The Meaning of Daraba: Difference between revisions

"Men are overseers over women, by reason of that wherewith Allah hath made one of them excel over another, and by reason of that which they expend of their substance. Wherefore righteous women are obedient, and are watchers in husbands absence by the aid and protection of Allah. And those wives whose refractoriness ye fear, exhort them, and avoid them in beds, '''and beat them'''; but if they obey you, seek not a way against them; verily Allah is ever Lofty, Grand." }}The word "wadribuuhunna" means "beat them (i.e. the wives of men)," yet some modern Islamic [[Dawah|du'aah]], embarrassed about this obvious command for men to beat their wives in the Qur'an, have claimed rather that this verb means to "separate from them" or to "strike them out (sic)." All the verses in the [[Qur'an]] that contain ''daraba'' against a human (as a direct object) are understood to mean "beat" or "strike" that human, by their context, and this is agreed upon by these obscure "modern" translations. The only reason to translate the verb "daraba" to mean "separate from them" is to obfuscate the meaning of the verse for modern readers who view the injunction for men to beat their wives as barbaric, inhumane, incompatible with modern human rights. The attempts to translate this word in this way is novel, done only for audiences in majority non-Muslim countries, and flies in the face of over a thousand years of Islamic commentary and exegesis.  

An argument has been presented on some Islamic websites ( exclusively geared towards western audiences) and by some Muslims and apologists which claim to have "modern" translations of the [[Qur'an]]<ref>Such as [http://free-minds.org Free-Minds.org] and [http://progressive-muslims.org Progressive-Muslims.org]</ref>, which claims that the Arabic verb "ضرب" "daraba" means something other than to "strike" "beat" or "hit." Alternatives offered include "separate from them" or somewhat nonsensically for a native English speaker  "strike them out." The people making these claims are generally seeking to "reform" [[Islam]], but this translation flies in the face of over a thousand years of understanding of the Arabic language, by Muslims and non-Muslims alike.  These apologetic arguments are clearly directed people of a westernized/liberal background with little to no knowledge of Arabic, as any Muslim who has an adequate command of the [[Arabic]] language or any non-Muslim Arab, or any non-Arabic speaking Muslim familiar with the [[hadith]] and [[tafsir]] text [[Wife Beating in Islamic Law#Islamic_Scriptures_and_Wife-Beating|related to this issue]], will find the claim being presented to be ridiculous and prima facia untenable. Despite this, the obviously incorrect translation of this verb can be found in prominent cases such as that of Laleh Bakhtiar, an American Muslim apologist. She went so far as to incorporate this incorrect translation into her  translation of the Qur'an, a translation which the Islamic Society of North America (ISNA) refused to sell in their bookstore for its inaccuracy.

 

#Set out (''Road'')

#When an English speaker "hits the road," [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OY4jondX6tg as in this famous song], it means he "departed" or "set out." It surely doesn't mean he got a hammer and hit the road with it. The base meaning of "hit" remains untouched when not used with "the road."

This is a great example. Here, ''darban bialyameeni ضَرْبًۢا بِٱلْيَمِينِ'' literally means "'''hit them [people] with the right [hand].'''" According to this verse, when verb ''daraban'' ''ضَرْبًۢا'' is applied to humans, it means "beat" or "strike." It cannot be translated as "separate them from your right hand," as that is utterly ridiculous. The Islamic sites in question, also agrees that ''daraban'' here means  "strike."