Alma 58:23 Textual Variants

Here the original manuscript is not extant for the end of “strong hold(s)”. In the printer’s manuscript, Oliver Cowdery initially wrote the singular City, then crossed out City and wrote strong hold, with strong written in supralinearly but hold written inline as part of the continuing text (which means that the correction was immediate); as expected, there is no difference in the level of ink flow for the correction. The 1830 typesetter, however, changed the singular strong hold to the plural strong holds, probably unintentionally. The context definitely implies a singular usage. Earlier, in verse 21, the text refers to Gid and Teomner (with their men) taking “possession of the city”—that is, the city of Manti.

Generally speaking, the text refers to a single fortified city as “a strong hold”, not in the plural as “strong holds”:

• Alma 53:5
  • and this city became an exceeding strong hold ever after
• Alma 53:6
  • Moroni ... had obtained possession of the city Mulek which was one of the strongest holds of the Lamanites
• Alma 55:33
  • for behold the Lamanites had by their labors fortified the city Morionton until it had become an exceeding strong hold
• Helaman 1:22
  • and now when Coriantumr saw that he was in possession of the city of Zarahemla … and that he had obtained the possession of the strongest hold in all the land …

There is also one plural example that implies each city is a strong hold:

• Mormon 5:4
  • and there were also other cities which were maintained by the Nephites which strong holds did cut them off that they could not get into the country which lay before us to destroy the inhabitants of our land

Thus the singular reading strong hold in 𝓟 for Alma 58:23 is fully acceptable. Since it is the reading of the earliest textual source, the critical text will restore the singular strong hold to this passage. (For discussion of the need to spell stronghold as two words in the Book of Mormon text, see under Alma 50:6.)