Bruce Porter, Apologist Fireside

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_grindael
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Re: Bruce Porter, Apologist Fireside

Post by _grindael »

Please, please just watch this: (Dan Vogel: Truth of the Book of Abraham, Pt. 8)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8lJ2mzO1vRI

He destroys any silly apologist arguments and Porter is doing nothing new, a guy named Einar Erickson tried this in the 1970's, with the Firesides. I even did a few myself. (Kerry Shirts would have been proud).

Erickson's website where he claims to be an "Ancient Document Mormon Scholar". I kid you not. I believe he is about 90 years old, so his website is probably run by his children, etc.

https://www.einarerickson.com/
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_slavereeno
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Re: Bruce Porter, Apologist Fireside

Post by _slavereeno »

Thank you all for the responses. This is helpful to me.
_Maksutov
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Re: Bruce Porter, Apologist Fireside

Post by _Maksutov »

grindael wrote:Please, please just watch this: (Dan Vogel: Truth of the Book of Abraham, Pt. 8)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8lJ2mzO1vRI

He destroys any silly apologist arguments and Porter is doing nothing new, a guy named Einar Erickson tried this in the 1970's, with the Firesides. I even did a few myself. (Kerry Shirts would have been proud).

Erickson's website where he claims to be an "Ancient Document Mormon Scholar". I kid you not. I believe he is about 90 years old, so his website is probably run by his children, etc.

https://www.einarerickson.com/

"He received his Ph.D. in A.S. Near Eastern Studies from George Wythe College. "

Look into George Wythe College. It's a Skousenite wannabe academy that flounders around trying to stay afloat and never achieved accreditation.

The dude is an old medical doctor who has the illusion of competence in other fields. Lynn Hilton, John Heinerman, there are many similar self appointed Mormon fringers.
"God" is the original deus ex machina. --Maksutov
_Brackite
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Re: Bruce Porter, Apologist Fireside

Post by _Brackite »

I have a question wrote:
slavereeno wrote:Hi All,

Instead of trek, our stake recently had a tabernacle tour for the youth. They had a company bring a tabernacle replica, an an olive press etc. Later they did a two part fireside with Bruce Porter who is an LDS Apologist and student of Hugh Nibley. Here are some notes from the presentation by Bruce Porter.

Bruce Porter claims:

1. The Three Facsimiles represent an endowment. The lion couch represents "The Death of God", the circle one represents the resurrection and Ascension, and the Throne one represent enthronement. These facsimiles represent the endowment process.
2. Joseph Smith never used the word "Translation" about the papyrus, he only said he was telling us the meaning of them, not translating them.
3. Joseph Smith filled in the writings around the outside edge of circle one without having the original source, which was miraculous.
4. He then stammers through a translation which speaks, allegedly of exaltation and temples.
5. Osiris means "The Redeemed"
6. Abraham is telling us that God is locatable
7. Abraham names a bunch of planets including Kolob, but says God doesn't actually live on Kolob, just near it.
8. All religions diffuse from one original religion, but are changed through apostasy
9. He quotes E.A. Wallis Budge - curator of the Egyptian museum as saying "There was never a people more ready to accept Christianity than the Egyptians" Porter suggests this is because they were originally part of the Adamic religion before theirs branched off after the tower of Babel.
10. He says "Osiris is Christ" "Horus is Peter" "Patah (?) is the father God"
11. The brass plates were written in Egyptian.
12. Laman and Lemuel are Phoenician names, Nephi and Sam are Egyptian Names
13. Joseph Smith received the book of Joseph at the same time as the Book of Abraham
14. Egyptian for Pharaoh means Great House Abraham 1:20 says "Pharaoh signifies royal blood" great house = royal blood, Joseph Smith could not gotten this by accident.
15. Min is Ham, Hathor is Egyptus so the Book of Abraham is correct here too Min is the only one depicted with dark skin in the Egyptian glyphs
16. Egypt was a Matrilineal Patriarchy just like Abraham was.
17. Egyptian religion imitated the Melchizedek priesthood, just like it says in the book of Abraham
18. The pyramids were just attempts to imitate temples and do work for the dead.
19. The Shabaka Stone was the first written document and was basically the endowment
20. Christ gives the keys to sealings to peter
21. He shows several stone reliefs are a depiction of the "ritual embrace" that are basically the veil ceremony, including hands on shoulders, and whispering into the ear of the the embraced. This was done to enter the holy part of the Egyptian temple, this according to Porter is proof that the endowment is ancient.
22. The things in the Book of Joseph are so sacred they cannot be published
23. The book of Joseph led to the restoration of the endowment at Nauvoo, he then shows some example from the papyrus and explains the veil ceremony by "translating" the Egyptian on the spot.
24. There is no way Joseph Smith could know these things, and no way he could make them up
25. Bruce Porter considers himself a "Scholar"
26. He mentions some text that was "found" in 1979 that says Abraham was on the lion couch and that proves Joseph Smith was right.


Given that this was taught in a Church setting (a fireside) Porter and the local leaders should be censured for teaching personal opinion (I’m being charitable) as if it was Church doctrine.

CFR on 26


The Tanners dealt with #26 back in 1992.

The "lion couch scene" Gee speaks of is found in the Leiden Papyrus 1 384. The F.A.R.M.S. article concerning this matter caused some Mormons to be very excited because it stated that the "lion couch scene" shows "Anubis standing over a person..." (Insight: An Ancient Window, September 1991, page 1) Many were undoubtedly led to believe that the "person" on the couch must be Abraham as shown in Facsimile No. 1 of the Book of Abraham. Unfortunately for Mormon apologists, this has not turned out to be the case. Mormon Egyptologist Edward Ashment claimed that it was actually a woman who was lying on the couch. In his article published in The Ensign, July 1992, p. 61, John Gee acknowledged that this is the case: "the figure on the lion couch in this papyrus is a woman."


http://www.utlm.org/newsletters/no82.htm
"And I've said it before, you want to know what Joseph Smith looked like in Nauvoo, just look at Trump." - Fence Sitter
_I have a question
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Re: Bruce Porter, Apologist Fireside

Post by _I have a question »

Thanks Brackite.

Either Bruce Porter is misleading his audience to believe something that isn’t correct, or Abraham was a woman...
“When we are confronted with evidence that challenges our deeply held beliefs we are more likely to reframe the evidence than we are to alter our beliefs. We simply invent new reasons, new justifications, new explanations. Sometimes we ignore the evidence altogether.” (Mathew Syed 'Black Box Thinking')
_Fence Sitter
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Re: Bruce Porter, Apologist Fireside

Post by _Fence Sitter »

So many problems with these claims but this one I could not let pass.

3. Joseph Smith filled in the writings around the outside edge of circle one without having the original source, which was miraculous.


We know what the hypocephalus of Sheshonq or facsimile #2 looked like before Joseph Smith "restored" the lacuna from a sketch of it made sometime between 1835-1842 which is now part of the Kirtland Egyptian papers. See here.

This sketch has remained in the SLC church's possession continuously since that time. Up until the KEP was published in the late 1960's by the Tanners it, along with the rest of the KEP, was hidden away by the church. In spite of the fact that no scholar had access to this sketch to know what the hypocephalus looked like before Joseph Smith "restored" it, scholars before 1960 were able to identify those parts Joseph Smith restored, because the parts he restored did not accord with how a hypocephalus should have looked.

Regarding Joseph Smith's restoration of the outer circle. The characters on the hypocephalus are hieroglyphics. The missing characters would also have been hieroglyphics a fact Joseph Smith did not know since he did not know there was a difference between hieroglyphics and hieratic text. The characters he erroneously "restored" to the outer circle were hieratic text taken from the Hor scroll and copied upside down on the circle. Joseph Smith didn't even know in which direction hieratic text was read.

Not only was there no miraculous restoration of the circle, it was easy to determine from the restoration that Joseph Smith tried to do even before the sketch of the original showed up, which parts were missing and which parts were original. There is no miracle going on here, just flim flam that even today is being touted as evidence that Joseph Smith could read Egyptian. Claims that even official Church historians are now disputing.

If you are really interested in how a world renown Egyptologist would translate facsimile #2 see The Joseph Smith Egyptian Papyri: A Complete Edition Spoiler alert, it isn't what Joseph Smith said it was.
"Any over-ritualized religion since the dawn of time can make its priests say yes, we know, it is rotten, and hard luck, but just do as we say, keep at the ritual, stick it out, give us your money and you'll end up with the angels in heaven for evermore."
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