1 Nephi 12:4 Textual Variants

In this passage there are three examples (numbered as 1, 2, and 3) that involve either removing or reinterpreting the subordinate conjunction that. In the first example, scribe 3 of 𝓞 originally deleted “that it”. (The initial crossout of the two words “that it” is identical to two other crossouts made by scribe 3 on the same manuscript page.) Scribe 3 thus changed the text from “I saw the earth that it rent the rocks” to simply “I saw the earth rent the rocks”, although one might have expected the base form of the verb rend (that is, “I saw the earth rend the rocks”); compare, for instance, “I saw many fall down at his feet and worship him” in 1 Nephi 11:24. The unacceptability of “I saw the earth rent the rocks” may thus be a further indication that scribe 3’s deletion was secondary and does not represent the original text. (Oliver Cowdery later made some additional changes to this reading, which are discussed below.)

In the second example, the pronoun they was removed in the 1858 Wright edition; this deletion was followed by the first two RLDS editions. This change made the resultive subordinate conjunction that into a subject relative pronoun (“and I saw many that were burnt with fire”). This reading, however, has not been maintained in the RLDS text.

In the third example, Joseph Smith himself deleted the they for the 1837 edition, thus making the that into a subject relative pronoun (“and I saw many that did tumble to the earth”). This reading continues in both the LDS and RLDS texts.

The reinterpretation of the resultive subordinate conjunction that as a subject relative pronoun has been inconsistent since in the same verse there are two other examples where the resultive subordinate conjunction that has been maintained throughout the textual history:

and I saw the plains of the earth that they were broken up and I saw many cities that they were sunk

So the original text for this verse has a sequence of five resultive that ’s, each of which should be retained:

and I saw the earth that it rent the rocks …

and I saw the plains of the earth that they were broken up and I saw many cities that they were sunk and I saw many that they were burnt with fire and I saw many that they did tumble to the earth because of the quaking thereof

In the last two examples, the word cities is implied. This interpretation is supported by the text in 3 Nephi where the record of this destruction is actually given. There the text specifies that the Nephite cities were sunk, burned, or shaken till their buildings collapsed:

3 Nephi 8:14

and many great and notable cities were sunk and many were burned and many were shook till the buildings thereof had fallen to the earth

As in 1 Nephi 12:4, the word many is again twice repeated and without repeating the head noun cities. In fact, the same sequencing of types of destruction is given (sinking, burning, and collapsing).

We now return to the first example listed here in 1 Nephi 12:4. As already noted, the text originally read “and I saw the earth that it rent the rocks”, which was edited by scribe 3 of 𝓞 to “and I saw the earth rent the rocks”. Later, in heavier ink, Oliver Cowdery overwrote scribe 3’s crossout of “that it” with his own crossout and then further emended the text to read “and I saw the earth and the rocks that they rent”. Oliver was apparently dissatisfied with the earth rending the rocks, so he changed the verb rend from transitive to intransitive. His emendation does restore the resultive subordinate conjunction that to this passage (“that they rent”), but the resulting construction is ambiguous: the resultive clause definitely applies to the preceding noun phrase “the rocks” (that is, the rocks rent), but one cannot be sure if the clause also applies to the earlier noun phrase “the earth” (that is, the earth rent). In other words, the text could be interpreted as either (1) Nephi saw the earth and [he saw] the rocks that they [the rocks] rent, or (2) Nephi saw the earth and the rocks that they [both the earth and the rocks] rent. Oliver Cowdery’s emendation has therefore introduced some indeterminacy as to how the resultive clause should be interpreted.

Despite its difficulty, the original reading (“and I saw the earth that it rent the rocks”) is understandable. Since the same resultive construction is used four more times in this passage, we should assume that its initial use is fully intended and represents the original text.