Joel 1:10 in 8 translations
8 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.
The field is wasted, the land mourneth; for the corn is wasted: the new wine is dried up, the oil languisheth.
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.
The field is laid waste, the land mourneth; for the grain is destroyed, the new wine is dried up, the oil languisheth.
1901 · Public domain · The American revision of the English Revised Version. Deliberately literal, and the base text behind several later translations.
The field is laid waste, the land mourneth; for the corn is wasted, the new wine is dried up, the oil languisheth.
1890 · Public domain · John Nelson Darby's translation, made for close study rather than public reading. Often exposes grammatical detail other versions smooth over.
Spoiled is the field, mourned hath the ground, For spoiled is the corn, Dried up hath been new wine, languish doth oil.
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.
The field is laid waste. The land mourns, for the grain is destroyed, The new wine has dried up, and the oil languishes.
2000s · Public domain · A modern-English update of the ASV. Reads close to contemporary speech while staying in the literal tradition. Includes the Apocrypha.
The fields are blasted, the land is in mourning, for ruined is the grain, the new wine fails and the oil is dried up.
in progress · Public domain (CC0) · A modern open-licensed translation, still being completed. Some Old Testament books are not yet available.
The fields are blasted, the land is in mourning, for ruined is the corn, the new wine fails and the oil is dried up.
in progress · Public domain (CC0) · The Commonwealth spelling edition of the Open English Bible. Identical wording to the US edition apart from spelling.
Simplified English
Built from a deliberately small vocabulary so the sense stays reachable for new readers and non-native speakers. Trades nuance for clarity.
The fields are wasted, the land has become dry; for the grain is wasted, the new wine is kept back, the oil is poor.
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.
The field is laid waste. the land mourns, for the grain is destroyed, the new wine has dried up, and the oil languishes.
Word-for-word swaps
- wasted→laid
- mourneth→mourns
- corn→grain
- wasted→destroyed
- is→has
- languisheth→languishes
The verses either side
King James text. A comparison is easier to judge when you can see the sentence the verse sits inside.