THE USE OF EGYPTIAN MAGICAL PAPYRI TO AUTHENTICATE THE BOOK OF ABRAHAMPart 1© 1993 Edward H. Ashment |
|
Edward H. Ashment, former Coordinator for Translation Services, Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, is a doctoral candidate in Egyptology at the University of Chicago. NOTE: The reader will notice numerous references in this essay to "fig. 1", "fig. 2", etc., which are not present in this on-line version. A printed version of the essay which does include these figures is available on request from the Institute for Religious Research, 1340 Monroe Ave. N.W., Grand Rapids, MI 49505, U.S.A. Please include $2 for postage and handling. Outside the U.S., include $3 for postage and handling. In two recent articles John Gee appeals to ancient Egyptian documents in an effort to establish the historicity of the Book of Abraham. The first appears as the lead article in the September 1991 newsletter, Insights: An Ancient Window, published by the LDS-Church-funded Foundation for Ancient Research & Mormon Studies (FARMS), titled 'References to Abraham Found in Two Egyptian Texts'. [2] His second article (taking advantage of an early version of the unpublished review of the first and of a general request for 'anyone aware of any... references' to Abraham in Egyptian literature to contact him c/o FARMS[3]) appears in an official publication of the LDS Church, The Ensign (July 1992, 60-62), titled 'Abraham in Ancient Egyptian Texts'. Since in his second article he significantly modifies some of the major arguments he makes in his first, it is important to present the review of the first as well as of the second. 'References to Abraham Found in Two Egyptian Texts'.In his first article, Gee declares that his 'discoveries give students of the Book of Abraham new evidence to evaluate'. Moreover, he asserts as 'premature' any conclusions that Joseph Smith was the first to conceive a relationship between a lion-couch vignette, a hypocephalus (see figs. 3, 4) and the Book of Abraham, because the materials he cites 'expressly mention Abraham and also connect him with representations similar to Facsimiles 1 and 2 of the Book of Abraham' (FARMS 1991, 3; emphasis added). The documentation that Gee offers as evidence of his extraordinary assertions comes from magical papyri - a fact Gee neglects to tell his readers. He states that the 'texts' he cites 'date to about the same time as the Joseph Smith papyri' (1). He first discusses the last column [4] of Pap. Leiden I 384vo. (fig. 1), which contains a lion-couch vignette (figs. 1 B; 2) that is roughly similar to the vignette in Papyrus Joseph Smith 1 (fig. 3). He claims to identify the name of Abraham in what turns out to be a Greek magical spell immediately below the vignette (fig. 1 C) and utilizes textual material from another Greek magical spell, which he states comes from 'the next to the last column of this papyrus', to suggest that the scene refers to the sacrifice of Abraham on a lion-couch 'altar', thus attempting to authenticate Joseph Smith's interpretation of Facsimile One of the Book of Abraham. Gee next concentrates on the Magical Papyrus of London and Leiden 8.8 (fig. 5), in which he again claims to recognize the name of Abraham identified as the 'pupil [and iris] of the wedjat-eye', appealing to the Book of the Dead, chapters 162 and 163 to assert that the 'pupil of the wedjat-eye' is an Egyptian name ('epithet') for a hypocephalus. Even more astounding, he declares that 'Abraham is called this in the midst of a section on how to obtain revelation' (3; emphasis added), ambitiously claiming that Facsimile Two also 'deals with obtaining revelation about the heavens and the cosmos' (3; emphasis added). Thus, Gee attempts to connect hypocephali-specifically the Facsimile Two hypocephalus (fig. 4)-with Joseph Smith's Book of Abraham. Fig. 1. Papyrus Leiden I 384.1 (from Johnson 1975, pl. 13) Do those papyri 'expressly mention Abraham' in the manner Gee avers? That is, do they 'connect him with representations similar to Facsimiles 1 and 2 of the Book of Abraham'? Is the lion-couch vignette of 384:1 a depiction of Abraham as a human sacrifice, and does the text from the previous - or any - column of that papyrus refer to that sacrifice? Does Magical 8.8 connect the hypocephalus with Abraham; and does it deal with 'how to obtain revelation', and the hypocephalus 'with obtaining revelation about the heavens and the cosmos'? Because outside of the Book of Abraham there are no known references to Abraham on a lion-couch 'altar', who is about to be sacrificed by pharaoh's priest (Abr 1:7,12,14), and because Joseph Smith's interpretation of the Facsimile Two hypocephalus is unparalleled, the remarkable substantiating claims that Gee makes for Facsimiles One and Two require scrutiny. Egyptologically, the papyri from which the alleged evidence comes were written by a single scribe, most likely in Thebes, and date to the third century CE [5] 200 or more years after the composition of the Joseph Smith Papyri. [6] They are comprised of magic spells in both Demotic and Greek, with superlinear glosses in Old Coptic to ensure correct pronunciation of important magical words. 384 appears to have been written before Magical (Johnson 1975, 48, 53; in Betz 1992, lvii). The spells in 384 generally are 'designed to separate people and make them hate each other'. The vignette that Gee avers is a depiction of the lion-couch sacrifice of Abraham is in the last column of that papyrus. The spells in Magical, among other things, [7] 'give instructions for divinations, especially divinations using a lamp' (Johnson 1975, 51 note 28) [8] Gee's attribution of Abraham as the wedjat-eye is in one such lamp-divination spell. Fig. 2. Lion-Couch Vignette from Pap. Leiden I 384:1 as reproduced by FARMS Gee's presentation of 384 as evidence of the historicity of the Book of Abraham is misleading. He declares inaccurately that the 'next to the last column', the one preceding the column containing the lion-couch vignette, 'contains a text... entitled "The sacrifice [or burning] of so-and-so"', which he claims includes an appeal of a sacrificial victim to the gods for salvation from the 'jackal-headed god' and his cohorts. Gee then refers to the magical spell immediately below the vignette (fig. 1 B) as though it were a fragmentary caption (see fig. 2) and translates it as: 'Let Abraham who... upon... wonder marvelously'. Ignoring the text before and after the portion that he chooses to interpret, he inaccurately tells the reader that the 'text is broken at that point, and many endings are possible', conjecturing two possibilities that suggestively parallel Joseph Smith's Book of Abraham: that it is Abraham '"who lies upon the altar" or "who calls upon God"' (FARMS 1991, 1). Thus, he links his alleged sacrificial victim to the vignette and to Abraham. The fact is that the magical spell from which Gee develops his interpretation of Abraham's desperate appeal for deliverance does not come from the next to the last column on the papyrus. Rather, it is the last spell in the last column on the papyrus (fig. 1 D). Contrary to Gee, the subject of the spell is a woman-not Abraham. Moreover, its title is not 'The sacrifice of so-and-so' and does not contain a desperate appeal of a human-sacrifice victim. Instead, the spell is entitled 'Another' - a variant of the previous spell (fig. 1 C), in which the magician was instructed to write the spell, including a drawing of the lion-couch scene, on a piece of new papyrus. The magician was to take the piece of papyrus with the spell on it and 'cook it in the bath!' The spell itself consists of a series of magical abracadabra words, followed by the actual conjuration, in which the magician would bedevil a woman to him by commanding a demon 'to become a bath-woman and to inflame the beloved with the heat of the bath waters' (Daniel 1991, xxiii). In certain places, the magician was to supply the name of the woman over whom the spell was cast. The incantation is as follows:
Contrary to Gee, the text of the spell cannot authenticate the historicity of the Book of Abraham, because it has nothing to do with the human sacrifice of a victim on a lion-couch that is about to be killed by a jackal-headed god. The text from which Gee extracts his caption for the lion-couch vignette that 'expressly mentions Abraham', is actually in the middle of a series of magical abracadabra words for the spell immediately underneath the vignette (fig. 1 C). [10] The subject of that conjuration, too, was a woman - not Abraham. It reads:
There simply is no support for Gee's assertion that the vignette is a depiction of a human sacrifice, with the victim lying on the altar and calling upon God for deliverance. Rather it is a normal lion-couch vignette, showing 'Anubis administering to a mummy lying on a lion-couch' (Johnson 1975, 30), which here seems to have been used as a magical representational device in connection with certain magical spells. [11] Gee fails to point out that Magical 8 (fig. 5), his 'section on how to obtain revelation', is in reality a pagan lamp-divination spell and leaves his Mormon audience to misunderstand divination as having the same meaning as 'revelation' that they learned in church. The purpose of lamp divination was to conjure the presence of a deity by using a properly prepared wick lamp and casting various spells. The divinity was then to respond to questions about topics of interest to the magician (Jacq 1985, 62). Contrary to Gee's assertion, Magical 8 was merely a follow-up spell to be recited if a conjured divinity had not already appeared. Several times, the magician recited magical abracadabra words and called the god to answer his queries. Then he uttered more abracadabra words:
Finally, the magician appealed once more to the divinity to come and truthfully answer his questions. The entire spell was to be recited seven times (Griffith and Thompson 1904, 63-65; Johnson in Betz 1992, 208). Certainly Gee does not want to imply that conjuring by lamp divination is the method by which prophets converse with God. Contrary to Gee, the hypocephalus (fig. 4) has nothing to do with 'obtaining revelation about the heavens and the cosmos'. Hypocephali appeared in the latter part of Egyptian history, serving as magical amulets placed under the head of the deceased to provide heat ('the flame of Re') for his/her birth into and continued life in the netherworld. Formulae were written on them from Book of the Dead chapter 162 for that purpose, often accompanied by protective ('prophylactique') representations. Hypocephali had the secondary effect of procuring for the deceased a part of the divinity of the sun god, Re. The Greek name, hypocephalus ('under the head'), is derived from the term 'heat under the head' in the Egyptian title of BD 162: 'Spell for providing heat under the head of the blessed dead'. Parenthetically, the hypocephalus may have been a prototype of the halo that crowned the heads of personages in Egyptian art from before the Fourth Century CE (Bonnet 1952, 389f.; Kessler, 1980, 693; Goyon 1972, 276; Barguet 1967, 228 note 1). Fig. 5. A Lamp Divination Spell (from Griffith and Thompson 1905, 2:VIII) Contrary to Gee, Book of the Dead chapter 163 is not related to chapter 162 or to hypocephali.[12] But since BD 162 does not contain the phrase, 'the pupil of the wedjat-eye', [13] which Gee has identified with Abraham and considers to be 'one of the Egyptian names' for a hypocephalus, he must treat BD 163 as though it too were a hypocephalus chapter, because of its reference to the deceased as one 'hidden within the pupil of the Sound Eye [wedjat]' (Allen 1974, 159). Gee thus improperly asserts that 'the pupil of the wedjat-eye' refers to a hypocephalus in order to make a connection between it and Abraham in his effort to authenticate 'Joseph Smith's explanation of the hypocephalus in the Book of Abraham' (FARMS 1991, 3). [14] A crucial claim of Gee's article is that ABRACAM (Magical 8.8)/ABRAAM (384:1.6) refer to the biblical Abraham in such a way as to prove the historicity of Joseph Smith's Book of Abraham. Unfortunately, he fails to acknowledge that his alleged references occur within series of magical abracadabra words. An important question, therefore, is whether those occurrences actually refer to Abraham probatively; or do they, like the words around them, primarily have the significance of magical abracadabra words? Appeals to Abraham and other Judeo-Christian elements - even Jesus - appear frequently in the syncretistic magical papyri. [15] One spell cites a portion of the Lord's Prayer, after which it appeals to, inter alia, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob (Kotansky in Betz 1992, 300). Another conjurs the god 'by the great, famous name, Abraam... ' (Smith in Betz 1992, 125). Indeed, coming from the Greco-Roman period, the magical material 'reflects an amazingly broad religious and cultural pluralism', with most spells being 'mixtures of several religions - Egyptian, Greek, Jewish, to name the most important', including 'a few sprinkles of Christianity' (Betz 1992, xlv). It is not known how the Jewish material made its way into the magical papyri, although at least some may have originated in the Greek Septuagint, written in the second century BCE. [16] To the itinerant magicians,
Moreover, the magician 'no longer understood the old languages, although he used remnants of them in transcription' (xlv). In addition, 'incomprehensible words' were often used in the magical spells, 'arranged into patterns of sounds which are judged to be effective; they are a mixture of Egyptian, Babylonian, Cretan, and other foreign languages to make "abracadabra" spells' (Jacq 1985, 20f.). 'Abra-' was a widely-used formative element in the magical texts that was combined with various other elements to produce abracadabra words. It 'was probably originally a secret paraphrase of the name of the Jewish God Yahweh written in four (Hebrew: arba = abra) consonants (tetragram)' (Rudolph 1983, 311). [18] For example, observe how abra is combined with another element in the following instance: In the magical spell of which fig. 6 is a part, the magician stood on top of his house and sought divination from the moon, pronouncing an incantation from seven to nine times until the divinity appeared to him. This part of the incantation was 'Ho! Sax, Amun, Sax, Abrasax; for thou art the moon' (Griffith and Thompson 1904, 147). 'Abra' here was combined with s(t)-`ks[19] 'saks' to form the magical word 'Abrasaks'. [20] 'Abrasax'/'Abraxas' continued to be used throughout the centuries in connection with magical spells. [21] Fig. 6. 'Saks' and 'Abra-saks' (from Griffith and Thompson 1905, 2:23.24 Note the various uses of abra in other magical spells:
For example, in the first magical spell that Gee cites (384:1.6-11, fig. 1 C), composed in Greek, ABRAAM occurs as part of a group of magical words. The second spell in which Gee finds an authenticating reference to Abraham (Magical 8.8; see fig. 5), does not refer probatively to the biblical Abraham. Rather, ABRACAM functions as a magical word, the proper pronunciation of which was important for making the spell effective. (Since the Demotic and hieratic writing systems were only consonantal, leaving uncertain the proper vocalization of important magical words, the scribe of 384 and Magical provided glosses in Old Coptic [24] for certain magical words so that they would be pronounced correctly [Johnson 1975, 48, 53]). [25] ABRACAM here is a gloss in Old Coptic for two Demotic elements: abra and hmy, the word for 'artificer' [26]: `br`- The same word, ABRACAM, was used magically in another instance (in 384:2*.16f. = PDM 12.6-20), which Gee does not cite: 'Write this name on [a white, grape-shaped stone] ... saying, "ABRACAM FILHN . . . CNI . . . ."' (Johnson 1975, 33 [ Johnson in Betz 1992, 152]). [27] ABRACAM clearly has no significance as the biblical Abraham in these spells. Note (Abrm) as 'Abraham' in Demotic (LYddeckens 1980, 1:1.8) and as 'Abraham' in the Coptic Nag Hammadi codices (Nag Hammadi 2:82.26; 133.29). [28] The lion-couch vignette of 384:1 does not depict a human sacrifice. The adjacent text Gee cites does not contain a plea for deliverance by an intended sacrificial victim. Book of the Dead chapter 163 has nothing to do with hypocephali, which in turn have nothing to do with Abraham. ABRAAM and ABRACAM, possibly originating from the name 'Abraham', serve merely as potent magical words; they have no authenticating connection with Abraham as depicted in the Book of Abraham. As a result, Gee's statement that Pap. Leiden I 384 and the Magical Papyrus of London and Leiden 'expressly mention Abraham' is misleading, and it is impossible for them to 'connect him with representations similar to Facsimiles 1 and 2 of the Book of Abraham'. As a result, conclusions that Gee asserts as 'premature' (FARMS 1991, 3) must still be considered seriously:
'Abraham in Ancient Egyptian Texts'.John Gee's evidence for his second article is comprised of the two magical spells he presented in his first (Pap. Leiden 384vo. 1 and Magical 8) and four additional spells: one introduced in the above review of his first article (Pap. Leiden 384vo. 2* = PDM 12.6-20) and three new ones (PGM 12. 260-321; PGM 36.295-311; and PGM 5.459-89). They are reviewed in the order he presents them. The first spell to which Gee appeals in his effort to establish the historicity of the Book of Abraham was designed to magically empower an iron ring to 'cause praise' for the petitioner (PDM 12.6-20). As part of the procedure, the magician was to take a white, grape-shaped stone and empower it by writing several magically potent words on it, one of which was ABRACAM. (See Johnson in Betz 1992, 152.) For Gee, ABRACAM must refer to the patriarch Abraham and the white stone must be a seer stone. He draws his readers' attention to three scriptural texts to support the interpretation he has read into the spell according to Mormon hermeneutics:
The fact is that this is only one among numerous magical spells prescribing that the magician write magically-potent words, figures, and/or numbers on papyrus, linen, gold, lead, silver, copper, tin, iron, branches, leaves, roots, bat wings, and stones.[29] Gee's reference to the grape-shaped, white stone as a seer stone is unwarranted; and abracam, as noted in the review of Gee's first article, is a magically-potent word that has no authenticating significance for the Book of Abraham. The second magical spell to which Gee appeals (PGM 12.270-350) also utilized a stone with writing on it. The purpose of this spell was to empower a ring to make 'men famous and great and admired and rich as can be', or at least making possible for the ring-bearer to make friends with famous-and-great-and-admired-and-rich-as-can-be men. The ring-bearer was instructed that whenever he had the ring with him, "you will always get whatever you ask from anybody. Besides, it calms the angers of masters and kings. Wearing it, whatever you may say to anyone, you will be believed, and you will be pleasing to everybody. [The power of the ring can] call back souls, move spirits, subject legal opponents, strengthen friendships, produce all [sorts of] profits, bring / dreams, give prophecies, cause psychological passions and bodily sufferings and incapacitating illness, and perfect all erotic philters" (Smith in Betz 1992, 163f).The ring was empowered by a 'first-rate name', Helios, inscribed on a stone, which, when made potent by the magical spell 'can open doors and break chains and rocks' (164). At dawn the magician was to face the sun (Helios) and magically embue the 'well-planned, beneficent, divine, holy, useful, economical, merciful stone which provides your needs' by invoking the 'Greatest god, who exceed[s] / all power'. From the long list of names of the god the magician was to recite, Gee focuses on 'IAO SABAOTH ADONAI EILOEIN [ELOHIM]', and 'Abraham, Isaac, Jacob'. He declares that the 'first four names are Hebrew for "LORD of hosts, my Lord, God"' (1992, 60). But he fails to acknowledge that by the time the magical spells were written, 'even the Jewish god Iao', originally YHWH, was in many respects an underworld deity (Betz 1992, xlvi-xlvii) who 'became an important deity in magical literature' (335); that the meaning of 'my Lord' for ADONAI 'had been long lost to the practitioners of the Roman Empire' and now referred to an 'important angelic figure in gnosticism and in magic' (331). In fact, IAO, SABAOTH, ADONAI, and ELOHIM occur so frequently in the magical spells that their appearance is not noteworthy. Moreover, the occurrences of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob in several magical spells [30] are disconnected from any biblical context and therefore do not constitute an assurance 'that we are dealing with references to the biblical Abraham' (61) in any more than the vaguest sense. The currency of these terms in Egyptian literature is unknown before the Late Period and therefore they are not evidence of a long tradition that dates to the second millenium BCE that would in any way authenticate the Book of Abraham. Gee's third example is a modified appeal to Pap. Leiden I 384:1 (PGM 12.480-495) that he introduced in his first article. This time he concedes that the spell is a 'love charm' (60) instead of merely a 'text ... entitled "The sacrifice [or burning] of so-and-so"' (1991,1) and that the subject of the spell is a woman, not Abraham. But Gee's new interpretation does not correctly reflect the data he cites. In the first place, he misleads his readers when he takes license to translate neku n as 'the dead (pharaohs)' in his attempt to relate the spell to the Book of Abraham. As justification for his interpretation, he claims that 'Neukoi [sic] can refer to the dead in general or specifically to certain dead pharaohs,' appealing to the Ptolomaic Egyptian chronographer Manetho as his authority (62 note 4). What he fails to mention is that Manetho's work was a translation of the Egyptian king lists into Greek, with the obvious result that Manetho's use of 'the dead' would refer to kings. The word neku n itself has no intrinsic meaning that refers to dead pharaohs. [31] Secondly, because Joseph Smith restored a man's head to the damaged Anubis from the lion-couch vignette and identified him as the 'Idolatrous Priest of Elkenah' in Facsimile One of the Book of Abraham, Gee wants to minimize the fact that the facsimile should have been restored with Anubis' head, instead of a man's. Accordingly, he begs the question with his assertion that Anubis 'is indistinguishable from his priest, who wears a jackal mask over his head' (61), appealing for support to an article about masks by Seeber (1980, 1196-1199). The Egyptians in fact were concerned about representing the god in their illustrations, not the person doing the officiating, which may be why there is only one known illustration of a priest wearing the mask of a god-and it may not even be a depiction of an actual event (see Seeber 1980, 1197).[32] The question is not whether priests impersonated gods on cultic occasions by wearing masks. The question is whether or not Joseph Smith's reconstruction of the standing figure in his lion-couch vignette is accurate. It is not. The evidence from the lion-couch vignette of Pap. Joseph Smith 1 (fig. 8a) clearly shows the remnants of Anubis' headdress (fig. 8b), which Joseph Smith's restoration omits (fig. 8c). But then, because Smith was unacquainted with ancient Egyptian lion-couch scenes, it is only natural that he would not recognize the headdress remnants for what they are, and he instructed Reuben Hedlock to restore hypothetically a man's head, consonant with his interpretation of Anubis as the 'Idolatrous Priest of Elkenah'. As figure 8 indicates, the correct restortation of the vignette would require Anubis' head, not a man's. There is no evidence of a man's head on the papyrus, and there is no precedent for one on any known lion-couch scene.[33] In light of the review of his first article, Gee drops his original claim that the person about to be sacrificed was Abraham and now maintains that it was a woman on the lion-couch vignette of the magical spell who was the intended sacrificial victim: 'The idea of incinerating the woman as a punishment in case the woman does not yield to the man who casts the spell is an old Egyptian formula' (61). This would call to his readers' mind Abr 1:11-12: "Now, this priest had offered upon this altar three virgins at one time, who were the daughters of Onitah, one of the royal descent directly from the loins of Ham. These virgins were offered up because of their virtue; they would not bow down to worship gods of wood or of stone, therefore they were killed upon this altar, and it was done after the manner of the Egyptians. And it came to pass that the priests laid violence upon me, that they might slay me also, as they did those virgins upon this altar; and that you may have a knowledge of this altar, I will refer you to the representation at the commencement of this record." In support of his singular assertion that the lion-couch was used to sacrifice unyielding women, Gee misinterprets PDM 12.147-164 as referring to human sacrifice, when its real purpose was intended to inflame a woman with passion, as pointed out in the review of his first article. Worse, he wrongly appeals to a ca. 20th-Dynasty love charm to support his contention for the immolation of women. Unfortunately for Gee, it contains no reference to lion couches or to incinerating, sacrificing, or even harming women in any way.[34] Instead, the suitor threatens to set fire to the city of Busiris and Osiris himself if the gods do not make the intended woman submissive: "Hail to you, gods, lords of heaven and earth-let (the woman) NN
born of NN come after me like a cow after grass, like a maidservant
after her children, like a herdsman after his cattle. If they fail
to make her come after me I will set There is no evidence to support Gee's claims that men (e.g., Abraham
in his first article) and/or unyielding women (in his second article)
ever were sacrificed on lion couches.
Gee's fourth example is a modification of his appeal to Magical
8 ( = PDM 14.150-231) from his first article. He now at least refers
to it as a magical papyrus even though he places magical in quotation
marks (61). This time he almost admits that the text is a lamp divination
spell - he now calls it 'a long chapter on using a lamp to get revelation'
(61) - whereas before he referred to it merely as a 'section on
how to obtain revelation' (1991, 3). His second article wisely omits
the claim he made in his first that, like Magical 8, 'Joseph Smith's
explanation of the hypocephalus in the Book of Abraham also deals
with obtaining revelation about the heavens and the cosmos' (3);
for Magical 8 has no such stated purpose.
Gee focuses his attention on the phrase `br`hmy pa ¶f n ta
irt n ta wedjat, 'ABRAHME [Old Coptic gloss: ABRACAM], the pupil
of the sound eye' (Johnson in Betz 1992, 208), trying to use it
as the link between Abraham and Facsimile Two of the Book of Abraham.
He first claims significance for the 'sound' (wedjat) eye by noting
that it 'occurs four times' in Facsimile Two. But only two occurrences
are certainly authentic. The other two come from Joseph Smith's
hypothetically-restored section of the badly-damaged hypocephalus
(fig. 9a; see fig. 4). The restoration was taken from a vignette
in Pap JS 2:8 (fig. 9b).[35]
He misleadingly quotes Hopfner that 'it is very noteworthy that
the Patriarch Abraham is called "the apple of the wedjat-eye"' (61),
by omitting why Hopfner thought it was remarkable, for Gee wants
his readers to equate the wedjat eye with the Facsimile Two hypocephalus
and Abraham in such a way as to authenticate the Book of Abraham.
What Hopfner found remarkable was that 'ABRACAM' was equated with
the full moon; not with an wedjat-eye-as-hypocephalus as Gee would
have his readers believe. Here is his full statement:
"Finally, it is very remarkable that the patriarch Abraham is called
'the apple of the wedjat eye'; that is, the full moon. [Endlich
ist es sehr bemerkenswert, da§ der Patriarch Abraham ãder
Apfel des Auges der Uzat", d. h. der Vollmond genannt wird.]" (Hopfner
1935, 118)36
Continuing with his wedjat-Abraham-Facsimile-Two theme, Gee next
declares that 'in Christian times it [the wedjat eye] was the word
the Copts used for salvation' (61). Unfortunately, Gee's claim incorrectly
reflects the Coptic toujw, 'salvation' (Rettung), and its etymology.
toujw is the causitive of oujai ('whole, uninjured', originating
from w¶a), and comes from di w¶a (Westendorf 1977, 261,
287; Vycichl 1983, 226, 242; Cerny 1976, 224)-not the wedjat eye,
also a derivative of w¶a (an adjectival verb meaning 'be uninjured'
[Wb. 1:399]).
Gee next uses the wedjat eye to connect Facsimile Two to Book of
the Dead chapters 162-167, which he claims 'treat the theme of preserving
the dead until the time of the resurrection' and discuss 'the hypocephalus
- the general class of documents to which facsimile no. 2 belongs'
(61). He describes these spells as being 'closely related' and consequently
treats them as a unit ('this set of chapters'), even though BD 163-167
are not even related to BD 162. In contrast to the rest of the Book
of the Dead, in which the sun god Re is the primary deity, BD 163-167
as a group is characterized by the Theban god Amun acting as the
sun god (Barguet 1967, 233). BD 163 and 165 appeal to Amun, who
is prominent also in BD 167; and Mut is the primary deity in BD
164. Mosher (1992, 156) points out that their 'stature in these
spells is unique, for neither held such status in the funerary cult,
at least as far as the Book of the Dead was concerned'. In fact,
BD 163-165 were excluded from Memphite versions of the Book of the
Dead, suggesting that 'they were rejected by the Memphite clergy,
at least by the 3rd century if not earlier, as non-traditional,
perhaps as the upstart work of Amen adherents'.
Fig. 10. BD 162 in Papyrus Berlin 3031 (from Msller 1905, 48)
Not only do the disparate deities demonstrate that BD 162-167 did
not originate as a group, but they they are temporally disparate
as well. Mosher (1992, 155) argues convincingly against Yoyotte,
whom Gee (1992, 62 note 12) cites with approval. Yoyotte concludes
that BD 162-167 'were composed in the Theban milieu during the Ramesside
period' and 'were popularized for the benefit of the dead in Dyn.
21' (1977, 200), even though BD 163-165 'are not attested until
the 26th Dynasty' (Mosher 1992, 155 note 58). BD 167 is first attested
in Dynasty 18; BD 166 is first attested in Dynasty 19; BD 162 is
first attested in Dynasty 21 (fig. 10); BD 163-165 are first attested
in Dynasty 26; and there are no attestations of BD 166-167 ever
occuring on the same papyrus as BD 163-165 (Mosher 1990, Appendix
C). But Gee must treat BD 162-167 as a unit, because otherwise he
has no justification for calling the hypocephalus an wedjat eye
and relating it to Abraham probatively, as the review of his first
article makes clear.
Moreover, contrary to Gee, the Egyptians had no theological concept
of 'the time of the resurrection'. Rather, their hope was that after
death they would be revivified by being re-integrated into the cycles
of nature and cosmos (Frankfort 1948, 117), and their religion contained
numerous 'models of continuity' that symbolized their hope. The
term 'resurrection', with its heavy Eurocentric Christian presuppositions,
does not properly describe the content of the ancient Egyptian beliefs,
and therefore is unsuitable (Buchberger 1986, 1254).
Gee's attempt to get his readers to connect the biblical Abraham
to the wedjat eye, to Facsimile Two, to salvation, and to the Mormon
notion of the resurrection is based on incorrect and misleading
evaluations of the evidence.
Gee declares that his fifth reference to Abraham in the Roman Period
magical spells 'is linked to a Bible story' placed in a 'love charm'
(viz., PGM 36.295-311):
"The heavens opened and the angels of God descended and destroyed
the five cities: Sodom and Gomorrah, Admah and Zeboiim and Zoar.
When a woman heard the sound she became a salty pillar." The individual
using this charm also calls upon "the great Michael, Souriel, Gabriel,...
Istrael [sic], [and] Abraham." (61-62)
Gee leaves his readers with the misimpression that he is citing
a clean reference to a biblical story by omitting several important
items: Firstly, using associative magic, the magician was to take
lumps of sulfur and throw them into a fire, appealing to them as
though they were the sulfur that God reigned down on the five cities
of the plain: 'You are the sulfur which served God - so also serve
me'. Secondly, Gee does not inform his readers that the purpose
of the spell was to bedevil a woman so thoroughly as to 'not allow
her to go to bed or to find sleep until she comes' and makes love
to her suitor. Thirdly, he omits all the other deities to whom the
magician was to appeal:
"As you throw [the lumps] into the fire, say: "If I throw you into
the fire, I adjure you by the great PAP TAPHEIAO SABAOTH ARBATHIAO
ZAGOURE PAGOURE, and by the great MICHAEL/ ZOURIEL GABRIEL SESENGENBARPHARANGES
ISTRAEL ABRAAM, attract her, NN, to NN" (O'Neil in Betz 1992, 276).
Finally, Gee changes the spelling of one of the cities of the plain
from the 'Segor' (Chgwr) of the original spell to 'Zoar' (r[wx).
That the spell refers to the city as 'Segor' argues in favor of
the 2d Century BCE Septuagint (where the city is also spelled 'Segor'
[Shgwr]) as the source of the biblical material in this spell, and
against Gee's claim of a long-standing tradition of Abraham in ancient
Egypt.
In contrast to his other references, Gee fails to document the
last magical spell in which he claims to find a reference to the
biblical Abraham. Attempting to establish the ancient Egyptian historicical
claim of the Book of Abraham, Gee invites his readers to compare
his creative rendering of this spell with several Book of Abraham
citations:
"I call upon thee, the creator of earth and bones and all flesh
and every spirit and the one who stands upon the sea and shakes
the heaven, who separated the light from the darkness [compare Gen.
1:4; Moses 2:4; Abr. 4:4], O great mind, lawful administrator of
the universe [see explanation to facsimile no. 2, notes of figures
1, 3 and 7], eternal eye, daimon of daimons, god of gods, the lord
of the spirits [compare Abr. 3:22-23], the fixed planet [compare
explanation to facsimile no. 2, notes on figure 5], Jehovah [compare
Abr. 1:16], hear my voice. Thou canst not misunderstand my voice
in Hebrew: [many foreign words] Blessed is my Lord, the God of Abraham.
I babble in a foreign tongue" (1992, 62).
Unfortunately, Gee's rendering misrepresents the contents of the
spell. PGM 5.459-489 is an alternate spell that was to enable the
petitioner to loosen shackles, make himself invisible, send dreams,
gain favor, and get whatever else he may want (Aune in Betz 1992,
110). By omitting key parts of the spell's invocation to the 'Supreme
Intelligence', Gee gives the impression that the magician is addressing
'Jehovah' and pronouncing a variation of the Jewish blessing, 'Blessed
is my Lord, the God of Abraham'.
In fact, the magician syncretistically invokes the 'Supreme Intelligence'
in his various names: "Eternal Eye, Daimon of daimons, god of gods,
the lord of the spirits, the invariable AION IAO OYEI, hear my voice.
I call upon you, master of the gods, high-thundering Zeus, sovereign
Zeus, ADONAI, lord IAO OYEE; I am he who calls upon you, great god,
in Syrian: 'ZAALAERIPHPHOU', and you must not ignore my voice in
Hebrew 'ABLANATHANALBA ABRASILOA'."
Gee altogether omits 'master of the gods, high-thundering Zeus,
sovereign Zeus' and 'I am he who calls upon you, great god, in Syrian:
"ZAALAERIPHPHOU"'. Moreover, he dismisses as 'many foreign words'
and accordingly omits the un-Hebrew name of the Supreme Intelligence,
'ABLANATHANALBA ABRASILOA'. In addition, he omits the fact that
the Jewish blessing (BAROUCH ADONAI ELOAI ABRAAM) occurs in the
magician's proclamation of his own name:
"for I am SILTHACHOOUCH LAILAM BLASALOTH IAO IEO NEBOUTH SABIOTH
ARBOTH ARBATHIAO IAOTH SABAOTH PA/TOURE ZAGOURE BAROUCH ADONAI ELOAI
ABRAAM BARABRAOU NAUSIPH" (Aune in Betz 1992, 109-110).
By those omissions, Gee makes it seem that the Jewish blessing
is what the magician, addressing 'Jehovah', speaks in Hebrew, instead
of merely being part of the magician's abracadabra designation of
himself.
It is not clear that the the magician even understood the phrase
BAROUCH ADONAI ELOAI ABRAAM.[37] Moreover, as the review of Gee's
first article points out, abraam often only has the force of a magical
abracadabra word. In ADONAI ELOAI ABRAAM, ABRAAM is interchangeable
with other abra- words, as the same or similar phrases in other
magical spells make clear:
Gee curiously interprets 'the invariable AION IAO OYEI' as 'the
fixed planet'. Thus he creates a parallel to Joseph Smith's note
about Facsimile 2.5 of the Book of Abraham: 'Kae-e-vanrash, which
is the grand Key, or, in other words, the governing power, which
governs fifteen other fixed planets or stars'. Gee's claim is unparalleled.
The fact is that AION is the name of a god[38] who 'plays an important
role in the magical papyri, and 'whose name signifies "long period
of time," "eon," "eternity"' (Betz 1992, 331) not Gee's 'fixed planet'.
John Gee's Ensign article is a revised and expanded version of
his FARMS piece this time in a more sophisticated package. Echoing
the apologetic creed that even though a spiritual witness through
faith is the only way a person will know that Joseph Smith's scriptural
writings are True, Gee declares that any supporting evidence that
can be proffered would be helpful:
"Of course, acceptance of the book of Abraham, like acceptance
of all scripture, will always depend on faith, and the only real
proof of scripture can come only through the power of the Holy Ghost.
But a knowledge of external factors can help in the search for truth,
and a number of Egyptian texts mention Abraham" (1992, 60).[39]
In contrast to his first article, however, he now concedes that
his evidence is not good. In the first place, of the 'dozens of
references to Abraham in Egyptian texts', the six examples he produces
are from the Third Century CE and from a category that has, he now
admits, 'traditionally, been called "magical"'. Because he selects
only six from the 'dozens of references', it is reasonable to assume
that he considers those six to be the most compelling. Accordingly,
in his conclusion, Gee represents his examples as though they are
compelling, indeed-so compelling that had they been accessible to
Joseph Smith, critics would have accused Smith of copying them.
For that reason, he is careful to point out that all his examples
'have come forth since Joseph Smith translated the book of Abraham'
(62).[40]
Secondly, his discomfort with and consequent attempt to neutralize
the significance of his appeals to 'Abraham' in magical texts is
reflected by the fact that he offsets magic within quotation marks
and declares that 'many scholars are not sure how to distinguish
ancient magic from religion' (1992, 60).[41] His statement is problematic
in the context of Mormon hermeneutics, for Mormonism clearly distinguishes
between magic and religion:
"In imitation of true religion with its miracles, signs, and gifts
of the Spirit, Satan has substitute rituals and practices called
magic. Attempts by unauthorized and therefore powerless ministers
to duplicate the miraculous wonders of true religion result in the
degenerate worship of magic. In its nature magic is the art which
produces effects by the assistance of supernatural beings or by
a mastery of secret forces in nature; magicians (those skilled in
magic) are necromancers, sorcerers, conjurers, and the like.
Magic has flourished among apostate peoples in all ages. The magicians
of Pharaoh's court had power given them from Satan to duplicate
many of the miracles wrought by Moses" (McConkie 1966, 462).
Consequently the magical spells, as examples of satanic imitations
of 'true religion' - and Gee's citations of Abraham in them - could
not serve validly as evidence to his Mormon audience; that is, unless
he ignores Mormonism's strong antipathy against magic by elevating
it to the category of 'true religion'. In any event, Gee obscurantistically
tries to authenticate more convincingly the historicity of the Book
of Abraham.
Thirdly, while Gee concedes that 'these texts tell us nothing directly
about Abraham', he asserts correctly that 'they do tell us that
there were traditions of Abraham circulating in Roman Egypt'. Declaring
that traditions 'often stem from older truths', he is strangely
silent about the Egyptian Late Period (664-323 BCE) as a source
for Abraham in Egyptian writings. For during that time, large numbers
of Jews migrated to Egypt, bringing with them their magic and their
holy book, which they soon translated into Greek (the Septuagint).
Because the Egyptian magicians appealed to any and all deities and
powers that might make spells effective, and because 'Jewish magic
was famous in antiquity (Betz 1992, xlv), it was only natural that
the Jewish God, angels, and heroes would appear in the spells.
In fact, Gee fails to acknowledge the dearth of evidence about
the biblical Abraham in Egyptian records before the Late Period.
Instead, he affirms the consequent by appealing to the 19th-Century
CE Book of Abraham itself as the original 'older truth' from which
the traditions he alleges stem.[42] That is, using the Book of Abraham
as an already historically-True template against which to evaluate
his material, Gee recognizes as 'evidence' anything in the Roman-Period
magical spells he can make resemble the contents of the Book of
Abraham, thus 'proving' that the Book of Abraham must be historically
True.[43] Attempting to neutralize any criticism of his arguments
by implying that it would be based on anti-Mormon bias not scholarship
he takes the martyr's view that critics have an agendum to reject
the Book of Abraham anyway, so that
"Even if we had a manuscript for the book of Abraham in Egyptian,
dating to Abraham's time, the critics still would not accept the
book of Abraham. Those who seek to know the truth of the book of
Abraham will have to wait upon the Lord (62)."
In other words, in Gee's final analysis, evidence is worthless,
for critics will look at it straight in the face and deny its validity.
Testimony, on the other hand, is his arbiter of what is True, and
believers 'who wait upon the Lord' will have the advantage of having
a testimony that the Book of Abraham is historically True-even in
the face of no evidence.
To date, believers will have to continue to 'wait upon the Lord'
for their conviction of the historicity of the Book of Abraham.
It is inappropriate to associate the grape-shaped white stone of
PDM 12.6-20 with a Mormon seer stone with the initiate's new name
written on it. The Hebrew names in PGM 12.270-321 are disconnected
from any biblical context. The lion-couch vignette and its related
love spell of PDM 12.147-164 do not depict or refer to any human
sacrifice - let alone the sacrifice of an unyielding woman. Neither
'ABRACAM, the pupil of the wedjat eye' of Magical 8 nor the wedjat
eye itself refers to hypocaphali (e.g., Facsimile Two of the Book
of Abraham). ABRAAM in PGM 36.295-311 is not an authenticating reference
for the Book of Abraham; it merely has the value of a potent abracadabra
word in Roman Period Egyptian magic. The same is true of BAROUCH
ADONAI ELOAI ABRAAM in PGM 5.459-489.
CONCLUSIONS
Although he declares that faith is the 'real proof of scripture',
John Gee paradoxically has gone to great lengths in his articles
to develop evidence out of Christian Era magical spells from Egypt
in an effort to authenticate the historicity of the Book of Abraham.
Unfortunately, none of the six authenticating references he has
presented is historically rigorous. Gee provides his own dramatic
demonstration of that fact when he abandons the extraordinary claim
he makes in his first article that he actually has a reference suggesting
Abraham lying on a lion-couch altar calling on God, which he boldly
declares 'compares closely with Joseph Smith's indication that Facsimile
1 from the Book of Abraham is an illustration of "Abraham fastened
upon an altar" to be sacrificed by idolatrous priests'. After the
review of his first piece pointed out that the evidence indicated
clearly that the person on the lion-couch was a woman who was the
object of a love spell, Gee abandons his remarkable claim and admits
in his second article that the person on the lion-couch was a woman
and that she was the object of a love spell. Only now he claims
that she was to be sacrificed (on the lion couch) if she would not
yield to her suitor, 'according to an old Egyptian formula'. The
spell no longer is 'evidence' of Abraham on the altar. Now it is
'evidence' for three young virgins on the altar. Less dramatic,
but no less significant is the fact that Gee has, as the reviews
have shown, misquoted and misinterpreted the data and the sources
in order to develop his authenticating evidence.
Gee's articles are illustrative of one of the two approaches that
the Mormon apologetic school uses to deal with the major problem
it faces, viz., for the plethora of proclaimed Truths that are to
be rooted in history, there is a dearth of evidence.44 The first
approach, used elsewhere,[45] involves the denial of contrary evidence
on philosophical grounds. It assumes relativistically that evidence
that is not faith-promoting exists only in the head of the 'objectivist'
historian, who would have a hidden agendum, but who would pretend
to be empirical. On the other hand, it assumes objectivistically
that the apologist would have the sure, 'objective knowledge' of
proclaimed Truth, with the result that he could be more discretionary
with evidence.[46]
The second approach the implicit method of Gee's articles involves
the logical fallacy of 'affirming the consequent'. Gee appeals to
the 19th-century CE Book of Abraham as an already historically-True
template to recognize or ignore 'evidence' regarding its historicity.
In other words, the Book of Abraham would reflect an original revelation
(an 'Uroffenbarung'), of which authenticating bits and pieces survive
in various sources.[47] Something is hailed as 'evidence' if it
authenticates the template and ignored if it does not. That is why
Gee does not inform his readers about the magical nature of the
papyri in his first article. That is why he avoids the fact that
his occurrences of the name of Abraham in the magical spells have
no more meaning than potent abracadabra words. That is why to Gee
a white stone with several magical words on it becomes a seer stone
as in DC 130:10-11. That is why he freely interprets the lion-couch
vignette and the magical spells following it in accordance with
Joseph Smith's interpretation of Facsimile One in his first article,
or Abr 1:11-12 in his second. That is why he feels free to connect
Magical 8.8 to Book of the Dead chapter 163 to Book of the Dead
chapter 162 to the hypocephalus to Abraham to Joseph Smith's interpretation
of Facsimile Two. That is why he omits significant amounts of original
material in the last two magical texts he cites to make them appear
as strong evidence for the the Book of Abraham.
More than anything, the articles indicate that Gee's scholarly
vision is clouded by his anxiety to produce 'faith-promoting evidence'.
Readers of apologia, consequently, must be extremely cautious about
accepting such 'faith-promoting' claims. As the above reviews show,
apologia can present 'faithful history' that is not historically
rigorous to an unsuspecting audience. Unfortunately, everyone loses:
apologists are not taken seriously by their collegues in the academic
world; church members are mis-informed; and embarrassment may ultimately
come to the church, which prides itself in adhering to the honorable
claims of its Thirteenth Article of Faith.
|
Endnotes