The best known Bible translation to use the words ‘pure religion’ consecutively is the King James version (KJV or Authorised version) – see the BibleHub website which lists out this verse (James 1:27) in many different translations.
In the KJV translation, James 1:27 reads: “Pure religion and undefiled before God and the Father is this, To visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction, and to keep himself unspotted from the world.”
Most other well-known translations of James 1:27 have a different word order, many putting the word undefiled before the word religion, or some using different words altogether.
For example, the New King James Version starts: “Pure and undefiled religion before God…” rather than “Pure religion and undefiled before God…” – presumably because the wording “Pure religion and undefiled” could be difficult for the modern reader to understand. The modern reader, who tends to digest words in small chunks, may tend to separate “Pure religion” from “and undefiled before God” when the words are presented in this order, whereas the original translators back in the early 1600s when the KJV version was written probably assumed people would read “pure religion and undefiled” as one concept, before going on to read “before God”.
An examination of lesser known translations does reveal 11 more that use the word order “pure religion” for James 1:27, however, some of these translation have borrowed their wording from the well-known and popular King James translation. This parallel comparison of James 1:27 shows a total of 12 examples of the ‘Pure religion’ word-order, including the King James version:
