Textus Receptus Bibles
Julia E. Smith Translation 1876
| 90:1 | Prayer to Moses the man of God. O Jehovah, thou wert a refuge to us in generation and generation. |
| 90:2 | Before the mountains were born, and the earth shall be begun, and the habitable globe, and from forever even to forever, thou art God. |
| 90:3 | Thou wilt turn man even to crushing, and thou wilt say, Turn back, ye sons of man. |
| 90:4 | For a thousand years in thine eyes as the day of yesterday, for it shall pass away, and watches in the night. |
| 90:5 | Thou didst overwhelm them; in sleep shall they be; in the morning as the grass will pass away. |
| 90:6 | In the morning it will flourish, and it will pass away at evening; it will be cut off and will dry up. |
| 90:7 | For we were finished in thine Anger, and in thy wrath we were terrified. |
| 90:8 | Thou didst set our iniquities before thee, our hidden things before the light of thy face. |
| 90:9 | For all our days turned away in thy wrath: we finished our years as a meditation |
| 90:10 | The days of our years, in them seventy years; and if in strengths, eighty years, and their pride labor and vanity; for being soon cut off and we shall fly away. |
| 90:11 | Who shall know the strength of thine anger? and according to thy fear, thy wrath. |
| 90:12 | To number our days so make known, and we shall bring the heart to wisdom. |
| 90:13 | Turn back, O Jehovah, how long? and have pity upon thy servants. |
| 90:14 | Satisfy us in the morning with thy mercy, and we shall rejoice and be glad in all our days. |
| 90:15 | We rejoiced according to the days thou didst humble us, the years we saw evil. |
| 90:16 | Cause thy works to be seen to thy servants, and thine honor for their sons. |
| 90:17 | And the sweetness of Jehovah our God shall be upon us: and the work of our hands prepare thou it upon us; and the work of our hands prepare thou it. |
Julia E. Smith Translation 1876
The Julia Evelina Smith Parker Translation is considered the first complete translation of the Bible into English by a woman. The Bible was titled The Holy Bible: Containing the Old and New Testaments; Translated Literally from the Original Tongues, and was published in 1876.
Julia Smith, of Glastonbury, Connecticut had a working knowledge of Latin, Greek and Hebrew. Her father had been a Congregationalist minister before he became a lawyer. Having read the Bible in its original languages, she set about creating her own translation, which she completed in 1855, after a number of drafts. The work is a strictly literal rendering, always translating a Greek or Hebrew word with the same word wherever possible. Smith accomplished this work on her own in the span of eight years (1847 to 1855). She had sought out no help in the venture, even writing, "I do not see that anybody can know more about it than I do." Smith's insistence on complete literalness, plus an effort to translate each original word with the same English word, combined with an odd notion of Hebrew tenses (often translating the Hebrew imperfect tense with the English future) results in a translation that is mechanical and often nonsensical. However, such a translation if overly literal might be valuable to consult in checking the meaning of some individual verse. One notable feature of this translation was the prominent use of the Divine Name, Jehovah, throughout the Old Testament of this Bible version.
In 1876, at 84 years of age some 21 years after completing her work, she finally sought publication. The publication costs ($4,000) were personally funded by Julia and her sister Abby Smith. The 1,000 copies printed were offered for $2.50 each, but her household auction in 1884 sold about 50 remaining copies.
The translation fell into obscurity as it was for the most part too literal and lacked any flow. For example, Jer. 22:23 was given as follows: "Thou dwelling in Lebanon, building as nest in the cedars, how being compassionated in pangs coming to thee the pain as in her bringing forth." However, the translation was the only Contemporary English translation out of the original languages available to English readers until the publication of The British Revised Version in 1881-1894.(The New testament was published in 1881, the Old in 1884, and the Apocrypha in 1894.) This makes it an invaluable Bible for its period.