Academic evaluation of translations

Mazhar

Assalamo alaikum,

The membership of the forum has become quite respectable. Active members are also quite many.

We can undertake an academic study to evalute the existing translations and benefit from the collective effort of members to arrive at a better translation. The approach should be sequential beginning with First Ayah.

We can select 7 which are available on one page of Leeds and two earlier ones of Rodewell and George Sales since both have great influence on later translations.

We have on line parsar both for English and Arabic of Qur'aan. It will facilitate as it will serve as good toolkit.

John Medows Rodwell In the Name of God, the Compassionate, the Merciful
George Sale In the name of the most merciful God.
Sahih International In the name of Allah , the Entirely Merciful, the Especially Merciful.

Pickthall In the name of Allah, the Beneficent, the Merciful.

Yusuf Ali In the name of Allah, Most Gracious, Most Merciful.

Shakir In the name of Allah, the Beneficent, the Merciful.

Muhammad Sarwar In the Name of Allah, the Beneficent, the Merciful

Mohsin Khan In the Name of Allah, the Most Beneficent, the Most Merciful.

Arberry In the Name of God, the Merciful, the Compassionate

Would the English speaking members enlighten us

Whether this English "sentence" is a complete sentence or is lacking in linkages.
If it is not a complete sentence, what will be the meanings or connotation of "In the name of God"
(a) In behalf of;
(b) By the authority of;
(c) With appeal to; or
(d) Just a swearing
(e) innovocation a calling upon Allah

Mazhar

A living translator also visits this forum quite often. Sad! No response.

The translated "sentence" is incomplete and sufers ambiguity. English grammar tells A sentence is a group of words which starts with a capital letter and ends with a full stop (.), question mark (?) or exclamation mark (!). A sentence contains or implies a predicate and a subject. There has to be a verb in it.

Translated text can be termed as a SENTENCE FRAGMENT. It fails to be a sentence in the sense that it cannot stand by itself. It does not contain even one independent clause. It may locate something in time and place with a prepositional phrase or a series of such phrases, but it's still lacking a proper subject-verb relationship within an independent clause.

Hence Rodewell's translation is patently incorrect. Since others have just copied him-plagiarised, they neither seem to have given a thought nor seem to have revisited the Arabic text to parse it and then translate. Unfortunate!

Mazhar

Grammatically and semantically nearest to the source text translation

Elided Verb The elevated Messenger of Allah the Exalted pronounced

"Ar'Reh'maan the Personal Name of Allah the Exalted is the recourse-resort to activation.

Ar'Reh'maan is eternally the Fountain of Infinite Mercy".

Graphic parsing about elided verb-Leeds 'Varsiy
http//corpus.quran.com/treebank.jsp

The prerequisite to accurately and comprehensively perceive the perception and thought conveyed in Arabic text is to know and determine the relation of each and every word with its preceding and subsequent word while determining its own position and role played in the sentence/text. One cannot comprehensively perceive the thought-idea conveyed therein merely by knowing the vocabulary of language. Some say about Arabic that we learn Arabic to read Arabic.

These two words constitute a grammatical unit comprising a Prepositional Phrase + Possessive Phrase. The learned grammarians lay the principle that a Prepositional Phrase in Arabic is neither the Subject nor the predicate of a sentence. It relates to either. Therefore, a verb is understood and conveniently estimated before this phrase. We need a citation for a statement. A written word or a statement is firstly spoken by someone, thereby it is reiterated in time and space. We know the Person who orally and in writing communicated the Book that we are reading and trying to translate in English, the Grand Qur'aan. Therefore, the elided Verb before the statement of universal import that can most appropriately be estimated is "Muhammad Sal'lallaa'hoalaih'wa'salam, the elevated Messenger of Allah the Exalted pronounced that------". The structure of sentence is simple and is declarative type.

Grammatically and semantically nearest to the source text translation

supportpeacenotwar

Peace Mazhar,

Only just noticed this. In terms of a complete sentence I think that means it needs to have a verb, so this might not be a complete sentence. In which case, it could be viewed as both (d) Just a swearing and (e) innovocation a calling upon Allah depending on the context. I hope this helps in some way.

god1quran1

From corpus Quran
"
The first word of verse (11) is divided into 2 morphological segments. A preposition and noun. The prefixed preposition bi is usually translated as "with" or "by". "

So shouldn't the correct translation be "with/by The God's name, most gracious, most merciful'?

And you are right there is no verb which makes it an invocation?

Mazhar

Thanks supportpeacenotwar, god1quran1;

Academic evaluation of translations exegeses is important tool to learn self translating and perceiving the Message of Qur'aan because it will make us of an active reader. This evaluation is also utmost necessary because they have inserted their own intellect and passions attributing it to Qur'aan.

Qur'aan has alarmed us

Plagiarism is a cognizable crime; output liable to seizure, person disqualified. It includes inserting opinions, stories, names gathered from unauthentic books, personal whims etc under pretext of explaining Qur'aan and then suggesting it as if it is the part of Qur'aan.
Grand Qur'aan the book most feared by ruling elite and coterie intelligentsia. Throughout history they are trying to propogate against Qur'aan to render it nugatory.

We must know above two facts to realize how important is it that we start learning to translate Qur'aan and understand it.

Grand Qur'aan the book most feared by ruling elite and coterie intelligentsia

Mazhar

We move to 12

John Medows Rodwell PRAISE be to God, Lord of the worlds!
George Sale Praise be to God, the Lord of all creatures;

Praise be to God, the Lord of the worlds.
Sahih International praise is to Allah , Lord of the worlds -

Pickthall Praise be to Allah, Lord of the Worlds,

Yusuf Ali Praise be to Allah, the Cherisher and Sustainer of the worlds;

Shakir All praise is due to Allah, the Lord of the Worlds.

Muhammad Sarwar All praise belongs to God, Lord of the Universe,

Mohsin Khan All the praises and thanks be to Allah, the Lord of the 'Alamin (mankind, jinns and all that exists).

Arberry Praise belongs to God, the Lord of all Being,

No substantial change what Rodwell chose to say.

What is the function played by the linking verb "be" in the sentence?

And Encarta says
be (v)

exist
exist, live, have being, be present, coexist, subsist
take place
take place, happen, occur, transpire, come about, befall (archaic or literary), ensue, come to pass (archaic or literary)
be situated
be situated, be located, remain, be present, be there, stand, stay

To

To has a wide variety of uses, especially as a preposition indicating, among other things, direction or destination (as in flying to New York), position (as in standing to the right), a recipient (as in give it to me), and range (as in from A to B); it also indicates the infinitive of a verb (as in to go).
Microsoft? Encarta? 2006. ? 1993-2005 Microsoft Corporation.

Is it a complete sentence which could keep the listener silent?
Is it a prayer or wish in favour of God?
Or an opening slogan to start an address to public?

Would the English natives kindly enlighten!

Mazhar

John Medows Rodwell PRAISE be to God, Lord of the worlds!
George Sale Praise be to God, the Lord of all creatures;

English natives members have not helped. Fine!

English sentence chosen by Jew Rodwell is reflective of his mood for which he embarked upon translating the Qur'aan. He did it not as a work of scholarship but in jesting mood and purpose. Sadening is the fact that majority of translators who were and are Muslims, pergaps to earn title of a scholar, kept blindly copying him and became authors.

It is a complete nominal sentence with Subject and its Predicate.

It is the Subject; Verbal Noun/noun made definite by prefixing definite article. It is in nominative case since Subject is always in nomincative case or state.

originates from Root " ". The basic perception infolded in the Root is to willingly and sincerely acknowledge and appreciate the grandeur and greatness, positive and proportionate qualities, traits and acts of a person and thereby express admiration. is used only for a person of will and intellect and not for matter and other living creatures while the English word "praise" refers to expression of admiration for somebody or something. &#1583 ) is on one hand the prerogative and exclusive right of a person intrinsically possessor of grandeur, greatness, power, dominion, sovereignty etc, and on the other hand it is an obligation upon others to recognize, acknowledge and express their admiration reflecting willful and affectionate acceptance of their relative inferiority and humility.

It is evident that is not something like matter having dimensions. It is abstract, and can be appreciated intellectually giving rise to the affectionate feeling of expressing it. Moreover, it is conspicuously a two-person relational word. It should be remembered that human beings do not appreciate self sung praises.

is not something that could exist in isolation. It emerges only when there is the Object Person- and another person of will and intellect to act as subject of performing it. There has to be the Praised One-the Revered, and simultaneously the one who praises/Admirer-the Reverent when the Praise, Admiration will become a reality.

This is a Prepositional Phrase. A prepositional phrase is NOT the predicate of a sentence. It only relates to the predicate. Rodwell knew it. He was a linguist. But he was translating Qur'aan in a playful mood and objective. All translators afterwards either did not know about the dependencies of Prepositional Phrases or opted to naively overlook and just copy paste the work of Rodwell and quickly become author of a book.

The Preposition is for i.e. specifying something exclusively for and indicating exclusive prerogative of its object Noun.. This Preposition suffices to indicate the embedded predicate.

This Possessive Phrase is equivalent apposition for Allah the Exalted portraying additional information about Him.

The Infinite Glory and Praise stands specified eternally and exclusively for Allah the Exalted.
Allah the Exalted is the Sustainer Lord of the Known-Multiple universes-All that exists.

The next two Ayahs are also equivalent apposition and the part of this sentence. Arabic sentence is simple and declarative in terms of English grammar.