Lyle Fletcher has proposed (personal communication, 23 August 2006) that the statement “I cannot deny his word” may be an error for “he cannot deny his word”, which certainly seems to fit the immediate context better. Amulek is speaking here, yet earlier in this narrative Amulek answered Zeezrom by referring to the impossibility of God denying his own word:
Here the passage does not read “for me to deny his word”. In Alma 11:37, if “I cannot deny his word” is an error for “he cannot deny his word”, then the I could have been prompted by the I in the immediately preceding sentence (which begins verse 37): “and I say unto you again that he cannot save them in their sins”.
In a revelation dating from January 1831, the Lord himself refers to the impossibility of him denying his own word:
To be sure, a person can deny the word of God; but except for here in Alma 11:37 the Book of Mormon text refers only to nonbelievers denying the word of God or, by extension, the words of his prophets:
Thus the use of I is somewhat unexpected in “I cannot deny his word”. Nevertheless, it is not impossible: if God cannot deny his word, then neither can his prophet.
If I is an error here in Alma 11:37, it would have occurred during the dictation of the text since 𝓞 is extant here and reads I, not he. Yet elsewhere there isn’t much independent evidence in the history of the text for mix-ups between the subject pronouns I and he. The only instance of such a mix-up occurred when scribe 2 of 𝓟 wrote he instead of the correct I in 3 Nephi 27:14; later, Oliver Cowdery, when he proofed 𝓟 against 𝓞, corrected the he to I:
In that case, 𝓞 undoubtedly read I since the 1830 edition was set from 𝓞, not 𝓟, for this part of the text and it reads I. So the chances of he being replaced with I in Alma 11:37 seem fairly remote. The critical text will therefore maintain in Alma 11:37 the earliest reading (“for I cannot deny his word”), the reading in 𝓞, since it will work. Nonetheless, the I here could be an error for he.
Don Brugger points out (personal communication) that the use of I is no doubt correct given Amulek’s response to Zeezrom in the preceding verse: “for thou sayest that I speak as though I had authority to command God because I said he shall not save his people in their sins”. Brugger notes that in verse 36 Amulek says that he is accused of falsely speaking for God, so he then quite naturally and appropriately emphasizes in verse 37 that he cannot deny God’s word.
Summary: Maintain the pronoun I in Alma 11:37 (“for I cannot deny his word”), even though other examples of this phraseology support the reading “for he cannot deny his word” (as nearby in Alma 11:34).
Near the end of this discussion regarding Alma 11:41, I cite Alma 41:4 as another instance of the usage under discussion. In addition, I could have also cited a passage that occurs right before Alma 41:4:
For further discussion of both instances of initial its in Alma 41:2–4, see under Alma 41:4 in part 4.
The reference to the end of line 16 on page 228ªof 𝓞 is an error; instead, the line number should be 15; on the following page, the line number is correctly given.
In this sentence, the participial verb form should be shortened, not shorten (thus the phrase should read as “the shortened form raign”).
Here the sentence should start out as “And in a few cases the dittography was missed”—that is, in a few cases, not in few cases.
Grant Hardy (personal communication, 15 December 2006), in response to the question raised by Douglas Stringer, writes:
You note the unexpected adverb forward. One of your correspondents wondered if the phrase should read “I would cite your minds back to the time which the Lord God gave these commandments unto his children”. You suggest that “the use of the word forward may be related to the idea of ‘inciting’ (or ‘citing’) one’s mind to go forward in confronting a new thought.” There is an easier, more integrated solution. It does seem strange that Alma, speaking in about 82 b.c.e., wants to direct his listeners’ minds forward to a past event—Moses’s establishment of the Mosaic law and ordination of priests—but this is a result of the extraneous 1879 chapter break. If we follow the flow of Alma’s argument in Alma 12, he starts with the fall of Adam (verses 22–27), refers to the first revelation of the plan of redemption to mankind (verses 28–30), and then moves on to God’s giving of commandments (verses 31–37), explicitly a commandment to repent, but also perhaps with an implication of the law of Moses. At that point, in Alma 13:1, Alma wants to draw his readers’ attention forward to the first ordaining of priests—not forward from the listeners’ own circumstances, but chronologically forward from the last time period he has been talking about. He wants us to think forward to the next major event on a historical time line he is showing us.
Hardy’s comments help to clear up a difficult reading, allowing us to interpret “cite your minds forward” as carrying the subject matter forward in time.
Another possibility, suggested by David Calabro (personal communication), is that here the word forward may be a Hebraism that actually refers to past time. He notes that the Hebrew word qedem has the meaning ‘in front of ’ as well as ‘in former time’. Actually, we can see something of this same notion in the diverging semantic development of the English word before, as in “he stood before her” (meaning ‘in front of her’) versus “he came before her” (as her forefather). Note that in archaic English we can refer to an event in the past as occurring “aforetimes”. Consequently, the phrase “forward to the time” (in the expression “I would cite your minds forward to the time when the Lord God gave these commandments unto his children”) could actually mean ‘back to the time’.
Thus there are a couple of alternative ways to view the use of the word forward in Alma 13:1. In any event, there appears to be no need to appeal to a more general meaning of ‘urge you to consider’ for the phrase “cite your minds forward”. The earliest (and current) reading will be maintained here in Alma 13:1.
In the summary here, although the 1830 semicolon is accepted, a comma or a dash will also work; the basic point is that the punctuation should place “in the first place” with the following present participial clause.