Alma 29:2 Textual Variants

Royal Skousen
yea I would declare unto every soul as with the voice of thunder repentance and the plan of redemption that they should repent and come unto our God that there might [be no 1PS|not be no A|not be BCDEFGHIJKLMNOQRT] more sorrow upon all the face of the earth

The 1830 typesetter added an extra not here in Alma 29:2, thus creating a multiple negative. The 1837 edition removed the multiple negative by deleting the original no rather than the intrusive not. The printer’s manuscript reads “that there might be no more sorrow”, and Joseph Smith made no change in 𝓟 in his editing for the 1837 edition (𝓞 is not extant here). The LDS text has maintained the 1837 reading, while the RLDS text has restored the original reading (beginning with the 1908 RLDS edition).

Moreover, the 1837 change made a difference in meaning. The original reading says that there will not be any sorrow anymore, while the secondary reading literally means that there won’t be any increase in sorrow. Clearly, the original reading is what is intended here. In addition, the 1837 reading created a unique reading for the Book of Mormon text. Elsewhere in the text, there are no occurrences of “not be more ”, but there are three more of “be no more ”:

For further discussion, see under 2 Nephi 26:32 as well as more generally under negation in volume 3.

Summary: Restore in Alma 29:2 the original use of the negative: “that there might be no more sorrow” (which is consistent with other usage in the text).

Analysis of Textual Variants of the Book of Mormon, Part. 4

References