1 Corinthians 15:34 in 8 translations
7 distinct wordings, grouped by what each translation is trying to do. Differences from the King James text are marked below.
Early modern English
Seventeenth-century wording and sentence shape. Familiar, rhythmic, and the version most quotations you have heard are taken from.
Awake to righteousness, and sin not; for some have not the knowledge of God: I speak to your shame.
1611 / 1769 · Public domain · The Authorised Version, revised to the 1769 Blayney text. Includes the Apocrypha as printed in 1611.
Literal, word-for-word
Follows Hebrew and Greek word order and grammar closely, even where the English becomes stiff. Useful for seeing what the underlying sentence is doing.
Awake to soberness righteously, and sin not; for some have no knowledge of God: I speak [this] to move you to shame.
1901 · Public domain · The American revision of the English Revised Version. Deliberately literal, and the base text behind several later translations.
Awake up righteously, and sin not; for some are ignorant of God: I speak to you as a matter of shame.
1890 · Public domain · John Nelson Darby's translation, made for close study rather than public reading. Often exposes grammatical detail other versions smooth over.
awake up, as is right, and sin not; for certain have an ignorance of God; for shame to you I say it.
1898 · Public domain · The most extreme word-for-word rendering here, keeping Hebrew and Greek tense and word order at the cost of natural English.
Modern English
Contemporary vocabulary and punctuation, aiming for the sentence a present-day reader would write while staying close to the source.
Wake up righteously, and don’t sin, for some have no knowledge of God. I say this to your shame.
2000s · Public domain · A modern-English update of the ASV. Reads close to contemporary speech while staying in the literal tradition. Includes the Apocrypha.
These 2 editions word this verse identically.
Wake up to a righteous life, and cease to sin. There are some who have no true knowledge of God. I speak in this way to shame you.
in progress · Public domain (CC0) · A modern open-licensed translation, still being completed. Some Old Testament books are not yet available.
Simplified English
Built from a deliberately small vocabulary so the sense stays reachable for new readers and non-native speakers. Trades nuance for clarity.
Be awake to righteousness and keep yourselves from sin; for some have no knowledge of God: I say this to put you to shame.
1949 · Public domain · Written with roughly a thousand basic English words plus a small Bible vocabulary. The plainest reading available here.
What changes between the King James and modern wording
The modern rendering is printed below with every word that differs from the King James text marked, so the actual divergence is visible rather than left for you to spot.
Wake up righteously, and don’t sin for some have no knowledge of God: I say this to your shame.
Word-for-word swaps
- righteousness→Wake
- the→no
- speak→say
The verses either side
King James text. A comparison is easier to judge when you can see the sentence the verse sits inside.