Mormon 5:2 Textual Variants

Royal Skousen
but behold I was without [hopes 1ABDEFIJLMNOPQS|hope CGHKRT]

Here the 1840 edition changed the earlier hopes to the singular hope. The 1908 RLDS edition restored the original plural (the reading in 𝓟) to the RLDS text. The 1920 LDS edition made the same change to the singular, perhaps by reference to the 1840 edition or independently. As explained under Alma 52:21, there are six other instances in the Book of Mormon text of the plural hopes where the singular is expected in modern English. The critical text will restore the original plural here in Mormon 5:2.

Summary: Restore in Mormon 5:2 the original plural noun hopes (“I was without hopes”), the reading of the earliest sources; although the singular hope is more frequent in the text, there are six other instances of hopes.

Analysis of Textual Variants of the Book of Mormon, Part. 6

References