Alma 5:3 Textual Variants

Royal Skousen
he began to establish a church in the land which was in the [Border >+ Borders 1|borders ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRST] of Nephi yea the land which was called the land of Mormon

Scribe 2 of 𝓟 initially wrote the singular Border; shortly thereafter he inserted a plural s with heavier ink flow. The original manuscript probably read as a plural since scribe 2 is not known for his editing of the text. Moreover, in the Book of Mormon text we find examples of only the plural borders but none of the singular border (for further discussion and examples, see under 1 Nephi 2:5). The critical text will maintain the plural borders here in Alma 5:3.

Summary: Retain in Alma 5:3 the plural borders, the corrected reading in 𝓟; the text otherwise uses borders, not border.

Analysis of Textual Variants of the Book of Mormon, Part. 3

References