Mark 9:50 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.
Salt good: but if the salt have lost his saltness, wherewith will ye season it? Have salt in yourselves, and have peace one with another.
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.
Salt is good: but if the salt have lost its saltness, wherewith will ye season it? Have salt in yourselves, and be at peace one with another.
1901 · Public domain · The American revision of the English Revised Version. Deliberately literal, and the base text behind several later translations.
Salt [is] good, but if the salt is become saltless, wherewith will ye season it? Have salt in yourselves, and be at peace with one another.
1890 · Public domain · John Nelson Darby's translation, made for close study rather than public reading. Often exposes grammatical detail other versions smooth over.
The salt is good, but if the salt may become saltless, in what will ye season it? Have in yourselves salt, and have peace in one another.'
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.
Salt is good, but if the salt has lost its saltiness, with what will you season it? Have salt in yourselves, and be at peace with one another.”
2000s · Public domain · A modern-English update of the ASV. Reads close to contemporary speech while staying in the literal tradition. Includes the Apocrypha.
Salt is good, but, if the salt should lose its saltiness, what will you use to season it? You must have salt in yourselves, and live at peace with one another.”
in progress · Public domain (CC0) · A modern open-licensed translation, still being completed. Some Old Testament books are not yet available.
Salt is good, but, if the salt should lose its saltiness, what will you use to season it? You must have salt in yourselves, and live at peace with one another.’
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.
Salt is good; but if the taste goes from it, how will you make it salt again? Have salt in yourselves, and be at peace one with another.
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.
Salt is good: but if the salt has lost its saltiness, with what will you season it? Have salt in yourselves, and be at peace with one another.
Word-for-word swaps
- have→has
- wherewith→its
- ye→you
- have→be
The verses either side
King James text. A comparison is easier to judge when you can see the sentence the verse sits inside.