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The language of the Quran: Aramaic?
#1
Uh, wacha think about this?

Quote:The Qur'an: Misinterpreted, Mistranslated, and Misread.
The Aramaic Language of the Qur'an

... So what causes Muslim fundamentalists to follow the path of hostility and hatred to Christians and Jews? Why do Muslim fundamentalists treat the West in general, and the United States in particular as 'enemy'?

The problem lies in the fact the Muslim commentators do not understand the language in which the Quran was written. The language of the Quran has always been Aramaic. Aramaic renders interpretations that are totally different from those rendered by Muslim commentators throughout the last fourteen centuries.

The Quran states that its language is Arabic, but Arab speaking people have difficulty understanding its language. The difficulty stems from the fact that the language of the Quran has always been and still is Aramaic. In the seventh century, the written language of the Near East was Syriac, a dialect of Aramaic, not Arabic. The classical Arabic is a distorted form of Aramaic. The Palmyrene and Nabataean inscriptions in Syria and Transjordan indicates that these two Arab kingdoms had their literature written in Aramaic, Greek and some Latin. None of these inscriptions were written in the "classical Arabic".

There are numerous Quranic verses that are kept out of translation, among those are the Quranic words of "kalalat" (Q. 83: 9); "iliyyun" (Q. 83: 20); "ra'ina" (Q. 2: 47, 105); "sijjin" (Q. 83: 9); "tasnim" (Q. 83: 28); "iblis" (Q. 2: 35, 18: 51); "al-riss" (Q.25: 39); "al-samiri" (Q.20: 86); "wasatan" (Q. 2: 144) etc. These and other words can be understood within the Aramaic context only, not Arabic.

Eastern Syriac dialect is dominant in the Quran. This is indicated by the use of ending /a/ rather than /o/, and the change from /b/ to /w/. The book deals with the erroneous interpretations to the Quran given by Muslim commentators, and the consequences of those erroneous interpretations in the life of Muslims around the world. It deals with the Aramaic language of the Quran. It also lists the Quranic verses that were borrowed from the Bible.

The book is available for sale on this website. To place an order, please follow instructions under "How to order" shown on the panel to the upper left of this page. You may also order from AMAZON.COM

Source: <!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://www.syriacaramaicquran.com/index.html">http://www.syriacaramaicquran.com/index.html</a><!-- m -->

Another book on the subject: <!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Syro-Aramaic_Reading_Of_The_Koran">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Syro-A ... _The_Koran</a><!-- m -->
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#2
The Quran is just about as Arabic as can be, although there are definitely some Aramaicisms and Aramaic loan-words. That's to be expected though, as much of what Muhammed learned about Judeo-Christianity was in an Aramaic milieu.

That's a far cry from the document originally having been written in Aramaic, which I find nearly impossible since virtually none of the famed rhyme and alliteration-assonance within the Quran would work if translated into Aramaic.
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#3
Paul Younan Wrote:The Quran is just about as Arabic as can be, although there are definitely some Aramaicisms and Aramaic loan-words. That's to be expected though, as much of what Muhammed learned about Judeo-Christianity was in an Aramaic milieu.

That's a far cry from the document originally having been written in Aramaic, which I find nearly impossible since virtually none of the famed rhyme and alliteration-assonance within the Quran would work if translated into Aramaic.

Yeah, I thought this theory was bogus <!-- sConfusedtupid: --><img src="{SMILIES_PATH}/withstupid.gif" alt="Confusedtupid:" title="Stupid" /><!-- sConfusedtupid: -->
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#4
Dear Christina

Just wanted to drop a quick note for you here. Please, if Islamic studies are your comparative-religious ???cup of tea???, then do not yet give up on Prof. Sawma???s book. Here???s why:

He appears too educated to waste his time scholasticizing over an issue that could end his life.

He of all people would realize this, being not an outsider.

Thumbing through the Bibliography alone one can tell that this is not some mere ???brain fart???.

Without accusing him of pure knowledge, the book???s content otherwise seems rather compelling.

He is conversant enough through interdisciplinary studies to write on p.21 ???In an effort to make the Qur???an easily understood, the author has compiled ???Syriac and Aramaic Lexicon of the Qur???an??? to be published soon.???

And essentially, with his background and credibility aside, as well as his move to go ???across the grain??? ???.

Most folks are completely ignorant of Arabic and Islam???s history. When I set down Hal Lindsey, Michael Evans, and the ???Left Behind??? gang???s propaganda literature, and sniffed out Bernard Lewis, Mark Gabriel, and Ibn Warraq???s more informed postures, I learned that this topic, honestly, is bigger than I can presently handle; that is, unless I drop everything else to delve into it alone. So I???m not necessarily trying to go ???cross-grain??? with what akhan Paul said (since he is far more qualified in his overall understanding), but leaving Prof. Sawma aside for the moment, realize that he wasn???t the first one with this idea of his, and that any immediate negative attention paid to it certainly defends its position in light of Islam???s mainstream theological attitude (and the Church???s).

Now philologically and what I do intend to point out, however, is based on what Paul mentioned about Aramaicisms versus Aramaic Primacy. May I mention first, though, that despite having many books, that???s not to say that I???ve read them all yet. But what I do read I always intend to digest properly, and frankly, the subject of Islam and its Qur???an deserves more than a brief or superficial (or sarcastic) overview paid attention to it. In fact, back in the day I had the opportunity to sit in an Islamic meeting, except that it was cancelled due to extraneous circumstances, so I instead migrated to a Buddhist meeting which disappointed. That???s how close I could have come to a life-altering encounter with it, personally. It???s taken some seriously weird and unexpected turns in my walk with Y???shua to discover what???s behind each of these religions and all religions, really. It???s not what you think, I assure you (do you realize how integral Islam is to a very conspicuous social branch of Freemasonry?).

So my purpose is not to do a one-time ???drive-by shooting??? with bullets of opinionated ignorance here, but to offer my ???note??? here before I can reach that time I???d some day soon like, to really dig seriously into Arabic???s and Islam???s etiologies. I think in light of current events, it???s sort of important, ya know? So there???s one thing that I notice consistently popping up, mentioned also apparently by Christoph Luxenberg who I noticed you discovered at Wikipedia (thanks by the way, since I wasn???t aware that his German work had recently been made available in English), and that would be that Classical Arabic was written in Defective Script. Now whereas Sawma argues for Aramaic primacy, Luxenberg takes what we Peshitta folks would call a Text-critical approach; hybridization of Classical Arabic and Classical Aramaic. My food-for-thought examples will be drawn from Ibn Warraq with all of this in mind, specifically ones with any notions of assonance, cadence, or homogeny; with your awareness of Hadithic influences presumed:

The Origins of the Koran: Classic Essays on Islam???s Holy Book, Prometheus Books 1998, p.47
??????. And if such a character appeared after Muhammad, still he could never be anything but an imitator, like the false prophets who arose about the time of his death and afterward. That the adversaries should produce any sample whatsoever of poetry or rhetoric equal to the Koran is not at all what the Prophet demands. In that case he would have been put to shame, even in the eyes of many of his own followers, by the first poem that came to hand. Nevertheless, it is on such a false interpretation of this challenge that the dogma of the incomparable excellence of the style and diction of the Koran is based. The rest has been accomplished by dogmatic prejudice, which is quite capable of working other miracles besides turning a defective literary production into an unrivaled masterpiece in the eyes of believers.???
[essay ???The Koran??? by Theodor N??ldeke ??? who under ???Contributors??? p.409 is stated as being the late 19th Century eminent German scholar responsible for the 1860 Geschichte des Qor??ns which ???became the foundation of all later Koranic studies???and is considered an indispensable tool for further research on the Koran.???]

On p.16 of the selfsame book, within Ibn???s own essay entitled simply ???Introduction???, he quotes Charles Adams [Encyclopedia of Religion, 1987]:
???It is of some importance to call attention to a possible source of misunderstanding with regard to the variant readings of the Quran. The seven (versions) refer to actual written and oral text, to distinct versions of Quranic verses, whose differences, though they may not be great, are nonetheless substantial. Since the very existence of variant readings and versions of the Quran goes against the doctrinal position toward the Holy Book held by many modern Muslims, it is not uncommon in an apologetic context to hear the seven (versions) explained as modes of recitation; in fact the manner and technique of recitation are an entirely different matter.???

Following, Ibn states on pp.16-17:
???If we allow that there were omissions, then why not additions? The authenticity of many verses in the Koran has been called into question by Muslims themselves. Many Kharijites, who were followers of ???Ali in the early history of Islam, found the sura recounting the story of Joseph offensive, an erotic tale that did not belong in the Koran.???

???Most scholars believe that there are interpolations in the Koran; these interpolations can be seen as interpretative glosses on certain rare words in need of explanation. More serious are the interpolations of a dogmatic or political character, which seem to have been added to justify the elevation of ???Uthman as caliph to the detriment of ???Ali. Then there are other verses that have been added in the interest of rhyme, or to join together two short passages that on their own lack any connection.???

And one more from this book, p.17:
???Bell and Watt carefully go through many of the emendments and revisions and point to the unevenness of the Koranic style as evidence for a great many alterations in the Koran:
  • There are indeed many roughnesses of this kind, and these, it is here claimed, are fundamental evidence for revision. Besides the points already noticed ??? hidden rhymes, and rhyme phrases not woven into the texture of the passage ??? there are the following: abrupt changes of rhyme; repetition of the same rhyme word or rhyme phrase in adjoining verses; the intrusion of an extraneous subject into a passage otherwise homogenous; a differing treatment of the same subject in neighbouring verses, often with repetition of words and phrases; breaks in grammatical construction which raise difficulties in exegesis; abrupt changes in length of verse; sudden changes of the dramatic situation, with changes of pronoun from singular to plural, from second to third person, and so on; the juxtaposition of apparently contrary statements; the juxtaposition of passages of different date, with intrusion of late phrases into early verses;
    In many cases a passage has alternative continuations which follow one another in the present text. The second of the alternatives is marked by a break in sense and by a break in grammatical construction, since the connection is not with what immediately precedes, but with what stands some distance back. ???
    [quoted from Introduction to the Quran, 1970]
Now a mention or so from his much more massive and scholarly tome (and I???ve yet to get his ???Which Koran?: Variants, Manuscripts, and the Influence of Pre-Islamic Poetry??? after being stood up by Amazon for a good whole year???and I notice it is yet ???currently unavailable??? ??? gee, I wonder why):

What the Koran Really Says: Language, Text, & Commentary, Prometheus Books 2002, pp.23-24
???.???Jackson Mathews also singles out another feature that is most difficult to translate: ???Rhythm is the one feature of a foreign language that we can probably never learn to hear purely. Rhythm and the meaning of rhythm lie too deep in us. They are absorbed into the habits of the body and the uses of the voice along with all our earliest apprehensions of ourselves and the world. Rhythm forms the sensibility, becomes part of the personality; and one???s sense of rhythm is shaped once and for all on one???s native tongue.??? Thus, we can grant that in any translation, whatever the language concerned, there will be inevitable loss of melody and evocative power. However matters are, as we shall see, even more complicated when it comes to Arabic.???

???Many educated Muslims whose native tongue is not Arabic do learn it in order to learn the Koran; but then again, the vast majority do not understand Arabic, even though many do learn parts of the Koran by heart without understanding a word.???

???In other words, the majority of Muslims have to read the Koran in translation in order to understand it???Even for contemporary Arabic-speaking peoples, reading the Koran is far from being a straightforward matter. The Koran is putatively (as we shall see, it is very difficult to decide exactly what the language of the Koran is) written in what we call Classical Arabic (CA), but modern Arab populations, leaving aside the problem of illiteracy in Arab countries, do not speak, read, or write, let alone think, in CA.???

Sounds like the same human dilemma most Christians struggle with, no? But I???m not going to go there. Thank God for the Peshitta, because the Qur???anic ???textual-jihad??? sounds an awful lot like Greek Primacy, doesn???t it!

In fact, this is why I???m suggesting another look for this provocative book .???
???Muslim commentators do not understand the rules of Syriac grammar, they interpret Syriac prefix prepositions as if they were Arabic, and render erroneous interpretations accordingly. In many cases, Muslim commentators rendered contradicting interpretations to the same verse, as we shall see. In many verses, the commentators are frustrated about what meaning should they render to a verse; such a frustration is shown in the use of words like: ???if??? (Ali???s commentary # 2602); ???I think??? (Ali???s commentary # 2013), ???perhaps??? (Ali???s commentary # 2000), ???may mean??? (Ali???s commentary # 2546), etc. In other cases, the same commentator renders two interpretations having opposite meaning to a Qur???anic word. For example, in his commentary on verse 20: 16, A. Yusuf Ali explains the Qur???anic word ???ukhfiha??? (to hide) as following: ???Ukhfi may mean either ???keep it hidden???, or ???make it manifest??? (Ali???s commentary # 2546). The reason for this contradiction is due to lack of knowledge of Syriac and Aramaic. He is unable to interpret a book, which is written in a language, alien to him.???
[Sawma, pp.16-17]

???There are numerous Qur???anic verses that are borrowed from the Old Testament. We will examine those similarities in this book. Others are taken from the Talmud; the following chapters will show the sources of those verses. Certain verses are borrowed from ecclesiastical writings of early Christian authorities that are known to exist, and yet were omitted from the authorized New Testament. There are 16 verses from chapter 18 that are taken from the story of the Cave written by the Syriac Metropolitan, Jacob of Suruj (431-521 A.D.).???
[p.17, Sawma]

???The Qur???an says its language is Arabic ???Qur???aanan ???Arabiyyan???. In Syriac the Qur???anic word ??? ???Arabiyyan??? means ???western??? i.e. the setting of the sun. In other words, the Qur???an says it is a ???western reading???. Syriac ???qeryono ???arboyo, or qeryana arabaya??? means ???western reading???.???
[p.19, Sawma]

And finally, considering whether this topic or particular author is worthwhile or not, this should do, for now ???.
???The tools I used to write this book are: Biblia Hebraica, Biblical Aramaic, the Syriac Peshito (Fshito), the liturgy and hymns of the Syrian Orthodox Church of Antioch as taught by Professor, the late Patriarch Jacob III of the Syrian Orthodox Church of Antioch, and Professor Malfono Asmar El-Khoury; the dialect of Eastern Syriac as spoken in the region of Tur Abdin in South East Turkey and the Jazirah district in east Syria; the magnificent handwritten Syriac Bible of the Four Gospels scribed by my late professor, Malfono Asmar El-Khoury, of St. Severius College in Beirut, Lebanon, to whom I owe my knowledge of Syriac; the Hebrew and English Lexicon of the Old Testament (H&EL) ???.???
[p.21, Sawma]

I???m actually provoked more now through that information given at Wikipedia, than I was when I first got Sawma???s book a while ago. Granted we???re no masters of Comparative Semitic, we somehow nevertheless broke through King James and acknowledged the truth of Eastern Aramaic???s Peshitta. Whatever the case be, any cadence to be found within Quranic textualism appears to be under serious suspicion. For now that???s all I???ll say, since it is about all I can say, until perhaps another day?

Shlama w???burkate,

Ryan
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#5
The language of the Quran is arabic..

Audio Quran
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#6
anwar34 Wrote:The language of the Quran is arabic..

Yes, but the pre-quran is not what we call 'standard Arabic'.
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There are a lot of words in common b.t.w. The Arabic for 'unbeliever' is often translated as 'one who covers' (kaafir", "kufr" or "kuffar)
however, the Aramaic word 'Kapar', means 'denyer' which is a much more plausable authentic meaning.
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#7
1- Arabic, and yes, it's same as today.
2- No. God said in Quran: "We have, without doubt sent down the Message; and We will assuredly guard it (from corruption)".
3- I never heard about the ancient Quran, and I'd never believe it, for the same reason above "

It's fabricated story, because:
1- The Prophet (bpuh) was Arab, so the original text was in Arabic.
2- It's not Quran if not in the original text. The translation you read in english or any other language, is not Quran, it's translation of the Quran.
3- The Arabic language is still spoken until today, which kept the original text until today.
4- The miracle of Quran is not only in it's scientific content, but also in its language as well. The beauty of Quran as a literature is still in today's Enmac Digital Quran Price.
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#8
asifadeel Wrote:1- Arabic, and yes, it's same as today.
2- No. God said in Quran: "We have, without doubt sent down the Message; and We will assuredly guard it (from corruption)".
3- I never heard about the ancient Quran, and I'd never believe it, for the same reason above "

This already falsified and proven wrong. There were hidden ancient versions of the quran in Yemen.
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You can deny it, but that's just cognitive dissonance <!-- sSmile --><img src="{SMILIES_PATH}/smile.gif" alt="Smile" title="Smile" /><!-- sSmile -->

<!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://answeringislam.org/Green/uthman.htm">http://answeringislam.org/Green/uthman.htm</a><!-- m -->
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#9
Like the Peshitta, the Qur'an underwent a strong standardization early on in its life. Most of the pre-standard manuscripts were destroyed; however, we do have a number of examples that preserve pre-standard readings as they missed the chopping block.They have been vetted by serious scholars.
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#10
Steve, since you keep bringing it up...

If you know of anything from the Eastern Peshitta text, which got chopped off during this supposed "standardization" of its text, then please show it here.

If you have seen anything, anything at all....then please let's see what we might be missing in the Aramaic NT, don't hold back what we should be reading in God's Holy Word.

If not, and until I see some real proof of it, I'll call it mere assumption.


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#11
Thirdwoe Wrote:Steve, since you keep bringing it up...

If you know of anything from the Eastern Peshitta text, which got chopped off during this supposed "standardization" of its text, then please show it here.

If you have seen anything, anything at all....then please let's see what we might be missing in the Aramaic NT, don't hold back what we should be reading in God's Holy Word.

If not, and until I see some real proof of it, I'll call it mere assumption.


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Nothing else but the 'old scratch' and <!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://nl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Codex_Bezae">http://nl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Codex_Bezae</a><!-- m -->
You know he's going to answer that <!-- sSmile --><img src="{SMILIES_PATH}/smile.gif" alt="Smile" title="Smile" /><!-- sSmile -->
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#12
I was drawing a metaphor to discuss the Qur'an here, not looking to debate the Peshitta.

As such, I will only say here that there are only about 60 early Peshitta manuscripts (which is a small pool compared to the Greek tradition) and a few of them, such as Paris, Bib. Nat. Ms Syr 30 (which is dated early) differ almost as much as 10% from the "standard" text originally compiled by Pusey and Gwilliam. This isn't hidden knowledge. <!-- sHuh --><img src="{SMILIES_PATH}/huh.gif" alt="Huh" title="Huh" /><!-- sHuh -->
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#13
Steve,

I keep hearing this line from you, that what we see in the Eastern MSS such as the Khabouris Codex, the Houghton 1199 (Ashael Grant's MSS), and the Mingana 148, is some type of "standardized", text of the Aramaic NT, which some think has something different than what is found in the earlier dated Eastern Peshitta MSS.

I believe that the Eastern text is the older form, which was maintained in the transmission of MSS copies by the Church of the East, not the Western Syriac Orthodox revised copies, which I see has been at times mixed in with some Greek readings.

What I am asking you, Steve, is not to give more statements like, what you said here:

Quote:...and a few of them, such as Paris, Bib. Nat. Ms Syr 30 (which is dated early) differ almost as much as 10% from the "standard" text...

I'm looking for some real examples of these supposed 10% differences that might exist in the Eastern MSS witnesses, if you know what they are. Eastern I mean, not the Western variety....But, if you don't have any that's fine, but if you do, please show us some actual examples that you might know of.

You can put them up on another thread for our consideration.

As to P&G's 1901-1920 A.D. edited version of the Aramaic NT text, I think you know that they added some Greek readings into their text, where it didn't exist, as well as adding the western five books to it, which comes from Greek sources, putting them into the appendix section of their production.

I don't consider their patchwork of a text to be "the standard" form of The Peshitta, but see it as their form, being part Aramaic NT part Greek NT in origin. Thus a hybrid text.

Shlama,
Chuck

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