Editing Book of Abraham (section)

==Interpretations and contributions to the LDS movement==
[[File:Book of Abraham FirstPage.png|thumb|The first page of the Book of Abraham]]

===The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints===
The Book of Abraham was canonized in 1880 by the LDS Church, and it remains a part of the larger scriptural work, the Pearl of Great Price.<ref name="ldst&h" /><ref name=":0">{{Cite journal|last=Johnson|first=Mark L.|date=2020|title=Scriptures through the Jeweler's Lens|url=https://journal.interpreterfoundation.org/scriptures-through-the-jewelers-lens|journal=[[Interpreter (journal)|Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship]]|type=review|volume=36|pages=85–108}}</ref> For Latter-day Saints, the book links Old and New Testament covenants into a universal narrative of Christian salvation, expands on premortal existence, depicts ''ex materia'' cosmology, and informed Smith's developing understanding of temple theology, making the scripture "critical to understanding the totality of his gospel conception".{{sfn|Givens|Hauglid|pp=121–124|2019}}

Church leadership traditionally described the Book of Abraham straightforwardly as "translated by the Prophet [Joseph Smith] from a papyrus record taken from the catacombs of Egypt",{{sfn|McConkie|1966|pp=100, 563}} and "Some have assumed that hieroglyphs adjacent to and surrounding facsimile 1 must be a source for the text of the book of Abraham".<ref name="ldst&h" /> However, modern Egyptological translations of papyrus fragments reveal the surviving Egyptian text matches the Breathing Permit of Hôr, an Egyptian funerary text, and does not mention Abraham. The church acknowledges this,<ref>"None of the characters on the papyrus fragments mentioned Abraham's name or any of the events recorded in the book of Abraham. Mormon and non-Mormon Egyptologists agree that the characters on the fragments do not match the translation given in the book of Abraham, though there is not unanimity, even among non-Mormon scholars, about the proper interpretation of the vignettes on these fragments. Scholars have identified the papyrus fragments as parts of standard funerary texts that were deposited with mummified bodies. These fragments date to between the third century B.C.E. and the first century C.E., long after Abraham lived." (From [https://churchofjesuschrist.org/study/manual/gospel-topics-essays/translation-and-historicity-of-the-book-of-abraham?lang=eng&_r=1 "Translation and Historicity of the Book of Abraham"])</ref> and its members have adopted a range of interpretations of the Book of Abraham to accommodate the seeming disconnect between the surviving papyrus and Smith's Book of Abraham revelation.<ref name="ldst&h" /><ref name=":1">{{Cite book|last=Gee|first=John|url=https://rsc.byu.edu/book/introduction-book-abraham|title=An Introduction to the Book of Abraham|publisher=[[Religious Studies Center]]|year=2017|isbn=978-1-9443-9406-6|location=Provo|pages=83–86|chapter=The Relationship of the Book of Abraham Text to the Papyri|author-link=John Gee|chapter-url=https://rsc.byu.edu/introduction-book-abraham/relationship-book-abraham-text-papyri}}</ref> The two most common interpretations are sometimes called the "missing scroll theory" and the "catalyst theory", though the relative popularity of these theories among Latter-day Saints is unclear.<ref name=":0" /><ref name=":2">{{Cite web|last=Folkman|first=Kevin|title=Gee, 'Introduction to the Book of Abraham'|url=http://associationmormonletters.org/blog/reviews/older-reviews/gee-introduction-to-the-book-of-abraham-reviewed-by-kevin-folkman/|url-status=live|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210213221921/http://associationmormonletters.org/blog/reviews/older-reviews/gee-introduction-to-the-book-of-abraham-reviewed-by-kevin-folkman/|archive-date=February 13, 2021|access-date=May 25, 2021|website=Dawning of a Brighter Day|publisher=[[Association of Mormon Letters]]|type=review}}</ref>

The "missing scroll theory" holds that Smith may have translated the Book of Abraham from a now-lost portion of papyri, with the text of Breathing Permit of Hôr having nothing to do with Smith's translation.<ref name=":1" /><ref name="ldst&h" /> [[John Gee]], an Egyptologist and Latter-day Saint, and the apologetic organization [[FairMormon|FAIR]] (Faithful Answers, Informed Response; formerly FairMormon) favor this view.<ref name=":3">{{Cite web|last=Holyoak|first=Trevor|date=December 19, 2019|title=Book Review: The Pearl of Greatest Price: Mormonism's Most Controversial Scripture|url=https://www.fairlatterdaysaints.org/blog/2019/12/19/book-review-the-pearl-of-greatest-price-mormonisms-most-controversial-scripture|url-status=live|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210310185054/https://www.fairlatterdaysaints.org/blog/2019/12/19/book-review-the-pearl-of-greatest-price-mormonisms-most-controversial-scripture|archive-date=March 10, 2021|access-date=May 25, 2021|website=[[FairMormon|FAIR]]}}</ref><ref>In support of his interpretation, Gee has proposed that the original surviving portion of the Breathing Permit of Hôr (of which 66 centimeters survive) was more than 1,300 centimeters long, based on his use of Friedhelm Hoffman's formula for calculating scroll length based on extant fragments. However, when Andrew W. Cook and Christopher Smith "attempted to replicate Gee's results" with similar calculations in another study of the Breathing Permit, they "found that his measurements did not seem to be accurate" and instead estimated that no more than 56 centimeters are missing from the original scroll. See {{Cite journal|last=Gee|first=John|date=2008|title=Some Puzzles from the Joseph Smith Papyri|url=https://scholarsarchive.byu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1757&context=msr|url-status=live|journal=[[Mormon Studies Review|FARMS Review]]|volume=20|issue=1|pages=113–137|doi=10.5406/farmsreview.20.1.0113 |s2cid=171273003 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200709033841/https://scholarsarchive.byu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1757&context=msr|archive-date=July 9, 2020|postscript=;|via=BYU ScholarsArchive|url-access=subscription}} {{Cite journal|last=Cook|first=Andrew W.|date=Winter 2010|title=The Original Length of the Scroll of Hôr|url=https://www.dialoguejournal.com/wp-content/uploads/sbi/articles/Dialogue_V43N04_413.pdf|url-status=live|journal=[[Dialogue: A Journal of Mormon Thought]]|volume=43|issue=4|pages=1–42|doi=10.5406/dialjmormthou.43.4.0001 |s2cid=171454962 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210414192612/https://www.dialoguejournal.com/wp-content/uploads/sbi/articles/Dialogue_V43N04_413.pdf|archive-date=April 14, 2021|postscript=;}} {{Harvtxt|Givens|Hauglid|2019|pp=159, 214n234}}. In a historical apparatus for the Joseph Smith Papyri, the Joseph Smith Papers describes the Permit as having originally been "between 150 and 156 centimeters", based on citations from Cook, Smith, and other scholars: {{Cite web|title=Introduction to Egyptian Papyri, circa 300–100 BC|url=https://www.josephsmithpapers.org/paper-summary/introduction-to-egyptian-papyri-circa-300-100-bc/1|url-status=live|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20211223201956/https://www.josephsmithpapers.org/paper-summary/introduction-to-egyptian-papyri-circa-300-100-bc/1|archive-date=December 23, 2021|access-date=December 27, 2021|website=[[The Joseph Smith Papers]]}}</ref>

Other Latter-day Saints hold to the "catalyst theory," which hypothesizes that Smith's "study of the papyri may have led to a revelation about key events and teachings in the life of Abraham", allowing him to "translate" the Book of Abraham from the Breathing Permit of Hôr papyrus by inspiration without actually relying on the papyrus' textual meaning.<ref name="ldst&h" />{{sfn|Givens|Hauglid|2019|pp=|p=180}} This theory draws theological basis from Smith's [[Joseph Smith Translation of the Bible|"New Translation" of the Bible]], wherein in the course of rereading the first few chapters of Genesis, he dictated as a revelatory translation the much longer [[Book of Moses]].<ref name="ldst&h" />{{sfn|Bushman|2005|pp=130–133}}

FAIR has claimed the church "favors the missing scroll theory".<ref name=":3" /> However, in 2019, [[the Joseph Smith Papers]]' documentary research on the Book of Abraham and Egyptian papyri makes it "clear that Joseph Smith and/or his clerks associated the characters from the [surviving Breathing Permit of Hôr] papyri with the English Book of Abraham text".<ref>{{Cite web|last1=Hauglid|first1=Brian M.|author-link=Brian M. Hauglid|last2=Jensen|first2=Robin|date=January 11, 2019|title=A Window into Joseph Smith's Translation|url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tznpRR0Fos8 |archive-url=https://ghostarchive.org/varchive/youtube/20211221/tznpRR0Fos8 |archive-date=2021-12-21|url-status=live|access-date=May 25, 2021|website=[[Maxwell Institute]]|publication-date=January 29, 2019|via=[[YouTube]]|quote=It is clear that Joseph Smith and/or his clerks associated the characters from the papyri with the English Book of Abraham text.}}{{cbignore}}</ref>

===Community of Christ===

The [[Community of Christ]], formerly known as the Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, does not include the Book of Abraham in its scriptural canon, although it was referenced in early church publications.<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Stokes|first=Adam Oliver|date=2018|title=John Gee. 'An Introduction to the Book of Abraham'|url=https://byustudies.byu.edu/article/an-introduction-to-the-book-of-abraham/|journal=[[BYU Studies Quarterly]]|type=review|volume=57|issue=1|pages=202–205}}</ref>{{#tag:ref|In 1896, two leaders of the church at the time, [[Joseph Smith III]] and [[Heman C. Smith]], made the following observation on the Book of Abraham: "The church has never to our knowledge taken any action on this work, either to indorse {{sic}} or condemn; so it cannot be said to be a church publication; nor can the church be held to answer for the correctness of its teaching. Joseph Smith, as the translator, is committed of course to the correctness of the translation, but not necessarily to the indorsement {{sic}} of its historical or doctrinal contents.<ref>{{Harvnb|Smith|Smith|1896|p=569}}.</ref>|group="nb"}}

===Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints (Strangite)===

The [[Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints (Strangite)|Strangite]] branch of the movement does not take an official position on the Book of Abraham. The branch notes, "We know that 'The Book of Abraham' was published in an early periodical as a text 'purporting to be the writings of Abraham' with no indication of its translation process (see Times and Seasons, March 1, 1842), and therefore have no authorized position on it."<ref>{{cite web|title=Scriptures|url=http://www.strangite.org/Scriptures.htm|publisher=[[Strangite]].org|access-date=August 4, 2016|archive-url=https://wayback.archive-it.org/all/20131021190834/http://www.strangite.org/Scriptures.htm|archive-date=October 21, 2013}}</ref>

===Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints===

The [[Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints]] holds to the canonicity of the Book of Abraham.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.fldstruth.com/sysmenu.php?MParent=ARTICLES&MIndex=87&SParentID=60|title=Mediation and Atonement|publisher=Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints|access-date=March 22, 2010|archive-date=November 27, 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201127142730/http://www.fldstruth.com/sysmenu.php?MParent=ARTICLES&MIndex=87&SParentID=60}}</ref>