What Dan Peterson Leaves Out on Facsimile 3

[_Shulem]

When have you ever heard a General Authority ever bear testimony of the truthfulness of the Explanations of the Facsimilies? I submit to you that none of the General Authorities believe the Explanations. There simply is no testimony given. The leadership doesn’t believe it any more than I do. The Explanations of the Facsimilies is simply part of the Mormon freak show. It’s for intertainment purposes only.

[_Philo Sofee]

I love the comments on this particular article! Dr. Peterson is so adroit at one thing, like MG, not sticking his neck out on anything, but conveniently taking swipes against the evidence. Offering no real analysis of anything. He's like a fish out of water. Ritner must terrify him outta his pants. I know he does Gee. It's an interesting conundrum they have given themselves, taking Nibley's stance and evidence which is so soundly thwarted by a real professional Egyptologist... they are quite bankrupt.

[_Shulem]

My personal intuition tells me that the Book of Abraham is something Daniel C Peterson doesn't want to debate on any level let alone discuss. He steers clear of it and for good reason. He knows he can't win an argument as a Book of Abraham apologist. He's washed his hands of that.

Then there is John Gee. He'd love to come here and attempt to bully us with all kinds of technical jargon and definitions peppered with footnotes from various academic sources. But there is no way in hell John Gee will come to debate us. We would kick his ass and destroy him. Then he would have to deal with the backlash of his colleagues who surely would find a way to defrock him and strip his credentials.

John Gee:

You're a liar for the Lord. We know your doings. We understand your apologetic. If you come here to Mormon Discussions to debate us we will utterly destroy you.

I swear by my throat.

Shulem.

[_Dan Vogel]

http://www.patheos.com/blogs/danpeterson/2018/09/abraham-and-the-heavens.html

Yes, Dr. Peterson is actually accurate in noting there is nothing about Abraham's dealing with astronomy in the Bible. But is that the only possible book Joseph Smith could have known? What about Josephus?

Antiquities, 8:2 notes that the Egyptians were ignorance of much of science, which Abraham is said to have supplied. "He communicated to them arithmetic, and delivered to them the science of astronomy..."

Erich Robert Paul, Science, Religion, and Mormon Cosmology, shows the bookstores and library in both Canandaigua and Palmyra had Josephus. (p. 85) And I agree with him that the details in Josephus are meager, at best, but the idea that Abraham was familiar with astronomy is clearly in Josephus. From there Joseph Smith could easily have come up with anything he wanted, and apparently he did so in the other facsimiles, but the mistake was pawning it off to Egyptian knowledge. Nothing astronomical is verified as being the Egyptian understanding of astronomy in any of the facsimiles. Univ of Chicago Egyptologist Robert Ritner has conclusively demonstrated the serious errors of Joseph Smith's astronomical claims and no apologist has shown that Ritner is in error.

And Dan Vogel and Brent Metcalfe demonstrated an enormous amount of the cosmology in Abraham could easily have been taken from Thomas Dick and Adam Clarke's writings. (Joseph Smith's Scriptural Cosmology," in Vogel, editor, The Word of God, Signature, 1990, chapter 13. The exquisite details are rather alarming to a faithful believing Mormon. It was to me when I read this as an apologist!

Cabalistic influences of Abraham's doctrines and cosmology in Joseph Smith's environment was also noted by D. Michael Quinn, Early Mormonism and the Magic World View, 2nd ed. (1998) Signature Books, pp. 212f.

So the sleight of hand of attempting to show this is something Joseph Smith could not have known because it's not in the Bible (implicitly suggesting therefore Joseph Smith got things right and through revelation after all) is weak, since we have evidence in Josephus that the idea was available to Joseph Smith. I find the argument unconvincing that Dr. Peterson's argument holds water.

Abraham teaching the Egyptians astronomy was well known in Joseph Smith’s day from a variety of sources. I will soon post my fourth video on the Book of Abraham dealing with Joseph Smith’s Egyptian Grammar and Race. The next video will deal with the Grammar and the cosmos, which among other things will discuss Abraham and astronomy and the apologists’ claim that the Book of Abraham is geocentric. In my analysis I include Joseph Smith’s Grammar, which is the earliest “translation” dealing with the unfolding of the system of astronomy mentioned in Joseph Smith’s official history and journal as occurring in October 1835. I contend that the best model to explain the Book of Abraham and Egyptian Grammar is the one held by the natural theologians of Smith’s day.

[_Shulem]

I contend that the best model to explain the Book of Abraham and Egyptian Grammar is the one held by the natural theologians of Smith’s day.

That makes perfect sense. Smith's work lacks ancient authenticity and it doesn't jive at all with modern Egyptology. It had to be from Smith's time.

[_aussieguy55]

Kiwi was making sarcastic comments at me and someone who had read the Vogel/Metcalfe article came up and stuck up for me. That is the way Kiwi deals with critics. Petersen thinks Baer's work is not relevant nowday since his Dialogue article etc. Brigham Young thinks the Sun is inhabited. Good grief. He was speaking as a man however.

Thomas Dick online

https://archive.org/stream/worksthomasd ... g_djvu.txt

Search for "intelligences" 75 instances.

[_Philo Sofee]

Kiwi was making sarcastic comments at me and someone who had read the Vogel/Metcalfe article came up and stuck up for me. That is the way Kiwi deals with critics. Petersen thinks Baer's work is not relevant nowday since his Dialogue article etc. Brigham Young thinks the Sun is inhabited. Good grief. He was speaking as a man however.

Thomas Dick online

https://archive.org/stream/worksthomasd ... g_djvu.txt

Search for "intelligences" 75 instances.

Nice link, thank you

[_aussieguy55]

Id like to recommend one read Dan Vogel and Brent Metcalfes article Joseph Smiths Scriptural Cosmology in The Word of God: Essays on Mormon Scripture.