Mosiah 3:3 Textual Variants

Oliver Cowdery initially wrote the for thee in 𝓟; then almost immediately he corrected it to thee by inserting the extra e. The 1830 compositor interpreted the corrected thee as a mistake for the and therefore set “the glad tidings of great joy” and inserted the pronoun you, despite the fact that in this part of his message the angel uses only the pronoun thou (and its forms thee and thy) in speaking to king Benjamin:

• Mosiah 3:3–4
  • awake and hear the words which I shall tell thee
    for behold I am come to declare unto thee glad tidings of great joy for the Lord hath heard thy prayers and hath judged of thy righteousness and hath sent me to declare unto thee that thou mayest rejoice and that thou mayest declare unto thy people that they may also be filled with joy

The 1908 RLDS edition restored the corrected reading in 𝓟 to the RLDS text (“to declare unto thee glad tidings of great joy”). The critical text will also maintain this reading.

The use of the definite article the before “glad tidings of great joy” is unexpected. In the Book of Mormon text, we have three other examples of glad tidings followed by an of prepositional phrase:

• Alma 13:22 that they may have glad tidings of great joy
• Alma 39:15 he cometh to declare glad tidings of salvation unto his people
• Helaman 16:14 and did declare unto them glad tidings of great joy

Two of these read as “glad tidings of great joy” (identically to Mosiah 3:3). Similar usage is found when good tidings is followed by an of prepositional phrase:

• Mosiah 12:21 that bringeth good tidings of good
• Mosiah 15:14 that hath brought good tidings of good
• Mosiah 27:37 they did publish good tidings of good
• 3 Nephi 20:40 that bringeth good tidings unto them of good

All four of these examples are either citing or paraphrasing Isaiah 52:7 (“that bringeth good tidings of good”). And of course, we have the familiar King James usage of Luke 2:10 (“I bring you good tidings of great joy”), which has almost the same noun phraseology as Mosiah 3:3 (“to declare unto thee glad tidings of great joy”).