Alma 2:11–12 Textual Variants

The spelling of the name Amlici and the associated name Amlicite involves considerable complexity. Amlici appears 16 times (from Alma 2:1 through Alma 2:31). Unfortunately, the original manuscript is not extant for any of this portion of the text, but in the printer’s manuscript the name is consistently spelled as Amlici and without any miswriting or immediate correction, as in the first occurrence in 𝓟:

• Alma 2:1
  • for a certain man being called Amlici he being a very cunning man …

On the other hand, the first two occurrences in 𝓟 of Amlicites (in Alma 2:11–12) are spelled Amlikites. But afterwards, for 25 more occurrences (from Alma 2:13 through Alma 3:20), we have a consistent Amlicites in 𝓟, again without any miswriting or immediate correction. Once more, there is no extant portion of the original manuscript for these chapters.

This evidence, taken all together, suggests that the current spellings Amlici and Amlicites are correct. But there is a need to explain why the first two occurrences of Amlicites were spelled as Amlikites in 𝓟. It would seem that the k in this spelling was probably also in 𝓞, which would suggest that Joseph Smith pronounced Amlicites (as well as its base morpheme, the name Amlici ) with a /k / sound rather than with the /s/ sound proposed in the Pronouncing Guide at the back of the 1981 LDS edition (and similarly in the Pronouncing Vocabulary at the end of the 1920 LDS edition). The /k / pronunciation does seem to be directly supported by two distinct Book of Mormon names that take the same stem form am-l-k and a third name where the /k / is spelled ck:

Amaleki the record keeper mentioned in the book of Omni and the Words of Mormon; also the name of one of Ammon’s men (Mosiah 7:6)

Amulek Alma’s missionary companion from Ammonihah (Alma 8–16, 31–35, and referenced in Helaman 5 and Ether 12)

Amalickiah the Nephite rebel and usurper of the Lamanite throne (Alma 46–62); also Amalickiahite, a follower of Amalickiah (Alma 46, 49)

The name Amalickiah should be interpreted as Amalick +iah, where -iah is the theophoric ending Jah that refers to Jahweh (that is, Jehovah)—as in the biblical names Isaiah, Jeremiah, and Zedekiah (which are also referred to in the Book of Mormon). It should also be noted that there are pairs of Book of Mormon names that suggest that both c and k could serve as alternative spellings for the same sound (or similar sounds):

Corihor Korihor

Cumeni, Cumenihah, Kishcumen Kumen, Kumenonhi

(The original spelling for the compound name is Kishcumen, not Kishkumen, the systematic misspelling introduced by Oliver Cowdery when he copied the text from 𝓞 into 𝓟; see the discussion under Helaman 1:9.) Of course, for all these pairs of similar names, the letter c or k is followed by a nonpalatalizing vowel (a, o, or u). In modern English, when the following vowel is a historically palatalizing vowel (e, i, or y), the letter c typically takes on the /s/ pronunciation, at least in words borrowed from the Romance languages, while the letter k maintains its /k/ pronunciation.

What may have happened in the early transmission of the text is that when the name Amlici first showed up in the text (in Alma 2:1), Joseph Smith spelled out this name for his scribe, probably Oliver Cowdery. But when the name Amlicite first showed up (later in verse 11), Joseph could have assumed that Oliver would spell it as Amlicite based on Amlici, which he had already told him how to spell. But Oliver might have not paid enough attention to the morphological connection between Amlici and Amlicite and therefore in 𝓞 spelled Amlicite more phonetically as Amlikite (or perhaps even Amlickite), at least for the first two occurrences of Amlicite, until he realized that he might be making a mistake and asked Joseph for the spelling of Amlicite. For the rest of this part of the text, from Alma 2:13 through Alma 3:20, Oliver correctly wrote the name of Amlici’s followers as Amlicites.

There is one additional Book of Mormon name, Amalekite, that could be included in the above list of names taking the form am-l-k. The printer’s manuscript (and every published edition) uses the term Amalekite(s) to refer to a group of religious apostates, 14 times in Alma 21–27 and 5 times in Alma 43. Yet the original manuscript and other evidence suggest that these Amalekites were not an otherwise unidentified group of religious dissidents, but were in fact Amlici’s own group, the Amlicites.

To begin with, we note that for the initial occurrence of Amalekites in Alma 21 (as well as the initial occurrence in Alma 43), the text assumes the reader is already familiar with this group of dissidents:

• Alma 21:2
  • now the Lamanites and the [Amalekites 1ABCEFGHIJKLMNOPQRST|Amelekites D] and the people of Amulon had built a great city which was called Jerusalem
• Alma 43:6
  • and now as the [Amaleckites 0|Amalekites 1ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRST] were of a more wicked and a murderous disposition than the Lamanites were …

Moreover, the current text for Alma 21:4 indicates that “many of the Amalekites and the Amulonites were after the order of the Nehors”, which agrees with the earlier statement in Alma 2:1 that Amlici was “after the order of the man that slew Gideon by the sword who was executed according to the law”—that is, Nehor (as identified in Alma 1:15). And in Alma 43 these Amalekites are listed along with the Zoramites and Amulonites (the descendants of the priests of king Noah) as dissenters from the Nephites:

• Alma 43:13
  • and all those which had dissented from the Nephites which were [Amalickites 0|Amalekites 1ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRST] and Zoramites and the descendants of the priests of Noah

The current spelling Amalekites may be due to the occurrence of the name Amaleki earlier on in the Book of Mormon text (which is the name of the record keeper in the book of Omni and the Words of Mormon as well as the name of one of Ammon’s men, mentioned in Mosiah 7:6). The name Amalekites is also found in the King James Bible and refers to one of the original peoples in the land of Canaan. It is possible that this biblical name had some influence in producing the spelling Amalekites in the printer’s manuscript for Alma 21–27.

The earliest manuscript evidence for the 14 occurrences from Alma 21:2 through Alma 27:12 provides support for identifying these Amalekites as Amlicites. The printer’s manuscript consistently spells these 14 occurrences (as well as the 5 occurrences in Alma 43) as Amalekites. But this is not the case when we look at the extant occurrences of this term as found in the original manuscript for Alma 21–27. The first 8 occurrences (from Alma 21:2 through Alma 23:14) are not extant, but the spelling for the 9th, 11th, and 13th occurrences is Amelicites (not Amalekites, the corresponding spelling in the printer’s manuscript):

The spelling Amelicite(s) differs from Amlicite(s) by only the intrusive e.

The earlier spellings Amlici and Amlicites (in Alma 2–3) are found only in the printer’s manuscript, but if the original manuscript had read Amelici and Amelicites, it seems doubtful that Oliver Cowdery would have copied these names without the e. The intrusive e found later on (in both the original and printer’s manuscripts) may have been influenced by other names (such as Amaleki, Amulek, and Amulon, where a vowel is found between the m and the l ). Note, in particular, that the name Amulek occurs 67 times in Alma 8–16 (that is, after Alma 2–3), where the name Amlici (along with Amlicite) was first introduced, but before the return of Amlicite to the narrative in Alma 21–27.

As already noted, the spelling of Amlicites for the five occurrences in Alma 43 is Amalekites in the printed editions as well as in the printer’s manuscript. Amalekites, the consistent spelling in 𝓟 for Alma 21–27 and Alma 43, is found only once in 𝓞 (namely, in Alma 43:44, the very last occurrence of the name in the text). In the original manuscript for Alma 43, we find that the spelling varies considerably and has moved even further away from the original Amlicites. In particular, its spellings seem very much like the spelling for the soon-to-appear Amalickiah and its related forms (which occur 68 times from Alma 46:3 through Alma 62:35):

In fact, in the original manuscript Oliver Cowdery frequently misspelled Amalickiah as Ameleckiah (28 times) and Amelickiah (21 times). For further discussion of the spelling of Amalickiah, see under Alma 46:5.

Woodrow Huntamer has argued (personal communication, 1 July 2003 and 7 July 2003) that these Amalekites existed prior to the Amlicites: Alma 17:6 indicates that the four sons of Mosiah left in the first year of the reign of the judges, and Alma 21:1–4 refers to Aaron and his fellow missionaries as preaching to the Amalekites after separating from Ammon. No intervening missionary work on Aaron’s part is mentioned, so one might naturally assume that Aaron tried to preach to these Amalekites at the beginning of his missionary work. The problem with the emendation Amlicite(s) for Amalekite(s) is that there is no mention of the Amlicites until the fifth year of the reign of the judges, when Amlici first appears in the narrative (see Alma 2:1–11). And even if Amlicites existed earlier, they did not unite with the Lamanites until the fifth year (as described in Alma 2–3).

One possible solution to this conflict in the sequencing of events is to note that the Amalekites (as described in Alma 21:4) were after the order of the Nehors, as was Amlici himself. Nehor “began to establish a church after the manner of his preaching” (Alma 1:6) in the first year of the reign of the judges, the same year that the four sons of Mosiah left on their mission to the Lamanites. Thus the reference in Alma 21:4 to meeting the Amalekites (that is, Amlicites) may be an anachronistic use of the name Amlicite(s) in the original text to refer to followers of Nehor who later became identified as Amlicites. In fact, Alma 21:4 essentially makes that point later on in the verse: “for many of the Amalekites [Amlicites] and the Amulonites were after the order of the Nehors”.

Another possible explanation may derive from the fact that Mormon’s account of the four sons’ missionary work is highly abbreviated. The sons of Mosiah spent 14 years among the Lamanites (as stated in Alma 17:4), yet the events described by Mormon in Alma 17–24 seem to cover only a few years. So perhaps as readers we should not automatically assume that the city of Jerusalem was the first place where Aaron preached. The text in Alma 21:4 simply states that after arriving in the city of Jerusalem, Aaron “firstly began to preach to the Amalekites [Amlicites]”. There is no explicit statement about how long and where Aaron and his companions might have worked prior to reaching the city of Jerusalem.

The emendation of Amlicite(s) for Amalekite(s) was first suggested by Lyle Fletcher in an unpublished paper he wrote on this question in the early 1990s. John A. Tvedtnes, on pages 324–325 in The Most Correct Book: Insights from a Book of Mormon Scholar (Salt Lake City, Utah: Cornerstone, 1999), proposes that the Amalekites might be the Amlicites and provides considerable evidence to show that these Amalekites were Nephite dissenters.