Textus Receptus Bibles
Julia E. Smith Translation 1876
| 4:1 | Hear this word, ye heifers of Bashan, which are upon the mountain of Shomeron, oppressing the poor, breaking in pieces the needy, saying to their lords, Bring, and we will drink. |
| 4:2 | The Lord Jehovah sware by his holiness, that behold, the days coming upon you and he took you away with hooks, and your last part with thorns of the fish. |
| 4:3 | And ye shall go forth at the breaches, a woman before her; and ye cast to the fortress, says Jehovah. |
| 4:4 | Come to the house of God and transgress: at Gilgal multiply to transgress; and bring your sacrifices for the morning, your tenths for three days: |
| 4:5 | And burn incense from leaven, a thanksgiving, and call; cause the free will offerings to be heard: for thus ye loved ye sons of Israel, says the Lord Jehovah. |
| 4:6 | And also I gave to you cleanness of teeth in all your cities, and want of bread in all your places: and ye turned not back even to me, says Jehovah. |
| 4:7 | And I withheld from you the rain in yet three months to harvest: and I caused to rain upon one city, and upon one city I will not cause to rain: and one portion shall be rained upon, and the portion which shall not be rained upon, it shall dry up. |
| 4:8 | And two, three cities wandered about to one city to drink water, and they will not be satisfied: and they turned not back even to me, says Jehovah. |
| 4:9 | I struck you with blasting and with yellowness: the multitudes of your gardens and your vineyards and your fig-trees and your olives the creeping locust shall eat: and ye turned not back even to me, says Jehovah. |
| 4:10 | And I sent death among you in the way of Egypt: and I slew your young men with the sword, with the captivity of your horses; and I will bring up your camps with fire and in your anger, and ye turned not back even to me, says Jehovah. |
| 4:11 | I overthrew among you as God overthrows Sodom and Gomorrah, and ye shall be as a fire-brand snatched from the burning: and ye turned not back even to me, says Jehovah. |
| 4:12 | For this, thus will I do to thee, O Israel: because that I will do this to thee, prepare to meet thy God, O Israel. |
| 4:13 | For behold, he forming the mountains and creating the wind, and announcing to man his meditation, making the morning darkness and treading upon the heights of the earth, Jehovah, God of armies his name |
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.