2 Nephi 26:29 Textual Variants

Royal Skousen
that they may get gain and praise of [men >+ the 1|the ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRST] world

In copying from 𝓞 into 𝓟, Oliver Cowdery originally wrote inline the impossible “praise of men world” (and without any change in the level of ink flow). Somewhat later he corrected the text by crossing out men and supralinearly inserting the. The original manuscript must have read as the corrected text in 𝓟. The correction itself is in somewhat heavier ink flow and could have been made almost immediately (after redipping his quill) or somewhat later when he proofed 𝓟 against 𝓞.

The Book of Mormon has two other instances of “praise of the world” (in 1 Nephi 13:9 and Mormon 8:38), a phrase which never occurs in the King James Bible. Oliver Cowdery was perhaps influenced by the familiar language from John 12:43 (“for they loved the praise of men more than the praise of God”) when he initially wrote “praise of men” in 2 Nephi 26:29. An improbable source for the initial error in 2 Nephi 26:29 is the virtually identical phraseology in Helaman 7:21 (“but behold it is to get gain / to be praised of men”); this passage in Helaman is considerably far away from 2 Nephi 26:29.

Summary: Maintain in 2 Nephi 26:29 the corrected reading in 𝓟 of “praise of the world”.

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

References