Skousen & McGuire apologetics on the Book of Abraham.
Posted: Mon Jul 24, 2023 9:43 pm
"The Book of Abraham was a revelation given to Joseph Smith, who later (mistakenly thinking it was a translation from the papyri he had in his possession) tried to connect the revealed text to the papyri by inserting two sentences, verse 12c and verse 14, into Abraham 1. The secondary nature of these two inserted sentences can be directly observed in the photos of folios 1a and 1b in the document identified as Ab2. Verse 12c is totally inserted intralinearly, not partially (as incorrectly represented in the accompanying transcription – and without comment). Verse 14 is not written on the page as are other portions of this part of the text (instead, it is written flush to the left), which implies that it is a comment on the papyri and that it was added to the revealed text. Overall, these results imply that all the facsimiles from the papyri (1-3 in the published Pearl of Great Price) should be considered extracanonical and additions to the revealed text of the Book of Abraham, not integral parts of the original text of the book."
page 39 https://humanities.BYU.edu/wp-content/u ... -J2019.pdf
McGuire
https://www.mormondialogue.org/topic/75 ... 1210155740
"For me, part of the challenge is that Skousen comes to this with some sort of idea of what scripture should be (I don't think that I agree with him). Even if the couple of lines of text are later insertions (something I myself have been arguing for at least 30 years or so), doesn't necessarily disqualify the use of the facsimiles. It simply suggests that the facsimiles were appropriated - repurposed - by Joseph Smith. And this would mean that the meaning of the facsimiles in the context of the Book of Abraham should NOT be understood as translations of some Egyptian text but rather that they should be understood as documents produced by Joseph Smith that borrowed from earlier documents in a purely aesthetic fashion. What matters isn't the original context, or their original meaning (which has been tossed aside) but the meaning and context given to them by Joseph Smith. It would be an application of the Book of Mormon idea of "likening scripture" - by ignoring that original context, we make them useful to ourselves by using them to explain or interpret or contextualize modern revelation.
This particular issue also points to the reason why someone like Bokovoy would label the Book of Abraham as Pseudepigrapha. Skousen wants the text to be ancient scripture (in some way). Bokovoy would argue that it is modern scripture."
Is McGuire a lawyer?
page 39 https://humanities.BYU.edu/wp-content/u ... -J2019.pdf
McGuire
https://www.mormondialogue.org/topic/75 ... 1210155740
"For me, part of the challenge is that Skousen comes to this with some sort of idea of what scripture should be (I don't think that I agree with him). Even if the couple of lines of text are later insertions (something I myself have been arguing for at least 30 years or so), doesn't necessarily disqualify the use of the facsimiles. It simply suggests that the facsimiles were appropriated - repurposed - by Joseph Smith. And this would mean that the meaning of the facsimiles in the context of the Book of Abraham should NOT be understood as translations of some Egyptian text but rather that they should be understood as documents produced by Joseph Smith that borrowed from earlier documents in a purely aesthetic fashion. What matters isn't the original context, or their original meaning (which has been tossed aside) but the meaning and context given to them by Joseph Smith. It would be an application of the Book of Mormon idea of "likening scripture" - by ignoring that original context, we make them useful to ourselves by using them to explain or interpret or contextualize modern revelation.
This particular issue also points to the reason why someone like Bokovoy would label the Book of Abraham as Pseudepigrapha. Skousen wants the text to be ancient scripture (in some way). Bokovoy would argue that it is modern scripture."
Is McGuire a lawyer?
