Ether 3:25–27 Textual Variants

and when the Lord had said these words [the Lord >js he 1|the Lord A|he BCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRST] shewed unto the brother of Jared all the inhabitants of the earth which had been and also all that would be and [the Lord 1APS|he BCDEFGHIJKLMNOQRT] withheld them not from his sight even unto the ends of the earth for [the Lord 1APS|he BCDEFGHIJKLMNOQRT] had said unto him in times before that if he would believe in him that he could shew unto him all things it should be shewn unto him therefore the Lord could not withhold any thing from him for he knew that the Lord could shew him all things ) and the Lord said unto him write these things and seal them up

In this long passage the original text had seven occurrences of the subject noun phrase the Lord. Since the second one occurred very close to the first one, Joseph Smith changed it to he in his editing for the 1837 edition (he also marked the change in 𝓟). The two next occurrences of the Lord were also changed to he in the 1837 edition, yet these changes were not marked by Joseph in 𝓟. But the final three cases of the Lord in this passage were left alone. In 1908 the RLDS text, in accord with Joseph’s actual editing in 𝓟, restored the Lord in the two cases where the change was not marked in 𝓟 (namely, cases 3 and 4, as listed above).

Later in this last part of the text, Joseph Smith replaced another instance of the Lord with he; as before, the change was prompted by an immediately proceeding instance of the Lord:

Ether 9:35
- and it came to pass that when they had humbled themselves sufficiently before the Lord [the Lord 01A|he BCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRST] did send rain upon the face of the earth

There are no other instances of this kind of editing in the text. In fact, there are numerous examples in the text of close occurrences of the Lord where there has been no editing of the Lord to he, as in the following examples:

2 Nephi 1:32
- wherefore if ye shall keep the commandments of the Lord the Lord hath consecrated this land for the security of thy seed with the seed of my son
Alma 27:11
- and it came to pass that Ammon went and inquired of the Lord and the Lord said unto him …

The critical text will therefore maintain or restore, as the case may be, each original instance of the Lord here in Ether 3:25–27; the original the Lord will also be restored in Ether 9:35. (See under Alma 62:50 for a case where Oliver Cowdery momentarily replaced the Lord with he as he copied the text from 𝓞 into 𝓟.)

We should also note here that in verse 25 of this passage we have another example of a which that refers to people but which has not been edited to who (namely, in the clause containing the second instance of the Lord ): “all the inhabitants of the earth which had been and also all that would be”. In his editing for the 1837 edition, Joseph Smith typically changed such instances of which to who(m). For a general discussion of this, see under which in volume 3.

Summary: Restore in Ether 3:25–27 the three instances of the Lord that were changed to he in the editing for the 1837 edition; also restore the similar instance in Ether 9:35; close repetition of the phrase the Lord can be found elsewhere in the Book of Mormon text.

Analysis of Textual Variants of the Book of Mormon, Part. 6

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