Facsimiles Do Not Match Translation?

[sunstoned]

Seems to me that if Joseph was caught in so many other lies about his claims, seems to reason he did here too. Of course, I don't have a religion to defend today...so no need to complicate the simplistic.

This all seems really open and shut to me.

[ERMD]

Seems to me that if Joseph was caught in so many other lies about his claims, seems to reason he did here too. Of course, I don't have a religion to defend today...so no need to complicate the simplistic.

Since it isn't the point of this thread, perhaps you would like to start another that delineates "so many other lies".

I'm simplistic enough that I need such things spelled out for me.

thanks!

[cksalmon]

CKSlamon:

And now you are beginning to become enlightened about the entire nature of the beast called "Egyptology," and how the scholars reallywork. It is always, ALWAYS, ***ALWAYS*** 100% of the time entirely without question the fact in historical research of "a case that might be."

ANd it is precisely how you state it. If the Egyptologists cannot even translate Ptolemaic Egyptian hieroglyphs yet, how on this living earth can they pronounce anything Smith said as false, if they themselves cannot even tell us what anything says?! See the point yet?

Yeah, I guess I see your point: who on earth knows what the figures mean? JS might just have been correct after all. Who can disprove him? The ancients? No. (They disagree with him; and are thusly wrong.) Modern Egyptologists? No. (They disagree with him; and are thusly wrong.) In fact, his translation just can't be proved wrong (because he wasn't wrong), ergo, we should believe his is somehow "correct." That's an unfalsifiable position, Kerry. JS just can't be wrong no matter what. For, he could still be right, n'est-ce pas? Ergo, he is right. Is that your argument?

I have a hard time parsing what else it might be.

CKS

[e=mc2]

Yes it is open and shut that the final word is not in yet on very much at all about the ancient Egyptian religion and the meanings of the hieroglyphs in Ptolemaic times (the era of when the J.S. Papyri were written). Not one Egyptologist in this world would proclaim game over, we know it all now, and it's all perfectly clear to us about all the nature of the politics, religion, history, psychology, etc. We know all there is to know about what went on in their temples. No one can pronounce finality, let alone even being close yet.

This is why two of the recent books I have on this were actually written, to dispel this myth of it is all more of the same with the ancients, we already know what they did, thought, believed, and accepted as real. The two books are Jeremy Naydler, Temple of the Cosmos: The Ancient Egyptian Experience of the Sacred, Inner Traditions, 1996; and Rosemary Clark, The Sacred Tradition in Ancient Egypt, Llewellyn, 2004. I challenge you to read them and not find something new, another amazing connection, an intriguing new idea and interpretation, etc.

[e=mc2]

CKSalman:

who on earth knows what the figures mean?

WHO on earth really *does*? And can they PROVE the meaning? And will all other Egyptologists see the light of day in the obvious meaning and AGREE? JOHn Anthony West, Serpent in the Sky demonstrated very powerfully that no two Egyptologists agree, not only in HOW to translate the hieroglyphs, but WHAT they say and mean.

CKSalmon:

JS might just have been correct after all. Who can disprove him? The ancients? No. (They disagree with him; and are thusly wrong.)

That is not my stance, nor other LDS scholars' stances. It is not the ancients who are wrong who disagree with Joseph Smith. It is what the final word of modern Egyptologists who say what the ancients meant (when they don't know) and who then say "See? Smith blew it" that is wrong.

Modern Egyptologists? No. (They disagree with him; and are thusly wrong.)

Since there is no uniform and agreed upon meanings of even the Book of the Dead, even what it is, why is this a problematical stance? Is the Book of Breathings any more obliging?

In fact, his translation just can't be proved wrong (because he wasn't wrong),

Ignorance abounds (and I mean in your above comment, as well as my knoweldge, and others on the ancient Egyptians also). We do NOT say he can't be proven wrong BECAUSE he wasn't wrong. We say he can't be proven wrong, AT THIS POINT OF OUR KNOWLEDGE, ***BECAUSE*** enough is not understood, known, or translated correctly from the ancients with our modern scholars yet.

ergo, we should believe his is somehow "correct." That's an unfalsifiable position, Kerry. JS just can't be wrong no matter what.

YOUR characature of my position is truly silly.

[cksalmon]

Since you're interested, can you parse this for me:

one needs to have an answer to the question: why do Joseph Smithâ??s interpretations need to match ancient Egyptian interpretations at all? I do not intend to answer the issue here but merely to raise it. Critics should note that unless they can answer this question satisfactorily, they have no case.

One answer would be, "I have no idea what Gee is saying here." I guess another answer would be to attempt to explain it.

What on earth does Gee mean here? Any ideas? Any suggestions? Seems like a complete non sequitur to me.

CKS

[cksalmon]

YOUR characature of my position is truly silly.

Hi Kerry--

Your position seems to be: "Let's withhold judgment. We don't have all the relevant information yet. JS may have been right. We just don't, at this moment, have the relevant information to exonerate him. But it may be there."

Okay. Fair enough. Let's keep waiting. And waiting.

I don't think your position is "silly," so much as I think it is hopefully naive. That's not necessarily a bad thing. More power to you. To believe proposition X in the face of fairly conclusive proof to the contrary is not so much evil as it is irresponsible.

[e=mc2]

CKSalmon:

Your position seems to be: "Let's withhold judgment. We don't have all the relevant information yet. JS may have been right. We just don't, at this moment, have the relevant information to exonerate him. But it may be there."

Exactly right. The pure essence of scholarship is to make propositions, but not as finalities, but as suggestive probabilities. This is the essence of the historical enterprise. None more powerfully obvious to anyone well read, than in Egyptology itself.

I am just now working on a massive paper on Melchizedek, and another one on the Servant Songs in Isaiah. I have literally HUNDREDS of scholars (at least a dozen more since this weekend I just acquired -woo hoo!) who have translated, argued, re-translated, interpreted, suggested, proven, then changed their minds, proven yet another theory about something in the Servant Songs, then CHANGED THEIR MINDS again 3 MORE TIMES, each with different outcomes(!?), and they still are not convinced there is finality yet. Now Isaiah in the Massoretic text has been around for over 1200 years mind you! That's 1200 YEARS, and now we have a most beautiful and very POWERFUL control on the Hebrew text of the ENTIRE BOOK of Isaiah, via the Dead Sea Scrolls, ANOTHER 1,000 years OLDER, and virtually intact, and yet scholars are ********STILL******** arguing about whether the servant was a contemporary of Second Isaiah, or whether a future Messiah, a suffering Messiah, an Eschatalogical Messiah, whether he was killed via crucifixion, or even if he died. They are arguing whether there is vicarious suffering of an individual, or is it corporate Israel as a nation. Is it an individual, or an entire group? Is it a smaller group within the larger corporate group of entire national Israel, or is it something else? Is it really a substitute motif involved here in the Fourth Servant Song, or something else? Is it mainly a political message, a literary creation, or a religious meaningful thing we are reading? Is it mere pious fiction?! Why is the Servant anonymous? Was this meant tobe? Or was it assumed everyone already knew who the servant was in that day? Is it dealing with past events, current events, or the future? All? None? There is absolutely NO AGREEMENT in any of these issues, which pretty much covers everything cocerned with the Servant Songs? Is it Jesus Christ? Jehoiachin? Jerubabel? Moses? Elijah? Who was this figure? What is the significance (is there any?) of the tenses in the Hebrew, both the perfect and imperfect, and which patterns are meaningful within a context of say an individual servant as opposed to another entirely contradictory context of a corporate group image for the servant? Why are there so many different voices in the Hebrew? Why were the use of so many pronouns included? Why not just name who the servant was? What is the theological underpinnings to it all? IS there any theological underpinning that makes sense? If so, what is it? Suffering? Righteousness? Justice? Love of God? Repentance? Israel? Christ's atonement? Levitival animal sacrifice? Which makes the most sense of the data?

Does the Hebrew translate out correctly with Duhm?, Barker?, Barre?, Sekine? Driver? Van der Woude? Weiser? Keil-Delitzsch?, Weingreen?, Walton?, LaSor?, Pfeiffer?, Brewer?, Fishbane?, Rembaum?, Blenkinsopp?, Goulder?,Syren?, all of whom I am reading and am truly astounded to no end that there is virtual DISAGREEMENT on the majority of issues involved, and this in less than a mere 15 biblical verses?!

And we have had the Bible around for a whole lot longer period, and have at least 100 times the amount of scholars working on it, than we do the ancient Egyptian materials, and it has hardly come out of the wash as pristine, perfectly translated, and completely agreeable in all cases about the most elementary issues involved in the stories! Is Egyptology any easier?

It would be ludicrous for Bible scholars to pronounce Joseph Smith's comments on Isaiah wrong because we have translated it, and Joseph SMith doesn't make sense. Yes, it's been translated, but that hardly proves we know what is happening or what it means.

[e=mc2]

ckSalmon:

Let's keep waiting. And waiting.

Is this even close to fair to what we all are doing with these issues? Your charicature of all this is what is naive.

I don't think your position is "silly," so much as I think it is hopefully naive.

It is the essence of the enterprise of scholarship to work, and rework, and rework the data, always including yet more discovered, sometimes damaging, sometimes contradictory data from what was known earlier. The current study of Melchizedek and Enoch studies prove this absolutely, as do the ever ongoing continual reassessment of the significance, meaning, and translation (and re-translation!) of the Dead Sea Scrolls, the Gnostic texts, the Ras Shamra documents, and yes, even the ancient Egyptian Book of the Dead, THANK GOD we update! Otherwise we would still be reading E.A.W. Budge's hopelessly lousy translation of the Papyrus of Ani. But thanks be to Raymond Faulkner, for yet again, going through it again and re-translating, and CORRECTING many of the umpteen MYRIADS of blatantly stupid errors of Budge (who has been used against the Prophet mind you! And now he's no good!) There is always a changing of positions, and updating of the theories. This is scholarship. If you think it's something different, go ahead and present your case.

That's not necessarily a bad thing. More power to you.

Waiting is not what scholarship is about, but updating, and keeping flexible certainly is. Margaret Barker has demonstrated this over the last decade! Leonora Leet has done the same with the Kabbalah in astonishing successful manners, as has many new studies of the Historical Jesus. Heh..... ironically, the same thing is actually being done with the game of Chess, of all things! CONSTANT updating and changing of ideas about openings, middle game strategy, end game tactics, prophylaxis strategies, attacking, pawn formation, assessing strengths of knights verses bishops, etc.

To believe proposition X in the face of fairly conclusive proof to the contrary is not so much evil as it is irresponsible.

And since nothing has been fairly conclusively proven, then we are all safe, for now........ and we are still working on the issues also. That's kinda nice and responsible thing ta do, and we are doing so.

[Jan]

Since you're interested, can you parse this for me:

one needs to have an answer to the question: why do Joseph Smithâ??s interpretations need to match ancient Egyptian interpretations at all? I do not intend to answer the issue here but merely to raise it. Critics should note that unless they can answer this question satisfactorily, they have no case.

One answer would be, "I have no idea what Gee is saying here." I guess another answer would be to attempt to explain it.

What on earth does Gee mean here? Any ideas? Any suggestions? Seems like a complete non sequitur to me.

CKS

Heh, what part of it don't you understand?

Perhaps the full sentence would be helpful, plus an examination about what comes before this (essentially last) sentence in the paragraph:

Before any conclusions can be drawn from any comparisons between the two [i.e., ancient Egyptian interpretations and Joseph Smith's interpretations], one needs to have an answer to the question: why do Joseph Smith's interpretations need to match ancient Egyptian interpretations at all?

Essentially, the question is: If modern Egytologists' interpretations don't match the ancient Eygtians' interpretations and if ancient Jewish interpretations don't match the ancient Egyptian interpretations, then why must Joseph Smith's interpretations need to match ancient Egyptian interpretations? Here is the full paragraph as well as a related earlier sections:

We want to know: does X (the interpretation of Joseph Smith) = Y (the interpretation of the ancient Egyptians)? But in reality the question is usually modified slightly by asking: does X (the interpretation of Joseph Smith) equal Z (the interpretation of modern Egyptologists)? As I have already tacitly demonstrated elsewhere (at least for Facsimile 2), Z (the interpretation of modern Egyptologists) usually does not equal Y (the interpretation of the ancient Egyptians).1 Z is therefore irrelevant....At the present time, it is perhaps more important that we determine a method for ascertaining what the ancient Egyptians who drew the facsimiles might have understood by them. I published this methodology some time ago. While I wrote about hypocephali in particular, the same methodology needs to be followed for all of the facsimiles. The methodology comprises four steps...<snip>

....

Earlier in this review I referred to the desire to know the answer to the question: Does the interpretation of Joseph Smith match the interpretation of the ancient Egyptians, or does X=Y? We know that the interpretations of the Egyptologists typically do not match either those of the ancient Egyptians (Z=Y) or Joseph Smith (Z=X) and so they are simply irrelevant to the issue. But the unquestioned assumption is that the interpretation of Joseph Smith has to match the interpretation of the ancient Egyptians (X=Y). This assumption is related to assumptions and theories (both formal and informal) about the nature of the facsimiles. Several such theories do not require Joseph Smith's interpretation to be the same or even close to that of the ancient Egyptians. For example, ancient Jewish interpretations for various Egyptian scenes are known that differ considerably from the ancient Egyptian interpretations and to which Egyptological methods give us no clue. [fn11] Before any conclusions can be drawn from any comparisons between the two, one needs to have an answer to the question: why do Joseph Smith's interpretations need to match ancient Egyptian interpretations at all?

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

fn1. John Gee, "Towards an Interpretation of Hypocephali," in "Le lotus qui sort du terre": M

[LifeOnaPlate]

Hey, I am way behind in my scholarship. However, hasn't there been considerable debate about this subject?

We ought to ask Doctor [sic] Dee Jay Nelson.

[amantha]

So again, the apologetic slant is to show that evidence is not really evidence of anything. This is why it does not make sense to offer evidence to an apologist. In matters of religion, in the end, there is only opinion and faith. So just stick with the faith and stop asking for evidence.

[Scott Gordon]

And what is being left out of the conversation is what Joseph Smith did get right in the Book of Abraham text.

I know this has been hashed to death, but it seems the position from the non believer is that Joseph Smith didn't translate it right and the position from the believer is 1) how do you know? and 2) how is it that Joseph Smith got some of the historical items within the Book of Abraham text correct?

Of course other related discussions are:

1) That isn't the scroll it was translated from (there were a lot)

2) or The Book of Abraham was a direct revelation just as many of the writings in the D & C

Then of course...this gets into one group talking about the translation process, and the other group talking about the Book of Abraham text.

I think this all goes back to what John Gee was saying that this really isn't a cut and dried case, and that those who think the evidence is overwhelming on one side or the other are ill informed.

Did I cover everything?

[e=mc2]

Good points Scottie (Gordon that is). Hey...... I gotta give Scott the nod ya know, being el Presidente of FAIR and all, I want him to let me go to next year's FAIR Conference.......

Amantha:

So again, the apologetic slant is to show that evidence is not really evidence of anything.

I don't believe that is what we are saying or doing. We are saying there are no final answers in the world of human scholarship. I truly think that is a fair assessment for us to make.

This is why it does not make sense to offer evidence to an apologist.

I would kindly disagree. If there is evidence, lets present what we think is such. If it turns out not to be valuable or good or praiseworthy, etc., then we go on from that. But ONLY after as rigorous analysis and presentation, interpretation, translation, and assessment of all data from all angles and all ideas out and available sizing up strengths and weaknesses. This sometimes can take LIFETIMES..........Scholarship is not an easy "O.K. class, I am the professor, and the answer is 3, class dismissed, have a nice day."

In matters of religion, in the end, there is only opinion and faith. So just stick with the faith and stop asking for evidence.

I disagree.

[gitxsanartist]

Honestly I think we have all wasted way too much time on this. I'm not saying JS was trying to "con" anyone but he was an opportunist and the mummies and papyri were just too good of an opportunity to pass up. He already had a reputation in dealing with ancient script so I'm sure someone suggested that the JS have a look at the papyri, what could he do but provide a "translation", and inevitably it would become scripture.

I say look at it for what it is. Its not a translation of the papyri, it may be revelation, it may even be true but it is in no way a translation or transliteration of these ancient documents. All I can say is take off the blinders and open your eyes, or should I say "Emperor's New Clothes".

[paulhadik]

Lord Kerry:

so if Smith had translated the glyphs nearly perfectly than we would be arguing.....uh....

what would we be arguing??

[Thinking]

See A Method for Studying the Facsimiles by John Gee and the sources referenced in his footnotes.

Thinking's review of Gee's review:

Articles like this give Mormon apologists a bad name.

Gee starts by identifying the question.

The question that is constantly asked about the facsimiles is how Joseph Smith’s interpretations match those of the ancient Egyptians.

Then he discusses the questions which Fletcher will ask about each figure on the facsimiles and gives the reader a preview of the remainder of the article with the following statement.

I disagree with his answers because I disagree with many of Fletcher’s assumptions and his method. I shall not analyze most of his assumptions here but will, instead, focus on his method.

This is my favorite quote.

Of the twenty-seven interpretations that Fletcher gives for the figures in the facsimiles, only two are certainly correct while eight are certainly wrong; the remainder are quite likely wrong.

So Fletcher and Gee agreed on two interpretations. Don't you think then that Fletcher would say that Gee was certainly correct on only two interpretations? Also, why are the remainder "quite likely wrong?" Is this a tacit assumption for which Gee criticizes Fletcher in the following statement?

For me, among the more interesting aspects of works on the Book of Abraham are the various tacit assumptions made by the authors about the Book of Abraham or the facsimiles. These assumptions always color, and in most cases overwhelmingly guide, the work done. Yet these assumptions are rarely made explicit. In many cases they are demonstrably false or at least open to question.

And then Gee avoids the original question with a question of his own.

Before any conclusions can be drawn from any comparisons between the two, one needs to have an answer to the question: why do Joseph Smith’s interpretations need to match ancient Egyptian interpretations at all? I do not intend to answer the issue here but merely to raise it. Critics should note that unless they can answer this question satisfactorily, they have no case.

And I will answer Gee's question with a question. If the LDS Church claims that the writings on the papyrus were written by Abraham's own hand,

A Translation of some ancient Records, that have fallen into our hands from the catacombs of Egypt.—The writings of Abraham while he was in Egypt, called the Book of Abraham, written by his own hand, upon papyrus. See History of the Church, vol. 2, pp. 235, 236, 348—351.

why does Gee claim that the facsimiles were drawn by Egyptians?

At the present time, it is perhaps more important that we determine a method for ascertaining what the ancient Egyptians who drew the facsimiles might have understood by them.

[kamenraider]

Maybe Eyptologists should use the Kirtland Egyptian Papers to help them understand the true meaning of texts like the Book of Breathings for Hor, rather than the Rosetta Stone (which, after all, was translated according to the interpretations of Young and Champollion who were not prophets or seers).

[e=mc2]

Maybe the Egyptologists don't have the final answers, anymore than the Christian Bible scholars do about the meaning, interpretation, and translation of Isaiah 53. No one of the multitudinous Jewish scholars I am reading about their views of Isaiah 53's meaning has had the final word either, and they have gone over it with a fine toothed comb, exactly as the Christian scholars have done, and there still is no concensus or finality. Again, I ask, with over 1200 YEARS, over a MILLENIUM of scholarship of this, is the mere child of 200 years of Egyptology any more obliging?

What I am arguing is that the scholars have wonderful insights, ideas, and astonihsingly interesting new translation they come up with because they have NOT yet finally said, "This is it. We now know it all, and there is nothing new under the sun now." They are still looking. Their pronouncements have never been final, finished, and done with full knowledge yet in the last 250 years. Why on earth, with all the new Egyptological knowledge, and new connections, reconnections, translations, and knowledge would we ever accept anything they say as final concerning Joseph Smith at this point? That there is something always new to understand is fundamentally proven through the new "Studies in the Book of Abraham" series (3 volumes thus far), which have electrified many of us with such amazing new stuff we never knew about before. We simply are nowhere near done yet. I have the faith to KEEP LOOKING, and KEEP LEARNING, do our critics?

[solomarineris]

So what if the Facsimiles of the Egyptian Breathing Permits do not match the Book of Abraham. Other than that noxious stuff about a black skin curse, does it really matter? Couldn't we just work from the symbolism of this religious allegory?

do you think there's any chance they do?

If it had any chance Hugh Nibley would disclose it with fanfare fifty years ago.

There's nothing really anybody can do to clean this mess.

[LifeOnaPlate]

Kerry: where is the "Studies of the Book of Abraham?"

[kamenraider]

This is why two of the recent books I have on this were actually written, to dispel this myth of it is all more of the same with the ancients, we already know what they did, thought, believed, and accepted as real. The two books are Jeremy Naydler, Temple of the Cosmos: The Ancient Egyptian Experience of the Sacred, Inner Traditions, 1996; and Rosemary Clark, The Sacred Tradition in Ancient Egypt, Llewellyn, 2004. I challenge you to read them and not find something new, another amazing connection, an intriguing new idea and interpretation, etc.

I wouldn't be surprised at all to find new ideas, interpretations, etc., in these books, since they come from publishers that distribute witchcraft and new age books.

Edit: LifeOnaPlate's question above reminded me of another one. Where is Studies in Scripture Vol. 2?

[e=mc2]

All should be available from FARMS. Have you seen their website? Its a great series!

[LifeOnaPlate]

I just joined so I'll check it out.

[poulsenll]

Scholarship is not an easy "O.K. class, I am the professor, and the answer is 3, class dismissed, have a nice day."

Looking back on thirty years of teaching graduate students in the sciences, I can only say that this attitude was so common that it was a major enterprise to disabuse them of this attitude and unfortunately many were never convinced that the correct answer was not written down somewhere. Unfortuately this is a common outcome of the way in which we teach at the undergraduate level.

Some reasons for it are the large sizes of undergraduate classes, the need to publish or perish thus the need to keep everything cut and dry in order to dedicate time for research, the high opinion some professors have of themselves because they managed to get a PhD abd so on and so on.

On one occasion as a graduate student, I took a class in physical biochemistry where a friend of mine's answer to one of the questions on the final, based on a hypothetical experiment, was marked as wrong. When my friend showed the professor a published paper where the experiment was actually carried out and the answer given by my friend was shown to be correct, the professor refused to change the grade with the statement that only the answers he wanted were the right ones.

Larry P