Facsimile No. 3 of the Book of Abraham: Quentin Barney’s 2019 Master’s Thesis Examined

[Philo Sofee]

Facsimile No. 3 of the Book of Abraham: Quentin Barney’s 2019 Master’s Thesis Examined
By Kerry A. Shirts

If memory serves me, someone showed this to me a couple years ago, and I glimpsed at it, but didn’t have time at all to take an in-depth look. Now I have, and here is my result of this 2019 Master’s thesis partial requirement write up. My thanks to Hauslern for recently giving us a link to this. Here is my look into this material of Barney. It can be found and consulted here: https://scholarsarchive.BYU.edu/cgi/vie ... ontext=etd

I immediately made a prediction before I even started reading this seriously, carefully. Here is what I wrote down as my prior probability of having my disbelief in all the Book of Abraham discussions/arguments going on to be changed.

“Does he verify Joseph Smith’s translation of Fac. No.3? That’s what I want to know. I don’t even think he will. I give it a 5% chance upfront. That’s the level of my belief that he will try and verify Smith with success and refute Ritner with Egyptological evidence. This is my prior. I am seriously skeptical he will even attempt to refute Ritner, let alone succeed if he tries.”

So, now onto my analysis of his interesting Master’s thesis which was used in partial fulfillment of his Master’s degree. His chair was Kerry Muhlestein, with John Gee on his advisory committee, and I was already mad at myself for giving him such a high prior, knowing what I already know as my background about how these two operate, I already knew I was right to be so very doubtful, the only question was how far too much benefit of the doubt I had given him, but, I wrote it, and we shall see. He could actually surprise me, but I know he won’t.

However, he did surprise me! But it was because it was actually a very nice collection of Egyptian art, papyri, and in color, which was really cool, and great to see as I am an artist in my heart, and this ancient art is fascinating! However, lets get to the real issue here.

In the beginning of his thesis he ignored Ritner in several pages of discussion and of his footnotes, #’6 7, 8, 11, and finally mentioned him in footnote 12 in dealing with the controversial nature of the defense and how Mormon apologists have been tangling with the Egyptologists. Ritner has been, by very far, the most complete critique in all areas he was mentioning and discussing, but he gave the lion’s share of discussion to Gee and Muhlestein with just a mention of Ritner. Honestly, not a very good start for assessing the full background of the entire catfight.

P. 13 he boosts Gee’s points of view on the restoration of lacunae in the facsimiles and his claim that Egyptological work is criticized as hasty, but ignores Ritner’s response to this restoration gaffe, and Ritner’s demonstration of the LDS scholars who were the hasty ones even so hasty as to plagiarize Ritner in their own translations in his book! And his use of a literal non-Egyptologist LDS church goer (chapel Mormon) Allen Fletcher instead of Ritner?! Fletcher? He does not even belong in the arena against Ritner, and this made it in a Master’s thesis?! Pretty eyebrow raising I have to say... all the hullabaloo about lacunae and restoration is irrelevant to complexity. The lacunae are restored incorrectly. That is the issue.

He does use Klaus Baer on p. 19. And then he launches into yet another almost trivial irrelevancy, that there may be more than one meaning intended, and using a very early Mormon source for this claim. So, the implication being that, Egyptologists may not have the final word. So this may possibly and perhaps mean if we are lucky enough, that Joseph Smith’s different meaning is possible, this silly argument used by Harris is used for Joseph Smith’s inspiration?! (p. 21). Ayiyi…

He also immediately launches into as many other possible theories (since Smith’s translation being incorrect is really bugging him deep down, so there just has to be a reason, any reason!) and brings in Kevin Barney’s Semitic adaptation theory, which, of course, literally has to ignore everything Joseph Smith ever said about his entire experience with the papyri, translating them, showing the mummies and papyri to the public etc., but hey! This might work, so show it, there may be help for Joseph Smith yet… hang on, let me show you! This is the miserable impression he is leaving page after page after page, sigh. Well, he truly has nothing better.

P. 22 uses Ritner’s book as a critic and p. 23 uses Gee as the advocate for fac No.3 as not being part of the Book of Breathings. P. 24 follows up with Muhlestein with the not familiar theme that not every drawing lined up with the text, therefore this fac no. 3 may not either, and we may be in the clear of our troubles after all.
P. 24 the same song and dance of this may be too complex to settle. What all this discussion ignores is everything Joseph Smith himself said about it all. To him it was clear and plain as day. This was Abraham’s signature, autograph, and writing, along with Joseph’s work, and here is what he said, and I got this from this papyri. No apologist today supports Joseph Smith anymore, which irony cannot possibly be thicker on any other subject under the sun. They have to ignore Joseph Smith in order to save him!

And then things get very interesting. On p. 25 Egyptologists are all shown to be in fundamental agreement (with a mere nit picking of difference which makes absolutely no difference at all) about the identities of the figures in fac. No. 3 and Michael D. Rhodes, the LDS scholar, is shown to be in complete, 100% agreement with everything Robert Ritner has translated concerning the identities! None of them confirm Joseph Smith’s translations, none of them are even close.

P. 26 is his smokescreen. THE point is it's the Mormons trying to muddy up the waters, the Egyptologists are crystal clear, the identities of Smith are just wrong. It is not Egyptologists who are confused and concerned, only the Mormons are. He says this shows since Mormons are the confused ones that this is a stalemate?! This is willful blindness on his part. Only the Mormons are in cognitive dissonance on this. The debate is not ongoing, it’s over. No unanimity of Egyptologists?!? There is perfect unanimity! Even Rhodes AGREES with them. The debate is over, Smith’s views are wrong in relation to the hieroglyphics which Smith claimed to translate. While there are many details yet to learn, the main one is that Joseph Smith was wrong. On this there is no disagreement.

P. 26, Can we rely on the translations? If he means Smith’s then no we cannot. If Egyptologists, then yes. Even Rhodes AGREES here, so why is he questioning it all?!

Chapter 2

I hope he starts picking up steam and presenting something favorable to Smith he’s in a seriously deep hole out of the gate.
P. 30, Egytptologists identified hieroglyphics roughly as correct with their translations? No, exactly. Ritner, now that he actually has translated with good copies can translate them rather easily as he says.
P. 31, Ritner and Rhodes translate entire fac. No. 3. And he properly tells about Ritner’s work on page 32. P. 33 is an excellent table comparing Ritner and Rhodes translations in Ritner’s book! Very interesting. P. 34 he tries to make Ritner appear uncertain while Rhodes is more certain. All irrelevant however. NEITHER of them find Joseph Smith’s translations or interpretations of anything in fac. No. 3.
P. 42, a careful look at the hieroglyphs, which still have utterly no connection to Joseph Smith’s view. They all translate as “Isis,” no one else.

P. 44, It is not fundamentally certain that it’s Isis, but the probability is high enough and comparative evidence he admits he would agree with Ritner and Rhodes. So, Joseph Smith is still not confirmed. The issue is not about certainty, so why bring it up? You admit you would agree with both scholars, sheesh! This is a failed Gee strategy, so doesn’t surprise me it shows up in this kind of research with Gee involved in his advisory committee...
P. 44, footnote 38, pure speculation and Gee is trying to save Joseph Smith. “Isis the Great, the god’s Mother” Gee says is not in conflict with “King Pharaoh”?! Ritner which Barney does NOT reference, disagrees entirely! The bias of the author here is overwhelming as he is presenting it that he is really familiar with Ritner, so ignoring him on THIS is entirely inexcusable. But it just had to please Gee…

P. 45f, Trying to continually make Rhodes superior to Ritner. It’s not only incorrect, but irrelevant to the only issue that matter and makes any kind of difference to everyone. Both Rhodes and Ritner agree. And there is no confirmation of anything of Smith’s translation yet. The hieroglyphs translate as “Osiris, foremost of the Westerners.”
P. 50, Again, both Rhodes and Ritner translate the hieroglyph as Maat. Yes, there is a quibble about the shapes of the hieroglyphs, but this does not end up confirming any wrong translation of theirs, and Smith being correct in his. He is not.
P. 51, Baer, Rhodes, and Ritner, ALL agree with “Osiris Hor, justified forever.” This has no correlation to Joseph Smith’s translations at all.

P. 54, all scholars, both LDS and non-LDS translate “Anubis” here in the facsimile. Nothing of Joseph Smith’s translation comes through.
P. 56, All scholars agree, again, and none of it gives Joseph Smith any kind of authenticity.
P. 57, Barney tries to leave the door open that future translations may be different than these, since they are not entirely and totally certain, an impossibly ridiculous bar in any translation of ancient languages of all kinds. However, Barney fails to realize that the conclusion is still obvious, regardless of minor uncertainties here and there, Joseph Smith’s translations are just wrong.
P. 59, No he says Joseph Smith is not translating the hieroglyphs but is speculating. But even this means Joseph Smith is clueless, so I don’t see how this helps his case.
P. 61, He implies that since we cannot be 100% sure and certain in scholarly translations, then we might yet in the future find confirmation of Joseph Smith. This is possible, but rather improbable. Sure it’s complex with variant spellings in the names, but if we had the same problem in English such as a manuscript with variants of “Sam,” and “Shem,” and even “Shaun,” would that imply due to our uncertainty that we could find a way to translate it out as “Frederick” in the future? So Isis has variants, so what? Oh there are different ways to come up with Osiris, so what? At this point with our knowledge, we can say Joseph Smith’s translations and speculations are just wrong, dead wrong. He didn’t have any kind of a proper clue.

P. 64, Everything is up in the air with the Book of Breathings, the Book of the Dead, and the Book of Abraham… uh, no. We know Joseph Smith blew it. Ritner shows relationship based on Smith’s own description that the papyri he had is the stuff he used to translate his Book of Abraham. Comparative iconography does not save his woefully wrong translation.
P. 78, Identifications of all scenes, but there is still no biblical figures in any Egyptian papyri remains we possess, no Abraham, no slaves of any princes, kings, or stewarts, it’s all deities. There is just no confirmation of Joseph Smith’s identifications in any of the hundreds of different scenes similar to fac. No. 3. It’s Hathor the goddess, not Pharaoh the human being. All of this extra Egyptological materials does not change the issue and appears to be entirely irrelevant to the Joseph Smith translation.

P. 80, Joseph Smith said Shulem, a waiter, but it’s Hor from the actual hieroglyphics accompanying the text. No proof for Joseph Smith here either. Slave is Olimlah? Uh, nope. Just the same old Egyptian ANubis figure, properly identified. Joseph Smith is not confirmed.
P. 81, It doesn’t matter if fac no.3 is common place or rare, IS Joseph Smith’s translation accurate is ALL anyone cares about. ALL evidence YOU have brought forward here continue to show he wasn’t. All the other stuff is window dressing for Masters and Ph.d degrees.
P. 85, Various differing depictions may show its not Anubis which are, once again, entirely irrelevant to our specific case right here in fac no. 3. In none of the other depictions which you bring forth is there ever anything identified remotely close to Joseph Smith’s own claim. In the majority of cases scenes show Anubis, it’s probability is truly far more than favorable. It does not have to be 100% before we are probabilistically properly informed.

P. 86, Translated as Anubis here. It’s irrelevant to this one, if others are depicting Thoth, Horus or Osiris. There’s still no human slave here as Joseph Smith so stupidly translated. That other infographics have differences does nothing to prove this translation is not Anubis. But those others, ironically, do demonstrate its even less probable that Joseph Smith’s “slave” is correct.
P.87, And now he gives the entire game away, and shows his real fear which he is trying to cover, so I quote here, it’s too good to miss! “Though these features [the many truly trivial meaningless differences in iconographic depictions] may prove to be of little consequence in the end, they nevertheless urge us to give Fac No.3 far greater attention than what it has hitherto received.” Again, you’re wishful thinking. These already have little consequence right now, here and today, immediately. We don’t have to keep going, the evidence has no strength to it. Anubis here is still Anubis, Osiris is not Abraham, Isis is not King Pharaoh. If you have anything stronger you seriously must and ought to present it now., or you can’t change the fact that Joseph Smith’s ship is already on the bottom of the deep blue sea. It’s not presently sinking, it quit sailing a long time ago, you’re not even on a life raft here, let alone wearing a life vest for Joseph Smith. We go by what we know now. None of this thesis changes the probability against Joseph Smith. He was wrong before you wrote this, he’s still wrong now that you have nothing new to show his translation is accurate after all this new evidence. That is what matters.

You’re telling us that “it may be that Fac no.3 did not belong to the Book of Breathings at all…” is entirely irrelevant to your failing to overturn the probability that this connects to Joseph Smith’s translation in order to demonstrate it is accurate and correct. Joseph Smith is still just wrong. That is what people want to know.

The entire Chapter 4 is a complete red herring, which, of course, knowing your chair being Muhlestein and Advisory Committee including John Gee, makes perfect sense as it is fundamentally irrelevant to everyone that Fac no. 3 may belong to the Book of the Dead instead of to the Book of Breathings. Or it has parallels in Egyptian temples, regardless of whether in Ptolemaic times or whenever. The evidence you have, Egyptologically not only fails to controvert the Egyptological translations of either non-LDS or LDS scholars translating Fac No. 3, all your evidence also fails to evince any evidence in favor of Joseph Smith’s translations. Yes, each scene has different depictions during different time periods. This establishes honestly nothing concerning the only issue that matters.
As of now, today, our knowledge is, and even after all your work, continues to be that Joseph Smith’s translations are wrong. Nothing has changed. Until better evidence comes along, we can say thank you for an interesting read and bid you adieu until next time when you present (hopefully) much better evidence than you have here on that issue.

[Fence Sitter]

I wonder if Shulem has an opinion on this?

[Tator]

I wonder if Shulem has an opinion on this?

Ya think?

[hauslern]

Thanks Kerry for taking the time to do this. I am sure some of the "guests" include someone from the Fair crowd.

[Shulem]

I wonder if Shulem has an opinion on this?

see here:

The Neglected Facsimile: An Examination and Comparative Study of Facsimile No. 3 of the Book of Abraham, Quinten Barney

I've since critiqued one sentence on this board in Philo's Book of Abraham thread here.

Now, I will enjoy seeing what Philo has to say in this thread!

[Philo Sofee]

I wonder if Shulem has an opinion on this?

Ya think?

Hey Tator! Good ta see ya man! Sometime this summer we are gonna hafta wrangle ya up here and Sock and I will take us all to pizza again!

[Philo Sofee]

I wonder if Shulem has an opinion on this?

I opened a thread on this very subject on the old board (now defunct ) but you can still see the thread title listed on the latest page of the Terrestrial Board of Mormon Discussions But sadly, nobody was interested! I made 12 comments that are no longer accessible but are in the old Mormon Discussions memory hole.

17th tread down in the Topics:

The Neglected Facsimile: An Examination and Comparative Study of Facsimile No. 3 of the Book of Abraham, Quinten Barney
by Shulem » Sun Oct 18, 2020 7:31 pm

I've since critiqued one sentence on this board in Philo's Book of Abraham thread here.

Now, I will enjoy seeing what Philo has to say in this thread!

Holy cow I was off somewhere else. Lol! Yes I am curious now what you said! See? Patience is a virtue...

[Shulem]

“Does he verify Joseph Smith’s translation of Fac. No.3? That’s what I want to know. I don’t even think he will. I give it a 5% chance upfront.

You're much too generous, Philo. The odds are actually 0% because he'd have to break universal laws and defy logic in order to verify Smith's translation of Fac. 3. Therefore, poor Barney is faced with impossible odds!

He will not verify Smith's translation. I guarantee you that! Barney would love to hit that hole-in-one in defending the Book of Abraham but the problem is that the hole does NOT exist. You can't sink a ball down a hole that does not exist!

[Philo Sofee]

“Does he verify Joseph Smith’s translation of Fac. No.3? That’s what I want to know. I don’t even think he will. I give it a 5% chance upfront.

You're much too generous, Philo. The odds are actually 0% because he'd have to break universal laws and defy logic in order to verify Smith's translation of Fac. 3. Therefore, poor Barney is faced with impossible odds!

He will not verify Smith's translation. I guarantee you that! Barney would love to hit that hole-in-one in defending the Book of Abraham but the problem is that the hole does NOT exist. You can't sink a ball down a hole that does not exist!

Well, I don't think there is ever 0%, since that implies certainty, and we don't have that here in life. But I am well aware that the odds are truly millions to one. I would not have been incorrect to say rather than my 5% if I had given him a 0.0001% chance. But it honestly can never be absolutely either 0 or 100 with percentages. It doesn't have to be for us to simply say no to a claim. And in this instance, yet again, anuthuh one bites the dust, we can very comfortably say no dice amigo, come back when ya have something that significantly advances the validity of Joseph Smith's claims in Facsimile no. 3.
I am curious if he is going to pursue this with more rigor for his full Masters and then move on to a Ph.d like Steve Smoot has done. I really like that kid, I really do, but I truly fear for him, I truly do! He is simply going down the wrong path for the wrong reasons, and we all already know what his reasons are. There is no life in this subject after John Gee and Kerry Muhlestein. It is truly, fundamentally over, the war is lost for them.

[Shulem]

I am seriously skeptical he will even attempt to refute Ritner, let alone succeed if he tries.

Just think of the fame he will achieve if he's able to pull off the impossible and verify Smith's translation and disprove Ritner! Millions Billions of people around the world will be lining up at Mormon meeting houses around the world looking to learn more and hear the words of the prophet, Rusty Nelson! If Barney can refute Ritner and verify Smith then Mormonism will become invincible and Barney will become a hero. Can Barney do it?



I'm so sure that Barney will fail that I'll bet any amount of money against him. In fact, I'll pay him $100 if he wins but if I win then he has to pay me $1. I'm willing to up the anti too. What do you say, Barney? Want to bet? In other words, I have a sure bet. It's the sure sign of the bet!