The Book of Mormon

Alma 5:6

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~83 BC

1830 Edition

And now behold, I say unto you, my brethren, you that belong to this Church, have you sufficiently retained in remembrance the captivity of your fathers? Yea, and have you sufficiently retained in remembrance his mercy and long-suffering towards them? And moreover, have ye sufficiently retained in remembrance that he hath delivered their souls from hell?

Influences

2 Timothy 1:6 (KJV)
Wherefore I put thee in remembrance that thou stir up the gift of God, which is in thee by the putting on of my hands.

Changes

And now behold, I say unto you, mMy brethren, you that belong to this Cchurch, have you sufficiently retained in remembrance the captivity of your fathers? Yea, and hHave you sufficiently retained in remembrance his mercy and long-suffering towards them? And mMoreover, have yeou sufficiently retained in remembrance that he haths delivered their souls from hell?

Simple English

Brothers, you who belong to this Church, do you remember how your fathers were held as prisoners? Do you remember how God was patient and kind to them? Do you remember that he saved their souls from hell?

Paraphrase

Now let me ask you, my brothers and sisters in this church: Do you remember what your ancestors went through in captivity? Do you remember God’s mercy and patience with them? Do you remember that he rescued their souls from hell?

Notes

5:6

Alma 5:6 is an example of the circular repetition that pervades the Book of Mormon.

"And now behold, I say unto you, my brethren, you that belong to this Church, have you sufficiently retained in remembrance the captivity of your fathers? Yea, and have you sufficiently retained in remembrance his mercy and long-suffering towards them? And moreover, have ye sufficiently retained in remembrance that he hath delivered their souls from hell?"

As mentioned above, this repetitive writing style is found to be consistent across each author of the Book of Mormon. See also, Ether 2:17, 2 Nephi 3:4-21, and 3 Nephi 16:8-15.

Mormon critic M.T. Lamb made the rather axiomatic comment, "The prevailing style of the Book of Mormon is so verbose, so full of inelegant and uncalled-for repetitions, that any ordinary writer can greatly excel it-often reducing its wordy sentences to one-half, and one-third, and even one-fourth their present compass without any sacrifice of thought or force or beauty..." -M.T. Lamb, The Golden Bible; or The Book of Mormon, Is It From God? (New York: Ward and Drummand, 1887), p. 27.

The verbose, lengthy, and repetitive style of the Book of Mormon casts doubt on the authenticity of the Book of Mormon. As Jerald and Sandra note, "Considering the effort needed to make the original gold plates of the Book of Mormon and then to engrave them, one would expect a scribe to be as concise as possible, not wordy. Nephi's brother, Jacob complained: 'I cannot write but a little of my words, because of the difficulty of engraving our words upon plates' (Jacob 4:1). However, lengthy sentences abound in the Book of Mormon." -Jerald and Sandra Tanner, Joseph Smith's Plagiarism of the Bible in the Book of Mormon, p. 231.

For other examples, see: 3 Nephi 8:1-3; 3 Nephi 10:37 (compare against Matt. 23:37); 3 Nephi 16:8-10.