Khilafat Centenary Souvenir 1908-2008 — Page 124
Khilafat Centenary Tafseer-i-Sagheer, of which several editions have been published to date from R abwah, Qadian , and London. English Translation: The responsibility of the translation of the Hol y Qur'an in Eng li sh with commentary was given to Maulvi Mohammad Ali ra during the life of the Prom i sed Messiah as. But in 1941 , at the beginning of the second Khilafat, he left the Jama ' at, took the entire work with him to Lahore and published it on his own. Later, in 1933, the responsibility of the English translation was given to Hadhrat Maulvi Sher AlF a, by Hadhrat Musl eh Mau ' ood ra. In 1936, he was s ent to England, where during three years of his stay, he completed this assignment. This English translation was first publish ed in 1955 and numerous editions have been publish ed to date. In 1944, Hadhrat Khalifatul Masih rr ra instigated a special project of translation of the Hol y Qur'an in various languages. Hence , on October 20 1 \ 1944, he started the magnificent project of translation in seven of the most popular languages of the world: English, Russian, German, Italian, Dutch , Spanish and Portuguese. Huzur ra strived for the successful completion of this project in his lifetime. All the expenses for translation of Qur' an into Italian were incurred by Huzur ra himself. Lajna Imaillah, India was made responsible for the expenses of the German translation, andjama ' at Ahmadi yya, Qadian was to bear the expenses for another. He asked that the expenses for the rest of the four languages were to be borne by either four Jama 'ats or individuals. After this annou n cement in a Khutba (sermon) Hadhrat Chaudhary Muhammad Zafrullah Khan ra and a few of his friends decided to bear the expense on one such translation. As had been prophesized in the Qur'an in: ' Wa aakhareena minhum lima yalhaui behim ', (the companions of the Promised Messiah as will be like the sincere companions of the Holy Propher aw ), the wa y in which the members ofjama'at Ahmadi yy a, presented themselves with love and obedience, at the call of their Imam for this magnificent project, is extraordinary. As the differentjama'ats heard the second Khalifa'sra khutba, more pledges for bearing the expenses of translations of the' Qur'an started coming in and within a few da ys, expenses had been pledged for all nine translations. The devotees of Khilafat presented magnificent models of competition and sincerity which made Hadhrat Musleh Mau ' ood ra comment in his November 3, 1944 khutba in these words, "Allah, the Exalted's dealings with me have always been such that whenever He makes me sa y something, He provides for its success also. . . After the initiation of this project, the requests receiv ed for participation have exceeded our requirement. We had requested for seven translations and we ha ve received pledges equivalent to twelve, and are still receiving requests from abroad for participation" (Al-Fa zl, Nov. 8, 1944). According to Hadhrat Musleh Mau'ood's ra estimates, the cost for printing and publication of these translations was 19 4,000. 00 Rupees, which he had requested from the members of the J ama'at , but the devotees of the Promised Messiah as and his true Khilafat presented pledges of 260,000. 00 Rupees in a short period and most of the amount was collected soon after. Within two years, tran slations in the aforementioned sev en languages were completed (translation into English had alre ad y been completed). Hadhrat Musleh Mau 'oo d ra c ommented , "W ith the blessing of Allah, the Exalted, translations of the Qur ' an in seven different languages has b e en completed and a cop y of each of these has be en safe-deposited in a bank. We are waiting for our missionaries to learn these languages in order to review these translations, so that possibilities of an y mistakes are eliminated" (Al - Fa zl, Dec. 28, 1946). Thus, under the appeals and supervision of the rev ered Khulafa of the Promised Me ssiah as , the project of publication of translations of the Holy Qur ' an proceeded further and, as of April 30, 2008, Jama'at Ahmadi yya is blessed to ha ve publis hed complete translations of the Qur'an in sixty five different languages of the world. Many of these translations include explanatory notes of important verses, introduction of the surah s, and a detailed index of subjects- matter. In addition, the first twenty parts of the Qur 'an have been translated into the Thai language and translation of the first ten parts has been completed in Burmese and Javanese languages; the remaining parts are currently being translated. Translations in man y more languages have been