Textus Receptus Bibles
Julia E. Smith Translation 1876
| 49:1 | And Jacob will call to his sons, and will say, Be ye gathered together, and I will announce to you what shall happen to you in the last part of the days. |
| 49:2 | Be gathered together, and hear ye sons of Jacob, and hear to Israel your father. |
| 49:3 | Reuben, my first-born, thou my strength, and the beginning of my strength, the abundance of elevation, and the abundance of might |
| 49:4 | Vain glorious as water, thou shalt not be preeminent; for thou didst go up out of thy father's. bed; then didst thou defile, going up to my couch. |
| 49:5 | Simon and Levi brethren; their swords instruments of violence. |
| 49:6 | My soul shall not come into their consultation; in their assembly, my honor shall not be united, for in their anger they killed a man and in their will, houghed a bullock. |
| 49:7 | Cursed their anger, for it was hard; and their wrath, for it was hardened: I will divide them in Jacob, and I will disperse them in Israel |
| 49:8 | Judah, thee, thee shall thy brethren praise; thy hand upon the back of thine enemies; thy father's sons shall worship before thee. |
| 49:9 | Judah, a lion's whelp; from the green leaf, my son, thou didst go up: bending, lying down, as a lion, and as a lioness: who shall raise him up? |
| 49:10 | The rod shall not depart from Judah, and a leader from between his feet, till that Shiloh shall come: and to him the obedience of the nations. |
| 49:11 | Binding his colt to the vine, and to the purple vine the son of the she-ass; he washed in wine his garment, and his clothing in the blood of grapes. |
| 49:12 | The eyes flashing from wine, the teeth white from milk. |
| 49:13 | Zebulon shall dwell by the coast of the sea; and he by a coast of ships, and the extremities, even to Zidon. |
| 49:14 | Issachar, an ass; a heap of bone lying down in the midst of the tribes. |
| 49:15 | And he will see the rest that it was good, and the land that it was pleasant; and he extended his shoulder to bear, and he will be a servant to tribute. |
| 49:16 | Dan shall judge his people as one of the tribes of Israel. |
| 49:17 | Dan shall be a serpent upon. the way, creeping upon the path, biting the heels of the horse and his beast for riding shall fall behind. |
| 49:18 | I waited for thy deliverance, Jehovah. |
| 49:19 | Gad, a troop, shall press upon him; and this shall press upon the heel. |
| 49:20 | From Asher his bread, fat, and he will give the dainties of a king. |
| 49:21 | Naphtali a mighty shoot, giving fair words. |
| 49:22 | Joseph a fruitful son, a fruitful son upon a fountain, the daughters mounting over a wall. |
| 49:23 | This adversary will embitter him, and the lords of the arrows will lie in wait. |
| 49:24 | And his bow will dwell in strength, and the seed of his hands will be firm by the hands of the mighty one of Jacob; from whence the shepherd, the stone of Israel |
| 49:25 | By the God of thy father, and he will help thee, and by the Almighty, and he will bless thee with the blessing of the heavens above, the blessing of the sea lying under, the blessing of the breasts and the womb. |
| 49:26 | The blessings of thy father were strong above the blessings of the everlasting mountains; the delight of the eternal hills, they shall be upon the head of Joseph and upon the crown of the head of him separated from his brethren. |
| 49:27 | Benjamin, a Wolf, tearing in pieces; in the morning will he eat the prey, and at evening he will divide the prey. |
| 49:28 | All these tribes of Israel, twelve: and this what their father spake to them, and he will bless them; each according to his blessing he blessed them. |
| 49:29 | And he will command them, and will say to them, I am added to my people: bury me with my fathers in the cave which is in the field of Ephron the Hittite. |
| 49:30 | In the cave that is in the field of Machpelah, which is before Mamra in the land of Canaan, which Abraham bought with the field from Ephron the Hittite, for the possession of a grave. |
| 49:31 | There they buried Abraham and Sarah his wife; there they buried Isaak and Rebekah his wife; and there I buried Leah. |
| 49:32 | The possession of the field and the cave which is in it, from the sons of Heth. |
| 49:33 | And Jacob will finish to command his sons, and he will gather his feet to the bed, and will expire, and will be gathered to his people. |
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.