Isaiah 7:6 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.
Let us go up against Judah, and vex it, and let us make a breach therein for us, and set a king in the midst of it, the son of Tabeal:
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.
Let us go up against Judah, and vex it, and let us make a breach therein for us, and set up a king in the midst of it, even the son of Tabeel;
1901 · Public domain · The American revision of the English Revised Version. Deliberately literal, and the base text behind several later translations.
Let us go up against Judah, and harass it, and make a breach therein for us, and set up a king therein the son of Tabeal;
1890 · Public domain · John Nelson Darby's translation, made for close study rather than public reading. Often exposes grammatical detail other versions smooth over.
We go up into Judah, and we vex it, And we rend it unto ourselves, And we cause a king to reign in its midst--The son of Tabeal.
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.
“Let’s go up against Judah, and tear it apart, and let’s divide it among ourselves, and set up a king within it, even the son of Tabeel.”
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.
Let us go up against Judah, troubling her, and forcing our way into her, and let us put up a king in her, even the son of Tabeel:
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.
“Let’s go up against Judah, and tear it, apart, and let’s divide it among ourselves, and set up a king within it, even the son of Tabeel.”
Word-for-word swaps
- us→Let’s
- vex→tear
- of→within
- Tabeal→Tabeel
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.