and it came to pass that not many days after his death Laman and Lemuel and the sons of Ishmael were angry with me because of the admonitions of the Lord for I Nephi was constrained to speak unto
them according to [the >js his 1|the A|his BCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRST] word
In his editing for the 1837 edition, Joseph Smith emended “according to the word” to “according to his word”. Since the previous sentence refers to “the admonitions of the Lord”, it is obvious
that “according to the word” means ‘according to the word that I Nephi received’.
The unmodified phrase “the word” is frequently used in the Book of Mormon to refer to ‘the word of the Lord’, especially in contexts referring to preaching, declaring, and teaching the gospel. In
the following examples, “the word” alone means ‘the gospel’:
- Enos 1:26 (“declaring the word”, plus 9 other examples)
- that I must preach and prophesy unto this people and declare the word according to the truth which is in Christ
- Mosiah 28:6 (“preaching the word”, plus 16 other examples)
- and it came to pass that king Mosiah went and inquired of the Lord if he should let his sons go up among the Lamanites to preach the word
- Alma 38:15 (“teaching the word”, plus 2 other examples)
- now go my son and teach the word unto this people
Furthermore, one of the 17 examples of “preaching the word” has been consciously emended to “preaching the word of God”:
- Alma 17:8 (Oliver Cowdery’s correction in 𝓟 in pencil)
- and thus they departed into the wilderness with their numbers which they had selected to go up to the land of Nephi to preach the word [NULL >p of God 1|of God
ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRST] unto the Lamanites
On the other hand, there is a nearby example where it seems that Oliver Cowdery momentarily omitted “of God” when he copied “the word of God” from 𝓞 into 𝓟:
- Alma 17:12 (Oliver Cowdery’s correction in 𝓟 without any change in ink flow)
- and it came to pass that the hearts of the sons of Mosiah … took courage to go forth unto the Lamanites to declare unto them the word [NULL > of God 1|of God
ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRST]
Thus there has been a tendency in the manuscripts to both add and drop the phrase “of God” after “the word”.
Of course, in 2 Nephi 4:14 Nephi is not referring to the gospel. Instead, he is referring to the specific word that the Lord gave him in admonishing Laman, Lemuel, and the sons of Ishmael.
Elsewhere in the text there are a few examples where the phrase “the word” is used alone to refer to a specific message from the Lord:
- Jacob 2:11
- for behold as I inquired of the Lord thus came the word unto me saying Jacob get thou up into the temple on the morrow and declare the word which I shall give thee unto
this people
- Mosiah 25:21
- every church having their priests and their teachers and every priest preaching the word according as it was delivered to him by the mouth of Alma
- Alma 8:29
- and the word came to Alma saying go and also say unto my servant Amulek …
- 3 Nephi 1:21
- and it came to pass also that a new star did appear according to the word
- 3 Nephi 1:25
- but it came to pass that they soon became converted and were convinced of the error which they were in for it was made known unto them that the law was not yet fulfilled and that it must
be fulfilled in every whit yea the word came unto them that it must be fulfilled yea that one jot nor tittle should not pass away till it should all be fulfilled
These examples refer to the word of the Lord coming either to a prophet or from a prophet to the people. Thus there is nothing inappropriate in 2 Nephi 4:14 about Nephi using only “the word” to
say that the Lord revealed what he, Nephi, should speak.
