English

Qur’an translation of the week #149: ‘God’s command’: A milestone in early Turkish Republican Qur’an translation

In 1934, the Islamic scholar, writer and journalist Ömer Rıza published a pioneering Turkish Qur’an translation-cum-commentary entitled Tanrı Buyruğu (‘God’s Command’) in Istanbul. Appearing five years after the Turkish Republic’s script reform, which abolished the use of the Arabic script, Tanrı Buyruğu was probably the first Turkish Qur’an translation to be printed in Latin script …

Qur’an translation of the week #149: ‘God’s command’: A milestone in early Turkish Republican Qur’an translation Read More »

Qur’an translation of the week #146: Noor International: An emerging Saudi Arabian publisher of Qur’an translations

In around 2018, another publisher that specializes in ‘translating the meanings of the Holy Quran into international languages’ emerged in Riyadh, registered as ‘Noor International.’ During its first four years of operation, this publishing house has produced English, French, European Spanish and Latin American Spanish translations of the Qur’an. For its English translation, it simply …

Qur’an translation of the week #146: Noor International: An emerging Saudi Arabian publisher of Qur’an translations Read More »

Qur’an translation of the week #145: A meeting of languages and cultures: A French Qur’an translation from colonial Mauritius

In 1949, Zainul Abedin Rajabalee, a schoolmaster living on the Indian Ocean island of Mauritius, published the first part of his Qur’an translation. In the introduction, he wrote ‘If we are not mistaken, this is the first work of this kind in French’ – by which he meant the first to be written by a …

Qur’an translation of the week #145: A meeting of languages and cultures: A French Qur’an translation from colonial Mauritius Read More »

Qur’an translation of the week #140: Anglo-Islamic Publishers Going Global: Darussalam International

A guest contribution by Azhar Majothi, University of Nottingham (azhar.majothi@nottingham.ac.uk) Darussalam International is one of the Muslim Anglosphere’s most recognisable brands in Islamic book publishing today. Since its establishment in Riyadh in 1986, the publisher claims to have printed more than 1,400 ‘authentic’ Islamic titles in various world languages. Despite the publisher’s achievements, little is …

Qur’an translation of the week #140: Anglo-Islamic Publishers Going Global: Darussalam International Read More »

Qur’an translation of the week #138: Inspiration and plagiarism in translation: Cheikh Boureïma Abdou Daouda’s French Qur’an translation, published by Daroussalam

When does a translation draw inspiration from its predecessors and when is it plagiarized? The French Qur’an translation published by the private Saudi daʿwa-oriented publisher Daroussalam certainly raises this question. Compare these two translations of Q 100 (Sūrat al-ʿĀdiyāt): The one on the left was produced by Cheikh Boureïma Abdou Daouda from Niger and published …

Qur’an translation of the week #138: Inspiration and plagiarism in translation: Cheikh Boureïma Abdou Daouda’s French Qur’an translation, published by Daroussalam Read More »

Qur’an translation of the week #130: ‘To every age its book’: An Exiled Post-Ottoman’s The Wisdom of the Qur’an (La sagesse coranique)

In 1935, the Orientalist publishing house Paul Geuthner in Paris published posthumously the last oeuvre of an exiled Turkish Muslim who had only just died of a heart attack en route from Alexandria to Europe. This work, a partial Qur’an translation titled La sagesse coranique (‘The Wisdom of the Qur’an’), was printed at the behest …

Qur’an translation of the week #130: ‘To every age its book’: An Exiled Post-Ottoman’s The Wisdom of the Qur’an (La sagesse coranique) Read More »

Qur’an translation of the week #127: The First Ahmadi English Qur’an translation

In 1915, the Ahmadiyya Movement published the first part of The Holy Qur-ān with English Translation and Explanatory Notes, the first Ahmadi translation to be published in a European language. The Ahmadiyya Movement was the first Islamic group to begin translating the Qur’an into European languages, a project they initiated at the beginning of the …

Qur’an translation of the week #127: The First Ahmadi English Qur’an translation Read More »

Qur’an translation of the week #126: Global publishers of Qur’an translations: The World Islamic Call Society of Tripoli, Libya

The World Islamic Call Society (WICS, est. 1972) is one of the most active institutions engaged in global Muslim missionary activities. Part of the ideological strategy developed by Muammar al-Gaddafi (1942–2011) to use the Islamic religious network as a tool of leadership in Africa and beyond, WICS continues to operate even after the Libyan revolution …

Qur’an translation of the week #126: Global publishers of Qur’an translations: The World Islamic Call Society of Tripoli, Libya Read More »

Qur’an translation of the week #122: In defence of miracles- Badshah Husain’s Shi’i English Qur’an translation

In 1931, the Indian Shi’i activist A.F. Badshah Husain started publishing an English Qur’an translation ‘according to Shia traditions and principles.’ In this translation, which has to the best of our knowledge never been completed, Husain aimed to defend both the Qur’an and Imami Shi’i doctrines against British Orientalists, Islamic modernists and, in particular, the …

Qur’an translation of the week #122: In defence of miracles- Badshah Husain’s Shi’i English Qur’an translation Read More »

Qur’an translation of the week #117: ‘The teaching of Islam in verses from the Koran’ by Jakub Szynkiewicz

While the issue of Qur’anic translatability was still a subject of debate during the 1930s in the Middle East, some European Muslims did not regard this as a problem to be discussed at all (even for the English language). Jakub Szynkiewicz (1884–1966), a Muslim and Orientalist scholar who served as mufti of Poland is a …

Qur’an translation of the week #117: ‘The teaching of Islam in verses from the Koran’ by Jakub Szynkiewicz Read More »