2 Nephi 26:32 Textual Variants

Apparently it was John Gilbert, the 1830 compositor, who deleted the not here. The crossout is precisely like the crossout of with found a few verses later in 2 Nephi 27:2. (The crossed-out not is on line 17 of page 85 of 𝓟, while the crossed-out with is on line 26.) We know that the later crossout (of the with) is Gilbert’s because the supralinearly inserted of looks precisely like the of that he later inserted in Alma 51:7; there he emended “many the people of liberty” to “many of the people of liberty” (see the discussion under Alma 51:7).

Here in 2 Nephi 26:32, the earliest text has a sequence of eight occurrences of the same phraseology (“that they should not”), preceded by an initial “that men should not”. Clearly, one could view the last occurrence (“that they should not do none of these things”) as an error—that is, one could presume that the not was accidentally added because of the preceding eight occurrences of should not. On the other hand, multiple negatives (also known as double negatives when only two negatives are involved) are found in the original text, as in the following examples:

• 2 Nephi 33:9 (“for none of these I cannot hope)
  • but behold for none of these [I cannot 0A|I cannot >js can I 1|can I BCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRST] hope except they shall be reconciled unto Christ
• 3 Nephi 17:17 (“no tongue cannot speak”)
  • and no tongue [can not 1|can ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRST] speak
• Mormon 8:26 (“no one need not say”)
  • and no one need [not >js NULL 1|not A| BCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRST] say they shall not come
• Ether 12:6 (“ye receive no witness not until after … ”)
  • for ye receive no witness [not 01| ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRST] until after the trial of your faith

(Note, in particular, the examples in 3 Nephi 17:17 and Ether 12:6; there the 1830 compositor is the one responsible for deleting the extra not.) These four examples are all similar to the example here in 2 Nephi 26:32 in that each one involves a not following either none or no. In each case, the not has been removed by editing.

Interestingly, there is evidence that the manuscript scribes and even the 1830 compositor himself sometimes created multiple negatives:

• Alma 9:12 (initial error in 𝓟 by scribe 2, corrected by himself )
  • and except ye repent ye [can not > can 1|can ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRST] in [no wise 1ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQS|nowise RT] inherit the kingdom of God
• Alma 29:2 (the 1830 compositor added an extra not)
  • that they should repent and come unto our God that there might [be no 01PS|not be no A|not be BCDEFGHIJKLMNOQRT] more sorrow upon all the face of the earth
• Ether 6:25 (no room in 𝓞 for not; initial error in 𝓟 by Oliver Cowdery, corrected by himself)
  • and he commanded them that they should [ 0ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRST|not > NULL 1] constrain no man to be their king

So it is possible that the five cases where the earliest sources support the multiple negative could be due to dialectal interference during the early transmission of the text.

Even so, the critical text does not necessarily favor standard English. Instead, in each case of negation, we allow the earliest textual sources to determine whether the multiple negative should be included in the original text. When supported by the earliest reading, the critical text will accept multiple negation, despite its unacceptability in standard English.

For examples of multiple negation involving the negative conjunction nor, see 2 Nephi 23:17. For examples of multiple negation involving the prepositional but, see 1 Nephi 14:28. And for a complete discussion, see negation in volume 3.