A Word For Word Meaning Of The Quran

This set places one or a couple of words of the ayah in one line of a column and gives their meanings side by side in another column, taking care to see that the flow and intelligibility of the English meanings are not thereby lost. This method enables the reader to identify which English words or phrases represent the meaning of which words in the Arabic text. It has the additional advantage of keeping the meaning strictly to the wording of the text or importing in the meaning any word or expression that has no correspondence with anything in the text.

To further facilitate the understanding of the text, the meanings of almost all important words in the text have been given separately. To do this a number has been placed on the English word which represents the meaning of the particular word in the text and then the meanings of that word have been given under that number in another column by the side of the general meaning of the text. The numbering has been kept individual for each page.

Also grammatical notes, particularly verb forms and verbal nouns, have been given as far as possible. As the words recur at different pages, so their meanings and grammatical notes also have been repeated, giving cross reference to at least one previous occurrence of the word, indicating the page on which and the number under which the word has been explained before. The aim has been to enable a non-Arab reader to understand the Quran as well as to improve his knowledge of Arabic, particularly the Quranic Arabic.

About his translation, Professor Mohar Ali said,

“The translation that I gave is continuous, the meaning is clear, the English is idiomatic, not broken, so that even if the Arabic text is not kept side by side, by reading English only, the sense can be understood and sense can be found. That is why I have named it the Word-for-Word Meaning of the Quran.”

Another feature of this translation is the cross-references. Professor Mohar Ali has given cross-references. He has given the word meaning side by side along with the general English meaning and within the Arabic grammar and also the verb forms, so that any person who does not know Arabic can get some help in learning Quranic Arabic and if any Englishman wants to know and understand the meaning of the Quran, he will have with him the text as well as the English meaning.