Literature: Alma2 continues with his testimony of the coming Messiah, translating his personal experience into a universal one. Just has he has now confessed the Messiah, so too will “every tongue confess before him.” Just as Alma2 has undergone the judgment, so too will all men undergo the judgment. Just as Alma2 quaked and trembled (perhaps an oblique reference to the voice of thunder shaking the ground?) so, too, will all quake and tremble before Yahweh.
Text: The quotation of Alma2’s words ends here, and Mormon returns to summary narration.
Reference: Verse 31 borrows language from Romans 14:11: “For it is written, As I live, saith the Lord, every knee shall bow to me, and every tongue shall confess to God.” Paul’s language combines phrases from two passages in Isaiah: “As I live” (Isa. 49:18) and “I have sworn by myself, the word is gone out of my mouth in righteousness, and shall not return, That unto me every knee shall bow, every tongue shall swear” (Isa. 45:23). Alma2’s reference was certainly to Isaiah. However, Joseph Smith’s translation leans to Paul’s recasting.