Obviously 1 Corinthians influenced the translated text in each of these five Book of Mormon lists. Joseph’s familiarity with the King James New Testament guided his selection of phrases as he translated. However, he did not always replicate the Corinthian catalogue. The parallel verses expand the Corinthian “discerning of spirits” into a more direct contact with those spirits. The gift is not to discern, but to have the presence of those spirits, either through ministering (Omni 1:25), conversing (Alma 9:21), or beholding (Moro. 10:14). The Corinthian “divers tongues” is correctly expanded to the clearer “speaking with tongues,” or glossolalia. (See commentary accompanying Alma 19:29–30 for more information on glossolalia.) Interestingly, however, the Corinthian “interpretation of tongues,” which is appropriate to the social context of glossolalia, is transformed to “interpretation of languages” (Omni 1:25, Moro. 10:16) or more specifically “the gift of translation,” a context perhaps more appropriate to the Book of Mormon’s interest in translation, both of the twenty-four plates of Ether and eventually the Book of Mormon itself.
One explanation for the Book of Mormon and 1 Corinthians parallels is that these gifts are known to the various prophets as set. This is possible, but I find the second alternative more likely, which is that, when the plate text references anything similar to the gifts of the Spirit, King James language guided Joseph’s translation. Nevertheless, it was not a copying but a borrowing. The translation followed the Corinthian general model but altered some of the specifics appropriate to the new context. The plate text must therefore have a parallel but imprecise relationship to the English text. If the spiritual gifts catalogues appeared only in Mormon’s text (or in Moroni, who was arguably influenced by his father’s language), we might explain the similarities as part of Mormon’s language. However, Omni is part of the small plates, not part of Mormon’s redaction. Therefore, the similarities are more likely due to the only common hand between the two sets of plates: Joseph’s.
Reference: See commentary accompanying Jacob 1:9 for the meaning of “began to be old.”