the best books" than others. Some learn by study; some by faith. Convincing comes by one or the other force, or a combination thereof (see Alma 37; Moroni 10). Moroni anticipates that the readers of the Book of Mormon will be so astonished, so deeply moved, by the narrative sweep and spiritual power of the Book that in prayers they will only ask: "is it not [then, indisputably] true?" In large measure, Moroni was wrong. The forces warring against learning <i>either by study or by faith</i> prevail in the latter-days. Make no mistake. Critics not only attack our appeal to faith; they also attack all our attempts to learn Scriptural truth "by study."<br />
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For Nephi, the words of the prophets come together as "convincing" "proof." We say the same thing often of Joseph Smith: his visions and his revelatory words turn the key of proof to yet other revelatory words--line-upon-line--and the Holy Scriptures confirm it all. Yet the convincing power of historical evidence, reason, logic, cannot ever be discounted in the great story of faith.<br />
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Hugh Nibley once drew a very long line on the board and, making hash marks, showed that each person found convincing evidence, historical, linguistic, and so forth, at some different but clearly marked point along that long line. A growing body of evidence rings in, at a given point, absolute proof to that particular soul--even if not to any other. It's so simple. And what of the spiritual convincing? Draw another line. Ezra Thayre in 1830 held a copy of the Book of Mormon in his hands--that moment was enough. There is no proof, evidence, or witness, however convincing, greater than the spiritual, especially when combined with the words of the former prophets.<br />
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<b><br /></b>
<b>II The little foxes, that spoil the <i>vignettes</i></b><br />
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The rest of the essay baffles, even jars, and the English--forget the Egyptian--proves difficult to read. I wonder whether anyone can understand many of the sentences in the essay, much less grasp the paragraphs. Yet the baffling whole has been translated into German, Portuguese, French, and Spanish. No reader can dance around the thing; we all must simply plow through. And no matter what we cut through or plow under in that honest, fearless, and seeking style which characterizes the Latter-day Saint community, the direct way is the only way that the Saints will ever arrive at clear and candid discussion about hieroglyph and papyri--and Abraham. If the essay has its flaws and follies, all the better: more to sort through, more to discuss.<br />
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Let's start with what the essay says of the several vignettes (the "little vines," or iconographic representations) from which Reuben Hedlock prepared woodblock facsimiles for printing: Facsimiles 1, 2, and 3, of the Book of Abraham.<br />
<i><br /></i>
<i>Elegant Variation</i>: We read "of these facsimiles" and "of these drawings" in a single sentence. The same representations are also called "vignettes" and "illustrations." Yet none of these words is entirely synonymous with any of the others--and the variation, undefined, will confuse any reader. We recall Hugh Nibley's persistent reminders about these symbol-laden vignettes being anything but <i>pictures</i> or <i>illustrations</i>. Must we forget everything he wrote on the subject over four decades? must we return to what he once called "Phase One"?<br />
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And how about the hieroglyphs found on the vignettes? We read of "the hieroglyphs or hieratic characters that originally surrounded the vignettes"--but why "characters"? Even young and curious readers might be expected to know about Chinese characters, Mayan glyphs, Indus signs, Mesopotamian cuneiform, Hittite hieroglyphics, Egyptian hieroglyphs, Egyptian hieratic. And are there indeed "hieratic characters" on any of the vignettes from which the Prophet published facsimiles? If so, Where are they?<br />
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What of "hieratic characters that originally <i>surrounded</i> the vignettes"? Facsimile 2 has much <i>hieroglyphic</i> text <i>inside</i>--not only surrounding. How could such an oversight have been made? It's not owing to any lack of knowledge; an overabundance of proofreading works its magic.<br />
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Speaking again of these particular three vignettes, the essay postures and postulates: "Moreover, documents initially composed for one context can be repackaged for another context or purpose."<br />
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What does it mean to compose, much less "initially compose," documents "for one context"? That's not clear to me or to the teen.<br />
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"Context or purpose"? These words aren't synonyms and jar when found together. <i>Context, </i>misapplied and overused, jars everywhere. The authors intend: "The vignettes were originally associated with Abraham, or with his book, and were later also used by a Theban priestly family ca. 200 BC" (not BCE and CE as in this essay, unburdened as it is with a sense of audience). From Abraham to Theban priests--How could this be? We don't know--but we are standing by the claim. Indeed the Egyptians did search out and reuse older, even ancient, writings all the time and down through the millennia.<br />
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"Repackaged for another context"--it's one thing to fill paragraphs with cant and jargon, quite another to use jargon that never appears any egyptological journal. I get the point, and I don't disagree, but the sentence is hardly clear. And who is doing the "repackaging"? Hor's sons? or Joseph Smith?<br />
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"Drifted or even dislodged from that original context and reinterpreted"--again, I get the drift--but clarity also drifts here. "Reinterpreted?" To what degree? or was it just reused? Was it reused to invoke a special or ancient power? We must think more deeply here about how or why Theban priests adopted or adapted vignettes having reference to an historical Abraham in Egypt.<br />
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"Joseph Smith had published the facsimiles as freestanding drawings."<br />
<br />
Untrue. Both facsimiles 2 and 3 show plenty of hieroglyphs, hieroglyphs which Joseph Smith said he could interpret, at least in part. Some were not to be revealed to the world at present, but he said these also were of deepest import--"to be had in the temple." "Freestanding drawings" is a stunning misstatement because only Facsimile 1 appears in the published book of Abraham without "surrounding hieroglyphs." And why is that? Perhaps the Prophet saw the accompanying hieroglyphic text on that vignette as being entirely irrelevant to the book of Abraham, as opposed to, say, the writings of sacred import on Facsimile 2. And, to be sure, much of the writing on Facsimile 2 has thematic and verbal correspondence to at least the first three chapters of the Book of Abraham: the petition for divine rescue (as Nibley noted), the "noble" and "great" god who acts in the <i>zp tpy </i>(the primeval time), and yet more.<br />
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As for Facsimile 3, there are also lessons here: Joseph Smith addresses specific hieroglyphs as representing names of the persons depicted. And notice how he says that the names are "written in characters" over their hands or heads. If Joseph Smith truly believed that one hieratic sign could be translated into many lines of Abrahamic text, why would he also say that several characters were required to spell a single name? Answer: Because he never believed that one hieratic sign could be translated into a paragraph of text. Read his description of the title page of the Book of Mormon; its translation balances the Egyptian with the corresponding English, one page to one page. So much for the refrain of the critics over the last half century: Joseph Smith thought he was translating sentences, even paragraphs, of Scripture from single hieratic signs.<br />
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"Illustrations with no clear connection to Abraham anciently could, by revelation, shed light on the life and teachings of this prophetic figure."<br />
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Abraham is usually known as the Patriarch, or Father Abraham, not as a "prophetic figure." The elegant variation, i.e., "Abraham" and "this prophetic figure," throws the reader off the scent, as does the vague "<i>clear</i> connection"-- as opposed to "any connection whatsoever."<br />
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"Illustrations with [should read <i>having</i>] no clear connection [whatever that means] to Abraham anciently could, by revelation, shed light on the life and teachings of this prophetic figure."<br />
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The sentence invites but one response: How? How could illustrations (or vignettes, facsimiles, drawings), having no connection, clear or otherwise, to Abraham, anciently, then suddenly find a connection to him by revelation? What kind of a tie could that be? Right! No tie at all!<br />
<br />
What purpose would that revelatory moment serve? Why would such an ungrounded matter need to be revealed? What then to make of the three now fictive facsimiles? Are there other revelations in which illustrations having nothing to do with an ancient prophet suddenly have much to do with him? Wouldn't that just be making a connection that's not there? Or is it there but just not <i>clearly</i> there? Reading clouds in the sky: Five-star bad sentence.<br />
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<b><br /></b>
<b>III The Kirtland Egyptian Papers: the "Grammar Book"</b><br />
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What the essay says next of the Alphabet Document (or "Grammar book") of the Kirtland Egyptian Papers rings in an unforced error.<br />
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"Some evidence suggests that Joseph studied the characters on the Egyptian papyri and attempted to learn the Egyptian language. His history reports that, in July 1835, he was 'continuously engaged in translating an alphabet to the Book of Abraham, and arranging a grammar of the Egyptian language as practiced by the ancients.' This 'grammar,' as it was called, consistent of columns of hieroglyphic characters [not hieroglyphs and hieratic signs?] followed by English translations recorded in a large notebook by Joseph's scribe, William W. Phelps. Another manuscript, written by Joseph Smith and Oliver Cowdery, has Egyptian characters [wrong: not for Joseph Smith!] followed by explanations."<br />
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"Some evidence suggests that. . ." What evidence exactly? Why the vague "some" cropping up everywhere in the essay to the frustration of the young reader? Why the repeated cloying adverbials ending in "that"? And if "his history reports that," why is it a matter of "some" suggestive evidence only? Because we don't know who later set down this matter of history?<br />
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The essay fails to clearly, or accurately, describe the "Alphabet document." Yet we are told what it all means by an essayist (or committee of such) who confesses the tie between that document and Abraham's book "is not fully understood."<br />
<br />
"Columns" followed by "translations" is an unforced error: at this point transparency becomes surrender. The easy-going acceptance of translations of whole paragraphs of text from corresponding single hieratic signs perpetuates an error exploded by Hugh Nibley some 50 years ago. The sentence gives away, free of charge, the claim to Abrahamic Scripture through divine translation. If Joseph Smith thought he was translating huge segments of Scripture from a relatively few signs having nothing to do with Abraham, then the work can hardly lay claim to the imprimatur of the Divine. And yet there are many who say it's a <i>simple</i> matter to reconcile Joseph's weak and ignorant toying with Egyptian with the revelation of the Patriarch's brilliant visions.<br />
<br />
Prove it. Use clear terms and bring evidence.<br />
<br />
Here's contrary evidence that approaches demonstration: 1) The translation by W.W. Phelps (not Joseph Smith, as Chicago Professor Robert Ritner states in <i>The Joseph Smith Egyptian Papyri: A Complete Edition</i>) of a paragraph of hieratic, in Kirtland Egyptian document #7, shows how Brother Phelps understood the requisite balance of hieratic and English lines (see Hugh Nibley, "The Kirtland Egyptian Papers"). So did Phelps translate correctly? No. He wasn't a prophet. 2) We've already touched on the matter of several "characters" being required to write a single name in the Explanation of Facsimile 3, as well as the evidence from 3) the translation of the Egyptian Title Page of the Book of Mormon into a corresponding page of English; 4) Joseph Smith's explanation of that same Title Page speaks of Egyptian "running" like Hebrew: thus a running script; 5) in Moroni 9, Brother Joseph also let's us know that he is translating from an Egyptian script, which like Hebrew, is built on phonetic principles, not symbolic ideograms of dark and wonderful purport. Again, 6) notes in the possession of both Oliver Cowdery and Frederick G. Williams yield examples of how Egyptian hieroglyphs, formed or reformed, translate names and noun phrases: two characters yield two or three English nouns. Did we leave anyone out? Joseph Smith, Oliver Cowdery, Frederick G. Williams, William W. Phelps make up the roll (we omit Warren Parrish), where the Kirtland Egyptian project was concerned. And they all understood alike, when it came to the nature of Egyptian writing and translation. (Before doing anything else, read Dr. W.V. Smith's "Criticisms of Joseph Smith and the Book of Abraham": http://www.boap.org/LDS/critics.html#N_19_ .)<br />
<br />
Again, Joseph Smith's own explanations in the "grammar book" follow study of "Egyptian characters." False. That particular manuscript starts with mysterious characters having nothing to do with the papyri or hieroglyphs--the Egyptian comes later. A big error. Joseph Smith doesn't touch <i>any</i> "Egyptian characters" in the portion written in his own hand--as is <i>very well known</i>. (See discussion in the latest volume of the Joseph Smith Papers.)<br />
<br />
"Not fully understood": Is it, then, understood in part? And exactly which part? "Grammar book": I like the phrase, but it's cute--this manuscript is not a book, and hardly a grammar. Where are the rules?<br />
<br />
To repeat: all the talk about "rules" and "translations" turns the page on the entire argument for the divine nature of the Prophet's translation of the book of Abraham--and it's an unforced error. The "grammar book" is no such thing: it does <i>not</i> set out "rules" per se; it has certain assumptions--obscure beyond thought--but neither rules nor delineation of rules. It says nothing of nouns, verbs, adverbs, or syntax. Nor can the "grammar" be said to contain Abrahamic "translations" from hieratic signs. That's the principal anti-Mormon line, and the most fervently propagated. (See my essay, "Running from the Truth about The Book of Abraham," 2017.) A single sentence in the Gospel Topics Essay, working crossways the tenor of the whole, thus blithely gives away the entire game to the anti-Mormons, and without any attempt at defense whatsoever. Yet it's a simple thing to defend and was effectively defended half a century ago.<br />
<br />
The various claims about the "Grammar book" are so casually and, at once, so obscurely stated that no agent or officer of the Church who might have reviewed the essay could ever have caught the full implications. Who knew them? The few, the jet set. Will Latter-day Saint youth get the point? There is no point to get; no point, no clarity, no evidence. In fairness, sometimes it's a matter of <i>Out with the Truth</i>--even if the Truth may be damaging. <i>Transparency</i> is the watchword. But the claim that these "translations" derive from the hieratic signs to the left of the Abraham texts is not only crafted in dense glass but demonstrably false--and we have as proof the Prophet's own clear and repeated words, over a lifetime, about translating Egyptian characters. We mustn't confuse transparency with surrender. No matter how often or how loudly critics promulgate untested ideas, we need not fall for them hook, line, and sinker. The subtleties of agenda, traced throughout the essay, are sure to baffle every reader--the teen quickly bends back to Instagram and Facebook.<br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-size: x-small;">See "What Did Joseph Smith Say about the Nature of Egyptian Hieroglyphs," http://valsederholm.blogspot.com/2017/05/what-did-ohioans-in-joseph-smiths-day.html; : "Running from the Truth about the Book of Abraham," http://valsederholm.blogspot.com/2017/01/running-from-truth-about-joseph-smith.html</span><br />
<br />
<b>IV "Translation": Defining Seeric Translation</b><br />
<br />
The essay's attempt to explain translation, any kind of translation, fails the tests of thoroughness and clarity. The confused and contradictory essay deals with matters far beyond any of us, and easy explanations about the workings of the divine get us nowhere. Can we explain the Liahona? the Interpreters? Can we understand how Brother Joseph was gifted with "the eye of the Lord," as both Brigham Young and Orson Spencer put it? Can we even explain how a papyrus roll containing Abraham's very record showed up in the Ohio village a modern Prophet called home? The essay, better words eluding, calls that last unfolding, "a set of unique historical events." And so it goes. Was not 24 July 1847 also the unfolding of "set of unique historical events"? We are dealing with a different universe of discourse, what Doctrine and Covenants 130:4 terms "prophet's time."<br />
<br />
The essay confidently introduces the topic of translation in these uncertain words: "We do know some things about the translation process. The word <i>translation</i> typically assumes an expert knowledge of multiple languages. Joseph Smith claimed no expertise in any language."<br />
<br />
The first question any reader will raise is: Are you claiming to know some things (and exactly what things?) about the translation process of Joseph Smith? or just some things about the process (or workings?) of translation in general? The answer is: Joseph Smith--but the logic of the sentence points in the other direction. And why the cloying phrase "translation process?" Jacques Barzun spent decades trying to dislodge <i>process</i> from America's facile wordhoard.<br />
<br />
Again: Does translation really (or even "typically") assume "an expert knowledge of multiple languages?" Define "expert." People translate every day, and in every type of conversation or business transaction imaginable. Parents are forever lugging children to offices to do a day's work of translation. Ah! That's why we need the <i>process</i>. <i>Translation</i> meets up with <i>expert</i> and the precisely qualifying <i>typically </i>to signal that we are now entering the professional world through the gates of scientism. And while Joseph Smith doubtless never claimed "expertise in any language," <i>including his native English(?)</i>, he constantly translated words and phrases from Hebrew, Greek, and German before audiences numbering in the thousands. He would cite lexicons, translate, and then call on the dozens of native Germans congregants to give the thumbs up. <i>Weak</i> he may have been, but he was not shy.<br />
<br />
Nor did he simply "receive" "knowledge about the life and teachings of Abraham," as the essay states, in apparent, and bland, reference to the complex book of Abraham. He had to work at it over a span of decades. Knowledge of Abraham came through Brother Joseph's intense work in Book of Mormon translation, through his inspired additions to the Bible, by his entertaining an heavenly messenger from the "dispensation of the gospel of Abraham," through startling revelations of Abraham's priesthood, doctrine, and covenants, often expounded upon in his public discourses, and from what he himself--in his own handwriting--called "the sacred record" of Abraham on papyrus. None of the several elements that make up this decades-long revelation of the covenants and dispensation of Father Abraham was a simple matter of a dense or unaware instrument picking up knowledge in the manner of radio, television, or Internet.<br />
<br />
The essay correctly quotes Scripture about Brother Joseph's translations being effected by "the gift and power of God." But remember the further scriptural injunction to "stir up the gift of God, which is in thee" (2 Timothy 1:6). Then power comes.<br />
<br />
And the last scripture also explains the long entombed papyri--it came to stir us all up! And how it stirs us up! It emerged from the catacombs to awaken again the Prophet's seeric gift of translation from a surviving, nay, resurrected, ancient record. And how it awakens our minds to Abraham! The papyri sounds in our ears an alarm--and there is no snooze button. How uncomfortable it makes us--"Awake, and hear the words" (Mosiah 3:3)! Should the papyri disquiet--that is the hand of God working His perfect work. Never mistake the hand that wrenches your very heart strings as a sign that the Divine Work is frustrated, or about to collapse (Doctrine and Covenants 3). Joseph had already wrestled with the angels of the Abrahamic dispensation--lo these many years--now he was to wrestle with the word of God on papyrus. To the very last week of his life that wrestle with learning "from the papyrus now in my house" never left his mind. The concrete is no dream: we try to shake it off, explain it away, but Material Papyri and Conscious, Knowing Translation remains. We speak of the papyri serving as a catalyst to revelation, to Abraham. Forget it. Joseph Smith had already been "catalyzed" on the subject. He would now <i>translate </i>by stirring up the gift of God, which was in him.<br />
<br />
The Abraham papyrus, though astonishing, surely works as one of the "small and simple," even "foolish," Scriptural means through which God in His wisdom ministers salvation to His children. A torn sheet of papyrus, about the size of a postcard, is all God requires to confound the wise in the inspired Explanation of Facsimile 1. And some tightly rolled and tarred papyri, in all its long itinerary, simple step-by-step to Kirtland, carries all our hopes for exaltation in the eternal family covenant. And by "carries" I mean it yet so carries--for the book, "stopping midair" with the marriage of Adam and Eve, "is not complete"--neither is our eternal mansion (see Alma 37).<br />
<br />
Promises locked in past dispensations require the high gift of a seer. But defining that seeric work demands something more than <i>Webster's</i>.<br />
<br />
The following sentence from the Gospel Topics essay, which cites <i>Webster's American Dictionary</i> (1828), would make any teen dizzy:<br />
<br />
"In Joseph Smith's day, the word <i>translate</i> could mean 'to interpret; to render into another language.' The word <i>interpret </i>could mean 'to explain the meaning of words to a person who does not understand them,' or 'to explain or unfold the meaning of predictions, vision[s?], dreams, or enigmas; to expound and lay open what is concealed from the understanding.'"<br />
<br />
I'm intrigued by <i>Webster's</i>, but the point of citing a dictionary made specifically in Joseph Smith's early 19th century American setting is to show how words used in that particular time and place differ from how the same words are used in other times and places. Can we be quite sure that "the word <i>translate" </i>doesn't also (lose the infirm qualifier <i>could</i>) "mean 'to interpret; to render into another language,' in <i>Johnson's Dictionary </i>or in any other English dictionary? Of course it does. The<i> OED</i> would serve better, for it shows how the connotations of words change over time, that is, when they do change.<br />
<br />
And what of the dictionary game? <i>Translate</i> means <i>interpret</i>; <i>interpret</i> means <i>explain enigmas</i>; and so forth. What are we left with? A merry-go-round of<i> coulds</i>. What the Prophet taught in his last public discourse: "I translated it [Abraham Chapter 3] from the papyrus now in my house" by lexical legerdemain now "could mean": "I laid open the enigmatic vision I had after studying, noticing, glancing at, the papyrus now in my house." The pursuit of scholarship frees us from the dominion of such games. Let's be free of them.<br />
<br />
And just who did all the translating? "Joseph Smith, or perhaps a colleague, introduced the published translation by saying that the records were 'written by his [Abraham's] own hand, upon papyrus.' The phrase can be understood to mean that Abraham is the author and not the literal copyist."<br />
<br />
I don't understand the last phrase: "the literal copyist." Would a teen understand it? What the author intended was: "Abraham wrote his book; other hands made copies of it over time; a Late Egyptian copy fell into Joseph Smith's hands. 'By his own hand upon papyrus' may imply composition not copied manuscript."<br />
<br />
"Or perhaps a colleague"? Did the "highly esteemed" Seer and Translator have a colleague? (I'm quoting from 2 Nephi 3.) Was Willard Richards, the Prophet's scribe, the colleague? W.W. Phelps? Hugh Nibley is immediately cited as source, but what Nibley said half a century ago--and the authors of the essay know it--was that "The Book of Abraham Written by His Own Hand upon Papyrus" serves up a complete and typical ancient title. (The scribe <i>was</i> responsible for the faulty capitalization and punctuation, as it now stands.) The mere existence of that odd title, so casually punctuated, may well be the best evidence we have for a book of Abraham really present "upon papyrus" in Brother Joseph's house! And the fact of the title's being misunderstood by critics ranks high among the abundant ironies with which the anti-Mormon literature teems. No wonder Hugh Nibley stated: "We need more anti-Mormon literature"!<br />
<br />
Conclusions about translation: "A careful study of the book of Abraham provides a better measure of the book's merits than any hypothesis that treats the text as a conventional translation."<br />
<br />
I think I know what all this means, as I hurry along. It later becomes the sentence I read most often. There's a fine air about it; it's been highly polished. Let's translate it into French and fork it over to a delightful teen in Grenoble who's been asked a couple questions about the merits of the Book. I'm remembering a French grad student I knew in Indiana, an Hebraist. When I assured him that, yes, Abraham could read and write, astonished denial filled the air. So I brought up our wee Book. Full-blown academician's distress set in. He couldn't allow me to speak! and left in a huff. Our teen might be <i>son petite cousine</i>. She inhabits a universe sliced through with logic, steadied only by geometric proofs. So what's her answer? her saving <i>esprit de finesse</i>?<br />
<br />
Let's look at the sentence at which her brow furrows:<br />
<br />
"Study" "provides a better measure of the book's merits." <i>Yields </i>would be the simpler word; or <i>gives; </i>or <i>better takes the measure; better shows the book's merits. </i>And are these the book's intrinsic merits? its literary or historical merits? or its merits as a translation from "text"?<br />
<br />
Science built this sentence: "Study" "a better measure" "than any hypothesis" (are not these always the result of study? even of measurements?) "that treats" (the scientific language continues) "the text" (another rather technical word perhaps referring to the above mentioned "book"--or is it a hint at the original text in hieratic?) "as a conventional translation" (as opposed to What?).<br />
<br />
President John Taylor admired French philosophy--<i>and</i> he called it "fried froth." We think if we speak the frothy language of grad school--and the kids will pick up on it, that's for sure!--we're just going to knock 'em dead.<br />
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<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
Then I start to wonder whether there is one "hypothesis" here that I am to avoid by study, or perhaps even several hypotheses about the
translation of Abraham being "a conventional
translation." Yet isn't the premise of the book that Abraham wrote down an autobiography in Egypt and
that Joseph Smith published its equivalent in conventional English, that is, pretty much word-for-word? Or is that hopelessly naive? And would
not such a transmission of content stand consistent with the idea of
translation in every time and place? Doesn't the book, then, claim to be a "conventional translation"?<br />
<br />
But it is the manner of translation, not the
translated text, to which the sentence refers. Yet even if Brother Joseph
understood and conveyed the Egyptian text by means of an instrument--his
spiritually endowed eyes and mind--isn't the result the same as what a
"conventional translation" would produce? Isn't that the point of the
whole enterprise of translation--especially prophetic translation? What does
the Book of Mormon say about translation? Text is transmitted, period. Is the Book of Nephi really not, in fine, a "conventional translation" of what was on Nephi's plates. The
method shouldn't matter. It's a miraculous method, yes--but on to the miracle of the book
itself and to its merits.<br />
<br />
Aha! That's what the sentence means--I knew it all along!<br />
<br />
<br />
We know come to deep waters--deep and murky. No amount of reading helps teen know what sentence says:<br />
<br />
"It is likely futile to assess Joseph's ability to translate papyri when we now have only a fraction of the papyri he had in his possession. Eyewitnesses spoke of 'a long roll' or multiple 'rolls' of papyrus. Since only fragments survive, it is likely that much of the papyri accessible to Joseph when he translated the book of Abraham is not among these fragments. The loss of a significant portion of the papyri means the relationship of the papyri to the published text cannot be settled conclusively by reference to the papyri."<br />
<br />
"It is likely futile to assess Joseph's ability to translate [the gold plates] when we now have [no plates at all] he had in his possession." At first blush, the sentence evinces a flawless logic. Then we start to think: But what of all the philological and other work done throughout many decades on the text of the Book of Mormon? Look at the names, themes, historical correspondences, look at the archaeology and anthropology done by so many, for so very long, on the Book of Mormon, or even on Abraham. Isn't this the stuff on which assessments are made. The book of Abraham weighs in at 14 pages. There is hands down more linguistic, literary, historical, and archaeological evidence for the genuine nature of that book than for any other ancient book of comparable size. As with the Book of Mormon, Abraham's egyptianisms and hebraisms also abound and refute the simplistic "likely futile to assess Joseph's ability to translate" papyri. This sentence robs any curious young reader of the opportunity to address such linguistic or thematic bull's-eyes.<br />
<br />
Another sentence defies logic altogether: "Since only fragments survive" [stated as fact], "it is likely that [here comes the argument] much of the papyri accessible to Joseph. . . is not among these fragments." "Likely"? Obvious. And why the pretentious and unclear "accessible"?<br />
<br />
"The loss of a significant portion [Alas! the weary <i>significant</i>: how much, more or less?] of the papyri [owned by the Prophet] means the relationship of the papyri to the published text cannot be settled conclusively by reference to the papyri." Why "settled conclusively," and not just "settled"; or why "settled. . . by reference"? What "papyri"? Why "published text"? The first mention to <i>papyri</i> is clear: all papyri owned by the Prophet; but how about the second and third mentions of the same word? As a lifelong student of the history of the Joseph Smith papyri, I would <i>first</i> take the author's intent to be: "The loss of much or most of the papyri once owned by the Prophet means that the relationship of the limited papyri, elsewhere termed 'fragments,' now in the Church's hands to the published text of the book of Abraham cannot be settled [omit unnecessary "conclusively"] by reference to these same papyri now in the Church's hands." More likely, the author's intent was: "The loss of much of the papyri once owned by the Prophets means [that] the relationship of that entire set of papyri to the published Abraham text cannot be settled by reference to the fragments and sheets of papyri now in the Church's hands." That's a true statement.<br />
<br />
We now turn to the paragraph heralded by the <i>Salt Lake Tribune, </i>the<i> New York Times</i>, and the British papers, as a mighty breakthrough in the Church's stance on the Book of Abraham translation.<br />
<br />
"Alternatively, Joseph's study of the papyri may have led to a revelation about key events and teachings of the life of Abraham, much as he had earlier received a revelation about the life of Moses while studying the Bible. This view assumes a broader definition of the words <i>translator </i>and<i> translation. </i>According to this view, Joseph's translation was not a literal rendering of the papyri as a conventional translation would be. Rather, the physical artifacts provided an occasion for meditation, reflection, and revelation. They catalyzed a process whereby God gave to Joseph Smith a revelation about the life of Abraham, even if that revelation did not directly correlate to the characters on the papyri."<br />
<br />
The famous paragraph opens with <i>Alternatively</i>--a headline catching word! But no matter how often or how carefully read, the keen reader fails to see any argument or statement for which an "alternative view" is now stated. Consider again the preceding paragraph. Does it give a view for which an alternate now appears? Shall we search further up the essay for the link? <i>Alternatively</i> simply hangs there, without referentiality.<br />
<br />
"Joseph's study of the papyri may have led to a revelation"--this is clear, without need of <i>Alternatively</i>, that is, whether we accept one or another of the speculations about how he translated or "translated."<br />
<br />
"A revelation about key events and teachings of the life of Abraham": Does the sentence mean to say that an alternate view of the book can also discard the autobiographical presentation, and instead amount more amorphously to "key events and teachings of the life." Has the autobiography now been recast as a manual and travelogue? The book of Abraham, with its sweeping views, including the surprising scene from Abraham's premortal "life," is something much beyond "key events and teachings of the life of Abraham."<br />
<br />
"Much as he had earlier received a revelation about the life of Moses while studying the Bible." "Studying the Bible" hardly catches the supreme import of the projected translation. And why "the life of Moses"? not Moses' vision? Besides, had Joseph not also received a revelation about Adam, Eve, Abel, Enoch, Lamech, Noah, and even Abraham himself while preparing his New Translation of the Bible? The sentence means: Could not "study" of the papyri have occasioned a revelation of the autobiography of Abraham, just as study of the Bible led to a revelation of additional details of Abraham's life, now found in the Joseph Smith Translation. Now we have the meaning of the sentence clearly in mind, it's a simple thing to show the error of its claims.<br />
<br />
Let's think it through. How well does Joseph's "study of the papyri" match his "study of the Bible"--are they the same, even similar, kinds of study. Again, "study of the Bible" hardly describes the New Translation. And to what degree do details, or longer additions, to the life and teachings of Abraham match in kind what we see in the elaborated book of Abraham? And why was the ancient title of the book: "The Book of Abraham Translated from His Own Hand upon Papyrus?"<br />
<br />
Or what exactly is the purport of the words in the Prophet's last sermon, 16 June 1844, that he learned the content of Abraham Chapter 3 "from translating the papyrus now in my house?" Here we also note words written by Joseph in "his own hand" about "papyrus": he calls some of his collection: "the sacred record." Is not "the sacred record" the same "papyrus now in my house" from which he is "translating"? Right from the beginning, Joseph Smith recognized some of the papyri as containing a record of the Patriarchs. To so recognize, or identify, there must have been some moment of divine translation in which certain hieratic signs yielded specific English text (the title?). That's what led to purchase, then to study, then to "translation or revelation as the case may be." Remember that the Prophet, to satisfy Mr. Chandler's mind about the gift of interpretation, presented him with a translation of some of the writing found with the mummies. In this case, there was no mention of the Patriarchs; the Prophet was reading some undoubtedly curious but rather mundane lines. And perhaps what he so translated were the very titles belonging to the priest Hor, as found alongside our Facsimile 1. If not so, these best illustrate the nature of Joseph Smith's first seeric translation from the collection, names, ancient ownership, etc.<br />
<br />
"This view assumes a broader definition of the word <i>translator </i>and <i>translation</i>. According to this view, Joseph's translation was not a literal rendering of the papyri as a conventional translation would be."<br />
<br />
Again, how to make a coherent link between "this view" and "alternatively," or between "alternatively" and some unstated different "view." Has "this view" yet been defined? "A broader definition": Broader that what? What definition? We're never once told! A startling new and alternative view is now allowed--and what is that "view"? A broad definition of "translator." But didn't we always know the the Prophet translated after a manner enigmatic and divine? And that's all we know because he never explained anything to us about his "high gift" (see Mosiah 8). Nor could he explain any such thing--nor could even Gabriel himself--to our dark minds, to recall what Joseph Smith told the Elders preparing for the preliminary ordinances of the priesthood endowment.<br />
<br />
"According to this view [still undefined], Joseph's translation was not a literal rendering of the papyri as a conventional translation would be." Now we're getting somewhere! Some Latter-day Saints have long believed, without any taint of official criticism at any time, that Joseph's translation of Abraham "was not a literal rendering of the papyri as a conventional translation would be [i.e., would have been]." Again, What papyri are we speaking about here? The entire collection, or that which we now have? Since a "literal rendering" (whatever the phrase means) of the papyri we now have yields only chapters from the Book of the Dead and the Breathings Document, how could anyone believe--and no one ever has so believed--that Joseph's translation of Abraham was a "literal" or any other kind of "rendering" from that limited set of fragments?<br />
<br />
What, then, does the sentence imply? It simply implies that Joseph Smith, weak and ignorant instrument that he ever was, clearly thought that he was translating from the same papyrus that contains the Breathings Document, but--oops!--he wasn't, though he may have been composing or rendering some divine, but unseen, music from that score.<br />
<br />
And how do we all know this? By what Paul calls "imaginations." We're an imaginative lot. To speculate on mysteries has ever been the campfire entertainment of the Latter-day Saint community. Today such "vain imaginings," as Nephi puts it, parade as if demonstrable fact. We simply know what it was that Joseph knew--and what he didn't. We've set the bounds and the stakes as narrowly as we possibly can, and all despite his own repeated warnings about narrowness, fancies, and stakes. Did Brother Joseph only imagine that he was talking with an Elias from Abraham's gospel dispensation, when receiving his message and keys in the Kirtland Temple? divine messages? No. Then why say that the Seer, with his "high gift," only imagined, he was translating from the papyri? That's the big news today, as published in both BYU's <i>Religious Educator </i>and the latest volume (Fall 2017) of the Joseph Smith Papers: "If Joseph Smith thought he was translating the papyri [which papyri?] but he wasn't, what, then, does Joseph Smith's <i>inspired translation process </i>really mean?" (Brian Hauglid, "The Book of Abraham and Translating the Sacred," <i>Religious Educator</i>, Winter Review 2017). Institute teachers need not worry since "scholars" are busy "analyzing <i>the revelatory process</i> of Joseph Smith" (Robin Scott Jensen, "The Joseph Smith Papers and the Book of Abraham," <i>RE</i>). In fact, as the result of sampling <i>some </i>extant evidence, the analysis is already in: "Following a period of studying <i>some</i> [which?] of the papyri, Joseph dictated a manuscript containing the Book of Abraham, <i>which he believed </i>was a translation of the papyri [which?]. While significant portions [which?] of the papyri collection are missing, the extant papyri<i> in fact</i> [here's the analysis] contain <i>relatively</i> [mandatory qualifier] common Egyptian funerary texts" (ibid.).<br />
<br />
The burden of proof rests on the one who so speculates.<br />
<br />
Prove it, or drop it.<br />
<br />
Again, a look at what the Prophet says of the translation of the Title Page of the Book of Mormon, of Egyptian names being the equivalent of several "characters," and of Egyptian being a "running" script based on phonetic principles (Mormon 9), would lead to the truth about his supposed "renderings" from the Book of Breathings. Or does one little <i>owl</i> hieroglyph really yield several lines of narrative, studded with elaborate names like Elkenah and Potiphar and Mahmackrash (including spelling variants like Elkenner)? We also have an eyewitness account, both famous <i>and </i>overlooked, showing us, in brief scope, what it would have been like for any of us to sit in the translation room with the Seer (see "Eyewitness: Joseph Smith 'Interpreted Hieroglyphics for Us': http://valsederholm.blogspot.com/2017/06/joseph-smith-interpreted-hieroglyphics.html).<br />
<br />
But the Church now confirms the circular alternative theory! The Church does no such thing. Not as "explained" by "Translation and Historicity," anyhow. Sorry <i>New York Times</i>.<br />
<br />
Besides, Latter-day Saints think as they choose. Do any of us wait for the Church to confirm a thing before we choose to think or to believe it? What would the point of that be? To limit the choice of others to believe as they might see fit? Highly educated Saints are forever running to the Church to do their thinking for them. We loudly yearn, like so many children, to have our own notions stamped <i>Authorized </i>and then blog triumphantly when we think it happens. In Alma 4:8 we read that "the people of the church" often scorned and policed members "that did not believe [some point of doctrine] according to their own will and pleasure." Forget Abraham--these words describe our every intellectual move to a tee. The result: "great contentions in the church," which "began to fail in its progress" (4:9-10). Without room to think--and the Nephites never allowed anyone an inch of room--and especially to think erroneous thoughts, there can be no progress.<br />
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And why this tendentious word <i>assumes</i>: Do views assume? A view implies a point of view, a standpoint, or high ground. Is the standpoint here an "assumption," then? or does it rest upon some basis? I nitpick. Yet every single word from a sentence so trumpeted by the press as the longed-for breakthrough about translation being merely "translation" calls for weighing. And why not? The lions of the press never read the paragraph word-for-word: they simply reproduced it as Hieroglyph in bulk.<br />
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No matter how opaque the Egyptian darkness of the essay's earthshaking moments, we all must join in the groundswell of thrill and emotion. "Translation and Historicity," say all the papers, is a feel good essay.<br />
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<b><br /></b><b>V "Historicity"</b><br />
<b style="color: #333333; font-family: "open sans", zoram, "noto sans", helvetica, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 18px;"><br /></b><span style="color: #333333;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">In search of clearer freshets, we move on to the matter of historicity.</span></span><br />
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<span style="color: #333333;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">The first thing to note about the section entitled <i>Historicity</i> and its accompanying bibliography is the heavy dependence on an article published in the <i>Ensign</i> a quarter-century ago, and thus aptly named "News from Antiquity." Portions of both text and biography appear to be either lifted, quoted, or paraphrased from this old article, which is indeed cited throughout the essay. Is the article of any current value? It was a thorough-going summary of many things published about the book of Abraham in the early Nineties and shows a good grasp of what others had been discovering and discussing during the Carter and Reagan eras, while also juggling sundry awkward explanations of the Egyptian evidence, before</span></span><span style="color: #333333;"> </span><span style="color: #333333;">tumbling into an abandon of speculation.</span><span style="color: #333333;"> </span><br />
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<span style="color: #333333; font-family: inherit;">Let the perceptive reader compare, for the same article, joined with three or so other </span><i style="color: #333333; font-family: inherit;">Ensign</i><span style="color: #333333; font-family: inherit;"> offerings of the same period, have been cobbled together as a foundation of a new Gospel Topics essay. So the Essay is not so new, after all, is it? No. It is not a new or independent look at the sources on the book of Abraham for today's youth--that much is clear. The entire discussion about papyri as catalyst, though touted as news, goes back to the very first thoughts associated with the Church's purchase of the papyri in the late Sixties, from which premature formulations it has been lifted without further analysis whatsoever. And the same thing goes for the comments about the Egyptian Grammar. It other words, if the Essay was a cake, it must be considered by any candid observer both flat and stale!</span><br />
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<span style="color: #333333;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">There are no clear freshets:</span></span><br />
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<span style="color: #333333;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">"The book of Abraham speaks disapprovingly of human sacrifice offered on an altar in Chaldea." What on earth! Would a student ever write: The Torah or Kings speaks <i>disapprovingly</i> of human sacrifice offered in Canaan? <i>Speaks disapprovingly</i>--no native speaker of English would ever bark out such a howler. The right word is <i>condemns, excoriates, abhors</i>. Imagine reading in Abraham: "I rahther disapprove of being sacrificed."</span></span><br />
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<span style="color: #333333;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">As for the statement that people were executed for opposing "the religion of Pharaoh," not only does the evidence, however arresting, remain delicate, nowhere in all the egyptological literature will the reader find such a "religion of Pharaoh." What does it mean? The phrase indeed appears in the writings of Kemetology and in an old tract from the early 18th century, but not in any careful work. </span></span><br />
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<span style="color: #333333;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">"Punishment dating to Abraham's time" and "now known to have been meted out in the Abrahamic era" also overclaim. We simply don't know the dates of the Patriarchal Age. Has the author of the essay any new insights on the matter? Again, the matter of ritual killing in Middle Kingdom Egypt is itself of deep interest, but it's not clear yet how it might specifically support the historicity of the book of Abraham and the sacrificial practices in Ur of the Chaldees. On the other hand, though his work on the theme may call for revisiting, Hugh Nibley had much to say of the rival claims of royalty and priesthood in the Abraham stories--an often deadly game--of the tales of attempted sacrifice and escape throughout the Ancient Near East and Classical world, of the theme of drought and sacrifice, the motif of the three sacrificial virgins of royal blood, and so on. </span></span></div>
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As is already apparent then, the several evidences of historicity that the essay introduces, though perhaps chosen as a sampling of the very latest from many hands, were poorly chosen or injudiciously treated. More peculiar, germane, and specific evidence could have been put forward.<br />
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Again, the note on the inverted parallelism of a couple verses in Chapter 3, while not wrong, has, in its placement, the feel of an afterthought. Verbal parallelism does obtain in lines labeled <i>C</i> through <i>D</i>, though not so clearly in <i>A</i> through <i>E</i>. The idea merits study, and the sole and casual sentence describing the findings serves it poorly: "Further, Abraham 3:22-23 is written in a poetic structure more characteristic of Near Eastern languages than early American writing style." One wonders what is meant by "more characteristic" of one set of "languages" than of the "style" of another? And what of the composition and style of the book as a whole?<br />
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The essay also refers to "a <i>town</i> called 'Ulisum." <i>Town </i>is the wrong word for the ancient place. But whether Ulisum has any relation to Abraham's <i>plain </i>of Olishem, the essay misses an opportunity to be more specific about the similarity in the form of the name. John Gee and Christopher Woods (Chicago) both note that Ulisum can also be transcribed from the cuneiform as Ulishim or even Olishem. "Certainly," Woods concedes, "Ulisum could be superficially linked on phonetic grounds to the Olishem mentioned in the Book of Abraham," though "much more substantial evidence" is required (p. 91). I agree, even when "certainly" and "superficially" make for jarring company (See Christopher Woods, "The Practice of Egyptian Religion at 'Ur of the Chaldees," in Robert K. Ritner, <i>The Joseph Smith Papyri, </i>89-91).<br />
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"Facsimile 1 and Abraham 1:17 mention the idolatrous god Elkenah. This deity is not mentioned in the Bible, yet modern scholars have identified it as being among the gods worshipped by ancient Mesopotamians." "As being among the gods worshipped by ancient Mesopotamians" leaves the curious reader with absolutely nothing: no added knowledge of Mesopotamian deities, worship, or anything else. There are many, many Mesopotamian gods and many, many Mesopotamian cultures, but it is Canaan <i>not</i> Mesopotamia to which the essay's footnotes on Elkenah point the reader. "Modern scholars" is tendentious. Name the scholar. "Deity" and "it" also break with usage: have identified <i>him. </i><br />
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"Joseph Smith represented the four figures. . . as 'this earth is its four quarters.'"<br />
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"A similar interpretation has been argued by scholars who study identical figures in other ancient Egyptian texts." "Similar interpretation?" Wouldn't the same interpretation be better? And what's the difference stated here? Here's what appears to be an "opposing" interpretation of the four figures, or just a telling rhetorical dodge: "While any group of four can have directional relevance [the cardinal points], that is hardly the <i>pivotal</i> significance here" (Robert K. Ritner, <i>The Joseph Smith Egyptian Papyri</i>," 274.) Yet who can say which of various ideas in the mind of the Egyptian priest in the most "pivotal" or germane to the specific matter at hand, "in this case, in relation to this subject." Again: "Interpretation has been argued by scholars who study"? Hmm. "Scholars who study!?" And do scholars "argue" an "interpretation"? or just put interpretations out? The sentence obscures beyond repair a clear fact: corroborating evidence exists for Joseph Smith's identification of the four sons of Horus (or, to quote the Prophet again, "in this case, in relation to this subject," the four sons of Geb = Earth]); similar support exists for Joseph Smith calling the crocodile, the "god of Pharaoh." With a little care, these weighty points could have both been made and clearly made.<br />
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Here's another opportunity tossed away: mention is made of extra-biblical literature, nearly all of which was unavailable to Joseph Smith, that sustains what appears in the book of Abraham. This telling literature includes the Apocalypse of Abraham, The Testament of Abraham, and the Genesis Apocryphon (from the Dead Sea Scrolls). Instead of mentioning any of these by name, the essay lamely notes: "Some of these extrabiblical elements were available to Joseph Smith through the books of Jasher and Josephus. Joseph Smith was aware of these books, but it is unknown whether he utilized them." "Utilized" or "used"? "<i>Through </i>the books?" or "in the books?" "The books of Jasher and Josephus? Since when is there is a Book of Josephus? What a howler! As for the Jasher, my Hebrew professors always insisted on it being a late medieval forgery. Joseph Smith is on record as saying that despite rumor, we don't claim to have the Book of Jasher. Why are these two "books" mentioned, and such records as the Genesis Apocryphon, stock full of matter supporting the book of Abraham, set aside? (See Ed Brandt, "The Book of Jasher and the Latter-day Saints.") It's the Hebrew evidence for Joseph Smith's Abraham that most stirs mind and soul.<br />
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Reviewers properly focus on content rather than omissions or missed opportunities, except those brushed by--then brushed aside. Yet there is one matter so glaring in its absence that a few words are required. "Translation and Historicity" makes no reference whatsoever to the embarrassing planet Kolob! That's like the guides in the Beehive House never mentioning that Brigham Young had wives, until a visitor demanded to hear about the facts. The response eked out in a few pained words. All Latter-day Saints know what it is to eke out a few pained words!<br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">Embarrassing or not, Kolob, "near to the throne of God," since Janne Sjodahl's findings a century past, has rightly been associated with the Semitic verbal root <i>q-r-b </i>(to be near, draw near, etc.) Hugh Nibley added to the significance of the root, when he noted how the Arabs have used both <i>q-r-b</i> and <i>k-l-b</i> to name the greatest of stars: the heart star, the dog star, the middle star, etc. Michael Rhodes also notes how the same root appears in Egyptian (spelled<i> q-3-b</i>), belly, middle, heart, <i>m-q3b</i>, in the midst of (sometimes used of Re), etc. Is this unwelcome news, not to be shared? As they say in Swahili, <i>Karibu! Karibu!</i> Welcome! Welcome! Draw Near!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">Draw near to the wellspring of light and truth! Drink from the fountains of latter-day revelation!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">And how to interpret the Kolob figure on the hypocephalus (Facsimile 2, figure 1)? (See "Kolob in Color": http://valsederholm.blogspot.com/2012/04/kolob-in-color.html)</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">The hieroglyphs on the hypocephalus panels call figure 1 "noble" and "great" and say that he inhabits the primeval "first time," the <i>zp-tpy. </i>What a match with Abraham Chapter 3! And who said that Joseph Smith could not read Egyptian? </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">David Klotz simply struggles for the best way to render the name of this same supernal Ram-figure in his "transcendent, invisible, and ineffable" manifestation as the Creator, whom the Egyptians variously call "Amun with four ram-heads upon one neck" or "Amun within the Iris" or "Amun with ten names" (<i>ten</i> being the "deep" number): the Cosmic Deity, the Cosmic Shu-Amun, even the Transcendent Amun (David Klotz, <i>Adoration of the Ram, </i>183 [Yale University Press, 2006]). </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">"A universal purview," says Professor Donald Redford in a startling new book, "attaches itself to the Ram of Mendes. He becomes the Father of the Gods ["the First Creation" says Joseph Smith], the Ram of Rams, the King of the Gods, the Manifestation (<i>bai</i>) of every god, the Heir of Tatenen (the primordial earth-god), the Unique God with overwhelming awfulness" (Donald Redford, <i>City of the Ram-Man</i>, 134). His being flows "unrestricted in the universe": "Besides his essence as the earth, he is also water 'who comes as the inundation that he may bring life to the Two Lands.' As the Living One of Re he becomes the source of living heat 'that brightens heaven and earth with his rays'; as the air 'he is breath for all people'" (<i>Ibid</i>., from the Mendes Stela). As the four-faced Ram, he is "identified as the great creator, the 'Complete One" [Atum], even "He Who Rises on the Horizon with Four Faces. The Ram of Mendes likewise becomes the manifestation "of the union of dynamic solar power (Re) with latent fertility (Osiris)." With the Mendesian Ram now also becoming "the embodiment of national existence, Amun-Re" ["First in government," says Joseph], we end up with "a primordial deity of unequaled antiquity and immanence" (Ibid., 135-6). It all seems too much--the snowball effect that is Egyptian Religion--but we must remember that <i>an unquenchable aspiration to become </i>was for Egyptians the only way out of the predicament of the static. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">We don't heighten at Kolob; we hie to Kolob!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><b>Part 2: Responding to the Critics of the Essay--and of Abraham</b></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">While the Saints may often find the knowledge and critique of those who represent the outsider viewpoint on Abraham, Moses, etc., satisfying--the academic world ultimately seeks so much more of us: we are now to yield <i>all </i>our Scriptures, <i>all</i> our claims to prophetic dispensation, and <i>all</i> this nonsense about freedom to express belief at will.</span><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">Any review of "Translation and Historicity" must also take into account the prompt response crafted by Professor Rob</span>ert K. Ritner of the University of Chicago. All Latter-day Saints should be very grateful that Professor Ritner, in the form of several articles and one book, has joined in the debate over Abraham. That's what Latter-day Saints love to see, and it shouldn't bother anyone in the least when his take on matters does not match that of Joseph Smith. Abraham invites readers, and it's the open discussion that counts--so long as that discussion never dismisses any participant, argument, or evidence, with a wave of the hand.<br />
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Ritner opens with a volley meant to stun: "Translation and Historicity" "represents new reflection on a document whose authenticity as <i>verifiable history </i>is now officially acknowledged to be in serious dispute." "Serious dispute" can reflect almost anything, but the volley overshoots. The title of the essay speaks to historicity, the essay makes claims based on historicity, and backs the claims with evidence we are free to test. Ritner may disagree with the evidence so presented, and he may misread the intent of the Church in sponsoring the piece, well and good; but the claim of "official acknowledgment" and "[the Church's] discomfort with its own conclusions and reasoning" rings false.<br />
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While the essay does say matters of "veracity and value" "cannot be settled by scholarly debate [alone]," the same statement--which could use finer wording--has always (not "newly") been made about the Book of Mormon--including its geography--the book of Moses, and even the divinity of the history, visions, doctrines, and ordinances of the Latter-day Church. "Translation and Historicity," despite clumsy wording and several unforced errors, is not rhetorically framed as a document of surrender; it tackles the questions swirling about the book of Abraham head on. Acknowledging the difficult, it proposes answers, not surrender.<br />
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Ritner's response includes nearly everything he finds objectionable about the book of Abraham, including so very many things that Hugh Nibley, without flinching, answered thoroughly in 1968-1970, 1975, 1980, and 2013, in a long series of articles and hefty volumes. I cannot summarize all these things in a fairly short review (Joseph Smith's attempts to deal with lacunae in the facsimiles--here, unfairly labeled "forgeries"; the question of anachronisms; names: Zeptah not Egyptus, etc). But let it be understood that to invoke abstract ideas such as <i>scholarship</i> or <i>Egyptology</i> as opposed to "apologists" is merely cute; it is not a reasoned way to escape the hundreds of answers, questions, arguments, evidences, and insights about both Abraham and the Egyptians put forth by Hugh Nibley (and others) over many decades. Read the "Conclusion" to his <i>Abraham in Egypt.</i><br />
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I want to see dialogue based on what books say rather than statements made on the authority of capital <i>E</i> "Egyptology" and "Egyptologists." How often would like noble appeals to the authority of Egyptology appear in the journals, monographs, and books published in the discipline? Never. Dr. Ritner complains often, and justifiably, about his own articles and books not receiving due notice in discussions about the book of Abraham. From this point forward, may we all be willing, without neglect, prejudging, or ad hominem reference, and without reference to the university at which one may teach, to diligently and equally consider the arguments made by every student.<br />
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If quantum mechanics is the theme, whether today or in 2050, I wish to hear of Niels Bohr. But it's the Latter-day Saints themselves who have slammed the door on Hugh Nibley and his many thousand pages of dense and beautifully written argument. Just this Spring an article touting a startling new interpretation about what Joseph Smith intended with the facsimiles appeared in the Mormon <i>Interpreter. </i>Its author stated categorically that <i>all</i> earlier scholarship on the matter was based on mere "assumption," an empty word he drummed a dozen times, without even naming his worthy predecessors. They were <i>all</i> just wrong--period. We may consider the article on its own merits, but what self-respecting reader allows himself to be snowed under by a vast cloud of abstraction?<br />
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The book of Abraham belongs as much to Robert Ritner as it does to anybody else--it is certainly not the special province of the "educated" or of the "apologist." Hugh Nibley, by the way, never called himself an "apologist." Not once. So why use that increasingly overworked and empty label, which properly belongs to other religious traditions, to dismiss him?<br />
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And Professor Ritner is quite correct to challenge the claim that a Roman period magical papyrus from Egypt should somehow invoke what Joseph Smith explains about Abraham and the altar, or lion couch. <i>The Demotic Magical Papyrus of London and Leiden</i> gives us a picture of a lion couch in connection with a love charm--and <i>Abraham</i> is one of the various magical names written under the couch. But what of that? The vignettes don't look anything alike! <i>Abraham</i>, in the middle of another elaborated chain of invoked names, also appears next to <i>Pupil of the Wedjat-Eye.</i> Does that side-by-side occurrence, or link, automatically spell <i>hypocephalus</i> and thus<i> Abraham Facsimile 2</i>"? No. If so, how? and exactly how? Latter-day Saint students, a quarter-of-a-century since, wondered about a link between the magic and the facsimiles--well and good--but what is the substance of the claim? In other words, What should a teen do with such a claim? Teach it to friends?<br />
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And why does the Gospel Topics essay disguise the magic manual as a text belonging to an "Egyptian temple library?" Placing <i>temple</i> and <i>Abraham</i> in a single sentence may enchant the hapless Latter-day Saint teen, but it's nothing more than sleight-of-hand. If the reader wishes to enjoy potions concocted of pulverized shrewmouse, if he wishes to revel in jumbled chains of Egyptian, Greek, Hebrew names invoked for the greater cause of love or power, <i>The</i> <i>Demotic Magical Papyrus of London and Leiden</i> is your book.<br />
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Let us spare our teens, who know magic when they see it (if no one else does), from having to murmur charms and lisp spells to all comers, while choking back laughter: "CHA CHA CHA CHA CHA CHA CHA. Then clap thrcc timcs, TAK TAK TAK, go 'pop, pop, pop' for a long timc; hiss a
grcat hiss, that is, one of some length." And how exactly would they explain the following command: "Come to me, Kanab"!? perhaps in terms of Kanab, Utah, Gateway to Zion and Kolob Canyon?<br />
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Further, because the magical archive postdates the Patriarchal Age by eons, the essay, to make it relevant to the book of Abraham, must resort to claiming it shares a date with the Joseph Smith papyri. Because hundreds of years separate the archive from the papyri, how does the claim jive with the idea that the Joseph Smith Papyri included what was merely a copy, or copy of a copy, of a very ancient book of Abraham?<br />
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Ritner therefore rightly contests any attempt to link these magical texts with the Abraham facsimiles--and what he says mostly repeats what Ed Ashment set forth so convincingly decades ago. Let's drop the matter, appreciate the work of these brethren in the vineyard of scholarship, and go on our way rejoicing.<br />
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Professor Ritner also correctly sets forth the difficulties in using a medieval Coptic text about the Persian King Shapur and Abraham as sound evidence for the book of Abraham. The document, after all, points to Persia, not to Ancient Egypt. While the late and derivative Coptic text may show correspondences with other stories about Abraham circulating in antiquity, and these last may in turn recall in places our own book, its prominent appearance in "Translation and Historicity" is an unfortunate choice. The document in question is certainly not "a later Egyptian text," as claimed, "that tells how the Pharaoh tried to sacrifice Abraham." Again, how can our youth use the Coptic tale to sustain the case of the book of Abraham? They can't be expected just to throw out smoke: Coptic = Egyptian, therefore Coptic text mentioning Abraham = Abraham in Ancient Egypt.<br />
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While Ritner further objects, with some justification, to the use in the Essay of the various Middle Kingdom sources referencing ritual slaughter to support the story of Abraham's sacrifice, the matter requires a closer look before teen or student can make a proper assessment. Bridges to scriptural understanding require careful building and awareness of audience; yet, with best intent, students may sometimes construct a "bridge to nowhere" or require of youth the holding of a "bridge too far," that is to say, "a bridge too far for faith." God never requires a "bridge too far for faith."<br />
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In the grand tournaments, therefore, of <i>Abraham and the Demotic Magical Papyrus</i>, to cite but one instance, we all must call points as we see them, as do watchful and mature umpires, on the chair or the line, and never as partisans in a religious contest. Besides, the games and the sets play themselves out so very often as a contest of personalities and academics, each opponent vying for the mastery. The sets once lost, the tournament ended, a continuing challenge can only be characterized as quixotic. Insistence over a particular geography, a particular reading of science, ancient or modern, all appear quixotic. We seek <i>the specific and the peculiar</i>, the kind of evidence that approaches demonstration. The deep faith undergirding the Holy Scriptures, in their inspiration, in their writing, transmission, and preservation, in their restoration, reception, and their reading, as we strive to receive into our spiritual bloodstream the nutrients vital to eternal life, cannot flow from a tilting at windmills, from sets lost, or from trying to hold a bridge far, far, behind the line.<br />
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Here's something else that the Chicago Professor gets right: the vignette we call Facsimile 1 belongs at the beginning of Hor's Breathing Document. The Gospel Topics essay had renewed Nibley's old observation about vignettes often being placed at some remove from passages describing them. That is true in many cases, but Ritner correctly refuses to disassociate the vignette we call Facsimile 1 from the Breathings Document. I had already reached the same conclusion based on what the accompanying text says of the priestly office of Hor, with whom the roll was buried. Among other offices, the accompanying text identifies Hor as "the Prophet of Min who massacres His enemies."<br />
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I quote from something I posted some years ago:<br />
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Latter-day Saint students, running in the track of Professor Marc Coenen's clarifying publications about the ancient owners and dating of the Joseph Smith Book of Breathings, all take note that Hor's lot in the priesthood includes a rare office associated with Resheph-Min: "Prophet of Min who massacres his enemies." Does the office somehow correspond to the action depicted on Facsimile 1? Resheph, who dwells in the house of Montu [Manti], a Canaanite god of war inducted into the Egyptian pantheon, shares an identity in Min, who, in turn, shares a role with Horus as avenger of his father, Osiris.<br />
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Since our Theban priest, Hor, is the namesake of Horus, why not also take on Horus' avenging role, the very role belonging to Min and to Resheph? (Hor <i>is</i> a very common name--but let's mull over the likenesses.) Any other likenesses? That the Book of Abraham's violent "god of El-Kenah" bears comparison with Canaan's Resheph, whose name (<i>r-sh-p</i>) bespeaks the vivid lightning and flames of fire, must be clear to the attentive reader of the Book of Abraham! Abraham, the survivor of lightning, flame, and earthquake (see Abraham Chapter One), certainly also escapes Min-Resheph-Hor. Besides, one of Abraham's own descendants, through Ephraim, bears--and here's ritual reversal and the sign of escape--the name Resheph, perhaps now to be understood as descriptive of the God of Israel: "I cause the wind and the <i>fire</i> to be <i>my chariot</i>," Jehovah tells rescued Abraham (Abraham 2:7; see 1 Chronicles 7:25). For Resheph in a chariot see Professor Muennich's, <i>The God Resheph in the Ancient Near East</i>, 112f.<br />
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Though Professor Coenen sees in Facsimile 1 not a scene of sacrifice but one of Osirian resurrection and the conception of Horus (and Osiris not only escapes death, he lives to found a dynasty)--the figure on the vignette that Joseph Smith names the priest of Elkenah, or the priest of Pharaoh (who is thus the priest of the living Horus, the living king), does something recall a surviving bronze figure of "Min who massacres the enemy": "dressed in a short kilt, held up by two bands that cross over the breast and back" (p. 1113). We can add sacrifice to Coenen's descriptions of our Facsimile 1. Sacrifice, resurrection, and an endless posterity all form a single constellation that Facsimile 1 delicately manages to display.<br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;">See Marc Coenen, "The dating of the Papyri Joseph Smith I, X and XI and Min who massacres his enemies," in Willy Clarysse, <i>Egyptian Religion: </i>1103-14. A detailed review of the Hor Book of Breathings and the nature and historical setting of the priestly offices of Hor and Osoroeris, including examples of symbolic slaughter and burning having correspondences to Facsimile 1, is John Gee, "Some Puzzles of the Joseph Smith Papyri," <i>FARMS Review</i> 20:1 (2008), 113-157. Also see "Conclusion," <i>Abraham in Egypt</i>, by Hugh Nibley.</span><br />
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The Egyptian record attests a symbolic killing of foreigners, a ceremonial act or depiction only, at centers like Philae, Edfu, and Karnak, with special maces, swords, and clubs, including "a particular kind of [bladed] mace much resembling in shape the <i>Dd</i>-pillar, the symbol of Osiris' enduring life and dynasty," as also resurrection (Val H. Sederholm, <i>Papyrus British Museum 10808 and Its Cultural and Religious Setting</i>, Leiden: Brill, 2006, 114). How strange that the bladed mace used to kill foreign victims in royal ceremony also symbolizes the perpetuity of the Osirian dynasty. But the Egyptians are not finished: "The king, playing Horus-Min, cuts off the heads of his father's enemies at the stroke of a pole-axe [or bladed mace, both sword and club]. The special word for <i>killing</i> at Edfu [also <i>Ddj</i>!] alludes to Osiris and the stability of his dynastic line" (<i>Papyrus 10808</i>, 117). Both name, action, and instrument of sacrifice thus confirm the dynastic line. No sacrifice; no posterity. That's also the paradox of Abraham and Isaac.<br />
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At Karnak we see paired depictions of Resheph and "the pharaoh stabbing two prisoners kneeling in a metal kettle [for burning] with their arms tied behind their backs in front of [a representation of] 'Min who [massacres] his enemies' " (Coenen, 1113). Why the <i>doppelganger</i>? Does the depiction show Pharaoh as both priest and king? Or does it hint at the king working in concert with his priestly representative? Pharaoh, twinned with a Canaanite god, here acts in the office of Min who massacres his enemies. And as Pharaoh, so Abraham's "priest of Pharaoh," who is also the priest of the Canaanite god of Elkenah. And as Elkenah, or as Resheph-Min, so also Ptolemaic priest Hor. Behind Min "stands a tree on a hill surrounded by a wall," a setting that recalls "the hill called Potiphar's Hill, at the head of the plain of Olishem"; the tree (or, Heliopolitan pillar) likewise recalls the sacrifice of the "three virgins" who "would not bow down to worship gods of <i>wood</i> or of <i>stone</i>" (Abraham 1:10-11; Coenen, 1113; for ceremonial hills marked with standing <i>stones</i> see Nibley and Rhodes, <i>One Eternal Round</i>, 170-3; for another royal massacre and burning of enemies, 179).<br />
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By killing the enemies of Osiris, Pharaoh and his designated priest, or double, reverse the inimical act of killing Osiris himself, and thus ensure both Osiris' resurrection and Horus' (that is, Pharaoh's) dynastic claims. It bears repeating: As the priest of Min who massacres his enemies, Hor himself becomes Pharaoh's (Horus') stand-in, a role evoking the sacrifice-mad "priest of Pharaoh" in Abraham's account. The role, however essential, is not without its risks. And here's a genuine touch: "And the Lord. . .smote the priest that <i>he</i> died; and there was great mourning in Chaldea, and also in the court of Pharaoh" (Abraham 1:20). "Great mourning" in Pharaoh's court? for a distant priest? By smiting the Pharaoh's ceremonial agent, God has smitten the Pharaoh himself and has also smitten his dynastic line (cf. the slaying of the firstborn in Exodus and the subsequent swallowing up of Pharaoh in the Red Sea). It is the priest's office, as agent, that matters, and the mourning over his death must then match in intensity and cloud of disaster that which prevails at the actual death of a king. One can picture the choking dust storm at Ur sweeping down to Egypt. A panicked herald runs with the news.<br />
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That is the world of Facsimile 1. But what of Facsimile 3? It's the very same thing. The Theban priesthood, following a hoary tradition, diligently searched out and put to use earlier vignettes and writings with which to interlace their own glory. As as Nibley points out, the symbolic journey in the facsimiles from altar to throne, becomes the message of Abraham. Ritner, pointing to the names and titles now appearing on the vignettes, declares that "no amount of special pleading" can save Joseph Smith's references to the figures such as king, prince, principal waiter, slave, having names like Shulem or Olimlah above their hands or heads. None is necessary.<br />
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The Seer saw deeper than the reuse of the vignettes of the late Theban priests--he looked beyond the insignificant names attached in Ptolemaic Thebes--and instead gave us the <i>Urtext</i>, the original intent, as he did in his New Translation of the Bible. What's wrong with that? Why else possess the seeric gift? <i>Urtext</i> is the obsession of modern philology. As for Shulem and Olimlah, the names fit perfectly in the world of Abraham. The reviewer never notes the possibility, but we cannot fault an <i>egyptologist </i>on the count of special pleading for not knowing the latest archaeological discoveries from <i>Syria</i> (Nabada) that yield both Shulem and Ishmael.<br />
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Again, Brother Joseph invited the entire learned world to "find," that is, to translate all they could--and to share it posthaste. He wasn't working in a corner, hiding from the latest breakthroughs, or anything remotely like it. "Special pleading" was not his style. Neither is it ours.<br />
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Thus, when that same learned world makes and shares its findings, welcome or blistering, we need not gloss anything over. We may even answer.<br />
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<b><i>All</i> Wrong</b><br />
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For instance: "All of Smith’s published 'explanations' are incorrect, including the lone example defended by the new web
posting: the water in which a crocodile is swimming (Fig. 12 of Fascimile 1), supposedly
a representation of 'the firmament over our heads … but in this case, in relation to this
subject, the Egyptians meant it to be to signify Shaumau, to be high, or the heavens.' Although Egyptians might place heavenly boats in the sky, that is not relevant 'in this
case' where the water is placed below the figures and represents the Nile, not the sky.
The selective defense of these explanations by the church is telling, and all other
explanations are simply indefensible except by distorting Egyptian evidence."<br />
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Although Ritner quite correctly notes a jumbled use--or "selected defense"--rather than a proper thematic interweaving of what evidence we might offer, the only distortion here is the typical critic's distortion of <i>method. </i>As all students of Egypt know, representations may signify <i>more than one thing</i>, and interpretation remains perforce delicate. To Western eyes <i>a</i> cannot be the equivalent of <i>-a; </i>for the Egyptians <i>x</i> may be both <i>a</i> and <i>-a</i>. Through the decades, egyptologists have described such a <i>many-valued logic</i> in tones of wonder and astonishment.<br />
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Now consider what Joseph Smith says in his Explanation of Facsimile 1: elsewhere it is <i>x</i>, "but in this case, in relation to this subject, the Egyptians meant it to be to signify" <i>y</i>. Nibley, who calls the "folly of giving just <i>one</i> interpretation" "the pit into which Joseph Smith's critics have always fallen," quotes E. Otto: "the <i>greatest possible </i>number of meanings in the briefest possible formulation"; "a mysterious plurality of meaning"; and H. Frankfort: "unbridled chains of associations and conclusions"; "we must attempt to hear the resonance of this polyphony of meaning." ("Many-valued logic": Erik Hornung, <i>Conceptions of God in Ancient Egypt; </i>Hugh Nibley,<i> Abraham in Egypt, </i>116-17, 124).<br />
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Ritner, therefore, is not wrong in identifying these zigzags with the Nile and with the story of the act of collecting, by crocodile, the members of Osiris preparatory to his resurrection; neither is he wrong when he elsewhere <i>also</i> wonders whether they may represent the Lake of Khonsu. Yet for <i>all</i> egyptologists, since we're using the word <i>all</i>, it goes without saying that in writings of ritual significance, <i>Nile</i> may refer either to the terrestrial or to the celestial Nile. As for the mysterious Lake of Khonsu, the place of passage and transition in the burial rites, the whereabouts of its otherworldly counterpart is anybody's guess. Facsimile 3 conveys, in text and in iconography, all three levels of the cosmos: the starry heavens, the terrestrial court, and the netherworld--and the events depicted thereon may unfold in any one, or <i>all</i>, of those realms (<i>Abraham in Egypt</i>, 123). Then why not so with Facsimile 1? Again: "<i>All</i> of Smith's published 'explanations' are incorrect." Here is special pleading; for Ritner elsewhere confirms the idea of the croc as "god of Pharaoh": "Horus-Sobek was a god of Pharaoh, so one out of five [explanations] is correct" (Robert K. Ritner, ed., <i>The Joseph Smith Egyptian Papyri</i>, 118). That being so, you would hope that "Translation and Historicity" would place emphasis on, rather than neglect, such a direct hit.<br />
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Egyptian Religion is not a monolith, and we must keep that fact in mind when we interpret the figures and representations found on temple walls or on papyrus rolls. Every region, city, mesa, or kiva, as throughout Classical Greece, as at Hopi, unfurls its own religious and symbolic universe. In the Faiyum, or "the inland sea" region (<i>pa-ym--</i>a Semitic word), crocodile is king. The Book of the Faiyum equates that inland sea with the <i>Mehet-Weret</i>, the Great Flood Waters of the Celestial Cow in which the crocodile with pharaonic crown swims in one eternal round. (Horst Beinlich, <i>Das Buch vom Fayum</i> and this essay: http://archiv.ub.uni-heidelberg.de/propylaeumdok/2891/1/Beinlich_Faiyum_2013.pdf<br />
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While the cosmos of the Faiyum might not match Facsimile 1 in every particular, local interpretations do resonate with the larger abstraction we call <i>Ancient Egyptian Religion</i>. Yet in light of the evidence from the Pyramid Texts, Utterance 317 (R. Faulkner, <i>The Ancient Egyptian Pyramid Texts</i>, 99 and n.6), according to which Sobek swims in "the flood of the Great Inundation"--"The sky according to Sethe"--and in light of the Faiyum, we can unpack what Joseph Smith sets forth, as follows:<br />
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The zigzags do not here, as in most (or many) cases, represent Mehet-Weret (Flood-Great), the Great Cosmic Flood, or the Celestial Expanse, but in this case, in relation to this [particular] subject, they represent the very heights of heaven in which the crocodile as king and sun god reigns crowned and supreme. As Horus the Elder spreads his wings over all below, so the crocodile, as god of Pharaoh, swims round his domain, master of all he surveys.<br />
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Does Pharaoh rightfully attain such reach? Yes, says Brother Joseph, for the priest of Syrian Elkenah is the priest of Pharaoh, his representative in whose name and with whose delegated power he acts. Thus, when the priest is smitten, the "court of Pharaoh" mourns. The play of identities, even of substitute death, or sacrifice--a favorite theme of Hugh Nibley's--fits the ancient world like a glove.<br />
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As in other Near Eastern and Mediterranean texts, the king (or his representative) is about to sacrifice a victim on a mountain top, when struck down by lightning. Thus: "Shamau to be high or the heavens," refers to both the ritual height of sacrifice, and, at once, to the beetling look at the watery depths below. Is there any like trace of these things in the archaeological record? A stele representing Ramesses the Great worshipping a Canaanite god is known from Syria. The name of that god should be read Elkenah.<br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">(See: "The god of Elkenah in Hieroglyphs and in the Book of Abraham":</span><br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">http://valsederholm.blogspot.com/2014/02/the-god-of-elkenah-in-hieroglyphs-and.html.)</span><br />
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Am I open to other interpretations of these symbols? Of course. And Ritner's (often multiple) explanations are of deepest import. That's how the discipline works. Otherwise, we're left with the sort of simplistic arrangements parading as definitive science that everywhere propagate online, that is, in the domain of the frosh. Who hasn't seen a chart comparing Joseph Smith's interpretations of the facsimiles to those of various egyptologists, including a few consigned to oblivion: in the left column, Joseph Smith; in the right, "<b>E</b>gyptology?" Students of Egypt never reduce themselves to such a simplistic view of the ancient evidence, <i>x</i> is only <i>x</i> and<i> y</i> is <i>y</i>, except when distorting method to snap at an unwelcome reading.<br />
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There is never any good reason to box oneself in like that--unless there's a need to box ears: "all other explanations [the Mormons may offer] are simply indefensible"; "all" Smith's "'explanations'" are incorrect"--not even worth calling explanations, rather "explanations."<br />
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We all must face amateur hour, and some, perhaps justifiably, learn to snap off "answers." Packaged books arrive in the mail; an early morning call awakes. The voice on the other end assures that Ancient Egyptian is really Finnish. I've always been curious about Finland, so wrapped in a daze, I listen. The person on the other end of the lines says he has just finished speaking, in the most favorable terms, to Professor Erik Hornung--or was he just about to call him?<br />
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How to deal with such unwelcome packages and morning calls? How to deal with the Kemeticists, Saycians, Rosicrucians, or the Mormons? Mormons should never get flustered, or throw up hands in surrender, just because an egyptologist or assyriologist gets testy or declines to discuss some position or evidence.<br />
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John Baines, Oxford University, warns against such testy response to ideas originating outside the discipline (John Baines,"Restricted Knowledge, Hierarchy, and Decorum," <i>JARCE</i> 27, 1-23). We might miss an insight, he says, by throwing up the walls. Alas! as Professor Baines reports, we belong to a take-no-prisoners discipline, riddled with cliques, and in which every other egyptologist must always be wrong for "us" to be right. Trenches zigzag the field--how startling, how devastating, what one egyptologist will say about another!--and we should always forgive our colleagues, for whom reputation is ever at stake, for failing to lay down the weapons of the discipline when addressing the hapless lay man who blithely stumbles into no man's land. And wo to the novice who appeals to antiquated Budge!<br />
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And in charity to Joseph Smith, let's remember that he worked after the hieroglyphs had been cracked but before the discipline was well launched. Even so, lacking access to those few then working in the field, he had the good faith to share his own ideas with the whole world--his results were published in New York City so well as in Nauvoo. Does he ever claim that his interpretations are the only possible ones? No. He asks: If the world can find out these numbers (numbered figures), please do let us know (Explanation, Facsimile 2). Coming to grips with the mind of the ancients takes decades--not a tap on the screen. Because of the powerful changes in our understanding of Egyptian religion, especially since the 1980's, it's unfair to judge Brother Joseph's work by charting the conclusions of egyptologists working in the discipline's genesis. Some of the best work came early on, it is true, but the differences in understanding are revolutionary.<br />
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Another complaint, rhetorically crafted and targeted for a particular, and thankfully uninformed, lay audience alone: "Smith confuses human and animal heads and males with females." But as <i>all</i> students know, so do the Ancient Egyptians, and with astonishing and bewildering frequency. As for the particular confusion of male with female, please note that the Ma'at figure in Facsimile 3 wears a sheath dress that leaves the bosom uncovered. Even in the rough Hedlock woodcut, from which the facsimile was printed, the nipple can be seen; on the original papyrus, the nipple would have been clearly and indisputably visible to any observer; the same must be said for the Isis figure behind the throne, even though the Hedlock facsimile gives us little help here. Just look at any other representations of Ma'at on papyrus--including elsewhere on the Joseph Smith Papyri. Given such artistic attention to the feminine, unmistakable to either prophet or disciple or wife or mother or visitor by the hundreds, why on earth would Joseph Smith, on purpose, make the same kind of illogical and improbable associations, <i>x</i> equals <i>a</i>; <i>x</i> equals <i>-a</i>, that the Egyptians themselves make in almost every depiction or writing? (For more on the symbolic multiplicity of the Egyptians, as well as the Prophet's symbolic reading of Facsimile 3, see Hugh Nibley, "All the Court's a Stage," in <i>Abraham in Egyp</i>t, a book published some <i>40 years ago</i>.)<br />
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Latter-day Saints will not have our minds "stolen away" into believing that Joseph Smith could not tell the women from the men on the vignette. What's the point of having a Seer, unless he can scan symbolic depths not visible to the natural eye? And what's the point of having a gifted scholar like Hugh Nibley, if we're not even going to read his words or ponder his sources? Neither neglect nor prejudice is any excuse at all. Remember, critics not only mock our appeals to testimony, they also do all they can to prevent our reading the words of our own scholars. In doing so, are they not diminishing us as a culture and as a people? Have we so little confidence in our own honor and ability as a university-building Church, that we must shrink before every wind of ridicule?<br />
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<b>The Rise of the Book of Abraham</b><br />
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Professor Ritner closes by asking the Church Authorities to discard the book of Abraham as canonical Scripture and instead consider it Joseph Smith's "perhaps[!] well-meaning" but flawed attempt to sound lost cultural values beyond his depth. The confident, caustic tone insists: "With the Book of Abraham now confirmed as a perhaps well-meaning, but erroneous
invention by Joseph Smith, the LDS church may well devote some reflection to the status
of the text."<br />
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Church leaders made no response. Demands come and go. And it comes as no surprise when men and women "cast many things away which are written and esteem them as things of naught" (2 Nephi 33:2). The living Abraham continues upon his throne, in his exalted state, and forever holds the keys of his book (Doctrine and Covenants 132).<br />
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I do have a response to Professor Ritner's request, however.<br />
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It's high time for one realization to dawn on critics of Abraham's writings: Joseph Smith gave us more than one book of Abraham. The Joseph Smith Translation of Genesis yields as many surprises about Abraham's world as does the Pearl of Great Price. Revelations in the Doctrine and Covenants and many verses in the Book of Mormon give us yet a Third Book of Abraham. 1st, 2nd, 3rd, and 4th Nephi find a worthy match in Abraham.<br />
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Dismiss any one of these books, and we'll hand you yet another. Discard Potiphar's Hill, and see Mount Hanabal rise lofty among the Mountains of Moab. Reject Shulem, and find blessed Esaias. Each of these various "books" of Abraham also contain new words of divine revelation received in his dispensation and now offered to us--words about covenants made long ago by the Father of the Faithful.<br />
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And Latter-day Saints, by unanimous vote, stand in eternal covenant relation to the book of Abraham--to every last word and explanation. Its place, including its genuine nature, stands as one of unquestioned permanence--no matter how the translation was effected or what opinions about the ineffable method of seeric learning and reading we may choose to hold.<br />
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There is no end to the revelatory world of Joseph Smith. In like manner, our covenantal link to the World of Abraham continues. The book of Abraham belongs to what we call a Pearl of Great Price. We will never sell the pearl or give it away. Neither can the covenantal link all members have with the book--affirmed by unanimous vote in General Conference--ever be broken. As we hold true to that covenant, other books will yet come forth from the dust. There is more of parchment and of papyri than we can now imagine.<br />
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One thing we can take from the Gospel Topics Essay: The living Prophets and The Councils of the Church will never set the various books of Abraham aside--not now, not any of them, not a jot or a tittle of them, no never. Neither will the seeric Explanations of the three facsimiles ever disappear from the hundreds of thousands of copies of Scripture, copiously pouring from the presses day by day. Will living prophets claiming direct revelation (available to all) about the genuine nature of the Book of Abraham--and isn't that what the essay says?--ever stop the presses from rolling? You might as well stretch out your hand to stop the mighty Missouri River in its course, or turn it upstream.<br />
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Attacks will make no difference whatsoever to any claim carrying the revelatory imprimatur of the founding Prophet. Answers to attacks, new and old, scriptural and linguistic and historical, will continue to be shared to all willing to study them. And, in the simplest expression of which I am capable, the linguistic evidence sustaining the name and description of Kolob will never cease to hold the interest both of Latter-day Saints and of many, many others. Such telling witnesses to truth will yet fill the whole earth, as the waters fill the great deep.<br />
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<br />I began to reflecthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11853353050355842605noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7657330582593799810.post-47312473853113649162017-07-09T01:10:00.001-07:002017-09-08T13:40:46.009-07:00Korea and the Prophets: George Albert Smith, Gordon B. Hinckley, Thomas S. MonsonEven as ISIS peaks, then falls--so we hope--North Korea emerges as the greatest threat to a long and happy life for hapless millions. The West and her allies far exceed North Korea in military might; yet that most unfortunate of little lands might prove our Achilles' heel. Little Athens trumped Persia. Articles I read by day, and sleepless, by night, show how quickly the West could demolish that state--but only at the loss of millions of South Korean and Japanese lives. A week ago I didn't realize how many millions would surely die from artillery, chemical weapons--and from nuclear warheads--already in place.<br />
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I'd like to avenge Mr. Warmbier's murder. But what of the unbounded love I've always had for the people of Japan and South Korea? I would die for them. We must forever tuck away thoughts of rash vengeance. </div>
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On July 3 our experts assure us that North Korea tests a run-of-the-mill missile. On July 4 news reports interrupt our celebrations of freedom as our experts tell us that North Korea tests an ICBM that can hit Alaska, but not Hawaii--but, yes--comes the update--Hawaii, too. (July 29 update: Now Los Angeles, too--and maybe New York; September update: a hydrogen bomb.)</div>
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It'll be another 5 years even so, experts say, before California and New York can be rubbed out within one half hour from launch time. We have time. Time to waste on politics, quarrels, jarrings, assurances. Captain Moroni warned the government in his day of the fatal consequences of "great neglect," "thoughtless stupor," and "great slothfulness": "Could ye suppose that ye could sit. . . and because of the exceeding goodness of God ye could do nothing and he would deliver you?" (Alma 60). Have we prepared? Moroni prepared. <span class="verse-number verse" style="background: 0px 0px rgba(255 , 255 , 255 , 0.01); border: 0px; color: #333333; font-family: "palatino" , "palatino linotype" , "pahoran" , "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: 18px; font-weight: 700; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"> </span></div>
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As I've pondered, I have recalled words spoken at the end of the April 1950 General Conference of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints by a latter-day prophet, President George Albert Smith: "It will not be long until calamities will overtake the human family unless there is speedy repentance. It will not be long before those who are scattered over the face of the earth by millions will die like flies because of what will come. Our Heavenly Father has told us how it can be avoided, and that is our mission, in part, to go into the world and explain to people how it may be avoided, and that people need not be unhappy as they are everywhere but that happiness may be in their lives—because when the Spirit of God burns in your soul, you cannot be otherwise than happy" (Conference Report April 1950, 167-170; I read either "scattered over the face of the earth by millions" "will die like flies"; or "millions will die"; it all adds up to the same sad tally).<br />
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Can the impenitence, the sins and the pride, of the West, the prophet's audience, lead to disaster throughout the world? Who today would argue to the contrary?<br />
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When he was 1st Counselor in the First Presidency of the Church, our living Prophet, President Thomas S. Monson, also cited President Smith's words in General Conference, April 2007. Why did he refer to them? Who knows, really? In the talk, President Monson was revisiting several "Tabernacle Memories." </div>
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"These were alarming words," President Monson said, "for they came from a prophet of God." He then spoke of finding the somber fulfillment of these words in the 2.5 million killed in the Korean conflict that broke out thereafter. "The event prompted me to reflect on the statement President Smith made as we sat in this building that spring day." </div>
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So I've wondered of late, whether that "prophetic warning" will visit us again, and whether fulfillment will come again in terms of a Korean conflict that has never really ended, there being only an armistice to the war, not an end.</div>
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In past months, I've also become better informed about the true cost in human lives under communist regimes in the 50's and thereafter. A new book, exploding the lesser tallies of apologetic textbooks, now establishes that up to 45 million died in China's Great Leap Forward (1958-1962), some 20 million more than previously thought. The Cultural Revolution perhaps caused the loss of 8 million "scattered throughout" China, with millions more victims of persecution.<br />
(Frank Dikotter, <i>Mao's Great Famine: the History of China's Most Devastating Catastrophe; </i>https://www.nytimes.com/2016/05/15/world/asia/china-cultural-revolution-explainer.html)<br />
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These presumptive 53 million deaths must surely increase the estimated number (103 million) of people under communist rule who lost their lives, in peacetime, at the hands of their own governments, mostly during the second half of the 20th century (see David Hackett Fischer, <i>Liberty and Freedom</i>). And of themselves these 53 million deaths rank high on the list of the greatest wipe-outs of recorded history. As Bible readers, we speak of the great Flood that swept over the inhabited world. Would there have even been 103 or 115 million people "scattered over the face of the earth" at that time? Have we passed through a Second Flood and, in large measure, failed to truly "see" it? That's how it is when we lack charity. George Albert Smith saw it.</div>
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And we could speak of the purge of communists throughout Southeast Asia: the Malayan Emergency, for instance, or of the "at least half a million people in Indonesia alone" in 1965. Vietnam. Cambodia. Congo. Guatemala. Peru (See: http://thediplomat.com/2015/10/what-1965-means-in-southeast-asia/ ).</div>
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So we are safe to build on what the living Prophet of God now says about the fulfillment of the "prophetic warning" of George Albert Smith in April 1950, when, in addition to the Korean conflict, we add to the count the latest tallies of the Great Leap Forward, the Cultural Revolution, Southeast Asia, Africa--and "thus far, with all un-able pen." </div>
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But no farther.</div>
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There is a danger in mishandling prophecy. Disregarding what the living prophet says about the fulfillment of a past prophet's words, some distribute throughout social media or in books what they say are fuller accounts of President Smith's prophecy, accounts that speak of a supposed future war between the "Soviet Union"(?) and America. The conflict is to begin shortly after the election, but before the inauguration, of an American President of Greek descent.<br />
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We all need to laugh a little more these days--and here's the perfect material.</div>
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The tale relies on one adult's jumbled recollections of what he thought he heard, as a mere child, in a family meeting with President Smith. And no wonder that the story to be credible at all not only comes with detailed family "credentials," it weakly calls upon such well-known names as Sidney Sperry and Hugh Nibley for supporting outside "evidence," though what that evidence may be comes either third hand and unstated (Nibley) or as simply bizarre (Sperry). And who hasn't heard about Event X being like a Sunday School picnic compared with Event Y? Apparently you can't be a latter-day prophet unless you make such a comparison; in the account making the rounds today, the actual picnic menu appears!<br />
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We would do well to take to heart a true account, a General Conference account, from President George Albert Smith. In a time of sickness, it seemed to him that he passed through the veil and found himself on a forest path. His grandfather, George A. Smith, met him there with a question: I want to know what you have done with my name?<br />
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When we attribute preposterous visions to George Albert Smith, or to any other prophet, and especially when money is at the <i>root </i>of the matter, What are we doing with his name? And what are we doing with the name of our beloved <i>Spencer</i> W. Kimball? or the name of <i>Thomas Spencer</i> Monson.<br />
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False prophets, spiritually blinded by false visions, adopt even the names of the true in their efforts to wrest Scripture and to deceive. Pseudonymity!? "The Lord God worketh not in darkness" (2 Nephi 26:23). Neither does He work by rumor, fiction, madness, or the latest insider Hebrew hermeneutic, "for he doeth nothing save it be plain unto the children of men" (2 Nephi 26:33).<br />
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President Harold B. Lee warned the Church about chasing after purported visions and prophecies (October 1972). He spoke of "many loose writings," saying, "Let me give you the sure word of prophecy [for instance, JST Matthew 24] on which you should rely for your guide instead of these strange sources which may have great political implications" (Conference Report October 1972). Talk about a startling prophecy by the Lord's mouthpiece at General Conference! "Strange sources"? "Great political implications"? It is a sure word: "This day this Scripture hath been fulfilled in your ears" (Luke 4:21).<br />
<br />
President Boyd K. Packer further taught that even something the President of the Church may be <i>known</i> to have said to an individual or small group, or written in a private letter, does not carry the same authority as a statement of the full First Presidency (see Doctrine and Covenants 107:27, 29; "Boyd K. Packer, "The Law and the Light"). No one has the right to pass around a letter, journal entry, or written recollection, no matter if reflecting <i>the very words</i> of a President of the Church of Jesus Christ, in order to announce a prophecy, revelation, doctrine, or authoritative interpretation. What President Smith shared at General Conference may well distill impressions felt over time, including impressions only gradually grasped, but it is the Conference Report, which comes out under the imprimatur of the councils of the High Priesthood, that becomes the channel for Truth to all the world.<br />
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What is less than that is not the Truth.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Is there a letter? is there a journal entry? Of course not. The tale of George Albert Smith's vision of American presidents of Greek descent trading missiles with the "Soviet Union" is as phony as it gets. It is bizarre; it is contradictory; and it is the epitome of vanity and light-mindedness. To set aside the unthinkable loss of life in the 50's, 60's, and 70's, particularly in Asia, and particularly under communism, and in its place conjure up the apocalyptic terror of some Great War of the West under a Greek President is to fail to learn the greatest lessons of the modern era about what constitutes a just and righteous government. </div>
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<br /></div>
<div>
We must never lose sight of those who died under unjust and unrighteous ideologies, governments, and dictatorships of every stamp during the second half of the 20th Century. Those are the unfortunate souls a prophet foresaw and of whom our living prophet also speaks.</div>
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<br /></div>
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Shall we lose sight of our beloved brothers and sisters of every land, of their struggles and crosses and losses, of their hopes and dreams and poverty, to instead fixate upon some preferred vision of apocalypse, one that matches our own notions, our own politics, and our own love of the phony and of anonymous visionaries?</div>
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Prophecy does not work by preference. Prophecy doesn't consult our politics or our hermeneutics. From George Albert Smith's words we receive what we have received--it's as simple as that and it's all a matter of history now--and we would do well to look back, and for a blessed moment, stop meddling with the future.</div>
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For Latter-day Saints, to gaze into the future is to "look beyond the mark."<br />
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How many false visions and false prophecies about the coming Plague or War of the West circulate in Utah and Arizona! Each in its own way, and each bristling with political overtones, lays claim to apostolic authority, and therein fulfills the words of the Doctrine and Covenants: "and they who are not apostles and prophets shall be known" (64:39). How often the First Presidency and other apostles have warned the Saints about the phony White Horse Prophecy and the like, in which reticulated giraffes of various paint gallivant about representing the nations of the earth.<br />
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The people of Nephi, very much alone in a bewildering American homeland, "searched much" "to know of things to come" (2 Nephi 9:4). What Jacob, finally, shared to comfort them is also what the Lord intends for readers in 2017, including the following promise: "And I will fortify this land against all other nations" (see esp. 2 Nephi 10:10-19).</div>
<div>
<br />
And what of Hawaii? "Great are the promises of the Lord unto them who are upon the isles of the sea" (2 Nephi 10:21). Among those promises, we today have the prophecy of President David O. McKay at the dedication ceremonies of the Church College of Hawaii in 1955: "From this school, I'll tell you, will go men and women whose influence will be felt for good towards the establishment of peace internationally" (https://newsroom.byuh.edu/node/750).<br />
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Not so very long ago, I heard an apostle advise his audience at a Thanksgiving chapel meeting to give thanks. For what? Food, shelter, a solid meal? No. Thanks that the Lord has spared us as yet. (The words, prompting a lifetime of repentance, also echo what President Gordon B. Hinckley said at General Conference after 9/11.) I think of all these words from time-to-time. Perhaps, then, that was what it was like to hear the words of George Albert Smith.</div>
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Some of us may also recall the words of Elder Dallin H. Oaks at the dedication of the Nauvoo Temple. It's not within my right to unpack them here, but we all have come to see their fulfillment. It's in our daily lives, over time, that we face the varied tests of the Lord's judgments, decisions, opportunities, and will. Latter-day Saints know that. The Test has nothing to do with pitching a tent, decoding Scripture, hoarding vast supply, or adhering to any particular party line. No. Doing such things would be to <i>fail</i> the Test "of a sound faith and a firm mind" (Mormon 7:30). I'm now remembering some counsel Hugh Nibley gave a class about surviving a possible future moment of grave emergency. I jotted it all down. For now, I'll paraphrase his key point: Don't do anything dramatic unless the Brethren direct. Then quickly respond!<br />
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<br />
But what of North Korea? Is it to be war in our time? Do a prophet's words in 1950 extend the full length of the endless armistice? Who can tell? Even a troubling vision of war can be turned to peace in the light of sufficient repentance. Remember Jonah; remember Ammon; in fact, remember every Elder and every Sister of this dispensation of the fulness of times who has ever lifted up the voice of peace! Has there been no harvest? "Can ye tell"? (Alma 26).</div>
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<br /></div>
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I remember the keen love Gordon B. Hinckley felt for the people of the Koreas. Knowing of that love, I would often pray that President Hinckley might live to see the dawn of Gospel light in North Korea. It would be amiss to set such prayers aside in these troubled days. "Miracles can occur as we do so" (Thomas S. Monson, Conference Report October 2009). I think of the love Harold B. Lee had for Korea--as a Lee, he was taken for Korean on one occasion. It's wonderful to know that Joseph Fielding Smith dedicated the land for the preaching of the Gospel. So let's soberly reflect on the lessons of history--and build a future "as bright as our faith." Here is the love and the hope of all the living prophets. </div>
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I recall another General Conference in which a Prophet spoke of the food he arranged to be sent to North Korea: "This very day hungry children are eating food in North Korea because of the aid which you have sent." President Hinckley looked beyond politics to the needs of the individual soul. He looked for the day of peace in which the Gospel in its fullness would be taken to the Land of the Morning Calm--to Choson. Despite a fleeting cloud cover, and a fleeting fear, let us honor the true vision of that beloved prophet by fostering the same hope and the same love (Conference Report October 1997, "Look to the Future"). That was the hope and vision inspiring the patriarch, when he laid his hands on young Gordon's head and pronounced: "Thou shalt ever be a messenger of peace. The nations of the earth shall hear thy voice." <span style="font-size: x-small;">(https://www.lds.org/ensign/1986/02/president-gordon-b-hinckley-first-counselor?lang=eng)</span></div>
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"Weeping may endure for a night, but joy cometh in the morning" (Psalm 30:5).</div>
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In the light of the everlasting Gospel, I believe in that peace. I trust we shall see it.</div>
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<b><br /></b>
<b>Note</b><br />
<b><br /></b>
Nothing I say here should be taken as anything other than what any reader of history duly notes about documents and source criticism. Read history and discern the phony. Yes, I have also been influenced by the teachings of the living prophets and apostles, and I am glad to point interested readers to the talks that they have given at General Conference or at BYU. We'd all be lost without those talks, and we constantly need yet more reminders and more light from the Brethren.<br />
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I began to reflecthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11853353050355842605noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7657330582593799810.post-70380534134235053562017-07-08T20:09:00.002-07:002019-10-12T21:12:54.985-07:00How Firm a Foundation--and What Singing! The Johan Söderholm Journal The following story, found in the journal kept by Johan Söderholm, my 2nd great-grandfather, shows the clear-minded and frank faith of the early converts to the Gospel of Jesus Christ. How could a simple factory worker, but newly baptized, find the words and the power to defend a position before a learned Lutheran priest, a man whose name yet appears in Växjö's biographical registers? While the narrator obviously has a gift with words, the answer is as simple as he was, and neither priest nor police mattered to him at all. As President Boyd K. Packer would often remind us: All members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints have had hands laid upon their heads and received the Gift of the Holy Ghost, which "giveth utterance." The Truth is received, loved, studied--and shared.<br />
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<br />
Truth must be shared:<br />
<br />
<br />
"In the month of June, J. Cannon and I rented a hall on the west of the farmer Peter Johan Magnusson's house. We wanted to use it as our meeting hall. We were going to use it for the first time on the next Prayer day with Brother J. Cannon, and Brother Andersson from Norrkoping.<br />
<br />
We began the meeting at 4:00 P. M. when the Wäxjö Township Parish Priest, whose name was Granstrand, came up with the entire Wäxjö police force with him, and fisherman Graffman leading the way. He wanted to prevent the people from coming in and hearing our message, but we started singing and the people continued to come.<br />
<br />
Brother Cannon opened the meeting with prayer and song. Brother A. Andersson spoke and bore his testimony to the people in its entirety. At the meeting's end the Lutheran Priest Granstrand stood up and said it was false doctrine, and that Joseph Smith was a false prophet; that the doctrine was contrary to that of the pure Evangelical Lutheran Church, and what revelations were claimed were of the devil.<br />
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There was a physician, whose name was Hjällenqvist, who spoke to the brethren. I couldn't hear what they talked about because the Priest Granstrand called me privately into an anteroom and asked me if I had left the Lutheran Church. I said yes. He asked me why I had done so. I answered him that the Lutheran Church did not have the truth because it was built on a false premise and therefore it must stagger as those who stood outside the door for it was not built upon the foundation of Apostles and Prophets but upon Reformers whom God had never sent; but I knew for certain that God had sent the Prophet Joseph Smith, and that He had revealed Himself to him, and had given him the authority to establish God's Kingdom and the Church of Jesus Christ upon the earth, and had commanded him to preach the Gospel. That same Gospel have I accepted and therein I am happy and fortunate.<br />
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All the same, he said, it was a deception. I said to him that the church which is not built upon the foundation of Prophets and Apostles is not true. He said accordingly then you believe in a prophet. I said we believe in God and in those whom He had sent and in those whom He would send. <br />
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Then the Priest rushed out. . . "<br />
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As Johan Söderholm continues his account, and once the threatening fisherman also said his piece and went his way, we learn that the congregation simply returned to its singing. "Babylon's gentility," as grandfather terms it, could not "interrupt [their] rejoicings" (see Alma 30:16). They "heeded them not" (1 Nephi 8:18). It was clear: once "awake unto God," nothing on earth could interrupt the desire of these Saints of the Dawn to "sing redeeming love" (see Alma 5; 26:13). And we know from the journal that as they sang, they sang of the glory and blessings of the Holy Temple in Mount Zion, and all this years before Temple spires in St. George, Manti, Logan, Great Salt Lake City--or Brigham City, where the family planted roots--pierced crystalline skies.<br />
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In the Gospel of Jesus Christ we are happy and fortunate: "If ye have felt to sing the song of redeeming love, I would ask, can ye feel so now" (Alma 5).<br />
<br />I began to reflecthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11853353050355842605noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7657330582593799810.post-60018869813892111152017-07-07T19:21:00.001-07:002020-08-02T23:48:20.410-07:00"Moroni Did Not Stop" (Stopping Amalickiah, Phase II)Beginning in the 19th year of the Reign of the Judges, we continue to look at the character and energy of the man we call Captain Moroni by paring the narrative to its verbal quick.<br />
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"Moroni, on the other hand":<br />
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"had been a preparing the minds"<br />
"strengthening the armies"<br />
"erecting small forts"<br />
"throwing up banks of earth"<br />
"building walls of stone"<br />
"he did place"<br />
"thus he did fortify and strengthen"<br />
"thus he was preparing to support"<br />
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Mormon here pauses to sketch, with high praise, the character of Moroni.<br />
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Then back to work:<br />
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"Moroni had stationed an army"<br />
"Moroni had altered the management"<br />
"Moroni had fortified or had built forts"<br />
"by the means of Moroni, became strong"<br />
"for he had supposed"<br />
"Moroni had appointed Lehi"<br />
"Moroni had kept the commandments of God in preparing"<br />
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End of 19th year: the Lamanite invasion has failed, and they will not dare it again for some five years.<br />
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Beginning of the 20th year<br />
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"Moroni did not stop making preparations"<br />
"he caused that his armies should commence"<br />
"that they should commence in digging up heaps"<br />
"he caused that there should be timbers, yea, works of timbers built up"<br />
"he caused that. . . there should be a frame of pickets built"<br />
"he caused towers to be erected"<br />
"and he caused places of security to be built"<br />
"Thus Moroni did prepare"<br />
"Moroni caused that his armies should go forth"<br />
"when Moroni had driven"<br />
"he caused that. . . should go forth. . . and possess the land"<br />
"he also placed armies"<br />
"and caused them to erect fortifications"<br />
"And thus he cut off"<br />
"fortifying the line"<br />
"Moroni, with his armies. . . they did seek to cut off the strength"<br />
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End of 20th year: the Nephites have never before exerted themselves with such power, built so many new cities and fortifications, or been so secure. Thus far "there never was a happier time" in their recorded history. These days, a few choice years before war breaks out again, are forever remembered as "the days of Moroni."<br />
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<br />I began to reflecthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11853353050355842605noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7657330582593799810.post-23822362542053827032017-07-03T14:58:00.002-07:002020-03-29T18:27:12.341-07:00"Moroni, Being A Man": Responding to Attacks on The "Foundation of Liberty" (Phase One)Alma 46 shows one man's prompt answer to a driven and gifted politician seeking to destroy "the foundation of liberty." To capture both the response and the character and dynamism of the champion, we need only follow the verbs in the swift yet dense narrative, a verbal outpouring without parallel in the Book of Mormon. And amid the swirl of events, and the escalating anger, there's one verbal action that hits me at the heart: "Moroni prayed."<br />
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"When Moroni"<br />
"had heard"<br />
"he was angry"<br />
"he rent"<br />
"he took"<br />
"and wrote"<br />
"and fastened"<br />
"fastened on"<br />
"girded on"<br />
"he took"<br />
"called"<br />
"bowed himself"<br />
"he prayed mightily"<br />
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"Moroni prayed"<br />
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"he had poured out his soul"<br />
"he named"<br />
"Moroni had said"<br />
"he went forth"<br />
"waving"<br />
"he had written"<br />
"crying with a loud voice, saying"<br />
"Moroni had proclaimed"<br />
"Moroni said"<br />
"when Moroni had said"<br />
"he went forth"<br />
"he sent forth"<br />
"and gathering together. . . to stand against"<br />
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At this point, the enemy flees!<br />
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But Moroni is not finished with him.<br />
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"Now Moroni thought"<br />
"he thought to cut off"<br />
"to take them and bring them back"<br />
"and put Amalickiah to death"<br />
"for he knew"<br />
"this he knew"<br />
"Therefore Moroni thought"<br />
"that he should take"<br />
"he took"<br />
"and marched"<br />
"to cut off"<br />
"he did"<br />
"marched forth"<br />
"headed"<br />
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The politician now flees again!<br />
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"Moroni, being a man, who was appointed"<br />
"he had power"<br />
"to establish"<br />
"to exercise authority"<br />
"he caused to be put to death"<br />
"he caused the title of liberty to be hoisted"<br />
"Moroni planted the standard of liberty"<br />
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<br />I began to reflecthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11853353050355842605noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7657330582593799810.post-73277791245725051062017-06-27T16:12:00.001-07:002020-06-26T23:10:52.111-07:00Book of Mormon Sources and Abridgment and iPhones. What does Helaman or even "Deutero-Isaiah" Show?We take up the Book of Helaman and, starting with its ancient title page, see in the very last line: "the record of Helaman and his sons, even down to the coming of Christ, which is called the book of Helaman, and so forth." (Et cetera: The 1830 edition shows an ampersand; in today's edition we see "and so forth.") The Book of Helaman, and so forth? The very last verse of the work significantly answers, in ring composition, to the last line of that title page: "And thus ended the book of Helaman, according to the record of Helaman and his sons."<br />
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There's still more to that ampersand: Helaman, and so forth, is not only full of Mormon's summarizing comments, it is a "book" "according to the <i>records</i> of Helaman, who was the son of Helaman, and also according to the <i>records</i> of his <i>sons</i>, even down to the coming of Christ--wonderfully down to Christmas! (The last phrase is part of the ancient title, and states the thesis of the whole: the Christ is coming.) <div><br /></div><div>Helaman was the governor and Chief Judge of the Nephites. Who were his sons? Nephi and Lehi. Nephi clearly wrote, but here we learn that Lehi likewise kept his records and that either Nephi or Mormon later added what Lehi wrote to his father's book. All this detail comes from the short but labored and repetitious--and marvelously informative--title page. The headings and subheadings found throughout the Book of Mormon are easy to overlook: the Book of Helaman, for instance, includes ancient subheadings introducing both the prophecies of Nephi and those of Samuel.<br />
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And note how the pairing of Nephi and Lehi and that of Nephi and Samuel (in the divisions of the Book of Helaman, son of Helaman), matches the book's pairing of such ancient prophets as Zenos and Zenock, Ezaias and Isaiah (Nephi and Jacob, Mosiah and Abinadi, Alma and Amulek). </div><div><br /></div><div>Ezaias and Isaiah? What's that all about? What we see is clearly the name <i>Yesha'yahu</i> given in two forms as a simple matter of differentiation; in other words, we see Isaiah and Isaiah, which could answer--might it not?--to First and Second (Deutero-) Isaiah, both of which were seemingly and <i>surprisingly</i> available to the Nephites. Might not these two Isaiahs, both prophets, have also been father and son? and perhaps also prophet and prophetic editor? When we consider the prophetic naming of Helaman's two sons (in Helaman 5), we should also bear in mind how two of Isaiah's sons, Shear-Jashub, Maher-shalal-hash-baz, bear names of sign and prophecy. Shear-Jashub refers to the Return, which is the burden of the second half of the book, or the "Second" Isaiah. "The Book of Isaiah the prophet, and so forth."<br />
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That's one way to look at things, a rather unitary way, and it's very much in line with what Hugh Nibley says in <i>Since Cumorah: </i>"If others than Isaiah wrote about half the words in the book, why do we not know their names? The answer is, because of the way is which they worked. They were (as it is now explained) Isaiah's own disciples or students," or his sons, grandsons, and so forth, ampersand. "If anything," says Nibley, "the Book of Mormon attests the busy reshuffling and reediting of separate pages of sacred writings that often go under the name of a single prophet."<br />
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The form of the name Ezaias, Ezias, Esaias, etc., in Greek, English, or whatever linguistic cast we may choose to present, functions merely as a semiotic pointer--this Isaiah, not that one. Each is absolutely swallowed up in the other anyhow, ampersand. One of the Nephite chosen Twelve bears the name Isaiah. Doctrine and Covenants 84 tells of yet another Isaiah, in this case semiotically, and thus <i>simply</i>, differentiated as Esaias, who "lived in the days of Abraham." Again, when Doctrine and Covenants 76 addresses all professing partisans, including "some of Esaias, and some of Isaiah," it helps to read the words as being a critique not only of an undue--even a nitpicking--sectarian devotion to a particular prophet or gospel dispensation or book of scripture or even spelling of a name, but also as a critique of overzealous devotion to some kinds of higher criticism: these are the true words of Isaiah, these not; this is genuine Peter, this not; Romans is Pauline, 2nd Timothy not; John is Johannine, the Revelation not; Nephi quotes Deutero-Isaiah and is therefore in error, Joseph Smith mistakenly refers to Elias as other than Elijah, and so forth. Some are thus partisans of such-and-such a theory; some of another. As disciples progress toward sainthood, we shed the partisan line, however learned it may seem, however we may have learned it, and no matter how much we have been draped in "all the rights and privileges pertaining thereto." And let's stop boasting about knowledge of biblical languages, as if a badge of supremacy. By the way, Brother Joseph's differentiation of Elias and Elijah is another instance of a metalinguistic and semiological indicator of difference for two men having the same name, <i>Eliyahu</i>, but different roles to play. How many stumble, or parade, over such matters!<br />
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The occurrence of the unusual--and the pairing of Ezaias and Isaiah is unprecedented--signals that the Book of Mormon has something to tell us. When the Doctrine and Covenants chimes in, it's time to perk up our ears.<br />
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The Book of Mormon (that is, ensconced Helaman) thus resolves, with deft plainness, a weighty and long-standing difficulty about quotations from what many consider a Deutero-Isaiah. Helaman's ampersand-plus-c(etera) and the side-by-side naming of two Isaiahs in both Helaman 8:20 and Doctrine and Covenants 76:100 together provide us with sufficient answer for those who dispute one Isaian chapter or another making an appearance in the Book of Mormon. As for a pre-exilic Deutero-Isaiah in Father Lehi's hands, consider the chapters his son Nephi includes in his own double book, and what he leaves out--then get over it. Nephi left Jerusalem with a unitary copy of Isaiah, etc. It's as simple as that. (Nephi includes Isaiah 48-49 in his own first book; Isaiah 2-14, and then 29, in his second book; Isaiah 50-52, 55, in Nephi's brother Jacob's record, again in Nephi's second book. Mosiah and a <i>Third</i> Nephi (Trito-Nephi) include Isaiah 52-54.)<br />
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The later 20th Century scholarship confirms, says Hugh Nibley, how "the peculiar practices employed in the transmission of inspired writings in the Book of Mormon, as well as the theory and purpose behind those practices, are the very ones that prevailed in Palestine at the time Lehi lived there." Indeed: "We have come across a great tradition of prophetic unity that made it possible for inspired men in every age to translate, abridge, expand, explain, and update the writings of their predecessors without changing a particle of the intended meaning or in any way jeopardizing the earlier rights to authorship. Isaiah remains [one Isaiah], no matter how many prophets repeat his words or how many other prophets he is repeating. The Book of Mormon explains how this can be so, and its explanations would seem to be the solution to the Isaiah problem toward which the scholars are at present moving" (Hugh Nibley, <i>Since Cumorah</i>). When Brother Nibley further cites Hans Wildberger about how Isaiah and Micah, in prophesying of the Mountain of the Lord's House, the Salt Lake Temple, may be quoting from "archaic ritual texts" (or a single ancient text?) might not the Book of Helaman also afford a solution to the "problem toward which scholars are at present moving?" Could that archaic source perhaps be Helaman's Ezaias? or yet another of the name?<br />
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That's the sort of thing for which readers should forever be on the lookout, for the Book of Mormon continually invites our awareness as it awakens and enlarges our memories. Just so, the Brass Plates, a supersized and up-to-date Library of Hebrew Scripture in Lehi's hands, once served "to enlarge" "the memory of [his] people" (see Alma 37).<br />
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<br />
As Professor James Sanders would tell his students: 'Scripture is full of itself''--consciously so. It's kaleidoscopic, with built-in intertextuality that serves a crucial purpose. If otherwise, "it were not possible," as Benjamin tells his sons of Lehi, that he [or we] could have remembered all these things, to have taught them to his children" (Mosiah 1:4). I'd add that "Scripture is also full of the latest world report and abounding in politics"--a BBC of sorts. (I'm thinking of the well-informed Prophets here--they were Prophets to the World.)<br />
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The wee but rich Book of Helaman, compressing 51 years into 38 columned pages, cites as vital sources and guiding points of reference: Amulek, Zeezrom, Alma, Nephi, Lehi, Joshua, Zenock, Zenos, Ezaias, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Elijah, Abraham, Lady Wisdom, Ether, Moses--and Messiah. Hugh Nibley, who labeled Helaman "the Book of Crimes," while also calling it the most spiritually charged book in the entire collection, further noted surprising correspondences between Helaman and the apocryphal Enoch literature, the Dead Sea Scrolls, etc. He filled the margins of his own copy with such references.<br />
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All that's not going to make for a once-over or easy reading. Helaman's going to require effort, its going to require checking the footnotes and reviewing other stories, so turn the TV off. Yet take away the words and deeds of these prophets, and the authorial expectation that the reader will know what he is referring to--the Red Sea, the Brazen Serpent, Elijah's contest with the priests of Baal, imprisoned Jeremiah--and the message of Helaman falls flat. We'll need Bible literacy to understand the Book of Mormon. On the other hand--so turn the tube back on--too much quoting from these prophets, and Helaman's own delicate narrative line would be lost. So when we speak of Mormon and abridgment, much of his work had to do with pruning citation, and ever more quotes and citation.<br />
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We only get the thousandth part of either citation or of story, or something like that, for a hundreth part," of these and many other matters, "<i>cannot </i>be contained in this work [the entire abridgment of the plates of Nephi]" (Helaman 3:14). Editing Mormon, who ultimately has access to "many books and many records of every kind" (v.15), including "many records," "which are particular and very large" (v.13) gives us a list of the 99%: wars, contentions, dissensions, preaching, prophecies, shipping, building of ships, building of temples, building of synagogues, sanctuaries, righteousness, wickedness, murders, robbings, plundering, abominations, whoredoms. The shipping and craftsmanship intrigues the acolyte of Rick Steves, but you'd want to avoid interacting with the tense, preachy, even violent, locals. Note how righteousness is hopelessly outnumbered: 1 to 6; note the ceaseless building, the restless troublers of civility.) Mormon still cannot help but include in his abridgment of Helaman's record what readers today might paradoxically call an "Omni-sized" but endlessly compelling note about far-reaching explorations into lovely, long since abandoned but yet timberless lands of lakes and rivers, the consequent building of houses, temples, synagogues, sanctuaries, and "all manner of their buildings" with cement, and the necessary shipping of timber. The description reminds us of Chaco Grande's timber-consuming construction--an ecological disaster. (Hugh Nibley would mull over this verse.)<br />
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To get a feel for Mormon as condenser, pick up a library copy of Ibn Ishaq, the first editor-biographer of the Prophet Muhammad, then scroll through a version online. The unabridged copy in the library, which stuns us with its prolixity, being "particular and very large," preserves the sourcing. It gives each particular <i>isnad</i>, or connecting chain tracing who reported what to whom, etc., while the online version frees the casual reader of such a ponderous chain of reference. What readers have, thanks to prophetic and judicious pruning, may be called the online Book of Mormon. It's all preset for ready reading on iPads and iPhones, and during TV commercials. . .<br />
(For the uses of abridgment in packaging literary works for the media, ponder the following: http://grammarist.com/spelling/abridgment-and-abridgement/ .)<br />
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So find a chair--you'll need one--link to Helaman 1, and safely turn it over to your favorite news channel: politics and political theater, campaigns, disputed elections, accusations, curtailment of freedom of speech, growing skepticism, detection, elitism, corruption, collusion, gangs, crimes, assassinations, intense famines, ecological disasters, financial collapses, surprise attacks on urban centers, and ordinary people "visited with terror"--everything you get when the shield of protection slips from an America of favor and promise (see President Boyd K. Packer, Conference Report, April 2004; Elder Neal A. Maxwell, Conference Report October 2001). Such applies equally well to Venezuela or to the United States.<br />
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Keeping up with Helaman? You'll need a 24/7 cable news network.<br />
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<b>Notes</b><br />
<b><br /></b>Though I know no instance of it in print, likely others, perhaps even many other readers have noted the possibility of an Ezaias/Isaiah authorship or dual editorship of what we call the Book of Isaiah. My own thoughts on such a relationship, with the one prophet's name, identity, and book completely enveloped in the other's, simply derives from reading and thinking about Helaman 8 yesterday and today--30 June 2017, yet the idea builds on what Hugh Nibley presents in<i> Since Cumorah, </i>ideas I've mulled over since the age of 10 or 11. The Scriptures of the Restoration give us so many prophetic doubles, double books, "and so forth's." And there are so many possibilities in the Holy Scriptures. The Septuagint, the Dead Sea Scrolls, the New Testament all know but one Isaiah. The Book of Mormon, that great Scripture of the Restoration, with Ezaias and Isaiah, like Urim and Thummim, may show a double-Isaiah, or Isaian figure, likely father and son. It's moments like these in which Scripture enlarges our memory.<br />
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As a child, I often read from George Reynolds's <i>Dictionary of the Book of Mormon, </i>which describes Ezias (or Ezaias) as "An ancient Hebrew prophet, referred to by Nephi." Exactly! Because there are multiple kings and prophets in the Book of Mormon who are named Nephi, even Zenephi (Egyptian for "son of Nephi," <i>z3-nb-hy</i>), one particular Nephi might have talked about one Ezaias, another about another; one Isaiah may have spoken about a particular Nephi, or one Esaias of another--and so forth.<br />
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I will add that I accept without question that Isaiah's prophecy addressed to Cyrus by name came by the spirit of prophecy and of revelation and was recorded long before the great Cosmocrator appeared on the scene. Here is one of the great moments of prophecy in the history of the world. It is God who appoints a Cosmocrator--Cyrus himself recognized that (see the Cyrus Cylinder). As the Coffin Texts state: God knows every name.<br />
See the various forms of the Ezaias name in the helpful: https://onoma.lib.byu.edu/index.php/EZIAS<br />
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<br /></div>I began to reflecthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11853353050355842605noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7657330582593799810.post-11875927672925764692017-06-20T15:58:00.003-07:002021-10-17T18:25:49.356-07:002 Nephi 33:1, the Egyptian Tale of Petese, and the Corpus Hermeticum<span style="color: #333333; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.008); font-size: 18px;">"When a man speaketh by the power of the Holy Ghost," says Nephi, "the power of the Holy Ghost carrieth it unto the hearts of the children of men:"</span></span><br />
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<span style="color: #333333; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.008); font-size: 18px;">And now I, Nephi, cannot write all the things which were taught among my people; neither am I mighty in writing, like unto speaking; for when a man speaketh by the power of the Holy Ghost the power of the Holy Ghost carrieth it unto the hearts of the children of men (2 Nephi 33:1).</span></span><br />
<span style="color: #333333; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.008); font-size: 18px;"><br /></span></span><span style="color: #333333; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.008); font-size: 18px;">We can start thinking plainly about this scripture by noticing how Nephi favors speaking because of a perceived weakness inherent in writing, in his writing anyway. "I cannot write" is a theme that Moroni, the last living man trained in the scribal tradition of Lehi and Nephi, takes up again, and poignantly, at the end of the Book of Mormon. For Nephi, the immediacy of the spoken word is both personal gift and cultural value, but, here, rhetoric finds enhancement "by the power of the Holy Ghost" and thus becomes the "divine word" as well. </span></span><br />
<span style="color: #333333; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.008); font-size: 18px;"><br /></span></span><span style="color: #333333; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.008); font-size: 18px;">To speak by the power of the Holy Ghost, is to speak "in a new tongue, yea, even with the tongue of angels" (2 Nephi 31). And might not writing also be done by the same power? Moroni, the final scribe, later explains that gift of writing with power as a higher gift, one possessed alone by the ancient Brother of Jared after the Flood and after the confounding Tower.</span></span><br />
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<span style="color: #333333; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.008); font-size: 18px;">And who may qualify to speak by the power of the Holy Ghost, or the tongue of angels? Lehi, we are instructed, "received" this "power" "by faith in the Son of God" (1 Nephi 10:17).</span></span><br />
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<span style="color: #333333; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.008); font-size: 18px;">As every reader knows, Nephi says he "makes my record in the language of the Egyptians," though his father had also taught him "in the learning of the Jews." "I cannot write," Nephi says, because writing and speech, for him, already stand far apart, writing in Egyptian is a far different matter than writing in Hebrew letters (as Moroni, at the end, also painfully observes.) Nephi, whose very name looks Egyptian (Nepri?), speaks a dialect of Hebrew (as evidenced throughout his record), reads the Hebrew of the courts (the Hebrew of Isaiah), yet also knows how to read and write in Egyptian language and script. We note that the Egyptian of Nephi's day includes much Hebrew or other West Semitic vocabulary. In other words, when Nephi speaks to his errant brethren, he catches the spirit of a Hebrew prophet at court, yet phrases all in what he calls the "plainness of my speech." When he records the same words, that is, when he translates and sets down the same words into Egyptian idiom and hieroglyphs, his plain preaching now appears to him markedly simple and bland. </span></span><br />
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<span style="color: #333333; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.008); font-size: 18px;">We may ask why it is that Nephi, a literate Hebrew, should give us a record "in the language of the Egyptians," especially when the record, for us, appears only in English? Moroni explains it as a way to save space on precious plates. When I contemplate the English version, I see a more profound reason for all that linguistic transfer; it works to place the record beyond and above the simplistic concerns of human language and commentary, and thus makes necessary the workings of the Holy Ghost in carrying the sacred message to our hearts, and even expansively "unto [the hearts of] every nation, kindred, tongue, and people." Nephi's language, the language he speaks of in 2 Nephi 33:2, is a universal language. The Bible, too, stands above human language, while also being wrestled and wrested to the last syllable of recorded Hebrew, Aramaic, or Greek. That is why we write <i>Exhaustive</i> commentaries and the like, and have endless translations.</span></span><br />
<span style="color: #333333; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.008); font-size: 18px;"><br /></span></span><span style="color: #333333; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.008); font-size: 18px;">All this recalls, in both parallel and in a nice reversal, the Egyptian expression for the written word: the <i>mdw-nTr </i>or "Words of God," "divine words"; it also recalls what the Late Antique Hermetic books claimed about the nature of the Egyptian language, a claim reflecting "the Greek perception of Egyptian anxiety about the translation of Egyptian texts into Greek." In his Perfect Discourse to King Ammon, Asclepius says: "The very character of the sound. . . of Egyptian words has in itself the power meaning (<i>energeia</i>) of what is said" (Orly Goldwasser, <i>From Icon to Metaphor, </i>27).</span></span><br />
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<span style="color: #333333; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.008); font-size: 18px;">"Leave this text untranslated, so that these secrets remain hidden from the Greeks [cf. from the Gentiles] and their irreverent, feeble, and orotund speech does not undermine the dignity and vigor of our language and the energy of the names. For the discourse of the Greeks, though outwardly impressive, is empty, and their philosophy is nothing but verbose noise. We by contrast, we employ not words but sounds full of energy" (quoted in Jan Assmann, <i>T</i></span></span><i style="color: #333333; font-family: times, "times new roman", serif; font-size: 18px;">he Mind of Egypt</i><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.008); color: #333333; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: 18px;">, 396). </span><br />
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<span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.008); color: #333333; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: 18px;">This boast about "efficacious (<i>energetikos</i>) speech" (Goldwasser, 27), recalls how Nephi spoke to his brethren "in the <i>energy</i> of my soul" (1 Nephi 16:24). </span><br />
<span style="color: #333333; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.008); font-size: 18px;"><br /></span></span><span style="color: #333333; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.008); font-size: 18px;">The notion of an effective spiritual energy (<i>3x, 3xw</i>) inherent in Egyptian ceremonial speech may everywhere be found in the Ancient Egyptian texts themselves, and elsewhere I note how the Greek phrase describing Egyptian speech can in fact be matched by a well-known Egyptian idiom for such speech: "Akhu-power upon the mouth": "According to the <i>Corpus Hermeticum</i> spells do not consist of mere words, they must be repeated 'in mighty speech of <i>3x.w'</i> (= <i>3x.w m tpj-r3, phonais mestais ton ergon</i>)."</span></span><br />
<span style="color: #333333; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.008); font-size: 18px;">(See Val H. Sederholm, Papyrus British Museum 10808, 105, citing Festugiere and Nock, CH XVI: II 230).</span></span><br />
<span style="color: #333333; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.008); font-size: 18px;"><br /></span></span><span style="color: #333333; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.008); font-size: 18px;">Such "mighty speech" may also be called the speech of a Pharaoh: "Be an artist in speech, then you will be victorious. for behond: the sword-arm of a king is his tongue," </span></span><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.008); color: #333333; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: 18px;">which recalls Alma's statement about "the preaching of the word" having "had more powerful effect upon the minds of the people than the sword, or anything else, which had happened unto them" (Wisdom of Merikare, see Jan Assmann, <i>The Mind of Egypt; </i>Alma 31:5).</span><br />
<span style="color: #333333; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.008); font-size: 18px;"><br /></span></span><span style="color: #333333; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.008); font-size: 18px;">Nephi says of his own preaching:1 Nephi 15:25: "I did exhort them with all the energies of my soul" and 16:24: "they had humbled themselves because of my words; for I did say many things unto them in the energy of my soul." Again, both words, <i>energy</i> and <i>soul,</i> invoke the Egyptian word <i>akhu</i>, a word signifying (in the plural!) an <i>efficacious power</i> and also a <i>spiritual being</i>, an <i>akh</i> (or <i>ghost</i>). Nephi, in the Hebrew sense, is speaking in the energy of "my nephesh," quite a powerful phrase, <i>in the energy of my life-force</i>, <i>bekoakh naphshi </i>or<i> bekoakhei naphshi,</i> <i>in </i>or<i> through the power of my life's soul</i>. <i>Koakh</i> and Akhu (<i>k-w-x</i> and <i>'-x</i>) sound a bit alike--these are strong-sounding words bespeaking a powerful drain on the life force. Here we discern something far beyond how we consider the spoken word in present times.</span></span><br />
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<span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.008); color: #333333; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: 18px;">So much for the spoken word.</span><br />
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<span style="color: #333333; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.008); font-size: 18px;">I also note the immediate power on my heart of Nephi's written word--well, we're also told that the Book of Mormon comes to us as if a spoken word: "a <i>voice</i> out of the dust."</span></span><br />
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<span style="color: #333333; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.008); font-size: 18px;">We next move toward the heart. What is the distance between speech and heart? Is it forever? or can the gap be bridged? </span></span><br />
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<span style="color: #333333; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.008); font-size: 18px;">In riddling out what Nephi is saying, we must also look at the prepositions. The <i>unto</i> in "unto the hearts" must be the equivalent of the Afroasiatic preposition <i>l, </i>or <i>le </i>(the Egyptians write <i>r</i>), but as we shall see, perhaps also the equivalent of the Egyptian preposition <i>n</i>. Given that we only have Nephi's written words in English, what does <i>unto</i> mean? Gothic-Low Germanic <i>un-to </i>or Gothic-North Germanic <i>un-til</i> are variants of the same thing: "even to" or "all the way to." So how does speech, human speech, ever go "all the way to" the human heart? From mouth to heart--the Holy Ghost carrieth the word. Does "all the way to" signify "into" as well? (See Mason's <i>English Grammar.</i>) Again: Mason tells us that <i>und</i> is the Gothic equivalent of German <i>bis</i>; when the two Germanic prepositions, <i>und</i> and <i>to</i>, of like meaning, combine, the first takes on an emphatic, adverbial quality: <i>bis-to</i>, <i>un-to</i>, <i>un-til</i>, and seems to convey the idea: "really, all the way to--lest there be any doubt."</span></span><br />
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<span style="color: #333333; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.008); font-size: 18px;">Elder David A. Bednar makes a fine distinction in explaining how the Holy Ghost carries the divine word <i>unto</i> the heart, the <i>into</i> depends on each hearer, as in the distinction between <i>hearing</i> and <i>obeying</i>, though intended for synonyms, an idea also expressed in Scripture as not "being hearers only." That attentiveness to the prepositional difference is therefore consistent with the doctrine of a learner's agency, as also found in the Parable of the Sower and in the many Scriptural statements about "hardening the heart." When you see the words "hardening the heart," the distinction between unto and into doesn't seem all that fine, after all. The words are carried until, all the way up to the heart, or <i>unto</i> the heart, but not all the way into the heart. And notice how Nephi reminds us in the following verse that some do reject the word, lodge-the word where it may. It's a matter of "until the heart accepts the word"--a temporality which may never find fruition.</span></span><br />
<span style="color: #333333; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.008); font-size: 18px;"><br /></span></span><span style="color: #333333; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.008); font-size: 18px;">In such a reading, <i>unto</i> is not quite <i>into</i>, West Semitic <i>l</i> not quite<i> b</i>, Egyptian <i>r</i> not quite <i>m</i> (though the Egyptian preposition <i>n</i> slips through the barrier), though well on the way; for already there's a spiritual impact, a clear invitation, the transfer, in plain terms, of a idea (or is it a feeling) upon which one may lay hold, in faith. The Book of Mormon does make much of distinguishing prepositions: Amulek discourses on the salvific necessity of realizing that Christ saves us <i>from</i> not <i>in</i> our sins, a clear-cut distinction, though <i>unto</i> and <i>into</i> becomes a more delicate matter, a matter of the heart. </span></span><br />
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<span style="color: #333333; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.008); font-size: 18px;">Leaving prepositions aside, What of the heart? What does "unto or until the hearts of the children of men" signify? Speech is carried by the Holy Ghost all the way to the heart--but What is the heart? Does <i>heart</i> speak primarily in English to feelings? to intellection? or both? (Answer:<i> Primarily it speaks to feelings, or as Frost says, "never with the heart"--you might let go with the hands or mind, but "never with the heart."</i>) And how about <i>heart</i> in other languages? <i>lev, jb, h3ty, kokoro</i>. . .Well, the heart escapes us.</span></span><br />
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<span style="color: #333333; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.008); font-size: 18px;">In English, or in any language you may please, the phrase "unto the hearts" can be unpacked variously: "touching upon the feelings" or "entering into our feelings;" or, on the other hand: "beginning to enlighten our understandings," entering into our understandings. In English, when something is carried unto our heart, that's where we begin to love it, to feel it, but in Hebrew and Egyptian the heart first references what we call the <i>mind</i>, with the heart being the seat of intelligence, though the heart is also the soul of love. And, of course, English also knows the thoughtful heart (thoughtful in what sense? in mind or heart?). So is Nephi speaking to us, here, more in English or in Hebrew or in Egyptian? Does his heart signify feeling or thought? Or does heart capture both ideas? </span></span><br />
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<span style="color: #333333; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.008); font-size: 18px;">Nephi does have much to say about the heart. His poetic personification of his heart, found in 2 Nephi 4, shows an active, speaking, even exclaiming heart. This Prayer of the (Personified) Heart and Soul, while slipping away, here and there, beyond the culturally comprehensible, still speaks directly to each of us. The Ancient Egyptian reader would pick up the cultural references more precisely than we can, but we understand Nephi's heart, do we not? Somehow Joseph Smith's translation gives us our heart, and Nephi's, while also holding fast to the cultural truth of the original language. (See Jan Assmann, "The Theory of the Heart," in <i>The Mind of Egypt</i>, 135ff.)</span></span><br />
<span style="color: #333333; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.008); font-size: 18px;"><br /></span></span><span style="color: #333333; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.008); font-size: 18px;">While avoiding any attempt at definition, I also like the way Nephi's words resonate with an Egyptian phrase <i>ph n h3t</i>, a phrase which seems to mean "reach the heart" in the sense of "reach till understanding." Words that "reach the heart" or are carried unto or into the heart, are words plain to the understanding, and thus words understood. Yet there are always those who do not or will not understand the words, as in the case of the seed fallen on hard ground, the obdurate heart, the blind mind, those who will not understand my words, the tongue of angels. </span></span><br />
<span style="color: #333333; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.008); font-size: 18px;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="color: #333333; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.008); font-size: 18px;"><br /></span></span><span style="color: #333333; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.008); font-size: 18px;">But now to a story.</span></span><br />
<span style="color: #333333; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.008); font-size: 18px;"><br /></span></span><span style="color: #333333; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.008); font-size: 18px;">Nephi's words about speaking by the power of the Holy Ghost resonate with a story from Ancient Egypt in which Re speaks to a woman in the voice of her deceased husband--and his words reach her heart. Is there not a parallel here, with God speaking to us through the power of the Holy Ghost, in some ineffable way that yet reaches the heart? </span></span><br />
<span style="color: #333333; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.008); font-size: 18px;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="color: #333333; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.008); font-size: 18px;">So let's see how Professor Kim Ryholt understands this moment from the Ancient Egyptian storybook: </span></span><i style="color: #333333; font-family: times, "times new roman", serif; font-size: 18px;">The Story of Petese, Son of Petetum: and Seventy Other Good and Bad Stories.</i><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.008); color: #333333; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: 18px;"> </span><br />
<span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.008); color: #333333; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: 18px;"><br /></span>
<span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.008); color: #333333; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: 18px;">It's a strange story anyhow, for we find seventy other stories packed into the principal story, or story frame, of Petese. The priest Petese learns from the god Osiris, through a spirit messenger, that he has but 40 days left to live. His name is already inscribed on Osiris' netherworldly register.</span><br />
<span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.008); color: #333333; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: 18px;"><br /></span>
<span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.008); color: #333333; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: 18px;">After confronting the pain and shock, Petese plans three vehicles to convey him to immortality--a bit of crafty overkill typical of the Egyptians. First, he arranges for a lavish, even sumptuous, burial--an immortal tomb--which is what one may expect of a wealthy Egyptian priest. In Ancient Egypt, mummification and burial makes up not only the eternal monument of the worthy dead, it is the ceremonial gateway to eternal life. Second, Petese, through the agency of magical creatures he himself fashions, gathers 70 tales, 35 good, 35 bad. The Egyptian word for such a magical creature is <i>Hk.t</i>, a <i>hikat--</i>and note how story and magic flow together in a single stream. As Kim Ryholt observes, the collection, or composition, of these spellbinding tales, tales no less of the good and bad deeds of women, will win Petese deathless acclaim. Third, Petese also sets to work preparing a magic potion (<i>pHr.t</i>) which, when prepared by his widow (and on which side of the telling tally of tales will she land?)--for he will enter his coffin and "die"--will assure his escape from death altogether, even his resurrection. His life, his heart, is in a woman's hands.</span><br />
<span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.008); color: #333333; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: 18px;"><br /></span>
<span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.008); color: #333333; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: 18px;">Petese thus covers all bases--indeed achieves all three forays into immortality. And, for me, these three grand plans finally combine into one--his efforts comprehend the entire Egyptian encyclopedia of glorious immortality, even as the offerings of frankincense, myrrh, and kyphi evoke the three offerings to Re at morning, noon, and dusk, and thus also comprehend the immortal solar cycle to which Petese now, too, belongs (see Ryholt, here). Note further that 70 (the 70 tales) is for the Egyptians a solar number, a number of completeness.</span><br />
<span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.008); color: #333333; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: 18px;"><br /></span>
<span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.008); color: #333333; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: 18px;"><br /></span>
<span style="color: #333333; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.008); font-size: 18px;">So on to the moment in which his wife, of splendid name--The Beautiful One of Sakhmet--like Isis or Helen, administers the <i>pharmakon, </i>burning three measures of incense to the sun.</span></span><br />
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<span style="color: #333333; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.008); font-size: 18px;">Column 5, lines 24-30 (page 57):</span></span><br />
<span style="color: #333333; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.008); font-size: 18px;">After this, Sakhminofret [went] to his store-rooms on the morning of the following day. On this day, her heart was exceedingly sad because of Petese, her husband, who she did not see, and [she] truly [hoped (?) in (?)] her heart that Petese [had (?)] made the remedy for the illness. . . She acted according to everything which he had commanded [to her]. She put myrrh, frankincense, and kyphi, [on the brazier], and she said: My brother, Petese. Do you watch for yourself. O, son of Petetum. [I pray that] Re will rescue you in the remedies which you are making. Re spoke [with] her. He answered [her with the] voice of Petese. It reached her heart. Petese said [. . .</span></span><br />
<span style="color: #333333; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.008); font-size: 18px;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="color: #333333; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.008); font-size: 18px;">What a surprising outcome, the voice of Re:</span></span><br />
<span style="color: #333333; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.008); font-size: 18px;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="color: #333333; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.008); font-size: 18px;">Re spoke [with] her. He answered [her with the] voice of Petese. It reached her heart (<i>ph [=s] Xn H3t[=s]</i>. (The hieroglyphs may be found on pg. 19.)</span></span><br />
<span style="color: #333333; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.008); font-size: 18px;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="color: #333333; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.008); font-size: 18px;">It reached (<i>ph</i>) her heart, or it reached to within her heart (<i>ph Xn h3t</i>). </span></span><br />
<span style="color: #333333; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.008); font-size: 18px;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="color: #333333; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.008); font-size: 18px;">Re responds to the plea for deliverance from death and his voice descends: an act of <i>nHm, </i>of<i> rescue</i>.</span></span><br />
<span style="color: #333333; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.008); font-size: 18px;"><br /></span></span><span style="color: #333333; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.008); font-size: 18px;">Professor Ryholt comments on the story (p. 42):</span></span><br />
<span style="color: #333333; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.008); font-size: 18px;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="color: #333333; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.008); font-size: 18px;">"If it is correctly understood in lines 29-30 that Re answers Sakhminofret with the voice (<i>3spy</i>) of Petese, then the phrase 'it reached her heart (<i>ph=s Xn H3t=s</i>) must mean that she understood it. Erichsen, <i>DG</i>, 137, lists <i>di pH=s n H3t </i>in the meaning 'sich etwas ueberlegen, o.a.? consider something.'" </span></span><br />
<span style="color: #333333; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.008); font-size: 18px;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="color: #333333; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.008); font-size: 18px;">In other words, the idiom <i>it (the voice) reached her heart</i> means that Sakhminofret understood it: she understood the voice of her husband speaking to her through the medium of the divine voice, that is, "the tongue of angels." The voice "speaketh unto their understanding," that is, "unto the heart."</span></span><br />
<br />I began to reflecthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11853353050355842605noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7657330582593799810.post-55554481348364814182017-06-10T01:24:00.004-07:002022-08-28T23:29:21.296-07:00Eyewitness: Joseph Smith "Interpreted Hieroglyphics for Us"<b>"A prophet was a prophet only when he was acting as such"--Joseph Smith, <i>History of the Church</i> 5:265.</b><br />
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Oft repeated is the assertion that no on-the-spot, eyewitness account exists of Joseph Smith translating from the Egyptian papyri. Warren Parrish, scribe, gives but a one-line summary of his work, and three years after the fact: "I have set by his side and penned down the translation of Egyptian Hieroglyphicks as he claimed to receive it by direct inspiration of Heaven" (<i>Painesville Republican</i>, 5 February 1838). John Whitmer, the contemporary Church Historian, recorded: "Joseph the Seer saw <i>these Record[s]</i> and by the revelation of Jesus Christ could translate <i>these records</i>" (italics added: see "Book of Abraham Translation" in Church History Topics). The statement fully accords with what Orson Pratt later taught: The first gift given to the Prophet was that of <i>revelation: the power to translate</i> by the Urim and Thummim (<i>Journal of Discourses</i>, December 9, 1877, italics added).<br />
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For insight into what that seeric correlation of revelation and translation means, we turn to our guide and pattern in all things: the Book of Mormon. Here we find the accounts of King Mosiah I, translating, by revelation, or by the revelatory means of what the book calls "interpreters," engravings on a large stone, and of King Mosiah II translating, again by revelation, mysterious engravings on plates of ore. In each case, we find 1) an actual record, 2) written in an unknown language, 3) and a Seer, 4) who translates the same record by the revelation of God, that is, by instruments that convey the revelation of God, 5) a means of translation that belongs to God, and not to men. In such a way, and twice-over, the Book of Mormon explains, so far as it can or should be explained to our limited minds, how that or any other ancient record, brought to us in concrete form and lying before our eyes, can be read by the power of revelation.<br />
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We gratefully acknowledge these sparse insights from the Book of Mormon, and about the Book of Mormon, though the lack of such a first-hand account for the Book of Abraham leaves to the eyes of some a unbridgeable gap in understanding: How did the Prophet translate the Book of Abraham? What of the papyri? Owing to the supposed absence of an eyewitness account showing how the "work of translation" unfolded, an account that brings both papyri and the act of translation to one table, it's as commonly believed as not that the Prophet did not translate from the papyri he owned at all; instead, he "translated" by receiving a revelation about a lost record that he never once saw, as was indeed the case with his translation from a lost record of John the Beloved. As for the Egyptian artifacts, though so very physically present, many believe that these did not contain a record of Abraham at all but rather played the role of "prompt" or "catalyst" or "springboard" to the revealed "translation."<br />
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Joseph Smith was indeed given the translation of the Book of Abraham by revelation, but the words of Abraham were also inkbrushed onto a specific papyrus in his keeping, according to a clear statement in his last sermon, given on June 16, 1844, and recorded by Thomas Bullock: "I learned it by translating the papyrus now in my house." Did that papyrus contain all of what we have of Abraham's book? We clearly cannot quantify how many of the words of Abraham appear thereon, but it's clear that Joseph Smith read <i>at very least</i> the full ancient title of the book, <i>The Book of Abraham written by his own hand upon papyrus</i> (a typical ancient title, as Hugh Nibley pointed out), and it's also clear that the text of the Book of Abraham shows some remarkable parallels to the hieroglyphic text found on the hypocephalus, Facsimile 2. Then on June 16, 1844, the Prophet connects material found in Abraham Chapter 3 with hieroglyphic writing on a papyrus he owned. Did all of Chapter 3, <i>every last word or idea</i>, derive from that source? I doubt it; we don't know; and it doesn't matter. It's wrong for us to even ask the question.<br />
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From that date, Sunday, June 16, 1844, we move forward a mere eleven days to Thursday, June 27 and Martyrdom; and we move back exactly one month to Wednesday, May 15. These are days of witness, days of final--and lasting--doctrinal explanations to his hearers and of the final demonstrations of his prophetic power to teach new Christian doctrines, prophesy of future events, and, uniquely, to translate "by the gift and power of God." And so, the ministry of a Prophet closed as it began, with gifts, knowledge, and prophecy.<br />
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The assertion about there being no contemporaneous eyewitnesses linking papyri, or record, to spiritual interpretation is not entirely true. On Thursday, May 16, 1844, young Josiah Quincy, soon-to-be mayor of Boston, wrote his "very darling wife" about what it was like for him and Charles Francis Adams to spend an entire day with the Mormon Prophet.<br />
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So what was it like?<br />
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Thursday, May 16, 1844 (describing the events of the previous day, the 15th).<br />
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"We passed the whole day in his society and had one of the most extraordinary conversations I ever participated in he preached for us
prophesied for us interpreted hieroglyphics for us exhibited his mummies and took us to his temple which he is now erecting on a most majestic
site of hewn stone."<br />
<br />
Jed L. Woodworth, "Josiah Quincy's 1844 Visit with Joseph Smith," <i>BYU Studies</i> 39/4<br />
http://scholarsarchive.byu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=4071&context=byusq<br />
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Joseph Smith, to honor his esteemed guests, and to satisfy their wishes, was more than willing, by grace, to demonstrate for them, in "an extraordinary conversation," what it meant to be a Prophet, Seer, Revelator, and Translator, charged with spiritual gifts and powers. These remarkable moments unfolded in the most candid way possible--there was absolutely no reticence--and these visitors thus got to see who and what Joseph Smith professed to be, and, as he clearly intended, what they saw and heard that day left a lasting and "extraordinary" impression on both men. That is what they came to see and to hear, after all, and that is what they were given--but only by the kindness of God. What Brother Joseph chose to share yet reverberates; for many who have since read Quincy's and Adams's various accounts of the experience have likewise sensed something of what it was like to share a "whole day" with a Prophet. How it impressed this reader as a child!<br />
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Josiah Quincy uses many active verbs to describe to his wife what an energetic and inspired Joseph Smith did and said that day, mundane and otherwise, but it is a special few that describe his renowned prophetic gifts:<br />
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On greeting them:<br />
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He "blessed us."<br />
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Then, throughout the day:<br />
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"He preached for us,<br />
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prophesied for us,<br />
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interpreted hieroglyphics for us."<br />
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Latter-day Saints will fondly note where this "extraordinary conversation" ultimately led--<i>to the Holy Temple</i>. He "took us to [the] temple."<br />
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Jed Woodworth has edited the letter to a perfection and sorted out how it correlates with the other, more famous, and more whimsical, accounts of Quincy and Adams, including Adams's diary. (Quincy's ten-page journalizing on the visit has never been archived.) Yet as we take up this priceless letter, we must also momentarily set these other records aside. We must take that rare fresh look at a much repeated conversation. What this letter does better than all other accounts, in their paint and detail, is to capture, with succinctness, the interview as a manifestation of spiritual charisma, something Joseph Smith himself described as that special moment when a Prophet speaks and acts as a Prophet, something Scriptures describe as a Prophet speaking by the power of the Holy Ghost.<br />
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These two men might as well have find themselves suddenly alongside Nephi, as he journeyed in the wilderness from Jerusalem, a man who "opened his mouth and it was filled" (Doctrine and Covenants 64), or, again, with seeric king Mosiah, when he interpreted engravings on a large stone by the power of God, a stone others carried into his presence. And whether Mosiah interpreted the writings one or many times for the benefit of wondering court visitors, each time the mysterious characters had to succumb once again to the seeric vision.<br />
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All this is to throw together the "extraordinary" with the diurnal. Brother Joseph's clothing and home, said Quincy, were both somewhat "dirty"; the "conversation" came pure.<br />
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And note how <i>message</i> takes second place to the <i>act</i> itself--really, a demonstration in three acts. What mattered was the sign, the expression: what we might call the prophetic "speech-act." These guests wanted to see prophecy in action, not learn doctrine. The men wondered about Joseph as Minister of the Gospel: He preached by the power of the Holy Ghost. And note that he "preached for us," not "to us." They marveled at his claims to be a Prophet: he accordingly prophesied. They had wondered at his translation and publication of New Scripture--a unique and curious pretense. To satisfy that wonderment, he interpreted hieroglyphs from a roll of papyrus.<br />
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And note it well, the Prophet did not show them a copy of the translated Book of Abraham as published in the <i>Times and Seasons</i> newspaper, or anything like that, that is, <i>What</i> I translated. No. He took up the papyrus to show them <i>How</i> I "interpreted hieroglyphics." And it makes no difference whether he had preached to this particular theme or translated that particular line before, the gift--with assertion, yes, but no fanfare--was both summoned and manifested in their immediate present and in their profane presence. Add a little dirt to a warm Spring day in Illinois and it won't affect the presence of the Divine one iota.<br />
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The pair were given to understand that they were witnessing the "act" of divine translation itself, firsthand, and in expression of authoritative charisma. Adams's diary records that Joseph Smith concluded the demonstration with "I say it!"<br />
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Who said it? Brother Joseph, in plain humility, once taught: "A prophet was a prophet only when he was acting as such." On May 15, 1844, 15 years to the day of the appearance of John the Baptist and his ordination to the Priesthood, Joseph Smith certainly "was acting as such."<br />
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As remarkable as it all sounds, such odd conjunction of the mundane and the highly charged appears from time-to-time in accounts others left of their own encounters with Joseph Smith, moments in which he took up, in their very presence, the prophetic mantle. He might preach many times from a particular text or two found in Mark or Matthew; he might repeatedly prophesy of judgments on Missouri--or the like--but for each new hearer the experience was doubtless startling and unique: their chance to meet a Prophet "acting as such."<br />
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What does it mean to translate as seer and revelator? How does that differ from other acts of translation? What does it mean to prophecy? How does the preaching of a living prophet differ from that of other men? The questions all collapse into one: What does one see, hear, and feel in the presence of a working Prophet of God? Or, What can one see, hear, and feel? The answer may depend on the individual observer. And what does it mean when each of us is also told "that it is by my power [that] you can read them [the Revelations] one to another" (Doctrine and Covenants 18:35). The Lord invites us to read His Scriptures, but when we read "in spirit and in truth," "they shall be read by the power of Christ" (John 4:24; 2 Nephi 27:11).<br />
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Many, it would appear, were those who passed a spell in the Book of Mormon "translation room" back in Pennsylvania, in 1829--1830, and, as did Adams and Quincy, witnessed an act of prophetic translation. What they reportedly observed of translation, and what the Bostonian pair observed, do not essentially differ. The action partook of no mystic element. Without ceremony, a man dictated, or claimed to dictate, into plain English, characters found in "records of ancient date" (Mosiah 8:13).<br />
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"These were days never to be forgotten," writes scribe Oliver Cowdery, who, "day after day," as he puts it, witnessed the divine gift and power of interpretation. These were long days of listening to an ordinary voice dictate, but along with the seemingly<div>
mundane, he attests that the entire work unfolded "by the inspiration of heaven," a reality certainly lost on the merely curious observer. But might not the ordinary voice and the long days spell boredom? Read the Book of Mormon sometime.<br />
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Day after day--or just today--let us walk and talk with Joseph Smith as he takes up the prophetic mantle and speaks and prophesies and translates by what he called "the unspeakable power of the Holy Ghost." And remember: What is unspeakable is not all to be understood, or even at all to be understood. Yet we can attest that we have heard, and now hear, in extraordinary conversation, God's voice speaking through a living Prophet, from Joseph Smith to Thomas S. Monson, in our walk today. (See, again, Doctrine and Covenants 18:34-36).<br />
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<br /></div>I began to reflecthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11853353050355842605noreply@blogger.com0