Brigham Young University BYU ScholarsArchive Theses and Dissertations 1973 Possible Lexical Hebraisms in the Book of Mormon: (Words of Mormon - Moroni) Melvin Deloy Pack Brigham Young University - Provo Follow this and additional works at: https://scholarsarchive.byu.edu/etd Part of the Mormon Studies Commons, and the Rhetoric and Composition Commons BYU ScholarsArchive Citation Pack, Melvin Deloy, "Possible Lexical Hebraisms in the Book of Mormon: (Words of Mormon - Moroni)" (1973). Theses and Dissertations. 5007. https://scholarsarchive.byu.edu/etd/5007 This Thesis is brought to you for free and open access by BYU ScholarsArchive. It has been accepted for inclusion in Theses and Dissertations by an authorized administrator of BYU ScholarsArchive. For more information, please contact [email protected], [email protected]. POSSIBLE LEXICAL HEBRAISMS IN THE BOOK OF MORMON WORDS OF MORMON MORONI A thesis i presented to the department of ancient scripture brigham young university U in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree master of arts by melvin deloy pack april 1973 this thesis by melvin deloy pack is accepted in its present form by the department of ancient scripture in the college of religious instruction of brigham young university as satisfying the thesis requirements for the degree of master of arts ar jda ofA burt &rhohosley1681eyhorsley1681 ey jaacommitteete Chairmanjlchairmanjl airman robrobertelteleit t C patc5patch committee member V aprilrilrii 1973 L date robert C patch departmentcchairman typed by sondra bob jones zi acknowledgementsACKNOWLEDGE MENTS to each from whom some assistance cooperation or direction was received which helped to bring to co- mpletion this study gratitude is felt and expressed in particular gratitude is expressed to dr sidney B sperry who suggested this topic and gave assis- tance in the early phases of research to dr A burt horsley and dr robert C patch for the time they spent reading rough drafts and giving helpful suggestions also especially deserving of gratitude are the authors wife and immediate family who had to decipher his reformed englishenglish1111 script in order to type the early drafts they also gave their assistance in proofreading to all these and many others who have contributed each in his own way the author expresses his indebtedness iiiili111 TABLE OF CONTENTS page acknowledgementsACKNOWLEDGEMENTS iiiliilil chapter I1 introduction 1 statement of the problem 1 justification of the problem 1 limitationsdelimitationsDe of the problem 8 research design 10 definition of terms 13 critical apparatus is15 II11 SOME RELATED QUESTIONS 18 the manner of translation 21 possible influence of king james bible english on joseph smiths speech 33 liiIII111 LEXICAL HEBRAISMS NOUNS 40 IV VERBS ioslos105 V miscellaneous PARTS OF SPEECH 143 VI SUMMARY AND conclusion 176 bibliography 183 APPENDIappendixesXES 188 A VERSES IN THE BOOK OF MORMON WORDS OF MORMON MORONI WHICH APPEAR TO CONTAIN quotations paraphrases OR ALLUSIONS TO BIBLICAL PASSAGES 189 iv chapter page B POSSIBLE HEBRAISMS FOR 143 PAGES approxi- mately 68500689500 WORDS OF ALEXANDER CAMPBELLs LECTURES 195 C A comparative LIST OF POSSIBLE LEXICAL HEBRA- ISMS OCCURRING IN approximately 68500 WORDS OF THE BOOK OF MORMON AND ALEXANDER CAMPBELLS LECTURES 200 D POSSIBLE LEXICAL HEBRAISMS IN THE BOOK OF MORMON THE WORDS OF MORMON MORONI 208 CHAPTER I1 introduction statement of the problem it is the purpose of this thesis to determine whether the book of mormon reflects a hebrew linguistic background in the sections entitled the words of mormon through moroni thus continuing the work begun by E craig bramwell who has investigated the book of mormon material corresponding to the small plates of nephi 1 for evidence of hebrew idioms 2 justification of the Probproblernprnhlpmleirleinlern joseph smith claimed that the book of mormon pub- 3 lished by him in 1830 was a translation of an ancient record written by a people of israelitic lineage who left ithethe small plates of nephi are comprised within the first 132 pages of the modern post 1920 editions of the book of mormon 2 2eaeE craig bramwell hebrew idioms in the small plates of nephi unpublished masters thesis department of biblical languages brigham young university 1960 ajoseph3josephjoseph smith jr the book of mormon palmyra EB grandin 1830 the copy used for this thesis was a photo offset reproduction from uncut sheets of the 1830 edition published by wilford C wood under the title joseph smith begdegbeginsins his work salt lake city deseret news press 119633 1 2 4 jerusalem about 600 years before christ it would seem reasonable that such a group would have spoken hebrew and that their records would have been written in hebrew or if not they would at least have been influenced by hebrew both in word usage and in thought patterns the hebraism thus present could be recognized if carried over in trans- lation the claims made by joseph smith are based on the claims of the record itself which informs us that lehi S a descendant of joseph through manasseh led his group from jerusalem at the commencement of the reign of zede- 6 kiah king of judah As a colony of israelites they would have spoken hebrew and in fact the record states that they were still using it a thousand years later and now behold we have written this record ac- cording to our knowledge in the characters which are called among us the reformed egyptian being handed down and altered by us according to our manner of speech and if our plates had been sufficiently large we should have written in the hebrew but the hebrew hath been altered by us also and if we could have written in the hebrew behold ye would have had none imperfection in our record 7 ajoseph4joseph4 joseph smith history of the church of jesus christ of latter day saints eae3titB HFL roberts and2nd ed rev salt lalakeke city deseret book co 1960 IV 537 hereafter cited as HC the excerpt ferredberredreferredre to here is a copy of the wentworth letter n 515 ne 514 al 103 616 ne 14 7mormmorm 93233932 33 3 if these verses do not make it clear in what language 80 the record was written they do at least indicate that the language in which the nephitesNep hites felt proficient was hebrew a good indication that it was the spoken language even at the end of their history if the people were still thinking in hebrew hebraisms would occur in their writings regardless of the language in which they were composed how much the language of the nephitesNep hites changed during their history can not be determined A language does not have to be greatly altered however in order for one to be 9 able to say none other people knoweth our language A knowledge of hebrew does not guarantee that one will be able to understand aramaic nor does a spaniard understand a frenchman if the nephite language suffered a normal alter- ation during the thousand year period involved it would still be essentially semitic and hebraisms would occur throughout the nephite record the claims of the record itself with regard to language would therefore justify a search for hebraismsflebraisms in its translation A further justification is the fact that people well versed in hebrew have noted the hebraic nature of the book of mormon english these include henry herman miller a 0 ifor8forfor contrasting views see sidney B sperry book of mormon comcompendiumendiumeddiumsalt lake city bookcraft 1961963 appp 313931 39 anand hugh nibley lehi in the dedesertsert and the world of the Jaredjareditesites salt lake city bookcraft 1952 appp 131713 17 9mormorm 934 4 jewish convert to the mormon church who translated approxi- mately eighty pages of the book of mormon into hebrew about 1922 10 dr joshua block former director of the semitic division of the new york public library 11 and mordecai kamrat a former director now deceased of a major school for teaching modern hebrew to foreigners alpanulpan eziondzion located in jerusalem the latter after reading the book of mormon at the request of a mormon student commented on the hebraic nature of the proper names in the book of mormon and suggested that a study of the language of the 12 book be made with regard to its hebraic nature A ffewew years later after translating the fifth chapter of jacob into hebrew for another mormon he also commented on the ease with which the book of mormon translated into he- brew because of its semitic thought patterns 13 dr sidney B sperry professor emeritus of old testament languages and literature at the brigham young university after some study of book of mormon english with regard to its nature as translation english n concluded 10 microfilm in brigham young university library 11 see sperry compendium appp 3537353735 37 for copies of letters regarding these mens impressions 12 in conversation with dr eldin ricks presently associate professor of religious instruction brigham young university 13 in conversation with dr daniel H ludlow former- ly dean of the college of religious instruction brigham young university 5 that the book of mormon shows more evidence of its being a translation from hebrew than do the four gospels as some scholars maintain 14 in addition dr hugh nibley has suggested that some of the bad grammar of the book of mormon could be the result of a too faithfulfaithful1111 rendering of the origioriginaloriginalloriginalenailnallnaly is and has furthermore stated that the book of cormonsmormonsMormons language and style from the first were consciously modeled after the literary and linguistic usage