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The Book of Abraham
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The facsimiles in the Book of Abraham

Questions

==

• Joseph Smith's translation of the facsimiles does not agree with that provided by Egyptologists.
• Missing portions of the facsimiles were incorrectly restored before they were published.

Subtopics

• Facsimile 1—This article deals with issues specifically related to Facsimile 1.
• Facsimile 2—This article deals with issues specifically related to Facsimile 2.
• Facsimile 3—This article deals with issues specifically related to Facsimile 3.
• Missing portions of the facsimiles—The facsimiles in the Joseph Smith papyri contain some missing sections. Before the facsimiles were published, the missing sections were filled in. Critics charge that the sections that were filled in are incorrect, and that this proves that Joseph Smith was not a prophet.

Detailed Analysis

== Hugh Nibley notes the following,

[I]t is important to emphasize what many Egyptologists are insisting on today as never before, namely, the folly of giving just one interpretation and one only to any Egyptian representation. This is the pit into which Joseph Smith's critics have always fallen: "This cannot possibly represent 'A' because it represents 'B'!" "The value of an Egyptian presentation," Eberhard Otto reminds us, "depended on seeing the greatest possible number of meanings in the briefest possible formulation."3 Heretofore, critics of the Joseph Smith explanations have insisted on the least possible number of meanings, namely one, to every item, and as a result have not only disagreed widely among themselves, but also exposed their efforts to drastic future revision. The Egyptians "considered it a particular nicety that symbols should possess multiple significance," wrote Henri Frankfort, "that one single interpretation should not be the only possible one."4 ^[1]

There are at least two possibilities here:

• Kevin Barney hypothesizes that the Book of Abraham was written by Abraham himself, then passed from generation to generation until it fell into the hands of a hypothetical Jewish editor in the second century B.C. This editor attached it to a the Egyptian papyri because of the useful symbolism contained on the Egyptian funerary text.^[2]

For a detailed response, see: A Jewish redactor

• Richard D. Draper, S. Kent Brown, and Michael D. Rhodes have similarly theorized that "the original illustration drawn by Abraham had been modified and adapted for use by Hor, the owner of the papyrus. What Joseph Smith did with the facsimiles is thus similar to the Joseph Smith Translation of the Bible—he gave the original meaning of Abraham's illustrations, correcting for the changes and distortions that had taken place over nearly two millennia."^[3]

Answer

== We don't have all the material Joseph was working with, and until we do (which seems unlikely), we won't know why he interpreted the facsimiles as he did.

== Notes ==

1. [note] Hugh Nibley, "All the Court's a Stage: Facsimile 3, a Royal Mumming", Abraham in Egypt
2. [note] Kevin L. Barney, “The Facsimiles and Semitic Adaptation of Existing Sources,” in John Gee and Brian M. Hauglid (editors), Astronomy, Papyrus, and Covenant (Provo, Utah: Brigham Young University, 2006), 107–130.
3. [note] Richard D. Draper, S. Kent Brown, Michael D. Rhodes, "Introduction to the Book of Abraham," in The Pearl of Great Price: A Verse-by-Verse Commentary (Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 2005), 243.