Early translations

The earliest known translation of the Qur'an

Qur'an

The Quran , also transliterated Qur'an, Koran, Alcoran, Qur’ān, Coran, Kuran, and al-Qur’ān, is the central religious text of Islam, which Muslims consider the verbatim word of God . It is regarded widely as the finest piece of literature in the Arabic language...

 into the English Language was The Alcoran of Mahomet in 1649 by Alexander Ross

Alexander Ross (writer)

Alexander Ross was a prolific Scottish writer and controversialist. He was Chaplain-in-Ordinary to Charles I.-Life:He was born in Aberdeen, and entered King's College, Aberdeen, in 1604. About 1616 he succeeded Thomas Parker in the mastership of the free school at Southampton, an appointment which...

, chaplain to King Charles I. This, however, was a translation of the French work L'Alcoran de Mahomet

L'Alcoran de Mahomet

L'Alcoran de Mahomet was the third western translation of the Qur'an, preceded by Lex Mahumet pseudoprophete and the translation by Mark of Toledo...

 by the Sieur du Ryer, Lord of Malezair. L'Alcoran de Mahomet in French itself being just the third western translation of the Qur'an

Qur'an

The Quran , also transliterated Qur'an, Koran, Alcoran, Qur’ān, Coran, Kuran, and al-Qur’ān, is the central religious text of Islam, which Muslims consider the verbatim word of God . It is regarded widely as the finest piece of literature in the Arabic language...

 at the time, preceded by Latin works from Robert of Ketton

Robert of Ketton

Robert of Ketton was an English medieval theologian, astronomer and Arabist.Ketton, where Robert was either born or perhaps first took holy orders, is a small village in Rutland, a few miles from Stamford.Robert is believed to have been educated at the Cathedral School of Paris...

 (Lex Mahumet pseudoprophete

Lex Mahumet pseudoprophete

Lex Mahumet pseudoprophete is the translation of the Qur'an into Latin by Robert of Ketton...

, circa 1143) and Mark of Toledo

Mark of Toledo

Mark of Toledo was a Spanish physician and a canon of Toledo.He produced one of the earliest translations of the Qur'an into Latin while working at the Toledo School of Translators...

 (1210). In his English rendition, Ross' somewhat tainted views of Islam are apparent in the title page, which reads as follows:

The Alcoran of Mahomet, Translated out of Arabick into French. By the Sieur du Ryer, Lord of Malezair, and Resident for the French King, at ALEXANDRIA. And Newly Englished, for the satisfaction of all that desire to look into the Turkish Vanities. To which is prefixed, the Life of Mahomet, the Prophet of the Turks, and Author of the Alcoran. With a Needful Caveat, or Admonition, for them who desire to know what Use may be made of, or if there be danger in Reading the ALCORAN.

In 1734, George Sale

George Sale

George Sale was an Orientalist and practising solicitor, best known for his 1734 translation of the Qur'an into English. He was also author of The General Dictionary, in ten volumes, folio....

produced the first scholarly translation of the Qur'an, The Al Koran of Mohammed, based primarily on the Latin translation of Louis Maracci

Louis Maracci

Louis Maracci was an Italian Catholic priest who translated the Qur'an into Latin in 1698 in Padua. Maracci held that Mohammed and Islam were not very dissimilar to Luther and Protestantism.-Life:...

 (1698). George Sale's translation was to remain the most widely available English translation over the next 200 years, and is still in print today, with release of a recent 2009 edition.

The next major English translation of note was by John Rodwell

John Medows Rodwell

John Medows Rodwell was a friend of Charles Darwin while both matriculated at Cambridge. He became an English clergyman of the Church of England and a Non-Muslim Islamic scholar. He served as Rector of St.Peter's, Saffron Hill, London 1836-43 and Rector of St Ethelburga's, Bishopsgate, London...

, Rector of St. Ethelburga

St Ethelburga's Bishopsgate

St Ethelburga-the-Virgin within Bishopsgate is a Church of England church in the City of London, located on Bishopsgate near Liverpool Street station.-History:...

, London, released in 1861, entitled The Koran. It was soon followed in 1880 with a 2-Volume edition by E.H. Palmer, a Cambridge scholar, who was entrusted with the preparation of the new translation for Max Muller's

Max Müller

Friedrich Max Müller , more regularly known as Max Müller, was a German philologist and Orientalist, one of the founders of the western academic field of Indian studies and the discipline of comparative religion...

 Sacred Books of the East

Sacred Books of the East

The Sacred Books of the East is a monumental 50-volume set of English translations of Asian religious writings, edited by Max Müller and published by the Oxford University Press between 1879 and 1910...

 series.

20th and 21st century translations

• The Qur'an (1910) by Mirza Abul Fazl
  Mirza Abul Fazl
  Abul Fazl, Mirza , , was a native of Allahabad, India. Among the contemporary Muslim scholars Dr Mirza Abul Fazl, learned in Arabic and Sanskrit, was a pioneer who took interest in the study of the chronological order of the Qur`an and invited the attention of Muslim scholars towards its...
  
  , Arabic Text and English Translation Arranged Chronologically with an Abstract (Allahabad). Mirza Abul Fazl (1865–1956), was a native of Allahabad
  Allahabad
  Allahabad , or Settled by God in Persian, is a major city of India and is one of the main holy cities of Hinduism. It was renamed by the Mughals from the ancient name of Prayaga , and is by some accounts the second-oldest city in India. It is located in the north Indian state of Uttar Pradesh,...
  
  , India
  India
  India , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world...
  
  . Among the contemporary Muslim scholars Dr. Mirza Abul Fazl was a pioneer who took interest in the study of the chronological order of the Qur'an and invited the attention of Muslim scholars towards its importance. He was the first Muslim to present a translation of the Qur'an in to English along with the original Arabic text.

• The Holy Qur'an (1917) by Maulana Muhammad Ali
  Maulana Muhammad Ali
  Muhammad Ali was a Pakistani writer, scholar, and leading figure of the Ahmadiyya Movement.-Biography:Ali was born in Punjab, British India, in 1874. He obtained an English and Law in 1899...
  
  . According to some sources this work is strongly colored by the Lahori-Ahmadi
  Ahmadiyya
  Ahmadiyya is an Islamic religious revivalist movement founded in India near the end of the 19th century, originating with the life and teachings of Mirza Ghulam Ahmad , who claimed to have fulfilled the prophecies about the world reformer of the end times, who was to herald the Eschaton as...
  
   belief of its translator, including disbelief in the miraculous and disdain for Judaism
  Judaism
  Judaism ) is the "religion, philosophy, and way of life" of the Jewish people...
  
   and Christianity
  Christianity
  Christianity is a monotheistic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus as presented in canonical gospels and other New Testament writings...
  
  . Other orthodox Islamic sources praise it, stating the opposite, "The writer has kept his annotations altogether free from sectarian influence with wonderful impartiality, and has gathered together the wealth of authentic Muslim theology." It has been the basis for many later works, and is notably the version adopted by the Nation of Islam
  Nation of Islam
  The Nation of Islam is a mainly African-American new religious movement founded in Detroit, Michigan by Wallace D. Fard Muhammad in July 1930 to improve the spiritual, mental, social, and economic condition of African-Americans in the United States of America. The movement teaches black pride and...
  
  .
• The Qur'an: Translated, with a Critical Re-arrangement of the Surahs in 2 Vols (Edinburgh University Press, 1937–39) by Richard Bell
  Richard Bell (Arabist)
  Richard Bell was a British Arabist at the University of Edinburgh. Between 1937 and 1939 he published a translation of the Qur'an, and in 1953 his Introduction to the Qur'an was published Richard Bell (1876–1952) was a British Arabist at the University of Edinburgh. Between 1937 and 1939 he...
  
  may well have been the first comprehensive non-Islamic analysis of the Qur'an in the English language. The translation gained immediate notoriety for Bell's attempt at re-arranging the structure of the Qur'an in order of how it was written down originally at the time of the Prophet. Detailed commentary to accompany the translation was too extensive to find its way into print at the time. And yet it managed to get published, 50 odd years later, as a University of Manchester
  University of Manchester
  The University of Manchester is a public research university located in Manchester, United Kingdom. It is a "red brick" university and a member of the Russell Group of research-intensive British universities and the N8 Group...
  
   imprint entitled A Commentary of the Qur'an (1991) with significant editorial input from Clifford Edmund Bosworth
  Clifford Edmund Bosworth
  Clifford Edmund Bosworth FBA is an English historian and orientalist, specializing in Arabic studies. He received his B.A. degree from Oxford University and M.A. and Ph.D. degrees from Edinburgh University. He held permanent posts at St. Andrews University, Manchester University, and the Center...
  
   and M. E. J. Richardson.
• The Meaning of the Glorious Koran (1930) by Muhammad Marmaduke Pickthall. Heavily influenced by Muhammad Ali, this version shares that author's bias against descriptions of miracles. Popular in the first half of the 20th century, it is now in limited demand due to its archaic prose and lack of annotations.
• The Holy Qur'an: Translation and Commentary (1934) by Abdullah Yusuf Ali
  Abdullah Yusuf Ali
  Hafiz Abdullah Yusuf Ali, CBE, FRSL was an Indian Islamic scholar who translated the Qur'an into English. His translation of the Qur'an is one of the most widely-known and used in the English-speaking world....
  
  . Yusuf Ali elegantly conveys the rich style of the Arabic into eloquent English verse, but his translation has been criticized for providing copious medieval exegesis in the footnotes without contextualization. Written in a context of growing anti-Zionism, the commentary is also a polemic against Jews, to the extent that a Saudi-financed 1989 revision was banned from use in Los Angeles schools in 2002. Yusuf Ali's translation was until recently the most popular version used by Muslims, notably due to its subsidization by the Saudi government, but is losing influence due to its dated language.
• The Koran Interpreted
  The Koran Interpreted
  The Koran Interpreted is a translation of the Qur'an by Arthur John Arberry. The translation is from the original Arabic into English. First published in 1955, it is one of the most prominent written by a non-Muslim scholar...
  
   (1955) by Arthur Arberry. The title of this first English translation by a bona fide scholar of Arabic and Islam reflects the Muslim belief that the Qur'an cannot be translated, just interpreted. Arberry's translation without prejudice has received wide acclaim by other scholars and remains the academic reference work at the beginning of the 21st century.

• The Koran (1956) by N. J. Dawood
  N. J. Dawood
  Nessim Joseph Dawood was born in 1927 to an Iraqi Jewish family in Baghdad, Iraq. He emigrated to England in 1945 as an Iraq State scholar, and settled there. He graduated from the University of London...
  
  is a popular English translation in North America, having become part of the Penguin (Classics) imprint. Dawood, a native Arabic speaker from Iraq's now defunct Jewish community
  History of the Jews in Iraq
  The history of the Jews in Iraq is documented from the time of the Babylonian captivity c. 586 BCE. Iraqi Jews constitute one of the world's oldest and most historically significant Jewish communities....
  
  , compromised liberally on faithfulness to literalism to yield a narrative that is succinct, fast-paced and perhaps the easiest to read of all the English translations. In the first edition, Dawood even rearranged the chapters (suras) into more-or-less chronological order. Later editions restored the traditional sequence.
• Tafsir-ul-Quran (1957) by well-known Indian scholar Abdul Majid Daryabadi
  Abdul Majid Daryabadi
  Abdul Majid Daryabadi was an Indian Muslim writer and exegete of the Qur'an. He obtained his BA in Philosophy from Canning College, Lucknow in 1912. In his academic career, he edited the Urdu weekly Sach and then Sidq . Amin Ahsan Islahi, another Indo-Pak Muslim scholar, also worked with him on...
  
  is a translation with commentary on par with Yusuf Ali's work in terms of size and scope. Daryabadi ventures into comparative religion with a thoroughly critical study of the Bible in particular, as also other major world faiths, anthropology and history in general, demonstrating in the process how the Qur'an stands out above other Scriptures which have been tampered with down the ages.
• The Message of the Qur'an : Presented in Perspective (1974) by Dr. Hashim Amir Ali. He translated the Qur'an into English and arranged it according to chronological order. Dr. Hashim Amir-Ali (b.1903-1987) was a native of Salar Jung, Hyderabad, Deccan, India. In 1938 he came under the influence of Dr. Mirza Abul Fazl
  Mirza Abul Fazl
  Abul Fazl, Mirza , , was a native of Allahabad, India. Among the contemporary Muslim scholars Dr Mirza Abul Fazl, learned in Arabic and Sanskrit, was a pioneer who took interest in the study of the chronological order of the Qur`an and invited the attention of Muslim scholars towards its...
  
   Allahabadi, and took deep interest in the study of the Qur'an and was aware of the significance of the chronological order of the Qur'an.
• The Message of the Qur'an
  The Message of The Qur'an
  The Message of the Qur'an is a translation and interpretation of the Qur'an by Muhammad Asad, a Polish Jew who converted to Islam...
  
   (1980) by Muhammad Asad
  Muhammad Asad
  Muhammad Asad , was an Austrian Polish Jew who converted to Islam, and a 20th century journalist, traveler, writer, social critic, linguist, thinker, reformer, diplomat, political theorist, translator and scholar...
  
  . Written by a Jewish convert to Islam, this work is banned in Saudi Arabia because of conflicts with the dominant Salafi
  Salafi
  A Salafi come from Sunni Islam is a follower of an Islamic movement, Salafiyyah, that is supposed to take the Salaf who lived during the patristic period of early Islam as model examples...
  
   interpretation of Islam, which has made the book difficult to obtain. It has been acclaimed as "one of the best translations available" on account of the quality of its English and its annotations. However, outside of Saudi Arabia, the Muhammad Asad translation is widely available, reprints in 1984, 1993 and 1997 having been followed by a new edition released in 2005.
• Al-Qur'an, A Contemporary Translation (1984) by Ahmed Ali
  Ahmed Ali
  Ahmed Ali was an Indian novelist, poet, critic, translator, diplomat and scholar, who was responsible for writing Twilight in Delhi. Born in Delhi, India, he was involved in progressive literary movements as a young man...
  
  . This accessible translation, published by the Princeton University Press
  Princeton University Press
  -Further reading:* "". Artforum International, 2005.-External links:* * * * *...
  
  , has been criticized by many Muslim scholars because of the many liberties it takes with the text.
• The Qur'an: The First American Version (1985) by T. B. Irving
  T. B. Irving
  Thomas Ballantyne Irving , also known as Al-Hajj Ta'lim Ali Abu Nasr, was an American Muslim author, professor, and scholar, who produced the first American English translation of the Qur'an.-Early life and education:...
  
  . Canadian Muslim convert and Islamic Scholar Dr. Irving's translation is considered the first translation of its kind to use proper American English vernacular and is widely available in outlets across North America. This version, criticized for fundamental flaws in translation, has met with little demand.
• The Holy Qur'an (1988) by Syed V. Mir Ahmed Ali. A widely used Shi'ite translation, criticized as unwieldy and for its "heavy sectarian bias". Mir Ahmed Ali's translation includes expansive commentary notes similar to the Yusuf Ali translation and is published by New York-based publishers Tahrike Tarsile Qur'an.
• A Simple Translation of The Holy Quran (1993). by Dr. Mir Aneesuddin
  Mir Aneesuddin
  Dr. Mir Aneesuddin , son of Mir Hasanuddin, was a geologist at Indian Institute of Chemical Technology , President of Islamic Academy of Sciences , an author and an orator...
  
  . This unique translation has gained recognition due to its use of Simple English Language. Many Arabic words have been translated by projecting the classical meaning through terms representing modern concepts. It contains a section called Explantory Notes on topics of Science, which provides information on topics of modern science appearing in more than 700 verses of the Qur'an. This translation was published by Islamic Academy of Sciences, Hyderabad, India and is currently in its 3^rd Edition. (ISBN 81-86337-00-8)
• The Noble Qur'an in the English Language
  Noble Qur'an (Hilali-Khan)
  The Noble Qur'an, also informally known as the Hilali-Khan translation, is a translation of the Qur'an by contemporary Pakistani Dr. Muhammad Muhsin Khan , a man of Afghan Khattak heritage, and Dr...
  
   (1996) by Muhammad Taqi al-Din al-Hilali and Muhammad Muhsin Khan
  Muhammad Muhsin Khan
  Muhammad Muhsin Khan born 1345 Al-Hijri is a contemporary Islamic scholar of ethnic Afghan origin, most notable for his renowned English translations of Sahih Bukhari and the Qur'an, entitled The Noble Qur'an, which he completed along with Muhammad Taqi-ud-Din al-Hilali.-Biography:Muhammad Muhsin...
  
  . The Noble Qur'an Translation is among the most widely read translations in the world, primarily because it is published in Saudi Arabia and exported world-wide by the powerful Darussalam Publishing company and it is also the officially promoted translation of the Saudi Government. As such, a version, produced by the King Fahd Printing Complex, is disseminated free of charge to English speaking visitors and is also exported for free distribution to the English-speaking world. It has been severely criticized in the West, primarily in non-Muslim circles, as a "supremacist Muslim, anti-Semitic, anti-Christian polemic" for its reliance on medieval commentary and for its use of parenthetical insertions that reflect contemporary political disputes, such as "Holy Land (Palestine
  Palestine
  Palestine is a conventional name, among others, used to describe the geographic region between the Mediterranean Sea and the Jordan River, and various adjoining lands....
  
  )" instead of just "Holy Land
  Holy Land
  The Holy Land is a term which in Judaism refers to the Kingdom of Israel as defined in the Tanakh. For Jews, the Land's identifiction of being Holy is defined in Judaism by its differentiation from other lands by virtue of the practice of Judaism often possible only in the Land of Israel...
  
  ".
• The Holy Qur'an by Saheeh International is the second major modern translation originating from Dar Abul Qasim Publishing House, Saudi Arabia. It has been translated by a team of three women converts to Islam. Umm Muhammad, one of the translators is supposed to be the major contributor. It claims to rectify inconsistencies in and improve upon the English language of the Hilali-Khan translation, and as such is often assumed to be based upon the later translation.
• The Qur'an by Mohammedali Habib Shakir is an English translation with its roots in the Shia tradition. It is widely available in the North American market, primarily due to its printing in numerous editions by New York-based publishers Tahirke Tarsile Qur'an.

• Quran: The Final Testament is controversial author and computer scientist Rashad Khalifa
  Rashad Khalifa
  Rashad Khalifa was an Egyptian-American biochemist, closely associated with the United Submitters International. He was assassinated in 1990.-Life:Khalifa was born in Egypt on November 19, 1935...
  
  's seminal work and is not recognized in the mainstream American Muslim circles, primarily due to Dr. Khilafa's development of heretical beliefs later in life, to which his untimely homicide by an unknown assailant, could well have been attributed. Earlier, Dr. Khilafa had caused a major stir in the Muslim world by allegedly showing (via computer and mathematical analysis) extraordinary hidden numerical structures centered around the number 19 in the Qur'an.
• The Noble Qur'an: A New Rendering of Its Meaning in English (1999) by Abdalhaqq Bewley and Aisha Bewley. A Sufi translation, acclaimed for lack of bias and readable English, but difficult to obtain because it is not supported by religious institutions. Aisha Bewley, one of the translators, has also translated numerous classical Islamic works from Arabic into English, including the Muwatta of Imam Malik, Tafsir al-Qurtubi
  Tafsir al-Qurtubi
  Tafsir al-Qurtubi is a famous Qur'an exegesis by the famous classical scholar Al-Qurtubi d.671H....
  
   and 'the Ash-Shifa
  Ash-Shifa
  Kitab Ash-shifa bi Ta'rif Huquq al-Mustafa, , of Qadi 'Iyad is perhaps the most frequently used and commented upon handbook in which Muhammad's life, his qualities and his miracles are described in every detail...
  
   of Qadi Iyad.
• The Glorious Qur'an (1993), a joint translation of UK-based Egyptian-born Dr. Ahmad Zidan and British Muslim convert Mrs. Dina Zidan.
• The Quran: A Poetic Translation (1999) a recent work by Iranian-born lecturer, translator and linguist Fazlollah Nikayin attempts to capture the poetic brilliance of the Qur'an in the English Language.
• The Qur'an: A New Translation (2004) by well-known California-based translator of numerous oriental works Dr. Thomas Cleary
  Thomas Cleary
  Thomas Cleary is a prolific author and translator of Buddhist, Taoist, Confucian and Muslim classics, and of the Chinese Art of War tradition of strategy and statecraft. He lives in Oakland, California in the United States.-Life and work:...
  
  appeared in an earlier volume as a partial translation, which at the time was highly praised by famous American-Muslim scholar Hamza Yusuf
  Hamza Yusuf
  Hamza Yusuf Hanson is an Islamic scholar of the Sunni tradition, and co-founder of Zaytuna College in Berkeley, California, United States. He is an American convert to Islam, and is one of the signatories of A Common Word Between Us and You, an open letter by Islamic scholars to Christian leaders,...
  
  .
• The Qur'an is one of the many new translations to appear since the mid-1990s, this work by M.A.S. Abdel-Haleem being published under the Oxford World Classics imprint.
• The Glorious Qur'an, by Dr. Syed Vickar Ahmed is another in the stable of translations from New York based Tahirke Tarsile Qur'an.
• The Qur'an in Persian and English (Bilingual Edition, 2001) features an English translation by famous Iranian poet and author Tahere Saffarzadeh.
• The Qur'an (2002), by UK-based Afghanistan-born writer M.J. Gohari, is an Oxford Logos Society imprint.
• Translation and Commentary on The Holy Quran (2000), a 1,256 page effort by the eminent Indian-Bengali translator Dr. Zohurul Hoque.
• Al-Qur'an: Guidance for Mankind by M. Farooq-e-Azam Malik is a new translation popular among North American Muslim readership. The translation is unusual among modern translations in that it is written by a professional immigrant layperson and not by a traditional university academic or clergyman translator. Unique to the work is the author's refusal or inability to translate the commonly occurring word Rabb (God) into English throughout the translation.
• The Majestic Qur'an: An English Rendition of Its Meanings (2000) is a highly regarded translation released by upscale sufi publishers Starlatch Press, LLC from the United Kingdom. The translation (ISBN 978-1-929694-50-1) was undertaken by a 'translation committee' featuring such prominent writers as Cambridge Professor Timothy Winter
  Abdul Hakim Murad
  Abdul Hakim Murad may refer to:*Timothy Winter, British Muslim scholar, aka Abdal Hakim Murad*Abdul Hakim Murad , convicted in connection with the Bojinka plot...
  
  , American-Muslim writer Uthman Hutchinson and Mostafa al-Badawi.
• The Qur’an with an English Paraphrase (2003), a translation by Indian-born Sayyid Ali Quli Qara'i is an imprint of the Iranian "Centre for Translation of the Holy Qur'an".
• The Sublime Qur'an (2007), is a recent translation, this by Chicago-based scholar Laleh Bakhtiar
  Laleh Bakhtiar
  Laleh Mehree Bakhtiar is an Iranian-American Muslim author, translator and clinical psychologist.-Biography:...
  
  , a translator and editor of numerous major Islamic and philosophical works, mostly of sufi and shia background, somewhat similar in nature and scope to the spiritual writings of popular writer Seyyed Hossein Nasr.

• The Message - A Translation of the Glorious Qur'an is a new translation officially credited to the Monotheistic Group whose background traces to the new emerging wave of Progressive Muslims
  Liberal movements within Islam
  Progressive Muslims have produced a considerable body of liberal thought within Islam or "progressive Islam" ; but some consider progressive Islam and liberal Islam as two distinct movements)...
  
   receiving wide media coverage in the Western world. Liberal Muslims do not necessarily subscribe to the more culturally-based interpretations of the Qur'an and Hadith. They generally claim that they are returning to the principles of the early Ummah and to the ethical and pluralistic intent of their scripture.
• The Quran: A Reformist Translation (2007), is a recent translation by the team of Edip Yuksel
  Edip Yuksel
  Edip Yuksel is an American intellectual considered one of the prime figures in the modern Islamic reform and Qur'an alone movements...
  
  , Layth Saleh al-Shaiban and Martha Schulte-Nafeh, who claim to offer a non-sexist understanding of the divine text, explicitly rejecting the right of the clergy to determine the likely meaning of disputed passages, using instead the logic and the language of the Quran itself as the ultimate authority in determining likely meanings.
• The Tajwidi Qur'an is a monumental work undertaken by Virginia-based American Muslim convert and Sufi A. Nooruddeen Durkee
  Nooruddeen Durkee
  Shaykh Abdullah Nooruddeen Durkee is a Muslim scholar, thinker, author, translator and the khalifah for North America of the Shadhdhuli School for Tranquility of Being and the Illumination of Hearts, Green Mountain Branch. Nooruddeen Durkee became a Muslim in his early thirties in al-Quds,...
  
  . While its primary emphasis is to develop a new romanized transliteration system to allow readers to pronounce the Arabic using English letters, the work is accompanied by a translation, which the author has amalgamated from various other extant translations.
• The Quran: Translation and Commentary with Parallel Arabic Text (2009) by Maulana Wahiduddin Khan
  Maulana wahiduddin khan
  Maulana Wahiduddin Khan is a noted Islamic scholar and peace activist. He has received, among others, the Demiurgus Peace International Award, under the patronage of the former Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev; the Padma Bhushan, India's third highest civilian honour; the National Citizen’s...
  
  , a widely available translation due in part to it being from the major publishing house Goodword Publications of India.
• The Gracious Qur'an: A Modern Phrased Interpretation in English is a major new translation by Al-Azhar University's Dr. Ahmad Zaki Hammad, who boasts a formidable resume in translations as a senior professor of the Languages Department at Al-Azhar, Egypt
  Egypt
  Egypt , officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, Arabic: , is a country mainly in North Africa, with the Sinai Peninsula forming a land bridge in Southwest Asia. Egypt is thus a transcontinental country, and a major power in Africa, the Mediterranean Basin, the Middle East and the Muslim world...
  
  .
• The Qur'an With Annotated Interpretation in Modern English (2007) traces its background to the Gülen Movement
  Fethullah Gülen
  Muhammed Fethullah Gülen is a Turkish preacher, author, educator, and Sufi Muslim scholar living in self-imposed exile in Pennsylvania . He is the founder and leader of the Gülen movement...
  
  , a modernist Islamic group in Turkey, with which the translator Ali Ünal
  Ali Ünal
  Ali Ünal is a Turkish author born on 19 January 1955 in Uşak province of Turkey.He often associated with the Gülen Movement, a modernist Islamic group in Turkey...
  
  is closely associated.
• The Qur'an (2007) a recent translation by retired Oxford University lecturer and Arabist Alan Jones
  Alan Jones
  Alan Jones may refer to:* Alan Jones , Ulster architect* Alan Jones , cinematographer active 1984–1996, see Love Is All There Is* Alan Jones , Welsh cricketer...
  
  .
• The Qur'an: A New Translation (2008) is a Penguin Classics imprint translated by Tarif Khalidi
  Tarif Khalidi
  Tarif Khalidi , born January 24, 1938 in Jerusalem, is a Palestinian historian who now holds the Shaykh Zayid Chair in Islamic and Arabic Studies at the American University of Beirut in Lebanon.-Family:...
  
  , Professor of Islamic Studies at the American University of Beirut
  American University of Beirut
  The American University of Beirut is a private, independent university in Beirut, Lebanon. It was founded as the Syrian Protestant College by American missionaries in 1866...
  
  .
• Irfan ul Quran (2009) is a new translation by prominent Pakistani scholar Muhammad Tahir-ul-Qadri released in conjugation with an Urdu translation of the same name. It is published by Minhaj-ul-Quran
  Minhaj-ul-Quran
  Minhaj-ul-Quran International is an international Sufi-based non-governmental organization founded by Muhammad Tahir-ul-Qadri in 1981 in Lahore, Pakistan...
  
   Publications and it is claimed to be the most modern and scientifically correct translation and interpretation to date. Second Edition published as The Glorious Qur'an (2011)
• The Holy Qur'an: Guidance for Life (2010) is a translation by well-known American-Muslim writer Yahiya Emerick
  Yahiya Emerick
  Yahiya Emerick is a former President of the Islamic Foundation of North America, vice-principal at an Islamic school, and a Muslim author. He has written several articles and works of fiction that have been published in North America and abroad.-Life:...
  
  , who is also the author behind the Complete Idiot's Guide to Understanding Islam imprint.

Translations from Urdu into English

• The Meaning of the Qur'an (Lahore, 1967), by Muhammad Akbar is the first English translation of Maulana Abul Ala Maududi's
  Abul Ala Maududi
  Syed Abul A'ala Maududi , also known as Molana or Shaikh Syed Abul A'ala Mawdudi, was a Sunni Pakistani journalist, theologian, Muslim revivalist leader and political philosopher, and a major 20th century Islamist thinker. He was also a prominent political figure in Pakistan and was the first...
  
   original Urdu translation of the Holy Qur'an.
• Kanzul Iman
  Kanzul Iman
  Kanzul Iman is the name of the 1910 Urdu translation of the Qur'an by Ahmad Raza Khan. It was subsequently translated into English by Professor Shah Faridul Haque...
  
  , Ahmad Raza Khan Barelvi's famous Urdu translation, originally published in 1910, has several editions translated into English. The first translation into English was by University of Kuwait
  Kuwait University
  Kuwait University was established in October 1966, five years after Kuwait's independence from British Colonization. KU started with only two faculties, namely the Faculty of Science, Arts and Education; and a Women's College. The university had 418 students enrolled and 31 faculty members. By ,...
  
   based Prof. Hanif Akhtar Fatmi. A second translation was completed by Prof. Shah Fareed al Haq in Pakistan
  Pakistan
  Pakistan , officially the Islamic Republic of Pakistan is a sovereign state in South Asia. It has a coastline along the Arabian Sea and the Gulf of Oman in the south and is bordered by Afghanistan and Iran in the west, India in the east and China in the far northeast. In the north, Tajikistan...
  
  . And recently a third translation in English has arrived, this by Aqib Farid Qadri.
• Exposition of the Holy Quran (1996) by Ghulam Ahmed Pervez
  Ghulam Ahmed Pervez
  Allama Ghulam Ahmad Parwez was a prominent Islamic scholar, famous in the area around Lahore. He urged the Muslims to ponder deeply over the Message of the Quran. He considered Islam a din , a form of government, a system of government like democracy, autocracy, or socialism...
  
  (d.1903-1985), is the English rendering of the Urdu
  Urdu
  Urdu is a register of the Hindustani language that is identified with Muslims in South Asia. It belongs to the Indo-European family. Urdu is the national language and lingua franca of Pakistan. It is also widely spoken in some regions of India, where it is one of the 22 scheduled languages and an...
  
   presentation Mafhum-al-Quran, that was published in 1961.
• The Meaning of the Noble Qur'an (with Explanatory Notes) is a new translation by Justice Maulana Muhammad Taqi Usmani
  Muhammad Taqi Usmani
  Muhammad Taqi Usmani is a Hanafi Islamic scholar from Pakistan who was born in 1943. He served as a judge on the Federal Shariat Court of Pakistan from 1981 to 1982 and the Shari'a Appellate Bench of the Supreme Court of Pakistan from 1982 to 2002. He is an expert in the fields of Islamic...
  
  printed by (Maktaba-e-Darul Uloom) Karachi, Pakistan (2007). It is not clear whether this translation is a direct Arabic to English translation by Dr. Taqi or whether this is a reproduction of an Urdu to English translation undertaken by Dr. Taqi as part of his English translation of the popular Urdu commentary Ma'ariful Qur'an originally by Mufti Muhammad Shafi
  Mufti Muhammad Shafi
  Maulana Mufti Muhammad Shafi‘ was a Hanafi Islamic scholar from India. During his life he served as the grand Mufti of India and later Pakistan as well.-Biography:...
  
   (1897–1976).

• Towards Understanding the Qur'an
  Towards Understanding the Qur'an
  Towards Understanding the Qur'an is the English rendering of Syed Abul Ala Maududi's famous Urdu Tafsir or commentary of Qur'an -- Tafhim al-Qur'an....
  
   (2006) is an English translation by Dr. Zafar Ishaq Ansari
  Zafar Ishaq Ansari
  Zafar Ishaq Ansari is a scholar of Islamic Studies. He is the Director General of the Islamic Research Institute of the International Islamic University. Previously, he has also been the President of the International Islamic University Islamabad...
  
  of Maulana Abul Ala Maududi's
  Abul Ala Maududi
  Syed Abul A'ala Maududi , also known as Molana or Shaikh Syed Abul A'ala Mawdudi, was a Sunni Pakistani journalist, theologian, Muslim revivalist leader and political philosopher, and a major 20th century Islamist thinker. He was also a prominent political figure in Pakistan and was the first...
  
   immensely popular Urdu translation of the Holy Qur'an. The present work is a second translation of Maulana Mawdudi's Urdu original, this new attempt having been published by the UK-based Islamic Foundation
  The Islamic Foundation
  The Islamic Foundation, established in 1973 in the city of Leicester, is a centre for education, training, research and publication of issues related to Islam. The Foundation seeks to build bridges between Muslims and others....
  
   (ISBN 978-0-86037-510-4).
• The Holy Qur'an by Allamah Nooruddin is an English rendition of an obscure Urdu translation by the Allamah's modern-day disciples Amatul Rahman Omar and Abdul Mannan, who have published a very polished high-quality edition for the English-speaking readership. The translation has failed to gain mainstream acceptance, however, since Allamah Nooruddin, an early 20th century figure, is virtually unknown among the numerous figures active in Islamic work in the Indian Sub-continent at the time.

External links

• The full text of Ross's Translation in pdf
• The full text of Sale's Translation in pdf
• The full text of Rodwell's Translation in pdf
• The Koran (1876), by John Medows Rodwell at wikisource
• The Holy Qur'an (1917, revised 1920), by Maulana Muhammad Ali at wikisource
• The Holy Qur'an - original source (1917, revised 1920), by Maulana Muhammad Ali at wikisource