Egyptian Alphabet: Initial Results Of Greek Influence Hypothesis

I would love to see some specific, thoughtful criticism. So far, the only negative responses people have raised to me about this project have been with a broad brush and seem to be based on assumptions they make due to the lack of trappings they would expect to see in a formal analysis. However, the evidence I'm gathering is informal and preliminary to any advanced academic undertaking which may or may not ultimately result, so the objections people have raised are not really apt. 

For instance, multiple people have said they dismiss my work because my transliterations aren't correct. However, these people fail to realize that Joseph Smith's Egyptian Alphabet misspells numerous words in English, so if we are to evaluate any potential Greek transliterating he may have been doing, we can't hold it to a higher standard than his English. That's why the results I return are from a wide net, although many people jump to the conclusion that a wide net equals cherry picking, which is just not the reality. 

People also assume that potential Joseph Smith Greek transliterations should be expected to perfectly match, rather than merely be associated with, the descriptions provided in the Egyptian Alphabet. However, that's their arbitrary preference and should not be projected onto Joseph Smith. For instance, if different descriptions were "mowing lawns," "looking at the sky" and "walking in winter," and the respective transliteration results came back as "green," "blue," and "white," common sense would tell us there's a likely association between the descriptions and the transliterations, but people who aren't able or willing to see beyond the surface will, with a broad brush, dismiss any association as imagined. 

Even without knowing exactly how Google Translate is glossing out its results, the results are still very useful. But people have to actually think. If the description is "Brigham Young," and there's a Google Translate result of "wagon," is that closer than a random word like "dog?" Yes of course. And that's the point of the evidence. If we consistently return results which are more closely related than random expectations, we can become quite confident that the results are not random. 

One of Joseph Smith's descriptions is about something "seen" underwater, and the Google Translate result came back as "see." Obviously that's positive evidence, even without knowing how Google Translate glossed it out. 

So it's a matter of evaluating each of the examples against a null hypothesis of random or, most often, no result at all. I have yet to see any serious engagement with the evidence, which will hopefully change. 

Moreover, the threshold that needs to be met is just plausibility. The whole controversy around Joseph Smith's Egyptian Alphabet has been about the assumption that it represents Joseph Smith's ability to translate regular Egyptian. But there's no proof that that's what Joseph Smith was even trying to do, and if it appears that other languages are involved (Reformed Egyptian, Greek, Hebrew, etc.) then the assumption grows weaker and the case against Joseph Smith becomes baseless.     

If you've read my initial post and the follow-up, you probably have some pretty good context for understanding the following data, including the limitations of this experiment until we can trace down exactly what glosses Google Translate is basing its results on. Although, if the results are ultimately confirmed, that could greatly change the lens through which we evaluate Joseph Smith's Egyptian Alphabet. 

This post will walk you through the results I have so far. I want to emphasize that we should not expect the names of every entry in the Egyptian Alphabet to yield a result here, because other languages than Greek and English might also be involved, and we are not testing for those. We don't know how many entries are intended to relate to Greek. It's a question of how much cumulative evidence points to some sort of Greek connection. There's a pattern of meaningful results, and each result strengthens that pattern. 

Also, it's possible that some of the Egyptian Alphabet entries are contractions which don't play out in the real world of linguistics but which involve real words and which play out for the Egyptian Alphabet's internal purposes, similar to how Joseph Smith combined the real word "more" with the real word "mon," even though one was modern English and one was Ancient Egyptian. In other words, the fact that he took liberties does not negate the fact that his claim about the ancient language is defensible, as I explained in a previous post. 

Now, a word is in order about my transliteration methodology. 

The testing process itself is not concerned with how Joseph Smith would have access to Greek. And it is not our job to correct Joseph Smith's methodology. The purpose of my methodology is not to fully identify and understand Joseph Smith's own methodology, but to cast a net large enough to capture any potential Greek transliterating Joseph Smith may have been doing, even if we don't understand all the nuances of his methods. 

For instance, we see the letter B at the start of the word Beth in the Egyptian Alphabet. It might be tempting to think, "well, in Greek B is represented with the digraph μπ, so that's how Joseph Smith would have transliterated it into Greek." However, that's only one possibility. 

Another possibility is that Joseph Smith intended the word Beth to refer to a single Greek letter, e.g. Beta. It's true that Beta has a V-sound in modern pronunciation, but we can't assume that Joseph intended it to sound like an English, rather than Greek, B. Similarly, when we see the letter P, such as in the second entry of the Egyptian Alphabet, "pha-e," we can't just assume it's supposed to sound like the English letter P, but it may be a trilled R like the Greek letter rho. 

Yet another possibility is that each letter in Beth corresponds with a single Greek letter, meaning that Beth would transliterate into four different Greek letters. 

Or, he could be going strictly by sound and it would be our job to piece together the small variety of ways the word "Beth" as it sounds in English could be transliterated into Greek, regardless of how many or how few letters are involved. 

And at least one other possibility exists, which is that Joseph Smith was using a combination of methods, and changing them as he felt like doing so, without instructing us. In the case of Beth for instance, Joseph Smith may have intended the letter B to directly represent the Greek letter Beta, while the E is supposed to be sounded out as the long-e of Upsilon (not Epsilon) and the last two letters of Beth, th, sound out together as Theta. And indeed this gives us the Beta-Upsilon-Theta transliteration which yields a very relevant English result in Google Translate. 

As one last note on my methodology for now, I want to stress that I'm not cherry-picking. The key here is that as I keep casting out the net, I'm not retrieving lots of other results and arbitrarily discarding them. Some, yes, but not many. Usually no English result materializes with any particular transliteration, and if a result in English does materialize, what pops up is something either relevant or inconsequential like the word "the." 

Alright, what follows are the results (see appendix, below, for Google Translate screenshots).

ah the first being who exercises Supreme power

The name here is ah. Ah is the sound of Alpha, the first letter of the Greek alphabet. The description, "the first being who exercises Supreme power," seems like a reference to Deity. Alpha is part of the title for God, "Alpha and Omega." Alpha also represents the first of anything, therefore matching the words of the description, "the first being." So, right off the bat we have reason to believe that Greek is involved, here. 

Ah-bra-oam. The father of many nations, a prince of peace, one who keeps the commandments of God, a patriarch, a rightful heir, a high priest

The name here is Ah-bra-oam. The whole description is about works, so it's fascinating that when I rendered it into Greek and entered it into Google Translate it gave the word "Works."

Ahnaios God without begining or end

The name here is Ahnaios. This might be confusing, because the Joseph Smith Papers website transcript has this as "Ahmeos," but they apparently made an error in this case. Looking at the word as written by Joseph Smith, it is clearly "Ahnaios," not "Ahmeos." The JSPP website also shows a word crossed out in the transcript here, where the actual document does not show a word crossed out. 

As we parse this out, it seems likely to be a contraction, because Joseph Smith has already associated "ah" with the description, "the first being who exercises Supreme power," indicating God, and this seems confirmed by the fact that Ahnaios starts with "ah," and the corresponding description associated with Ahnaios starts with "God." 

So if we break down "ah" and "naios" as two separate parts, what is the meaning for the naios part? I transliterated it and searched in Google Translate and the result came back, "Temple." There's plenty of room for a match here, considering the temple's extensive symbolism, and it's remarkable that such a relevant result would come back at all.

While keeping the result of "temple" in mind, consider how it relates to the next entry we will cover. 

Ebethcha the greatest place of hapiness where God resides the Celesstial Kingdom

The name here is Ebethcha. Here, it's talking about the absolute greatest place of happiness, and the Google Translate result is "Get in," which of course means to "enter." This is actually very significant because from a temple perspective the idea of the Celestial Kingdom, "where God resides," is symbolically depicted in a Celestial Room, and has very significant connotations with the invitation to "enter" (or "get in"). This match is actually very remarkable and substantive in meaning, despite the informal verbiage of the Google Translate result. 

Kah tou man the name of a royal family in female line

The name here is Kah tou man. I discuss this at length in a previous post, but the Google Translate result is "Mrs. Min." Like the Egyptian Alphabet entry, then, the Google Translate result is making a very specific female reference. Every woman referred to in that "female line" would be a "Mrs." The significance of this in the big picture is not stated, but the odds of Google Translate randomly returning such a specific result seem very low.

Iota the eye or to see or sight sometimes me myself

Iota tou-es Zip-Zip the land of Egypt first seen under <​water​>

Sue Eh ni what other person is that or who

These three consecutive entries in the Egyptian Alphabet go together, as pretty powerful evidence, as I explained and unpacked in a previous post. Even the simple fact that Iota is a Greek letter and Tau is a Greek letter is enough to lend plausibility to a Greek connection, but I would encourage you to read the analysis in the other post.  

ho-ee-oop young unmarried man a pri[n]ce

The name here is ho-ee-oop. The description gives us the distinction of "a prince," and the Google Translate result gives us "Your Honor." Now, I realize that one might be more inclined to think of a judge than a prince when hearing "your honor," however the exact conventions are not the primary issue here, since we don't know how Google Translate is glossing this out. The fact Google Translate returned a reference to honor/authority being held by an individual and that the description also references honor/authority being held by an individual seems quite significant.  

ho-ee oop hah Crown of a prince or King

The name here is ho-ee oop hah. This is similar to ho-ee-oop. But the Google Translate result is "The Hour." This is very interesting actually, as it brings to mind Christ repeatedly saying that his hour had not yet come, then at the Last Supper we are told "his hour had come" (John 13:1) and then Jesus prays, saying "Father, the hour has come; glorify your Son so that the Son may glorify you" (John 17:1). Glorify = crown, as Hebrews 2:9 tells us Jesus was "crowned with glory and honour" in the context of his death, i.e. Christ's death being the very symbolism of the Last Supper, in which Christ also declares the hour has come. So this is a context in which "Honor" (see my analysis of "ho-ee-oop," above), and "The Hour" and "Crown of a prince or King" all come together and make sense. 

<​Zi​> Virgen unmaried or the pri[n]ciple of vi[r]tue

The name here is Zi​. My rendering allows the Z to stand for the Greek letter zeta, and the i to stand for the Greek letter eta, in which case Google Translate gives the result, "she lives." That's very interesting when talking about a vigin and virtue, etc. Google Translate wasn't forced to return any result at all, but it returned something quite relevant. I discuss this entry at greater length in a previous post.

Zie oop hah An unmaried woman and a vi[r]gin pri[n]cess

The name here is Zie oop hah. The Joseph Smith Papers Project suggests the "Zie" may be "Zii," which I tried and got the Google Translate result "living well." This of course could describe a chaste and/or royal life, from the Egyptian Alphabet description, but I also suspect some wordplay here, based on John, chapter 4. The first little convergence I find interesting is the woman at Jacob's Well who declared to Jesus she had no husband (4:17), because the Egyptian Alphabet description says "an unmaried woman." Of course, she's not the virgin princess, but I'll get to that part in a moment. Jesus was talking with her at a well, discussing living waters, and Jesus promised the ability to give "a spring of water welling up to eternal life" (4:14, NIV), i.e. describing a "living well." The well where Jesus spoke to the woman was Jacob's Well, which converges with the "virgin princess" part, as Jacob's mother Rebecca is introduced to us in the Bible as a virgin at a well (i.e. "...when a virgin cometh forth to draw water..." Gen. 24:43) and Midrash identifies Rebecca's father, Bethuel, as a king (Numbers Rabbah 14:11), which would make her a princess, thus a virgin princess at the time of her introduction at the well, thus tying together the Egyptian Alphabet description of Zi (virgin, principle of virtue, etc.) with the Google Translate result for Zi (She lives) and the description of Zie oop hah (unmaried woman, virgin princess) and the Google Translate result for Zie oop hah (living well). 

Aleph in the begining with God the Son or <​first born​>

The name here is Aleph. Although Aleph is not a Greek letter, it is related to the Greek letter Alpha. Aleph is the first letter of the Hebrew alphabet, and has strong allusions to God in Judaism. 

In Chabad, the shape of the Aleph is symbolic of God and man's unity with God. The character associated with Aleph in the Egyptian Alphabet has the characteristics representing God and man's unity with God, matching the description given by Joseph Smith of being "with" God. See the slide, below. The original shape is thought to be derived from an Egyptian hieroglyph depicting an ox head. If Joseph Smith is showing a Nephite "Reformed Egyptian" version, they may have left off the bottom YUD. For more on the Reformed Egyptian connection to the Egyptian Alphabet, see Dr. Michael Hubbard Mackay's comparison between Reformed Egyptian characters and characters in the Egyptian Alphabet. For clarification and expansion of this argument, see the following slide:

I have only analyzed about half of the Egyptian Alphabet entries, most of which have yielded results. The last thing I want to do for now is just touch on some of the Beth entries.   

The Beth entries

Beth mans first residence frui[t]ful garden A great valy a place of hapiness 1 times  

This sounds like the Garden of Eden. The Garden of Eden had set boundaries and rules, it was a district. What if I told you that Google Translate returned the word "district" when I rendered Beth to Greek and entered it? 

Webster's 1828 dictionary says this about the word "district": "Properly, a limited extent of country; a circuit within which power, right or authority may be exercised, and to which it is restrained; a word applicable to any portion of land or country, or to any part of a city or town, which is defined by law or agreement."

Consider those words: "a limited extent of country ... within which power, right or authority may be exercised, and to which it is restrained..." The word "district" directly describes the Garden of Eden. 

The Egyptian Alphabet has a theme of being underwater ("beneath or under water," "the land of Egypt first seen under <​water​>") and some of the Beth translation results are very in line with that theme. 

There is "abyss," "deep," dive," "dry," and even "submarine" which literally means underwater. The fact that these are established themes within BOTH the document and the translation results indicates a level of convergence that really defies coincidence. Although this is pending verification of the Google Translate glosses, the fact that Google Translate would return these results at all is remarkable. 

Conclusion 

The results here are not what anyone would have likely expected. These results reinforce my hypothesis, although I'm hoping for well thought out critical feedback from readers. 

I'm very interested in hearing substantive appraisals of the evidence, including evidence-based alternate explanations anyone might have. 

Results, etc. (Appendix)

On Joseph Smith Being Right About "mon" Meaning Good, And The Egyptian Alphabet

I recently set out to test a potentially significant hypothesis, as introduced in my last post. Preliminary results are looking good for the hypothesis.

However, it looks like my last post was not easy for people to understand. 

To help orient the reader, I would like to provide a quick bit of background on the documents in question, and explain Joseph Smith being correct about the word "mon" as an example of how I think the documents work. 

For those who aren't familiar with the situation, Joseph Smith and his scribes created some Egyptian Alphabet documents but left us with no explanation as to what exactly they were. Scholars have dismissed the contents of these documents in the past as made-up words with no real meaning, and some scholars have pointed to them to claim Joseph Smith was a fraud. 

One of the documents is in Joseph Smith's handwriting, and may be the only one he was directly involved with. W.W. Phelps was very interested in languages and may have tried to extrapolate more than what Joseph Smith had told him.  

For a while, I have suspected the characters in the Egyptian documents are logograms, perhaps of Reformed Egyptian, and that the descriptions accompanying the characters constitute a list of connotations which the Nephites or someone else attached to those characters. 

This idea came to me while I was researching Joseph Smith's famous letter (penned by W.W. Phelps) which claims the word "Mormon" means "more good," if seen as a modern contraction between the English word "more" and the Egyptian word "mon," meaning "good." The letter places the Egyptian in the context of Nephite usage. So, I thought to myself, what if the Egyptian word "mon" (mn) has a meaning which the Nephites took and then added additional connotations to, so that when we see the literal meaning of the Egyptian word showing up in the Book of Mormon, it is accompanied by specific added connotations which match Joseph Smith's claim? 

In Egyptian, "mn" means to remain, endure, to be set in place, etc. (used in the word for monument, for example). 

This means we can potentially test Joseph Smith's claim. And when we do, it looks very good for Joseph Smith.

Because we know what "mn" means in Egyptian, we can find, within the text of the Book of Mormon, words which, on their face, match the Egyptian meaning of "mn." From there, we can identify the connotations Nephites attached to those words. 

Mosiah 5:15 equates being "steadfast and immovable" with "always abounding in good works." There we go. "steadfast and immovable" matches the literal definition of "mn," and the Nephites add to it connotations of "good." Paul also made this connection (in Greek), so the conceptual origin may have been in the Ancient Near East, before the Lehites left Jerusalem.  

Since "steadfast and immoveable" captures the meaning of the Egyptian "mn" (which is represented by the senet board hieroglyph), we can picture a Nephite Alphabet showing the senet board hieroglyph (or a modified version of it) accompanied by the description: "always abounding in good works." 

And thus Joseph Smith is vindicated. We can verify this by the fact that if we wanted to translate the Book of Mormon into ancient Egyptian, we could even use "mn" in Mosiah 5:15, using its actual Egyptological meaning, and it would also mean good. Joseph Smith had no personal way of knowing that, but it's a bullseye. 

So, that's how I suspect the alphabet works. The problem I've faced is that I hadn't accounted for the "names" which accompany the characters in Joseph Smith's Egyptian Alphabet. They seem mostly like strange made-up words. 

Here's where my new hypothesis comes in. I think it might be a phonetic alphabet, which references other languages. In some cases it has name for letters (like Iota and Tau), and in other cases it sounds them out or represents a foreign letter with a letter in the English alphabet.

For reasons stated in my previous post, I decided to use Greek to gloss out the letters and their meanings. 

I don't know Greek. And I don't think Greek is the only language involved here. And ancient Greek is not fully understood by scholars. But I'm just trying to see if some plausible results show up. Because then we could start looking into other languages and do a deep dive into the theory. 

I am using Google Translate, and it has been returning relevant, specific results which align with the descriptions in Joseph Smith's Egyptian Alphabet. 

The results are not likely to be found in a Greek dictionary, but that's irrelevant. Google Translate is casting a wide enough net to capture glosses (compensating for Joseph Smith's imperfect renderings) and return non-random matches. 

Of course, word association can lead to false positives. But random combinations of Greek letters rarely bring any results, let alone directly relevant results. Joseph Smith fares far better than random letter combinations.

When more than one Greek letter seems a plausible match for Joseph Smith's phonetic alphabet, I try each of them out. But that does not mean I could just keep trying until I got what I wanted. The key here is how rare it is for Google Translate to return any translated result. It is not as though it gives me lists of words to choose from.

I'm probably already confusing everyone, so let me show a really short example. 

Walkthrough: 

First, we look at an entry in the Egyptian Alphabet (the Alphabet document in Joseph Smith's own handwriting):

We can see that the entry has a character in the column on the left. Then it has the strange word, "Zi." Then it says, "Virgin unmarried or the principle of virtue." 

This brings to mind Mark 5:30: "And Jesus, immediately knowing in himself that virtue had gone out of him, turned him about in the press, and said, Who touched my clothes?" 

What does it mean that virtue had gone out of him? And that His virtue, in turn, healed the woman who touched his clothes? There is certainly an important principle here, the principle of virtue. A special healing power. 

Second, let's take a closer look at the strange word, "Zi."

We see two letters there. What if the Z stands for the Greek letter zeta, and the i stands for the Greek letter eta? If we combine the two letters, could that maybe spell something meaningful, according to Google Translate's net that it casts out?

Sure enough, we come back with an interesting result:

She lives. That sounds like the principle of virtue we were just discussing. What are the odds that it would come back with something relevant like that? It could have said anything, or most likely not given any translation at all, if it were random. 

Are you starting to get the idea of how this works?

Okay, now let's jump to something more advanced. The last, and probably most important entry in the Alphabet document is Ah-bra-oam. "The father of many nations, a prince of peace, one who keeps the commandments of God, a patriarch, a rightful heir, a high priest." 

The whole description is about works. So would it surprise you that when I rendered it into Greek and entered it into Google Translate it gave the word "Works?" 

Very interesting evidence.

Next, a lot of the entries involve the word "Beth." Let's look at Beth. 

The Alphabet says: "Beth mans first residence frui[t]ful garden A great valy a place of hapiness 1 times"

Sounds like the Garden of Eden, right? The Garden of Eden had set boundaries and rules, it was a district. What if I told you that Google Translate returned the word "district" when I rendered Beth to Greek and entered it? 

Webster's 1828 dictionary says this about the word "district": "Properly, a limited extent of country; a circuit within which power, right or authority may be exercised, and to which it is restrained; a word applicable to any portion of land or country, or to any part of a city or town, which is defined by law or agreement."

Consider those words: "a limited extent of country ... within which power, right or authority may be exercised, and to which it is restrained..." The word "district" directly describes the Garden of Eden. 

Now, after having read this post, you can go back and read the previous post and hopefully get more out of it. 

One final note for now. The Egyptian Alphabet entries are inter-connected in a way I haven't figured out yet. 

There is a theme of being underwater ("beneath or under water," "the land of Egypt first seen under <​water​>") in the Alphabet document, and some of the Beth translation results are very in line with that theme. 

There is "abyss," "deep," dive," "dry," and even "submarine" which literally means underwater. The fact that these are established themes within BOTH the document and the translation results indicates a level of convergence that really defies coincidence.

Joseph Smith's Egyptian Alphabet, Revisited!

 I had never put much stock in Henry Caswall or the "Greek Psalter" incident, in which Joseph Smith allegedly identified a Greek Psalter as a document relating to Reformed Egyptian. 

But what if, instead of an alleged scandal, we consider it a potential clue? After Greece conquered Egypt, the Greek language could be considered an Egyptian language. And, long before that, Greek letters had actually evolved from Egyptian hieroglyphs. And who knows what potential role Reformed Egyptian and Hebrew may have in this discussion. The Egyptian Alphabet could involve all of these, and more. 

As I was ruminating, I remembered that Joseph Smith's Egyptian Alphabet has a partial entry for Hah-dees, and Hades is a legitimate ancient Greek word. And the Egyptian Alphabet includes words like "Iota" and "Tau," which are letters of the Greek alphabet. And, moreover, the Book of Abraham itself changed a more Egyptian name as originally written in a manuscript, Zeptah, to a more Hellenized name, Egyptus. 

So, I decided to take a cursory look at the Egyptian Alphabet (there are three documents, but I'm only looking at the one in Joseph's handwriting - see note at bottom of this post), and look for references to the Greek letter Tau. 

The breakdown of the name Katumin in the Alphabet, as "Kah Tou man" seems to potentially reference the letter Tau. 

I substituted the letter Tau in place of the word "Tou," and rendered the name in Greek letters in Google Translate. The result is pretty interesting. The Kah Tou man entry in the Egyptian Alphabet says, "the name of a royal family in female line" and the Google Translate result actually came back as "Mrs. Min". 

Now, I don't know Greek. And I suspect Google Translate is performing some sort of gloss. But something made it return this result. Perhaps Joseph Smith is using an obscure Greek dictionary which Google is picking up on, I don't know. 

The word Mrs. refers to a female, which places our Kah Tou man in a female line, just as the entry says. You can try your own search with the letters: κα τ μιν 

The next few entries after that one center on men and women being married or unmarried, which is also directly relevant to the title "Mrs."

Now, what about it being a lineage? This becomes even more interesting. I noticed while perusing witness statements, on the Mormonr website, that an anonymous contributer to the New-York Tribune made an odd reference in 1841 to Joseph Smith mentioning "Daughters of Sharon." Said the source: "...he showed me the Egyptian mummies, of which he has four, i.e. the ancient Kings of Egypt, and the Daughters of Sharon, so it is revealed to him, he says..." So, among Joseph Smith's mummies was a Daughter or Daughters of Sharon? What is that supposed to mean? Well... Ta-Sherit-Min, the name of one of Joseph's mummies, translates through Greek to an English rendering, "Shenmins," which sounds a lot like "Sharon." And, guess what? It means "daughter of Min." So, we have a Mrs. Min and a daughter of Min, which makes a lineage. 

So, to reiterate, Joseph's anonymous guest, who wouldn't have understood the nuances of ancient Egyptian mythology or the Book of the Dead, left Joseph's company with an association formed in her mind between at least one female mummy and a name sounding similar to the ACTUAL name of the mummy, a name which literally means "daughter of Min," while the guest remembers "daughters of Sharon." Oh, and the reference to royalty? Well that's not literal but mythological (the funerary papyri declares the dead, including Ta-Sherit-Min, to be the King, Osiris), although we shouldn't expect Joseph's guests to have understood the difference. Nevertheless, in the context of the mythology discussed in the papyri, they are kings. 

Well, that was a very interesting start to things. 

Moving on, we find Tau again in "Iota Tau-es Zip Zi(p)." Using Iota and Tau as precedent, it seems likely that capitalized words are names for letters, while lower-case words are just letters. So this would give us Iota (I) Tau (T) es (es) Zip (Z) Zip (Z) or ITesZZ, i.e. ἰτησ ζζ

When we put that into Google Translate, we get the word "see." This is interesting for a couple reasons. The Alphabet entry for "Iota Tau-es Zip Zip" actually says "The land of Egypt first seen under water," so we get the word "see" as if it's being used in a sentence instead of being defined. But also, the entry right above it is for Iota, and it says "The eye or to see or sight sometimes me myself." 

So the Iota entry tells us Iota can be used in the context of seeing, and in the context of "Me, Myself." But what's interesting is the Alphabet then proceeds to use Iota as a dot in the next two entry characters, "Iota Tau-es Zip Zip" and "Sue Eh ni," using those entries to illustrate Iota in both of the two contexts mentioned in the Iota entry! 

We'll get to "Sue Eh ni" in a moment, but first let's get back to "Iota Tau-es Zip Zip," because the character that is drawn actually incorporates the letter Tau, but reversed. Tau is combined with the Iota dot. The name says "Iota Tau..." and actually gives us a character combining Iota and Tau (the Iota used in the Egyptian Alphabet is not the letter itself, but is a "jot," translated from Greek in Matthew 5:18, originally the Hebrew yodh).  

Okay, now the next entry, Sue (S) Eh (E) ni (ni) = SEni, ΣΕνι presents us with an upside-down Greek letter, Gamma, with the Iota dot on it, and an apparent question, i.e. "what other person is that or who." 

When I enter SEni in to translate, a coherent answer comes back: "You." 

Once again, I don't know what resulted in this gloss, and I don't know Greek. But there's a pattern developing of meaningful results, and each result strengthens that pattern. 

What are the odds that such a relevant, coherent answer would come back to such a specific question? Who are you, to you? To you, you are "me, myself." It's like a riddle. First it says "me, myself," then asks "what other person is that or who" and then answers "You." 

I wish I had more time to research, but I will continue slowly hacking away at the Book of Abraham from different angles. I would do this all day if I could. Hopefully more people will get involved in putting together the puzzle. 

----

Note: We can't hold Joseph accountable for everything everyone around him does. For instance, I previously demonstrated that what happened in the Phelps manuscript was legitimate, but characters in the margins of other manuscripts appear to be some sort of copycat job, possibly by William Smith when he had the Egyptian materials and was trying to drum them up (since these are many of the same characters used to fill in lacunae in Facsimile 2, I suspect Joseph had copied characters for Reuben Hedlock, the engraver, and Joseph had labeled them something like, "use these to fill in the empty Abraham spots," and that piece of paper later ended up in the Egyptian and Abraham related materials, which could easily be mistaken as instructions for filling in what might appear to some as "missing" margin characters, resulting in the confusion surrounding the issue).

The Restoration Theory

Where I left off in my last post on the subject, the reader may have felt a little overwhelmed by all the ideas and info. 

The Restoration Theory is an alternative to the Missing Roll and Catalyst theories. 

To simplify, I’m proposing that the Hor vignettes/facsimiles did not originate with Hor, and, moreover, they were originally drawn by Egyptian-Jews, for a non-funerary purpose. You might recognize the Jewish influence idea from the Semitic Adaptation Theory, although the Jewish role is a little different in my theory. I'm proposing the figures in the vignettes, despite being outwardly recognizable Egyptian characters, were used by the Egyptian-Jews to represent different characters. I'm proposing that their original purpose was to accompany the Book of Abraham (this is in Ptolemaic times), probably on a wall in the temple of Onias, and Joseph Smith was thus able to use the vignettes, which were physically on the papyrus, as a window through which he accessed the original text. Because he was penetrating something that was physically on the papyrus, this falls under the umbrella of translating the papyrus, making statements to that effect true. 

And I’m saying there’s actual evidence to support this theory. Because, we would expect/predict different things about the vignettes, based on what purpose they originally were intended to serve, and we can assess how well they align with expectations. 

By analogy, suppose a certain restaurant serves only  Mexican food, but a friend claims he used to get Greek food from there all the time. Is your friend lying? You come up with a theory that the restaurant originally served Greek food. You discover the owners are Greek, and the basement has Greek recipes, and old pictures on the wall show people eating what appears to be Greek food. All of that is evidence in favor of your theory. 

Okay, so how did the illustrations end up in Hor's Book of Breathings? Well, for one thing, Hor's "Book of Breathings Made By Isis" is the oldest known and possibly the very first of the "made by Isis" genre. So, if Hor invented the genre, he would have had liberty as well as an apparent desire for novelty, so we shouldn't be surprised to see him look for and find something unique and then adapt it to his purposes. 

The Restoration Theory is of course inspired by the Semitic Adaptation theory, but instead of proposing that a Jewish scribe took Egyptian funerary scenes and assigned new meaning to them, the Restoration Theory proposes that the scenes originally had Jewish meaning and Hor took them and assigned new meaning to them. This means we would expect the illustrations to be distinguishable from vignettes originally made for funerary papyri, rather than adapted for funerary use, which I’m proposing Hor did. 

Under this theory, we don't need to account for any characters Hor had his scribes write on the vignette for Facsimile 3. Joseph Smith is likely giving us what was originally written on the original version of the illustration. And part of the reason why the characters on Facsimile 3 are so illegible may be because Joseph Smith partly restored what was originally written, purposefully leaving hybrid characters, sort of like scratching out Hor's changes. Of course, if the illustration was originally a larger scene on a temple wall, a lot more could have been written and we wouldn't expect Joseph to be able to carry it over to a small papyrus version of the scene. 

This also means we don't need to reconcile why a Jewish redactor would append a Book of Abraham onto an Egyptian funerary text, since the vignettes themselves were the window into the text. 

This also means we can look at the witness statements through a new lens. For instance, Joseph Smith III said that the papyrus from which his father was said to have translated the Book of Abraham was found “with other portions” in a roll, singular. This seems to either suggest that multiple different documents bundled together can be considered a roll, or that on one single piece of papyrus there was both the content from which Joseph translated the Book of Abraham, and also unrelated content (i.e. the text of the Book of Breathings?).

This may also help us understand the reference to Abraham's own hand. In light of apocryphal stories of Abraham which had circulated anciently, when Joseph restored Abraham's original version it would be fair to make that distinction by pointing out that the version he is giving us is the one written by Abraham's own hand. Or, alternatively, if the Ptolemaic version was faithful to Abraham's original, or claimed to be, it would be fair to point that out by saying it is purporting to be the version written by Abraham's own hand. At no point did Joseph claim that Abraham had touched the papyrus (assumptions of others notwithstanding).

Now, let's take a look at some of the evidence.

As others have pointed out, although this is rarely talked about enough, Joseph Smith received the only lion couch scene in the world where the figure on the couch is in the prayer position. Early critics tried to say the top hand is a bird wing, but that has proven not to be true, as the dots are not dapple marks but are the remnants of finger lines after   ink flaked off. 

Unexpected presence of the goddess Bastet on Facsimile 3. This leads us right to Bubastis, and the Jewish temple of Onias. Claims that the printing plate shows that an Abubis snout was originally on the facsimile are misguided. The sharp cut and the area where lead was dug out are not in the shape of an Anubis snout. And I’ve demonstrated that the cut was made after that area was already cut lower than the printable portions. 

Unexpected Abraham in Egypt - the name Abraham is literally spelled out on the vignette. This is not like seeing things in the clouds where an unlimited number of shapes are possible, but these are actual distinct shapes representing Upper Egypt and the spelling, in order, of the name Abraham. 

Unexpected elaborate falcon on standard  this is not expected to be there, nevertheless the evidence is strong. 

The Meaning Of Life, Scholars Like Robert Boylan, and My Best Friend Austin

 

That may look like a lot of books behind Robert Boylan, but he can eat all those before breakfast.

This post is going to read like a free-flow of thought, a bit of a ramble, but if you follow along and don't skim, you should be rewarded with some interesting thoughts. 

I'm not a huge fan of debates in general, but it does say something that the prominent LDS scholar Robert Boylan, whom I count as a friend, has a difficult time finding people who are willing to debate him. If you look through his blog, Scriptural Mormonism, you'll understand why prominent Protestant scholars (let alone your local Pastor) will find every excuse in "the book" to avoid talking about "The Good Book" with him. 

When it comes to apologetics, I'm more of an armchair guy than a scholar but I come up with ideas other people don't come up with, and I put those ideas "out there" in the hopes that people will consider them. Some aren't fans of my style because I leave ideas on the table which they don't know what to do with. But although I may be one of the "weak things" of the world, sometimes that's what God uses.

(As an aside, in an odd way I have the same problem as Robert, i.e. trying to get people to engage rather than dismissing from a distance). 

Engaging is not simply responding. It entails taking time to understand and steelman, then respond, THEN listen and wait for the counter-response, and start the process over, attempting to provide clarification and find mutual agreement on where the disagreements lie. 

And it's beautiful when we can actually see it work.

However, apologetics and criticisms are both limited by certain realities. 

For one thing, they are 90% about history, and history is deeply flawed. People tend not to realize how deeply flawed it is, because people from the past aren't here to correct us. 

Misunderstandings happen all the time in our own daily lives, but when people are dead they are no longer able to clarify. Misunderstandings get set in stone, and we don't account for the fact that much of what we read, be it in a journal scrap someone wrote when angry, or a passing reference in a newspaper from 200 years ago, penned by a busy journalist, do not reflect reality. Many misunderstandings got cleared up before making their way into the historical record, but many did not. And we don't know how many that is. 

Try this thought experiment. Imagine you die, and 100 years from now the only thing people know about you is what others wrote on social media when mentioning you. How accurate would that picture be of you? 

My Best Friend  

Yesterday I attended the Memorial Service of my best friend, Austin. A celebration of his life, by those who knew and loved him. And although only true things were said about him, there is no way anyone would have even close to an accurate understanding of him and his life if they were basing their understanding on the service rather than knowing him intimately and having hundreds of hours of deep conversation. And that's okay. 

But the same problem faces us with history. 

A good example is the Kinderhook Plates. I've tried to make this point for years, and I'm grateful that at least LDS Scholar/Philosopher Blake Ostler told me that he thinks my analysis is very good. That's pretty much the only feedback I've received from anyone, though. 

But the point here isn't about the Kinderhook Plates specifically, but how much we don't and can't know, generally. 

The work of grief is so hard. But the growth and learning that can come from it is incalculable. And I'm grateful I was able to know him as deeply as I could have in this life. And yet I'll still be surprised when I get to the other side and learn how many misconceptions I've had, even about him. 

We don't know what misconceptions we have. Compounding this further, many answers are intentionally put out of our reach by God. We aren't supposed to have them. 

The Meaning Of Life

After the Memorial Service, I went with some friends to a favorite spot, a particular restaurant where Austin and I had been to countless times. 

Right as we sat down, before we even ordered our food, in light of my best friend's death one of my friends said, "Ryan, what is the meaning of life?"

I thought for just a second, then I answered, "It's not what meets the eye. There's more going on than we know."

I used the analogy from the first Harry Potter film, where the bad guy was trying to get the Sorcerer's Stone, but he was stumped. He was standing in front of a mirror which contained the stone, but he couldn't figure out how to obtain the stone from the mirror. You see, the mirror had been enchanted so that one could only obtain the stone if they were not seeking it and didn't want it. 

What is it that we are seeking knowledge for? Is it to build a Tower of Babel to get us to heaven? Or is it because we want to know God? 

Knowledge comes forth "in the own due time of the Lord." Otherwise, we would not be able to exercise and strengthen our faith. What a wonderful time we live in, 200 years are marked from the time God the Father introduced His Beloved Son, Jesus Christ, to a 14-year-old named Joseph Smith, in a Sacred Grove.  As our living Prophet has declared, big things are coming, and we are so fortunate to be able to live through this marvelous time and help prepare the world for the Second Coming.

As that 14-year-old showed, even prophets are here to learn and are experiencing a mortal probation. God never pronounced that prophets (or parents!) are perfect, but that they have a place in His plan, pointing His flock to Him. God's plan is perfect, but is intended to be implemented by imperfect people, in a setting of powerful opposing forces. On one hand, perfection. On the other hand, purposeful imperfection.

By understanding that there is a purpose to imperfection, we can accept a "precept upon precept" approach, expecting some answers will come now, others later. This, the Gospel predicts. If we understand the fall of man and the Atonement, along with the role of faith and repentance, it only makes sense that we would struggle with challenges.

If one accepts D&C 76:1-10, it shapes the possibilities one is willing to pursue. This approach does not preclude scholarship, although the scholarly research operates within parameters. Those who think unkindly of this approach might not be aware of ways in which their dismissal of such evidence affects their own scholarship. When dismissing claims which point to Joseph Smith being a true Seer, one must be aware and upfront about whether or not they are imposing their own prejudices and thereby restricting the scope of their own scholarship. We may tend to think our own biases are just obvious facts. And that can lead to premises which we have not taken time to formally consider. We may also tend to think this is only a problem other people have which we don't have. We think our own opinions, of course, are always the best. That's why we hold them.

Differences in ways of viewing information may be unavoidable, because some assumptions may be required prior to the application of logic. Each individual's intuition plays a role in determining which assumptions they will make. It is important to remember that intuitions lead to assumptions which lead to premises which only then do we apply logic to. It is helpful to be aware of our intuitions and how they cause us to favor our chosen assumptions over alternate assumptions.

The existence of intellectual challenges is expected in LDS doctrine. These, along with other challenges, are even central to the Gospel; the Atonement of Jesus Christ being the greatest challenge and the centerpiece of the Gospel. We might not realize it but our challenge, our yoke, is mitigated through the Atonement, so that our challenge is limited to only what is necessary for our growth and our exercise of agency.

In an LDS view, we intentionally left a Heavenly home and intentionally had our knowledge of reality temporarily erased from our memory. We are meant to search. This is the intended context of our earth experience. Knowing this is the intended context helps us understand why God does not usually make Himself known through our external senses, but speaks instead to our hearts. Even when we are mentally and physically in a state of tumult, the veil allows us to choose for ourselves whether and how we will search out and follow that voice.

This unique LDS concept, of us choosing to come to earth with a "veil" over our minds, offers a theological explanation for the question our atheist friends pose: "if there is a God, why doesn't God just prove it is so?" From the LDS point of view, with the veil being part of the plan, the question can be answered with a question: "what would be the purpose of a veil that blocks our knowledge, if God were to simply turn around and reveal all that knowledge?" Instead, this world is intended to house varying degrees of understanding. Precious spirits are born into a variety of circumstances. Half of the world's population worships the God of Abraham, and over half of that group worship Jesus Christ as their Savior - and, among those Christians, a variety of interpretations and understandings exist. The Restored Gospel of Jesus Christ is itself far from completely revealed. Much more is to come.

We may at times wonder why sacrifice is necessary, and why God does not just give us the end result without the struggle. I suspect it might not be logically possible to know what suffering feels like without feeling it. The intellectual side we might be able to comprehend through reason, but the human side we might only be able to comprehend through experience. I believe this underlies the struggle in the war in heaven.

In accordance with God not generally revealing Himself directly to the world's physical senses, the purpose of life is not to figure out God with our intellect, again like the Tower of Babel, trying to reach Heaven with human reasoning instead of God. What sense would it make for God to test our intellect? That is not the purpose for our coming here. Christ never required from us the wisdom of man. He chose a 14-year-old boy. He chose fishermen. He never said anyone must be "scholarly enough" to get into heaven. He's not impressed with our intellects. He said one must become as a little child. The idea behind coming to this earth is to give us opportunities to choose and to experience. As we are surrounded by a fog, God's voice speaks to our heart, a voice our spirit recognizes even though it doesn't remember why.

Even if we don't intellectually know that the voice is God, we hear it in our souls. The test of this life is to use our agency to determine how important that voice is to us. When we hear His voice and want to be closer to Him, even though we can't see Him, that is faith.

I believe that when we pass through the veil, and greet those who have gone before, we will see that Joseph Smith is sweet and kind and gentle, just as so many who knew him in life attested.
For now, there is a great deal of disagreement on what to believe. Why does God not just tell us in objective, scientific terms? Because the reason for believing matters. 

God does not just want people to believe, but to believe for the right reason. As Jesus said in Matthew 11:25, "I thank thee O Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because thou hast hid these things from the wise and prudent, and hast revealed them unto babes." See also Matthew 13:10-13.

So, then, what do we make of challenges like the arguments against the things God tells us and we know to be true? Childlike faith, based on staying close to Heavenly Father, is paramount in dealing with issues we don't understand. 

But it is also understandable for people to want answers along the way, in the same way that knowing how some magic tricks are performed can give us a lens through which to interpret illusions we don't yet know the answers to. If you look at the best magic tricks in the world, not knowing how they are performed, they might seem to have no plausible explanation. But once you learn how a trick is done, it may no longer even be interesting. It may even seem like it should have been obvious and you may even be astounded by the fact that you were previously unable to see it. Such, I believe, will be the experience of each of us when we stand before God and see what was really going on and how many misconceptions we all had when we were on earth. And why it was necessary for it to be that way and why we chose before coming to earth for it to be that way.

Bastet, The Book Of Abraham, And The Restoration Theory

Intuitively, you might feel like the Egyptian goddess Bastet (Bast) shouldn't have anything significant to do with the Book of Abraham. 

But, like a game of chess, you can't declare an outcome based on prior assumptions. Computer chess engines are showing us the importance of this principle. You have to wait until there's a mate demonstrable. Otherwise, you have to allow room for possibilities to play out. 

So, let's play this out. 

First, Figure 6 in Facsimile 3 more closely resembles the goddess Bastet than it resembles any other deity. 

I'm not saying it perfectly matches any particular image of Bastet, but if we consider how different the various depictions of Bastet are from each other, we see a range which is big enough to house Figure 6. But we see no such range with Anubis. If we simply look at the figure 6 image, without bringing any assumptions to the table, this figure should be identified as Bastet. Consider the front of the face. Consider the length of the ear sticking up. Consider the round, rather than flat head. And, again, consider the range that simply doesn't exist for Anubis. Anubis is very standardized. But Bastet has essential features, which Figure 6 is able to match. Although, admittedly, the body of Figure 6 is a bit androgynous.

Now, you might be thinking Figure 6 originally had a snout, like Anubis. I address that in an earlier blog post, here. 

Click Image To Enlarge

Okay, so what relevance could Bastet have to Abraham?

Well, contemporary with the time-range of the verifiable Joseph Smith Papyri, the Jewish temple of Onias was built. And it was put right in the worship center of Bastet. In fact, it was built on an old temple of Bastet. 

Yes, the Jewish temple was built right on top of a temple of Bastet which was no longer in active use. 

Within the city of Bubastis, where Bastet reigned supreme, we are talking about an actual temple to Bastet. That's where the Jewish temple was built. For the Jewish population which moved to the city because of the temple, Bastet was part of daily life. Images of Bastet abounded everywhere, and people had cats and mummified them. 

As Onias said to King Ptolemy: "Wherefore I beg you to permit me to cleanse this temple, which belongs to no one and is in ruins, and to build a temple to God the Most High in the likeness of that at Jerusalem."

He was talking about a temple of Bastet, which he transformed into a Jewish temple. 

The reply from Ptolemy and Cleopatra II: "We have read your petition asking that it be permitted you to cleanse the ruined temple in Leontopolis in the Nome of Heliopolis, called Bubastis-of-the-Fields. We wonder, therefore, whether it will be pleasing to God that a temple be built in a place so wild and full of sacred animals. But since you say that the prophet Isaiah foretold this long ago, we grant your request if this is to be in accordance with the Law, so that we may not seem to have sinned against God in any way."

Most of the Cleopatras were associated with (and even identified as) Isis, even taking on her epithets like "mother of the god." For example, see here. This may be a clue for interpreting Facsimile 3. Ptolemy VI came to the throne as a small child, and his mother, Cleopatra I, reigned in his behalf until her deathbed. The two of them could therefore be candidates for the King and Prince in Facsimile 3, then. Cleopatra I even had the epithet found in the first column of text in Facsimile 3, i.e. "mother of the god." The question of why Joseph Smith would refer to the figure as a male is also answerable if the figure is Cleopatra I, because she was ruling as King on her son's behalf  which means she represented him and he was male. 

This may also help explain the seemingly redundant "King Pharaoh," in Joseph Smith's explanation, because in Egypt a Pharaoh could be either male or female. As for why they would be relevant to Onias, he may have been paying homage to them, through adapting the figures. Also worth noting is that Lenaeus, a Syrian slave, was appointed as a special regent to Ptolemy VI. This slave might be a candidate for Figure 6, adapted through use of the image of Bastet (also a potential play on words, Lenaeus and Leontopolis). 

If you are not familiar with adaptation of images like this, Robert Ritner here discusses an example of the image of Isis being used to represent the Virgin Mary. Also of great interest is this piece from Blake Ostler and this piece from Kevin Barney. 

But, you may also ask, "doesn't the Facsimile have the name of Anubis written on it?" Actually, no. To quote Quinten Barney from his master's thesis: "Thus, the arms, the presence of determinatives, and absence of the glyph suggest that this column does not read 'Anubis' so easily." But even if it is intended to read as Anubis, it does not identify the figure as Anubis and could easily just be Hor's preference for what he wanted the text to say. See this follow-up post. 

A quote from the late Egyptologist Robert Ritner may also tie things together. Dr. Ritner came to believe that the extant vignette from the Hor Book of Breathings was quite special and was copied from a scene on a temple wall. 

Dr. Ritner discusses his theory here

Let's assume Dr. Ritner was correct. 

That would mean, in his words, "what we've got here is like a Kodak moment that's been taken of a now lost temple, and I think that makes this papyrus extremely valuable..." Ritner said he intended to announce this discovery at a future meeting with his colleagues, which evidently never happened due to his failing health.

Suppose, then, that these vignettes on the Hor roll came from the Jewish temple, as reliefs adapted for Jewish purposes. Then suppose that Hor had some of the writing changed to accommodate his own purposes. By the time Hor's roll came into Joseph Smith's hands, the vignette was likely spotted with small lacunae, so Joseph Smith appears to have had the extant writing collapsed/redacted together on the facsimile, in order to make it appear tidy in the facsimile columns. 

The portion of the writing which appeared on the temple wall, rather than being added by Hor, might be expected to have been more elaborate, hence the intricate details of the extant Falcon of the Standard glyph in place of the missing spelling of Isis. Joseph Smith may have been referring to the original in his explanation. The name Isis or Cleopatra, for instance, may have originally appeared but been lost like the other half of the Falcon on the Standard glyph. And, correspondingly, smooshed together in the facsimile. 

Now, how would these scenes have made their way to Hor in the first place? Well, Marc Coenen speculated, in Robert Ritner's book on the Joseph Smith Papyri, that Hor's family may have collected a variety of papyri and stored them in a family vault. To quote Coenen (p. 65, HC), "Given the impressive number of papyri preserved for this priestly family, one wonders if they might have a common provenance and originate from a family vault, which at some time during the early nineteenth century was discovered only to have its contents plundered and scattered all over the world." 

Some might wonder why Hor would want anything to do with Facsimile 1, which appears to call the Egyptian religion idolatrous? See my post on human sacrifice, to see how I deal with that issue. To that I would add that in Abraham's early life, Egypt may have been in the First Intermediate period, where different people claimed to be Pharaoh. The "idolatrous" pharaoh may play into that. Abraham does distinguish Onitah as being of a true lineage. But read the post and it will make more sense. I identify who I think historically Abraham may have been referring to. Read carefully. 

Now, I'm undoubtedly leaving some loose ends and unanswered questions, which can be dealt with as they arise. But for now, all of this leads me to a theory.

The Restoration Theory

1) Abraham wrote a history, on papyrus

2) Joseph of Egypt redacted that history, focusing on Abraham's experiences with Egypt

3) Joseph of Egypt gave the redacted history to Pharaoh, who kept it in his court, until it eventually went into storage

4) When Onias became friends with Ptolemy, and Ptolemy helped him build his temple and celebrated it, Ptolemy gave him, among other things, the roll which Joseph of Egypt had written which contained the teachings of Abraham

5) The beginning of Joseph's record contained a vignette depicting Abraham being sacrificed on an altar. However, since it was on the very outside of the roll, it had deteriorated over the centuries and was by then in tatters

6) Using the description of it in Abraham 1:12-14, which Joseph of Egypt had written in reference to his original vignette, Onias restored it, by adapting contemporary Egyptian symbols to represent the elements which Joseph of Egypt described on the roll, and Onias put it as a relief on the temple wall, as well as being an adapted relief honoring Ptolemy and showing appreciation for his help with the temple and the roll of Abraham (Facsimile 3). The figure of Abraham in Facsimile 3 may very well be symbolic of the teachings of Abraham which Pharaoh had allowed to stay in his court for a time.  

7) Copies of the vignettes made their way to Hor's family vault, possibly alongside a copy of the text of Abraham's record (or, since Hor's family was one of the most powerful and well-connected in Egypt, he may have even obtained the original). 

8) Hor, when deciding what to be buried with, liked the vignettes and adapted them to his purposes. Hor wanted his Book of Breathings to be special, because it was probably the first ever "Book of Breathings made by Isis" and the depiction of Cleopatra as Isis would have been very special and honorific for a Book of Breathings made by Isis. 

9) It's not necessary to say that Hor was buried with the text of the Book of Abraham (although number 10, below, addresses that possibility), because the vignettes would have been derived from the Onias Temple where they would have been originally on a relief alongside the text of the Book of Abraham, which means that Joseph Smith, by penetrating through the vignettes on the Hor roll, would have been led to the text of the Book of Abraham (although of course it would have been difficult for him to explain this to anyone, but is similar to how he translated texts like the Book of Moses by penetrating what was in front of him and being led to a text which was not in front of him). Remember, Abraham 1:14 says clearly that the fashion of the figures (i.e. vignettes) signifies hieroglyphics. While keeping the word "hieroglyphics" in mind in reference to the vignettes, consider the words of Warren Parrish: "I have set by his side and penned down the translation of the Egyptian Hieroglyphics as he claimed to receive it by direct inspiration from Heaven." Hieroglyphics being a reference both to the vignettes and a reference to what it was Joseph was translating from, certainly lends plausibility to the idea that Joseph was penetrating the vignettes and being taken through them to the text of the Book of Abraham, without the text needing to be on the papyrus he owned. 

10) If the text of the Book of Abraham was buried with Hor and in the possession of Joseph Smith (which again is not necessary, as explained in number 9), here's a way it may have happened: Because they were related and derived from the same source, Hor had bound together Abraham's record with the Book of Breathings, in the same linen (creating a "roll" - remember, Joseph Smith's eyewitness contemporaries wouldn't have known what constituted a "roll" and, like a newspaper "roll," they may have thought it was okay for a papyrus roll to have different parts, thinking what made it a roll was that the parts came wrapped together. Just as they would not have known what the word "long" means in "long roll," they also wouldn't have known what the second word, "roll," means in "long roll") Eventually, the roll came to Joseph Smith. Sometimes people would refer to it as one roll, other times as two rolls. But it was the record of Joseph and the teachings of Abraham. Joseph Smith penetrated through any changes Hor may have made, and Joseph Smith put into his own words the interpretations of Onias (who may have had himself, rather than Hor, featured as Figure 5, and Joseph's mother may have confused the name Onias with King Onitah/Onitas as well as complications arising from Osiris being king and the Hor papyrus declaring that Hor is Osiris and thus king) 

The key connecting it all is that we have a depiction of Bastet on Facsimile 3, which can't be easily explained through conventional means, and remnants of an elaborate Falcon on the Standard which isn't "supposed" to be there. 

UPDATE: I've written a follow-up to this post, and you can read it here.