New Book of Abraham Research Group

[_Maksutov]

Using aliens as an explanation is about as strong as using angels or just "God did it."

What is your evidence that beings with completely compatible human DNA exist on other worlds? You do realize that "cosmic pluralism" is both an ancient and a thoroughly debunked notion. Besides dealing with pseudoarchaeological problems, would you also add the burdens of endless UFOlogical fraud and delusions to be sorted through?

Well, I didn't suggest that Adam and Eve were "aliens" precisely, in the same sense that we are used to. That was this guy's theory:

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0671227475/

There is some similarity between his theory and mine of course. I just learned of the existence of this book recently when a guy on the LDSFF referred me to it, and then I acquired a copy.
I am actually just suggesting that God himself is a human, but the fact that he is not from this world makes him extraterrestrial. He didn't use UFO's to get here. And he and his wife came here to have children, so that their children would eventually meet up and hybridize.

I don't have specific evidence of this course. You have to remember that some of my evidence is religious, and everything that I do is an attempt at harmonization between science and that. And so it is a foregone conclusion that those that don't share that epistemological ideology will not agree. I'm comfortable with that fact.

The empirical evidence I have is only that of science, of course and I don't presume to suggest that science is supportive of every specific thing that I theorize. Rather, it is in the hybridization of science and Mormonism where these things emerge from.

But, specifically, science is more generally supportive of the idea of horizontal gene transfer and hybridization of unrelated species. For example the sea squirt is a product of a hybridization event of an ancient chordate and the ancestor of the sea urchin. Yes, most of these kinds of events are not viable, but once in a while, there will be a weird event that ends up being viable. Most of the time when horizontal gene transfer is viable is at the microbial level. We see it all the time where a gene for resistance is spread throughout the whole microbial world between non-related species.

Another example is that the genes from jellyfish where our eyes came from is actually something that the jellyfish got from a horizontal transfer of genes from plankton.

But there is a serious scientific position called the pig/chimp hypothesis which states that homonins are descended from the common ancestor they have with the chimp, but that along the line, there was an introduction of porcine genes into the line. This makes a lot of sense as to why pig organs are so compatible with humans, etc., and why many things that differentiate us from chimps is what we share with pigs, etc. Except, the scientist that suggests this hypothesis believes that there was an actual mating event between a pig and a chimp-like animal. In my emails with the scientist that came up with this hypothesis, I have told him that I disagree with this, but that rather, I believe that the genes were introduced into a homonin ancestor through a bite from a wild pig-like animal, perhaps a wild boar or something. And so, it introduced stem cells, and there was a fusion at a fundamental chromosomal level, and then those cells made their way to the reproductive organs of the animal.

This is similar to how there were multiple events were SIV was introduced to humans from chimps and from gorillas, and how some HIV strains are more related to the Chimp variety of SIV, while other strains are more related to the gorilla variety. And how probably these events sometimes may have been because of a bite. SIV may have jumped the species barrier multiple times in history from various great apes or other primates.

And so, its not surprising that Heavenly Father's children would have hybridized with native humans.

Some of what you're talking about is science and some is religion, but you are trying to apply scientific concepts to religious ones. This is like trying to calculate the airlift of angel's wings or the weight of the soul. This is a textbook example of pseudoscience. I think this is because of your confusion over religious vs scientific evidence. This is not a distinction that is made in courtrooms or in laboratories, only in the special pleading of believers. Religious evidence is evidence that a person believes, not that what is believed is verified. It points inward, not outward.

[_EdGoble]

Some of what you're talking about is science and some is religion, but you are trying to apply scientific concepts to religious ones. This is like trying to calculate the airlift of angel's wings or the weight of the soul. This is a textbook example of pseudoscience. I think this is because of your confusion over religious vs scientific evidence. This is not a distinction that is made in courtrooms or in laboratories, only in the special pleading of believers. Religious evidence is evidence that a person believes, not that what is believed is verified. It points inward, not outward.

Well, here is where I think your definition for pseudoscience a little off. Please bear with me for a moment.

You see, if, for example, I was a "creation scientist", and I try to bring God or "intelligent design" into science, and I'm actually calling it "science" and promoting it as if it really is indeed science then I really am creating and practicing pseudoscience.

I don't think it's fair to equate what I'm doing with that. Because that is an attempt to bring a religion into science. I would never agree with that, nor would I ever presume to call such a thing science. I would never bring my religion into science and call it science.

What I am doing is the reverse. I am applying science to religion. The product of this is a modified religious view. It is still just religious. Just because it employs science for some of the *religious* conclusion. In other words, in every post I have made on this message board, I have never for one moment claimed that what I am doing is scientific, or that it is science. I have never equated it with science, and I know better than that.

I am modifying my religion using scientific concepts. Absolutely. But that is not Pseudoscience. That is just religion. And so, the distinction between what I am doing and pseudoscience is that pseudoscience is more specifically claiming that something is science when in fact it is not, because it has been mixed with something that is not science.

And so, if you can see that I am claiming that I am coming to a *religious* conclusion, I think you can appreciate that I have never claimed what I am doing to be science. Therefore, I am just still coming to strictly religious conclusions in a religious context. Therefore, this is just modifications on religion, and it is not pseudoscience. It would only be pseudoscience if it was claiming to be science.

I think this is the general problem with apologetics too, is that apologists don't make enough distinction between their claims and scientific claims. They don't make disclaimers that what they are doing is just religion. Sometimes apologists make claims as if their apologetics is science, which it is not. In that case, they are the ones that are doing pseudoscience. And so, this is the distinction I make between myself and regular apologists.. In fact, I have always made that kind of a disclaimer. From the beginning, I stated that I did not expect that you would accept my propositions, because I knew that I was doing religion and coming to religious conclusions. And some of you no longer agree with the religion that I'm a part of, and you have separated yourselves from it, and I didn't expect that you would agree for that reason. Rather, in the first place, I was here hoping for dialogue with other Mormons and not speak to you who have this fundamental disagreement with me at all, but I decided I would answer some of your questions, even though I know the outcome is not that you will consider my position well-based. But, in fact, I hope that you can appreciate that what I am trying to do is to bring more rationality and good thinking into a religious realm of things. I know you don't agree with that. That's ok. But at least I have made clear to you what I am doing, and how I never intended to confuse science with what I am doing. I am comfortable doing what I am doing, even though its not science, and even though there isn't scientific evidence for some of the specific things in this point of view. For Mormons who want good arguments that uphold their religious point of view, this type of thing for them will be of value. And I know that that is where it has value. It doesn't have value for trying to convince people of it that already disagree with its foundation. It is only helpful to Mormons, and is only meant for Mormon consumption really, because it is a forgone conclusion that non-Mormons will not look upon it as if it is well-based. Because it is a religious conclusion.

And so, I don't think I have ever confused religious evidence with scientific evidence. In fact, I think I have been very explicit in my disclaimers that I know very well the distinction between the two. And I know that a product of something scientific and something religious is just more religion. It doesn't make it science. But for a Mormon mind, it does make the religion more rational, and also for that mind, it makes it more likely to be true in that mind.

[_Maksutov]

Thanks for that thoughtful exposition, Ed. I think I understand you better now. And I can appreciate what you're trying to do and that it can yield some positive results.

I think you may run into difficulties, though, when you decide where and when to apply science to religion. While you may be seeking earnestly to find out "how", the greater context may require the analysis also be applied to "who" and "why" and many other perspectives. You can confine yourself to a very narrow slice of Mormonia and make no claims outside of it, but I think a lot of other scholarship will pass you by.

Where we have ways to confirm the translating powers of Joseph Smith, he fails. He could not translate Egyptian, Ed. Nibley tried to save him, Gee, Schryver, many others, but it's increasingly clear. He couldn't translate it. He pretended to translate it. Sometimes it's really just that simple. This is one of those times.

Here is a list of channeled texts that includes the D & C.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_m ... lled_texts

I am willing to bet that you haven't read much of any of these. But every one of them has had loyal defenders who have argued for them and many still do to this day. And they suffer from the same limitation of Joseph Smith: once critically examined, their supernatural claims fall apart. How do we approach all of these texts and their claims? Do we embrace them all and try to live accordingly? Do we believe the ones our parents believe? Do we read each one and find out how to confirm it from within the logic of the text's creator? Or do we strive for objectivity, knowing that perfect objectivity is impossible, but still taking pains to consider all data available?

Mormonism is undergoing some painful transformations. I wish you well in trying to ease the suffering of some believers. I think, however, that a path of parsimony will ultimately help them more than piling on layers of complexity.

[_EdGoble]

Thanks for that thoughtful exposition, Ed. I think I understand you better now. And I can appreciate what you're trying to do and that it can yield some positive results.

I think you may run into difficulties, though, when you decide where and when to apply science to religion. While you may be seeking earnestly to find out "how", the greater context may require the analysis also be applied to "who" and "why" and many other perspectives. You can confine yourself to a very narrow slice of Mormonia and make no claims outside of it, but I think a lot of other scholarship will pass you by.

Where we have ways to confirm the translating powers of Joseph Smith, he fails. He could not translate Egyptian, Ed. Nibley tried to save him, Gee, Schryver, many others, but it's increasingly clear. He couldn't translate it. He pretended to translate it. Sometimes it's really just that simple. This is one of those times.

Here is a list of channeled texts that includes the D & C.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_m ... lled_texts

I am willing to bet that you haven't read much of any of these. But every one of them has had loyal defenders who have argued for them and many still do to this day. And they suffer from the same limitation of Joseph Smith: once critically examined, their supernatural claims fall apart. How do we approach all of these texts and their claims? Do we embrace them all and try to live accordingly? Do we believe the ones our parents believe? Do we read each one and find out how to confirm it from within the logic of the text's creator? Or do we strive for objectivity, knowing that perfect objectivity is impossible, but still taking pains to consider all data available?

Mormonism is undergoing some painful transformations. I wish you well in trying to ease the suffering of some believers. I think, however, that a path of parsimony will ultimately help them more than piling on layers of complexity.

Muksutov,

Yes, I thoroughly agree that Joseph Smith's information was "channeled" by powers from the unseen world. If it wasn't that, it was plain made up thing. There is no if's, and's or but's about that. But of course, being a faithful Mormon, I opt that it was channeled from the unseen world. The seer stone and spectacles are certainly "occult" instruments if there ever were any. I own a copy of Quinn's Early Mormonism and Magic Worldview. I own a copy of the brand new book on Joseph Smith's Seerstones, ironically put out by Deseret Book, which references Quinn a lot. I am perfectly comfortable with prophets using "occult" instruments. Other Mormons that are uneducated TBM's, maybe not so much, but the facts are what they are.

And so, for critics and Mormons alike, the issue is between those two options: whether it was channeled or whether it was made up. Some critics who are also believers in the unseen world, of course, will say that it was an unclean spirit that was the being behind the channeling. Critics that believe that it was made up believe that either Joseph Smith was a sincere fraud, or that he was fooling himself.

Mormons, of course, believe it was channeled from the source it was claimed to be channeled from, the Holy Ghost. This is no different from ancient prophets like Balaam in the scriptures who fell into a trance and channeled true communications from the God of the Hebrews (that is, before Balaam's apostasy/fall). So, really, the only thing separating Joseph Smith from the producers of other "channeled" documents is the source, not the means of reception. That is, if you opt to believe that.

So, once again, it comes down to a religious conclusion, ones religious beliefs and subjective conclusions based on one's discernment from the Holy Ghost. That is what Mormons are left with, and of course, we all know what the conclusions of the Mormons are on this matter. They believe that their discernment has led them to the conclusion that Joseph Smith got it from the right source in the unseen world.

So, yes, I admit the "difficulties" that you speak of. Nevertheless, at this point, for a Mormon, the difficulty rests only in spiritual discernment, not in scholarship or science.

But there is another element about other "channeled" documents. And that is, that the truth of anything can be discerned from the Holy Ghost. With any document that makes claims, channeled or not, ancient or modern, it comes down to discernment, just as much. Because if I have a piece of apocrypha from the ancient world, according to D&C 91, it is not as simple as it being entirely true or entirely false. But rather, the Spirit manifesteth truth on each point. Even ancient apocrypha that are frauds make religious claims, some of which are true, in spite of the fact that an apocryphal document may be fundamentally fradulent. The other option of course, as shown in D&C 91, is that some apocrypha started out as genuine documents, but that they had been interpolated with additions that are false, and so, the claims in the documents from ancient times as we have them are a mix of true and false information.

So, if I have some channeled document, that may have been channeled by some other "medium" for example, I can discern each claim in that document by way of the Holy Ghost. I can even do this with Satan's claims in Eden, where some of his claims are true, and some false. His description of opposition in all things where the fruit of the tree of knowledge would cause a transformation, where Adam and Eve would then experience these opposites, was correct. Yet, the source of this was the mouth of Satan himself. Satan's claim that Adam and Eve would not die, on the other hand, was false. So, in this instance, even from the mouth of Satan, we have something that was true on the one hand, and something that was false on the other. And by the Spirit, regardless of the source, we can discern each claim made in a document, and know which claims are true, and which claims are false, regardless of the source of the document.

As for your comments on Joseph Smith's Egyptian, and on the apologists that have tried to save him. Actually from a Mormon point of view, Nibley did a great job, and came up with some great defenses. Not defenses that are convincing to a critic of course, but defenses that are helpful to a Mormon. Similarly, Schryver led the way in showing a point of view where Egyptian symbols can be able to de-coupled (in the Computer Science sense) from the ties of the strict Egyptological definitions of the symbols, where they are used as a code scheme in a cipher. Schryver's only problem was a claim that it was a modern-day cipher. He was not wrong that the KEP/GAEL/EAG is a code-book or cipher, so to speak. He was just wrong about the people that put it together. Ancient people created this cipher. And Joseph Smith transmitted those ancient pairings of symbols to meaning assignments into modern speech. This is different from the regular Egyptological use of Egyptian. It is where ancient Egyptians turned Sensen papyrus symbols into an encoding scheme, and had a key like the KEP that provided the meaning assignments, like a modern day code-book that is used as a substitution cipher. People in the ancient world did use substitution ciphers.

And so, from my religious point of view, you are mistaken. Because Nibley did great in many ways, and Schryver only failed in a part of his analysis. My analysis uphold's Schryver's point of view that it is a cipher. Schryver only failed in not recognizing the ancientness of the cipher. My analysis has shown its ancientness, from my religious point of view. Perhaps my analysis is not accepted by you. But when other Mormons come around to my point of view, at least they will see the value in what I have produced, as a fundamental modification of Schryver's position, but something that upholds Schryver's position in certain ways.

So once again, from your epistemological standing, yes, you don't perceive that Schryver or Nibley or myself had success. I get that. But we perceive on our side that there is success. And we have laid the groundwork for future scholars to build on what we have shown, and further modify and strengthen our positions where we don't have the facts quite right. But we have made great inroads toward solving this puzzle, whether you acknowledge that or not, with all due respect to your point of view in your epistomological stance.

[_Maksutov]

Ed, if a cipher model to explain the EAG and the Book of Abraham in general is to be taken seriously, it has to be submitted to professional linguists or cryptoanalysts or others who would treat it as a secular problem. The proportion of faithful belief that you mix into your science, or vice versa, no matter the proportion, becomes a fatal compromise. You begin to be arguing for different forms of apologetics, some more detailed or ambitious than others, but still subject to the same testing. You can go on talking about this stuff in Mormon forums to Mormons, but if you really believed it, you would take it to the world. Peer reviewed, professional/academic publication. Not protected Mormon speculation.

If we are going to approach Mormonism with science, why not use ground penetrating radar to investigate the interior of the Hill Cumorah? Why not nondestructive analyses of seer stones? Why not even test the seer stones to see if they actually have any discernible power? Why not undertake the dating and analysis of the 'altar of Adam' at Ondi-Ahman?

These things are not done because the leaders of the church don't want to know. And if you don't want to know something, you aren't looking for truth--of any kind. These are the people you choose to follow and believe, whom you are trying to protect with ever more elaborate Rube Goldberg devices to exonerate Smith. This has very little to do with science or history.

[_Quasimodo]

Ed, if a cipher model to explain the EAG and the Book of Abraham in general is to be taken seriously, it has to be submitted to professional linguists or cryptoanalysts or others who would treat it as a secular problem. The proportion of faithful belief that you mix into your science, or vice versa, no matter the proportion, becomes a fatal compromise. You begin to be arguing for different forms of apologetics, some more detailed or ambitious than others, but still subject to the same testing. You can go on talking about this stuff in Mormon forums to Mormons, but if you really believed it, you would take it to the world. Peer reviewed, professional/academic publication. Not protected Mormon speculation.

If we are going to approach Mormonism with science, why not use ground penetrating radar to investigate the interior of the Hill Cumorah? Why not nondestructive analyses of seer stones? Why not even test the seer stones to see if they actually have any discernible power? Why not undertake the dating and analysis of the 'altar of Adam' at Ondi-Ahman?

These things are not done because the leaders of the church don't want to know. And if you don't want to know something, you aren't looking for truth--of any kind. These are the people you choose to follow and believe, whom you are trying to protect with ever more elaborate Rube Goldberg devices to exonerate Smith. This has very little to do with science or history.

+1
Precisely!

[Guest]

Ed, if a cipher model to explain the EAG and the Book of Abraham in general is to be taken seriously, it has to be submitted to professional linguists or cryptoanalysts or others who would treat it as a secular problem. The proportion of faithful belief that you mix into your science, or vice versa, no matter the proportion, becomes a fatal compromise. You begin to be arguing for different forms of apologetics, some more detailed or ambitious than others, but still subject to the same testing. You can go on talking about this stuff in Mormon forums to Mormons, but if you really believed it, you would take it to the world. Peer reviewed, professional/academic publication. Not protected Mormon speculation.

If we are going to approach Mormonism with science, why not use ground penetrating radar to investigate the interior of the Hill Cumorah? Why not nondestructive analyses of seer stones? Why not even test the seer stones to see if they actually have any discernible power? Why not undertake the dating and analysis of the 'altar of Adam' at Ondi-Ahman?

These things are not done because the leaders of the church don't want to know. And if you don't want to know something, you aren't looking for truth--of any kind. These are the people you choose to follow and believe, whom you are trying to protect with ever more elaborate Rube Goldberg devices to exonerate Smith. This has very little to do with science or history.

Muksutov,

I'm not against my apologetics being scrutinized by professionals if they want to do so, and I'm interested to see what they come up with, and then I would just turn around and review their review. I'm not afraid of having to admit on certain points that I'm wrong if I'm wrong. Nevertheless, I'm not going to submit it to a publication of that sort myself to that kind of a journal, because I know to some degree the outcome, because by its nature, I can't necessarily get something that I produce up to the academic standard that they want, just by nature of the fact that I am not a credentialed scholar. If they are interested enough, they can review my materials themselves, but chances are, they are not interested. So, I invite them to come review my materials if they please, but I am not going to do that myself.

Nevertheless, if there is sufficient religious reason to believe that I'm not wrong on a certain point, I'm not going to agree with every criticism that a peer-reviewed publication would make of my material.

Funny you should bring up the ground penetrating radar for Cumorah. My book Resurrecting Cumorah calls for that very thing. If Mesoamericanist Mormon apologists are going to say that Cumorah is not in New York, then BYU ought to do a dig there to prove that it is not Cumorah, or rather, prove that nothing is to be found there. And so, for me, if Mesoamericanist apologists are going to make charges that nothing is to be found, then they ought to step up and prove that nothing is to be found. For people like me, if nothing is to be found, it would not change our faith that it is Cumorah. I am one of the few believers in the New York Cumorah left I think, that is not a proponent of the Heartland Theory. On the other hand, I would not stop believing in Cumorah in New York even if nothing is found. Again, I have religious reasons for that belief. Incidentally, my book This Land: Zarahemla and the Nephite Nation, co-authored with Wayne May, is the origin of the Heartland Theory and Movement. However, I retracted that book.

Funny that you should bring up the altar of adam. I have called also for archaeological digs there at Adam ondi Ahman. Mormons should be hoping and searching diligently for any evidence that can be found.

On the other hand, seer stones are just stones. There is nothing physically different about them than any other stone. This is the nature of the miraculous. A believer at some point just has to believe, and be content with the fact that not everything has evidence. Otherwise, there is no belief. On the other hand, believers are not just going to sit back and not muster every evidence that they do have available to them. But they have to be realistic enough to realize that they aren't going to have the degree of evidence or proof that they would love to have for their positions.

[_Themis]

Ed, if a cipher model to explain the EAG and the Book of Abraham in general is to be taken seriously, it has to be submitted to professional linguists or cryptoanalysts or others who would treat it as a secular problem.

He needs to show there is a cipher going on. All he has is the idea that maybe the person who created funerary documents for their dead, also made up in his own mind a meaning for each part of the documents into an Abraham story. No real cipher, and no logical reason to attach it to these documents. Joseph would need God to get the Abraham story that had really nothing to do with funerary texts he got others to pay for. Supposedly he didn't need any props for the Book of Moses.

I could claim some special meaning for any text in existence, so his ideas have the same amount of credibility.

[Guest]

Ed, if a cipher model to explain the EAG and the Book of Abraham in general is to be taken seriously, it has to be submitted to professional linguists or cryptoanalysts or others who would treat it as a secular problem. The proportion of faithful belief that you mix into your science, or vice versa, no matter the proportion, becomes a fatal compromise. You begin to be arguing for different forms of apologetics, some more detailed or ambitious than others, but still subject to the same testing. You can go on talking about this stuff in Mormon forums to Mormons, but if you really believed it, you would take it to the world. Peer reviewed, professional/academic publication. Not protected Mormon speculation.

If we are going to approach Mormonism with science, why not use ground penetrating radar to investigate the interior of the Hill Cumorah? Why not nondestructive analyses of seer stones? Why not even test the seer stones to see if they actually have any discernible power? Why not undertake the dating and analysis of the 'altar of Adam' at Ondi-Ahman?

These things are not done because the leaders of the church don't want to know. And if you don't want to know something, you aren't looking for truth--of any kind. These are the people you choose to follow and believe, whom you are trying to protect with ever more elaborate Rube Goldberg devices to exonerate Smith. This has very little to do with science or history.

Muksutov,

I'm not against my apologetics being scrutinized by professionals if they want to do so, and I'm interested to see what they come up with, and then I would just turn around and review their review. I'm not afraid of having to admit on certain points that I'm wrong if I'm wrong. Nevertheless, I'm not going to submit it to a publication of that sort myself to that kind of a journal, because I know to some degree the outcome, because by its nature, I can't necessarily get something that I produce up to the academic standard that they want, just by nature of the fact that I am not a credentialed scholar. If they are interested enough, they can review my materials themselves, but chances are, they are not interested. So, I invite them to come review my materials if they please, but I am not going to do that myself.

Nevertheless, if there is sufficient religious reason to believe that I'm not wrong on a certain point, I'm not going to agree with every criticism that a peer-reviewed publication would make of my material.

Funny you should bring up the ground penetrating radar for Cumorah. My book Resurrecting Cumorah calls for that very thing. If Mesoamericanist Mormon apologists are going to say that Cumorah is not in New York, then BYU ought to do a dig there to prove that it is not Cumorah. I am one of the few believers in the New York Cumorah left I think, that is not a proponent of the Heartland Theory.

On the other hand, seer stones are just stones. There is nothing physically different about them than any other stone. This is the nature of the miraculous. A believer at some point just has to believe, and be content with the fact that not everything has evidence. Otherwise, there is no belief. On the other hand, believers are not just going to sit back and not muster every evidence that they do have available to them. But they have to be realistic enough to realize that they aren't going to have the degree of evidence or proof that they would love to have for their positions.

Ed, you can't come to conclusions about seer stones without examining them. What you say about them speaks not about them, but what you have been taught about them and speculated about them. You don't take the final step and put it on the line. Some stones are magnets. Some are radioactive. These are extraordinary properties. The only way you find out if they are is if you test them. If you avoid that then you have to build a world view around avoiding investigation. Good luck with that.

Small groups of people discussing passionately the stories and characters that they love is a good description of a literary club and a gathering of Mopologists. It is a not a scientific or academic conference. It's about affirmation, not discovery. It's people trying to prop up each other's testimonies because they care about them and they think it's helpful. I don't see malice or stupidity or superstition in that. I do see, in this case, futility.

[_EdGoble]

Ed, if a cipher model to explain the EAG and the Book of Abraham in general is to be taken seriously, it has to be submitted to professional linguists or cryptoanalysts or others who would treat it as a secular problem.

He needs to show there is a cipher going on. All he has is the idea that maybe the person who created funerary documents for their dead, also made up in his own mind a meaning for each part of the documents into an Abraham story. No real cipher, and no logical reason to attach it to these documents. Joseph would need God to get the Abraham story that had really nothing to do with funerary texts he got others to pay for. Supposedly he didn't need any props for the Book of Moses.

I could claim some special meaning for any text in existence, so his ideas have the same amount of credibility.

Well, then Themis, I welcome you to review my material yourself and show that I have not indeed demonstrated that a cipher exists in the KEP/Facsimile Explanations. Or, anyone you please can review my material. It is there for the reviewing, not for the dismissing.