August 2022
The Joseph Smith Translation (JST) is a translation of the Bible made by the prophet Joseph Smith from 1830 to 1833.[1] In his calling to provide a better Bible for the Church, Joseph Smith added over ten thousand words of new text to the Bible, and he revised about 3,600 versus of existing King James translation (KJV) text. We Latter-day Saints care about the JST because the Lord does, as is made clear in several revelations. “It is meet that my servant Joseph Smith, Jun., should have a house built, in which to live and translate” (Doctrine and Covenants 41:7); “Thou shalt ask, and my scriptures shall be given as I have appointed” (Doctrine and Covenants 42:56); “It is expedient to continue the work of translation until it be finished” (Doctrine and Covenants 73:4); “It is my will that you should hasten to translate my scriptures” (Doctrine and Covenants 93:53); “The second lot on the south shall be dedicated unto me for the building of a house unto me, for the work of the printing of the translation of my scriptures” (Doctrine and Covenants 94:23); “I have commanded you to organize yourselves, even to print my words, the fulness of my scriptures” (Doctrine and Covenants 104:58); “Let [William Law] . . . publish the new translation of my holy word unto the inhabitants of the earth” (Doctrine and Covenants 124:89).[2]
The Brother of Jared and Joseph Smith’s Bible Translation
In some ways, we can think of the experiences of the brother of Jared as a model for some parts of the Joseph Smith Translation. God gave the brother of Jared instructions for doing what he was called to do, to build barges in which he and others could cross the ocean. But he did not give him instructions for everything. The brother of Jared needed to use his own initiative for some parts of the project, initiative that would require him to use his best judgment and resourcefulness (Ether 2:16–3:6). Sometimes, it appears, Joseph Smith needed to use his own initiative in his preparation of a Bible to bless the lives of the Latter-day Saints. Perhaps he used his own prophetic instincts in his translation, and sometimes even his common sense, because God did not spell out everything his prophet needed to do.
There is an abundance of revealed material in the Joseph Smith Translation. There are many places in which I believe that the Lord revealed exact words to his Prophet through the Holy Ghost. This would include material like most of the Book of Moses, which seems to have been revealed mostly in exact words, and many smaller insertions in other parts of the Bible, particularly in the Gospels. In addition, there are other parts of the JST in which I believe that God revealed thoughts to his Prophet, by means of the Holy Ghost, and Joseph Smith was required to provide the words for those thoughts.[3]
But was Joseph Smith influenced in the JST by sources other than those kinds of revelation? For example, was he influenced by material he saw in printed sources? Was he influenced in the Bible revisions he made by things he learned from others? Was he influenced by his own life experience or by interactions he had with others?
Written Sources
We know indeed that Joseph Smith was influenced by previously written sources in his efforts on the Joseph Smith Translation. We will look at four written sources that influenced the work.
Written Source Number 1: The King James Bible
Thousands of JST passages were influenced by the King James Bible, the base text of the Joseph Smith Translation. Virtually all of the verses that were revised in any way in the JST retained KJV words. In addition, most of the new text that Joseph Smith added to the Bible contains some kind of KJV idiom.
The italicized words in the King James translation played an important role in the JST, because the Prophet made a disproportionate number of changes where italicized words appear in the King James text. Most italicized words in the KJV indicate words that are needed in the English translation that do not specifically appear in the original text. For example, the Hebrew text at Genesis 1:10 reads, “And God saw that good.” In order to make a coherent sentence in English, translators needed to add the words “it was.” So in the King James translation the passage reads, “And God saw that it was good.” The King James translators identified the added words by italicizing them, and this is the origin of most of the italicized words in the Bible.
The evidence is clear that Joseph Smith and his associates were suspicious of the italicized words, knowing that they were additions to the text. The Prophet made hundreds of JST revisions at italicized words. Sometimes he let them stand when they were needed in the new translation, but often he simply deleted them or revised the text at their location.
The old vocabulary and grammar of the King James translation influenced the JST in many passages. The Prophet modernized many archaic words, as in this example:
KJV: To whom also he shewed himself alive after his passion by many infallible proofs (Acts 1:3)
JST: to whom also he showed himself alive after his sufferings by many infallible proofs
The reading in the King James Bible is not incorrect, it is just that we don’t use the word passion with that meaning anymore. The word sufferings expresses the intent better.
The Prophet also modernized a great deal of archaic grammar that is found in the KJV. It regularly uses that and which as relative pronouns for humans, but in today’s English we prefer who and whom. This was already the case in Joseph Smith’s day.
KJV: He that cometh from above is above all: he that is of the earth is earthly, . . . he that . . .” (John 3:31)
JST: He who cometh from above is above all; he who is of the earth is earthly. . . . He who . . .”
In the following passage, notice how the Prophet changed ye to you:
KJV: Ye serpents, ye generation of vipers, how can ye escape the damnation of hell? . . . and some of them ye shall kill and crucify; and some of them shall ye scourge (Matthew 23:33–34)
JST: You serpents and generation of vipers, how can you escape the damnation of hell? . . . and of them you shall kill and crucify and of them you shall scourge
Also in this passage, notice how the Prophet removed all the italicized words, and he modernized the word order of “shall ye” to “you shall.”
In the following example, he changed “an” before the pronounced letter h to “a,” consistent with the usage in his own time and now:
KJV: Make not my Father’s house an house of merchandise. (John 2:16)
JST: Make not my Father’s house a house of merchandise.
Two observations are needed here: Joseph Smith did not make changes like these consistently, and, as we have seen in other examples, much of the Joseph Smith Translation is specific to English speakers and the King James Bible and is not relevant in many other languages.
So our first written source that influenced the Joseph Smith Translation was the King James Bible.
Written Source Number 2: Other Bible Passages
There are several passages in the Joseph Smith Translation where it is clear that revised text comes from elsewhere in the Bible.
KJV: But whom say ye that I am? And Peter answereth and saith unto him, Thou art the Christ. (Mark 8:29)
JST: “But whom say ye that I am?” And Peter answered and saith unto him, “Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God.”
The new words in the JST of Mark 8:29 come from Matthew 16:16.
KJV: There shall no sign be given unto this generation. (Mark 8:12)
JST: There shall no sign be given unto this generation save the sign of the prophet Jonah. For as Jonah was three days and three nights in the whale’s belly, so likewise shall the Son of Man be buried in the bowels of the earth.
Almost all of the added words come verbatim from Matthew 12:39–40.
For me it is not important whether the Lord inspired Joseph Smith to add those specific words or whether he simply gave the Prophet his general instructions to improve the text wherever he could. In either case, the passages above from Mark 8 now have better readings than they had before, because of the addition of words from Matthew.
Another example provides an even more interesting case:
KJV: And set up over his head his accusation written, THIS IS JESUS THE KING OF THE JEWS. (Matthew 27:37)
JST: And Pilate wrote a title and put it on the cross. And the writing was, “Jesus of Nazareth, the King of the Jews,” in letters of Greek and Latin and Hebrew. And the chief priest said unto Pilate, “It should be written and set up over his head his accusation: ‘This is he that said he was Jesus, the king of the Jews.’” But Pilate answered and said, “What I have written I have written. Let it alone.”
This short passage is revised in a dramatic way, with additions from John 19:19 (“Pilate” to “Jews”); Luke 23:38 (“in letters of Greek and Latin and Hebrew”); John 19:21 paraphrased (“And” to “Jews”); and John 19:22 (“Pilate” to “written”). Clearly, in these passages, adding to the text with words from other New Testament verses was part of the process of creating the Joseph Smith Translation, and thus passages from other parts of the Bible are a second written source that influenced the Joseph Smith Translation.
Written Source Number 3: The Book of Mormon
The evidence shows that some passages in the Joseph Smith Translation were taken from the Book of Mormon.
In the JST of Matthew 5, the first chapter of the Sermon on the Mount, Joseph Smith revised the text to match the corresponding text in 3 Nephi in the 1830 Book of Mormon. He took some text verbatim from 3 Nephi, and he took some from 3 Nephi and then modified it further. In all Joseph Smith made about thirty revisions in Matthew 5 to match the corresponding wording in 3 Nephi. Interestingly, he did not do the same with Matthew 6 and 7, the other chapters of the Sermon on the Mount.
The Book of Mormon contains about one-third of the book of Isaiah. There are variations between Book of Mormon Isaiah and biblical Isaiah, but generally the differences are not extensive. Despite that, when Joseph Smith arrived at Isaiah while working on the JST, he revised the biblical passages to match the Isaiah verses in the 1830 Book of Mormon. Perhaps he believed that because there was already a revised translation of some of the Isaiah verses, it was better for him to copy them from the Book of Mormon rather than to revise the text anew. This was a very systematic project, carefully done to match Isaiah in the JST with the Isaiah passages in the Book of Mormon. There are a few exceptions, but they appear to be accidental.
The Book of Mormon is thus a third written source that influenced the Prophet’s work on the Joseph Smith Translation.
Written Source Number 4: The Joseph Smith Translation
One major JST passage was taken from another JST passage.
Matthew 24 contains a text called the Olivet Discourse. It was a sermon given by Jesus to his disciples on the Mount of Olives in which he spoke of future events. A shorter version of the sermon also appears in Mark 13, and some of the sermon’s content is found in Luke 21. Joseph Smith revised Matthew 24 in the spring of 1831. He revised it dramatically, giving us one of the gems of the Restoration, now known as Joseph Smith—Matthew in the Pearl of Great Price. Months later, in the winter of 1831–32, the Prophet arrived at the version of the sermon at Mark 13. But there, instead of revising Mark’s account of the discourse, he copied onto the manuscript at Mark 13 the revision he had made months earlier of Matthew 24. Again, I suspect he did so knowing that he already had a revised translation of the sermon that was sufficient, and thus he did not need to revise it again.
Matthew, Mark, and Luke are called the Synoptic Gospels, because they share a common point of view and cover many of the same events and sayings of Jesus. In some of the parallel passages, the Prophet seems to have made changes in one or two of the Gospels to match the others. Thus the Joseph Smith Translation itself, at least in such cases, is our fourth written source that influenced the Prophet while he was revising the Bible. It must be pointed out, however, that the Prophet revised most of the synoptic passages independently of the others, without any effort to make them the same.
Nonscriptural Sources
What the written sources discussed thus far have in common is that they are all scriptural in nature. In addition to these, were there other sources that influenced Joseph Smith in his Bible revision? For example, did he learn things from sermons that he incorporated into the JST? Did he learn things in conversations with others that helped him as he revised the text?
The Prophet changed the word wot to know in the JST. Wot was already an obsolete word in his day. Did he learn in some sermon or conversation that it means know? Another example is the word conversation, which has changed its meaning in the past centuries. In the King James translation it does not mean “conversation,” it means “behavior” or “conduct.” Did Joseph Smith learn that from interactions with other people before working on the JST and thus changed it when he saw it while revising the Bible? In any case, he did not change it consistently in his Bible revision.
What about other sources of scriptural knowledge current in Joseph Smith’s day, for example Bible commentaries or other books?
Adam Clarke’s Commentary
In 2020 two articles appeared in print that proposed the Adam Clarke theory, both written by BYU Professor Thomas A. Wayment.[4] The theory goes like this: Joseph Smith got information from Adam Clarke’s Bible commentary and put it into the Joseph Smith Translation in many places. Thus Clarke’s commentary “shaped” the JST “in fundamental ways.”[5]
Adam Clarke was a British Bible scholar who lived 1762–1832. He wrote a six-volume Bible commentary of over 5000 pages. According to Professor Wayment, there are “200 to 300 . . . parallels where Joseph Smith has the exact same change to a verse that Adam Clarke does. They’re verbatim.”[6] Joseph Smith “was inclined to depend on Clarke’s commentary for matters of history, textual questions, clarification of wording, and theological nuance.”[7] “He’s either read it, has it in front of him, or he reads it at night.”[8]
None of these claims are true, in my opinion.[9]
What do the proposed parallels look like? They are usually one- or two-word similarities. They rarely have identical wording, they are mostly in unimportant passages, and in most cases the revisions are not important ones. One way to describe the JST is to say it contains three kinds of text: (1) new text that has no biblical counterpart, like most of the Book of Moses, (2) revised text that changes the meaning of existing verses, and (3) revised text that does not change significantly the meaning of existing verses, as in the modernizations of vocabulary and grammar that we have seen so far. Most of the proposed borrowings from Adam Clarke are of the third category, so they do not represent the most important parts of the JST.
Would there be anything wrong if Joseph Smith did borrow ideas for JST revisions from Clarke’s Bible commentary? The answer is No. If the Prophet found good suggestions from any source to improve the content of the Bible, there would be nothing wrong with him drawing information from that source. But the problem with the Adam Clarke theory is that there is no evidence that shows that he drew any ideas from Clarke.
In his articles, Professor Wayment discussed or mentioned thirty JST passages that he believed were influenced by Clarke’s commentary. I examined each of them in the context of the JST and in the context of Clarke’s commentary, and I found no evidence of any influence from Clarke’s commentary on any of the JST revisions. All the purported borrowings from Adam Clarke are better explained in other ways. In addition to that examination, I had a separate unrelated list of 260 more JST revisions, and I found no influence from Clarke’s commentary in any of those. Of course there were some similarities in some places, and it is not hard to understand why.
Clarke’s commentary is a remarkable source. It is very academic and very erudite. His volumes include the entire Bible with about three to four times as much commentary on a page as Bible text. The commentary is very philological, which means that it deals with words. It is also very wordy. Clarke provides millions of words as he comments on the text and the message of the biblical passages. There is much discussion of the text and its meaning and much interaction with the words of the King James translation. Clarke often recommends better ways to translate text, and he provides much paraphrasing, much restating, and much clarifying. He often discusses the phrase from the KJV and then introduces alternate readings with words like “meaning . . . ,” “or in other words . . . ,” or “that is to say. . . .” Thus statistically there is a very good chance for some overlap or resemblance with individual words in anyone else’s commentary or translation.
My finding is that there are trivial similarities of isolated words in Clarke’s commentary and the Joseph Smith Translation. But out of the millions of words in Clarke’s commentary, the similarities are only random and coincidental, as we will see in the following examples.
Joseph Smith had an instinct to modernize the language of the Bible, an instinct that is shown in hundreds of examples. One verse that proponents of the Adam Clarke theory believe was revised with help from Clarke is Exodus 11:9.[10]
KJV: Pharaoh shall not hearken unto you.
JST: Pharaoh will not hearken unto you.
In his commentary, Adam Clarke discusses the verb and argues that will would be a better translation here than shall. Proponents of the Adam Clarke theory believe that Joseph Smith got the idea for the change from Clarke’s commentary, but the evidence shows otherwise. Before this passage, the Prophet had already changed shall to will multiple times, showing that he didn’t get the idea from Clarke. He changed the wording in the exact phrase in a previous verse. None of those revisions were recommended by Clarke, showing that the Prophet’s change here was not influenced by Clarke at all but is evidence of the broader instinct that Joseph Smith had to provide more modern language in his revision of the Bible.
This example goes to the core of what is wrong with the Adam Clarke theory. The theory does not examine JST revisions in the broader context of the other revisions that Joseph Smith made.
As we saw above, the JST shows an instinct to remove or change italicized words.
KJV: Honour thy father and thy mother (Matthew 19:19)
JST: Honour thy father and mother
The word thy is italicized in the KJV, and thus it is not surprising that Joseph Smith removed it in his translation of the verse. Adam Clarke’s commentary also argues in this case that the italicize word is incorrect. Did Joseph Smith get this idea from Clarke?[11] No, he had already removed hundreds of italicized words, especially in cases like this where they could be removed without changing the meaning of the verse. In other cases he changed words or reorganized the sentences after deleting the italicized words.
The Joseph Smith Translation shows an instinct to correct doctrine.
KJV: Thou shall not revile the gods (Exodus 22:28)
JST: Thou shalt not revile against God
Because there are no “the gods,” and Joseph Smith knew it, a change here in the JST would absolutely be expected. He made many changes where the KJV wording led to inaccurate or imprecise doctrine. That Adam Clarke’s commentary points out that “the gods” is a bad translation is irrelevant.[12] Joseph Smith didn’t need that suggestion to change the passage on his own.
KJV: All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable (2 Timothy 3:16)
JST: And all scripture given by inspiration of God is profitable
This biblical passage is demonstrably untrue as it stands. Not everything in the Bible is given by inspiration from God, and not everything in the Bible is profitable. Knowing Joseph Smith’s interest in correcting errors in the Bible, we can predict how he would change this verse. Notice also that both occurrences of the word is are italicized. Removing the first one and relocating the and makes the passage clear and doctrinally sound.
Adam Clarke didn’t like the KJV wording of this passage either. This is his preferred translation:
Clarke: every writing divinely inspired, is profitable
To suggest that Joseph Smith got the idea for the revision from Adam Clarke is entirely unnecessary, because the Prophet knew that the wording in the KJV was not accurate.[13] In addition, notice the distinctive wording in Clarke’s rewrite of the verse: “every writing divinely inspired.” If Joseph Smith had used such characteristic language as this, one might have a case for attributing the revision to Clarke. But, as we will see elsewhere, there are no such examples in the JST.
KJV: lead us not into temptation (Matthew 6:13)
JST: suffer us not to be led into temptation
This verse has an obvious doctrinal problem, so it is predictable that Joseph Smith would make a change here. God does not lead us into temptation. The JST revision beautifully corrects the doctrine of the verse. Adam Clarke’s rendition of this passage is as follows:
Clarke: bring us not into sore trial.
Clarke’s preferred translation does not even address the issue of God bringing us into temptation. But in his 200-word commentary on the verse, he states that God “only permits or suffers“ some things to happen. From those words in the commentary, proponents of the Adam Clarke theory believe that Joseph Smith got his idea for this change from Clarke.[14]
But such is not the case. Joseph Smith frequently used the word suffer with the meaning “allow.” Suffer with this meaning appears often in the Bible and was still in use in Joseph Smith’s day, so he hardly needed to search through Clarke’s commentary to find it. In addition, the Book of Mormon uses the word suffer with this meaning about a hundred times. Thus an examination of the JST change in context shows that there is no reason to believe that it was influenced by Adam Clarke. Clarke uses the words “sore trial” in in his translation of the passage. If Joseph Smith’s translation had used such characteristic Clarke vocabulary, one might have a case for attributing this revision to Clarke. But such is not the case.
When Joseph Smith arrived at the Song of Solomon, he had his scribe write, “The Songs of Solomon are not inspired writings.” Proponents of the Adam Clarke theory attribute this change to Joseph Smith following Clarke.[15] Clarke has an extensive commentary on the Song of Solomon but never suggests deleting it from the Bible. He makes two important points about it: it is love poetry, and preachers shouldn’t preach from it. There is nothing innovative here. Anyone who reads this book can tell that it is love poetry, and any Latter-day Saint who reads it should be able to tell that it is out of place in the scriptures. Thus it is hard to imagine why anyone would want to attribute Joseph Smith’s deletion of the book to Adam Clarke’s conclusions about it.
The Joseph Smith Translation shows evidence of other instincts that guided its creation: the instinct to remove ambiguity, the instinct to provide plainness, and the instinct to explain metaphor. The JST shows evidence of these instincts in hundreds of passages. But it seems safe to say that people who write Bible commentaries are motivated, to a greater or lesser degree, by those same instincts, so it should not surprise us if there are coincidental similarities in commentaries and translations.
If Joseph Smith had borrowed from Adam Clarke, we would see direct, recognizable borrowing of distinctive words or phrases. Examples might include the distinctive phrases we have seen already: “sore trial,” and “every writing divinely inspired.” Instead, what we have are a few vague, random resemblances out of millions of words.
Paul wrote to Church members in Corinth:
KJV: The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death. (1 Corinthians 15:26)
JST: The last enemy, death, shall be destroyed.
Notice the italicized words, that and is. The Joseph Smith Translation revision gets rid of the italicized word that, and the new wording is grammatically sound and makes perfect sense. Adam Clarke, in his paraphrase, moves the word death up in the sentence as Joseph Smith did, so the Adam Clarke theory attributes the change to Clarke’s commentary.[16] But Clarke’s wording is very different from the Prophet’s. Clarke wrote that death “shall be counter worked, subverted, and finally over turned.” Again, if Joseph Smith had borrowed from Adam Clarke, some of Clarke’s characteristic word choices, like “counter worked,” “subverted,” and “overturned,” would be found in the Joseph Smith Translation. But there are no examples of Clarke’s distinctive word choices like these anywhere in the JST. Instead, we see occasional vague similarities of words or ideas.
If Joseph Smith had borrowed from Adam Clarke, there would be a clear, repeated pattern of borrowing. The borrowed words would not be hard to find, they would not be so vague, they would not be so random, and they would be important revisions. Adam Clarke made many profound observations about the biblical text, many of which would be useful to any of us as Bible readers today. But the convergences that proponents of the Adam Clarke theory have brought forth are only in vague word choices and not in the important discussions that Clarke provided so abundantly in his commentary. If Joseph Smith borrowed from Adam Clarke, why did he overlook the genuinely important insights that Clarke offered and just make the small and usually inconsequential word revisions that believers in the Adam Clarke theory propose? It makes no sense. Joseph Smith was indeed influenced by other written sources in his work on the JST: the King James translation, other Bible passages, the Book of Mormon, and other JST passages. But there is no evidence of any connection between Adam Clarke’s commentary and the Joseph Smith Translation, and there is no evidence that Joseph Smith had ever seen Clarke’s commentary.
Final Thoughts
Is the Adam Clarke theory an anti-Mormon argument? No, it is not. It was an attempt to explain some of the content of the JST, though I believe it was ultimately misguided and unhelpful. Professor Wayment’s co-author on one of his articles left the Church and was heralded by critics of the Church, who then adopted the Adam Clarke notion as evidence against Joseph Smith’s prophetic calling. This is unfortunate, and I have no reason to believe that it reflects the intent of Professor Wayment’s research.
But here is something else to consider: We have no record of Joseph Smith ever caring what other religions taught, and we have no record of him turning to others to obtain ideas on doctrinal or scriptural matters. That was not his style. He was entirely confident of his own calling. His editing of the Bible, as well as his use of Bible passages in his sermons, show that he believed his own authority even exceeded that of the Bible.
Here is something else to think about. Before Joseph Smith started revising the Bible, he had already translated the Book of Mormon, which teaches the fundamental messages of the Old Testament and the New Testament better than those books do. Also, before arriving in his revision of the Bible to the place where proponents of the Adam Clarke theory believe he started using Clarke, he had already dramatically changed the nature of the Bible itself, revealing that Adam and Eve were Christians, as well as many of their descendants. He had already revealed in the JST important truths found nowhere else about the nature of God and his work.
It does not seem likely to me that someone as confident in his prophetic calling as Joseph Smith was, who had already revised the biblical text so dramatically, would be inclined to search for doctrinal suggestions in someone else’s book.
Again we should be reminded of what the Lord and his Prophet told us about the Joseph Smith Translation: “The scriptures shall be given, even as they are in mine own bosom, to the salvation of mine own elect” (Doctrine and Covenants 35:20); Joseph Smith said that “except the Church receive the fulness of the scriptures, that they would yet fall”;[17] and “My servant Joseph is called to do a great work and hath need that he may do the work of translation for the salvation of souls.”[18]
[1] This is a transcript of a presentation given at the FAIR Conference in Provo, Utah, August 4, 2022. I thank the organizers for inviting me to speak on this topic.
[2] For the complete Joseph Smith Translation, in scripture format, see Joseph Smith’s Translation of the Bible: The Joseph Smith Translation and the King James Translation in Parallel Columns (Provo, UT: Brigham Young University Press, 2021).
[3] For these matters and others pertaining to Joseph Smith’s translation of the Bible, see Kent P. Jackson, Understanding Joseph Smith’s Translation of the Bible (Provo, UT: Religious Studies Center, Brigham Young University, 2022).
[4] Thomas A. Wayment and Haley Wilson-Lemmon, “A Recovered Resource: The Use of Adam Clarke’s Bible Commentary in Joseph Smith’s Bible Translation,” in Producing Ancient Scripture: Joseph Smith’s Translation Projects in the Development of Mormon Christianity, ed. Michael Hubbard MacKay, Mark Ashurst-McGee, and Brian M. Hauglid (Salt Lake City: University of Utah Press, 2020), 262–84; Thomas A. Wayment, “Joseph Smith, Adam Clarke, and the Making of a Bible Revision,” Journal of Mormon History 46, no. 3 (July 2020): 1–22.
[5] Wayment, “Making of a Bible Revision,” 22.
[6] Thomas A. Wayment, “Joseph Smith’s Use of Bible Commentaries in His Translations,” LDS Perspectives Podcast, Episode 55, https://ldsperspectives.com/2017/09/26/jst-adam-clarke-commentary, 6.
[7] Wayment and Wilson-Lemmon, “A Recovered Resource,” 267.
[8] Wayment, “Joseph Smith’s Use of Bible Commentaries,” 6.
[9] My response to the Adam Clarke theory is found in Kent P. Jackson, “Some Notes on Joseph Smith and Adam Clarke,” Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship 40 (2020): 15–59.
[10] Jackson, “Some Notes on Joseph Smith and Adam Clarke,” 28–29.
[11] Jackson, “Some Notes on Joseph Smith and Adam Clarke,” 35.
[12] Jackson, “Some Notes on Joseph Smith and Adam Clarke,” 29.
[13] Jackson, “Some Notes on Joseph Smith and Adam Clarke,” 45–46.
[14] Jackson, “Some Notes on Joseph Smith and Adam Clarke,” 34.
[15] Jackson, “Some Notes on Joseph Smith and Adam Clarke,” 31–32.
[16] Jackson, “Some Notes on Joseph Smith and Adam Clarke,” 42–43.
[17] Minutes, October 25–26, 1831, the Joseph Smith Papers.
[18] Revelation, Jan. 5, 1833, the Joseph Smith Papers.
