The Death of Jesus in earliest Persian Translations of Quran up to the 12th Century

The Quran was written in Arabic in the late 6th and early 7th centuries andis considered by Muslims to be a direct revelation from God to the ProphetMuhammad. The similarities of concepts between the Quran and the Bibleare so numerous that no one doubts that the Quran was written incontinuation of Judeo-Christian tradition. Nevertheless, the denominationsof Islam living today differ from Christian denominations in fundamentalbeliefs, of which the crucifixion of Jesus is one of the most significant. Themost important document of this belief is verse 157 of Sura Nisa in theQuran, which is very open to interpretation.After the Prophet died, Arab Muslims attacked their northern neighbor, theSassanid Empire, in 633. They were victorious, and since then, Persiansadopted Islam as the state religion. Therefore, it was necessary to translatethe Quran into Persian. To the extent that they have survived to the presentday, these translations provide valuable insights into the early phase ofIslamic culture. The analysis of translations into Persian will show that in allof the surviving six translations up to the 11th century, the death of Jesuswas accepted, but later theological developments in the central area of theIslamic world led to a different interpretation of verse 157 of Sura Nisa, andthis new interpretation was able to establish itself as the standardinterpretation. The theological controversies are left aside here, and thisarticle deals with the issue of the presentation and analysis of the OldPersian translations of this verse. These syntactic and pragmatic analysesshow that in the ancient translations of the Quran into Persian, the death ofChrist was accepted.

The Death of Jesus in earliest Persian Translations of Quran up to the 12th Century Keywords:

Quran translations , translation studies , Semiotics , Crucifixion , Persian language , 11th and 12th centuries.