Mosiah 23:12 Textual Variants

Here Oliver Cowdery initially wrote opposed in the printer’s manuscript; then almost immediately he corrected opposed to oppressed (the level of ink flow for the supralinear insertion is unchanged). Undoubtedly, the orthographic similarity of the two words and the semantic possibility of opposed led to this scribal error. It turns out that there are no examples of oppose being used in the passive in the Book of Mormon text—instead, there are only three active uses:

• Alma 51:7 that they durst not oppose
• Alma 57:19 and did administer death unto all those who opposed them
• Helaman 1:20 and they did slay every one who did oppose them

On the other hand, there are three additional passive examples of oppress in the text as well as three active examples; all six of these are in biblical quotations or refer to such:

• 1 Nephi 21:26 and I will feed them that oppress thee with their own flesh
• 2 Nephi 6:18 and I will feed them that oppress thee with their own flesh
• 2 Nephi 13:5 and the people shall be oppressed every one by another
• Mosiah 13:35 and that he himself should be oppressed and afflicted
• Mosiah 14:7 he was oppressed and he was afflicted
• 3 Nephi 24:5 and against those that oppress the hireling in his wages

The corrected reading in Mosiah 23:12 is at least consistent with other usage in the Book of Mormon.