Young's Literal Translation

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Young's Literal Translation
Full name: Young's Literal Translation of the Holy Bible
Abbreviation: YLT
Complete Bible published: 1862
Translation type: extremely literal (on the extreme formal equivalence end of formal and dynamic equivalence spectrum: possibly most literal English rendering)
Copyright status: Public domain


Translation philosophy[edit]




13   and there is an evening, and there is a morning — day third.[1]




1   In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.
3   And God said, "Let there be light"; and there was light.[2]

Bereshith bara elohim, the RSV's "In the beginning God created...", is in the construct state (bereshith), not the absolute (barishona), meaning it refers to an action in progress, not to a completed act. Similarly, there is no license in the Hebrew for the RSV's division of these verses into three sentences (ancient Hebrew lacked punctuation, and sentence divisions have to be inferred), as the order of the words wa ha-aretz hayetha (subject-verb) points to the rendering "the earth being" (Young's "the earth hath existed"), while the RSV's "and the earth was" requires words in the order wa tehi ha-aretz (verb-subject).[3] Young's usage of English present tense rather than past tense has been supported by scholars ranging from the medieval Jewish rabbi Rashi (who advised, "[I]f you are going to interpret [this passage] in its plain sense, interpret it thus: At the beginning of the creation of heaven and earth, when the earth was (or the earth being) unformed and void . . . God said, ‘Let there be light.’") to Richard Elliott Friedman in his translation of the Five Books in "The Bible with Sources Revealed" (2002).[4]

The translation has been criticized by some[who?] as falling short in some respects. It renders Luke 24:1 as “And on the first of the sabbaths” while it translates Acts 20:7 as “And on the first of the week” even though the two phrases are identical in the Greek texts. To quote the preface "Every effort has been made to secure a comparative degree of uniformity in rendering the original words and phrases. Thus, for example, the Hebrew verb nathan, which is rendered by the King James' translators in sixty-seven different ways... has been restricted and reduced to ten, and so with many others. It is the Translator's ever-growing conviction, that even this smaller number may be reduced still further."[5] David Dewey, in A User's Guide to Bible Translations, mentions that "his method of translating Hebrew tenses makes his Old Testament in places virtually unreadable." [6]

Eternity or age[edit]

Another important feature of YLT is its treatment of the Hebrew word olam and the Greek word αιων. These two words have basically the same meaning, and YLT translates them and their derivatives as “age” or “age-enduring”. Other English versions most often translate them to indicate eternality (eternal, everlasting, forever, etc.). However, there are notable exceptions to this in all major translations, such as Matthew 28:20: “…I am with you always, to the end of the age” (NRSV), the word “age” being a translation of aion. Rendering aion to indicate eternality in this verse would result in the contradictory phrase “end of eternity”, so the question arises whether it should ever be so.[7] Proponents of universal reconciliation point out that this has significant implications for soteriology and the problem of hell.[8] However, "age" and "age-enduring" imply indeterminacy which may be either timeless and atemporal or pertaining to an indefinite period of time, the first (but not the second) meaning having been acquired by the words "eternity" and "eternal", but "eternity" and "eternal" also have other meanings including "endless period of time" and "endless in time" respectively.[9][10] Compare the following sets of verses of scriptures (quoted from YLT with words corresponding to "age" or "age-enduring" marked in bold):


Rom 16:26 and now having been made manifest, also, through prophetic writings, according to a command of the age-enduring God, having been made known to all the nations for obedience of faith—



John 3:16 for God did so love the world, that His Son—the only begotten—He gave, that every one who is believing in him may not perish, but may have life age-enduring.

Tit 1:2 upon hope of life age-enduring, which God, who doth not lie, did promise before times of ages,


Gal 1:5 to whom [is] the glory to the ages of the ages. Amen.

Matt 6:13 `And mayest Thou not lead us to temptation, but deliver us from the evil, because Thine is the reign, and the power, and the glory—to the ages. Amen.


Matt 25:46 And these shall go away to punishment age-enduring, but the righteous to life age-enduring.'


Luke 18:30 who may not receive back manifold more in this time, and in the coming age, life age-enduring.'

Notes and references[edit]

  1. ^ Genesis, Young's Literal Translation
  2. ^ Genesis, Revised Standard Version
  3. ^ H. M. Orlinsky, Genesis 1, from Notes on the New JPS Translation of the Torah (1969), Jewish Publication Society
  4. ^ Richard Elliott Friedman, "The Bible with Sources revealed", Harpers, 2002.
  5. ^ Preface to the first edition, 7th paragraph
  6. ^ David Dewey, A User's Guide to Bible Translations, ISBN 0-8308-3273-4, pg. 134
  7. ^ Canon F.W. Farrar “Mercy and Judgment” 1904 pages 378–382
  8. ^ Thomas Talbott "Three Pictures of God in Western Theology" 1995 pages 13–15
  9. ^
  10. ^

External links[edit]