The Call to the Labor

Six revelations in this range open on nearly the same words. Reading them side by side is the point of this page: the repetition is a fact of the text, and what varies between the copies is where each revelation does its individual work.

What this page maps. Modern revelation, reported as the text gives it. Recipients named in the verse text are textual facts and are given here as the text gives them — a first name and nothing more, where that is all the text supplies. The revelations’ dates, places, and occasions are not in this wiki’s source text and are not stated. Two recipients here share names with New Testament apostles; the wiki reports what the text says and declines the identification (see A caution about names below).

Account

The repeated opening

Four of these revelations open with the same two sentences, one after the other, with only punctuation and one small word varying. Set out in full:

D&C 6:1–2: “A great and marvelous work is about to come forth unto the children of men.” / “Behold, I am God; give heed unto my word, which is quick and powerful, sharper than a two-edged sword, to the dividing asunder of both joints and marrow; therefore give heed unto my words.”
D&C 11:1–2: “A great and marvelous work is about to come forth among the children of men.” / “Behold, I am God; give heed to my word, which is quick and powerful, sharper than a two-edged sword, to the dividing asunder of both joints and marrow; therefore give heed unto my word.”
D&C 12:1–2: “A great and marvelous work is about to come forth among the children of men.” / “Behold, I am God; give heed to my word, which is quick and powerful, sharper than a two-edged sword, to the dividing asunder of both joints and marrow; therefore, give heed unto my word.”
D&C 14:1–2: “A great and marvelous work is about to come forth unto the children of men.” / “Behold, I am God; give heed to my word, which is quick and powerful, sharper than a two-edged sword, to the dividing asunder of both joints and marrow; therefore give heed unto my word.”

The variation between the four is confined to four points: “unto” or “among the children of men”; “give heed unto” (D&C 6:2) or “give heed to my word” (D&C 11:2); singular “my word” or plural “my words” at the close; and a comma at “therefore, give heed” (D&C 12:2) that the other three sections do not carry. A fifth revelation opens the same movement without the two-edged-sword sentence: “Now behold, a marvelous work is about to come forth among the children of men” (D&C 4:1).

The harvest sentence then repeats across five sections, four of them word-for-word: “Behold, the field is white already to harvest; therefore, whoso desireth to reap, let him thrust in his sickle with his might, and reap while the day lasts, that he may treasure up for his soul everlasting salvation in the kingdom of God” (D&C 6:3; the same at 11:3, 12:3, and 14:3, the only divergence being a comma after “reap” in section 6). D&C 4:4 carries the figure in a different build: “For behold the field is white already to harvest; and lo, he that thrusteth in his sickle with his might, the same layeth up in store that he perisheth not, but bringeth salvation to his soul”. The two verses that follow are identical in all four sections, character for character and mark for mark: “Yea, whosoever will thrust in his sickle and reap, the same is called of God” (D&C 6:4, 11:4, 12:4, 14:4) and “Therefore, if you will ask of me you shall receive; if you will knock it shall be opened unto you” (D&C 6:5, 11:5, 12:5, 14:5). Three of the four then carry a sixth verse in common as well — “Now, as you have asked, behold, I say unto you, keep my commandments, and seek to bring forth and establish the cause of Zion” (D&C 6:6, 11:6, 12:6), the divergence a semicolon in section 6 where the other two close on a full stop — and it is at this verse that section 14 leaves the pattern, with a sentence of its own: “Seek to bring forth and establish my Zion. Keep my commandments in all things.” (D&C 14:6). Counted end to end, the shared material runs to five verses in all four sections and to six in three of them.

The run “the field is white already to harvest” stands at seven corpus verses (counting rule: distinct frozen verses in the corpus, case-insensitive, punctuation-normalized, word-bounded): the five above plus D&C 33:3 and D&C 33:7, with the corpus’s other carrier of the figure at John 4:35 registered below.

[Textual] — distinctive shared phrasing. () - D&C 4:4: “For behold the field is white already to harvest; and lo, he that thrusteth in his sickle with his might, the same layeth up in store that he perisheth not, but bringeth salvation to his soul;” - John 4:35: “Say not ye, There are yet four months, and then cometh harvest? behold, I say unto you, Lift up your eyes, and look on the fields; for they are white already to harvest.”

Divergences: singular “the field is” for the plural “the fields; for they are” (John 4:35). The sickle half of the revelation’s sentence has no counterpart in the Johannine verse; in the frozen corpus the phrase “thrust in his sickle” stands only in the D&C sections above and at Revelation 14:16 and Revelation 14:19, where the reaper is an angel and the reaping is judgment — disclosed, not paired.

[Textual] — distinctive shared phrasing. () The two-edged-sword sentence against the epistle that carries the same figure: - D&C 6:2: “Behold, I am God; give heed unto my word, which is quick and powerful, sharper than a two-edged sword, to the dividing asunder of both joints and marrow; therefore give heed unto my words.” - Hebrews 4:12: “For the word of God is quick, and powerful, and sharper than any twoedged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart.”

Divergences reported: the epistle reads “quick, and powerful, and sharper than any twoedged sword” (Hebrews 4:12) (three coordinated terms, “any,” and “twoedged” as one word) where the revelation reads “quick and powerful, sharper than a two-edged sword” (D&C 6:2); the epistle divides “soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow,” (Hebrews 4:12) the revelation “both joints and marrow” (D&C 6:2) only; and the epistle’s closing discerner clause has no counterpart here. That closing clause does appear in a later D&C section carrying this same opening — D&C 33:1, “soul and spirit; and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart” — which stands nearer the epistle than any section in this range. Paired at the W3 merge as , hosted on The Missionary Charge.

What each revelation adds

The shared opening is followed, in each case, by material that is not shared. The revelations name their recipients by first name only, in a closing formula: “Behold, thou art Oliver” (D&C 6:20); “Behold thou art Hyrum, my son” (D&C 11:23); “And behold, thou art David, and thou art called to assist” (D&C 14:11). D&C 12 names no recipient at all and widens instead: “I speak unto you, and also to all those who have desires to bring forth and establish this work” (D&C 12:7); “no one can assist in this work except he shall be humble and full of love, having faith, hope, and charity, being temperate in all things, whatsoever shall be entrusted to his care” (D&C 12:8).

The same revelation twice

Sections 15 and 16 are not a variation on a shared opening but the same six verses set down twice, addressed to two different names. Every verse of the one stands against a verse of the other, and across the two sections the whole of the difference is two words.

[Textual] — verbatim quotation. () - D&C 16:1: “Hearken, my servant Peter, and listen to the words of Jesus Christ, your Lord and your Redeemer.” - D&C 15:1: “Hearken, my servant John, and listen to the words of Jesus Christ, your Lord and your Redeemer.”

One word divides the two verses, and it is the name addressed; the remaining thirteen run identically. An intra-collection record, the pairing putting the higher section first. On the two names, see A caution about names below: the texts make no identification and neither does this page.

[Textual] — verbatim quotation. () - D&C 16:2: “For behold, I speak unto you with sharpness and with power, for mine arm is over all the earth.” - D&C 15:2: “For behold, I speak unto you with sharpness and with power, for mine arm is over all the earth.”

Identical, nineteen words, mark for mark.

[Textual] — verbatim quotation. () - D&C 16:3: “And I will tell you that which no man knoweth save me and thee alone” - D&C 15:3: “And I will tell you that which no man knoweth save me and thee alone”

Identical, fifteen words; both verses close on a dash. Neither verse says what the thing promised is — the promise is made and left standing, and the answer comes three verses later.

[Textual] — verbatim quotation. () - D&C 16:4: “For many times you have desired of me to know that which would be of the most worth unto you.” - D&C 15:4: “For many times you have desired of me to know that which would be of the most worth unto you.”

Identical, twenty words. “of the most worth unto you” stands at four distinct frozen verses in the corpus — D&C 15:4, D&C 15:6, D&C 16:4 and D&C 16:6, which is these two sections twice each, the question and then the answer — and nowhere else.

[Textual] — verbatim quotation. () - D&C 16:5: “Behold, blessed are you for this thing, and for speaking my words which I have given unto you according to my commandments.” - D&C 15:5: “Behold, blessed are you for this thing, and for speaking my words which I have given you according to my commandments.”

The second and last divergence between the two sections, and it is one inserted word. With the name in the opening verse, that is the whole of it.

[Textual] — verbatim quotation. () - D&C 16:6: “the thing which will be of the most worth unto you will be to declare repentance unto this people, that you may bring souls unto me, that you may rest with them in the kingdom of my Father.” - D&C 15:6: “the thing which will be of the most worth unto you will be to declare repentance unto this people, that you may bring souls unto me, that you may rest with them in the kingdom of my Father.”

Identical across the whole verse, forty-seven words including the closing “Amen.” This is the answer the promise three verses earlier was left waiting for, and it is the same answer in both sections. “declare repentance unto this people” stands at exactly two distinct frozen verses in the corpus, these two.

A caution about names

Two of these recipients are addressed as “John” and “Peter.” A separate revelation in this same range speaks of a John and a Peter who ministered with the Lord (D&C 7:1–7; see John the Beloved). The verse text nowhere connects the two sets. Sections 15 and 16 address living servants told to “declare repentance unto this people” (15:6, 16:6). The names coincide; the texts make no identification, and this page makes none. Nor does the wiki supply surnames the verse text withholds.

Individual clauses worth checking against the corpus

[Textual] — verbatim quotation. () The closing couplet of D&C 4 stands word-for-word in the risen Lord’s Book of Mormon discourse: - D&C 4:7: “Ask, and ye shall receive; knock, and it shall be opened unto you. Amen.” - 3 Nephi 27:29: “Therefore, ask, and ye shall receive; knock, and it shall be opened unto you; for he that asketh, receiveth; and unto him that knocketh, it shall be opened.”

Eleven words identical. The couplet stands at five corpus verses, counted case- and punctuation-insensitively: these two, D&C 49:26, D&C 66:9, and D&C 88:63. The sister revelations carry the couplet in a second-person conditional instead — “if you will ask of me you shall receive; if you will knock it shall be opened unto you” (D&C 6:5, 11:5, 12:5, 14:5) — which is a different wording and is not paired here.

[Textual] — distinctive shared phrasing. () The riches-and-wisdom verse, repeated at D&C 11:7, carries a clause of Nephi’s: - D&C 6:7: “Seek not for riches but for wisdom, and behold, the mysteries of God shall be unfolded unto you, and then shall you be made rich. Behold, he that hath eternal life is rich.” - 1 Nephi 10:19: “For he that diligently seeketh shall find; and the mysteries of God shall be unfolded unto them, by the power of the Holy Ghost, as well in these times as in times of old, and as well in times of old as in times to come; wherefore, the course of the Lord is one eternal round.”

The eight-word run stands at exactly three corpus verses — these two and the parallel at D&C 11:7. Divergences: second person “unto you” for Nephi’s “unto them”; Nephi attaches the unfolding to diligent seeking and to the Holy Ghost, the revelation to seeking wisdom rather than riches. (Nephi’s verse also closes on “one eternal round,” a clause a revelation in this range uses of God’s constancy — see Joseph Smith.)

[Textual] — distinctive shared phrasing. () The superlative, applied to different things: - D&C 6:13: “If thou wilt do good, yea, and hold out faithful to the end, thou shalt be saved in the kingdom of God, which is the greatest of all the gifts of God; for there is no gift greater than the gift of salvation.” - 1 Nephi 15:36: “…that tree of life, whose fruit is most precious and most desirable above all other fruits; yea, and it is the greatest of all the gifts of God. And thus I spake unto my brethren. Amen.”

The seven-word run stands at exactly three corpus verses — these two and D&C 14:7, where the referent is “eternal life.” The referents thus differ across all three instances: salvation in the kingdom of God, the fruit of the tree of life, and eternal life. Reported as a textual fact; the wiki does not merge them.

[Textual] — distinctive shared phrasing. () The close of D&C 11: - D&C 11:30: “…that as many as receive me, to them will I give power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on my name. Amen.” - John 1:12: “But as many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on his name:”

The divergence is grammatical person throughout — the revelation speaks in the first person of itself (“receive me… will I give… on my name”) where the Johannine verse speaks in the third (“received him… gave he… on his name”) — and the tense shifts from past to future. Otherwise the clause is word-for-word. The run “power to become the sons of God” stands at exactly these two corpus verses.

Significance

The plainest fact about this cluster is that the revelations repeat. Four of them open with the same two sentences; five carry the same harvest figure; two are the same six verses addressed to two different names. A reader who meets them one at a time may not notice; set side by side, the repetition is unmistakable, and so is the small set of things that vary — a preposition, a singular for a plural, and, at the end of each, a name and a task.

What this page reports is that pattern, and the individual clauses that can be checked against the rest of the corpus. What it does not do is explain the repetition. Any account of why several revelations share an opening is a question about how these texts were produced — external, real-world material outside this wiki’s scope in both directions.

Key references

D&C 4:1–7 — the shortest of the group; the qualifications list; “Ask, and ye shall receive”
D&C 6:1–13 — the fullest form of the shared opening; wisdom before riches; the greatest gift
D&C 11:1–10, 11:23 — the same opening; “thou art Hyrum, my son”
D&C 12:1–9 — the same opening, no named recipient; “humble and full of love”
D&C 14:1–11 — the same opening; “thou art David”
D&C 15:1–6 and D&C 16:1–6 — the same six verses, addressed to “my servant John” and “my servant Peter”

Joseph Smith · Oliver Cowdery · John the Beloved · Faith, Hope and Charity · Index · Connections

Sources

Doctrine and Covenants sections 4, 6, 11, 12, 14, 15, 16 (verse text only; headnotes excluded). Cross-references quoted from John 1, John 4, Hebrews 4, 3 Nephi 27, 1 Nephi 10, and 1 Nephi 15; Revelation 14 and D&C 33, 49, 66, 88 are cited, not quoted, inside disclosures.

Every quote is verbatim from the frozen source text, cited to its exact reference and checked character-for-character; no quote crosses a verse boundary. Twelve connection records are registered here, all [textual] and all asserted_by: wiki — none of these revelations names a source for the clauses paired. The side-by-side comparisons of the shared openings quote each section’s own verses in full rather than describing them, so a reader can check the variation directly. Phrase distributions are counts of distinct frozen verses in the corpus, derived by search at the time of writing. Recipients are given exactly as the verse text gives them; no surname, date, place, or occasion is supplied, and no identification is made between the “John” and “Peter” of sections 15 and 16 and the figures named in section 7.