1 Nephi 5:10 Textual Variants

Royal Skousen
my father Lehi took the records which were engraven upon [the 01ABCDEFGHIJLMNOPQRST| K] plates of brass

The 1892 RLDS edition accidentally dropped the definite article the in the phrase “the plates of brass”. This error did not persist, especially because these plates had already been identified in the text. The only time “plates of brass” occurs without any determiner is at the very beginning when the text first refers to them:

From that point on, we have either “the plates of brass” (23 times) or “these plates of brass” (3 times), which is what we expect in English.

Summary: The determiner (either the or these) for “plates of brass” is always appropriate after its initial reference in 1 Nephi 3:3.

Analysis of Textual Variants of the Book of Mormon, Part. 1

References