Joshua 17:10 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.
Southward Ephraim’s, and northward Manasseh’s, and the sea is his border; and they met together in Asher on the north, and in Issachar on the east.
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.
southward it was Ephraim`s, and northward it was Manasseh`s, and the sea was his border; and they reached to Asher on the north, and to Issachar on the east.
1901 · Public domain · The American revision of the English Revised Version. Deliberately literal, and the base text behind several later translations.
Southward it was Ephraim's, and northward it was Manasseh's, and the sea was his border. And they touched upon Asher on the north, and upon Issachar on the east.
1890 · Public domain · John Nelson Darby's translation, made for close study rather than public reading. Often exposes grammatical detail other versions smooth over.
Southward is to Ephraim and northward to Manasseh, and the sea is his border, and in Asher they meet on the north, and in Issachar on the east.
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.
Southward it was Ephraim’s, and northward it was Manasseh’s, and the sea was his border. They reached to Asher on the north, and to Issachar on the east.
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.
To the south it is Ephraim's, and to the north it is Manasseh's, and the sea is his limit; and they are touching Asher on the north, and Issachar on the east.
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.
Southward it was Ephraim’s, and northward it was Manasseh’s, and the sea was his border; they reached to Asher on the north, and to Issachar on the east.
Word-for-word swaps
- is→was
- in→reached
- in→to
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.