Helaman 13:32 Textual Variants

Royal Skousen
for your [destruction > desolation 1|desolation ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRST] is already come upon you and your destruction is made sure

Here in the printer’s manuscript, Oliver Cowdery initially wrote “for your destruction is already come upon you”; virtually immediately he corrected destruction to desolation (the level of ink flow for the supralinear desolation is unchanged). Oliver’s error was very likely in anticipation of the following clause: “and your destruction is made sure”. In addition, he probably expected destruction rather than desolation to come upon someone; elsewhere in the text, there are 12 cases of “destruction(s) coming upon someone”, as in 2 Nephi 25:10: “wherefore it hath been told them concerning the destruction which should come upon them”. The only instance of “desolation(s) coming upon someone” is here in Helaman 13:32. The 1830 edition, also a firsthand copy of 𝓞, reads desolation in this passage, so 𝓞 must have also read this way. The unique reading with desolation in this passage is apparently intended, and the critical text will therefore maintain it.

Summary: Maintain in Helaman 13:32 the corrected reading in 𝓟 (“for your desolation is already come upon you)”; despite its uniqueness, this expression appears to have been the reading in 𝓞 since the 1830 edition also reads this way.

Analysis of Textual Variants of the Book of Mormon, Part. 5

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