Alma 57:13 Textual Variants

The 1840 edition deleted the so before numerous; this is undoubtedly a typo. There are six other occurrences of “so numerous that” in the original text:

• Mosiah 22:2 the Lamanites being so numerous that it was impossible for …
• Alma 2:35 they were so numerous that they could not be numbered
• Alma 58:2 they were so exceeding more numerous ... that we durst not go forth
• Alma 59:8 their armies were so numerous that the remainder of the people of Nephihah were obliged to flee before them
• Helaman 4:19 for so numerous was the Lamanites that it became impossible fo. .
• 3 Nephi 2:11 the Gaddianton robbers had become so numerous ...  that it became expedient that …

The so has never been omitted from any of these instances, although the that was removed from the example in Mosiah 22:2 (for discussion, see under that passage). To be sure, here in Alma 57:13 the secondary construction “our prisoners were numerous that …” is quite unacceptable as it stands; yet even then it was maintained in the RLDS textual tradition until the 1908 RLDS text restored the original so. The critical text will, of course, maintain the so in this phrase.