Comments on: Quran Translation: American Muslim Woman Presents New Translation of “Beat Them (Lightly)” Verse

By: Umber

Umber — Mon, 17 Aug 2009 16:29:06 +0000

Assalamaolekum!…I don’t know why such a fuss about the meaning of one word…there are so many hadiths advicing the men to treat their wives fairly and with love…Any practicing Muslim, Man or woman, would never disobey the prophet and his teachings. The practicing Muslim man would never ever think of treating his wife unfairly let alone beat the wife, and if he does it he is not a good Muslim, . Also, no practicing Muslim wife will think of adultery or anything that her husband does not like (except if he is on the wrong path or disobeying the commands of Allah and His prophet).

The Verse under discussion is in reference to a particular and extreme situation and teaches men how to deal with it. Why would Allah and his prophet allow men to beat/ strike his wife in normal circumstances? when on various other places, which unfortunately we do not discuss in detail, advice man to treat women as their other half?, why would Quran or the prophet tell to beat wife , just because she cooked a bad dinner? gives an opinion? expresses to do something meaningful in her life(within her veil)?….Allah is not unjust,He is Wise and provides guidance on various situations both regular and extreme ones.

The Verse under discussion is an advising on an extreme situation. Allah never encourages violences unless it is to counter one when all other means fail. He reveled an entire Chapter on the subject of Marriage and husband wife relationship, The prophet was an exemplary husband; a role model, this Ayath was a equally a commandment for him as it is to any other Muslim man, but did we have single instance of him beating his wife?…No. Even when the incident of Ayesha R.A happened (infidels accused her of adultery) he did not beat her, he simply stopped talking to her because he was angry and did not know the truth and later the matter cleared out. Any man who will hear such a thing is bound to get angry ( nothing more can upset a husband other than the knowledge of his wife being unfaithful or he is a sadist looking for excuses to beat his wife, and needs treatment) but through Prophets example we learned that one should hold the anger and as adviced by Allah look for facts(refer to Chapter Al-Nur of Quran). Isn’t this an example for Muslim men? unfortunately many Muslim Man do not follow. So the problem is not the interpretation but lack of knowledge and failure to understand the message as a whole. and What if the verse really means ‘to beat’…so what? would we stop believing?

Allah is not ashamed to give examples even of a mosquito or bee then why do we get embarassed? specially when the verse is just advising on a particular situation?

The problem is not the interpretation but the practice…First, if we accept Quran as it is, and do not be influenced by the crticism of the unbelievers who just just for the sake of criticism pick up Ayaths randomly and just go for their literal meaning without the context and understanding this issue will not arise at all…The verses of Quran can not be interpretated in isolation, we have to look at the various other verses, the life and sayings of the Prophet and form an opinion on the matter as a whole.

Now ask yourself does Allah and Prophet will allow the beating of a wife randomly?…Oh today i am in the mood of beating my wife so lets do it and yeah i have a verse of a Quran to support me, i will just get away by saying my wife was disobedient!…Is Allah so unjust???

By: Zaman

Zaman — Thu, 23 Jul 2009 17:20:36 +0000

Salam- I don’t see why people should leave the faith if they don’t agree it every aspect of it. People should be allowed to use their intelligence to analyse and draw their own conclusions. If there are different interpretations of words and men have interpreted some words to mean something, women have a right to think for themselves and have a debate. I can’t understand how as a Muslim, you could tell someone to leave the faith just for daring to ask questions. Husbands and wives should treat each other fairly, honestly and with respect. Two wrongs don’t make a right. Violence is not a civilised way of dealing with problems. The prophet is said to have said, “The best man among you is the one who is best to his wife.” How does violence fit into this? Surely, it is much better to separate from someone if they betray your trust. We should all be honest, pure and trustworthy because the prophet set an example by being honest. Men and women should be faithful and chaste. Infidelity is not acceptabl. However, I don’t agree with the male interpretation of Islam which suggests that women should obey men in everything and treat men as though they are infallible. Men and women are fallible and make mistakes. To treat a man as though he is infallible is treating him like God and this is idolatry. No one but God is perfect. No man can claim to be like God and therefore, men can make mistakes. If this is the case, a woman has the right to think for herself if the man is in the wrong. Women are human beings with intelligence. They are PARTNERS to men, not dogs submitting to their masters! Until all Muslim men can get this through their heads, Islam will always be perceived as a backward religion.

By: Zaman

Zaman — Thu, 23 Jul 2009 17:03:39 +0000

Response to Whole-earth. There is a book calle Evolution Deceit by Harun Yahya in which he uses scientific research and proof to debunk Darwinism. You can google it on the internet. It’s a really interesting read.

You’re probably right. Ignorant people have probably added superstitious beliefs to religion but I believe that there is some truth in it. I don’t want to throw out the baby with the bathwater. Prayer has helped me to survive awful experiences and cured me of terrifying nightmares. It’s not all superstition otherwise, I would not be alive today.

By: Zaman

Zaman — Thu, 23 Jul 2009 16:59:24 +0000

Over the centuries, religions become changed by people who add things on here and there and interpret things differently to the way that they were meant originally. I’m a Muslim woman. I dress modestly but I don’t wear the scarf but I respect women who choose to do so. I follow the five pillars of Islam. I read the English translation of the Quran and I have a little book of hadith which I read- Forty Hadeeth on the Islamic personality. I’m an honest person and I try to treat others as I would like to be treated but I don’t get caught up in obsessing about rituals and cultural laws which have been innovated and added to religion over the centuries. My faith has helped me to survive terrible times and given me great strength. I used to have terrible nightmares ( for 10 years) and once I started praying five times daily, the nightmares went away. Faith can help in everyday life so long as you don’t get bogged down with cultural things that people have added to the religion over the centuries!

By: Faqir

Faqir — Fri, 10 Jul 2009 12:24:09 +0000

and it is “strike” that is a better translation, not “beat”. Thought there would be a chance to review and edit.

By: Faqir

Faqir — Fri, 10 Jul 2009 12:22:18 +0000

It seems that this website cannot handle standard unicode. Correct unicode transliterations of Arabic words got munged. Sorry. Bad!

By: Faqir

Faqir — Fri, 10 Jul 2009 12:21:16 +0000

I hate to be a boring old philologist but
a) ?araba is best translated as “to strike” not “beat.” This is a problem of English. “Beat” suggests a repeating drubbing. ?araba can mean beat, but in isolation “beat” is a better translation. ?araba is frequently used as an example in grammatical discussions, and there is a difference between “?arabtuhu” and “?arabtuhu ?arban”. So the Qur??nic verse would seem to allow the husband to strike his wife, not to beat her.

b) but it has to be said, “beat lightly” and “depart” and whatever else might be suggested as alternate translations are proposed from a desire to make the Qur??n say what we seem to think it ought to say. This is a well-meaning but unconvincing, and ultimately unsuccessful because dishonest enterprise.

Muslims, like everyone else, need to be able to “forget” verses (as they already do with the many verses referring to slavery–and rightly so) and just say, “that was the 7th century. This is not.” “Beating” whether lightly or not is hardly an essential feature of the Qur??n—why not just do what many have done and say that parts of the Qur??n are linked to the time and place of their revelation–and move on!

By: Hilal from Oman

Hilal from Oman — Fri, 03 Jul 2009 01:44:03 +0000

I would first like to thank the writer, Mrs. Useem, for her good unbiased writing. I would also like to express my disappointmen with “modern Muslims” as well as great apprehension for the future of Islam in the West or the new world.
I have several points that should be taken into consideration regarding the practices of those “modern” Muslims, mostly living in the West,
1. some don’t seem to care about some obvious teachings of Islam.
2. some feel ashamed of being Muslims
3. some are influenced by false ideologies that don’t contradict the teaching of Islam.
4. Bakhtiar herself is not a good Muslim [this is from what I saw in interview with her]. I don’t know about her inner self but I sure know about her appearance. She is not covering her head, which is clearly commanded in the Quran. I know some may think this is not important and that only beliefs what count. This is ridculous; we don’t have such a thing in Islam. Islam is a complete way of life. You can’t choose what you like and disregard what you don’t like. Faith is both by heart and by action. If a “Muslim” is committing a minor sin, and insisting on doing so, then it becomes a major sin and if he/she doesn’t repent before dying, then Allah will not forgive him/her. Period. Allah is most Merciful, true, but He is, too, “ShadeedulEqab”, punishes severely.
5. It always amazes that those who claim to be Muslims, but not practicing seriously, are defending Islam. They are Muslims for sure, but Islam is not only about words. Period.
6. most of those “modern” Muslims are difficult to identify as Muslims, simply because they don’t preserve their Muslim identity, which they feel ashamed to show, to the extent that some have tatoos in them, which is a clear violation of the teachings of Islam.
To list but a few… to sum it up, it’s a distorted image of Islam created by no other than Muslims themselves!
Muslims as well as non Muslims should not give their opinions on certain things in Islam that do not afford opinion because they are basics/pillars/etc… they just do not afford interpretations. On the other hand, other issues that afford interpretations are not open to everyone to give their opinions. Scholars are to be consulted in such matters.
Those of you who called Tariq Swuaidan as a scholar of Islam, well he is not, besides he himself can’t claim this.
- Why do we have to prove ourselves to others? Islam is Islam. You like it, good for you; you don’t, never embrace it and keep away from it.
- one of the silly examples of Muslims in the West is a conversion/reversion incident of a Christian woman to Islam. The lady was being taught “Shahadah”, declaration of faith, by a Muslim Imam. After she did, he hugged her; he hugged her! If this is the Imam, how would the others be?
At the end, don’t get me wrong. I’m not denying that wrong practices do exist in the East, as well but most of the wrongdoers are aware that what they do is haram/prohibited in Islam. Wrongdoers in the West, on the other hand, think there nothing wrong with it!

By: bzb

bzb — Thu, 02 Jul 2009 19:31:52 +0000

It seems as if lalah Bakhtiar commited yet another immoral act of passing work as her own. She has recently made changes in her translation. I discovered this on wikipedia under yahya bin zachariah the islamic view.?!

By: Quran Translation American Muslim Woman Presents New Translation | Shed Kits

Wed, 27 May 2009 01:50:15 +0000

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