Representation of Anthropomorphic and Non-Anthropomorphic Perceptions of God in English and Persian Translations of the Holy Quran: A Case Study of “Yad [Hand]” and “Sāgh [Shin]”

One of the greatest difficulties Quran translators have been faced with is rendering those verses in which, at least on the surface, material, anthropomorphic qualities have been attributed to Allah. Given the wealth of theological dimensions of the concepts relating to God, this challenging area, which has always been the center of attention and diverse opinions by philosophers, theologists, and exegetes, can have direct implications for Quran translation. The present study has been aimed at investigating English and Persian translations of those Quranic verses containing the terms “Yad [Hand]” and “Sāq [Shin]” in connection with God so as to find out how they have been dealt with in under the influence of the translators’ dominant theological conceptions. To this end, all the verses containing these words were extracted and then their rendition in 18 English and 12 Persian translations was scrutinized. The results indicated that in 79% of the cases, an anthropomorphic translation has been produced while in the remaining 21%, a non-anthropomorphic translation has been opted for. In addition, an interesting difference found between the English and Persian translations with regard to their preference for (non-)anthropomorphism in the translation of such verses. These findings suggest that the dominant theological conceptions of the translator, as well as those of the receiving community, play a considerable part in the process of decision-making when faced with such challenging parts of the text.