Exodus 15:16 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.
Fear and dread shall fall upon them; by the greatness of thine arm they shall be still as a stone; till thy people pass over, O LORD, till the people pass over, thou hast purchased.
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.
Terror and dread falleth upon them; By the greatness of thine arm they are as still as a stone; Till thy people pass over, O Jehovah, Till the people pass over that thou hast purchased.
1901 · Public domain · The American revision of the English Revised Version. Deliberately literal, and the base text behind several later translations.
Fear and dread fall upon them; By the greatness of thine arm they are still as a stone; Till thy people pass over, Jehovah, Till the people pass over that thou hast purchased.
1890 · Public domain · John Nelson Darby's translation, made for close study rather than public reading. Often exposes grammatical detail other versions smooth over.
Fall on them doth terror and dread; By the greatness of Thine arm They are still as a stone, Till Thy people pass over, O Jehovah; Till the people pass over Whom Thou hast purchased.
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.
Terror and dread falls on them. By the greatness of your arm they are as still as a stone— until your people pass over, Yahweh, until the people you have purchased pass over.
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.
Fear and grief came on them; by the strength of your arm they were turned to stone; till your people went over, O Lord, till the people went over whom you have made yours.
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.
Terror and dread falls on them; by the greatness of your arm they are as still as a stone; until your people pass over, Yahweh, until the people you have purchased pass over,
Word-for-word swaps
- Fear→Terror
- upon→falls
- thine→your
- be→are
- thy→until
- till→Yahweh
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.