“They Shall Cry from the Dust”

Brant Gardner

Lehi returns to Joseph Smith and the Book of Mormon, which will fulfill the prophecy that Lehi’s faithful descendants will “cr[y] unto them”—meaning their far-distant descendants—through the Book of Mormon. Although Joseph Smith will bring forth the book, it is the words of Lehi’s descendants that will recall those future generations to faith in the Messiah.

Variant: Skousen speculates: “The original manuscript is not extant in 2 Nephi 3:20, but it seems quite plausible that it read ‘their cry shall go forth.’ The adverb forth could have been accidentally lost when the text was copied into the printer’s manuscript.

“There are two cases in the manuscripts where the adverb forth was dropped while the scribe was copying the text into the printer’s manuscript; in the first case, the error was caught, but not in the second.”

Second Witness: Analytical & Contextual Commentary on the Book of Mormon, Vol. 2

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