Monday, May 18, 2020

Isaiah 9:3 and the Removal of "Not" in 2 Nephi 19:3


Isa 9:3 in the KJV reads as follows:

Thou hast multiplied the nation, and not increased the joy: they joy before thee according to the joy in harvest, and as men rejoice when they divide the spoil.

2 Nephi 19:3, a quotation of Isa 9:3, reads:

Thou hast multiplied the nation and increased the joy. They joy before thee according to the joy in harvest and as men rejoice when they divide the spoil.

As one can see, the Book of Mormon lacks the negation ("not") in the KJV.

Many modern translations, as with the Book of Mormon, omit “not” in Isa 9:3, such as the following:

You have multiplied the nation, you have increased its joy; they rejoice before you as with joy at the harvest, as people exult when dividing plunder. (NRSV)

You have magnified that nation, Have given it great joy; They have rejoiced before You As they rejoice at reaping time, As they exult When dividing spoil. (1985 JPS Tanakh)

You have brought them abundant joy and great rejoicing; They rejoice before you as people rejoice at harvest, as they exult when dividing the spoils. (New American Bible)

You shall multiply the nation, You shall increase their gladness; They will be glad in Your presence As with the gladness of harvest, As men rejoice when they divide the spoil. (1995 NASB)

George Buchanan Gray, in the 1912 International Critical Commentary on Isaiah 1-39 rendered Isa 9:3 (v. 2 in the Hebrew) thusly:


    Thou hast multiplied ‘the rejoicing,’
      Thou hast made great the joy;
    They have joyed before thee as men joy at harvest,
      As they rejoice when they divide the spoil.

Commenting on this verse, Gray wrote:

Thou hast multiplied the rejoicing, etc.] the translation rests on a very slight conjectural emendation; see phil. n. 𝕳 reads thou hast multiplied the nation: thou hast not increased the joy, which is obviously unsuitable; the Ḳerê (RV) is probably an early conjectural emendation which restores sense at the expense of style and without restoring the parallelism (see phil. n.). The two figures which enforce the greatness of the joy both recur; see Ps 4:8; 126:6 (joy in harvest), Ps 119:162 (joy over spoil). It no more follows that the poet expected the new era to open after a victorious battle, than that he expected it to begin at the end of harvest. (George Buchanan Gray, A Critical and Exegetical Commentary on the Book of Isaiah, I-XXXIX [International Critical Commentary; New York: C. Scribner's Sons, 1912], 169)

While hardly overwhelming evidence for the Book of Mormon (like the Arabian Peninsula geography of the Book of Mormon), the removal of “not” in Isa 9:3 in the Book of Mormon is a small piece of evidence for the authenticity thereof.