The Arab American News
RAMADAN 2011
8
By Abu Tariq Hijazi
O
ne of the great literary personali-
es of Britain, Mohammed Mar-
maduke Pickthall, was born in
London into a Chris an family as William
Pickthall on April 7, 1875.
His mother was Mary O’Brien. His fa-
ther, Reverend Charles Grayson Pickthall,
died when he was only five. In his school
years he was a contemporary of Sir Win-
ston Churchill at Harrow private school.
His ancestry is traced to William the Con-
queror. He was over 30 when WWI broke
out.
He visited Turkey, Egypt, Jordan and
Pales ne where he gained fluency in Ara-
bic. He studied the Orient and was soon
acknowledged as a Middle Eastern
scholar. He was a strong advocate of the
O oman Caliphate.
The year 1917 was a year of revolu on
in his life. When delivering a lecture on
Islam and progress at the Muslim Literary
Society in No ng Hill, West London, on
Nov. 29, 1917, he publicly declared his
embracing of Islam. He was not a hyp-
ocrite. He believed what he said and he
said what he believed. Very soon this
young scholar, esteemed by D.H.
Lawrence, H.G. Wells and E.M. Forester,
became a leader among an emerging
group of Bri sh Muslims.
In 1919, Pickthall worked for the Lon-
don-based Islamic Informa on Bureau,
which also published the weekly “Muslim
Outlook.” In 1920 he le England for India
where he stayed for 15 years. He worked as editor of Bombay Chronicles for
some me.
In 1925, he was offered a job of principal (director) at a Hyderabad college
which he gladly accepted. The largest Muslim state of
India was established in 1748, commanding a larger
area than England with a popula on of 12 million.
Pickthall regarded the Holy Qur'an as a “Wonder
of the World.” He saw that there was an obliga on
for Muslims to understand it in mately. So to ac-
quaint his English speaking brothers and sisters
interna onally with the beauty and wisdom of
the Qur'an, he embarked on the mission of trans-
la ng the Holy Qur'an into English.
In 1928 he took a sabba cal for two years and devoted himself fully to the
noble cause. He rendered the glory of the Holy Qur'an into classical Biblical Eng-
lish and named it the Glorious Qur'an.
For its clarifica on and authen ca on he traveled to Egypt and stayed there
a few months with the help of Rashid Rida, procuring the authority of Jamia Al-
Azhar in Cairo for his transla on. He had a profound love for the word of God
and noted that while he had great difficulty in remembering a passage in his na-
ve English, he could easily memorize page a er page of the Holy Qur’an in Ara-
bic with perfect accuracy.
His monumental work of the transla on was completed in 1930. And "The
Meaning of The Glorious Qur'an" was published by the nizam of Hyderabad as
a gi to the Muslim ummah. It was hailed by the Times literary supplement as
“a great literary achievement.” Pickthall encouraged Muslims “to keep the mes-
sage always in your hearts, and live by it.” In his introduc on to the surat, he
powerfully focused on the universality of Islam.
In 1939 Allen and Unwin published Pickthall's work under license from Knopf
in England. Later, Pickthall completed an edi on of his transla on with corre-
sponding Arabic text (mushaf) within days of his final departure from India.
Pickthall's transla on itself has been translated. In 1958 extracts were trans-
lated into Turkish in Ankara. Other extracts were published by M. Cevki Alay and
Ali Kitabo in Istanbul the same year. In 1964 it was rendered into Portuguese in
Mozambique and in 1960 a trilingual edi on — English, Arabic and Urdu — ap-
peared in Delhi. It has also appeared in Tagalog, the na onal language of the
Philippines.
In 1927, Pickthall took over as editor of “Islamic Culture,” a new quarterly
journal published under the Nizam of Hyderabad’s patronage. When in 1927
the Islamic Commi ee of Madras, India, invited him, he delivered his eight lec-
tures, which are included in the famous collec on named “Khutbat Al Madras.”
His lectures on Islam were published separately in 1961 under the tle of “The
Cultural Side of Islam” by Sheikh Mohammed Ashraf Publishers Lahore. His lec-
ture en tled “The Tolerance in Islam” is a marvelous piece of scholarship.
This “Soldier of the Faith” and “The Servant of Islam” (as termed in his elegy
published in Islamic Culture), a er a long stay of 15 years in India, returned to
England in 1935.
In 1936 he moved to St. Ives where, at the age of 60, he died on May 19,
1936.
Pickthall: World famous
translator of the Qur’an
"... The Qur'an cannot be
translated. ...The book is here
rendered almost literally and
every effort has been made to
choose befi ng language. But
the result is not the Glorious
Qur'an, that inimitable sym-
phony, the very sounds of
which move men to tears and
ecstasy. It is only an a empt
to present the meaning of the
Qur'an-and peradventure
something of the charm in
English. It can never take the
place of the Qur'an in Arabic,
nor is it meant to do so..."
— Marmaduke Pickthall, 1930
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