FAIR is a non-profit organization dedicated to providing well-documented answers to criticisms of the doctrine, practice, and history of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
The Joseph Smith Papyri
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Criticism
The Joseph Smith papyri date to about the 2nd century, B.C. Latter-day Saints, however (including, perhaps, Joseph Smith), have claimed that the papyri were written by Abraham who lived about 2,000 years earlier.
The Egyptian papyri Joseph Smith used to translate the Book of Abraham have been found and translated, and they don't match the text of the Book of Abraham. They are instead a collection of Egyptian funerary documents known as the Book of Breathings.
The "Kirtland Egyptian Papers" seems to indicate that Joseph "translated" the characters that followed Facsimile 1 on the Book of Breathings into what we have in the Book of Abraham. As noted above, the Egyptological translations do not match Joseph's translation.
Joseph drew in missing parts of Facsimile 1. Egyptologists do not recognize the parts he "restored". According to non-LDS Egyptologists, other Egyptian lion-couch vignettes do not depict a bald priest holding a knife. In typical Egyptian lion-couch scenes, the figure on the couch is Osiris, rather than Abraham (as claimed by Joseph Smith), and Osiris does not have two hands raised in prayer. According to the critics, the fingers of Abraham's second upraised hand (as depicted by Joseph) is actually the wing-tip of a second hawk (which is typical in Egyptian lion-couch scenes).
Source(s) of the criticism
- Edward H. Ashment, The Use of Egyptian Magical Papyri to Authenticate the Book of Abraham: A Critical Review, Salt Lake City: Resource Communications, 1993.
- Charles M. Larson, By His Own Hand upon Papyrus: A New Look at the Joseph Smith Papyri, 2nd ed., Grand Rapids, MI: Institute for Religious Research, 1992.
- Jerald and Sandra Tanner, "Solving the Mystery of the Joseph Smith Papyri," Salt Lake City Messenger 82 (September 1992): 1–12.
Response
Conclusion
Further reading
FAIR web site
- FAIR Topical Guide: Book of Abraham
External links
- John Gee, "Abracadabra, Isaac and Jacob", FARMS Review of Books 7/1 (1995): 19–84