The Book of Mormon

Mosiah 29:38

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~92 BC

1830 Edition

therefore they relinquished their desires for a king, and became exceedingly anxious that every man should have an equal chance throughout all the land; yea, and every man expressed a willingness to answer for his own sins.

Influences

Hebrews 7:27 (KJV)
Who needeth not daily, as those high priests, to offer up sacrifice, first for his own sins, and then for the people's: for this he did once, when he offered up himself.

Changes

tTherefore they relinquished their desires for a king, and became exceedingly anxious that every man should have an equal chance throughout all the land; yea, and every man expressed a willingness to answer for his own sins.

Simple English

So they gave up wanting a king. They became very eager for every person to have an equal chance throughout the land. Every person was willing to answer for their own sins.

Paraphrase

They gave up their desire for a king. They became passionate about everyone having equal opportunity. Everyone was willing to take responsibility for their own choices.

Notes

29:32-39

"Another seemingly anachronistic issue in the Book of Mormon is a republican form of government. When the Puritans settled in the New World they drew up a document known as the Oath of a Freeman. The word 'freeman' was commonly used in Joseph Smith's day. Als, members of the Smith family had been involved in America's fight for freedom from England in 1776, and in the war of 1812. Thus the concept of liberty and freedom were part of Smith's environment....Also in Smith's day it was common to refer to America as the 'land of liberty,' a phrase found in the Book of Mormon." -Jerald and Sandra Tanner, Joseph Smith's Plagiarism of the Bible in the Book of Mormon, p. 11-12.

See also Alma 51:6-7 for use of the phrase, "freemen."

LDS author Grant Hardy writes, "In 1831, Alexander Campbell, one of the book's first critics (and certainly the first one to read it carefully), famously observed that it seemed to weigh in on all the popular religious questions of the day, including 'infant baptism, ordination, the trinity, regeneration, repentance, justification, the fall of man, the atonement, transubstantiation, fasting, penance, church government, religious experience, the call to the ministry , the general resurrection, eternal punishment, who may baptize, and even the question of freemasonry, republican government, and the right of the man.' This is a fair list, and references to these topics-or their analogous counterparts-can be found throughout the Book of Mormon." -Hardy, Understanding the Book of Mormon, p. 184