Syria

Qur’an translation of the week #177: The quest for a ‘translation of the middle way’: AbdAllah Penot’s Le Coran (2005)

Some translations are known for their controversial choices. Others come across as ostensibly uncontroversial, which is precisely their point and their selling proposition: Addressing those many Muslim and non-Muslim readers that have no predetermined ideological expectation of a Qur’an translation, they strive to represent a ‘middle way’ and to avoid flagging any kind of sectarian …

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Qur’an translation of the week #71: Al-mathani and the gigantic Qur’aan: Strategies of translating Arabic terminology in Amir Zaidan’s At-tafsiir

At the time it was first published in 2000, Amir Zaidan’s At-tafsiir, an annotated translation of the Qur’an into German, stood apart from all other German translations due to its deliberate and extensive use of Arabic terminology. It contained phrases such as ‘In it are clear ayat, [including] maqamu-Ibrahim’ (‘In ihm sind deutliche Ayat, [davon] …

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Qur’an translation of the week #28: Forging Muslim ‘Orthodoxy’ in Russia: New Translation of Qur’anic Meanings Kalam Sharif

The most recent translation of the Qur’an into Russian, produced by the Kazan Muftiyat in 2019, can tell us much about Muslim theological polemics in contemporary Russia. Widely discussed on social media, the Kalam Sharif translation claims to be the only Sunni “orthodox” translation of Qur’anic meanings corresponding to Maturidi/Ashari theology. As well as the …

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Qur’an translation of the week #07: ‘Le Saint Coran‘ and its convoluted publication history

This book, which I purchased in a bookstore in Tunis, was published in Homs, Syria, in 2011 and claims to contain a French Qur’an translation produced by the Mauritanian scholar Mohamed El-Moktar Ould Bah (b. 1924) for the King Fahd Complex in Medina – evidence of the longstanding presence and importance of Mauritanian scholars in …

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