The Quest of a Curious Muslim

The Quest of a Curious Muslim — Page 25

25 Such care was unfortunately not taken with the Bible, for instance, and it led to the loss of much of the original language in which it was first written. According to scholars, Jesus Christ as , for instance, spoke in Aramaic—a language closely related to Hebrew—but none of his original words have been preserved. They were translated into Greek and the oldest documents containing his words are all written in Greek. This was then further translated into Syriac and Latin and then translated into English. Hence, parts of the Bible that we read today are a translation of the translation of the translation! By keeping the main parts of the prayer in Arabic, Islam has ensured that the original wording is always retained and available to be translated into whatever newer languages that exist at a time. Language itself evolves and translations will keep on getting updated to conform to modern usage, but the original will always be there to ensure that the revised translation is accurate. As far as the Salat is concerned, there is no doubt that it takes some effort to learn it in Arabic, which is a foreign language for many people, and may