Textus Receptus Bibles
Julia E. Smith Translation 1876
| 39:1 | Knewest thou the time of the bringing forth of the wild goats of the rock? and wilt thou watch the bearing of the hinds? |
| 39:2 | Wilt thou number the months they shall fill up? and didst thou know the time of their bringing forth? |
| 39:3 | They will bow, they will bring forth their children, they will cast forth their pains. |
| 39:4 | Their sons will be fat, they will increase with grain; they will go forth and not turn back to them. |
| 39:5 | Who sent the wild ass free? and who opened the bonds of the wild ass? |
| 39:6 | To whom did I set the desert his house, and the salt land his dwellings? |
| 39:7 | He will laugh at the multitude of the city; he will not hear the noise of him driving. |
| 39:8 | The searching out of the mountains his pasture, and he will seek after every green thing. |
| 39:9 | Will the buffalo be willing to serve thee, or will he lodge by thy stall? |
| 39:10 | Wilt thou bind the buffalo in the furrow with cords, or will he harrow the valleys after thee? |
| 39:11 | Wilt thou trust in him because great his strength? and wilt thou leave to him thy labor? |
| 39:12 | Wilt thou believe in him that he will turn back thy seed and gather to thy threshing-floor? |
| 39:13 | The wings of ostriches exulted; and the wing-feather of the stork and the pinion. |
| 39:14 | For she will leave her eggs to the earth, and she will warm them in the dust; |
| 39:15 | And she will forget that the foot will press it, and the beast of the field will crush it |
| 39:16 | She made hard to her sons as not to her: her labor in vain without fear; |
| 39:17 | For God caused her to forget wisdom, and he divided not to her in understanding. |
| 39:18 | For the time she will lash herself up upon height, she will laugh at the horse and at his rider. |
| 39:19 | Wilt thou give strength to the horse? wilt thou clothe his neck with thunder? |
| 39:20 | Wilt thou cause him to tremble as the locust? the glory of his snorting is terror. |
| 39:21 | They will dig in the valley, and he will rejoice in strength: he will go forth to the meeting of the weapon. |
| 39:22 | He will laugh at fear, and he will not be dismayed; and he will not turn back from the face of the sword. |
| 39:23 | The quiver will give forth a whizzing against him, the flame of the spear and the javelin. |
| 39:24 | With leaping and rage he will swallow the earth; and he will not believe that it is the voice of the trumpet |
| 39:25 | He will say according to the multitude of the trumpet, Aha! and he will smell the battle from far off, the thunder of the chiefs, and the war cry. |
| 39:26 | From thy understanding will the hawk mount upwards? will it stretch its wings to the south? |
| 39:27 | If at thy mouth the eagle will lift itself up, and if it will raise up its nest? |
| 39:28 | She will dwell in the rock, and she will lodge upon the cliff of the rock and the fortress. |
| 39:29 | From thence it sought food; far off shall its eyes behold. |
| 39:30 | Her young shall suck up the blood: and where the wounded, there is she. |
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.