Post on 23-Apr-2023
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How the Book of Breathings and theHow the Book of Breathings and theBook of Abraham are Book of Abraham are ConnectedConnected
Kyle Beswick
It goes without saying that the world in general,
especially in academia, takes the claims of believing
Mormons with much less than a single grain of salt. They
jeer at our “alternate” history of Central America and
Native Americans. They scoff at the visions of Joseph Smith.
But when it comes to labeling with the brand “Oscar Meyer,”
their favorite variety is the Book of Abraham.
Now, we as members of the Church are apt to brush their
claims off as nothing more than the faithless mumblings of
those who are lost in the dark, trying to grope their way to
the great and spacious building. We instantly classify such
people as heathens and proceed to bear testimony, as we try
to inject them with the Spirit to open their minds and fog
their biased reasoning whispered to them by the father of
lies. While we cannot dispute the power of emotions given to
us by the Holy Ghost, we cannot overlook this fact: that
these people are not idiots, and they may very well be
convicted with the same intensity through logic, discovery,
and science as we are through faith, spirituality, and
enlightenment. Such is especially the case with the Book of
Abraham.
As the supposedly lost fragments of the Joseph Smith
Papyri were found by Dr. Aziz S. Atiya1 the world’s
attention peaked. Both skeptics and faithful alike had the
ultimate test of fraudulency or verification, respectfully.
As the original source of the Book of Mormon wasn’t around
to prove or disprove, there was much excitement now that we
some sort of acid drop for the Prophet. And this is where
the skeptics found their supposed redemption. They could be
silenced no more, and there was good reason for it. The text
contained material not expected and required a different
understanding of history to fit with the Prophet’s context.
There was no Abraham. No mention of Kolob. It was
discovered that these documents were just traditional
funerary texts of ancient Egypt named the Book of Breathings. For
someone who has no comprehension of spiritual things (which
Paul says would be any man without experience in faith) and
relies solely on the evidence, then of course, they appear 1 Church Education System, Pearl of Great Price Study Manuel (Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, 2000), pg. 29
to be correct. But to someone who has received a sure
knowledge of the truthfulness of the gospel in their heart
via the Holy Ghost, and relies on that conviction in their
perspective of all things, what does this mean for them? It
would be easy to hang up one’s hat in the face of being
duped. Professor Hugh Nibley prefaces his great work on this
very issue (from which much more will be said), that “the
reader pursuing the translation…may well wonder if someone
isn’t pulling his leg.2” But Nibley continues to say they
may discover more…a pattern which contains important truths
not even inherently expressed in our canonical text itself.
And with his genius scholarship, we can, in the face of
blatant opposition, broaden our scope of the gospel and
drive the seed of faith even further in our souls. Those
cynics just can’t win out to the convicted – their arguments
just have the opposite effect.
If the gospel is to be the truth of all that is and
was, then we must be able to find a correlation between it
and all history to thus verify the gospel as the source of 2 Hugh Nibley, The Message of the Joseph Smith Papyri: An Egyptian Endowment (Deseret Book, 2005), pg. xxvi
all this history. Egyptian documents called the Pyramid
Texts are among the oldest in the world and should thereby
have remnants of the teachings of the Patriarchs, being
dated around the time of the Great Flood (if the biblical
math provides an accurate date). If Egypt was settled
initially by the granddaughter of Noah, as the Book of
Abraham tells us, then this dating makes sense and these
texts should contain blatant references to many of the
truths of the gospel taught by him, as he was yet alive when
these were supposedly produced.
However, even though Noah was amongst the children of
men preaching the Word of God, the priesthood was not with
everyone. Egypt was settled by Ham’s lineage, which was
denied the priesthood in Gen. 9:25 so therefore the entire
Egyptian line was without that blessing. We read of this
briefly in an oft-overlooked passage: Abr. 1:26. Pharaoh
wished to imitate the priesthood – knowing that it was good
but that he did not have proper authority, he still wished
to teach his people after its ways as far as could be
understood. Of course, without the Holy Spirit of Promise
and misunderstandings of those who had not the blessing of
endowment, and in the course of oversimplification and over-
symbolizing, these rites and rituals became quickly skewed,
though no doubt unintended by Pharaoh.
The Pyramid Texts are the result of this corruption.
However, they are a primeval version of the Book of Breathings
which is directly related to Abraham’s writings and so they
must have contained enough truth to be the Great Patriarch’s
direct reference. Perhaps they are more pure, being less
shrouded in the mythology that developed over time. These
texts, in summary, contain instructions for initiation rites
to prepare the body of a deceased Pharaoh for entrance into
a glorious afterlife. These rituals center around the god
Osiris, who is the Eldest Son of the anthropomorphic god of
the Earth, Geb. According to Egyptian legend, Osiris was
betrayed and killed by his brother Set for jealously of
honor and who later became the god of Evil. He was later
resurrected and became the judge of all who pass on to the
next life.3
3 Dr. Robert K. Ritner, Ancient Egypt (Oxford University Press, 1997), pg. 137
In the very basic idea, this legend was no doubt derived from the
Atonement of Jesus Christ. In the corruption that became of
Pharaoh’s attempts to practice the ordinances with no
authority, the Atonment became a legend of its own to these
ancient people and, as all oracles, legend built upon
legend. It transformed Jesus into Quetzalcoatl among the
Lamanites, and likewise to the Old Dynasty, Jesus became
Osiris, Lucifer became Set, and Elohim became Geb. But the
essentials remain, even some relatively minor symbols, as
ideas remain linked in the cultural status quo. All the way
to the end of Osiris’s prominence in worship, he (as well as
other persons of power) were always portrayed with a crook
and a flail, which can be seen as a indirect remembrance to
the titles of “Good Shepherd” and “provider of the Bread of
Life” given to Christ.
With this basic foundation of Ancient Egyptian worship,
all other texts were built upon, just as the Atonement of
Christ is the building foundation of the uncorrupted gospel.
As this was tweaked into mythology, so too were the other
corresponding parts tweaked to adapt to the same mythology.
In the same book stated earlier, Bro. Nibley
hypothesizes that the basic traditions that came out of the
Pyramid Texts and later the Book of Breathings were derived
from none other than the endowment received in the House of
the Lord. This endowment being one of the Highest Ordinances
of the Priesthood (in fact, being a part of the Priesthood
itself) and totally dependent upon it, it is easy to see how
this experience was changed, intentionally or not, for those
who did not hold even the most basic form of the Priesthood.
We can see the resemblance in basic ceremonial
ideology. The Book of Breathings, in very essence, is a set
of instructions given to the deceased to allow them to
ascend to the afterlife, much like the endowment, except of
course the endowment is given while the recipient is still
living, or performed by the living on the dead’s behalf –
not performed on the dead. Perhaps it was changed this way
because of the lack of understanding. Those who received the
rites without the Priesthood would not understand how to
participate. And so the rite was given after death, with the
idea that the spirit (or to them called the Ba4) was
receiving it and participating.
Besides the timing of performance and the tweaked
symbolism, the basic idea remains the same. Compare the
summaries of the two ceromonies:
For the Book of the Dead - “It enabled the Dead to
overcome obstacles of the underworld and not lose their way.
It did this by teaching passwords, giving clues, and
revealing routes that would allow to answer questions and
navigate around hazards. It would grant the help and
protection of the gods while proclaiming the deceased's
identity with the gods to attain an afterlife of bliss in
the Field of Reeds.5”
And for the Temple Endowment - “Your endowment is, to
receive all those ordinances in the house of the Lord, which
are necessary for you, after you have departed this life, to
enable you to walk back to the presence of the Father,
4 Wikipedia, “Egyptian Soul,” (en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Egyptian_soul)5 Aldokkan.com, “The Complete Book of the Dead - Papyrus of Ani - Translated by E.A. Wallis Budge,” (www.aldokkan.com/religion/dead.htm)
passing the angels who stand as sentinels, being enabled to
give them the key words, the signs and tokens, pertaining to
the holy Priesthood, and gain your eternal exaltation in
spite of earth and hell6…First, there is a course of
instruction relative to man’s eternal journey from the dim
beginning towards his possible glorious destiny. Then,
conditions are set up by which that endless journey may be
upward in direction. Those who receive this information
covenant to obey the laws of eternal progress, and thereby
give life to the knowledge received. Finally, it is made
clear that a man must sometimes give an account of his
deeds, and prove the possession of divine knowledge and
religious works. It is a very beautiful, logical and
inspiring series of ceremonies.7”
As we can see, the very form and purpose of the two
ceremonies are essentially the same. They are a set of
instructions, classified to those who receive the right to
obtain them, to progress through the eternal realms. They 6 Brigham Young, Discourses of Brigham Young – comp. John A. Widtsoe (Deseret Book, 1941), p.4167 Elder John A. Widtsoe, A Rational Theology (Deseret Book, 1965), pp. 125-26
consist of passwords and tokens required to take this
journey toward exalted status.
So, we can see an obvious correlation filling an
awfully empty gap in history being filled with mocks and
mimicries of the deceptive. But must the void be crossed
with nothing but shadowy bridges to satisfaction? Despite
the comfort of many that such connections exist, we must
face reality in that we can only explain part of the story.
Apparently, we can see where the plan of salvation and
gospel teachings can be found as source material, but what
of the Book of Abraham itself? What of the claim that such
was “written by the hand of Abraham on papyrus” when all we
have are these vague traces of truth eroded by time? Surely
Abraham would have restored such to clarity and not remained
restricted to legends and folklore – he communicated with
the ultimate source. And so why does this remain?
Well, here we must solidify our findings with faith. We
have read many times throughout God’s dealings with people,
particularly in Jesus’ ministry in the flesh, where Divinity
tends to wrap Themselves with some sort of ambiguity in
order for the saving power of faith to take full effect, and
the learning experiences of seeing through the glass darkly
to contribute to our progression. If we knew everything,
faith would be invalid and we would hardly have a test of
character in this life, for we would know exactly how to
proceed.
But we can justify our faith with theory.
Perhaps the Lord allowed only the most indistinct
fragments of Joseph Smith’s acquired papyri to be saved from
the ashes of the Great Chicago Fire, where the record in its
entirety was located before any significant knowledge of the
Egyptian language was accessible for a proving translation.
After all, we He did remove the Golden Plates from the
presence of man, and thereby disallowing any absolute
confirmation of the sacred proceedings described by the
Prophet. There is record of the original writings being so
lengthy that when unraveled they covered the length of the
entire floor of the Mansion House.
Another theory seems to be that perhaps the Book of
Breathings acted as a sort of spiritual catalyst for the
long-lost writings of Abraham. After all, when Joseph Smith
translated the Golden Plates, some records say he hardly
ever looked at them directly, instead he looked at the Urim
and Thummim while they remained covered on the table8. So
perhaps he didn’t really need the actual book, but just some
medium of writings similar to it (and perhaps derived from
it, for they contain the same illustrations) to allow the
Spirit to elaborate.
However, judging from the historical Church records, it
seems fairly clear the early Church leaders were under a
strong impression that the papyri contained literal
handwriting of Abraham, and so the first seems much more
plausible.
But, regardless of history and sources, the most
important part of the Book of Abraham is the content itself.
This is what any priesthood leader would say, and this is
because it is the teachings that become the source of faith,
through which all else is perceived. This paper itself was
written with that same perception. Had there been no faith, 8 Richard Lyman Bushman, Joseph Smith: Rough Stone Rolling (New YorkCity: Vintage Books, 2005), pg. 71
the eye-opening comparison of Ancient Egyptian religion with
our own would not have been clear.
And thus we see that it is only with faith that we can
achieve eventual pure knowledge. It is only with faith that
we can accept the claims of spirituality over supposed
science, and scoff back at those who do not understand. It
is only with faith that we see the truth over the
counterfeited traditions of Pharaoh’s Priesthood.