professor abdel haleem quran translation epub

In fact I would also recommend Abdel Haleem's book 'Understanding the Qur'an: Themes and Styles'.Ī little background on Abdel Haleem, born in Egypt, learned the Qur'an by heart as a child, educated at Al-Azhar, Cairo and Cambridge Universities, taught Arabic at Cambridge and is now Professor of Islamic Studies at SOAS University of London.Īgree with Queeg5000 about the free Saudi translations, a lot of them have some pretty serious inaccuracies in translation.įor an INTRO that is readable to a secular person, try the 1980 version of Rashad Khalifa's 'The Last Testament'. He also does a good job of explaining the stylistic features of the Qur'an which I personally think is essential in order to get a proper understanding of the text. It manages to avoid literal translations of arabic idioms which are usually rendered meaningless in english, rather he tries to explain their underlying meaning.Īlso it has good notes on context and the historical differences in interpretation of certain words and phrases. I'd recommend the Abdel Haleem translation, in my opinion it's probably the most accessible translation for an English speaker, it uses modern english and has an easy free flowing style while aiming to be as accurate as possible. Islam and the Qur'an are essentially oral traditions passed from person to person and in solitary readings a lot of the wisdom and context can be easily overlooked. One last thing: if you are serious about knowing about the Qur'an, then I don't know if you have the time, but it may be worth it to sit with someone who does know it and learn from them. There are only some certain areas where Shi'i translations differ, which you might have to go to a scholar to determine. If you want a shi'i perspective, Ali Quili Qar'ai has a translation which also comes with paragraphs of the Qur'an right next to it. Also, Orthodoxy includes the study of etymology of words and uses translations of words that were used at the time of revelation of the Qur'an and this may be ignored by any 'reform' translation. Also, it would defeat your goal of understanding the Qur'an in the context that most Muslims today understand it. *Edit: I would avoid any non-orthodox translation such as that mentioned below, but only because people who have tried to re-translate without Orthodoxy means they are missing a lot of the science involved in Quranic translation. The Haleem translation is probably the best, even according to academics and Muslim intellectuals (scholars).

Professor abdel haleem quran translation epub