Alma 37:44 Textual Variants

Royal Skousen
which will point [to you 01ABCEFGHIJKLMNOPQRST| D] a straight course to eternal bliss

The 1841 British edition omitted the prepositional phrase to you, perhaps because it somewhat awkwardly intrudes between the verb and its direct object. The subsequent LDS edition (1849) restored this prepositional phrase.

Even though to you is extant in 𝓞, one wonders here if the original text might have read unto you, as in the parallel relative clause that ends this sentence: “which would point unto them a straight course to the promised land”. Each of these instances of to you and unto them is extant in 𝓞, so we may reasonably assume a case of variation here between to and unto. For another example where the text shows variation between to and unto, see under 1 Nephi 15:33. For each case of to versus unto, we generally follow the earliest textual evidence.

Summary: Maintain in Alma 37:44 the prepositional phrase to you in “which will point to you a straight course to eternal bliss”; the preposition to is also firm, even though the sentence ends with “which would point unto them a straight course to the promised land”.

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

References