Alma 16:21 Textual Variants

Royal Skousen
and the Lord pouring out his [blessings 1ABCDEFGIJLMNOPQRST|blessing HK] upon the people

Here the 1874 RLDS edition once more replaced a plural noun with its singular (see the nearby examples in verses 18 and 19). As with these other examples, the 1908 RLDS edition restored the correct plural to the RLDS text. Here in verse 21, either the singular blessing or the plural blessings will work, at least in theory. But in other places in the text where there is a reference to the Lord pouring out a blessing or blessings, the Book of Mormon text favors the plural blessings when referring to unspecified blessings (as here in Alma 16:21):

Only when the blessing is specific do we get the singular blessing with the verb pour:

Summary: Retain the plural blessings in Alma 16:21; when referring to the pouring out of unspecified blessings, the Book of Mormon uses only the plural blessings.

Analysis of Textual Variants of the Book of Mormon, Part. 3

References