A few questions for Shulem

[_Shulem]

Yep. I have come around to agreeing that the way to refute the apologists these days on the papyri and Book of Abraham issues is to quote Joseph Smith back at them. It's the entire premise and response of my paper I wrote. See here. No polemics, just the evidence from Joseph Smith himself and the probabilities http://drpepaw.wixsite.com/backyardprof ... e-Evidence

Yes indeed, and don't forget the 28 page thread in which zerinus got his ass kicked and has since hightailed it out of here like a deer running from the headlights.

Coward!



Joseph Smith & a LITERAL 3500 Year Old Abraham Autograph
http://mormondiscussions.com/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=46549

[_Philo Sofee]

Yep. I have come around to agreeing that the way to refute the apologists these days on the papyri and Book of Abraham issues is to quote Joseph Smith back at them. It's the entire premise and response of my paper I wrote. See here. No polemics, just the evidence from Joseph Smith himself and the probabilities http://drpepaw.wixsite.com/backyardprof ... e-Evidence

Yes indeed, and don't forget the 28 page thread in which zerinus got his ass kicked and has since hightailed it out of here like a deer running from the headlights.

Coward!



Joseph Smith & a LITERAL 3500 Year Old Abraham Autograph
http://mormondiscussions.com/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=46549

Shulem, you are a one man army/wrecking crew! That is a phenonmenal thread!

[_Fence Sitter]

I'm aware of some of their work. Have they commented on the missing sections at the top of the papyri and how they became missing and if they match up? I think it may have been one of them that made me aware of the evidence suggesting the missing sections I am talking about were missing before Joseph got the papyri.

So first you may want to read this short paper by Cook and Smith demonstrating that the missing section at the interior of the Hor scroll is about 56 cm or about 22 inches. The Original Length of the Scroll of Hôr

As I discussed above, I think it is reasonable to assume that the Hor scroll was in somewhat the same shape it is in now when it arrived at Kirtland. The thing with the damage on the top is that in all likelihood it occurred when the scroll was rolled up or maybe when it was unrolled.


See for example this photo or this unrolled papyrus scroll here.

So that scroll damage, be it on top or on the bottom or both as is the case with the Hor scroll, can used to measure winding lengths. A winding length is the length from from a damaged spot to a damage spot. This will either be the full circumference of the roll or 1/2 of the circumference of the roll at the damaged spots depending on whether or not the damage is completely across the top or just part way.

This is easy to demonstrate. Take a roll of toilet paper which is mostly gone, take a pair of scissors and cut a 'v' shaped section out of the top on one edge, then unwind it, you can then take the measurements of of the first few sequential notches on the outer most end of the roll and extrapolate those dimensions out to see how long the entire section of TP is. Since each dimension gets smaller as we proceed to the interior end of the roll it is possible to determine what the maximum length that the roll would have been. (With the toilet paper roll you have to determine what the circumference of the cardboard inner roll is and deduct that from your equation to get a final length but you still get the idea how this is done.)You also do not need all of the roll to make this determination, just a few successive measurements at the beginning to make the calculation.

Cook and Smith's paper lays all this out along with the math showing how they determined the length of the scroll.

[_Shulem]

This also explains why other parts of the missing section were not recreated correctly. Such as the bird.

Sorry I skipped over that. You know there are two birds in question.



Considering the bird over Abraham's head: The bird head on the original papyrus doesn't match the Facsimile wood cut at all. Hedlock totally goofed up and was not faithful to the design leading to the actual head as shown on the papyrus -- opting for a different kind of head to represent Smith's dove rather than the Egyptian human headed Ba soul.

That's Joseph Smith, recreating his idea of ancient Egyptian funerary imagery. It's pathetic, I know. The Mormon prophet desecrated the papyrus with Christian symbolism or the sign of the dove. The Mormons just ate that garbage up along with all the other crap Smith peddled.

[_Shulem]

Can you sketch in what might have been chiseled out? that might give another perspective as to what was originally there.

I'm afraid an artistic manipulation of this kind is outside the scope of my ability in presenting something credible or realistic. It would require the work of an artist who is skilled in engraving. But from what I can see in the wood cut there is an ample footprint wherein a proper jackal head was first cut and likely test printed but afterward redesigned under the direct supervision of the prophet himself. The more I look at that wood cut under magnification the more I'm convinced the jackal head was original to the papyrus which is now lost. Why Smith would change this is anyone's guess but we have to consider the evidence and question everything.

One thing is for sure: The person in the papyrus is none other than the jackal headed god, Anubis, as represented by the characters above his head:

Recitation by Anubis, who makes protection(?), foremost of the embalming booth.

And so it begins!

[_Fence Sitter]

I can only imagine that the missing roll theory is evaporating and no longer carries weight in LDS apologetic circles. The extant papyrus and the Facsimiles demonstrate that Joseph Smith used them to translate and produce his phony interpretations. The fantasized Egyptian Alphabet and Grammar is additional proof to show how Joseph Smith and his comrades pulled off their Egyptological caper.

Another straw to add to the already broken back of the missing scroll theory.

First off for those who do not know, there is a known missing section in the middle of the Hor/Book of Abraham scroll. No one disputes that, what is in dispute is the length of this section. Here is another tidbit from Ritner, backed up by Lanny Bell as to how long that missing section could have been based on textual analysis of other similar texts.

In your new thread about whether or not Joseph Smith had the face of Anubis altered I noted that the vignettes in books of breathing like the Hor permit were not standardized. As of 2005, thirty three examples of hieratic "Breathing Permits" had been identified. In all of these "Permits" the "text is fixed, with very little deviation" Seehere on page 2-2.

This has led Ritner to declare in 2010 in his book

This specific form of "permit" was used by (often interrelated) priestly families in Thebes and its vicinity from the middle Ptolemaic to early Roman eras, and the limited distribution probably accounts for their uniform pattern,
which displays only minor modifications.

As a result of this uniformity, the original size of the papyrus is not in doubt.
With textual restorations and the now lost Facsimile 3, the papyrus will have measured about 150-155 cm [about 5'-0"]....there is no reasonable expectation of any further text. Gee has repeatedly insisted that the Breathing Permit was "followed by another text, the only portions of which have been preserved are the maddeningly elliptical opening words: 'Beginning of the Book of...'" No such words "have been preserved" and the statement derives from an early error in reading the text by Seyffarth and a guess, recast as a fact, by Gee.

See Ritner pg 87

We have the majority of Hor scroll from which Joseph Smith pretended to translate the Book of Abraham.
We know exactly which characters on the Hor scroll he used to produce the first chapter and a half of the Book of Abraham.
We even know that in one missing area next to where he was translating he just made up his own Egyptian characters.
We know what was on the missing portions of the Hor scroll.
We know how long the missing portion of the Hor scroll is.
There is no evidence at all that what is missing from the original Egyptian collection contains anything other than standard funerary documents. NONE.

And yet we keep hearing about the missing scroll.

[_Maksutov]

It's kind of like the God of the Gaps. The incredible shrinking Book of Abraham source.

[_Themis]

This also explains why other parts of the missing section were not recreated correctly. Such as the bird.

Sorry I skipped over that. You know there are two birds in question.

I am, which would be another reason that the missing part of fac 1 in the papyri was missing before Joseph ever saw it. The significance of the woodcutting original having a more jackal like head just supports that the missing head of anibus is that of a jackal as Egyptology has always said. It would further undermine apologia that Joseph had a very unique scene with a human priest holding a knife. I have always thought the second hand looked more like the tip of a wing, as the other hand had all four fingers of the same length, the other supposed fingers were feathered out at different lengths.

[_Shulem]

And yet we keep hearing about the missing scroll.

Thank you for the contribution and source material that provides expert analysis involving the papyrus. The missing roll theory is getting smaller and smaller with each passing day. Eventually it will be totally disregarded and the catalyst theory will take center stage. But with that said, the catalyst theory is already DOA and is something entirely concocted by modern Mormons who run the early saints over with their apologetic bus. Today's apologists are heartless and run them over leaving a pile of bodies under the bus, most notably, poor Joseph who started the whole thing. The prophet Joseph Smith is under the bus.

[_Shulem]

I am, which would be another reason that the missing part of fac 1 in the papyri was missing before Joseph ever saw it. The significance of the woodcutting original having a more jackal like head just supports that the missing head of anibus is that of a jackal as Egyptology has always said. It would further undermine apologia that Joseph had a very unique scene with a human priest holding a knife. I have always thought the second hand looked more like the tip of a wing, as the other hand had all four fingers of the same length, the other supposed fingers were feathered out at different lengths.

Prior to the printing of the actual Facsimile the only knife people saw was the one Joseph Smith penciled in with the fictitious human head on the paper backing in which the papyrus was mounted. Some knife!



The knife in the actual Facsimile was a later convention taken out of Joseph Smith's Egyptian play book. The first knife was rejected and a second knife was fabricated right out of thin air along with the rest of Joseph's silly Egyptian revelations.