Mosiah 15:5–6 Textual Variants

Royal Skousen
and thus the flesh becoming subject to the spirit or the Son to the Father—being one God— suffereth temptation and yieldeth not to the temptation but suffereth himself to be mocked and scourged and cast out and disowned by his people and after all this [& 1|and APS| BCDEFGHIJKLMNOQRT] after working many mighty miracles among the children of men he shall be led yea even as Isaiah said as a sheep before the shearer is dumb so he opened not his mouth

The 1837 edition dropped the and preceding the second after in verse 6. Yet there is no real reason why the original and should not be there. The RLDS text restored the and in the 1908 edition since the conjunction was never crossed out in the printer’s manuscript. Perhaps placing dashes around the second after-clause might help the reader process this passage:

The demonstrative this near the beginning of verse 6 does not refer to the miracles Jesus will perform (referred to in the following phrase) but instead to what he will suffer (mentioned previously in verse 5). Thus the original and is necessary for maintaining the original distinction between what Christ will suffer and the miracles he will perform. Since Joseph Smith did not mark this change in the printer’s manuscript, it is quite possible that the loss of the and was simply a typo in the 1837 edition.

Summary: Restore the original and before the second after in Mosiah 15:6 (“and after all this and after working many mighty miracles”); the demonstrative this refers to the preceding language rather than the following clause.

Analysis of Textual Variants of the Book of Mormon, Part. 2

References