The earliest text here in Mosiah 8:17 reads “a seer can know of things which has past”. The spelling past has occurred in every textual source; even though the original manuscript is not extant here, the word was probably spelled there too as past. Nonetheless, this spelling is merely phonetic. The correct spelling should be passed, given that it occurs as the past participle for the perfect auxiliary have. The earliest form for the auxiliary is the singular has, which is nonstandard since the antecedent for the relative pronoun which is the plural things. The singular form is undoubtedly intended here. Notice that for the following clause the verb for the relative clause again takes a nonstandard singular form, namely is (“and also of things which is to come”). Here the use of has is unusual for the original text; hath would be more expected. But as explained under Mosiah 7:20, there are a few cases in the earliest text where a plural subject took the singular form has. As would be expected, here in Mosiah 8:17 Joseph Smith edited the has to the standard have for the 1837 edition. But he left the spelling past, which should have been edited to passed. The 1920 LDS edition removed the contradiction, not by changing the spelling of past but by replacing the perfect auxiliary with the plural present-tense form of the be verb, namely are. This change guaranteed that the LDS text would interpret the spelling past as an adjective rather than as the past participle of the verb pass.
Usage elsewhere in the text supports the contrast between things which have passed and things which are to come:
Basically, we expect the form passed in the perfect (that is, when the finite verb is the auxiliary have) and the form past when the finite verb is the linking verb be.
David Calabro (personal communication) suggests that the original has in Mosiah 8:17 could be an error for is:
Calabro notes the increased parallelism resulting from this emendation:
of things which is past
and also of things which is to come
Further, in unstressed position, the h of has would typically be dropped and the vowels of has and is would tend to be reduced to a schwa, thus creating a phonetically similar /ßz/. In other words, Calabro proposes that Joseph Smith dictated “of things which is past” but Oliver Cowdery misinterpreted the /ßz/ as has.
There are two objections to such a proposal. First, the parallel passage from 3 Nephi 15:7 (cited above) reads in the original text as “old things hath passed away”—that is, the helping verb is have, not be, despite the fact that later in 3 Nephi 15:7 we have “concerning things which is to come”. In other words, the only passage that is parallel to Mosiah 8:17 has have and be, not two cases of be. Second, there are no instances in the manuscripts of any of the scribes ever mixing up has and is, even momentarily. Thus there is no independent support for emending Mosiah 8:17 to read “a seer can know of things which is past”.
In most instances, the printed text has correctly distinguished between the two words passed and past, but there are a few exceptions. All of the problematic cases can be traced back to the manuscripts and probably arose when the scribe for 𝓞 originally took down Joseph Smith’s dictation (given that both passed and past are pronounced identically as /pæst/). In the following analysis, I set out the different cases and indicate how the scribes spelled the two words passed and past. For the original manuscript, the statistics are always less than the expected number since only 28 percent of 𝓞 is extant. I also cite the relevant textual variation for all those cases that involve variation (or potential variation):
the simple past tense for pass (20 cases of passed )
original manuscript
Oliver Cowdery passed (2 times)
scribe 3 of 𝓞 past (1 time)
printer’s manuscript
Oliver Cowdery passed (15 times)
scribe 2 of 𝓟 passed (5 times)
the perfective use of the past participle for pass (66 cases of passed )
original manuscript
Oliver Cowdery passed (7 times), past > pased (1 time), pased (1 time)
printer’s manuscript
Oliver Cowdery passed (40 times), past (1 time)
scribe 2 of 𝓟 passed (24 times), past (1 time)
the adjectival past (6 cases)
original manuscript
Oliver Cowdery past (1 time)
printer’s manuscript
Oliver Cowdery past (4 times), passed (1 time)
scribe 2 of 𝓟 passed (1 time)
In all six cases of the adjectival past, the verb is the linking verb be. Two cases (listed just above) show variation; the four other cases show no variation in the spelling:
In the first and last cases, the adjectival past acts prepositionally in the phrase “past feeling”.
The critical text will follow the basic distinctions as outlined above. As far as Mosiah 8:17 is concerned, past should be spelled passed; in addition, the original perfect auxiliary have should be restored: the plural have in the standard text but the singular has (the earliest reading) in the critical text. The above analysis also indicates that Mormon 2:15 should be changed in the LDS text to past (“the day of grace was past with them”) and Mormon 9:15 should be changed in the RLDS text to passed (“have all these things passed of which I have spoken”). For further discussion of these last two cases, see those passages.
This problem of past versus passed was first brought to my attention by Paul Thomas (in particular, with regard to the current LDS reading in Mormon 2:15).
Summary: Restore in Mosiah 8:17 the original perfect auxiliary has and emend the spelling past to passed (“a seer can know of things which has passed”).