1 Samuel 20:19 in 6 translations
6 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.
And thou hast stayed three days, thou shalt go down quickly, and come to the place where thou didst hide thyself when the business was and shalt remain by the stone Ezel.
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.
And when thou hast stayed three days, thou shalt go down quickly, and come to the place where thou didst hide thyself when the business was in hand, and shalt remain by the stone Ezel.
1901 · Public domain · The American revision of the English Revised Version. Deliberately literal, and the base text behind several later translations.
but on the third day thou shalt go down quickly, and come to the place where thou didst hide thyself on the day of the business, and abide by the stone Ezel.
1890 · Public domain · John Nelson Darby's translation, made for close study rather than public reading. Often exposes grammatical detail other versions smooth over.
and on the third day thou dost certainly come down, and hast come in unto the place where thou wast hidden in the day of the work, and hast remained near the stone Ezel.
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.
When you have stayed three days, go down quickly, and come to the place where you hid yourself when this started, and remain by the stone Ezel.
2000s · Public domain · A modern-English update of the ASV. Reads close to contemporary speech while staying in the literal tradition. Includes the Apocrypha.
Simplified English
Built from a deliberately small vocabulary so the sense stays reachable for new readers and non-native speakers. Trades nuance for clarity.
And on the third day it will be specially noted, and you will go to the place where you took cover when the other business was in hand, waiting by the hill over there.
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.
When you have stayed three days, go down quickly, and come to the place where you hid yourself when this started, and remain by the stone Ezel.
Word-for-word swaps
- hast→When
- thyself→you
- was→this
The verses either side
King James text. A comparison is easier to judge when you can see the sentence the verse sits inside.
Not shown for this verse: Open English Bible (US), Open English Bible (Commonwealth). Those translations are still incomplete in the corpus, and empty cards are not padded in.