Another Gee/Schryver Deception Exposed

The catch-all forum for general topics and debates. Minimal moderation. Rated PG to PG-13.
_The Dude
_Emeritus
Posts: 2976
Joined: Wed Nov 01, 2006 3:16 am

Re: The Gee/Schryver Deception

Post by _The Dude »

Kevin Graham wrote:I think this is funny because wade just informed me in celestial that we have no business questioning a bonafide Egyptologist on these matters. According to him, trusting anyone else is like taking someone with heart disease to a computer programmer instead of a cardiologist.


Oh, that's a great analogy.

Here's another: like Tarski using Google to diagnose his own rhabdomyolysis instead of waiting for a specialist to tell him.
"And yet another little spot is smoothed out of the echo chamber wall..." Bond
_Kevin Graham
_Emeritus
Posts: 13037
Joined: Fri Oct 27, 2006 6:44 pm

Re: Another Gee/Schryver Deception Exposed

Post by _Kevin Graham »

Aristotle Smith wrote:Kevin, thanks for the summary and refutation of Gee/Schryver. It's no wonder that Gee was MIA at the last FAIR conference and that Schryver either volunteered or was put up to do the dirty work.

I have a theoretical question for you. Suppose the church gave you an offer you couldn't refuse to defend the Book of Abraham. They give you reassurances that you would only have to privately deliver a paper to LDS Inc., that your name would be kept confidential, and that they wouldn't expect you to personally defend the Book of Abraham after the paper. Once you are done with the paper, you can wash your hands of the whole thing. Now, for whatever reason you decide to take up the church on that offer. How or what would you do to defend the Book of Abraham, what's the best case the apologists can possibly make?

I'm just trying to see what's left for apologists to actually work with. It seems that Joseph Smith slammed the door shut to so many explanations that a believer could use to wiggle out of Book of Abraham problems, defending the Book of Mormon seems to be a cake walk compared to defending the Book of Abraham.

Also, Celestial Kingdom, feel free to also answer this question.


Tough one.

But I'd probably have to go with catalyst, and try to avoid the topic altogether and minimize exposure to the problems. This is what the Church tried to do for more than a century but then when Marquart and Metcalfe let the cat out of the bag, they eventually realized that was no longer an option. Sitting on the documents while pretending they were of no consequence, was an act in contradiction.

What I would definately do is abandon the intellectually insulting apologetics, by dropping the missing papyrus theory, the 40ft papyrus theory, the scribes did it theory, and of course the "substantial word analysis" theory, which is the mother of all idiocies.
_Kevin Graham
_Emeritus
Posts: 13037
Joined: Fri Oct 27, 2006 6:44 pm

Re: The Gee/Schryver Deception

Post by _Kevin Graham »

The Dude wrote:Oh, that's a great analogy.

Here's another: like Tarski using Google to diagnose his own rhabdomyolysis instead of waiting for a specialist to tell him.


Touché!

Best healthcare in the world eh?
_Doctor Scratch
_Emeritus
Posts: 8025
Joined: Sat Apr 18, 2009 4:44 pm

Re: Another Gee/Schryver Deception Exposed

Post by _Doctor Scratch »

Aristotle Smith wrote:I have a theoretical question for you. Suppose the church gave you an offer you couldn't refuse to defend the Book of Abraham. They give you reassurances that you would only have to privately deliver a paper to LDS Inc., that your name would be kept confidential, and that they wouldn't expect you to personally defend the Book of Abraham after the paper. Once you are done with the paper, you can wash your hands of the whole thing. Now, for whatever reason you decide to take up the church on that offer. How or what would you do to defend the Book of Abraham, what's the best case the apologists can possibly make?

I'm just trying to see what's left for apologists to actually work with. It seems that Joseph Smith slammed the door shut to so many explanations that a believer could use to wiggle out of Book of Abraham problems, defending the Book of Mormon seems to be a cake walk compared to defending the Book of Abraham.



Maybe Pres. Monson could receive new revelation that the Book of Abraham is not canonical scripture?
"[I]f, while hoping that everybody else will be honest and so forth, I can personally prosper through unethical and immoral acts without being detected and without risk, why should I not?." --Daniel Peterson, 6/4/14
_Kevin Graham
_Emeritus
Posts: 13037
Joined: Fri Oct 27, 2006 6:44 pm

Re: Another Gee/Schryver Deception Exposed

Post by _Kevin Graham »

Maybe Pres. Monson could receive new revelation that the Book of Abraham is not canonical scripture?


That would probably be the best thing for the Church, just so they can avoid the issue by throwing it into the usual, "that's not official doctrine" bin. This is standard protocol for doctrinal matters that become overwhelming for them.

Ben McGuire once mentioned to me that he thought the Book of Abraham never should have been canonized to begin with. Either way, the evidence still proves Joseph Smith was a fraud who only claimed the ability to translate ancient documents.
_CaliforniaKid
_Emeritus
Posts: 4247
Joined: Wed Jan 10, 2007 8:47 am

Re: Another Gee/Schryver Deception Exposed

Post by _CaliforniaKid »

Kevin Graham wrote:But I'd probably have to go with catalyst, and try to avoid the topic altogether and minimize exposure to the problems.

Yeah, I think the catalyst is the best option for them at the moment. That's at least honestly reconcilable with the historical evidence, even if it's not very appealing to most people.
_Themis
_Emeritus
Posts: 13426
Joined: Wed Feb 17, 2010 6:43 pm

Re: Another Gee/Schryver Deception Exposed

Post by _Themis »

Kevin Graham wrote:
Ben McGuire once mentioned to me that he thought the Book of Abraham never should have been canonized to begin with. Either way, the evidence still proves Joseph Smith was a fraud who only claimed the ability to translate ancient documents.


It amazes me that such intelligent nice people like Ben can view the Book of Abraham as not really true, but yet not see how obvious this also relates to the Book of Mormon, etc.
42
_Themis
_Emeritus
Posts: 13426
Joined: Wed Feb 17, 2010 6:43 pm

Re: Another Gee/Schryver Deception Exposed

Post by _Themis »

CaliforniaKid wrote:Yeah, I think the catalyst is the best option for them at the moment. That's at least honestly reconcilable with the historical evidence, even if it's not very appealing to most people.


The catalyst theory never made sense to me. Is God really stupid enough to give Joseph revelation he thinks is written on some papyri and not at least correct him on it so as to not deceive him and others as well as avoid so many future problems with it. I mean if he can tell Joseph some very specific information to come up with the Book of Mormon, Book of Abraham, why would he be so stupid not to tell him it's source is or where it is not.
42
_CaliforniaKid
_Emeritus
Posts: 4247
Joined: Wed Jan 10, 2007 8:47 am

Re: Another Gee/Schryver Deception Exposed

Post by _CaliforniaKid »

To be persuasive, I think the catalyst theory would have to operate under a different God-concept. Rather than God deliberately intervening in history to give Joseph revelation, this would have to be Joseph striving to commune with inner divine light. In other words, human-initiated experience of the divine rather than divine-initiated "revelation" of some literal truth.

I'm thinking of something along the lines of the Emersonian poet:

Jesus Christ belonged to the true race of prophets. He saw with open eye the mystery of the soul. Drawn by its severe harmony, ravished with its beauty, he lived in it, and had his being there. Alone in all history, he estimated the greatness of man. One man was true to what is in you and me. He saw that God incarnates himself in man, and evermore goes forth anew to take possession of his world. He said, in this jubilee of sublime emotion, `I am divine. Through me, God acts; through me, speaks. Would you see God, see me; or, see thee, when thou also thinkest as I now think.' But what a distortion did his doctrine and memory suffer in the same, in the next, and the following ages! There is no doctrine of the Reason which will bear to be taught by the Understanding. The understanding caught this high chant from the poet's lips, and said, in the next age, `This was Jehovah come down out of heaven. I will kill you, if you say he was a man.' The idioms of his language, and the figures of his rhetoric, have usurped the place of his truth; and churches are not built on his principles, but on his tropes. Christianity became a Mythus, as the poetic teaching of Greece and of Egypt, before. He spoke of miracles; for he felt that man's life was a miracle, and all that man doth, and he knew that this daily miracle shines, as the character ascends. But the word Miracle, as pronounced by Christian churches, gives a false impression; it is Monster. It is not one with the blowing clover and the falling rain.


In Joseph Smith's case, the "mythus" would be the historical Book of Abraham. And it would be not something invented by his followers after his death, but something he himself believed.

Peace,

-Chris
_sock puppet
_Emeritus
Posts: 17063
Joined: Fri Jul 23, 2010 2:52 pm

Re: Another Gee/Schryver Deception Exposed

Post by _sock puppet »

My biggest problem with the catalyst theory is that it requires deception by god, either leading or allowing JSJr to think he's actually linguistically translating these ancient records when it ain't so.

Did their god really not trust JSJr to understand and accept what was really going on, but expect us--with the help of apologists--to understand and accept that god was deceptively using JSJr? Isn't JSJr supposed to be pretty damn high up in the eternal scope of things? And yet he couldn't be trusted by god with the truth?

I may agree that the catalyst theory is the best that they have for a defense, but like their other BoAbr apologetics, it doesn't add up.
Post Reply