The Book of Mormon

Jacob 5:71

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~544–420 BC

1830 Edition

And the Lord of the vineyard saith unto them, Go to, and labor in the vineyard, with your mights. For behold, this is the last time that I shall nourish my vineyard: for the end is nigh at hand, and the season speedily cometh; and if ye labor with your mights with me, ye shall have joy in the fruit which I shall lay up unto myself, against the time which will soon come.

Influences

1 John 2:18 (KJV)
Little children, it is the last time: and as ye have heard that antichrist shall come, even now are there many antichrists; whereby we know that it is the last time.

Changes

And the Lord of the vineyard saithd unto them,: Go to, and labor in the vineyard, with your mights. For behold, this is the last time that I shall nourish my vineyard:; for the end is nigh at hand, and the season speedily cometh; and if ye labor with your mights with me, ye shall have joy in the fruit which I shall lay up unto myself, against the time which will soon come.

Simple English

The Lord said to them: 'Go work in the vineyard as hard as you can. This is the last time I will feed my vineyard. The end is close. The time is coming quickly. If you work hard with me, you will be happy with the fruit I save for the coming time.'

Paraphrase

The Lord of the vineyard said to them, 'Go work with all your strength in the vineyard. This is the last time I’ll nourish my vineyard. The end is near—the season is coming quickly. If you work with all your strength alongside me, you’ll share in the joy of the fruit I’ll store up when the time comes.'

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.