Liahona Irreantum Rabbanah deseret

[_nc47]

Great!

Now cross the rubicon and show the veracity of the Book of Abraham. Biblical higher/contextual/historical criticism in not a tool that can do so.

Just read the Bokovoy articles.

[_Bazooka]

I don't think I can let my mind delude myself to make this assumption. It allows me to discard what ever I don't like as Joseph's input. I couldn't be honest and do this. I am not sure what you think he got right. I see he got almost everything wrong, and there is a good thread on the dangers of parallelisms. We get an F when we get most things wrong on a test.

Did you read the Charlesworth quote? He is the world's authority, pay close attention.

Did you read what Joseph Smith stated? He is the Prophet who restored God's Church on earth in these Latter Days. He got the definitive explanation of the seven thousand years directly from God himself through revelation.
Why do you find the words of a mere mortal Charlesworth more credible than those of God (your God) spoken to us through the Prophet?

[_Res Ipsa]

Yes, well Smith claimed to be restoring ancient traditions. In fact, one of Smiths' critics tried to connect him to hermeticism.

Where did Smith claim to be restoring the "ancient tradition" of attributing authorship of a document to the wrong person? This is the parallel game: I can draw a parallel between something Smith did and some "ancient tradition," can draw a parallel between restoring the gospel of Jesus Christ and restoring "ancient tradition," and this somehow makes legitimate a completely erroneous translation of an Egyptian manuscript. And who cares what one critic somewhere tried to accuse Smith of?

And none of the writings he's talking about involve an alleged "translation" from one language to another that turned out to be completely and abosolutely wrong.

This was already addressed by Bokovoy.

Bokovny doesn't "address" anything. He simply draws the most abstract of parallels between what Smith did and an ancient tradition of writing, ignores all the parts that aren't parallel, and then decides he's found meaning in the parallel he's imposed. It's straight out making stuff up. Bokovny rejects Smith's subjective motive as irrelevant. Apparently, I can write a piece of fake scripture tonight, attribute it to Moses, and be just as legitimate as Smith writing the Book of Abraham.

What you're doing is flat-out dishonest, but is within the finest "tradition" of Nibleyology.

I want to say the same thing about you, but I forgive you. God bless you!

I absolutely believe that you want to say the same thing about me, but can't because I haven't been dishonest. In contrast, you tried to pass this off as an expert's definition of pseudepigraphy as:

These Pseudepigrapha usually bear the names of Old Testament heroes and carry such titles as the Apocalypse of Abraham, the Apocalypse of Elijah, the Testament of Job, the Psalms of Solomon, and the Abode of the Rechabites. These and other similar writings were part of the large group of documents from which first the Old Testament, and then the New Testament, were eventually collected and canonized. However, they made their way neither into the Hebrew Old Testament nor into the larger collection of the Greek Old Testament, called the Septuagint. It is misleading to state that the documents are falsely attributed to Abraham, Elijah, Job, or Solomon; they were written under the inspiration of these figures and there seems to be little question that many of these authors thought that they were writing as Abraham, Elijah, Job, or Solomon. The principle of solidarity in the Semitic world linked the son with the father and the father with his father and he with his fathers. Therefore, the Jew living in the intertestamental period believed that he was indeed part of Abraham.

When what you really did was skip the part where the expert actually defined the term:

For the sake of clarity, the present discussion will be limited to the fifty writings called the Pseudepigrapha.[4] The books designated Pseudepigrapha were written by Jews and Jewish Christians and were usually redacted by later Christians. They were composed, for the most part, during the period 200 B.C. to A.D. 200. This is the period that separates the Old Testament, beginning with the First Letter of Paul to the Thessalonians in A.D. 50.

http://rsc.BYU.edu/archived/reflections ... book-mormo

Why argue from a definition that leaves out the definition part? When you read the whole thing, it's clear the world's leading expert on Pseudepigrapha would not consider the Book of Abraham to be part of that tradition. So, you cherry pick a quote from an expert to argue the exact opposite of what the expert says. Dishonest.

Show me where I've been dishonest and I'll address it.

[_SteelHead]

Great!

Now cross the rubicon and show the veracity of the Book of Abraham. Biblical higher/contextual/historical criticism in not a tool that can do so.

Just read the Bokovoy articles.

Why? I reject the methodology. I am approaching this from a baliwick of physical sciences, how it fares when compared to geology, archeology, physical history and physics. As it tells of the discovery and naming of Egypt in a totally false manner it fails the physical sciences. And don't get me started on the cosmology.

[Guest]

333

[Guest]

444

[_SteelHead]

That is not my debate. My debate is. The Book of Abraham a crock of BS!

Egyptus -D'oh
Pharaoh - D'oh
Noah - D'oh
Ham - D'oh
Flood - D'oh

But if you want to frame it in terms of biblical studies, the current consensus among biblical scholars is that Abraham was not a real person but is rather an amalgam of multiple early Hebrew stories and characters.

[_Res Ipsa]

This is the debate.

Brad: Pseudepigrapha is not legitimate! Look at this wikipedia article definition.
Nelson: Pseudepigrapha is legitimate. Look at what the world's authority on pseudepigrapha says.
Brad: But that's not during Joseph Smith's time period!
Nelson: Exactly. Joseph Smith restored things from ancient time periods.
Brad: But he didn't say he did.
Nelson: Yes he did. He claimed he restored elements from every dispensation.
Brad: He didn't specifically say he was restoring pseudepigrapha.
Nelson: I didn't say I put my pants on this morning but I did. Look what he did.

Actually, the debate is more like:

Nelson: The Book of Abraham is legitimate because Joseph Smith said it was written by Abraham when it really wasn't.
Brad:

[_SteelHead]

What Brad said.

[_ludwigm]

Yes.