Jacob 5:29 Textual Variants

Here the 1830 typesetter changed the preposition from in (the reading in the printer’s manuscript) to into. Whenever the verb involves motion from one place to another and the adverb down occurs, the Book of Mormon text nearly always uses the preposition to, unto, or into to describe the place one is going to—that is, the preposition contains the morpheme to. Consider the following sampling from those cases where the preposition is into:

• 1 Nephi 3:4 and bring them down hither into the wilderness
• 1 Nephi 18:5 we should arise and go down into the ship
• 2 Nephi 31:13 by following your Lord and Savior down into the water
• Mosiah 7:6 and they went down into the land of Nephi
• Alma 43:32 and so down into the borders of the land Manti
• Alma 62:23 they were all let down into the city by night
• Nephi 28:20 and they were cast down into the earth
• 1 Ether 1:42 thou shalt go at the head of them down into the valley

There are only two cases for which the preposition does not contain the morpheme to. And in both cases, the exceptional preposition is in: namely, here in Jacob 5:29 and in 1 Nephi 4:33 (which reads “if he would go down in the wilderness with us” in all the textual sources, including 𝓞). For the second of these, evidence from errors made by scribe 3 of 𝓞 and internal evidence regarding the phrase “in(to) the wilderness” argue that the original text for 1 Nephi 4:33 read “if he would go down into the wilderness with us” (see the discussion under 1 Nephi 4:33).

Here in Jacob 5, all the other instances refer to “going down into (the nithermost parts of) the vineyard”:

• Jacob 5:15 let us go down into the vineyard
• Jacob 5:16 the Lord of the vineyard and also the servant went down into the vineyard
• Jacob 5:30 the Lord of the vineyard and the servant went down into the vineyard
• Jacob 5:38 let us go down into the nithermost parts of the vineyard
• Jacob 5:39 they went down into the nithermost parts of the vineyard

The probable source for the error “in the vineyard” in Jacob 5:29 is the use of that very phrase in the following clause:

• Jacob 5:29 (proposed original text)
  • come let us go down into the vineyard that we may labor again in the vineyard

In anticipation of the following “that we may labor again in the vineyard”, the scribe accidentally wrote down “let us go down in the vineyard” instead of the correct “let us go down into the vineyard”. This error could have occurred as Oliver Cowdery took down Joseph Smith’s dictation or when Oliver copied the text from 𝓞 into 𝓟 (𝓞 is not extant here).