Proposing a Tentative Revision Hypothesis for Sacred Texts: The Holy Qur'an's English Translation and Revision in Focus

SKASE Journal of Translation and Interpretation, 2025; 18(3): 3–19 doi: 10.33542/JTI2025-2-2 3 Proposing a Tentative Revision Hypothesis for Sacred Texts: The Holy Qur’an’s English Translation and Revision in Focus Mahmoud Afrouz, University of Isfahan Abstract The present study analyzes a translation of the Holy Qur’an and its revision to take a step towards formulating a tentative revision hypothesis. Muhammad Ali’s (1917) translation and its edited version by Aziz (2010) are the corpus of the study. The major principle of the revision hypothesis was found to be that the translation of a sacred-text is less targetoriented than its edited-version. This revision hypothesis is not formulated in absolute terms. Other researchers can test the validity of its principles by focusing on specific genres (i.e. religious texts, children’s literature, etc.). Keywords: the Holy Qur’an; sacred texts; the revision hypothesis; Maulana Muhammad Ali (1917); Zahid Aziz (2010) 1. Introduction The passage of time may cause cultures, languages and translations to experience some changes. In the case of translations, such change sometimes appears in the form of a revised (self-)edition of the translation or the production of (re)translations by other translators. Retranslation refers to the process of translating a source text (ST) that has previously been rendered into the same target language (TL). Retranslation, as a product, “denotes a second or later translation of a single ST into the same” TL (Koskinen & Paloposki 2010: 294). Accordingly, retranslators are those who produce retranslations. Although retranslations may sometimes “respond to a lack in the initial translation,” they “exist not because earlier translations are defective but because they are the necessary condition for the survival of the canonical source text” (Massardier-Kenney 2015: 73–81).On the basis of Berman’s Retranslation Hypothesis, “later translations tend to be closer to the source text” (Chesterman 2004: 8).Editors are those who just edit a target-text, and self-editors denote those translators who commit self-retranslations. While “corpus-based studies of translation use published texts as the basis for their corpus” (Bisiada 2018: 1), almost all of them just concentrate on the original translations or their edited versions. To the best of the researcher’s knowledge, no study has yet been conducted to compare the original translation with its edited version to propose or even pave the way for formulating a tentative hypothesis for the revised editions. The current study aims at analyzing a translation and edition of a sacred text: the Holy Qur’an. The corpus is introduced comprehensively in the methodology section. Edited versions (or revisions) of published translations always appear after the original translation. They share this feature with retranslations. The question that may arise here is whether revisions and retranslations share the same hypothesis or not? In other words, do we need to formulate a separate hypothesis for revisions? Can we confidently assert that revised versions are closer to the STs (i.e. are more ST oriented) than the original translations (as is the case for retranslations)? The present paper aims to find answers to these questions. SKASE Journal of Translation and Interpretation 4 2. Literature review In Section 2.1, previous works on the Holy Qur’an’s translations are reviewed. In the two sections after that, some studies on the issue of the retranslation hypothesis and revision hypothesis (RH) are reviewed. 2.1. Previous works on the Holy Qur’an’s translations Al-Salem (2008) analyzed procedures employed in rendering metonymies in five English translations of the Holy Qur’an: Pickthall (1930/1992), Arberry (1955/1996), Al-Hilali and Khan (1996), Ghali (1998) and Bewley and Bewley (1999). He found the following methods used by translators: “translation into a metaphor;” “translation into the same metonymy;” “translation into the same metonymy with the intended meaning in parentheses;” “reduction of metonymy to its sense only;” “assuming that there isn’t a metonymy,” and “translation into another metonymy” (196). The findings indicated that translators showed great tendencies towards rendering Arabic metonymical expressions into the same metonymy in English. All translators were chosen from the 20th century. The researcher could have selected a number of translations carried out in the 19th and the 21st century to investigate whether the time span really affects the type of strategies selected by translators and the overall tendencies of translators towards the targetor the source-language. If Al-Salem (2008) had done so, he could have also tested the RH in the context of religious texts. Pirnajmuddin & Zamani’s (2012) study investigated English translations of Qur’anic culture-bound terms by Al-Hilali and Muhsin Khan (1995), Shakir (1980), Arberry (1955), Yusuf Ali (1934), and Pickthall (1930). Concentrating solely on “[p]ractical laws of religion (Furū al-Dīn),” they found that “literal translation” is the most frequent and the most proper procedure in rendering culture-bound terms (CBTs) (71). The researchers could have examined the genera tendencies of the retranslators and tested the RH. Naseri and Shiravi Khoozani’s (2015) paper focused on four Persian translations of the Qur’an by Moezzi (1993), Sharany (1995), Dehlavi (1996) and Mesbah-zadeh (2001). The researchers concentrated on a set of criteria for comparing the translations: “accuracy” of equivalents, “consistency and cohesion,” “eloquence,” the morphological and stylistic issues, etc. (137). Based on their findings, once the first two translations (i.e. Moezzi 1993 and Sharany 1995) are compared, it would be revealed that the later one is slightly more source-oriented, and, when the translations of Dehlavi (1996) and Mesbah-zadeh (2001) are compared, it would be found that the later translation is more source-oriented than the earlier rendition. Therefore, as far as the RH is concerned, Naseri and Shiravi Khoozani’s (2015) paper neither confirms nor disproves the hypothesis. Mohammadi and Valavi’s (2019) paper examined metonymies in three ancient translations of the Holy Qur’an by Tabari (13th century), Meybodi (15th century) and AbulFutouh Razi (15th century). The researchers found that “Tabari and Abul-Futouh Razi” mainly used “literal translation,” while “Meybodi has had the most content-wise translation in rendering metonymy” (17). If Tabari’s translation is merely compared with Meybodi’s, it can be pointed out that the RH is disproved since the earlier translation was more source-oriented than the later one. However, the study could have obtained more conclusive results in terms of the RH if more recent (re-)translations had been also taken into consideration. Mahmoud Afrouz 5 2.2. Previous works on the retranslation hypothesis Paloposki & Koskinen (2004) took the retranslation hypothesis into consideration and compared “its claims with data from Finnish first translations and retranslations” (27). Based on their findings, “while there are numerous (re)translations that fit in the RH schema, there also exist several counter-examples where the schema is turned the other way round, and also cases where the whole issue of domestication/assimilation versus foreignization/source-text orientation is irrelevant” (36). Paloposki & Koskinen (2004: 36) contended that there were “no inherent qualities in the process of retranslating that would dictate a move from domesticating strategies towards more foreignizing strategies”. The researcher, finally, pointed out that they did not find enough support for the RH. El Damanhoury (2015) analyzed three Japanese translations of the Holy Quran and tested the applicability of the RH in this respect. Translators included Izutsu (1964), Mita (1972) and Nakata (2014). Based on the results of her study, Izutsu employed foreignizing strategies in 60%, Mita in 62% and Nakata in 70% of the cases (56-59). The earliest translation (by Izutsu in 1964) was found by the researcher to be “the most domesticating” one, “followed by Mita (1972) and lastly Nakata (2014)” (56–59). The findings of El Damanhoury’s (2015) study were in line with the basic principles of the RH. Kitanovska-Kimovska (2017) attempted to test the RH by analyzing three Macedonian translations of Shakespeare’s Hamlet. The study was on the basis of a comparison between the source text (ST) and the target texts (TTs) by Shopov (1960), Gjuzel (1989), and Mihajlovski (2008) “in terms of the number of lexical inventions, i.e. the number of words derived through the processes of conversion and compounding” (201). The earliest translations, both direct and indirect one, were found to be more “target-oriented, while the second direct translation” was “more source-oriented” (210). The researcher confirmed the RH in her study. Oyali’s (2018) study investigated the validity of the RH “in representations of certain Biblical concepts in the translations of the Bible into Igbo” and his findings proved that “most of the borrowings in the first translation are de-borrowed in the retranslations” (84). Analyzing five translations of the Bible, he finally concluded that “the opposite” of the retranslation hypothesis “is true” in this case since “later translations” were found to be “more target culture oriented than earlier translations” (97). The findings of El Damanhoury’s (2015) thesis and Oyali’s (2018) paper were in sharp contrast: one confirmed the RH and the other totally disproved it. It should, however, be noticed that while the genre of the two studies was the same (i.e. sacred texts), the corpora studied by the two researchers were not the same. Moreover, the sourceand the target-languages were not the same in the two works. Overall, such factors might play a role in (dis)proving the RH. Prospective researchers can work on such an issue, but what is significant for us, in the present study, is that there are at least a few works dealing with the issue of the retranslation hypothesis in religious texts. But no one, as far as the researchers know, has yet attempted to take a step towards formulating the RH. Therefore, the present study is conducted to fill the research gap. SKASE Journal of Translation and Interpretation 6 2.3. Previous works on revision hypothesis All works conducted so far have generally focused on translations of the Holy Qur’an and almost none of them took the issue of edited versions into account. Only the study carried out by Afrouz (2021) straightforwardly dealt with RH. But it needs to be clarified that his work focused on “self-revision”. Afrouz (2021) found that subsequent revisions made by a translator were more accurate and more natural than the first translation produced by the same translator. However, Afrouz’s (2021) paper concentrated on self-revisions and modern Persian literature, but the current study worked on a translation of the Holy Qur’an as a classical Arabic literaryreligious text and its revision (made by a person other than translator himself). Such a study has never been conducted by any other researcher. From among numerous English translations of the Holy Qur’an by individual translators (e.g. Sale 1734; Muhammad Ali 1917; Pickthall 1930; Yusuf Ali 1934; Arberry 1955; Shakir 1980; Irving 1985; Nikayin 2000; Saffarzadeh 2001; Abdel-Haleem 2005; Starkovsky 2005) or groups of translators (e.g. Yuksel et al. 2007; Royal Aal al-Bayt Institute for Islamic Thought 2008; The Monotheist Group 2012), only the one by Muhammad Ali (1917) was selected because it was revised by Zahid Aziz in 2010. 3. Method The current study is analytical-comparative qualitative research exploring the potential relationship between religious translations and their edited versions. The sacred literary text selected in this study is the Muslims’ greatest religious Book the Holy Qur’an, originally translated by Muhammad Ali (1917/1951) and edited by Aziz (2010). The following steps were taken to carry out the study: 1. It was attempted to find a sacred literary text with its original translation and its latest revision. 2. The translated version was linguistically compared with its revised version to detect the changes applied by the reviser. 3. The features of the revised version were analyzed. 4. On the basis of the findings and data analysis, a tentative hypothesis concerning revised versions of sacred texts was suggested. 4. Results and discussion The issue of RH is first discussed in terms of classical literary texts and then is dealt with in the context of sacred literary texts. The most conspicuous changes applied by the editor was the exclusion of the ST which reduced the number of pages from 1388 to 923—a 20 percent reduction in hardcopy versions. It may make the edited version appear much handier and reader friendly. Moreover, while the electronic version of the original translation is about 80 megabytes, the edited version is less than four megabytes. Although both of these changes may, at first sight, seem superficial, they can potentially influence the accessibility of the edited version to the TT audience. Mahmoud Afrouz 7 Other changes applied by Aziz are discussed here by referring to some tangible evidence from the corpus. It is noteworthy that the changes mentioned here were majorly found to be consistent throughout the whole revision. 1. Replacing the second person singular form thou and thee by you: ST /ةحتافلا{ َنيِ لاَّضلا َلاَو ْمِهيَلَع ِبوُضغَملا ِ ريَغ ْمِهيَلَع َتمَعنَأ َنيِذَّلا َطاَرِ ص7} TT The path of those upon whom Thou hast bestowed favours, Not those upon whom wrath is brought down, nor those who go astray. (Muhammad Ali 1917: 6–7) RTT The path of those upon whom You have bestowed favours, Not those upon whom wrath is brought down, nor those who go astray. (Aziz 2010: 1) As can be seen, the subject pronoun Thou is changed into You. This modernization has also occurred in alteration of hast as have. Consider the following instance which contains further changes: 2. Modernizing antiquated endings to English verbs: ST /ةرقبلا{ ُميِكَحْلا ُميِلَعْلا َتنَأ َكَّنِإ اَنَتْمَّلَع اَم َّلاِإ اَنَل َمْلِع َلا َكَناَحْبُس ْاوُلاَق32} TT They said: Glory be to Thee! we have no knowledge but that which Thou hast taught us; surely Thou art the Knowing, the Wise. (Muhammad Ali 1917: 24) RTT They said: Glory be to You! we have no knowledge but what You have taught us. Surely You are the Knowing, the Wise. (Aziz 2010: 9) Besides modernizing the pronouns Thee and Thou, the (auxiliary) verbs have also experienced such a change: hast vs. has; art vs. are. In the same line, the more traditional construction that which… is replaced by what…. Additionally, the sentences which had been partially separated by a semicolon are now totally separated by a period. It may presumably imply that the revised version shows stronger tendency towards simplification via separating complex sentences. Further evidence of such changes will be presented as follows: 3. Replacing the second person singular form thy by your: ST َيَو اَهيِف ُف ِ ِِِسْفُي نَم اَهيِف ُلَعْجَتَأ ْاوُلاَق ًةَفيِلَخ ِ ضْرَلأا يِف ٌلِعاَج يِ نِإ ِةَكِئَلاَمْلِل َكُّبَر َلاَق ْذِإَو ُ ِ بَ ِِِسُن ُنْحَنَو َاَمِ فلا ُكِفْ ِِِس /ةرقبلا{ َنوُمَلْعَت َلا اَم ُمَلْعَأ يِ نِإ َلاَق َكَل ُ سِ فَقُنَو َكِفْمَحِب30} TT And when your Lord said to the angels, I am going to place in the earth one who shall rule (in it), they said: What! Wilt Thou place in it such as make mischief in it and shed blood, and we celebrate Thy praise and extol Thy holiness. He said: Surely I know what you do not know. (Muhammad Ali 1917: 23) RTT And when your Lord said to the angels, I am going to place a ruler in the earth, they said: Will You place in it such as make mischief in it and shed blood? And we celebrate Your praise and extol Your holiness. He said: Surely I know what you do not know. (Aziz 2010: 8–9) Muhammad Ali has been inconsistent in using the archaic forms like thou/thee and thy. As the instance above clearly demonstrates, both your and thy are present in his translation, while in the edited version by Aziz, just a single form is used: your. Therefore, whereas expressions like Wilt Thou, Thy praise, and Thy holiness are modernized, your Lord is left unchanged since it had been modernized in the original translation. It seems that Muhammad SKASE Journal of Translation and Interpretation 8 Ali has only used archaic forms to refer to God. Whatever the case may be, his behavior can be considered as a sort of stylistic inconsistency. Furthermore, the sentences separated by a comma (i.e. …shed blood, and we…) are now totally separated by a question mark (i.e.…shed blood? and we…). It shows the meticulousness and diligence of the editor in the accurate use of punctuation marks. This would promote the readability and fluency of the TT. In the same line, Aziz has replaced the long and rather complex clause to place in the earth one who shall rule (in it) by to place a ruler in the earth. Aziz has also removed the unnecessary term What! to observe the brevity of his revised edition. Take the last part of the above verse into consideration: Surely I know what you do not know. Interestingly, Muhammad Ali in his 1951’s edition has employed structures like they see not and you know not while he has used simpler constructions such as they do not see and you do not know in his original 1917’s version. Aziz (2010), as could evidently be seen, has restored the original translation’s style. 4. Replacing more traditional phrases by modern ones: ST /ةرقبلا{ َنوُنِقوُي ْمُه ِةَرِخلآاِبَو َكِلْبَق نِم َلِ زنُأ اَمَو َكْيَلِإ َلِ زنُأ اَمِب َنوُنِمْؤُي َنيِذَّلاو4} TT And who believe in that which has been revealed to you and what was revealed before you, and they are sure of the hereafter. (Muhammad Ali 1917: 13) RTT And who believe in what has been revealed to you and what was revealed before you, and of the Hereafter they are sure. (Aziz 2010: 4) As was explained in previous instances, the phrase that which is replaced by what. There were other alterations in the revised version. Firstly, the Hereafter, as a religious-bound term, is capitalized by the editor to distinguish it from ordinary terms. Secondly, in rendering the Arabic clause َنوُنِقوُي ْمُه ِةَرِخلآاِب /bel ākherate hom jūqenūn/, the original translation’s word-order is more target-oriented than the edited version. The edited version follows the Arabic wordorder and is, therefore, structurally more source-oriented. It should, nonetheless, be remembered that this event has been an exception, and in other cases, the edited version has been much more target-oriented than the original translation. 5. Replacing more formal and difficult lexical items by everyday words: ST /ةرقبلا{ َنوُلِقْعَت َلاَفَأ َباَتِكْلا َنوُلْتَت ْمُتنَأَو ْمُكَسُفنَأ َنْ وَسنَتَو ِ رِبْلاِب َ ساَّنلا َنوُرُمْأَتَأ44} TT What! do you enjoin men to be good and neglect your own souls while you read the Book? Have you then no sense? (Muhammad Ali 1917: 29) RTT Do you tell people to be good and neglect your own souls while you read the Book? Have you then no sense? (Aziz 2010: 12) In the above instance, the difficult word enjoin in the original translation is replaced by everyday verb tell. Other changes in the revised version include: • Removal of the word What!—which is used typically by Muhammad Ali wherever the Arabic item أ /a/ is used at the beginning of a sentence to make interrogative constructions • Replacement of the word men with people—which may display the tendency of the editor to employ more neutral gender-free words Mahmoud Afrouz 9 • Breaking up longer sentences into shorter independent sentences to boost the flow of constructions (usually by replacing comma, colon or semicolon with question mark, exclamation mark, period, etc.) 6. Avoiding prolixity and showing more tendencies towards brevity: ST َو ٌلْفَع اَهْنِم ُذَخْؤُي َلاَو ٌةَعاَفَش اَهْنِم ُلَبْقُي َلاَو ًائْيَش ٍ سْفَّن نَع ٌ سْفَن ي ِ زْجَت َّلا ًام ْ وَي ْاوُقَّتاَو/ةرقبلا{ َنوُرَصنُي ْمُه َلا48} TT And be on your guard against a day when one soul shall not avail another in the least, neither shall intercession on its behalf be accepted, nor shall any compensation be taken from it, nor shall they be helped. (Muhammad Ali 1917: 30) RTT And guard yourselves against a day when no soul will avail another in the least, neither will intercession be accepted on its behalf, nor will compensation be taken from it, nor will they be helped. (Aziz 2010: 12) Other changes in the revised version include replacing the less frequently used modal shall by will and changing the word order (i.e. on its behalf) to promote the flow of the sentence. 7. Replacing complex constructions by more simplified ones: ST /َاسنلا{ اًريِعَس َمَّنَهَجِب ىَفَكَو ُهْنَع َّفَص نَّم مُهْنِمَو ِهِب َنَمآ ْنَّم مُهْنِمَف55} TT So of them is he who believes in him, and of them is he who turns away from him, and hell is sufficient to burn. (Muhammad Ali 1917: 217) RTT So some of them believe in him, and some of them turn away from him. And Hell is sufficient to burn. (Aziz 2010: 117–18) The expression نَ ِم مُِهِن ِ ِم /menhom man/, originally rendered as of them is he who, is simplified as some of them. Moreover, the last clause in the Arabic text, being a dependent segment in the original translation, is broken up as an independent sentence in the edited version. The religious-bound term Hell is also capitalized. 8. Replacing literary (and old-fashioned) words by more everyday (modern) ones: ST َوُهَو ْتَقَفَ ِِِصَف ٍلُبُق نِم َّفُق ُه ُ ِِِصيِمَق َناَك نِإ اَهِلْهَأ ْنِ م ٌفِها َِِِش َفِه َِِِشَو ي ِ ِِِسْفَّن نَع يِنْتَدَواَر َيِه َلاَق َنيِبِذاَكلا َنِم /فسوي{26/فسوي{ َنيِقِداَّصلا نِم َوُهَو ْتَبَذَكَف ٍ رُبُد نِم َّفُق ُهُصيِمَق َناَك ْنِإَو }27} TT He said: She sought to make me yield (to her); and a witness of her own family bore witness: If his shirt is rent from front, she speaks the truth and he is one of the liars. And if his shirt is rent from behind, she tells a lie and he is one of the truthful. (Muhammad Ali 1917: 482) RTT He said: She sought to seduce me. And a witness of her own family bore witness: If his shirt is torn in front, she speaks the truth and he is a liar. And if his shirt is torn from behind, she tells a lie and he is truthful. (Aziz 2010: 289) The word rend in Muhammad Ali’s translation is a literary old-fashioned verb. It is replaced with tear in Aziz’s revision. Prolixity in expressions like make me yield (to her), one of the liars and one of the truthful are respectively replaced with seduce, a liar, and truthful. It should be reminded that the original translation is closer to the ST since, for instance, the two parallel-structured expressions َنيِبِذاَِكلا َنِم َوُه /howa menal kazebīn/ and َنيِقِدا َّ ِِِِصلا نِم َوُه /howa menal şādeqīn/are literally rendered in the original translation as he is one of the liars and he is one of the truthful, respectively, while they were condensed in the edited version as he is a liar and he is truthful, respectively. SKASE Journal of Translation and Interpretation 10 9. Replacing literary constructions with everyday ones: ST /ةرقبلا{ َنوُنِمْؤُي اَّم ًلايِلَقَف ْمِهِ رْفُكِب َّ اللَّ ُمُهَنَعَّل لَب ٌ فْلُغ اَنُبوُلُق ْاوُلاَقَو88} TT And they say: Our hearts are securely covered. Nay, Allah has cursed them on account of their unbelief; so little it is that they believe. (Muhammad Ali 1917: 47) RTT And they say: Our hearts are securely covered. No, Allah has cursed them on account of their unbelief; so it is little that they believe. (Aziz 2010: 20) Sometimes changing some lexical items and word-order can result in the change of literary style into normal one. Take, for instance, the alteration of Nay and little it is into No and it is little, respectively. It should also be remembered that although Muhammad Ali (1917) has typically rendered the word لَب /bal/ as nay, he has not been consistent and, in some verses, the same word لَب /bal/ had been translated as yet, rather, or but. 10. Observing the (more creative and accurate) use of punctuation marks: ST /َارعِِِِ لا{ َني ِ رَّحَ ِِِِسُمْلا َنِم َتِنَأ اَِمَّنِإ اوُلاَِق153 َنيِقِدا َّ ِِِِصلا َنِم َتِنُك نِإ ٍةَِي ِِب ِةْأَِف اَِنُلْاِ م ٌر َِِِِ َب َّ لاِإ َتِنَأ اَِم } /َارع لا{154} TT They said: You are only of the deluded ones: You are naught but a mortal like ourselves: so bring a sign if you are one of the truthful. (Muhammad Ali 1917: 736) RTT They said: You are only a deluded person. You are nothing but a mortal like ourselves—so bring a sign if you are truthful. (Aziz 2010: 463) While three successive colons are used in the translation, the editor has replaced two of them with a period and a dash. Aziz has accurately used a full stop at the end of the first verse, while Muhammad Ali had employed a colon. Furthermore, the expressions َني ِ رَّحَِسُمْلا َنِم /menal mosaḩarīn/ and َنيِقِدا َّ ِِصلا نِم /menal şādeqīn/are again rendered literally by Muhammad Ali as of the deluded ones and of the truthful, respectively, while they are reduced as a deluded person and truthful, correspondingly. While the expression ٌر َِِِِِِ َب َّ لاِإ /ellā basharon/is translated originally as naught but a mortal, it is replaced by nothing but a mortal. Although Muhammad Ali (1917) has employed equivalents naught and aught in his rendition of some verses, he has been inconsistent in this respect since in other verses the same expressions were rendered using equivalents such as nothing, anything, at all and in the least. Compare the abovementioned instance with the following one. 11. Removing redundant expressions: ST َرْحِ سلا َنوُتْأَتَفَأ ْمُكُلْاِ م ٌرَ َب َّ لاِإ اَذَه ْلَه ْاوُمَلَظ َنيِذَّلا ى َوْجَّنلا ْاوُّرَسَأَو ْمُهُبوُلُق ًةَيِهَ لا/َايبنلأا{ َنوُرِ صْبُت ْمُتنَأَو 3} TT Their hearts trifling; and those who are unjust counsel together in secret: He is nothing but a mortal like yourselves; what! will you then yield to enchantment while you see? (Muhammad Ali 1917: 643) RTT their hearts trifling. And they—the wrongdoers—counsel in secret: He is nothing but a mortal like yourselves; will you then yield to enchantment while you see? (Aziz 2010: 398) The redundant what! and together is removed in the edited version. Again, as can be seen, here the same expression َّ لاِإ ٌرَِ َب /ellā basharon/appears identically in both the translation and the edition: nothing but a mortal. In general, the edited version was detected to be more consistent in terms of employing equivalents. Mahmoud Afrouz 11 Furthermore, while the Arabic expression ْاو ُ ِِم َ ِِل َ ِِظ َنِِيِذَّ ِِلا /al lazina ẓalamū/ is literally translated as those who are unjust, it appears more concise in the edited version: the wrongdoers. Therefore, again, the original translation was more source-text oriented than the edition. It should also be reminded that Muhammad Ali has again been less consistent than Aziz in terms of equivalent choice since the words wrongdoer, unjust and iniquitous have been interchangeably used in various verses. Take the following instances into consideration: ST1 /ةرقبلا{ َنوُمِلاَظ ْمُتنَأَو ِهِفْعَب نِم َلْجِعْلا ُمُتْذَخَّتا َّمُث ِةاَنِ يَبْلاِب ىَسوُّم مُكَاَج ْفَقَلَو92} TT And most certainly Moses came to you with clear arguments, then you took the calf (for a god) in his absence and you were unjust. (Muhammad Ali 1917: 48) RTT And Moses indeed came to you with clear arguments, then you took the calf (for a god) in his absence and you were wrongdoers. (Aziz 2010: 21) ST2 /ماعنلأا{ َنوُبِسْكَي ْاوُناَك اَمِب اًضْعَب َنيِمِلاَّظلا َ ضْعَب يِ لَوُن َكِلَذَكَو129} TT And thus do We make some of the iniquitous to befriend others on account of what they earned. (Muhammad Ali 1917: 183) RTT And thus do We make some of the wrongdoers to befriend others on account of what they earn. (Aziz 2010: 315) While the synonymous terms َنوُمِلاَِظ /ẓālemūn/in ST1 and َنيِمِلاَِّظلا /ẓālemīn/ in ST2 are respectively rendered by Muhammad Ali as unjust and iniquitous, Aziz has consistently chosen wrongdoers in all cases. Aziz has also been more considerate of the TT grammatical rules in terms of verb-tenses—do, make, and earn are all simple present. 12. Condensing the footnotes and even removing them in some cases: ST َمَو ْمُكاَنْقَنَر اَم ِةاَبِ يَط نِم ْاوُلُك ىَوْلَّ ِِِِسلاَو َّنَمْلا ُمُكْيَلَع اَنْلَزنَأَو َماَمَغْلا ُمُكْيَلَع اَنْلَّلَظَو ْمُهَ ِِِِسُفنَأ ْاوُناَك نِكَلَو اَنوُمَلَظ ا /ةرقبلا{ َنوُمِلْظَي57 TT And We made the clouds to give shade over you* and We sent to you manna and quails*: Eat of the good things that We have given you; and they did not do Us any harm, but they made their own souls suffer the loss. (Muhammad Ali 1917: 33) RTT And We made the clouds to give shade over you and We sent to you manna and quails. Eat of the good things that We have given you. And they did Us no harm, but they wronged their own souls. (Aziz 2010: 13–14) Asterisks are added to the above TT by the researcher to show where Muhammad Ali has marked for providing footnotes. As can be seen, both footnotes have been removed in the edited version. Other changes include replacing a full stop by a colon/semicolon; simplifying the expression they did not do Us any harm as they did Us no harm; and abridging the expression they made […] suffer the loss by they wronged. 13. Substituting longer expressions with shorter ones: ST ْفَق ًانْيَع َةَرِْ َع اَتَنْثا ُهْنِم ْةَرَجَفناَف َرَجَحْلا َكاَِصَعِ ب ب ِ رْ ِِا اَنْلُقَف ِهِمْ وَقِل ىَِسوُم ىَقِْسَتِْسا ِذِإَو ْمُهَبَرِْ َّم ٍ ساَنُأ ُّلُك َمِلَع /ةرقبلا{ َنيِفِسْفُم ِ ضْرَلأا يِف ْاْ وَاْعَت َلاَو َِّ اللَّ ِقْنِ ر نِم ْاوُبَرْشاَو ْاوُلُك60} TT And when Moses prayed for water for his people, We said: Seek with your staff a way into the mountain. So there flowed from it twelve springs; each tribe knew its drinking-place: Eat and drink of the provisions of Allah, and do not act corruptly in the land, making mischief. (Muhammad Ali 1917: 34) SKASE Journal of Translation and Interpretation 18 Bisiada, Mario. 2018. The editor’s invisibility. 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