Acts 2:24 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.
Whom God hath raised up, having loosed the pains of death: because it was not possible that he should be holden of it.
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.
whom God raised up, having loosed the pangs of death: because it was not possible that he should be holden of it.
1901 · Public domain · The American revision of the English Revised Version. Deliberately literal, and the base text behind several later translations.
Whom God has raised up, having loosed the pains of death, inasmuch as it was not possible that he should be held by its power;
1890 · Public domain · John Nelson Darby's translation, made for close study rather than public reading. Often exposes grammatical detail other versions smooth over.
whom God did raise up, having loosed the pains of the death, because it was not possible for him to be held by 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.
whom God raised up, having freed him from the agony of death, because it was not possible that he should be held by it.
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.
But God released him from the pangs of death and raised him to life, it being impossible for death to retain its hold on him.
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.
But God gave him back to life, having made him free from the pains of death because it was not possible for him to be overcome by it.
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.
Whom God raised up, having freed him from the agony of death: because it was not possible that he should be held by it.
Word-for-word swaps
- loosed→freed
- pains→agony
- of→held
The verses either side
King James text. A comparison is easier to judge when you can see the sentence the verse sits inside.