Textus Receptus Bibles
Julia E. Smith Translation 1876
| 3:1 | Wo! to the city of bloods: all of it was filled with falsehood, with violence; the prey will not withdraw. |
| 3:2 | The voice of the whip and the voice of the shaking of the wheel, and the horse moving swiftly, and the chariot bounding. |
| 3:3 | The horsemen also lifting up the flame of the sword, and the lightning of the spear: and a multitude of wounded, and the heavy carcass; and no end to the corpses; they shall stumble upon their dead bodies. |
| 3:4 | From the multitude of the fornications of the fair harlot, the beauty of the mistress of sorceries, selling the nations by her fornication, and families by her sorceries |
| 3:5 | Behold me against thee, says Jehovah of armies; and I uncovered thy skirts upon thy face, and I caused nations to see thy nakedness, and kingdoms thy shame. |
| 3:6 | And I cast abominable things upon thee, and I disgraced thee, and I set thee as a sight |
| 3:7 | And it was all serving thee shall flee from thee, and say, Nineveh was laid waste: who shall be moved for her? from whom shall I seek those consoling to thee? |
| 3:8 | Wilt thou be good above No, the builder dwelling among the rivers, the waters round about to her, whose strength the sea, from the sea her wall? |
| 3:9 | Cush her strength, and Egypt, and no end; Put and Lubim were among thy helpers. |
| 3:10 | Also she being carried away captive went into captivity: also her young children shall be dashed in pieces at the head of every street, and upon her honored ones they cast the lot, and all her great ones were bound in chains. |
| 3:11 | And thou shalt be intoxicated, and thou shalt be hid; thou shalt seek a fortifiedplace from the enemy. |
| 3:12 | All thy fortresses, fig trees with the early figs: if they shall be shaken, and they fell into the mouth of him eating |
| 3:13 | Behold, thy people women in the midst of thee: the gates of thy land being opened were opened to thine enemies: a fire devoured thy bars. |
| 3:14 | Draw the water of the siege to thee, strengthen thy fortresses go into clay, tread upon the clay, hold fast from the brick. |
| 3:15 | There shall the fire devour thee; the sword shall cut thee off, it shall devour thee as the feeder: make thee numerous as the feeder, make thee numerous as the locust |
| 3:16 | Thou didst multiply thy traffics above the stars of the heavens: the feeder spread out and it will fly away. |
| 3:17 | Thy devoted ones as the locust, and thy satraps as the locust of locusts encamping in the walls in a cold day; the sun arose and they fled away, and where his place he knew not |
| 3:18 | Thy shepherds slumbered, O king of Assur: thy chiefs will lie down: thy people breathed upon the mountains, and none gathering. |
| 3:19 | No healing to thy breaking; thy blow sickly: all hearing thy report shall clap the hand upon thee: for upon whom did not thine evil pass continually? |
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.