James 3:5 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.
Even so the tongue is a little member, and boasteth great things. Behold, how great a matter a little fire kindleth!
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.
So the tongue also is a little member, and boasteth great things. Behold, how much wood is kindled by how small a fire!
1901 · Public domain · The American revision of the English Revised Version. Deliberately literal, and the base text behind several later translations.
Thus also the tongue is a little member, and boasts great things. See how little a fire, how large a wood it kindles!
1890 · Public domain · John Nelson Darby's translation, made for close study rather than public reading. Often exposes grammatical detail other versions smooth over.
so also the tongue is a little member, and doth boast greatly; lo, a little fire how much wood it doth kindle!
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.
So the tongue is also a little member, and boasts great things. See how a small fire can spread to a large forest!
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.
So is it with the tongue. Small as it is, it is a great boaster. Think how a tiny spark may set the largest forest ablaze!
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.
Even so the tongue is a small part of the body, but it takes credit for great things. How much wood may be lighted by a very little fire!
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.
so the tongue is also a little member, and boasts great things. See how a small fire can spread to a large forest!
Word-for-word swaps
- boasteth→boasts
- Behold→See
- little→small
- kindleth→can
The verses either side
King James text. A comparison is easier to judge when you can see the sentence the verse sits inside.