Book of Abraham
The Book of Abraham (English Book of Abraham ) is one among the canonical Scriptures of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints ( commonly called Mormons) and forms a part of the book Pearl of Great Price. The book is probably the most controversial among the Mormon scriptures.
The five -chapter text was written by Joseph Smith and issued as a translation of ancient Egyptian texts. For canonical Book of Abraham are also three facsimiles of papyri with added explanations of Smith.
While the Church of Jesus Christ holding of Latter -day Saints in this book as Scripture, no longer as such it is regarded in the community of Christ, the second largest Mormon church.
Formation
Joseph Smith, the first prophet of this Church, acquired in July 1835 by a traveling showman two Egyptian mummies, in which a number of papyrus rolls were. Smith claimed to have translated with the help of divine revelation one of these roles, just as he did the Book of Mormon translated from golden plates. The text and facsimiles published in March-May 1842 issues of the Mormon newspaper Times and Seasons were first in several published. Smith wrote in it, the contents of this papyrus came from Abraham himself In the introduction Smith writes: ". The writings of Abraham while he was in Egypt, called the Book of Abraham, written by his own hand on papyrus "
Importance
Since the Book of Abraham makes some theological statements that
- Not so clearly and explicitly reflected in the other scriptures of the Mormons, or at least,
- Be considered for the Mormon faith as a central and
- The teachings of most other Christian churches oppose, for example, the assumption of existence of man before his conception and his physical existence and a plurality of gods (English Plurality of Gods )
There are intensive efforts by critics of the Mormon religion, deny the Book of Abraham his credibility as an authentic signature of Abraham and, thereby, to expose Joseph Smith as a false prophet, and an equally intense counter- argument of supporters of this belief.
Assessment
After the papyri were lost for decades from the estate of Joseph Smith, popped a small part of it in 1967 to again. These fragments were of Egyptologists, both those who believed in the statement about the Book of Abraham by Joseph Smith, as identified by those who rejected this statement, agreed to be the "Book of breath ", a short version of the Egyptian Book of the Dead, which in Egypt has traditionally placed the deceased in the grave. This text has the Book of Abraham nothing in common. In addition, the emergence of this papyrus was dated to the late Egyptian, Hellenistic period, many centuries after Abraham. The opponents of the divine origin of the Book of Abraham see confirmed. They also lead the field, that of Joseph Smith, a 34 -page manuscript entitled "Egyptian Alphabet and Grammar" (Egyptian alphabet and grammar) is obtained, which indeed testifies to an intense study of the papyri, but a product of fantasy, the has nothing to do with a real grammar, an alphabet or a vocabulary list of the Egyptian. Furthermore, they point out that the illustrations in the book of Abraham ( the facsimiles 1 to 3 ) by Joseph Smith and / or his staff with his endorsement fake Egyptian statues be, had the highest probative value of the potential for fraud and charlatanism of Joseph Smith.
Proponents believe that we are dealing with a divinely inspired translation of the Book of Abraham, especially the representative of FARMS, on the other hand argue that Joseph Smith (actually his colleague Oliver Cowdery ) have spoken of a papyrus preserved, the partially clean with red ink was written. But the rediscovered fragments correspond to this description by no means. However, proving the picture in the book of Abraham, Facsimile No. 3, that Joseph Smith was indeed used this rediscovered fragments for the "translation ". The papyrus fragments were ever found again only in that someone again saw the picture in the museum's archive as the picture in the book of Abraham. The experiments of Joseph Smith, to decipher a scientific way Egyptian characters, consider these scholars as irrelevant as it took place only after the writing of the Book of Abraham and have nothing to do with a translation with the help of divine revelation. They assume that the Book of Abraham underlying papyri are still missing. Regarding the young age to lead them into the field, that a text could be much older than the present edition. For example, Shakespeare's works were still written in an edition from the 20th century by Shakespeare in the 17th century. This principle also applies to the Book of Abraham. The statement that the book had been written by Abraham " by his own hand ," refers to the proponents of the book only on the text itself, not the Smith concretely present papyri.
Supporters and opponents interpret the contents of the Book of Abraham completely different. The opponents try to prove that the book of imagination of Joseph Smith sprung and thus is a product of the 19th century. Its proponents try to prove that the statements therein, the description of the text accompanying a facsimile pictorial representations, the cosmological and religious and social views in the ancient Egyptian or Hebrew culture in which influenced correspond. It is also referred to them, that the statements of Joseph Smith certainly with Egyptian modes of representation are in line and the critics criticized as arbitrary additions of missing parts of the illustrations have parallels elsewhere in discovered Egyptian representations. The explanations of Joseph Smith to the facsimiles prove, in the opinion of critics, the absolute incompetence of Joseph Smith in Egyptology. Critics conclude even a fraudulent intent by Joseph Smith. Those who regard the Book of Abraham as genuine, these criticisms have replied in detail and are of the opinion that she was soundly refuted.