The Book of Abraham
BOOK OF ABRAHAM
The studying of the origin of the Book of Abraham was my first serious clue
there was something wrong with Mormonism. The following is from CRI.
To the people alive in 1835 it was an incredible accomplishment. Several
members of the Mormon church had pooled their money and bought a travel ing
Egyptian exhibit which contained some mummies and ancient writings on papyrus
scrolls. They presented this to Joseph Smith who announced they contained the
writings of the biblical patriarchs Abraham and Joseph while they were in Egypt.
There was a lot of surprise and excitement in the Mormon community back in
July of 1835 when they realized what Joseph was saying. He claimed they had
"The writings of Abraham while he was in Egypt, called the Book of Abraham,
written by his own hand, upon papyrus" (from the introductory heading to
the Book of Abraham as contained in the Pearl of Great Price).
This meant that, according to Joseph Smith, they had an original copy of
a book of Scripture as it was written by the Old Testament patriarch Abraham.
Now Abraham is dated around 2000 B.C. and Genesis, as written by Moses, is dated
around 1400 B.C., so the Book of Abraham predates the first book of the Bible
by over 500 years.
Joseph immediately went to work making what he claimed was a translation
of the Egyptian scrolls into the English language. History of the Church, Volume
2, records several of the numerous comments made by Joseph Smith.
"... I commenced the translation of some of the characters or hieroglyph-
ics, and much to our joy found that one of the rolls contained the writ- ings
of Abraham, another the writings of Joseph of Egypt, etc. -- a more full account
of which will appear in its place, as I proceed to examine or unfold them"
(History of the Church, Vol.2, p. 236. Later he wrote: "The remainder of
this month, I was continually engaged in translating an alphabet to the Book
of Abraham, and arranging a grammar of the Egyptian language as practiced by
the ancients.")
The entry for Thursday, November 19, 1835 reads: "... I returned home
and spent the day in translating the Egyptian records." Part of the entry
for the next day says: "We spent the day in translating, and made rapid
progress" (Ibid, p. 318).
These statements indicate that Joseph Smith and his scribes were produc-
ing a literal, word for word translation of the symbols contained on the papyri.
However, the study of the Egyptian language was in its infancy, so there was
no real way to test Joseph's ability as a translator. Which meant that even
if somebody suspected he was making it all up, they would have had no way to
prove it.
Then, sometime after Joseph's death, the Mormon church lost control of the
papyri and they were presumed to have been destroyed in the Chicago fire of
1871. For several decades it appeared that Joseph Smith's claims to be a divinely
inspired translator of ancient languages could never be tested. But, in 1967,
the Mormon church made a dramatic announcement: a collection of papyri manuscripts
were found in the New York Metropoli- tan Museum of Art. These papyri manuscripts
were given to the Mormon church in November of 1967. One of the pieces of papyri
even contained the original document used by Joseph Smith to copy the drawing
known as "Facsimile No. 1" which is part of the Book of Abraham.
There was really no doubt these were the original papyri Joseph Smith used
to make his translation, for, glued to the back of the papyri were architectural
drawings of a temple and maps of the Kirtland, Ohio area where the Mormons had
settled during this time period.
No one within the LDS church had a degree or any expertise in the area of
Egyptology, so the papyri were sent to several competent Egyptologists. They
each made a separate objective translation of the hieroglyphics and compared
it with the translation made by Joseph Smith 125 years earlier.
At first, church leaders seemed to be excited about the discovery of the
original papyrus manuscripts which Joseph Smith had in his possession when he
translated the Book of Abraham. Both Mormon and non-Mormon scholars agreed that
although they did not have all the papyri Joseph had originally, they did have
the pieces he used to translate the Book of Abraham (Jerald & Sandra Tanner,
Changing World of Mormonism, pp. 340-345).
However, the initial excitement quickly died down as those within the LDS
church who knew about Egyptology discovered the Joseph Smith papyri had nothing
to do with the biblical patriarch Abraham.
At first, the church simply refused to publish a translation of the papy-
ri. But photographs of the papyri were submitted to three different professional
Egyptologists. These men were: Dr. John A. Wilson of the University of Chicago,
Professor Klaus Baer of the University of Chicago's Oriental Institute, and
Professor Richard A. Parker of Brown University.
Independently, each came to the same conclusion - the papyri were part of
a pagan text that gave instructions on preparing the body of a man named Hor
for burial, and there was no mention of Abraham or his religion in the text.
These men also dated the Joseph Smith papyri to right around 100-200 years
before Christ, which meant these papyrus manuscripts were made almost 2000 years
after the time of Abraham. From this it was clear that the Book of Abraham could
not be defended as a translation of the Joseph Smith Egyptian papyri.
In fact, Stephen B. Thompson, the one Mormon scholar with a Ph.D. in Egyptology,
agrees with their assessment. At an August 1993 conference in Salt Lake City,
he concluded there is no connection between the Mormon scripture called the
Book of Abraham and the papyrus scrolls Joseph claimed to translate. (A transcript
of Dr. Thompson's paper is available on request.)
Other Mormon scholars, however, refused to admit that the Book of Abraham
was not scripture. Instead, they began looking for alternate ways to defend
it.
Some of the most recent rationalizations try to link the Book of Abraham
with pagan magical papyri, apocalyptic literature and even the Muslim Quran.
Mormon writers seem to be willing to grasp at any Egyptian con- nection in order
to convince people that the Book of Abraham is of divine origin.
The problem is, this approach contradicts specific teaching in the Bible
which says that God does not want His name mixed or associated with any other
pagan deities. God repeatedly punished his people when they began worshipping
other gods (Judges 2:2-3, 11-15) and commanded them to break off any association
with foreign gods. Joshua 24:14 states: "Now therefore fear the LORD, and
serve him in sincerity and in truth: and put away the gods which your fathers
served on the other side of the flood, and in Egypt; and serve ye the Lord."
So, given God's specific commands, it is unreasonable and illogical to say
that God would use pagan documents containing prayers to the false gods of Egypt
as a way to communicate truth about Himself.
The evidence clearly shows that Joseph Smith deceived people back in the
1800s. He could pretend to translate Egyptian because no one knew any better.
For an indepth treatment of this subject see the book "By His Own Hand
Upon Papyrus." This 240 page book contains spectacular color photographs
of the complete Joseph Smith papyri collection.
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