The Browns Fail to Save the Book of Abraham
By Jerald and Sandra Tanner
In 1912, F. S. Spalding published a booklet entitled, Joseph Smith, Jr., As a Translator. In this booklet Spalding questioned the authenticity of the Book of Abraham—a work which Joseph Smith claimed he translated from an ancient Egyptian papyrus. The Book of Abraham is published in the Pearl of Great Price, one of the four standard works of the Mormon Church. Although Spalding presented a very good case against the Book of Abraham, he was limited because he did not have the original papyrus or the handwritten manuscripts of the Book of Abraham. Since Spalding’s time a great deal of material has come to light which demonstrates conclusively that Joseph Smith failed in his attempt to translate the Book of Abraham, the Kinderhook plates and the Book of Mormon.
Book Of Abraham
On November 27, 1967, the Mormon-owned Deseret News announced:
NEW YORK—A collection of pa[p]yrus manuscripts, long believed to have been destroyed in the Chicago fire of 1871, was presented to The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints here Monday by the Metropolitan Museum of Art. . . .
Included in the papyri is a manuscript identified as the original document from which Joseph Smith had copied the drawing which he called “Facsimile No. 1” and published with the Book of Abraham.
In the Salt Lake City Messenger for March 1968 we demonstrated photographically that one of the papyrus fragments in this collection was used by Joseph Smith in producing his “translation” of the Book of Abraham. Grant Heward, an amateur Egyptologist who had previously done missionary work for the Mormon Church, pointed this out to us and also demonstrated that what Joseph Smith believed was the Book of Abraham was in reality the pagan “Book of Breathings”—an Egyptian funerary document having nothing to do with Abraham or his religion. Some of the world’s top Egyptologists later confirmed that this is a copy of the “Book of Breathings.” Professor Klaus Baer, of the University of Chicago’s Oriental Institute, and Professor Richard A. Parker, of Brown University, published translations of the papyrus in Dialogue: A Journal of Mormon Thought—a periodical printed by a group of liberal Mormons but not controlled by the Church leaders. To save space here we will only include Professor Parker’s translation. In Dialogue, Richard Parker was listed as “Wilbour Professor of Egyptology and Chairman of the Department of Egyptology at Brown University.” Mormon apologist Hugh Nibley said that Professor Parker is “the best man in America for this particular period and style of writing.” His translation reads as follows:
1. [. . . .] this great pool of Khonsu
2. [Osiris Hor, justified], born of Taykhebyt, a man likewise.
3. After (his) two arms are [fast]ened to his breast. one wraps the Book of Breathings, which is
4. with writing both inside and outside of it, with royal linen, it being placed (at) his left arm
5. near his heart, this having been done at his
6. wrapping and outside it. If this book be recited for him, then
7. he will breath like the soul[s of the gods] for ever and ever (Dialogue: A Journal of Mormon Thought, Summer 1968, page 98).
Except for a few minor variations other renditions of the text are essentially in agreement with Professor Parker’s. The Book of Abraham, therefore, has been proven to be a spurious work. The Egyptologists find no mention of Abraham or his religion in this text. The average number of words that the Egyptologists used to convey the message in this text is eighty-seven, whereas Joseph Smith’s rendition contains thousands of words. It is impossible to escape the conclusion that the Book of Abraham is a false translation.
The Browns’ Attack
In 1981 Robert L. and Rosemary Brown published the book, They Lie in Wait to Deceive. This book purports to tell “The amazing story of how ‘Dr.’ or ‘Prof.’ Dee Jay Nelson, Jerald and Sandra Tanner, and other anti-Mormons work to obstruct and distort the truth.” Actually, this book is nothing but a smoke screen to divert attention from the Book of Abraham problem to Dee Jay Nelson.
In this work Mr. and Mrs. Brown make a devastating attack on Nelson, a man who translated the Joseph Smith Egyptian Papyri in 1968. The Browns demonstrate that in 1978—ten years after making his translation—Nelson made the false statement that he had obtained a doctor’s degree. After a careful examination of this book, we concluded that the Browns did an excellent job of exposing some false claims made by Dee Jay Nelson. Unfortunately, however, in their zeal to destroy Mr. Nelson they have made some very serious errors. Although they have made a number of false statements concerning Dee Jay Nelson, their most flagrant violation of the principle of honesty occurs when they accuse us of being part of a cover-up. Those who are acquainted with the facts about the situation know that nothing could be further from the truth.
The Browns claim that “in the latter part of 1980,” they “sent information about Dee Jay Nelson to Moody Press”—the publisher of our book The Changing World of Mormonism. They go on to state that we were given “instructions to revise the section concerning Dee Jay Nelson. At this time they were also informed that no more copies of their just printed book would be released for sale, and all future editions must also be revised. In 1981, the new revised edition was printed . . . Between the Moody Press and us, it looks like the Tanners had no choice but to come clean” (They Lie in Wait to Deceive, page 161).
While the Browns would have their readers believe that we covered up the situation until they and Moody Press forced us “to come clean,” the truth of the matter is that we commenced our own investigation into Nelson’s credentials as soon as we became convinced there was a problem. The results of that investigation were published immediately in the Salt Lake City Messenger.
By March 20, 1980, we had learned that Pacific Northwestern University (the school Nelson claimed he had received his doctor’s degree from) was really a diploma mill, and we wrote to Nelson that his “claim to a doctor’s degree in anthropology cannot be substantiated. Even though we have never made this claim, we feel that it would not be right for us to continue selling your booklets.” Just about one week after we wrote this letter to Nelson, we were contacted by Charles F. Trentelman of the Ogden Standard-Examiner. Mr. Trentelman had heard that Nelson’s credentials had been questioned and asked us if we could throw any light on the subject. We informed him of all we had learned about Pacific Northwestern University, and on March 29, 1980, he wrote the following: “Mrs. Tanner said they investigated the claims and found Nelson’s diploma was from a university that was shut down recently by the federal government as being a diploma mill, an operation that sells diplomas without requiring any schooling” (Ogden Standard-Examiner, March 29, 1980).
Immediately after Mr. Trentelman’s article appeared in the Ogden Standard-Examiner, we published the 42nd issue of the Salt Lake City Messenger. This was printed in April 1980 and fully exposed Nelson’s deception with regard to the doctor’s degree. A copy of this paper was mailed to the Moody Bible Library, and there was no attempt to hide the matter from anyone. As a matter of fact, we printed somewhere in the neighborhood of 10,000 copies of this issue!
In spite of these facts, the Browns try to make it appear that we were covering up the matter. To do this they had to entirely omit any reference to the fact that we published an exposé of Nelson in the April 1980 issue of the Salt Lake City Messenger. Instead of telling the truth about the matter, they assert that “Between the Moody Press and us, it looks like the Tanners had no choice but to come clean” (They Lie in Wait to Deceive, page 161). On the same page the Browns admit that they “sent information about Dee Jay Nelson” to Moody Press “in the latter part of 1980.” It should be obvious, then, that the Browns are completely misrepresenting the situation. Since we had already exposed Nelson in the April 1980 issue of the Salt Lake City Messenger, how could the Browns and Moody Press force us “to come clean” in the “latter part” of the same year? This, of course, just doesn’t make any sense.
In a new booklet entitled, Can the Browns Save Joseph Smith? we deal with other false claims which the Browns have made concerning us and Dee Jay Nelson. We show, for instance, that the Browns were incorrect in stating that
Dr. Klaus Baer’s, Dr. Richard A. Parker’s, and Dr. John A. Wilson’s translations preceded Nelson’s!
Nelson, and his supporters, likes to make it sound as if . . . he was the first to translate and publish the Egyptian document. In reality, the first scholarly publications were by Dr. Klaus Baer, Dr. Richard Parker, and Dr. John A. Wilson. (Ibid., page 110)
Actually, Nelson’s work The Joseph Smith Papyri was advertised for sale in the Salt Lake Tribune on April 6, 1968, (see Salt Lake City Messenger, April, 1968), while the translations of Professors Baer, Parker and Wilson did not appear in Dialogue: A Journal of Mormon Thought until the Summer and Autumn issues. In fact, Klaus Baer refers to Nelson’s publication in his article:
So far as I know, Nelson, The Joseph Smith Papyri, page 42, was the first to point out that the bird above the head of Osiris clearly has a human head and therefore must be his ba. In “Facsimile No. 1,” it is drawn with a falcon’s head, and I must confess with some embarrassment that I also “saw” the falcon’s head before reading Nelson’s study. (Dialogue: A Journal of Mormon Thought, Autumn 1968, page 118)
It would, of course, have been impossible for Professor Baer to refer to Nelson’s study unless it was already in print when he wrote his article.
The Browns accuse Nelson of lying when he said he went to President Tanner’s office to obtain photographs of the papyri which were being suppressed from the general public. In the booklet, Can The Browns Save Joseph Smith? we quote from a letter written by N. Eldon Tanner himself which supports Nelson’s claim. Furthermore, we reproduce a photograph of a memorandum from President Tanner’s office which verifies Nelson’s visit. Robert L. Brown has charged that “the Tanners are being deceitful” with regard to this matter. The evidence, however, completely supports our statements regarding this incident.
In our rebuttal to the Browns, we examine the charge that some of the information found in their book was obtained through secret tape recording of telephone conversations. We also show that they have cut out a paragraph from a photograph of a letter written by the Egyptologist Klaus Baer, and that the other parts of the letter have been pasted back together to make it appear that nothing is missing! The Browns have also suppressed over 900 words from a letter which we wrote. The reason for the suppression of these words is very obvious: we tell that the Mormon Church itself used a fake Ph.D. to defend the Book of Abraham at the time of Spalding’s attack. The noted Mormon scholar Dr. Sidney B. Sperry confirmed that deception was practiced in this regard:
He wrote a wonderful book . . . under the name Robert C. Webb, Ph.D. I regret that the brethren let him put down Robert C. Webb, Ph.D., because he was no Ph.D. (Pearl of Great Price Conference, December 10, 1960, 1964 ed., page 9)
In their book, the Browns main thesis appears to be that the critics of the Mormon Church have been discredited because one of them used a fake Ph.D. The Browns, however, completely suppressed the fact that the Church previously used a man with an assumed name as well as a fake doctor’s degree. We feel that Mr. and Mrs. Brown are operating under a double standard. They accuse us of deception, but the truth of the matter is that we were completely unaware of Nelson’s false claim to a Ph.D. As soon as we found out, we exposed him and quit selling his books. The Mormon Church leaders, on the other hand, allowed Mr. Homans to call himself “Robert C. Webb, Ph.D.” They engaged in a cover-up concerning this matter and continued to print his books for many years. As late as 1936 Church President Heber J. Grant took out a copyright on R. C. Webb’s book Joseph Smith as a Translator.
In any case, the Browns have tried to divert attention from the Book of Abraham problem. On the “Mormon Miscellaneous” radio program, August 3, 1981, we challenged Robert L. Brown to a public debate concerning the Book of Abraham, but he said he would only debate on the Dee Jay Nelson affair. We feel that this is just another attempt to avoid facing the real issue. As long as the Browns continue side-stepping the evidence against the Book of Abraham, their work will be of no real value.
While the whole foundation for the Book of Abraham seems to be crumbling, we can point with confidence to the case we have prepared against the Book of Abraham. Our arguments are just as good as when we first advanced them thirteen years ago. Our case is not based on any one man or any wild speculation, but rather on the science of Egyptology, original documents and careful research. We have the testimony of some of the world’s greatest Egyptologists— i.e., Professor Richard A. Parker of Brown University and Professors Klaus Baer and John A. Wilson (now deceased) of the University of Chicago’s Oriental Institute. We feel that the case against the Book of Abraham is irrefutable. If the Browns feel otherwise, they should be willing to meet us in a public debate in Salt Lake City.
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