In his response to John Tvedtnes’ study of Isaiah variants in the Book of Mormon, David P. Wright, an advocate of a strong naturalistic-form of Higher Criticism(*) had the audacity of critiquing someone for speculation about a text which is not available to us and whose content is speculative:
(1) Isaiah 2:5//2 Nephi
12:5: The
KJV has "O house of Jacob, come ye, and let us walk in the light of the
Lord." The BM has a plus following this: "Yea, come, for ye have all
gone astray every one to his wicked ways." Tvedtnes says a two-part
textual error led to the loss of the BM's long plus here: (1) the omission
of b'w (which he says lies behind "Yea,
come") because of its similarity to the b'wr in v.
4 (a type of haplography) and (2) the omission of "for ye have all gone
astray every one to his wicked ways" because it would begin with the same
conjunction as the beginning of v. 6 (parablepsis). An argument for the
antiquity of the BM text based on supposed textual error is speculative and
cannot be calculated as proof, because it essentially invents a text to provide
a parallel for the BM reading. That a plausible development can be imagined
does not prove that the supposed original text ever existed and that the
textual development has in fact taken place. An argument that textual
error has occurred is all the more speculative when it involves multiple stages
of supposed textual error and development, such as this particular example. In
any case, it is unlikely the error noted by Tvedtnes occurred. The BM's
plus "Yea, come..." is resumptive; it picks up and reiterates
the "come ye" earlier in the verse. Therefore one would expect
an underlying Hebrew verb to be the same as the earlier verb, i.e., lkw,
not b'w. Tvedtnes' further argument that the plus is
original because it its language is similar to Isaiah 53:6 is no proof. Smith
could have added this phrase, which occurs in the most famous chapter of Isaiah
for Christian readers. In Part 5, above, reason is given to suspect this plus
as being secondary. (David P. Wright, "Appendix:
Supposed Evidence from Ancient Manuscripts and Hebrew Language and Style," emphasis in bold added)
Wright is a proponent of JEPD and other
theories that speculate about possible texts and the content and redaction of
these purported texts. When it comes to JEPD etc., that is acceptable. When it
comes to the Book of Mormon? Nope. Physician: heal thyself (of thy
metaphysical naturalism)!
(*) I am actually enthusiastic about higher criticism/the
historico-critical method of criticism; I just reject the a priori assumption,
held by many other proponents, of metaphysical naturalism.
