Textus Receptus Bibles
Julia E. Smith Translation 1876
| 1:1 | The lifting up of Nineveh. The book of the vision of Nahum the Elkoshite. |
| 1:2 | God is jealous and Jehovah avenging; Jehovah avenging and possessing wrath; Jehovah avenging to his adversaries and he keeping for his enemies. |
| 1:3 | Jehovah slow to anger and great of power, and Jehovah acquitting, will not acquit his way in the whirlwind and in the storm, and a cloud the dust of his feet |
| 1:4 | Rebuking upon the sea, and he will dry it up, and all the rivers he laid waste, and Bashan languished, and Carmel, and the flower of Lebanon languished. |
| 1:5 | The mountains shook from him, and the hills melted, and the earth will lift up from his face, and the habitable globe and all dwelling in it |
| 1:6 | Before the face of his wrath who shall stand? and who will rise up in the burning of his anger? his wrath was poured out as fire, and the rocks were torn down from him. |
| 1:7 | Jehovah is good for a fortress in the day of straits; and he knew those trusting in him. |
| 1:8 | With an inundation passing through he will make a completion of her place, and darkness shall pursue his enemies. |
| 1:9 | What will ye purpose against Jehovah? he made a completion: straits shall not rise up twice. |
| 1:10 | For even to thorns surrounding them, and drinking to excess as drunkards, they shall be devoured as straw fully dried up. |
| 1:11 | From thee shall he come forth purposing evil against Jehovah, a counselor of Belial. |
| 1:12 | Thus said Jehovah: If peace thus many, and thus they were shown and he passed through. And afflicting thee I will afflict thee no more. |
| 1:13 | And now I will break his rod from off thee, and I will tear away thy bonds. |
| 1:14 | And Jehovah commanded concerning thee, of thy name no more shall be sown: from the house of thy God I will cut off the carved image and the molten image: I will set thy grave, for thou wert contemned. |
| 1:15 | Behold upon the mountains the feet of him announcing good news, causing peace to be heard. O Judah, keep thy festivals, complete thy vows: for Belial shall no more add to pass through thee: he was completely cut off. |
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.