By Jerald and Sandra Tanner
In our book Mormonism—Shadow or Reality? Chapter 22, we show that the original papyrus from which Joseph Smith “translated” the Book of Abraham was rediscovered in 1967 in the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Egyptologists translated this papyrus and found that it was an Egyptian funerary text known as the “Book of Breathings.” This is a pagan text which has absolutely nothing to do with Abraham or his religion.
Since the Mormon Church is supposed to be led by a “Prophet, Seer, and Revelator,” we might have expected the President of the Church to make a translation of the rediscovered Joseph Smith Papyri. Instead, however, the papyri were turned over to Dr. Hugh Nibley of the Church’s Brigham Young University to be translated by “the wisdom of the world.” The Mormon writer Jay M. Todd stated:
One major remaining issue remains still undiscussed in this background study, and that is the meaning of the papyri themselves. . . . The import and the significance of the papyri recently rediscovered will be told Latter-day Saints by Dr. Hugh Nibley, to whom the First Presidency has given the assignment. Surely his mind and hand will be blessed, and his report will be one of immense interest and significance to members of the Church. (The Saga of the Book of Abraham, pages 387-388)
[Bold in quotations is added for emphasis and does not appear in originals.]
Dr. Nibley wrote a series of articles which lasted for over two years in the Improvement Era—from January 1968 to May 1970. Although he used almost 2,000 footnotes, he never did translate the papyri. In the Salt Lake Tribune for November 11, 1973 we criticized Dr. Nibley for not producing a translation of the papyri. He replied that he had prepared a book which was 800 pages long: “It is all about the ‘Book of Breathings’ and is 800 pages long, but that is not enough to account for keeping the impatient Tanners waiting for six years. What took up all that time was having to find out about a lot of things” (Salt Lake Tribune, November 25, 1973). This book, which many people believed would answer the objections of the critics and save the Book of Abraham, was finally published by the Church’s Deseret Book Co. in 1975. Dr. Nibley’s book, The Message of the Joseph Smith Papyri: An Egyptian Endowment, will certainly prove to be a disappointment for those who hoped he could save the Book of Abraham.
Although the First Presidency of the Church assigned Dr. Nibley to work on the papyri, they seem unwilling to give his work any real official endorsement. When John L. Smith asked about Dr. Nibley’s new book, Francis M. Gibbs, Secretary to the First Presidency, replied:
Answering your letter dated August 19, 1975, the writings of Dr. Hugh Nibley concerning the papyri scrolls have been done entirely on his own responsibility and do not have the official approval and sanction of the Church.
The brethren appreciate your interest and asked me to extend to you their best wishes.
At any rate, the reader may order Dr. Nibley’s new book from the Deseret Book Store, 60 East South Temple, Salt Lake City, Utah. Although this book is nicely printed and bound, the contents are very disappointing. Of the eleven fragments of papyrus which were discovered, ten of them contain significant Egyptian messages which can be translated. We would expect that any book about the papyri would at least have a translation of all ten pieces. Dr. Nibley’s book, however, only contains a translation of two fragments! Dr. Nibley has now had photographs of the papyri for almost ten years, and yet he has only provided a translation of two fragments. Among the fragments which Dr. Nibley has not translated is the original of Facsimile No. 1 in the Book of Abraham. This fragment contains a number of lines of hieroglyphs which tell what the drawing is about. The reason Dr. Nibley has not translated these lines is obvious: they show that Fac. No. 1 is not a picture of “Abraham fastened upon an altar” as Joseph Smith proclaimed, but rather a picture of an Egyptian by the name of Hor being prepared for burial (see Mormonism—Shadow or Reality? page 347).
Those of us who have purchased Dr. Nibley’s writings in the Improvement Era, the BYU Studies and now his new book have spent at least $30.00. What do we have to show for this investment? We have hundreds of pages of material with thousands of footnotes, but we have a translation of only two of the fragments of papyrus and no answer to the main problems about the Book of Abraham.
After the Joseph Smith Papyri were first located it was pointed out that the papyrus labeled “XI. Small ‘Sensen’ text (unillustrated)” contained the very Egyptian characters which Joseph Smith “translated” into the Book of Abraham. In a speech given at the University of Utah on May 20, 1968, Dr. Nibley admitted that it was a “definite fact that, one of the fragments seemed to supply all of the symbols for the Book of Abraham. This is the little ‘Sensen’ scroll. Here are the symbols. The symbols are arranged here, and the interpretation goes along here and this interpretation turns out to be the Book of Abraham” (Mormonism—Shadow or Reality? page 314).
At first Dr. Nibley toyed with the idea that the papyrus might have a second or hidden message. Now, he apparently believes that this idea cannot be successfully maintained and has decided to take the position that Papyrus XI was not the source Book of Abraham. He states:
Is the Book of Abraham a correct translation of Joseph Smith Papyri X and XI? No, the Book of Breathings is not the Book of Abraham! . . .
Doesn’t the text of the Book of Abraham appear in a number of manuscripts in columns running parallel with characters from the Book of Breathings? Yes, the brethren at Kirtland were invited to try their skill at translation; in 1835 the Prophet’s associates, miffed by his superior knowledge and determined to show him up, made determined efforts to match up the finished text of the Book of Abraham with characters from the J.S. Papyrus No. XI; . . .
Whatever exercises, discreet or indiscreet, the brethren in Kirtland may have engaged in, the Prophet Joseph himself has supplied us with the most conclusive evidence that the manuscript today identified as the Book of Breathings, J.S. Papyri X and XI, was not in his opinion the source of the Book of Abraham. For he has furnished a clear and specific description of the latter: “The record of Abraham and Joseph, found with the mummies, is (1) beautifully written on papyrus, with black, and (2) a small part red, ink or paint, (3) in perfect preservation.” (The Message of the Joseph Smith Papyri, page 2)
Dr. Nibley says that Papyrus XI could not be the source of the Book of Abraham because he feels it is not as beautifully written or well preserved as the other fragments of papyrus and does not contain writing in red ink. Now, besides making the baseless assumption that Joseph Smith allowed his scribes to add the wrong Egyptian characters to the original translation manuscripts, Dr. Nibley does not seem to understand that the statement he cites from Joseph Smith’s History about “The record of Abraham and Joseph” is a statement about Joseph Smith’s Papyri collection in general, not just the one roll which Joseph Smith called the Book of Abraham. This is made very clear in another entry in Joseph Smith’s History:
On the 3rd of July, Michael H. Chandler came to Kirtland to exhibit some Egyptian mummies. There were four human figures, together with some two or more rolls of papyrus . . . some of the Saints at Kirtland purchased the mummies and papyrus, . . . I commenced the translation of some of the characters or hieroglyphics, and much to our joy found that one of the rolls contained the writings of Abraham, another the writings of Joseph of Egypt, etc., . . . (History of the Church, vol. 2, pp. 235-236)
Now, when we understand that Joseph Smith believed the Book of Abraham was written on a different roll of papyrus than the Book of Joseph, it becomes clear that he was referring to the collection of papyri in general and not specifically to the Book of Abraham. That Joseph Smith did in fact choose the papyrus identified as the Book of Breathings as the source for his Book of Abraham is established by irrefutable evidence.
To begin with, Joseph Smith used the drawing at the beginning of the Book of Breathings roll as Facsimile No. 1 for his Book of Abraham. It does no contain red ink and the workmanship appears to be no better or well-preserved than that found on Papyrus XI. This in itself would completely destroy Dr. Nibley’s argument, but the evidence becomes even stronger as we look into the matter. The writing in the columns to the side of the fragment used for Fac. No. 1, which Dr. Nibley does not dare to translate, mentions that the papyrus was made for Hor, and this is the same name mentioned in the Book of Breathings text which follows on Papyrus XI.
Second, even Dr. Nibley has to admit that before the papyrus was cut Papyrus XI followed immediately after Fac. No. 1 on the roll: “It can be easily shown by matching up the cut edges and fibers of the papyri that the text of the Joseph Smith ‘Breathing’ Papyrus (No. XI) was written on the same strip of material as Facsimile No. 1 and immediately adjoining it” (The Message of the Joseph Smith Papyri, page 13). On page 3 of the same book Dr. Nibley has to admit that even Joseph Smith’s own scribes felt that the text of the Book of Abraham followed right after Fac. No. 1: “Since this is an illustration to the Book of Abraham, it has naturally been assumed that the text that follows the drawing could only be that of Abraham—even the brethren at Kirtland assumed that.”
The strongest evidence that Joseph Smith believed that Papyrus XI was the Book of Abraham is found in the fact that the characters from this fragment were used in the translation manuscripts. Dr. Nibley’s suggestion that this was only the work of his scribes is absolutely preposterous. That Joseph Smith would allow his scribes to copy the characters from the wrong papyrus into three different manuscripts of the Book of Abraham is really beyond belief. A person might almost as reasonably conclude that the Book of Abraham itself was made up by Joseph Smith’s scribes.
All evidence, then, points to the unmistakable conclusion that Joseph Smith believed that Papyrus No. XI was the Book of Abraham. This papyrus has been translated by qualified Egyptologists and found to be nothing but the Book of Breathings—a pagan text. Even Dr. Nibley has to admit that Papyrus XI contains “the directions for wrapping up the Joseph Smith papyri with the mummy. . . .” (Ibid., page 6). Fortunately, Nibley has included a translation of this fragment in his new book. His work agrees in substance with the translations we have published in Mormonism—Shadow or Reality? page 317. In fact, Dr. Nibley includes the names of many pagan gods in his translation of the Book of Breathings. Dr. Nibley cannot find anything about Abraham in this text, but to soften the disappointment he tries to relate it to the Mormon temple ceremony. Why he would want to equate the Egyptian religion with Mormonism is really a mystery to us. The Egyptian religion is so filled with magic and other pagan practices.
At any rate, Dr. Nibley’s book contains some very serious errors. We may find time to point these out in the future, but in the meantime, Michael Marquardt has prepared a good rebuttal entitled, The Book of Abraham Papyrus Found: An Answer to Dr. Hugh Nibley’s Book The Message of the Joseph Smith Papyri: An Egyptian Endowment. The Mormon Egyptologist Dee Jay Nelson made these comments in an Introduction to Mr. Marquardt’s new work:
In this book Mr. Marquardt’s research has been meticulous and the evidence of his contention infallibly documented. . . .
The original ancient Egyptian papyrus from which Joseph Smith claimed to have “translated” the Book of Abraham in the The Pearl of Great Price, has been found and is now in the possession of the Latter-day Saint Church. From my own translation of the hieratic text, substantiated by the translations of other responsible Egyptologists, the fraudulent nature of the Book of Abraham is obvious. . . .
Dr. Hugh Nibley, . . . has recently published a book . . . in which he denies that the Hor Sensen Papyrus is the original from which Smith made his so-called translation. The L.D.S. Church has in its possession three separate “translations” written by two of Smith’s scribes, at his dictation, which prove that these are the documents Smith used. Mr. Marquardt effectively proves the reality of this fact.
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