How to Read Isaiah in the Book of Mormon: 7 Steps Anyone Can Use

How to read Isaiah beside the Book of Mormon, and find things for yourself. The Study skill, worked through Isaiah 48 and 49 and Nephi’s text of them. Every move is named for the place in Nephi’s text that taught it.

Most people read Isaiah one of two ways. They skip it, or they read it and hope something sticks.

There’s a third way, and it’s the one Jesus commanded: “search these things diligently” (3 Nephi 23:1). Searching has steps. This article teaches the first set: Study, the fourth of the seven depths of Isaiah study (skip, skim, read, study, search, feast, treasure).

At this depth you do one thing: lay Isaiah in the Bible beside Isaiah in the Book of Mormon, and work out what’s different and why it matters. You need two columns and a pencil. That’s all.

Here’s the whole method on one line:

Comparison tells you what changed. Study tells you who it was said to, where it was pointed, and what the man who chose it thought it meant.

We’ll walk it through the two chapters Nephi put first: Isaiah 48 and 49, which are 1 Nephi 20 and 21. There are seven moves, numbered zero to six. (It came out that way, not by design.)

Step 0 · Date it

The move: before you trust a difference, ask when it appeared. Was it in the first printing (1830), or did a later edition add it?

Where Nephi’s text taught it: 1 Nephi 20:1. Today’s verse reads “come forth out of the waters of Judah, or out of the waters of baptism.” Those words aren’t in the 1830 printing. Joseph Smith added them for the 1840 edition, in parentheses: a prophet’s note beside a prophet’s words. (Later editions dropped the parentheses, so your copy hides the seam.)

It cuts both ways. 1 Nephi 21:20 says “after thou hast lost the first.” That’s Joseph’s 1837 change. The 1830 reads “the other,” like the King James. But 1 Nephi 20:2’s “do not” is there in 1830. The big differences are early. The small corrections come later. Step 0 tells you which is which.

Try it: the 1830 text is in the public domain. Find 1 Nephi 20:2 in it.

Step 1 · Sort it: meaning, or music?

The move: for every difference, ask does this change what it means, or only how it sounds? Mark it with one of four marks:

Where Nephi’s text taught it: 1 Nephi 20:2, the one-word flip. Most differences are music: shew or show, which or who. The skill is learning to walk past the music and stop at the meaning.

Try it: chapter 20 has 22 verses, and 21 of them differ. Mark verses 3 through 7, and see how many marks are music.

Step 2 · Find the frame

The move: read the original chapter, not today’s chapter numbers. The Book of Mormon’s chapters and verses as we know them were made in 1879. The Bible’s chapters are medieval. Neither is how Nephi divided his record.

Where Nephi’s text taught it: in the 1830 printing, Isaiah 48 and 49 aren’t two chapters. They’re one (First Nephi, Chapter VI), with Nephi’s reason for reading Isaiah in front of them, and his explanation in the next chapter (our 1 Nephi 22). One reading, then its answer.

Why it matters: read as one, chapter 48 (false confidence) and chapter 49 (false despair) become a pair. The frame is the meaning.

Try it: Jacob’s reading of Isaiah, in 1830 Second Nephi Chapter V, ends at Isaiah 52:2, right after the third “Awake, awake.” Where does the King James chapter break fall?

Step 3 · Track the voices

The move: mark every ***O ___*** (who is being addressed). Then mark every I and my (who is speaking).

Where Nephi’s text taught it: 1 Nephi 21. Nephi’s text adds five addresses the King James doesn’t have: O house of Israel four times, O isles of the sea once. And the opening sentence speaks as the Lord Himself: “the pastors of my people… who are of my people.”

Know the limit. A pronoun tells you whose voice it is, but not always who wrote it down. “My people” rules out Nephi as narrator, but not Nephi as prophet. And some voices stay open: in 1 Nephi 20:16–17, the “me” and “him” shift, and an honest reader leaves that question open.

Try it: in Isaiah 53, mark every we, our and us. Who’s talking?

Step 4 · Find the center

The move: Hebrew writing often points inward. Ideas are laid out in mirror pairs, A B C D C′ B′ A′, and the middle is the point.

Where Nephi’s text taught it: 1 Nephi 21:1, the sentence no Bible has. (John Tvedtnes and H. Clay Gorton both laid it out this way.)

A Hearken · B O ye house of Israel · C all ye that are broken off, and are driven out · D because of the wickedness of the pastors of my people · C′ all ye that are broken off, that are scattered abroad · B′ who are of my people, O house of Israel · A′ Listen

The center is the cause: the shepherds scattered the flock.

Try it: not every passage has a mirror, so don’t force one. But when you see the same words come back in reverse order, look at the middle.

Step 5 · Find the second witness

The move: when the Book of Mormon quotes the same Isaiah passage twice, compare the two Book of Mormon versions to each other.

Where Nephi’s text taught it: Isaiah 49:22–26 is read by Nephi (1 Nephi 21) and read again by his brother Jacob (2 Nephi 6). Same plates, two prophets. In verse 25, Nephi has “I will contend with him that contendeth with thee.” Jacob has “with them“ (2 Nephi 6:17). A Book of Mormon prophet adapting Isaiah as he quotes it.

Why it matters: two witnesses tell you what was fixed and what a prophet felt free to apply. And some passages have many witnesses. Isaiah 52 is carried by six different Book of Mormon voices.

Try it: compare Isaiah 52:7–10 as Noah’s priests quote it (Mosiah 12:21–24) with how Abinadi quotes it back (Mosiah 15:29–31). What changed between the trap and the answer?

Step 6 · Read the author’s own commentary

The move: check your reading against the prophet who chose the passage. He usually tells you what it means, right after it.

Where Nephi’s text taught it: 1 Nephi 22, the chapter right after the Isaiah. Laman and Lemuel asked the question every reader asks: “What meaneth these things… are they to be understood according to things which are spiritual?” (22:1). Nephi answered: both. And then: “it meaneth us in the days to come” (22:6). He even tells you who carries Israel’s children home in 49:22: “a mighty nation among the Gentiles, yea, even upon the face of this land” (22:7).

Why it matters: this is your guardrail. If your reading fights the author’s own explanation, start over. Isaiah in the Book of Mormon always comes with bookends: the reason before, the meaning after.

The seven moves on one card

Your turn: this week’s reading

The Come, Follow Me reading for October 5–11 is Isaiah 50–57. The first chapter of it, Isaiah 50, is 2 Nephi 7, read by Jacob. Run the seven moves on it yourself before you read anyone else’s findings.

Three hints, no answers: – Step 1: look hard at the very first verse. Jacob’s version asks a question the King James doesn’t. – Step 3: count the *O ___* addresses. – Step 1 again: verse 10. Something the King James has is missing. Which word from 1 Nephi 20:2 does it contain?

Then check yourself against our deep dive on Isaiah 50 when it’s posted.

THE GREATER PORTION · “to him is given the greater portion of the word” (Alma 12:10). The worked examples, at full depth: 1 Nephi 20 / Isaiah 48 · 1 Nephi 21 / Isaiah 49. The next depth after Study is Search.

The seven-step method is Ken Krogue’s. The structure of 1 Nephi 21:1 follows John Tvedtnes and H. Clay Gorton.