Joseph Smith And The Veil

[kryoung1983]

I read the book the Kolob theorum which is heavy conjecture but there was one area which seemed to ring true because of its reliance on something Joseph Smith said in Egyptian alphabet and grammar. For one has anyone read this..I have not been able to find it, and have no knowledge outside of the fact that critics try to use it to attack any validity in the book of Abraham. It seems an irony since I think the following shows that Joseph Smith was well ahead of his time at least in this area.

"A VEIL SHIELDS THE EARTH

Again, from the Doctrine and Covenants, the Lord promised that the veil â??which hideth the

earth shall be taken off and all flesh shall see me together. And every corruptible thing . . .

shall be consumed; and . . . shall melt in the fervent heat and all things shall become newâ?

(Doctrine and Covenants 101:23-25). This passage clearly shows the shielding effect of the

veil.

Considerable and astonishing detail about this barrier between the earth and heaven is

offered in the Prophet Josephâ??s Egyptian Alphabet and Grammar. His comments recorded

under the heading, Fifth Degree of Flosisis reads, â??God has said, Let this be the center for

light, and let there be bounds that it may not pass. He hath set a cloud round about in the

heavens, and the light of the grand governing . . . fifteen fixed stars center there . . . So God

has set the bounds of light lest it pass over and consume the planets.â?19

Consider that nearly 150 years ago, long before science had any idea of the structure of the

Universe, Godâ??s prophet said that there exists â??clouds round about in the heavensâ? for

â??bounds of lightâ? from the concentrated emissions â??of the fifteen fixed starsâ? in the center

place, and that the purpose of these clouds is to keep the planets from being consumed.

What profound insight! We stand with awe and respect for Josephâ??s prophetic powers.

VEILS OF DUST INSIDE THE GALAXY

Only in our generation has mankind stumbled on to this idea earlier stated by Joseph in his

Egyptian Alphabet and Grammar. E.E. Barnard and Max F.J.C. Wolf, in our day, after

studying the dark patches in the Milky Way for many years, finally concluded that these

â??emptyâ? spaces in the heavens were not holes.

They did not indicate the absence of matter, but rather the presence of

matter, vast clouds of dust particles that absorbed and blocked off the light of

the stars that lay behind them, much as the clouds in the earthâ??s atmosphere

absorbed and blocked off the light of the sun behind them.

This interstellar dust is thought to be very fine in diameterâ??only a few thousandths or

hundredths of an inch. Bernhard, et al., said, â??Inasmuch as the edges of the [dust] masses

are often sharp, as in the horse-head nebula, it is concluded that likely the clouds of this

material are held together by gravitation.â?

For evidence of these dark patches of dust that mask the stars behind them, see the

accompanying picture on page 13, which is a view of the Milky Way Galaxy in the general

direction of the hub. The black patches, oddly shaped, are part of the dust in the region of

Sagittarius, blocking our view.

These vast clouds of dust are discussed by Professor Shapley of Harvard:

Much of the obscuring material that conceals the galactic nucleus is at no

great distance, only a few hundred or a thousand light-years away, and it

probably has nothing to do with the nucleus itself. It is in part the dust that

lies between the spiral arms. But wherever the obscuring material may be

located, it effectively conceals some of the nucleus, and probably dims it all to

a measurable degree. Beyond the center, there must be much dust, for in its

general direction, no external galaxies show through . . . . We suspect

sometimes that there may be around our galaxy a continuous peripheral ring

of obscuration.

It appears, therefore, that what the Prophet Joseph Smith described has actually been

discovered as this band of obscuring matter stretching through the galaxy."

[kryoung1983]

I don't know if I defined my question well enough. Has anyone read The egyptian Alphabet and grammar and what do you think of it? Does it throw light on the book of Abraham...what does its pages hold? I have never read any of it outside of this quote.

[ckonrad]

I don't know if I defined my question well enough. Has anyone read The egyptian Alphabet and grammar and what do you think of it? Does it throw light on the book of Abraham...what does its pages hold? I have never read any of it outside of this quote.

Hello

I've never read the Kolob Theorem although i have heard of it. I also have never read the Egyptian Alphabet and Grammer, however i have read a good article which sheds some light on this issue http://farms.byu.edu/publications/transcripts/?id=48

-corey

[kamenraider]

I don't know if I defined my question well enough. Has anyone read The egyptian Alphabet and grammar and what do you think of it? Does it throw light on the book of Abraham...what does its pages hold? I have never read any of it outside of this quote.

You can read it yourself HERE.

[JeffM]

You can read it yourself HERE.

Interesting document. I noticed this comment near the top:

NOTE: THIS IS NOT AN AUTHENTIC GRAMMAR AND ALPHABET OF THE EGYPTIAN LANGUAGE. IT DOES NOT CONTAIN ANY GRAMMAR OR ANY GENUINE OR RELIABLE ANALYSIS OF THE EGYPTIAN LANGUAGE. THIS IS PART OF THE JOSEPH SMITH EGYPTIAN PAPERS. IT IS MADE AVAILABLE TO HELP UNDERSTAND JOSEPH SMITH IN 1835 WHEN HE WAS PREPARING TO WORK ON THE BOOK OF ABRAHAM.

What is the point of an "Egyptian Alphabet" manual that has nothing to do with the Egyptian language?

[kryoung1983]

Interesting document. I noticed this comment near the top:

What is the point of an "Egyptian Alphabet" manual that has nothing to do with the Egyptian language?

This is from the site 72 languages.

"Joseph Smithâ??s Contributions to Egyptology

David Grant Stewart, Sr.

[JeffM]

This is from the site 72 languages.

"Joseph Smithâ??s Contributions to Egyptology

David Grant Stewart, Sr....

I am not going to try to dissect this complete document or argue about the authenticity of the Book of Abraham. But let's look at a few things Mr Stewart said.

I am sure I must sound critical of scholars at times. I would like to say in their defense that after examining the foundations of Egyptology and Sumerology, I do not wonder that they are confused. The wonder is that they do as well as they do with what they have to work with and what has been handed down to them. As Prof. Cyrus Gordon said, independent thought is not encouraged, to put it mildly. In a field where credentials are everything, we should review the definition of credentials: the measure of your ability and willingness to demonstrate strict conformity to what is commonly believed by those already in the field.

I am the last person to defer mindlessly to scholars - secular or otherwise - and I concur that group thinking can be a problem in any discipline. But this paragraph, without engaging anything specific, shows a complete readiness to dismiss any conclusion ever reached by any Egyptian scholar. Many lifetimes of hard work are implicitly made to count for absolutely nothing. If this doesn't cause warning bells to go off in a person's head, I don't know what would. This is not the approach of a person genuinely looking for answers. (Plus, it doesn't acknowledge the possibility of "groupthink" in Mormon circles.)

One thing is true, and Nibley figured it out: The JS GAEL can not be reconciled with conventional Egyptology. Obviously the sen-sen papyrus was not the source of the Book of Abraham. This was the thesis of Nibleyâ??s book, and that ought to have put an end to the questions of Joseph Smith as a translator. There is no way that the JS GAEL makes sense on the foundation of Egyptology, the foundation our scholars have built upon since Champollionâ??s book became accepted around 1867. Nibley very ably proved it many times over using the conventional tools of the conventional Egyptologist.

Why, then, could not the critics accept the verdict of one who was universally regarded as the best scholar in such matters?...

These paragraphs make it sound like Nibley had to convince secular scholars of a view they already held - that the Book of Abraham was not a correct translation of Mr. Smith's Egyptian papyri! This is completely confused! Where did the idea come from that the Book of Abraham was ever a correct translation of those papyri if not from Mormons themselves? I am mystified at what, other than wide-eyed certainty about the Book of Abraham, could cause a person to argue like this.

The fact of the matter is this: The Joseph Smith Grammar and Alphabet of the Egyptian Language is absolutely correct insofar as it is transcribed correctly [it abounds in scribal errors, even to the point of having whole pages of pure gibberish].

Correct about what? Something other than the topic of the book -- "Egyptian Alphabet and Grammar?" Perhaps the book should have been called "Non-Egyptian Alphabet and Grammar!" Also, if Joseph Smith was so careless about how his scribes represented his ideas as to let them produce pages of gibberish, then one can only wonder what the whole point of the exercise actually was.

[JS GAEL] is entirely out of step with what [secular scholars] have been taught. Even more seriously, it is extremely difficult to understand. I have never met or heard of anybody who has been able to make any sense of it. Even the great Hugh Nibley - and he was great in every sense of the word - could not make heads or tails of it, and concluded that it could not be done. It deals in concepts which are not even considered the province of graphic communication...

If I looked at a page of chicken scratch that I was determined must mean something, could I not say the same thing about it?

The JS GAEL is not complete...

...what Joseph Smith provided are nothing more or less than the missing links in a very long and complex chain.

These paragraphs are basically filler - an apology for the fact that the "Egyptian Alphabet and Grammar" book is incomprehensible.

From my own discoveries, let me cite this example...

It is a correct document, and I can prove every correctly transcribed word of it.

I will leave it to scholars to argue the details of the Egyptian (or whatever it is) language. However, it's hard to see what this peculiar nitpicking at a few unidentified words is trying to accomplish.

I should tell you something else about the JS GAEL. For over a hundred and seventy years, scholars have been barking up the wrong tree. They have said, â??Joseph Smith can not translate Egyptian hieroglyphs because he does not do it the way we do.â? It never occurred to them that they might be wrong and he might be right. And it never will. So letâ??s bark up a different tree and see what we find.

Notice how this same line of reasoning could be used to defend Ptolemy's claim that the sun revolves around the earth:

"I should tell you something else about the earth revolving around the sun. For over a hundred and seventy years, scholars have been barking up the wrong tree. They have said, â??Ptolemy cannot see that the earth revolves around the sun because he does not do it the way we do.â? It never occurred to them that they might be wrong and Ptolemy might be right. And it never will."

That is, it never will as long as study and new data continue to count for nothing.

Joseph Smith also translated a lot of hieroglyphs, but that would yield the same result. I would claim it means one thing and scholars would not accept it, and neither of us would be profited.

Why do scholars not accept it? Because their study leads them to different conclusions. Why does the author accept it? Because no amount of study is allowed to make Joseph Smith wrong when God has told you that he's right. This goes right along with what I said in "Concerned about Conclusions of Mormon Scholars"

Scholarsâ?? inability to decipher the Kirtland Egyptian papers reflects several factors. First, they map the sounds and meanings of impoverished Ptolemaic Egyptian onto the much richer Egyptian language of nearly two thousand years earlier. This is a start, but this does not reflect how sounds and meanings have changed over time. Early Egyptian was a richer and more descriptive language that towered over late the Ptolemaic and Coptic language, just as the early pyramids provide a window into a more advanced civilization of which little evidence can be found in the architecture of the Ptolemaic era.

This author has already disparaged the work of the entire community of Egyptian scholars in the world. Where, then, does he get his expertise, if not from that very community? For example, if the conclusions of Champollion and his successors were wrong about how to read Egyptian, then how did David Grant Stewart come by his knowledge of Egyptian without relying on their work? Did he have his own Rosetta stone?

There has been little effort by LDS scholars to evaluate why Joseph Smith translated Hebrew different from modern scholars, let alone to understand the logic and implications. I chose to follow Joseph Smith, trying to understand why he translated as he did rather than writing him off as an â??ignorant farmboy.â?

The statement in bold summarizes everything. This is what prevents him from seeing all of the Egyptian Alphabet and Grammar as gibberish. Is this not why there are "marbles are in the box?"

I leave the evaluation of the rest of Mr. Stewart's essay to someone else.

[Charactor]

I am not going to try to dissect this complete document or argue about the authenticity of the Book of Abraham. But let's look at a few things Mr Stewart said.

I am the last person to defer mindlessly to scholars - secular or otherwise - and I concur that group thinking can be a problem in any discipline. But this paragraph, without engaging anything specific, shows a complete readiness to dismiss any conclusion ever reached by any Egyptian scholar. Many lifetimes of hard work are implicitly made to count for absolutely nothing. If this doesn't cause warning bells to go off in a person's head, I don't know what would. This is not the approach of a person genuinely looking for answers. (Plus, it doesn't acknowledge the possibility of "groupthink" in Mormon circles.)

These paragraphs make it sound like Nibley had to convince secular scholars of a view they already held - that the Book of Abraham was not a correct translation of Mr. Smith's Egyptian papyri! This is completely confused! Where did the idea come from that the Book of Abraham was ever a correct translation of those papyri if not from Mormons themselves? I am mystified at what, other than wide-eyed certainty about the Book of Abraham, could cause a person to argue like this.

Correct about what? Something other than the topic of the book -- "Egyptian Alphabet and Grammar?" Perhaps the book should have been called "Non-Egyptian Alphabet and Grammar!" Also, if Joseph Smith was so careless about how his scribes represented his ideas as to let them produce pages of gibberish, then one can only wonder what the whole point of the exercise actually was.

If I looked at a page of chicken scratch that I was determined must mean something, could I not say the same thing about it?

These paragraphs are basically filler - an apology for the fact that the "Egyptian Alphabet and Grammar" book is incomprehensible.

I will leave it to scholars to argue the details of the Egyptian (or whatever it is) language. However, it's hard to see what this peculiar nitpicking at a few unidentified words is trying to accomplish.

Notice how this same line of reasoning could be used to defend Ptolemy's claim that the sun revolves around the earth:

"I should tell you something else about the earth revolving around the sun. For over a hundred and seventy years, scholars have been barking up the wrong tree. They have said, â??Ptolemy cannot see that the earth revolves around the sun because he does not do it the way we do.â? It never occurred to them that they might be wrong and Ptolemy might be right. And it never will."

That is, it never will as long as study and new data continue to count for nothing.

Why do scholars not accept it? Because their study leads them to different conclusions. Why does the author accept it? Because no amount of study is allowed to make Joseph Smith wrong when God has told you that he's right. This goes right along with what I said in "Concerned about Conclusions of Mormon Scholars"

This author has already disparaged the work of the entire community of Egyptian scholars in the world. Where, then, does he get his expertise, if not from that very community? For example, if the conclusions of Champollion and his successors were wrong about how to read Egyptian, then how did David Grant Stewart come by his knowledge of Egyptian without relying on their work? Did he have his own Rosetta stone?

The statement in bold summarizes everything. This is what prevents him from seeing all of the Egyptian Alphabet and Grammar as gibberish. Is this not why there are "marbles are in the box?"

I leave the evaluation of the rest of Mr. Stewart's essay to someone else.

Mr. Stewart makes the comment without engaging anything specifically because there is too much material to cover here. It would take a few months to get up to speed on it. I think the fact that Mr Stewart can translate 72 languages says something about his linguistic ability. Kind of like an Einstein Linguist with his study of ancient languages included. He's eons ahead of the average Joe. So maybe he's right and what he said sounds like gibberish to you but that would not make it any less true. I think what he's saying is that the linguistics of Ptolemaic Egyptology has it's place but there is another school of thought that might best be termed Ancient Egyptian linguistics that has been ignored by modern Egyptologists. The basics for this were more in vogue during Champollions time but the Ptolomaic field has gone it's own way for the sake of convenience. An inclusion of Ancient Egyptian linguistics would be a "Sea Change" People have to be exposed to it in order to receive it. Other than internet publishing I don't think Mr. Stewart has published a book on it yet. Since research shows that researchers are less likely to to accept web publication over Book/Periodical publication. I don't think he has gotten the recognition yet. I do think in his research on ancient languages, Mr. Stewart's statements are the result of a person who has sought and found his own answers and has gone on from there.

I understand Joseph Smith and/or the church never published the book called "Egyptian Alphabet and Grammer" This was done by anti-Mormons who got a copy of the Joseph Smith Papyri and used it for their own ends.

[jonzlaw]

I can document time after time that Joseph Smithâ??s translations are correct while those of worldly scholars are wrong. The scriptural prophesy of Joseph stands: â??Then shall the Lord God say unto him: The learned shall not read them, for they have rejected them, and I am able to do mine own work; wherefore thou shalt read the words which I shall give unto theeâ? (2 Nephi 27:20).

Hey I thought it was "Reformed Egyptian?"

Also, can you please cite a couple examples of times that Smith's translations were correct while those of worldly sholars were wrong?

Thank You!

[BCSpace]

I am the last person to defer mindlessly to scholars - secular or otherwise - and I concur that group thinking can be a problem in any discipline. But this paragraph, without engaging anything specific, shows a complete readiness to dismiss any conclusion ever reached by any Egyptian scholar. Many lifetimes of hard work are implicitly made to count for absolutely nothing. If this doesn't cause warning bells to go off in a person's head, I don't know what would. This is not the approach of a person genuinely looking for answers. (Plus, it doesn't acknowledge the possibility of "groupthink" in Mormon circles.)

I can only partly agree in the sense that we should approach carefully. Many times throughout scientific history, it has taken someone rejecting all the old theories and working outside the box to advance our understanding