The 1837 edition replaced unto with to. This change was not marked by Joseph Smith and appears to be a typo. The Book of Mormon text clearly favors “unto repentance” over “to repentance”. Excluding this case, the text has 34 instances of “unto repentance”, but only 6 of “to repentance”. In fact, five of those six occur with the verb bring (the sixth one with the verb call ). The instances of “unto repentance” also occur with the verbs bring (nine times) and call (once) as well as with a multitude of other verbs (stir up, baptize, have faith, exercise faith, lead, be, come, and believe). So the occurrence of “unto repentance” with the verb persuade is clearly consistent with the diversity in verb choice for the rest of the text; there was no need for the 1837 replacement of unto with to in 2 Nephi 26:27.
Summary: Restore the frequently used phraseology “unto repentance” in 2 Nephi 26:27, the reading of the earliest textual sources.