© 2024 The Interpreter Foundation. A 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization.
![Creative Commons License](https://interpreterfoundation.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/08/CC-BY-NC-ND-icon-80x15.png)
All content by The Interpreter Foundation, unless otherwise specified, is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License. Permissions beyond the scope of this license may be available here.
Interpreter Foundation is not owned, controlled by or affiliated with The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. All research and opinions provided on this site are the sole responsibility of their respective authors, and should not be interpreted as the opinions of the Board, nor as official statements of LDS doctrine, belief or practice.
I enjoy imaging our brother William Tyndale participating in some way in the translation of the Book of Mormon… as a joyful observer in the Spirit World or perhaps with some more participative role. Brother Tyndale paid such a price for his central part in the restoration and he must have found great peace and happiness watching the process play out from a vantage on the other side in which those who tried to suppress truth could not reach him or harm him. Thanks for that thought.
So I suppose a post-mortem Tyndale was tasked by God or by Moroni to translate the Book of Mormon? (Joseph Smith just read the translation)
Or Moroni learned English from the people of this period?
That’s thinking outside the box. It seems most likely to me that the initial translation to English was done–if not by Joseph Smith–then by some other mortal (which could include a “translated” individual; 3 Nephi 28:36-40). God tends to get his earthly work done that way (think missionary work, genealogy/ordinance work, writing scripture) rather than by having angels, other perfected beings, gadgets (including miraculous stones) or the dead do it. The “Principal Translator” could have been Moroni in a mortal yet “translated” (as opposed to dead & resurrected) state, or it could have been one of the “three Nephites,” or perhaps a mere mortal Englishman who knew Hebrew (and/or Egyptian) and was given a little help with the Nephite dialect. But, if Royal Skousen is correct that word usage in the Book of Mormon reflects Early Modern English (roughly 1500s, into the 1600s) and that some of the issues addressed also reflect that period (per this paper), YET a relatively late version of the KJV (probably 1769 or later) was used as a base text for the Isaiah/Malachi chapters, the Principal Translator would seem to have lived for well over 100 years spanning those periods. Such a long life would favor Moroni or other translated Nephite as the Principal Translator, with Joseph Smith being the Finish Translator, perhaps smoothing the text and modernizing the English somewhat while “translating” (transmitting) the text to the modern world. It’s so much speculation at this point, though. We need more research based on Skousen’s Earliest Text. The electronic version will be very useful.
As usual Professor Skousen’s article is most interesting. It seems significant to me that the early claim by Alexander Campbell, and subsequently others, that the Book of Mormon was/is merely a product of early 1800 doctrinal controversies among the various Churchs. This article certainly weakens that arguement. The Wikipedia article on the “Tyndale Bible” illustrates why Tyndale’s translation of Church/Congergation, Charity/Love, Priest/Elder and Repentance/Penance were such a challenge and of such great importance in the 1500’s. And then as Skousen states, “The Book of Mormon resolves the controversy in favor of the King James solution but from the point of view of William Tyndale”. I really love that Book of Mormon.
Royal,
Great work, as always. And this accords with your previous mention of word usage in the Book of Mormon indicative of early modern English but not found in the Bible. I would like the hear more about “secret combinations” and “standing at the bar of God to be judged” in reference to that time period.
Also, do you suppose that phrases in the Book of Mormon such as “which charity is love” are translations of text on the gold plates, or simply glosses supplied by the translator (and so existing only in the English text)? In other words, if both “charity” and “love” mean “love,” it makes sense to say “charity is love” in English because it addresses their usage in the New Testament, but it would make little sense for Nephi to say “which love is love” in Hebrew.
Hi Stan,
In answer to your question, there are several different words meaning “love” in both biblical Hebrew and in ancient Egyptian, so that Nephi and others need not have used silly repetitions such as “which love is love,” just as Peter does not repeat himself in 2 Peter 1:7 where he parallels “charity” (agapēn) with “brotherly kindness” (philadelphia); and just as Paul says in 1 Cor 13:4 that “love [agapē] suffereth long and is kind” [chrēsteuetai “be kind, act benevolently”].
Nephi too had plenty of synonyms and complementary terms available which Joseph likely had to find some reasonable way to express in English. Naturally, he used phrases already well-known to him.
I am so confused about how to process the significance of this information.
However, I am curious about what he means when he writes about references to “secret combinations” and “standing at the bar of God to be judged” fits better in 1600