English Translations of The Quran - 20th and 21st Century Translations

20th and 21st Century Translations

• The Qur'an (1910) by Mirza Abul Fazl, Arabic Text and English Translation Arranged Chronologically with an Abstract (Allahabad). Mirza Abul Fazl (1865–1956), was a native of Allahabad, India. He was the first Muslim to present a translation of the Qur'an in to English along with the original Arabic text.

• The Holy Qur'an (1917, 4th rev. ed. 1951) by Maulana Muhammad 'Ali, an Ahmadiya scholar of the Qur'an, Hadith and religion of Islam, and author of several widely-read books on these topics. 'Ali gives copious explanatory notes, introductions to each chapter, and a general preface-introduction of nearly 70 pages.

• The Meaning of the Glorious Koran (1930) by Muhammad Marmaduke Pickthall. An English convert to Islam penned this translation at the behest of the Emir of Hyderabad while on a sojourn in India. Clearly following M.M. 'Ali's wording and notes, Pickthall's widely-printed translation was regarded as "an important milestone in the long course of Koranic interpretation" by later esteemed Qur'an translator A.J. Arberry, who also noted a few problems with Pickthall's verse-numbering, deviating in places from the by-then standard Arabic edition by Gustav Fluegel.

• The Holy Qur'an: Translation and Commentary (1934) by Abdullah Yusuf Ali. This translation is widely used in many English-speaking countries.

• The Qur'an: Translated, with a Critical Re-arrangement of the Surahs (1937–39) by Richard Bell. Published by Edinburgh University Press. A.J. Arberry, in the Preface to his own translation of the Qur'an, notes: "Dr Bell was a most erudite scholar of Arabic, and had devoted many years to his 'critical re-arrangement of the Surahs '.... He quite literally took the Koran to pieces and put it together again, his meticulous reconstruction extending as far as individual verses and even parts of verses. As he set up his translation in a kind of tabular form to indicate his views of how the discourse originally ran, it is virtually unreadable; certainly one needs to have some detailed knowledge of the text in order to benefit by the arduous exercise of studying his hard-laboured pages."

• The Koran Interpreted (1955) by Arthur Arberry. The first English translation by an academic scholar of Arabic, Islam and also Sufism. For many years the scholarly standard for English translations, this rendering of the Qur'an makes special attempt to reproduce something of the rhythms and cadence of the Arabic original.

• The Koran (1956) by N. J. Dawood is published by Penguin. Dawood, a native Arabic speaker from Iraq's now defunct Jewish community, is said to have preferred comprehensibility to literalism in translation, making his version comparatively easy to read. The first edition of the Dawood translation rearranged the chapters (suras) into more-or-less chronological order, but later editions restored the traditional sequence.

• Tafsir-ul-Quran (1957) by the Indian scholar Abdul Majid Daryabadi is a translation with commentary. Daryabadi criticizes the scriptures of other religions, such as the Christian Bible, claiming they have not been transmitted faithfully.

• The Message of the Qur'an: Presented in Perspective (1974) by Dr. Hashim Amir Ali. The suras are presented in chronological order.

• The Message of the Qur'an (1980) by Muhammad Asad. Written by a Jewish convert to Islam.

• Al-Qur'an, A Contemporary Translation (1984) by Ahmed Ali. This translation, published by the Princeton University Press.

• The Qur'an: The First American Version (1985); by Dr. Thomas Ballantyne Irving / T.B. Irving (Al Hajj Ta'lim Ali Abu Nasr), Dr. Irving is a Canadian Muslim who is an author, professor, translator (Arabic, Spanish) and activist. His translation (which is English only) uses North American English vernacular; published by Amana Books, Brattleboro, Vermont.

• The Holy Qur'an (1988) by Syed V. Mir Ahmed Ali. A translation used by English-speaking Shi'ite Muslims.

• Quran: The Final Testament (1992); revision of work first published in 1981) is the work of the controversial teacher and computer scientist Rashad Khalifa. Khalifa claimed that he had used mathematics and computers to find hidden meanings in the Qur'an.

• The Nobel Qur'an (1992); by Dr. Thomas Ballantyne Irving / T.B. Irving (Al Hajj Ta'lim Ali Abu Nasr). Arabic text with English translation and commentary by Dr. Irving. Published by Amana Books, Brattleboro, Vermont.

• The Glorious Qur'an (1993), a joint translation of UK-based, Egyptian-born Dr. Ahmad Zidan and British Muslim convert Mrs. Dina Zidan.

• A Simple Translation of The Holy Quran (1993), by Dr. Mir Aneesuddin. This translation uses Simple English, also called Basic English; it is published by the Islamic Academy of Sciences, Hyderabad, India.

• The Glorious Qur'an (1995), by Dr. Syed Vickar Ahmed, is another translation from New York publisher Tahirke Tarsile Qur'an.

• The Holy Qur'an (1997) by Saheeh International is translated by three American women converts. It is published by the Dar Abul Qasim Publishing House, Saudi Arabia.

• Al-Qur'an: Guidance for Mankind (1997) by M. Farooq-e-Azam Malik.

• Interpretation of the Meanings of the Noble Qur'an (1999) by Darussalam (first published 1977) is translated by Muhammad Muhsin Khan and Muhammad Taqi-ud-Din Al-Hilali. This translation is among the most widely read translations in the world, primarily because it is the officially promoted translation of the Saudi Government.

• The Qur'an (1999) by Mohammedali Habib Shakir is an English translation directed towards Shia Muslims. It is published in New York by Tahirke Tarsile Qur'an.

• The Noble Qur'an: A New Rendering of Its Meaning in English (1999) by Abdalhaqq Bewley and Aisha Bewley. The husband and wife team behind this translation are disciples of Abdalqadir as-Sufi. They have also translated the Muwatta of Imam Malik, Tafsir al-Qurtubi, and the Ash-Shifa of Qadi Iyad.

• The Quran: A Poetic Translation (1999), a recent work by Iranian-born lecturer, translator and linguist Fazlollah Nikayin attempts a poetic rendering of the Qur'an.

• Translation and Commentary on The Holy Quran (2000), a 1,256 page effort by Indian-Bengali translator Dr. Zohurul Hoque.

• The Majestic Qur'an: An English Rendition of Its Meanings (2000) was translated by a committee that included Cambridge professor Timothy Winter, American-Muslim writer Uthman Hutchinson, and Mostafa al-Badawi. It is published by Starlatch Press.

• The Qur'an in Persian and English (Bilingual Edition, 2001) features an English translation by the Iranian poet and author Tahere Saffarzadeh.

• The Qur'an (2002), by UK-based Afghanistan-born writer M.J. Gohari, is an Oxford Logos Society imprint.

• The Tajwidi Qur'an (2003) is a translation by an American Muslim convert from Virginia, Nooruddeen Durkee. It presents the Arabic text using a romanized transliteration system that allows English-speaking readers to pronounce Arabic. The English translation is an amalgamation of other translations.

• The Qur’an with an English Paraphrase (2003), a translation by Indian-born Sayyid Ali Quli Qara'i is an imprint of the Iranian Centre for Translation of the Holy Qur'an.

• The Qur'an: A New Translation (2004) by a well-known California-based translator of numerous Buddhist works, Dr. Thomas Cleary. Based on an earlier, partial translation, which was highly praised by famous American-Muslim scholar Hamza Yusuf.

• The Qur'an (2004), by M.A.S. Abdel-Haleem, is published by Oxford World Classics.

• The Quran: A Reformist Translation (2007), is a recent translation by the team of Edip Yuksel, Layth Saleh al-Shaiban, and Martha Schulte-Nafeh. They claim to offer a non-sexist understanding of the text.

• The Sublime Qur'an (2007) is by Chicago-based scholar Laleh Bakhtiar, an America Shi'a.

• The Qur'an (2007) a recent translation by retired Oxford University lecturer and Arabist Alan Jones.

• The Qur'an With Annotated Interpretation in Modern English (2007) by Ali Ünal. The translator is a member of the Gülen Movement, a Turkish Islamic group.

• The Gracious Qur'an: A Modern Phrased Interpretation in English (2008) by Dr. Ahmad Zaki Hammad, of Egypt's Al-Azhar University.

• The Message - A Translation of the Glorious Qur'an (2008) was translated by the Monotheistic Group, which claims to be a group of progressive Muslims.

• The Qur'an: A New Translation (2008) by Tarif Khalidi, who is a professor of Islamic Studies at the American University of Beirut. The translation is published by Penguin Classics.

• The Generous Qur’an (2009) is a translation by Usama Dakdok.

• The Quran: Translation and Commentary with Parallel Arabic Text (2009) by Maulana Wahiduddin Khan. Published in India.

• Irfan ul Quran (2009) is a translation by Pakistani scholar Muhammad Tahir-ul-Qadri; it was released together with an Urdu translation of the same name, by Minhaj-ul-Quran Publications.

• The Holy Qur'an: Guidance for Life (2010) is a translation by American-Muslim writer Yahiya Emerick, who has also published the Complete Idiot's Guide to Understanding Islam.

• The Qur'an (2011) Translated by Bangalore-resident Nazeer Ahmed into American English.

• The Glorious Qur'an (2011) is a translation by Pakistani scholar Muhammad Tahir-ul-Qadri; it was published in the UK by Minhaj-ul-Quran Publications.

• The Wise Qur'an: A Modern English Translation (2012) is a translation by Chicago-based writer and lecturer Dr. Assad Nimer Busool.