Mosiah 14, the deep dive: why Abinadi answered a question about Isaiah 52 with the very next chapter, what his own commentary does with it, and the six small places the Book of Mormon reads differently.
New here? This week's lesson tells the story simply. This is the deep end: the same chapter, slowed down, with the tools to search it yourself.
Step 0 · Date it
Mosiah 14 is Isaiah 53, whole, all twelve verses. The Book of Mormon text matches the King James almost word for word. Every difference below is in the 1830 first edition, so none of them is a later edit.
| Verse | King James (Isaiah 53) | Book of Mormon (Mosiah 14) | Mark |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Who hath believed our report? | Yea, even doth not Isaiah say: Who hath believed our report? | + Abinadi's lead-in, not Isaiah's text |
| 2 | as a root out of a dry ground | as a root out of dry ground | − music |
| 6 | the iniquity of us all | the iniquities of us all | ↔ |
| 7 | so he openeth not his mouth | so he opened not his mouth | ↔ music |
| 8 | for the transgression of my people | for the transgressions of my people | ↔ |
| 9 | because he had done no violence | because he had done no evil | ↔ meaning |
| 12 | he bare the sin of many | he bore the sins of many | ↔ |
Step 1 · Sort it — meaning, or music?
Most of these are music: an article, a verb tense. Two deserve a second look.
- Verse 9: no evil is wider than no violence. The King James clears Him of violence. Abinadi's text clears Him of evil of any kind.
- Verses 6, 8 and 12: three times, a singular becomes a plural. Iniquities. Transgressions. Sins. (Orson's observation, not a doctrine:) the King James can read like one great load laid on Him. Abinadi's text reads like many: every one, counted.
Step 2 · Find the frame
Don't start at Mosiah 14. Start two chapters earlier.
Abinadi stands before King Noah's priests. They question him "that they might cross him… that thereby they might have wherewith to accuse him" (Mosiah 12:19). Then one of them asks about a different Isaiah passage:
"What meaneth the words which are written… How beautiful upon the mountains are the feet of him that bringeth good tidings; that publisheth peace… that saith unto Zion, thy God reigneth…?"
— Mosiah 12:20–21 (Isaiah 52:7)
That's the trap. Isaiah 52 is the triumphant chapter: the messenger on the mountain, the Lord making "bare his holy arm in the eyes of all the nations" (12:24). The priests want the Messiah who wins.
Abinadi first asks them a question back: "Are you priests, and pretend to teach this people… and yet desire to know of me what these things mean?" (12:25). Then he walks them through the law. And when he finally answers, he doesn't go back to chapter 52. He goes forward to the very next chapter, the one about a man so marred that "we hid as it were our faces from him."
They asked about beautiful feet. He answered with a face no one wanted to look at.
Step 3 · Track the voices
Isaiah 53 changes voice. Read it and mark every we, our and us:
"He is despised and rejected of men… we hid as it were our faces from him… Surely he has borne our griefs… All we, like sheep, have gone astray."
— Mosiah 14:3–6
The speakers are the ones who looked away. It's a confession. And Abinadi recited it to men who were, at that moment, looking away. (Interpretation.)
Step 4 · Find the center — your turn
Hebrew prophecy often points inward, with the most important line at the middle. Where is the center of Isaiah 53? Many readers land on verse 5: "with his stripes we are healed." Read the chapter both directions and decide for yourself. This one is an open question. We're not handing you the answer.
Step 5 · Find the second witness
Isaiah 53 doesn't stand alone in the Book of Mormon. Line up the witnesses:
- Abinadi again, a chapter later: "he shall be led, yea, even as Isaiah said, as a sheep before the shearer is dumb, so he opened not his mouth" (Mosiah 15:6).
- Alma, a generation on, on griefs and sorrows: "he will take upon him the pains and the sicknesses of his people… that he may know according to the flesh how to succor his people" (Alma 7:11–12).
- Nephi, long before (an echo, labeled): "they scourge him, and he suffereth it; and they smite him, and he suffereth it. Yea, they spit upon him, and he suffereth it" (1 Nephi 19:9).
- And the silence. The risen Lord quoted Isaiah 52 and 54 to the Nephites, and the record never shows Him reading 53 (this week’s lesson).
On screen: The Chosen quotes 53:3, despised and rejected, in Season 4, Episode 7, the raising of Lazarus.
The New Testament says the same thing: Matthew 8:17 (53:4), Acts 8:32–35 (53:7–8, Philip and the Ethiopian on the Gaza road), and 1 Peter 2:24, "by whose stripes ye were healed."
Step 6 · Read the author's commentary
Abinadi doesn't leave the chapter hanging. Mosiah 15–16 is his commentary, and it answers the priests point for point.
Who is this man? "God himself shall come down among the children of men, and shall redeem his people" (15:1). He had already said all the prophets taught it: God would "take upon him the form of man… and that he, himself, should be oppressed and afflicted" (13:34–35).
What does "who shall declare his generation" mean? Abinadi takes Isaiah's word generation (53:8) and the promise he shall see his seed (53:10), and asks, "Who shall be his seed?" (15:10). His answer: those who believed the prophets, and the prophets themselves, "every one that has opened his mouth to prophesy… they are his seed" (15:13).
And the beautiful feet? Now he goes back to the priests' question. The feet on the mountains belong to the prophets who "published peace" (15:14). Then he goes higher: "O how beautiful upon the mountains are the feet of him that bringeth good tidings, that is the founder of peace, yea, even the Lord, who has redeemed his people" (15:18).
The answer to their trap was in the chapter they skipped. The Messiah who wins in Isaiah 52 is the Man who suffers in Isaiah 53. You don't get the beautiful feet without the stripes.
Abinadi's last words to them: "Teach them that redemption cometh through Christ the Lord" (16:15). It cost him his life. One young priest in the room, Alma, believed him.
Search it yourself
- Read Mosiah 12:20–24, then Mosiah 14. Notice the turn.
- Mark every we / our / us in Mosiah 14. Who is confessing?
- Find the center (Step 4). Write down why you chose it.
- Read Mosiah 15:10–13. Abinadi says the prophets are His seed. Who else does he include?
THE GREATER PORTION
"He that will not harden his heart, to him is given the greater portion of the word." — Alma 12:10
Next in the deep end: Isaiah 48 / 1 Nephi 20, called by the name, leaning on nothing (Road to Esaias, week 2).
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