Abrahams Facsimile #2

[_Gazelam]

The time of Abraham is disputed, but I found a nice little article on it:

Dating of Abraham
Just when did Abraham live? We can't know that for sure either. It is difficult to find fixed events in Genesis that can be connected absolutely to dates established from archaeology.

One approach to dating Abraham is to backtrack from the first fixed event we find in the Bible -- a statement that Solomon laid the temple foundation in the 480th year after the exodus (1 Kings 6:1), which would date the exodus at about 1447-1446 BC. Working backward from the genealogies and other data in the Pentateuch puts the birth of Abraham in 2166 BC, and frames Abraham's life from 2166 to 1991 BC.[11] However, there are several problems with this approach. First, textual: the Greek Septuagint and the Samaritan Pentateuch agree with Paul (Galatians 3:17) that the 430 years of Exodus 12:40 apply to the whole time span between Abraham and the Exodus, not just the Israelite stay in Egypt as the Hebrew Masoretic text would suggest, bringing Abraham's birth year to 1952.[12] Second, genealogies in Bible occasionally skip generations.

Another approach to dating Abraham uses a combination of history and archaeology. One prong is the dating of the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah (Genesis 19) by some kind of cataclysmic event, which archaeological evidence seems to point to around 1900 BC.[13]

You can also compare the lifestyle described in Genesis to archaeological findings to find a match. At the end of the Early Bronze Age (2400 to 2000 BC), Palestine was in a post-urban phase, with numerous settlements, camps, and cemeteries in the Jordan Valley and the Negev-Sinai. The Palestine described in Genesis also was sparsely populated, with few if any urban centers. By about 1800 BC, a number of urban centers had developed -- Dan, Hazor, Akko, Shechem, Aphek, Jerusalem, Jericho, and Ashdod. By 1600 BC, there were a number of heavily fortified sites, such as Gezer and Shechem. But, by 1550 BC, nearly every city in Palestine had been destroyed by the Egyptians driving out the Hyksos from Egypt.[14]

The Hyksos, a Semitic rather than Egyptian people, ruled over Syria, Palestine, and Egypt 1650 to 1542 BC until they were driven out by the Egyptian Amosis (Pharaoh Amenhotep I), founder of the Eighteenth Dynasty. It is easier to image the non-Egyptian slave Joseph rising to the position of second in the kingdom under a Hyksos ruler (1786 to 1575 BC), than under an Egyptian ruler, either before or after the Hyksos period. The period after the Hyksos dynasties would be expected to yield the pharaoh "who knew not Joseph" (Exodus 1:8), who would oppress the Semitic peoples remaining in Egypt.[15]

Depending upon how one views the evidence, Abraham might fit into Middle Bronze I (2100-1900 BC, Nelson Glueck and William F. Albright), Middle Bronze II (1900-1550, Ephraim A. Speiser), or the Amarna Period of the Late Bronze Age (early 14th century, Cyrus H. Gordon).[16] Of course, there are no archaeological findings that refer specifically to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, so where they fit into the archaeological periods isn't precise, but we can place the birth of Abraham with some degree of confidence between 2100 and 1800 BC.[17]

Nibley has a small section on dating, and he states that the times are argued roughly along the same lines as the article above. Cutting and pasting the above was easier than typing out the chapter from "Abraham in Egypt".

Source:

http://www.jesuswalk.com/abraham/0_intro.htm

[_Fortigurn]

To fortigurn: I don't have time to address all your points right now as I'm heading off to work. But let me just say that I did not "shoot myself in the foot" as you say. I didn't mean to insinuate that he was tryanslating via real knowledge. He wasn't at all. What I'm saying is that Joseph Smith demonstrated through other means (like his wildly erratic egyptian alphabet) that he knew very little egyptian if any at all. Its with this assumption that the fascimile captions should be read. If he knows no egyptian, then those points are pretty damn close. And in translation (especially a glyph language like egyptian) pretty damn close is close enough, since so much relies on the context.

Well you see, this is my point:

* If he was inspired, we would expect a far greater accuracy from Smith (in fact we would expect 100% accuracy)

* If he wasn't using his knowledge of Egyptian, then there's no point in mentioning it

The fact is that his guesswork is about what we would expect of someone with little to no knowledge of Egyptian. It is not what we would expect of someone who is inspired.

I think you need to read some of those explinations more carefully, some of your criticisms showed that you missed the significance of some of the elements.

Walk me through it, please.

It also might be helpful for you to understand that in egyptian the "God of something" is often used in place of that thing in heiroglyphics. And when I say often I mean more often than not. So figure six for example is actually dead on.

You're missing the point. The fact is that the heirogphy still shows the god, not the thing itself. So when you read the hieroglyph, and someone asks you what it is, you should say 'It's the god X, who is used to represent Y'.

And when talking about the 25 out of 30 percentage, the other five were not contradictory, just uncommon interpretations.

Evidence please. How many professional non-LDS Egyptologists agree with Smiths' translation? Let's have the list please. Just the top ten, as I said.

And really, if Joseph Smith actually knew no egyptian at all, which he really didn't (in fact no one did at that time) then 25 our of 30 really is remarkeable.

But he didn't get 25 out of 30 right. He didn't even get half of that.

[_Fortigurn]

Gaz, can you explain the connection between the shield of Achilles and the Book of Abraham? So far all I have is that they're both circles with historical scenes on them. Is that it?

In addition, are there any non-LDS professionals who agree with Joseph Smith's translation of the Book of Abraham?

Tucked away at the end there is a quote from Justin Martyr that is the crux of sorts to the arguement. I should have bolded the statement when I made the post. I will post the source of the quote later when my wife gets up from her nap and I can retrieve the book:

Those whp protest that it is extravagent if not impious to look for ties between the Father of the Faithful and the pagan Homer may be referred to the earliest and most revered of ancient Christian apologists, Justin Martyr himself, who sees in the Shield of Achilles a most obvious borrowing from the book of Genesis, explaining the coincidence by suggesting that Homer became aquainted with Moses' cosmic teachings while he was in Egypt. For him the shield "proves that the poet [Homer] incorporated into his own work many things from the sacred history of the Prophets; first of all the account of the Creation in the Beginning as given by Moses, 'In the beginning God created the heaven,' etc. Having learned these things in Egypt, and impressed [pleased] by what he [Moses] had writen about the origin of the cosmos, he depicted it in the Shield of Achilles, with Hephaestus [the Smith] in the role of the Creator of the world."

Justin source: Justin Martyr, [I]Cohortatio ad Graecos (A Hortatory Address to the Greks) 28, in PG 6:293.

PG means: J.-P. Migne, ed., Patrologiae Cursus Comletus... Series Graeca, 161 vols. (Paris: Garnier, 1857-66)

Yes, I did read that. Martyr believes that Homer learned about Moses' teachings in Eygpt. It was common among the Greek Christian apologists to claim that the greatest of the Greek philosophers and scientists had derived their knowledge from Jewish sources. Of course, none of it was true. They made it all up. They had people meeting each other, who didn't even live in the same century.

So I don't see how this is any evidence for the Book of Abraham.

[_Gazelam]

Dang it Gaz I've been getting all geared up for a post on this subject and it was going to be much better supported than this. But I'm not ready yet.

Oh, theres always room for more, just start a new post. I just found this snippet really interesting and wanted to share it. Theres a mountain of things to discuss about the Book of Abraham.

[_Inconceivable]

[

In my opinion, the issue in question is justifying over a century of misquotes from latter day prophets and apostles referring to the original misquotes. The original misquote in this case being: using an incorrect definition of the word "TRANSLATE".

Book of Abraham a direct "translation"? No, that is an inaccurate description yet the word was coined by those that "translated" it.

Book of Abraham something other than a "direct translation from the Egyptian"? Yes, but then what is implicated concerning those that testified that it was indeed a "direct translation"?


Could the Kinderhook incident take on any different relevance?

So pull out the harpoon, yet it leaves a nasty and potentially mortal wound.

[_Quantumwave]

I have been reading Hugh Nibleys work on Abraham and Egypt, and thought I'd share something realy interesting from one of the ewarly chapters.

There has been alot of talk about Joseph Smith being wrong about the facsimiles being not what he thought, that they are just typical burial writings found in many coffins. What is proposed tough is that the Egyptians got the original drawings and teachings from Abraham in the first place.

Here is facimile #2:


There is a mountain of things that could be said about what is contained and taught in that picture. What is to be understood is that this is an effort to display the prophetic vision similar to that discused by Lehi in Nephi chp 1 and by Moses in Moses chp. 1. The doctrines taught in Abraham concernign the pre-existence no doubt came from this vision.

In the various Abraham accounts, both ours and others known (And the things taught in these other book of Abrahams support Joseph Smiths account), Abraham is shown all these things by an Angel.

At the outset of their journey, the angel promises to show Abraham what is " in the fulness of the whole world and its circle - thou shalt gaze in (them) all." Accordingly, he saw the pattern of the heavens, "the firmaments,... the creation foreshadowed in this expance,...the age prepared according to it. And I saw beneath the sixth heaven,...the earth and its fruits, and what moved upon it... and the power of its men... And I saw there a great multitude - mean and women and children, [half of them on the right side of the picture] and half of them on the left side of the picture." "And I said... 'Who are the people in this picture on this side and that?' And he said to me: 'These which are on the left side are...some for judgement and restoration, and others for vengeance and destrruction... But these which are on the right side of the picture,... these are they whom I have ordained to be born of thee and to be called My People'" "And I looked and saw; lo! the picture swayed and [from it] emerged, on its left side, a heathen people, and they pillaged those who were on the right side." (Apocalypse of Abraham)

Note that Abraham was shown all these things in a picture, a graphic representaion of "the whole world in its circle," in which the whole human race, "God's people and the others," confront each other beneath or withen the circle of the starry heavens, on opposite halves of the picture. To the classical scholar, this evokes one of the most ancient and venerable images of antiquity, the famous Shield of Achilles, as described by Homer in book 18 of the Illiad

it was a great round (Grosskreutz.antyx) shield, with a conspicuous rim around the outside, representing the celestial ocean. it was covered with designs of deep signifigance (Grosskreutz. iduiesi prapidessin), designating earth, sea, and sky, including sun, moon, and constelations, in their relative positions and motions. Human society was also indicated, divided into two parts, one, a community at peace, the other at war. The former are engaged in religious rites and festivals, marriages, dancing, and music and games, with housewives relaxed and happy watching from their doors; there is a solemn but lively law court in session in the town square, with freedom of speech and great prize for the wisest. A long idylic poem describes the happy agrarian life, enjoying the fruits of the earth in its seasons in a peaceful and prosperous kingdom. The other city is at war, besieged on two sides by armies that are already quarreling over the expected loot, even while the besieged are laying deadly ambush for them. What a fine sight as they go forth in their splendid armor! But presently the fine sight becomes a nightmare, an orgy of slaughter on both sides, as Eris (Strife, contention) and Confusion enter the fray while Fate in a blood-soaked robe runs about spreading havoc and butchery.

The pictures are equally lurid and inspiring in Homer's and in Abraham's accounts. While Abraham is repeatedly invited to inspect and ask about "the world and its circle," Homer refers us to an equally tangible design placed on a round shield. Those whp protest that it is extravagent if not impious to look for ties between the Father of the Faithful and the pagan Homer may be referred to the earliest and most revered of ancient Christian apologists, Justin Martyr himself, who sees in the Shield of Achilles a most obvious borrowing from the book of Genesis, explaining the coincidence by suggesting that Homer became aquainted with Moses' cosmic teachings while he was in Egypt. For him the shield "proves that the poet [Homer] incorporated into his own work many things from the sacred history of the Prophets; first of all the account of the Creation in the Beginning as given by Moses, 'In the beginning God created the heaven,' etc. Having learned these things in [I]Egypt, and impressed [pleased] by what he [Moses] had writen about the origin of the cosmos, he depicted it in the Shield of Achilles, with Hephaestus [the Smith] in the role of the Creator of the world."

Gaz: I'm sure you've seen this before, but since it provides evidence from non-LDS professional Egyptologists, I will provide it for you to review.

Without listing the many problems with fac-simile no 2 found by professional Egyptologists, the following quote gives a representative summary of their assessment. This is from the book, Joseph Smith Jr, as translator, by F. S. Spalding D.D.

It is difficult to deal seriously with Joseph Smith’s impudent fraud. His fac-simile from the Book of Abraham No. 2 is an ordinary hypocephalus, but the hieroglyphics upon it have been copied so ignorantly that hardly one of them is correct. I need scarce say that Kolob, etc., are unknown to the Egyptian language.

Dr A. H. Sace, Oxford, England

This was published over 90 years ago, but is as valid now as it was then. There have been no “new developments” to change the assessment of the Egyptologists recorded in the book.