Zub Zool oan and Abraham 1:2b?????3

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_William Schryver
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Re: Zub Zool oan and Abraham 1:2b–3

Post by _William Schryver »

maklelan wrote:
sock puppet wrote:I suppose that establishing your succinct thesis would indeed establish that 1a and 1b are secondary to a prior, "lost" manuscript of Abr 1-3.


I'm going to let Will respond to the rest, if he wishes, but this brings something up that I've been wondering about. Looking at the translation manuscript with Abr 1:1-3 on it, it seems likely to me that the characters in the margins were added after the text was written. It seems space was left for them, but the text flows without breaks at the characters (as is found in other pages) or trying to squeeze in writing before arriving at the character in the margin. Additionally, the first two characters are moved further to the left in the margin to make room for the notations which were added in the text. This makes little sense if the characters were written first. Some of the definitions associated with the third character in the margin are, as I've pointed out, found before the character, and well after other characters pop up to govern the text. The translation does not seem to be secondary to the placement of the characters, but the other way around. Considering these observations, it seems, dictated or not, Abr 1:1-3 was written out, more or less, all at once. Now, I don't think that Smith composed this on the fly with just the EAG sitting in front of him. That's incredibly unlikely. It would have moved incredibly slowly, and the organization of the EAG definitions in the text is too accurate for the EAG to simply have obliquely inspired him as he dreamed up the narrative. The secondary insertion of "a possessor of greater knowledge" is also intriguing. Is this an example of homoioarchon? Why would Smith be concerned with telling Phelps to go back and insert this principle in that specific location if he were composing the narrative on the fly? It's not found in that arrangement anywhere in the EAG. It's actually not even associated with the character in the margin. The only reason I can think of that it would need to go there is that it went there in the parent text. If it is homoioarchon, then Phelps was transcribing. If it was dictated, it seems most logical that Smith had the narrative in front of him.

Now, while there are many reasons to conclude the manuscripts were dictated, there are reasons to conclude it was not entirely dictated. For instance, there is a very clear example of homoioteleuton on one page of the translation manuscripts. Phelps ends Abraham 2:2 with the word Haran. When he begins the next paragraph, however, he starts with the "Haran" at the end of Abr 2:2, reproducing the entire paragraph again. The fact that he didn't catch the repetition, and the size of the text reproduced, indicates he was likely away from the text for quite some time. Dictation is unlikely to produce this result. I would have to ask Skousen, but I don't think dittography like this ever happened during the dictation of the Book of Mormon. It's possible both methods were used. I still have a lot of work to do on this, though.

One minor correction, Dan. It is the Frederick G. Williams manuscript (Ab2, page 4) that contains the dittograph you're talking about.

Otherwise, I concur with pretty much everything you've observed. In fact, I've spoken about all of those things at one point or another over the course of the past four years, as several people here will confirm.
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Re: Zub Zool oan and Abraham 1:2b–3

Post by _Kevin Graham »

I suspect that both Metcalfe and Smith are beginning to realize, on the basis of Dan McClellan's arguments of the past few days, that the Schryver Thesis of Dependency is not quite as ridiculous as you were all led to believe.


You make silly predictions like this all the time and you're always wrong. The theory that the Book of Abraham was already translated before the GAEL, is utterly ridiculous, if for no other reason, because the overwhelming historical evidences suggests so. You don't get to invent a new paradigm and call the "game changed" and expect to be taken seriously outside your religious circle. If you want to pretend you've killed arguments, you must first show how you've dealt with the evidence that was used to support said arguments, otherwise it is just a cop-out. This is standard methodology in scholarship, but I understand we're not dealing with scholarly methods. We're witnessing the epitome of apologetic thinking. Enjopy the ride.
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Re: Zub Zool oan and Abraham 1:2b–3

Post by _William Schryver »

Kevin Graham wrote:
I suspect that both Metcalfe and Smith are beginning to realize, on the basis of Dan McClellan's arguments of the past few days, that the Schryver Thesis of Dependency is not quite as ridiculous as you were all led to believe.


You make silly predictions like this all the time and you're always wrong. The theory that the Book of Abraham was already translated before the GAEL, is utterly ridiculous, if for no other reason, because the overwhelming historical evidences suggests so. You don't get to invent a new paradigm and call the "game changed" and expect to be taken seriously outside your religious circle. If you want to pretend you've killed arguments, you must first show how you've dealt with the evidence that was used to support said arguments, otherwise it is just a cop-out. This is standard methodology in scholarship, but I understand we're not dealing with scholarly methods. We're witnessing the epitome of apologetic thinking. Enjopy the ride.

Speaking of people who don't have a grasp of the material, let alone "scholarly methods" ...

<yawn>

Suffice it to say that I am familiar with every single piece of historical information even remotely related to the production of the Book of Abraham. There is nothing in the historical record that would preclude my thesis of dependency.

And with that I will leave you all to your standard methods of operation.

I'll follow your progress from the sidelines, Dan. It's plain to see you have matters well in hand ...
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Re: Zub Zool oan and Abraham 1:2b–3

Post by _sock puppet »

William Schryver wrote:It appears to me that one reason many critics are not appreciating the implications of my findings is that they aren’t aware of the historical facts that underlie those implications.

The documents that have long been claimed to be “the simultaneously produced transcripts of Joseph Smith’s original dictated translation of the Book of Abraham” (exact words from my FAIR presentation) are in the handwriting of Frederick G. Williams and Warren Parrish. The historical record makes it clear when Warren Parrish actually started working as a scribe for Joseph Smith (right around the second week of November 1835).

Therefore, if these documents are what the critics have claimed them to be, then we know they were produced no earlier than sometime in November 1835.

We also know that the Egyptian Alphabet documents were commenced in the third week of July 1835.

If, therefore, it can be demonstrated that the text of the Book of Abraham to which the Alphabet documents refer must have existed prior to the Alphabet documents, then we know that the alleged “translation manuscripts” are nothing of the sort; they must necessarily be copies of one or more predecessor documents, and they cannot represent a scenario where Joseph Smith was claiming to “translate” the characters from the Book of Breathings text in order to produce the Book of Abraham; the hieratic characters must therefore be juxtaposed with the English text for some other purpose.

I’m convinced these facts are lost on most of the people who have been opining on this issue.

Simply put, if the Alphabet & Grammar is dependent on a pre-existing text of the Book of Abraham, then virtually all of the critics’ arguments of the past 40 years concerning the Kirtland Egyptian Papers are wrong, along with the theory that the Williams/Parrish documents are the original translation manuscripts.
sock puppet wrote:
Will, thanks for putting your thesis so succinctly.

I don't think, however, that if it could be established that the GAEL is dependent upon the Abr text that one gets away from the KEP tying the Abr text to the Hor Breathing Permit papyri characters. To successfully disconnect the Abr text from the Hor Breathing Permit papyri characters, one needs to establish that each of the four pieces, the EA, the EG, the GAEL and the Abr Mss. is derivative of a completed, final version Abr. Granted, you might have set your sights a bit dimmer, hoping for now just to knock off the GAEL and AG, for example, which is what mak seems focused on for the immediate time being.

Problematic for knocking off the Abr Mss. is that you have corresponding corrections on both of 1a and 1b that made their way into the final, printed text of Abr. Even if there is a prior manuscript to 1a and 1b, Joseph Smith was obviously not done yet.

If Joseph Smith was reading from a prior manuscript, what evidence is there for the hieratic characters in the left hand margins of 1a and 1b from the Hor Breathing Permit papyri only being inserted during this dictation and not read off of the hypothetical prior manuscript from which Joseph Smith would have been reading?

There is no reason that the default position is that a prior text would have been without the Hor Breathing Permit papyri characters that appear on both the Phelps (1a) and Parrish (1b) Abr Mss. In the absence of proof to the contrary, it would seem that forensically the assumption would be that the hieratic characters appearing on 1a and 1b would also appear on the source text from which the dictation resulting in 1a and 1b was read by Joseph Smith.

Indeed, due to the changes made in that process, it would be safe to say that 1a and 1b are less of a draft copy and more towards an end product than whatever the hypothetical prior text was. So why would there be inserted unrelated hieratic characters corresponding to the first of each paragraph and next line after an abrupt stop mid-sentence?

I suppose that establishing your succinct thesis would indeed establish that 1a and 1b are secondary to a prior, "lost" manuscript of Abr 1-3. However, the best evidence of what might or might not be on the "lost" manuscript would be the dictations taken by Phelps and Parrish (less the corrections noted Abr 1-3). It would not forensically "erase" the hieratics from the best evidence we have. So we're back to the best theory supported by the historical evidence being that those hieratic characters were there and a part of a prior manuscript. For apologists, that's back to square one on the problems posed by those hieratic characters being in the margins of 1a and 1b.

Game unchanged.

To tell you the truth, sock puppet, as I read through your post above, it was really quite a frustrating experience, because your misconceptions and lack of understanding about the documents and their relationships is such that it would take me a five page post just to explain it all to you. This is one of the reasons why I have chosen to cease any attempts to dialogue with people on this board. With the exception of Chris Smith and Brent Metcalfe, no one else has the requisite understanding of the documents in order to carry on an intelligent and worthwhile conversation. Of course, that doesn't stop people from attempting to talk about this stuff, and doing so with an undercurrent of confidence that they really do have a grasp of the material. But they simply don't.

An example is contained in this sentence from your post above:

To successfully disconnect the Abr text from the Hor Breathing Permit papyri characters, one needs to establish that each of the four pieces, the EA, the EG, the GAEL and the Abr Mss. is derivative of a completed, final version Abr.

In the first place, my thesis does establish that the entire collection of the Kirtland Egyptian Papers is derived from a pre-existing text of the Book of Abraham, as revealed in at least two stages. That said, the inaccuracies and misconceptions contained just in this one sentence of yours are such that I don't feel motivated to discuss this stuff with you. I will say that you are just plain wrong in believing that the Abraham manuscripts are relevant if the Alphabet & Grammar can be shown to be dependent on the text from the Book of Abraham to which they refer. Metcalfe and Smith understand, and that's why they have decided that they will fight to the death on the question of dependency.

Frankly, I don't understand how you could not "get it" if you have really viewed my presentation. I explained the different groups of documents. I explained the critics' arguments of the past forty years. I explained why they are rendered moot if my thesis is correct. I explained it all such that many people who never paid attention to this stuff before came away from the presentation finally understanding what the KEP are and how they relate to the Book of Abraham. But in order to profit from the presentation, you have to view it with the desire to learn something rather that with the desire to find fault with it.

In any event, given the fact that I'm sure there is nothing I could possibly say that would persuade you to believe my theses are correct, I really have no motivation to make the attempt to disabuse you of your ignorance when it comes to these things. Suffice it to say that the thrust of your post above is incorrect. The fact is that, if the Egyptian Alphabet & Grammar materials are dependent on a pre-existing text of the Book of Abraham, then the prior arguments of Howard, Ashment, and Smith are necessarily rendered moot.

I suspect that both Metcalfe and Smith are beginning to realize, on the basis of Dan McClellan's arguments of the past few days, that the Schryver Thesis of Dependency is not quite as ridiculous as you were all led to believe. And this after an analysis limited to only the first three verses! In other words, the first quarter hasn't even ended and you're already down three touchdowns, and I haven't even published my detailed article yet.

Will, as succinct as you were in outlining your overall thesis (http://mormondiscussions.com/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?p=350647#p350647), I am sure you have the communicative skills and abilities to set me straight in less than 5 pages. So I am left wondering why you opted instead for a screed attempting to belittle and excoriate me.

In any event, I guess you do not want to explain or refute the points I made. So let it be.
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_maklelan
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Re: Zub Zool oan and Abraham 1:2b–3

Post by _maklelan »

William Schryver wrote:One minor correction, Dan. It is the Frederick G. Williams manuscript (Ab2, page 4) that contains the dittograph you're talking about.

Otherwise, I concur with pretty much everything you've observed. In fact, I've spoken about all of those things at one point or another over the course of the past four years, as several people here will confirm.


Ah, my mistake. Thanks for the correction.
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Re: Zub Zool oan and Abraham 1:2b–3

Post by _Kevin Graham »

For instance, there is a very clear example of homoioteleuton on one page of the translation manuscripts.


Homoioteleuton is considered a scribal error, which has not been established here. Simply pointing out a copied portion doesn't establish this. For instance, if the last portion was an intentional copy, then there is no Homoioteleuton.

Phelps ends Abraham 2:2 with the word Haran. When he begins the next paragraph, however, he starts with the "Haran" at the end of Abr 2:2, reproducing the entire paragraph again.


Actually, thanks to Edward Ashment, we know that the author of this manuscript was F.G. Williams, although Hauglid and others at BYU have refused to give him credit for the discovery.

The fact that he didn't catch the repetition, and the size of the text reproduced, indicates he was likely away from the text for quite some time. Dictation is unlikely to produce this result.


He wasn't transcribing from dictation. Did you notice where he begins to provide double copy is precisely where Parrish left off? So it makes sense that Joseph Smith wanted two copies of the dictated text, as evidenced by the fact that he hired two scribes. So when Phelps leaves the session for whatever reason, Joseph Smith finishes translating the character that had been started.

1. We know the Egyptian characters were placed in the margins as the English text were being transcribed. So why didn't Williams provide the Egyptian character? Because it was merely a copy. We know that the scribes felt it important to align the English text with its corresponding Egyptian character. This photo illustrates two characters that had been erased and then written in again to properly line up with the text. Image

2. We know the scribes were careful to respect the integrity of the margin, and yet half way through this "Homoioteleuton", Williams decides to intrude into the margin area. Why? Because he knew how much space he had to squeeze the rest of the text in and he didn't want to start another page. Also, because he knew he would not be inserting any more Egyptian characters. In this photo we see that when Williams continues writing from one page to another, he writes without a margin even though all the pages had one:
Image
This only makes sense if he was transcribing an oral dictation. Smith was probably dictating text as he reached the end of the paper, so Williams kept writing, focusing on accuracy of the transcription instead of worrying about placement. Once there was a break in dictation, Williams then drew in a margin, making room for the next Egyptian character. This has not been adequately accounted for in a "copy" hypothesis.

I would have to ask Skousen, but I don't think dittography like this ever happened during the dictation of the Book of Mormon.


These guys were professional scribes. This was not an unintentional dittograph and any argument to the contrary needs to produce a similar example elsewhere (90 words!). But I think typical standards in scholarship would require much more than evidence that something was copied (which is precisely what the critical argument had always said anyway). I raised this point in August 2006 when Hauglid asked me about it. He said it was worth thinking about and then he never said anything about it again to me.
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Re: Zub Zool oan and Abraham 1:2b–3

Post by _Kevin Graham »

Suffice it to say that I am familiar with every single piece of historical information even remotely related to the production of the Book of Abraham. There is nothing in the historical record that would preclude my thesis of dependency.


You're not even familiar enough with the KEP to properly represent it in your presentation. But yes, you and Hauglid have said the same thing for years about the undermining evidence; "We're perfectly aware of it."

OK, so you're aware of it. Are we supposed to be impressed that you're aware of something you refuse to address? If you expect to make your arguments fly outside your immediate apologetic sphere, then you're going to have to deal with these evidences at some point.

I'll follow your progress from the sidelines, Dan. It's plain to see you have matters well in hand ...


I like Dan, but it is clear he is very "green" on this subject. He doesn't even have access to all the materials we're discussing. But I can see why you'd choose to leave. You've come too close to having to actually deal with evidence in this thread. That's your dangerzone.
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Re: Zub Zool oan and Abraham 1:2b–3

Post by _maklelan »

Kevin Graham wrote:Homoioteleuton is considered a scribal error, which has not been established here. Simply pointing out a copied portion doesn't establish this. For instance, if the last portion was an intentional copy, then there is no Homoioteleuton.


What reason do you have to believe they intentionally repeated this paragraph exactly at the word Haran? Without a reason, and a good one, it must be concluded to be homoioteleuton.

Kevin Graham wrote:Actually, thanks to Edward Ashment, we know that the author of this manuscript was F.G. Williams, although Hauglid and others at BYU have refused to give him credit for the discovery.


Will corrected my mistake there. I'm perfectly happy to recognize his scholarship.

Kevin Graham wrote:He wasn't transcribing from dictation. Did you notice there where he begins to provide double copy is precisely where Phelps left off? So it makes sense that Joseph Smith wanted two copies of the dictated text, as evidenced by the fact that he hired two scribes. So when Phelps leaves the session for whatever reason, Joseph Smith finishes translating the character that had been started.


Which manuscript are you talking about? I'm talking just about the dittography on the Williams manuscript at this point.

Kevin Graham wrote:1. We know the Egyptian characters were placed in the margins as the English text were being transcribed.


How do we know this? I'm not being confrontational, I am just interested in the process.

Kevin Graham wrote:So why didn't Williams provide the Egyptian character? Because it was merely a copy. We know that the scribes felt it important to align the English text with its corresponding Egyptian character. This photo illustrates two characters that had been erased and then written in again to properly line up with the text.

IMAGE


This is good for those two characters, but my concern with the characters in the margin revolves primarily around Abr 1:1-3.

Kevin Graham wrote:2. We know the scribes were careful to respect the integrity of the margin, and yet half way through this "Homoioteleuton", Williams decides to intrude into the margin area. Why? Because he knew how much space he had to squeeze the rest of the text in and he didn't want to start another page.


But that page ends one-third of the way into verse 6. There were clearly more pages that are no longer extant.

Kevin Graham wrote:Also, because he knew he would not be inserting any more Egyptian characters. In this photo we see that when Williams continues writing from one page to another, he writes without a margin even though all the pages had one:

IMAGE

This only makes sense if he was transcribing an oral dictation.


Why does this only make sense if he was transcribing from dictation?

Kevin Graham wrote:Smith was probably dictating text as he reached the end of the paper, so Williams kept writing, focusing on accuracy of the transcription instead of worrying about placement. Once there was a break in dictation, Williams then drew in a margin, making room for the next Egyptian character. This has not been adequately accounted for in a "copy" hypothesis.


Any number of scenarios could produce that result. If he knew there were no characters to go in the margin he could have gone to the edge of the paper. If he was copying then he would be able to see where the characters went. If it were dictation, however, he wouldn't know when the next character was coming.

Kevin Graham wrote:These guys were professional scribes. This was not an unintentional dittograph and any argument to the contrary needs to produce a similar example elsewhere.


I'm sorry, but that's simply not a legitimate evidentiary standard. This is unquestionably homoioteleuton, and I can't imagine anyone with training in text-critical methodologies arriving at a different conclusion.

Kevin Graham wrote:But I think typical standard in scholarship would require much more than evidence that something was copied which is precisely what the critical argument had always said. I raised this point in August 2006 when Hauglid asked me about it. He said it was worth thinking about and then he never said anything about it again to me.


I can't speak for Brian Hauglid, but unless a good explanation can be produced for why they would want to copy this section of text right at the same word which falls at the end of a line of text, there's simply no way to argue against homoioteleuton. It's a textbook case.
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Re: Zub Zool oan and Abraham 1:2b–3

Post by _Kevin Graham »

8
What reason do you have to believe they intentionally repeated this paragraph exactly at the word Haran? Without a reason, and a good one, it must be concluded to be homoioteleuton.

Again, homoioteleuton is dependent on the premise that these men were copying manuscripts, and that the copy must have been in error. That's two unestablished assumptions that weakens the theory. You ask why he would intentionally copy it but I already explained. Joseph Smith felt it was important to have two copies of the text. This is why he hired two different scribes:
Image
The end result was two copies of the dictated text. Now I propose that Joseph Smith wanted two copies of dictated text, and so before you critique this theory, please consider the alternative, which goes like this. Since it is argued that these are merely copies, Will and Hauglid proposed that Joseph Smith, for whatever weird reason, decided he wanted to hire two scribes to "copy" an error-ridden text of just a few pages. But it gets even more ludicrous. Not only does Joseph Smith want two copies of an error-ridden text, but his scribes, as experienced and well paid as they are, couldn't manage to copy properly. We know this is true because in several instances they misspelled words differently. So Joseph Smith decided he wanted them to copy a manuscript down to its exact scribble and cross-out, but felt it was acceptable to completely misspell words? This is beyond unlikely... but I digress.

In short, your scenario doesn't explain why no Egyptian character was placed before its corresponding translation. Your proposed scenario doesn't explain why he suddenly decided to disregard the margin altogether. These are abrupt shifts in the flow of the transcription that demand explanation. Also, your proposed scenario doesn't explain how a professional scribe would copy 90 words by accident, before realizing what he was doing. Homoioteleuton usually occurs when a scribe's eye scans the wrong line while copying another page after long hours of writing many pages of text. But what we find here would require a professional scribe to scan over roughly a half page of text going into his four page. Highly unlikely in my view.

My proposed scenario explains all of these things and accounts for a dozen other pieces of evidence that strongly suggest a simultaneous transcription via dictation. You know, stuff like the two scribes making the same exact mistakes, or misspelling words different (words that happen to be difficult to discern audibly). The copyist theorists have failed to produce valid explanations for these or any of the other textual anomalies that have been addressed.
Which manuscript are you talking about? I'm talking just about the dittography on the Williams manuscript at this point.

Right, that's the one. We've always maintained that that portion of the text was copied. We also acknowledge that everything after Abr 1:1-3 in Ms2, was also copied.
How do we know this? I'm not being confrontational, I am just interested in the process.

Well, aside from the photo I already presented, we also have instances where the text ends with an Egyptian character with no corresponding English translation. In fact, the document we're discussing (Ms1b), which was transcriped by Parrish (not Phelps) ends with an Egyptian character that is supposed to have, consistent with the other manuscripts, at least 90 corresponding words of translated English. Here it is:
Image
So I think this pretty much kills the argument that the English was written before the Egyptian; in this case the English wasn't written at all!

Now John Gee tried to undermine this argument by saying the Egyptian characters sometimes "overrun" the margin as well as the English text, therefore some person came along latter and added the wrong Egyptian characters. The example he used was this one:
Image
In this example the margin was drawn in before realizing it would not be enough space to contain this particular character, so the Egyptian character overlapped the margin a bit, but the English text, if it were already there, would have certainly been in the way. But it wasn't, so the scribe began the sentence with enough of a space cushion between them.
This is good for those two characters, but my concern with the characters in the margin revolves primarily around Abr 1:1-3.

Ok, well your proposed homoioteleuton is well in to chapter two. You knew this, right?
But that page ends one-third of the way into verse 6. There were clearly more pages that are no longer extant.

Maybe, but we still know that Abr 3 wasn't translated until seven years later. In 1842 Joseph Smith published the first installment of the Book of Abraham, and it went from Abr 1:1-Abr 2:18, precisely where Phelp's Ms2 ended in 1835! Joseph Smith then makes an announcement that he would begin translation for the next installment, which consisted of 2:19 and beyond. This Trump's whatever word count analyses Will has in store for us.

Now I know Will says he's aware of this evidence, but in four years he has yet to explain how this dovetails with his theory that Abr 1-3 was translated within the first couple of weeks after the papyri were purchased. This isn't assertion via evidence, it is assertion despite evidence.
Why does this only make sense if he was transcribing from dictation?

Well, can you make sense of it within Will's copyist theory? Because neither he nor Hauglid were able to.
Any number of scenarios could produce that result. If he knew there were no characters to go in the margin he could have gone to the edge of the paper.

But we know this translated text has a corresponding character. We know this. It is manifest in all the manuscripts. He doesn't decide to go into the margin until after he begins to copy it. This suggests that he was trying to cram what was left for that day's session, on that sheet.
If he was copying then he would be able to see where the characters went.

True. But this presupposes a preexistent copy that looks identical to this one. It seems more likely to me that once a scribe realized that the majority of a page was a mistake, that he'd throw it away and start again on another sheet. Especially if Joseph Smith wanted precision as the copyist theory must assume.
If it were dictation, however, he wouldn't know when the next character was coming.

If it were dictation, then the Prophet would more than likely tell them to add the next character as he finished translating the previous one.
I'm sorry, but that's simply not a legitimate evidentiary standard.

Of course it is. You can't say something is X without providing a reasonable basis for X to exist. Skipping over 90+ words is not likely. How many examples can you find of professional scribes engaging in a "copying" project of only a few pages(!), and then shortly into the project one of them skips over half a page!?
This is unquestionably homoioteleuton, and I can't imagine anyone with training in text-critical methodologies arriving at a different conclusion.

Well, that's because you haven't fully absorbed the manuscripts and understood the evidences that undermine the copyist scenario. Once it becomes clear that a copyist scenario was most certainly not acceptable, the homoioteleuton gets thrown out the window too.
I can't speak for Brian Hauglid, but unless a good explanation can be produced for why they would want to copy this section of text right at the same word which falls at the end of a line of text, there's simply no way to argue against homoioteleuton. It's a textbook case.

I've already provided an explanation, and until you can explain why my explanation is no better than the one accompanying the copyist theory (and yes, if you insist on the homoioteleuton then you have to own and explain the other arguments too) we must dispense with the homoioteleuton notion. There is simply nothing "textbook" about this example unless you first assume what hasn't been established, and if you want to argue otherwise, then please provide just one example similar to this. I mean if its truly textbook, then this should be easy to do. Right?
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Re: Zub Zool oan and Abraham 1:2b–3

Post by _Paul Osborne »

Polygamy-Porter wrote:Will,

Given how hard you are straining at the gnat's ass sized plausible truth in the Book of Abraham, I can say without doubt that when you fall you will fall hard and fast.

Fear not, you will be openly welcomed into this place.

Just ask Paul O.


That's right. We will all welcome our beloved brother William and completely forgive him for all of the false apologetics he fed to this board. In fact, at such time when William denies his testimony and admits his error, nobody here need flame him for it. He will have suffered enough and we will have mercy on him. Anyone attacks my William at that time will face my full wrath and warfare down in the telestial board. I will flame them to hell and back with everything I have. So, don't do it or you'll be sorry. I swear it, on my father's grave.

William, it's time. Come on, now. Break free out of the mold. Think of President Kimball being fooled by Mark Hoffman. Let that be your standard of Mormon prophetic inspiration.

Paul O
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