Koran to get Irish translation

national | anti-war / imperialism | news report

Thursday June 19, 2003 23:20

by Leslie Carter

The Islamic holy book, the Koran, is to be translated into Irish. Ms Leslie Carter, of the Islamic Cultural Centre, in Clonskeagh, Dublin, said yesterday the project was at an early stage but would "definitely happen".

There were Irish speakers among the Muslim community here who wanted an Irish-language version of the Koran, she said. "We think it's very important to bring the Irish language more into everyday life. There's a lot in common between the Irish and the Islamic way of looking at life."

There are about 18,000 Muslims in the State, almost 12,000 of them in Dublin. The Islamic community is the fastest-growing religious minority in the State.

Ms Carter said the centre was establishing a research committee to oversee the project, which would be chaired by Mr Mirza Sayeigh, of the Al-Maktoum Foundation in Dubai. The Islamic Cultural Centre and mosque were founded by Mr Hamdan Al-Maktoum in October 1996.

"Mr Sayeigh is very eager to see the Koran translated into Irish," said Ms Carter. "He's very supportive. So we are waiting for him to be able to come over from Dubai to chair the research committee. It's going to be a very big job."

The translation would be directly from Arabic into Irish, she continued, "because when you go from Arabic into English you lose something. We don't want to lose too much". It is expected the centre will be helped in the project by Foras na Gaeilge.

Mr Eamon Ó Hargain, director of development services at Foras, pointed out that the organisation had just completed a successful collaboration with the centre in translating its 200-page handbook into Irish.

"There have been some discussion and expressions of interest in the idea of translating the Koran into Irish, and we would be delighted to work with them in any way we can," he said.

Foras na Gaeilge, a North-South body established under the Belfast Agreement to promote the Irish language, is mandated to assist organisations with such major works of translation.

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Comments (14 of 14)

Leslie

by Raymond McInerney

Thu Jun 19, 2003 23:38

Excuse my ignorance on this.

Has the Arabic language changed in any significant amount over the centuries and if it has how will you ensure that the purity of the Koran will not be tainted during the translation to Irish?

Arabic

by Samir

Fri Jun 20, 2003 01:00

Every Arab child aquire a colloquial dialect as a mother tounge.There's a high degree of mutual unintelligibility among the various colloqiual dialects.A native speaker of Morrocan Arabic,for example,does not understand a native speaker of Gulf Arabic.Every Arab learns through formal education in school Modern Standard Arabic,the language that unifies the Arab World linguistically[Official language in all the Arab countries].MSA is used in a sermon,university lecture,mass media,political speech and letter writing.The colloquial dialect is used at home conversing with friends and in television soup operas.The classical language has changed in grammar very little since the 7th century AD,and learning MSA will enable you to read not only modern novels,but also the Koran[Written in classical Arabic].Muslim orthodoxy has generally been opposed to the translation of the Koran.Arabs and Muslims believe that Arabic is the most perfect of all languages since God speaks it and has revealed his message in the Holy Koran. Orthodox Islam, for the greatest part of its existence, has left the Qur'an untranslated because of its view of the Arabic from Allah. Any translation of the Koran immediately ceases to be the literal word of Allah, and hence cannot be equated with the Koran in its original Arabic form.
Recommended books to learn Arabic are Thackston's "Koranic and Classical Arabic" and Schulz's "Standard Arabic".

It's not that difficult

Fri Jun 20, 2003 02:07

I'm not sure that there's a lot in common between the Irish and the Islamic way of looking at life,but there's much in common between Arabic and Irish Gaelic:
1]No indefinite article. Fear/Rajul "a man"
2]Word Order:Verb Subject Object.
Glanann Maire an bord
clears Maire the table

Wasala lwazir ila lbalad
arrived the minister to the country
3]Prepositional pronouns.
orm "on me" ort "on you" orthu "on them"
minka "from you[masculine]" minhu "from him" minhaa "from her"
4]"To have"
Tá teach ag an mbean
there's a house at the woman "the woman has a house"

'indi kalb "I have a dog"
at me thers's a dog

5]The construct state
Kitaabu rasuulin "an apostle's book"
Seomra mhairtin
"Mairtin's room"

Thanks Samir

Fri Jun 20, 2003 16:59

Just wondering how close is Arabic to Sanskrit 'the language of Nature?

You've got to giggle

by Badman

Fri Jun 20, 2003 18:10

Translating a book of the deluded megalomaniac ramblings of a petty merchant from archaic times on the arabian peninsula, into a language that is the mother tongue of pretty much nobody, when every single speaker of that language already speaks a language which has numerous translations of the deranged text easily available - how worthwhile. I want to contribute. Where's the collecion bucket?

The connection between the irish and islamic way of 'looking at life', maybe it's the misogyny, navel gazing, insularity & small minded bigotry?

I just hope that they use that nice thin paper that they use for bibles so we can get some use out of the damn thing - skinning up, the only practical use of a holy book (they're not absorbent or soft enough for bogroll).

The Voice Of The Colonial Is Heard In The Land (part 378b)

by Breatnach

Sat Jun 21, 2003 20:10

Badman roused himself from his dope-induced stupor to say :

"into a language that is the mother tongue of pretty much nobody, when every single speaker of that language already speaks a language..."

Great. So everyone must abandon their own land's indigenous language because they can speak English as well.

Do you know what that makes you, Badman (as if you cared a monkey's anyhow)? A cultural imperialist, of the sort that first tried to destroy the languages (and hence the identities) of the Celtic nations by brute force, and then by the State education system, and finally by jollying the deluded majority into behaving as if they were nothing other than Brits who talk funny.

Our nations' languages are key to our understanding of ourselves (that's why colonialists try to wipe them out and replace them with their own), and when we destroy them (or can't be arsed to stop them being destroyed because we're too busy getting stoned witless) we undermine our own civilisation.

Hope you set fire to your bed with your spliff, you stoner quarter-wit.

Peace*

by Nina Hall

Sun Jun 22, 2003 01:45

nhirish4ever at webtv dot net

I think translating the Koran into Gaelic is a wonderful idea! It may create more of a closeness between the Irish and the Muslims and why not? More power to you for going towards peace with others... I don't believe that life is about fighting among ourselves but rather learning how to get along with each other in a peaceful way. Learning to celebrate each others differences! Blessings to all...

Sun Jun 22, 2003 01:46

Hey Breatnach

Sun Jun 22, 2003 14:43

What's the Irish for "do you know where I can score a ten spot" - maybe you can convince me that the Irish language is useful after all.

I may only have a quarter wit, but at least that quarter is enough to let me know that you can't recreate a culture that no longer exists; that attempts to re-animate dying languages are almost never succesful; that, when they are succesful, they invariably end up being a grotesque parody of both the original language and the ancestral culture; that such projects of 're-nationalisation' are invariably the products of the national bourgeious who use them as a means of stifling criticism and progessive voices by labeling them as 'alien' ideoligies.

'Modern' Irish is a case in point. Partition of the country allowed the gombeen ruling class of the South to con the public into accepting a culture that was much more insular, restrictive, puritanical and corrupt than anything that ever existed before the Irish language and native Celtic culture were, in practice, fatally wounded by British economic policy in the 18th and early 19th century.

My quarter wit, is also enough to let me know that your response was a ignorant knee-jerk reaction that lacks any evidence of a wit whatsoever. Maybe you could let me know why you think that this is a worthwhile project and what you think it might achieve?

Golly, indymedia is so trying. I'm off to read Conrad and Kipling for a while to revitalise my cultural reservoir. First I'm off to the leithreas, now where did I leave that copy of Peig?

Badman

by pat c

Sun Jun 22, 2003 16:22

I have an English translation of Peig if you want to borrow it ;)

I fail to see why it is a good idea to translate the ravings of a medieval misogynist into Irish. Dont we have enough hate materiel around already?

1 moment please

by me

Sun Jun 22, 2003 22:40

These attitudes are anti-scholarly. This book is of massive importance to millions of people. I am no expert but the Suras are said to have huge aesthetic power also. The person who plants and harvests the hash you smoke probably reads it every evening. You're willing to smoke his dope but take umbrage when you hear his book is to be translated into your original language. Puzzling. I fear you've been listening to too much anti-islamic hyteria in the wake of 9/11. As regards the book Peig Sayers, not a bad work compared to a lot of the crap on bookshelves nowadays. It wasn't the authors fault it was obligatory for the leaving.

publish it

Mon Jun 23, 2003 11:28

but dont expect me to think its a big deal. i agree that its as important as poetry book and fable collection from the 7th century.

peig is dire crap. the bitch should have been drowned at birth, over the years hundreds of thousands of us were forced to study the drivel.

Peig! Peig! Peig! Peig! Boooooooo....

by Daithi

Mon Jun 23, 2003 16:41

Thank you Pat, for expressing what I feel deep inside of me ... to save the Irish language I would replace Peig with An Beal Bocht and require every Leaving Cert. student to read it. An absolute work of genius in any language.

Speaking of the Koran now. Nice idea, but it's a tricky project, though. Very ambitious. I wonder if they'll go through English or do it directly? The only thing close to it I can think of is a book from the early 19th century that was trilingual - Hebrew, English, Irish - of course there are already good Irish biblical translations, but this is unique case of the 3 on the one page, as well as the use of the older Irish script, so it looks suitably antique. Nice image at http://www.wjc.org.il/Graphics/irl_b.jpg . I don't know if this is a prayerbook or a full set. Certainly I doubt that the translation into Irish of the likes of the Talmud has ever taken place. I think the Biblical translations are more widespread on account of Vatican II.

In any case, why is this being published again? http://www.indymedia.ie/newswire.php?story_id=34514

me again

Tue Jun 24, 2003 16:30

I reckon you'd be doing Flann O Brien a disservice by making him compulsory in school. Literature reaches people because their peers turn them on to it (like drugs). School is a place to rebel against and become an individual. The best a teacher could do would be to discretely mention Flann O Brien. Interested students would prick up their ears. To finish on Peig: generations have taken the piss out of her. Why was it never explained to anyone that she was just one of a number of islanders who were invited to write(or dictate) their memoirs for posterity? At that time everyone knew their way of life was on the way out. It was felt important that something could be salvaged. It was outsiders who went to the trouble of encouraging them to do this. It was well meant. Flann O Brien may parody them but he doesn't despise them, he loves them, it's obvious, he is, in fact, one of them. These fanatical nationalists/religionists who made Peig obligatory and who viewed a child who could n't get to grips with the language as some kind of degenerate are to blame. Not Peig. For it's genre: i.e. A memoir, it's grand. You hate it because of your experiences of school. (The islanders were anti-capitalists.) Re Koran, must be direct from Arabic to Irish and viewed as an interpretation rather than translation, as they say the Koran is impossible to translate into any language, nice job that would be, unfortunately I know neither language. (Thought I learnt Irish for 14 years) (Not ms Sayer's fault ;))

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Koran to get Irish translation

Comments (14 of 14)