Chiasmus is a Hebrew form of writing found in both the Bible and Book of Mormon

Three examples of simple chiasmus are found in Isaiah 5:20:

A Woe unto them that call evil

B good,

B and good

A evil;

A that put darkness

B for light,

B and light

A for darkness;

A that put bitter

B for sweet,

B and sweet

A for bitter!

Here the terms evil and good are presented once and then again in reverse order, a simple chiastic inversion. The verse features two other simple chiasms based on darkness/light and bitter/sweet.

Another simple example is Isaiah 6:10:

A Make the heart of this people fat,

B and make their ears heavy,

C and shut their eyes;

C lest they see with their eyes,

B and hear with their ears,

A and understand with their heart.

 

The Book of Mormon contains more than three hundred instances of chiasmus,[4] each one unique, impactful, and inspiring.[5] This is a remarkable number. Second Nephi 9:20 is a beautifully simple chiasm about God’s omniscience:

A For he knoweth

B all things,

B and there is not anything

A save he knows it.

 

In only a few lines, Alma 34:10 features a chiasm that presents essential truth about Jesus’s infinite and eternal sacrifice:

A there should be a great and last sacrifice;

B yea, not a sacrifice of man,

C neither of beast,

C neither of any manner of fowl;

B for it shall not be a human sacrifice;

A but it must be an infinite and eternal sacrifice.

 

Mosiah 3:18–19 gives us a chiasm focusing on Jesus Christ and his atoning blood:

A they humble themselves

B and become as little children,

C and believe that salvation was, and is, and is to come, in and through the

atoning blood of Christ, the Lord Omnipotent.

D For the natural man

E is an enemy to God,

F and has been from the fall of Adam,

F and will be, forever and ever,

E unless he yields to the enticings of the Holy Spirit,

D and putteth off the natural man

C and becometh a saint through the atonement of Christ the Lord,

B and becometh as a child,

A submissive, meek, humble . . .

 

Mosiah 2:5–6 provides another example of a chiastic passage:

A And it came to pass that when they came up to the temple,

B they pitched their tents round about,

C every man according to his family,

D consisting of his wife, and his sons, and his daughters,

D and their sons, and their daughters, from the eldest down to the youngest,

C every family being separate one from another.

B And they pitched their tents

A round about the temple.

 

Alma 36 Chiasmus

No one was even aware of chiasmus being in the Book of Mormon until John W. Welch first identified chiasmus in the Book of Mormon in 1967 while on his mission in Germany after attending a lecture about chiasmus being in the Bible. 

It is bewildering that there are 300 examples of chiasmus in the Book of Mormon and Joseph Smith didn't even know about chiasmus. The mathematical probability of chiasmus occurring 16 levels deep, centering on Jesus Christ, then reversing in perfect order as found Alma 36 is absolutely impossible!