🚨 5 Things the Book of Abraham Gets Completely Wrong (and Why It Still Matters)

Spoiler alert: the Mormon cult’s "Book of Abraham" isn't just wrong—it’s hilariously, embarrassingly wrong. Think ancient aliens meets discount papyrus fraud. And yes, it's still canon.

Introduction: How a 19th-Century Grifter Fooled Millions With a Mummy Scroll

In 1835, Joseph Smith bought a few Egyptian mummies and papyrus scrolls from a traveling showman. Instead of displaying them like any sane person would, he claimed the scrolls were sacred writings by Abraham himself, dictated while chilling in Pharaoh’s court.

The result? The Book of Abraham—a core Mormon scripture that’s still in their holy canon, despite being debunked harder than flat Earth theory.

Let’s unravel five of its most ridiculous, provably false claims, served with a side of scathing sarcasm and historic receipts.

1. The Scroll Was Written by Abraham. It Wasn’t.

“Written by his own hand, upon papyrus.” — Book of Abraham, intro

The Mormon cult still publishes this line, even though the actual papyrus was a common Egyptian funerary text, written nearly 2,000 years after Abraham allegedly lived. That’s like finding a Harry Potter book and claiming Moses wrote it.

When the papyri were rediscovered in 1967 (after surviving the Chicago Fire, unlike Joseph Smith’s credibility), Egyptologists worldwide translated them—and guess what? Zero mentions of Abraham. Or Hebrews. Or anything remotely biblical. Just your everyday instructions for helping dead Egyptians into the afterlife.

🧠 Verdict: Historically impossible. Documented fraud. Still canon.

2. Kolob Exists. Somewhere. Out There. Maybe.

Yes, Kolob. The star closest to the throne of God. Described in painful astrological detail in the Book of Abraham, it's where God “resides.” Because obviously, God lives on a celestial body that revolves more slowly than Earth. In cubits.

Even the cult now tries to shrug Kolob off as “metaphorical,” but oops—there’s a hymn. In the official Mormon hymnbook. Still sung. About a literal star-God combo.

🎵 “If you could hie to Kolob...”
Translation: If you could hitchhike to fantasy space...

🧠 Verdict: Sounds like a rejected Star Trek planet. Still doctrinal.

3. The Facsimiles? Totally Misidentified.

The Book of Abraham includes three Egyptian drawings, called facsimiles. Joseph Smith “translated” them too. Except... Egyptologists have identified these images as:

• A funerary scene

• A common embalming illustration

• A pagan fertility god with a giant erection

Joseph? Claimed they were:

• Abraham being sacrificed

• Egyptian astronomy lessons

• Jehovah explaining priesthoods to Abraham

To be clear, this is like mislabeling a subway map as a secret alien blueprint. The original symbols are well-known and publicly catalogued. Scholars around the world have laughed, sighed, and then peer-reviewed the hell out of this farce.

🧠 Verdict: National Geographic says no. The Mormon cult says yes.

⛓ 4. Egyptian Hieroglyphs? Nope. Complete Gibberish.

Joseph created something called the “Egyptian Alphabet and Grammar.” He claimed it would let him translate hieroglyphs. What it actually is: a 5th-grader’s notebook of made-up characters, paired with English sentences like, “The sign of a flaming sword” or “The woman is virtue.”

It’s pure word salad. Egyptologists reviewing it didn’t even get mad—they just burst out laughing. One scholar called it “a creative but ultimately meaningless attempt at translation.”

Imagine making up your own version of Spanish by guessing at what each word should mean. That’s Joseph Smith’s translation method.

🧠 Verdict: Not just wrong—anti-accurate.

5. “Ancient” Teachings That Just Happen to Match 1830s Racism

The Book of Abraham includes a now-scrubbed gem: black skin is the mark of a curse, inherited from Cain, passed through Ham, and used to justify priesthood bans until 1978. It wasn’t just a footnote. It was core theology, taught in temples, published in manuals, and used to block Black members from full participation.

And where did it come from? Surprise: the Book of Abraham. The “curse of Pharaoh” passages were Joseph Smith’s divine justification for American racism, cloaked in fake hieroglyphs and patriarchal nonsense.

🧠 Verdict: As racist as it is fabricated. Still embedded in church history.

Conclusion: Still Scripture, Still a Scam

Despite all of this—the fabricated scroll, the fake translations, the outer-space God planet, the mistranslated genital god, and the racist theology—the Book of Abraham is still part of Mormon canon.

The cult just pretends these issues don’t exist. They don’t apologize. They don’t revise the canon. They just bury it in footnotes and hope new converts won’t ask too many questions.

“Pay no attention to the man behind the papyrus,” they whisper.
But we’re looking. And we’re laughing. And we’re not shutting up.

📎 Sources & Receipts

• Ritner, Robert K. The Joseph Smith Egyptian Papyri: A Complete Edition. Signature Books, 2011.

• Baer, Klaus. “The Breathing Permit of Hôr.” Dialogue: A Journal of Mormon Thought, 1968.

• Official LDS Book of Abraham: https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/scriptures/pgp/abr?lang=eng

• Hymn 284: “If You Could Hie to Kolob”
  
  

Do you believe in the story that Joseph Smith created out of thin air? Let me know in the comments