Ibn Hanbāl: Creating Imaginary Characters in a Translation of a Theological Article (A critical review of a problematic translation of Richard Frank's "The Structure of Created Causality"

The book The Structure of Created Causality According to Abulhassan Ash'ari's Perspective is a Persian translation of an article by Richard M. Frank, one of the most prominent Western scholars in the field of Islamic theology, who examines Abulhasan Ash'ari's views in the book Al-Luma on the role and manner of human causality in doing of his actions. In the present article, first Frank's important works on Ash'ari and Mu'tazilite theology are briefly introduced, and the importance of his research in this field is pointed out, then the Persian translation of this article is criticized and evaluated. This critical essay shows that the mentioned translation, in addition to problems in its appearance which are related to its publication, contains numerous and significant flaws and shortcomings, including: Significant errors in reading and writing names and phrases, incorrect translations, selection of erroneous equivalents, spelling and punctuation errors, omission and numerous small and large misunderstandings, and punctuation errors.