As I was preparing this third reflection on the Book of Mormon - you can still read one and two — it became clear to me that working in smaller scale – just a focus on 3 Nephi, just this one of all the books in the Book of Mormon – is indeed giving me more work, not less. Reading closely does open new vistas — all of it becomes interesting — and gives many insights and raises many questions. There is certainly no exception here, as I face the prospect of saying something about the three appearances and three sermons of Jesus in 3 Nephi. (Once again, I recommend Grant Hardy’s The Book of Mormon: A Reader’s Edition, and likewise his Understanding the Book of Mormon.)
Here I will comment just on the first of Jesus’ three teachings. In 3 Nephi 12-14, Jesus in essence repeats the Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 5-7). I mentioned last time that Krister Stendahl has written a learned article on the similarities and subtle differences between the Sermon in Matthew and the Mormon version of the Sermon. No very large change stands out, but small changes appear frequently enough. I suggest that you read these chapters with your New Testament nearby, using Hardy and Stendahl as aids. If you read closely, you will appreciate both the continuity and changes. In my own brief study - a start, though hardly decisive - I did not discover any smoking gun, such as would prove something decisive about Mormons, or about the use of the New Testament in the Book of Mormon.
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