Answering Another Alleged Parallel

[Pahoran]

But you, of course, you get to dismiss responses to your argument as "summary dismissal" before you've read them. Indeed, before they've even been written. See the problem?

On the other hand, I hope you don't expect us to agree with your conclusions before we've read them.

Just surrender in advance. It will save time.

As for me, I eagerly anticipate Chris's paper to be (yet) another "Galileo event" ranking with the discovery that Joseph based his account of Moroni's vist on Der Goldne Topf.

Regards,

Pahoran

[Daniel Peterson]

Not before you've read them, it isn't.

The irony of the sentence above is palpable, and, indeed, many yards thick.

Our presumed responses haven't even been formulated, written, or published yet, and you've already dismissed them as inadequate, etc.

[Chris Smith]

It would be unproductive for me to engage in this thread any further. I am already disappointed with myself for participating in the sniping as far as I have. I sincerely hope you gentlemen have a pleasant evening, and I want you to know that I harbor no personal ill-will against any of you, however much I may disapprove of our message board exchanges.

Best to all of you,

-Chris

[Daniel Peterson]

I sincerely hope you gentlemen have a pleasant evening, and I want you to know that I harbor no personal ill-will against any of you, however much I may disapprove of our message board exchanges.

Nobody has any personal ill-will against you, either, despite your willingness to dismiss as inadequate any and all future responses to what you will eventually publish unless they express abject surrender to your opinions, and your subsequent implicit condemnation of us [!] for dismissing things that we haven't read yet.

[Bill Hamblin]

Nobody has any personal ill-will against you, either, despite your willingness to dismiss as inadequate any and all future responses to what you will eventually publish unless they express abject surrender to your opinions, and your subsequent implicit condemnation of us [!] for dismissing things that we haven't read yet.

Dan, I think Chris is surrendering the field. It is customary to be gracious in victory.

[Daniel Peterson]

You're right, of course.

Okay:

Even in defeat, Chris Smith has our respect, and we wish him well in all of his continued endeavors. May his herds multiply and his fields richly yield. May flowers spring up beneath his feet, and butterflies and rainbows accompany him on his way.

How's that?

[LifeOnaPlate]

You're right, of course.

Okay:

Even in defeat, Chris Smith has our respect, and we wish him well in all of his continued endeavors. May his herds multiply and his fields richly yield. May flowers spring up beneath his feet, and butterflies and rainbows accompany him on his way.

How's that?

A hackneyed rip-off of some old Celtic prayer? Bah, you can do better, Dr. P.

[Daniel Peterson]

A hackneyed rip-off of some old Celtic prayer? Bah, you can do better, Dr. P.

No. Altogether original, so far as I'm consciously aware. But hastily done, I'll admit.

When Mr. Smith formally surrenders in a few months, after the appearance of his pathetically poor still-uncompleted failure of an article, I'll issue a more satisfactory gracious acknowledgment of his utter defeat.

[Cold Steel]

Genesis says he "had gotten" souls. The BoA says he "won" souls. The connotations are quite different, and the change cannot be chalked up to a mere rewriting in third person on the part of Moses.

And you really find this to be a compelling criticism? This is an argument that you spend a substantial amount of time building up, and you do so with the intent of showing the Abrahamic text to be a recent work. Again the verse:

And I took Sarai, whom I took to wife when I was in Ur, in Chaldea,

and Lot, my brotherâ??s son, and all our substance that we had

gathered, and the souls that we had won in Haran, and came

forth in the way to the land of Canaan, and dwelt in tents as

we came on our way.

You conclude: "The Hebrew undoubtedly just means that he acquired a retinue of servants and laborers, but Christians, with their Greek ideas about the salvation of the spirit, have long read Genesis 12:5 through the lens of anachronistic 'soul-saving' rhetoric."

E. Douglas Clark, in his series on the Book of Abraham in Meridian Magazine, notes:

[Abraham] was also a missionary par excellence, freely imparting both spiritual and physical sustenance, with which in both regards he was blessed abundantly. In the Book of Abraham he specifically speaks of the â??many flocks in Haran,â? and, upon finally leaving the place, mentions â??all our substance that we had gatheredâ? (Abr. 2:5, 15). The hand of the Lord prospered him in his temporal affairs, which included raising livestock. He probably engaged in mercantile activity with merchants and caravaneers with whom he would have come in nearly constant contact, since his own journeys and residences seem to have been along the important trade routes.

Abraham â??was an immensely wealthy man who surely had business dealings of all varieties,â? providing him â??as much opportunity as the next man for sharp dealing, even dishonesty.â? But â??he never drove a hard bargain and he â??took no advantage of othersâ?? weakness,â? for â??all men received their due at his handâ? even though many with whom he dealt â??were scoundrels â?? mean and inhospitable,â? their â??one guiding principle [being] the maximizing of profits.

His life was in sharp contrast, his example such that many wanted to learn more of his principles and religion. â??Word of his teaching traveled beyond the borders of the city, and spiritual pilgrims from elsewhere in Mesopotamia had no trouble finding Abram if they wished to go sit with him and learn.â?

For Abraham, the temporal blessings God placed in his hands were opportunities to extend blessings to others. â??He was the father of guests,â? reported al-Thalabi; â??he would not eat the morning meal or evening meal without a guest.â?

The Midrash says that â??Abraham our father used to bring them into his house and give them food and drink and be friendly to them ... and convert themâ? in a joint effort with Sarah: â??Abraham used to convert the men and Sarai the women.â? Thus does Abraham write about the souls â??weâ? had won. Sarah was â??an equal partner with her husbandâ? in this endeavor, and though she was biologically barren, her success in winning souls to Godâ??s kingdom were already making her the mother of many.

The people of Haran â??readily yielded to the influence of Abrahamâ??s humane spirit and his piety. Many of them obeyed his precepts,â? and â??he taught them the instruction of the Lord and his waysâ? in this â??large-scale missionary effort.â?

His teaching was as eloquent as his example, for the Lord had blessed him with the gift of mighty teaching, says the Qurâ??an: the Lord made Abraham â??a prophet; and ... bestowed upon [him] gifts of ... grace, and granted [him] a lofty power to convey the truth unto others.â? He was â??an eloquent speaker,â? says Islamic tradition, and according to Jewish tradition, â??call[ed] out in a mighty voice to all the world.â? â??He led them to righteousness by speaking persuasivelyâ?¦. Even the guilty he led to righteousness,â? as their hearts were changed and they felt to declare that â??the Lord, He is God in the heavens above and the earth below, and you are Abraham, His prophet.â?

Whatever "Christians, with their Greek ideas" thought has no bearing on either the Latter-day Saints or this Abrahamic verse. After all, why would you think this anachronism was any more egregious than, say, Adam being taught about the significance of animal sacrifice in relation to the sacrifice of Christ? Or Enoch's and Moses' visions of the human epic, including the crucifixion and resurrection of Christ? Or of the Book of Mormon's repeated preaching of Christ, the practice of baptism hundreds of years before Christ, or the Brother of Jared's vision of the premortal Christ? Are you going to let all of that go and focus on one little verse in Abrahamâ??a verse I've read many times and have always interpreted as "people" rather than "spirits"? Abraham was, after all, winning people.

Joseph Fielding Smith's vision of Abraham as an evangelist is as anachronistic as the BoA's, so I don't see how this helps resolve the problem.

Again, is it? If the BoA is of Godâ??if it is actually an Abrahamic text written by the great patriarch himself, then this really isn't a problem. A Latter-day Saint might look at the passage and find confirmation on all the other alleged anachronisms that we believe. Hebrew scripture nowhere describes the Messiah in terms that the revealed, restored scriptures describes. Thus, when the Lord revealed the BoA, no one thought it was especially strange that he would use such terminology as the winning of people to the ways of God. Isn't that the purpose of a prophet?

[Chris Smith]

Since this relates to the OP, I'll respond.

My point was not primarily to argue that this is an anachronism that disproves the BoA. (Obviously I didn't make this clear in the OP, cause you're not the first person to misunderstand my intent.) I think there are other evidences that do a much better job of that. Rather, I was responding to arguments like the one in the article you quoted, which use late Jewish and Christian sources as an evidentiary "parallel" in support of Book of Abraham historicty. I think that, at the very least, I have established that this is not a compelling BoA evidence.

Best,

-Chris

[Bill Hamblin]

My point was not primarily to argue that this is an anachronism that disproves the BoA. (Obviously I didn't make this clear in the OP, cause you're not the first person to misunderstand my intent.) I think there are other evidences that do a much better job of that. Rather, I was responding to arguments like the one in the article you quoted, which use late Jewish and Christian sources as an evidentiary "parallel" in support of Book of Abraham historicty. I think that, at the very least, I have established that this is not a compelling BoA evidence.

I thought you had surrendered. Oh well.

If parallels to ancient Abrahamic sources are not evidence of the antiquity of the BOA, why are parallels to 19th century sources evidence for its 19th century origin?

Alas, apparently some of the more objective among us do not believe in methodological consistency.

[Ron Beron]

May his herds multiply and his fields richly yield. May flowers spring up beneath his feet, and butterflies and rainbows accompany him on his way.

How's that?

Sounds like you wish he has a lot of fertilizer in his future.

[Daniel Peterson]

Sounds like you wish he has a lot of fertilizer in his future.

Who knows? My wish may already have been fulfilled.

[Olavarria]

The word translated "souls" in English is probably better rendered "persons".

The Judaica Press Complete Tanack uses the word souls.

http://www.chabad.org/library/article_cdo/.../Chapter-12.htm

The Hebrews conceived of humans as composed of a physical body and an inner spiritual principle. Where we read about "souls" in the Old Testament usually the word is nephesh, denoting the spirit. But Hebrew literature contains a literary device called synecdoche, in which a part stands for the whole. Nephesh is used this way on a number of occasions to refer to the whole person, and in fact is sometimes translated as such in the KJV. Abraham 12:5 is an example of synecdoche.

I was alaways tought to belive that a soul is a person, in other owrds: spirit+body=soul.

The failure to understand synecdoche has led to longstanding confusion about the interpretation of this verse, wherein Abraham seems to have acquired "souls" or "spirits" in Haran. The Hebrew undoubtedly just means that he acquired a retinue of servants and laborers, but Christians, with their Greek ideas about the salvation of the spirit, have long read Genesis 12:5 through the lens of anachronistic "soul-saving" rhetoric. In so doing, they have transmogrified Abraham into an itinerant evangelist.

I dont know.

I like Rashi's commentary on this.

"and the souls they had acquired in Haran whom he had brought under the wings of the Shechinah. Abraham would convert the men, and Sarah would convert the women, and Scripture ascribes to them [a merit] as if they had made them (Gen. Rabbah 39:14)."

http://www.chabad.org/library/article_cdo/.../Chapter-12.htm

The Hebrews had no concept of "saving souls" in the modern/Western/Greek sense.

Niether do mormons, in one sense, we are all "saved". What we are seeking for ourselves and the rest of the world is exaltation.

Joseph Smith's use of the image of soul-winning is distinctly Christian and singularly out of place in the world of ancient Judaism.

But did Abraham practice 'judaism"?

[John D the First]

If parallels to ancient Abrahamic sources are not evidence of the antiquity of the BOA, why are parallels to 19th century sources evidence for its 19th century origin?

Alas, apparently some of the more objective among us do not believe in methodological consistency.

Even if a parallel with antiquity is also mirrored in Joseph's environment, I think it can still count as evidence. How many things in Joseph's environment are not reflective of an ancient understanding of Biblical figures and religion? The fact that Joseph incorporated those aspects of his environment that are mirrored in antiquity is evidence that he has restored ancient understandings. It may or may not be compelling evidence, but it is evidence non-the-less.

[MormonMason]

...

Yes. And in so doing, I was responding to claims that since late Jewish and Christian sources similarly represent Abraham as an evangelist, the BoA is somehow vindicated. Rather, I am suggesting, they are based on the same flawed interpretation of Genesis 12:5 as the BoA portrait.

...

Many traditions, although written late, often have underlying them much earlier oral traditions. I find that if there are a number of similar or identical traditions scattered over a wide geographical area, they can point to an earlier factual tradition. Even if they are not widely scattered, many legends and traditions have as their basis an absolute truth. For instance, we know that there was a city of Troy, not just because it was mentioned in the context of Greek Mythology but because there is other evidence of it. Traditions regarding King Arthur have a basis of truth underlying the legends.

Yes, one can say that the Rabbis shared the same errors of the later commentaors. On the other hand, it can also be said that these old traditions might, just might, have a basis in fact. Not everything that the biblical patriarchs said or did is recorded in the Bible. The Bible as we now have it is the result of the winners in the religious debates about the validity of certain texts and textforms. Even that Bible is clear that there are other, more detailed texts that were there to which the biblical texts owe portions of their origins.