2 Nephi 5:21 Textual Variants

Joseph Smith removed the therefore here in 2 Nephi 5:21 because of the wherefore at the beginning of the same sentence. Joseph apparently viewed this repetition as an unnecessary redundancy. In a number of other places in the text, Joseph Smith removed this kind of repetition from a long extended sentence:

• 2 Nephi 6:11 (deletion of second wherefore marked by Joseph Smith in 𝓟)
  • wherefore after they are driven to and fro
    —for thus saith the angel many shall be afflicted in the flesh and shall not be suffered to perish because of the prayers of the faithful—
    [wherefore 0A|wherefore >js NULL 1| BCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRST] they shall be scattered and smitten and hated
• The Words of Mormon 1:18 (deletion of second wherefore marked by Joseph Smith in 𝓟; they also deleted)
  • wherefore with the help of these king Benjamin
    —by laboring with all the might of his body and the faculty of his whole soul—
    and also the prophets
    [wherefore >js NULL 1|wherefore A| BCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRST]
    [they >js NULL 1|they A| BCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRST] did once more establish peace in the land
• Alma 42:6 (deletion of second therefore marked by Joseph Smith in 𝓟)
  • therefore as they were cut off from the tree of life
    [therefore 0A|therefore >js NULL 1| BCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRST] they should be cut off from the face of the earth
• Alma 42:9 (deletion of second therefore not marked in 𝓟)
  • therefore as the soul could never die and the fall had brought upon all mankind a spiritual death as well as a temporal
    —that is / they were cut off from the presence of the Lord—
    [therefore 01APS| BCDEFGHIJKLMNOQRT] it was expedient that mankind should be reclaimed from this spiritual death

Even so, Joseph Smith left unchanged some cases of the repeated wherefore and therefore:

• 2 Nephi 2:18
  • wherefore he saith unto Eve
    —yea even that old serpent which is the devil which is the father of all lies—
    wherefore he saith partake of the forbidden fruit and ye shall not die but ye shall be as God knowing good and evil
• 3 Nephi 7:12
  • therefore Jacob seeing that their enemies were more numerous than they
    —he being the king of the band—
    therefore he commanded his people that they should take their flight into the northernmost part of the land

In the original text, the repetition of wherefore or therefore serves an important narrative function— namely, to bring the reader back to the initially stated conditional clause that begins the sentence. In most instances, there is a long interruptive dependent clause or phrase between the repeated wherefore ’s and therefore ’s. For similar examples of this kind of usage, see 1 Nephi 11:1.