Book of Abraham or Egyptian Book of Breathings?
Is the Mormon Book of Abraham a Hoax?

The Book of Mormon was said to have been translated from golden plates, which angels later took away, so the translation can no longer be checked against the originals.
Joseph Smith translated the Book of Abraham from some scrolls he purchased from Michael Chandler in 1835. These scrolls disappeared for a time, and later "reappeared in the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City, which were clearly part of Joseph Smith’s original collection. The papyri were acquired by the Church, and they are now located at Brigham Young University." (quote from Michael D. Rhodes, “I Have a Question,” Ensign, July 1988, 51 - "Why doesn’t the translation of the Egyptian papyri found in 1967 match the text of the Book of Abraham in the Pearl of Great Price?" )
The papyri have been viewed and scholars' translations have shown them to be from the Egyptian Book of Breathings, an offshoot of the Egyptian Book of the Dead, not at all even related to Abraham.
According to Michael D. Rhodes, “I Have a Question,” Ensign, July 1988, 5, either "One explanation is that it may have been taken from a different portion of the papyrus rolls in Joseph Smith’s possession." or "A second explanation takes into consideration what Joseph Smith meant by the word translation. While translating the Book of Mormon, he used the Urim and Thummim rather than dictionaries and grammars of the language. Translating with the Urim and Thummim is evidently a much different process than using the tools of scholarly research."
Looking at the following graphics from the Book of Abraham and papyri, I do not think they speak of Abraham, and in fact the Book of Abraham cannot be from the papyri that contained these graphics. My personal opinion is that Joseph Smith received unrelated material from spirit channeling and did not actualy translate the papyri. Study and decide for yourself.

Following are 3 graphics contained in the papyri and in the Book of Abraham (click to enlarge)

Read the Smith translations directly from lds.org: of Book of Abraham Facsimile 1, Facsimile 2, Facsimile 3,.

FairLDS.org discusses the issue in www.fairlds.org/apol/ai125.html
According to Hugh Nibley, “I Have a Question,” Ensign, Mar. 1976, 34:
Q: Are the three facsimiles related to each other?
A: Definitely, by all being attached to one and the same document, namely, the Joseph Smith Papyri X and XI, which contain a text of the Egyptian Book of Breathings.

The evidence shows Smith did not translate the papyri properly

I do not find any convincing arguments to show that Joseph Smith did translate the papyri correctly. It appears his translation is false, and has no relationship to the papyri.
There is evidence that Joseph Smith used diviner's stones for Urim and Thummim, calling on spirits to do the work.
You can review some of the analyses that indicate that Joseph Smith's translation was false in the following:
Field Guide to Papyri,
www.carm.org/lds/ldspapyri.htm,
www.utlm.org/onlineresources/fallofbookabraham.htm and www.utlm.org/onlinebooks/changech11a.htm,
www.lds-mormon.com/book_of_abraham.shtml and www.lds-mormon.com/book_of_abraham.shtml,

Especially read www2.ida.net/graphics/shirtail/ponderin.htm (from www2.ida.net/graphics/shirtail/papyri.htm):

"Debating the Book of Abraham with a Professional Egyptologist
Dr. Castillos: http://www.geocities.com/martsego/comments.txt
I've read the apologetic remarks by several Mormon writers trying to justify Joseph Smith's version of the figures in the three facsimiles attached to the Book of Abraham which I tried to consider with an open mind, but after some thought I found them to be quite unconvincing."

See also http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Parthenon/2671/Abraham.html Links on Book of Abraham
Unfortunately, I must conclude that the "Book of Abraham" is not a correct translation of the papyri. This then puts into question the rest of the Joseph Smith translations. Were they translated from actual physical documents or were they spirit channeled?

Other questions I have on Mormonism are at lds.htm

Specific Refutations of the Facsimiles

The following are drqwn from www.xmission.com/~research/about/abraham.htm. (Go there for more details)
M. Theodule Deveria, at the Louvre Museum in Paris, France, commened about Facsimile No. 3, Figure 5:

The deceased led by Ma into the presence of Osiris. His name is Horus, as may be seen in the prayer which is at the bottom of the picture, and which is addressed to the divinities of the four cardinal points.
(First published in French in Voyage au Pays des Mormons, par Jules Remy, 2 vols. (E. Dentu, Paris, 1860), and in English translation in A Journey to Great Salt Lake City, by Jules Remy and Julius Brenchley (London: W. Jeffs, 1861), 2:539-46. Published in parallel columns were Joseph Smith's explanations of each facsimile with that of Theodule Deveria's interpretation. This quote is from page 546.

Deveria was the first Egyptologist to note that what Mormons had published as a "Facsimile from the Book of Abraham" was really a funeral illustration for a corpse named Horus.
Later, when the mummies and papyri which Joseph Smith had owned were sold to the St. Louis Museum and put on display, Professor Gustavus Seyffarth, who had devoted considerable study to Egyptian, was also able to read the name of the person for whom Facsimile No. 3 was made. The following mentions his visit and observations:

. . . according to Prof. Seyffarth, the papyrus roll is not a record, but an invocation to the Deity Osirus, in which occurs the name of the person, (Horus,) and a picture of the attendant spirits, introducing the dead to the Judge, Osirus. (Catalogue of the St. Louis Museum, 1859, p. 45; cited in Saga, p. 298. Prof. Seyffarth saw the actual papyri on display)

In 1873 T. B. H. Stenhouse published his book, The Rocky Mountain Saints: A Full and Complete History of the Mormons, which republished Deveria's study of the Book of Abraham facsimiles. His book was republished four times by the year 1905.14 This helped to circulate more widely the information that the Book of Abraham material really was funerary in nature and that Facsimile No. 3 was made for an Egyptian named Horus.
The second edition of the Pearl of Great Price was issued in 1878, after Orson Pratt, Sr., had edited the work. It was here that the words "purporting to be" were removed from the heading of the Book of Abraham. George Reynolds during the following year wrote and published a defense of the Book of Abraham as a divine and ancient record.15 He apparently felt that he had answered some of the criticism dealing with the Book of Abraham, and on 10 October 1880, the Pearl of Great Price was voted upon and canonized, along with Smith's revelations. (from www.xmission.com/~research/about/abraham.htm
In 1912 the Rev. Franklin S. Spalding published his own independent study of the Book of Abraham, which included letters from eight Egyptologists and Semitists who had responded to his inquiry concerning the interpretations of the three facsimiles published with the Book of Abraham text. All eight scholars independently reported that the facsimiles were funerary illustrations that had no relationship with Abraham. (17. Rt. Rev. F. S. Spalding, Joseph Smith, Jr., As a Translator (Salt Lake City, Utah: The Arrow Press, 1912). The brief comments by the eight Egyptologists and Semitists on Facsimile Nos. 1, 2, and 3 are contained in their letters, which are published in this booklet. While the Rev. Spalding was aware of Stenhouse's The Rocky Mountain Saints and A Journey to Great Salt Lake City, both of which included Theodule Deveria's examination. Spalding decided to make his own study by writing letters to various scholars. One of the scholars, Samuel A. B. Mercer, summarized the controversy in 1913 in his article, "Joseph Smith As an Interpreter and Translator of Egyptian," in The Utah Survey 1 (September 1913):4-36.).

Line by Line Refutation of the Smith Translation

Study http://www.waltermartin.org/abraham.html for a character-by-character comparison of Smith's translation with that of Egyptian Hieroglyphists

The Reorganized Church of Latter Day Saints = not scripture

The Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, while in their earlier years they used the Book of Abraham (though never canonized by their conference), today consider this book as a non-scriptural, speculative writing of Joseph Smith. See W. Wallace Smith, Saints Herald 117 (March 1970):5; Richard P. Howard, "The Book of Abraham, in the Light of History and Egyptology," Courage: A Journal of History, Thought and Action, Pilot Issue (April 1970):33-47, and his articles entitled "Joseph Smith, the Book of Abraham, and the Reorganized Church of the 1970s," Saints Herald 117 (October to December 1970), and republished in A Decade of the Best (Independence, Missouri: Herald House, 1972), 186-211. See also Richard P. Howard, Restoration Scriptures: A Study of Their Textual Development, Second edition, revised and enlarged, (Independence, MO: Herald Publishing House, 1995), 192-210.

Other