Joseph Smith Translation of verses in Isaiah 42 vs the Great Isaiah Scroll

score:7

Accepted answer

Probably. It's kind of complicated. First to re-iterate the intro to the JST

The Lord inspired the Prophet Joseph Smith to restore truths to the King James Bible text that had become lost or changed since the original words were written

While many Latter Day Saints believe the corrections the JST make are from the period when the KJV was originally translated, that isn't explicitly stated by Joseph Smith and much of the KJV is translated correctly (so to me this hints that some of the errors were introduced earlier). Instead the errors could have been introduced at any point after the original words were written.

An article on the Dead Sea scrolls gives the most direct answer to the OP question:

However, with the exception of the copies of biblical books, there is no evidence to suggest the scrolls ought to be regarded in the same category as the standard works.1

Continuing from that article:

Another reason for Latter-day Saint interest in the Dead Sea Scrolls community is the theme of apostasy and restoration found among both groups. The scrolls indicate that the Qumran sectarians regarded themselves as the true Israel surrounded by spiritual traitors and false brethren in a corrupt world. They possessed the true covenant that God had restored or renewed with them. They went off by themselves to establish the “Community of the Renewed Covenant”....They witnessed firsthand the apostate conditions among the leadership and priesthood of Judaism in their day. They tried to do something about it. They accomplished much, but without the Melchizedek Priesthood and authorized prophets they erred in many things.

In addition, Isaiah was written in the 8th century BCE, which is long before the Great Isaiah Scroll was written, so it is not an original text but an earlier text.

To try to show you how truths could've been lost we can use the OP citations as an example. Let's assume that the Great Isaiah scroll is the original text. If that is the case the other copies that were used in the KJV must have been copied from it at some point. While there are no major differences you can see there are slight differences. Part of these could be because the English language changes and translation isn't one to one, but there could be other differences (I don't have the original of both side by side, not fluent in ancient languages -- so I can't really say, but from my research it looks like there are some differences in text content that scholars have found).

So the Great Isaiah scroll isn't the original, since the timeline is off, so it is probably at least one copy off of the original. So it can't be taken as the correct truth at least by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints.

1 The Dead Sea Scrolls and Latter Day Truth---READ ME, I'm much better written

all emphasis added by me

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