Problems of translating collocations in the glorious Qur'an into English : a rhetorical approach

Abstract EN

The present paper attempts to study collocations in the Glorious Qur'ān and their renderings into English.

It focuses on the rhetorical use of these collocations and highlights difficulties translators encounter in rendering them as they are not the collocations one can find in the everyday use in the source language (Arabic) due to the inimitable nature of the Qur'ānic texts.

The paper hypothesizes that translators sometimes fail to reflect the rhetorical meaning and consequently, effect of collocations of Qur'ānic texts in the target language (English).

They may also use figures of speech different from those of the source language (SL) text.

The procedure followed in this paper involves selecting collocational Qur'ānic texts and analyzing them in the light of the interpretations by exegetes.

Attention is given to rhetorical features explained in the interpretations.

This is followed by discussions of their English (TL) renderings, pinpointing in the meantime areas of success or failure on the part of the translators and suggesting the most appropriate translation.