Abraham and the “Promises” of the Temple—Part 1
- Stephen Fluckiger
- 24 minutes ago
- 14 min read
“Abraham . . . abode in my law; as Isaac also and Jacob did none other things than that which they were commanded; and because they did none other things than that which they were commanded, they have entered into their exaltation, according to the promises, and sit upon thrones, and are not angels but are gods” (D&C 132:37).
Abraham and Sarah are two of the most important figures in all our standard works. Much of what we know about them comes from the Book of Abraham. Described as “the father of the faithful” (D&C 138:41),[1] we turn to Abraham’s ministry (and its temple-related features) barely six weeks into our 2026 Come Follow Me “home-centered” and “Church-supported” gospel study (and a mere three lessons in a new assignment as a Gospel Doctrine teacher).
Thus, from my last blog about the temple themes Joseph and Oliver Cowdery were introduced to in their translation and transcription of 3 Nephi in April 1829 in Harmony, Pennsylvania, we fast forward six years to July 1835 in Kirtland, Ohio. Because of the complexity of the story and its relevance to God’s on-going efforts to tutor the Prophet Joseph Smith in all things temple related, this “blog” will be divided into four parts:
1. How did we get the Book of Abraham?
2. What was in the Egyptian papyri and how did Joseph translate them?
3. What do we learn about Abraham and Sarah from the Book of Abraham?
4. What do we learn about the temple from this revelation?
How did the Egyptian Papyri come into the Prophet’s possession? Through a series of “miraculous” events that now have been extensively documented, which many early and current members of the Church (including myself) attribute to divine oversight,[2] 11 Egyptian mummies and associated papyri travelled from Thebes, Egypt, to Trieste, Italy to New York City.[3] There Michael Chandler, as agent for a group of interested individuals, purchased them and began exhibiting them in various cities around the United States.
After two years on the road, during which he sold seven of the mummies, Chandler’s mummy show reached Kirtland, Ohio”[4] in “late June or early July 1835.” Having heard of Joseph’s notoriety as a translator, Chandler came to Kirtland to “see if [Joseph] wanted to purchase”[5] the four remaining mummies.
When did Joseph Smith translate the Egyptian Papyri? “Upon seeing the papyri,” Kerry Muhlestein reports, Joseph “wanted to have some time to study them more closely.”
Oliver Cowdery and John Riggs, whose father hosted Chandler during his visit to Kirtland, recalled the details of what happened next differently. In reconciling the somewhat disparate accounts, Muhlestein suggests that the morning after Chandler’s arrival, July 4, 1835, after seeing the papyri, the Prophet had Oliver Cowdery copy several lines from the papyri.
At the same time Joseph Smith translated some of them. Chandler attested that he was impressed with the translation. Father Riggs vouched that Joseph Smith could be trusted, and Chandler allowed the Prophet to take at least some of the papyri home. Apparently, through inspiration, Joseph Smith translated part of the papyri so that the next day, when he returned the ancient writings, Oliver Cowdery was able to read from the leaves—or pages of the translation. [According to Muhlestein,] the Prophet . . . worked diligently the prior evening to produce several pages of translation.[6]
Chandler apparently compared Joseph’s translation with what “experts” (including Charles Anthon) had told him about the characters in the papyri (even though such experts at the time would not have been able “to translate much”). Chandler was sufficiently impressed that “he created an affidavit attesting that, as far as he could tell in comparing the notes of scholars and those of Smith, there was agreement between the two.”[7]
William W. Phelps wrote to his wife that from his first examination of the papyri, the Prophet “knew what they were and said they, the ‘rolls of papyrus,’ contained the sacred record kept of Joseph in Pharaoh’s Court in Egypt, and the teachings of Father Abraham.”[8] This confirmation of the Prophet’s gift of translation, together with Joseph’s enthusiasm for what the papyri represented, “created a small stir in Kirtland that July.”[9]
“Shortly after Chandler produced the certificate, Joseph Smith and others purchased the mummies and papyri for $2,400.”[10]
Scholars who have looked at the historical record have argued “that Joseph translated at least through Abraham 5 [the end of our current Book of Abraham] by the end of 1835 and then heavily edited [chapters 3, 4 and 5] in 1842 to reflect more fully both his Hebrew learning and any fuller understanding of the gospel he had developed since his 1835 translation.”[11] No translation appears to have been done between late 1835 and early 1842.[12]
After escaping from Liberty Jail in 1839 and settling in a new home in Illinois, Joseph hoped to find time to “engage, more particularly, in the spiritual welfare of the Saints & also, to the translating of the Egyptian Records.”[13] However, it was not until March 1842 that Joseph reported that he was finally “busily engaged in Translating.” Such “translation,” however, some scholars suggest, may have consisted mostly of revising revelation he had previously received (whether committed to writing or not is unclear)[14] to render certain phrases in a way that was more consistent with what he had learned about the ideas expressed in such phrases during his study of Hebrew from the end of 1835 and beginning of 1836 (for example, that the word Eloheim in Hebrew is plural, which is consistent with Abraham’s account of the creation being carried out by “the Gods”).[15]
Unfortunately, the manuscript history of the Book of Abraham does not definitively tell us when God revealed to Joseph Smith the content of Abraham’s writings. In their effort to reconstruct a timeline for the translation of the Book of Abraham, Kerry Muhlestein and Megan Hansen noted that “three manuscripts created in 1835 still survive, along with one that was begun in 1835 but finished in 1842. None are the original translation manuscript, none are the same, and none of the 1835 documents go past Abraham 2:18.”[16]
The Book of Abraham was initially published in the March 1 and 15, 1842 issues of the Times and Seasons,[17] with Facsimile 3 being published on March 16.[18] Before the publication of the second installment of the Book of Abraham on March 15, the JSP editors note, Willard Richards created a copy of one of the Kirtland-era Book of Abraham manuscripts (what is now Abraham 1:1–2:18) and apparently acted as scribe for the creation of an additional Book of Abraham manuscript (the remainder of the extant text) and the extant explanations of the vignettes that were published as Facsimiles 1, 2, and 3.”[19]
That Richards acted “as scribe for the creation of an additional Book of Abraham manuscript” does not necessarily contradict the argument by scholars that Joseph had translated Abraham 2:18 through the end of Abraham 5 in 1835. Rather, Willard Richards, in whose handwriting the Nauvoo-era manuscript is written, may have been transcribing as Joseph Smith “read from [his earlier translation in] the Kirtland-era manuscript, making occasional changes.”[20]
Joseph Smith intended to “to furnish . . . further extracts from the Book of Abraham,” but never did.[21] One scholar concluded, however, that these three installments “included [only] about one quarter of what Joseph Smith translated. Unfortunately, the location of the original manuscripts of his translation is presently unknown and thus about three quarters of Joseph Smith’s translation of the Book of Abraham is lost.”[22]
[1] February 16–22: “To Be a Greater Follower of Righteousness”: Genesis 12–17; Abraham 1–2, Come, Follow Me—For Home and Church: Old Testament 2026, https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/manual/come-follow-me-for-home-and-church-old-testament-2026/08?lang=eng. [2] Richard D. Draper’s characterization of the coming forth of the Book of Abraham seems apt: “God was directing history to His ends.” Richard D Draper, S. Kent Brown, and Michael D. Rhodes. The Pearl of Great Price: A Verse-by-Verse Commentary (Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 2005), 5. [3] H. Donl Peterson, The Story of the Book of Abraham: Mummies, Manuscripts, and Mormonism (Salt Lake City, Utah: Deseret Book Company, 1995),79-80, Internet Archive, https://archive.org/details/storyofbookofabr0000pete/page/n3/mode/2up. See also Draper, et.al., Pearl of Great Price Commentary, 15 (“In 1822 [Antonio] Lebolo returned to his native town of Castellamonte in Italy, taking these mummies with him. Sometime between then and his death on February 19, 1830, he arranged with the Albano Oblasser Shipping Company in Trieste to sell the eleven mummies.”). With a slightly different recounting of the papyri’s journey to the United States, John Gee, in his 2017 recounting of the “Early History of the Papyri,” reported that in 1825 “Bernardino Drovetti,” “the French consul in Alexandria [who] was heavily involved in the trade in Egyptian antiquities,” commissioned Antonio Lebolo “to select some of his antiquities to send to America. These included eleven mummies and a number of papyri.” John Gee, An Introduction to the Book of Abraham (BYU Religious Studies Center, 2017), 2. The JSP editors add the detail, however, that “in addition to supplying material for Drovetti, Lebolo obtained a small collection of artifacts for himself.” They also indicate that it was not Lebolo, but “the guardian of Lebolo’s younger children [who] authorized the sale of the mummies” “by 1831.” JSP, “Book of Abraham and Related Manuscripts.” See also Gospel Topic Essays, “Translation and Historicity of the Book of Abraham,” https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/manual/gospel-topics-essays/translation-and-historicity-of-the-book-of-abraham?lang=eng (“Lebolo shipped the artifacts to Italy, and after his death, they ended up in New York.”) [4] John Gee, "A Guide to the Joseph Smith Papyri" (Maxwell Institute Publications, 2000),1 https://scholarsarchive.byu.edu/mi/3. [5] Saints, vol. 1, 220. [6] Kerry Muhlstein, Let’s Talk About: The Book of Abraham (Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 2022), 25. [7] Michael Chandler, Certificate, Kirtland Township, Geauga Co., OH, to JS, Kirtland Township, Geauga Co., OH, 6 July 1835, https://www.josephsmithpapers.org/paper-summary/certificate-from-michael-chandler-6-july-1835/1#source-note. The JSP editors add that Chandler “traveled through the United States with the mummies in 1833 and 1834, visiting cities such as Baltimore, Pittsburgh, and New Orleans and selling the mummies as he went.” “Book of Abraham and Related Manuscripts.” [8] JSP, “Book of Abraham and Related Manuscripts.” The Prophet is reported to have said, after his initial examination, “one of the rolls contained the writings of Abraham, another the writings of Joseph of Egypt, etc.” Gee, "A Guide to the Joseph Smith Papyri," 3, citing History of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, 2nd ed. (Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 1950), 2:236. [9] Muhlstein, The Book of Abraham, 25-26. [10] JSP, “Book of Abraham and Related Manuscripts.” [11] Kerry Muhlestein and Megan Hansen, “‘The Work of Translating’: The ‘Book of Abraham's Translation Chronology,” in Let Us Reason Together: Essays in Honor of the Life’s Work of Robert L. Millet, ed. J. Spencer Fluhman and Brent L. Top (Provo, UT: Religious Studies Center; Salt Lake City: 2016), 153, https://rsc.byu.edu/let-us-reason-together/work-translating. Compare John Gee’s conclusion that “the current text of the Book of Abraham was translated” by the end of July 1835. He adds that Joseph received additional revelation about Abraham’s record beginning in October 1835, including a revelation about the system of astronomy the Lord revealed to Abraham (Facsimile 2), and in November 1835. According to Gee, “while Joseph slightly revised the translation preparatory to its publication in 1842, there is no other evidence that he worked on the translation of the existing Book of Abraham after 1835.” Gee, "A Guide to the Joseph Smith Papyri," 4. The Church’s statement in its Gospel Topics Essay, “Translation and Historicity of the Book of Abraham,” that during the summer and fall of 1835 Joseph “completed at least the first chapter and part of the second chapter,” is not necessarily inconsistent with the conclusions of these scholars. [12] For a slightly different take on the historical record of the Book of Abraham’s translation history, see John S. Thompson, "‘We May Not Understand Our Words’: The Book of Abraham and the Concept of Translation in The Pearl of Greatest Price," Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship, vol. 41, article 4, 9 n.19, https://scholarsarchive.byu.edu/interpreter/vol41/iss1/4, in which he argues—
The following timeline makes more sense of the evidence as it currently stands: Due to material from Abraham 3 referenced in 1835 and later sources, Joseph Smith appears to have translated at least into Abraham 3 prior to Aug. 1835. Additional translation occurred in or beyond Abraham 3 in the days between Oct. 1 and late Nov. 1835 when the last entry indicating that he translated that year appears in Joseph Smith’s journal. How far they went in the story of Abraham during 1835 cannot be determined. When the Prophet returns to translating and also revising after the first installment is published in Nauvoo in 1842, some of the material he translates appears to have been prepared for the second installment as stated in his journal: “Commenced Translating from the Book of Abraham, for the 10 No of the Times and Seasons” (“Journal, December 1841-December 1842,” p. 89, The Joseph Smith Papers, https://www.josephsmithpapers.org/paper-summary/journal-december-1841-december-1842/20). Nothing precludes material from the later end of the published chapters (e.g., Abraham 5) to have been translated during this time, contra Gee as well as Muhlestein and Hansen’s leanings, since it is difficult to know how far they got in 1835 [emphasis added].
[13] JSP, “Book of Abraham and Related Manuscripts.” [14] The JSP editors suggest that doctrines taught by Joseph Smith after 1835 that are found in the later chapters of Abraham suggest that the Lord may have revealed to the Prophet the content of those chapters before they were transcribed and published in 1842:
Between 1835, when JS suspended his work on the Book of Abraham, and 1842, when he resumed the translation, he expanded upon or taught several new doctrines—regarding the nature of God, the Godhead, and the premortal existence of souls—that are also found in the 1842 Book of Abraham text. On 20 March 1839, for example, JS wrote an epistle to the church while he was in prison in Missouri that speaks of a “councyl of the eternal God of all other Gods before this world was.” In early 1841, he gave a discourse explaining that “Spirits are eternal.” According to JS, “At the first organization in heaven we were all present and saw the Savior chosen and appointed, and the plan of salvation made and we sanctioned it.” In another early 1841 discourse, JS preached about the Godhead, which he said he understood “according to Abraham’s record.” Despite JS’s reference to “Abraham’s record,” no known Kirtland-era manuscript contained these teachings, perhaps indicating that JS had an understanding of the later portion of the Book of Abraham before he committed it to paper. These themes from the years when JS’s work on the Book of Abraham was on hiatus are all found in the Nauvoo-era text of the Book of Abraham.
JSP, “Introduction to Book of Abraham Manuscripts, circa February–circa 15 March 1842,” https://www.josephsmithpapers.org/paper-summary/introduction-to-book-of-abraham-manuscripts-circa-february-circa-15-march-1842/1 (emphasis added). [15] See, for example, Abraham 4:1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 14, 16, 17, 18, 20,21 (two references), 22, 24, 25 (two references), 26, 27 (two references), 28 (two references), 29, 31; 5:2, 3 (two references), 4 (two references), 5, 7, 8, 9, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 20. Muhlestein and Hansen argue that while certain linguistic features in the Book of Abraham suggest a translation date of 1842, a closer analysis of the text and Joseph Smith’s interactions with Hebrew indicates that the core translation likely occurred in 1835.
On the surface, Abraham 3–5 contains numerous transliterations and phrases that match the Hebrew grammar and lexicon Joseph Smith studied in 1836. For example, Abraham chapters 4 and 5 use specific phrases like "organized and formed" instead of "created" and "empty and desolate" instead of "without form and void". Chapter 3 includes terms such as "Kokob" and "Kokaubeam," which were clearly influenced by the Prophet's Hebrew studies. These Hebraic elements are "so thoroughly interwoven" in the creation account of chapters 4 and 5 that they appear to be "integral features of the text" rather than mere later additions.
However, Joseph’s use of "gods" in the creation narrative, Muhlestein and Hansen suggest, actually argues against the idea that he learned these concepts solely from his 1836 Hebrew studies. The Hebrew grammars and lexicons Joseph used (Seixas and Gibbs) defined Elohim as a plural form that should almost always be "construed as singular". Joseph Smith is known to have argued with his teacher, Rabbi Seixas, that Elohim should be rendered as plural. These scholars contend that Joseph "would probably not have disagreed with his respected teacher" unless he "had already come to believe that there was more than one god at work in the creation story" through a prior translation of the text.
Thus, Joseph used the day and a half that his journal entries suggested he had for “translation” before the publication of the second installment of the Book of Abraham, Muhlestein and Hansen propose, to "heavily edit" the text, "incorporate[ing] the Hebrew-influenced phrases" that better expressed the concepts he had already learned during the initial 1835 translation. They estimate that roughly 150 words were changed due to his Hebrew study, nearly half of which involved adjusting nouns and verbs to reflect a plurality of gods. Because Joseph was "consulting his Hebrew grammars and lexicon during this process," it explains why he continued to use the term "translate" when referring to his work in 1842.
In conclusion, they argue, “Joseph translated at least through Abraham 5 by the end of 1835 and then heavily edited the last three chapters in 1842 to reflect more fully both his Hebrew learning and any fuller understanding of the gospel he had developed since his 1835 translation.” Muhlestein and Hansen, “The Work of Translating,” 149-153. [16] Ibid. 142. [17] For transcriptions and digital images of the manuscript copies of the Book of Abraham or “Kirtland Egyptian Papers,” see “Book of Abraham and Egyptian Material,” josephsmithpapers.org. [18] Gee, "A Guide to the Joseph Smith Papyri," 5. [19] Book of Abraham and Explanation of Facsimile 1, [Nauvoo, Hancock Co., IL, ca. Feb. 1842], JSP, https://www.josephsmithpapers.org/paper-summary/book-of-abraham-manuscript-and-explanation-of-facsimile-1-circa-february-1842-abraham-11-218/1#source-note. For a timeline of the Book of Abraham translation, see Gee, "A Guide to the Joseph Smith Papyri," 5. [20] JSP, “Book of Abraham and Related Manuscripts.” For an example of how scholars have sought to use the manuscript history in their efforts to understand not only what portions of the Book of Abraham were translated when, but also what such history can tell us about how Joseph Smith translated the Book of Abraham, see Thompson, "We May Not Understand Our Words.” One of the Kirtland-era manuscripts (created by Frederick G. Williams and Warren Parrish), Thompson argues—
Could be understood as an effort to produce a “printer’s manuscript.” Phelps had mentioned in his July 20, 1835 letter to his wife their intention of publishing the Book of Abraham even at that early date, so it is not unreasonable to think that a printer’s copy may have been started in Kirtland, though never published at that time . . . Having an original translation manuscript and separate copy for printing would be in keeping with the pattern that Joseph Smith and his scribes followed before with the Book of Mormon. In this framework, the editing and markups in the surviving Abraham manuscripts would not be indicative of a struggling, collaborative, intellectually fluid translation process as Givens asserts — such could only be determined by viewing the original manuscript — but of editorial preparations for publication [italicized text emphasis added; bolded text emphasis in original].
Thompson, "We May Not Understand Our Words,” 12-13 & n. 29 (in this review of Terryl Givens and Brian Hauglid’s book, The Pearl of Greatest Price: Mormonism’s Most Controversial Scripture (New York: Oxford University Press, 2019), Thompson seeks to “demonstrate that the conclusions that these and other scholars make with respect to the Book of Abraham translation are not as inevitable as they portray.” The “conclusions” that Thompson specifically seeks to rebut are Givens’ and Hauglid’s assertion that “Smith certainly believed that he was successfully rendering the actual Egyptian symbols into their English counterparts. In the case of the facsimiles he was apparently wrong, and in the case of the Book of Abraham narrative he may have been as well.”). [21] See also Peterson, “Sacred Writings from the Tombs of Egypt,” 137–54 (quoting Oliver Cowdery statement in 1835, “When the translation of these valuable documents will be completed, I am unable to say; neither can I give you a probable idea how large volumes they will make; but judging from their size, and the comprehensiveness of the language, one might reasonably expect to see a sufficient to develop much upon the mighty acts of the ancient men of God, and of his dealing with the children of men when they saw him face to face.”). As to the scroll containing writings of the Patriarch Joseph, Peterson asserts that “after visiting Kirtland, a non-member had been told that the writings of Abraham and Joseph, when published, would require ‘a larger volume than the Bible . . . to contain them.’” [22] Gee, "A Guide to the Joseph Smith Papyri," 5-6.