In the olive tree allegory, the Lord of the vineyard places the branches from the tame olive tree in various faraway places in the vineyard. We have six references to these “nithermost part(s)”. (For discussion of nithermost versus nethermost, see below.) In each case, the plural parts is required by the context since the Lord of the vineyard always refers to each of the different branches that were distributed throughout those parts; he also travels from one place to another, and some of the spots are poor and one is very good (see verses 20–25 and verses 38–40). In no instance can the singular part be used to refer to all of “the nithermost parts” of the vineyard. In fact, when the text in Jacob 5 refers to one of these particular places, the word used is always spot rather than part:
The plural parts is also used in one of these cases to refer to various places in the vineyard but without the word nithermost:
In all, there are seven instances of part(s) in Jacob 5. Besides the two in verses 13–14 and the one in verse 43 (just cited), there are three invariant cases of the plural parts:
In one case, the printer’s manuscript originally had parts, but the 1830 typesetter accidentally changed it to part:
The 1908 RLDS edition restored the original plural parts in verse 19. Thus in only one case, in verse 13, does the printer’s manuscript itself have the singular part, and this singular form has been followed in all the printed editions. We do not have the original manuscript for this instance, but it is quite clear from the manuscripts that Oliver Cowdery frequently added and deleted final s ’s in his copy work (see, for instance, the discussion regarding border(s) and shore(s) under 1 Nephi 2:5). Here in Jacob 5, the allegory itself requires parts for all six cases of “nithermost part(s)”.
The printer’s manuscript consistently has nithermost instead of the standard nethermost (the form found in all the printed editions). The i vowel can be found in the Old English stem, ni∂er ‘lower’, with the base word nither being retained in northern British and Scottish dialects (at least as a verb meaning ‘to bring low’, used metaphorically). In other British dialects, the competing form nether (with citations dating from Middle English) has replaced nither. (For discussion and examples, see the Oxford English Dictionary under nether and nither.) The consistency of the spelling nithermost in the printer’s manuscript argues for including this spelling in the critical text (although this particular form could be the result of dialectal overlay on the part of Oliver Cowdery or Joseph Smith).
Summary: Emend part in Jacob 5:13 to read parts; also restore the plural parts in Jacob 5:19; maintain the dialectal nithermost instead of the standard nethermost throughout the allegory.