Philo Sofee wrote:Well, I know before, when I was defending the Book of Abraham, that I used only partial information. Now that we have the more full witness views and comments, I see little wiggle room for apologists. I also now don't see the discussion occurring much anymore either. That makes sense, since the evidence appears to have now gone the other way against apologetic tendencies.
When you were defending the Book of Abraham you weren't playing with a full deck of cards but had only a limited selection of cards and the game you were playing was based on Nibley's rules. You thought you had a winning hand because of your testimony of the restoration of the gospel. Nibley tried to stack the LDS deck using all manner of deceptive apologetic tricks. You, my friend, were a victim of his abusive form of deceptive scholarship. Indeed, you are a Nibley victim and bear those scars even today. I think it will take a lifetime for you to completely recover from the abuse you suffered at the hands of Nibley, or maybe, not.
LDS apologists today know the Book of Abraham is a tough subject to try and defend. They know it's impossible to defend on any kind of conventional level and are having to rely on purely supernatural explanations steeped in mystery and questions that can never be fully answered in their own lifetimes. That's a painful cause to have to bear. Mystery and suspense can be a painful way to have to believe in something that appears on every level to be out of kilter with logical reasoning.
The LDS church will eventually remove the Facsimiles. It will happen. Then they will deemphasize the translation process and chalk it up as a revelatory exercise in which Smith restored the story of Abraham using Egyptian props to excite his mind and receive teachings from the Spirit through a process of spiritual translations that only a prophet is entitled to experience. But in the end, all of that will directly contradict and counter what Joseph Smith and his companions actually said and taught in their day. The modern LDS church will have to throw the old LDS church under the bus in order to survive.
I appreciate your directive: "Keep quoting Joseph Smith", there is nothing the modern LDS church can do or say to change what he said. All they can do is ignore it or try and twist his words in order to vindicate their testimonies.