Kevin Barney paper on Elkenah

[_Jersey Girl]

Here's another quick one, Gaz.

Kerry

The third canopic is most interesting! The apes headed Mahmackrah. What a weird name! However, that is not to discredit it, but to cause us to look closely at it. Critics all too often simply toss something off they don't understand. The crrect thing to do is look and read. The Egyptians always placed this ape or bulls head (sometimes they are interchangeable with canopic jars) in the north. When we are confronted with odd looking names in Joseph Smith's writings, it is to the SOUND of them that we call your attention to, not necessarily how they are spelled. For instance, Baurak El and Shaumahyeem are perfectly good Hebrew if you read them OUT LOUD, though they look simply outlandish. The names of the canopics are addressed to the EAR not to the eye. Mamackrah suggests all sorts of things to the ear, especially with syllables such as Mah, mack, and rah. These are full of meaning in any language.

In the intro to the commentary, Kerry claims that Abraham is addressing Egyptian customs to his non-Egyptian audience. Who is the audience? If the audience is the Hebrews, why are we told that we need to read them out loud because then, they sound like perfectly good Hebrew? Couldn't Abraham produce perfectly good Hebrew writing?

Jersey Girl

[_Fortigurn]

Pow! Short but sharp.

[_Jersey Girl]

Pow! Short but sharp.

Why yes, yes I am. I'm going to try the Barney article next.

Jersey Girl

[_Jersey Girl]

Kerry

The last is Koash or Korash, variant spellings of the same name, and correlating to the South. This could very easily be the land of Cush.

Gaz, everything that follows is based on the above bolded statement for which there is no proof. The Book of Abraham uses the name "Korash". Kerry claims that Korash and Koash are variant spellings of the same name. He fails to demonstrate that. Now, I am not well familiar with the Book of Abraham (which is why I decided to tackle all of this as a amateur) so it could be that the two names are used interchangeably in the text of the Book of Abraham. But in this commentary, Kerry doesn't demonstrate how or where the names are interchangeable. He simply states that they are and then goes on to assert that what he hasn't demonstrated could "easily be the land of Cush". Gaz...it could just as easily be a variation of the name Korah that Joseph Smith made up from the Bible. "Korah" is right there in Exodus along with "Elkanah". If I could find that, couldn't Joseph have done the same?

This is the region SOUTH of Egypt, according to the Standard Jewish Encyclopedia. The name (Nubia or Ethiopia) in Hebrew and other ancient languages which expanded south of Elephantine and Syene (aswan). It has also been identified as southern Arabia and even India as far as that goes.The names of the four brothers, Mizraim, Punt, Canaan, and Cush certainly remind us of the division of the world into four regions. The Queen of Punt certainly lived in the South. The natives of Saba, way down there at the south end of Arabia worshipped a goddess Iagouth, who came from, of course, Heliopolis!

Yes, Cush is in the South region, but again, Kerry hasn't demonstrated (1) the variations of the name and so (2) his assertion is based on something he hasn't established to begin with. The 4 brothers, sons of Ham, do definitely remind of us of the division of land into 4 regions. While Kerry is using "Cush" to indicate the South in this portion of his commentary, why hasn't he also followed the same method in applying Mizraim, Punt (Put/Phut) and Canaan to the other 3 regions in the previous portions of his commentary?
*
FYI: Kerry is dead dog wrong about the Queen of Punt and if he were on this thread, I'd debate him on this one. The Queen of Punt (Put/Phut) would have lived in the WEST.

She was simply a local form of the Goddess Hathor, the regent of Heliopolis, worshipped at Punt and Saba. Her people were known as the Koraish! They were also called the Beni Qananee, or sons of Canaan. Back home at Heliopolis, the lady went by the name of Wadjit which was Semiticized into Ozza, under which title she turns up as one of the principle idols of the Qoreish in Mekkah. This Qoreish is the diminutive of the name Koraish.

IMNSHO, the above is irrelevant. As I stated previously, the Queen of Punt (Put/Phut) would have lived in the WEST, not the SOUTH as Kerry claims so it doesn't matter if her people were known as the Koraish because they have no ties to the SOUTH to begin with. The attempt to connect "Koraish" to "Korash" in the Book of Abraham doesn't fly. If it does, I don't see it.

All in all, the names correlate to the exact correct regional directions of which are depicted on the HEADS of the four canopics in the Facsimile No.1. This is amazing to no living end as far as I am concerned.

I don't see where an exact correlation has been demonstrated. If someone else knows more about this, please post your information.

[_Fortigurn]

He also forgot about the Cush east of Israel.

[_Jersey Girl]

Retraction: Kerry is correct about the Queen of Punt living in the South. I do think his use of the names of sons of Ham is incorrect. I'll try to drum up a source for this shortly.

[_Jersey Girl]

Okay, this is from Wiki and I'll post a link for it.

* Phut, son of Ham. Ancient authorities are fairly universal in identifying Phut with the Libyans (Lebu and Pitu), the earliest neighbors of Egypt to the west. (Although more recent theories have tried to connect Phut with Phoenicia, or the currently unidentified Land of Punt.)"

It mentions recent theories and unidentified Land of Punt. Huh? Kerry could have some leeway here based on these theories. If I only knew what they were!

Jersey Girl

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sons_of_Noah

[_Jersey Girl]

Okay, where am I? ;-)

Elkanah and Korah appear in the Old Testament in Exodus.

Libnah appears in various parts of the Old Testament in reference to the Exodus.

So why couldn't Joseph have gotten the names from there?

Jersey Girl

[Guest]

Jersey Girl,

Any theory attempting to explain the significance of the names in the Book of Abraham should reckon somehow with variant spellings, and I think should usually prefer the earliest spelling. That actually is the rule the apologists usually follow: revert to the earliest manuscripts. They'll tear you apart in FARMS Review if you don't. Curiously, the earliest manuscripts of the Book of Abraham do not have a god of Korash! He is completely ommitted from all the relevant verses! The second rescension has Koash, and by the third he has become "Korash." I think that originally Joseph meant for the fourth canopic jar to be the god of Pharaoh. Later he thought better of it because the gods of the Chaldeans looked too much like Pharaoh's god. So he made up a new god, and made pharaoh's god into the crocodile.

The earliest spelling of Libnah is actually "Zibnah". Not until the third rescension does Zibnah turn into Libnah. Spellings of Elkenah vary a little in one of the first-rescension manuscripts, but the other quite consistently spells it "Elkkener". This doesn't work quite as well for Kevin's theory as "Elkenah" does, since it would tend to exclude his favorite option.

Reverting to the earliest manuscripts does kind of mess with the "got it from the Bible" hypothesis.

http://mormonscripturestudies.com/exmo2 ... online.doc

-CK

[_Jersey Girl]

Thanks, CK! What I was trying to do with the commentary, was point out inconsistencies (as a complete amateur) in the reasoning and methods used. Do you tend to agree or disagree with Kerry's assertions, connections and conclusions that he draws?

Jersey Girl