jonw@tekmdp.UUCP (Jonathan White) (09/17/83)
Due to the volume of pro-Mormon articles, as well as the decreasing amount of time that I have to devote to this, I am forced to let a lot stuff pass by without comment. The purpose of this article is to demonstrate that one must take the pseudo-scholarly ramblings of Mormon apologists with several large grains of salt. For example, J.D. Jensen wrote an article that was supposed to refute my statement: Incidentally, no one has ever been able to find even the slightest hint of this language called "reformed Egyptian." All reputable linguists and Egyptologists who have examined the evidence put forth by the Mormons have rejected it as mythical. In response, he quoted from the prolific Mormon apologist, Hugh Nibley: ...Nobody knew anything about reformed Egyptian then. The word Demotic had not yet come into general use. Lacking that, "Reformed Egyptian" is as good a term as any to describe that peculiar and remarkably abbreviated style of "cursive writing developed out of the Hieratic by systematic abbreviation from the 8th to the 4th centuries," which enjoyed the heyday of its international popularity in Lehi's own time.... that peculiar type of writing known as Meroitic a baffling and still largely undeciphered Egyptian script which developed out of the Demotic under circumstances remarkably paralleling the purported development of Nephite writing, has the most striking affinities to the characters of the so-called Anthon Transcript, which is thought to be Joseph Smith's own copying of a sample of the writing on the plates. The point is that there was such writing... Hugh Nibley is neither an Egyptologist nor an archeologist, and should probably not be involving himself in such matters. I quote from the Tanners: On May 3, 1980, the church section of the Mormon-owned Deseret News announced an important find that further demonstrates that present church leaders have no gift to translate ancient documents and that Dr. Hugh Nibley is unqualified to deal objectively with the subject. The important find is a paper that is supposed to contain "reformed Egyptian" characters copied by Joseph Smith from the gold plates... As in the case of the "Book of Abraham" Papyri, this new discovery put the Mormon prophet in an embarrassing position. Instead of using the "seer stone" to translate the characters, President Kimball examined them with a magnifying glass. While Kimball offered no comments on the implications of this important discovery, Dr. Hugh Nibley immediately proclaimed that the writing was similar to the Egyptian script known as Demotic. He claimed, in fact, that "it's translatable" (Herald [Provo, Utah], 1 May 1980). Dr. Nibley obviously jumped the gun on this matter. When the transcript was submitted to Klaus Baer, professor of Egyptology at the University of Chicago's Oriental Institute, he replied that it is "probably not Egyptian....I suspect that one would have about the same batting average in comparing this with Chinese or Japanese or other systems that arrange signs in columns" (letter dated May 10, 1980). According to the Book of Mormon, "reformed Egyptian" was the universal language throughout North and South America 1500 years ago. However, the reformed Egyptian characters that Joseph Smith has preserved for us in the Anthon transcript do not match anything we have been able to find in the Western hemisphere. The anti-Mormon writer M.T. Lamb expressed this problem very well: ...unfortunately for the claims of the Book of Mormon, we are able to learn precisely what kind of characters were used in Central America by its ancient inhabitants. They have been preserved in imperishable marble. Engraven upon stone in such a way as to retain to the end of time a silent though solemn rebuke of the false and foolish pretensions of the author of this book. (The Golden Bible, p. 259) Jon White Tektronix Aloha, Ore