Textus Receptus Bibles
Julia E. Smith Translation 1876
| 5:1 | Watch thy feet when thou shalt go to the house of God, and draw near to hear, rather than give the sacrifice of the foolish, for they not knowing the doing of evil. |
| 5:2 | Thou shalt not hasten with thy mouth, and thy heart shall not be quick to bring forth a word to the face of God: for God is in the heavens, and thou upon the earth: for this thy words shall be few. |
| 5:3 | For the dream came in the multitude of labor; and the voice of the foolish one in the multitude of words. |
| 5:4 | When thou shalt vow a vow to God, thou shalt not delay to repay it; for there is no desire in the foolish: repay what thou shalt vow. |
| 5:5 | Good that thou shalt not vow rather than thou shalt vow and not requite. |
| 5:6 | Thou shalt not give thy mouth to cause thy flesh to sin; and thou shalt not say to the face of the messenger that it is an error: wherefore shall God be angry at thy voice, and destroy the work of thy hands? |
| 5:7 | For in the multitude of dreams, and vanities, and many words: but fear thou God. |
| 5:8 | If thou shalt see the oppression of the poor one, and the spoiling of judgment and justice in a province, thou shalt not wonder at the inclination: for the high one above the high one is watching, and the high ones over them. |
| 5:9 | And the profit of the earth in all: it is the king being served to the field. |
| 5:10 | He loving silver shall not be satisfied with silver; and whoever loved not the increase with the multitude. Also this is vanity. |
| 5:11 | In the multitude of good they were multiplied eating it: and what the success to its possessors but seeing with his eyes? |
| 5:12 | The sleep of the servant is sweet, if little, or if much he shall eat: and the satiety to the rich not permitting to him to sleep. |
| 5:13 | There is an evil making sick I saw under the sun: riches watched to its owners for their evil. |
| 5:14 | And those riches shall perish by evil labor: and he begetting a son, and not anything in his hand. |
| 5:15 | According as he came forth from his mother's womb, naked he shall turn back to go as he came, and he shall not take away anything in his labor that shall go in his hand. |
| 5:16 | And also this an evil making sick, wholly as he came so shall he go: and what to him he shall labor for the wind? |
| 5:17 | Also all his days in darkness shall he eat, and much vexation and his sickness and his anger. |
| 5:18 | Behold, what I saw: good, which is beautiful to eat and to drink, and to see good in all his labor that he will labor under the sun the number of the days of his life, which God gave to him; for this his portion. |
| 5:19 | Also every man which God gave to him wealth and riches, and permitted him to eat from it, and to lift up his portion, and to rejoice in his labor; this the gift of God himself. |
| 5:20 | For he shall not much remember the days of his life; for God humbles him in the gladness of his heart. |
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.