Talk:Reformed Egyptian/Archive002

"Why Joseph Chose Egyptian Heiroglyphics"

At that time the Egyptian heiroglyphics had only recently been deciphered. There was still a mystery at that time and so by stating it to be hieroglyphics it was a safe bet that any hoax would not likey be discovered. The Rosetta Stone is a stone with writing on it in two languages (Egyptian and Greek), using three scripts (hieroglyphic, demotic and Greek). Many people worked on deciphering hieroglyphs over several hundred years. After many years of studying the Rosetta Stone and other examples of ancient Egyptian writing, Jean-François Champollion deciphered hieroglyphs in 1822. The book of Mormon was published in 1830. However, the structure of the script was very difficult to work out. The Rosetta Stone is written in three scripts because when it was written, there were three scripts being used in Egypt. The first was hieroglyphic which was the script used for important or religious documents. The other two scripts which were based on the phoenecian alphabet(as was hebrew) were much more efficient only having 24 characters while hieroglyphics has hundreds. Why mormon, who abridged the original plates, chose a complex writing style with hundreds of characters over hebrew with only 24 makes no sense.

I appreciate your argument. Scholars have discussed the benefits of hieroglyphics over phonetic languages - (particularly in coveying double meaning, and their religious connotations). Your Understanding of the Rosetta Stone is overly simplistic and drawn out in a historical timeline. The deciperization process was relatively quick once it was actually begun. Second, there were dozens of languages used in Egypt at the time - heiratic and other coptic scripts - not just three scripts. Smith would have been familiar with the Rosetta deciperization if he was familiar with the island Comoros, or other things he was accused of lifting from other sources. If he had access to a library, for plagerization, he had access to the best research on Rosetta developments. In fact, his family regularly purchased a newspaper, and therefore would have been familiar with the discover, and to choose "reformed" egyptian would have been "religious" suicide as he would have undoubtedly been aware that egyptian characters were then beign decipered. At best, he may have hoped that it would have exhanerated him as an expert in egyptian, thus proving him a prophet. When he got to the Book of Abraham, and looked at the characters, he did not have the "interpretations" of champillion, etc. so for him to undertake such a work as the "grammar" would have been even more problematic and was done in a silo - as the brethren could have been trying to show that Smith could come up with the same interpreations that were done in Europe (by "studying it out" revelation). Some things are quite divergent, others are not so far off. You have over-simplified a complex issue and not considered all of the consequences of your statement, one of which I have begun to expand here. Good thought process, but missed major points. Think deeper with the obvious consequenses and of course, happy editing. Hope you do become a wikipedian and contribute your thoughts and knowledge. -Visorstuff 18:46, 18 August 2005 (UTC)

"There is no non-Mormon scientific, archeological, or linguistic support for the existence of reformed Egyptian"

I don't believe this sentence necessarily has a place in the article. Other aspects of this piece have been greatly improved in my opinion. At the very least, I removed "scientific" because there's not really such a thing as Mormon science. I also think the "archeological" point should be moved into its own sentence without the "non-Mormon" qualifier. Finally, I propose rewording "There is no non-Mormon linguistic support for the existence of reformed Egyptian" into something more like: "linguistic evidence for reformed Egyptian comes solely from Latter Day Saint texts," or a similar positive statement. Cool Hand Luke 05:13, 27 Oct 2004 (UTC)

We're not here to put things "positively", we're here to inform. There is no scientific support for the existence of reformed Egyptian. There is no archaeological support for the existence of reformed Egyptian. There is no linguistic support for the existence of reformed Egyptian. The only support for the existence of reformed Egyptian is a statement in the Book of Morman that it existed. It's only proper to state this clearly. - Nauvoo 05:39, 27 Oct 2004 (UTC)

Actually that is not true. Would you care to undertake a scientific study of the Caractors document? You are pushing a POV here and making unsupported assertions. It would help us arrive at a solution if you would try to disclose the core concern you have with the article. Tom - Talk 16:23, 27 Oct 2004 (UTC)

I am pushing for inclusion of facts. No original manuscript of "reformed Egyptian" exists; there are only two reputed transcripts, and the claim that it existed as a writing system is an extraordinary claim which demands extraordinary evidence - which does not exist. You are "pushing" for exclusion of this view, which is universal outside of Mormon circles. - Nauvoo 22:53, 28 Oct 2004 (UTC)

So why not use a positive statement like that. is only as opposed to is not? Cool Hand Luke 06:30, 27 Oct 2004 (UTC)

I'm not sure where you mean to make that substitution ("is only" for "is not"), but it's not neutral reporting to emphasize the assertion in the Book of Mormon and leave out the fact that it is unsupported by evidence. I'm happy with the current version in the article. Are you not? - Nauvoo 06:40, 27 Oct 2004 (UTC)

I like User:Gazpacho's revision. It now makes no reference to evidence but clearly states non-Mormon linguists and archeologists don't believe in it. Cool Hand Luke 05:32, 27 Oct 2004 (UTC)

Evidence is important to some people - linguists and archeologists, for example - and belief is important to others. Belief and evidence are two different things, and the lack of existence of evidence for reformed Egyptian is not a matter of "belief". - Nauvoo 05:45, 27 Oct 2004 (UTC)

It is a truism that "Belief and evidence are two different things", and it is a matter of belief/opinion whether there is a "lack of existence of evidence for reformed Egyptian". It is not NPOV to state "There is no scientific support for the existence of reformed Egyptian."; it is a POV to state "no scientific support/evidence". "Scientific" has a much broader, dynamic meaning than you are attributing to it, Nauvoo. If you think otherwise, then you need to educate yourself some more on how modern philosophers of science define science...it is more NPOV to simply state, per Gazpacho's edit, that "Archaeologists and linguists outside of Mormonism do not recognize it as a historical writing system". —B|Talk 12:41, 27 Oct 2004 (UTC)

I appreciate that you think I am ignorant of the philosophy of science, but question what evidence you base that conclusion on. - Nauvoo 05:40, 28 Oct 2004 (UTC)

Not just the philosophy of science, but science generally...and I might add that wiki's current articles in those topics is lacking considerably. For example: the neglect in those articles regarding "theory-laden observation" (as if "evidence" speaks for itself); the false presumption that there is "one scientific method" and the oversight regarding "shaping principles"; or the general neglect of the "underdetermination of theories". Why someone who is not a scientist, like you, nor a philosopher of science, like you, would care to contribute to part of an article on which they are more likely to make mistakes nor add anything uncommonly insightful is an anathema to me. So, the evidence of my conclusion about your background?: the simple fact that you support the "no scientific evidence" edit despite what I know to be a more correct understanding of science and its philosophical foundations. —B|Talk 16:06, 30 Oct 2004 (UTC)

Gentlemen, you are both highly intelligent. No need arguing over credentials. Let's focus on our fundamentals of Wikipedia:Neutral Point of View and Wikipdedia:Wikilove. Tom - Talk 03:53, 31 Oct 2004 (UTC)

Precisely. (Damn philosophy.) Cool Hand Luke 18:09, 27 Oct 2004 (UTC)

Precisely what?- Nauvoo 05:40, 28 Oct 2004 (UTC)

That it's less POV to state that practitioners in a field do not believe something than to assert there's no evidence for it. This is partially due to philosophic concerns. Evidence is intelligible only within a conceptual framework, thus a community's failure to find evidence is attributable both to the facts they perceive and the underlying assumptions of that community. The least POV way to tie this up is to state they don't believe it. Cool Hand Luke 06:47, 28 Oct 2004 (UTC)

No, it's not less "POV" to assert that experts form their opinions on "belief" rather than on the lack of supporting evidence. - Nauvoo 22:53, 28 Oct 2004 (UTC)

There is evidence, just not any evidence most archeologists and linguists would believe. You could either state they don't believe it outright or that they don't believe there's evidence for it. Stating flatly that there's no evidence for it is just a POV way of saying the latter. Cool Hand Luke 23:27, 28 Oct 2004 (UTC)

B is correct, Nauvoo. We were quite careful about a month ago to represent fairly the different POVs on this subject, but maybe we didn't quite achieve what we thought. But your insistent insertions without discussion are disrespectful to other editors. Please take the time and effort to explain your actions and let us solve this permanently. You were here last time we hashed this through, and I heard no objection from you over the solution we carefully reached. It is bad behavior to stay silent when the workshop is proceeding, then to come around a month later when things are silent to make your views known. Make them known fully now while we are all mobilized, please, so we can have a decent solution. Tom - Talk 16:23, 27 Oct 2004 (UTC)

Without discussion? Mobilized? I certainly believe the article would profit from the participation of a wider community. I'm happy to list it on "Requests for Comment". - Nauvoo 05:40, 28 Oct 2004 (UTC)

Yes. Thank you for requesting outside comment. Unfortunately, we don't seem to be getting any. I don't know how long it has been since you read the Wikipedia:Neutral Point of View article all the way through, but if it has been a while, I think it may help here. I am going to read it carefully again before coming back. Tom - Talk 03:53, 31 Oct 2004 (UTC)

I made some edits. I am thinking that may have been bad at this point. Here is the paragraph as I left it in case it is reverted. I would like to go over the subject paragraph on this page so we don't resemble an edit war. Tom - Talk

• There is little material available for those who would study the Book of Mormon style of alleged Egyptian writing called reformed Egyptian. There have been only two purported examples of the writing. Because archaeologists and linguists outside of Mormonism do not recognize The Book of Mormon as an authentic ancient document, the alleged writing system is solely a Mormon subject. Within Mormonism, few have undertaken to study the writing system, but most believe in its historicity as a matter of faith in The Book of Mormon.

I don't know that we should add the sentence that begins "Because..." Presumably some are open to specific Latter Day Saint claims but in fact find evidence unconvincing? (This is certainly the case with Latter Day Saint trans-oceanic cultural diffusion, but I'm honestly not sure about reformed Egyptian.) In any case, the revision you made to the last sentence was greatly needed. As it was, the sentence implied that even most Latter-day Saints don't believe in reformed Egyptian. In fact, just few study it (an almost unremarkable claim, actually). Cool Hand Luke 18:09, 27 Oct 2004 (UTC)

Proposed solutions in general

Agree with comments repeated more than once below regarding terms like "alleged". Edits that use terms like "alleged" or "purported" appear syptomatic of a failure to distinguish between "objective" articles and "NPOV" articles. Words like "alleged" or "purported" should rarely if ever need to be used to convey a NPOV wikipedia article. Any "outside of Mormonism"/"just part of Mormonism" language needs to go too. —B|Talk 16:16, 30 Oct 2004 (UTC)

Re: Alleged and purported; agree. Re: Inside/outside; I think your suggestion can be implemented by briefly summarizing the Joseph Smith story like in proposal 7. Then maybe there's no need to say inside/outside. What do you think, Nauvoo? Tom - Talk 16:28, 30 Oct 2004 (UTC)

It occurs to me that perhaps we have all (myself included) kind of forgotten the absolute and non-negotiable non-bias policy amid all this. Yes, I know; we have flung around the acronyms POV and NPOV like water balloons. But if Nauvoo's point of view is significant, we need to represent it fairly somehow. It is Nauvoo's POV that, "There is no evidence, and that's a fact." It is apparently Visorstuff's, B's, CHL's, and mine that "There is scant evidence, and no consensus on what it means." Our non-bias policy says we have to represent all significant points of view fairly, and I think both points of view I've summarized are significant. Or if everybody agrees on them, we can present just the facts, ma'am. I see only two options:

1. We add zero content by saying the tired old "Book of Mormon critics say there is no evidence. Apologists say .... " <groan>.Tom - Talk 03:53, 31 Oct 2004 (UTC)
2. We avoid asserting either one by simply telling the "ludicrous" story of the gold plates, angel, and Anthon transcript, and then saying, "That's all folks!" Then we have given "knowledge" and we have been fair. And that is in harmony with the Saddam Hussein example "We won't even have to say he is evil. We just list the facts, and the facts condemn him a thousand times." Tom - Talk 03:53, 31 Oct 2004 (UTC)

Well, I promised to read the WP:NPOV article carefully again before I come back, so I'll see you when I'm done. Tom - Talk 03:53, 31 Oct 2004 (UTC)

Proposed solution 1

Okay - this reads too strange to me - "alleged" and the connotation of "outside Mormonism" are too absolute. how about this:

• There is little material available for those who study reformed Egyptian - only two purported examples of the writing exist, and the authenticity of one is often disputed. Because of the lack of primary samples, the authenticity of reformed Egyptian cannot be established though conventional emperical methods, and is typically considered a matter of faith. There are some individuals who have undergone detailed sceintific research of the available sources and the results have varied from simple decipherable translation samples from the text to statements from individuals that there is a lack of liguistic support for the writing system.

What do you think? This lets the body of the article give both sides of the argument. -Visorstuff 18:47, 27 Oct 2004 (UTC)

Positives:

• Good content in the last sentence, though some specifics would be nice. The article currently doesn't have anything but one study referenced.

Problems:

• The article currently doesn't give both sides of the argument. And this article isn't about the argument. I think the intro summary is all we need to say about "some disbelieve there ever were people writing such a way"
• "cannot be established through conventional..." is more than I believe we should say.
• Does this move farther away from satisfying Nauvoo's concern? It is essential to him that we state "within Mormonism", which is true. Should we be renaming the article to Reformed Egyptian (Mormonism)?
• If there is no such "language" as Reformed Egyptian, how can people study reformed Egyptian? The problem here is that Egyptologists could probably be said to study reformed Egyptian. But they don't study the Book of Mormon style of writing. This is perplexing, and some of the editors are adamant that the article needs to be clear that there is no such language as Reformed Egyptian (which we all agree, I suppose), as the title of this section suggests.

Proposed solution 2

Another try:

• There is little material available for those who would study Book of Mormon reformed Egyptian -- only two purported examples of the writing have surfaced, and the authenticity of one is generally disputed. Most archaeologists and linguists do not regard The Book of Mormon as an authentic ancient document, and have shown little interest in studying its language. Within Mormonism, some individuals have undertaken detailed scientific research of the available sources and the results have varied from simple decipherable translation samples to statements that there is a lack of linguistic support for the writing system. Most Mormons believe in the historicity of reformed Egyptian as a matter of faith in The Book of Mormon.

Tom - Talk 21:25, 27 Oct 2004 (UTC)

I generally like the edits - however, I don't consider the Tanner's research on the charactors "within Mormonism." Therefore, I don't think the term has place under its current context in this sentence. My other point, is that there is a lack of available sources, so it cannot be properly studied. It cannot be "proven" through empirical methods. That is why it is a matter of faith. I see nothing wrong with that. you may not believe we should say that, but the fact is that is the truth, and is not in any way damaging or embarassing. At least no more so than looking at the book of abraham papyrus - these are matters of faith, just like the bible and book of mormon. The article should not be "some believe, some don't" that is pointless - it is a religious topic, of course that will be the case. It should, however, show why people can/can't believe - and that is a lack of samples, and lack of scientific method testing because of this scarcity - making it frankly impossible. I love the idea of changing the name of the article. It would clarify the linguistic connection. -Visorstuff 23:52, 27 Oct 2004 (UTC)

I'm okay with the idea. I just think the word "cannot" be proven through empirical methods is a little anomalous. I like saying it is a matter of faith, but I think it is superfluous, as you get at, to say that it can't be "proved". Is it good enough just to say there is little material? Possibly the following? I revised the first sentence and added "Within Mormon studies."

Proposed solution 3

• It is debated whether there is enough evidence available to seriously study Book of Mormon reformed Egyptian -- only two purported examples of the writing have surfaced, and the authenticity of one is generally disputed. Most archaeologists and linguists do not regard The Book of Mormon as an authentic ancient document, and have shown little interest in studying its language. Within Mormon studies, some individuals have undertaken detailed scientific research of the available sources and the results have varied from simple decipherable translation samples to statements that there is a lack of linguistic support for the writing system. Most Mormons believe in the historicity of reformed Egyptian as a matter of faith in The Book of Mormon.

Proposed solution 4

• In Mormonism, it is believed that some pre-Columbian Americans used specially reformed Egyptian characters to write on gold plates in what became The Book of Mormon (a sacred text of Mormonism). The Book of Mormon says these people were a line of prophets originating in 600 B.C. Jerusalem. (The term comes from Mormon chapter 9 verse 32. [1])

• It is debated whether there is enough evidence available to seriously study the alleged original Book of Mormon language -- only two purported examples of the reformed Egyptian characters have surfaced, and one is generally believe to be a forgery. Most archaeologists and linguists do not regard The Book of Mormon as an authentic ancient document, and few have shown interest in studying its language. Within Mormon studies, some individuals have undertaken detailed scientific research of the available sources and the results have varied from simple decipherable translation samples to statements that there is a lack of linguistic support for the writing system. Most Mormons believe in the historicity of reformed Egyptian as a matter of faith in The Book of Mormon.

Tom - Talk 20:55, 28 Oct 2004 (UTC)

Proposed solution 5

I dislike alledged. The connotation is not helpful for either side of the argument for reasons i will not go into here. How about this:

• Latter Day Saints believe that some pre-Columbian Americans used a written language called reformed Egyptian to write on gold plates in what became The Book of Mormon (a sacred text of Mormonism). The Book of Mormon states these people were a line of prophets originating in 600 B.C. Jerusalem. (The term comes from Mormon chapter 9 verse 32. [2])

• There is little material available for those who study reformed Egyptian - only two purported examples of the reformed Egyptian characters have surfaced, and one is generally believe to be a forgery. Few linguists have shown interest in studying the available samples of the The Book of Mormon language, however, within Mormon studies, some individuals have undertaken detailed scientific research of the available sources and the results have varied from simple decipherable translation samples to statements that there is a lack of linguistic support for the writing system. Most Mormons believe in the historicity of reformed Egyptian as a matter of faith.

-Visorstuff 20:18, 28 Oct 2004 (UTC)

We need to get Nauvoo's response to this. He/She is the one whose edits drove this current struggle over the issue I explain in the following sentence. I think Nauvoo will feel that (and perhaps I agree) "those who study reformed Egyptian" is either ambiguous (Reformed how?) or gives too much validation to the existence of "Reformed Egyptian" (There is no such language). Otherwise I really like it. And I vote we wait for wider comment. Tom - Talk 21:00, 28 Oct 2004 (UTC)

Not sure if it validates or simply lets the reader decide that people study it whether it exists or not. Nauvoo - waiting for you.... -21:16, 28 Oct 2004 (UTC)

The question is not about the "ability to study" reformed Egyptian, it's whether there is evidence (outside the influence of The Book of Mormon) that it existed. There is not, and the article should so state. - Nauvoo 22:53, 28 Oct 2004 (UTC)

What about Visorstuff's first solution (Proposed solution 1)? I actually liked it better (apart from the ambiguity caused because reformed Egyptian is not a language). In particular, I like the line "the authenticity of reformed Egyptian cannot be established though conventional emperical methods," although I think the word "conventional" might be unneeded. Cool Hand Luke 23:27, 28 Oct 2004 (UTC)

Contrary to Nauvoo's suggestion above, this issue is in part an issue about the "ability to study" reformed egyptian. Everything is subject to scientific inquiry, IMO (I don't accept the false dichotomy that matters of faith and science are mutually exclusive), but there are objects of science which can only be studied in theory, but not practically. However, such an object is not "unscientific" or "unempirical" just because it cannot be studied in practice; whether an object can only be studied in theory is more of a reflection of both the current state of science and discoveries made so far. For these reasons I don't like the line: "authenticity of reformed Egyptian cannot be established though conventional empirical methods". Reformed egyptian can be established though conventional empirical methods, but that inquiry is limited due to the current state of science and discoveries made so far. If a record with reformed egyptian was discovered in an ancient american ruin or if the golden plates were presented to scientists to study, obviously, very conventional empirical methods could be employed to study the records. —B|Talk 16:53, 30 Oct 2004 (UTC)

I agree with you on evidence, but I think this wording gets closer to the tone Nauvoo seems to want. Maybe the wording can be salvaged to "Because of the lack of primary samples, the authenticity of reformed Egyptian cannot currently be established..." I'd like to know if there's more to his objection than a narrow understanding of evidence. Cool Hand Luke 19:00, 30 Oct 2004 (UTC)

Of course I agree, but like my first paragraph changes in proposal 5 above too. :^) Nauvoo, whether or not the language exists in other settings is a moot point to a certain degree (although i agree it should so state). The issue is that it is studied, that it is a topic, that it is the basis for this aricle. If you read back on the history of this page, I believe I cautioned against its existence (and the existence of Golden plates) in the first place. However, because it is mentioned in the Book of Mormon, and some in the Latter Day Saint community study about it, it must be treated as a realistic language, just as much as french, pig latin, klingon, elvish or spanish. Like it or not, it is what it is. I agree, however, as I stated in the first proposal that there is no evidence for it outside the Book of Mormon and the two available (albeit questionable) samples in existence. Tom, I think that you ar going to be outvoted on this one - the lack of available evidence makes it what it is. The language cannot be tested via empirical methods because of this lack and I feel this will satisfy Nauvoo's objections - Nauvoo am I right?. -Visorstuff 00:07, 29 Oct 2004 (UTC)

I think it is important for an encyclopedia to distinguish between fictional languages (klingon, elvish, etc) and actual languages (French, Spanish, etc.), and would add that The Book of Mormon does not maintain that "reformed Egyptian" is fictional! The statement that it is an actual writing system would be verified by, for example, actual manuscripts written with it, and the absence of such manuscripts suggests that it was not an actual writing system. All I'm looking for is a clear, unequivocal statement of the facts. I'm not asking that the article say "there was no reformed Egyptian" I'm asking that is say there is no evidence not based on Mormon assertions that reformed Egyptian existed. One reason I don't enthusiastically endorse any of the 5 proposed solutions is they all emphasize the "availability" of the material - the crucial point is not that the material is "unavailable", it's that the material doesn't exist. - Nauvoo 01:52, 29 Oct 2004 (UTC)

This "evidence" issue is in part a semantics issue. Nauvoo, what you call "Mormon assertions" is evidence; direct eyewitness testimonies of people who have seen the Golden Plates and at least one extant sample of that language from which the BoM was translated is evidence. Whether someone considers that evidence as credible, fraudulent or whatever is a separate issue. I reiterate: your suggestion that the article state "no evidence" is a POV in conflict with wiki policy. "Evidence", like "scientific", have broad meanings and wikipedians must be careful to state precisely without stating too much or too little. In this case, "no evidence", "unscientific" or some such goes too far, for example, because it excludes the possibility that the gold plates exist or that there is a other yet undiscovered records written in reformed egyptian. —B|Talk 15:38, 30 Oct 2004 (UTC)

I have consistently said that we need to say explicitly that "it is a Book of Mormon thing". And that is what I am hearing from Nauvoo. But we are failing to say that to his satisfaction. What we are talking about in this article is "Book of Mormon reformed Egyptian writing". Nothing more and nothing less. Book of Mormon reformed Egyptian writing only exists within Book of Mormon studies. Can we say that without saying things like "there is no evidence" and "can't be proved"? "There is no evidence" is superfluous just as saying there is no evidence for papal abuses in Mormonism. And "can't be proved" is rather strongly stated. I personally would prefer to see something like the following. Tom - Talk 07:40, 29 Oct 2004 (UTC)

No, Hawstom, it is not "just a Book of Mormon" thing. You have no idea whether reformed egyptian has been used in other contexts. Just because its use in one context is recognized in some subset of society in the history of the universe does not mean it has not been used in other contexts. Your oversimplification is dead wrong, your centrism is misguided, and your comments put words (the wrong words) in Nauvoo's mouth. Nauvoo can speak for himself. —B|Talk 15:38, 30 Oct 2004 (UTC)

I'm sorry, but I don't know what centrism means. Anyway, I'll explain better what I meant here shortly. Meanwhile, it would be kind of nice if we could assume good faith and remember [[civility] and Wikiquette when addressing each other. Tom - Talk 05:54, 5 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Proposed solution 6

• First para is fine above

• Joseph Smith purportedly translated the Book of Mormon from reformed Egyptian characters on gold plates between 1827 and 1829, then returned the gold plates to an angel. Smith was said to have copied characters from the plates, but only two purported examples of the characters have surfaced, and one is generally believe to be a forgery. Few linguists have shown interest in studying the available samples of the The Book of Mormon language. However, within Mormon studies, some individuals have undertaken detailed scientific research of the available sources and the results have varied from simple decipherable translation samples to statements that there is a lack of linguistic support for the writing system. Most Mormons believe in the historicity of reformed Egyptian as a matter of faith.

Does this clarify what you were feeling was missing, Nauvoo? Tom - Talk 07:51, 29 Oct 2004 (UTC)

I believe this might be farther from what Nauvoo wants than even the 1st propsal by Visorstuff (which is still my favourite). Nauvoo said above that he doesn't like talk about "availability," and he seems to reject any wording that doesn't use the words "no evidence". Maybe it would be more productive if Nauvoo offers a counterproposal. Cool Hand Luke 08:04, 29 Oct 2004 (UTC)

Maybe. And I personally wish I hadn't used the tone-non-neutral word "purportedly". I should know better. I should have said simply: "Joseph Smith said he translated .... I increasingly begin to think (though it will be a bit of a repetition of what is said elsewhere), that the article should narrate briefly where in the world this idea of this reformed Egyptian came from.

Proposed solution 7

• First para is fine above

• Joseph Smith said he (or Latter Day Saints believe their founder Joseph Smith) translated The Book of Mormon from reformed Egyptian characters on gold plates between 1827 and 1829, then returned the gold plates to an angel. Smith gave supporter Martin Harris some characters he said he copied from the plates, which Harris showed for evaluation or validation in February 1828 to Professor Charles Anthon in New York. These characters Smith said he copied are the only known example of Book of Mormon reformed Egyptian provided by Smith. Two documents have surfaced purporting to contain the characters Smith provided; one, presented in the 1980s by convicted forger Mark Hofman, is generally believed to be a forgery. Few linguists have shown interest in studying the available credible sample of the The Book of Mormon characters. However, within Mormon studies, some individuals have undertaken detailed scientific research of the available characters, and the results have varied from simple decipherable translation samples to statements that there is a lack of linguistic support for the writing system. Most Mormons believe in the historicity of reformed Egyptian as a matter of faith.

Okay, my only pause here was which is the latest version we are reviewing - please post it as version 8, and let's move forward. -Visorstuff 15:45, 5 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Nauvoo revised and overwrote 6 and renamed it porposal 7 which was odd because 7 already existed. I've added the original 6 (Tom's) back in from history, and have moved Nauvoo's proposal below. Cool Hand Luke 18:58, 5 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Proposed solution 8 (6 as revised by Nauvoo)

Too many proposed solutions at once, I think, without delineating what they propose to solve. The points would seem to be:

• Does The Book of Mormon claim that it was written in reformed Egyptian?
• Is it possible to investigate the claim that such a writing system existed by seeking out physical evidence of inscriptions or manuscripts in reformed Egyptian?
• Have such investigations been made?
• Have they found evidence of any other such inscriptions or manuscripts?
• Other word forms and languages have been postulated by linguists in the absence of extant inscriptions on the basis of linguistic rules of language transmission and word change. Is the existence of reformed Egyptian inferrable in a similar manner?

My answers would be yes, yes, yes, no, no.

My answers would be no, no, yes, yes, ?. These questions are open too wide to different readings. Tom - Talk 19:32, Nov 5, 2004 (UTC)

It's not possible to investigate, but those investigations have been made? - Nauvoo 05:59, 6 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Joseph Smith said he translated The Book of Mormon from reformed Egyptian characters on gold plates, then returned the gold plates to an angel. Smith gave supporter Martin Harris some characters he said he copied from the plates, which Harris showed to Professor Charles Anthon in New York. This specimen created by Smith (or its copies) is the only known specimen of writing that purports to be in reformed Egyptian. No original inscriptions or manuscripts in such a writing system exist, and there is no archaeological evidence for, or linguistic grounds for suspecting, outside of the testimony of the Book of Mormon, that such a writing system ever did exist. Mormons believe in the historicity of reformed Egyptian as a matter of faith, rather than on the basis of scientific, archaeological, or linguistic evidence.

I'm not sure that's any more acceptable to those who wish to keep talk of evidence out of the article. - Nauvoo 04:01, 31 Oct 2004 (UTC)

This is better. I was much more hostile toward blanket denials of scientific and linguistic evidence. I think this statement is much more precise. I do still have reservations about it, but it's more acceptable. If both you and Tom could agree to a wording in this vein, I would be entirely supportive. Cool Hand Luke 07:25, 31 Oct 2004 (UTC)

Are we to take lack of further input here as assent or loss of interest? - Nauvoo 05:05, 5 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Very frustrating because I think it's the latter. I'd like to get this dispute behind the article, not have it pop up again after a month like last time. Cool Hand Luke 05:11, 5 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Whew *wipes brow*! I just barely finished reading the WP:NPOV article again (!), which I promised I would do before returning to this article. I am going to have to be careful about volunteering to read it in the near future. It is still fresh and pertinent, but I haven't as much patience (*grins sheepishly*) after three or four reads. I have not lost interest at all, and have thought about this article plenty. And I agree it is important that we try to fix this before moving on. Anyway, I'm back. Tom - Talk 05:54, 5 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Fundamentals of the dispute

I propose we stop all the proposals above until we figure out what it is we are all thinking. Tom - Talk 19:32, Nov 5, 2004 (UTC)

Nauvoo said, "Too many proposed solutions at once, I think, without delineating what they propose to solve." Let's back off from the proposals for a time and look at the fundamentals. Nauvoo formulated some questions, but I would like to parse a little more if you all don't mind. Tom - Talk 19:32, Nov 5, 2004 (UTC)

If every question gets answered by a new series of questions, this will lead nowhere, and I think we'd be better off looking, as we were, at the proposed text. Nonetheless, for what it's worth, here are my answers, which you'll not be surprised to learn don't match well with yours<g> - Nauvoo 05:59, 6 Nov 2004 (UTC)

The general idea of modifying Egyptian

Do we all agree that there is historical precedent for the concept of modifying Egyptian writing (demotic, hieratic) in general and that that idea is not "a Book of Mormon thing"?

Agree

Agree. This is obvious. Tom - Talk 19:32, Nov 5, 2004 (UTC)

Not unreasonable. Cool Hand Luke 05:31, 6 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Agree. Using your same logic below - Reformed Egyptian could be Egyptian writing the same type as Demotic and hieratic. We simply don't know all the vulgar egyptian languages that existed, although we have evidence for a dozen or more.

Disagree

Not as stated. Demotic and hieratic are not "modified" Egyptian writing, they are Egyptian writing. - Nauvoo 05:59, 6 Nov 2004 (UTC)

The Book of Mormon source language

Do we all agree that the Book of Mormon itself could be interpreted to indicate that its style of Egyptian writing is unique to the plates the prophets wrote on--that their writing style is uniquely "a Book of Mormon thing"?

Agree

I agree. In fact, this is my point of view. It would be very unlikely the Book of Mormon source language would ever be found anywhere but on the prophetic plates, even in America. Tom - Talk 19:32, Nov 5, 2004 (UTC)

Disagree

Nothing in The Book of Mormon states that its script was "unique": rather it is a script that is known to the Nephites, not unique to one manuscript. - Nauvoo 05:59, 6 Nov 2004 (UTC)

The "unique" POV is merely Tom's speculation. —B|Talk 15:29, 6 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Problems with the traditional name "Reformed Egyptian"

What is our position on the idea that the term "Reformed Egyptian language" is causing a lot of the trouble here?

Agree

I agree. It causes confusion as to whether this article is about specifically the Book of Mormon source language, or some supposed wider language called Reformed Egyptian that was never asserted by anybody to exist in the first place, or the generic concept of reformed Egyptian that would include demotic and hieratic. Tom - Talk 19:32, Nov 5, 2004 (UTC)

Yes, and I also favor this nomenclature. As I earlier said "reformed Egyptian" should be prefered—with capitalization we misleadingly imply that it's a language. Cool Hand Luke 05:31, 6 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Disagree

No one seems to be using that term. I certainly have not called reformed Egyptian a "language". "Reformed Egyptian" is the original wording used in The Book of Mormon. - Nauvoo 05:59, 6 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Factually inaccurate. "the characters that are called among us the reformed Egyptian" is the quote. Tom - Talk 21:58, Nov 6, 2004 (UTC)

I think the original question was unclear. I percieved (correctly, apparently) that you were refering to the capital. Nauvoo doesn't seem to have a big problem with the capital, just substantive article content: he even used "reformed Egyptian" above (just not when grammar dictated a capital). I believe this all might be peripheral though. I find the Nauvoo and B proposals below satisfactory. What do you think Tom? Cool Hand Luke 23:21, 6 Nov 2004 (UTC)

What is this article about?

Is this article really about Linguistics and the Book of Mormon? Should this article be merged and redirected to Linguistics and the Book of Mormon?

Agree I would be willing to support this move if it was strongly favored by any editor. I think this article is really about the source language of the Book of Mormon. I do like the separate article, but I can see why it would be less a problem if it were presented within Linguistics and the Book of Mormon. Tom - Talk 21:46, Nov 5, 2004 (UTC)

Disagree

I don't know about this, simply because reformed Egyptian is an interesting and full topic in its own right. I would not be so very opposed to the move, but if the linguistics article ever went over 32 kB, reformed Egyptian should be broken out again. (They are about 11,600 and 7,400 bytes respectively—so a merge would be well within limits. Incidentally, thank you for archiving the discussion.) Cool Hand Luke 05:31, 6 Nov 2004 (UTC)

There does not seem to be any overlap between this article and that one, and moving a dispute doesn't solve it. - Nauvoo 05:59, 6 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Opposed to merger. —B|Talk 16:08, 6 Nov 2004 (UTC)

No merger

None of this seems to go to why there's any objection to this:

Joseph Smith said he translated The Book of Mormon from reformed Egyptian characters on gold plates, then returned the gold plates to an angel. Smith gave supporter Martin Harris some characters he said he copied from the plates, which Harris showed to Professor Charles Anthon in New York. This specimen created by Smith (or its copies) is the only known specimen of any writing purporting to be in reformed Egyptian. No original inscriptions or manuscripts in such a writing system exist, and there is no archaeological evidence for, or linguistic grounds for suspecting, outside of the testimony of the Book of Mormon, that such a writing system ever did exist. Mormons believe in the historicity of reformed Egyptian as a matter of faith, rather than on the basis of scientific, archaeological, or linguistic evidence.

Is there some particular phrase there that is untrue or unfair? I don't think so: I wonder who it is who does and which phrase it might be. - Nauvoo 05:59, 6 Nov 2004 (UTC)

It seems neither fair, sympathetic, nor positive. Here is why:

• "This specimen created by Smith (or its copies) is the only known specimen of any writing purporting to be in reformed Egyptian."

This sentence seems to say it all. Why need there be more? Tom - Talk

Because there is obviously more to say. - Nauvoo 06:43, 8 Nov 2004 (UTC)

• "No original inscriptions or manuscripts in such a writing system exist,"

This goes a bit too far, don't you think? Unavailable or unknown, yes, but non-existent? Tom - Talk

Unavailable implies that the problem is access: it's not: it's existence. Evidence by its very nature is known. - Nauvoo 06:43, 8 Nov 2004 (UTC)

There's nothing fair unfair or unsympathetic there. If someone maintained there were extant original manuscripts, we would state it. But no one does. - Nauvoo 06:43, 8 Nov 2004 (UTC)

• "and there is no archaeological evidence for, or linguistic grounds for suspecting, outside of the testimony of the Book of Mormon, that such a writing system ever did exist." - 06:43, 8 Nov 2004 (UTC)

If this were only redundant of the above sentence as well as self-redundant it would violate the principle of fair, sympathetic, and positive tone. But the word "testimony" makes it inaccurate too. The Book of Mormon, the Anthon transcript, and Lehi's historical context are all pieces of evidence. There is much more to sink one's teeth into than this sentence is willing to let on. Tom - Talk

They are all, as is stated, based on the testimony of The Book of Mormon. There is no other evidence. - Nauvoo 06:43, 8 Nov 2004 (UTC)

It's not redundant. We've said there's a purported transcription, and we're adding there is no original manuscript. -- Nauvoo 06:43, 8 Nov 2004 (UTC)

• "Mormons believe in the historicity of reformed Egyptian as a matter of faith, rather than on the basis of scientific, archaeological, or linguistic evidence."

Situated as it is at the end of the proposed paragraph. This sentence seems rather a put-down of Mormons, especially with the word "rather". And again, it paints an inaccurate picture of the historical plausibility of and available evidence for the claims of the Book of Mormon. Tom - Talk

It paints an accurate picture of the basis of belief. I didn't add it; I'd be happy enough if it read "There is no non-Mormon scientific, archeological, or linguistic support for the existence of reformed Egyptian." But that's how we got here. - Nauvoo 06:43, 8 Nov 2004 (UTC)

As stated, I would accept this with one addition: "known archeological evidence." Is something along these lines acceptable to you, Tom? If so, we can resolve this very quickly. Cool Hand Luke 07:42, 6 Nov 2004 (UTC)

I think "known" is redundant. There's no such thing as "unknown evidence". If it's evidence, it's "evident". To add "known" is to hint that the writer suspects there's undiscovered "evidence" somewhere, and seems a bit slanted - though tolerably so. I'll incorporate it in the next draft. - Nauvoo 23:11, 7 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Hang on. 67.3.155.166 18:51, 7 Nov 2004 (UTC)

A redlined version of a sloppy edit of the blockquote by me would look something like this:

Joseph Smith said he translated The Book of Mormon from reformed Egyptian characters on gold plates, then returned the gold plates to an angel. Smith gave supporter Martin Harris some characters he said he copied from the plates, which Harris showed to Professor Charles Anthon in New York. This specimen created by Smith (or its copies) is the only known specimen of any writing purporting to be in reformed Egyptian. Except for the claims about the gold plates and the specimen copied from the plates, there is no other known No original inscriptions or manuscripts in such a writing system exist, and there is no archaeological evidence for, or linguistic grounds for suspecting, outside of the testimony of the Book of Mormon, that such a writing system ever did exist; no other known original inscriptions or manuscripts of such a writing system exist. Mormons believe in the historicity of reformed Egyptian as a matter of faith and, rather than on the basis of but believe that further scientific, archaeological, or linguistic evidence investigation and discoveries will ultimately lend more support to their position.

- (BoNoMoJo)

Since you don't explain why you think these changes are needed, let's look at what they do. First, they eliminate the word "evidence", which is crucial here. Then, they rework a sentence so it says that "the claims about the gold plates and the specimen copied from the plates" are "archeological evidence" or "linguistic evidence", which they are not. Then it adds the word "other" in a way that suggests that the transcription is an "original inscription or manuscript", which it is not - it's a purported copy of an original inscription. And you can't say "other" specimens without claiming the purported copies "are" specimens. The addition about the faith of some that some evidence of reformed Egyptian's existence may ultimately be found is, I think, not particularly relevant to whether there is evidence, but nonetheless I've added it to the next draft.

Joseph Smith said he translated The Book of Mormon from reformed Egyptian characters on gold plates, then returned the gold plates to an angel. Smith gave his supporter Martin Harris some characters he said he copied from the plates, which Harris showed to Professor Charles Anthon in New York. Copies of this specimen are the only known samples of any writing purporting to be in reformed Egyptian. No original inscriptions or manuscripts in such a writing system exist, and there is no known archaeological evidence for, or linguistic grounds for suspecting (other than the testimony of The Book of Mormon) that such a writing system ever did exist. Mormons believe in the historicity of reformed Egyptian as a matter of faith, rather than on the basis of scientific, archaeological, or linguistic evidence. Some believe such evidence may one day be discovered.

-- Nauvoo 23:11, 7 Nov 2004 (UTC)

I like BoNoMoJo's changes. And I appreciate Nauvoo's patience and persistence. I still think the paragraph says some inaccurate, superfluous, and insinuating things and is redundant.

Joseph Smith said he translated The Book of Mormon from reformed Egyptian characters on gold plates, then returned the gold plates to an angel. Smith gave his supporter Martin Harris some characters he said he copied from the plates, which Harris showed to Professor Charles Anthon in New York. Copies of this specimen are the only known samples of any writing purporting to be in reformed Egyptian. Since the Book of Mormon says its reformed Egyptian was developed uniquely by its scribes and implies it was used and known uniquely by them also, it is unlikely any other other samples will ever be found.

- unsigned, presumably Tom/Hawstrom

But the last sentence is special pleading. It needs attribution, by names of those who maintain it if they have published it as a position.

Joseph Smith said he translated The Book of Mormon from reformed Egyptian characters on gold plates, then returned the gold plates to an angel. Smith gave his supporter Martin Harris some characters he said he copied from the plates, which Harris showed to Professor Charles Anthon in New York. Copies of this specimen are the only known samples of any writing purporting to be in reformed Egyptian. No original inscriptions or manuscripts in such a writing system exist, and there is no known archaeological evidence for, or linguistic grounds for suspecting that such a writing system ever did exist(other than the testimony of The Book of Mormon). Mormons believe in the historicity of reformed Egyptian as a matter of faith, rather than on the basis of scientific, archaeological, or linguistic evidence. Some Mormons believe such evidence may one day be discovered. Others believe that the Book of Mormon was developed uniquely by its scribes and it is unlikely any samples will ever be found.

- Nauvoo 06:57, 8 Nov 2004 (UTC)

I think I liked where this was going before introducing the "unique writting system" idea. This paragraph deals with evidence for the system, and although being a unique writting system would help explain scant evidence, it feels out of place here. Is it too much use language somewhere in between Nauvoo and B's earlier proposals. Something like "Some Latter Day Saints believe future investigations will ultimately lend more support to their position." Maybe we could transition to a short paragraph introducing the unique-writing-system theory. It should be noted the theory probably isn't even a dominant orthodox position (or is it?) Cool Hand Luke 07:18, 8 Nov 2004 (UTC)

I know none of us want it to look like an edit war, but I am wondering if, to avoid the confusion of all the proposals on this talk page, we might be better off editing the main article for a while. Or possibly putting a fluid version at the top of this page. Would that be okay? And until we agree on that, is this close enough to Nauvoo's proposal? Tom - Talk 17:26, Nov 8, 2004 (UTC)

In Mormonism, reformed Egyptian is the writing system believed to have been developed by some pre-Columbian Americans to write on gold plates in what became The Book of Mormon (a sacred text of Mormonism). The Book of Mormon says the authors of the plates were a line of prophets originating in 600 B.C. Jerusalem. (The term comes from Mormon chapter 9 verse 32. [3])

Joseph Smith said he translated The Book of Mormon from reformed Egyptian characters on gold plates, then returned the gold plates to an angel. Smith gave his supporter Martin Harris some characters he said he copied from the plates, which Harris showed to Professor Charles Anthon in New York. Copies of this specimen are the only known samples of any writing purporting to be in reformed Egyptian. No original inscriptions or manuscripts in such a writing system are extant, and there is no known archaeological evidence for, or linguistic grounds for suspecting that such a writing system ever did exist other than in The Book of Mormon. Some Mormons believe such evidence may one day be discovered. Others read the Book of Mormon to say the Egyptian was "altered by [the scribes]", that "none other people knoweth [the] language", and that it is unlikely any samples will ever be found. - (The last two sentences could be removed.) Tom

The inversion of the parenthetical subverts the meaning. See if this is acceptable:

Reformed Egyptian is the writing system believed, in Mormonism, to have been developed by some pre-Columbian Americans to write on gold plates in what became The Book of Mormon (a sacred text of Mormonism). The Book of Mormon says the authors of the plates were a line of prophets originating in 600 B.C. Jerusalem. (The term comes from Mormon chapter 9 verse 32. [4])

Joseph Smith said he translated The Book of Mormon from reformed Egyptian characters on gold plates, then returned the gold plates to an angel. Smith gave his supporter Martin Harris some characters he said he copied from the plates, which Harris showed to Professor Charles Anthon in New York. Copies of this specimen are the only known samples of any writing purporting to be in reformed Egyptian. No original inscriptions or manuscripts in such a writing system are extant, and there is no known archaeological evidence for, or linguistic grounds for suspecting that such a writing system ever did exist that are not based on this one purported transcript. Some Mormons believe such evidence may one day be discovered. - Nauvoo 03:06, 9 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Content

Very often, NPOV disputes are aided by displacing innuendos with good content. I think a bit of content might help this article, or at least this struggle. The following is my addition. Here are some points from all this content: Tom - Talk 05:38, Nov 8, 2004 (UTC)

• This article is not about the Egyptian Lehi spoke and wrote with. It is not about the Egyptian the brass plates were written with. It is about the unique system drived therefrom that forms the golden plates characters. The term reformed Egyptian seem to be causing trouble. Perhaps this article should be renamed to "Golden Plates Characters", "Book of Mormon characters", or "Book of Mormon Writing System". Tom - Talk

It's not a term Wikipedia made up. The article discusses what people mean when they use it. - Nauvoo 06:43, 8 Nov 2004 (UTC)

• The Book of Mormon says its writing system was unique and otherwise unknown. Tom - Talk

Does it? That's not my understanding. Where does it say this? What you've quoted below state that it was unique to one people, not to one manuscript. - Nauvoo 06:43, 8 Nov 2004 (UTC)

• There is lots of evidence to corroborate and support Joseph Smith's inclusion of the idea of Egyptian in the Book of Mormon and the statements of the Book of Mormon about Egyptian.Tom - Talk

All of which stems from The Book of Mormon and the purported facscimile of a portion thereof. Which is all we're trying to say. - Nauvoo 06:43, 8 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Innuendo is a word with some ugly implications. I'm sure you meant none of them. NPOV disputes are also aided by not continually changing subjects, and by pointing out what in a given revision is thought to be a violation of NPOV. You've just added some comments that address this: they seem to center around "fairness". Specifically, whether in a list of "evidence" we must list "potential evidence". Listing "potential evidence" makes no sense: everyone knows that theories are evaluated on the basis of new evidence when it is discovered. And everything else you've evinced seems to all stem from the single tradition of The Book of Mormon, which we've already included. - Nauvoo 06:43, 8 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Lehi's language

Lehi's language is a form of Egyptian. Tom - Talk

"Yea, I, [Nephi], make a record in the language of my father, which consists of the learning of the Jews and the language of the Egyptians." (1 Nephi 1:2)

The brass plates of Laban were written in the language of the Egyptians (Lehi could read the brass plates only because he knew the language of the Egyptians). Generations after Lehi continued able to read the Egyptian of the brass plates of Laban. Tom - Talk

"For it were not possible that our father, Lehi, could have remembered all these things, to have taught them to his children, except it were for the help of these plates; for he having been taught in the language of the Egyptians therefore he could read these engravings, and teach them to his children, that thereby they could teach them to their children, and so fulfilling the commandments of God, even down to this present time." (Mosiah 1:4)

The Book of Mormon scribes used Egyptian. Book of Mormon Egyptian was reformed in accordance with ancient American speech to an extent no other people would know it. The American prophets also knew of Hebrew, but did not use it for the Book of Mormon. Tom - Talk

"And now, behold, we have written this record according to our knowledge, in the characters which are called among us the reformed Egyptian, being handed down and altered by us, according to our manner of speech.

"And if our plates had been sufficiently large we would have written in Hebrew; but the Hebrew hath been altered by us also; and if we could have written in Hebrew, behold, ye would have had no imperfection in our record.

"But the Lord knoweth the things which we have written, and also that none other people knoweth our language, therefore he hath prepared means for the interpretation thereof. (Mormon 9:32-34)

Historical setting for the origin of Reformed Egyptian

Lehi, the patriarch of the Book of Mormon, left Jerusalem in 600 B.C. (1 Nephi 10:4, 19:8, 2 Nephi 25:19, 3 Nephi 1:1) with a set of brass plates written in Egyptian (Mosiah 1:4). At this time, Lehi's family included four sons of marriageable age (20 - 30 yrs?) and their mother still of childbearing age (45 - 50 yrs? See [menopause]). Lehi's age was probably around 50 to 60 years. Lehi's childhood and early manhood were probably around 650 to 630 B.C. Tom - Talk

"Egypt regained its independence in 656 BCE under Psammetic I (656-609 BCE) of Libyan origin, founder of the 26th dynasty. Under him the country experienced another golden age. Towards the end of his reign he aided the crumbling Assyrian empire in a vain attempt to contain the rising Babylonians." http://nefertiti.iwebland.com/history21-31.htm#psammetici

Lehi would have been learning Egyptian either as a lingua franca or for commerce during this golden age of king Psammetic I of Egypt. This Egyptian was demotic script, which was developed from from the hieroglyphic in 675 B.C. Tom - Talk (http://nefertiti.iwebland.com/timelines/culture9.htm)

Hugh Nibley suggested that the names Laman and Lemuel (born about 630 B.C.) were Arabic influenced indicating early mercantile travels of Lehi's, Sam and Nephi (born about 620 B.C.) were Egyptian influenced indicating mid-life refined affluence of Lehi's, and Jacob and Joseph (born about 600 B.C.) were Hebrew influenced indicating late-life devition of Lehi's. From the above, these markers of Lehi's times would harmonize with Psammetic's Golden Age and what the Book of Mormon tells us of Lehi. Tom - Talk

The translation effort content already in the article suggests that the Anthon transcript bears markers of Egyptian similar to demotic. Tom - Talk

Again, all this information comes from The Book of Mormon, and is already covered by the proposed paragraph. I'm seeking to include the fact that outside this single source/single tradition, there is no evidence that such a thing as "reformed Egyptian" existed. You would prefer not to point that out. - Nauvoo 06:43, 8 Nov 2004 (UTC)

I am very sorry that we are not seeing eye to eye. I am trying hard to understand why. And yet there is just something missing. It seems the very same little point keeps sticking. You continue to say, "You would prefer not to point that out," which I take as bemoaning a lack of willingness to disclose on my part. But I feel perfectly willing to disclose an accurate picture of the state of things. I am not a logician nor a debater. I hardly know a straw this or an ad that, let alone the numerous other classical fallacies and such. So I can't describe very well with a succinct label what is troubling me. But I will try to describe it. There are two ways of looking at this: relative to claims and relative to evidence.

CLAIMS. There never was any claim that outside this single source/single tradition there ever was such a thing as "reformed Egyptian". Yet you would prefer to say that outside this single source/single tradition, there is no evidence that such a thing as "reformed Egyptian" existed.

EVIDENCE. There is evidence that there was such a thing as scribes writing in a sort of Egyptian on golden plates to produce the Book of Mormon. You handily pronounce that all that evidence "comes from the Book of Mormon", when the small amount of evidence I gathered above shows obvious corroboration between the Book of Mormon and other sources. I am honestly taken aback that you would say "all this information comes from The Book of Mormon". I don't know what to say to that.

Relative to claims, The Book of Mormon simply does not make the claims that your phrasing seems to be trying to balance. And relative to evidence, there is much more evidence than your phrasing seems to be willing to admit. That is why I cannot in honesty let it stand. I am for full disclosure. Please oh, please, at least understand that well enough to stop saying, "You would prefer not to point that out." Tom - Talk 07:19, 8 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Yes, of course I'd prefer to say that "outside this single source/single tradition, there is no evidence that such a thing as "reformed Egyptian" existed". Because it's true, and it is remarkable: writing systems that are known to "a people" seldom exist in only one manuscript. And all the evidence you cite does come from the Book of Mormon. Are you trying to draw a distinction between "Mormon's Record" and "The Book of Mormon"? - Nauvoo 07:35, 8 Nov 2004 (UTC)

No.  :-) I'm saying that 1) the corroboration of demotic with the characters on the Anthon Transcript and 2) the corroboration of Psammetic I's golden age with the Book of Mormon idea that Lehi took an Egyptian language set of brass plates from Jerusalem 600 B.C. (which formed the linguistic base for the system developed by Nephite scribes) are not in harmony with your "all this information comes from the Book of Mormon". All this information corroborates with The Book of Mormon, but doesn't all come from it. Tom - Talk 17:11, Nov 8, 2004 (UTC)

But the characters on the Anthon Transcript did - at least purportedly - come from the Book of Mormon! It all comes down to that one purported specimen. - Nauvoo 02:56, 9 Nov 2004 (UTC)

details

Details of why I think some changes had to be made to some of Hawstrom's changes:

Copies of this specimen are the only extant samples of these reformed Egyptian characters.

Copies of this specimen are the only known samples of any writing purporting to be in reformed Egyptian characters.

1st version ("these") assumes the characters are reformed Egyptian characters; 2nd version correctly characterizes this position as an assertion.

(No original inscriptions or manuscripts in such a writing system are extant, and) - excised

No original inscriptions or manuscripts in such a writing system are extant, and

No reason for this removal was stated. I've returned it because it's true, and needs to be stated.

There is no known archaeological or linguistic evidence or any tradition for suspecting that such a writing system ever did exist outside of The Book of Mormon.

there is no known archaeological or linguistic evidence or any tradition for suspecting that such a writing system ever did exist—other than that tradition which followed the publication of The Book of Mormon in the 19th century.

1st version implies that the writing system did exist in the Book of Mormon; 2nd version makes no such assumption, and avoids the assertion that such a writing system did exist within the Book of Mormon.

Some Mormons believe that the writing system may have existed in Mesoamerica outside The Book of Mormon, and that such evidence may one day be discovered.

Some Mormons believe that the writing system may have existed in Mesoamerica outside The Book of Mormon, and that someday evidence that it did exist may one day be discovered.

1st sentence switches between subjects ("writing system" and "evidence".

I also removed the extra links to "Joseph Smith" and "Mormonism" and a second characterization of him as "the founder of Mormonism" - this sort of thing only has to be done once in any given article. - Nauvoo 06:40, 8 Dec 2004 (UTC)

• I think it looks ok. I would change "purporting" to "purported": the characters don't purport this themselves. And perhaps using simply say "...someday evidence for it may be discovered." Oh, and de-capitalizing The Book of Mormon. For some reason this style makes me cringe. I just don't remember ever seeing the convention (unlike "The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints", which is used by the Salt Lake Tribune and other independent media). It appears there's no consensus on Mormonism naming conventions, so would anyone mind if I de-capitalized "The"? Cool Hand Luke 09:06, 8 Dec 2004 (UTC)

I have no objection to the "-ing"/"-ed" change, and no strong feelings about the capitalization of "The" (that's a matter for the style guide, so that we match the style of "The Bible" and "The Beatles" or "the Bible" and "the Beatles", but neither one bothers me enough to track it down there). Remember though that for everyone bothered by "The" there's someone bothered by "the" so to me it makes little sense to change back and forth based on which one was last bothered enough to change it. - Nauvoo 00:11, 9 Dec 2004 (UTC)

It seems we have a genuine disagreement about something core to this subject. We should be able to characterize that disagreement if we can get to the point of understanding what it is. I think it is worth trying again so that we can remove some redundancies and address more directly the points of view on the subject. I guess it might help to try discussing our common goals first.

• I want to build a respectable encyclopedia that can be held up to the world as an example of un-biased writing.
• I want to treat all Wikipedians with kindness and respect, and I want to learn in the process to be a better person.
• I want to share my "knowledge" regarding the Book of Mormon.

As I understand, the Wikipedia:Neutral point of view doctrine tells us that "[i]f we're going to characterize disputes fairly, we should present competing views with a consistently positive, sympathetic tone. A lot of articles end up as partisan commentary even while presenting both points of view. Even when a topic is presented in terms of facts rather than opinion, an article can still radiate an implied stance through either selection of which facts to present, or more subtly their organization--for instance, refuting opposing views as one goes makes them look a lot worse than collecting them in an opinions-of-opponents section." It is a concern of mine, Nauvoo, that you are unwilling to present the view of Mormonism on the Book of Mormon in a consistently positive, sympathetic tone.

I'm sure you don't mean to imply that I don't share your three goals. And I would point out that I've said nothing negative or unsympathetic about the Book of Mormon. - Nauvoo 00:11, 9 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Rather than collecting your concerns about the Mormonism view in an opinions-of-opponents section, you seem determined to radiate an implied stance skeptical of the Mormonism view consistently throughout the article by refuting it as the article goes along. But our admonition requires that we let people tell their story, or tell it sympathetically for them.

No, you're mistaken. In fact, in Wikipedia's history this led to an actual fork: those who insisted that articles be entirely "sympathetic" migrated to "Wikinfo" (see http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Sites_using_MediaWiki and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikinfo) while those who preferred neutral, integrated articles stayed at Wikipedia. Articles should not read as advocacy pieces: they should be written not by partisans but by those interested in conveying information. Our admonition requires that we tell the story in such a way that we do not misrepresent people or mischaracterize their opinions. It doesn't require us to be one-sided: quite the opposite: it encourages the inclusion of all points of view. You also seem intent on labelling me as a "opponent", which is hostile, incorrect, and an unduly polarizing way of conceptualizing the process of collaboratively editing an article. - Nauvoo 00:11, 9 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Neutrality does not need to mean sharing all opposing views in the lead, but rather, present a balanced article, which I believe most of those of us that have edited this article have bent over backwards to do. Tom's argument is that we present what the majority of people who care about this topic believe, followed by the critical view. -Visorstuff 19:18, 9 Dec 2004 (UTC)

I am very confused, Nauvoo, about your personal point of view, and I believe this is making this job harder for me.

Yes, that seems clear, and I find it most unfortunate. You shouldn't need to know someone's religion in order to collaborate with them. - Nauvoo 00:11, 9 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Your user name leads me to at least entertain the thought that you are a Latter Day Saint. Yet your stance seems to be that the whole Book of Mormon story is a house of cards that be rebutted at every turn.

That's completely unfair, but let us imagine for a moment that it's true. The fact is that that is a belief (POV) of some people, and needs to be represented here. It can't be excluded because it's "unsympathetic", and it can't be shoved to the "back of the bus" just because it's not your POV. - Nauvoo 00:11, 9 Dec 2004 (UTC)

I want to understand better so I can address you more properly. And so that you don't have similar difficulties regarding me (though I doubt that is likely),

I don't have any difficulties: I don't condition my reaction to people's reasoning based on their religiion. - Nauvoo 00:11, 9 Dec 2004 (UTC)

I'll say again that it is my point of view that the Book of Mormon says, and the external and internal evidence supports believing that, a lineage of elite scribes guarded and maintained the ability to read the brass plates of Laban, which were a Psammetic I era artifact written in egyptian demotic, and that based on the language of those plates, they fashioned a house language for writing on the Plates of Nephi, and this article is about that house language, nothing more and nothing less. Neither the Book of Mormon nor external evidence gives any support for thinking that this article should purport to address anything other than the house language of the Book of Mormon scribes. Sentences, phrases, words, and arguments that imply a greater scope for this aritcle are disingenuous, though it would be fair to say that "some Mormons hold the opinion that reformed Egyptian may have been used in ancient America outside the Book of Mormon. To date no known archaeological or linguistic evidence or any tradition validates this opinion." Tom - Talk 19:38, Dec 8, 2004 (UTC)

This is not a disagreement about what you believe, or what I believe - neither of us is important enough that our opinions should be the subject of an encyclopedia article. So we need to concentrate on the language of the article, not on personalities. - Nauvoo 00:11, 9 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Agreed. The above is moot. -Visorstuff 19:18, 9 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Hawstom, you make an interesting point with that last quote - the issue I've had with the edits recently is that they again point to no evidence for the system, but the Charator docutments themselves are evidence. In addition, doesn't the scientific method and most common law systems believe that something is as it is, unless disproven?

No, scientific systems do not work that way. Hypotheses are used to predict outcomes, and the predicted outcome is compared with reality. If they match, it is evidence that the hypothesis was a step towards understanding reality, and if they do not, it's an indication that the hypothesis was misleading. Common Law is not terribly relevant (unless you're arguing law) as it is not a system for understanding reality. - Nauvoo 00:11, 9 Dec 2004 (UTC)

I'm not sure how to respond to you on this. First, the common law example was showing that this is a common thought process. Second, There is frankly not enough evidence to have a hypothesis about "reformed egyptian." It is faith-based, not fact-based, and this article in my opinion should reflect this. TO ME THIS IS THE POINT OF DISPUTE BETWEEN YOU AND HAWSTOM. (Actually, I think Hawstom and I agree on this!-Nauvoo 00:18, 10 Dec 2004 (UTC)) You want to make it fact based (which there is little evidence for - no one disputes this), while Tom wants to reflect that this is a faith-based issue.

The dispute then would be that Tom does not want me to point out that there is little evidence for the existence of reformed Egyptian (even though this is not disputed). I have no objection to Tom (or anyone else) pointing out that those who believe that reformed Egyptian existed do so on the basis of their faith. - Nauvoo 19:48, 9 Dec 2004 (UTC)

We shouldn't be trying to build a oddly-balanced, disproven case, but rather, state it is what it is and then state that others don't agree and the reasons why. This has been a Wikipedia best practice on controversial issues such as Pope Joan and Joshua A. Norton, obviously not true tales. In addition, there is no (or as little) evidence that the modern Hebrew is the same as was spoken 4000 years ago - we don't know, but even Hebrew doesn't strongly address this issue. We are taking too critical a view of issues. Let's state what Mormonism or the Latter Day Saint movement as a whole believe about Reformed Egyptian and then talk about the lack of external evidence in its own section. this seems to be standard practice. Nauvoo, I know you'll disagree, but we have to get past this dispute soon. Others - looking for consensus? I think we are in only two distinct camps on this, let's make a compromise. -Visorstuff 22:25, 8 Dec 2004 (UTC)

The proposal to privilege one point of view by placing it first should really be a non-starter: the first part of the article needs to be a simple statement about what ALL people have to say about reformed Egyptian, not just what SOME say. The detailed explanations can then follow—as the article does in its current version. - Nauvoo 00:11, 9 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Again, there are no non-Mormonism views on this subject, so why start off an article stating a convoluted issue of problems before someone understands what Mormonism purports it to be?

I don't understand why you say there are no non-Mormon views on the existence of reformed Egyptian characters. Lots of non-Mormons have expressed such views. - Nauvoo 00:18, 10 Dec 2004 (UTC)

• I apparently don't believe the disagreements are as large as Tom and Nauvoo seem to—I've found many proposals on boths sides to be satisfactory. Restructuring the article might not be a bad idea though. As it is, almost all of the criticisms are in the lead blocks, which is a little odd. Making a subheading for criticism might be a good idea for purely stylistic reasons. Cool Hand Luke 22:44, 8 Dec 2004 (UTC)

I think dividing the article into two sections, privileging one by putting it first and hiding the other "below the fold" is rather unfair. Of course, if you are determined to hide fair and accurate statements because you don't like them, you are probably sufficiently well-organized and sufficiently numerous that you can make the article more perfectly mirror your own opinions. - Nauvoo 00:11, 9 Dec 2004 (UTC)

I honestly wish I understood why we are having so much trouble. Can somebody see it and explain it clearly? Is there something positive we are failing to say? Is there something negative we should not be saying? I feel certain Nauvoo is tempted to discard me and others as POV-pushing cranks, and that troubles me deeply. Is it possible to state the facts in a way that is not laden with innuendo? Tom - Talk 16:27, Dec 9, 2004 (UTC)

I confess that I have mulled over the fact that the text of a Wikipedia article is never going to be identical with that of a faith-promoting brochure, and wondered if you will ever be satisfied with anything less than the latter. But I'd never call you a crank! - Nauvoo 18:39, 9 Dec 2004 (UTC)

:-) I thought you might have mulled that over. Thanks for saying so. And obviously I don't want to have that position, which is why I am troubled. Articles should not be faith-promoting brochures, and I don't want to be blind in this subject to that need. I fear I may be, and that troubles me. I do, however (hope against hopes!), believe that you may be still misunderstanding a bit of my intent. And I appreciate your efforts to come to an understanding before calling this closed. So, let's start by trying to assume that I don't want a faith-promoting brochure. Then what do I want? I will take a statement of yours that you have repeated and which I think I need to better understand. You said, "The dispute then would be that Tom does not want me to point out that there is little evidence for the existence of reformed Egyptian (even though this is not disputed)." Wow! That is quite a lot to dissect! But I think I can distill the misconception. Here is my attempt at a restatement we can both agree on: Tom wants Nauvoo to carefully avoid innuendo in the article.

The problem being that you see innuendo where I see none. This is, at long last, a concrete description of what bothers you. Now we need to see where you see these innuendos and see if we can word them in a way that is objectionable to both of us. This might be hard, and might be easy. - Nauvoo 00:18, 10 Dec 2004 (UTC)

I believe the main factor tending toward innuendo has been redundancy of presentation. When we say, "Copies of this specimen are the only known samples of any writing purporting to be in reformed Egyptian characters," that is factual and sufficient; only means only. When we say immediately afterward, " No original inscriptions or manuscripts in such a writing system are extant, and there is no known archaeological or linguistic evidence or any tradition for suspecting that such a writing system ever did exist—other than that tradition which followed the publication of The Book of Mormon in the 19th century," that is redundant and unwieldy; it adds no information, only innuendo by emphasis. If we can state things with a straight face, simply, factually, and without emphasis, I am fine with the facts. Tom - Talk 21:01, Dec 9, 2004 (UTC)

You see this a redundant, I see it as necessary. Writing systems simply do not generally leave a solitary specimen: they leave multiple exempla, and that is worth mentioning. They also may leave behind other archaeological or linguistic evidence of their existence (the various word forms of proto-Indoeuropean were all reconstructed from such evidence), and the existence or non-existence of this form of evidence is NOT redundant to the previous sentence. These things seem to me to be said with a straigh face, simply and factually. So the dispute here would be that you think they are over-emphasized, and I do not. - Nauvoo 00:18, 10 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Oh, p.s. I do think what V has said is important: "there are no non-Mormonism views on this subject, so why start off an article stating a convoluted issue of problems before someone understands what Mormonism purports it to be?" An encyclopedia is about "Knowledge" All human "knowledge". In scare quotes. Tom - Talk 21:06, Dec 9, 2004 (UTC)

As I said above, I find V's statement odd, as there are non-Mormon views on this subject. - Nauvoo 00:18, 10 Dec 2004 (UTC)

In thinking about it, you are right, Nauvoo. And this article needs to address that. I am going to work on some alternate incarnations at User:Hawstom/Chalkboard. I have one that is progressing well. I would appreciate your feedback, and I will try to come up with fresh approaches to help myself see this new ways. Tom - Talk 19:27, Dec 10, 2004 (UTC)

Arbitration

Nauvoo, what's the deal with deleting my consensus comment?

The deal is that if I deleted it, it was an accident.- Nauvoo 00:18, 10 Dec 2004 (UTC)

I'm adding back in, as it was likely a mistake. None of us think this needs to be a "faith promoting" article - I agree that that is not right, (and feel that we've been very careful about this) however, it needs to reflect, honestly, what it is. 'Honestly' no one cares outside of Mormonism about "reformed egyptian" and would not be offended by the Mormon (originating) point of view introducing the topic (faith-based versus physical facts). Nor am I trying to get involved in your dispute with Hawstom, but rather, trying to mediate a finality to this conflict.

Here is what was deleted by you:

Okay, we have two of the five main editors of this page in agreement to restructure. Tom? Nauvoo? COgden? How about it? Once we have a majority of three let's move forward and call it an consensus. -Visorstuff 23:40, 8 Dec 2004 (UTC)

I agree with Nauvoo that it isn't ideal, but I am okay with the idea. Tom - Talk 22:12, Dec 9, 2004 (UTC)

I realize you think this statement unfair based on your comments above. That is fine. We are not trying to gang up on you. But we don't see what the big deal is and the issues you have. It keep going on, and on, and on. Based on available content, there is not enough to state physical issues that you keep bringing up. Wikipedia is not a place to do primary research in this area, and I'm not aware of any research in the areas you are introducing fact from.

I've also pasted above the following:

I'm not sure how to respond to you on this. First, the common law example was showing that this is a common thought process. Second, There is frankly not enough evidence to have a hypothesis about "reformed egyptian." IT is faith-based, not fact-based, and this article in my opionion should reflect this. TO ME THIS IS THE POINT OF DISPUTE BETWEEN YOU AND HAWSTOM. You want to make it fact based (which there is little evidence for - no one disputes this), while Tom wants to reflect that this is a faith-based issue.

If this continues to go down this path, I think we'll need to put it up for arbitration. Obviously, the majority of editors on this page are in one camp (this is a faith-based topic), and you are in the other (trying to prove what physical fact there is). If no compromise is reached by mid-next week, I'll post the arbitration request, because this has gone on too long and is frankly ridiculous. I have offered my opinion, but you and Tom need to work this out before then. -Visorstuff

First step is mediation, actually. I do agree with your sentiment though. There are few enough of us here that we should be able to get consensus on the article, and I'm surprised at how difficult a dozen-word divide has become. I believe that Nauvoo's claims do have merit: we have clear disclaimers on fictional articles, which also go into great detail in their own context. Nauvoo wants to represent the view that rejects reformed Egyptian on empirical grounds. (To Nauvoo:) I honestly don't think a subheading for criticism is a bad idea. The introduction would naturally include material about how most non-Latter Day Saints do not believe there is any such writting system. Details (most of which are being fought over) would go into the new heading.

I also can't figure out why the divide between Nauvoo and Hawstorm is so great, and I would like Nauvoo to know that I'm honestly not trying to make this article into some sort of missionary tool. Nauvoo's status is not important, and doesn't make his arguments any less legitimate. Cool Hand Luke 21:53, 9 Dec 2004 (UTC)

I agree with what CHL is saying about Nauvoo's status. I hope he understands that with the little difficulty we have had arriving at an agreement, I merely thought it might be useful to try the approach of understanding better his POV. It sounds like I made you feel otherwise, Nauvoo. Please forgive me. Tom - Talk 22:12, Dec 9, 2004 (UTC)

Arbitration? Yikes! This is far from intractable, and there has never been an edit war. This is model Wikipedia community in action. I am sure Nauvoo and I can figure this out (Your occasional input to keep our sanity helps). I don't feel he is recalcitrant, and I would hope he would feel there is hope for me too. There is no bad behavior here at all from what I can see. There is only some honest attempting to learn to communicate better and understand better. Do you disagree? Is there some bad behavior going on? Tom - Talk 21:20, Dec 9, 2004 (UTC)

Sorry - I meant mediation from others outside our area - perhaps a posting to the village pump would be a nice next step instead - my bad on the terminology.

To your point below, Tom, I think we've taken too many "breaks" from this article and come back. This conflict (although handled quite peacefully and properly) needs an outside opinion to make a decision. It has gone on for too long and it not productive. Frankly, we need others to weigh in if both of you cannot agree on a solution. -Visorstuff 23:57, 9 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Brainstorming different approaches

I am thinking of alternate ways to approach this (these thought processes are useful in general, so, at least in my mind, this effort is not wasted solely on this article): Tom - Talk

1. Consider how we might approach articles on studies of the Plagues of Moses, the Flood of Noah, or the Virgin of Guadalupe. Tom - Talk 22:12, Dec 9, 2004 (UTC)

Or more closely other Mormonism articles:

There is no non-Mormon scientific, archeological, or linguistic support for the existence of _______________. Insert Curelom, Gadiantons, Lehi-Nephi, Zarahemla,Ammon (Book of Mormon), Captain Moroni, Coriantumr, Enos (Book of Mormon), Ether (Book of Mormon), Ishmael (Book of Mormon), Jaredite, Joseph (Book of Mormon), King Benjamin, King Noah, Laban (Book of Mormon), Laman, Lamanite, Lamoni, Lemuel, Limhi, Mahonri Moriancumer, Mosiah, Mulek, Nephite, Sam (Book of Mormon), Sariah, Zedekiah, Zeniff, Zoram, Abinadi, Alma the Elder, Alma the Younger, Helaman, Jacob (Book of Mormon), Jarom, Lehi (Book of Mormon), Mormon (prophet), Moroni (Mormonism), Nephi, Omni (Book of Mormon), Samuel the Lamanite. How does the current difficulty relate to these articles? Can we learn from them or apply any solution we arrive at to them? Tom - Talk 03:40, Dec 10, 2004 (UTC)

1. Select readings for each other from the Wikipedia documents and take a break for a month or more to read and absorb them for ideas. Tom - Talk 22:12, Dec 9, 2004 (UTC)
2. Get someone whose editing and NPOV skills we both admire - someone disinterested in the article and subject, but willing to make the effort to take a look and offer an opinion. - Nauvoo 00:18, 10 Dec 2004 (UTC)

• I have thought of a few people: Wesley (familiar with keeping us fair about the Mormonism subject), Rednblu (simply a creative thinker, does enjoy the process an awful lot), Cookiecaper (I know nothing about his skills, just another Mormon) Tom - Talk 03:33, Dec 10, 2004 (UTC)

I'm not really familiar with them. From the Arbcom elections (I'm thinking we will both know people running there) I'd trust the editing and judgment of User:Theresa knott, User:Ambi, and User:Hephaestos. How do you feel about any of them? - Nauvoo

Hmm. I would support any of those, but Ambi in particular as mediator. Cool Hand Luke 06:10, 10 Dec 2004 (UTC)

We're not talking about mediation, we're talking about asking for content and presentation advice. I'm assuming you also support them for that purpose? - Nauvoo 07:44, 10 Dec 2004 (UTC)

I'm not sure this is much different, and she is a mediator also, but: of course. Any of those three would give good outside advice, I think. Cool Hand Luke 08:04, 10 Dec 2004 (UTC)

1. At some point we need to archive this 87 KB page. - Nauvoo 00:18, 10 Dec 2004 (UTC)
2. Just so no one feels left out, there's a bit of a writng process going on at User:Hawstom/Chalkboard as well. - Nauvoo 07:17, 11 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Mediation? Arbitration?

I just wanted to pop in to thank everyone who is working on this article for the fine work. I don't think mediation or arbitration is even remotely needed here, just more ongoing discussion to try to find a compromise. I don't see anyone getting angry, and I see people on both sides of the issue working to find a common ground.

Usually when someone leaves a message on my talk page to please have a look at some dispute, I find a completely annoying situation in which both sides are bashing each other and the dialogue has degenerated into nonsense. Here, I see the opposite: people having a content disagreement but all willing to compromise, and most importantly, all in agreement on the broad principles of _getting it right_.

It might take some time, and some creative thinking, but this is the sort of thing that Wikipedia does better than any other encyclopedia -- does Britannica have 5 people carefully puzzling and agonizing over every single word, over the exact precise best way to put something? No, only Wikipedia does this, at this level of detail.

If I had to make a content recommendation, it would be for a brief summary introduction which introduces both the concept and a bit of the controversy, and then two sections, one on the beliefs of Mormons, and one on the beliefs of critics. But I'm not editing the article, and of course you are all in a better position to work it out.

Regarding the "redundant" sentence, it does seem to add some information not contained in the prior basic statement, but I wonder if as a compromise the two sentences might be rewritten somehow as one, i.e. to lessen the redundancy while still more firmly introducing the idea that the evidence is limited, something which I believe everyone agrees about?

Jimbo Wales 14:21, 10 Dec 2004 (UTC)

This is what I was looking for - Thanks - I agree with your suggested introduction, and sections and that strides are being made in the right direction - even though this has gone on for months. While I think we are too wrapped up in our own opinions to see clearly and creatively, I do think asking User:Wesley and User:Hephaestos to chime in may be a good thing as well. They are both trusted in matters of objectively looking at religous content. I would be comfortable with asking them to collaborate and edit the introduction and outline the article. We can fill in the details, but an outside POV would bring some balance. Thoughts? -Visorstuff 15:36, 10 Dec 2004 (UTC)

I know you are wearied, V. And from your suggestions and appeals to others, you are apparently at wit's end. But I don't think Nauvoo and I are the least bit angry with one another personally. I would be delighted to work with Nauvoo on any article. And I see that progress is being made here. That said, I wouldn't mind the input of User:Wesley. From my interpretation of the last summary of Nauvoo, I think the burden is on me to produce some wording that is satisfactory to Nauvoo. I propose that I keep trying new approaches for his comment. Patience and faith. Tom - Talk 19:24, Dec 10, 2004 (UTC)

Nauvoo (and Tom you just agreed) - you mention above that find it odd that I say that people outside the realm of Mormonism have no views on Reformed Egyptian. If that is not the case, and people outside of Mormonism have views, then either this article should be renamed "Reformed Egyptian (Mormonism)" (because this deals directly with subject from a Mormonism point of view) or we should add in those views from Liberia, Egypt, China, Argentina or whereever they come from - as the article stands right now, it deals with it from a purely Mormonism point of view (both pro and con). Who outside the realm of Mormonism (whether pro or anti-Mormon) care or have views? Where is the content that those who study Egyptian know of a "Reformed Egyptian" outside of Mormonism? Please note, I didn't say no Non-Mormons or Anti-Mormons have views, but outside of the realm of Mormonism would "reformed egyptian" warrant a Wikipedia entry? Please clarify as if there is another group outside the Latter Day Saint Movement that have mentioned or study a form of "reformed egyptian" then this drastically would change my personal view of this article. I'm open, just would like to understand this point better.

No, you are of course right. I didn't realize you were including Anti-Mormons in the mix. Of course this is solely a subject of Mormonism. Nauvoo may see it differently, and maybe he would like a separate article for general reformed Egyptian. Tom - Talk 20:12, Dec 10, 2004 (UTC)

Anyway, I'll let you two work it out - sorry if I seem frustrated, but taking this much time on the semantics of this article is counterproductive when there is so much other work to be done. I agree that it is important to get it right, but it is frustrating watching you two butt heads.

I understand. Tom - Talk 20:12, Dec 10, 2004 (UTC)

Incidentally, happy holidays, dunno if you are all taking off for the holidays - I'll be on and off for the next few weeks, but will have more ON time than OFF. -Visorstuff 19:57, 10 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Yes, best to everyone for Christmas. (Having just set up a intra intranet here, I'm actually amazed I can still use Wikipedia). But for anyone who takes a bit of time off, enjoy, there's really no urgency here, and we've gotten sever good suggestions so far that just need to be put into play!) -- Nauvoo 07:23, 11 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Is it possible? A solution? Merry Christmas!

This is from Nauvoo and Tom. Tom wrote the base, Nauvoo fixed it, and Tom agrees Nauvoo's fixes are king. Check it out, put it up front, and have a Merry Christmas. Tom - Talk 17:43, Dec 13, 2004 (UTC)

The Book of Mormon (a sacred text of Mormonism) says it was written with "reformed Egyptian" (Mormon 9:32) characters on "plates of ore" (1 Nephi 19:1) by Messianic Israelite prophets between 600 B.C. and 421 AD. Joseph Smith, Jr. (the founder of Mormonism), said that the last of those prophets appeared to him on September 21, 1821 in resurrected form, told him "gold plates" were "deposited" near his home, and commanded him to translate them. Smith published the Book of Mormon in 1830 as that translation. There is no consensus outside Mormoinsm that the Book of Mormon is a translated ancient record. But Mormons generally believe that the Book of Mormon was translated from ancient gold plates inscribed with reformed Egyptian characters.

Those who have examined the position critically (including several outright opponents of Mormonism, eg: [5]) have commented on the Book of Mormon's claim to have been written with reformed Egyptian characters. Because there is no archeaological, linguistic, or other evidence of the use of Egyptian writing in ancient America, they have suggested that the claims of the Book of Mormon regarding reformed Egyptian are implausible (or false). Mormon apologists have generally responded that 1) the Book of Mormon at least allows for, and possibly suggests, that reformed Egyptian writing was solely used for writing on sacred plates and 2) the choice of Egyptian for the scribal language of sacred plates is plausible in light of the statements in the Book of Mormon and the historic influence and development of Egyptian writing. In either case, even within Mormonism, studies of Book of Mormon reformed Egyptian are necessarily limited to to linguistic footprints in the translated text itself and a 7-line sample that may be the characters Joseph Smith and associates said was copied from the gold plates. Some Mormons, however, believe that the writing system may have existed in Mesoamerica outside The Book of Mormon, and that someday evidence that it did exist may one day be discovered.

Other than some grammar (use of a colon before "1)" ) and spelling changes (spelling "Mormoinsm" correctly as "Mormonism" in the second-to-last sentence in the first paragraph) and a suggestion to use the word "states" rather than "says" in the first sentence, I think this is ready for prime time again. Would suggest you put live and see how it stands up, and that both of you outreach to others outside of Mormonism to read over and make suggestions as well. Let's see how it works.

Thanks for your work on this - sorry I got so frustrated last week. -Visorstuff 18:51, 13 Dec 2004 (UTC)

No problem. I too, am seeing little edits that need to be made, but I would rather not edit the above. I would change the second sentence of the second paragraph from "they have suggested that the claims" to something like "some have suggested that the claims". I would change the redundancy in the last sentence to something like "and that evidence that it did exist may someday be discovered." I will definitely get Wesley over here eventually. And maybe Rednblu. p.s. It would be nice to standardize on the Book of Mormon or The Book of Mormon. I thought you told me to put the Book of Mormon, so that's what I tried to use, though you can see both appear in the above. Tom - Talk 19:53, Dec 13, 2004 (UTC)

Nauvoo, since it is my base, I feel more comfortable letting you put it live (sponsor it) with my and V's blessing. Tom - Talk 19:53, Dec 13, 2004 (UTC)

I've put it online, correcting the small things noted above, and hopefully without introducing any new errors! - Nauvoo 20:51, 18 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Bryant synopsis deletion

I think it is important to give a brief synopsis of what Bryant translates the Caractors dovument to say. If you don't like the synopsis given, could you please reword it to be more accurate? Alternately, perhaps you could tell how the rendition of the translation was biased. Meanwhile, I hope you don't mind if I restore the content. I hate to revert, but I don't know any other way to synopsize the translation attempt. Tom - Talk 21:17, Dec 10, 2004 (UTC)

Jan 2005 Tom Edits

I added a bunch of information. Note: I removed the statement that the authenticity of the Anthon Transcript is open to question. It would be much better to state here what the questions are if any. It just seemed in light of the new info I added it was a little lame to simple say "disputed". We need a little more substance or silence, I think. Tom H. 06:31, Jan 13, 2005 (UTC)

Dead Sea Scrolls

Which dead sea scrolls were of metal? Grye 05:35, 16 December 2005 (UTC)

The so-called Copper Scroll is apparently. --JGGardiner 05:47, 23 December 2005 (UTC)

Metal Books

What is the purpose of the section on metal books? I think that it is actually more about the Golden Plates than the writing itself. In this article, all that it does is suggest that Mormons have a tendency to be proven right despite scientific doubts. I find that somewhat POV. I think it is enough to say that some Mormons hope that evidence will be discovered; it doesn't need to say "Mormons 1 - Science 0". I do however believe that it belongs in the Golden Plates article or perhaps an article about metal books more generally. --JGGardiner 23:08, 6 January 2006 (UTC)

I've removed the info and placed it here for dicussion:

In fact, at the time of the publication of the Book of Mormon, most scholars considered the idea that ancient writing existed on metal plates, at all, preposterous, even though stories of gold, silver, copper and brass books existed in Masonic and Enoch legends. However, when more writing on metal plates was discovered, ranging from little-known works to well-known artifacts, such as the Copper Scroll which is a part of the Dead Sea Scrolls collection, to Sumerian and Cuniform texts on tin and brass pages, to gold Laminae funerary texts in Italy, the scholarly community had to admit it was wrong in that particular regard.

I agree with the point, I believe, however, the intent was from a earlier paragraph that said that R.E. was a writing method only for golden plates. The portion cut shows that religious books did exist on metal plates, and it duplicative to information at Archeaology and the Book of Mormon and Golden Plates. Perhaps there is another way to capture the intent? -Visorstuff 00:14, 7 January 2006 (UTC)

Thank you Visorstuff. I agree that there is a place for that in the article but not where it had been. However, as it is external to the Book of Mormon, I don’t think that it should be in the “Claims” section in the current form. If the purpose of the text is to describe a previous attempt to discredit R.E. by discrediting the Golden Plates themselves, that probably belongs in a history section or perhaps a skeptics section. I don’t think that this article is the proper place to discuss the authenticity of the plates; it should just say that as the Plates (and related samples) are the only example of R.E. that we have, doubters of them doubt R.E. The Plates can be defended on the Plates page. --JGGardiner 17:51, 9 January 2006 (UTC)

Reformed Egyptian studies

I modified text in Crowley’s study removing apologetics and retained the part referring to the article on Egyptian studies. Bryant’s translation section was edited and a link set to the material. Anything more and it would effectively endorse the translation which would be POV. I added Stan and Polly Johnson’s translation. RelHistBuff 10:01, 2 June 2006 (UTC)

I would prefer to see more about both the Bryant and the Johnson translations rather than less. -anon

Charators document study

Wondering if anyone has done or read a study on Anthon's letter? I was a bit suprized at this description by Anthon of the document provided by Harris to him:

This paper was in fact a singular scrawl. It consisted of all kinds of crooked characters disposed in columns, and had evidently been prepared by some person who had before him at the time a book containing various alphabets. Greek and Hebrew letters, crosses and flourishes, Roman letters inverted or placed sideways, were arranged in perpendicular columns, and the whole ended in a rude delineation of a circle divided into various compartments, decked with various strange marks, and evidently copied after the Mexican Calender given by Humboldt, but copied in such a way as not to betray the source whence it was derived. I am thus particular as to the contents of the paper, inasmuch as I have frequently conversed with my friends on the subject, since the Mormonite excitement began, and well remember that the paper contained any thing else but "Egyptian Hieroglyphics." [6]

A detailed look at his statement shows that he is confusing the charactors transcript with the hypocephalus. He met Michael chandler about the time this letter was published, and I would theorize that there is enough primary evidence from this and other statements he made (others more direct) that he seems to confuse the two documents. Interesting as Smith bought the mummies only a few months later. Small world, but his discription of the "crosses and flourishes, Roman letters inverted or placed sideways" and the "rude delineation of a circle divided into various compartments" is definitly describing a hypocephalus - whether the BOA one or a differing one from another era. -Visorstuff 16:43, 10 October 2006 (UTC)

Proposed Changes

I have information that will entail various changes in this page. Would anyone like to help\comment on these? They involve Martin Harris taking two documents to Professor Anthon, not one. (I have a reference for this. Times and Seasons, vol 3. pp.772-773.) They also involve two other sources for reformed Egyptian. (I have sources for these as well. You can see them at: http://www.reformed-egyptian.com/Sources.htm)This would change "and a seven-line sample that may be the characters Joseph Smith and associates said were copied from the gold plates." to include these sources. This would also change "If the so-called Anthon transcript is the actual piece of paper that Martin Harris took to Charles Anthon, it is safe to assume that the characters came from the text they were then translating (the 116 missing manuscript pages, which contained a record from the time of Lehi to the time of King Benjamin). Thus Ether should not be a logical source for the transcript's contents. [3]" because it would allow the possibility that the untranslated charactors could come from an\other part(s) of the Book of Mormon. I also like to talk about changing "It is unclear whether the Caractors document is the same as the one seen by Anthon. According to his account, the letters were definitely not "reformed Egyptian", and could in fact be identified as Greek, Hebrew, and Latin letters flipped around or turned on their sides.[1]" as it seems disingenuous. While it may be true that Professor Anthon said this. Writing it in the context of the article makes reformed Egyptian appear to be fake. -rlittlec 16:59, 20 December 2006

Hi rlittlec. Thanks for your note. Can you provide the Times and Seasons quote? I think we have to be somewhat careful with the changes as we are also dealing with Mark Hofmann forgeries when we deal with charactor documents. I think that Anthon's later comment (see my comments in the paragraph directly above) could be placed into context better, but should stay, as it gives a secondary viewpoint and balances the article from a completely LDS point of view (Mormons are often accused of censorship at Wikipedia for less than that). Other than those cautions, go for it. -Visorstuff 23:22, 20 December 2006 (UTC)

Visorstuff, I added a heading called "A Second Anthon Transcript" along with an internal link to a new article I created by the same name with the quote in it. I'll try to add two other articles with the two other sources for reformed egyptian in the near future. Comments are welcome. -Rlittlec 11:32, 28 December 2006

Thanks for adding the quote - I actually think the new article is a likely AfD candidate - there is little context and at first glance there is not a "first anthon transcript" article. I personally appreciate the effort, but think it would be a better section within the current article. I'm pasting the text below in case of it becoming a speedy delete candidate:

Common belief suggests that there was only one document which Martin Harris took to Charles Anthon. However, a close examination of the statement of Martin Harris From "Times and Seasons", Volume III, Page 773 will illustrate that there were actually two transcripts which were shown to Prof. Anthon. Here is that quote:

"I went to the city of New York and presented the characters which had been translated, with the translation thereof to Professor Anthony, a gentleman celebrated for his literary attainments;-Professor Anthony stated that the translation was correct, more so than any he had before seen translated from the Egyptian. I then showed him those which were not yet translated, and he said that they were Egyptian, Chaldeac, Assyriac, and Arabac [Arabic] , and he said that they were true characters. He gave me a certificate certifying to the people of Palmyra that they were true characters, and that the translation of such of them as had been translated was also correct."

The first transcript was of characters which had been translated and was accompanied by a translation. This is probably the document which Professor John Geesuggests came from the 116 pages which were lost. The second transcript contained charactors which had not yet been translated.

• Some Notes on the Anthon Transcript by John Gee (Ph.D. in Egyptology, Yale University.
  
• "Times and Seasons" quote

Categories: Book of Mormon studies | Religious language

Thanks for the initiative. I do think it needs more context - what the transcript is - IE when Smith wanted to share that he was translating the plates he gave Martin Harris....blah blah. needs the context. And then in historical context with the Hoffmann forgery - this was the specimin likely forged by Hoffmann, etc. Just my two cents. -Visorstuff 19:24, 28 December 2006 (UTC)

"reformed Egyptian"

I know this issue has been rehashed several times, but I think we're missing a fundamental point. "reformed Egyptian" is not necessarily a proper name in the Book of Mormon, notice the lower case "reformed," it's a descriptive term. The notion that "no scholar thinks reformed Egyptian is a real language" is completely false (and irrelevant). Look at Egyptian hieratic and demotic, Meroitic, Proto-Sinaitic, Byblos Syllabic, and Cretan... it's just completely false, several times cultures (especially ones separated by time/space/tradition) have taken languages and altered it for whatever reason (language evolves over time... look at old English), and there are numerous examples to this specifically happening to Egyptian, presumably due to it's wide influence. "reformed Egyptian" isn't mentioned until the end of the Book of Mormon, allegedly in 400 AD, one thousand years after they lost contact with the old world. The Book of Mormon states that their language was altered egyptian... I'm not sure why this false assumption (that "reformed Egyptian" is a specific language that presumably would exist outside of Mesoamerica if it were really true) gets any credence... gdavies 04:27, 17 February 2007 (UTC)

Removed POV, unsourced, unreasonable, illogical, false and irrelevant statement: "Outside of Mormonism, there are no scholars that recognize "Reformed Egyptian" as a real language. To date, nothing has been found to be written in Reformed Egyptian." gdavies 04:34, 17 February 2007 (UTC)

Also... this is minor, but not strictly true: "The Book of Mormon states that it was written with "reformed Egyptian" characters on plates of ore by Messianic Israelite prophets between 600 B.C. and A.D. 421." The Book of Mormon doesn't "state" that it was written by "Messianic Israelite" prophets... there is a general assumption that they were all Israelite, but this is likely not the case. Either way, the statement is not made... gdavies 04:34, 17 February 2007 (UTC)

This may be nitpicky, but the Book of Mormon also doesn't claim to be entirely written in "reformed Egyptian" (as the article now suggests). "reformed Egyptian" is only mentioned at the very end. Mormon abridged the Large Plates (presumably into "reformed Egyptian") but "attached" the small plates, which were written by Nephi. This section (1 Nephi through Omni) then would be written in Egyptian, unreformed. gdavies 04:34, 17 February 2007 (UTC)

Further, "The book also describes this language as consisting of the 'learning of the Jews and the language of the Egyptians'" Also, this is not strictly true, that was Nephi talking about his learning and his language, not what Mormon would have transcribed the Large Plates into... Nephi spoke Hebrew and read/wrote in Egyptian (as the reference stated), however, this language is not the language translated from after Omni (Mormon's abridgment), and it's use could conceivably have stopped before then. gdavies 04:37, 17 February 2007 (UTC)

another little bit of unsourced, POV, false, and irrelevant statement... "Because there is no known archaeological, linguistic, or other evidence of the use of Egyptian writing in ancient America, some have suggested that the claims of the Book of Mormon regarding reformed Egyptian are implausible." There are a variety of similarities that have been pointed out between Mayan and Egyptian society (um... the pyramids?!?!) including linguistic ones Jeff Lindsay points out Linda Miller Van Blerkom of the University of Colorado who showed that "Maya glyphs were used in the same six ways as those in Egyptian writing" ("A Comparison of Maya and Egyptian Hieroglyphics," Katunob 11 [11 Aug. 1979]: 1-8, as cited by Sorenson, 1993 p. 21). Also cited by Jeff Lindsay, Dr. Cyrus Gordon (not LDS) said that the "Bat Creek Inscription [in the US] is important because it is the first scientifically authenticated pre-Columbian text in an Old World script or language found in America; and, at that, in a flawless archaeological context. It proves that some Old World people not only could, but actually did, cross the Atlantic to America before the Vikings and Columbus.... The discredited pre-Columbian inscriptions in Old World scripts or languages will have to be reexamined and reevaluated, each on the merits of the evidence, case by case." gdavies 04:57, 17 February 2007 (UTC)

Haha, in last edit, reduce some POV, added citation request to statement I removed once... also, deleted this gem (apparently attempting to prove it unreasonable to not write in Hebrew, because of Hebrew's "compactness"): "The Twenty-third Psalm is only 55 characters long in Hebrew." A quick count, and there are well over 200 characters in the 23rd psalm... not as impressive as 55... There are some substantial claims made with questionable (or no) references, such as statements made in Howe's book. I'd like to see more reliable sourcing before these comments are made as unquestionable fact. gdavies 08:48, 18 February 2007 (UTC)

Sorry about the 55 characters in the 23rd Psalm. Serves me right for taking the word of an Internet source instead of counting. (Sounded awfully small, but hey....).

As for that first sentence that you asked for a citation: I tried hard to maneuver it around possible objections. It's accurate, of course, but if you can think of a more neutral way of communicating the information, I'll be glad to work with you.--John Foxe 19:35, 18 February 2007 (UTC)

Hey no worries. I'm glad you're willing to work with me on this one, my biggest problem with the way it is now is the implications it's making. The sentence as currently written implies that the "reformed" in "reformed Egyptian" is part of the name of a specific language, rather than a descriptive word. The way Mormon 9:32 is written is too ambiguously to make or act on either assumption ("which are called among us the reformed Egyptian). "the" may suggest it was a proper noun, while the lower case "r" may suggest that they are "the Egyptian" characters, but "reformed." As we've hammered out previously, there are hundreds of cases of Egyptian being reformed, and wording the sentence (as it is now) basically states "no non-LDS scholars believe there were reformed egyptian characters on the golden plates" (of course they don't believe this... or else they probably wouldn't be "non-Mormon" scholars) is kind of irrelevant, though correct, and is rather misleading in my eyes (it kind of sounds like they don't believe in the existence of reformed Egyptian, which of course they do... then it adds "on the plates like Smith said" to make it strictly true). Other correct, though possibly irrelevant and misleading statements might include "no non-LDS scholar has ruled out the possibility that reformed Egyptian characters were on the plates that Joseph Smith claimed to translate from," or "no non-LDS scholar has denied that Mayan hieroglyphs may have some root in Egyptian." I could be wrong on that last one, but I'm just pointing out that a sentence like this is a pain... a pain to cite, a pain to refute etc. that's why people who add material are responsible to add citations, rather than those who wish to remove them required to prove "that there aren't pink dinosaurs under the surface of the move". Instead of claiming that there's an implicit consensus among non-LDS scholars/linguists as to the validity of this argument (which it seems to me like there isn't), we could just state that "Skeptics of Smith's account of the Golden Plates (or) Some (or) Critics of the Book of Mormon have criticized the idea of "reformed Egyptian" being the source language for the Book of Mormon for a variety of reasons." Does that sound reasonable to you? gdavies 23:25, 18 February 2007 (UTC)

Palmer as a source

I'm very averse to using Palmer's works as sources for facts, but they can surely be used as sources for critical statements (Critics of Joseph Smith say...). One example of his faults... (and this is in the article currently) "No primary witness reported that Joseph used [the plates] in any way." Palmer, 4. Presumably he is referring just to the translation process (which he fails to point out), but his statement can be easily refuted either way. In the general "never used [at all]" sense, we could look at the statement of the three and the eight for starters, plus the dozens who claimed he translated the Book of Mormon from the Golden Plates. In the more specific sense, "never used [during the translation]," there are several instances that strongly indicate the contrary (I think we both agree on this point, I'll mention one example here, if more is really necessary I'll gather some quotes). Joseph's sister Catherine said that while she was dusting in the room where Joseph had been translating she "hefted those plates [which were covered with a cloth] and found them very heavy." What were the plates doing there if Smith didn't need them to translate? Why did he ever get them at all? Why weren't they out in the woods or delivered up at that point? I'm not doubting that (especially towards the end of the translation process) Smith might not have had the plates "on hand" every minute of the translation, but certainly this wasn't the case the whole time. The statement (as well as the footnote) needs to be rewritten to reflect this ambiguity and the fact that the plates might have been absent at certain times, though likely not the whole time. gdavies 00:16, 19 February 2007 (UTC)

Your comment about Catherine proves Palmer's point. No one ever saw Smith use those plates. Personally, I think Smith needed a material object to give some verisimilitude to his tall tale, but the whole business quickly got to be a bother, especially with so many people curious about what they looked like (and if gold, what they might be worth).--John Foxe 14:29, 19 February 2007 (UTC)

Well, unless you can prove your "I think"s, they're not welcome on the article's mainpage. That's not what Palmer said, he just said no one used them at all. How on earth can Catherine saying Smith used the plates to translate possibly prove the statement, "No primary witness reported that Joseph used [the plates] in any way."!! That's utterly and completely ridiculous. gdavies

If the plates were covered by a cloth, then Smith wasn't translating from them in the usual sense of the word "translate"; he wasn't looking at reformed Egyptian but at a stone in his hat.--John Foxe 22:09, 19 February 2007 (UTC)

Because the plates were in a cloth while Smith wasn't in the room and his sister was cleaning it?? That has no bearing as to the specific method he used (or didn't use) in translating the plates, except that they were in that room for some reason or another. If he didn't need them there, why didn't he just hide them far from his house so they wouldn't get stolen? The logic just doesn't make sense... Again, I'm not refuting that the plates might not have been present throughout the translation process, but certainly the citations we have now don't prove that they were "usually" not present. I'm rewording to reflect this distinction, and we can keep talking about Palmer as a source. We can pick him apart using Wikipedia's guidelines if you really think it's necessary, although I'd rather not... gdavies 08:31, 20 February 2007 (UTC)

To argue that Smith translated from the plates themselves, a primary source is necessary. It's speculation that because the plates were in the room when Smith's sister dusted that Smith must have used them. (I think this is a repeat of the U&T conversion we had, except in reverse.)

I got rid of another Palmer reference, having replaced it with primary sources.--John Foxe 20:13, 20 February 2007 (UTC)

Yeah, we've gone over this I believe. The David Whitmer reference already included seems to suffice that need, thanks for swapping the references. Funny how E. D. Howe managed to get such a convenient letter from Anthon... gdavies 08:02, 21 February 2007 (UTC)

Looking at the plates?

I'm suspicious of the source because at EMD 5: 76, Whitmer is quoted as saying, "He did not use the plates in the translation, but would hold the interpreters to his eyes and cover his face with a hat, excluding all light, and before his eyes would appear what seemed to be parchment, on which would appear the characters of the plates in a line at the top, and immediately below would appear the translation in English."--John Foxe 22:20, 21 February 2007 (UTC)

What, huh? That's why I put that the accounts vary. I provided the primary source as you requested. Remember, you were the one who first introduced the "David Whitmer Interviews" as a source, so you must have trusted the source then. What changed? It's not up to us to say which source is correct. Just because it disagrees with the source that supports your POV is not grounds for removal. If that were the case, I would be justified in removing the EMD quotes because I find them suspicious since they disagree with my sources. Unless you can show a NOR reason to mistrust the source, it should stay in. --FyzixFighter 22:35, 21 February 2007 (UTC)

You've given me a secondary source rather than a primary source. Please provide the primary reference so that I can check the context. The David Whitmer Interviews were probably here when I arrived. I would have used EMD.--John Foxe 22:46, 21 February 2007 (UTC)

Ah, I see what you're asking for, similar to how you've listed the EMD cites - I'll hunt down the full citation then. And yes, you were the one that included it first [7]. --FyzixFighter 23:02, 21 February 2007 (UTC)

Sorry, a cut-and-paste from another article with a little too much paste.--John Foxe 23:07, 21 February 2007 (UTC)

Okay, got the full citation in there. I suddenly realize that I need to go back and check if it is a direct quote from Whitmer or a paraphrase of his statement. Likewise we should check on that other Whitmer statement (the custodian angel) whether it's a quote or paraphrase. I think we should also replace Morse's comments with Emma's description as Morse makes no claim as to whether or not the plates were present whereas Emma places them on the table in a a linen tablecloth, and Emma's account preserves the peering into the hat process. This way all the main accounts (though I'm probably missing one at the moment) are accounted for: 1) plates covered on table, looking into hat 2) plates not present, looking into hat 3) plates present, U&T as spectacles looking at plates. We might also add in something about how Smith may have copied/claimed to have copied the engravings and used the copied characters during the dictation. Isaac Hale's comments seem to intimate that this may have been what happened (EMD 4:286), and I seem to remember reading a similar, more explicit description along these lines but I'll have to go back and check. --FyzixFighter 01:04, 22 February 2007 (UTC)

Um, John, you removed the comment again, this time without saying why. Since I've provided the citation that you wanted, I'm at a loss to understand why you did this. --FyzixFighter 18:55, 23 February 2007 (UTC)

Note about the Anthon Trasncript

The text of this note reads:

"Anthon's report of the transcript is that it 'consisted of all kinds of crooked characters disposed in columns, and had evidently been prepared by some person who had before him at the time a book containing various alphabets. Greek and Hebrew letters, crosses and flourishes, Roman letters inverted or placed sideways, were arranged in perpendicular columns, and the whole ended in a rude delineation of a circle divided into various compartments, decked with various strange marks, and evidently copied after the Mexican Calender given by Humboldt, but copied in such a way as not to betray the source whence it was derived. I am thus particular as to the contents of the paper, inasmuch as I have frequently conversed with my friends on the subject, since the Mormonite excitement began, and well remember that the paper contained any thing else but 'Egyptian Hieroglyphics.Charles Anthon to E. D. Howe, February 17, 1834, in EMD, 4: 380. If Anthon's memory is correct, this example could not have been the same as the "Caractors" document."

I'm very concerned about this statement/it's placement and its interpretation. "this could not have been the same." I think we're just scratching the surface with this issue, and we need to avoid original research, in the form of interpreting and making assumptions. Of the top of my head, I know there are other interpretations to this situation. One that I've heard from several sources is the idea that, because very little was known about Egyptian at the time (hadn't been cracked yet), Anthon might have been embarrassed afterwards for making statements beyond the scope of his knowledge, and wanted to avoid the ridicule of his academic peers for making such a statement as was allegedly written on the certificate. Also, he didn't say that they were "Egyptian Hieroglyphics" according to the JS-H account any time, but rather that "... they were Egyptian, Chaldaic, Assyriac, and Arabic; and he said they were true characters." This doesn't seem to imply that they were hieroglyphs, but that he thought they were comparative to this language family (semitic and Egyptian). Then it looks like he kind of oversteps the bounds of his expertise by claiming that "the translation was correct, more so than any he had before seen translated from the Egyptian." His later statement, from a letter to E.D. Howe (some red flags should shoot up there) and compiled by good ole Vogel if I recall correctly, seems contrived to me, seems like he's trying to do "damage control" for something he didn't really say. This could be a useful part of the article, but it doesn't seem to support the point it is sourcing, and I'm not sure the source is completely credible. gdavies 02:22, 22 February 2007 (UTC)

We really should put a synopsis of the two accounts of the Anthon visit side by side, or rather one after another. I do think John did I good job of paring the Anthon quote down to its essentials with regards to the reformed Egyptian. The same could be done with the LDS account. I have no objections to the content of the last sentence. It probably could be written to say simply that the "Caractors" document and Anthon description of the symbols do not match, thus not taking sides on whose account is true or if the "Caractors" document is authentic. --FyzixFighter 04:46, 22 February 2007 (UTC)

I think that it's an interpretation, and not the only one. A qualifier like "seems" or "might not be" etc. seems like it might be in order (hehe). gdavies 06:50, 22 February 2007 (UTC)

Anthon/Harris meeting

It is important to include both men's account of the meeting, however, I do not know for sure that the account attributed to Harris in JS-H can be truthful since it was not printed by Harris and is attributed to him by the writer of JS-H (who was not necessarily Smith). This can be deduced by viewing non-LDS Mormon sources which do not necessarily agree with much of the JS-H account at other points. Harris was also not a member of the church at that time so we cannot know that he had control over what his quoted statement in JS-H said.

Despite all this, however, it is important for fairness that both the official LDS and Anthon accounts are not relegated to footnotes.

In order for Wikipedia to remain credible as a resource, it is also important that the majority view of Smith's claims about reformed Egyptian be given proper respect. All non-mormon anthropologists, linguists, and historians do not believe reformed Egyptian existed, therefore, it is important to place RE in its proper historical context. Deleting important historical context about Champollion and Smith's other translation work, the Book of Abraham, does not keep Wikipedia credible in academia.

I agree that we need to maintain the integrity of Wikipedia, but claiming that there's a majority view that reformed Egyptian does not exist is just false. It's absolutely not true. Unfortunately, the "majority view" is really "reformed Egyptian? What? who cares!" (ie the majority of people don't care, there isn't a "majority view" that so many talk about). Most "anthropologists, linguists, and historians" have obviously conceded that languages are changed and evolve over time, especially with isolation from others (as the Book of Mormon describes). This isolation coupled with contact with outside cultures as well as hundreds of years has resulted in dozens of "reformed Egyptian" languages as mentioned above. gdavies 06:55, 22 February 2007 (UTC)

(after edit conflict with gdavies) IMHO, it would be better to have something that is easier to trace to Harris on his account of the meeting. I'll rummage through some the sources I have immediately at hand. Hey John, anything in EMD on that? As to the point about the historical context and the implications, I see the majority of that as OR without a reference to some other scholar who has already noted and synthesized an analysis along those roads. For me it's not a question of NPOV as much one of NOR. I also disagree with the inclusion of the Book of Abraham inferences, especially without a reference to who the critics are; there is nothing that says the papyri were in reformed Egyptian, so any connection smells of OR and seems irrelevant to me as this is about reformed Egyptian, more specifically the Anthon script (the subheading). --FyzixFighter 07:01, 22 February 2007 (UTC)

Anyone who studies ancient languages of the new world or the ancient middle eastern languages as a profession has heard about the idea of the Book of Mormon in some form. They may not have heard of the concept of RE specifically but they have heard (and rejected) the idea of the BOM being a scientifically valid document. Therefore, if Wikipedia is to be valid in an academic setting, it is important that the scientific consensus not be relegated to a footnote because it happens to conflict with a particular religious viewpoint. That is a violation of NPOV.

The Book of Abraham is eminently relevant to this discussion since no one denies it was written in ancient Egyptian. Smith claimed that the Book of Mormon was likewise written in ancient Egyptian. The two books are completely linked. Either Smith translated both from source documents or he fabricated his translations. In order for this article to be objective, it needs this information. Providing the link to the BOA article is not OR. It allows the reader to both realize this controversy exists and allows them to decide what to think about it. Removing it is restricting choice and a violation of NPOV.

I could make the case that reformed Egyptian studies should not be in this article as linguistic analysis through translation is an extremely problematic hermeneutical concept. In the interest of comity, however, I have not removed it from the entry. In that spirit, I would request that others not remove BOA material.--Vardok 07:44, 22 February 2007 (UTC)

No one claims the Book of Abraham wasn't written in Portuguese either... (enough on that I think you get my point) I'm not sure about the link, I don't have an opinion either way as long as we're not implying anything ("click here for more on why Mormon's are wrong, etc."). My concern is that you seem to have, along with several of those who disagree with the LDS church, the false impression that there is a scientific consensus about the Book of Mormon/Mormonism in general and that the consensus is that the Book of Mormon is a forgery. This isn't the case. There are many and varied explanations as to the origins of the Book of Mormon, and all are equally incredible. It seems to be an anomaly, most easily dismissed by those who don't put forth the time to honestly investigate it. Surely you can quote a linguist ("anyone who studies ancient languages... as a profession") who says the idea that there is a connection between old world and new world language is impossible. In fact, I (respectfully) defy you to show me such a reference. Unfortunately for this debate, no responsible linguist is going to make a comment regarding the Book of Mormon's authenticity because they realize they don't have the information to comment. Quite frankly, the vast majority of non-Mormon scholars don't care and consequently don't expend the effort. However, textual analysis (of the source used to convict criminals by linking letters for common authorship) has proved that different books were written by different people (as the Book of Mormon claimed) and there are several "evidences" that have not been adequately "explained" by the non-Mormon community. This isn't the place to discuss these, but the fact is there are plenty of languages that fall under the descriptive category of "reformed Egyptian." gdavies 08:10, 22 February 2007 (UTC)

You seem to be operating under the idea that so-called word-print analysis of the BOM proves it. It absolutely doesn't. Forensic document experts never vouch for a document when they cannot see the source, therefore any hermeneutic analysis is invalid right from the get-go. I notice you accuse me of siding with "those who disagree with the LDS church," while not admitting that you agree with it. I believe the idea of having kind of hermeneutic statements in the article is unnecessary and completely unscientific. The reason you do not see non-LDS academics routinely commenting on the Book of Mormon is because it does not even enter into their mind to take it seriously. They have heard of it but dismiss it outright.

As I said above, though, I am willing to have that kind of information in the article because it is relevant historical sense, if not a scientific sense. The old Smithsonian response (before they were pressured to remove it) contained such statements denying the idea of Old World languages being found in the New. As a fairness gesture, you should be willing to allow information about non-Mormon scholars' skepticism about Smith's claims.--Vardok 08:43, 22 February 2007 (UTC)

Claims of Consensus

After reviewing WP:Reliable Sources, I'm very leery of the sentence recently introduced to the end of the introduction:

"While Latter Day Saints believe that the Book of Mormon originated from these plates, no scholar outside of the movement believes such a writing system existed as no instances of any type of Egyptian writing have ever been discovered in the archaeological record of the Western hemisphere."

This sentence, by it's format, is basically impossible to adequately cite. It implies a consensus that isn't provable except by a poll of an ambiguous party who allegedly holds this view "scholar[s] outside of the [LDS] movement." We need to reword this sentence to something more concise and factual, such as "Critics don't believe/agree with this belief because..." or something of that nature. The issue of religioustolerance.com as a source has been hotly debated in the past (due to a variety of scholarly concerns), but it is often useful as an example of a critical source ("Critics of the LDS movement believe..." cited to RT.com). From WP:Reliable Sources:

Just as underlying facts must be sourced, claims of consensus [and I add, negative or positive] must be sourced in the presence of differences of opinion. Claims that "most" or "all" scientists, scholars, ministers (or rabbis or imams etc.) of a religious denomination, voters, etc. hold a view require sourcing, particularly on matters that are subject to dispute. In the absence of a reliable source of consensus or majority view [in another section defined as polls, etc.], opinions should be identified as those of the sources.

Rewording should be adequate to cover these concerns... as an aside, I think it's definitely time to archive this talk page... perhaps up until "Metal Plates," anyone else agree? gdavies 08:37, 22 February 2007 (UTC)

Your statement about ReligiousTolerance.org applies equally as well to anything written by FARMS, Shirts, Lindsay, et al. All of these sources admit to having an agenda and that agenda is to "defend the faith." Your claim of disbelief in scholarly consensus about RE fails by virtue of the 1996 Smithsonian statement which was never retracted. By trying to phrase everything as "critics say" you are obfuscating the reality that there isn't a single non-Mormon archeologist, linguist or anthropology who believes in RE, the BOM, or the BOA. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Vardok (talk • contribs) 08:50, 22 February 2007 (UTC).

I agree that religioustolerance.org is on equal footing (in some cases) with JeffLindsay, and therefore I don't cite to either website. However, I often find JeffLindsay useful as a pointer to scholarly works (I haven't used religioustolerance for this purpose at all because they often source out of context to support sensational claims, etc.) From religioustolerance's website, it's invariably obvious that they are not (nor do they claim to be) experts in the field that they so persistently delve into. The most educated has a PhD, though it's in Urban planning, there's an engineer, a nurse, etc. but no scholars of Religion, linguistics, archeology, genetics or Mesoamerican historians. I'd recommend looking around FARMS website, specifically at the authors and the qualifications of the authors. Knowing some of these writers personally I can attest to their individual scholarly qualifications. They've often been the biggest critics of Mormon cultural beliefs, and strongly back up anything they say. I'd recommend reading any of their articles, very interesting and well sourced. Putting these websites all in one category is (although humorous) rather naive.

As to the Smithsonian statement, this has been pointlessly rehashed over and over. From reading it and looking over the context it seems evident that it was a slipshod "throw it together" document to send to persistent inquiries as to their using the Book of Mormon as an archaeological guide (embarrassing to them, it seems they really wanted to send the opposite message). As to the validity of their claims, we have to bear in mind that this is an eleven year old document and several of their points have been contradicted by more recent research. It seems to represent the encompassing idea that pre-columbian contact with the New World was very limited or nonexistent, but emerging research (from reputable non-LDS sources) is beginning to turn this idea on its head. Although it's true they haven't come out and "retracted" the 1996 statement (which would be equal to saying, "yes, the mormon's are right, we're wrong) they did stop sending it about 5 years ago if I remember right, and now they send a form letter merely stating that they "ha[ve] never used it in archeological research, and any information that you have received to the contrary is incorrect." Apparently they recognized that what they were saying did not have the necessary teeth behind it (as said before, very little has been done by the non-LDS scholarly community in regards to Book of Mormon studies), and that more research needs to be done before a scholarly judgment on the historicity of the Book of Mormon can be responsibly made. In all, it's really here nor there, the "claims of consensus" policy of wikipedia (cited above) argues strongly against the language that has popped up here and there in the last few weeks, and we'd all do well to avoid statements that are impossible to source (ie "All Scholars/No reputable non-LDS scholar/everybody knows..." etc.). gdavies 23:25, 22 February 2007 (UTC)

Removed last sentance from lede

I removed:

"While Latter Day Saints believe that the Book of Mormon originated from these plates, no scholar outside of the movement believes such a writing system existed as no instances of any type of Egyptian writing have ever been discovered in the archaeological record of the Western hemisphere."

First, this conflates the existance of a "reformed Egyptian" (Hebrew in Egyptian writing, with some possible other linguistic modifications) with the New World archaeology issues. Certainly when taken as a whole, these issues are conflated. However, they are seperate concerns when taken academically. (Was Hebrew written in Egyptian and especially a modified Egytian? Is there evidence of of Egyptian or other Semitic writing or language in the New World?) There is ample evidence of Hebrew being written using Egyptian glyphs, but this removed sentance would imply otherwise. Also, there is some (often controversial) evidence of Semitic language in the New World, which this sentance would also imply does not exist. The sentance I replaced it with is less problematic, but still needs work to avoid such misconceptions. Thoughts? Vassyana 00:22, 23 February 2007 (UTC)

I agree, I didn't know where to go with the sentence or else I would have edited myself. Your edit, as you said, is still slightly problematic: "The existance and likelihood of a "reformed Egyptian" langugage or script is strongly contested." I don't think there is any serious contest regarding the existence of modified Egyptian, scripts... several of which I've named earlier. Perhaps some sort of reference to the New world (though possibly just as problematic) or a general statement would be better. Since this is an intro, and there isn't really room to discuss specific critical arguments, we could just state that "Critics of the LDS movement/the Book of Mormon/the Golden Plates/Joseph Smith Jr. (etc.) question the idea of "reformed Egyptian" in Mesoamerica for a variety of reasons." I think this statement is easy to source, factual though NPOV, and provides for more in depth information later on and maintains the integrity of the point. gdavies 01:32, 23 February 2007 (UTC)

I actually prefer Vassyana's sentence as it doesn't categorize who is on which side of the boundary yet. People are generally going to fall into several categories on this issue: LDS movement people who think RE is real, LDS movement people who don't (iirc, CoC believe the book is inspired but not necessarily historic), non-LDS who think it never exist, and non-LDS who have no opinion or don't care. There is one thing I would add: "...of a "reformed Egyptian" language or script as described in the Book of Mormon is strongly..." since most of the contestation is with regards to Book of Mormon RE. --FyzixFighter 23:57, 23 February 2007 (UTC)

I think that it is very necessary to categorize who is actually contesting this, as that distinction is inextricably connected with this argument. This isn't an argument made by the Church of Christ, even if they don't see it as strictly historical (perhaps it isn't made in an effort to "refute" the Church of Christ), so it's okay to state that the idea is questioned by those critical of "x" (I'm not set on what "x" should be, perhaps "The Book of Mormon's claim that it was written in reformed Egyptian," unwieldy, I know, but that's the idea I'm trying to put across). I like Vassyana's sentence as well, except that it's general to the point of being infactual: "The existance and likelihood of a "reformed Egyptian" langugage or script is strongly contested." There actually is not scholarly debate on this point, it's certainly not "strongly contested." The only people who criticize the existence of reformed Egyptian are those who misinterpret the Book of Mormon account (mistake "reformed," the adjective for "Reformed" the proper noun), context, history, implications, etc. and have no knowledge of Near Eastern languages (and several other groups). Your proposed addition, "as described in the Book of Mormon" would provide useful context, but I think that would bring back the original problem that brought about Vassyanna's sentence in the first place, we're conflating two separate issues (reformed Egyptian and the historicity of the Book of Mormon). Of course, those who don't believe in the Book of Mormon aren't going to believe in just about anything "described in the Book of Mormon," and so the point is kind of blurred. What about putting "Those who dispute the historicity of the Book of Mormon" in place of Critics? Hopefully that's a good compromise? gdavies 00:32, 24 February 2007 (UTC)

As I said in edit summary Foxe, it's not my responsibility to prove something false in order to remove it (I couldn't put in the statement "reformed Egyptian is spoken by 95% of people with indian blood, and they all talk about Mormon, Moroni, Nephi, Teancum and others") Sentences don't need to be disproven in order to be removed. All users are responsible to support their own edits with sources. I reworded the sentence to be more clear, as expressed above, the sentence you inserted is combining two separate ideas and is very misleading in the process. gdavies 22:35, 23 February 2007 (UTC)

Added two other sources of reformed Egyptian

the Kirtland Egyptian papers[17] and one other entry[18] The second is a picture of page 102 found in "Title:Meet Dr. Frederick Granger Williams ... and his wife Rebecca Swain Williams ... Read their true story in the first introduction - After one hundred years! : Williams, Clemens Nancy: 1951, Independence, Mo., Zion's Printing & Publishing Company" The book is being shipped to me so I'll put in more of a descripter when I get it.rlittlec 01:02, 23 February 2007

awesome... however, I do think we need to stress that the origin of these papers is questionable, and that they very well might not be fully the work of Joseph Smith (Phelps appears to have taken a major role). I found this article interesting from FARMS, The Meaning of The Kirtland Egyptian Papers. I'm very ignorant in this area though... gdavies 07:50, 23 February 2007 (UTC)

My only problem with these two sources are that they are not identified as reformed Egyptian. The Kirtland Egyptian Papers are only identified as Egyptian characters and come from several years after the publication of the Book of Mormon. For both this and the other image that is referenced, we need sources that show people believe these to be reformed Egyptian. --FyzixFighter 18:49, 23 February 2007 (UTC)

FyzixFighter, Here are quotes from one my sources: "After 100 Years", Nancy C Williams, pp 101-102. Picture across from p. 102.

After the dedicatory prayer, singing and administration of the Lords Supper, Don Carlos Smith and President Cowdery arouse and bore their testimonies. President Williams then arose and testified that while President Rigdon was making his first prayer an angel entered the window and took his seat between Father Smith and himself and remained there during the prayer.⁴ Heber C. Kimball related it thus: "During the ceremonies of the dedication an angel appeared and sat near Joseph Smith Sen., and Frederick G. Williams, so that they had a fair view of his person. He was tall, had black eyes and white hair and stooped shoulders and his garment was whole, extending to near his ankles, on his feet he had sandals. He was sent as a messenger to accept of the dedication. ⁵ Frederick had in his pocket a piece of paper which he carried to take notes on. On this he wrote in pencil: "John the Beloved"--then a space followed and a few lines written in another language.(Bold Added RL) A large space followed and then at the bottom of the page he wrote the following revelation: "The course that Lehi traveled from the city of Jerusalem to the place where he and his family took ship: They traveled nearly south, southeast direction until they came to the nineteenth degree of north latitude. Then nearly east to the Sea of Arabia; then south, southeast direction and landed on the continent of South America in Chili, thirty degrees south latitude." Returning home, he transcribed the revelation in ink on another sheet of paper. Rebecca kept these papers with his other notes until her death. Their son, Ezra, loaned them to the Church Historians Office in Salt Lake City in the 1860's where they have lain these many years, known only to historians, to be brought to light and published for the first time. ^5a "After 100 Years", Nancy C Williams, pp 101-102.

⁴ History of the Church. Vol. II, p. 427
⁵ Whitney's Life of Heber C. Kimball, p. 103.
^5a The original, written in pencil was shown to the author by a Historian, in the early 1930's and was the only one she had seen until February 29, 1949, when she was shown the film and the letter from which it was taken-- (My Bold again) and received with others a wonderful manifestation that it was indeed a revelation given to Frederick G. Williams for his and his family. The original, written in pencil, cannot be found at this meeting.

I don't think we need to fall into the trap that someone actually has to say exactly that something is reformed Egyptian in order for it to be so. Perhaps the most compelling testimony that they are reformed Egyptian Charactors is "Characters on the book of Mormon"--a sub heading written by Frederick G Williams within the picture itself. It also has the translations for those charactors, "Book of Mormon" and "Interpreters of Languages".Rlittlec 22:53, 25 March 2007 (UTC)

Removed interpretation

This was the first time I'd heard the theory that Lehi's group "brought" a form of Egyptian (such as demotic or hieratic) that was already "reformed," and so I began to supplement this with the far more common theory that the language evolved over the thousand years between when Nephi said he was taught "after the... language of the Egyptians" and when Mormon said he was writing in a "reformed Egyptian." I found a citation for this theory, and then realized it was the same article cited to this sentence (which I edited a little before hiding):

"Other LDS scholars note that other languages evolved from Egyptian through the centuries and some have speculated that the term "reformed Egyptian" might refer to a form of Egyptian writing known as hieratic, a priestly shorthand for hieroglyphics thousands of years old by the first millennium B.C., or early demotic, a derivative of hieratic, perhaps used in northern Egypt fifty years before the time that the Book of Mormon prophet-patriarch Lehi is said to have left Jerusalem for the Americas.(ref)See William J. Hamblin, Egyptian(/ref) Nevertheless, the Book of Mormon states that no other people knew the language of Moroni's civilization, and demotic or hieratic were understood and used for centuries in Egypt."

This article absolutely does not suggest this theory (I skimmed it twice, it's a very short article)... perhaps it was misinterpreted for naming off a whole bunch of "reformed Egyptian" languages in an effort to demonstrate that this language evolution is commonplace. This may very well be a theory held by some, but certainly not by Hamblin, we'll need another citation to include it... the theory doesn't make nearly as much sense as that suggested by the Book of Mormon account itself (evolved from regular Egyptian). gdavies 19:24, 23 February 2007 (UTC)