The 1840 edition replaced the plural instances with instance, giving “in many instance”. This reading continued in the RLDS textual tradition until the 1908 RLDS edition. The singular “in many instance” is a colloquial form that derives from earlier English when the ending -(e)s was not always expressed after words ending in /s/ in an unstressed syllable (see the discussion under 2 Nephi 31:18 regarding the occasional use of witness for witnesses in the earliest text). Literature Online provides the following examples of many instance:
Usage like this may explain why the secondary “in many instance” in Alma 37:6 lasted so long in the RLDS textual tradition. (It is still prevalent in English, as exemplified by the many examples of “in many instance” found on .) Elsewhere in the Book of Mormon, this phrase is consistently rendered in the plural (“in many instances”):
The critical text will maintain the plural expression “in many instances” in Alma 37:6.
Summary: Maintain in Alma 37:6 and elsewhere in the text the plural expression “in many instances”.