Mormon 8:15 Textual Variants

Here the original manuscript apparently read “for God will”, which appears to be a subjunctive use of the main verb will (both 𝓟 and the 1830 edition read this way). Of course, the original text might have been “for God wills” and Oliver Cowdery, in taking down the text as Joseph Smith dictated it, might have accidentally dropped the s, with the result that both the 1830 edition and the printer’s manuscript ended up with will (here Oliver is the presumed scribe in 𝓞). For the 1920 LDS edition, the text was emended so that the verb reads in the indicative: “for God wills”.

One problem with this emendation is that the third person singular verb form wills occurs nowhere else in the Book of Mormon or in the King James Bible. There are, however, a couple of alternatives for emending will in Mormon 8:15. The first would be to use the archaic third person singular ending -eth (“for God willeth”), especially since willeth does occur in the King James Bible:

• Romans 9:16
  • so then it is not of him that willeth nor of him that runneth but of God that sheweth mercy

This example suggests the emendation willeth as being more appropriate to the biblical style of the Book of Mormon text. As further support for this alternative, it appears that in Mormon 8:14 scribe 2 of 𝓟 accidentally dropped the -eth ending for the verb hide (see the nearby discussion under that passage). Perhaps in a similar way, Oliver Cowdery accidentally dropped this same ending in 𝓞 as he was writing down Joseph Smith’s dictation. Note, in particular, that here in Mormon 8:15 the -eth ending could have been lost because of the following th of that (“for God willeth that …”); in other words, Oliver could have missed hearing the ending during the dictation process.

A second alternative would be to use doth will in Mormon 8:15 (“for God doth will”), which would imply that Oliver Cowdery omitted the helping verb doth as he took down Joseph Smith’s dictation. There is one occurrence of “doth will” in the Book of Mormon text, although with inverted subject-verb word order because of a preceding neither:

• Ether 8:19
  • for the Lord worketh not in secret combinations neither doth he will that man should shed blood

One could add other alternatives here in Mormon 8:15, for example does will (“for God does will”).

Of course, we could leave the form will as a subjunctive form. We have one definite case of this usage elsewhere in the text:

• Ether 15:34
  • whether the Lord will that I be translated or that I suffer the will of the Lord in the flesh it mattereth not

In this example, we have a whether- clause, which is one that frequently takes the subjunctive in the Book of Mormon text, as in Alma 2:5 (“whether it were for or against Amlici”) and in Alma 18:3 (“whether he be the Great Spirit or a man”). But for Mormon 8:15, we expect the indicative after the conjunction for.

Interestingly, in older English we can find instances of the subjunctive will in sentences like the one here in Mormon 8:15. In the Oxford English Dictionary, under definitions 3 and 4 for the verb, it states that will was used to ‘denote expression of a wish or intention’ or to ‘affirm or maintain’. This usage is designated as obsolete; citations do not extend beyond the 1600s except in legal language. The following instances use will with third person singular subjects (vocabulary and accidentals regularized):

• Thomas Cromwell (1528)
  His grace then will that the election of a new dean shall be among them of the college.
• William Tyndale (1534)
  When he saith that a man is justified by deeds and not of faith only, he will no more than that faith doth not so justify everywhere, that nothing justifieth save faith.
• William Shakespeare (1597)
  • Our battle is more full of names than yours, Our men more perfect in the use of arms, Our armor all as strong, our cause the best;
    Then reason will our hearts should be as good.

Literature Online gives the following example from the Elizabethan play The History of Sir John Oldcastle, the good Lord Cobham: “God will that sinners live” (this particular citation dates from a 1664 printing of the play). This example virtually parallels the original usage in Mormon 8:15 (“for God will that …”). Given such usage from Early Modern English, the critical text will restore the reading of the earliest text in Mormon 8:15: “for God will that it shall be done with an eye singled to his glory”.