The Book of Mormon—Nephite Record Abridgment

The Book Of Mormon—Nephite Record Abridgment

By Elder Cecil E. McGavin

Author of “Mormonism and Masonry” and “Cumorah’s Gold Bible”

THE Book of Mormon professes to be an abridgment or summary from the extensive records of the Nephites. For a thousand years the Nephite historians had inscribed their history upon the metal plates prepared for the purpose. When one set of plates was filled with writing, another set was prepared. By the time of Mormon, who lived at the close of the fourth century A.D., there were many sets of records of his people.

Mormon was instructed to make a set of plates and inscribe upon them a brief summary of the history of his people. When the gold plates were prepared for that purpose he would read from the extensive writings of his ancestors and then make an epitome or abridgment upon his gold plates. For this reason the record upon the gold plates bears the name of the abridger.

His son, Moroni, made a similar abridgment of the Jaredite literature, reducing the history of that nation which had flourished for 1600 years in the land of America to forty pages of printed matter. Since practically all of the material in the Book of Mormon is abridged from more extensive records, we find many are true types of Hebrew abridgment, yet are regarded as good English construction.

Furthermore, the presence of these perfect types of Hebrew abridgment is indisputable evidence that the Book of Mormon is exactly what it claims to be.

Much of the material recorded by Nephi was in the form of an abridgment. “Behold, I make an abridgment of the record of my father,” we read in I Nephi 10:1.

It is evident that some of the first chapters in I Nephi are summarized from the writing of Lehi The writings of Mormon and Moroni were confined almost entirely to the field of abridgment. This arrangement introduces a strange problem which no untrained person could have foreseen and adjusted to, unless inspired by the Lord. The first chapters in the book, though as much of an abridgment as the Jaredite history, are in the first person, while the epitomized account of Mormon and Moroni are in the third person.

If any man had been the author of the Book of Mormon his eyes would never have seen through this complex problem. The answer is simply this:

These first chapters are in the first person because the compiler, Nephi, was contemporary with the events his father had narrated. He was an eye witness of the things he summarized from his father’s record. Thus he used the first person, entirely, while Mormon and Moroni were removed by time and space from the events they narrated, thus making it necessary for them to employ the third person.

However, there are two noticeable exceptions to the assertion that Mormon and Moroni used the third person. These two challenging exceptions are of sufficient strength to impress the candid investigator with the fact that the Book of Mormon is a divine record, translated by the gift and power of God.

In that section known as “The Words of Mormon,” comprising about 1,000 words at the close of the material translated from the small plates of Nephi, the first person is used, but the moment we resume the translation the third person re-appears.

At the close of Mormon’s abridgment, a section containing nine long chapters is added. This is called “The Book of Mormon,” and contains an account of things he had seen and heard. For a time he takes his gaze from an ancient people and writes as an eye witness. Covering a thousand years of history he has written about an ancient people and distant scenes, using the third person all the time. Now he suddenly closes the dust-covered pages of the past, steps down to his own time and generation and narrates events that he' beheld with his own eyes. Strangely, but naturally he leaves the third person with the records of the past, employing entirely the first person as he deals with persons and events of his own time. His book of contemporary history is introduced by this sentence: “And now I, Mormon, make a record of the things which I have both seen and heard.” From that point on the use of the third person ceases entirely, as does the expression. “And it came to pass,” except as he summarizes the events he has witnessed.

Moroni resorts to this same practice, using the third person throughout his abridgment of the Jaredite history, yet when he writes an appendage of ten chapters at the close of the volume he brings into play the first person in each case where he speaks as an eye witness or a contemporary.

Another unmistakable characteristic of an abridgment is the use of the impersonal “we.” This small word reveals the hand of an abridger with remarkable clarity. A few examples follow: “Now we will return in our record.”—Alma 47:1. “Now we shall say no more.”—Alma 43:2. “Things as we saw.”— III Nephi 17:16.

Reference to numerous records from which Mormon made his brief summary, is often made in the Book. The style of procedure reveals where the abridged material begins and ends. Likewise, one can readily see a difference of style in the first- 157 pages of the Book, which was translated from.the small plates of Nephi, and the material that immediately follows, which was abridged from the large plates of Nephi; the first being religious history, the second secular history.

In Mormon 6:6 we read that Mormon buried in the earth “all the records which had been entrusted to me by the hand of the Lord, save it were these few plates which I gave unto my son Moroni.” Yet only a portion of these “few” plates was translated to give us a book of more than 500 pages.

The Book of Mormon is but a chapter of Nephite and Jaredite history. The compilers read from the voluminuous records before them and then inscribed a brief account upon the gold plates Mormon had prepared for the purpose.

(To be continued)