Revelation 18:21 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 a mighty angel took up a stone like a great millstone, and cast into the sea, saying, Thus with violence shall that great city Babylon be thrown down, and shall be found no more at all.
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 a strong angel took up a stone as it were a great millstone and cast it into the sea, saying, Thus with a mighty fall shall Babylon, the great city, be cast down, and shall be found no more at all.
1901 · Public domain · The American revision of the English Revised Version. Deliberately literal, and the base text behind several later translations.
And a strong angel took up a stone, as a great millstone, and cast [it] into the sea, saying, Thus with violence shall Babylon the great city be cast down, and shall be found no more at all;
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 one strong messenger did take up a stone as a great millstone, and did cast it to the sea, saying, `Thus with violence shall Babylon be cast, the great city, and may not be found any more at all;
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.
A mighty angel took up a stone like a great millstone and cast it into the sea, saying, “Thus with violence will Babylon, the great city, be thrown down, and will be found no more at all.
2000s · Public domain · A modern-English update of the ASV. Reads close to contemporary speech while staying in the literal tradition. Includes the Apocrypha.
Then a mighty angel took up a stone like a great millstone, and threw it into the sea, crying – “So will Babylon, the great city, be violently overthrown, never more to be seen.
in progress · Public domain (CC0) · A modern open-licensed translation, still being completed. Some Old Testament books are not yet available.
Then a mighty angel took up a stone like a great millstone, and threw it into the sea, crying – ‘So will Babylon, the great city, be violently overthrown, never more to be seen.
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 a strong angel took up a stone like the great stone with which grain is crushed, and sent it into the sea, saying, So, with a great fall, will Babylon, the great town, come to destruction, and will not be seen any more at all.
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.
a mighty angel took up a stone like a great millstone, and cast it into the sea, saying, Thus with violence will Babylon, the great city be thrown down, and will be found no more at all.
Word-for-word swaps
- that→will
- shall→will
The verses either side
King James text. A comparison is easier to judge when you can see the sentence the verse sits inside.