Matthew 10:8 in 8 translations
7 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.
Heal the sick, cleanse the lepers, raise the dead, cast out devils: freely ye have received, freely give.
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.
Heal the sick, raise the dead, cleanse the lepers, cast out demons: freely ye received, freely give.
1901 · Public domain · The American revision of the English Revised Version. Deliberately literal, and the base text behind several later translations.
Heal [the] infirm, [raise the dead], cleanse lepers, cast out demons: ye have received gratuitously, give gratuitously.
1890 · Public domain · John Nelson Darby's translation, made for close study rather than public reading. Often exposes grammatical detail other versions smooth over.
infirm ones be healing, lepers be cleansing, dead be raising, demons be casting out--freely ye did receive, freely give.
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.
Heal the sick, cleanse the lepers, and cast out demons. Freely you received, so freely give.
2000s · Public domain · A modern-English update of the ASV. Reads close to contemporary speech while staying in the literal tradition. Includes the Apocrypha.
These 2 editions word this verse identically.
Cure the sick, raise the dead, make the lepers clean, drive out demons. You have received free of cost, give free of cost.
in progress · Public domain (CC0) · A modern open-licensed translation, still being completed. Some Old Testament books are not yet available.
Simplified English
Built from a deliberately small vocabulary so the sense stays reachable for new readers and non-native speakers. Trades nuance for clarity.
Make well those who are ill, give life to the dead, make lepers clean, send evil spirits out of men; freely it has been given to you, freely give.
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.
Heal the sick, cleanse the lepers, and cast out demons. freely you received, so freely give.
Word-for-word swaps
- dead→and
- devils→demons
- have→you
The verses either side
King James text. A comparison is easier to judge when you can see the sentence the verse sits inside.