In these first five references to the land Jershon, the earliest text varies between “land of Jershon” and “land Jershon” (2 to 3). In one case (the fourth one listed), the earliest text had the of, but the 1830 typesetter omitted it, perhaps accidentally. In fact, Oliver Cowdery also omitted, at least initially, this same of as he was producing the printer’s manuscript, but there he caught his mistake almost immediately and inserted the of supralinearly (there is no change in the level of ink flow for the of in 𝓟).
After this initial variability in Alma 27:22–24, the remainder of the text basically settles on “land of Jershon” (16 times), although there is one more instance of “land Jershon” in the earliest text (namely, in Alma 31:3). In that case, the 1830 typesetter accidentally replaced “land Jershon” with “land of Jershon” (see the discussion under Alma 31:3). Clearly, either reading is possible; so for each case of “land (of) Jershon”, the critical text will follow the earliest textual sources in determining whether the of is there or not. We have found similar variability elsewhere in the text for “land (of) X” and “city (of) X”; see under 1 Nephi 17:7 for “land (of) Bountiful” and under 1 Nephi 11:13 for “city (of) Jerusalem”.
David Calabro (personal communication) points out that the phrase “land Nephi” here in Alma 27:23 is unique to the text. Everywhere else the text reads “land of Nephi”. He suggests that this one instance of “the land Nephi” may be an error: perhaps the preceding “the land Jershon” led to the loss of an original of in a conjoined “the land of Nephi”. There is, in fact, a similar loss of an original of in another instance of “between the land (of) X and the land (of) Y”:
The portion in bold was skipped in the typesetting of the 1837 edition. When restored to the 1981 LDS edition, the of in “the land of Zarahemla” was set as “the land Zarahemla”, perhaps under the influence of the following conjunct “the land Bountiful”.
Calabro also suggests that the Book of Mormon always places of in phrases of the form “land (of) X” whenever X is a personal name. This proposed consistency could be used, for instance, to explain why the text has examples of only “land of Zarahemla”, but none of “land Zarahemla” (see the discussion under Alma 2:15). Similarly, one could argue that the one case of “land Nephi” in Alma 27:23 is an error for “land of Nephi”. Another case where this proposed consistency could be used to emend the text deals with “land (of) Manti”. The earliest text has nine occurrences of “land of Manti” but only one of “land Manti”:
In this instance, the 1953 RLDS edition supplied the expected of. Yet in the case of Manti, one could permit the possibility of “land Manti” by noting that Manti is a place-name as well as a personal name:
Ultimately, however, there is probably not much in the proposed consistency of “land of ” since that consistency does not hold for “city of ”. In the earliest text, there are definitely a few instances involving city and a personal name where the of is lacking:
Thus there is little force in the argument from personal names that “the land Nephi” in Alma 27:23 is an error for “the land of Nephi”. The critical text will therefore retain the earliest reading, “between the land Jershon and the land Nephi”.
Summary: Maintain in Alma 27:23 the unique instance of “land Nephi”, but restore the original instance of “land of Jershon” in the clause “that we may protect our brethren in the land of Jershon”; the earliest text has examples of both “land of Jershon” and “land Jershon”, although the cases with the of considerably outnumber the cases without it (18 to 4).