Jeremiah 10:20 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.
My tabernacle is spoiled, and all my cords are broken: my children are gone forth of me, and they are not: there is none to stretch forth my tent any more, and to set up my curtains.
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.
My tent is destroyed, and all my cords are broken: my children are gone forth from me, and they are not: there is none to spread my tent any more, and to set up my curtains.
1901 · Public domain · The American revision of the English Revised Version. Deliberately literal, and the base text behind several later translations.
My tent is despoiled, and all my cords are broken; my children are gone forth from me, and they are not; there is none to stretch forth my tent any more, and to set up my curtains.
1890 · Public domain · John Nelson Darby's translation, made for close study rather than public reading. Often exposes grammatical detail other versions smooth over.
My tent hath been spoiled, And all my cords have been broken, My sons have gone out from me, and they are not, There is none stretching out any more my tent, And raising up my curtains.
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.
My tent has been destroyed, and all my cords are broken. My children have gone away from me, and they are no more. There is no one to spread my tent any more, to set up my curtains.
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.
My tent is pulled down and all my cords are broken: my children have gone from me, and they are not: no longer is there anyone to give help in stretching out my tent and hanging up my curtains.
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.
My tent has been destroyed, and all my cords are broken: my children have gone away from me, and they are no more. there is no one to spread my tent any more, to set up my curtains.
Word-for-word swaps
- spoiled→tent
- are→have
- of→away
- not→no
- none→no
- forth→spread
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.