Mark 5:7 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.
And cried with a loud voice, and said, What have I to do with thee, Jesus, Son of the most high God? I adjure thee by God, that thou torment me not.
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.
and crying out with a loud voice, he saith, What have I to do with thee, Jesus, thou Son of the Most High God? I adjure thee by God, torment me not.
1901 · Public domain · The American revision of the English Revised Version. Deliberately literal, and the base text behind several later translations.
and crying with a loud voice he says, What have I to do with thee, Jesus, Son of the Most High God? I adjure thee by God, torment me not.
1890 · Public domain · John Nelson Darby's translation, made for close study rather than public reading. Often exposes grammatical detail other versions smooth over.
and having called with a loud voice, he said, `What--to me and to thee, Jesus, Son of God the Most High? I adjure thee by God, mayest thou not afflict me!'
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.
and crying out with a loud voice, he said, “What have I to do with you, Jesus, you Son of the Most High God? I adjure you by God, don’t torment me.”
2000s · Public domain · A modern-English update of the ASV. Reads close to contemporary speech while staying in the literal tradition. Includes the Apocrypha.
shrieking out in a loud voice, “What do you want with me, Jesus, Son of the Most High God? For God’s sake do not torment me!”
in progress · Public domain (CC0) · A modern open-licensed translation, still being completed. Some Old Testament books are not yet available.
shrieking out in a loud voice, ‘What do you want with me, Jesus, Son of the Most High God? For God’s sake do not torment me!’
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.
And crying out with a loud voice he said, What have I to do with you, Jesus, Son of the Most High God? In God's name, do not be cruel to me.
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.
And crying out with a loud voice, he said, What have I to do with you, Jesus, you Son of the most high God? I adjure you by God, don’t torment me
Word-for-word swaps
- cried→crying
- and→he
- thee→you
- thou→don’t
The verses either side
King James text. A comparison is easier to judge when you can see the sentence the verse sits inside.