Psalms 66:4 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.
All the earth shall worship thee, and shall sing unto thee; they shall sing thy name. Selah.
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.
All the earth shall worship thee, And shall sing unto thee; They shall sing to thy name. Selah
1901 · Public domain · The American revision of the English Revised Version. Deliberately literal, and the base text behind several later translations.
All the earth shall worship thee, and sing psalms unto thee: they shall sing forth thy name. Selah.
1890 · Public domain · John Nelson Darby's translation, made for close study rather than public reading. Often exposes grammatical detail other versions smooth over.
All the earth do bow to Thee, They sing praise to Thee, they praise Thy name.' Selah.
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.
All the earth will worship you, and will sing to you; they will sing to your name.” Selah.
2000s · Public domain · A modern-English update of the ASV. Reads close to contemporary speech while staying in the literal tradition. Includes the Apocrypha.
All the earth does homage to you, singing praises to you, singing praise to your name.”Selah
in progress · Public domain (CC0) · A modern open-licensed translation, still being completed. Some Old Testament books are not yet available.
All the earth does homage to you, singing praises to you, singing praise to your name.’Selah
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.
Let all the earth give you worship, and make songs to you; let them make songs to your name. (Selah.)
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.
All the earth will worship you, and will sing to you; they will sing to your name. Selah.
Word-for-word swaps
- shall→will
- thee→you
- thee→to
- thy→to
The verses either side
King James text. A comparison is easier to judge when you can see the sentence the verse sits inside.