Song of Solomon 7:12 in 6 translations
6 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.
Let us get up early to the vineyards; let us see if the vine flourish, whether the tender grape appear, and the pomegranates bud forth: there will I give thee my loves.
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.
Let us get up early to the vineyards; Let us see whether the vine hath budded, [And] its blossom is open, [And] the pomegranates are in flower: There will I give thee my love.
1901 · Public domain · The American revision of the English Revised Version. Deliberately literal, and the base text behind several later translations.
We will go up early to the vineyards, We will see if the vine hath budded, [If] the blossom is opening, And the pomegranates are in bloom: There will I give thee my loves.
1890 · Public domain · John Nelson Darby's translation, made for close study rather than public reading. Often exposes grammatical detail other versions smooth over.
We lodge in the villages, we go early to the vineyards, We see if the vine hath flourished, The sweet smelling-flower hath opened. The pomegranates have blossomed, There do I give to thee my loves;
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.
Let’s go early up to the vineyards. Let’s see whether the vine has budded, its blossom is open, and the pomegranates are in flower. There I will give you my love.
2000s · Public domain · A modern-English update of the ASV. Reads close to contemporary speech while staying in the literal tradition. Includes the Apocrypha.
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 us go out early to the vine-gardens; let us see if the vine is in bud, if it has put out its young fruit, and the pomegranate is in flower. There I will give you my love.
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.
Let’s go early up to the vineyards; Let’s see whether the vine has budded, its blossom is open, and the pomegranates are in flower. there I will give you my love.
Word-for-word swaps
- up→Let’s
- us→Let’s
- appear→vine
- forth→are
- thee→you
- loves→love
The verses either side
King James text. A comparison is easier to judge when you can see the sentence the verse sits inside.
Not shown for this verse: Open English Bible (US), Open English Bible (Commonwealth). Those translations are still incomplete in the corpus, and empty cards are not padded in.