The Book of Mormon

Jacob 5:7

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~544–420 BC

1830 Edition

And it came to pass that the master of the vineyard saw it, and he sayeth unto his servant, It grieveth me that I should lose this tree; wherefore, go and pluck the branches from a wild olive tree, and bring them hither unto me; and we will pluck off those main branches which are beginning to wither away, and we will cast them into the fire, that they may be burned.

Influences

Romans 11:17 (KJV)
And if some of the branches be broken off, and thou, being a wild olive tree, wert grafted in among them, and with them partakest of the root and fatness of the olive tree;
John 15:6 (KJV)
If a man abide not in me, he is cast forth as a branch, and is withered; and men gather them, and cast them into the fire, and they are burned.

Changes

And it came to pass that the master of the vineyard saw it, and he sayethid unto his servant,: It grieveth me that I should lose this tree; wherefore, go and pluck the branches from a wild olive tree, and bring them hither unto me; and we will pluck off those main branches which are beginning to wither away, and we will cast them into the fire, that they may be burned.

Simple English

The master of the vineyard saw it. He said to his servant: 'I am sad that I might lose this tree. Go get branches from a wild olive tree. Bring them to me. We will cut off the main branches that are dying. We will burn them in the fire.'

Paraphrase

When the master saw this, he told his servant, 'It breaks my heart to lose this tree. Go find branches from a wild olive tree and bring them here. We’ll cut off these dying main branches and burn them.'

Notes

5:1-77

In Jacob chapter 5 and 6, an allegory of the tame and wild olive trees is attributed to an ancient prophet named Zenos, who supposedly lived before Lehi’s journey to the New World. The allegory, however, closely mirrors material from multiple biblical sources: Apostle Paul’s discussion of olive trees in Romans 11:17–24, Jesus’ parable of the unfruitful fig tree in Luke 13:6–9, and imagery from Isaiah 5:1–7 concerning a vineyard. In the Book of Mormon, these sources are expanded into an allegory spanning over six pages. As Jerald and Sandra Tanner note, “It is probably the most repetitious part of the Book of Mormon. It gives the impression that the author is deliberately trying to use up as much space as possible. It is very hard to resist the idea that it is merely filler material." -Jerald and Sandra Tanner, Joseph Smith's Plagiarism of the Bible in the Book of Mormon, p. 165.

Similarly, Wesley P. Walters observes, “For a grand finale of his work, however, he returned to this olive tree illustration [given by Apostle Paul] and worked it into a mind-boggling allegory, combining it with Jesus' parable about the unfruitful fig tree (Lk. 13:6–8) and working in the words from Isaiah 5:1–5 about God's disappointment with his grape vineyard. The result is a staggering conglomeration that would perplex a horticulturalist and bewilder an exegete” -Wesley P. Walters, "The Use of the Old Testament in the Book of Mormon," (Master's thesis, St. Louis: Covenant Theological Seminary, April 1981), pp. 152-153.

5:4-7

"A phrase that is used to the point of monotony in the Book of Mormon is 'and it came to pass.' In just four verses of Jacob, we find this phrase used four times." Besides the many times the phrase is used in Jacob, it is used repeatedly in 1 Nephi, Alma, Mosiah, Ether, Helaman, 3 Nephi, 4 Nephi and Mormon. It is also used repeatedly in the Book of Moses, which Smith composed shortly after finishing the Book of Mormon." - Jerald and Sandra Tanner, Joseph Smith's Plagiarism of the Bible in the Book of Mormon, p. 42.

See Book of Moses 7:19-21; Joseph Smith's 1832 diary, as recorded in An American Prophet's Record, p. 6; and Book of Abraham 4:19.

For additional examples of Smith's common phrases, see: 1 Nephi 19:2; 2 Nephi 28:22; 2 Nephi 26:15; Helaman 3:30; and 2 Nephi 28:16.